Warnings: PTSD, and sort of unintentional self harm.

Chapter 10: Unwanted Summons

"So, we've got nothing on Santiago or Stoll," Ron said with a yawn.

"Anderson is clean as well," Hermione added in a disappointed tone.

"That just leaves Wright and McCormac," Draco commented.

"Wright's been in Azkaban for five years, and McCormac's dead," Ron countered.

"We're getting nowhere with this," Harry whinged.

They were all sitting in the back corner booth in the Calico Rose. The little cafe still needed some repairs, but at least it was open again. The place was empty except for them and the owner's cat, Pitty Pat, who was curled up in Hermione's lap. The barista, as usual, was sitting at the table near the window reading a book. Draco stirred his coffee absently and crossed the names they'd mentioned off his list. Half of them were dead, had fled the country after the war, or had already been in ministry custody long before the Folly began making its presence known. Lucius couldn't have known of course, and to be fair his input was more valuable than anything else Ron had come across.

"We still haven't ruled out Churchill?" Harry asked, noticing that Draco hadn't crossed her name off.

"It's worth having a look into," Hermione countered.

"Yes," Draco agreed. "Even if only because my father was adamant that she is probably involved."

"She was the one who decided his sentencing after the war wasn't she?" Ron asked. "He could be being biased. I mean, she's a miserable bitch, but Churchill is the epitome of what an Auror should be."

"Yet, she wasn't part of the Order of the Phoenix and no one ever mentioned her," Harry said with a frown. "Doesn't it seem odd at all? Was she even at the battle at Hogwarts?"

"Not that I recall," Draco supplied. "Her twin sister, Anne, definitely was. I saw her die. She and Bellatrix both tried to curse me not long after the fight in the room of requirement. I dodged it and they hit each other. Bellatrix got stunned, and Anne took the killing curse that was meant for me."

"Why was Bellatrix trying to kill you?" Hermione asked, raising her eyebrows. "Weren't you on their side then?"

"After Harry saved my arse? No. I didn't fight them directly, but I did try my best to protect some of the younger students. Bellatrix and Anne decided they'd had it with my shit and went after me, against Voldemort's orders," Draco explained, hating to dredge up the memories. "It's also suspicious that Mary suddenly had an interest in Politics after the war, and has a reputation for being a little sadistic. I didn't know her before Auror training, but the others complained about her early on. They said she'd had a complete change of personality following the war."

"All right, so how do we find dirt on the Chief Warlock?" Harry asked, picking at a cookie. "That's got to be a little more involved that sneaking into her office with my invisibility cloak."

"You still have that bloody thing?" Draco said with a smirk. "It wasn't at the house when it burnt down?"

"No, it's in my vault at Gringotts," Harry replied. "But it won't get past the ministry wards."

"I might be able to help there," Hermione suggested. "As the minister's secretary, I have access to Churchill's office. Not everything, mind you, but I can definitely poke around a bit while she's out on lunch. I can say I was dropping off case files if I get caught."

"It's a start," Ron said with a nod of his head. "Just be careful."

Ron and Hermione decided to call it a night, leaving Draco and Harry alone at the cafe. Harry pet Pitty Pat while Draco finished his coffee. Draco wasn't sure what to make of the whole mess. If Churchill was involved, the entire Ministry could be compromised. If it was even Mary. He supposed it could be possible that Mary had been working undercover during the war – using her sister's identity as a cover-up. Perhaps it had been Mary that Bellatrix had killed, and Anne had taken up her mantle. It was possible, but Anne had been a Death Eater. Mary, who often wore flowery dresses instead of robes, most certainly did not have a dark mark. And, as far as Draco knew, there was no way to conceal it other than wearing long sleeves.

"It's still early," Harry said breaking the silence. "Did you want to bring Maggie some cookies or something? You need to give her homework, right?"

"Yeah, I probably should. Want to come?"

Maggie was awake when they got there, reading something in her Charms textbook. She barely even bothered to look up when Draco and Harry walked into her room. She was miserable most of the time, but Draco could hardly blame her. He hated that most of all – the way she'd gone from being strong-willed and cheerful, to bitter and angry. He'd spent a lot of time laying awake at night wondering if she blamed him for her predicament. Maybe it was his fault. If he'd gotten there faster...

"You couldn't have known. My bloody owl got caught in the explosion," She said, snapping her book shut. "Stop blaming yourself for everything that goes wrong, moron."

"Stop listening to my thoughts," Draco countered.

