A/N~ I'm a filthy liar. -_-" Because of my awful habit of writing a 15k+ endings to fics, I've decided to split Acquiescence's ending into three chapters. I swear I won't be delaying it any further and the last chapters will be posted back-to-back over the next three days. :)

I hope you enjoy this fic as much as I have. I'm in the eternal debt of all my readers and will serve them with more slash until the end!

A special thanks to my betas, and another to my amazing reviewers! :D

Thanks for reading! Please review!

:D

The Violin's Bow

"Just like him, isn't it, to run like the weasel he is?" Ginny spat, the malice in her voice clear even through the odd ringing in Harry's ears.

"Bloody coward,"

At one time, Harry would have agreed, but today every cell in his body seemed to disagree, the curse that never thought ill of its master protesting, and his own heart, weighted with a horrible knowledge, argued violently. His cells were tingling, curse growling, and heart pounding, the corridor suddenly seeming very hot and loud.

"No, he's not," he found himself saying, near snarling.

"Harry?"

He turned, still feeling incredibly, achingly, empty-armed without Draco protected in his embrace. Ginny was still hunched over a sweating Goldstein, all concern and innocence as if she was not the one who moments ago had a powerful rancor glowing in her eyes, her wand twitching to curse an unarmed boy. Her open gaze somehow made him angrier, a serpent of fury slithering through the curse and setting it aflame with the hisses she'd hissed, sparking with the sparks she'd directed at Draco, his master, that poor burdened, brave boy.

"He's not a coward."

Her stare hardened to something scrutinizing and frustrated, as if he was being stupid.

"You see? You see what he's done to you?" she pointed accusingly at him, but he didn't so much as blink.

"Done to me?"

"You—you're—he—" words failed her and her sharp look flickered back down to Goldstein, who was holding her hand and breathing shallowly, sweat slicked across his face as he recovered from the Cruciatus Curse.

"Is it really that awful?" Harry asked quietly, rage cooling, "Haven't you ever…felt like this?"

The look she gave him, melancholy, defeated, wistful, said that she had, she was, right at that moment she was as entangled was in something that was a curse not that much unlike Harry's own. It kept you captive to a single person, making you do the oddest things, like smile like a nutter or go out of your way to fetch quills, just to see if you might brush hands with someone that's become the master of something very important within you. It made you feel the strangest things, sometimes awful, but most of the time glorious, above all else it was reckless, unpredictable, and warm like a tumbler full of Firewhisky you simply, blissfully drown in.

They were all under curses, he, Draco, and Ginny; expectation, pain, and that mad, binding feeling.

Harry couldn't dwell on that now however, because somewhere Draco was running, believing he was hated, believing Harry was disgusted with him, and that was simply something Harry couldn't allow him to keep thinking.

This time he wasn't going to bid his time, sit around and play the coward. He was going to do something.

But then, as if the fates were truly against him, or in this instance, a single Hogwarts staff member, his escape was snatched away by the intimidating figure of a furious Severus Snape swooping down upon them.

"Again, I find Gryffindors in my dungeons and can't help but wonder as to why they assume these passageways were made to stage their petty disputes."

Once again, Harry was struck dumb by that black glare, this time accompanied by the echo of the seemingly unfitting title of 'Sev'rus' ringing through his mind. Would the Potions master he knew really consent to be called such a thing, even by his godson? Evidently, it was a very different man that Draco saw as his godfather, a man that had more feelings than indifference and loathing.

"Well, Potter?"

Harry realized with a jolt that the glaring man who was indeed at this moment the Dungeon Bat of Hogwarts and not Uncle Sev'rus was demanding something of him, probably an explanation that he didn't have.

"I—I cursed Goldstein again," he lied, "Sorry, I'll take him to the Hospital wing right away, Professor."

For a stupid, splendid moment Harry thought he'd gotten out of detention for a short time in which he'd spend every second catching up to Draco, wherever he may have fled to.

Unfortunately, for him, however, he'd have no such opportunity. Not that night.

