Two months later...

"Scorpie!"

"Rosie!"

Grinning ear to ear, I ran up to my one and only, the boy of my dreams and wrapped my arms around his neck. We were in a quiet part of Diagon Alley- as in as far away from the Weasley shop as you could get. He kissed me long and hard, pulling me close to him. I could feel him pour every thought he had had about me over the summer into that kiss. My heart fluttered like he hadn't kissed me in a year.

When we broke apart. I could see an imprint of the peach lip bam Lily forced me to wear on his upper lip. It glinted and glittered in the summer sun.

"Makeup, Rosie?" he teased as I wiped away the stuff with the sleeve of my cloak. "I haven't seen you for a couple of weeks and this happens. The Weasleys have destroyed you."

I frowned mockingly, I couldn't find the will in me to tease him back. I just wanted to stare into his silver eyes and kiss him. I could tease him in writing anyway.

"I missed you," I said, standing on my tip toes. I didn't grow over the summer but it felt like Scorpius had again.

"Missed you too." he tucked a stray piece of hair behind my ear. "We have an hour, maybe more, my mother enjoys long shopping trips."

"I have until Dad and Hugo finish at the shop, so years."

He kissed me again, his hands on my waist. I giggled, butterflies were flying menacingly around in my stomach. The good kind. "I wish we were alone." He murmured. "It feels like we've never alone since…" he suddenly brightened. "Finish the sentence, Rosie." He said like it was a joke.

My cheeks heated because it was not a joke it was a bloody crime to everyone but us. And still an embarrassment to me.

"I don't remember." I played dumb. "Something to do with someone deciding to strip."

He grinned wolfishly. "Only for you. But I remember something red-"

I pushed him playfully. His arms were back around me in a second. He kissed the back of my neck sending shivers down my spine. My heart pounded. I found his hand and squeezed it.

"Come on, Scorpie," I said, in a fake sexy voice. I twirled out from him and batted my eyelashes. "Tell me, in detail, all the intimate troubles of your life."

"Over ice cream?"

"Obviously."

Scorpius started talking about how he was trying to convince his dad to let me go with them to the Quidditch cup next year. We were getting to the packed section of Diagon Alley but I held his hand anyway. I had a lot of time to think over the summer. This is my life and my business, I'll tell who I like and I'll hold my boyfriend's hand when I like (in a crowd of strangers who didn't know my parents directly). Anyway who's looking at hand level?

He swung my hand in his, smiling like I had just paid him the nicest compliment in the world when really all I've said is,

"I don't like quidditch, Scorpius, and you know that."

"But you like my father so much, it would be a shame to let another bonding opportunity pass." He said. "He absolutely loves you. I overheard him tell Mother, you were clever. He never says that unless he's boasting. And Mother thinks you're a good influence."

"To an extent," I added.

Scorpius rubbed the back of his neck with his free hand.

"That's the quote you gave in your letter." I squeezed his hand.

"But the quidditch thing-"

"Scorpius, that would be torture and you know it. Imagine a day of seeing each other and not touching."

"I wouldn't say that."

"You're not kissing me in front of your parents."

"Of course not, all the Malfoy blood in Father would work together to give him a stroke if he saw something so beautiful," Scorpius said. "But think of all the dark corners there will be, how we can accidentally get lost in the crowd and say we have to go to the bathroom but really we don't." he wiggled his eyebrows at me, holding the door open for me into the ice cream parlour.

I couldn't help but laugh. "That sounds claustrophobic and problematic. You're not paying for my ice cream this time. I swear to Merlin, holding the door for me and paying for me reeks of the eighteen hundreds."

"Purebloods have the best manners," Scorpius grinned. "Don't argue. My father's feeling sorry for me so he gave me five galleons."

"Seriously? Is it because of something I said?"

"I tell you in second, get a table and don't argue, I can feel you're about to argue."

"I love that my boyfriend feels the need to paid for my every whim," I said, sarcastically.

