The light was on in the kitchen and the voices murmured softly. Every once in a while one, the strangers voice, would rise; either angry or upset, she couldn't tell. It would then be shushed by the other voice, the voice she sought as she sleepily made her way down the stairs. She pushed open the kitchen door slowly...
"Harry?"
He leapt up, the chair scraping the floor, and stood uneasily blocking her view of their late-night visitor. She frowned.
"Gin, what are you doing up?"
"I heard voices. What-"
There was a flash in the low-lighting, a gleam of sleek silver head and she stiffened. Harry was reaching for her, and her wand was suddenly out.
"What the hell is he doing here?"
Harry bridged the distance quickly and caught her wand hand in his, still standing between them.
"No! Ginny, stop-"
Behind him, wood scraped on tiles again and the blonde stood quickly, shoulders hunched against the sudden animosity pouring from the red-haired witch in the doorway.
Ginny yanked at her hand and dragged her eyes from Draco to look furiously at Harry.
"-the hell is going on, Harry? What the bloody hell is he doing here?"
Unseen by the furious woman, Draco rubbed a hand across bloodshot, weary eyes and grabbed a coat from the back of his chair.
"Look, Potter, I'm gunna-"
"Sit down Malfoy" Harry cut him off sharply and looked back at Ginny. Their eyes clashed, angry and slightly pleading. He was yet to release her wand hand.
"He's assisting an investigation, Gin. It's just for tonight"
"What's just-" she read his expression in the way that only wives can and her eyes widened-
"No! No, no, no! No Death Eater, reformed or not is staying in the same house as my children! No, Harry!"
His hand tightened exponentially on her arm and his gaze flicked out the door, up the stairs. His voice was soft, furious, sharp, cutting through her panic and anger like icy water.
"Lower you voice, Ginny, or you'll wake them. This, he, is the only chance we've got of putting Theodore Nott away for the torture of those Muggles in Bulgaria. You can kick him out, Nott'll be extradited and be whisked away by some goddamn Grindiwald zealot, never to be bloody seen again. Do you understand?"
She was shaking under his hand, whether because his sheer intensity had frightened her or because she was so blindly angry, he didn't know. Behind them, an uncomfortable Draco cleared his throat.
"Look, Weaslette, I'm not 'sactly happy about it either, orright. But-"
He glanced at Harry, who nodded.
"Tell her" he said.
A look full of such complete agony Ginny did not think he was capable of it, tore across Draco Malfoy's face and his hands fisted by his side.
"Nott killed Goyle" he spat as though the words tasted bad and looked away, jaw clenched tightly.
Standing in the half-light of her kitchen, shoulders hunched as if under a great weight, his once fine clothes ragged and too large on his hollowed build, the icy sharp edges of Ginny's anger began to dull. She frowned at Harry, looking for further explanation, and remembered;
The Room of Requirement. Fiendfyre. Crabbe falling to his death, consumed by the monster that he had summoned. Goyle making it out alive; Draco Malfoy's only companion left alive.
His only friend, she realised with a jolt, studying his tired, grey features cast in stark artificial light. The thought, true as it was, did not sit right with her. After all, Malfoy's didn't have friends. Yet here the heir of the proud clan stood, mourning a friend. She wondered whether it was his mourning or simply the tribulations of the post-War world that had hollowed out his proud figure so thoroughly. Where was that muscular Seeker's build that girls had raved about? Where was the sexy glint in those cerulean-silver eyes that had, if one believed the Hogwarts rumours, talking many girls into late-night sojourns behind the Quidditch stands? Where was that arrogant sneer and the cold pride?
What was a Malfoy without the infamous Malfoy sneer?
He was standing in the small, usually brightly lit kitchen of the Potter residence in Godric's Hollow, hands shoved in his pockets, eyes squinted like he was battling tears.
A little more ice melted.
"What if Nott comes after you? For selling him out?" Ginny asked firmly, fingers still tight on her wand. Draco's head jerked up and his eyes met hers. By Godric, those eyes were deadened.
"Let him come" he whispered dejectedly. The hopelessness in his voice and eyes and stance made Harry and Ginny both flinch. Ginny reached blindly, instinctively, for her husband's hand. He wrapped his warm fingers around hers and met her eyes beseechingly. She nodded and his shoulders relaxed.
"One night" she said firmly and went back to bed.