I'm so exited, this being chapter 10. A super-happy birthday to Mr. Tom Felton! I know I can't respond to all my fantastic reviewers 'cause I have my PM off, but I wanted to give a special thanks to all of you here. Hope you enjoy reading it and are enthralled. Enjoy!

-Kit Kat

Draco waited in silent anticipation, would the potion truly be delivered to Dumbledore? It seemed strange, like taking the easy way out.

He didn't have to wait very long. The potion never made it past Slughorn. It actually landed in the hands of a certain Blood Traitor by the name of Ronald Weasley.

Draco didn't feel as much guilt as he had about Katie. Maybe he was becoming more and more heartless. The idea of being heartless both scared him and appealed to him.

But how could he be heartless? He couldn't, not when he was losing his heart to a certain Astoria Greengrass.

He walked down the hallway to his next class. He saw her standing around and talking to some friends. She seemed happy and content, but she also seemed out-of-place.

"Could I steal you for a second?" he asked. She appeared surprised.

"Just a moment," she told her friends, seconds before Draco pulled her into an empty classroom.

"I was wondering," he began in a hushed voice, staring intently at her, "if you might…want to join me in the Room later. I have something I'd like to discuss with you." He could tell by the understanding in her face she knew what he meant by 'the Room', although that was what he only called it in his head.

"I'm sorry, I can't." She said it softly. As if she regretted each word as it dripped from her mouth and landed a blow. It wasn't an offensive statement, even an slightly sad one. Yet it confused and hardened what little bit of a heart Draco had left.

Draco always saw her alone, on her own. He knew she had friends, but she appeared lonely even when she was around them. He didn't understand it. But why would she turn him down? Did she no longer feel for him What, he scolded himself sharply, am I thinking? Feel for me? She finds me interesting, a bit exotic I suppose. But she felt more for Snow than she would ever for me. And I? I find her merely irritating. Lying to himself was so easy. It made being incompassionate and thoughtlessness much simpler and well-executed. But in an amusing sort of way, he had to the end, he only inquired,

"Why, exactly?" Draco didn't mean it, but it came off more demanding and intimidating than merely inquisitive. Maybe it was because that was the side of him he was most used to showing.

"I can't spend time with you, Draco. I'm sorry, but I've decided you're really not the best influence. It tears me to pieces, really," she said pleading. She looked up at him, begging him to understand. Sadly, Draco did not have a understanding bone in his body.

"Absolutely fine," he snapped at her, shattering her brown-eyed stare, "perhaps that horrible sister of yours would be better company. I see she's doing a fantastic job at ignoring you."

"Daphne is not horrible! She's simply… got her priorities wrong." He looked at her with cold indifference.

"I'm sorry," Astoria begged, "please try to grasp what I'm feeling."

"I think I've got the idea," he said, and walked off then and there. Leaving her all by herself in the deserted classroom.

Draco later regretted that decision. He spent days alone working on the cabinet. Times he thought he was making progress. But it was always one step forward and two steps back. He didn't see Astoria around as much. He wondered if she was intentionally ignoring him, or if maybe she had gone back into her regular routine and she had been bumping into him on purpose before. Draco sensed it was some of both. Either way, he felt deserted. Which was ironic and hypocritical of him.

Draco tried to carve out some 'thinking time' into his day. School was getting harder and harder. Being NEWT students, they had intense homework and longer periods. Teachers were less forgiving in grades. Each class was a painfully boring chore. His old friends were friendlier now, but he hadn't changed. Daphne seemed ecstatic he and Astoria were now seldom seen together, Then again, they were seldom seen together before. But now it was in a less secretive way. As if they were openly 'not together' were as before they were privately 'not together'. Officially, anyways. Draco hated this girl gossip nonsense. It made his head spin when he could be focusing on something much more necessary.

So now Draco was strolling alongside the lake. It was a particularly cold early spring/late winter day, although no snow had fallen. The lake was not frozen, just bitter bone-chilling.

He was walking by the big pine tree, the one Astoria normally sat under. Although he would never admit it to himself, he had hoped to catch a glimpse of her. But she wasn't there. The leaves fell from the trees with grace and the wind whirled them around where Astoria should've sat. Draco began to trudge on past lake when he glimpsed something out of the corner of his eye. Something was floating in the lake. A person. Astoria.

Draco ran headlong, fully clothed, into the lake. The icy water splashed him but he payed no mind. He pulled her out of the lake. It took him a moment to realized she was screeching and coughing as he did so.

"What's in the name of Merlin did you go and do that for, Malfoy," she sputtered. Draco was equally irked, seeing as he was freezing cold and soaking wet for no good reason.

"I though you'd drowned!"

"I was swimming!"

"In your clothes?" Astoria frowned heavily at him.

"Look, at first I thought I was going to just dip my toes in. But then before I knew I was splashing and having a good time and relaxing on the water and…"

"That…water…is…freezing cold!"

"I know," Astoria said, and then added scathingly, "and I'm glad your just as cold as your heart is now."

"That makes no sense!" She began to walk off, brushing past him. The water was dripping from her hair like off a stalactite and had left a puddle were she had been standing.

