Chapter 29: Home
Even if Hildegard hadn't sucked the air right out of the room, Draco's lungs would have depressed anyway from force of emotion as he watched. He'd thought, coming to the Ministry today, that he had properly braced to see the state of Dagmar. Dagmar's shadow-Aurors kept Draco and the rest of their family in the loop about how Voldemort's state of mind physically affected her. It still kicked him in the stomach when she'd walked into the courtroom. Even from where Draco sat, he could see how shadows played more over Dagmar's face. Her eyes had sunken, and her skin looked like wax about to melt.
Several times throughout the trial, Draco wondered if she might collapse. Only Voldemort's determination to relive every last detail of his exploits seemed to keep Dagmar's body upright. When Hildegard pulled Voldemort out, Dagmar slumped worriedly. She had enough wits about her to flinch when Voldemort's soul shattered.
It's over. Those two words repeated in Draco's mind as Madam Bones said whatever about Dagmar being free to go, and then closed the Wizengamot until they would resume session at whatever time on whatever day. Draco's gaze trained on Dagmar as Hildegard and Lydia helped her to her feet. They braced her on their way toward the same door Draco had gone through at the end of his trial.
Harry turned around in front of Draco. "Nobody would stop you, if you went."
That was all the prompt Draco needed. The side-chamber was quiet spare stilted sobs. Dagmar and Hildegard clung to each other. Black lines ran down Dagmar's cheeks. Hildegard murmured something in her ear, which Dagmar nodded in response to.
Dagmar's gaze found Draco when she opened her eyes. She stumbled a little to disentangle herself from her mum. Draco was more than happy to take Hildegard's place in holding her upright.
Dagmar felt smaller than the last time they were able to hold each other. His face still fit in the crook of her neck. Sheer relief overshadowed anything else as Dagmar's arms tightened around him.
"Did they remove your stymy and everything yet?" Draco asked.
Dagmar nodded against his shoulder.
"Then let's go home."
"Please."
Aware Dagmar didn't have a whole lot of strength to her right now, Draco made quick work of the hallways that would take them somewhere they could apparate from. From the private Level Two departure area, Draco jumped them to the Grand Floo Junction. For nearly dinner time on a Friday afternoon, it was eerily dead. They headed next for Den Sultne Jotunn. Before anyone nearby had the chance to glimpse or recognize Dagmar, Draco apparated them both up to the cottage.
Them suddenly appearing by the garden door startled Heimdall out of the snooze he'd fallen into in front of the fireplace. It shockingly hadn't gone out since Draco left this morning, although the cottage had a slight chill.
Dagmar slumped against Draco's side. Her blinks were getting long, and Draco could tell that she would probably be asleep as soon as she laid vertical.
"Hey." He got her attention. "I know you're exhausted, but could you wait long enough for me to warm up some stew? I made a pot last night. I figured you'd need something quick."
"I can try, ja."
Draco walked her to the kitchen. Dagmar's feet were sluggish when she got up onto one of the stools. She held the island's edge with both hands, as if scared she might teeter over. Tentatively, Dagmar settled with her arms folded in front of her and her chin on top of them. She jolted a bit when closing her eyes caused her head to nod forward.
"I'll get it as quickly as I can," Draco told her as he dug the pot out of the ice box. "You don't need to eat a whole lot. Just some. I think you'll sleep better if you do."
"Ja. I'm starving."
Exhaustion had stolen the affect from her tone. Draco's heart hurt for it, even though this was about exactly what he expected in bringing her home. While Draco lit an element on the stove and got things going, he kept glancing at Dagmar to see if she fell asleep. She kept jarring herself out of it, her eyes more unfocused each time. She finally found some sort of awareness that mascara dried on her cheeks. Dagmar propped herself up enough to clear it away. Rubbing her eyes seemed like a bad idea in pursuit of staying awake.
Draco would've thought Dagmar too tired to really absorb that, nearly five months later, she was home. She seemed to come into some sort of second wind, maybe as that realization finally hit. Her eyes rimmed red with a different sort of irritation before she wiped at them with the hem of her robes.
She looked around the kitchen, sniffling, and paused when her gaze fell on the counter by the sink. Draco had been too lazy last night to move the beer bottles into the recycling. Dagmar looked at the half-eaten loaf of bread that Draco had bought at the market a few days ago. A jacket that belonged to neither of them—left on accident by one of the Weasley twins—draped over one of the dining room chairs.
