"Look at him," Harry said, glaring at Draco Malfoy from around the corner at the top of the stairwell leading to Snape's dungeon office. "He's just standing there knocking, like it's normal for students to drop in on Snape uninvited, looking for huge, dangerous favours."

From the bottom of the stairs, Draco sneered back at Harry and Ronald. He mouthed the word, "Quiet," before turning to knock again, louder.

"It's going to be fine. Just you watch," Ronald whispered from over Harry's shoulder. "Snape gives him whatever he wants. It's creepy as anything but - there it is."

Harry glanced back at him. "But why? It makes no sense. Snape's got no problem abusing you like the rest of us."

Ronald shrugged. "Dunno. Maybe he's got a bit of a fancy for mum. She's considered quite beautiful and charming, you know. And since Draco's her only biological child..."

Harry shuddered. "Trust me. Having Snape fancy your mum is no way to get him to treat you decently."

Ronald nodded. "Yeah, right."

Harry shuddered again, as he'd been doing at regular intervals all day. How had he let Hermione talk him into getting Draco involved in figuring out what Voldemort and the Death Eaters were up to in the Department of Mysteries? She was right that things were only getting worse, and something had to be done. Dumbledore wanted Harry's visionary connection to Voldemort shut down, so without using it, they needed to find out what the hidden weapon was, what Voldemort might use it for, and what made it worth all the pain and chaos it was creating.

Two innocent men had already been put under Imperius curses and sent to break through the locked door from Harry's dreams. Sturgis Podmore was sent to Azkaban over it, and Broderick Bode ended up injured and eventually dead by Devil's Snare strangulation while he recovered in the hospital. Then there was the attack on Arthur Weasley which Harry had seen firsthand. Horrible. But at least the weapon - whatever it was - was still safely hidden.

Harry still hadn't told Ronald that he'd learned from his visions that Lucius Malfoy was the person who'd cast those disastrous Imperius curses in the first place. Did that make Mr. Malfoy a murderer? He hadn't meant to kill anyone, but poor Bode wound up dead all the same.

Below them, Draco waited at the door. He'd called himself Harry's black knight, and here he was, jumping out over the line of the other chess men toward the opposing king. It sounded heroic but Harry didn't trust him. Maybe he never would. Ronald did. Hermione did. And frankly, Harry needed to make some move against Voldemort besides trying to learn how to shut his mind to him. He did trust Dumbledore but he hated these orders. Similar strategies had failed them before. Concentrating on the tournament and ignoring the Death Eaters during fourth year had ended extraordinarily badly.

The door at the bottom of the stairs was flung open with Snape's signature histrionic flair. "Yes, Draco?" he said.

"Sir, forgive the intrusion," he began, bowing slightly, "it's just that, I've run into a personal problem - a family problem - and I don't trust anyone else to help."

From above them, Harry scoffed quietly. "Will you listen to that simpering - "

Ronald silenced him with a jab of his elbow just as a pair of arms circled his waist. He barely swallowed his yelp, flinching, and nearly striking out before he saw it was Pansy grasping him around his middle. He raised his arm and she stuck her head beneath it, smirking at Harry.

At the sound, Snape stepped out into the landing, crowding Draco and looking up into the shadows at the top of the stairs. Harry and Ronald held their breath as Pansy suppressed a laugh. Snape's eyes narrowed as he listened for them.

"Being the head of Slytherin house, I am always prepared to see to the well-being of all its students," he said, as if reciting lines for an audition. "Right this way, Mr. Malfoy."

The enormous old door closed with a gentle click.

Harry and Ronald slumped out of their hiding place.

Ronald let out his breath and squeezed Pansy against his side. "You - I thought you were supposed to be sneaky," he said.

She snickered. "And I thought you were supposed to be brave. Who knew you'd spook so easily? Well, no harm done." She looked past Ronald to nod at Harry. "Potter."

He might have shuddered. "Parkinson."

Ronald was tucking her hair behind her ear, smoothing it where it had been disordered when he jumped. He was muttering sweet, teasing reprimands about her needing to behave herself.

