Okay, a few things to go over before we get started. One, I'm looking for a beta for this story, so if anyone's interested, drop me a line. Two, The rating is subject to change, but there won't be anything too intense, so don't worry. Also, I take forever to update purely because I'm a slow writer, but I will finish. I promise. And, last but not least, I do not own Harry Potter or anything about it, and the following story is not for profit. I hope you all like my new little tale, but even if you don't, please tell me what you think. Now, onward!

1 - Not Crazy

Harry Potter was not crazy. He really wasn't, and he would appreciate it if everyone would quit accusing their "Chosen One" of being bonkers. It was one or the other, in his opinion. Either they have a boy hero who they expect to save their asses, or they have a crazy kid with a scar on his head. And this time it was his friends doing the accusing!

"It's not a feeling, Ron, I know. Malfoy wouldn't kill himself," he insisted for the millionth time. Hermione and Ron, who were sat across from him at the Gryffindor table in the Great Hall, both shook their heads in exasperation, Ron going so far as to roll his eyes. Though Hermione was still mad at Ron, it appeared that the death of one of their classmates was enough for her to overcome her anger at the redhead enough to sit by him.

"Look, mate, I know you've had a bit of a Malfoy obsession lately—" Harry scoffed and opened his mouth to correct his best friend's word choice, but Ron ploughed on, ignoring him. "Obsession, but it's pretty clear he offed himself. Turns out he's the coward we always thought he was, so just forget about him."

"That's a bit insensitive," Hermione reprimanded, then seemed to remember she was ignoring Ron and turned sharply to Harry. "I know this news is sudden and…difficult, but it is probably better if you don't think too much about it, Harry. It's really very tragic that he apparently felt he had no other option but to take his own life, but what's done is done," Hermione said gently, pulling away the Daily Prophet that bore the article that had stunned the entire Hall that morning as soon as the owls had arrived. Malfoy Heir Found Dead In Ancestral Home, the headline read. It didn't matter that Hermione had taken the paper away. The article's words were repeating in his head, spinning around and inexplicably not adding up.

Malfoy Heir Found Dead In Ancestral Home

Draco Malfoy, 16, son of Death Eater Lucius Malfoy, was found dead in Malfoy Manor Saturday night, just days before he was to return to Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, where he was a sixth year student. The apparent cause of death, as determined by a close friend of the family who wishes to remain anonymous, was blood loss from slashes across each of his wrists. His door was locked from the inside, and there are wards to prevent apparition within the mansion, so the Aurors quickly declared it a suicide. Narcissa Malfoy, Draco Malfoy's mother and wife of known Death Eater Lucius Malfoy, demanded that investigations continue, though authorities doubt they will find any evidence to point to foul play.

This leaves only one question: what would cause this young man to take his life? The shame of having his Death Eater father arrested under mysterious circumstances in the Ministry last June? The pressure of being the heir to the Malfoy fortune? Perhaps we will never know, especially as his death is as surrounded by mystery as his father's arrest was. Mrs. Malfoy has allowed no one besides the anonymous family friend to inspect the body, as dictated by Malfoy family tradition, she claims. Also according to tradition, the funeral will be private and on the Malfoy Manor's grounds. Could she be hiding something under the convenient excuse of tradition, protecting her son even after his death? So many questions left unanswered, but rest assured that this reporter will keep on digging until answers are found.

Of course Rita Skeeter herself had penned the article. Who else could turn a teenager's suicide into a scandalous headliner? And maybe Harry was crazy for falling into her trap and not merely accepting the overwhelming evidence that Malfoy had committed suicide, but it just didn't feel right. If anything, it supported his "Malfoy is a Death Eater" theory, as his friends liked to call it. Maybe he wasn't doing whatever job he'd heard him bragging about at the beginning of the year and telling Snape about before the Christmas holidays, so they'd sent someone in to finish him off. But that didn't really add up either. If he was killed for not doing a job properly, they'd want to make an example of him, not hide away his murder and disguise it as a suicide. Maybe he really had killed himself when he couldn't do his job, in order to avoid the shame of failing and having a failure of a father. But he'd been so sickeningly proud at the beginning of the year. Being a Death Eater and attacking innocent mugglebornes was probably his life-long goal. He'd doubtless dreamed of it as a kid (the way most people dream of being a fireman or a Quiddich player) and been pruned for it by his father, Mr. Right-Hand-Man himself.

