Disclaimer: Doesn't belong to me, never will. Darn.

Thanks to Dom for beta reading again, and putting up with my terrible spelling.

***

ENTER THE DRAGON

***

Draco Malfoy sighed angrily in his potions lessons. This term had been the most boring he's ever encountered. The day before he had come back to Hogwarts his father had taken him aside to have 'a word'.

"Listen carefully Draco, because I'm not going to repeat myself." He's hissed when he's been sure that Narcissa was elsewhere "You are to stay away from Potter and Weasley this year, do you understand? Do nothing to aggravate them, nothing. Don't even make any cheap shots at the filthy mudblood they hang around with. And if I hear that you have even mentioned the death of that little Weasley where they can hear you, I will hang you up in the dungeons and leave you there."

"Why do you care if I hurt Weasley's feelings?" Draco asked.

"Because people are already suspicious of my connection with the. incident that killed her. If my son is seen goading one of the victims family members, it will not look good on me."

You think I'm stupid, don't you? Draco had thought to himself afterwards, you think I didn't notice you sneaking something into the manor that night, and didn't connect it to you banning me from a wing of the house that I never went to anyway. She's in here somewhere, and I'm going to use that against you.

But he'd done as his father had asked, mainly out of pure fear. So he had spent half a term trying to stay out of the trio's way, and being thoroughly bored. To keep his mind occupied, he's taken to cursing Crabbe randomly. Goyle went along with it, mainly because he was glad it wasn't him being cursed.

"Accio book." Draco said after a while, and watched with satisfaction as his huge volume of 'Most Potent Potions' hit Crabbe in the head.

"Ow!" Crabbe muttered, glaring at Goyle, who was laughing.

"Mr Malfoy." Snape scorned, but said nothing else. Potter and Weasley glared at him, and to stop himself from making some sort of remark, he turned around to flirt with Pansy Parkinson.

"You know, I think you've gone soft on those Gryffindors." Said Blaise Zabini after a while, she was sitting next to Pansy "You never try and curse them anymore."

"Father has advised me to stay away from them for a while." Draco explained, glaring at the pretty dark haired girl. If under a truth telling curse, he would have admitted that he was far more attracted to Blaise then he was to Pansy, but she was too intelligent for him. Not that she was more intelligent that him, he just preferred his girls to be less intelligent than him, so they wouldn't question his ways.

"And you obey all your fathers orders?" Blaise asked pointedly.

"I listen to his advice, Zabini, I don't obey his orders." Which was a lie of course. Draco was terrified of his father, and would probably do anything to stay in his good books.

"Mr Malfoy, Miss Parkinson, Miss Zabini, please write down what I've written on the board." Snape called. Draco turned around, and groaned when he saw the word 'HOMEWORK' written above a large amount of small writing. He pulled out his eagle feather quill and scribbled it down hurriedly.

"I expect three roles of parchment on polyjuice potions by the end of the holidays." The Potions master called. Draco saw Potter and Granger exchange quick grins, which left him puzzled. Granger probably knew everything about that potion already, but what would Potter know? Maybe she'd held him down and forced him to listen to her recite her notes on it.

When the bell rang for them to leave, Draco released a satisfied sigh. The half term had ended, and he got to go home for a week.

***

This half term had been hard for Ron. Everyone seemed depressed at the beginning, but after a few weeks, everyone had cheered up a bit, except for him. Harry and Hermione did their best to make him feel better, but it just wasn't working. Despite his earlier beliefs that people hadn't been honouring Ginny properly by being silent and glum, it was even worse now that everyone was feeling better. It felt like they were forgetting her, and Neville and the others.

He had felt better after the funeral, but only slightly. He had been allowed to return home for the weekend, and they had held a small ceremony in the local church. Afterwards the whole family had returned to the Burrow, and that had stayed up all night talking about her, telling stories. Several times aunts and uncles had convinced him to tell a story or two of his own, and people had smiled and patted his back. Percy hadn't attended.

He wrote to his mother twice a week now, for his sake more than hers. Family had always surrounded him, and now he was alone. He had to reassure himself that there were people waiting for him to come home.

