Chapter 54

Draco gripped his girlfriend tighter as Harry walked away. He knew that she would need some time to be able to come to terms that she was about to lose her best friend.

They walked together back into the Great Hall, and almost immediately, Ron approached them. "There the two of you are. Where's Harry? I've been looking everywhere for him, but I can't find him anywhere."

"He's gone, Ron," Hermione said thickly, as she held back her tears.

"Gone?" Ron asked confused, "Where?" It took him a moment, but realization finally hit him. "No," he whispered, before yelling another one. "Why would Harry just turn himself over to him? We could have all fought him together. It's just the snake, and then we could have killed him. We would have won!"

"It isn't," Hermione said calmly, and Draco knew she what she was trying to tell him.

"Why didn't either of you bother stopping him? Were you so selfish that you wanted him to die so you could live?" Ron shouted. "I'm going after him, like a friend would do."

Draco blocked him from going anywhere, "Don't you dare speak to her like that. It broke her heart to watch him leave. Don't you dare speak to her as if she were so selfish enough to want something like that. I might tolerate you speaking like that to me, but I refuse to let you speak that way to her."

Draco paused briefly, before proceeding to explain to him about Harry being a Horcrux. Ron's face paled of all colour that it had.

"He said to tell you that he loves you and that you were like a brother to him," Hermione said softly, as she began to cry once more.

"You got to say goodbye to him?" Ron asked, his voice slowly rising. "Why didn't you bring me with you? Why didn't he say it to my face that he was leaving? I deserved to know. Just as all of you did."

"We didn't know where he was going, and you looked like you needed some time with your family," Draco said, cutting in.

"Why didn't he say anything to me? He should have told me," Ron said, as he slumped down to the ground.

Hermione sat beside him and held his hand. Draco, feeling slightly awkward, sat down beside him.

"We'll make sure he didn't die in vain, Ron," she said. "We're going to bring that sorry bastard down, but first, we need to kill Nagini. As soon as the hour is over and Voldemort has killed Harry, I can almost guarantee you that he will come in here and slaughter the rest of us. So we need to get to him before he can get to us."

"How?" Ron asked, sounding helpless.

"Neville," Hermione said simply. "Harry told him to kill the snake, and if it's what Harry wanted, then we have to help him do it."

"Neville?" Ron asked, a bit confused. "You want to leave this to him? I know he's a lot braver now but-"

"Don't you but me, Ron Weasley. Neville has grown up so much over the last little bit, and I believe more than anything in the world that he can do this."

"I agree with you," Draco said. "I never thought I would see the day where I trusted Longbottom with anything, but I trust him with this, and I trust him to do this properly, because I've seen what he's done in the last year, and it is incredible."

"I never thought I would ever hear the day where Malfoy praises me behind my back," Neville said with a smirk.

Draco just shot him a weird look, "Whatever Longbottom. Now come here, we have some things to discuss."

"Draco!" Hermione admonished. "Be nice. Neville, we need to talk about what Harry told you earlier. He wanted you to kill the snake, so if you're up for it, then we'll all help you make sure that it gets done. It's the only thing stopping Voldemort from being killed."

"I want to help then," Neville said. "I might not be able to kill the snake myself, and if that were the case, I will do everything I can to help."

"We should plan this," Hermione said, as she looked down at a notepad she pulled out. "We need to isolate him from his snake, and we all know that's not going to happen."

"We're going to have to do it in public," Neville said calmly. "I'll use myself as a distraction, and one of you get to the snake and kill it. That way, no one would notice that when you skip away."

"No, Neville!" Hermione shouted out. "I don't want you to die just so we can bring him down. And don't say that it won't happen, because we both know that it will. We both know that the minute that it happens, he'll kill you."

"I'll guard his back, making sure that no spell hits him," Draco said. "No Hermione," he said, when she tried to protest. "It has to happen, and someone has to make sure that Neville isn't harmed."

She launched into planning details with them, and Draco looked around the room at the other people. All of them were willing to fight to the end; all of them willing to die for this cause.

"Draco, come here for a second," He heard Blaise call out over the people.

He looked at Hermione, to make sure that he was okay with him leaving and going to Blaise. She paused from her conversation with Longbottom and looked at him, before nodding with approval. Draco was still hesitant to leave her alone, but he knew that she would be safe with the two Gryffindors.