"Keep my hands to myself, should I?"

"Now, that's not what I said - "

"It's useless," Harry burst, drawing their attention away from each other. "This will all be over in minutes. Draco will ask Snape for help. Snape will send him away, and maybe he'll report him to Dumbledore or your parents. He'll never convince him."

Pansy shrugged. "If Draco can't get his help, then no one can."

Inside Snape's office, he was pouring tea, settling the boy into a comfortable seat opposite his large, potion-stained desk.

"What is it you need?" Snape began. "I understand you haven't seen your mother since arriving here during the holidays, but you have my word that she is safe and well, regardless of the company anyone may suspect her of keeping."

On hearing this, Draco was both relieved and bristling slightly, inexplicably. "Thank you, sir. But as long as she has her own wits about her, and Father there to protect her, I needn't worry. Isn't that right, sir?"

Snapped frowned into his teacup but said, "Indeed."

Draco cleared his throat. "It appears our family troubles have become front page news, what with Aunt Bellatrix getting loose and causing trouble. She's been with my parents since her escape. Mother told us as much when she rushed us back to school. And thanks to Ronald's connections, I know what happened to Arthur Weasley, and that Potter still dreams about the Department of Mysteries nearly every night - "

"Even so, you do not know nearly as much as you think you do," Snape interrupted, setting his tea down hard enough to add another stain to his desktop. "Your parents have decided that the less involved you are in your aunt's unlawful return, the better. Know too that your parents insulate you from their house guests at great peril to themselves. Something for which you ought to be grateful."

"What does that mean, sir?" Draco said, his voice rising.

Snape leaned over his desk, his voice low and silky by contrast. "It means that at this moment, your father is working to obtain what the Dark Lord desires without involving you or your brother as the Dark Lord would have had him do."

"His desire - the thing hidden in the Department of Mysteries - "

Snape tugged at his cuffs, as if preparing to set to work. "That is just the beginning. And the pursuit of it grows ever more dangerous. Your father has exhausted attempts to please the Dark Lord through the manipulation of other people and must now - get his own hands dirty, as it were."

Draco flinched, knowing well that there was little his father hated more than dirty hands. "So he's about to put himself in danger," he surmised.

Snape closed his eyes, as if considering his words very carefully. "If he has not brought you into his confidence in this, I must respect his fatherly judgment and not discuss it further."

"Please, sir," Draco pressed. "Father is letting his emotions cloud his judgment, fatherly or otherwise. Ronald and I aren't children. And you're the only teacher here who trusts students with unvarnished truth."

Opening his eyes, Snape spoke with a new darkness. "You are indeed children. And what is unvarnished, is also unprotected."

Snape moved to the fire, spinning to face its orange glow. "The Dark Lord understands your father must be dirty and beaten before he can be forced to relinquish you and your brother into his service as Hogwarts operatives, close to Potter. To bring that about in a swift, natural way, he has given Lucius Malfoy one final chance to procure what he desires. But it was never intended that your father would succeed. This exercise may serve to further the Dark Lord's purposes, but its paramount function is to degrade and punish your father for certain - missteps during your second year here."

Before the fireplace, Snape spun, the flames at his back now, his face in shadows as he spoke. "You see, Draco, the Dark Lord does not forgive and he does not compromise. But he does penalize. He will be repaid. He wants the weapon, Potter, and both of the Malfoy heirs - all of you. Short of that, there is nothing Lucius can do to satisfy him."

Draco's voice was dry and strained. "But Father may succeed all the same. Especially if - "

"No, Draco," Snape said over him in a loud, unequivocal voice, not quite a shout. "It is highly unlikely, but not quite impossible that your father could succeed. You, however, will not aid him in any attempt to do so. Your only role in this is to do nothing to distract or frustrate him."

Draco stood, shaking his head. "I can't accept that, sir. I have to help him. Perhaps not directly, but by working secretly. If it's as bad as all of that, then we've nothing to lose in me satisfying the Dark Lord, at least in part, by turning myself over and doing what you do: working both sides."

