Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor any of the characters from it. I make no money from this story, it is purely a work of fan appreciation.

Prologue

It was almost like heaven.

Men were writhing, dancing, fit bodies turning, bending, coming up again – lights flashing, music with a good beat, dark and forward. The club was pure energy. If he went out onto the floor, those bodies would enfold and accept him – if he decided to turn back towards the bar instead, the people there would smile and buy him a drink. Somewhere near the back his friends were waiting, ready to slap him on the back, ask how his week had been – show off the latest new thing they had acquired, be it material or human. Everyone accepted him, and he was so grateful for that, it was something he never forgot.

The boy with the short blonde hair ran a quick hand over his scalp, not pushing the hairstyle into spikes, as he normally did, but rather pushing it down, trying to make it lie flat against his scalp – for a moment it made him look younger, tamer, even adolescent.

Things were only getting started, but he could come to heaven any time. Tonight might be his only chance to re-connect with – well, the real world – the one he always felt for, with his fingertips, first thing when he woke up in the morning, when his hands inched across his bedside table looking for his wand.

The young wizard who had left the magical world behind, made his way back towards the entrance of the club. He took his coat from the attendant, slipping the muggle garment over his shoulders with an ease he didn't even think of anymore, flipping his collar up to prevent the snow that fell thickly from making its way inside. He left the club behind him, and walked out into the night.

ooo

Harry knew it was a murder as soon as he entered Shacklebolt's office. He could tell from Shacklebolt's shoulders, which had a grim set to them, and the more than usually gloomy way in Shacklebolt nodded to Harry as he entered: without first saying hello, or asking how things were going. Shacklebolt looked stern, and there were fine lines around his eyes and mouth – he often looked that way when things were bad.

They both hated murder investigations, though perhaps for slightly different reasons. They both hated the crime, of course – both grieved for the victim and the victim's family. But Shacklebolt, Harry suspected, took murders as a sort of personal, professional failure – after all, the Auror's office, of which he was the head, had the task not only of catching criminals, but also of preventing such crimes in the first place.

Harry, for his part, hated murders because they represented the existence of something once good, or at least something once neutral, finally, incontrovertibly turning wrong, past the point of retrieval.

He was accustomed to evil, of course, from his childhood. His teenaged battles against Voldemort, in which he had sometimes been the pawn, sometimes the director, of his own actions, he now felt had been filled with a very rare kind of moral certainty: never had he doubted that his own cause was the good and the just one, worth dying for, if need be. He had never felt any uncertainty about the need to destroy Voldemort.

And, in his first few years with the Aurors, he had seen every new case set before him with much the same black and white clarity. Every new criminal had been a challenge, and a wrong for him to set right; each announcement of a crime to solve sent adrenaline coursing through his veins. Preferring excitement, he had actually been disappointed when, during quiet periods, he was tasked with confiscating dark teapots and sorting domestic disturbances.

But one day the criminal had been Jeremy Thigget.

Jeremy Thigget, a small Griffindor who had only attended meetings of Dumbledore's Army once or twice before his parents had pulled him from school in what would have been Harry's seventh year, was arrested by the aurors for raping a muggle girl, and then, in his panicked attempt to oblivate her, giving her brain damage. His eventual sentence was rather light, and his mother's petulant, soft whinging during his trial – "well, she was only a muggle", had set Harry's teeth on edge.

But he had remembered as well that Jeremy was once been a small, rather funny boy, always hopefully trying to fit in. His ears were very large and he'd always gotten some teasing over that, until eventually his parents had taken him to someone who had permanently modified them.

It was not the thought that there were ultimately good and ultimately evil people in the world that was frightening to Harry. It was the thought that a good person could be lost - could become evil.

A murder was like that. A murder meant that something had been irreparably broken. One could go out and arrest the culprit, perhaps stop them from doing something terrible a second time. But it wasn't possible to put anything right again.

He sat down before Shacklebolt's desk and waited.

"I've got a case for you." Shacklebolt put the manila folder in front of Harry, and waited as Harry pulled it forward and began leafing through the information: an auror's report from earlier in the day, paper-clipped in front of a series of reports from the London Metropolitan Police. This was standard procedure: there were always one or two aurors on MET duty, assigned to keep an eye out for any cases with possible magical involvement, and, whenever one appeared, erase the necessary evidence, and transfer the work over to Shacklebolt's office. Harry had done that shift for six months with Ron, and he had found it to be quite an enjoyable foray into muggle culture.