"What is it?" he asked as he approached Blaise by the entrance to the Great Hall. Blaise didn't say a thing as he motioned to the tall door, and made a gesture to follow him out of it.

He followed, to see none other than Pansy Parkinson standing on the other side with Theo.

"What is she doing here?" he asked, as he saw his former female friend standing on the other side of the doors.

"Draco-" She started, in a soft voice.

"No," he said cutting her off. "I don't want to hear whatever lie you've come to tell us. I wouldn't be surprised if Voldemort asked you to come in here to lead us into a trap."

"I wouldn't do that," She said. She paused for a moment before speaking again. "Okay, that may have been something that I would have done in the past, but not anymore."

"Why should I even believe you?" he asked her. He then looked at both his friends with incredulous stares, "You called me out here so I can talk to her? I don't know what you're playing at Pansy, but it's not going to work."

"Just hear her out, mate," Theo said gently.

"Fine," he said exasperatedly. "But make it quick," he said, as he looked at the closed doors of the Great Hall.

"You want to get back to her, don't you?" she said, in a calm manner. There was no accusing undertones, or sneer behind her words, just the calm question.

"What would you know about it?" he asked her in a harsh voice.

"A lot more than you would think. I know how you used to sneak around with her last year, and I know when it was that you decided to betray the Dark Lord. I know when you went to Dumbledore, and when you and she fell in love," She said coolly.

"Y-you knew?" he asked in a shocked tone. "But you never said anything. Not to me, not to my parents, and certainly not to Voldemort."

"Of course I didn't," she said in a cool tone. "I loved you, Draco, and I wasn't about to let them kill you because you wanted something else. I didn't understand it; it should have been everything you could have ever wanted. It should have been what you were conditioned to want. But for some reason you didn't, and I was going to say anything. I thought it might have been a phase; you rebel by dating the mudblood, and throwing away what your parents wanted. I thought you would come to your senses, and when you did, you'd want me again."

"Pansy-" Draco started. He felt bad, as he knew Pansy had a crush on him in the past, and his old self, encouraged it selfishly, even though he knew he would never feel that way for her.

"Don't, Draco," she said, as she raised a hand. "You love her; it's not hard to see. But the thing I never got was why you would throw everything away. Then I went out there. I went and fought by his side, and watched as the Death Eaters killed innocent children and people, all in the hopes of purifying our world. I get it now. It's one thing to believe that we're better. It's another to cause a mass genocide to receive that."

She paused for a moment, "I'm not saying that I don't believe that we aren't better, I still do. But I would be lying if I said that I believed we were the only ones allowed to live. We are where all the old wealth comes from, and we hold the history of the magical world in our blood. But society needs other people as well."

Blaise gave him a look. "Well?" he asked Draco. "I believe her, and I don't think we should force her to go back to that side, to Him."

Theo nodded as he gripped Pansy's hand briefly. "I do too."

Draco smiled at them both. "Well I guess the gang's back together again, now isn't it?"

Pansy laughed before smirking, "Merlin, you sound like such a Gryffindork. Seriously, Draco, you hang out with those tossers for a few months and they already got you singing their tune."

"I said the exact same thing!" Theo exclaimed gleefully.

He shoved Pansy playfully into Theo, "Shut up, Parkinson. You're the one who literally used to memorize the Sorting Hat's song, just to sing it mockingly after the feast."

She stayed where she was, but glared at him. "You're just jealous that it was the one night everyone would pay more attention to me instead of fawning over you, the great Malfoy Heir.

He scoffed, "Please I was fawned over because people worshiped me."

Pansy looked like she wanted to retort, but Blaise cut her off. "Now that this great reunion is over, we should go back in. I'm sure a lot happened during the fighting, and we should probably tell people you're on our side, especially because of the way you tried to turn over Potter."

She blushed, "Yeah, okay."

Draco held the door open, and waited for his Slytherins to enter before following himself.

Tonks watched as her young cousin stood by his two Slytherin friends and plotted. She was so proud of him and everything he had done in the last year, and how far he had come.

When she was a lot younger, she had asked her mom why she had no relatives on her side that she saw during the holidays, and on weekends. Her father's parents and family were great, but they were muggles. They didn't understand everything about how the world worked, and that was okay. But she wanted to meet her mother's family as well, the ones who she had learned from late night whispers between her parents, were very magical.

