Draco's head swam with questions but he waited, watching Harry as he began detailing what the next two years would look like for Draco to the full Wizengamot.

Thirty hours of work a week? What kind of lunacy is this – wait, plus community service? What community is going to let me in enough to do anything? And what's this poppycock about rehabilitation? We should be fighting that...

Sensing that Draco was about to complain again, Hermione pinched his leg and gave an almost imperceptible shake of her head, so he said nothing. Draco was becoming more and more frustrated, with himself for never asking these questions before and with everyone in the room for their involvement in this farcical justice system.

He subconsciously crossed his arms, barring himself from the world around him, and began tapping one foot anxiously while the other dangled over his crossed leg. If the motion was annoying Hermione, she said nothing.

"Hermione, you're up."

Hermione looked up to Harry, who had finished his portion of their hearing without either Hermione or Draco noticing. She nodded and vacated her seat, which was immediately refilled by Harry. "How're you holding up?" he asked, eyeing the blond. Draco looked at him with a tightly drawn in face, but Harry could guess there was a storm raging inside. He gripped Draco's knee, exactly where Hermione had held him earlier, tightly and gave a weak smile to try and reassure him.

"Why is my mother using her maiden name again?" Draco asked, knowing Harry was likelier to spill when it came to Narcissa than Hermione.

He was right.

"You're not going to like the answer but you'll get it in a minute or two if you listen to Hermione's testimony. Just promise me you won't make any outbursts," Harry whispered, his tone frantic enough to suggest Draco probably would.

Nothing could have made Draco more attentive at that exact moment.

"On the topic of the Malfoy estate, we have no intention of appealing for early access. We would, however, like to make clear that Gringotts will be allowed to supply us and by that effect Mr. Malfoy – with reports on his financial standings in the interim to make sure his family's assets are being well protected. We would also like to include in this appeal that while Mr. Malfoy would see none of this himself, we would also like for his mother to be given access to the Malfoy fortune, as she should have been following her trial."

Draco stood up and exclaimed loudly, earning a round of screams and complaints from the Wizengamot and a sharp glare from Hermione.

"What do you mean my mother was barred from the Malfoy fortune?"

Harry pulled him back down to his seat by his elbow and cast a wordless silencing charm, reminding Draco that he needs to keep his head straight if they're to get any of these stupid rules changed. The Malfoy heir, however, was grinding his teeth and balling his hands into fists, prepared to lose his cool any second.

"Mr. Malfoy, address the court."

Harry and Draco turned sharply to the centre of the stands where Shacklebolt stood, facing Draco. Hermione and Harry had hoped to avoid having the temperamental blond from saying anything but it seemed Kingsley had other plans. Draco stood, his rage making his shake as he approached the stand and stood next to Hermione. He avoided her eyes intentionally, not caring how angry she was with him.

"You seemed surprised to find out that your mother had been denied access to the Malfoy vaults," the Minister noted, which received a scornful snort in response by Draco.

"Oh, very much so, sir. I was under the impression that saving your sacrificial lamb from the Dark Lord and helping to end the second war would have at least given my mother the right to her own fortune, but apparently the Malfoy name is a curse too strong to bear."

Hermione sighed and covered her face with her hand, a move that confused Draco.

"We actually had nothing to do with barring her from the Malfoy vaults, Mr. Malfoy. With you and your father behind bars, the Malfoy estate had no rightful leader and so your mother was deemed no longer necessary to the Malfoy line. Were you not aware of this?" Shacklebolt asked, looking at Hermione who refused to look at him.

"What?" Draco asked dumbly.

"Your family's estate ejected her on the basis of her gender," Hermione explained from behind the hand that still covered her eyes and was massaging her temples, "Technically, either you or your father can reinstate her manually once either of you assume the role of head of the Malfoy estates but until then, she's back under the Black banner."

Draco, on top of apparently being a terrorist, now felt like the world's largest idiot. Unable to handle the fifty or so pairs of eyes bearing down on him, he turned and fled the courtroom. He could hear shouts and outrage from the old monsters ruling the country but he didn't stop until he was well shot of the courtroom, down the long and empty hallway and up against the lift gate, gripping it tightly to try and regain some control. He let out a loud, scream in frustration but it did little to calm him down.