"You've had company?" Dagmar asked. "You've been staying here?"
"For a few weeks now." Draco grew nervous, for it was a decision he made with a lot of guilt. "I could never get in to see you with Voldemort around, so I figured I might as well start getting things ready."
"Who's all been here?"
She at least just sounded curious. Still, Draco hoped that knowing life went on while she was stuck in a horrible situation wouldn't upset her. "A bit of everyone, really. Dad wanted to see the place, so he and Mum have been here a few times. Wes. Theo and Daphne. Andie, Ted, and Tonks. Sirius, Harry, Ron, Fred, and George. Blaise. Luca came up with him for a visit last night, since he got off school today for the trial."
Dagmar blinked a few times before her brow wrinkled. "Was he all right here? I mean, with his mum and all."
"He struggled a bit to start." Draco paused, bottom lip pulled back between his teeth. "It doesn't bother you, right? I wanted the place to feel like home when you got here, like it's seen people and didn't just sit empty. I wanted the ice box and pantry full. The bedding's fresh, everything's clean, and all that. Everyone understands that we're going to take some space to ourselves for a little while. It's up to you when you're ready for company. Your mum hasn't been here yet. She wanted to wait until you were home. I got the firedrakes all set up to coast for a week, so Gunvor told me to stay away until the ninth when I'm scheduled back. Agneta asked about us possibly coming to family dinner Sunday, but I figured it would be too soon."
Dagmar stayed quiet while Draco talked, continuing to wipe her eyes as silent tears kept welling up and spilling over.
"Does it bother you?" Draco asked when she still hadn't said anything.
"No, it's fine," Dagmar replied. "It's good. It does feel like home again. I'm glad you came back rather than sat around waiting for me. I think you've done enough of that."
"I'd do it all over again for you, if I had to." Draco came around the island to stand beside her. "That said, I am so fucking glad we're home."
Dagmar sniffled. "Me too."
She leaned on him again, her closer arm wrapped around Draco's middle. Draco held her shoulder in kind and leaned down to kiss the top of her head. He rested his cheek there afterward.
The stew finally came up warm enough to eat. Draco handed Dagmar a bowl of it, and she nearly had it down before he'd even scooped his own. That one taste of food for the first time in far too long had awakened her appetite beyond a point Draco ever saw in her. Something between pity and guilt nagged at him as he offered her the second bowl. Draco should've tried more to get Voldemort to eat, so that he wouldn't put Dagmar in this position. He'd accepted that if the Aurors couldn't, there was nothing Draco could do either. It just sucked, but Dagmar was here. She ate now. There was plenty of food in the house.
Dagmar's hand holding her fork trembled. She didn't stop for breath until she finished the second bowl, panting lightly. She looked over at Draco's, then away. "Ergh. I swear I didn't forget what table manners are."
"Don't worry about it. I heard it's been days since you last ate."
"Ja."
Dagmar's bottom lip trembled as her eyes misted anew. She leaned forward on the island again, her fatigue looking to take on the full weight of her misery.
"I really didn't like that feeling," she said when Draco rested his knee against hers. "Voldemort coming to terms with it, I mean. It was unsettling. He'd be euphoric, then depressed. I never want to go through that on my own."
"Keep on not murdering people, and it seems promising you won't have to."
However weakly, Dagmar laughed. She took Draco's free hand with hers.
"You should get some sleep," Draco told her. "If you want to go on up ahead of me, I won't be too far behind you. That trial was too long. Too mentally draining."
"I think if I lay down, I won't be able to wait for you to catch up," Dagmar said. "Are you done with the stew?"
"Yeah, I was probably just going to butter some bread instead of go for seconds."
Dagmar took her bowl over to the sink. Although she still shook as her body adjusted to a flood of nutrients, she took the stew back over to the ice box. Dagmar fumbled a little as she tried to find her wand in her robes. With a wave of it, she cooled the stew down so that everything else in the box wouldn't warm and spoil.
"I'm going to have to adjust again to having magic," she commented.
"It won't take long."
"Probably not."
