Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter. If I did I would hire a voice teacher. So that I could be a pop-star. Sounds like fun, huh?

IMPORTANT NOTICE: This is the last time I'm noting that because of the deleted chapter 2, all chapters are knocked back one placement. If you didn't know that chpt 2 was once just a disclaimer for chapter one (which still stands) then you don't need to read this.

louey31: thank you, it's always great to here from new people

Alexandria J.Malfoy: yay for hyperness, lol. Here's more.

DCoD: Your reviews are a source of great encouragement. Thanks.

Guineviere: On your fav. list? wow, thanks

Now onto the next chapter. Wooot!

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Draco barely made it home without collapsing and wordlessly handed Rolly his things. He had been planning on going up to his room and sleeping in his bed, but his room was on the third floor at the very end of the west wing, so he made his way to his study, which was on the first floor, and collapsed there on the brown leather couch beside his desk.

Work had comprised of going to Gringott's at six in the morning to get the money he had promised to the hospital, and then heading straight to the office to prepare a bunch of statements and speeches for the news. He had given press conferences after newspaper interviews after more press time. He had then been asked by Minister Lupin to give a quick, impromptu briefing about the economy to himself, his cabinet, and a few select others. The quick briefing turned out to be two and a half hours long and immediately afterwards Draco had been hounded by the press again. He had then returned to his office to go over the finances with his accountants and that had taken another two hours. He had consumed so much coffee in the morning that his stomach was rebelling as he hadn't eaten since breakfast, so he forced himself to only have water while he went over the budget, and now that the caffeine was out of his system, he crashed. Crashed hard.

And that was why he was sprawled face down on his sofa without the energy to move, but his shoes were uncomfortable and so were the buttons on his shirt. He stifled a groan, but sat up and pulled his shoes off and then unbuttoned his shirt. He didn't have the energy to take it off so he left it on and lay back down. His last image before he passed out from exhaustion was the clock that read four twenty-five.

He was lying in a field. His first thought was that the colors were way too intense. The long, blowing grass was an emerald green, the sky was the color of a robin's egg, the large, white puffy clouds were snow white and although they were blowing in the soft breeze, they never once passed in front of a sun so yellow it reminded him of the daffodils that grew in the gardens outside of Malfoy Estate. He frowned and stood up; something was wrong. No, not wrong, just missing. He couldn't describe it, but he knew that something was gone. He walked to the edge of the meadow, noticing a brook running merrily over silver stones next to golden sand. He looked into the sapphire water and saw his reflection, no it wasn't his. The face was older, the features too broad, the eyes too full of pride and disdain.

You don't have everything yet, whispered the wind. But until then, I'll be waiting. He couldn't help but think that the voice came from the reflection in the water and he pulled away hastily and began to run back into the field. But, as in most dreams, he tripped and found himself falling, falling, falling until he hit the grass, and he laid there, eyes shut tight as the blades of grass gently fluttered against his cheek. He tried to swipe them away, but was too tired to move.

The grass brushed again and somehow felt much more real. No real wasn't the right word, physical perhaps…no, present. Not quite, he figured hazily, more substantial. Yes, that was the word. More substantial as in tangible, corporal, material. Once his mind settled on that word he was about to drift off again, but the weeds patted his cheek again, and this time he realized that they were slightly damp. He opened his eyes, focusing on the dragon that was stitched onto the shirt of the little boy in front of him. A little boy that was tapping his cheek with fingers that he had probably been sucking on. He groaned and wiped his cheek and the little boy grinned.

"Dragon," he moaned. "What are you doing?"

The child held up a book featuring a picture of a phoenix, unicorn, and dragon on the cover.

"You want me to read it to you?" asked Draco.

Dragon frowned at him.

"You want to read it to me?" he asked.

The boy frowned again, seemingly exasperated. Draco's tired mind finally grasped on the fact that Dragon didn't talk and was obviously annoyed with the references to speech.

"Alright then," he said, not sitting up but rolling onto his side so that the boy had some couch to sit on. "Pictures it is."

