She shrugged her cloak off now and tossed it onto the sofa. It had seen better days, Draco noted almost incidentally. That was one thing that had changed about Bones, she was no longer neat. Her coffee brown hair wasn't tied into its once-familiar plait. It was windswept, somewhat slept in and snowflake kissed. Though the snowflakes had melted to tiny droplets that clung to her locks. Her robes too were less than immaculate, torn and patched as they were and stained with dirt – or blood.

"Like a fire?" he asked as she made herself comfortable on the sofa.

"Firewhiskey? If you have any. Sounds lovely, thanks," she replied with a bright smile. Not the wolf smile; Draco wondered what he'd have to do to bring that back.

He leant against the mantle-piece and watched her. "Sorry Bones, can't stand Firewhisky. You're going to have to settle for Scotch, tequila, vodka or some very vintage wines."

She smiled in delight. "All of them!" she exclaimed.

So Draco took her to the kitchen. She didn't like that any more than she'd liked the entrance, wrinkling her nose in disgust as she looked around the white and silver interior.

"You live here?" she asked finally. "And it's by choice?"

Draco merely smirked at her. "You wear that?" he inquired coolly, dusting the shoulders of his own superbly tailored robes. "And it's by choice?"

She didn't deign to answer that, opening one of the long, silver cupboard doors to check its contents instead. "Huh," she murmured, pulling out a tin of passionfruit. She found the blender and at least two armfuls of bottles just as easily and set them up with the cheer of a child to whom several years' worth of Christmases have come at once. It rather surprised Draco that he had so much alcohol in his apartment; and he certainly didn't remember buying that blender.

"So, what can I get you?" asked Bones as she started adding ingredients to the blender, taking a few generous swigs from the Scotch.

"Nothing," said Draco.

She stopped pouring the passionfruit into the blender to look at him, one of her eyebrows tilting in a way that meant uncertainty on her. "Your parents are dead then," she said in a voice that didn't sound the slightest bit uncertain and Draco wondered whether he could no longer read her before the impact of her words hit him.

He almost recoiled, but managed to stop himself, collecting himself carefully before speaking. "They are," he said in the tone that every friend of his knew meant that they had to change the subject or risk injury to themselves.

Bones was blithely unaware of his tones however, merely wrinkling her nose in concentration at the blender as she tossed ice-cubes into it. "What makes you unhappy?" she inquired contemplatively. "That they died, or that they deserved to?"

Six years ago Draco would have obliterated anyone who spoke of his parents like that whether they were living or dead, now he propped his shoulder against the wall and resolved not to speak until he could be absolutely sure he wouldn't lash out.

Bones picked the jug off the blender and shook it a little, sending the ice skittering around inside. Then she took a seat at the floating bar and began drinking from the lip of the jug.

"You didn't blend it," Draco pointed out, moving closer cautiously to take a seat opposite her; his tone wasn't even but at least he wasn't attacking.

"Too much noise. This conversation interests me."

"It doesn't interest me."

Bones took another long gulp from the jug. "People say you killed your father," she said.

"People talk shit!" Draco snarled, getting up so fast that his chair smashed to the floor. He had never been much good at controlling himself in school, he was better now but he had never expected Bones to be deliberately cruel.

When he glared at her she was smiling her slow, steady wolf-smile and studying him with eyes more Avada Kedavra green than ever.

"Did you?" she asked.

"Why are you doing this?" asked Draco hollowly. "What do you get out of it?"

Her smile grew sharper. "Nothing yet," she said, tone serenely bored. "Perhaps one day."

She took one last swig from the jug, put it on the closest bench and strode past Draco back into the lounge room.

Muscles still tense with anger, Draco leant against the kitchen bench and watched her. She bent over the couch, catching up her cloak with a deft flick of the wrist.

"In another five years, perhaps pet," she tossed over her shoulder, laughter clinging to the edges of her words as she started for the door, pulling her cloak on.

Draco's anger fled, replaced with a flash of blind panic. "Yes," he threw out, trying to keep the desperation from his voice. He succeeded, the word coming out cased in ice.

She paused, turning her head slightly, hair falling over her shoulder and a confused look in her eyes that Draco hadn't seen since they were at Hogwarts. "Yes?"

Draco let out an angry breath. "I killed my father."

The confusion melted into contemplation. "Did you love him?" asked Bones finally, tone softer and wistful as though the secrets of the world could fit into that little answer.

Draco thought of the man who had painstakingly tutored him in life, love, manners, morals; the man who had been utterly wrong in most of those teachings. He met Bones' gaze, eyes not flickering and said with absolute conviction, "Yes, I loved him."

Bones smiled, looking relieved. "Good," she said with a laugh. "Thank fuck. You have no idea how glad I am you've said that."

And, without a glimmer of unease, she ambled back to the kitchen, shrugging her cloak off once more as she walked.

Bones was like that though. She wasn't difficult to persuade; she was…easy. The morning after the D.A. raid and Dumbledore's flight, Bones had walked into Potions to find Draco sitting in her regular spot.

She hadn't fought, nor had she given in gracefully. It seemed that she didn't much care that he had chased away her usual partner and therefore there was no giving in to do.

"I've left my textbook behind," she'd said, sitting by Draco and rudely ignoring his attempts to intimidate her. "I hope you have yours."

Studying her with ice-cool grey eyes, Draco said coldly, "I never bring mine. My partner always brings his."

Even that outright attempt at making her feel inferior failed. Her eyes lit up. "Let's wing it," she said, her wolf-smile blazing out in full force.

Draco thought that winging it would entail watching the rest of the classes' progress and copying as best they could. Bones thought winging it meant making it up as they went along. Bones' definition won out. They spent the next three days scrubbing the potions class-room from top to bottom. And even Draco's Inquisitorial Squad membership didn't get him out of that.