Draco's heart swelled to see Dagmar back in the kitchen here. It bordered over to a longing not dissimilar to nostalgia as she headed for the cupboard they kept the butter dish in. Draco had gotten used in the last five months to doing everything for himself. He hadn't thought that mentioning wanting buttered bread would mean Dagmar went about getting it for him. It reminded him of better days so acutely that the next piece of beef he tried to swallow nearly got stuck on a lump in his throat. As much as Draco loved Dagmar—as far as he was willing to suffer and sacrifice for her—he couldn't exactly deny how much he'd missed being in a relationship with an active partner.
It tied into something Harry had said last weekend, when he'd come up with Sirius and the three Weasleys: I'm about ready for some peace and quiet, I think. Draco hadn't been surprised at all that Harry debated whether he would actually return to the Auror office. The war was over. Harry had done what was expected of him.
Voldemort having agreed to leave Dagmar's body put Draco in a similar place. Like he'd told Harry back when they visited Azkaban together, all he and Dagmar wanted was to live their life free of this bloody war. Today, they had finally been granted that. It made Draco far more sentimental than being handed a slice of bread ought to.
Dagmar buttered some for herself as well, then dug out the open jar of pickled herring to pick at while Draco finished eating. Some cured meat coming out next drew Heimdall into the kitchen. He circled Dagmar's ankles, imploring meows punctuating his purrs.
"You might want to slow down," Draco warned Dagmar when she debated cheese next. "You don't want to end up not being able to sleep because your stomach hurts."
She sighed. "Ja, I guess."
Draco put his bowl in the sink, deciding to deal with the dishes later. "Come on. Let's get some sleep, then you'll probably be ready to eat again."
The bedroom still smelled of clean laundry and fresh air. It was a little cool since Draco had left a window cracked that morning. While Dagmar changed in the closet, Draco used his wand to warm the room back up to a temperature that wouldn't leave them shivering under the blanket. Dagmar headed next into the bathroom to wash the rest of her makeup off from the trial. Draco crawled into bed, his throat tightening again as he idly watched Dagmar pull her hair down to redo it in a regular plait. She worked on it on her way back into the bedroom. Draco rolled over to face her side of the bed when she took a seat there to tie it off.
"I cannot wait for a good snog off," Dagmar said.
Draco laughed. "God, me neither. It's been a long month."
"A long winter, really."
Some of the body heat Draco had collected escaped when Dagmar pulled the blanket back. Before a chill had chance to set in, Dagmar pressed up against Draco. He groaned from a combination of soft lips, and idle nails scratching his back.
Like Draco expected, Dagmar was out within only a few minutes. She remained like a rock beside him in the bed when he woke up a couple of hours later. Heimdall had forsaken his place in front of the fireplace in favour of curling up against her bum. Draco pet him before getting up. When he came out of the toilet, Heimdall stood on the edge of the bed and stretched. He followed Draco downstairs and into the kitchen.
Draco tossed him pieces of reindeer sausage while he updated everyone about how Dagmar's homecoming went so far. He hadn't really known what to expect, although anticipated far more crying and emotional absence than had actually happened. It made Draco optimistic that his and Dagmar's dream of getting right back on track wouldn't be put off further by how the last month in Voldemort's grip had treated her.
It was nearly midnight when Dagmar roused. She had a sore stomach, as Draco suspected might happen, but a potion to settle it kicked in quickly enough that she had an appetite within the hour. She ate at a pace now more true to herself while the two of them chatted with more focus than when they first came home. When Dagmar had finished more stew, she leaned against Draco on the couch and pulled the throw up to their chins. The way soft firelight accentuated her features made for frequent snogs as punctuation.
Draco stirred a few times because of it, but he wasn't pushing Dagmar if that wasn't what she needed or wanted right at the moment. He started catching familiar signs in the way her gaze changed, and how her fingertips grazed where she rested a hand on his knee under the throw. Draco's blood warmed to a new degree as her touch migrated up his inner thigh at the same time she tugged his bottom lip with her teeth.
"Dagmar." Draco's voice turned hoarse.
The fireplace behind Dagmar put her face into shadows. There was enough light for Draco to see a small glint of the whites of her eyes. She likely studied him in kind. Between her touch reaching his pants in a tantalizing graze and the couch groaning as Dagmar shifted, Draco figured she'd reached the same conclusion of need. He looped his arms around her waist as she straddled him, his blood heating to a near boil with a fresh slide of their mouths.
Draco's pounding heart verged on painful when Dagmar stilled and looked around the room. He was about to ask what was wrong when Dagmar snorted. Her head bowing brought it down to his shoulder.
