Draco dodged. Harry's fist only struck a glancing blow, but it was hard enough. Rage burned up through his chest. It wasn't his fault Sirius had died, and Harry had been blaming him since Christmas, and just fuck him, fuck him, fuck him.

Words boiled away, and Draco lunged at the boy he'd called his brother for years. He swung a fist of his own, and this one connected much more solidly with Harry's nose. He could hear a crack, and blood ran down Harry's face.

Harry lifted a hand to his nose, looked at the red, and let out a low, bitter laugh. "Oh, it's on," he said.

Draco knew Theo had grabbed Blaise and was holding him back. He knew also that Pansy had Hermione by the arm. It didn't matter though. He was angry and hurt and ready to pummel his brother into the ground. When he was done, Harry would be begging him to stop. Harry would be the one in pain. And he'd deserve it. He'd gone off, betraying their lifetime of friendship, and then come out of the Manor floo ready to fight.

Harry's fist caught him in the gut, and Draco gasped and doubled over for a moment before swinging up and hitting Harry's chin from below. Harry staggered back a few steps, and then they were both down, rolling on the floor as feet danced out of their way. First Harry was on top, his fist coming down for Draco, then Draco wrenched himself up, and he was the one with the advantage. He sent a fist down into Harry's mouth, but Harry jerked his head aside and all Draco hit was the floor. Draco punched down, and this time he got Harry's jaw again Then Harry was out from under him and grabbing at his hair to slam his head into the floor.

Before he could, someone pulled him away.

"Okay," Remus said, his grip on Harry so strong he couldn't escape. "That's enough. I draw the line at you two putting each other in hospital."

"I didn't do anything," Draco spat out, scrambling to his feet.

Harry swiped at the blood still coming from his nose. "Then what's this?"

"You swung first, you fucking wanker."

"You deserved it."

"For what? I didn't kill Sirius!"

Narcissa appeared in the doorway. Her eyes took in the scene, and Draco waited for some response. Any response. Scolding. Fury. Her famous cutting sniff. Instead, she pretended she didn't see a thing. "Remus," she said. "How nice to see you."

"And you as well," Remus said. Harry jerked himself free of Remus's grasp and made a show of straightening his clothes and wiping his nose on his sleeve.

"Boys are so gross," Pansy muttered.

Narcissa's mouth might have twitched at that.

"Harry," Remus prompted.

"Thank you for inviting me, Mrs. Malfoy," Harry said. He put just enough emphasis on her name that everyone in the room knew he wasn't saying 'mum' on purpose. "I'm very sorry for the way I reacted when you confirmed my father had been brutally murdered by a monster on an errand he was doing for you. It was very gauche of me, and it won't happen again."

Remus muttered something Draco couldn't quite make out but which sounded like it might have been, "Oh, for fuck's sake."

"He never did well with forced apologies," Narcissa said lightly. "He's very young, and we've done our best to shelter him. Remus, why don't you join me and the rest of the adults and let the children work it out."

"Nothing sounds better," Remus said, and, with one annoyed look at Harry, he strode off after their hostess.

For a moment after they left, no one said anything. Then Pansy tossed Harry a handkerchief. "Clean yourself up, Potter," she advised. Hermione stepped to Draco's side, a scowl on her face, and Neville touched his arm.

"Are you okay?" he asked in a low voice.

"Fine," Draco muttered. What a stupid question. His brother blamed him for Sirius' death and wanted to beat him up. He wasn't fine at all, but what was he supposed to say. That he was hurt and angry and torn between wanting to start the fight again - to win this time - and wanting to run to his mum and have her make it better somehow.

Of course, she couldn't. This wasn't as simple as a broken broom or a stolen biscuit. And so he just glowered across the room at Harry, who returned the expression.

The room seemed frozen until Luna appeared in the Floo.

"Oh," she said. "Harry, you've done a blood sacrifice. Did it work?"

"No," Harry said.

"Too bad." She seemed to lose interest and wandered over to the sweets table, where Daphne and Theo joined her in a rush, all too obviously glad to have something to do other than have to choose between Harry and Draco.

