~ At Malfoy Manor ~

Draco slowly walked down the stairs, trying to take his time. He knew it would be at least ten when the guests would leave. That was if he was extremely lucky, and if he was lucky he only had to spend so much time with his family and his family's friends and then he'd be off the hook for the rest of the vacation home. If he wasn't lucky he'd have to go through many more of these dreadful dinner parties.

"So," Draco saw Narcissa standing near the oversized dinning room. "Who will be gracing us with their presences tonight? The Goyles and the Crabbes? Or the Bulstrodes?"

"All of them and the Parkinsons!" his mother told him happily.

"Son of a bitch..." Draco muttered to himself before wandering off to one of the many libraries until he heard the doorbell and knew it was time for dinner.

Draco basically spent dinner glaring at Lucius, Pansy, Vincent, Gregory, and Millicent. Deeply hating each one of them. He also tried to eat as little as possible, but when he did he tasted the familiar bitterness of the potion his father had slipped in his food. He sent a scowl to Lucius Malfoy, who saw and glared back. Amazingly, it took all the way until after dinner for all hell to break loose.

Draco had just excused himself for a few moments, saying he forgot to close an ink bottle in his room and should go close it before all the ink dried. Really he was going to the bathroom in connected to his bedroom so he could throw up what little of dinner he had actually eaten. It didn't take long for Draco to taste the salty vomit rise into his throat and see it go into the toilet. After which he brushed his teeth and went straight downstairs, where Pansy and Millicent were entertaining the adults with stories from Hogwarts. In the background Vincent and Gregory were nodding their heads in unison like the mindless drones they were.

As his father's noticeable anger grew with each story, Draco's boredom grew even more. Having lived the insults and the fights they were of absolutely no interest to him. However, he had not written home and told his father about any of them, so naturally he was definitely interested. So, he picked up a nearby book and began to read.

By ten o'clock all of the guests had left and Lucius Malfoy was about to pop a blood vessel if he didn't calm down soon. He kept going on and on about family honor and how Draco was such a disgrace, that he never had seen or heard of such an atrocious Malfoy in all of their family history. Not even an hour later Lucius had already broken out some of his favorite alcohol and was starting to talk in slurs, while Draco just rolled his eyes and sighed.

Then he picked Draco up by the collar and threw him onto the brick wall at the other end of the room. But Draco wasn't some passive little boy about to get beaten up without a good fight. And that's just what he gave. Sure, Draco ended up with welts, cuts, and bruises on his back, and a few welts on his legs, but Lucius ended up with about one broken rib and two cracked, an almost broken shin, plus many nasty bruises on his back from Draco kicking him in the wall. As far as Draco saw he didn't do half bad.

The rest of Draco's holiday went off without a hitch. He and Lucius didn't talk to each other for the rest of the time period. Lucius was angry for having an eleven year old show him up, and Draco just didn't want to talk to him. Draco decided to not mention his little incidence with Lucius to his friends, he didn't want them to get all worked up over it. As far as he was concerned, it was just one stupid fight. Not a world war, and that's what all his friends would make it out to be.

By the time winter break was over all of the small cuts and not so bad bruises were gone, all that were left were the worst of the welts. And they barely hurt anymore, and as far as Draco was concerned, that was that. The day he was to go back to Hogwarts he saw hide nor hair of his father, which was a blessing. So he left without so much as a good-bye to anyone.

While on the train Draco didn't talk to anyone, he just sat in his own compartment and read. Even though many fellow Gryffindors came to goof off or talk with him, he just told them he needed to be alone for a while and they left. He fell asleep not ten minutes after the Hogwarts Express left and was awaken with a harsh jolt when the train ride came to a halt. When everyone got off the train Hermione, Ron, and Harry were all waiting for Draco.

"I fell asleep! Can you believe it? I've never been able to fall asleep on a train before!" he smiled and then continued to talk. "That was the most boring two weeks of my life, I'm staying here next winter. How did it go here?"

"It was... okay, you know. Nothing special." Hermione said, trying to make Draco feel better about not being there.

"And that translates to, we had a great time and we don't want you to feel left out. Right?"

"Sort of," Harry told his friend almost guiltily.

"It's okay, why should I be upset that you guys had fun just because I didn't?" he grinned and started towards the school.

No one asked Draco much about his holiday, first of all because they all knew it probably sucked, second because everyone was so happy to be back at school they just didn't ask. Draco didn't even feel ignored, he felt relieved, it was like winter break had never happened. At dinner everything was going fine, until the Slytheirns came over to their table.

"So, Malfoy, I hope we didn't get you into too much trouble with your father." Pansy said, almost sounding earnest, almost.