"Herregud," she whispered near Draco's ear. "I don't have to ask anyone to give us the room anymore."
A wave of yearning washed down over Draco. "Sure don't."
"We're in our own home."
"Yep."
"We could shag right here, and nobody else could, would, or should care."
If Dagmar didn't sit flush on Draco's lap, the throb that passed through him would have resulted in a twitch. "Want to?"
"I mean, that's what I was going for here." Dagmar's grin was audible before her teeth found Draco's earlobe. "Unless you wanted to do something else?"
"I didn't think you'd be up for it today." Draco shivered. "I was just going to follow your lead."
"Follow my lead, then."
The only clothes they could really shed in that position was their shirts, which was how Dagmar ended up on her back. She also didn't have a whole lot of stamina. It was easier for her to take a more passive role between the two of them. So long as she kept on holding him, kissing him, and moaning the way she did, Draco was more than happy. Coupling their bodies was like sliding into a warm bath at the end of the day. Draco would never tire of how her lips would part and her eyelids fluttered as she readjusted her hips against him.
He rested his head on Dagmar's shoulder when they stilled. Dagmar turned her face toward him so she could kiss his forehead. Her fingernails took on a less intentional scratch as they wandered over Draco's shoulders and ribs.
She yawned. "I think I'm ready for bed again. You?"
"Yeah."
Coming up on four in the morning, Draco was a little sluggish getting off her. Dagmar hopped back into her pyjama bottoms while Draco used a cleansing charm on the couch. They both snickered for it. That giggly mood followed them upstairs. Dagmar laughed when Draco held her bum cheeks from behind on the way up.
Her mood turned again when they laid together in the dark. Dagmar played with Draco's fingers under the cover.
"He's really gone," she eventually said.
"Long time coming, huh?" Draco asked.
"Ja."
Her voice had a distracted quality to it. Tension pulled one of Draco's eyebrows down, simultaneously dipping toward his stomach. She didn't actually miss him, did she?
"It's going to take some getting used to," Dagmar eventually said. "I feel different. I didn't realize how used I was to the feeling of having two souls inside of me."
"What's it like?"
Dagmar bunched her lips to one side. She opened her mouth before taking more time to think first. "Imagine it like this. Say you're downstairs here, and the house is quiet. But you know I'm upstairs asleep. You know that feeling of general awareness someone else is sharing space with you, even if they're not detectable at that very moment?"
"Sure, yeah." Draco propped himself up on an elbow.
"That's what it used to always feel like, before Voldemort had any means of control," Dagmar said. "I just didn't realize it. When I'd become aware of his soul fragment, it was like coming home to a house you expect is empty. You're down in the kitchen, and you hear something shift upstairs in the bathroom. Maybe you're not alone after all. Now with him gone, it's like you know there should be someone asleep upstairs. But you go to check, and the bed is empty. There are signs that someone else has been here. Signs that someone else lives here. Clothes in the closet, their toiletries, a few of their things downstairs. But they've left, and they're never coming back."
Coming up with a metaphor had distracted Dagmar from the emotional part of that. Falling quiet, her lips worked again. She exhaled unsteadily.
"It's just weird," she whispered, looking back to Draco. "I didn't like him. I hate what he did to me. I'm so angry that he interrupted our lives the way he did. But my body is that house now, full of his things. I can't just throw all that away like you would in that actual situation. I can't move house. It's. . .just going to be weird for a while. I've never been alone. I know that's a silly thing to say. I don't know how to explain it. I always had this shadow."
"I think I get what you're saying." Draco rested a hand on her hip on top of the blanket. "It's okay to feel strange about everything. I'm sure you're far from the only one. Look at your mum. Voldemort tried to kill her less than a month ago. He was responsible for your dad dying. It's because of him that Magnus died, and she didn't get to see her son grow up. She still didn't want to have to shatter him today. Luca looked away when she did, you know. He was crying. Imagine watching your mum kill your dad, even if he's a monster. Bloody hell, just think about everything we heard today, that he did with his life. And not one person in that courtroom cheered when he was gone."
"I guess not, huh?"
Dagmar seemed to mellow out, to realize she was far from the only one with conflicted feelings. Draco didn't even know how he felt right now either. Mostly he was happy, but it was a selfish kind. He didn't care about Voldemort dying. Draco just cared about what he had to gain from that.