Draco took the napkin Hermione handed him and wiped at his face. What an arsehole his brother was. Harry had already made this party a nightmare, and now he had to spend several more hours stuck with him. "This sucks," Draco muttered.

"At least it won't get any worse, right?" Neville asked. "You didn't invite anyone else likely to want to kill you, right?"

Hermione wrapped an arm around Draco, and he leaned against her. Blaise Zabini's eyes were trying to burn a hole into him, and Astoria was making an attempt to wipe up Harry's blood, but her hat kept getting in the way. The room had neatly divided into Harry's partisans, his, and the people trying very hard to stay out of all of it. Draco thought he might resent that the most. Theo and Hermione were friends, but was he coming over to say hullo to her? No.

At least Neville was on his side. "I'm glad you could come," Draco said.

"Me too," Neville said. "That's a great sweets table. Though, something tells me this isn't going to be the best party for picking up girls."

That tricked Draco into a laugh, which surprised him. It shouldn't. Neville had been making his way through the girls at Hogwarts for several years. Ginny. Pansy. Draco didn't even know how many more. He was as bad as Harry. "There's always Astoria," Draco said, and they both turned to look at her. Harry's fingers were laced through hers as she cleaned the blood off his face.

"Why can't he wipe his own nose?" Hermione asked. "What is she, his mother?"

Neville snorted. "I don't think her intentions are motherly, no."

"And I don't think you're picking her up today," Draco said. "Looks like she's taken."

"For now," Neville said easily. "Things change." He silently accioed over a handful of candy and offered some to each of them. Draco took a chocolate frog and tried not to be so impressed. Neville was good. He was really good. It was hard to reconcile this relaxed and amused boy who was eying Astoria as if she were one more thing on the buffet table life had laid out for him with the awkward loser he'd been their first year.

As he said, things changed.

"I'm glad we're friends," Draco said. He gave Neville a light shove, the same way he would Harry, and Neville stiffened. Tension grabbed Draco by the throat, and for no reason he understood, he braced against Neville turning on him with fists and magic both. Even Harry's fight hadn't made him this defensive. Then the moment passed and Neville shoved him back.

"Me too," he said.

"If you two are done posturing," Hermione said, "maybe we could go sit down and play cards somewhere?"

"Sounds great," Neville said.

Draco leaned over and lightly kissed Hermione, lingering to brush his nose against hers. "I agree," he said. "Hermione has the best ideas."

#

Minerva McGonagall stood at the opening to the Malfoy's fiendfyre incinerator, Narcissa on one side, Molly Weasley on the other. She held Dumbledore's ring on the palm of her hand, carefully keeping fabric between the cursed object and her own skin.

"So that's the last one," Molly said. Her lip curled with disgust and Minerva didn't blame her. It was hard to think of a form of magic more degenerate than a Horcrux. She'd caught a glimpse of Draco and Harry brawling. Draco had a smudge of blood on his face, and it had been impossible not to remember the version of him she'd met first. Older than this by a few years – not many – but so much harder. So much more broken.

Impossible not to remember that in his world, Harry Potter was dead.

That made it easier to look at the two boys with fond indulgence. They were children, squabbling over their broken hearts, yes, and acting ridiculous, but still untouched by war. Still, in every way that mattered, innocent. She suspected Narcissa felt the same way. Harry Potter might blame her for Sirius' death – she might blame herself – but without their intervention, things would have been so much worse. Easier to bear the hatred of a living son than the grief brought by a dead one.

"Seven total," Minerva said. The ring was heavy in her hand.

"And we know for sure that this…this thing of yours will get rid of it," Molly pressed.

"Fiendfyre and basilisk venom are the best ways," Minerva said. She held the ring over the tunnel leading to the incinerator and at once wanted to snatch her hand back, to put the ring on, to have so much power. It took will hardened by one war and decades of teaching to turn her hand over and let the ring drop, and as soon as it slid away she wanted more than anything in the world to snatch it back. To accio it to her. All she had to say was one word and magic would bring it safely home to her again.

She took a step away from the opening to the incinerator and forced herself to breathe.

A scream rose out of the deepest cellars of Malfoy Manor. Unearthly. Haunting. Then it died away.

"Was that all," Molly asked nervously.

