Disclaimer: Harry Potter and all characters, places et al. are owned by J.K. Rowling

A/N: another one :) Hope you enjoy.

Chapter 15

"For a word, Potter," Snape called out from his desk. He looked at Draco, but he just shrugged. He was turning back into the dungeon when he spoke again, "Alone."
Draco shrugged again mouthed "I wait outside" and left.
Harry stepped closer to Professor Snape. He had known his good luck wasn't meant to last, but it had been really nice to be left unmolested by Snape the last weeks. Hermione still nearly went berserk as Harry's grades topped hers. That was just a topping, though.
Looking at the Professor, he wasn't sure what to expect. He seemed to hold Harry in a cold, calculating glare, unlike the disgust and hatred of former times. He wasn't sure what was worse.
"Is something wrong, Professor?" Harry asked innocently.
"Well," Snape slowly spoke, "of course you wouldn't have thought that your attack on Slytherin students yesterday morning would go unnoticed, would you?"
Harry was silent for a few more seconds. "Not really," he admitted finally. "Whatever you may say or do, they still deserved it."
Snape slightly inclined his head to the left and again looked in a funny way at him. "Be that as it may, Potter-" and the way he pronounced his name still sounded, almost, like an insult, "-why should I ignore it and not have you in detention for a week?"
"If your house's students would behave, we wouldn't have this conversation," Harry said hotly.
Snape chuckled. "Getting even more reckless by the day, Potter. I give you that. Either you are suddenly developing delusions of grandeur or there is really something behind your façade." He took his wand out and played with its tip. "Of course I know of your budding, ah, relationship with Mr. Malfoy. Not that it would be a secret, anyway. So I have talked with Mr. Crabbe and Mr. Goyle. And given the things they finally revealed, they really deserved it." His glance suddenly held a different feeling. Harry was tempted to call it honesty. "Think of me as you like, and I know you think a lot of things that would get you into deep trouble, I am not taking this kind of events lightly. Open violence between house members is intolerable." That fights between houses is something entirely different naturally went unspoken. "Thus, I let you go unpunished for this. But a warning, Potter," he lowered his head, "this relationship between Mr. Malfoy and you is, especially for the nobler family's, an affront. I would learn to control my temper when it comes down to Mr. Malfoy a bit more if I were you. It would become your future in this school."
Harry was puzzled and obviously looked it. "Why are you telling me that?"
Snape simply brushed a hand through the air. "Enough, Potter. I have not all day for this. Just heed my advice. Off you go."
Still puzzled, Harry walked out. As he closed the door, Draco was on him. "What did he do? It was not for yesterday, was it?"
"No-Yes-I don't know. He just said we should be careful. Dunno why."
"Well, just take every bit of luck you can get," Draco laughed.
The curious feeling dissolved as he saw Draco laugh. It was almost like magic.

