June 5, 1997
Darkness.
Perhaps the sun hadn't yet risen, and despite the assumed early hour, Draco felt unnaturally well-rested. Hermione had quite thoroughly knocked him out last night between his birthday shag and then that glorious news of her pregnancy. Merlin, it would be nice to have a daughter this time.
He wondered what had woken him so early. His body felt cold, and he realised with disappointment that she no longer slept in his hold.
Draco sighed and rolled to his side, groping along the silk sheets, reaching for the other occupant of the bed.
He found none.
He sat up quickly in his bed.
His four-poster bed with the curtains drawn.
His four-poster bed with the curtains drawn in the dormitories at Hogwarts.
No wife to be found, no joy to be had, just a doomed mission and a guaranteed future of either death or assassination.
Draco had been ordered to commit the murder of Albus Dumbledore. But it wouldn't be his first kill.
Because right now he was going to murder Theodore fucking Nott.
Draco violently ripped open his hangings and glared at the bed next to his. That traitorous arse was going to pay for his indecent prank. Putting images like that in Draco's brain, making him conjure up such utter ridiculousness, oh he'd make Nott pay for that error. Thought he could make a fool of him, did he? Thought he'd put lewd illusions of Granger—Merlin's bollocks, of all the fucking girls, the bushy-haired Mudblood?—and think Draco wouldn't retaliate?
Chest heaving in rage, he took the two steps in between the beds and yanked open the velvet hangings hiding that unrepentant peddler of dragon-shite. Wand in hand, Draco prepared to cast every insidious curse short of an Unforgivable.
He stopped cold at the sight in front of him.
Theo's weedy form was folded per his usual physical habits, but this time into the body of Blaise, curled snugly around him. Draco could only stare as he lowered his wand, shocked momentarily at both the intimate position and that Theo had made it so easy for Draco to find them this way. No privacy spells or wards in place.
It was also shocking in that there was nothing salacious about it at all. Draco observed the innocent peace of two people intertwined in a display of pure and absolute trust.
Something harsh and raw, like a wound not properly tended to, ached just inside Draco's chest. A clawing, festering feeling of bitter envy that swelled to an almost unmanageable crescendo.
Here was a picture of mutual vulnerability, a surrender to necessary sanctuary found in the arms of someone beloved. Someone worth protecting.
Draco had just known this feeling in a dream. But Theo knew it in real life. The jealousy pulsed angrily again. To have tasted that life so briefly, so wonderfully, only for it to have all been one euphoric, transient mirage.
He'd never felt so content upon waking.
No doubt disturbed by Draco standing over him letting the low light of morning into his face, Theo blinked slowly awake. He yawned, shifting carefully in Blaise's arms, scratching his chest over his pajama top and then carding a hand through his own pillow-mussed hair.
Theo noticed Draco standing at his bedside and his mouth unfurled in a lazy, pleased grin.
"You're up early, forgot to set your other gift out."
With that pronouncement, he moved out of Blaise's hold and Draco heard him rifling through his trunk at the foot of the bed. Draco's eyes clocked the way Blaise slept on, but his arm reached out, one hand flexing for a body no longer beside him. An empty spot meant to be filled. A slight pang in Draco's chest at having experienced that same sensation moments ago, that instinctual search for someone meant to be lying next to you.
Theo pulled Draco from his spiralling thoughts by shoving a box under his nose. An all-too familiar package of sweets. Draco accepted the present with a confused frown, and then glanced at the pile of birthday presents he had yet to unwrap awaiting him at the end of his own bed. The Jelly Slugs that should have been there were already clutched in his hand.
The pieces clicked into place for Draco, the mystery of the birthday sweets finally solved. "You give me these? Every year?"
"Yeah mate. They're your favourite. Happy birthday."
The fight left Draco at the sincerity of Theo's matter-of-fact statement. All these years, and not only did Theo still remember Draco's favourite childhood sweet, but ensured he received a box at least on his birthday.
Normally, it'd be dangerous to assume a fellow housemate didn't harbour an ulterior motive, but Draco now wondered if Theo hadn't let him see Blaise in his bed on purpose. An exchange of leverage. The language of trust between Slytherins.
Not that Draco presently had a cause to do so, but he'd not use this information about Blaise against Theo. If this was how he sought comfort, then so be it. Cling to that hope any way you can, he wanted to miserably warn him.
"Good dream?" prompted Theo.
"Don't you know?" Draco tossed back, wondering now if he'd own up to messing about with Draco's mind while he slept.