"The Malfoy fortune has to go somewhere." Scorpius grinned at me as he took our order.

I sat at a table in the back of the shop. I glanced at my warped reflection in the napkin dispenser, pushing my hair back. Lily was wrong, the gloss didn't make any difference.

A minute later, Scorpius returned with the cones and sat beside me. That part of manners he ignored. The only other people in the shop sitting down were a family but still as soon as Scorpius handed me my cone, his free hand went to my thigh. Where it had started resting since the quidditch match. I didn't protest it, even in public when it made the tips of my ears go red. My common sense kept telling me no one could see where his hand was unless they looked closely, or looked at us from above. I was making a drama out of nothing, it would be more obvious if he held my hand.

"Tell me then," I said after the first lick of my ice cream.

Scorpius blinked, his mind somewhere else and his ice cream melting. "Oh, yeah, that. Father's starting to feel sorry for me because I'm in the Manor all the time, friends with two half-bloods and a muggleborn and enemies with the Slytherins. I'm a charity to him."

"Can I join the charity?" I squeezed his hand between my legs.

"Sure thing, Rosie." He smiled. "Is it going any better with your family?" his brow creased.

I shrugged.

Scorpius nudged me.

I sighed. "No better than what I wrote in my letter yesterday. Dad's still questioning me, trying to win me back and Mother is locked away in her office working on a file that I apparently can't help with. Hugo's being secretive but what's new about him and his pre-teen angst. I've been spending most of my time at the Burrow with Grandad. He is working on bewitching a muggle television, he's trying to put secret wizarding channels on it."

Scorpius looked confused. "Television… the thing that has music."

"It shows muggle-moving pictures."

Scorpius nodded. "At least you have that, Rosie."

"I'm just worried, that I'm after doing something unrepairable… as stupid as that sounds."

"Not stupid." Scorpius murmured, reassuringly. "You're just worried. And you worry too much."

"That's because I care."

"Well, I care about you and you'll always have me so don't worry about it," Scorpius said, sensibly. "Life's too short."

I smiled to myself before pecking his cheek, my lips cold from the ice cream.

"Forget about your parents," Scorpius said. "I want to meet your Grandad, he sounds brilliant."

"He's prejudice," I warned.

"So was Hagrid. Hagrid can send him an awesome letter of recommendation about me."

"Hagrid does love you," I said, batting my eyelashes again. "But not as much as he loves me."

"Wanna bet?" Scorpius raised an eyebrow.

Once we were finished our ice creams. We headed back out onto the streets of Diagon Alley moving with the crowd.

"How's Andrew?" I glanced up at Scorpius.

"Stop feeding him, Rosie, and he'll be perfectly fine," Scorpius said. "I don't know how you feed him-"

"I throw owl treats in his direction and he stops giving me such vile looks."

"You are making him fat."

"He's not fat!" I challenged. "He looks bigger because he's moulting."

"How's Pumpkin? The animal that is undebatably fat."

"He has a lot of fur, Scorpius, and he is doing fine. I think he misses you."

"He misses waking me up at three in the morning because he wanted to be lifted onto my bed-" Scorpius didn't finish his sentence. A massive bang behind us changed everything.

My ears popped. Scorpius' grip suddenly turned into a death grip on my hand as black smoke filled the air around us. Someone screamed. Then there was the snapping sound of people apparating around us.

Scorpius started cursing.

"Come on-" I started and stopped. He wasn't cursing at our non-existent plan of action but at the sky. I looked up and immediately wished I hadn't. The dark mark- the one I had only seen in textbooks- stood out in the blue cloudless sky. A skull with a snake coming out of its mouth. My heart pounded in my chest.

This couldn't be happening.

Mum, Dad and Hugo.

"Someone's dead!" I yelled at Scorpius as if he didn't know what the mark in the sky meant.

The smoke cleared just in time for us to see a masked figure, in black robes and an intricately carved mask, pointing his wand at a wizard.

