10 December, 8:45 a.m.

The Entrance Hall

Ginny slowly descended the stairs into the Entrance Hall, running her hand absentmindedly along the banister. Her eyelids felt heavy, and her eyes burned with tiredness. She'd been up most of the previous night with Luna in the Room of Requirement, preparing for their planned assault on the Headmaster's office. She had to tell Neville that everything was ready.

Yawning slightly, she reached the entrance to the Great Hall without really looking where she was going. As a result, she was awoken to her senses as she collided head-on with Draco Malfoy, sending her painfully to the stone floor. He looked ill and tired, and a very faint redness around his pale gray eyes told her he'd been crying. Though she'd said approximately nine words to him in her entire life, she found herself feeling, to her complete surprise, almost heartbreakingly sorry for him.

"Sorry," he nearly whispered, helping her up from the floor. "I-I didn't see you." Ginny frowned. This was very strange-she'd expected him to spit out a contemptuous suggestion that she watch where she was going.

"No," she said, dusting herself off. "It was my fault. Are you all right?" She realized this question was slightly ironic considering it was she who'd been knocked to the floor. He nodded briefly before moving past her and into the Great Hall. After a moment, she followed, taking a seat beside Neville.

"Morning, Ginny," he greeted her cheerfully. She yawned.

"Urgh, if you say so. Luna and I were up till three last night. It's ready." His eyes widened.

"Really? Wow! Brilliant!" She nodded, pouring herself some coffee and scanning the Ravenclaw table. Luna looked cheerful but every bit as tired as she.

"I think we should do it today," Neville went on, helping himself to bacon. "I mean, now it's ready, why wait?"

"Yeah, all right. I'll tell Luna in Charms."

In low voices, the two friends discussed their plan for the umteenth time. Everything was finally in order.

As Draco approached the Slytherin table, he saw that Pansy and Blaise had purposely left a space between them so they wouldn't have to sit next to one another. He rolled his eyes. Brilliant. Apparently, the two hadn't stopped their bickering. Sighing, he seated himself between them.

"You're late, Draco," said Pansy at once.

"Good morning to you too, Pansy," he said heavily. "Morning, Blaise."

"Morning, Draco." Blaise put a great deal of emphasis on Draco's name, which told him that he'd spend the day being addressed thus while his two friends determinedly did not speak to one another. Sighing, he poured himself some coffee, drinking it black. He didn't care much for the taste, but he found the warmth comforting. Pansy looked at him intently.

"You've been crying," she accused.

"I don't know what you're talking about," he snapped. She shrugged.

"Well, all right then. Hurry, will you, we're going to be late to Charms." He drank the last of his coffee and pushed aside his barely touched toast.

"Right, I'm coming." The two friends stood and made their way across the hall. As they were seventh years they parted the jostling crowd easily, and soon they were walking along the mostly deserted corridors to Charms.

Later that day, Draco made his way quickly across the grounds. Snow was falling and it was bitterly cold, but he was kept warm by his cloak. He intended to spend his free period out here. This meant cutting his next class very fine indeed, but he didn't care. He wanted to visit the Thestrals at least once before returning home for the holidays. They always soothed him, and seemed to understand him much better than most people did.

He passed through the large paddock sometimes used for Care of Magical Creatures lessons and made his way to the edge of the Forbidden Forest. He disliked coming in here, but the Thestrals were generally disinclined to venture out.

Coming to a stop barely twenty feet inside the forest, Draco reached inside his robes and extracted a small quanity of meat, wrapped in paper and stolen from the lunch table. Placing this gently on the forest floor, he moved back a few paces and waited. Not all of them always came, indeed some came very seldom. However, Aclyptia, Draco's favorite, always came. Indeed, after a few moments Draco detected a pair of red eyes between the trees, and seconds later Aclyptia's sleek, black form emerged from the darkness. She was small for a Thestral, barely thirteen hands tall, her leathery wings currently folded over her back. He smiled. Thestrals looked slightly alarming, with their black, skeletal forms and their glowing red eyes, but Draco rather liked them. They were very gentle creatues.

Draco had been able to see them since his first day at Hogwarts. When he was seven years old, his Aunt Bellatrix had taken him behind the house, telling him she wanted to show him something. She had been very excited, and had taken her nepphew by side-along apparation to a wood somewhere far away. Through the trees, they had seen a family of Muggles having a picnic in a sunny clearing. Bellatrix had told Draco firmly to remain where he was before marching into the clearing, where she amused herself by brutally tortuing the Muggles for a while before abruptly killing them. Draco had been terrified, and had remained at his mother's side for the rest of the day. He had never told anyone about this; even now, he didn't like to think about it.

"Hello," he greeted the Thestral. She approached him slowly, gently nuzzling his outstretched hand before turning her attention to the meat he'd left on the ground. Having consumed this, she turned back to Draco, extending her long pink tongue to lick his fingers. He smiled and gently stroked her head, moving his hand gradually down her neck. As she moved closer to him, however, he noticed that she was limping. He frowned.

"Are you all right?" he said softly, bending down to examine her leg more closely. What he saw nearly made him vomit. Aclyptia's left hind leg was slashed brutally open, from just above her hoof to just below her hip. The wound was very deep, so that in some places the bone showed through, and it was turning a nauseating greenish color. Draco couldn't believe he hadn't noticed it right away.

"Aclyptia..." he whispered, tears stinging his eyes as he gently wrapped his arms around her neck, resting his cheek in her soft mane. This wound looked terrible, and it looked as though she'd had it for several days. Judging by the discoloration, it was probably infected. He knew very little about Thestrals, but even he knew that they usually died soon after an injury of this magnitude. Draco couldn't imagine what he'd do if he lost his favorite Thestral. She had been a valuable friend to him for five long years. She had listened to him, licked away his tears when he cried, let him ride her when he fancied a bit of adventure. He couldn't lose her.