But Theo shook his head. "No. I told you, I just nudge the right feelings and emotions to the surface. I can't see into your brain or anything. Your dreams are your own."
"Uh, right."
He wouldn't be able to voice it aloud anyway. It'd be considered blasphemy. As it should.
Draco opened the rest of his birthday gifts. His mother had sent the traditional coming-of-age gift: a goblin-made wristwatch. His namesake constellation was engraved on the back of the silver watch face. Draco traced a finger along the pattern that comprised the star version of "the dragon."
"It's dragons for me. For me and Daddy."
Draco shoved the voice of an excited child into a far-flung corner of his mind.
Theo prodded him eagerly once more, clearly pleased that Draco seemed calm. "So, it was good then? You slept well?"
"Yeah…" Draco trailed off and stared down at the watch in his hand. "Yeah it was good. Really good."
Bacon, eggs, and freshly baked croissants. Draco loaded his plate at the breakfast table, eager to fill his empty and rumbling stomach for once. He hadn't felt this hungry and confident in his ability to keep food down in so long.
He looked up, halfway through chewing his fourth slice of bacon, to see several of his housemates' surprised eyes on him. They hastily all looked away, with the exception of Theo who stared knowingly from just across the table.
Draco resolved to slow down a bit from gorging himself and took his time with the rest of his food. It felt so wonderful to enjoy breakfast; to savour the first meal of the day that would energise him enough to concentrate in the hours ahead.
His clear head and settled stomach allowed Draco to observe the quiet scene just in front of him. Blaise and Theo sat next to one another on the bench just as they always did, but now given last night's and this morning's context for their closeness, Draco noticed the subtle tells. The hints of something so far beyond friendship, in the way each boy anticipated the other's needs.
Theo silently sliding the sugar bowl closer to Blaise's refilled tea cup.
Blaise wordlessly doling extra eggs onto Theo's plate.
Theo snatching a strawberry off Blaise's plate. Blaise batting his hand away when he went for another.
A silent duet of companionship. The sentimentality of it all, not to mention the futility of it all, should have disgusted Draco. Instead, something akin to wistfulness rose within him.
Pansy and Daphne trilled "Happy birthday Draco!" pulling him from his reverie. He shot them a signature smirk and a wave. Several others clapped him on the back as they passed by, delivering well-wishes and Draco revelled in the normalcy.
A good night's sleep, a hearty breakfast that he would immediately supplement with a few Jelly Slugs, and Draco felt ready to take on the world. On his way out of the Great Hall, he gave Crabbe instructions for acting as look-out that night while Draco worked in the Room of Hidden Things.
He could solve any problem feeling this clear-headed, this light inside. Just one good night's rest and he'd been rejuvenated, regained his confidence in his cunning and spellwork.
He occluded away the specific details of the dream. No need to dwell on something silly and out of his control. Theo had promised a peaceful night and he'd delivered, and that's all that mattered to Draco. He need not think any more on how his subconscious could have betrayed him in such a way by conjuring up that version of himself with that version of Gra— her.
He stood panting in front of the open door of the Vanishing Cabinet. The mended Vanishing Cabinet. The test bird had flown out seconds ago, alive and eager to escape the passageway. Draco clutched his wand in one hand, the door in the other, and grinned ear to ear.
All week after his birthday he'd worked diligently on his task, bolstered by several nights in a row of quality sleep. No more dreams like the one Theo claimed to have influenced, but flashes of similar motifs. Not a single nightmare.
And now those hours spent in rest had allowed Draco to realise his success. He'd done it! Him, the youngest one in the inner circle, the one the other, crueller followers liked to mock, liked to jeer at him about his father's failure… Draco would show them all up when he completed the mission in full.
Flushed with excitement, Draco dismissed Crabbe from guard duty, rushed to the Owlery and summoned his eagle owl. He penned a brief letter addressed to his mother, though he knew other eyes would see it first, informing her that he'd just completed a very important class project; one he'd been working on all year. Perhaps his mother would like to meet him in Hogsmeade soon? Could she send back the date that worked best for her?
Sending off the coded letter, Draco hustled back to the Room of Hidden Things. The Cabinet had worked once, but best to double-check his method, just in case. Hoping he hadn't been too hasty in writing home with the good results, Draco conjured a bird and performed the ritual with the Cabinet just as he had earlier.
It still worked.
