Draco was just drifting back to sleep after a nightmare when he was thrown back into consciousness by a timid knock on his door.
He quietly padded over to open the door, only to come face to face with Analissa.
"Aunt Lissa, what are you doing up this early?" Draco asked groggily, not noticing the mixed look of fear and pure joy on her face.
She stepped into his room, one of her perfectly trimmed and polished nails being held between her teeth.
"It's about Corvus." She told Draco, sitting nervously at the end of his bed.
She motioned with her other hand for him to join her, and he quickly did, having fully woken up once he heard his mates name.
He sat next to her at the foot of his bed, waiting with baited breath as Analissa wrung her hands.
"He's coming." She told him finally, a small grin gracing her normally sorrowful features.
Draco had to try very hard not to outwardly show the hope that was consuming him.
"Who's coming?" He asked, making sure he knew before jumping to conclusions, only to have his spirits drop.
"Corvus." She told him gleefully, with a bright smile, tears appearing in her eyes. "Our Raven is coming home, Dragon."
He couldn't keep the hope in any longer and, as if opening flood gates, the tears began to flow down his cheeks at the thought of finally getting to see his mate again, even if he did have years of mistakes to apologize for...
Now, laying face down on his bed, Draco waited patiently for any sign of what Analissa had told him, any sign that Corvus was here.
As he listened, straining his ears, he began to hear muffled voices at the front door.
"Draco must still be awake." He heard his aunt say softly as Draco snuck out of his room and began to tip toe down the staircase.
"I have to make the same assumption, Bella." Draco then heard his godfather's hard voice agree with her.
"Well, where would he be?" Draco heard another voice, one that made his steps and heart stop. "I'd like to speak with him."
Bellatrix was the one to answer Harry, as Severus was now staring at Harry in unmasked shock.
"He should be in his room," Bellatrix told him softly. "It's just up the stairs, second door on the left."
Draco began to breathe again, but only because he knew he had to move. He couldn't be caught eavesdropping on them when Harry/Corvus began ascending the staircase to find him, could he?
So he quietly rushed back to his room, flopping down on his bed as silently as he could.
And then he began to hear the quiet, shuffling footsteps of someone nervously pacing outside his door.
He was about to get up and ask who was out there, even if he knew perfectly well, when they knocked on the door.
"Come in." Draco told them shortly, barely keeping the nervous twinge out of his voice.
And as the door opened, Draco still couldn't believe what he was seeing.
Corvus Riddle, his mate, was stepping into his room after 12 years.
Draco leapt from his bed and threw his arms around the boy, dropping his head on the boy's shoulder as tears began to prick his eyes.
"I'm so glad you're here." He whispered, not caring that this contradicted everything this boy had ever seen of him.
"I'm glad I'm here too." Corvus agreed softly, wrapping his arms around the sobbing blond.
After Draco had calmed down, they moved to his bed, where they now sat discussing how things would be between them.
"So, I'm your mate, yeah?" Corvus asked. "What exactly does that entail?"
"I'm a veela Corvus, so you're my life mate." Draco told him shakily. "Every veela gets a life mate, but not all meet theirs."
"A veela can not, technically, live without their mate." Draco went on. "If they meet their mate they have only so long to reveal themselves and have their mate answer, if they run out of time, they usually die of restraint and if their mate rejects them they will certainly die from the heartbreak."
Corvus watched him with calculative eyes as Draco began pacing in front of him.
"It's not as if I'm telling you this to make your mind up for you or anything, but I will need an answer." Draco muttered as his pacing came to a halt.
"You need me to either accept or decline your mate-ship." Corvus answered softly, his head now in his hands, elbows resting on his knees.
"I'm so sorry." Draco told him quietly, sounding close to broken.
"What does this make us though?" Corvus asked carefully, lifting his head to look directly into Draco's molten eyes. "Because if I remember correctly, I'd already accepted you at three years old."
"Think of it as being engaged." Draco told him stiffly. "You accepted my 'proposal' but we didn't get 'married'. We didn't bond, and couldn't have at the age of three."
Corvus finally realized through his confusion and worry, that Draco was scared, terrified even.
"You're scared I'm going to leave you here to die." Corvus growled, a new fire in his eyes as he got up and walked to stand in front of Draco.
"Why shouldn't I be?" Draco asked uneasily, still trying to tread lightly and unsure what to do with the way Corvus was looking at him.
"Because, what kind of idiot would let you die?" Corvus asked, before swiftly placing a hand at the back of Draco's head and pulling him in for a kiss, making it impossible for the blond to answer.