She remembered asking her mother once why she never met her grandparents on her mother's side, and she completely had frozen up. Her mum had looked very sad, before telling her that she didn't speak to her mum or dad anymore, and for an eight year old Nymphadora, that was more than enough.

But then she had gotten older, and she learned of words such as 'Mudblood' and 'Blood-traitor' when the Slytherins at Hogwarts mocked her for being a disgrace to the longstanding line of the Blacks. The things they had told her were cruel and horrid, to the point where Nymphadora cried every night in her Hufflepuff dorm room. It was after a particular time when she decided that something had to change. She couldn't be as soft as she usually was, and learned to build up a protective wall to make her resistant to the taunts that they would throw at her.

And she remained like that until she met Remus through the Order. He was so damaged and insecure, but when she was around him, she felt like a different person. She didn't have to hide the fact that she was different. She didn't have to feel bad that the Blacks had cut off her mother, because he knew how important family was, but he also knew that there could be more to family than just blood.

They had started off simply by having a few patrols together, which turned into more and more time hanging out together, before she had fully accepted that she was in love with him.

And so she had her own family: her mum, her dad, and Remus.

It wasn't until she had learned from Dumbledore that Draco wanted out of the Death Eaters that she even began to think about her mother's side of the family again. When she had heard, she was confused, she was angry, and she didn't understand how it could happen.

So she began to think about it, and she realised that he, like her, didn't believe in the system that ruled the majority of the pureblood world. He had become so important to her in such a short time.

It broke her heart that she had to lie to him.

As she saw the body of her dead husband, she realised one thing, and she knew what it would mean.

"Molly, could I speak to you for a minute," she said, as she saw the older women huddled by her family. She knew now probably was one of the worst times to pull her away from them, but she had to say something.

Molly Weasley wiped a tear from her face, but nodded at her request. She followed Tonks into a secluded section of the Great Hall.

"What's the matter, dear?" she asked sympathetically. In the last few hours, they both had lost someone very precious to them, so both knew how the other felt at the moment.

"I'm not going to survive this, Molly," Tonks said softly.

"What do you mean?" Molly asked her in an incredulous voice. "Of course you are dear, you have a child at home! You can't just throw away everything over this, Nymphadora. Remus wouldn't want that-"

"It doesn't very well matter what Remus would want, now does it?" Tonks all but shouted. "He's dead. He's dead and he's gone and he left me here."

She slumped before speaking again, "I'm not going to survive this, Molly. I'm not saying that I want to die, now that my husband is dead. I'm saying that I'm going to fight with everything I have left, but I know that I'm not going to survive this. I know that I'm going to end up dead. And I could very well go home, because I know this is going to happen, but I can't do that."

Molly looked stunned at her outburst. "So what are you saying then, Nymphadora?"

"I'm just asking you, mother to mother, that you make sure that my son doesn't grow up alone. He'll have his grandmother, but he needs more than that. He needs a huge family to make up for the fact that both I and his father will be gone. He needs to never feel any more upset than he has to that we're gone. I need you to watch over him as well," Tonks said softly.

"And I need you to look out for Draco as well. He's a good boy, despite the harsh life he's had. I don't know how much family he'll have left by the end of this, but he needs everyone he can get. He's going to upset if I die, and I need him to know why I'm doing this."

She heard the elder women swallow. "Okay." Molly Weasley gave her a hug. "But I will fight by your side until to the end. If you do go down, then I promise to ensure that your son has the family he needs. But know this; I won't let you go down easily. They're going to have to get through me to kill you."

Tonks smiled at her. "Thank you, Molly, for understanding. You've always been there for all of us for so long, and you always care so much for us. You are so special to every one of us. I'll let you get back to your family now; I want to spend some more time with my husband."

Molly grasped her hand. "Take care, Nymphadora. We'll win this. I know we will."

She nodded at the older woman before walking away. She knew that no matter what happened to her, her child would be safe, all else aside.

A/N: The reason why I kept Nymphadora Tonks around is that I didn't think the book did her death justice. All we knew was that she died. I won't tell you yet if I am keeping her or killing her off, but I will tell you that regardless of what I do, she needed to have that talk with Draco, for both of their sakes.

I like Pansy Parkinson. She had no reason to change sides earlier, so I never wrote about her, mainly because her views would have been exactly as the book depicted her, but war changes people and their views on things.

Anyways, I'll see you all next week!