Then the whispers came. "What a disappointment you are," the voice said, sliding its way around them and taking hold of their fears with grabbing, greedy fingers. "So much power, Molly. You could have been anything. Could have done anything. And instead, you're nothing but a housewife making dinner and cleaning out boys' pockets."

There was a long pause, and the ring whispered, "It's pathetic," before falling wholly silent.

"Nasty bit of work," Molly said. Minerva pretended she didn't hear the shake in her voice. "And now we find him and get rid of him?"

"Exactly," Minerva said. She turned, then froze at the sight of the two people in the doorway.

#

Hermione had one hand tucked in Draco's and the other holding her cards when she heard the scream. It slid through the room and raised a thousand chills along her spine. She'd never heard anything like that before. She'd stood in a room, panting, dirt and blood on her face and shoved a blade over and over again into a locket while hearing that sound. She could feel the weight of the knife in her hand. Feel the exhausted tremors move through her body.

"What was that?" Draco whispered.

But she knew. It was a Horcrux, dying. It whispered in her brain just as they had the last time. Just as they never had. "You're nothing but Mudblood trash, and he'll fight at your side, but when this is over, he'll leave you for a girl like him. Rich. Beautiful. Pure. Don't delude yourself that you're anything other than the means to an end. It makes you even more pathetic than you already are. If he likes fucking you, it's because men will take anything offered at the edge of the battlefield, and you offered yourself so easily. So whorishly. And –"

And the voice stopped.

She met Draco's eyes. He looked as confused as she felt. As haunted. They'd never been on a battlefield. They'd been on a hundred. They'd never had sex. They melted into one another's arms every night, desperate to escape the horror that surrounded them. Harry, dead. McGonagall, dead. Theo, dead, vomiting poison as he fought the Mark rather than turn on his childhood friend. Luna, dead, a whirlwind of black fog dragging Death Eaters down but they kept coming and coming until she was overwhelmed and just another slight figure bleeding and broken on the ground.

"What's happening?" Hermione asked. She felt as if she were going mad.

Draco looked across the room at Harry, who glared back. "He didn't make it," he said, the words falling out of him like rocks. "Somewhere, he didn't make it."

"Didn't make what?" Neville asked. "What is going on?"

"I don't know," Draco said with frustration that echoed hers. Why was she remembering things that hadn't even happened?

"That scream," she said. Everything had been normal until the terrible, magical sound had reached into the room and with it that whisper. "It was like something out a nightmare I'd forgotten, and now I… but just pieces."

"Everything is black," Draco said. "It's night, and there's fire, and Harry's dead and I don't even care." He met her eyes desperately. "How could I not care? He's my brother?"

"We need to find your mum," Hermione said. "Or maybe Professor McGonagall." They were both powerful witches, and deep in her gut, something told her that they would understand this. They could make this right.

"Agreed." Draco stood up, card game forgotten.

Neville rose too. "I don't know what's going on with you two," he said, "but neither of you look good right now, and I'm afraid if you wander off you'll faint down a set of stairs or something."

Draco asked his father where his mum had gone, and he pointed them in the right direction. "Had something she wanted to show Mrs. Weasley," he said.

Draco, Hermione, and Neville reached the hallway leading to the room where the three adult witches were in time to hear Molly Weasley say, "And now we find him and get rid of him."

In a good and fair world, that would have been confusing, but it wasn't. A monster stood in the door between them and the witches. Its face was waxy and white. It had slits where a nose should be, and its eyes glowed red. Hermione didn't need to be told that this was Voldemort, who had gone after Harry in the cemetery.

Voldemort, who had killed Harry's parents when he was a baby.

Voldemort, who had killed Sirius.

Without thinking, Hermione stepped between him and Draco.

A hunched, nervous man stood to Voldemort's side with thinning hair that reminded her of the mangy rat Ron had loved for so many years, but it was hard to focus on him when the thing next to him was radiating so much malice. Voldemort was a snake in the grass waiting to bite. He was the ocean reaching up to drown the unwary. He was death and destruction and chaos made manifest in a single, malevolent form. Hermione drew her wand.

"You will not have to find me," Lord Voldemort said. "I am right here."

. . . . . . . . . .

A/N:

Thank you for reading.

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