Hi everyone!

As (hopefully) some of you will know, I'm writing three first chapters for three different stories. This is the second of three, the first being the marriage law fic called Unweddable, which you can find on my profile. Also on my profile is a poll (at least, it should be there, but it's the first one I've ever made and I wasn't sure how it worked). If I could ask you guys to vote for your favourite of the three opening chapters - and I promise all three will be up soonish - I'd be forever in your debt. Seriously, I would love to hear from you as to which one of these three ideas I should carry further.

Enough about that, now. Please review, if you should feel the urge to, and don't be afraid to be critical - I'm working without Microsoft Word, so I don't have the luxury of spell-check and I type rather fast so typos are pretty inevitable. Feel free to point them out, and anything else you think needs work, and I will love you all unconditionally for ever and ever.

Other than that, I only have a few more words for you: nitwit, oddment and squeak!

(Paraphrasing Dumbledore, let me know if I've misquoted since I'm going from memory here).

He visited her grave religiously every year on this day. It was his very own pilgrimage, but it offered no sense of self-fulfilment. It was closer to self-flagellation.

And yet, he couldn't bring himself to stop visiting her. He'd always bring her flowers (never lilies though, she'd always hated them). This time, he brought her a bunch of tiny flowers that recalled the distant past, the moment she showed her sister with pride the petals opening and closing in her delicate palm. He didn't charm them to stay perfect forever - it wasn't something she'd have liked. Nature is magical enough without our help, she'd told him once. He'd agreed then, since nature had produced her. Now, nothing was beautiful in his eyes anymore. All the colours had been siphoned out of his life, poured into the coffin where she lay beneath the earth.

He reached out to trace the familiar engraving, the stone cold and rough beneath his fingertips.

Lily.

Out of habit, his finger skipped over the letters that spelled out Potter, moving straight to Evans. Even now, as they rested side by side beneath a shared tombstone, even now as he returned to Hogwarts every year to be confronted by the living thing their two joined bodies had produced, he refused to accept it.

He hated himself for the mistakes he had made that had cost him the ultimate price. He, and he alone, was responsible for her death. Bad enough that his refusal to listen to her regarding his choice of friends (internally, he scoffed at the word 'friends') had driven her into the arms of Potter, but the words that had condemned her to death had fallen from his lips. He may not have cast the spell, but it was his fault.

He envied her her peace. She was free, unchained by human concerns, human failings, human emotions. She was not ravaged, gnawed from the inside out, by a terrible mixture of guilt and anguish. She had not had all the light ripped from her world in a single instant - no doubt she was happy, in the arms of Potter, in a better life.

She was not left behind.

The dew from the grass was beginning to seep through his robes where he knelt, almost in a position of devout worship, before the white stone. He raised his wand and murmured a barely audible incantation, eyes fixed on the glowing tip. A silver doe burst forth from the wisps of light, and regarded him with mournful eyes. She, at least, understood. The doe blinked and began prancing lightly in a wide circle.

The fragile shape of dancing light was his last tenuous link to Lily, and so he loved her.

Sometimes, as now, he conjured her just to be reminded of Lily. When they'd learnt the spell, together, Lily had seemed surprised and delighted to see they'd both produced the same animal. He hadn't been shocked - it could have been nothing else. His heart yearned so strongly to possess hers that he tried for years to mould his soul in the shape of hers.

But he was not pure and good and wonderful as she was: his mind was turned towards darkness, try as he might to pull it towards the light for her sake. He wanted to learn, but to learn the sinister secrets of his world. She, with her flaming red hair, seemed to be a torch for the 'greater good' - a proud Gryffindor, ready to risk everything to fight for the vulnerable. He, with his dark features, melted into the shadows and found that he enjoyed it there.

It was his fault, his own most grevious fault.

If only he'd listened to her supplications, if only he'd been swayed by the tears that made her green eyes shine more brilliantly than ever. If only. His silver doe disappeared, disintegrating into wisps of light before vanishing altogether as his mind was consumed by grief and he lost hold of the happy memory that was feeding her corporeal form.

His skill in Occlumency was the only thing that prevented the rising ball of emotions from getting further than his throat - he locked the dangerous thoughts away quickly behind the concrete wall he built in his mind, but the tight ball was still lodged behind his Adam's apple. He lowered his forehead to the ground, the smell of damp earth and the fresh dew against his feverish brow having a calming effect. Had a muggle have seen him now, in this half supplicant half worshipping pose, they would have thought that he was merely a religious man, praying to the sun.

And in his own way, he was doing exactly that. Except that his sun had been extinguished, and now burned brightly only in his memories.

