Having never been one for shyness, it was an unfamiliar and uncomfortable feeling for Draco as he tentatively approached the dining hall tent as others in pairs or small groups spilled in around him. Growing up, he'd always been flanked by Crabbe and Goyle and this, paired with a now-distant feeling of moral superiority over any others, tended to keep him from ever feeling shy or nervous. As he stepped inside the tent though, he felt a burning flush on the back of his neck as he shoved his hands deep into his jacket pockets, immediately regretting his decision to come but forcing his legs to move forward.

The dining hall's transformation was quite impressive, he had to admit. The four long tables had disappeared in favour of a few small high tables dotted around the large room, with a makeshift dance floor in the middle. An old-fashioned record player attached to a large brass speaker sat firmly atop what was usually the kitchen counter, merrily projecting Christmas music to the room. Trays of food were wafting out unaccompanied from the kitchen, floating themselves around small huddles of people, waiting just long enough for them to lift a small sandwich, mince pie or pastry from the pile before floating onwards to the next group. Above, twinkling fairy lights wove around the wooden pillars holding up the tent like sparkling vines, creating a warm glow around the room.

Staying firmly in the corner, Draco scanned the room, his eyes searching for one particular person. Amelia wasn't hard to find though – she stood out against a backdrop of forgettable faces.

Her hair sat in sleek waves, cascading down her shoulders, and she wore a burgundy lipstick to compliment the navy dress she wore. Draco had never seen her look so elegant: she was completely breath-taking.

His heart sank slightly as her eyes met his and her lips pursed – Draco couldn't tell what her expression suggested. Even though, she muttered something to the person she was speaking with and made off to weave through the crowds towards the tower of champagne glasses. Draco boldly followed suit.


Amelia ducked through the jubilant crowds towards the table of champagne in the far corner of the tent. The sight of Draco Malfoy had caught her off guard: her brother had said earlier that he was clear that he wasn't going to attend.
Seamus Finnigan was the self-appointed event planner in the resistance, and he took great pride in the aesthetic he created through spells and enchantments he had picked up over the years. Tonight the drinks table on the kitchen counter featured a large pyramid of champagne flutes, with the sparkling liquid freshly flowing and cascading down the formation like a fountain. As soon as Amelia approached, a full glass glided gracefully from the top and into her hand. She sipped as she scanned the large tent: twinkling fairy lights were twisting in all directions across the ceiling, creating a blanket of warm, yellow glow above the buzzing crowd. It reminded Amelia of the Great Hall at Hogwarts on a particularly clear night, when the ceiling would mimic a starry outside sky. She wondered if that was what Seamus was trying to achieve, but wasn't sure whether he was akin to such nostalgia. All around people danced and chatted in animated conversation. Even her brother, usually tense throughout these events and worried that an ambush might occur, was smiling and sipping on a glass of firewhisky.

She sipped the glass of champagne and scanned the room; no sight of the blonde haired Slytherin.

"Never took you for one to be on the outskirts of a party," a dry and drawling voice said behind Amelia. She exhaled deeply and took a large gulp of champagne before turning to face him.

"Well, there's quite a lot of things you don't know about me," she said back in a clipped voice.

To her surprise, Draco smirked. "You look beautiful tonight," he offered more plainly.

"Stop it," she hissed and cut him off with a small wave of her hand, darting her eyes around to see if anyone had heard. No one seemed to even realise they were talking; everyone was far too caught up in the festivities.

"You won't even have a conversation with me?" Draco asked with a cocked eyebrow. He put his hand out expectantly without looking away from Amelia, as a champagne glass flew obediently into his waiting grasp. His eyes, like a glinting silvery pool, pierced her.

"What's the point, Draco? Nothing's changed," She said wearily.

"But it's Christmas," he said with mocking appeal, gesturing around the room to the peppering of festive decorations.

She didn't respond, and instead fixated her gaze on the growing crowd on the dance floor.

He stepped a little closer, taking a quick swig of champagne. "Amelia – what do I need to do to show you I'm not lying to you? Even Potter – even your brother believes me." His tone had changed from joking and sarcastic. He sounded as if he was trying to swallow his frustration.

"They haven't seen what you're capable of."

Hurt flashed across his features at this and it threw her. Stay strong, she told herself, clenching a fist by her side.

In two more gulps, she finished her champagne and set it back on the table – a little rougher than she had meant to. "Suddenly, I'm not really in the mood for celebration. Goodnight." She turned her heel without allowing Draco another word. She had to get away from him or she would cave and allow herself to become vulnerable to his games again. She could feel her willpower slipping; could hear the voice in her head urging her to give in. She tried to silence it with the knowledge of the hurt it would cause.

