A/N: Hi, everyone! First fic, not quite sure where I'm going with this yet, so I would appreciate reviews and thoughts. Now then, let's play shall we? ;)

Disclaimer: Nothing belongs to me save for the plot.

Chapter 1

In which Draco recounts his truths.

In the years following the Battle of Hogwarts, Draco Lucius Malfoy had held on to the three great truths he had learned throughout the entire ordeal that had been his teenage years.

First, that despite everything that he had done, he still believed himself to be a good person (and thus good things were due him after the shit he'd survived) and would repent by doing nothing but good when given the chance. This he had repeated like a mantra as he squeezed his eyes tight and held onto his mother's hand with a vice grip as they stood trial before the Wizengamot.

Second, that he would take his fate into his own hands—regardless of the consequences. He, Draco Malfoy, swore on his mother's grave that never again would he allow himself to be a pawn in someone else's game. His future was his and his alone. This he swore the first time he had been refused service at The Three Broomsticks—a jarring event, as it had painfully driven home the gravity of his actions and the resonating consequences of the mark on his arm.

Last but definitely not the least, that despite how divisive and destructive the House ties were, he would learn to tread the middle ground between their most admirable traits. He would learn to be wise and cunning like the Ravenclaws, nurturing and kind like the Hufflepuffs and, for all their ostentatious displays of emotion and reckless behavior, he would be more like Gryffindors—he would be brave. A trait, he realized, that he had been sorely, if humiliatingly, lacking.

This was the resolve he held on to the entire year back at Hogwarts after the Dark Lord had fallen, really his 8th year back in its hallowed halls, to retake everything he had missed during his 7th. It had been a full year of house arrest before he was allowed back. A year that he had spent watching his mother slowly slip away now that she was sure he was safe and she could let go. A year avoiding all visitors and courtesy calls, a year without his wand, a year praying that an owl wouldn't arrive saying that his father had broken out of Azkaban and was making his way back to the Manor. A year of feeling so trapped in his own skin that he had retreated to the library and spent the remaining months in silence, teaching himself to harness his powers without a wand and learning about other, older magic.

It was all easier said than done, he knew. He thanked Merlin and whatever deities were watching over him that at least he had gone back to school after the Golden Trio had graduated, leaving him in relative peace to take his N.E.W.T.S.

He knew that Hogwarts had never truly been home for him, especially now that it held so many unpleasant memories. Between the new ghosts that ensured he never got a moment's peace and the glares and taunts he would get from the younger students, returning to Hogwarts was, to him, penance. So he watched from the sidelines, collecting good habits and measuring memories. He couldn't blame the other students for their cruelty—he had been no different at that age. Most of them had been too young to fight and had only heard stories of those dark years, and he silently blessed them, only slightly jealous that their graduating year was spent worrying about girls and grades rather than a homicidal madman slaughtering his friends and family.

After his graduation ceremony, he had apparated to his mother's grave to lay a bouquet of stargazers. He sat at the tombstone until the sun set, whereupon he snapped his wand in half and planted the pieces along with a new Elder Tree before saying goodbye. He returned to the Manor, the paperwork already settled and the house elves set free, to pack his trunk by hand. With a final walk through each room of the vast estate, he cast the last of the wards, sealed every door, and locked the gate behind him as he left.

The Manor, he knew, had no place in his future. Neither did magic.