Snape took in his eager face with a sneer curling his lip.

"I think not Potter. You'll carry out your punishment for this crime along with your other in detention, where you should be at this moment. Miss Weasley—" he snapped, turning to Ginny, who was whispering heatedly to Goldstein, propping him up into an unstable sitting position.

"Be sure Mr. Goldstein makes it to Madam Pomfrey in one piece. Also, kindly be sure to alert any fellow Gryffindors that may cross your path that yourself and Mr. Potter have lost your noble house another fifty points."

With much fumbling, Ginny helped the Ravenclaw off the floor, supporting his shaky frame as they started to hobble away. Harry stared at the floor, but he felt Ginny's eyes on him. The feeling made him shudder slightly, the intensity of it.

He looked up when their shuffling paused, panic rising in him as he saw that she looked as though she was going to say something, something horrible and undoubtedly the truth. Draco had used an Unforgivable on Goldstein. Harry was covering for him, like Draco had done for him the last time they'd had a run in with the Ravenclaw.

"He's going to hurt you,"

That's all she said, her voice almost inaudible, and maybe Harry had only imagined it as neither Goldstein nor Snape acted as if she'd said anything.

"Potter," Snape hissed as soon as the pair was out of sight, his voice a silken whisper, "I believe you've a detention you're late for."

Harry walked stiffly past him; mind working to try and find some escape from what would surely be a long, long imprisonment in detention. Could he possibly injure himself somehow and get Snape to send him to the Hospital wing along with Goldstein? Or would Snape leave him to suffer?

The click of a lock and the growl of a spell told Harry that the latter was much more likely.

The detention dragged on for what felt like the slow passing of a century. Harry sat, feigning progress as he scribbled aimlessly on a length of parchment that was supposed to be an essay about his being a spoilt brat with temperament problems. It was cold, and every tick of a second grated on the curse like a dull knife. His nerves were already frayed down to nothing under that glare he kept feeling, flickering onto him like the light of a guttering candle every so often and sparking some new annoyance and anger within him.

Shouldn't Snape understand? Obviously, the life of a spy was no ease; the secrets, the lies, the curses. He wondered why it seemed that only Draco endured the curses. Was it that Snape was already safe within Voldemort's inner circle while Draco was nothing more than a novelty of a Death Eater? It made him hate the man more than ever to imagine Draco twitching and thrashing and screaming while Snape stood by and did nothing more than watch.

Harry also wondered if he truly cared, if Uncle Sev'rus honestly cared. At least someone did, and that someone was the person who should the most; Draco's mother. Harry didn't know how much she could do, but she did something in ensuring her son's safety, risking her own as she turned to the enemy for help. She definitely cared, he knew, as he remembered that phantom figure, her beauty worn to worry.

She'd been so brave to do that, just as her son was to spy for the Light.

Harry wished he'd been less thick and a little braver in that bathroom days ago, but regret would get him nowhere but a miserable place he didn't want to return to. He knew that all too well whenever he heard a bark of a laugh in his dreams.

It must have been sometime well after midnight when Snape finally bid him a wordless good riddance with the swing of the dungeon room door opening. Harry walked out, an anxious spring to his step, not even pausing to glance back as he heard Snape set what was supposed to be an essay and was really a load of indecipherable scribbles aflame.

He wasn't about to go bounding about the castle, calling the Slytherin's name down the corridors. No, all the time had allowed him to think, too much perhaps about Dark Marks and his own brash stupidity, but he'd spared enough thought about how he wasn't utilizing the magic he had.

He nearly tore the Marauder's Map in two when he at last had it in his hands. He hadn't woken any of his dorm mates as he'd dashed stealthily into the room and rummaged in his trunk.

He scanned the folds frantically, turning the pages this way and that, but finding no dot labeled "Draco Malfoy". He was absent from the Slytherin dorms, there was no sign of him in the dungeons at all, in fact. Harry scoured every floor, the kitchens, the library, the Astronomy Tower, the Great Hall, everywhere, but, according to the Map that was never mistaken, there was no Draco Malfoy at Hogwarts.