He felt closer to her like this, touching the earth which she too was touching. It was like this that his visit culminated: whispered words to the deaf earth beneath his head, hands and knees. He told her about her son, the boy with the scar and brilliant green eyes. He told her how her boy had grown up to be a true Gryffindor, how he had saved the school again and again. He told her that the boy's eyes were old before his time, how he seemed to carry a heavy burden that no one could ever quite relieve. He told her how Dumbledore had forced them together, another of the old man's games, so that her boy would learn to protect his mind from Voldemort, and he told her how painful it was for him stare into those eyes, her eyes.

He told her all of this, and more, knowing full well that she couldn't hear him, but understanding that this release of words that fell unheard into the ground was more for him than for her. Where ever she was, he knew that she'd be watching her son and she would be smiling. But he was sure that she wouldn't be watching him and smiling, and so he visited the place where her body lay to try and pretend to himself that she was listening to him, that she cared.

His story over, he whispered five more words to the richly-scented earth, before standing, turning on his heel and disappearing into thin air.

I love you, Lily. Always.

Draco Malfoy sat at the back of the dank and gloomy Defence Against the Dark Arts classroom, flanked by the buffoons he usually associated with. They were chortling amongst themselves, no doubt laughing at some pathetic attempt at wit on Pansy's part, but he hadn't heard the joke. In fact, he hadn't heard much since the lesson had started. His eyes were firmly fixed on the back of a girl's head, as though willing her to turn around. His silver eyes narrowed with his intense concentration.

The object of his scrutiny seemed to feel the eyes boring into her back, and her head turned infinitesimally to the boy on her left to check that his eyes were still firmly shut. Draco leaned forward in his seat so as to get a better look at her profile. Her head snapped back to the front almost immediately, but it was enough time for her face to have been burned into his retinas. He closed his eyes, the better to allow his mind's eye to roam freely over her features. Something was different. Something had changed, but what was it?

"Mr Weasley, Mr Malfoy, am I boring you?" a low voice drawled from close to his ear. Draco's eyes snapped open and his cheeks flushed slightly as the rest of the class swiveled in their chairs to face him. Weasley had turned a shade of cherry red and was rubbing a spot on his side where the girl had obviously elbowed him awake. The girl whose face was quickly fading from his mind's eye was giving the ginger boy a look that clearly said I told you so. Malfoy allowed himself a small smirk, forgetting that he was currently the object of a rare death-glare from Professor Snape.

"Please explain to me, Mr Malfoy, what is amusing in what I have just said?" the hook-nosed professor intoned, his dark brow furrowing with a look of anger. Draco's mouth opened, about to give a witty response, but he thought better of it and closed it again.

Snape cleared his throat. "Ten points from Gryffindor and Slytherin respectively. The two of you will write me four feet on the importance of what we have been learning today, in addition to the essay I have just set the rest of the class, due in tomorrow. You may all leave."

Draco slammed his book shut with rather more force than was necessary, his anger stemming from the fact that he had absolutely no clue what they had covered in that lesson. His cronies paused to wait for him, but he waved them on dismissively. He really could not face spending any more time in their company, and it was only the second day of term.

Weasley, Potter and the girl walked past on their way out of the door. "Please, Hermione, please," the ginger boy was whining, tugging at the sleeve of the brown-haired girl.

"No, Ron. I told you that I wouldn't be letting you use my notes for any of our classes this year. It's our penultimate year - how are you going to survive in the adult world if you fall asleep in class?" She said it as though it were the ultimate sin. Draco smiled unconsciously.

"Something funny, Malfoy?" Potter spat, wiping the smile clean off of his face.

"Other than you, you mean? Nope, can't think of anything. Actually, maybe it was Weasley begging the know-it-all for help. I didn't realise you had to resort to second-hand knowledge as well as robes," he said, with a smirk that felt extremely forced. They'd see right through him, they'd know that he'd lingered behind just to watch her walk past him, just to hear her voice.

"Oh, go parrot your father somewhere else, Malfoy," the girl said, before either of the two boys could explode at him. She sounds tired, he noted with concern, before reminding himself that he didn't care what she sounded like at all.

Draco stuck his tongue out at the three of them, earning him three identically quizzical looks. He slipped the strap of his bag over his shoulder and dashed out of the classroom before they had time to think. Mature, Draco, really mature.

He slowed his pace to a walk once he was out of earshot of their bickering and Weasley's pathetic pleading, and headed towards the library, intent on spending his free hour catching up the lesson he had missed entirely. He already had so much to do - mostly catching up on the lessons he shared with the Gryffindors, since it seemed these were the lessons he could remember least of. He really needed to get a grip and focus on his school work, or his father would not be pleased.