"Mum's invited you to come stay with us over the half term." Ron said as he collapsed into the comfy chair in the common room.

"That'd be nice, I'll write to my parents and get they're permission." Hermione said.

"Yeah, I've been meaning to right to Remus for a while now anyway." Harry nodded. Before Sirius had died he's written in his will that the Guardianship of Harry was to be passed over to Remus Lupin, who had accepted happily.

"That is." Hermione began nervously "If you want us to come."

Ron was startled. It had honestly never occurred to him that he'd want to spend time away from his best friends. After Cedric's death, Harry had reacted by pushing them away, but for Ron, things were different. Harry had never had a family, and was used to being alone. Ron, on the other hand, had always had his family, and needed people to help with grief.

"Of course I want you to come, you're just as much part of my family as my parents." Ron said honestly. Hermione smiled gratefully, and Harry coughed, trying to hide the tears that had sprung to his eyes.

The three of them headed up to the Owlery to send the letters. Hedwig soared down as soon as they walked in, and landed on Harry's shoulder, affectionately nipping him on the ear. Hermione picked a fast looking eagle owl, and stroked it once or twice before fastening the letter to its leg.

"Be quick, ok? We need the reply soon, so pester Lupin until he replies." Harry said. Hedwig puffed up importantly, and swooped out, shortly followed by the eagle owl.

"I really should get an owl." Hermione muttered, as they watched the two beautiful birds fly away.

"Maybe." Ron started, and faltered, before beginning again. "Maybe you can get the money from you parents for Christmas, and we can go to D-Diagon Alley during the Christmas holidays."

Hermione took his hand and squeezed it, and Harry patted his shoulder.

"Maybe we can."

***

It was so dark and scary, she could barely move out of fear. And the worst part was she knew that this was inside of her, that this was part of who she was. She was filled with darkness and evil, his darkness and evil.

"You haven't visited me for so long Ginny." Came his voice, crawling over her body like silk. Only she knew it wasn't really her body, only a representation of it. He couldn't hurt her. Well.she didn't think he could hurt her.

"I've been busy." She muttered. It was such a relief to hear her voice, after that long silence. This darkness was better than the nothingness, no matter how scary.

"To busy for me? But I thought you loved me." There was genuine surprise in his voice, and he sounded so young. When she had written to him she had only been eleven and he had seemed so old, but now she was only a year younger than him.

"I did love you, but that was years ago, I've moved on." She explained, "Can I see you?"

"I'm not sure, I'm a bit confused as to where I am." There was a pause, "What do you mean, years?"

"It's been years since I last wrote to you. Over three years." He really did sound young, and confused, in a sweet endearing way. But she knew him well enough to know that there was something else. Even though she had never heard his voice before, she had always known what it would have sounded like, and she knew that under all his innocent confusion, there was a huge amount of anger. He hated not being in control.

"Oh."

"And we're in my mind, just in case you're wondering." She explained. The darkness was no longer so scary, just very calm. And even if he was a psychotic killer, he was company, and that was something she had been longing for, for weeks.

"Your mind. Well, if it's your mind, can't you control it? Any maybe turn on some lights?" He asked playfully.

"I suppose." She tried to concentrate on light. She fixed an image in her mind and focused on it, trying to will herself there.

She opened her eyes to see the familiar setting of the burrow kitchen.

"Is that better Tom?"

***

"Well, this is interesting."

"You'll have to explain, I have no idea what all these squiggly things mean."

"Well, we have two sets of M-Waves overlapping each other. At the moment they're about equal, so I'm guessing that they're match for match."

"Impossible. She's just a child, and not particularly powerful. A healing magic student if what I've heard is to be believed. He is the young incarnation of the Dark Lord. They cannot possibly be match for match. The most likely probability is that they're actually not fighting."

"Not fighting! But if they don't fight, all this will be for nothing. We'll just have a young girl's body with nothing to do with it.Hm."

"Don't be vulgar."

"What? Oh, sorry. What I'm saying is; if they don't fight, how will he take over her body and join our side?"