Waking up close to noon with Dagmar still beside him in the bed started Draco's day off on the right foot. Dagmar came to a little subdued. Paying off her sleep debt left her groggy again. She hadn't washed since the previous morning, and felt a little gross between that and things like excess body hair. Draco offered her coffee and lunch on the other side of a shower if she wanted to hop in. Between when Draco kissed her there in bed and when she found him close to an hour later downstairs, her mood had improved remarkably.
The rest of the day was good in its laziness, but Draco woke up on the precipice of dawn to find himself alone in the bed. Dagmar sat out on the deck holding the pouch of tobacco that had belonged to her dad. She'd dreamed about him with a vividness that bordered on unsettling, and it left Dagmar a little cocked up.
They sat outside long enough to watch the sunrise at half-five, then headed back to bed. Dagmar decided when she woke up that she didn't want to miss the Ramstad family dinner that evening, it being the first Sunday of May. Agneta had left her invitation as open, so Draco sent her an owl asking if it was all right they come. Dagmar fretted about what to bring, and wouldn't hear from Draco that she didn't need to worry about that. She ended up baking a quick batch of cookies to go on the table for dessert.
Lots of tears were involved at Agneta's. Dagmar got tired easily, so she and Draco ended up leaving at the same time that Flor and Nils took Else home. Draco deemed the evening a success, especially come the next day when Dagmar talked about having company. She wanted Hildegard to come, but didn't have any way of directly contacting her quicker than with an owl. Draco wrote his own mum in the messenger pair they shared. She ended up coming as well. It being mid-afternoon when their mums arrived, the discussion of dinner arose. Draco's mum sent a message to Draco's dad to come find them when he was done work for the day.
Dagmar's eyes widened as the four of them sat with tea in the living room. "I forgot he started his job today. Any idea how that's going?"
"Not a clue." Draco's mum smiled sweetly. "I'm certain we'll hear all about it tonight."
And they did. As much as Draco's dad did his best to adjust to the terms of his freedom, he still had a significant amount of pride. He'd never worked an actual job in his life. The only thing resembling a superior he'd ever had was his father, back when he was still alive. Arthur Weasley was very different from Abraxas Malfoy. Draco's dad had a hard time feeling as though he wasn't being patronized.
"It's all right," Draco said when his dad finally paused to sip his wine at dinner. "I'm sure you'll get over it."
"Excuse me?"
"Dad." Draco laughed at the single eyebrow raised at him. "Just relax. You've got it so easy. Mr Weasley probably won't ever rub in that you answer to him."
"I almost wish he would." Draco's dad gazed into his wine as he moodily swirled it. "I do like that we're both coming on at the same time. If I learn his position better than he does, he'll have no choice but to defer to me in a tight spot."
"There you go." Draco cut another piece of his steak. "Find your personal power, and run with it."
"Amelia's first rule for me was no power trips."
"Think she'll be keeping tabs when she leaves you two to your own device?"
Draco's dad hummed thoughtfully, which ended the conversation. Draco's mum tried not to laugh behind her own wine glass, and Hildegard stared determinedly at her plate in similar humour. All Draco cared about was that his dad's little diatribe hadn't put Dagmar off. She smiled when they caught each other's eye. Draco relaxed with that. It was just a painfully normal family dinner.
Draco slept in longer each day in preparation for night shift Sunday, so he woke up to find Daphne drinking tea in the living room with Dagmar. Dagmar herself had coffee, which Draco poured for himself.
"How's Theo faring?" Draco leaned over the back of the couch where Dagmar sat.
"Feeling a little overwhelmed after the first day," Daphne answered. Theo had started his new job yesterday too, at Diagon Alley's Apothecary. "It's not the job itself, but just having to get up at a certain time and be somewhere. He hasn't done that since we left Hogwarts. Apparently Snape actually gave a good reference."
"He would've advised Theo not to put him down, if he couldn't."
Daphne shrugged, smiling. "His NEWT grade said enough as is, but who gets good references from Snape?"
"Slytherins that got an O on the NEWT."
The three of them laughed. Draco was about to let the girls have their visit when he got roped in on the question about how his own work went. From there, Dagmar mentioned a desire to reach out to Arne and touch base sometime this week. That turned the conversation toward Daphne's bump.
"Did you want to feel?" Daphne asked Draco. "It's pretty neat."
"Sure."
