A/N: This is my first published foray into the world of Dramione. I will forewarn you that I'm a massive Ron lover and Romione lover so there won't be any blatant Ron hate in this piece. If that's your jam, you might be in the wrong place... otherwise, I'm happy to inform you that not only am I an enormous multi shipper, but that Dramione ranks really high on the list. I love the idea and what could have been between them, so this is my contribution to the ship.

As far as the story goes, currently I don't see it going more than ten chapters or so, but things can change! All I do know is that we definitely won't get passed twenty.

With all this in mind, I'd like to introduce you to The Winter Swing, a story which has been playing in my mind for years and that has finally come to fruition.

Please leave some feedback if you can, it's only ever a good thing.

Enjoy!

The Winter Swing

Chapter One

Summer and Autumn had come and gone quickly in London that year, and finally it seemed as though the dust was settling, and people were beginning to piece together what had once been their lives, turned upside down by the war that had ravaged their homes and their souls. Things had been difficult, of course, but what was left of the Order had been able to string together moments and memories enough to keep them uplifted in their times of crisis, of heart-wrenching sadness, of unbridled loss and hopelessness. Indeed, the wizarding world was moving on at long last from the horrors of what had come before.

Hermione was among those who favoured colder over the warmer months. For years she'd looked forward to returning to Hogwarts on the scarlet train, and how desperately she'd give anything for that feeling again. For there was no returning this year, nor the next. Hogwarts remained, of course, but so did the scars and the haunting thoughts she couldn't disassociate with its walls. She hoped one day to return, but not just yet. It was time to rebuild.

She smiled weakly at Harry as he passed her in the hallway of Grimmauld Place that morning, having already finished his breakfast before the rest of the house had woken. He touched her shoulder but did not meet her eye, and Hermione understood. Things were still painful. People's faces bared the scars of those they'd lost, and in her eyes, Harry saw them all because she felt them just as deeply. She knew that when he looked at her he saw Fred and Remus and Tonks and so many more, because she treasured them just as closely as he had. None other had ever really understood Hermione quite like Harry did, and she suspected that he felt similarly.

Despite her burgeoning relationship with Ron, Hermione would have laid down her life for Harry had the need arisen, and she knew he was aware of the fact. Perhaps it was this, rather than the ghosts of their dead friends, that kept him from looking her in the eye every day. Perhaps he knew that had the choice of sacrificing her life been presented to her, she would have given hers willingly, and in doing so chosen Harry, and not their best friend. Perhaps deep down they both understood that in war, decisions are sometimes made that reveal more of one's feelings than words ever could.

Hermione made herself tea and carried it with her to the living room of Grimmauld Place. She made for the window, eyeing the trees in the green outside, admiring the way the leaves had turned from green to brown, to frost-bitten grey. She watched as some dead leaves moved in the invisible breeze. Privately, she wondered if things would ever be as simple as the changing seasons. She thought fondly of her first year at Hogwarts, and how she'd been so bright eyed and excited and dumbfounded at the prospect that her life was going to change so completely. In her dreams she'd seen magic spells, dancing statues, moving pictures.

She'd never seen war, loss, a heartbreak so great that it threatened to spill from her every seam if she were to allow it.

Many mornings and nights since then, most especially when she had been hunting the horcruxes with the boys, she'd dreamed of life beyond war. So many times she'd imagined a peaceful life, a job she loved, a husband she'd want to come home to every day. His face used to be clear; fire-red hair, freckles across a long nose and a smiling mouth that welcomed her in. There had been times when Ron was all she'd dreamed of, but the times where he was nowhere in her dreams were becoming more commonplace.

She wondered if he felt his own feelings dissipating. Hermione certainly wouldn't hold it against him, but she couldn't be sure.

Just then, she heard footsteps descending that were unmistakably Ron's. He moved with heavier steps than Harry, and at a slower pace. He had always been the more relaxed of the pair. Hermione often liked the sound of his footsteps, the reminder that he was near. But like her dreams, it was becoming less so. It wasn't that she didn't want him close but, rather, she didn't mind if there was distance between them anymore.

Instead of going to the kitchen as she'd imagined, Ron came into the room behind her and crossed it in five steps. His hands touched just below her shoulders, palms flat against her arms, and he moved them up and down slowly. It was a cold morning in the house, and Hermione sank into him so that his arms came and wrapped around her, hands clasped over hers as she held her tea.

"You didn't sleep well last night," he told her, and she shook her head.

"Neither did you," she said, turning her head so that her cheek was against his chest. "Otherwise you wouldn't know that I didn't."

She felt Ron's lips press against the top of her head and she closed her eyes.