"Fool! Do you know nothing of our master, the Dark lord? Even in his younger days he had people eating out of the palm of his hand. Give him a few days and she'll give him her body willingly. And take that look of your face, you disgusting man."

***

The replies had arrived just in time, and Harry and Hermione had been able to visit the Weasley's over the holiday. Charlie had returned to Romania, but Bill was still staying at home, and there was someone else staying at the Burrow when they returned.

"Percy?" Ron's alarmed voice rang through the hall when he saw his older brother standing by the door.

"Hello Ron how was your trip home?" He smiled thinly, "Oh, Hello Hermione. Harry."

"What are you doing here?" Ron demanded.

"Well, as I wasn't able to make it to Ginny's. funeral. I thought it would be a good idea to stop by here." He explained.

"And why couldn't you make in to Ginny's funeral? Was there a meeting with the Minister of Magic? Tea with the High Wizard that you just couldn't miss? Ski trip to the Antarctic with the Foreign Minister of bloody Nepal!" Ron shouted and his startled looking brother.

"Ron, please." Mr Weasley pleaded.

"No dad, I want to know what was so important that he could miss his little sister's funeral. I want to know what he cared more about than Ginny." Ron's face was flushed red and he was bearing his teeth "You're a crap brother, you've always cared more about your career than you cared about us. But you missed Ginny's funeral, the last chance you'd ever have to say goodbye to her. Why, Percy? What career-furthering event clashed with our baby sister's funeral?"

"Nothing. I was just too ashamed to show my face. Too scared that I'd ruin it, that you'd turn me away." He said curtly, before turning around and disappearing up the stairs.

"I wish I'd explained it all to you before you got home." Mr Weasly said sadly, "He truly is sorry for what happened between us all, and I really think he was too scared to come to the funeral."

"Yeah." Ron shrugged, his face back to its normal colour, but his ears still red "Well.whatever."

Harry and Hermione dragged their suitcases up the stairs into Ron's bedroom. Hermione was sleeping in Ron's room for the next two weeks, because no one felt comfortable with the idea of her sleeping in Ginny's old room. Mrs Weasley lined them up and made them promise not to get up to anything, and the three teenagers, blushing furiously, agreed.

"As if we would!" Ron said afterwards "I mean, no offence Hermione, but you're like a sister to me."

"No offence taken." Hermione assured him as she pulled out several roles of parchment from her bag.

"What are you doing?" Harry asked.

"I'm starting on the potions homework." She said, looking startled as he begun to tug at the parchment, "What are you doing?"

"It's a rule." Ron told her solemnly as he helped Harry wrestle the homework from her bunched fists. "No homework in Ronald Weasley's room."

"But that's ridiculous!" Hermione insisted as they dragged her into the garden to help degnome it.

***

Draco's arrival at King's Cross Station was uneventful, other than the change in the greeting party. Instead of just the driver, his mother had arrived as well.

"Surprise!" She called, looking overly cheerful.

"Mother?" Was his only reply.

"Aren't you pleased to see me?" She asked.

"No, just surprised." He said honestly. She looked deeply hurt by this.

"You're cruel, just like your father." She pointed out sadly.

"Well mother, I like to think that I'm cruel in a different and far more interesting way."

"Well, if you're not going to be polite, I won't either." She bent over and grabbed him by the arm, surprising him "Listen to me Draco, because believe it or not I have your best interest at heart. Please stay away from your father this holiday. Visit friends, go on day trips, come over with the flu, come over with death! I don't care; just don't get in his way. If you upset him too badly then I can't protect you, and you're the only person in the world I care about anymore."

Draco was speechless. In all his life, his mother had never been so forward, or direct. He was so used to her being the doting wife and mother; it had never occurred to him that she had any passion in her.

"Ok mother, I'll try." He said. He suddenly felt bad about always being so cruel to her. She was his mother, and in his odd little way he did care for her a bit, and he didn't want her upset. On a random impulse, he placed his hand on her arm and whispered, "I love you mother."

"That was kind, but you don't have to lie to me." She replied, placing a small kiss on his temple. Draco drooped miserably, because, as horrible as it was, he had lied.

***

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