The next day it was pretty much the same, except that it was Transfiguration. As the day before, Jade, Neville, Ernie and Draco walked into the Great Hall together to be examined.

The spell they had been working on with rabbits and mice with McGonagall, well, Jade managed to do it on a cow without a problem. She also managed to transform books into cups, which was an extra task.

When all was over, Draco and Jade went straight to the common room to study Herbology, one of their worst classes.

Wednesday wasn't as bad as they only did the practical exam in the morning and then they had the rest of the day off. Jade was satisfied with Charms and Transfiguration and she knew she would get a good grade on both but Herbology was a different story, she felt like she would be lucky getting an 'A' for acceptable.

"Can you produce a Patronus?" the woman in front of Jade asked her.

"Sometimes," she admitted, feeling nervous.

"You can try, if you get it you get an extra point, if you can't, nothing happens."

Jade took her time, she thought again of the time when Draco admitted he not only liked her, but he loved her. Good and happy memories flooded her mind, she whispered the spell and when she opened her eyes, she saw a light blue flash coming out of her wand, Draco turned to look at her, in shock. He didn't know she could do that. In fact, Neville and Ernie had never seen her do it before.

Then as she smiled and felt happy that she had managed to do it on the first try, the light suddenly transformed into a swan, she stared at it in awe, her patronus had never took a form and it seemed that day was the perfect time for it to do it.

"Marvelous!" the woman cried with a smile.

Some of the D.A. members had beautiful patronuses, Harry's doe, Granger's otter, Luna's dog, someone even had a horse but she found her swan to be special and unique. She loved it.

"We haven't even learnt how to do a patronus," Draco whispered as Jade finally left the Great Hall, he was waiting for her outside.

"It's one of the things I learnt with Potter," Jade admitted. "I wasn't able to do it for a long time. Do you know when I finally managed to do it?"

"No, when?"

"After the first time you told me you loved me," Jade said with a smile and a slight blush.

"Really?" Jade nodded and blushed a bit more. Draco smiled.

Besides what Jade did in there, she wasn't too happy with her performance. She wasn't able to fight off a boggart. She told the examiner she couldn't really do that but the witch insisted.

Her boggart had changed over the years but she wasn't surprised to see the boggart taking the shape of her father. Draco and some of the examiners in the room recognized him.

Jade tried to think of funny things but she couldn't, Finley Lias kept coming at her. Jade knew it wasn't really her father but she couldn't do anything. The examiner had to step in when she saw the man pointing her wand at Jade and then heard the word 'Crucio'. Draco stopped what he was doing, along with Neville, Ernie and the other examiners. He looked sadly at the petrified girl, wanting to go and hug her and comfort her. If the woman hadn't stepped in, he would have. He was ready to jump in and intervene.

Draco and the woman in front of Jade weren't the only ones who were a bit surprised with Jade's boggart. Neville, who was on her left also heard the curse perfectly and he went a little bit pale. His parents were in the Hospital because of that specific curse, it affected him even more than any other person. And Jade didn't like that at least three examiners heard the curse and saw the form of her father, and Neville also heard. Why would she fear such a thing if it hadn't happened? Why would her father be the one thing she feared the most? She knew what had happened wasn't good at all.

Friday was free for Jade and for many other students as most didn't take Ancient Runes. She woke up slightly later than usual, went for breakfast and then went to the library to study Potions and Arithmancy.

After lunch, Draco almost begged her to go around the Hogwarts grounds with him and just take a break, her brain would just stop working from using it so much, or so he claimed. Jade didn't want to waste a second but she got to admit she was starting to confuse things a little and her capacity to memorize stuff had decreased. Maybe a break wouldn't be so bad.

Jade found herself smiling and laughing with Draco, even stealing a kiss or two along the way. Completely forgetting how stressful these exams had been and how tormentous these last weeks had been.

But it seemed like Draco wasn't there to forget, he was there to talk. Jade had commented she wanted to get back inside to study a bit more but Draco asked her to stay a bit longer as he needed to discuss certain matters with her.

"Okay, what is it?" Draco was never that serious, never used that sort of vocabulary so Jade was a bit nervous of what was going on. "Are you breaking up with me?"

"Why would you think that?" Draco asked, shocked. "No, I don't want to break up with you."

"Okay, what is so important then?"

