This is my first Draco/Astoria pairing. I hope you like it.

Reviews are always welcomed.

The bird Draco held in his hand was pecking at his skin and struggling to free itself. Perhaps it knew that there might be a possibly that its life would end once he put it into the Vanishing Cabinet. Like the other one before it. He shoved the bird inside and closed the door. Once he opened the door, he saw the bird lying flat on its side. Dead.

Consumed by despair he broke into tears. The magical cabinet was damaged. It was up to him to repair it or his family well be harmed. He thought he followed the repair instructions correctly. Why wasn't the cabinet working?

On the corner of his eye, he saw movement. Something had zoomed passed him. He wiped his face and grabbed his wand, amazed by what he was seeing. Not only was the bird alive but it was trying to fly away from him. He ran after it, shouting a series of stunning spells to stop it. It was flying in a swirling pattern that made it difficult for him to aim. Suddenly the bird dropped from the air and dived downward. He ran through piles of rubbish to see where it had landed. The little bird was nowhere to be seen.

Astoria Greengrass crouched closer into the opening of the barrel and watched as the boy wandered further away from her. There was no way she was going out until he was gone. She had seen what he'd done to the other bird that was in the bird cage with her. That guy was sick. He was torturing small animals by stuffing them in a cabinet. It was her misfortune that he captured her while she was having a midnight fly in her Animagus form. She had recently learned how to transform and had little control over it. She didn't know how long she could stay like this and feared what he would do to her. She could feel her body changing back into her human form. As her body grew she hopped out of the barrel. When she was fully transformed back she picked up a small object nearby and threw it. As the boy ran toward the sound, she slowly crawled in the opposite direction and hid herself in a large and battered wardrobe nearby. Concentrating hard, she turned back into a bird and flew into a tick coat hanging above her.

The door of the wardrobe was pulled opened, everything inside was shaking by his forceful action. He pushed the coats aside to search for her. Astoria's little bird feet clutched the inner fabric of the coat and willed herself not to vomit from the harsh movements. She reminded herself that if she was caught, she would surely die. Her tiny heart was pounding in fear through her feathered chest at the thought. The boy pointed his wand and whispered a Lumus spell to see into the dark. After a few more minutes, he slammed the door close and she heard his footsteps walking away from the wardrobe.

She waited inside of the wardrobe for a long time before she allowed herself to peek through a creak in the door. Seeing and hearing nothing, she turned back into a human and pushed opened the door with her wand in her hand. He must have left since he thought she was nothing but a stupid bird.

Astoria made it back to the Slytherin common room well after midnight. No one was awake with the exception of her sister, Daphne, who looked like she was about ready to explode. Daphne pulled her by the sleeve and dragged her to a corner of the room.

"Where have you been all night?" demanded Daphne. "Do you know how worried I was? No! You don't! How could you? I was sitting here, waiting for you! Didn't you hear what happened to that girl in Gryffindor?"

Ordinarily, Daphne wouldn't meddle in Astoria's affairs and vices versa but after word had spread about a Gryffindor student almost dying form a deadly curse, she was starting to demand to know Astoria's whereabouts at all times. Astoria was not affected by the terrible news since it was a normal occurrence at Hogwarts. A hand full people are harmed or murdered every few months.

"Well? Are you going to answer me?" Daphne's voice was like a bang that required Astoria's attention.

"Flying." Which was partially true.

Daphne's cheeks colored.

At the beginning of the year, Daphne had borrowed Astoria's new broom without asking permission and traded it for a magical item she thought was cool but had no use for. She refused to tell Astoria who she traded it to because she thought Astoria would go ballistic on him and embarrass her. Astoria had never gone ballistic for any reason. If anything, she was the reserved one out of the two of them. Daphne was treating Astoria like this because Astoria could be unpredictable.

At first, Astoria was upset at her sister for trading her personal things but got over it already. It was just a broom. She only brought it up every now and then to silence Daphne. Daphne knew what she did was wrong and would snap her mouth shut.

"Fine! I traded it to Blaise Zabini. Go talk to him if you want it back so bad but don't make a scene." confessed Daphne. She was tired of feeling guilty and having Astoria holding this over her head.

That settled Daphne went off to bed. Astoria went to her room and fell onto her bed. It had been a terrible day and she needed to sleep.

The next day, Astoria was pondering where to move her inventory. She could not use her old storage room anymore, since someone else had discovered it. A maniac, animal killer. She had to go back in there while he wasn't and remove her supplies.

Astoria was an entrepreneur with a small but booming business. At the start of summer, many magical shops were closing down after news broke about the return of You-Know-Who. The shops had sold everyday items that students need for school such as dragon hide gloves, inkwells, parchments, cauldrons and many more. If the shops had closed down, that meant students had to look elsewhere to buy those items. That was when Astoria conceived an idea. She had seized the opportunity and used all of the galleons she had saved to purchase a large number of items from different shops that were closing. She spent all summer designing and creating a brochure and order form to pass out to her fellow schoolmates. To save time and energy, she had bundled certain items together and sold them as a package deal, which were selling extremely well. There are loads of students in her school and they received their order quick since she was also in the school. Working alone was exhausting and took a lot of her time and effort. To make her work easier, she went to the Library to look up spells to bewitch the items to package themselves. That was when she met a sixth year Ravenclaw name Honey who was in the middle of tutoring her housemates. She was kind enough to invite Astoria into the study group and taught her how to perform the spells and charms she needed. Astoria was eternally grateful. Her work was not as taxing as before and she was pulling in large numbers in her accounts. If this keeps up she would become independently wealthy before the end of the school year.