He's doing something in the Room of Requirement.

Ginny's words whispered through his mind and he immediately felt the tension ease from him, a sort of nervous laugh escaping him as he folded the Map decisively, trying to shake the nonsense, the nightmares, from his head.

That was the only explanation Harry could handle, because the other, less plausible, possibilities made Harry reel, images of red eyes and green curses flashing across his vision. He didn't need to think of that however because Draco was tucked away in the Room of Requirement, that place Ginny knew he was.

Harry wondered deeply what he might be doing in there, but if Draco was in Hogwarts, he was safe.

He repeated this mantra until exhaustion pulled him into a fitful, restless sleep.

~o0o~

He awoke with a jolt in the morning, a nightmare he was happy to forget slipping away as he fumbled for his glasses. It'd been something about a dimly lit room, a stench in the carpets, and jeering faces peering out from under black hoods.

"Alright, mate?"

Harry blinked blearily at Ron, who was already straightening his tie. Neville was dragging on his robes and Dean and Seamus were already gone.

"I was going to wake you a little later, I know Snape kept you late." Ron said, but Harry slid out of bed and ambled toward the bathroom. He didn't want to return to that room, no matter how tired he was.

By the time Harry, Ron, and Neville were making their way toward the Great Hall, Harry felt wide awake, anxious to see a pale head of hair ducked between Zabini and Parkinson at the Slytherin table. He was disappointed to find a space where that white-blonde head should have been, his eyes darting to the pair who flanked the spot. They were exchanging scowls and Harry considered simply walking up and asking where Draco might be.

Hermione was giving him a look that he knew he wouldn't be allowed to escape, however.

"'Mione," he sighed, but the look didn't relent. He supposed he was meant to give some long-winded apology he didn't mean. It made him wonder what Draco would say to that, but the echo of his words hurt.

"What did I say about apologizing when you don't mean it?"

"Fine, I'm sorry about cursing Goldstein again and losing Gryffindor more points." He muttered, "But you should know—"

"Harry, what in the world are you on about?"

Harry gaped, and she gaped right back, looking uncharacteristically perplexed. Ron looked just as confused and was mouthing 'again'?

"You don't know then?" Harry asked.

"Know what?" said Hermione.

"Well, last night, Goldstein and I, um, got in a row and I cursed him with something nasty, so he's in the Hospital wing. Snape caught me and took points." He explained, sticking to the cover up Ginny had thankfully acquiesced to. He certainly didn't want Draco to get in trouble for using an Unforgivable. If poor Goldstein went along with the lie again, well Harry owed him. "Didn't Ginny tell you?"

Hermione shook her head and gave him a disapproving glare.

"What's up with you and Goldstein, anyway?" Ron asked, "You've gotten into a duel before?"

"Yeah, remember? It wasn't as bad as this time, but I still knocked him out cold. Flitwick-"

"Harry, that was Malfoy, wasn't it?"

Harry felt his blood go cold at Hermione's careful voice and the stare of those around him. Draco had taken the fall for that incident, he now recalled, thought it was really his fault in the first place, ordering Harry to.

"Right," he mumbled weakly, "Right."

"So what was it about then?"

Ron was thankfully oblivious to that slip of memory, along with everyone else, who had given up listening and went back to their breakfast.

"He was being a git to someone he shouldn't," Harry growled, and gave Hermione a significant look.

"Not Ginny?" Ron's face darkened, but Harry quickly shook his head. Ron didn't much care for Goldstein, or anyone who dated his sister, save for Harry, which did nothing to make him feel any less guilty.

"No, just—" Harry thought about telling them both everything, even if it seemed to break the promise the curse had made, but Hermione spoke up.

"Where is Ginny this morning anyway?"

"Haven't you seen here?" Ron asked around a mouthful of egg.

"No."

"Maybe she's with Luna?" Neville piped up.