Draco let out a loud triumphant laugh. Laughing and laughing until it turned hysterical. He couldn't stop the hearty guffaws bubbling out of his throat and he clutched onto the door for support as he gasped for air. Merlin, when was the last time he'd felt this happy outside of that dream?
Just as suddenly as he'd been moved to laughter, Draco's gulps of breath turned to ones rooted in panic. In the blind euphoria of completing this crucial step of his plan he'd quite forgotten exactly why he'd been performing this repair job in the first place.
Then he remembered.
Murderer.
Shaking and choking for his lungs to work properly, he sank to the floor. Draco braced his head between his knees and rocked his body back and forth.
The dream… the dream. It wilted, withered, then died.
Never to happen.
The alternate glimpse of a life lived happily burned across his vision and Draco jumped up to his feet. Panting and looking around wildly, he grabbed the first thing he could reach and threw it as hard as he could across the room. Something in the distance shattered and a few other things might have tumbled or fallen and then Draco could not stop.
Books, dented quaffles, candlesticks, glass jars, remnants of desks, chair legs, torn pillows, inkwells, crystal balls, tea cups, mirrors, Draco tore through the aisles grabbing desperately at items that could suffer at his hands. He pitched it all violently, this way and that, relishing in the chorus of smashing glass or china, wood breaking against stone, stone crashing into wood, ruining it, destroying it, making a mess of it all, fucking up everything beyond repair…
Just like he'd done to his own life.
All gone. All ruined. Death warrant signed. Future obliterated.
He yelled. He screamed. He let out a blood-curdling roar and finally dropped down to the floor in a sheen of sweat and tears.
Hopeless. Afraid. Alone. Miserable. Terrified. Unsalvageable. Unworthy.
Unforgivable.
"Scorpius worships you, you know… he couldn't wait to fly like you. Couldn't wait to be just like you."
What kind of child would want a father like Draco? What kind of woman would tie herself to him? What kind of future awaited a foot soldier in the army of the Dark Lord?
The images broke past the floodgates in his mind. A son, a wife, a happy home… all of it out of reach now.
Before long, he'd be an assassin or he'd be dead.
Draco sat on the floor surrounded by shards of discarded items and artefacts and wept for the man he'd never get to become.
He'd slept poorly. But he woke determined anyway. Determined to remember why mourning such a vision was not only futile, but distasteful. He'd rejected and buried and hidden the fact of the woman who'd been by his side, been in his bed in the dream, and now inspired a frustrating biological response upon waking.
But he focused on it now. On why that stupid fucking dream needed to be expunged from his brain along with any positive thoughts associated with such images.
Draco glared across the Great Hall from his usual spot at the Slytherin table during breakfast.
Granger. He watched her shake her completely unmanageable hair off her shoulders and tuck into a bowl of porridge, chatting animatedly with the She-Weasel.
Stupid, ugly, Mudblood.
Fine, not stupid. He could concede she possessed more than a modicum of intelligence. In her academic pursuits only, of course. If she knew what was good for her, she'd not hang around Potter and the Weasel. That sort of behaviour would only get her killed eventually, showing a complete lack of self-preservation skills.
She was too loud, Granger, with her hand in the air and her prissy voice shrieking facts or self-righteousness constantly. She'd be snuffed out for it. Though perhaps she needed to be loud for her dimwitted compatriots to understand anything she said. Draco wondered if he were to engage in any intellectual repartee with her whether the banter would flow as easily as it had in his dream.
Not exactly ugly either.
She'd fixed her teeth a few years back and carried herself with more grace and confidence than someone raised by Muggles should. She had aesthetically pleasing facial features, he supposed, as long as she didn't open her swotty mouth to blather out a shrill stream of grating nonsense. The rest of her could be considered attractive, if one were to regard her with an objective eye. She'd certainly looked fetching enough in that little black number in his dream.
He slammed his Occlumency walls into place.
Perhaps not ugly at all.
Still a Mudblood though.
And a loud one at that.
He noticed her in the hallways between classes. A satchel bulging with books as she cut through crowds with a determined step. Excuse me, I am going somewhere, her stride seemed to say.
He noticed her in the classes they shared. Even when she wasn't speedily answering questions from professors, her bright-eyed attention to learning spoke for her: I will soak up all this knowledge and contribute something to the world.
He noticed her in the library. She'd spread her belongings all over the table with no care for her personal possessions but took the utmost care with the books she pored over. I care about my education and I care about my friends and I care and care and care even if I get nothing in return. It rolled off her in rippling waves of sincere compassion.
