A/N: You all are wonderful! It's truly great to be back, not least in part to all of you. It is lovely to hear from you as always, and thank you for sticking with me all this time.

Alektorophobia

Draco was in a cocoon of warmth, his mind blissfully blank. He hadn't felt so deeply relaxed nor so free of any nightmare in…

Well, in years.

He let out a soft sigh and burrowed more deeply into material as soft as silk, his eyelids heavy. Over a constant sound of flowing water, he could hear extremely loud chirping. Oh birds of Scotland, how I've missed the indefatigable cheerfulness of your 5:00 am serenade, he thought sardonically, torn between irritation at the bloody things and honest-to-Merlin gratefulness that he was even able to hear the sounds of nature again. He rolled onto his back, reluctant to open his eyes, and stretched, inhaling deeply.

The unmistakable scent of hot-on-the-stove scrambled eggs met his nose.

All thoughts but those of guilt flew from his mind. Exactly where he was — and what was happening — slammed into him.

She was making breakfast — again. Which meant he'd overslept — again.

"Damn," he mumbled, shoving a hand through his hair and pushing it out of his eyes, squinting in the bright light streaming through billowing, sheer curtains. After a moment, he groggily reached over and replaced the stopper in the open bottle of Dreamless Sleep Potion beside the bed, pulled back pristine white sheets, and stumbled to his feet.

He dressed quickly, surrounded by rustic furniture bedecked in simple decor. He had been so deprived of sunlight for so many months that he couldn't help but allow himself to be momentarily drawn to the large, curved opening in the wood-planked wall, one that led to a plant-covered balcony and the bright "sky" beyond. Actual warmth touched his icy skin, and he allowed himself the briefest of moments to relish the sensation before plunging into what he knew would be another emotionally exhausting day.

A day of literally walking through beloved yet heart-wrenchingly painful memories.

One. By One. By One.

A week, he realized. It had been a full week since he and Pansy had moved down to this bizarre, magically-generated paradise; a week since he and Riddle had begun 'pensieve therapy' with his father to try to jar Lucius's lost memories.

In a way, it was stranger now for Draco to think of Lucius as 'his father' than when he had never met him at all. The man still had no true memory of Draco or the woman who had spoken of him so lovingly. Earlier that week, Lucius had overheard Draco refer to him as 'my father' during a conversation with Riddle, and it had agitated him so greatly that Draco been careful to never make the mistake of doing it again.

No, right now, Draco was getting to know an almost complete stranger. Lucius was doing well absorbing facts with ease, picking up spells and knowledge with a detached familiarity that suggested he had known them in a previous life — though he couldn't recall the experiences of his Hogwarts education that explained how he could understand difficult magical concepts quite so well.

But it was painfully apparent he lacked the emotional connection that accompanied memories. Whenever his father looked at him, Draco could see in his equally gray eyes that the man did not identify him as family, and it had wrenched open a hole in Draco's chest that he hadn't felt since his first year of Hogwarts, when the alliteration of "fatherless Fusty" had made him an easy Gryffindor and Hufflepuff target.

According to Riddle, jarring any of Lucius's buried emotions, if they existed, was the best chance they had of bringing back his father's memories, at least in a somewhat expedient way. Little by little, they had begun the slow process of showing Lucius relevant memories — not so many as to overwhelm him, but enough to begin to give him a sense of the life he'd had before he'd been captured, in the hopes of triggering something.

In the pensieve with Riddle and his father, Draco had relived some of his own memories of Narcissa telling him stories about herself and Lucius, and, courtesy of Riddle, witnessed scenes from Lucius' time at Hogwarts, a few planning meetings from the early days of the war, and Lucius's and his mother's wedding.

For the first five days, this approach appeared disappointingly unsuccessful. At first, Lucius had seemed somewhat curious, but then he quickly descended into suspicion about their motives, and became aloof and impassive. After everything he'd gone through in the hands of the Sovereignty, Draco honestly couldn't blame him for it.

But yesterday, they'd been given the slightest glimmer of hope… however twisted. It had come in the midst of the marriage ceremony. While Draco's grandfather Abraxas, the wedding's officiator, narrated the proceedings, the soft-spoken present-day Lucius had become increasingly distraught. By the time his and Narcissa's exchange of vows arrived, he had demanded they exit the memory.