Heaving a frustrated sigh, Harry turned away from his friends to look over at the Slytherin table behind him. That was the only table that seemed to be mourning Malfoy's death as a legitimate loss rather than a generic tragedy or, as most of the students were doing, not really caring at all beyond a slight curiosity. All of them, down to each little first year, seemed to be taking the loss quite personally, as though a beloved monarch had died. Well, Harry realized, in a way, theirs had. How many times had he seen Malfoy doted on by his house, or seen a younger student hurry to respond to a snapped command? Hadn't he even heard him called the Prince of Slytherin? Yes, he remembered, because Ron had been quick to amend that to "the Ponce of Slytherin." But Harry'd always assumed he ruled through fear and money, rather more like a spoiled dictator than a beloved king. Looking at the many sad faces lining the long table, he had to admit he might have been wrong.

A few Slytherins were even out of uniform, dressed in the deep black of mourning. At first Harry hadn't noticed because Hogwarts robes were mostly black anyway, but it seemed that four sixth years had traded theirs in for completely black robes and black garb beneath them as well. Pansy Parkinson, Crabbe and Goyle, and another boy who'd been invited to Slughorn's lunch on the train, and had been in the compartment when Malfoy had bragged about "bigger things," but Harry couldn't remember his name… All of them had broken school code, though none of the teachers seemed ready to reprimand them. They clearly weren't shocked like the rest of the Hall, probably because they hadn't relied on the Prophet for news of their friend's death. They'd probably been notified right away, maybe even just hours after he'd been found. The article hadn't said who'd found his body, or where he'd been. Had it been a house elf, or his mother? Was he in some moderately public place, like a drawing room, or locked away in his bedroom, not to be found for hours?

Harry knew his friends were probably right that he shouldn't dwell on these morbid thoughts, yet something about it just… caught, like a loose thread on a sweater. He couldn't help but want to unravel it.

"Harry, are you listening to me?" Harry's head snapped back around to face Hermione, who looked vaguely annoyed as though she knew exactly what he'd been thinking. Knowing her, she probably did. "I was saying we should be getting to class. It's almost time for it to start."

"I have a free," he mumbled distractedly, eyes and thoughts still on the Slytherins as he automatically rose with his friends to leave the Great Hall.

"Well I've got to get to Runes. And you should spend this time revising for that review Snape said he'd be giving us today. We were supposed to be preparing for it over the holiday, and I know you didn't spend one minute of your holidays studying," Hermione chastised, leading them out into the Entrance Hall.

"Only Snape would give a test the first day back from the holidays," Ron complained as soon as Hermione had left for her class and they'd started up the stairs to Gryffindor tower.

"Yeah, and I recon it'll be difficult, too," Harry mused, letting his thoughts linger only a moment more on Malfoy before turning to Defense class and its bat like teacher.

"Wanker'll probably make us write an essay on vampires or something else we haven't studied yet." Harry nodded, mumbling the password to enter the common room.

"Well, let's get started."

…

There was indeed a test in their first class back from the holidays, as Snape announced before they'd even had a chance to pull their books out. Though Harry hardly cared about his least favorite teacher's health, he couldn't help but notice how pale and drawn he looked, as though he'd not gotten proper sleep in days. Probably the loss of his favorite student, Harry though, surprising himself when the words, even in his head, sounded more sympathetic than bitter. Well, he reasoned with himself, it's sad. Malfoy may have been an arrogant git, but he was still just sixteen. People have a right to mourn.

As soon as the though occurred to him, his eyes darted over to the sixth year Slytherins that shared this class with the Gryffindors, most notably the four black-clad mourners. They'd left Malfoy's usual seat in the middle of them empty, but didn't look at it. Instead, they were all perfectly focused on whatever Snape was saying; indeed, much more focused than they usually were in class, regardless of the fact that they liked the teacher. It was a little odd, Harry had to admit, without Malfoy's pale face and white blond hair between them, whispering something undoubtedly snide to Parkinson or snickering at something the other boy—Zabini, Harry remembered randomly—had said. A similar thought must have been passing through Parkinson's mind, because her eyes suddenly filled with tears.

"Sir," she choked out. "May I please be excused?" Snape gazed steadily at her for a fraction of a second before he nodded once then turned back to his desk. With a flick of his wand, he distributed the tests, which ended up being so difficult that Harry couldn't spare a thought for Parkinson or her lost friend until much later.

The rest of the day passed similarly, with each teacher piling on the work in order to make up for the weeks they were on holiday. Only Slughorn seemed as relaxed as ever, though he did spare a moment for Malfoy before they began discussing Golpalott's Third Law.