He'd felt that care in his dream. How would she react to him at this moment? If he were to approach her little study sanctuary? She'd probably huff her hair out of her face and dismiss him with something pithy that would make his lip curl and a slur spew from his mouth.
Draco once again tucked away the lingering yet foreign sensation from his dream. Of when Hermione Granger had cared about him.
As Draco waited for the return owl over the following days, his mind wandered down a curious path. Perhaps the Cabinet, all the planning, had simply been a test?
Wild thoughts flew through his mind of the return owl bearing news of congratulations on a job well done. "Thank you for your service Draco, the adults will take it from here."
He let that naïve hope buoy him for a few days. He told himself he'd succeeded, he'd saved himself, saved his parents. Task complete, test passed, loyalty to the cause proved. This ignorance afforded him some more nights of deep sleep.
The owl bearing a reply to his triumphant letter found him at breakfast. The bird dropped its message right onto Draco's full plate of another hearty breakfast of bacon, eggs, and a warm croissant.
It contained stilted salutations from his mother and an assurance that an impromptu visit from her could be arranged at a moment's notice. Translation: they were ready the second he sent word that the castle was unprotected. He took out the charmed coin. He'd have to Imperius Rosmerta again. She'd need to notify him of Dumbledore's next nighttime stroll into Hogsmeade.
Murderer.
Draco hastily stuffed the letter in his robes and stood; food abandoned and appetite vanished. He considered it a victory that his shaking legs made it all the way back to his dorm. He only enjoyed about two minutes of solo hysteria in the form of sitting numbly on his bed and absently tearing the letter into pieces upon pieces. A stream of torn parchment floated to the stone floor.
Theo appeared, a slouching figure that seemed to curl around the doorframe of any room he entered. Blaise followed, the solid, looming presence to the oddly off-kilter Theo.
"Something's gone wrong, hasn't it?" Theo barged his way into Draco's melancholy just like he'd barged his way into Draco's psyche.
Draco had reached his limit of outside influences toying with his mind: his aunt in an attempt to toughen him up, the Dark Lord in an attempt to test his loyalty, and now Theo with his dream magic.
Not even bothering to draw his wand, Draco shot off the bed and charged at Theo. He grabbed the taller boy by the front of his robes and slammed him against the wall.
"What did you do? WHAT DID YOU DO TO ME?"
Blaise might have shouted in protest, but Draco heard nothing but his own laboured breathing and the blood pounding in his ears.
Theo's eyes only widened a fraction at Draco's face contorted in rage, demanding an explanation. Draco felt Blaise's hand on his shoulder, ready to rip him away, but Theo called him off with a shake of his head.
"I did what I said I would. I helped you sleep. Pleasantly so, it would seem."
That unfailingly measured tone only further incensed Draco.
"Not good enough," he snarled. "I need specifics. Why her?"
"Her?"
"Yes, her!"
Draco ripped himself away from Theo and staggered back to his bed.
"Don't you know what you've done to me? Don't you know how fucked I am? And I can't have it! I can't have what you showed me, ever! Fuck, it's all just—"
He whirled away, turned his back to the others as he choked on the words, the air, his failings.
"It was cruel. What you did, Theo. Truly fucked up."
"I wanted you to have a good birthday, that's all."
Draco controlled his breathing and only spoke again when he could be sure his tone lacked any semblance of sentiment. "The last word of your incantation… what exactly did you try to cast?"
"Happiness. I wanted you to dream of being happy. I wanted you to see how to be happy."
He'd only just mastered himself when Theo's revelation barrelled into him.
Happiness. No longer an option for Draco. Rage at Theo morphed into a strain of vindictiveness as Draco turned around. A calculating coolness commanded his voice now.
"This power of yours seems quite influential. Some might say it's my duty to inform the Dark Lord, to give him an edge in this coming war."
Blaise drew his wand.
Draco advanced slowly, taking out his own. A wild thought born of panic surged forward. Maybe if he gave this information to the Dark Lord he wouldn't have to murder the old man and his parents would be safe. He could avoid his own damnation by dooming another. He could present an ingenious little tool for torture in Theo's ability.
"Don't you fucking dare," murmured Blaise. "Is this what you've learned from your new friends? Using others to build yourself up? It's pathetic."
"Jealous, Blaise?" Draco sneered. "Some of us have been trusted with tasks of actual importance. I don't think a Slug Club membership will serve you well in the real world."
"You're in over your head. And I won't let you drag Theo down with you."