"I've been thinking a lot lately. And every time I think we shouldn't really do it, more things happen, like what your father did to you, or finding out Cassius has a bastard, half-blood French son, or even your coma and your sort of gift you got after you woke up," Draco said, worry and concern were written all over his face.

"Yeah, it's been a tough year."

"Jade, I know we are young. I just turned sixteen and you are fifteen and we might not know many grown-up things or be that skillful or have the support we need and I know we haven't been dating for a long time, but we know each other since we were babies, so, I think I would be considering this even if we weren't together."

"What?" Jade asked, she was frowning, thing that she normally didn't do.

"I think we shouldn't go back home after school is over. I think we should try our luck somewhere else, together. We... especially you, can't keep on like this. Fearing your own father using Crucio on you is not normal and I saw how much it affected you, and it's normal, of course it should affect you, you know? But you shouldn't go through that... We can't really just tell anyone what we think or feel so we should just go."

"Go where exactly?" Jade asked in disbelief.

"Anywhere."

"Do you realize we are in the middle of these really important exams? We are trying to get good grades so we can have good jobs... If we do that, if we run away, I doubt we can come back to school. They'll be looking for us in here. And both of us would be nothing. We might have rich families but if we do that we'd have nothing."

"It doesn't matter, Jade."

"It does. How are we going to survive? We would need to pay rent, buy food. How are we going to get a job? First of all, we would only do five years out of seven of school and people usually don't accept that and second, we would still be underage, it wouldn't be legal to work and people would take advantage of us. And we wouldn't be able to use magic as we would still have the trace, they'd find us."

"It will be hard at first but I think we can make it."

"What if we don't? We can't go back home... once we do something like that, there is no turning back. We won't be welcome with open arms and just get a small punishment... no. They won't consider us family anymore, it would be like if we were dead and if we do try to go back we might as well be dead."

"I wouldn't be considering this if I didn't think we could actually do it," Draco told her. "Yeah, we'll do sacrifices but it will be worth it. Two years from now you'll be graduating Hogwarts and marrying Cassius. You don't know what awaits us during those two years. More suffer, more worry, more death eaters, just dark stuff. You said you think you brother might be one of them, what if we become Death Eaters too?"

"I think we should think about this, we still have some time in school. But I actually think we shouldn't do it. We should see how things are these following months, and maybe just study one more year, it can be helpful. And next year we learn how to apparate, that can be handy. And we should learn other stuff, you know? Maybe become animagus so we can hide. Maybe also get some money while we figure out what to do. And it would be good if at least one of us isn't underage."

"I agree, all those things can be helpful but I think things are bad enough now. I think we shouldn't wait. I can find someone to teach us how to apparate. Maybe if we tell Snape or someone like that they can help us become animagus and lend us a hand."

"Do you really think Snape would support this? He's a teacher and sort of friends with our families. We can't be foolish. If we do run away, we got to go somewhere far where no one knows us and tell no one."

"I was thinking we could live in the Muggle world for a bit, maybe a year. Wizard money is more valuable than Muggle money so we would have loads."

"That wouldn't work, first, how do we even get the money? I don't have anything with me at the moment. I'd have to go back home, go to the bank, explain why I want money and probably go with my mother. And second,Muggles are grown-ups at age eighteen, not seventeen so we would be kids, no one would rent us a place. And third, we wouldn't be able to use magic at all, the Ministry could track our wands as we are underage."

"How do you even know that?"

"I've taken Muggle Studies this year... to learn. It's quite interesting to be honest. But anyway, I'd be fifteen Draco, if someone knows, they would take me away as I would be a kid. You too, Draco."

"What do we do then?"

"Think about it," Jade told him. "Make a plan. Write down possibilities, dangers, consequences, probably write a plan B and C too. And act with our brains not our emotions. Not out of fear."

"I just can't see you suffer anymore. I can deal with my issues but you, Jade, your father will kill you if he keeps doing what he is doing and if your brother already joined them, it's just a matter of time before he makes you join too and I don't want that... and I don't want you marrying Cassius... in all those scenarios, I'd lose you and I don't want to lose you," Draco said almost crying. "You are my only true friend and I think, the love of my life, so I need to get you out of there, I need to protect you."

Jade stared at Draco with tears in her own eyes. She opened her mouth as she felt like telling him that she also loved him but she couldn't find her voice. Something in her was stopping her.