"Stop thinking so loudly," Maggie argued.

"I brought you cookies," Draco said and handed her a small take out box from the cafe. "The caramel ones you like."

"And coffee," Harry said and put it on the small table beside her.

"They're letting me out of here on Saturday," Maggie said, not sounding particularly pleased.

"That's good!" Harry said as he sat in the empty chair near her bed. "You must be sick to death of this place by now."

"It would be," Maggie said sadly. "But I can't look after myself like this. My flat, obviously, is gone and I don't have any family in England. They're all in America. ...And they wouldn't take me in anyway. I don't suppose I can stay with you two for a bit?"

Draco sighed and stared at the floor. "Those wankers blew our house up as well."

"I'll talk to Molly and Arthur," Harry suggested. "We'll think of something."

"Why would they go after you two, though?" Maggie asked and took a sip of coffee. "Aren't you a pure-blood, Draco?"

"Not exactly, but I am according to the ministry records," Draco replied. "Technically I'm a half-blood seeing as one of my ancestors had a tryst with a muggle, but no one really knows that."

"I don't want to seem like an insensitive arsehole, but do you remember anything about what happened?" Harry asked.

Maggie shook her head. "Other than Draco calling me a cunt and telling me I wasn't allowed to die, not really. There was a man I'd never seen before hanging around the cafe, though. I remember telling him off for being a jerk to Jacob. He told me to watch my back, and not to disrespect him. I thought he was just some muggle being a douche, but maybe he was part of the Reaper's Folly."

"Jacob?" Draco asked. "Who's that?"

"The barista. The young one who works at night. You know him – skinny, brown hair, glasses, always reading silly muggle fantasy books about dragons," Maggie told him. "He didn't put enough cream in the guy's coffee, so he started yelling at him for no good reason."

"Do you recall what he looked like?" Harry pressed.

"He was tall – well, everyone's tall next to me – but, he was taller than you. He had long brown hair in a ponytail," Maggie replied. "... and a Spanish accent."

"Long brown hair in a ponytail... Spanish accent..." Harry mused. "Did he have a scar above his left eye?"

"Yeah," Maggie said. "It looked like a claw mark or something."

"It sounds like Ron was wrong about Santiago," Harry commented "That's interesting."

Maggie narrowed her eyes. "Are you going after them?"

"Yes, and when I find out who did this, I'm going to break their legs and see how they like it," Draco growled.

"Be careful, Draco. I have a bad feeling about all this," Maggie told him. "Besides, you're a healer, not a killer – even if you are a colossal dick sometimes, okay most of the time. Just don't do something you'll regret."

"What I would regret is doing nothing," Draco said angrily. "They have to be stopped."

"Oh, absolutely. I'm just asking you to think over what your part in this little crusade is meant to be. You quit being an Auror for a reason. You're in fucking therapy over it. And honestly, it's working – even if you don't see it yourself just yet. What I'm trying to say is that you had better think very carefully about what you're doing, before you dive right back into hell and throw all of that away." Maggie ignored his scowling and took a bite out of a cookie.

"She's right you know," Harry agreed. "You don't have to do this."

"And let you do it alone?" Draco asked incredulously. "What if something happens to you because of that bloody hero complex of yours? If you think I'll be any less of a mess while worrying about you, then you clearly don't know me."

"Did you forget about Ron and Hermione?" Harry reminded him. "No one of us are in this alone."

"Did you forget that your first reaction to anything dangerous is to charge in headfirst with no back-up, you bloody Gryffindor twat? What little time I spent working with you as an Auror was a nightmare, given your complete lack of survival instincts," Draco hissed. "Everyone can just shut up. I'm not a fragile little flower."

"Literally no one thinks you're fragile," Maggie complained. "Idiot. Go home. You need to sleep. Tomorrow is going to be a long day, probably."

"Probably," Draco agreed, having almost forgotten that it would be the first day that he would be observing the healers at St. Mungo's, rather than sitting in Charms lab. He hoped he would be able to survive it without Maggie.

Draco waited for Harry to fall asleep, and managed to escape. He couldn't sleep. He was having nightmares again. Every time he closed his eyes, he saw fiendfyre – Heard Crabbe's screams as it consumed him. Shaking, he threw on his cloak and cautiously made his way down the horribly creaky old stairs. The Weasleys had all returned to their own homes for the night, and the Burrow was, thank fuck, absolutely silent. It wasn't that he disliked them; they were kind-hearted people, and Arthur hadn't minded at all when Harry asked if Maggie could stay there as well. It was just... Too noisy, too cluttered, too chaotic. Draco stifled a yawn and wandered into the kitchen, cringing when the door swung open with a loud creak.