"No, not at all. In fact, we had a wonderful little chat, where we both agreed you should shove it up your ass. And I know you four wanted to get me into trouble, but you really didn't, so better luck next time. Bye now!" when Draco looked back a few moments later they had left. "Wow I hate them,"

"What'd they mean?" Hermione titled her head slightly.

"Oh, Lucius decided to have a little dinner thing and they all came with their parents and tried to get me into trouble. Harry, any idea who gave you the Invisibility Cloak?"

"I really don't know, it could have been Hagrid..." Draco had expertly been able to direct the conversation away from him for the rest of the night.

The very next morning Ron seemed oddly quite, but no one thought anything of it. They ate breakfast and went to Potions with the Slytheirns, as usual. Snape had partnered them off into pairs. Hermione was with Crabbe, Harry with Parkinson, Ron was with Draco, and so on. Mainly Slytheirn with Gryffindor, in fact, Draco and Ron were the only two working with someone in their own house.

"So... we're making a truth potion... Professor Snape, don't you think that's a little advanced for a first year class?" Hermione asked while everyone else got started.

"Miss Granger, I'll have you know I am a bit more experienced with potions than you and know more about what first years can and can't do, and that if you poor excuses want to pass your potions class you better get going," she made a little squeak of fear and went straight to work.

Ron and Draco didn't talk much, they had to work so close together before and it made them both uncomfortable. Draco often found Ron giving him this sad look before turning back to their potion. At the end of class when everyone left Draco took his usual slow pace and Ron hung back. They walked together through the hallway without saying anything for a few moments. Then Ron, very nervously, started to ask him a question, but he mumbled so much Draco couldn't understand a word he said.

"What did you just say? I didn't get a word of it you were muttering so much,"

"Never mind, I have to go talk to Harry,"

"Okay..." Ron went ahead to where Harry was and Draco just kept walking at his usual pace. He would have a chance to figure out what Ron was trying to say when he was in Charms, he had a seat right next to Harry.

In Charms, however, Harry was very silent and Draco couldn't get a full answer out of him. It didn't help that Hermione kept interrupting him in the middle of a sentence, also seeming very tense. Draco gave up until lunch, when he sat down with them at the deserted end of the table.

"What the bloody hell is wrong with you three?" Draco was now getting really angry.

"Nothing..." Ron said quietly.

"Yeah, right, and I'm the god damn Easter Bunny! What the hell is up with all of you? Why are you so quiet?"

"Fine..." Hermione looked down at the table before continuing. "Last night, Ron say a bunch of welts on your back, and we are really..."

"That? That's what this is about?" Draco looked relieved. "Thank god, I thought something else was wrong, like maybe someone found something out they weren't suppose to."

"Draco, you know I would never tell without your permission," Hermione looked at him with a bit of desperation.

"No, you wouldn't, but I know other ways people could find out. About the welts, Lucius and I got into a fight when I was home for vacation."

"He did that to you?" Harry asked anxiously.

"Yeah, but you didn't see what I did back. I broke a rib and cracked two others, I totally screwed up his back, and I almost broke his shin, I should have kicked him harder there. He was so pissed I beat him up worse than he did me he didn't talk to me for the rest of the holiday." he laughed lightly to himself. "It was hilarious!"

Ron, Hermione, and Harry all looked at each other. None of them were sure of what to do, none of them had any doubt in their minds that Draco wasn't capable of or wouldn't fight back as strongly as he said he did, but it was child abuse no matter what way you looked at it.

Dumbledore had said plainly that Lucius wasn't a very good parent, and there was always the question what if Lucius did this again only worse. Draco didn't seem worried about it, or even bothered. It was more like they were siblings than father and son.

Hermione was most worried about Draco getting extremely hurt or even possibly killed, it didn't even seem to register his mind that it would even happen again, much less that if it did it would be worse. Harry and Ron didn't even comprehend that Draco could be killed, they just thought it was freaky that he was so okay with it, but because of that it almost made them okay with it. Both of them figured that if he wasn't worried neither should they, it wasn't their bussiness and if he wasn't terribly hurt there was nothing to be overly concerned with.

Hermione had, at first, thought that Draco was just hiding that he was worried, but as the rest of the meal went on she became aware that he really wasn't nervous about the fight at all. To him it was something that happened that didn't matter anymore because it was over. In fact, she was beginning to suspect that Lucius Malfoy not being a legal guardian to Draco would be a stroke of luck to him. She was almost fully convinced he wouldn't be the slightest bit upset if she went and told Dumbledore right at that moment. All she had to do was ask him and she would find out, and that's just what she intended to do.