Chapter One

Pockets of Calm

There's a high wind in the trees

A cold sound in the air

And nobody knows when you can go

And where do you start

Oh, Into the Dark

Bright Eyes- Paul Simon and Art Garfunkel

Wednesday May 13th; Longhope, Gloucestershire

Half past five and a thin band of bright gold back-lit the distant hills and announced the dawn. Harry walked, almost silently, to Andromeda's back door and toed off his dew-damp Converse trainers. He considered briefly how strange it was that he was trying to be quiet, considering the cacophony of bird song all around him that accompanied the sun's arrival.

The key turned in the lock and he slid out of the early morning chill into the warmth of the kitchen.

"Morning, Harry." He jumped, startled at the sudden address. Silence really had been unnecessary after all. "Didn't mean to alarm you." The older woman smiled gently and lifted the coffee pot towards him in question.

"Please." He smiled slightly as he hung his brown leather messenger bag on the coat hook and rubbed quickly at bare arms in a bid to banish the lingering cold. Andromeda smiled at him affectionately, filled his favourite mug with coffee and nodded at a kitchen chair.

"He's down at the moment," she explained, placing the mug of black coffee and a plate of scones in front of Harry. He ignored the food but instinctively wrapped both hands around the mug, warming them. He considered the woman in front of him as she leant back against the kitchen counter.

She looked exhausted. The smart grey trousers and red sweater were covered with the deep creases that could only be acquired by sleeping in one's clothes; the sweater carried a small stain that gave testament to the number of Cleaning Charms used to clean up the baby sick. A few unruly strands of her salt and pepper hair had come loose from the twist that was born of practicality rather than elegance, and in general she exuded a weariness that made Harry feel tired just to look at her.

"We had a bit of a rough night, though," she explained, leaning back against the worktop, nursing her own mug. "It seems anytime I try and put him down he starts to fuss again. I think he's frightened I'll leave him." Her voice was sad. Harry looked at her with sympathy. Everyone had lost someone during the war but Andromeda's family had been completely decimated.

Only one week ago she had buried a husband, a daughter and a son-in-law and now her grandson was all she had left. In circumstances such as these, it was hardly surprising that she had decided to make Harry a member of the family, too. Harry had been thankful for it. The Weasley family were taking the loss of Fred very hard and being at the Burrow was a difficult experience.

Andromeda, on the other hand, appeared to be coping stoically with the loss. She invested everything she could in Teddy and all that was left she concentrated on Harry. Harry felt that he understood, at least partially, how she was able to persevere; when there was that much grief, how would she know where to begin? It was much easier to simply put it aside and get on with other things. It was a tactic Harry himself was very familiar with.

"How are the renovations going?" Andromeda attempted to break the heavy silence that had fallen over the kitchen. "I'm really looking forward to seeing if you can turn it into something that resembles a home. I haven't been there since I was about six so I don't really remember much, except that it was very dark, and we were strongly advised not to touch anything." A wry smile graced her lips at the last.

"I can imagine." Harry smiled with dark amusement. "It's coming on well," he admitted. "I've redecorated all the rooms. Pulled down all the panelling on the staircases and landings; managed to get rid of your Aunt's portrait along with it. It was permanently stuck to the panelling but the panelling wasn't stuck to the wall," he offered in explanation. They had spent half an hour trying to figure out how Harry could get rid of the portrait a few mornings before and he knew she would be interested that he had come up with a solution.

"What did you do with her in the end?"

"Threw her in the shed and surrounded the place with Silencing Charms."

Andromeda laughed, the sound dark, tired. Harry sipped at his coffee.

"Oh, and I found something interesting too."

The older woman's eyebrows rose in a silent question.

"I was removing the panelling on the top landing and I found a hidden door." There was genuine excitement on her face when she heard this and Harry found himself grinning back. "Next thing I knew, I was on a roof garden. It's still horrible right now but I'm hoping it'll look pretty good once I'm done."

She smiled at him. "I imagine the views from up there are just…" The first gentle sobs of a hungry baby drifted through the room, cutting her off.

Harry rose from the table and set his cup in the sink.

"I'll see to him." He stilled her with a hand placed gently on her shoulder. "Why don't you go and lie down for a bit?"

The look that flashed over her face was pure relief and Harry was surprised that she didn't even begin to resist.

He followed her up the stairs and entered the cool, dim nursery. Teddy wasn't quite crying yet but he was certainly working up to it. Harry ended the Monitoring Charm as he waited for his eyes to adjust to the semi-darkness.