Snape waved a hand, dismissing Draco already.

He insisted all the same. "I'll go to the manor, present myself to the Dark Lord on our own terms. Before he learns how to use Potter's connection against him, we may have some time to gather more information, gain his trust, misdirect him - use the whole thing to our advantage."

Snape coughed out a single joyless laugh. "You think it's that easy? To stand before the Dark Lord and misrepresent yourself? To lie to him undetected takes years of practice in Occlumency. There isn't time."

"Then we need to begin right away. Train me," Draco said, stepping up to meet Snape nose to nose. "Help me, sir. Do something. It seems foolish to close down Potter's connection to him without doing all we can to leverage it first."

Snape's head snapped, his eyes wide, fixing on Draco's as if he'd said something to prick his ears. This leverage was also what he wanted. It was one of the reasons why his Occlumency lessons with Potter were more like exploratory brain surgery than like productive classes. Snape was trying to trust Dumbledore, to be patient and follow his orders, but he was of the same mind as Draco.

Snape knew there were things to be learned about the Dark Lord's plans and desires that even he, a trusted servant, could not see. The connection between Harry Potter and the Dark Lord was both a weakness and a strength. Dumbledore found it gruesome and sought only to protect Potter from it. But Snape knew the power of the Dark Lord more intimately than Dumbledore, or anyone without the dark mark burnt into their flesh.

Dumbledore had forbidden Harry to act on his visions. He had forbidden Snape to do anything more for Harry than teach him Occlumency. But Draco was under no orders at all. He was free to act. Maybe the way around Dumbledore's objections was sitting right in front of him, waiting with wide grey eyes, offering himself, foolishly fearless and willing.

But this tall, overconfident teenager was also the baby from years ago.

The day after Draco's birth, Severus could wait no longer to visit Malfoy Manor. Narcissa had had the paternity potion waiting, stashed in her room to be used the moment the medi-witches cleansed their hands and left. Before he arrived, Severus had already been told the results of the potion test, and that the baby was not his son. He believed what Narcissa had told him, yet still, he wanted to see the child for himself.

Not knowing how he would be received, he came to the front doors of the manor, bold in broad daylight. He had rehearsed possible scenarios in his mind as he came walking up the gravel drive. If he was handled roughly, he would answer with roughness of his own, with questions about whether Lucius had any news about the baby born just weeks earlier to the Weasley family. Another boy, their sixth. Arthur must be such a proud father.

Yes, the Weasley's newest son, a reminder to Lucius Malfoy that he and Severus Snape were not so different.

But as he approached the doors to the manor, solid oak painted black, they opened for him without even a knock. The grand hall was empty as Snape stepped inside, but an inner door stood open, the drawing room. Snape found the Malfoys arranged as if posing in an informal but elegant tableau. Still delicate from the birth, Narcissa reclined on a sofa while Lucius stood in a sunny, floor-length window with the tiny bundle in his arms, the sweet newborn son shining in a haze of white blond, more like a halo than hair.

It was plain from the child's face - still so small - that he belonged to the man who'd given him his name. The baby was not Snape's child, but he felt himself in him nonetheless. The sense of it shook through Severus the instant Lucius placed Draco in his arms. He stood at Lucius's side, holding the baby, dressed in black against the white light flooding through the window. Narcissa watched the three of them, her eyes bright with tears.

This tiny thing had been a part of Narcissa when she joined herself to him. In that moment of intimacy, something of Draco had been there, safe and sealed away but present. In that moment, the three of them had been one. Lucius as well, as he lived in the cells that were Draco. When Severus took her, she brought all of them with her.

Biologically, sleeping with pregnant Narcissa almost a year before meant nothing. But magically, Severus felt something deep and primeval for the little boy.

He bent his head to smell the sweet scent of this still perfect child. Ever since his union with the boy's mother, Severus had carried a secret hope that the baby would be his own, chaotic and confounding as that would have been. And now, that hope needed to transform into something else. It could become bitter rejection, or earnest devotion.

