The mirror, fogged by the heat of the shower, revealed a shadowy outline which only sharpened slightly when a reddened hand reached up and wiped away the condensation. The hand then dropped to the side of the sink, gripping it tightly as a thin face with pointed features peered into the glass, at first apathetic, then with disgust.

Draco Malfoy had not been punished as he had expected when he had returned to the fold after his illness. In fact, the Dark Lord had asked him if he was feeling better, a sentiment so out of place, it had sent a chill down the Death Eater's spine as his mind raced to find meaning in those words.

And then it was over.

He had listened all night to the reports of activities, hiding his own thoughts as he smiled and simpered and laughed as any good Death Eater would, but he was sickened by it, by himself.

What was in this reflection? Was it a traitor to his blood? A traitor to mankind?

Or was it simply a man who wanted to return to bed and let someone else fight? Someone who understood more clearly his own beliefs and stances, someone who could see in more colors than black and white?

Who the hell was he kidding?

Did he think he was some kind of hero?

Heroes didn't do the things he had done. They didn't sneer when people begged for their lives. They didn't cheer when the unworthy finally screamed after refusing to open their mouths to torture. They didn't wash the blood off their hands as merely another day's work.

He glanced down to his hands still gripping the porcelain. They were still red from the scrubbing. It was getting harder and harder to get rid of the blood.

Is this what it meant to be Good? Raw hands and a disgusted reflection?

Draco scoffed, then turned off the light, leaving the reflection to be pondered another day. There was too much to be done today.

Chris sat at the table in his own apartment, a bottle of Blond Witch Ale spinning slightly under his touch. It was a Muggle brew, slightly fruity, but Maggie liked it and they both found the name amusing.

He watched his sister while she talked, telling about the latest piece she had uncovered in storage with the animation of Ron talking about Quidditch. Only Maggie, even with her glasses on the table in front of her and a bottle of ale in her hands, could be so excited by a piece of trash that had been thrown into storage years ago.

He dropped his eyes down to his bottle and quietly considered not broaching the subject. Would the others realize it if he never mentioned the Order to her? Could they understand his reasoning? Especially the Weasleys, who had already sacrificed more than any family should?

"Are you okay, Chris?"

The Auror, the protector, the older brother glanced up, startled to realize that Maggie was no longer speaking, but staring at him with concerned pale eyes.

"Yeah, I'm fine." He took a breath, then leaned forward on the table, gripping the bottle in both hands. "Look, Mags, there's something I wanted to talk to you about."

"What did you do?"

"Huh?"

She sighed.

"Whenever you want to talk to me about something, it usually means you're going to get in trouble and want my help in covering it up from Mum. That we're meeting here means it's something that you don't want her to know about, plus, you bought my favorite drink, so you're going to ask me for a favor or something."

"Nothing gets by you, does it?" he asked, his own pale eyes meeting hers. When she didn't answer, he continued. "It's not really a favor or anything. I just wanted to talk to you about something, and no, I don't want Mum to know."

"What?" She waited patiently while he considered where to begin. In the end, he chose the tactic that had been used on him.

"I talked to Granger the other day-."

"Hermione?"

"Yeah, Hermione. So, she said that you two had been talking about the war, and I was just wondering what you thought."

"About what?"

"The war."

"Is there a wrong answer? We're fighting against a narrow-minded fascist whose very ideals embrace Neo-Nazism in a way that makes even Hitler seem tame by comparison. The general population is terrified, and the Ministry, while having masterminded a quite daring and successful raid on his prison, has done very little to actually combat the perpetrator." She looked away from him, but Chris could see that she wasn't finished. "I'm tired of seeing the lists, Chris. I'm tired of checking the obituary page first thing every day, hoping I don't see a familiar name. And I'm tired of the fear that every time I come home, there could be someone waiting in Mother's house for me or for her or for you."

Her silence fell softly, her words still ringing in his mind. He hadn't realized.

"I'm sorry."

"About what?" she asked. "I didn't say anything you should have to apologize for. You're not the one doing this."

"No, I'm sorry that I didn't know you felt this strongly. I had just assumed that you were protected from all this in that little room of yours in the basement of the Ministry."

"I do come out sometimes," she answered seriously. "And I do pay attention to what's going on around me."

"You know, you've really grown up, Mag Pie," he said with a hint of a smile.

"You say that like you're so much older than me. And don't call me Mag Pie."

"A year still makes me older."