"It'll come," he told her. "Things will be better."

He had always hated the change between autumn and winter, how the weather changed, and the skies grew suddenly darker. He sometimes felt as though he needed the light of day to make up for the darkness inside himself, all the pain and grief he'd caused and left in his wake when he'd decided that destruction was the path he'd wanted to follow. Or had it been the other way around? Had destruction chosen him? Was he ever heading for anything else? Had he been moulded and shaped for a destiny that had never been his own to determine, ever since birth?

Questions swam in Draco's mind as he lay in bed. He'd nothing to get up for that day, no one to meet, nothing to tempt him from his warm sheets, even though everything seemed to feel cold to him now, and had done since the moment he'd accepted the blackness on his arm. The mistakes of his past would haunt him forever; it was no ordinary tattoo, nothing that could be removed with a simple healing charm or concealment spell. It was a decision he'd never wanted to make, nor felt he even had any say in. Now it would always be a part of his life; the past he could never escape.

He wondered silently how long it would be until they came for him.

Fugitive, criminal… murderer.

He turned the labels over in his mind, allowing the familiar feeling of cold sweat claiming the back of his neck and the swirling uncertainty of vomit in his stomach.

He was a murderer. He'd allowed Voldemort's followers into the castle, had led them to the astronomy tower; he was the one responsible for the death of one of the greatest wizards who'd ever lived. Privately he'd always wondered if he might have been able to ask for help, to go to Professor Dumbledore, to Snape, to anyone… perhaps if he had, things would be different. Perhaps if he had, Dumbledore would be alive and able to celebrate the downfall of the dark lord with Potter and all the rest of them.

Draco had never wanted Dumbledore dead; he'd only ever wanted himself alive, and in the stakes of life and death and Lord Voldemort, there had been only one solution – only one way forward.

Draco had never wanted to die, but he'd found himself wondering – lately more than ever – if it would have been easier. If he'd refused the mission, the orders, if he'd refused to murder the man who'd protected so many people for years and years…

But would his family have suffered? Would his mother have been safe?

Would he only have been remembered as the spoiled boy who'd been too afraid to fight and had been killed for it?

Draco had never wanted to be a coward, but a coward he'd been nonetheless when the time had come.

The guilt, the weight of his conscience, the unremitting hatred he felt for himself now seemed punishment enough for his crimes.

But he knew it wasn't, and he knew they would come for him one day.

"You should take some air," his mother remarked when he arrived for breakfast an hour later. Despite their circumstances, Narcissa Malfoy remained stoic and prepared, and Draco wolfed down the toast and fruit on offer.

'You look too pale."

"I rather think that would be counterproductive, Narcissa," said Lucius from the other end of the kitchen table. He was only one seat away, but the distance Draco felt between himself and his father seemed so much bigger than that.

"The ministry searches for us daily, if Draco is spotted wandering around, let alone in a place teeming with muggles -"

"The ministry is concerned currently with locating far more dangerous people than we," Narcissa told her husband, who looked momentarily aghast at the interruption.

His expression soon faded to one of defeat however, as Lucius knew more than any other that he was in no position to challenge his wife. It was she, after all, who had dragged them from the battleground on that fateful day so many months earlier. It was she, despite arguments to the contrary, that ran their household now.

"You haven't been outside in weeks." Narcissa returned her attention to her son, fondly touching the back of his hand where it rested on the table.

"The air will do you good, and when you've a clear head we can discuss further the plea bargains we intend to make-"

'Narcissa!"

"-when they come for us. Don't look at me like that, Lucius. They will come and you're a fool to think otherwise. We must prepare."

His father responded in some sour manner, but Draco didn't hear it. Truthfully, he hadn't listened to a word beyond his father reminding them that the ministry was searching for them each and every day. He knew it was true, and though they didn't seem to be giving urgent chase, it wouldn't be long until they tracked them all down and interrogated them one by one, then shipped them off to Azkaban.

Despite his mother's assurance that no harm would come to him, Draco often thought that it should. He had never imagined hating anything so intensely, let alone hating himself.

Hermione had taken to walking the gardens and green around Grimmauld Place, and that afternoon was no different. Ron kissed her before she left, ensuring her scarf was then up around her face because they were late into November and the weather had changed. Hermione tried not to dwell on the idea that his kiss seemed somehow limp, because she wondered if he had thought the same. She called through to the lounge to let Harry know she'd be back soon, but when no reply came she assumed he'd fallen asleep in the chair by the fire again. He often did that, and Hermione supposed he was catching up on all the sleep he'd missed the last seven years.