Narcissa rose from the sofa and crossed the room to where Snape stood with her child. Lucius had to stay close to him, the baby's hand clenched, as it was, around his finger. Narcissa threaded her arm through Lucius's, her head against his shoulder, and sighed.

She may have already found her peace with the new life all of them were beginning, but Snape's mind and heart were churning. He should leave the Malfoys to themselves, the way he'd left Lily Evans to James Potter and the rest of them, left her to bear the child that would separate them forever. She said it was his politics that pushed him away but - no, there was no point thinking of it now. That was his past, and this...

He looked down at the child again, saw his own body holding him up. Sunlight refracted in the cut stones of Narcissa's bracelet, scattering flashes of light and colour on Snape's black robes. He quieted his mind and let his heart choose for itself between a future of bitterness or devotion. It chose devotion, and he pressed his lips to the impossible softness of the baby's head.

"You must agree to be his godfather, Severus," Lucius had said - said it even though Snape was almost certain he knew what had happened that morning in Spinner's End, while he had been missing, arrested, held by Aurors.

Snape was honored but believed godfathers were for Muggle-borns and half-bloods. His own Muggle godfather had certainly been useless to him.

So he answered, "There is no need for empty titles and rituals. Instead, accept my pledge, here and now, with the sun itself as witness, that Draco Lucius Black Malfoy shall ever have claim on the guidance, the protection, the adoration of Severus Snape, for as long as I live."

In his office now, with the boy grown as tall as himself, Snape was torn between his promise to keep Draco from immediate harm, and the need to let him take risks to protect his future. Draco was clever, sly, but it was still too dangerous. Snape was opening his eyes, shaking his head to tell Draco 'no' and send him away.

"I'm going to do it anyway, sir," Draco said before Snape could speak. "It doesn't matter what anyone says. I'm going to go home, meet my aunt, and maybe the Dark Lord himself. I'm going to scheme and spy and protect my family. I know I can't do much, but I can't do nothing either."

Snape was speechless all over again. All he could manage was, "Draco, don't. You have no idea - "

He shook his head. "I've already decided. And either I can begin as I am, or you can take a few weeks to teach me some of what you do to keep yourself insulated and aloof when you're fooling them."

Snape spun again, distancing himself, moving to sit in an armchair before the fire. "As an officer of the school, if I want you held here indefinitely, you will be."

"And how will my parents explain that to the Dark Lord? They can't procrastinate much longer. They will run out of excuses to hide us, and soon. We need to train and plan before we're dragged helpless before him." Draco sat on the rug at Snape's feet. "And as distasteful to me as it is, if Potter is the best chance we have of containing the Dark Lord, we need to work together."

Snape flipped Draco's fringe out of his eyes. "We are working with him. You are engaging with Umbridge while mitigating any real harm to students. Yes, I have noticed. And I am teaching Potter Occlumency. Trying to, at any rate."

"Teach me," Draco said. "I'll be loads better than him."

Snape huffed. "Narcissa Black's son - you would be. Your mother could look the Dark Lord in the eye, tell him a dead man was alive or a live man was dead, and she would do it with such confidence that he wouldn't think to check for himself. As occlumens go, there is no one like your mother."

"Let's start with that then, sir," Draco said, quietly, with smooth persuasion. "Teach me Occlumency, tell me how to treat my aunt, her husband, the Dark Lord himself. Tell me what only you can. And by the February Hogsmeade trip, I'll be ready."

It was well after dinner when Hermione came through the false wall of the vanished room. Draco stood up from where he'd been sitting on the table, waiting, ready to meet her, but stopping when she raised one hand.

"Harry says," she began, "Harry says you convinced him."

He swallowed, nodding. "Yes. Snape is going to train me in Occlumency and the rest of it, starting tomorrow."

"In," she interjected, "in preparation to meet Voldemort."

He shrugged, trying to smile reassuringly. "Or maybe just my mad aunt."

He paused, waiting for her to go on. Surely she was pleased - not chuffed, but satisfied. His decision to take a stand that wasn't neutral began with a suggestion from her, after all.

