Chapter 1: Goodbye Malfoy Manor
Draco stood still against the wall, watching his mother, waiting to see if she was going to take any sort of action at all. He guessed that she wouldn't, that at this moment she was finished, ready to surrender to whoever came searching here, whether it be an auror or a dementor or some vengeful mudblood or half-blood filled with the arrogance that accompanied victory.
The light was fading from the overcast sky, and the entire manor was submerged in a waning gray. If these were to be his last moments in the house, the mood fit. Gray light evoked gray memories, which made up the vast part of Draco's time at Malfoy Manor.
In a way, he was happy this was all coming to an end, so that he didn't have to come back to face the myriad of painful and unpleasant moments he had endured, especially over the last few years, especially since he had come to stay here. Perhaps now that he was finally dead, Draco would have been able to find some refuge within these walls that had housed one Malfoy or another going back nearly 1000 years, some remnant of the pride he had once felt whenever he spoke his name, his father's name.
But Draco did not really think that he would ever feel comfortable here, and he realized that his father probably never felt completely at home either. The Malfoy family name had always stood for purity and unstained power, but as the years wore on and even the most ancient and powerful families of the wizarding world had become diluted by muggle blood, they had had to take this cause more and more upon their own shoulders, until, eventually, the strain of it all became too unbearable to live with happily.
So Draco expected to be the last Malfoy to stand in this place and call it home, the last bearer of an almost great name.
He looked back to his mother, to that dead expression that had become all too familiar whenever things had gotten bad and she'd wanted to make the whole world go numb. It would be like a relief for her, whatever happened.
He didn't really think she would be harmed. She had told him, as they were coming back to this place, that she had reported to You-Know-Who that Potter was dead when he was really alive. Draco had been shocked at this news, and somewhat afraid, but somewhat strangely never angry at his mother. She had lied right to his face, and now that had to be worth at least something, enough to save her skin. Without her, Potter might not even have won. Without her . . .
Draco turned at a noise outside the window. The light was very dim now, but he could still see a figure appear outside the gate, come walking up the pathway to the front door. This is it, he thought. Whatever happens happens, and I can't do anything about it. I'm in the hands of fate. This reassured him, and he leaned back a bit. He wouldn't have to make the pivotal choice, he could just float along with the current and see where he went.
The figure burst through the door and into the parlor. "We're leaving, get up." Draco Malfoy's father walked out of the shadows, his clothes tattered and his face bearing that familiar mark of extreme attentiveness under terrible exhaustion.
"You?" Draco sputtered.
His father eyed him quickly, before his eyes darted off in another direction, always watching his surroundings. "Yes," he said hoarsely. "Me. Your father."
"How did you escape?"
"It doesn't matter now. We have to go. They'll be here any moment, so we have to get a move on, get out of the country."
Draco turned briefly to his mother, who had hardly moved, but had her eyes closed now, a different, more tiresome sort of defeat now showing in her face. "Where are we going?" Draco asked.
"I'll tell you when we get outside and on the move." Lucius turned his head in frustration, but the room remained still and silent. "Narcissa, do you hear what I'm saying?"
Draco's mother opened her eyes and looked calmly and steadily at her husband. "I hear you," she said.
"Well we don't have much time, we have to go." Narcissa opened her mouth, but didn't say anything. "Did you hear what I said? We have to go. Are you coming or not?" he demanded.
She pursed her lips, holding the room hostage in anticipation longer than Draco thought possible before gradually standing up and whispering "I'm coming."
Lucius nodded collectedly and Draco's mother and father walked across the room together.
Still Draco stood back though, realizing he was determined to remain where he was, still thinking that he would either live or die right here, without any more of his father's expectations or requirements, which he knew would only end in pain for everybody.
At the end of the room his father stopped and turned to face him. "Draco?" he asked smoothly. Draco's eyes widened, because in his father's voice, unlike almost any other time his father had spoken to him before, perhaps because of how closely everyone had come to death that day, perhaps because You-Know-Who's shadow was finally gone from the world, perhaps because at-long-last, or more likely just for this instant, his father finally regarded him as an equal, Draco saw that he was being given a choice. He could shake his head no right now and his parents would walk out the door without protest, without admonishing him or telling him he was acting like a foolish, immature child.
He lingered as long as he could between moments, endless choices and questions running through his head, uncertain of anything anymore. He looked at his father, wondering if there was anything left in this man that he could admire or trust, any reason to follow him at all. It would, after all, be for his benefit that they were leaving; he had the most to lose from staying here. He looked at his mother, knowing he loved her, that he couldn't let her disappear forever while he himself stayed behind alone, the only Malfoy alive in Britain.
He swallowed, and though he was unaware of any message being sent from his brain down to his leg, he took a long, heavy step. That step turned into a series of quicker steps, and soon he found himself across the room next to his parents. Then he followed them out the front door and down the flagstone pathway leading west across the countryside.
The light was all but gone by this point, and as the Malfoy family walked out the gate, the giant house behind them was dark as well, not a single light left illuminated in the old residence. The trio stood together and looked back, the silhouette of the roof and chimneys barely discernible any longer. Then Lucius Malfoy put his hands on the shoulders of his wife and son and disapparated, leaving behind Malfoy manor forever.