Astoria was walking in the corridor when she spotted the animal killerstriding passed her, followed by another dark haired boy. Curious of what was happening she followed the two of them. By the time she reached them, they were in the middle of a duel and the blond one was injured. She turned to run for help but Snape was already behind her.

"You saw nothing." said Snape.

Astoria nodded and ran the other direction. It didn't take long for rumors to fly about Draco Malfoy, the blond animal killer, being in the hospital wing. From the sounds of it he appeared in critical condition. She paid a visit to him to see for herself. The state he was in shocked her and she felt sorry for him.

This was the perfect opportunity for Astoria to go to the storage room. As soon as she was free, she rushed to the enchanted chamber to gather her supplies. She spent the rest of the week hauling her inventory into a handbag she had casted an extension charm on. After everything was accounted for she went into an abandon old classroom closer to the Owlery. It was so she had a place to pack the items and ship them to her schoolmates through the owls. It was her daily schedule: finish all of her classes and go straight to work. This took up most of her social life.

In the months that passed a series of unfortunate events transpired. Hogwarts was attacked by rogues and their headmaster was murdered. Astoria didn't know what to make of it but one thing was clear: Hogwarts was no longer safe. Even for pure-bloods.

Tension was rising as war raged on. Astoria feared the only thing that could end it was death. There were two outcomes to this conflict and the cold war that would follow. Blood would stain the ground. It was a definite. If the pure-bloods won, their world would be reverted back to the dark ages. If the Muggle sympathizers won, things would remain the same but with a few new regulations. She was a pureblood but didn't discriminate against anyone because of their blood. If she was to dislike a certain group, it would be because they had personally offended her. She believed the best option for her to do at this time was to remain neutral. It appeared her father felt the same way, but with different sentiments.

"Is father really gone?" Daphne asked their mother.

School had ended, Astoria and Daphne had returned home to receive troubling information from their mother.

Clara Greengrass slumped over the settee with a bottle of Sherry in her hand. "He emptied all of the vaults. Everyone's! Mines! Yours! Yours! He even took the elves! All we have is the manor!"

"Where did he go? Did he leave a note?"

"Oh, he left us something all right!" their mother pointed at a stack of documents on the table.

Daphne went to the table and looked them over. They were signed divorce papers. Their father's reasons were that their mother had provided him with disabled children. The next documents were of those relinquishing his parental rights over her and Astoria.

"He claims my hostile womb made you two mentally ill."

"These are lies!" screamed Daphne, holding the parchment with the list of the illnesses they have. She shook her head in denial and then began to sob. She couldn't believe this. "I'm not ill!" she looked to Astoria, "We are not ill!"

Their father was not attentive of them he was using what little he knew against them and exaggerating it. Since the sisters were born their father didn't favor them. He had often lamented about how disappointed he was for not having boys instead and would treat them indifferently. Their mother barely acknowledged their existence. It had a negative impact on both of the girls as they grew. As teenagers, Daphne substitutes their parents love by acquiring unnecessary material that temporarily fill the void. Astoria became antisocial and kept to herself.

Astoria had no emotions to display. To her, their father was only a man who gave her life. They lived under the same roof but she rarely saw him. Whenever she did he was unpleasant and criticizes them. There was no attachment between them. No affection. Nothing.

If there was nothing then why did her chest feel hot and her throat was tight? Maybe some part of her did care for him but not enough to promote emotions like Daphne? Perhaps, she would be able to figure it out if the room was not so loud.

"Mother, Daphne!"

Clara and Daphne's cries had halted but it was not because Astoria had ordered them to. They stopped to stare at her because all her life, Astoria had never raised her voice.

"Cry," she ordered them, "cry today, tomorrow, until next week or next month. Let it all out right now. Afterwards, when you two are ready come to me and I will tell you my solution to our problem."

Daphne spent three days in her bedroom, crying over what she had lost. They were in financial ruin and their father abandoned them. It took their mother a whole week. Once they had recovered they approached Astoria to hear her plans.

"We are in a delicate situation and need to focus on us. We have two options: barrage ourselves inside the manor until the war is over or we move far away to another country and start our lives over."

"I don't want to be here." their mother said flatly. "I care nothing for this war. It took my parents. Almost everyone I loved."

"I second that." said Daphne. "But how are we going to leave? The streets are crawling with Death Eaters."

"I have a Portkey." said their mother. "It can take us to Scotland. We can travel from there." She dug into a pocket on her dress and presented an antique silver pocket watch. It was beaten and rusted, the only object she had kept from her humble life before her marriage to their wealthy father. It was a Portkey all along, which explained to the girls why they often see her holding it on her hand and staring at it. Deep down, she had always wished to leave but never had the courage.

"So we are all in agreement. We leave." Astoria went to her closet and took out two medium handbags with extension charms on them. "Pack whatever you want in here and then we met in the drawing room."

When all was done, their mother took out her watch and pressed it opened.

"Touch the numbers."

Before doing so, the three witches took one last look at their manor. To memorize all they could. They didn't know what the future held or what would become of them but they know that they only have each other to depend on.