If she said those words it would mean that they definitely would need to run away, as none would accept a miserable life away from each other and she was also scared of losing him. She had never loved anyone before and loving someone and everything that meant was a bit of a terrying thought.

Draco and Jade didn't bring up the topic again during the weekend, but it was very present on their minds. Jade could have the best grade in every class in every examination but that didn't mean she was ready for the real world, she didn't know lots of things and she felt overwhelmed by her thoughts and all the scenarios she was making in her mind.

Jade found herself stuck in certain questions of Potions that Monday, her mind was somewhere else. She sort of wished Draco could have waited a few days to drop that bomb as now she was focused on something else and not her exams.

Later that afternoon, Jade messed up two potions and she normally wasn't like this. And she didn't have enough time to finish it, so her sample would probably be not good enough for an acceptable grade.

On Tuesday they had Care of Magical Creatures, and as usual the written examination was in the morning and the practical one in the afternoon. Luckily, despite not being concentrated, Jade didn't mess up as bad as with potions.

Wednesday was one of the worst days. They had their written Astronomy exam in the morning and then Jade had Arithmancy in the afternoon while Draco had Divination. Luckily Jade had dropped divination that year. And just before midnight they had their practical examination for Astronomy.

Jade loved Astronomy but she hated having to stay up so long for the class and for the exan and not being able to have more time to sleep the next morning. But Jade found it nice to be in another place than the Great Hall, as they have spents several hours in that place for the last few days. Eating and doing their exams there.

She was labelling a constelation, almost two hours had passed since they started the examination, when she noticed Harry wasn't really into the exam, looking down at the grounds rather that at the sky. Jade felt curiosity and was going to see what was so interesting when she and everyone around her heard a roar.

"Try and concentrate now," Professor Tofty, one of the examiners said but it was hard to do so.

Jade tried to use her telescope again, she was just checking Jupiter's moons when a loud bang was heard. Lots of people jumped from the shock and bumped their faces against the telescopes.

"What's going on?" Jade asked not being able to keep her mouth shut.

"This is an examination young lady, please return to your chart," Professor Tofty said.

But no one in the room was paying attention to the exam, they were looking down at the grounds where aurors were trying to stun Hagrid.

"Look!" Parvati exclaimed.

Everyone turned to look and they saw a slender figure walking out of the castle. They could tell it was McGonagall, she demanded the other six people to leave Hagrid alone.

"Only sixteen minutes left, you know!" Professor Tofty exclaimed but no one was paying attention to him.

"How dare you?" McGonagall exlaimed. "Leave him alone! On what grounds are you attacking him? He has done nothing to warrant such..."

Three girls screamed and everyone else was shocked. At least four of the aurors had shot spells at McGonagall. The red lights hit her and she landed hard on her back and from the little they could see from where they were, she didn't seem to move any more.

"Outrageous behaviour!" Tofty, who now seemed to have forgotten about the exam too, exclaimed. "Not so much as a warning!"

Hagrid managed to knock out two out of the five aurors, and the three remaining hesitated as Umbridge urged them to get Hagrid, who had Fang on his arms. Hagrid ran and by luck Umbridge didn't hit him with her spell and then he disappeared from sight. He had escaped.

"Uh, five minutes to go, everybody," Tofty said, remembering they were in the middle of an exam.

Tofty didn't give them extra time and most people didn't have enough time to finish the chart. As Jade walked down the spiral staircase she could hear several people talking about the incident. At some point she also listened to someone's thoughts but she wasn't sure whose. But it was from a girl.

"Isn't that cowardly? Sneak like that without a warning in the middle of the night?" Jade said, to be honest Umbridge's behaviour didn't surprise her anymore but she was upset. "And poor McGonagall."

"She'll be alright."

"Those were four spells right in the chest, Draco. And she isn't young, you know?"

"Do you see all of this? This is another reason why we should go, Jade," Draco said in a quieter tone.

Jade knew that the Slytherins liked gossip but she noticed they didn't care enough about McGonagall or Hagrid so they went to bed, while every student from the other houses kept up a bit to discuss the matter further.

Jade stayed up all night, not only thinking of what she just saw but also Draco's request again. She couldn't get it out of her head.

Honestly, I really love Astronomy. I wanted to study Astrophysics at some point but I couldn't find a place for that. Do you also like it or not so much?

What do you think of Draco's idea? Should they run away?