"Eleven and a half months, and barely."

"Still older."

"And less mature."

His smile held for a moment, then faded. This conversation was not over yet.

"If you could help us fight- if you could help us win, even if it meant risking your own life, would you do it?"

She looked at him, noting the sudden change in his tone from the banter of just moments ago, and nodded.

George lay in his bed in the dark hospital room, his head turned to the side to stare at the birch cane leaning against the nightstand. The nurse had brought it in with a wide smile, believing perhaps that it held the key to new mobility for George, but the hooked piece of wood only served as a reminder of what he could no longer do on his own.

And right now, he couldn't even walk with the cane. He'd had more treatments and therapy than he could stand for the last three weeks, but he was still only slightly better than when he had first come out of the prison. True, his stuttering wasn't as bad, and there were times when he could get out a full sentence without cringing at his own syntax, but walking was still not possible. The bones were long mended, but muscles in his leg were still too weak and the nerves, still too damaged.

Another week with his walker (possibly the only thing he hated more than that damned cane) and they wanted him to start practicing with the cane. He couldn't go very far or very fast, but at least it was progress.

He sighed.

There didn't seem to be much left of him. He saw it in his siblings' faces when they visited- saw it more in Fred's than anyone else's- and it hurt him. But what the hell was he supposed to do?

Angry, he clenched his fist and pounded it against the mattress.

He wanted out of this prison. True, it was cleaner and brighter than his last one, but it was a prison nonetheless. He was tired of being cooped up, of being still or being told what to eat and when to sleep. He was tired of having guards outside his door who tried not to look at him with pity when he passed.

He wanted his room, not this hospital bed.

He wanted his wand, not the replacement Fred had promised they would get, but his wand. The wand he had had since he was a child. The wand that was destroyed in the fire.

He wanted his freedom and his privacy. He wanted people to stop asking him if he was okay and what they could do to help, because there was nothing they could do. They couldn't "fix" him. They couldn't fix his body, so how the hell were they going to fix his mind?

The door creaked open, spilling light across the far corner of the room, but leaving George in shadow.

"George? You awake?" Harry's voice whispered loudly into the room.

"Yeah," he answered, his voice only barely covering the bitterness of his thoughts. "What are you doing here so late?"

Harry and a second, taller figure moved into the room. George covered his eyes while the lights were turned on. When they adjusted, he looked up at Harry and Chris.

"Some people just aren't happy until they can see with their own eyes that you're alive," Harry answered good-naturedly. Chris, on the other hand, was frowning at the door, then removed his wand from his robes and flicked it in that direction. George tensed, but proudly did not flinch at the sight.

It was progress.

Then, Chris turned to him and seemed to examine him with his pale blue eyes.

"So Potter wasn't lying. You do look much better."

This didn't sound like Chris. It was his voice, but this wasn't how he spoke.

"I look the s-same as I did yesterday when you w-were here," he commented.

Chris smirked, but it wasn't his smirk. It was too- Malfoyish.

"Draco?"

The smirk deepened.

"There seems to be a lot of concern about you around the headquarters."

Great. Now he had a Death Eater checking on his health.

"I'm fine."

"And you can say a whole sentence without falling apart."

The look Harry shot him was worthy of any glare from any of the more reproving professors George had had, but both he and Draco ignored it. It felt good to be around someone who wasn't treating him like glass.

"D-Don't you have someone to t-torture?"

"It's my night off, so I thought I'd visit." He stood with a haughtiness that Chris had never had, and George almost smiled at how incongruent it seemed. He couldn't help wondering if the Auror knew that a Death Eater was wearing his face. "Your accommodations are improved."

"Slightly better prison."

The look he received was apprising.

"And how is your slightly better prison?"

"Better food."

A knock at he door drew Harry away, and with a short apology, out of the room. Draco turned back toward George.

"Without the jokes, George. How are you?"

"I'm healing."

"Your family?"

"What ab-bout them?" But George already knew what he meant. He just didn't want to deal with this question- didn't want to have to think about it.

"I think you know. I've heard them talk. They don't know how to deal with you because you won't talk to them."

"They d-don't have to d-deal with me," George replied bitterly.

"Alright. They don't know how to help you, because you won't talk to them."

"I d-don't w-want to t-talk about it."

Draco raised an eyebrow at the returned stutter. It seemed to have become more pronounced as he became agitated.

"But you need to talk to them."