Other than being shown Dagmar's heartbeat that one time, Draco had never experienced the full extent of what she could do. He'd gotten used to the idea in the past few months that he would be an uncle by the end of summer. However, since his niece wasn't here yet, the entire thing had a hypothetical element to it.
It felt a lot more concrete when Dagmar held his hand just underneath Daphne's navel. Daphne's heartbeat became apparent first, followed by a strong flutter behind it. Within the realm of Daphne's body was a mass about the size of a banana. It twitched when Daphne asked what Draco thought.
"I think she recognized your voice," Draco replied. "She responded."
The wistful look to Daphne had often been described to Draco by Dagmar. He understood now why she enjoyed receiving it so much from her patients at the hospital.
That seemed to motivate Dagmar to see about her old clinic. She sent Arne an owl after Daphne had left. He asked to meet on Friday morning, so the rest of the week started slipping away from her and Draco. In the mornings while Draco slept, Dagmar studied more seriously in preparation for classes starting again at the end of the month. The weather had been pleasant all week (hardly any rain at all), so Draco wanted to go for a hike Thursday afternoon. Dagmar wanted to go out for dinner afterward.
Being in public had certainly changed for them, although they'd worked their way up to an actual appearance by things like going to market. What a difference a week had made in Dagmar. She glowed, all grins, and her spine bent for nothing. Her colour had returned. Frequent and nutrient-dense meals had started filling her back in.
They bickered over the bill at the end of dinner, since both of them remembered it being their turn to pay. Draco eventually let it go under guise they would start fresh. It made Dagmar happy to treat him, so it wasn't like Draco lost anything by giving in. He lived for the normalcy of it, of thanking her for dinner and then taking her hand as they walked down Trollmannsgaten intent for the floo at Den Sultne Jotunn. They meandered a bit, just enjoying the evening, and Draco figured that delay made everything hit a little harder when he and Dagmar undressed each other back at the cottage.
He woke up mid-afternoon on Friday to the smell of baked goods. Mouth watering, Draco headed downstairs after throwing a shirt on. Cookies and quick breads covered the counters while they cooled. Proper dough rose in a bowl on the island, pushing up against the towel laid over it. The scent of coffee mingled far too well with all the banana, pumpkin, chocolate, and sugar that made Draco's mouth water.
"Morning," Dagmar greeted him with a smile. She held a mug in one hand while going through a pile of parchment at the dining room end of the island. "Sleep well?"
"Yeah, and about to eat well, apparently."
Dagmar laughed. "I noticed the freezer had been nearly emptied out."
Draco nibbled on a chocolate chip cookie while he poured himself coffee. "Bring a bag of goodies out every time company comes, and it dries up pretty fast."
"That's what it's there for. It's good. I like being able to start over with fresh things."
Draco joined Dagmar where she stood, setting his coffee beside hers and resting his chin on her shoulder from behind. "What's all this?"
"My modified programme." Dagmar rested her free hand on Draco's forearm when he held her about the waist. "I'll finish in 2001 instead."
"That's not bad." Draco kissed the crook of her neck.
"No, and it'll give me plenty of time to get my practicum hours done without a rush," Dagmar replied. "I've still got twelve-hundred left."
"Ouch."
"It's not bad." Dagmar shrugged carefully, only jostling Draco a little bit. "I had three-hundred down from my first term. There are two months a year dedicated fully toward them. Not to mention, I'm going to have this big gap until I redo the term I just missed."
Draco nodded as she showed him the empty space between May 8, 2000 and January 3, 2001. "Right."
"My prenatal clinic counts toward them." Dagmar turned in Draco's arms and loosely wrapped her own around his neck. "Arne still says I don't need my proper certificate to practice, but we agreed the courses are certainly beneficial."
"Yep," Draco too agreed. "So what do you do with your clinic when you run out of hours?"
"Just keep going." Dagmar shrugged. "All reaching fifteen-hundred means is that I've met the requirements for certification."
"Oh yeah."
"Not that I would say no to taking things easy while I'm still studying." Dagmar pulled Draco closer, her eyes smiling before her mouth tugged the same way. It turned wistful as she appraised Draco. "Now that I have a life, I ought to give learning how to balance it a real go. You, this house, our friends and family—I'm just so ready for it all."
Draco's stomach and chest fluttered in tandem, brimming with longing as he rested his forehead on her shoulder. "Me too."