Scorpius pulled me hard and started to run. "DON'T YOU DARE TRY TO SAVE HIM!" he yelled at me.

The sound of duelling erupted behind us. With every crack and snap my chest became more constricted.

I stopped short and pulled him into an alleyway. "It's dangerous, we're too exposed out there." I panted, my lungs were on fire. Scorpius was two shades paler than he should've been.

My wand was already in my shaking hands. "Scorpius, if they find us-"

"Rose, please." He said, sharply. "Not helpful."

I exhaled heavily as he pulled me behind some boxes. We rested against a grimy wall. The ice cream in my stomach was turning to bile fast.

"We could die," I whined.

Scorpius narrowed his eyes, at first I thought he was going to snap at me but then he wrapped his arm around me, protectively. It didn't make me feel any better.

"My parents taught me some hexes and jinxes," Scorpius said, sounding unsure of himself. "My mother… she has to be okay."

"Stupefy or Expelliarmus," I said, more to myself than him. "Would work best."

"They're probably not going to come down here," Scorpius said, his hands were sweaty. "It's afterwards that is the problem."

I looked up at him. I couldn't think. He had to spell it out for me.

"The Aurors don't like Malfoys especially at the scene of a crime," Scorpius muttered to me.

I dug my nails into his stomach. "Then they'll have to haul me off too-"

I was stopped short by the sound of whistling.

I almost gasped- Scorpius quickly clapped a hand over my mouth. The sound went back down my throat.

Three men in death eater costumes turned down the alley, their cloaks gliding over the puddles. The first two dragged an unconscious man with a sack over his head. The third death eater followed them, his wand out.

Scorpius was breathing heavily. Too loud for comfort. I put my hand over his mouth to stifle it. We slowly moved into a crouching position behind the boxes.

"That everything?" one said. He had a thick London accent.

"Done and dusted." A deluded sounding man called. "Easy peasy!"

"No one followed?" The Londoner called again.

The deluded one responded. "Nope. Everyone fled. People were slower in the olde days."

Londoner ordered. "Apparate now. Before the Aurors come. I don't want people to have the slightest inkling where we are or when we left."

"Aye, aye."

There was a loud snap. After counting to ten, I dared look around the corner of the boxes, the group and the man had gone.

I released Scorpius' mouth.

"Thank you, Merlin." He sighed, pulling his hand from my mouth. It was only then I realised I was crying. Not bawling, but tears had been sliding silently down my cheeks. They left streaks across Scorpius' hand.

"Rosie," he said softly. He brought his sleeve up to my cheeks and wiped them. "We got to go."

"Okay," I said surprising him by listening to him.

"The… death eater guys sometimes come back to check for evidence-"

"I understand, can we please leave now?"

My legs felt stiff as I stood upright. I felt for his hand and grabbed it, following him towards the light. Questions started bubbling in my mind. What were we going to tell the Aurors? Do we speak to the Aurors? How would I sleep tonight? Why didn't we do anything? Why did I listen to Scorpius? Was that man dead? Who had died-

Without warning, Scorpius shoved me around the corner right out onto the street. I fell, the skin on my hands and knees scraping across the pavement. I hissed. Just then a bright blue spell whizzed past, inches away. It hit a shop window and exploded on impact. Jagged glass showered the street. My first instinct wasn't to cover my head and roll up into a ball. Instead, with my wand still in my grip, I stood up and turned around, ready to seriously injure.

Scorpius pointed his wand in the direction of the death eater. He shouted, "Locomotor Mortis!" and grabbed me and started to run again before the spell hit the death eater. We didn't see the damage all we heard was a loud yelp. Unable to help myself, I pointed my wand at the alleyway and yelled, "Reductio!" there was a deafening bang. Bricks were launched into the sky.

"NECESSARY, ROSE?!" Scorpius yelled at me.