"Nah, saw her earlier on her way to the Astronomy Tower to do Merlin knows what." Seamus said.

"The Hospital wing with her boyfriend then," Lavender said, "I don't remember her coming back to the dorm last night, after all."

"Well I'm not going to let her go the day without breakfast," Ron said with an air of finality as he rose, gathering a plate full of food.

"Since when were you the Great Meal Enforcer?" Hermione quipped.

"Since the lot of you decided that food was unnecessary." He retorted, "I'm going up to the Hospital wing."

"I'll go too," Harry said. He'd feel much better if he knew that last night's events were going to be properly forgotten. Stories needed to be made, hopefully without questions asked.

Hermione trailed after them as they exited the Hall, quelled to silence by Ron's well meaning frustration.

When they got into the bright Hospital wing, only three beds were occupied: a first year with a nasty cold, a third year that had a growth on the side of his head that looked like the beginnings of an arm, and then Goldstein, asleep.

Ginny was nowhere in sight, not by his bedside or anywhere else. Madam Pomfrey emerged from her office just as they were about to go back to the Hall to see it they'd missed her.

"You three," she huffed. "What is it this time?"

"We're just looking for my sister," Ron assured her, backing away nervously as she approached.

"Oh, she brought Mr. Goldstein in last night," she said. "But she's not here anymore."

"When did he leave?"

"After she helped Mr. Goldstein in,"

The three stared at each other, and a silent agreement was made as they walked back into the hall and down into an empty classroom. Wordlessly, Harry pulled the Marauder's Map from his pocket and laid it flat on a desk.

"You always keep it with you?" Ron asked, looking over his shoulder.

Harry didn't answer as he solemnly swore he was up to no good, because he didn't always keep it with him. He only did when he was very, very worried about someone. Usually that person was Draco Malfoy.

After a few minutes of folding and squinting, Hermione was biting on her thumb and Ron was running a hand through his hair while Harry bit his lip.

"She's not on it." Ron said slowly, his face paling, "Does—does that mean she's not in the school?"

"There is one place that's Unplottable, if you'll remember Ron," Hermione hastened to say, "The Room of Requirement."

"What would she be doing there?" Ron said, looking far less pale, the exasperation returning to his face, "What's she require then?"

"Shall we go find out?" Harry asked, his heart thudding, speculations buzzing in his head. What was she doing there, if she was there? Was Draco with her? Why? Were they both actually gone from the castle? Were they both in the Room of Requirement?

There was only one way to get answers.

"We have time," Hermione conceded, watching Harry with eyes he knew were trying to figure out what he wasn't telling her.

She'd probably find out soon enough.

When they made it to the tapestry of Barnabas the Barmy, Harry was fretting about how they might gain entrance to the ever-changing room. When they looked upon the usually blank wall, however, that worry was gone and new ones sprung to life at the sight of a worn wooden door standing ajar, something certainly not normal for this extraordinary room.

Hermione asked something, but Ron and Harry were already bolting inside, stumbling at back the sight that lay before them. It was all junk, rubbish, unwanted things stacked in mountains that nearly brushed the high ceiling in the room that looked to be as large as a cathedral. Parchment and dust littered the floor, the walls sparkled with discarded potion vials, what was left of their contents dried and congealed, there were paths that twisted through the mountains, framed by broken furniture and stacks of torn and tattered books.

Harry wondered what this place was, why it was, but he couldn't stop to marvel now. There were people to find.

If they were there.

He and Ron split up, listening as Hermione did stop to marvel at the room, her questions and theories growing more and more faint as Harry stepped cautiously down the path he'd chosen, edging past the broomsticks and chair legs that poked out of the walls of rubbish beside him. After being turned around twice and running into the same patch of cobwebs, he found himself in a sort of clearing. There was no dust on the floor here, wiped clean by pacing and the swish of robes.

There was, however, Ginny Weasley on the floor.