With an unpleasant jolt deep in his stomach, he remembered the other thing he had to work on. He shuddered miserably, trying to clear his head of the impossible duty that had been placed upon him. A couple of first years ran past him, squealing with joy as they chased after a toad that had made a bet for freedom. He watched them go enviously - he had never been that free of responsibility in his life. Even before this summer, he had still been a Malfoy. He had still carried the heavy burden of his name, a name that ruled his every thought and action. And this Christmas, he would be forced to bear the mark of the heaviest burden of them all, the biggest sacrifice for his family he had ever made, the last link in the strong chain that would bind him forever to the dark side.

Suddenly, he found himself unable to move, his foot sunk up to his knee in the trick step on one of the staircases. Damn it, he cursed internally, trying in vain to wrench his foot free. The corridor was completely deserted, so he resigned himself to a long wait. Somewhere in the distance, he heard Peeves' characteristic cackle, and his heart plummeted. The screeches of glee were, without a doubt, coming closer, and soon they were so close that Draco could pick out fragments of his song.

"Ickle wickle student is stuck inside the stair,
but Peevesy is coming with something for his hair..."

Draco wriggled with renewed fervour, desperate to avoid Peeves' skewed sense of practical jokes. Footsteps echoed off of the stone walls like music to his ear - he'd never been so glad to hear anything in his life. He spun around as much as possible, ready to beg (in a dignified manner, of course) for his mysterious salvation to rescue him, but the words died in his throat when he saw who it was.

Her. Of all the people in this bloody school, it had to be her.

He had resolved not to ask her for help, but Peeves' song reached a very audible crescendo involving irreversible changes to his features, and Draco was forced to swallow his pride.

"Er... Little help?" he said as nonchalantly as possible (although his voice was higher than he would have desired due to the very real fear that now possessed him), awkwardly waving to attract her attention. Nose in a book, as usual, she jumped when she heard his voice. She stared at him blankly, as though her mind was a long way away. He coughed, and gestured at his trapped foot.

A smile began to dance on her lips as she was returned to reality, and recognised who it was who was desperately imploring her for help. She said nothing, merely returned to her book and began to walk down the stairs. When she reached him, she lightly hopped over the trick step and continued downwards without a backwards glance.

Draco did something then that surprised him.

"Please, H-Hermione?"

Her head whipped, shock blazing in her eyes. She sighed as though cursing her noble Gryffindor nature, and returned the book to her back.

"Fine," she said quietly. Again, Draco noted how weary she sounded, and again he reminded himself that he didn't care. She grabbed his wrist unexpectedly and Draco, not prepared for the physical contact, jumped slightly. Her eyes darkened, and she wrenched his arm with more vehemence than was strictly required. The stair released his foot with a squelching sound, and he flew forward, knocking the slender girl to the ground.

Draco took an instant too long to extract himself from the tangle of bodies.

"Get...off" she grunted and wheezed from under him. They rolled apart and both lay on the cool stone floor for a moment, their hands mere inches away from touching.

"Thank you," he said at last, breaking the silence between them that was perforated only by their slightly irregular breathing. "That was... nice of you." Goodness, he'd never realised being pleasant to her would be such an effort. His tongue seemed to refuse to form the rarely-used words.

She turned her head to look at him, and their eyes met.

"I didn't do it for free. I expect something in return, you know," she said, in a pensive tone of voice, still holding his gaze.

"What?"

"I haven't decided yet. I'll let you know, sooner or later."

Peeves' voice was getting louder and closer - he could be no more than two corridors away, and he was travelling fast.

"We should go," Draco said, scrambling to his feet and picking up his bag. After a moments' hesitation, he held out his hand to help her up. She looked at the outstretched appendage with distrust. He didn't blame her - it was his wand hand, the same hand that had cast the spell that made her teeth grow to ridiculous proportions. And it was attached to his body, which ought to have been reason enough to scramble away and sprint off in the opposite direction. But to his surprise, she took it. They looked at one another, joined at the hand. The air around them suddenly grew very still.

Then the moment was shattered by the explosive splatter of something green and slimy a few feet away. Peeves had reached their corridor and was hurling unidentifiable substances at them.

"RUN!" she screamed, and pulled him away at a breakneck speed. She was faster than he would have thought, given her slender physique and her hatred for Quidditch and sports in general. He was soon working harder than he liked to keep level with her, distracted by the fact that she had hitched her robes up to her knees, exposing bare leg. She dragged him left, right, right and left again, swerving around corners and ducking behind tapestries at such speed that Draco was completely disoriented by the time she finally slowed to a stop inside a dusty, disused classroom behind a tapestry of a particularly ugly wizard.

