A/N:Happy Belated New Year! I nearly this chapter in December, but it's been a stupidly chaotic few weeks so yesterday was the only time I had to finish it :P Also, it was planned to be longer, but I have a lot to muse over for the next one so I thought I'd give you this in the mean time :) Also, you might be interested to know that I have plans for a sequal that will probably take me until I'm fifty to write...Strange to think that next year I'll have been writing this fic for a third of my life :P I'm quite excited about my plans for the next one but I'm going to do some experimenting at some point to find my feet...Anyhow, hope you enjoy this chapter!

Oh, a quick shout out to Meg for the lovely review! Thank you supremely! It made my day :D

"What. The. Hell?" hissed Lucius, grabbing a hold of my arm and dragging me aside on the way to the dining room, practically steaming with fury.

I quite honestly had no idea what he was talking about and I told him as much, jerking my arm indignantly out of his grip.

He was not at all convinced. "The scarf, Severus. The Hogwarts scarf."

I shrugged innocently. "It is just a scarf, Lucius, not a jibe at you! I just thought that Draco would like it as a souvenir."

"Look," Lucius seethed. "I am having trouble enough as it is persuading Draco to revise for te Durmstrang exam without you filling his head with fantasies of Hogwarts!"

Sighing, I apologised sincerely. "I'm sorry. It was not meant vindictively. I merely thought, since Draco isn't going to Hogwarts, he should have at least a little piece of heritage from his family's past. Besides," I added with a wry smile, "if I had meant to piss you off, I'd have bought him a Gryffindor scarf."

Despite his best efforts, Lucius' expression softened, although his mouth was still set into a single, unamused line. "Just try not to encourage him," the 'please' was unspoken but clear nonetheless.

"But, it isn't as though Draco actually has any real say in the matter, is it?" I said, having agreed to Lucius' request.

"Theoretically," Lucius sighed. "But, as much as I hate to admit it, if Draco has his mind set on something, mot even I can make him do it."

I fought hard not let my pride in my godson show.

Just before we reached the dining room, Lucius stopped me again, much less forthcoming this time.

"What?" I prompted.

Lucius hesitated, then looked away before saying softly, "I'm thinking about having Draco see someone."

I frowned, not understanding. "What do you mean?"

"About..." he struggled with the words. "About what happened last night."

My eyebrows promptly shot up in surprise. "You mean like a psychologist?"

A helpless shrug. "Perhaps. I don't know... Do you think it would help? I just don't think that this is something that Draco can deal with by himself, and I just don't know how to."

It must have killed him to admit it.

I nodded, gripping Lucius' shoulder briefly. "It certainly can't hurt to try. Will you take Draco to London, or have someone come here?"

"I have no idea," admitted Lucius wearily. "All I know is that we simply cannot have a repeat of last night and, left to its own devices, this is not something that will just go away."

"You'll let me know how it goes?" I asked. "Or if you need me to do anything?"

"Of course." He paused suddenly, on the brink of a thought, then, hesitantly, "Does Madam Pomfrey still work at Hogwarts?"

"Yes, she's still there."

"Humm..."

"You think she could help?" I pressed keenly.

"Well," Lucius said slowly, as though testing the ground with his words. "She's used to dealing with all sorts, isn't she? She's discreet and, as Draco won't be going to school there, it wouldn't matter that she knows." He looked at me, anxiously seeking my approval. "Well? What do you think?"

"I think that that could be a very good solution. Do you want me to ask?"

"Yes...But don't say much about it. Just say...Just that it is quite important."

'Quite important'. Well, I suppose that's one way of describing it...

"Okay," I agreed. "As soon as I return, I'll speak to her on your behalf."

Lucius gave me a grateful smile. "Thank you."

Mrs Malfoy decided to choose that moment to storm out of the dining room and glare at us. "What on earth are you doing? Everyone is waiting for you!"

