It was early in the morning when Draco awoke. The sun just barely touched the lake and not a hair stirred in the dormitory. Draco carefully crept out of bed and headed over to the bathroom to shower. He came back out, drying his hair, when he had an idea.

Tiptoeing over to Blaise, he attempted to look inside his friend's mind. Since Blaise wasn't an Occlumens, it was easy for Draco to intrude, even if he knew it was wrong. But Draco had to practice on someone who wasn't Snape.

Blaise was dreaming about life with Voldemort as ruler of the Wizarding World. An older version of him was standing in front of the Dark Lord, waiting to receive his tasks as he was Voldemort's personal "fetcher". His Lord barked a few orders and Blaise trotted off to find the things he'd been asked to retrieve.

The scene changed to the end of the day. Blaise was putting on a cloak. He pulled on his hat, gloves, and wrapped his Slytherin scarf around his neck before heading out the door. Some time passed as he walked, but he finally arrived at a cemetery. He went straight to one of the graves without looking at the others, giving Draco the impression that were Dream-Blaise real, he'd've been doing this for some time.

Blaise knelt down on the cold frost and shook his head. Draco looked at the death date, which was the only visible piece of information. It said June 5, 1996.

"Why didn't you listen?" Blaise asked the grave. "It's your fault that we're in this situation. If you hadn't refused to become a Death Eater, you wouldn't be dead! You know how everything fell apart after you were gone." He sighed. "It's been exactly ten years now. Voldemort's getting worse day-by-day, and I'm not even sure how that's possible. A day doesn't go by and I don't regret your refusal. If you'd listened to Dumbledore, the Dark Lord wouldn't have killed you. You'd even gone home for the day, just to refuse your initiation. You could have saved us all. Potter never knew what he was doing. Oh, well. I've wasted enough of your time. I'll be going now. And remember, Theo, Adrian, and I will always miss you."

Why wasn't I included in that mix? Draco wondered. Blaise sneezed and the snow fell of the grave to reveal the truth:

DRACO MALFOY

June 5, 1980-June 5, 1996

Refused the Dark Lord and died on his birthday.

Blaise jolted awake and Draco quickly stepped away.

"Everything alright?" Draco asked uncertainly.

"You'll never guess what I dreamed tonight."

"Save the story for breakfast or we'll miss it."

Once all the boys had finished gobbling down their food, Blaise told the story of his dream. Draco's Legilimency had worked because he'd gotten the exact information Blaise had.

"And when I sneezed, the snow fell off the gravestone, and guess who was on it?"

"Me?" Draco said.

"Yeah."

They sat around awkwardly before Draco said, "I'm not going to refuse Voldemort in real life. He'd kill my parents. And Potter wouldn't fail as long as he had Dumbledore's help."

The others just looked glum so Draco pushed his empty plate, and walked away, knowing that they'd follow him to class.

Draco took a seat near the back, and Adrian plopped down next to him while the other two sat in front.

Someone had charmed a paper bird and it was flying around the classroom. Finnigan tried to knock it down with his hand, and Crabbe shot a small stone at it with a slingshot.

Suddenly, it burned and fell to the desk under it.

"Good morning, children."

Everyone spun around to find Umbridge standing at the back of the classroom with her wand pointed where the bird had been. She began to walk down the aisle, writing with her wand on the the chalkboard.

"Ordinary Wizarding Levels," she dictated as she wrote. "O, W, Ls. More commonly known as OWLs. Study hard, and you will be rewarded. Fail to do so, and the consequences may be…severe.
She smile creepily as she said that last bit. Raising her wand, she motioned for the books behind her to float to the students. As a book was dropped on each desk, Umbridge continued to speak.

"Your previous instruction in this subject has been disturbingly uneven, but you will be pleased to know from now on we will be following a carefully constructed, Ministry-approved course of defensive magic. Yes?"

As everyone was looking through the books, Granger had raised her hand. "There's nothing in here about using defensive spells," she said.

"Using spells?" Umbridge said, surprised. She gave a high-pitched laugh and, walking forward, continued, "Why, I can't imagine why you would need to use spells in my classroom."

"We're not going to use magic?" Weasley asked.

"You'll be learning about defensive spells in a secure, risk-free way."

"Well, what's the good of that?" Potter asked. "If we're going to be attacked, it's not going to be 'risk-free.'"

"Students will raise their hands to speak in my class." She walked to the front and turned around. "It is the view of the Ministry that a theoretical knowledge will be sufficient to get you through your examination which, after all, is what school is all about."

"And how is theory supposed to prepare us for what's out there?"

It's not, Draco thought.