"You wouldn't know as you're not exactly Sacred Twenty-Eight are you? We have a duty, Zabini, to serve our families and uphold their values and that is the way of the Dark Lord. But I suppose someone from your background wouldn't quite understand."
"If you go running with this to your master, understand that I will kill you."
"Blaise!" Theo cut in sharply.
Blaise held Draco's stare, daring him to act. His dark eyes were wild, but his hand was steady. Draco had no doubt that Blaise would try to cut him down should he make an attempt on Theo. His gaze spoke of the deepest kind of love: a person willing to murder, willing to bear a stain upon his soul if it meant the safety of Theo. He'd stand in front of any wand, commit any heinous act, rend himself in two with sins of an unspeakable nature if it meant protecting Theo.
And didn't it just break Draco apart a little to recognise their sameness in the moment.
Draco lowered his wand and backed away. As quickly as his temptation to betray Theo had surfaced, it dissipated. The fight left Draco as he realised the futility of his threat. The Dark Lord did not accept bargains, anyway. You did as he asked or you met his wrath.
Theo held up a placating hand in Draco's direction. A hand that had placed a box of Jelly Slugs at the end of Draco's bed every year on his birthday. Just how low had he sunk that he'd really consider dooming someone like Theo to the life of a sinister puppet?
"Draco, I don't know what went on in your dream. I truly do not. But what I do know," he sidestepped carefully around Blaise, giving the other boy a quick squeeze of his hand, "is that you're suffering. I tried to help but… perhaps I was wrong to have interfered. If there's another way to help I could—"
"No."
Draco did need to ask once more. Just to be sure. "You didn't… you didn't choose her? What I saw, it—it wasn't on purpose?"
Theo shook his head. "I'm sorry you've had to learn to distrust others, Draco. I really am. I swear on my magic that I have no idea what happened in your dream. And you don't have to tell me if you don't want to. I'd appreciate the kindness of your silence in return."
"Make him take an Unbreakable Vow," Blaise demanded.
"I won't say anything," said Draco flatly. Though he'd be missing class by now, Draco sank back on his bed and turned onto his side.
"None of this matters anyway," he murmured.
The body fell over the tower ledge, but the curse that had sent Albus Dumbledore to his death had not left Draco's wand.
Noise roared all around him. Screams, spells, curses, explosions, it all flew around him in one symphony of chaos and hell. The fury of war.
Whizzing hexes, dodging bodies, crashing bits of castle walls, shouts of pain or cries for help.
Snape hustled him along, keeping a firm grip on his arm. Draco, in shock, unsure if his legs even worked anymore and wondered if Snape had cast a Locomotor spell on his body. He kept moving, kept going forward, strung along by adrenaline and despair.
Snape told him not to turn back, told him to keep going and shoved him forward. But he looked back. Just once.
He saw her. Through the haze of smoke as a school turned into a battleground, he saw her.
She stood, wand raised, voice crying out as she volleyed back a curse, parried a hex, fought and defended herself and those around her. On the opposite side of battle lines from Draco.
She was magnificent. A force of fiery nature, expertly wielding her magic, throwing curse after curse at her adversaries. She'd die to defend her friends, her school, her home. A death he might have just inadvertently caused.
He couldn't picture her lifeless. Not when she seemed so alive, so bright, in the throes of battle.
Attack and defend, attack and defend.
Her hair flew about her head, streaming behind her like a banner of war, a model of proud courage.
Would he ever see her this way again? This warrior woman, fierce in the defence of her cause? Possibly. And he might be the one on the other end of her wand. Would she hesitate? If they met again, he in his Death Eater mask and she in her sense of justice as armour… would she cut him down? Her opponent in this war, a war determined for them before birth. Would she give him a chance at mercy, as Dumbledore had? Would he take it? Would she meet him as a boy she knew from school or an evil force to be eradicated? Although, now with Dumbledore gone, would his side land an easy victory? Would they meet again as prisoner and captor?
He at least knew the one way in which they'd never meet again.
Before it blinkered out of existence, Draco took one extended moment, a moment suspended on something much like that limbo state of the mind and body as it surrenders to dreams. He let himself imagine it for just one more moment.
That he made it out alive. That his parents made it out alive. That he earned the love and trust of a good woman. That she'd given him a beautiful son and couldn't wait to give him another child. That he was happy.
Then Draco's dream died. Dead like the body lying crumpled at the base of the Astronomy Tower.