After days of persistent tolerance, Lucius' patience with his mother finally snapped. "That is none of your business," he snarled in her face. "And, to be perfectly honest, nor is anything else! The one and only reason I am putting up with you is because it is Christmas and I don't want it ruined for my family!" He sneered his very best Malfoy sneer. "But, as ever, you seem to be doing a perfectly good job on your own." He jerked his head in my direction, "Come on Sev," before shoving his way past his stunned mother.

"Tell me about Hogwarts," came the inevitable request late into Christmas Day evening.

Having spent over twenty-four hours in the company of people, I had finally retreated to the library to be with myself for a while. But Draco sought me out easily, having been wise enough and patient enough not to ask in the presence of his family. Although his father had not said anything about the scarf directly to him, Draco was attuned to Lucius' disposition enough to know that the ambience had shifted considerably since he had opened his present.

And so, he had waited for an opportunity before begging me to make good my promise.

"Tell me about Hogwarts!"

I put my book down and looked at his eager face doubtfully. "Are you sure that's a good idea, Dragon?"

Draco's expression faltered. "You promised you would..." he reminded me with just a tinge of reproach.

"I know I did." I pulled him down into the chair beside me. "But don't you think it's just going to make it harder for you to accept that you aren't going?"

Draco pondered this silently, sullenly, fiddling absently with the green fronds of his scarf. "It's not fair," he muttered finally. "Everyone else is going, they were all talking about it last night, and I'm going to miss out! I don't understand why..." He sat, stiff and angry, smouldering with the unjustness of it.

"You won't be missing out," I told him, hoping that I sounded sincere. "It'll just be different, that's all. But you'll have just as good a time at Durmstrang as you would at Hogwarts. I'm sure of it."

Draco made an unconvinced growling sound at the back of his throat. "Then why are none of the others going? Why is it only me?"

I had no answer to that.

"Your father would not be making you do this unless he was absolutely certain that it was the right thing." Draco looked up at me with a raised eyebrow. I squeezed his shoulder reassuringly. "You will just have to have faith in him, Draco."

The boy sighed deeply, "I suppose so... Tell me about it anyway?" he asked hopefully. "Just so's I can have a pretend. I won't be difficult for Father," he added quickly.

I looked down at my godson in his Slytherin scarf wrapped four or five times around his neck and, against my better judgement, I did what I have always done; I gave him a glimmer of something wonderful that he would never know.

"Well," I began as Draco snuggled into the crook of my arm, leaning into me, "Long before you even get there, you can see the castle high up on the cliff top, with a thousand windows looking out over a black lake and the forbidden forest," Draco closed his eyes, fiercely devouring every word, committing it to memory for future imaginings. "The castle is the biggest you will have ever seen, your house could fit inside it at least ten times, with hundreds of people all living there. You cannot walk down a single corridor without meeting someone you know."

I talked for what must have been hours, describing to Draco what it is like to walk through the main doors for the very first time, to see the enchanted ceiling of the Great Hall and to get lost in the maze of moving staircases. "They still confuse me, even now." I spoke of Quidditch and of Hogsmede, of butter-beer and pumpkin juice; I told him about the acromantula of the Forbidden Forest and of the army of house-elves in the cavernous kitchens, and Draco listened, enraptured, to everything I said.

For a while, it seemed, it did not matter that he would never experience Hogwarts for himself because, at that moment, he was there.

To his credit, Draco did not wear the scarf in his father's company for the remainder of the holidays. This was certainly relieving as the mere presence of his parents was stretching Lucius' already thin patience to its absolute limit, and I don't think Draco would have been able to survive unscathed had he contributed in any small part to his father's irritation.

Lucius himself was counting down the days, hours and minutes until his parents left to go back to the Lake District for another fifty-two weeks. He seemed to be under the impression that, because they were there, the rest of them couldn't get on and do what they would normally be doing; there was a growing mountain of paperwork sitting threateningly on his desk, Draco's education was on standby and Narcissa... Well, Narcissa drifted about the Manor in the same whimsical fashion as she always had- happy in her own world and oblivious to anything and everyone beyond it.