Harry's heart dropped and his blood ran could at the sight of her, so very still, not much unlike the same form he'd looked upon lying near death in the Chamber of Secrets. He ran to her and gingerly turned her over, almost laughing in relief when she gave a sigh at his touch. Her features were peaceful, as if she'd merely decided this place was ideal for a pre-class kip.

"Ginny," he shook her gently, "C'mon, Gin,"

She wouldn't wake, and fear and memories of that dank, damp snake pit of a chamber rose up in Harry's head as he realized that whatever had pulled Ginny into unconsciousness wasn't sleep. It wasn't about to release her either. This time, thankfully, as he held someone injured, he was able to think through his panicked-scrambled brain and recall that there was such thing as magic and counter-curses.

"Rennervate," he swished his wand over her face.

Her eyes flew open and she sputtered as if gasping for air after a near-drowning, flailing and clutching onto Harry as she drew in breath after breath before, all at once, she went still and limp once more.

"Ginny what happened?" He asked, shaking her slightly and finding a small comfort in the fact that her gaze was still fixed on his, glazed and unfocused, but there and conscious.

"What happened?"

She blinked slowly, and Harry could see it was a struggle to open her eyes again as she fought whatever sought to drag her back into the dark again. He felt remarkably helpless as he watched and hoped and waited. It was all he could do, except to find Ron.

And whoever was responsible for this.

Her milky stare slid away from his suddenly, staring almost sightlessly somewhere behind him. He felt no prickle of a presence, but turned anyway, seeing nothing but an imposing-looking black cabinet that towered malevolently over them.

"What is it Ginny?" he asked slowly.

"…Ma—Malfoy's…" she replied in a weak, hoarse voice.

"Malfoy is what?" he demanded, something akin to terror tinged in worry snaking through him, through the curse like a serpent that seemed desperate to tell him something. It needed him to know—know what? This was the one instant Parseltongue was of no use to decode this slithering song.

"Gone,"

"What?" Harry was drawn back to the distant Ginny in his arms, "Gone?"

She nodded, the movement straining, her face scrunching in pain and Harry smoothed back her hair as her forehead broke out in sweat. She felt as though she had a fever. He focused on that, on the worry for her, because otherwise he'd think of Draco who was—he knew, from that sorrowful strumming of the curse—gone.

"He's gone?" his voice was hollow.

Ginny's stare was all the answer he needed.

"What happened?"

She seemed to think on this, a frown marring her slack jaw, her eyes concentrating for just a moment before slipping back into the fog that claimed her mind.

"Let me go," she said, and before Harry could protest she continued, "He said, 'let me go, Harry.'"

The room, once stuffy and cramped and pressing, felt very cold and empty all of a sudden. It lasted only a moment before the curse, and his mind, started writhing and whirling with worries, notions, and theories. Out of all the questions that he'd sought the answers to that day, he had only one true answer, the curse told him it was correct, and his heart lamented that it was true.

Draco was gone.

~o0o~

Madam Pomfrey had barely said a word after she took in Ginny, closing her off in the bed across from Goldstein's, which was empty now as he hovered along with Harry, Ron and Hermione.

As they congregated in the place Pomfrey had, with nothing more than an indecipherable look, designated for them on the other end of the long, white room, Goldstein had answered their queries but it appeared as if he knew less than they did.

But he knew something, he knew about what had really happened last night, that he'd been hospitalized not from Harry, but from Draco, and with an Unforgivable no less. Harry kept watching him, watched his anxious eyes glowering endlessly toward where Ginny lay in Merlin knows what condition. They never once shifted to him, as they once had with a glimmer of contempt. Now, it seemed, he was only focused on Ginny and not what outrages had happened to him.

Harry felt substantially warmer toward Goldstein now.

But really, he was cold all over, a fear that almost didn't seem his own flowing through him. Oh yes, he was petrified for Ginny, beside himself with worry for Draco, wherever he might be, but this terror was sharp and random, not the dull ache of fretfulness and helplessness. His scar seemed to be stinging, just a bit.