Dragon grinned the grin that lit up his dark eyes, clamored up on the couch, and leaned against Draco's stomach. He opened the book and held it so that Draco could see the illustrations as well. There was no need to communicate between the two of them, Dragon seemed to know when they had both finished looking at the pictures and would turned the page. They stayed like that for ten minutes before Fred and George came running in.

"There you are, Dragon," said Fred. "Hullo, Draco."

"You can't keep running away like that," said George to Dragon.

"It's very scary for Uncle George," said Fred. "He nearly had a heart attack."

"Yes, well Uncle Fred nearly wet his pants when we thought we lost you," said George.

Dragon smiled and his body shook, which Draco supposed was laughter.

"And he has the gall to laugh at us," said Fred to George.

"And to think his mother would have skinned us alive if she found out we lost him," said George.

"Lost who?" asked Pansy, coming in then.

"Oh, you're back," said Fred.

"Lost Draco here," said George, trying to convince the mother that her son had not been lost.

"I leave you two, Charlie, and Bill to baby-sit the kids while we women go check on Hermione and you manage to lose my son?" asked Pansy, hands on her hips.

"Course not," said Fred.

"He's with Draco," said George.

"Uh-huh," said Pansy, unconvinced but turning to Draco. "And I suppose you were taking a nap here because you completely over worked yourself at the office and were too tired to go upstairs so you slept on the couch instead. Didn't you promise Molly that you would come home when you were tired?"

"I did come home when I was tired," protested Draco. Which was true, he had been tired when he left the office. "And I wasn't sleeping."

"Which is why your hair is sticking up all over the place and you're lying down with your shoes off and your shirt unbuttoned," said Pansy. "If we weren't having dinner soon, I'd send you straight to your bed. Come Dragon, let Uncle Fred and George take you back to the family room."

Dragon obediently closed the book and slid off of the couch.

"Is that a book you were reading?" asked Pansy. "Can you say 'book'? Or how about 'dragon'?"

The boy visible wilted and Fred and George surprised Draco by stepping in.

"It's alright, Pans," said Fred.

"Yeah, we make enough noise to cover for him," said George. "Isn't that right, Dragon-boy?"

Dragon smiled again, and the smile turned into a grin when George swooped him into the air and took off down the hall, Fred chasing after them crying "No, I want to hold him. Dragon, you want Uncle Fred, don't you?"

Draco watched them disappear from sight, smiling faintly, then realized Pansy was looking at him with the same expression he was beginning to associate with Mrs. Weasley.

"What?" he asked.

"You okay, Draco?" she asked.

"Yeah," he said. "Why?"

"Dunno," she said, her bad grammar betraying her worry. "It's just that we used to talk, you know. Me, you, and Blaise, and you used to tell us stuff, when you were upset, or confused, or when you got in a fight with Lucius. Now, it seems like we don't talk any more."

"We talk," said Draco, sitting up fully.

"Not really," said Pansy. "And I know something's bugging you. What is it?"

Well, if you want the truth, I kissed Ginevra last night, or actually this morning, and I think I'm falling in love with her, and that's a bad thing because…well, because, so there, Draco considered saying. Not to mention she slept on top of me at the hospital, and I've had trouble getting that image out of my head.

"It's just a lot to take in," said Draco, opting for a half truth. "I mean, I hated the Weasleys in school and they hated me, and Lucius killed their dad, and they seem perfectly fine with being around me, they even seem to like me. It's confusing." While that may not be the most pressing thing Draco was concerned with, it still made him wonder.

Pansy sat next to him on the couch. "I think they were wary of you at first," she said. "But you did save their lives during the war. Not only that, but Ginny's only been saying nice things about you, and they decided to trust you."

"She did?" asked Draco, trying to sound causal. Maybe he was too casual about it because Pansy didn't elaborate.

"Mmm-hmm," she said. "Plus, after you practically ran off yesterday, they realized that you didn't have the best of relationships with Lucius, not to mention finding out that you were…mistreated counts for sympathy points."

He nearly bristled at that comment, but he had to remind himself that sympathy and pity were two different things.

"Now then, it's five o'clock and the group is eating over again, but while dinner is cooking we're all hanging out in the family room, so come on."

