Chapter Twenty-Seven

Above All, the Right Thing

Draco was lost for a moment in the panic of seeing a wand held on the boy he was protecting, and having his own wand tied up in the business of keeping that boy moving since he was in too much pain to move under his own power. He froze. Matt's swollen and uncooperative fingers somehow managed to grab Draco's wand from him, and he immediately crumpled to the ground. He yelped in pain, but in the same expelled breath and with the weight of all his feelings over the last night behind it, he screamed out,

"Stupefy!"

It was telling that he aimed for Cross, the less magically dangerous man, but Tyrell was distracted when the jet of red light struck his ally. Matt's spell pounded into him and stopped his momentum enough to nearly drive him backward. He fell so hard he bounced off the pavement on the street.

"Wha . . . good one, Matt," Draco muttered in surprise.

"Stupefy!" Matt shouted again, but Tyrell got a shield up and was only rocked a bit.

With a cry of rage, Tyrell bolted after them. Matt seemed to have used up everything he had. Draco grabbed him under the arms and dragged him inside. He tried to slam the door shut on Tyrell, but the young man slammed into the door before it had latched, and Draco, already off-balance with trying to drag a nearly twelve-year-old boy along on a bum leg, was thrown back and nearly tripped. Tyrell entered to find Matt on the cold, scuffed, wooden floor, and Draco straightening up and getting a better grip on his cane.

Tyrell smiled one of his awful, pleased smiles, and pointed his wand directly at Draco's chest. Draco's heart was pounding, and he flicked his eyes to Matt, who had dropped the wand from his fumbling hand, and who was staring back at him. His last words, he thought wildly, even as he wondered how he had time for it.

"Tell everyone I'm sorry." He gave Matt a sickly smile, wishing he had the time to apologize properly for what he'd done. Wishing he'd gotten the opportunity to hear Matt forgive him, though he never should have allowed himself to hope for that to begin with. Then Tyrell spoke just as he did.

"Matt, get up and run!"

"Avada Kedavra!"

---Break---

Matt gasped and flinched when he heard Tyrell speak the killing curse. He tried to obey Malfoy's final command, but his feet wouldn't cooperate. He fell only a step into his flight, and from his vantage point on the floor, he saw the most confusing thing in the world. Malfoy's legs, angling up above him. Malfoy was still standing. Matt twisted his head to stare up at Tyrell.

"What?" Tyrell said, barely breathing. He stared at his wand. "What is this?" He pointed the wand at Malfoy again. "Avada Kedavra!" he screamed. There was no green light, and Malfoy was still standing. Matt was amazed. He'd seen Tyrell kill with that curse already. "Why isn't it working?" Tyrell screamed, his face red with anger.

"It's the church," Matt said, then shrunk back as Tyrell turned on him.

"What about the church?"

"It's a place of power, like Mr. Townsend says." Matt hadn't been sure he believed it, but he should have known. Basil's father was just like he was—intelligent and self-confident. He wouldn't make a claim he didn't have support for. "It must have parishioners who really believe. It cancels magic like that."

"I'd heard that," Malfoy said in a slow, cautious voice, "but I never believed it."

"No doubt your father told you that," Tyrell sneered.

"No," he answered in that same slow way. It was almost like he couldn't believe he was speaking at all. "Voldemort did."

"You call him 'Lord'!" Tyrell shrieked, his eyes completely mad.

Malfoy smiled, but there was nothing happy in that smile. "I did. Never again. You made a mistake, Tyrell. You assumed I had some reason to want to see Voldemort's empire restored." Then he rolled up his sleeve, and Matt realized he'd never seen his teacher's bare arm before. He thought he'd see a Dark Mark tattooed there, but he didn't. There was only a mass of scar tissue. "I didn't like it the first time. You see, Tyrell? I burned his mark from me. I came here for Matt, and for that reason only."

Tyrell quivered in impotent rage. "I will kill you," he vowed in a whisper. "I'll kill you, Malfoy."

"You're a pureblood, aren't you Tyrell? Did your father teach you to fence?"

"No."

"Then you know nothing of the rigorous training, the hours it takes to become good enough to touch at precisely the place you mean to with such a long instrument?"

"No."

"Good," he said with a real smile this time. Then he hoisted up his cane with a quick flick of his wrist, lunged forward, and jabbed Tyrell in the throat. Tyrell gagged as Malfoy leapt back clumsily. He stared at Malfoy in shock, and clutched at his throat. He tried to breathe, but it was a poor little rasp of air, not enough. He fell to his knees, still staring, then to his hands and knees, and finally he broke eye contact when he lay down on the floor and curled up in a ball. Matt scooted away from him, and looked up at Draco Malfoy, who had saved him tonight.

Malfoy stood where he was, and watched Matt with a sorrowful look, as they listened to the ugly gasps of Tyrell as he suffocated ever so slowly. Matt tried to think. His mind had become so sharp for a moment, and he'd released a flood of magic at Cross and Tyrell that had almost scared him. Then his brain had gone fuzzy again. He still couldn't seem to marshall his thoughts into order. They floated about, and the only thing he could really fix in his head was that the words Malfoy had wanted to speak before dying were words of apology. Malfoy was sorry. He'd come to save Matt tonight. He'd risked his life to keep Tyrell from hurting him and maybe to keep him from becoming like Voldemort. Malfoy had done a very good thing.

