It had been months since that cold spring night at Hogwarts, and Draco Malfoy was still shut up in a rickety little shack in Hogsmeade. Snape had indeed returned, but not to take him away. It was too volatile, he had said, and when Draco had insisted he could take care of himself, Snape had simply laughed.

With a sigh, Draco wandered into the kitchen. He was hungry, and normally there were house-elves or servants to take care of this sort of thing, but in such a shack there was no proper staff. No proper food, either, he thought grudgingly, as he sat down with a loaf of cornbread and a pat of butter.

A rat scurried across the table, and Draco drew his wand. "Crucio," he said happily, and watched the little gray thing writhe in pain as he polished off his cornbread. I have to suffer, he thought-- something else may as well suffer with me, right? But the pained squeaking grew to be too much. "Finite incantatem," he said lazily, then picked it up by its pink tail and threw it out the window. He heard it scurry away through the dead leaves and dry grass.

At times like these, Draco thought of owling Snape with rude messages, and making him promise to at least bring a good supply of firewhisky if he was going to keep him shut up in a house that even the Weasleys would consider a shack. Then he wondered if he just thought things like that to make himself forget about what he'd actually done. Then he'd begin to wonder how much of the whole incident was his fault, and how many kids Greyback had bitten-- he'd only seen a couple copies of the Daily Prophet since that night-- and had any of his friends had gotten in the way? After that, weird questions would creep into his mind, questions he'd never asked before. What if I'm actually sorry for what happened to Dumbledore? And then he'd throw something fragile against the wall and curse Snape again for leaving him there, because really, that was the problem with this place. It was filthy and tiny and very unbecoming a Malfoy, but the worst part was that it provided way too much time to think.

He rose from the table, stepping over the teacup he just smashed on the floor, and went to pull another loaf of cornbread from the cupboard.

"Bloody hell," he swore, grabbing his wrist. "What--"

He held it up to his face-- the Dark Mark was burning.

"What do I do," he said out loud. "Snape said to stay--" He clutched his wrist again. There's no choice.

Draco landed hard on the cold ground, almost getting the wind knocked out of him. Catching his breath, he peered around. Dementors hovered in the distance; wispy fog encircled the small clearing in which he sat, and he shivered in the cold. Just as he began to wonder if he was alone, a dark, familiar figure stepped out of the fog.

"Master," Draco gasped, bowing low at Voldemort's feet.

"Get up," he said.

Draco obeyed, trembling from head to toe, and watched as his master lazily drew his wand forward. Two cloaked figures emerged from the white haze.

"Your family," Voldemort breathed, after a long silence, "has been kind enough to join us this evening."

"Father," Draco said softly. "Mum. I--"

"Silence!" Voldemort bellowed. He strode up to Draco, his red eyes blazing into Draco's icy blue ones, breathing hard. "You have failed me."

"But Dumbledore is dead," Draco protested, his voice shaking with every syllable.

"Dumbledore is dead because of Severus Snape," Voldemort said with disdain. "And he did what he did..." A sadistic smile crossed his disfigured face as he brought Narcissa to her knees. "He did what he did, the Unbreakable Vow, his treachery against me, all of it-- because of his soft spot for your dear mother."

Tears streamed silently down Narcissa's pale, pointed face as she stared into the hardened face of her husband. "Lucius..."

He turned from her.

"I must admit though, Draco," Voldemort continued placidly, as Narcissa wept uncontrollably, "it was because of you that Severus was able to kill him. Finding a way to get my Death Eaters into the school-- impressive. One might say that you-- half-succeeded in your task." While he spoke, he caressed his wand.

Lucius afforded his son a half-smile of approval.

"You knew the consequences of failure, Draco."

Draco nodded, his heart pounding.

"Luckily for your father, you only half-failed. Not so luckily, I think, for your mother."

"No!" Draco yelled, raising his wand.

"Expelliarmus!" came a shout from the shadows, and Peter Pettigrew appeared, his wand out. "Incarcerous!"