"Hey there, little guy, you been giving your Nana a hard time?" The child's whines softened as he became aware of Harry's presence and watched happily as his breakfast was prepared.

"She's gonna be pretty irritated if you were a horror all night and then turn on the charm the second I turn up. You're going to have to give me a hard time, too, or she might get jealous."

Setting the bottle down on the small table by the rocker, Harry bent over the cot and smiled as Teddy raised his tiny hands in anticipation.

"Nope, you're determined to play favourites aren't you?" Harry mused softly as he settled the baby in his arms and sank down into the rocking chair, Teddy cooing at him gently. He offered the bottle to the baby and he immediately latched on to the teat and for a long while the only sounds were the gurgle of the bottle and the quiet creak of the chair.

Teddy felt warm and heavy in Harry's arms and he felt himself relax. This peace, here in the nursery, was the only real comfort Harry had been able to find in the two weeks since Riddle's death. With Teddy in his arms, the demons that chased him every waking moment and beset his dreams at night, felt far off and less significant. It was almost as if the smell of milk and baby powder worked together to form their own special kind of Patronus.

In the peace, the world itself seemed to slow down. Teddy began to doze slightly as he fed, and Harry drifted with him.

He appeared, for all intents and purposes, as though he was asleep, but Harry was still very aware. After all, HH

Harry was responsible for the child that, at that moment, was relying on him so entirely. The signs of this awareness were small, but they were there. The way Harry would occasionally reposition the bottle to ensure the baby wasn't taking in air with his feed. The way he would jostle Teddy gently any time his grip on the teat slackened, reminding him that he should be eating, not sleeping. The way he knew the second the bottle was empty and shifted to the next step in the routine.

He didn't bother with the towel as he lifted Teddy to his shoulder and began to tap his back. The shirt he wore had, after only two days, been renamed his 'baby sick t-shirt'. It had been through the wash six times that week. He was certain that at some point it would go into the machine and never come back out again as it dissolved in the warm soapy water. A small sound from Teddy bought him back from his musings.

"C'mon little guy, let's get you cleaned up," Harry suggested and placed the child on the changing table. Teddy was awake again now and, as Harry tried to remove his baby-grow and nappy, he became a frenetic blur of fists and feet. More than once a small chubby fist shot out to grab Harry's glasses off of his nose and as Harry got him into the warm bubbly water, the gurgles of happiness quickly changed into squeals of excitement.

Harry threw a wandless Silencing Charm at the nursery door and began to try to wash the very slippery child who would not keep still. By the time Teddy was clean and back on the changing table it was difficult to tell which of them had been in the bath. Teddy's reluctance to remain still, coupled with the enthusiasm he had for the new game of smacking the water with his hands, had resulted in there being very little water left in the bath at the end.

Once Harry had Teddy dry, powdered and dressed he turned his attention to cleaning up the nursery. Drawing his wand, he cleared the water from the floor, and was about to do the same for the three inches or so remaining in the bath, when he noticed that his actions held Teddy's rapt attention.

Instead of Vanishing the water he whispered a charm and led a small trail of water through the air over Teddy's head. It twisted and turned in a shimmering ribbon, following the smooth strokes of Harry's wand as he traced an intricate pattern. Teddy was enraptured and slowly the huge blue eyes began to close. Harry allowed the water to fall back into the bath and Vanished it quickly.

He placed the now sleeping baby back in his cot, pausing to brush the silky turquoise curls off of Teddy's forehead before aiming a Drying Charm at his t-shirt. When he turned, it was to see Andromeda standing in the doorway, but he didn't jump; he knew she'd been watching them for some time.

"It's almost hard to believe that, a fortnight ago, you'd never held a baby." She smiled as they stepped out into the hallway and Harry reset the Monitoring Charm. "You're a natural."

Harry felt a burst of pride in his chest and couldn't keep the smile off of his face. That comment meant more to Harry than Andromeda would ever know. His destiny since before he'd been born had been to kill, to die; so he drew an inordinate amount of pleasure from knowing he had a talent for protecting, nurturing, as well.

The rest of the morning passed quickly, a flurry of laundry and nappy changes and running the lawnmower around Andromeda's garden. Before he knew it he was back at home on the roof garden scrubbing and planting, refusing to give himself a moment to consider those things which hovered, imposingly on the edge of his consciousness.

***

The grey pre-dawn light was filtering into his bedroom as Harry awoke the next morning and the gloom did nothing to alleviate his very bleak mood. Resisting with all his might, the urge to just snuggle back down amongst the covers, and give waking up another shot in a couple of hours, he forced himself from his bed and into the bathroom.