Even I was feeling cooped up and very much looking forward to my return to work; as welcome as the break had been, I was getting restless and bored, but felt it my duty as Lucius' ally to stay and counteract his mother's constant spurns on his character, which had become sharper and more vicious since Lucius had, effectively, told her to butt out of his business.

"Maybe if you shout at her more, she'll leave," I offered helpfully after Seraphina had cast some nasty aspersions on the state of the upstairs carpets and Lucius had stormed out of the manor in what could only be described accurately as a huff.

"As much as I dearly wish to," muttered Lucius with a frustrated sincerity, kicking gravel and clearly relishing the scuff it made on his shoes, "but it's just not what's done."

The sun was low in the sky, but what little white light there was reflected off the frost coating the estate, lighting the garden like it were the setting of a Christmas card. The air was perfectly chilled, so crisp and fresh that it felt almost brittle, as though any sudden movement could snap it; the only softness came from the steam rising from us as we walked to nowhere in particular- a welcome assurance that we were alive in a world that seemed, at that moment, so completely dead.

As we trudged on, I could see Lucius growing increasingly anxious as thoughts tumbled about his head with growing momentum. He stopped suddenly and turned towards me, looking strikingly like Draco when nervous. "What if..." he started hesitantly, "What if Draco feels like this about me and Cissa in the future?" He searched my face, as though I were able to provide the answer to his half-asked question.

But how was I supposed to respond to that? "What if?" I said lamely.

Lucius shot me a withering glare before lowering his gaze and kicking more gravel around.

"It's not the same," I offered, trying to redeem myself.

Hope flashed across his expression. "You think so?"

I hesitated before diplomatically replying, "I hope so."

"I suppose that'll have to do," he sighed, worry creasing his brow. "I am trying..."

"And Draco knows that. He appreciates that more than he will ever tell you."

Lucius nodded unhappily and continued on across the garden, clearly not convinced by my reassurance.

5th January 1989

"Severus, I cannot agree to give treatment to a child if I do not know what it is I am supposed to be treating!" Madam Pomfrey told me shortly, not shifting her attention from her task of reorganising the jars on her shelves for a moment. "It's completely unethical! Besides which, I do not know why whoever it is cannot go to St Mungos like everyone else. I am not a mediwitch and I do not do callouts!"

"It's delicate," I explained uselessly to her back as she clambered up as small step ladder and rummaged about on the highest shelves. "It's not something they want publicised..."

"If it's anything to do with eyes or teeth," she turned to shake a warning finger at me, "I don't want to hear it. The amount of times I have parents begging me to fix bloody eyes and teeth because they couldn't be bothered to do it at the proper time..." She humphed and returned to rattling jars. "Let their children wear glasses so everyone knows how irresponsible they have been, that's what I say!"

"It's not that," I muttered, feeling defensive, although these were things that Lucius would have to confront in the not-so-distant future. "I don't even know if there is anything you can do to help, but it's important. Anything at all that can be done that has even the slightest chance of helping, with as little fuss as possible..." I was desperate for her to agree, would have quite possibly done anything for her to say yes to my strange request. "Please."

"I have absolutely no idea what you are talking about, Severus," Madam Pomfrey told me, looking down from the top of her ladder. "It is most irregular and before I agree to anything, I would have to speak to the headmaster first. And they would have to come here. And only when it is convenient for me." She fixed me with a stern eye. "And, if I were to say yes, which I'm not saying I am, it would be on the express condition that you would to a better job of supplying my medicines than Professor Slughorn did, you understand?"

I could have kissed her. But I didn't. I knew it would be difficult to persuade Lucius to allow Draco to come to Hogwarts, but not impossible. And if this could help Draco in any small way, it would be worth it.

A/N: Yes, I know it was very long or massively exciting, but the next part really has to stand alone and this was really a set up for that :P I have a lot of bits of the next one, but they need stitching together and I'm dithering over to include some bits I've planned or leave them out for later so I have a lot to ponder...