By the time Ginny has dragged him all the way through London on foot, then up a flight of stairs to a dull looking townhouse, Draco's brief rush at being out of that holding cell and free of the threat of Azkaban has long faded. He hurt, and he was hungry, and his mood was as dark as the dirt and soot griming up the stones of their destination.

"Are you bringing me here to kill me?" he asked her, only half kidding. If he were going to kill someone, this would be the sort of place he'd bring them. "12 Grimmauld Place," he said, looking around. Grim and old was right. "Merlin, whoever named this street wasn't kidding."

Ginny just pushed the door opened and shoved him inside. The front hall delivered everything the facade promised. Dark walls loomed over a dark rug, and dark stairs wound up to where he assumed they kept the dead bodies. Heavy curtains hung over a portrait, and when he moved to tweak them back, Ginny jumped in front of him and knocked his hand away. "She's batty," Ginny said when she saw his surprised look. He'd been a bit forward, but her response had been somewhat drastic and his curiosity about what the curtain hid blossomed. "Sirius' mother. Screams at everyone, but we can't get her picture off the wall because there's a permanent sticking charm. The kitchen's better."

"If it has food, it would have to be," he said, letting go of his interest in the picture in favor of not being quite as physically miserable.

Ginny led him through the halls to a kitchen that did have food. "My mother sent over a bunch of things," she said. "Said there was no way either of us would know how to make things for someone who'd been in custody, that we'd probably just feed you cake and you'd throw it all up."

As she talked she ladled some kind of broth with noodles into a bowl and set it onto the table. Draco sat down, and as he began to eat he thought first that Molly Weasley, terrifying force on the battlefield, was a lot kinder than he would have expected, and second, that the word 'us' was far more terrifying. "Where is your other half?" he asked.

"Watching you eat."

Draco cringed as the smug words pushed into the room. He summoned the arrogant smirk neither time in the service of a madman nor incarceration had taken away, and glanced over at the source of the sound. Harry Potter looked damnably beloved. He always had. The savior of the wizarding world, given permission to play Quidditch a year early, no rumors had ever stuck to him, no sin had ever blackened him. Half-kill a boy in the toilet? Have a detention, Potter.

Funny how you could hate someone so much.

"Nice dinner," Draco said. He took another bite of the soup. "I'll have to write a proper note to thank my mother-in-law."

Draco watched Harry Potter's face go so white his ridiculous scar stood out even more than usual and just took another bite of the soup.

"Ginny," Harry said.

"There was a tiny hitch," she said.

Draco considered saying, "In that we got hitched, yes," but decided that perhaps discretion was the better part of being a good audience member and instead he kept eating as the pair of them engaged in a hissing fight he would have thought they'd have preferred to keep private.

Apparently not. Gryffindors.

As they continued on, with Ginny nearly screaming that what was she supposed to have done, they'd both agreed that Draco had been a victim and didn't deserve to go to Azkaban, the Draco in question began to profoundly hope that their sex life was quieter than this.

By the time Harry had sunk onto one of the other chairs and dropped his face into his hands, Draco had finished eating and felt a bit better. The habit of years took over and he decided to twist the knife he had in Potter's ribs. "I hate to interrupt your charming discussion," he said, "but I think I have a marriage to consummate. Darling?"

The look Ginny gave him would have left most men impotent for years. Draco admired the power of the look. It had no effect on him as he'd seen far worse at the Manor from Death Eaters and Dark Lords alike but it was still impressive. He couldn't back down quiet yet, however. "The kiss we shared was so good," he said. "Sweet and tender and filled with longing. I've kissed a few girls in my day, and I think you're probably the best. Second best, at the very least. I've been itching to taste more of you since - "

"If your penis is itching," Ginny said before he could go on, "it's probably a rash from some unspeakable thing you've done. We can have a mediwitch see to that."

Draco was relieved he wouldn't haven't to actually continue to spell out vulgarities. He felt a tiny bit of guilt he'd been ungentlemanly about the woman he'd saved him but managed to push that feeling aside in his delight that he'd managed to rile Potter up again. The man's predictability never grew old or dull. He could wax poetic about their little staged kiss every day for a week and Potter would probably fume every time.

"You kissed him?" Harry asked Ginny in obvious horror. "You kissed Malfoy?"

"Technically," Draco said, "I think whenever you kiss her from now on you'll be kissing 'Malfoy'."

"I think I'll keep my own last name, thank you," Ginny said, her lips twitching with amusement she was trying to hide.