Draco groaned, flopping back on the couch. Five o'clock meant that he had roughly twenty minutes of sleep and he was tired.

"Draco," said Pansy sternly and he grudgingly sat up, pulled his shoes on, and followed her to the large sun parlor, leaving his dark crimson shirt unbuttoned because he had a white undershirt on as well.

He entered the white and pale blue room with the glass ceiling and outer wall to find absolute and complete chaos. Eleven children were running wild, at least those who could run were running wild. He stared in shock at the kids and then turned to glare at the adults who were laughing at him.

"Alright Draco," said Charlie, coming along side him. "Who is who?"

Draco had an excellent memory; he could tell you exactly what the economy rating was for the past two weeks and spout off the budget allowed, the budget deficit, and the annual income of every one of his companies and also those he had invested in after merely glancing at the sheets, and he had tried to commit names to memory, so he took a deep breath and began.

"Alright, the two kids, the boy and the girl with Fred and George, have to be your twins, Charlie. Gabriella and Michael, who are named after the only two angels mentioned by name in the Bible, if I'm correct."

Charlie nodded, impressed. But is was easy to tell whose they were, they were the only set of twins and not only did they look like each other, but they had a very unusual look with auburn hair, purple eyes like their faerie mother and freckles.

"The boy next to them with the angry expression and the book with the black hair and freckles has got to be Percy and Penny's Emeric," he continued.

"Three down," said Charlie.

"And the other boy with them with the strawberry blond hair and blue eyes has got to be one of Bill and Fleur's," said Draco. "Gavin, right?"

"Yup," said Bill jumping in the conversation. "Which ones are my other two?"

"There's a group of girls in the middle of the room with dolls," said Draco. "The one with the strawberry blonde hair and brown eyes is also yours, her name is Alette, and the one with the straight pale blonde hair and bright blue eyes is Helena. She's named after Helen of Troy, isn't she?" She had to be, she was that gorgeous.

"Yup," said Bill. "Who's the other girl?"

"Straight brown hair, brown eyes, that's got to be Ron and Hermione's eldest Melody."

"How'd you know that?" asked Charlie. "We didn't tell you."

"Snape mentioned her, her godfather is Harry. And the baby girl that Ginevra is holding is Amandine, also Blaise's and so is Dragon with the dark hair and pale skin. And the boy that he's playing with has got to be Zakir, another one of Ron and Hermione's who shares my godfather."

Draco studied his 'little brother', who must have been three years old and his unusual looks rivaled those of the twins. He had a mop of tight curls that were both red and brown at the same time and a smattering of red freckles decorated light tan skin. His eyes were an odd shade of green-brown and he was playing with Dragon. The two of them were sharing a bunch of monster figurines between them; that is Dragon was holding one and studying it intently while Zakir was grabbing one than the other making them fight and eat each other. It was apparent he was a hyper kid because even while he was having the basilisk eat the hippogriff, he was twitching and making animal noises.

"I'm officially impressed," said Bill. "How ever did you do it?"

Draco shrugged. "Paid attention," he said. "Plus, they all look like you guys."

"Would you like to meet them?" asked Charlie, getting a wicked glint in his eyes that Draco thought only the Weasley twins were able to get.

"Oh, no," he said. "Kids don't like me." But it was too late.

"Hey, kids," yelled Charlie. "Meet your Uncle Draco!"

Dragon immediately ran to him and held up his arms. Draco stared at the boy who jerked his arms up again and Draco picked him up with a sigh. Not to be outdone by his silent counterpart, Zakir ran over as well.

"Up," he demanded. Draco looked at Charlie in askance but the Weasley just laughed.

"Kids don't like you?" he asked.

"Up, now," said Zakir. Draco sighed again and bent down. Zakir jumped up, flinging his arms around his neck and Draco hoisted him up with his free arm.

"You're my brother Draco," said Zakir, with surprisingly good English.

"Uh, yes, I suppose so," said Draco.

"So you have to take me flying," said Zakir. He was interrupted by Lida who had come over with her three friends.

"Uncle Draco," she said. "These are my friends, Alette, Helena, and Melody."