The pavements were icy under her feet as she left the house, making her way to the greens behind the estate. Despite the cold weather and the dead leaves having left behind empty branches, the green was enormous, and she felt safe and hidden within it. She passed the familiar sights as she always did: the fountain of flowers, now frozen over, the greenhouses that belonged to nearby residents that were fogged up with cold, the path that was sometimes overgrown but now treacherous with black ice… Finally, she found the playground.

For months she had been coming to it, and not once had there been any sign of children. Grimmauld Place itself seemed devoid of life, and Hermione often found herself wondering if anybody still lived there at all. Now and then she'd see lamps flickering in windows, but she knew well enough that it could be squatters or runaways just bedding down for the night. Still, she hoped that some life would return to the place. It didn't seem right to have a playground with no children to enjoy it.

The gate squealed as it always did, stiff from lack of use, as she eased it open and slipped inside. As she rounded the corner, she expected to find the emptiness of the park greeting her.

But for the first time in all the months she'd visited, she wasn't alone.

A man sat with his back to her on one of the swings, but he didn't sway backwards and forwards. His feet were set flat on the floor, his head bowed forward just slightly. Despite this, Hermione saw the inimitable flash of white-blond hair on his head, and her stomach fell. Immediately, her hand went for her wand where it was hidden inside her coat. As her fingers closed around the body of wood, she found herself rooted to the spot.

In the silence that followed, she heard only one, faint sound.

He was crying.

And then, as if by some magic, he stopped. His head shot up, he stood.

He turned.

Hermione looked at Draco Malfoy for the first time since the Battle of Hogwarts, but she didn't recognise him.

Her wand raised, she made no other move.

He stared back, and likewise he remained still. His eyes tracked her from head to foot, but he settled his gaze on her wand. His eyes were red, and Hermione saw the stains of wetness as they streaked down his cheeks. His tears were fresh and likely warm, but the air he breathed out made a haze in the cold air as he opened his mouth to speak.

"Do it," he breathed, barely audible but Hermione heard him, and she wondered what was taking her so long.

He deserved to suffer for everything he'd done, for all the pain he'd caused, for Dumbledore and Dean and Luna and Dobby and Ollivander and for his part in all of it. For all she'd endured that night at Malfoy Manor, when some tiny piece of her had wondered for the briefest of moments whether he might have helped, instead of standing by and watching as his aunt branded Hermione with blood and pain.

"Do it!" he screamed, and Hermione jumped, and his cry echoed around them for miles.

He had spread his arms out, level with the ground, and his eyes were wide and frenzied as he looked at her. Hermione tried to recall a time when she'd ever seen him like this but she couldn't. Malfoy had never looked so hopeless and so maddened all at once, and Hermione couldn't find it in herself to curse or jinx him. He looked so…

"Please," he whispered, his chin trembling with new unshed tears.

So broken.

She lowered her wand, ignoring the voice that sounded suspiciously like Ron calling her daft for doing so in the back of her mind. Malfoy looked at her still, and Hermione thought she saw disappointment in his face, mingled now with the madness of his eyes.

"They're looking for you," she told him shakily, wand still gripped tight in her hand.

"Then call them," he replied, hands falling loudly to his sides. He turned his gaze to the ground and shook his head.

Hermione was uncertain; she'd never seen him behave in this way. She knew how to handle Malfoy when he was raging, when he was arrogant, when he was vile… but not like this. And why hadn't she called the ministry? Why hadn't she sent her patronus to Harry and Ron to call for help? Why was she merely watching him fall apart before her eyes?

It would be easy to overpower him in this state, easy to haul him in to the ministry and have done with it. He deserved to feel the way he did, for everything he'd done, and she'd be glad when he was locked away for his crimes.

And yet she felt something she'd never imagined she'd feel for Draco Malfoy.

Pity.

Because weren't they all just children caught up in a war? Weren't they just two people whose circumstances found them on different sides?

Wasn't he just a boy forced to grow up too soon, just as she was a girl far older than her years?

No, said the voice again. She didn't pity him, she wouldn't.

Following a hollow chuckle, Malfoy turned his back on her and retreated towards the far entrance.

"Stop!" she called, and her hex missed him by inches.

But he was unperturbed. He continued to walk.

"I said, stop!"

She sent her hex once more but missed again.

By the time the body bind curse had formed on her lips a third time, he was gone. Hermione raced to the edge of the park and through the other gates, but no matter which way she looked, Draco Malfoy had disappeared, and there was a trail of damp patches as big as teardrops along the ground in his wake.

A/N: I've always been an enormous Draco fan, and I love the potential in him. This is how I see him in the months following the DH. Perhaps you'll agree, perhaps not, but either way hopefully you'll come back for more.

Thanks so much for reading! Em x