They waited, and waited, Ron asking questions to nobody in particular and Hermione giving answers to questions no one asked. They were missing classes and none of them appeared to care, not even Hermione, although she looked as if she was aching to find a book to find an answer in, because in this moment, there were no answers to be found in the sterile air of the Hospital wing or the anxious gazes of her friends. Pomfrey was silent and the world seemed just as so, waiting, breath held.

That breath was released in a gasp because things were worse than they thought.

Dumbledore came striding in, passing them without a glance, the twinkle in his eyes extinguished. His usually faintly happy face was grave, and he looked much, much older. Snape came storming after him, and he did spare their huddled little group a glance, but it was just black, unfathomable and without his usual sneer.

Never was that a good omen.

Ron was practically shouting his demands for answers, but some sort of silencing spell had been erected and it was useless. Dumbledore and Snape's figures disappeared behind the curtain that shielded Ginny from sight and they were left, again, to wait.

Harry hated this helpless feeling, made more intense by the curse, that utter need to be helpful, like a proper servant. He needed to do something, just then, he knew he was supposed to. It was like a command coiled in his veins, a song in a language he didn't understand, all the melancholy hymn of a cello interrupted by a raw, screeching wail in a speech he knew all too well: pain, desperation. Those grating notes were sporadic, but echoed in Harry's heart, strumming on his heartstrings.

Harry was jarred from his thoughts when he saw the curtain pulled back from Ginny's bed, and there she lay, so wan that the freckles on her face looked like blood splatter. Pomfrey was bustling over her, uncharacteristically tight-lipped, while Dumbledore and Snape spoke nearby, Snape's scowl deepening with every word Dumbledore's mouth formed. What Harry would have given at that moment for a good Weasley Wheeze that could hear through charms, especially when Snape suddenly gave a great twitch as if he were restraining himself from doing something violent. Dumbledore was merely shaking his head, looking terribly sad.

Hermione laid a hand on Harry's shoulder and he nearly jumped out of his skin, turning to demand what it was, but he saw her face, that thoughtful, calm face that he knew hid terror. The hand on his shoulder gave the smallest of gestures and he turned back to look at Ginny and Pomfrey. Pomfrey was now sorting through potions, but Harry saw nothing else, just Ginny.

Memory, that ruthless thing, reared up again, and he saw Draco in her place, the same worry Pomfrey had now as she indignantly groused her complaints to herself. It was the same.

Whatever had happened to Ginny, whatever curse had been placed over her, it was Unforgivable.

~o0o~

It was almost as if he'd been invited to follow, or rather, they knew there'd be no stopping him, so they made no effort to.

Harry marched after Snape and Dumbledore, leaving Ron, Hermione, and Goldstein to watch over Ginny who, Madam Pomfrey had told them shortly, was just fine. They too, knew that he wasn't about to stand by another moment without some sort of explanation, and made no protest, didn't even blink, when he left.

Once the three of them burst into the room, no lemon drops were offered and they all gravitated to their respective posts, Snape, in the shadows, blending in and looking as though he wished he could disappear into them, Dumbledore at his desk, looking weary but ready for whatever Harry had to throw at him. Harry felt very well as if he might throw and smash things again, the feelings whirling and screaming and whispering within him as he stood in the middle of the room.

"What's happened?" he asked first, his throat dry as Dumbledore's eyes bore into his.

"Miss Weasley has awoken from the spell of a Dark curse," Dumbledore replied, his words careful.

"An Unforgivable?"

"Yes, although we cannot yet tell if it was either the Imperius or Cruciatus."

Draco's phobia of the horrors of those three forbidden curses seemed to have spread to Harry as he shuddered at their names, at the images supplied with them.

"What's happened then?" he repeated.

There was another very pregnant pause, Harry felt as though he might scream just to fill it. In the silence, the cacophony that was building—an orchestra in his head, gaining a new musician with each passing hour—played louder and fiercer, that worry—that knowledge—Draco—his master—

"I know," It was the farthest thing from a scream, inaudible, powerless, "I know that he's Marked,"

Snape made a noise that was between a scoff and a growl. He swept from the darkness and started pacing, movement wooden and eyes glaring. Dumbledore slumped back slightly in his chair, closing his eyes in a vision of defeat that made Harry feel caught off balance.