"This is your house?" asked Melody, a bossy note in her voice Draco recognized as pure Hermione.

"Yes, it is," said Draco.

"It's very big," she said. "Are you rich?"

"I guess so," said Draco, wondering where this conversation was going.

"Daddy says you have so much money it's disgusting," reported the girl matter-of-factly.

Draco didn't know how to respond and the adults present merely laughed at him. Zakir got bored with sitting still so long and squirmed out of his grasp and proceeded to tug on Melody's ponytail as he ran past. Melody shrieked and picked up her doll and threw it with surprising force at her curly haired brother.

"I'm telling Mum!" the girl shouted. Zakir didn't stop but continued to run around the room for no reason yelling at the top of his lungs. His shouts caused Melody to yell even more, and then Helena chased after Zak, mimicking his movements in an impromptu follow-the-leader and little Amandine began to cry at all of the noise. Lida and Alette chased Zak as well, but only because he had snagged Melody's doll as he ran past her and Emeric yelled at them all to shut up because he was trying to read his book and then stormed out of the room, slamming the door behind him.

The twins and Gavin stepped in, Gavin grabbing his sisters and the twins separating the crazy boy from his outraged sister. Draco watched as parental control moved in and then he noticed that Dragon was trembling in his arms, tears leaking out of dark eyes.

"Hey, it's okay," he said softly. He moved Dragon from his hip into a two handed hold and the boy lay his head on Draco's shoulder, his tears sliding down Draco's neck. Draco instinctively began rocking the boy gently, rubbing the shuddering back with a soothing hand. He noticed that Ginny was also standing and swaying with Amandine whose cries had subsided into hiccupping sobs. He made his way over to her.

"Hey," he said.

She gave him a bright smile. "I wish I had a camera right now," she said. "I would love to hang up photos of you and Dragon at the office. It's even better than pictures of you in a diaper."

"I bet I could get some cute photos of you too," he countered. "All I'd have to do is ask your mother; I'm sure she'd love to let me look at the family photo albums."

She pouted. "Fine, no pictures. How was work? I saw you on the news a lot. Seems like every five minutes there was a picture of you talking or you giving a conference."

He rolled his eyes. "I would step outside and they were always there, I have no clue how they did it. Not to mention the fact that each and every news station and paper wanted their own private interview." He yawned, and sat on the couch; Ginny sat next to him.

"You look tired."

"Exhausted," said Draco.

Sev walked into the room just then, smirking at Draco when he saw his godson with the child in his lap and sitting next to Ginny. Draco willed his cheeks not to flush and merely raised an eyebrow in response. Sev settled himself in an armchair and turned to Draco.

"All during work, while I was trying to concentrate on my potions, every single, unattached witch kept coming down for some reason or another, and for some reason, the conversation kept turning to you. They wanted to know if you really were single and if you really were my godson. I had to lock and bolt the door to stop them from coming in," he said, accusation in his voice.

Draco grimaced and the door opened again, emitting Harry still wearing his Quidditch robes. He noticed that Potter looked pretty bad, with dark circles under his eyes and he looked paler than normal.

"Uncle Harry," yelled Zak running up to the Seeker. "I wanna go flying!"

Harry swung him into the air, zipped him around the room, and then deposited him in Sev's lap.

"Flying on a broom!" the boy demanded.

"Fred, George," said Harry. "I'm going to kill you for taking that boy up on a broom. He's obsessed."

"Flying, flying, flying!" Zakir chanted, but staying on the Potion Master's lap.

"What's the count today, Harry?" asked Charlie.

"Seventeen," said Harry, flinging himself down to the ground and playing absently with the figurines Zak and Dragon had left on the carpet. "Plus, the reporters have begun waiting at my apartment to talk to me. Our first game isn't for a while yet, and they can't leave me alone."

"Seventeen?" asked Draco.

"Fan letters," said Fred.

"Those from women," said George.

"We're keeping a tally," said Fred.

"You could probably have a competition between you and Harry," said George.

"How'd your date go?" asked Bill.

Draco raised an eyebrow. Potter had gone on a date?