The next few months of his life flew by in a whirl of pain, shame, guilt, more pain, regret, pain again, and complete and utter mind-bending rounds of terror. The darkest recesses of his mind could never have dreamt up such unfathomable awfulness. The kind of soul-shattering violence and gore that one would have to then file away into a thought corner, never to be revisited lest he risk a mental and physical unravelling.
Each day felt like a test. And that test, if failed, came with a price. Perhaps today's price was a Crucio. Or you'd have to Crucio someone else. Or watch your mother and father writhe and scream on the floor. Or a woman eaten by a giant snake on your dining room table.
Victory for the cause claimed (with control of the Ministry and Hogwarts), but no celebrations followed. Unless you counted the jeering from some of the more despicable recruits as victims were paraded in front of the Dark Lord or his followers for sport. The victims were both magical and Muggle, though after the first, Draco stopped noting their blood status. They'd scream and die the same anyway.
He'd never been more relieved to go back to Hogwarts. The Carrows generally left him alone. Snape kept him at a distance. Not that he'd been friendly with Draco, or with any one student, but a cordiality—a hint of a thaw—had always lurked in their conversations and interactions. A professor and a favoured pupil dynamic that Draco didn't realise he associated so positively with his schooling until now.
Now, the headmaster and favourite disciple of the Dark Lord kept himself to himself. He hid away in the headmaster's office, no doubt receiving daily missives on the running of the school and educational plans for the next generation of dark servants.
Occlumency. Draco's only refuge. Ridding one's mind of the daily crush of trauma. Of witnessing a first year Crucio'ed. Of seeing a young girl hung by her ankles as "detention." Of seeing Imperio used in the most humiliating ways in classes. Of seeing how the openly defiant were publicly tortured. Of seeing tears and blood and hearing screams and cries in halls that used to only know the normal sounds of students laughing, chatting, and learning.
He couldn't sleep. He couldn't sleep at the Manor and he couldn't sleep at Hogwarts either. Aside from the horrifying real-life scenes, he feared he'd fall into his trap of hope when he closed his eyes at night. Those tempting visions that would dance across his mind.
A home. A family. Safe and loved and cherished and happy. He'd take any future at this rate.
Theo noticed. Of course he noticed.
"I could help again," he suggested one night in their dorm. Crabbe and Goyle were absent, but they liked to take advantage of being allowed any curfew they wanted and helping the Carrows round up rebellious students.
"No," said Draco harshly. "I'm at risk enough with the first one. No more dreams."
"Finally realised you were in over your head, eh?" offered Blaise in that disaffected monotone. The accusation rankled Draco. Blaise could sit there in all his miserable haughtiness, but he didn't know the burden of a sacred family name, of a legacy laid out from before you were born.
And Theo, whose mother had died when he was 10, didn't know that pressure either. His father, a brutish, cruel man, contented himself with worshipping the Dark Lord, seemed to think his "failure" of a son required no further parenting. No love lost between father and son of the Nott line.
"I did it for my parents. For my mother," Draco said in a hollow voice. The excuse he would make for himself and, if he made it out of this mess alive, one he'd have to repeat over and over. "Wouldn't you, if it were yours?" he appealed to Blaise. "Haven't you tried to keep her safe?"
"My mother?" Blaise snorted. "My mother fucked off to Italy. Donated enough gold to the cause to get You-Know-Who off her back then swanned off."
"Why didn't you go with her?"
"Not without Theo."
Blaise's reply came as an instinct. Theo did not react to this pronouncement at all. Because the truth, the absolute certainty of such a statement seemed to be unsurprising. A fact of the universe, the two of them, together.
"And she still went? But… but you're her son." Draco could not fathom such an action. Narcissa had probably had the opportunity to run, at some point. Draco wondered if his father even suggested it as an option for her. But here she remained while her home was invaded and her family cowed.
"No," Blaise replied. "I'm an inconvenience. It's all I've ever been."
"It's not." Theo accompanied his quiet disagreement with an intertwining of his fingers with Blaise's.
Draco looked away and drew his curtains. He couldn't stomach the open affection. The willingness to cling to another person that spoke of such earnest, true devotion.
He rolled on his side and allowed himself a few minutes of a ghost of a memory. A bright burst of that feeling scorched through his being before he made himself snuff it out with Occlumency.
You can be happy. There's a way to be happy. You've seen it, you've felt it. It's fine, it'll be fine, you'll make it there.
A/N: See y'all on May 18 as we move on to the post-war era :)
All my thanks to mrsbutlertron for her beta skills.
Come chat on tumblr: heyjude19-writing.