Another time. Place.
She'd come to him, autumn leaves crunching under her feet as she walked towards the bench he sat on.
Her step a cautious one, hesitant, unsure of herself and her right to come to him, unsure of his reaction to her presence, unsure of many things, but the need to find him, to offer him what she could, undeniable, a heat in her bones, in her flesh, causing her to leave everyone else in the kitchen, causing her to slip out after him.
Follow him.
She knew him well, knew him better than perhaps even his Godfather, from the hours of watching him, puzzling over him, trying to explain him. Trying to match the picture of who she had always thought he was to what he was becoming, the boy who was sitting in the Weasley's garden on their bench.
But she was not analyzing then, as she came to where he sat, pausing, waiting for him to make a snide remark, waiting for him to say something harmful, caustic, forcing her away like he had so many times in the last several months.
But the boy who sat in the garden, moon turning white hair into silver, did not say a word, did not look at her, did not register her presence, staring straight ahead.
She sat down on the other end of the bench.
He could smell her, a familiar scent now combining and twining with the night air, with the smell of the coming cold, with the smell of falling leaves, with the smell of summer coming to an end and the long winter beginning.
"I'm sorry Malfoy," she said, so quietly he barely heard her.
Hesitant, it pulled at something in him, something he didn't know existed, or if he did, refused a long time ago to recognize.
Weakness.
It was what his father would have thought, what he would have called it.
But he couldn't help it from surfacing because her words were said, the tone was there, and something was achingly gentle about them, a gentleness that was breaking, tearing, forcing down the wall he had erected around himself.
And he spoke because on that night, with the moon looking down on them he could, because in that one moment it seemed like the world ceased to exist, that they were part of an enchantment, a world of magic outside of their normal world of magic.
"She loved me," the words.
Spoken in a whisper.
He saw her head move, saw the light fall in her brown eyes and in them he did not see pity, or judgment, or triumph, in them he saw softness, understanding.
So he continued, the ball of cold in his stomach physically painful, chest tight, he spoke, barely above a whisper, a rush of words, pain etched in every letter.
"She tried to protect me, when I failed, when I was brought before him, she tried to protect me, placing herself in front of me even as the curse was said; her body was writhing about in pain and her face was distorted, I could see it, like this, the moon highlighting it. I saw her face crawling with pain and I could do nothing, nothing at all, I could only stand there. I couldn't help her. I couldn't help her, and I wanted to, I needed to but nothing, there was nothing, do you understand, there was absolutely nothing I could do, and it didn't stop, it just kept on, again and again, he cursed her, and she was screaming and screaming, and I couldn't do anything, and I was hit, from behind, from I don't know - my father perhaps, probably, and suddenly I could just hear her screaming, and the pain, and the pain was so cold, but nothing was like the screaming, I couldn't see her anymore, I was blind, but I could hear her screaming, crying out, for my father, for me, crying out in love, in a love she had from the very beginning, that led her to protect me in the first place, screaming in love, do you know how that sounds? Screaming in love and then I was forced to look, my father, my father he grabbed me by the hair and I was ordered to look and I had too, I had too, and her face was bloodied, dark blood, everywhere, black, black and running down her face, out of her nose and mouth, out of her ears, and all the while she was screaming…"
And he broke off because he couldn't go on, because the sobs were coming then, dry sobs, wracking his lithe body and suddenly there were arms around him, arms that held him, pulling him closer and because she was who she was he let her pull him against her.
Whispering, over and over again, words of comfort, words that made no sense, because all he could see was his mother being tortured because of him, because of him.
And her hand was moving through his hair, coaxing him, trying to bring him back, fingers against his scalp, through the strands of white, lips fluttering down on his forehead, kissing away the beads of moisture there, kissing his closed eyes, kissing the side of his face, trying to bring him back, trying to connect, one hand moving through his hair, the other clenching at his linen shirt.
"Ok, its ok, it will be ok, Draco, it will be ok," over and over.
But the images were not done, because there was more and as if in a dream he continued.
"And then there was silence, silence, the screams just stopping and all I could hear was her gasping, on the ground, gasping, curled into a ball. My father still had me by the hair, and I was gasping, and I was crying, crying because, because he was there, in front of me and she wasn't dead, not yet, but she should have been, she should have been, but yet she wasn't and then, then my father, he brought his wand out and he pointed it at her, and then he said, he said, you have to finish this now Draco, you who have failed so utterly, you have to finish this now, and I took the wand, do you understand? Do you fucking understand? I took the wand, I took it and I killed my mother, I killed the woman who was just trying to protect me, who had spent her entire life trying to protect me against my father, against the men who were with my father, and I killed her, with a whispered word I killed her! Do you understand, I killed my mother with my father's wand, and I watched as the last bit of her blood spilt from her mouth, and her eyes, and I watched as the last bit of her breath fell between her lips."
And there was no more.
And she felt ill, down low in her stomach, and she held him because she didn't know what else to do, because she had to, because it had become about them and not only about him. And she had to help him, instinctively she had to help him, so she held him, rocking, slightly, kissing at his hairline, hands wrapping their way around his body, warming it against her own, pulling in as much of his grief as she could, telling him with murmurs of incoherent words that she heard, that she heard and she understood and she would do anything, anything at all.
And lean muscled arms came up and circled her waist, head lying on her chest.
And they sat.
There.
On the bench.
Under the autumn moon.