She heard him calling for her to come back as she darted back through the crowds, weaving her way between groups of people, a light-headedness setting in from the champagne she'd had.

She could feel him on her tail, could hear his mumbled pardons to the hordes of merry dancers as he followed her, but she persevered until she was out of the tent and taking quick strides back towards her own. The air outside was clean and cold, an instant drop from the warmth inside, and Amelia hugged her arms around herself as a chilled breeze whipped through the rows of tents.

An arm grabbed her from the shadows – firmly but without aggression, and she stopped in her tracks, unable to turn and look at him in the eye.

"Despite what you clearly think - I didn't leave you for dead in a forest that day, Amelia. I was forced to. You really think I wanted any of that to happen – you really think I planned any of the last four years?"

Her teeth were chattering in the cold. Amelia shrugged his grip from her and turned, her arms folded across her chest, her expression blank and waiting.

"This isn't exactly how I had wanted to tell you everything…" he mumbled, suddenly on the spot with the audience he had craved for so long. "Are you sure you don't want to speak in your tent?"

She scoffed at this, though she knew it wasn't meant to be forthcoming.

"Sorry… obviously not…" His sudden shyness and inability to articulate was endearing, and Amelia found herself thawing slightly. She rearranged her face so that she still appeared stern.

"Well, at least take my jacket – it's freezing out here," Draco asked, again – so timid and cautious. He shrugged the jacket from his own shoulders and offered it to Amelia. Glaring at him, as if the offering could be some sort of trap, Amelia slowly took it and wrapped it around her own shoulders. It was so warm and the scent on the collar immediately transported her back to four years ago. She steadied herself.

"Look," he resumed, "I would never have left you there. But I had a choice – leave with them, or stay and watch you die. You saw how outnumbered we were – there was nothing I could do. We were both as good as dead. So I made an Unbreakable Vow: if I left and re-joined the Dark Lord, you would stay safe. Throughout the whole war – no Death Eater could touch you."
She cocked an eyebrow. "And they just agreed to that?"
Draco exhaled. "I don't think they were thrilled. The Dark Lord didn't want the Malfoy bloodline to die out… I think that's pretty much the only reason I've made it up until this point," he said with faint amusement. "The Vow meant that I couldn't escape – couldn't even try. I think they knew I'd do anything to keep you safe – even marry Pansy Parkinson."

Amelia turned this around in her mind, her jaw clenched. "But you did escape… why haven't I been hunted down?" She asked, half mockingly, not yet willing to believe his tale.

"Because my father is dead."

Amelia already knew this from what she had already heard weeks earlier. "You killed him?" She tried to say it without any hint of what was happening inside her mind – she wasn't quite sure what she wanted the answer to be.

Draco took a long pause, before saying simply: "My mother did."

"So… the whole reason you've been a Death Eater all these years… was to protect me?" Amelia said, still trying to piece it all together.

Solemnly, Draco nodded.

Amelia ran her fingers through her hair and took a step away from him. "Enough – that's enough. I don't want to hear any more right now… sorry," she added when she caught the look on his face.

They stood a couple of metres apart, electricity between them.

"Sorry. I know it's a lot to hear, and I know what you must've thought of me all these years," he said with genuine understanding. She thought about how mature he seemed now – wizened by experience. He was almost completely unrecognisable from the boy she grew up with at school.

"You think?" She replied with a small, breathy laugh. She ran a shaky hand through her hair again and looked away from him, unable to hold his gaze for any longer as she was afraid of what might happen. She blinked away tears as a lump in her throat began to swell. Could this actually all be true? Had every move he'd made since that day in the woods been for her? She thought back to the night before they were parted, when he'd told her he loved her. It seemed so real – so maybe it was.

The wind whipped around between them, a low whistling filling the silence, but neither moved.

"I have missed you for every moment of every day since we were separated," he said in a low voice. Again, genuine.

She looked up slowly. His blonde hair glinted like a silky silver in the moonlight, with shadows cast across his features. Her fingertips tingled with the memory of touching his face – always so smooth.

"So have I." Her voice sounded far away, like an echo on the wind.

She stayed completely still as he took tentative steps towards her. The sound of the nearby festivities drowned out and all she could hear was her own breath, and the crunch of his approaching footsteps against the icy grass. He closed the space between them. She could feel his soft breath on her eyelids and was immediately taken back to their little tent in the middle of nowhere all those years ago.

She felt him take her hand from by her side, and allowed him to hold it. She raised her eyes to his. His expression was hard to read, but the way he held her hand, as if it were a rare and fragile jewel, told her that he was as scared as she was that either one of them might pull away.