"You're up late," Molly commented, looking up from a well-loved cookbook that was probably as old as she was. "Going somewhere, are you?"

Bugger, Draco thought to himself and scowled. "I can't sleep, so I thought I would go for a walk in the woods nearby."

"Even without the Reaper's Folly skulking around, you never know what you'll find in those woods – especially at night," Molly warned him. "They're infested with gytrashes, at the very least. Charlie caught one and tried to keep it as a pet when he was younger. Found the bloody thing in the cellar one night. It scared the living daylights out of me, even though it was mostly tame by then."

"There's an interesting image," Draco replied with a smile. "How did he even catch one? Aren't they spirits?"

"That's what I thought," Molly told him sullenly. "If you insist on going, just be careful. There's lots of creatures in those woods, and some of them are nasty."

"I will be fine; thank you for the warning," Draco said politely and left the warmth of the Burrow behind.

The chill autumn air felt good. He thought of Charlie's pet gytrash, and wondered what had become of Darkfoot. He hadn't seen the Grim since the afternoon when he woke up in St. Mungo's following the attack at the manor. He supposed that it wouldn't show itself unless he was in grave danger, or about to die. With that in mind, Draco decided that maybe he didn't miss the Grim's presence. He pulled up the hood of his cloak and made his way through the garden. It was lovely at night, really. Some of the plants had flowers that glowed faintly in the darkness, and the croaking of countless toads was oddly soothing. Maggie's scruffy barn owl was perched on the garden wall, and she hooted softly at him as he walked by. Draco had fixed most of her singed feathers, and she had decided to hang around the Burrow ever since. She probably knew she didn't have a home to go back to.

Molly hadn't been exaggerating about the gytrash infestation. Almost as soon as he set foot in the woods, Draco felt the hairs prickle on the back of his neck and wandlessly cast a patronus charm. The faint blue light emanating from the skunk patronus at his side revealed at least six gytrashes, watching him warily. The silvery spectral hounds wouldn't approach, he knew that. The light would harm them if they got too close, and most likely they were simply curious about who was wandering into their woods. They followed him, shadowing his every step. Draco didn't mind; there was something comforting about their silent presence. The manor grounds were full of them as well, so he was quite used to seeing them. He shoved his hands in his pockets and headed deeper into the woods, with the skunk patronus trailing along behind him.

The local muggle children must play here during the day, Draco thought to himself as he came upon a makeshift fort built from scavenged bits of wood. Some old toys were scattered about, and a sign said 'keep out' in a child's handwriting. An odd scratching noise came from inside the fort, and the gytrashes suddenly vanished.

"What the..?" Draco breathed and pulled out his wand. Nothing happened, nor did the gytrashes reappear. His curiosity getting the better of him, Draco cautiously approached the little wooden fort. He kicked the door open, and held his wand in front of him. It was empty. The skunk patronus wandered inside, illuminating the place. It looked like it hadn't been touched in years. A small wooden table was covered in a thick layer of dust, and spiders had strung webs across the expanse of the small room. What had made the noise? Draco had no idea. Maybe it was haunted? He went back outside, to see about ten gytrashes had appeared and were surrounding the entrance.

"Come on now," He said sternly to them. "You all know better."

The skunk patronus ambled forward, straight for the center of their little group and they faded away as it neared them. Draco sighed and followed it, knowing the gytrashes were harmless as long as he was in range of a light source. They continued to follow him as headed deeper into the woods. He wasn't sure what he was looking for, but an odd feeling nagged at him to continue on. He spotted something shining on the ground nearby and made his way forward. He knelt beside a puddle of shining, silvery liquid.

Unicorn blood, his memory supplied. He pulled his cloak tighter around his shoulders and tried not to think of the horrors he'd seen that night in the Forbidden Forest during his first year at Hogwarts. True, that particular scene had haunted for him years, but he'd seen much worse as an Auror. He held his wand at the ready and followed the faint trail of silvery blood leading away from the puddle. It didn't take long for him to track the wounded unicorn; he'd heard it before he saw it. It was trashing around on the forest floor as the life drained out of it's body. A man in a hooded black cloak was kneeling beside it, scooping the sparkling blood into a glass jar.