In just a few hours it would be over, Harry thought, as the water from the shower beat down relentlessly on the back of his neck. This was the last funeral, the last victim of Riddle to be laid to rest. It had been a struggle to get the Ministry to allow him this funeral. As it was, it had taken two weeks to get them to acquiesce and release the body of Severus Snape to him.

They had wanted to treat him as all the other dead Death Eaters and bury him within the grounds of Azkaban prison, he thought as he towelled dry. Snape's lack of a next of kin had almost made that fate inevitable. He had gone to the Ministry as soon as he could. Had asked what was going to happen to Professor Snape's body. He had been met with a wall of bureaucracy that had threatened to overwhelm even his Saviour status. First, he needed to get a pardon for Snape which had turned out to be an infinitesimal request compared to his attempts to have the Ministry release Snape to him for purposes of burial.

In the end, the Ministry's desire to use his name had won out. He had been to fill in the paperwork a couple of days before and had run into a very sarcastic woman working in the Department of Wizarding Registration. As he had finally slid the three-foot scroll back across to the table to her, she had sneered at him.

"Are there any other vicious murderers you would like us to pardon, Mr Potter?" she had asked snippily.

Harry had looked at her, slightly bemused for a moment, no idea what she could be talking about, and then it struck him: Malfoy. She was referring to the Malfoys. He had left her pokey little office, returning the sneer with interest as he went. As he made his way back through the Ministry to an Apparition Point he tried to tell himself that it was the first time he had thought about Malfoy since their handshake in the Great Hall. The lie had been far from convincing.

He huffed through a mouthful of toothpaste as he thought of the depth of his denial.

Still, the few hours following his conversation with the officious bitch from the Ministry, was the first time he'd actively allowed himself to think about Malfoy. It had occurred to him that Malfoy might be one of the few people who would be interested in the time and location of Snape's funeral. He spent an unconscionable amount of time composing the letter to him; unsure what tone it should take.

There had never existed anything but enmity between them, and just like that it was behind them. Something new had begun that morning in the Great Hall. Harry just wasn't quite sure what it was yet. He knew what he hoped it would be; that they might actually be friends. He felt a deep empathy for Malfoy, felt that there was a chance he would understand what Harry was going through. Perhaps even more than Ron and Hermione did.

In the end he had decided to just lay it out there, to try to extend the hand of friendship again. He understood why nothing had come from their meeting in the Great Hall. There had been a crowd. They were, both of them, playing the roles that were required of them, doing what was needed to make sure that neither Draco nor his Mother were forced to spend the rest of their lives in Azkaban. If Harry had been in Malfoy's position, he wouldn't have tried to further the friendship after that, either. He would have assumed that the entire thing was purely political. Any attempts at actual friendship had to come from Harry and had to exist without ulterior motive.

As he had tied the scroll to Archimedes' outstretched leg, Harry had felt a wave of panic flood through him and had very briefly questioned the wisdom of the entire scheme. But he had pressed on, and when his owl had returned near sunset with an empty leg he had found that he had been able to pretend that he was not disappointed and push Malfoy from his mind again.

Now, as he pulled on a thin black sweater and a pair of well-cut trousers, he allowed his well-sequestered disappointment to resurface. Only now, as the time for the funeral approached, he found it was tinged with hope. So, Malfoy hadn't written back. He'd only sent the letter two days ago and it was about a funeral taking place today. Maybe he was planning on attending. On talking to Harry once he got there.

Or maybe he wondered why he was inviting him to the funeral of someone who was little more than a teacher and Death Eater, the little voice in Harry's head opined as it tried to twist that hope into despair. It would appear that this shred of hope was made of sterner stuff, though, and it stayed with him as he pulled on his cloak against the early morning chill, headed up to the roof garden, and Apparated away.

Dawn's first light hit the town below and gave the whole place a very mystical feel. The small cemetery sat on a hill over looking a bleak little northern town. Mist hung heavy in its streets and from his vantage point only the terraced rooftops and factory chimneys were visible. The air was clearer up here but still the occasional wisp of mist drifted amongst the gravestones. Harry pulled his cloak tight against the chill.

"Why daybreak, Potter?"

The familiar voice behind him made Harry jump and whilst he fought with propriety to keep the smile off his face, he couldn't stop the feeling of elation that rushed through his chest, knowing that Malfoy had indeed come. He didn't turn to face the voice immediately though. He didn't want to seem too eager.

"Apparently, my word is enough for the Ministry but not for the court of public opinion." He turned slowly now, taking in the blond who leant so casually against the tree. "As I'm sure you've found out," he added sympathetically. "I didn't want there to be a hundred reporters and protesters here. He doesn't deserve that."

