He had one week to prove his value. Potter had come to tell him that there was to be a trial period where Draco could show his worth and his innocence to the resistance; he would confer with members and give information on the Death Eaters and be allowed to dine in their quarters, but his every move would still be watched closely. He still wasn't allowed a wand. Draco could see – with some amusement – that Potter faced an internal battle when it came to Draco. He clearly knew that a double agent would be invaluable to the failing resistance, but Draco was sure that Potter wished it was just about any other Death Eater than Draco.

"Potter," Draco called as Harry trudged back out of Draco's tent after delivering the verdict. Harry turned expectantly. "Uhh, thanks," Draco mumbled. Harry gave a small nod and left.

The resistance wasted no time. The next morning, as the sun began to rise, Draco found himself being marched to yet another tent. This one was large, spacious and mostly bare inside. In it was Harry, Henry, Dean Thomas (another Gryffindor Draco couldn't stand – great) and Ginny Weasley, all standing with their wands by their sides.

"Duelling practice," Henry announced, introducing the space with a gusto not befitting of the insultingly early hour. "Someone's in here most hours of the day – keeping sharp."
Draco looked around and saw a makeshift dummy reminiscent of a poorly crafted scarecrow with a Death Eater-style hood in the corner beside a fully stocked bookshelf.

"I'm guessing that's Granger's way of practicing curses?" Draco smirked with a nod towards the rows of leather-bound books, unable to help himself.

Harry looked at Henry with wide told-you-so eyes as if to justify a private conversation they'd had about Draco.

They wanted him to show the Death Eater's typical plan of attack when it came to duelling; what curses they would use and what for and how they would approach battle from a strategic point of view. They already had notebooks filled with information they'd gathered through their own dealings with the Death Eaters (though they did not elaborate on their findings), and wanted Draco to add and verify this as well.

Harry pulled a second wand out of his back pocket and offered it to Draco. It was unvarnished and the wood was slightly chipped and splintered, and Draco could see a small bit of the core feather peeping out of the top.

"Don't try anything," Harry warned as Draco took the wand and held it in front of him.

"With this thing? Looks more like a tree branch than a wand," Draco said and could sense another glance between the others as he tried to readjust his facial expression to look less unimpressed.

"You remember the old saying surely: only a lowly wizard blames his wand," Henry offered to Draco in a challenging manner as he tapped his own wand against his open palm.

Three hours later, Draco sat with his elbows resting on his knees, catching his breath and rolling the dodgy wand back to Potter.

Hermione Granger had come in half way through the session, looking as if she had overslept and rolled straight out of bed (though Draco would wager that this was her usual appearance). She sat in the corner scrawling notes ferociously, her brows knitted as her eyes darted from the action in front of her, back to the notebook in her lap. Draco wondered how often Amelia came to the duelling practice room, whether she was invited today. He imagined her scoffing and rolling her eyes, saying she'd rather get the extra hours sleep, and with that thought Draco had aimed a particularly strong curse at the scarecrow and watched as it's shoulder started smoking.

He had gone through typical curses the Death Eaters use in battle, including ones that he was sure the resistance wouldn't know of. All those years that Draco had been exiled at a very close distance to the Death Eaters he thought he hadn't been privy to much, but it was extraordinary what he had retained and observed over the years, so much so that he felt fairly confident is his being an asset for the resistance. He could tell that they felt the same, albeit reluctantly so.

He helped the others brainstorm counter curses as well as teach those preferred by the Death Eaters and felt something of a camaraderie as jubilant congratulatory jeers bounced around the tent when a particularly difficult manoeuvre was accomplished by one of the group.

"Reckon we've earned ourselves some breakfast," Dean Thomas announced, clapping Henry on the back as he stood.

Draco felt awkward – he'd served his purpose for the morning, but would members of the resistance really be okay with him dining alongside them? He stood up slower than the rest and let them walk ahead in conversation to save any embarrassment.