"I think... we... lost him," she panted, doubled over to catch her breath. Draco nodded in agreement, knowing that he would not be able to find the air to make his vocal chords work. She sat down heavily, still breathing heavily. And then, all of a sudden, she began to laugh. The peals of pure joy and exhilaration were so infectious that soon Draco found himself laughing with her. He hadn't laughed in such a long time - sure, he snorted derisively almost daily and sometimes if Pansy was lucky he would release a forced chuckle at one of her jokes, but he hadn't actually laughed in longer than he could remember.

Their laughter soon died down due to lack of oxygen, but a comfortable silence took its place. Draco had never in a million years thought that he'd feel this at ease with her. Somewhere deep in the heart of the school, the great clock began to count out the time, and Draco leapt to his feet. She opened her eyes, which had fluttered closed momentarily, and looked at him quizzically. It was funny how easy it was to read what her face was saying.

"I'm going to the library - I've got Snape's essays to write and not a clue what the lesson was on, let alone why it was important," he said, almost apologetically (although why he should be apologetic was beyond him).

She seemed to be internally debating something, as she didn't answer him right away and her brown eyes drifted towards the window in thought.

"Okay. You can borrow my notes for the lesson, on three conditions. One, you never, ever, tell Ron or Harry that I helped you. Two, you owe me two favours now. Three, you understand that this is the last time I will help you. I don't care if Peeves has you in a headlock next time - you call for someone else. Deal?"

He nodded, slightly irritated at her bossy tone of voice and unable to suppress a rather exaggerated roll of his eyes. Who was she to be making all the decisions, setting all of these rules for him, a Malfoy, to follow? How easy it was to slip back into the familiar routine of hating her for her lowly origins.

"Here," she said, thrusting a ream of pages at him brusquely. She turned to leave, and was halfway out of the door before he spoke.

"Granger - something's different about you. What is it?" he asked, the words slipping off of his tongue before he could stop them. You idiot. You stupid, stupid git. You brainless monkey. He continued in this vein for several long seconds, finding more and more colourful ways to insult his stupidity and trying not to notice that the girl had frozen to the spot.

"Um... My hair. I... My parents took me to this place... they fixed it..." she finally managed reply somewhat awkwardly, unconsciously twirling a lock of her tamed, wavy hair around her index finger.

"Oh. Well. It looks...nice?" he replied, just as awkwardly. He could have sworn her cheeks reddened slightly, but she was gone before he had a chance to see, leaving nothing behind but the faintest scent of citrus fruit.

The boy really should be a little more subtle, Snape thought to himself as he paced the length of his classroom, intoning some drivel about the limits of magic which only the Granger girl was actually listening to. His favourite pupil (a bit of a stretch, but the closest to a favourite pupil he was ever going to have) was staring far too intently at the back of Granger's head.

Granger turned, looking at one of the Weasley offspring who was lightly snoring by her side (a nap which Snape intended not to overlook for much longer), and revealing her profile to the blond boy who watched her. Snape continued to talk. Even he wasn't listening to himself anymore, his mind far too busy thinking about Draco Malfoy's seeming obsession with the muggleborn witch. Draco closed his eyes, a contented smile appearing faintly on his lips. Enough napping in my classroom, I think.

Snape dished out the punishments, rather laxer than he would normally give, and watched with pleasure as a frown disfigured Potter's features and Weasley's face turned a comical shade of vermillion. The girl laid a calming hand on Potter's forearm, placating the boy who was no doubt darkly muttering insults at Snape under his breath. Snape glanced at Malfoy, noting that his eyes had narrowed with unconscious jealousy.

The situation was so familiar that Snape felt as though he were back in his childhood again, observing himself watching the brilliant muggleborn witch run around with an arrogant Potter and his brainless friends. His poor, shrivelled heart twanged unpleasantly in his chest at the memory of Lily. He couldn't sit by and watch Draco go the same way - he had to stop this before it was too late, before Draco had condemned himself to a lifetime of unhappiness.

Snape had hoped to catch Draco at the end of the lesson, detain him in order to warn him from regarding her with anything more than an appropriate disdain, but the blond boy had exchanged a few terse words with the trio and run out ahead of them. Damn it, Snape cursed, elbowing past a few third years in the corridor outside of his classroom and punishing them with an icy stare simply for existing, where has that boy gone?