Draco briefly squeezed his eyes shut against the painfully fresh recollection: of watching, to his right, his mother and father — his mother hardly older than Draco was now — holding hands and practically glowing with happiness, younger versions of so many people he'd known as older adults dabbing at their eyes… and to his left, the world-weary iteration of Lucius Malfoy screaming.

"End it! End it, I tell you!"

"You feel something," Riddle noted, studying him intently.

"F-f-feel?" Lucius spluttered at him. "Of course I feel! What do you take me for? A — Another cog in your machine?!"

Riddle stepped closer, his dark gaze boring in to Lucius's. "Describe to me what you feel."

Lucius quickly took a step away from him. "You - You say you're my… my friends, are you? Yet you will not honor my demand to leave this place?!"

"Riddle —" Draco began hoarsely, hardly able to stand watching his father's aggrieved reaction himself.

Riddle held up a hand, shooting him a brief but stern look that clearly said, 'Wait,' before turning his attention back to Lucius. The gaunt man had clenched his scraggly hair tightly, his eyes wild, and sank to his knees. "Why are you doing this to me?" he exclaimed in anguish. "What do you want from me?"

Riddle's calm intensity was an eerie juxtaposition to Lucius' distressed hysterics. "This memory in particular seems to be bothering you. Is this scene… familiar to you?"

"No! What bothers me is your — your perverse desire to force me into someone I'm not! These 'memories?' Tricks to make me confess to something for which I have no answer!" Lucius flung his hand toward his younger self and Narcissa, who were now sharing a kiss to the standing ovation of the wedding guests. " I am not this man!" he shouted over the sound of the applause. "Do you hear me? I AM NOT THIS MAN!"

The smothering pain in Draco's chest became unbearable, and he could take it no longer. He sprung forward, grasping Riddle's arm. "You must stop this! It's too much for him!"

Riddle spared him a glance that held faint frustration. "Draco—"

Lucius shoved a finger toward them, his usually mild-mannered expression twisted into a snarl that reminded Draco of someone else entirely. "AND I AM NOT THAT BOY'S FATHER!"

The air left Draco's lungs; such pain exploded from his soul itself that he might as well have been cursed. His hand fell limply to his side. He clenched his fingers tightly and then turned dully from the scene, staring blankly at the ground behind them.

'He isn't himself; he doesn't know what he's saying,' some part of him thought numbly.

But that didn't stop Draco's heart from feeling like it'd been ripped from his chest.

The scene around them shifted back into the familiar soaring circular wood atrium, though Draco hardly noticed. Beyond the rushing water outside, the space was silent as the three men stood motionlessly, one trembling over his knees, one slumped in deep sorrow, one relaxed save the slightest of disappointed droops to his shoulders… and all very much alone.

Draco's hands ached, and he realized suddenly he was gripping the balcony railing tightly.

He choked in a breath, blinking rapidly and shaking his head against the memories before forcing himself to release the ledge.

Riddle had apologized to him privately afterward, though he also called the occurrence "an encouraging development." Draco had been too drained to respond with the rush of anger that he'd initially felt when Riddle had hesitated in honoring both his and his father's wishes to exit the memory.

But later that night, he'd had to admit that Riddle was right.

Even though the response had been far from positive, Lucius had seen a poignant memory, and he had felt something.

And after that incident, Draco needed that very encouragement to get himself through the next round of pensieve therapy.

He took a few more breaths in an attempt to calm himself before heading downstairs. A midnight blue butterfly flitted by the window, landing on a particularly broad leaf within the cascade of greenery climbing the massive structure that housed them.

Riddle called these strange buildings 'Tributes' — "To life. To death. To those who lost their lives in the struggle for our freedom. To the masterminds who created the spells I used to build them," — he'd explained to Draco earlier that week.

The unspeakable beauty of the Chamber was, quite honestly, a godsend. Any of the initial trepidation Draco may have felt about severing much of his contact with Hermione to stay here had been replaced by an immense gratitude for the opportunity to experience living in a place of absolute peace… no matter how brief it might turn out to be.

"There's no arguing it. You'll be far safer there," Hermione had said the morning after their first visit to the Chamber. "I might have put up warning charms, but the fact of the matter is that anyone can still barge in here: McGonagall, House-Elves… your mother," she added with a glance at Evans. He was sitting on the common room sofa in typical Evans fashion: arms crossed, face displeased.