"I see you've found out then,"

"As if such a secret was uncovered by even his meddling…prowess," Snape cut Dumbledore off, pinning Harry with a glare, "That fool told you, didn't he? He showed you. What is that boy thinking? If he is at all."

"Draco came back to Hogwarts from summer holidays Marked and with a mission," Dumbledore went on as if Snape hadn't spoken, "He didn't want to serve Voldemort, so he became a spy for the Light. Much like Severus."

"You speak as if he had a real choice in the matter, as I did, but—"

Dumbledore held up a hand for silence, but Harry burst as soon as Snape stopped talking.

"Where is he?"

There was an exchange of grim faces, the anger dropping from Snape's face and something beyond agitation and frustration flitted through his eyes, and it was a very human emotion Harry had had enough of today. Worry. He felt fit to shriek again, heart strings stretched, before Dumbledore finally went on.

"It appears as though he's gone to where Voldemort is."

It was very much like a scream, high, desperate, and soul curling as it raked through his ever tendon, every bone, every cell: an affirmative. Dumbledore was right.

"No," Harry was on the brink of laughing like a madman, the absurdity of it all. When had reality become so twisted? "No, he can't. Why would he? He's afraid—he couldn't have."

Dumbledore stared at him very sadly, pityingly; it made him feel like he was eleven all over again.

"His father has been taken from Azkaban. He is likely with Voldemort as well, and thus Draco has gone to him."

The most awful part of the words Dumbledore spoke was that they made sense, rather like Ginny, who was certainly right about one thing: Draco had hurt him.

His mouth felt numb even as another question mindlessly spilt past his lips, as if he were accepting what Dumbledore had said, even though he wasn't. He couldn't. Ever.

"How?"

Dumbledore gave him a long look, before shaking his head slowly.

"The mission he was set to do allow him the ability to leave it seems. Usually it's Severus who Apparates himself and Draco to the meetings."

"But how?"

"If I were to tell you, we both know what would happen, Harry."

They both did, far too well, the sharp, defiant looks traded between the aged wizard and the sixteen year old said everything, everything about reckless decisions and Gryffindor values.

So Harry turned to the Slytherin in the room, unflinchingly stared into those black tunnel eyes and shamelessly asked, begged for there to be another truth in this tangled knot.

"What was his mission? Can't—can't you do anything, Professor?"

At any other moment, Snape surely would have rolled his eyes, but they didn't move, piercing Harry's as if he was reading his mind, he very well may have been, but Harry didn't care. He wanted him to see, see that he cared just as much as Snape did when it came to Draco and the awful fate that befell him.

"Albus," Snape's gaze flickered to Dumbledore, "Surely you see how, even with his father factored in, that there'd be no sane way that he would return to that place. You can't seriously be suggesting that."

Harry marveled for a moment that he and Snape were working together, and against Dumbledore of all people. But then Dumbledore's grim voice dispelled the surreal feeling and brought cold reality crashing back down around them.

"Severus, unfortunately that is exactly what I am suggesting. The pull of the love of a family is in no way sane, I'm afraid."

Harry hated that Dumbledore was looking at him again, looking at him as he had just Snape, that imploring, stubborn, even sympathetic stare as he threw another dreadful truth into his face.

"With all due respect," there was absolutely no respect in Snape's sneer, "You don't know the boy as I have or…"

He trailed off, and for a fraction of a second, Harry could feel those cold eyes on him again, filling with loathing and a question not meant to be asked of Harry.

"Draco Malfoy was brave to take such a dangerous position as a spy, but even the most courageous of us have our weaknesses," Dumbledore said, "He, quite understandably, couldn't take the pressure or the pull of family."