Draco's breath caught in his throat as the man turned to face him. His patronus vanished, leaving him in darkness aside from the ethereal glow of the unicorn blood. It wasn't enough to see anything by, but Draco didn't want to see anything. He'd give anything to have not seen what he had.

"Well, if it isn't my favorite little traitor," An icy, thin voice hissed from the darkness. "Did you really think that you would get away with protecting Potter from me? That you wouldn't have to face the consequences?"

Draco turned and ran, his lungs burning for air. He didn't make it far. He tripped over one of the old toys near abandoned play fort and fell hard. He rolled over to get up, but found a wand at his throat – his own greenlox wand. Had he dropped it when he ran? Shaking, he looked up into snake-like eyes of his worst nightmare – Voldemort.

"Crucio!"

Draco woke up screaming, and covered in a cold sweat. He rolled right out of the bed and landed on the floor with a thud. It took a moment for him to remember where he was – in the bed in Percy's old room at the Burrow. He sat on the floor, with his back braced against the bed, gasping for breath. It was a nightmare, nothing more. ...But it had been so real. The truly unsettling thing, however, was the way the dark mark burned. He dragged his nails across the skin wishing he could literally rip it off. With no small amount of horror, Draco realized the dark mark burning could only mean one thing: Something very bad was going to happen. It didn't make sense for Voldemort to be summoning the Death Eaters, but someone was. And that couldn't be good news. It had been years since he'd felt it, but Draco knew what the burning meant – it was a call to assemble. All he had to do was disapparate, and the magic binding the mark would whisk him away to wherever he was being called to.

"No, no, NO!" He cried and dug his nails in deeper. It wasn't until he felt blood dripping down his fingers that he realized Harry was trying to talk to him. He looked up at him with wide eyes, and tried to remember how to breathe.

"Talk to me Draco, what the hell is wrong?" Harry asked, grabbing his hands – presumably to stop him from causing any more damage.

"He's back," Draco whispered, feeling faint. "No, he can't be, but... The dark mark..."

"What about it?" Harry asked, frowning at the bloody mess.

"It... Burns," Draco panted.

"What does that mean?" Harry pressed.

"I don't know. It's a summons. A call to assemble," Draco tried to explain, willing himself to be calm as best as he could manage.

"Come on," Harry said and pulled him to his feet. "We need to clean you up."

They found themselves in the kitchen with Molly and Arthur. Draco didn't make a sound as Harry held him still, while Molly disinfected the mess he'd made of his left forearm.

"Did I talk with you before?" Draco asked Molly once he'd calmed down a bit. "Something about Charlie having a pet gytrash in the cellar?"

Molly looked up and met his eyes. "No, Draco. I haven't spoken to you since you helped cook breakfast yesterday morning."

"Oh," He mumbled, still shaking like a leaf. "Did I leave at all?"

"No," Harry confirmed, smoothing Draco's sweat-dampened platinum hair out of his face. "You were having a nightmare."

"I agree with Draco," Arthur said with a sigh. "We can't take this lightly. It's not good news if the Death Eaters, well the ones that are still walking free, are being summoned. I'm not familiar with how that magic works, but wouldn't You-Know-Who be the only one who could control it? It's not something I want to think about, but we need to look into this properly."

"We can't trust the Ministry, though. They're doing bugger-all about the Reaper's folly and Ron's positive it's at least partially an inside job," Harry replied defensively.

"What we can do is get the Order back together – well, what's left of it," Arthur suggested. "Do you know where the Death Eaters are being summoned to?" He added, looking to Draco.

"No," Draco told him. "The way it works, is that while the mark is burning, I could disapparate and it would force me to appear where they are. It's stopped burning, anyway. ...But I am not going to do that."

"We would never ask that of you," Molly said, glaring at Arthur who flinched a bit. She made a small sound of disapproval and wrapped Draco's arm in clean bandages. "Now, I'm no mediwitch and I reckon you'd probably do a better job than me at this, but it should be healed in a few hours. Shouldn't scar at all, either."

"Thank you," Draco mumbled awkwardly.

"Take a calming drought and go back to bed," Molly told him. "We can deal with this in the morning."

Draco tried not to visibly sulk as he followed Harry back up the stairs. At least he didn't have to meet the third years and Professor Singh at St. Mungo's until two in the afternoon. Still, how was he going to manage to pay attention while losing his shit over this whole new mess? ...Especially when the last thing he wanted was to go back to sleep.