"Ma— Mr. Malfoy?"

The man, his teacher, the only enemy he'd ever really had, frowned at him. "You know, I liked 'Professor Stevens' a lot more."

"Thank you," Matt said, hating how squeaky his voice sounded. His whole body ached and he just let himself float and ignore it.

The door opened. They both stiffened.

"Dad!"

"Matt, oh, thank Merlin, Matt!"

Dad ran to him and gathered him up and the pain in his shoulders meant nothing, nothing at all.

"Matt, you're all right," Dad said, several times. "You're safe now. Everything's all right."

"I know," he said, and tried not to let Dad see how much the hugs hurt. "Dad . . . Malfoy. That's Draco Malfoy."
Dad looked up at the man, who was still standing very still. "I know, Matt. It's okay."

"I know it is. He rescued me."

"Yeah," Dad said in a weird voice. He sounded almost like he was choking, choking like Tyrell, now laying dead on the floor. He was looking at Malfoy still. "He did."

---Break---

Harry held his son in his arms, even though Matt was far too big for his lap. He'd sent word to Ginny that he was safe, and he was waiting for her to arrive so they could go to St. Mungo's together. In the meantime, he sat in Kingsley's office and held Matt, who was practically delirious with exhaustion but unable to sleep. He'd asked about Bear three times, seeming unable to remember that Harry had already assured him that she'd suffered no damage and he'd see her soon.

Draco Malfoy sat in the office with him. His face was drawn with weariness and shadows darkened his eyes. His first question, upon returning to the office, was if the werewolf Ran Edwards was okay. Once he'd found out that Hagrid had sat with him all night, he asked whether any other students at Hogwarts had been injured. Then he asked if they'd taken Max Cross into custody. They had not. There'd been no sign of him, and they assumed he'd run off to hide until he got the opportunity to go after Dudley, who was already being watched on Harry's orders. Finally, Draco slunk into the office to await whatever fate was in store for him.

He had one final question, it seemed, this one for Harry and Harry alone. "What are you going to do with me?" he asked softly. "The only people who know Drew Stevens' real identity are in this room. May I please just go? Like you said when we went to Cross' house?"

Matt muttered something incoherent, and Harry instinctively cradled his son's head against his chest. "Shh, just rest." He refocused on Draco, feeling very uncertain and at the same time absolutely sure of what he was doing. "You really care about the students, don't you?"

The blond wizard nodded, sighing out a deep breath. "That's my whole life, Potter. That school is everything to me."

"Where would you go, then?"

He shrugged. "Back to New York, I suppose. My friends there would be happy enough to have me back."

"The ones who doctored the records to give you a past?" Harry guessed.

"Yes."

"You don't want to go back?"

"No."

"Why are you here, Malfoy? What do you want?"

"A life," the man said desperately. "I want to make up for what I've done. I want to teach, I love to teach. Hogwarts is my home, now. Harry," he addressed him, and met his eyes soberly. Being addressed by his first name stunned Harry, and he nodded at Draco to continue. "Please. Don't tell the kids who I am. When I go. Make something up, anything. Just . . . I don't want them to know what I did." His eyes fell on Matt, and Harry held him tighter despite himself. "Matt? You won't tell, will you?"

Matt shifted a bit so he could look at Draco. He seemed confused. "I think I owe you for saving me."

"No," Draco said. "You don't owe me anything. I could never do enough to make up for what I've already done to you."

"Just don't kill anybody else," Matt mumbled, and his eyes closed. He buried his face in Harry's shirt again.

Draco looked miserable. "No. I don't want to do that."

"You really have changed, haven't you?" Harry asked, trying to comprehend the dramatic difference between the man in front of him and boy he'd last seen nigh on six years ago. He didn't want to believe it, but then, he'd stopped believing Draco was heartless on a fateful night while hiding under a cloak on the Astronomy Tower.

He smiled a little. "So says the Sorting Hat."

"What?"

"McGonagall made me wear the hat. To decide if I could be Head of Gryffindor. The hat remembered me, but it just spoke in my head about that. It remembered who I was, and how easy it had been to place me before. It told me that I was different. It told me that once I stopped being so concerned about myself, I'd gotten a lot more mature. It asked me if I wanted to become Head of Gryffindor. I . . . Merlin, I wanted to help McGonagall out, so I said I didn't mind. And it said that proved I had grown beyond the divisions of the houses, and only that made me capable of being a good leader for the students. It even told me it wished they would let it judge all the heads like this to make sure they were ready for it."

Harry reflected that the last time he and Draco had talked this much, Voldemort had been lying dead, not yet cold. Were they two destined to repeat history over and over like this? He sincerely hoped not. He couldn't take any more Dark Lords.

The thing Harry wanted, above all, the thing he'd always wanted more than he wanted anything else, was to do the right thing. Always, it was about whether he was doing the right thing. And this felt like the right thing.

"I know why you did what you did. I know that you blamed me for what happened to your mother. I let everyone think it was revenge agains the Weasleys driving you, when I knew it was revenge against me. I didn't want to put your life in any more danger by revealing to the last Death Eaters what you'd done."

"I realize that. Thank you."

"They're all gone now, though. No one is going to threaten your life again."

Draco frowned. "What are you saying, Harry?"

"Draco. Do you want to stay here?"