"But it'd be so much harder to see the both of you and Peia," Pansy protested, giving Evans a torn glance for a different reason entirely.

"Harry and I can have Peia show us how to open the passageway to the Chamber," Hermione said. "It'll make it easier for us to visit more often, and involve her less. It's too risky to try to find her anytime we might need to get ahold of — well — him."

"I hope you realize being a Parselmouth is a hereditary trait," Evans butted in. "I don't know about you, but I certainly don't plan on doing any genetic intermingling with Salazar Slytherin's offspring anytime soon."

"It is possible to learn the Parseltongue word for "open" without being a Parselmouth," Hermione said dryly. "Anyway, you were quite adept at it where I come from." At his raised eyebrow of disbelief, she quickly added, "Long story. Very long story."

Pansy turned toward him. "Draco, what about you? It's your father who's down there. If any of us would want to spend more time there, it's you."

Draco had been silent up until that point, ruminating over the answer to that very question. Pansy was right — if he stayed here, he'd have very little opportunity to be near the man who still didn't remember he was Draco's father. At the same time, if he was in the Chamber, he couldn't very well support Hermione… and he'd given her his sincere word that he would.

He took a small breath and glanced toward her. "Where would we be of greater use?" he asked simply, though he suspected he already knew what her answer would be.

She didn't hesitate in her reply, her tone full-on professional. "You know what Riddle said. Every bit of time you spend with him might bring him that much closer to remembering something."

Draco wasn't sure if he should be hurt or grateful she had dismissed him so rapidly.

Obviously he was as terrible at hiding his thoughts now as he'd ever been, because for the briefest of moments, her countenance softened. "He's your father, Draco — he needs you. Even if he… doesn't know it yet."

Draco felt a rush of gratitude and relief he couldn't properly explain. Had he been afraid he'd have to choose one person he cared about deeply over another? Either way, that simple exchange between them assured him that didn't have to be the case.

He gave Hermione the slightest of nods, which she returned, blessed understanding in her gaze.

"Pansy," he said, feeling a smile tug at his eyes before he composed his face and shifted his focus back to his childhood friend, "prepare to have your mind utterly blown."

Her dark eyebrows raised warily.

"The Chamber of Secrets holds the most monstrous creatures you can possibly imagine," he began ominously. "Descended from the fiercest of reptiles. Scaly claws as sharp as knives."

Pansy's blue eyes widened slightly, while in the background he heard Evans mutter, "Oh, for the love of Godric Gryffindor…"

"Oh, I assure you, Evans, their love is for Salazar Slytherin alone," he said knowingly. "You can hear them in the early morning, scavenging for food, screeching for their mates—" Draco glanced toward Hermione, who had crossed her arms and was shaking her head with a reluctant smile of thorough disapproval, "—and only the bravest of witches and wizards have dared call them by their true name…" He grinned mischievously back at an appalled-looking Pansy. "…chickens."

"Oh! You—" Pansy swatted a pillow in his direction, and he leapt out of the way, chortling. "Draco Malfoy!"

"I see you're taking full advantage of those Chamber monsters this week," Draco commented as he descended the spiral stairs to the open kitchen, where Pansy was scraping scrambled eggs onto two plates beside a simple stove, her dark hair tumbling down her back. The scene was so peculiarly domestic after two years of imprisonment that Draco momentarily felt as if he was walking through an outlandish dream, rather than reality.

"Yes, well luckily for me they aren't half as horrifying as you would have me believe," she replied without turning.

He came up alongside her, leaning the polished, dark walnut cane that Riddle had given him to help with his leg against the stove. "I disagree; I personally find them terrifying."

At this, Pansy gave him a queer expression.

"They peck at you," he explained indignantly, his theatrical aggravation more lighthearted than zealous. A pile of blueberries were drying on a tea towel; he slid them across the smooth wooden counter and began dividing them between the plates. "My trousers are not chicken feed, I'll have you know."

She laughed. "Oh Draco, they're just curious little things."

"Well, they can take their curiosity away from my legs."

She continued to chuckle. "Then you and Harry would have at least once thing in common."

He furrowed his brow. "What… Alektorophobia? That can't be right. Evans wouldn't admit to being terrified of anything."