Harry groaned. "Terrible. The paparazzi found out and kept taking pictures. It'll be all over the magazines tomorrow and Liz, she's a nice girl and all, but she's quiet. She hated it and said she couldn't deal with the stress."

Draco winced in sympathy while Bill and Charlie winced in sympathy. Fred and George looked shocked and gleeful.

"She dumped you?" asked Fred.

"She dumped the Boy-Who-Lived?" asked George.

"The Savior of the Wizarding World?"

"The Slayer of You-Know-Who?"

"Guys, stop," said Harry wearily. "I really liked her."

"She wasn't good for you," said Fred.

"Way too quiet," agreed George.

It was apparent form the look on Harry's face that they weren't helping any.

"You look like sh- really bad," said Bill, recovering from his near slip up.

Draco looked at Harry in concern. "This isn't going to affect your game, is it?" he asked.

"Aren't you nice," said Harry sarcastically. "And if I can play at Hogwarts when I knew Voldemort was out to get me, I think I can play now and be fine."

"You'd better," said Draco. "Else the reporters will have another thing to write about. Harry Potter, Sole Survivor of the Avada Kedavra Curse, Decimated by Heartbreak."

"Draco Malfoy Found Dead at his House. Sole Witness Harry Potter Claims it was Suicide," Harry shot back.

"With Death of Malfoy Comes the Collapse of the Economy Again. Sole Witness Harry Potter, One Time Savior of the Wizarding World, Unable to Help."

"The Wizarding World Celebrates Passing of the Biggest Prat Alive."

"Potter's Intelligence Found Alarmingly Sub-Par after Stating 'The Passing of the Biggest Prat Alive' Obviously It Would Be the Biggest Prat Dead."

"Mafloy Does Not Refute the Fact that He is the Biggest Prat."

"Malfoy is Dead and Unable to Talk. Potter Claims Title of Stupidest-Man-to-Ever-Walk-the-Face-of-the-Earth."

"Would you two stop talking in headlines?" asked an exasperated Ginny. "Although, if both of you are dead, then you wouldn't be able to talk at all."

"Grand idea, sis," said Fred.

"We've taught you well," said George.

"Dinner is ready sirs and ma'ams," said Rolly, peeking in the doorway.

"Excellent," said Fred.

"Maybe with food in their mouths they'll shut up," said George.

Ginny laughed and Draco glared at her. Honestly, taking their side. He shook his head and made his way to dinner, still holding Dragon.

It was after dinner, when the family had gone after thanking Draco for his hospitality, that Draco sat in the den by the fire, studying the flames, deep in thought.

"Uh-oh," said Blaise, coming in and taking the armchair on the other side of the fireplace. "That isn't a good look. What are you plotting, Draco?"

"Shouldn't you be putting your kids to bed?" asked Draco, still staring at the flames.

"Pansy's turn today," said Blaise. "And if you don't get up to sleep in half-an-hour, I'll make an exception and tuck you in as well."

Draco laughed and turned to his friend. "Potter needs a girlfriend," he said.

"We know that," said Blaise. "The trouble is the fame; it's nearly impossible to find a girl who isn't affected by cameras tracking her every move."

"Say I knew a girl who was used to cameras," began Draco.

"You aren't," said Blaise. "Tell me you aren't playing match-maker."

"Did you know that the economy always increases when popular figures are having a successful relationship?" asked Draco.

"You're becoming match-maker for the economy?" asked Blaise incredulously. He though a minute, then frowned. "Alright, I know you better than this. What's the other reason?"

"I figure that Potter and his girlfriend will be the main concern of the press once they get hooked up together," Draco admitted. "Then they'll stop hounding me."

"Very Slytherin," said Blaise. "Who's the girl?"

"That's a surprise," said Draco. He stood up. "If you'll excuse me, I think I'll retire now."

"Do you want me to tuck you in?" asked Blaise sweetly. Draco didn't deign a reply but shot him a look and walked out of the room quite dignified. Blaise just laughed.

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Okay. I didn't really proofread this that well, because I wanted to get it up. And nothing really major happened in this, but it's like a transitional chapter. And I promise you, there will be a real family dinner coming up in three or less chapters. So read and review!