"So, what do we have?" Elizabeth asked her assistant. Comfortably lying back in her chair her eyes wandered around her office. It was a dusty mess, littered with rolls of parchment, evidence, and half-eaten snacks, but it was her mess. Across the desk, Phil was hunched over a parchment holding the names of students Dumbledore had promised.
"It's as we guessed," he looked up. "Almost all the students who were old enough to go, did so. Only fourteen stayed at Hogwarts, which leaves a rather long list for us to look over."
"Can't we narrow it down a little more?"
"A bit," he nodded. "We can leave the ones too small for the footprints we found. We still have to go over all the rest. Their alibis, where they were,…"
She silently chewed on a pencil and pondered. She couldn't get that one scene out of her mind. "Might as well start with Harry Potter;" she simply said.
Phil just sighed. "Oh please Elizabeth," his eyes were almost pleading. "Just leave this, will you?"
"But you saw him, too, in Hogwarts. He attacked these boys, and when he found out who we were - switched from hot-headed teenager to calculating and cold-blooded within a second. That is suspicious."
"That can be said for many people."
"But those eyes," she tipped her chair back a bit. "I just have this feeling-"
"Please don't do that to me," Phil now actually whined. "You do remember the last time you had 'this feeling'?"
"That was something completely different," she exclaimed.
"The hell it was. The last 'feeling' exploded in your face so spectacularly that if it wasn't for Chief Bennson having been a good friend of your father you'd be scrubbing toilets in some godforsaken mental asylum."
"But-"
"But this time it is even worse. Harry Potter of all people!" he threw his hands up in despair. "If we don't have absolutely watertight evidence they'll have your badge for it and you have wrecked what last bit of career you, and I, might have. It's the bloody Boy-Who-Lived."
"I know," she said silently. Partially, she knew he was right. She had followed her gut and it led her into a chasm of bad luck; she even ignored evidence that went against her feeling. Still, the feeling was there. "Just let us think about it again, ok?"
Phil breathed heavily. "Ok."
"We have a dead Death Eater," she said.
"Check." Phil nodded.
"And we have evidence that someone was hanging from that tree at the time of his death."
"Check."
"We have some footprints."
"Check," he nodded again.
"And a presence of a very obscure kind of magic."
"Check, again."
"So, let my thoughts wander for a moment," her voice went into speculation mode. "Nelfayn was torturing the someone from the tree, was somehow surprised by a person following him and ultimately killed. Unknown person freed hanging person and fled together."
Phil thought about if shortly and then nodded. "A possibility. And now what?"
She tipped her hand towards a copy of the Daily Prophet. "Lucius Malfoy is still on the run, we haven't heard of him. I'm sure we would have, one way or the other. He hasn't had to be shy about being a Death Eater now. What if he left his master?"
"He wouldn't-"
"What if he did? Would He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named tolerate it? Wouldn't he do something to punish him?"
"Like?"
"Like assassinating his son? He and Potter are a couple now. The way he reacted in the school. Who knows what he does in worse situations?"
"But this weird magic? And an Unforgivable?" Phil said, still unconvinced.
"He has been through enough grave situations; he has seen things none of us has. Who knows?"
"But lets think again," Phil went on. "Let's go on this Lucius tangent." Elizabeth winced. "Just forget your past, ok? Now, what if it was, say, Lucius on the rope, who came here to meet his son, got captured, tortured, somehow freed himself – he is rather resourceful, one doesn't flee Azkaban just so – and the footprints are his son's who came looking for him?"
Elizabeth shook her head. "That's-"
"Just as likely, or unlikely, as your idea. We just don't have enough evidence to say anything with something even remotely like certainty. We should look at the case open-minded and present our findings when we're done. But until that, we should handle this as unobtrusive as possible. And even if it was Potter, who cares? Nalfayn was a Death Eater, he had it coming. No one gives a rat's ass about him."
"Justice, Phil," Elizabeth said with a calm voice, "Justice. I am not crying a tear for Nalfayn, but murder, even of scum like that, is still murder. I can't forget that."
"Ok," he waved her down, "ok. But please don't blow our careers this time. Please."

"You're bloody crazy," Draco said aloud. Draco was sitting across him up in the astronomy tower and luckily no one could hear them speak due to the marvellous wonder of the silencing spell.
"I don't think I am. I need the information, and this is as good an idea as any," he answered him.
"How do you even know I can do it?" Draco asked him with a slightly defiant edge.
"You great families certainly have ways, obscure ones, highly secretive. I know you can contact your father."
A slightly pained tone crept into his voice. "Maybe I can, ok. But even if, why should he give you the names of his fellows? Now that he is no longer with Voldemort doesn't mean he is on the 'good' side, either. You are not exactly popular with my father."
"Your father is an opportunist. An ambitious one, but still. He dropped off into hiding as soon as Voldemort was gone, and when he was strong again stood by his side again. Now that Voldemort seems to be vulnerable, with his latest scheme blown and after his time in Azkaban, he decided to wait out who would win and switch sides accordingly. And if you tell him they were after your life, he might be in even less inclination to support Voldemort. That leaves him with the 'good' side. If he helps us, me, he can always claim to have redeemed himself and manage to come out of this with minimal damage."
Draco just looked straight into Harry and swallowed hard. "Sadly, that fits my father's personality to the t. Cashing in on murder attempts on his son…"
"You'll do it?"
"I will, yeah," Draco pressed his hand. "But I'm not sure if it will work, or how long it might take."
"Well, I'll just have to wait then, don't I?"
"Yes, But you're still crazy. You can't even call that thing a plan. You might be sure of your abilities, but against the opposition we'll face…" Draco said.
Harry pulled Draco down with him on the blanket, cuddling. "I can't just wait here in school until my end comes. I have to do something. Fulfil a destiny if you will. I don't know. It may not be good, it might make me worse than the enemy I fight, but if I – if we win, who'll care? We can have anything, do anything, and no one will be able stop us then. Isn't this something to fight for? A life of our own?"