"I WAS MAKING SURE!" I yelled back at him as we rounded another corner. We kept running until-

"SCORPIUS!" A woman's voice came. She hurried towards us from a storefront, as fast as she could in her high heels and her tight constricting dress. I couldn't focus, not even when the woman wrapped her arms around Scorpius, her sharp cheeks red and eyes watering. "Are you all right? If anything had happened to you-"

"I'm fine, Mother," Scorpius said in one breath.

"I didn't know what to think- oh, my dear, you're bleeding!" it took me a second to realise she was talking to me. Reality snapped back when she took my hand from Scorpius' and examined my bleeding palms. It was then I realised how much they stung and my knees.

"Scorpius…" I said, my mouth feeling suddenly thick. I must've bitten my tongue on the way down.

"Nothing, a spell won't fix thank, Merlin." Astoria Malfoy said. Her hands were shaking barely supporting mine, her skin was as pale as Scorpius'. "Scorpius, hold onto me. We'll go back to the manor before this… it's going to get messy. She's apparated before hasn't she-"

"Yes, Mother, yes!"

"Don't be sharp with me. I have to check."

Suddenly the world blurred, that horrible apparating feeling came over me. Then dark wooden dusty floor came into view. Scorpius steadied me.

"Wait here," his mother instructed. "Scorpius, take my wand you know the spell to heal those cuts."

"It's fine," I found myself saying. I was starting to become aware I had been a complete doll and useless for the last two minutes. "I can do it."

Ms Malfoy just nodded. "Draco! Draco, darling!" she hurried out of the room.

Scorpius was shaking beside me. "I'm sorry, Rose, I had to push you-"

I took a sharp breath. "It's either these cuts or being dead right now. That spell would've killed me instantly. I saw what it did to the window." I wiped my eyes quickly.

I was still holding my wand. Breaking the law twice today couldn't have landed me in any more trouble, I brought it to my palms and muttered the incantation, surprisingly the spell worked. I was acting much calmer than I felt.

"What are we going to do?" I asked Scorpius. His eyes were darting around one of the many sitting rooms/parlours in Malfoy Manor. His eyes moved from the portraits on the wall.

"Father will know," Scorpius answered. Maybe Scorpius had a more layered opinion of his father than I thought.

"Welcome back, Master Scorpius!" Dinky appeared around the corner with a tray of drinks. "Oh, Miss Rose, Dinky is delighted to see you have returned to the manor."

"Hi, Dinky," I replied, weakly. Scorpius' hand went to my arm.

Ms Malfoy returned wiping her eyes, smudging her mascara further. "Sit down. You two look as if you're about to faint." Scorpius was more alert than I was. Everyone's voice but mine sounded dream-like to me. He gently led me to a sofa and sat beside me.

"It's okay, Rosie." He murmured.

"So this is Rose?" Ms Malfoy moved towards us. She sounded robotic. "I wish we were meeting under more agreeable circumstances. You have made quite the impression on Scorpius."

I forced myself to smile, for Scorpius' sake.

Draco Malfoy appeared behind Ms Malfoy. "Astoria, sweetheart, I told you to wait." He said in a softer voice than I had ever heard him use.

"And I told you to hurry up." Astoria raised an eyebrow at him. "Are you sure you weren't hit with anything?" Ms Malfoy directed the question at us.

I let Scorpius respond. "No, Mother."

"Right," Mr Malfoy put a hand on Astoria's back. "Maybe you should rest, sweetheart?" Draco cocked his head at his wife. He was saying something else to her in between the words.

"This is about my son." She stood up straighter. "I'm staying."

Draco nodded and moved to an armchair in front of us. Ms Malfoy followed perching on the arm of the chair.

"Tell me everything. From the start, every bloody detail, no matter how insignificant."

The almost overwhelming desire to leave took over me. I wanted to be with my parents. In my house. Not being questioned by the Malfoys.

As if Scorpius felt this he squeezed my now healed hand. He started talking.

I took a deep breath, remained seated and helped Scorpius.