Disclaimer - I don't own this bit of fun I wrote, sadly, because I did not create the characters or the world of HP. Slash warning. AU of course. Takes place instead of the sixth onward just because. Enjoy the random luff of doom. Can't believe the series is over, ah well, I enjoyed it while it lasted. I already have four and a half chapters written out for this, so ... for that long at least there will be speedy updates. And during that time I shall work on my other fanfics. Nifty system... wonder why I didn't think of it before.

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I will not die, I'll wait here for you…

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"Narcissa! What have you done?"

Draco woke to the sound of his father's voice rising in panic. It wasn't the first time that his father's voice woke him in such a manner. He wondered what it was this time. He hoped it wasn't about the flamingo in the pond… it had made Mother smile. Few things did, and it made the rare sight even more special.

"The Dark Lord shall not have my son now!" his mother's voice sounded shrilly.

Ah. That again. They always argued about it, whether or not he'd become a Deatheater when he left school. The argument was pointless. It was his choice.

"Mother, Father?" Draco said sleepily, sitting up in his bed. Then, as his sleep-induced confusion wore off, he blinked. "Father!" His father was in Azkaban wasn't he? Neither answered him.

"How could you cast that on our son without my permission?" Lucius demanded fiercely. He truly loved his wife, he did, but this… he wasn't sure he could forgive. Ever. His child. His only child. Draco.

"Cast what?" Draco asked, faintly annoyed that he hadn't gotten a response. Neither of the pair would look at the bed. It was almost as if they were afraid to. Nonsense.

"Draco will come back to his body eventually, Lucius."

Wait, what was that?

"My son is dead!"

Okay that's even worse.

"Technically, yes. But he'll get better."

Uh… ? Precisely how in Merlin's name is that possible if I'm dead?!

"You're mad, woman."

That seems like the most likely explanation. Mum cracked.

"What are you two talking about?" Draco asked, getting more frustrated and freaked out as time passed. No one said anything or looked at him, and his parents' conversation got more bizarre and worrisome. "Look at me! Someone look at me!" He jumped out of bed, barely feeling the cold floor, and ran in between his parents glaring at each other.

They took no notice. That was when he began to get scared. He looked at the bed, which his parents were avoiding. It still held his body. So I am dead, he thought, strangely calm for a moment. It didn't last. "Oh oh oh," he couldn't stop repeating that little sound even though he hadn't been aware that he'd been making it at first. His nails dug into his top lip as he covered his mouth. He had strange a feeling that he was about to get hysterical.

"That may be, Lucius," the beautiful, but possibly raving mad, woman murmured. She'd finally gathered the nerve to walk up to her son's bed to look at the still form. "But I don't care. He won't have my Draco." She gave her husband an almost innocently sweet smile. "You aren't aware of what I cast, precisely?"

"I am…" the Deatheater lied, realized that she could see through it, and stiffened.

"It caused his soul to leave his body, unharmed yet unable to return, and his body to remain as it would in the grip of death until his return."

"You said he couldn't return," Lucius whispered.

"Without help," Narcissa murmured softly, eyes downcast. That was the problematic part.

"Whose?"

"I don't know!" Draco's mother wailed suddenly. "It's vague about that part, something about spirits being invisible except to their other half unless they are actually dead and choose to remain earthbound. He has to find his other half and his other half must return him to his body somehow." She looked up at her love, trying to reassure and receive reassurance at the same time. "He'll come back."

Lucius looked troubled, then nodded. It wasn't quite as bad as he'd feared. However… "Draco will be displeased. He would want some choice in the matter. What if the other half is a mudblood. Or worse…"

Narcissa gave him a sharp look, and said in a soft voice, "Well, then we'd have to switch sides, darling, if we'd want our son and his other half to survive. Difficult as it may be." She sighed. "If only it were easy leaving the Dark Lord, but he'd be so angry. We'd need protection for our sweetums."

Draco snorted. Sweetums? When had she ever called him that? Despite that, the rest of her words sunk in. What if his other half was a Muggle? He felt a sickening nervousness, what if his other half was a witch he knew? What if she hated him and refused to return him to his body? Would he wander the Earth forever, or at least until his body truly died…

"How long does he have?" Lucius asked, startling his son from his uneasy reverie.

His wife stared at him, wide-eyed. That was a good question. She pulled an ancient little book filled with notes out of a pocket of her robes and flipped through it. "Hmm. Depends." She looked perturbed.