She might have been satisfied, but she was not happy. There was more she wanted to say, but she had stalled in the act, standing with one hand still raised to hold him off, her shoulders rounding ever lower as she crumpled, speechless before his eyes.

"Granger, don't cry," he said, crossing the floor.

"I - I didn't think he'd actually let you. They always tell Harry 'no', and 'wait.'" Her voice was lost in a rising sob. "Harry always puts himself in danger in spite of what they tell him, not because of it. That awful Snape, telling you yes."

Draco took her in his arms, rocking her gently. "Don't blame him. It's a lifelong pattern. Haven't you heard? Snape always gives me what I want. He's as bad as my parents for that."

He was trying to lighten the mood, but she didn't find it funny. Everything was terrible. It didn't matter that she knew this was how things had to be. She wanted to hide, tucking her arms between them, her face disappearing between her hair and his robes.

In return, he held her as close as he could. "You thought Snape would tell me to toddle off and I'd settle into decoding Potter's visions with Ronald? Scouring the newspaper for signs of Death Eater misbehaviour with you? Those jobs are taken."

"Right, and your job was to handle Umbridge," she said.

"Umbridge is a nightmare but she's not a Death Eater," he said. "She's not hiding in my parents house waiting to strike."

She sniffed against the front of his robes. "I don't know what I thought," she said. "But it wasn't that you'd go marching off to Voldemort in time for the Hogsmeade trip. By Valentines Day - "

Draco hissed. "Oh, it is Valentines, isn't it."

She gave a mighty sniff. "Not that I care about something like a stupid, fake holiday."

"Well, you should," he answered, smoothing her hair with a motion not unlike the one she used to soothe Crookshanks. "Valentines - it's the day everyone else will be drinking tea under floating Cupids at Madam Puddifoot's. Snogging in public and feeding each other chocolate."

"I've always known not to expect that for us," she said, nuzzling her jaw against him, not unlike Crookshanks herself.

Draco's playful tone was now serious. "No, but you have every right to. You should expect every good and pretty thing. And I should be the one to bring them to you. You are the best girl, my girl."

He took her face between his hands and turned it up so he could see her. Her eyes were shining with the last of her tears, her cheeks rosy and wet, her lips were swollen from crying. She was a mess, and he bent to kiss her anyway, softly, without asking much, yet offering his whole self as best he knew how.

She tasted the salt of her own tears in his kiss, rising high onto her toes, her arms locked around him. He knew she was in a tender state and was restraining the passion he felt for her. But she felt it in the slip of his tongue. Her pulse thumped and he bent lower, pulling her up and into himself by the fist he had clenched in the small of her back. Her voice sounded, still too much like a sob for him to press her any further. He broke away and hushed her, relaxing his fist to stroke her back.

"I'm going to be fine," she said. "The crying - all it does is relieve my tension. Boys always overreact to it. But don't be too bothered. All the pressure - it builds and then it breaks. And it leaves me so tired."

He led her to sit beneath the windows, on the spot where they'd been standing the first time he kissed her. He took off his robe and used one of his mother's favourite spells to transform it into a cushion large enough for them to sit on. She took off her robe as well, and wrapped it around them as she settled beside him.

"If you're tired," he said, "then sleep. Just for a little while. I'll stay up and keep watch."

She blinked her damp eyelashes. "Aren't you tired too?"

He nodded. "Yes, but for me, being tired doesn't necessarily align with falling asleep. It'll be fine. Just rest."

She blinked at him again before closing her eyes and reclining against his shoulder. She wanted to tell him things that could not possibly be true - not yet. She was only sixteen, for stars' sake, and she sank into the safety of quiet.

When she was almost asleep, her movements languid and heavy, she shifted against him, pushing him onto his back. He didn't resist, and lay back onto the cushion, grinning. His transformed robe was too small to be a proper bed even when she pulled her knees into her chest, curled into her smallest shape. He curved himself around her, his chest against her spine as she drifted away. With a whispered spell, the lights in the room went dark.