Hugging the Thestral tighter, Draco forced himself to think rationally. He must not panic. Not having studied Care of Magical Creatures beyond his fifth year and not having been particularly interested in the subject anyway, Draco had no idea how to go about treating a Thestral. Well, he would just have to get her to someone who had, that was all. He gently patted her neck.

"Lie down," he whispered, releasing her slightly. "I'll be back in a moment, all right? Stay here." Making sure that Aclyptia had settled obediently onto the forest floor, he gently kissed the Thestral's head before he turned and ran full-out back toward the grounds. He must find Hagrid.

Heart pounding, Draco tore up the slope to the paddock, leapt the fence with a strength he didn't know he had, and ran until he reached the small cabin on the edge of the grounds.

"Hagrid!" he called desperately, pounding on the door. "Hagird, please, it's important!" From within the cabin, someone muttered "What the ruddy hell...?" and seconds later the door was flung open. Hagrid narrowed his eyes.

"Malfoy," he said suspiciously. "What the ruddy hell're yeh doin' here, yeh should be in class."

"Please, sir, it's one of the Thestrals." Hagrid looked taken aback.

"Thestrals? And since when've yeh called me sir?"

"Please," said Draco, ignoring the second part of Hagrid's response. "She's hurt." Hagrid's frown deepened.

"Whaddaya mean, hurt?"

"It's her leg, sir, it's cut, it looks infected. Please, sir, I think it's serious." Hagrid nodded grimly.

"Show me," he directed. Immensely relieved, Draco led the gamekeeper as quickly as he could back to the forest. Aclyptia was still lying where he had left her, looking somewhat indignant at Draco's abrupt departure. He immediately knealt by her side, gently stroking her head and neck. Hagrid bent to examine her leg.

"Didn' know yeh could see Thestrals," he remarked. "Or, I dunno, can yeh?"

"Of course I can," Draco replied, a touch impatiently. If that wasn't a stupid question. How else would he have known the Thestral was hurt in the first place?

"Oh," Hagrid muttered distractedly. "Who'd yeh see..." he trailed off, looking as though perhaps he shouldn't have asked that question. Draco stared at the forest floor.

"Er...Dumbledore." It was not a lie, he had seen Dumbledore die. And he certainly wasn't going to tell about the Muggles.

"Ah...Well, I reckon yeh should go up to class. Yeh're cuttin' it fine, and there's nothin' yeh can do fer her anyway."

"But, sir...She will be all right...Won't she?" Hagrid looked at him for the first time since they'd arrived in the forest.

"Yeah, she'll be all righ'," he said, not unkindly. "I'll sort her out." Draco felt as though he might pass out from relief.

"Thank you, sir," he said before departing. He didn't want to leave, but he knew Hagrid was right; there was nothing he could do. He quickened his pace as the bell sounded overhead, breaking into a run as he reached the castle. Even so, however, he arrived at Transfiguration nearly five minutes late. Professor McGonagall raised her eyebrows as he dropped into his seat.

"Thank you for gracing us with your presence, Mr. Malfoy. You are five minutes late, so I think five points from Slytherin would be appropriate." He sighed slightly, ignoring Pansy's questioning look. Professor McGonagall turned back to the rest of the class.

"Now that Mr. Malfoy has been so kind as to join us, we are ready to further study the difficult branch of magic that is human transfiguration..."

Draco wasn't listening. He couldn't stop thinking of Aclyptia, her injury standing out horribly vividly in his mind. He hoped with all his heart that she would be all right.

"What do you mean we can't do it today?" Ginny demanded, tossing her long red hair behind her shoulder. "Of course we're doing it today, we've been planning it for weeks!"

"I'm sorry, Ginny, but it won't work," said Neville contritely. "We need all three of us, and I promised Professor Sprout I'd help her fit socks on the mandrakes."

"Well, that's all right," Luna put in. "We'll do it another day, that's all."

"But, Luna!" Ginny exclaimed. "We've worked so hard, we've been planning this for ages!"

"I'm really sorry," said Neville again. Ginny shook her head, sighing.

"Oh, all right," she conceded. "I've got a lot of homework tonight anyway." Neville looked immensely relieved, apologized once more, and departed at top speed for the greenhouses. Almost in spite of herself, Ginny felt her annoyance ebb away as she watched him go. He looked so eager, so happy. She turned to Luna.

"Well, I'm going up to the Room of Requirement to check that everything's still in order," she said. "Fancy coming along?"

"Oh, no, thank you," said Luna serenely. "I think I'll go and have dinner."

"All right," said Ginny, shrugging. "I'll see you later, then." She departed quickly for the seventh floor.

Upon reaching the correct corridor, however, Ginny discovered to her annoyance that it was still very crowded with students hurrying to and from the Great Hall. She sighed. The Room of Requirement would have to wait.

As she turned and slunk out of the corridor, she caught a fleeting glimpse of Malfoy as he passed her, heading the opposite way. She smiled very slightly. She'd thought he was mildly attractive in her fourth year, and he had grown steadily more so since then. She'd never mentioned this to anyone; Ron probably would have hit her, and in any case she'd never imagined they would ever be together. They'd exchanged barely ten words before this morning, and their paths hardly ever crossed. Besides, he probably prefered someone else-she rarely saw him out of the company of Pansy Parkinson.

Even so, she still noticed him. She couldn't help but notice his smooth, pale complexion, the sheen of his blond hair, his eyes which seemed to change between silver and gray depending on the light. No, none of this escaped her notice, and it was this image which settled into her mind, kept her company as she did her homework that evening, and refused to leave even as she fell asleep that night.