Laughing, Voldemort approached Narcissa, who knelt quietly in the grass, still weeping quietly, staring at the ground. "It's too bad, really," he told her, bending down to address her. "You could have lived, had your son the fortitude to serve his master. I hear he had Dumbledore at his mercy, and lowered his wand."

Draco's eyes widened.

"There was no need for her to die!" Voldemort spat, turning back to Draco with truth in his voice that cut like ice.

A silent tear ran down Draco's cheek as he watched his mother, not meeting his eyes, accepting her fate. "I'm sorry," he choked out.

Narcissa lifted her head and gazed at her son. Her face, wet with tears, was serene. "I'm glad," she managed to say through her sniffles, "that you have not become a murderer--"

"Avada Kedavra!" hollered Voldemort, and a jet of green light hit Narcissa square in the chest, silencing her. She fell, dead, to the ground.

"No!" cried Draco. "No!" He struggled to free himself from his ropes, struggled to reach his wand. "No!"

Lucius let out an apathetic sigh. "Well, now that's done with," he said nonchalantly, joining Pettigrew. "Pick up my son's wand, will you?" He strode over to where Draco stood, thrashing in his bounds. "Oh, stop it." It was as if he were reprimanding a young child. "You're just going to make it worse. Now come along-- we have work to do. Finite incantatem." He passed Draco's wand back to him.

Draco stood there, seething, and curled his fingers around the hard hawthorn of his wand. There were a thousand curses that came to mind, each one worse than the next. His father had just stood there-- just stood there, watched her die, and not shed a single tear.

"Are you just going to leave her there?" he whispered.

Lucius stared down at his son. "The crows will take care of her," he replied stiffly.

"Get going," said a thin voice from behind him, as Voldemort approached.

Automatically, Draco's feet began to move. Snape's voice echoed inside his head... if the Dark Lord finds you, it will be only a matter of time before you are dead.

It was hard to tell, but Draco thought he saw a tall, black, bat-like shape standing in the distance-- one moment it was there, just beyond the trees; the next it was gone, having flitted away into the cold, unforgiving night. Was he still being watched over--?

"One second, please, Father," Draco said quietly, lowering his eyes. "I just-- I just want to say goodbye." Without waiting for a response, he ran back to his mother's side, taking deep breaths. Calm down, Draco.

"Touching," Voldemort said derisively to Lucius.

"He was always too spoiled," Lucius replied, by way of explanation.

Draco knelt, his hands shaking, and put one arm around his mother's lifeless form. He took one last look at his father's cold glare, at Voldemort's contorted face, and closed his eyes.

Determination. Deliberation. Destination.

"Truthfully, I didn't think you'd come back here," said Snape, pushing his chair back from the kitchen table, and Draco noticed his eyes were wet.

Draco carefully brushed pieces of broken teacup from his mother's hair. "I wish I wouldn't have smashed that now."

"Too late to worry about such trifles." Snape knelt to help him. "What are you going to do now?"

"Didn't think about that," he admitted. "I can't go home. You're not going to let me come with you. I can't go back to Hogwarts, and I'm certainly not going to stay in this bloody hole."

"Well, I certainly can't go back to Hogwarts. I think, however, that Professor McGonagall may be a bit more forgiving in your case."

A sneer crossed Draco's face. "Potter will have given her the whole bloody story," he muttered. "No matter that I couldn't go through with it. I'll be just as guilty as you--"

Draco looked up suddenly to see Snape watching him with interest, and turned away. "Doesn't matter," he repeated. "It's hopeless for me to go back there. I might as well walk myself right up to Azkaban."

"Dumbledore offered you and your family the protection of the Order of the Phoenix, didn't he?"

Draco nodded.

"He said he would. I told Narcissa-- well, it doesn't matter." He laid a hand on her face. "It wouldn't have had to end like this."

Something churned in Draco's stomach, but he pushed it aside. "So whose side are you really on, anyway?"

"Whose side are you on?"

Draco thought about this. "My own side."

"For some of us, that's the only road to choose."

He stood. "Will you..." His voice caught in his throat and he nodded toward his mother's body; he couldn't force himself to say the words.

Snape nodded. "I'll take care of everything."

With a crack, Draco was gone.