"What do you mean, it depends?" Lucius asked impatiently. Draco would have liked to do the same, a little louder, and a little more hysterically. There was a time limit, and it wasn't concrete? How long did he have?

"Well, he has about six months, if he doesn't find his other half," she swallowed. She could have just killed her son. Narcissa forced her head up, and continued, "If he does find his other half, he may survive with his soul unscathed, until his body rots or until he is returned." She closed her eyes.

Draco, meanwhile, poked his body. It wouldn't let him in, of course. Bloody thing, sixteen years he lived in it and it chose now to disobey him. Then he noticed his wand poking out from under his pillow. He tried to pick it up, but it barely moved as his hand passed through it. He cursed under his breath.

"This is interesting," Lucius murmured, having taken the notebook from his wife. She was now sitting on the edge of the bed looking forlorn. "Says that once he's with his other half, he'll somehow be more solid. More solid than a ghost, visible to others if he chooses, and … like a poltergeist he'll be able to affect things. So even if it takes a while to convince his other half to visit Malfoy Manor," he chuckled, "he won't be too inconvenienced by lacking a body. Knowing Draco, he might have a bit of fun."

He then noticed his wife's distress. He sighed, and sat next to her. "Lovey, he'll make it. Despite himself."

"What's that supposed to mean?" Draco exclaimed, then felt a chill.

A ghost was looking at him, apparently it had went right through him and was more than a little surprised. "You're alive?"

"Am I?" Draco murmured, before looking up at the ghost. It reminded him of a portrait in the house, he couldn't remember which… "I won't be for long if I don't find my 'other half'." He sighed.

"That? Your mother found my old spell book?" The strange old ghost looked amused.

"It was yours? Then this is your fault!" Draco cried, pointing to his lifeless body on the bed.

"Not entirely mine, I assure you," the ghost said coolly. "I am sure some of the fault would lay with your mother."

"Don't speak of my mother."

"I shall do as I wish in my own home," the ghost replied. "I built this house, and to think of some of the guests I've been getting lately. Disgraceful, that excuse for a Dark Lord. Is that all wizardkind can muster up nowadays?"

"Ah… I… er…" Draco felt as if, by speaking to this ghost, he'd been Confounded.

"Never mind that," the strange Malfoy of ancient days said brightly, "About your 'other half' you must find him within three months or your soul will be damaged."

"Mother said six…"

"Mother was wrong, who wrote that book, she or I?" the ghost replied irately. "I made a few errors, in my research, that I found out entirely too late…"

"Sorry."

"To find your other half, search for the one person in all your life - other than that scum Voldemort he doesn't really count as his soul is ripped in shreds - that you've felt strongly for. Love or hate, it doesn't matter. Actually, hate is probably more likely. Your 'other half' is your complete opposite. She - actually he is more likely in your case -"

"Excuse me!" Draco stared at him.

"It's okay, dear, wizards do that all the time, didn't you know?" the wizard said oddly amused. "Well, not openly. Usually one of the pair pretends to be a woman for some weird reason." He shrugged. "It matters not. You'll still have an heir and that's all that matters."

"How?" Draco asked, utterly bemused.

"Dear me! Haven't you heard the facts of life yet? Well, it isn't my place, but the same way as any witch and wizard get a child. Well, not exactly, but the basics are the same."

Draco blushed - strange that he could as a spirit - and made a face at the wizard-ghost.

"Kehehe. As I was saying, was there anyone you've felt that strongly about?"

"No," Draco whispered, then remembered something that would have made him choke to death if he was currently residing in a living body rather than spirit matter. Whatever that was. He remembered standing in Madame Malkins and meeting a scruffy little boy looking as confused as could be. Trying to talk to him, as friendly as he knew how to be. Despite the scruffiness, he'd wanted desperately to be that boy's friend, his best friend, at Hogwarts. In hindsight, he'd said things that could only have upset the boy. Intense anger following that same boy's repulsion of him, and years - and years - of fighting. Enjoying pushing Potter until he snapped, despite the injuries he'd get. Better than being ignored. No. No possible way…

"I take it that you know who to seek, now?" the ghost asked kindly. There was no way that it was in his family. Could be Dumbledore, interfering old man.

"I do," Draco hissed through his teeth. He wondered whether it'd be better to let his body die…

"Go, then, child," the ghost of Malfoy Manor banished him from the grounds. Until the time that he meets his other half, he could not return. Otherwise he'd never leave.

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