"Look, Astoria," Draco began, still determined to have the last word. Although, technically, he already had. Maybe he wasn't satisfied with it, "I just could bear…" He trailed off win he realized he was about to say something kind.

"Couldn't bear what?" she snapped uncharacteristically, turning around.

"If you'd left." He said it quietly, definitely reluctantly, but the snarl hadn't quite left his face yet.

"Oh," she said even more softly, a bit caught off guard. She turned back around and started walking away again, but more slowly this time. As if hoping he would call after her. He didn't. He just stood there dripping wet and watched her trudge back to the castle.

Draco was sitting in the Slytherin common room studying. His Charms homework made no sense. He angrily tried to jot down notes and the ink blotted. He clenched his fists in frustration. Just then he heard a slight fluttering sound coming towards him. He looked up. It was an origami paper crane soaring across the room. Must be enchanted…he concluded. It landed in his open hand and unfolded itself.

Thank You For Caring

Sorry I Had Leave You Behind

But I Just Was Getting Too Lost

I Your Cold Grey Eyes

I Won't Say I'm Sorry

But Thank You

For Not Telling Me Lies

~ A

Slowly, Draco clenched his fist and crumpled the crane, then threw it into the roaring fireplace.

"Hi, Draco!" said a gleeful voice behind him. It was Daphne.

"Sooo," she said, sitting far to close next to him for his comfort, "what are doing?"

"Studying for this idiotic Charms test," he replied shortly, scooting slightly away from her.

"Well, I was wondering if you knew where Astoria was," she said, trying to look honest. As if that was the real reason she had come to talk to him.

"No idea."

"Oh, 'cause I just can't find her anywhere." She giggled ostentatiously.

"I don't know," he said pointedly, looking straight into her eyes. He scooted even farther away from her.

"Oh? 'Cause we were walking along the fifth floor and she was all like 'I've got to go.' and then she just, like, left." This perked Draco interest.

"But enough about her. How are you?" she asked, seeming genuinely interested.

"I'm horribly sorry," he said, not sounding sorry at all, "but I've got to leave now." He scooped up his this and hurried to the Prefect's dormitory. After promptly dumping them on his bed he raced back though the common room, out the secret entrance, and down the hallway. He didn't stop running (and bumping into several people) until he reached the entrance to the Room of Hidden Things. He burst in suddenly, finding exactly what he was looking for.

There was Astoria, sitting quietly on her bench, looking solemn. She was watching the black bird flitter around it's once-shared cage.

"Hello," she said softly, as if dreading his response.

"Astoria," Draco began loudly, the pure opposite of her, "I'm sorry."

She froze. Her features seemed to turn to stone and her fingers which clenched the bench seemed to become part the fixture itself.

"You are?"

Why had he said that? Did he even mean it? I did, he realized with shock, I meant it.

"I'm sorry I've been such a…monster. I'm sorry I'm such a liar. Your wrong, Astoria, for the first time, even. Your wrong. About me. I did lie to you. What's worse, I refuse to tell you the truth."

"You do?" One step forward an two steps back.

"I…." Draco he stopped. He walked over and sat down next to her. He was about to begin what he was sure was the end of his life.

"No," he stated clearly, "I'm going to tell you the truth. And you will hate me for it."

"I couldn't ever hate you." There was truth in her eyes.

"You will."

Silence.

"I've been in here to…to fix that cabinet (he gestured to his left). To let them in."

Silence. She didn't ask who 'they' were.

"I killed Snow." Astoria let out a single, strangled gasp.

"I knew," she said, as a single fell like a diamond and shattered on the floor, "somehow I already knew."

"If I don't fix it. He'll kill me. If I don't let them in, if I don't kill him, he'll kill me."

"Who? Who are you going to kill?" she asked, the horror written on her face.

"Albus Dumbledore."

Silence.

"On who's orders?"

"Lord Voldemort." The tears were falling freely now.

"I can help you, Draco. You don't have to…we'll find a way," she began to choke up, "why? Why do you have to?"

"I was chosen," he began, but then changed his mind. As long as he was being honest, "Punishment for my father's failures."

"Oh, Merlin. But, why you. I…I don't…I don't understa-" He cut her short.

"Astoria, I'm a Death Eater." It was so clear, so simple. Her tears were falling like rain. He held her close. Her teardrop were now falling on his shirt.

"I...I...I don't believe you. It...it can't be..." He only looked at her with sorrowful eyes.

"I don't...I...I can't...I always thought," she said between muffled sobs, "that we were like Snow and Midnight. That you were dark on the outside. But on the inside you were just like me…"

"No!" she screeched suddenly. Pulling away from him, "I can't. I'm sorry. I might tear me apart being without you, but being with you is doing the same." She ran out of the Room, slamming the door behind her.

For the first time in his life Draco Malfoy had to face the consequences of his actions. And the consequences of the tattoo on his arm was losing Astoria. And nothing was worth that. Not his family, not his friends, not his life. Then he realized, truly realized, and was able to admit to himself perhaps the greatest truth in his life. He loved her. And he had lost her. And he had no one to blame but himself.

Hope you liked it! Don't be afraid to review. I love both constructive criticism and praise!