He paced through the corridors, black robes whipping behind him in what he knew to be an intimidating manner. He'd never had Black and Potter's unnerving knack for finding the people they were looking for around the school, but he had all morning to find Draco. He passed a disgruntled Peeves - who was idly throwing little balls of pulsating green electoplasm at coats of armour, making their helmets spin wildly on their necks - at least three times and on each occasion was forced to make a rather sudden dash out of the vicinity to avoid a viciously hurled blob which was aimed with alarming precision at his own head.

He was beginning to think that Draco was hiding away somewhere, nurturing the forbidden emotions in his heart like the moody teenager he was. Snape's pace slowed and he considered giving up this ridiculous quest. Merlin knew why he had decided to appoint himself guardian of the Malfoy spawn's heart - it was really none of his business. He had made an unbreakable vow, yes, but nowhere in that vow had he agreed to help Draco with this sudden emotional development. Besides, he really needed a coffee - it had been a long morning of staring into green eyes he loved set in a face he hated.

And then his worst fears were confirmed.

Hermione Granger stumbled out from behind one of Hogwarts' uglier tapestries, cheeks suffused with blood and obviously deep in thoughts that were not of a studious nature. Moments after she had rounded the corner, smiling softly yet bemusedly to herself, Draco emerged from behind the same tapestry, sporting a similarly worrying look. His cheeks were also slightly flushed, and he was biting back a secret smile (a smile which Snape didn't like the look of at all).

Snape emerged from the shadows where he had been quietly observing the scene that caused so much turbulence in his mind.

"A word, Draco," he said, in what he hoped was his most threatening voice. Draco's face paled noticeably as his head of house seemed to materialise from nowhere, but he nodded in his superior manner. Snape drew the boy towards the shadows, calculating the spot where they'd be most protected from prying eyes.

"I don't know what you were doing in such close contact with Miss Granger just then, but whatever it was it has to cease immediately. Can you imagine how your father will react when he hears of this? And the Dark Lord, what will he say when he learns that the boy he has trusted with this most important honour has been wasting his time associating with mudbloods?"

Draco began to stutter out incoherent protests, but Snape didn't let him get very far.

"I don't care for your pathetic excuses, boy. I don't want to see this sort of behaviour again - looking at the filthy lowling so obviously in my lesson..." He trailed off in disgust, lip curling. If only Draco knew how every word that came out of his mouth tore at his heart as he heard himself repeating the words that Mulciber and others had threatened him with.

Draco was fired up, forgetting that Snape was Voldemort's most trusted servant.

"I don't know what you mean, sir," he said, the mark of respect somewhat ruined by the way the words were hissed between closed teeth. "I would never forget myself in that way, and believe me, I harbour nothing but disgust for creatures like mudbloods. You have no worry on that score."

It was a convincing performance, and if Draco was talking to anyone other than a man who had been lying to the world for half of his life, it would have been enough. However, Snape noted with increasing worry the deepening lines around Draco's eyes, the physical marker of the strain of forcing the lies from his tongue.

"Don't lie to me, boy. That might work on those idiots, Crabbe and Goyle, who follow you around like two brain-damaged puppies, but not on me. Believe me, whatever you think you feel for Granger, it's dangerous. It will only cause you great pain - besides, do you really think she would be stupid enough to return whatever feelings you have for her? You know full well what you are going to do, and you should also know that she will never love the man who murdered her idol." Pain was evident in the boy's eyes. He's too young for this, spare him the pain, his conscience murmured, but Snape pressed on. "It's for your own good I tell you this. I don't relish the words, but they are the truth, and it is a truth that you would have learnt sooner or later. In her eyes, you are nothing but a bully. By now, she probably suspects you are a Death Eater, and by the end of the year you will be a monster in her eyes."

"You know nothing about her!" Draco shouted.

"Neither do you. Tell me honestly, how many kind words - or even passably civil words - have you said to each other these past five years?"

Not for the first time that day, Draco's mouth opened and closed like a fish gasping for air.

Snape hated himself for the cruel smile that tortured his lips into a grimace. "As I thought. I may not know her but I do know you, Draco. And I know what you will go through if you do not heed my words. Let me help you, Draco."

"I don't need your help," he said, wriggling out from underneath his head of house and escaping down the corridor.

Snape sighed and returned to his classroom, catching sight of someone ducking behind a door that looked suspiciously like Potter.

I said at the start that I was going from memory (because I'm away and couldn't bring all seven books with me), so if anyone could find the exact moment in the sixth book where Harry overhears Snape offering to help Draco and copy and paste it for me into a review box thing, that'd be wonderful. Thank you all for reading!