"Are you hungry?" Henry asked Draco with a grin.

Trying to hide his surprise as Henry fell into step beside him, Draco nodded.

"Bill and Fleur are on cooking duties, they're both usually pretty good. I think when you become a parent you magically get much better at cooking," Henry continued. Draco thought back to his childhood where every meal was prepared by house elves and neither of his parents did so much as boil a kettle.

It was his first time setting foot in the dining hall tent. It was large enough to fit four long tables, with a makeshift kitchen at the far end. It was warmly lit, with modest candlelit chandeliers hanging from the thick wooden pillars which framed the ceiling.

There was a comforting smell of freshly baked bread in the air. Draco had been living off small plain meals delivered by anonymous members for days now and this confirmed that whatever they had been giving him, was certainly different to what was being eaten here by everybody else.

"We do rotations," Henry explained, "everybody chips in. However, it does make for varying degrees of culinary quality," he said with a small laugh as they approached the far kitchen counter. "To be fair though, those who are particularly averse to the kitchen tend to trade their duties with others, so it doesn't usually get too dicey."

Draco ate breakfast in silence, feeling more out of place than he ever thought possible. Despite a select few - mostly just Henry Collins - acting civil towards him, being in this communal tent for only five minutes it was abundantly clear that he was not yet welcome. He heard a few people mumble something about being a Death Eater as he ate the freshly baked bread with butter and jam, and could feel cold glares on him as he determinedly fixed his gaze to the table in front of him.

Despite this though, elsewhere there was a pleasant chatter all around the dining hall; some sitting in pairs or small groups at tables deep in conversation, and some hurriedly making their way to the kitchen counter, grabbing a ham and cheese sandwich and shouting greetings to those they passed as they weaved their way back through the tent. As two others came to sit beside Henry, completely ignoring Draco as they engaged in conversation, a laugh cut through the noise. His head shot up; it was a laugh he was familiar with from years ago, that he had desperately clung to in his dreams for all these years.
Amelia was making her way to the kitchen counter with Luna Lovegood, who seemed to be explaining something to her through her own fit of giggles. Draco watched on as Amelia tossed her head back in laughter, clapping a hand to her mouth. As the two Ravenclaws moved through the hall they greeted others, sometimes with a wave across the room or a small pat on the back as they passed their peers. Draco was reminded of their last year at Hogwarts, where he'd see Amelia across the room in the Great Hall as he had sat alone, exiled on the Slytherin table, watching as she laughed and joked with her friends. A familiar jolt of loneliness shot through him.

"Amelia! Mills!" Henry was calling from beside Draco, bringing him out of his trance. Henry was waving an arm at his sister and gesturing to a seat opposite.

Amelia looked over at Henry, the remnants of laughter still on her face. But as she waved back at her brother she locked eyes with Draco and her face instantly dropped. She mouthed something back to Henry and tapped her watch as if to say she was in a rush and Henry gave an oblivious thumbs up and went back to his conversation. Draco watched as she mumbled something to Luna and beelined for the front, grabbing a sandwich from the counter and hurriedly making her way back through the hall.

Draco hastily got to his feet, acting upon impulse and deciding to take the opportunity. He mumbled to Henry that he was going back to his tent and half-ran out of the dining hall and back into the open air.

It was much brighter outside and the glare of the morning sun made him squint, but he could see Amelia a few metres away still hurrying between the row of tents.

Draco called her name and broke into a run to catch up to her. She veered off to the left but as she did, Draco managed to catch her hand. It was the first time they had touched in years and Draco wondered if she felt the same electricity course through her as he did.

As if she had suddenly been burned, she flinched her hand away from his, cradling it against her chest as she turned to look at him. They stood in the shade between two tents; no one else was in sight.

"What are you doing?" She hissed, eyes widening. He felt like he could see fear in her eyes as she looked back at him and his heart sank.

"Please – give me a chance – just five minutes, to talk to you," Draco said, feeling breathless.