Draco shrugged. "I think you'll find I'm a reasonable husband. I don't have a problem with that."

Potter had gone from white to red and half risen out of his seat. Draco hoped the man didn't plan to start an actual fistfight. Three months in Ministry custody, some of it spent with what most people were happy to tell him were his former fellows, and he was somewhat the worse for wear and losing to Saint Potter - again - would be humiliating.

"Just stop," Ginny said, the amused twitch gone. She glowered at Harry until he sank back down and crossed his arms. The sulk wasn't attractive. Draco opened his mouth to say something about he was glad to see Potter knew who was boss, but Ginny turned her glare on him and he tried to make the way he cut himself off look natural. If her mean little smirk was any guidance, he'd failed and probably looked more like a gaping, gasping fish than he'd have liked. She sighed and let her eyes take in the worn clothing he had on. She couldn't see the bruises, but Draco suspected she wasn't stupid enough to think he was fine. "I'll show you to your room," she said. "We cleaned it out as best we could but this place is a dump."

Draco had noticed.

"It's a private dump, though, and Kreacher does his best, and you should stay here until we figure out if we can undo this sham without anyone noticing and tossing you into Azkaban."

Draco nodded. He pushed back from the table and tried to hide the flinch of pain when the movement pulled at a cut that had probably gotten infected. "I do appreciate it," he said, keeping his eyes only on Ginny. She'd done so much for him that looking directly at how much he owed her almost hurt; he didn't like having to be grateful to anyone, but he was, at least to indigent, ginger-haired, blood-traitor her. Potter could go hang. "All of it. More than I can say."

"Don't worry about it," she said. "Messing with the Ministry is what we do, right Harry?"

She turned for what she probably assumed was automatic agreement, but Harry wasn't looking at her at all. Instead, his eyes were on Draco and he said, "What's wrong?"

"You mean other than I got accidentally married today and seem to be living with you?" Draco asked. Of the myriad things he didn't want to discuss with Harry Potter, the variety of bruises and cuts he had under his shirt might have made the top of the list.

"You flinched," Harry said. "Just now, when you stood up."

"I'm fine," Draco said. He didn't look back when he let Ginny lead him up the stairs to the third floor and what was to be his room.

. . . . . . . . . . . .

The room huddled under eaves on the top floor. Draco knew rooms like this; they were meant for servants. He poked at the desk someone had shoved into a crowded corner. They'd stocked it with parchment and quills.

"I thought you might want to write your mother," Ginny said. She glanced around the small room somewhat apologetically. "I know it's probably not what you're used to but we didn't think you'd be here longer than a day or two. See a Healer, make sure everything was in order, but now -"

"If I go it will be obvious we aren't really married." Draco understood. He didn't like it, but he understood. They had to pretend or she'd end up in as much trouble as he would. Well, maybe not quite as much. He doubted they'd ship her to prison, but the Ministry could still make her life fairly unpleasant.

"This floor is more private," Ginny said, and Draco smiled a bit wanly at the offering. When she added that there was a bathroom that only he would use, his smile became broader. He hadn't been denied bathing facilities in detention, but they had been communal and the water had wavered between a tepid brown stream and something clearer but cold enough to turn you blue. Even a servants' bath in this decrepit townhouse would be better.

At least he hoped so.

It was.

The bath itself wasn't going to make it into any magazine his mother would read. An old clawfoot tub with a yellow ring staining the porcelain hoisted a battered copper frame that held a shower curtain and, wonder of wonders, a shower. The shower had hot water and someone had left a bottle of fresh, herb scented soap. He might smell a bit like rosemary, but within minutes he was clean. He was clean and dressed in pajamas that he hoped weren't Potter's, and a quick look in the scratched up mirror showed none of the cuts had festered and, with his top on, nothing showed.

Back in his room he found three bottles of pain potion had been left on the desk and he swallowed the whole of one before taking out a quill and starting a letter to his mother.

Ginny, he thought, wasn't the worst wife a man could have, it would seem. Soap, pain potion, and he'd be willing to bet the tiny closet in the corner had been filled with things his size. And she lied like a pro. Too bad she had had the bad taste to get involved with Potter. Better not to dwell on things that couldn't be. He might be an arsehole and a Death Eater but he wasn't a cad. He'd tweak Potter's delicate sensibilities until he couldn't get a rise out of the man anymore but he wouldn't try to steal his girl.

Even if he had married her.