Malfoy smiled sadly at this and pushed himself up off the tree.

"No, no, he doesn't." He came forward to stand by Harry. "This was very nice of you, you know."

Harry looked away and a feeling of guilt crept up his spine. "It was the very least I could do."

He looked off to the horizon, trying to keep his calm, to keep a grip of the emotions that were once again threatening to overwhelm him. He was relieved when the officials turned up and the service began. He barely listened to the words that the elderly wizard leading the ceremony said. Through it, Malfoy stood unmoving by his side. By the time they left the mist was beginning to dissipate and the town below began to stir.

Harry felt Malfoy looking at him, and a moment later he broke the silence.

"I want to thank you for letting me know that this was happening, Potter. Severus was like family to me. Looked out for me where Lucius could never be bothered. I wouldn't have made it through the last year if it hadn't been for his help."

"I'm sorry," Harry offered, his voice barely above a whisper; he still couldn't look at Malfoy. Silence again. He was just beginning to wonder if the other boy had left when he spoke again.

"Why did you organize this, Potter? You were never close in school; hell, I always thought you hated him. Not that you didn't have a right to, of course; he was always a complete shit to you." Malfoy's voice was gentle, not a trace of sarcasm or contempt.

"He saved my life," Harry whispered. "Several times, now I come to think of it, and it's not fair."

"What isn't?"

"He was a hero, Malfoy. A real hero; fuckers who keep labelling me a hero have no idea what the word actually means. He gave everything he had, gave his life to defeating Riddle. Spent pretty much his entire adulthood living a lie to help us defeat him and all people will ever remember is the fucking tattoo on his arm." Harry kicked the tree and pain shot through his foot, centring him, forcing the anger back down. Unfortunately, something needed to replace it.

He heard sobbing, felt hot tears on his face and it took him a moment to realise that it was him crying. The demons were at the door, threatening to overwhelm him. Why had he come back? He should have stayed dead; death would have been so much easier than this. Strong arms circled his shoulders; long fingers threaded themselves through the hair at the nape of his neck and pulled him forward.

He reached for the proffered comfort and looped his arms around Malfoy's waist, pressing his face into his shoulder as Malfoy began to rub slow circles on his back. He offered no words, made no attempt to stifle Harry's sobs, just held him until eventually the tears subsided.

"I'm so sorry, Malfoy." Harry suddenly felt embarrassed as he pulled awkwardly out of Malfoy's arms and leant against the tree to steady himself. He knew he should look up, meet Malfoy's gaze and brazen out his embarrassment, but he couldn't quite mange it. He heard shuffling. A pair of expensive-looking loafers came into view and Malfoy's cool fingers were under his chin, tilting his head up to meet his eyes.

"You don't have anything to apologise for," he said, silver eyes searching Harry's face. Harry felt himself relax and Malfoy smiled. A genuine smile without a trace of a sneer; Harry's head swam.

"Though I would appreciate it if you called me Draco." He allowed his hand to drop back to his side but continued to hold the eye contact. "Every time you call me Malfoy I feel like I should be calling someone Weasel or shooting Leg-Locker curses at your back." He grinned and Harry couldn't help but grin back.

"Thanks, Draco."

"You're welcome, Harry." Harry noticed that he put just the slightest bit of emphasis on his name. As if testing how the name felt in his mouth. "Are you okay? I told mother that I wouldn't be long but if you need me to stay…" Harry smiled at what was clearly a very genuine offer.

"No, thank you Draco, but I need to be getting along to take care of my Godson."

Draco nodded and turned to leave and Harry felt panic flood through him. What if this was it? Draco had given him a peace that until now he had only found ensconced in Teddy's nursery. He couldn't go back to the indifference, couldn't turn his back on this offer of comfort.

"Draco," he called out. The other boy paused and turned back slightly to look at Harry. "I thought maybe we could get a drink some time," Harry gushed feeling the embarrassment wash over him. Had he just asked Draco on a date? A slow smile spread across Draco's face.

"I'd like that." At that response, Harry felt giddy with relief and was desperately relieved that he was still leaning against the tree.

"I'll owl you and we can arrange something," he suggested, feigning a nonchalance that he most certainly didn't feel.

"I'll look forward to it. See you soon, Harry." Draco span on the spot and was gone before Harry was able to fully comprehend what had just happened.

"See you soon, Draco," he offered up to the now empty cemetery before spinning on the spot himself and reappearing at the bottom of Andromeda's garden, about three times lighter than he had been the day before.