"This is truly a tragedy!" he exclaimed in his most theatrical voice. "A tragedy. I don't believe a student of Hogwarts has felt the need to take their own life since Aders Riven in the sixteenth century, who was diagnosed with a fatal case of Spattergroit. A rare occurrence indeed, very rare."

"Too bad he can't get Malfoy's ghost to join the Slug Club," Harry mumbled to Ron, who snickered.

"Most notable thing Malfoy did was die," Ron replied, still chuckling a bit. That offhand sentence sobered Harry at once, though. The sad truth of it stuck with him, but though it rang true in many ways, it also served to pull the loose thread even more. Malfoy wouldn't just give up like that, because he knew people would say that about him, that he'd never done anything of note but die. It just didn't seem possible that "noble pureblood Malfoy" would take that lying down, bring it upon himself, in fact. Then again, Malfoy had easily set side his pride third year when he moaned and groaned about the small injury Buckbeak gave him. But that had served his ultimate goal of tormenting Hagrid by having the hippogriff sentenced to death. Dying didn't benefit him… unless things really were so bad here that death was preferable.

Harry shook himself, nearly laughing at the sheer absurdity of the idea. Malfoy, the spoilt boy who'd always had the best of everything and received numerous packages from his loving parents, feel desperate enough to take the plunge? No way, especially not when (and Harry was going to stand by this to the bitter end) he'd just been made a Death Eater and was head of the Malfoy household in his father's absence. Besides, hadn't he told Snape that he could do whatever task he'd been given on his own? If he was really in trouble, there was no way he'd sit back and quietly accept it. Malfoy didn't do a single thing quietly.

"Harry, mate, I can tell you're thinking about Malfoy again," Ron whispered, startling Harry.

"What? What makes you say that?" Harry asked, sure he'd misheard. If Ron could tell, then he must be acting really obvious about it.

"You're staring right at the place where he used to sit," Ron pointed out.

"Oh… I guess I was."

"Just drop it, Harry. You can't do anything about it, so just drop it."

"I know, but… don't you think it's weird? I mean, if he was getting desperate enough to—you know, then why wouldn't he accept help from Snape when he was offering it? It doesn't make any sense." Ron shook his head, glancing at Slughorn to make sure he was still occupied lecturing before answering.

"I dunno… maybe it was an accident or something."

"How?"

"A spell gone wrong? Like blood magic or something really Dark." He shrugged. "I don't know what kind of sick stuff a family like Malfoy's gets up to over holidays."

"I guess it's possible…"

"Would you two shut up?" Hermione snapped. "Some of us are trying to work here!" That effectively shut them up, Harry looking properly contrite while Ron… well, at least he didn't say anything nasty to her. That was progress, Harry thought morosely.

Trying to figure out what Slughorn was lecturing about halfway through proved to be more difficult than was worth it, however, so Harry let his thoughts turn to what Ron had said. Of the theories he'd had so far, the idea of it being an accident seemed the most likely. Maybe he was doing some Dark spell for his mission from Voldemort, and it had gone wrong. He had told Snape that "it" was taking longer than he expected… learning the spell, perhaps, so he got impatient and tried it, and—

"Alright, class. Now that you know the theory, let's see if you can put it into practice," Slughorn said, sweeping his arms to gesture to a table full of glass vials that they were clearly supposed to do something with. Oh shit.

The rest of class was, of course, a disaster, but Harry's spirits lifted slightly when Hermione pulled a note written in familiar slanted writing out of her bag as they left.

"I meant to give you this this morning, but when the news arrived I completely forgot," she said, walking with him. Ron skulked behind, clearly not wanting to get snapped at again. "What does it say?"

"Dumbledore wants to meet tonight," Harry answered her, stowing the note away in his bag. "Another lesson."

"You're going to talk to him about Malfoy and what you heard before Christmas, aren't you?" she asked, seeming resigned to the answer she already knew he'd give.

"Yeah, of course. He should know about what Snape said, anyway. About helping Malfoy. Fat lot of good it did him in the end, though." As he said it, that chord of wrongness, that hole in the story, struck him stronger than ever, but he pushed it aside.

"Look, Harry, he probably already knows, and—"

"I am not having this discussion again," Harry said, stashing the note in his bag. "Come on. We're going to be late for Transfiguration, and McGonagall will have a cow." Hopefully Dumbledore, at least, would agree with him that there was something very strange about Malfoy's "suicide."