"There is nothing out there, my dear," Umbridge said. "Who do you imagine wants to attack children, like yourselves?"

"Oh, I don't know," Potter said sarcastically. "Maybe Lord Voldemort?"

The students began to mutter among themselves.

Walking towards Potter, she began to say, " Now let me make this quite plain. You have been told that a certain Dark wizard is at large once again. This is a lie!"

"It's not a lie! I saw him, I fought him!"

"Detention, Mr. Potter." She walked back to the front of the room. Couldn't this woman keep still?

"So according to you, Cedric Diggory dropped dead of his own accord?" Potter said.

"Cedric Diggory's death was a tragic accident."

One Dumbledore could've prevented, Draco thought.

"It was murder!" Potter insisted. "Voldemort killed him. You must know that!"

"ENOUGH!" Umbridge shouted, losing her cool. In a calmer voice, she repeated herself. "See me later, Mr. Potter. In my office." And then she giggled.

"We didn't learn a piece of useful information today," Theo complained after class was over. "What on earth are we supposed to do with 'theoretical knowledge?'" He said the last two words mocking Umbridge.

"Pass our OWLs?" Draco suggested.

Theo lightly snacked his shoulder. "I'm serious."

Draco shrugged. "I don't know. Maybe practice on your own against each other?"

"Yeah," Blaise agreed, "but we'd have to be in our room."

Once this was decided, they talked about how they hoped the other classes would be less disappointing.

Draco was out for a walk that evening in the woods when he saw something peculiar. A barefooted blonde was looking up at some invisible creature and petting it. He saw Potter approach her so he hid behind a tree.

"Hello, Harry Potter," the girl said without looking behind her.

"Hi, Luna," came the reply. So this girl was Luna Lovegood, then.

Glancing down, Potter asked, "Your feet. Aren't they cold?"

"A bit," she said, nodding. "Unfortunately, all of my shoes have mysteriously disappeared. I think Nargles are behind it."

Looking at the same thing Lovegood was looking at, Potter said, "What are they?"

"They're called Thestrals. They're quite gentle, really, but people avoid them because they're a bit…" she trailed off.

"Different," Potter finished for her. "Why can't the others see them?"

"They can only be seen by people who've seen death."

So that was why Draco had no idea what they were watching.

"So you've known someone who's died, then?"

Lovegood nodded and began to walk forward. "My mum. She was quite an extraordinary witch, but she did like to experiment, and one day one of her spells went badly wrong. I was nine."

"I'm sorry.

"Yes, it was rather horrible. I do feel very sad about it sometimes, but I've got Dad." She reached into her bag and pulled out a red apple. "We both believe you, by the way, that He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named is back, and you fought him, and the Ministry and the Prophet are conspiring against you and Dumbledore." She threw the apple in front of her, and it appeared to roll around of its own accord.

"Thanks," Potter said. "It seems like you're about the only ones who do."

"I don't think that's true, but I suppose that's how he wants you to feel."

"What do you mean?"

"Well, if I were You-Know-Who, I'd want you to feel cut off from everyone else, because if it's just you alone, you're not as much of a threat."

Draco knew she was spot on.

Lovegood pulled some meat out of her bag and tossed it out. Draco saw it being gobbled up by a bunch of air, but he knew that it was probably the thestral. He waited for Potter to leave before he made to go, but was called back.

"I know you're there, Draco Malfoy."

Draco spun around and approached She-Who-Had-Called-His-Name.

"How long have you known?" Draco asked her.

"Long enough. I knew that you didn't want Harry to see you, so I didn't call you out."

"Oh. Thanks."

The girl tossed another piece of meat before saying, "You're father is with the Death Eaters, isn't he?"

Draco was taken aback by her bluntness, but nodded nonetheless. He quickly added, "It's not like he has a choice. Our house is the headquarters. Besides, Father doesn't want to get his family killed."

"And secretly, he's hoping that you're plotting to get rid of You-Know-Who eventually."

"Well, sure."

"It must be quite odd to have You-Know-Who in your house."

"Yeah, well, he lives with us."

Lovegood turned to face him. "How does he sleep?"

Draco laughed. "I wondered the same thing at first, but I don't know because I don't watch him in his sleep."

Luna Lovegood wasn't as weird as everyone made her out to be. She was about as sane as Dumbledore...although that may or may not have been the best comparison.

"It was nice talking to you, Draco Malfoy," Lovegood said, "and I hope we can converse again some other time. It's getting dark. We should head back to the castle."

He nodded and walked back with her in silence. As he was about to head to the dungeons, the girl said to him, "Don't worry. I'll help you keep your reputation."

Draco was satisfied that at least someone from another house was on his side.