"N-no I d-don't!" He squeezed his eyes shut, attempting to calm himself down. Draco watched as he breathed deeply, then swallowed before opening his eyes again. "I don't w-want to talk about what I w-went through," he said with no small amount of deliberation. "Th-they don't need to know that. I-I can't-."

"You can't talk about what you went through. That's fine. That's something I understand. But you cannot ignore them completely. You've returned from the dead for them, so forgive them if they act like idiots trying to help you."

George didn't answer him for a long time. Instead, he simply stared up at the ceiling, ignoring the other presence in the room. Draco seemed content with this, simply waiting patiently until either he spoke again or Potter returned to the room.

"S-since when did you become my counselor?"

"Weasley, I brought you back from the dead. I'm a step from sainthood right now." At George's slightly humored gaze, he smiled. "Besides, your brothers are more amusing when they're not whispering and acting all dejected. Insulting them is like kicking a wounded puppy."

The door opened and Harry slipped back in. He had only been out of the room for a few minutes, but those few minutes seemed to have aged him. He looked older, tired. Something had happened.

"What's wrong, Potter?"

"Nothing," he answered distractedly. "Just Auror stuff. You ready to go?"

"I think I'm finished here." He inclined Chris's head just slightly in a clipped nod. "George, good to see you're doing better."

"Yeah, thanks. Hey, I - heard you were sick."

Chris's- Draco's eyebrows rose just a touch.

"Exhaustion," he answered mildly. "It's wearing trying to keep you alive."

"Thank you." George reached out his hand and Draco stared at it a moment before grasping it in his own.

"You're welcome. Just don't get caught again." Now George did smile. "I'll let you sleep then," Draco said, glancing over at Harry. Harry nodded and laid his hand on George's shoulder.

"Let me know if you need anything, okay?"

"Can you b-break me out?"

Harry smiled.

"I'll see what I can do."

The two men moved to the door, but before opening it, Harry turned to Draco.

"Try not to sneer so much. Chris actually likes to be around people."

Draco shrugged, then followed Harry out the door, not changing the look on his face at all.

Alone again, George let his eyes fall again to the cane. With a disgusted sigh, he reached out and took up the small vial of Dreamless Sleep potion and drank it back. Then, he closed his eyes and let it do its work.

"Who else is in this Order?"

"I can't tell you that. Not until you've actually joined and all precautions have been taken."

"Precautions?"

"It's for safety. You-Know-Who would love a list of our roster."

"And how long have you been in it?"

"Two years."

"Two years?" The look of betrayal crossed her face. "Two years?"

"Mags, it's not like I was keeping a secret from you. Okay, it was a secret, but it wasn't mine. If we all told our families what we were doing, it wouldn't take long before the information got into the wrong hands."

"Chris, it's not about keeping it a secret. That I understand, but you waited two years before coming to me? What- Why wouldn't you let me help earlier? I could have been helping all this time!"

"Because I didn't want you a part of it. I still don't."

"Then why are you telling me about it now?"

"Because you can help us. I hate it, but we need you."

"But you don't want me to help."

Chris ran a hand through his raven hair.

"I do, but I also don't want you to get hurt. It's dangerous, Maggie. This isn't like in a movie where the good guys win and everyone survives with barely a scratch. We've already lost a lot of members." He sighed at her determined look. "I want you to think about your decision very carefully. Don't talk to anyone about it; I'm the only one you know anything about, so it's a danger to me. But I want you to decide for yourself- what you want to do. I'll give you a week."

"What if I know right now?"

"Please, just think about it."

"I can save you the time." She crossed her arms on the table and gave him that look she always did when she knew something he didn't and that it would seriously piss him off.

"Would it involve me having to Obliviate you?"

"No."

"Then wait the week. At least give me that time to get used to this."

"Fine. One week."

"So how is he?"

"Who?" Draco asked as they walked along the street.

"George."

"You see him more than I do, Potter. I should be asking you."

"True, but you're the only one he's actually spoken to. Moore said he heard George shout at you."

"He did."

"And?"

"I called him an idiot, though not quite in those terms, then declared my candidacy for sainthood," Draco answered, keeping his face composed. "We hugged. We cried. And now we're better friends than ever."

Potter stared at him for a long moment, as though Draco had another head growing out of his bum. Then, he shook his head and smiled.

"Sometimes, I really hate talking to you."

"There was a time, Potter, when you always hated talking to me."

"The good old days."

"Yes, the good old days."