The look of fear disappeared from Amelia's eyes as she cocked an eyebrow. "So that you can spin the same rehearsed story you gave everyone in there last night? I've heard what you had to say, and I don't buy it."

This caught Draco off guard and he opened his mouth without knowing what to say. "If you just hear me out – properly – you'll see. Everything I've done has been for you – for us."

Amelia stepped closer to him, glancing around to make sure no one was in earshot. "There is no us, Malfoy."

"What – of course there is…"
"Tell that to your wife," Amelia said, venom dripping from her voice.

Draco grunted in frustration. Bloody Pansy.

She lingered for half a second and again Draco felt a pulse of electricity between them so strong that it must've been impossible that she didn't feel it too.

"You may have half the resistance fooled, but they don't know you the way I do." Her voice was faltering slightly and as she took a step away from him, he could see her eyes becoming glassy.

"Amelia, c'mon… you must know deep down…"

She shook her head and put her hands up and he let his voice fade out. "I wish I could believe you Draco, but you have no idea how painful these last few years have been."

He wanted nothing more than to embrace her, but thought he'd receive a swift punch to the face, so let her walk away, watching helplessly until she disappeared.


Amelia stumbled her way back to her tent; her one haven she had left in the resistance now that it had been well and truly infiltrated by Draco Malfoy. The nerve he had to approach her unawares like that!

The ghostly tingle of his touch still lingered on her hand.

She went straight towards her bed, dropping to her knees and pulling out a small wooden chest. Inside were only a few items, most of which she had carried with her since escaping the Battle of Hogwarts. A chain she had taken from around her father's neck as he lay in the Great Hall, a pocket watch he had given to her on her first day of Hogwarts ("been in the family for generations; it'll give you strength and remind you to take your time," he had said as an 11 year old Amelia stood tearfully on Platform 9 ¾), a miniature wooden carved figurine that Henry had given her for her birthday a couple of years ago, her Ravenclaw perfect badge, and beneath all of these, as if it were a pillow for the rest of these possessions, a neatly folded charcoal coloured jumper.

She lay the jumper on her bed and traced her fingers up the arms and along the crewnecked collar. Even after all these years, and all the sleepless nights she had held tearfully on to the fabric so desperately, it still smelt like him.

She remembered so incredibly vividly wishing for him to miraculously come back, with such might that she thought she might burst. She had held that jumper to her face four years ago, inhaling the scent like an addict, feeling like a witness to her own grief. As if she was watching all of it happen right beside her, rather than to her. Now though, Draco being so close and offering some sort of perfect alibi, it felt all too real.

Her brother – a cynical man calloused by war and his own experiences as an auror in another life – trusted him. Was overwhelmed with excitement to have a defected Death Eater, a true double agent in the resistance. Why couldn't Amelia entertain the idea, especially when she knew him so intimately?

She had listened to him the night before, so vulnerable as he pled his case and admitted his wrongs, even showing the awful slash of a scar across his Dark mark. She had absorbed his words and spent the entire night turning them over and over and over in her head, trying to find a way to let go and believe them.

But believing him meant being open and vulnerable again. Knocking down barriers she had spent years painfully building secretly in her tent, away from the world. Believing him meant exposing the open wound he had left on her all those years ago, just to give him the opportunity to do it all again.

She picked up the pocket watch and circled the circular shape delicately with her thumb, smiling sadly as she thought of her father's words: 'take your time…' If only she had known how little time she would have with him, perhaps she would've tried to extract every single thing from his mind so that she could call upon his wisdom whenever she needed it now. She thought of her father observing her life now; what would he make of the choices she had made? She imagined being able to tell him about Draco, and Pansy, and the betrayal she felt. She would tell him it was like her legs were stuck in the mud and she was unable to move forward and give Draco a chance: it was too terrifying. She smiled as she envisioned her father's answer: you either stay in the mud and sink, or take a risk and move forward.