In one motion, she pulled him by the hand and caught his lips with hers, her other hand going almost instinctively to caress his face. Every part of it felt so natural, like two pieces of a jigsaw sliding back together. She hadn't been kissed or touched for so long that she had been scared she'd somehow forgotten how to, but kissing Draco was as easy and as natural as breathing. His arm brought her closer towards him, so that their bodies collided gently. She felt his hand across her back and warmth spread over her body. She let her fingers run up the length from his hand to his shoulder; he felt somehow muscular and tender at the same time, and she immediately recalled every inch of his body in her mind. She wondered if he was doing the same, if he remembered as vividly. It felt so real all of a sudden; had she been a fool for not believing him sooner? His story made sense – everything fit. He stroked her hair, twisting his fingers through it and bringing her body closer still to his.

But in a heartbeat, a jolt of anxiety sliced through her gut and everything that had just seemed so plausible and fitting suddenly crumbled around her. She tossed his words and his explanations around in her head and matched them with the intense feelings of grief and confusion and betrayal she had felt for years.

Waking up in the forest alone all those years ago.

Grieving his loss. Discovering his betrayal.

The picture of him and Pansy in the Prophet.

Her father lying dead – killed by Death Eaters.

She pressed a hand against his chest and pulled away, short of breath and suddenly very nauseous.

She looked at his expression and saw it turn from bliss to confusion.

"Draco – I'm sorry – I can't…" she managed, clutching at her neck feebly and stumbling away from him.

"Amelia – wait!"

She was already running in the other direction though, swallowing the lump in her throat and trying to ignore the taste of him on her lips.


In bed Amelia turned continuously, constantly feeling either too hot or too restless to sleep. Her mind replayed the evening again and again, and from every possible angle, she couldn't discern how she now felt. Every few minutes her mind would wander and she would stare at the wall, feeling as though her glare could burn through the many walls to where Draco slept.

She rolled onto her back, wide eyes to the ceiling.

May 3rd, 1998

She woke up, eyes swollen and limbs heavy, her heartbeat echoing through her hollow body. The floor of the cave was dry, but hard and uncomfortable and as she rolled onto her side, she felt the points of her body ache against the pressure of the hard rock beneath. Every inch of her body throbbed with the hangover over the lost battle of the day before, and as she blinked sleep away, memories of the previous day came crashing down around her.
Beside her sat Draco, hugging his knees as he stared out to the sea beyond the cave's entrance. She studied his face and couldn't tell whether he looked vacant or deeply contemplative, and for about the millionth time that year, she wished she could know what he was thinking.

His face – somehow smooth and inviting but hard and mysterious at the same time. His hair hung around his face, framing his features like glinting golden strands of honey with the ashy remnants of last-night's fire speckled through. She had often done this during their seventh year; secretly taken in his appearance. She loved to observe him in the moments where he thought no eyes were on him. Just now, watching him absently rub his chin, clear his throat, blink with tiredness, captivated her and drew her in towards him. He fascinated her beyond any other person or any piece of knowledge in the world. She wished there were books written about him so she could pore over each page and commit every detail to memory. And though the world around them felt utterly destroyed and she had been left bereft in so many ways, being huddled in this small cave in the dark corners of England, with him, felt somehow content.

"Good morning." His croaky voice jolted her out of her thoughts and she felt embarrassed to be caught in this odd moment. She blinked and became present, taking in the small and sad smile at the corners of his mouth. She slowly adjusted herself to sit upright next to him, mimicking his position by pulling her knees to her chest. They looked like two small children.

"I was hoping I'd wake up and it wouldn't be real," she said, watching the waves roll onto the shore beyond the cave.

"Me too," Draco offered. "We'll be okay though."
She looked at him, unsure of what expression was on her own face. She could tell that Draco knew she didn't believe him saying this. She allowed him to touch her face, stroking her cheek with such care, letting his hand twist gently through her tangled hair. A sudden urge to tell him she loved him came onto her tongue, and as she looked at him she wondered if maybe he had the same thought. They were connected now, deeply rooted within one another, and no matter what happened from now, Amelia knew they would shape the rest of their lives from this connection. She said nothing though, instead resting her head on his shoulder, limply linking her arm through his.

She closed her eyes, allowing herself to be relaxed by his scent and the soft rise and fall of his shoulder, and hoped that whatever it was between them, was never lost.


Amelia wasn't sure why this memory of the morning after the Battle of Hogwarts had pushed its way to the front of her mind, but she lay all night thinking about the young boy and girl in that cave, and all they had in store for them. She wondered endlessly, as she had for so many nights, if he was thinking then of his plans to redeem himself as a Death Eater. If, in those moments as she tried to connect to his soul and his thoughts, they were of betrayal.