The victim was young – nineteen, according to the papers supplied. The picture that had been attached was probably from a few years earlier, as he was in a Hogwart's uniform – Ravenclaw, from the colors. He was the type of teenage boy one often sees, at fifteen or sixteen, with too-large hands and feet, tripping over their own feet or awkwardly folding themselves into chairs that suddenly seem too small. In the photo, he was leaning over a desk, laughing at someone just outside the frame of the shot. Then he looked over, apparently surprised, at the person holding the camera, and made a face, before the photo reset itself.

"Timothy Wandsworth," Shacklebolt said, in the same moment as Harry read the name in front of him. "He was found two nights ago, dead outside of a muggle establishment – apparently a homosexual meeting place." Harry listened with interest how carefully Shacklebolt made this pronouncement, without any emotional intonation at all, where most people would have been hard-pressed not to add a thin layer of disgust or a nervous tremor to their voices. Aurors became like doctors – they had seen all parts of human nature, and very little of it surprised them anymore.

"He had been living apart from his parents for the past two and a half years. During his sixth year in Hogwarts, apparently, they had a falling-out over his sexuality –he left school – and was out of contact with them ever since. You will need to do a more through follow-up with them, of course. Margot and Hugo Wandsworth – they live in Hogsmead village."

Harry flipped to a second photo, which showed another Timothy, this time eleven or twelve, beaming excitedly as he stood in front of one of Hogsmead's typical thatched cottages while his father presented him with a small owl in a golden cage.

"Cause of death?" He asked briskly.

Shacklebolt frowned. "We don't know yet, exactly. The muggles thought it was a knifing, before we obliviated them, but then, muggle opinion in this case is hardly relevant. The body has been sent to the St. Mungo's morgue, where Mediwizard Dwindles will, of course, do the forensics for us."

"Wizards do get stabbed, from time to time, sir," Harry felt obligated to point out. "Especially wizard-raised ones, who tend to think muggles aren't a danger."

Shacklebolt shrugged ponderously. "That's true, but in those cases the MET Auror on duty doesn't usually detect traces of magic on the corpse when it's recovered."

"Oh." Harry said. "Another wizard, then."

"Yes." Shacklebolt waited as Harry continued to look through the dossier.

"Ron is on leave," Harry said. "Would you like me to handle this one on my own, then?"

Shacklebolt paused. Deliberately, he brought his two hands together in front of him, joining his fingertips.

"It seems that the kinds of muggle places that Timothy was frequently are not easy places for a stranger to gain entry too. And because of his sexuality, we must not discount the possibility that this was a hate crime." Shacklebolt drew a breath, and stared at Harry. It occurred to Harry that the gesture, which appeared intimidating, was actually a sign of Shacklebolt's nervousness or discomfort.

"There is another wizard…" Shacklebolt said, "that I would like you to work with. He is not an auror, but will act as a consultant on this case. He may be able to help you make contact with Wandsworth's muggle acquaintances, for instance, or perhaps advise you how to behave among them without raising suspicions.

"An expert on muggles?" Harry said, raising his eyebrows. Shacklebolt frowned very slightly.

"Yes, you might say that." He took a card from his robe pocket and handed it carefully across the table to Harry.

The script was gold and ornate, on heavy cream-colored paper. Harry, who had become skilled after the war in deciphering business cards, categorized it almost instantly as coming from someone pretentious, or pureblooded.

'Draco Malfoy', the card read, simply, and listed an address below. When Harry pressed the card with his thumb, it repeated the name and instructions in a sonorous voice.

Harry felt his jaw dropping open. It was imperative to say something to Shacklebolt quickly, to explain that it was quite impossible, but to his dismay he saw that the large man across from him was already rising, and gesturing towards Harry.

"Very good, Potter," He rumbled. "You will be a professional about this, I'm sure."

"Yes, but," Harry said. He rose, stumbling blinding forward as Shacklebolt opened the door.

"Start with the Wandsworths," Shacklebolt said, pushing Harry very gently out into the hallway. "I recommend you set up a meeting with Mr. Malfoy this afternoon, and then try to find a time and talk to the family as soon as possible."

"Yes, but…no, Kingsley, wait a moment,"

"Do your best to work with him, Harry," And with that, Shacklebolt closed the door, quietly but firmly, in Harry's rather startled face.