Wandlore: A discourse on the matter of wands and the heart.
"The Wand chooses the Wizard. That much has always been clear..."
I stood in the Room of Requirement. In the middle of warehouses of school property. Alone. Me against the three of them, while the battle raged outside. It was a strangely open, public place for such a personal question, but I had to know. I really had to know.
"Why didn't you tell her? Bellatrix. You knew it was me... You didn't say anything."
"I want my wand, Potter."
"It's nice to want, Malfoy. Tell me why."
"Give it to me."
"Tell me why you didn't tell her." Still no response. His towering ego was annoying. "Come and take it then, if you want it."
He didn't expect that. I could see it jolt him out of his arrogance. He came forward one slow step at a time, leaving Crabbe and Goyle, closing the gap between us. His eyes never left mine and then our hands touched. The wand began to glow. The hawthorn wand, precisely ten inches with a unicorn's hair for a core, created a globe of golden light - on its own.
"Tell me why." For the first time, I really looked into his eyes. I searched their crystalline ocean-blue depths. I finally saw it. It was like watching the Great Wall of China if it were to crumble, Draco's will. Somehow in the light of the wand, he knew at last. We knew.
"I could never let her hurt you. I have wanted us to be together since the very first time we met. Don't you remember? It was always you. I love you, Harry Potter." he whispered.
More light. Blinding. Incandescent. There is nowhere else, no other time that I would possibly believe this, but in that light and in my heart there was no doubt that I was hearing the truth. All the years of fighting, of hatred and now, this. I saw the fight in the second-floor girl's lavatory for what it really was. I wasn't ready. I wasn't ready for this truth. In the middle of this war, of the final stand at Hogwarts, of facing certain death and I simply wasn't ready. For the first time I really saw Draco Malfoy. In all of his pride... All of his brilliance, loneliness and bitterness. And underneath all of that I saw the beautiful heart and soul of a man - of a man who loved me. I wasn't ready for what I was feeling. When is anyone really ready to have their heart's truth revealed? And so, I whispered back... exactly as he said it to me. "I love you, Draco Malfoy."
The golden light got even brighter and we both heard a voice. A female voice steeped in the magic of nature, of life, of love. We stopped looking into each other's eyes and looked at the wand in our joined hands, our wand. And heard the voice of a unicorn. "So now you know. You know why I chose you, both of you. One heart, one soul, linked forever." I had only felt magic like this once before, it is what I felt on the night my mother kissed me goodbye. Shining glyphs surrounded the globe of light and fell around us like rain.
It is precisely then that we looked back at each other and I heard Crabbe and Goyle. "Draco? What is going on? Draco? Don't be a prat. Bring him to the Dark Lord."
It was magic. It was perfection. It was moving in a unison so perfect. So fast. It was a dance. Draco spun left - "Stupify." I lunged right - "Petrificus Totalus." Neither of them stood a chance. The echo of the twin spells kept going long after the two Slytherins fell to the ground. And suddenly there was no space between us, no words, no opposing sides and no one to keep us apart. I ran my hand through his golden blond hair, down the curve of his chin. As far as first kisses go, I have to tell you... the best ever.