His eyes and tone said that the matter was closed and never to be opened again, as if Draco now was just some fleeting memory that could be remembered with nothing more than a wistful nostalgia. The past tense of it all conjured images of a lonely tombstone in a potter's field somewhere, bearing the name of Draco Malfoy the Blameless Traitor.

It made Harry sick.

Snape drew back slightly, something uncertain flickering into his eyes, along with an uncertainty Harry felt was sneaking inside of him. Draco followed after his father so loyally, so blindly. Would that mean he'd follow him willingly into the den that housed his every nightmare? Harry wasn't all that sure if he knew the answer to such a question.

"You needn't worry, Harry,"

Harry met Dumbledore's eyes sharply, tensing as he expected to be told that Dumbledore and all his seemingly endless magic would have Draco back in a flash, or something not so happy, like the assurance that Draco never truly felt for him so there was no need to get all fretful and attached to the tosser.

"The curse is broken."

That was something Harry in no way expected. The air rushed out of his tensed body and he felt like laughing again, or crying in frustration, or doubling over and giving up on any further thought on the impossible matter because he knew, he felt that it most certainly wasn't. What else could this knotted bundle of musical strings attached to someone far, far away within him be?

"No, no it's not." He said flatly, not a trace of humor in his tone.

There was that pitying look again. Harry was beginning to lose patience with the Headmaster. Is this what Snape felt like all the time?

"The only thing Miss Weasley was able to tell us was that Draco's final words whilst in the school were, and I quote, 'Let me go, Harry'." He explained calmly.

Harry thought he might double over this time, realization hitting him like a merciless punch to the gut. He could almost hear Draco's voice, so cold, the scissors that snipped the needlework inside him to unimportant bits, commanding him to let go, to stop caring, to stop loving-

He felt the sudden paranoia that he was disobeying—but he couldn't be if the curse was indeed broken—or was it just his guilty, house elfish mind? He felt beyond confused, completely torn in two, half of him very lucid and rather without purpose, the other in a faraway place, a dimly lit room, tied firmly to a pale boy with wide, scared grey eyes.

Not for the first time, he wondered how far Draco Malfoy would make him go.

The other two in the room seemed to be waiting for him to say something, react in some way that wasn't merely gawking stupidly at the floor at his feet, a hand he hadn't remembered moving clutching at his shirt.

Snape's eyes were on him like a force, waiting and expecting him not to be good enough, for him to be Potter, that spoiled, arrogant Gryffindor that could never feel anything for a Slytherin. Dumbledore, with his forever mild gaze, a benign sort of smile beneath his beard, was watching for a defeated and disappointed boy, a heartache ailing him that would heal with time, good friends, and lemon drops.

Expectation was a terrible thing.

They were waiting for something that would never happen though, because Harry did care for a Slytherin, and obviously, he more than fancied him because the heartache Harry felt wasn't the passing pain of a passing crush, a summer love that would never see the snows of winter. This, the love he was fairly sure it was, wasn't something that would freeze and be forgotten. It was cold, yet somehow warm, biting like frostbite and insistent like a bad cold. It was messy, irritating, consuming the body with a fever that touched the mind and left it reeling and never sure whether everything was just a dream, just a nightmare, just a wonderful curse.

So he stood straight, defiant, a scowl set firm on his face as he addressed the two men, who had grown anxious as he'd stood dumbly while processing the churning of his emotions.

"I don't think he's a traitor, I think he's exceptionally brave." He said, "And I don't think you appreciate how he feels in this mess of a war, or how I feel about him."

Snape looked ready to sneer his opinion on how the Golden Boy of Gryffindor felt, Dumbledore prepared to soothingly agree how courageous Draco was indeed, but then smile sadly and insist that he loved his family enough to go off to be in a hellhole with them. Harry however didn't stay to listen as he walked, didn't run, out of the Headmaster's office.

Their opposition wasn't a fear to face, wasn't a fear to run from. What had really happened to Draco was though was. Harry only wondered what he'd do when he came face to face with that. Fight or flight?

He honestly hoped he was as brave as everyone made him out to be.

~o0o~