"Hey."

Harry had followed him, seemingly alone. Draco, ashamed and weak and trembling, collapsed to his knees but did not turn. Harry waited a moment to make up his mind before going to Draco's left and taking a seat. "Real smooth back there," he joked, no malice in his voice. Draco snorted in spite of himself.

"I know the world's upside down right now. We didn't tell you about Narcissa because you would have wanted to barge into Gringotts and fix it because she's your mother but we couldn't let you. It was optimistic but we had hoped you would just kind of go numb when you heard the news and then when the courts gave her back access, you'd decide not to yell at us too much."

Draco turned to look at the Boy Wonder with incredulous eyes, only to see a boyish grin on Harry's face that softened his rage.

"Once they stopped yelling, I told them Hermione would be finishing our appeal alone and had the two of us properly excused. We can leave whenever you want."

Draco closed his eyes and nodded, grateful and exhausted from the whole ordeal. Harry stood first and extended his hand to Draco, helping him to his feet. Draco was about to apologize for losing his mind – once again – when Harry was, of all things, hugging him.

"Hermione did this a lot when I thought I was losing my mind back in Hogwarts and somehow it always made me feel less pathetic." Harry admitted, letting go of Draco a moment later. Draco, stunned, said nothing, but privately felt a lot less horrible.

. . . . .

When Hermione returned home several hours later, Draco and Harry were just finishing setting the table. Harry had shown Draco how to cook a few dishes while the Slytherin managed overall ingredient prep, having learned those skills years earlier at the potions table. They had spoken more to each other that afternoon than in the all the days prior they'd been living together.

"We did it," she announced, tired but smiling.

"There was a lot of grumbling and one of the old coots in the back called me an ungrateful mudblood at one point but honestly I think that helped us out on a few tie votes," she admitted, unbuttoning her top robe and revealing a lovely dress underneath.

"Your breakdown also helped, Draco. I think some of the old purebloods were touched that you were indignant at how your mother was treated. I'm not sure they consider women equal to men by any means, but you clearly still respect family and that means a lot to them. Even had some of the lefties convinced you have a soul somewhere in there," she joked.

They all sat down for a wonderful meal made of all the odd dishes Draco had learned that afternoon while Hermione gave them the results.

"You can leave the country as long as one of us is with you and you can reapply for your apparition license but travel will be monitored along with everything else I'm afraid. You can visit St. Mungo's, the Ministry and even Hogwarts, although we didn't petition for that – Minerva did. We should send her a thank you note. Oh, and you'll also be getting an owl from Gringotts in the coming week to finalize readmitting your mother to the Malfoy family vaults," Hermione explained, clearly pleased with herself.

Draco was elated; they'd gotten everything they had asked for, and more. Harry thumped him on the back, in his way congratulating him when really they had done all the work. Draco merely smiled back, finished his food and made to start on the dishes. He was getting more comfortable contributing to their oddly comfortable household and figured contributing to household chores was the logical next step.

"Don't worry about those, Hermione has a spell on the sink that trains the dishes to wash themselves in about an hour," Harry explained, smirking as he placed his plate on top of Draco's in the sink and getting a beer from the fridge.

"Can I get you one?" Harry asked, having already shared several drinks over the span of the afternoon.

"Maybe in a bit. Excuse me a while."

Draco went to his bedroom and pulled a piece of parchment and a quill forward, starting a letter to Minerva McGonagall, his unexpected ally in this war on the world. Half way through though, he realized he was writing the wrong letter. Setting it aside, he pulled a new sheet of parchment out and set it in the centre of his desk.

"Dearest Mother…"

Authors note: Thank you all for continuing to read this! My apologies for the delay in chapters (which is why I've posted two tonight), I had planned to take this past weekend off to celebrate my birthday but I did not figure in how difficult it would be for me to finish the trial. I was insistent that the trial had to happen now before anything else but damn was it a trial of its own to write. On top of developing relations between Draco and Hermione and Draco and Harry, these chapters begin to shed light on the sub-plot of this series: the political post-war ramifications in a traditional and conservative society where women are not yet equals and justice is fair weather. Please let me know what you think of it all!