Pansy laughed again — in happier spirits here than Draco had ever seen her since the war had begun. "You goof. How in the world do you even know the word for that?"

"I told you. Chickens. Terrified." He swept both their plates off the counter and over to the nearest end of a long wooden table that could have accommodated at least six times their number. "I did research."

She sat down across from him. "Well, Harry might hate the chickens as well, but I'm not quite certain 'terrified' would be a word he'd use to describe himself."

"No, it wouldn't be, would it?" Draco mused, gazing thoughtfully at the vaulting wooden ceiling. "No, if Evans had to face down a flock of chickens, I'm sure he'd think of himself as a barbaric hunter. Stonily impassive. Citadel of steel."

She giggled, digging into her eggs. "I'm so glad you haven't lost your ridiculousness, Draco."

The comment acknowledging his drollness ironically served to pull him back down to earth. "Me too," he said quietly, his attention shifting back to her. "Pans, I'm sorry," he said sincerely. "I meant to actually be useful this morning. You should have woken me up to help; Merlin knows I've already slept more this week than Vincent Crabbe after his botched Somnius Potion."

"Vincent Crabbe!" she exclaimed. "Merlin, I haven't thought of that name in ages…" After a moment, she shrugged. "It's no problem, really. You've made lunch, and we all make dinner. It's only fair I take breakfast." Her eyes regarded him worriedly. "Draco, perhaps you should let yourself get as much rest as you can. The deeper you can sleep, the less the nightmares might affect you, and the few weeks you've had is hardly enough time to recover from two years of—"

She stopped speaking suddenly, and Draco felt his appetite abruptly deteriorate. He stared down at his eggs, the pity he knew was in her eyes crawling at the pit of his stomach.

"Well, I just mean to say that we all understand," she finished.

Frustration arose in his chest, and he hated himself for it. He knew her innocent words came from a place of love and care. But they didn't understand… not really. He didn't want to be treated like a glass house that could break at any moment. He didn't want people he cared about, people like Pansy and Riddle and his father (even though he didn't identify with that term), to continue to stare at his face and his arms and his hands and his limp with horror, and then look away quickly.

"Draco?" Pansy asked quietly, hesitant and nervous. "Did I… say something wrong?"

He looked up swiftly. "No. Merlin, no. No, not at all," he said quickly. When she didn't seem particularly convinced, he added, "Sorry, I'm… still just a bit out of sorts from — everything, I suppose."

He forced himself to start eating again, while she poked at her eggs.

"How are you doing? After… everything that happened yesterday?" she asked delicately after a minute.

"Trudging ahead, as per normal," he said jokingly, which was far more chipper than he really felt. "Riddle says it's all part of the process… thinks it shows we're getting closer to a breakthrough. Speaking of Evans, how is old happy face doing? " he asked, quickly jumping back to the earlier topic of conversation.

Pansy studied him for a second, clearly unprepared to change the subject, before she relented and gave him a slightly sour expression. "He's fine. You just missed him yesterday — he came by while you were with your father."

"He seems to have learned my schedule quickly. Always 'just missing' me," he said, feigning hurt. "Can you believe I think he's trying to avoid me?"

She smiled, shaking her head. "I don't know what it is with you two. You both resist even being in the same room with each other when you have so much in common." When Draco raised his eyebrows at her in disbelief, she elaborated, "You were both raised by a single mother, you both love Quidditch, you both can be total wise-arses…" She trailed off and paused. "You're both brilliant wizards…"

He laughed and waggled his finger at her. "Now you're just pulling at straws. Some things simply aren't in the stars, Pansy, and my and Evans' happy ending together is most assuredly one of them."

"Ah, well. I suppose your loss is still my gain. I get to have you both," Pansy said happily. She let out a soft sigh, gazing around their bucolic surroundings. "Merlin, we've only been here a week and this place has already done such wonders for my soul." She looked down at her half-empty plate. "I know I shouldn't cling to Harry so much anyway, I just haven't been able to be with him in so long…"

Draco was glad she was cognizant of her powerful attachment to Evans, though he couldn't exactly fault her for it — the two clearly cared for each other very much. That visible fact had been the only thing that had lessened Draco's initial concerns when he'd first suspected the two of a relationship.

"I'm fairly certain the clingship is mutual," he said thoughtfully. "Much as I struggle to see eye to eye with Evans on virtually everything, I can't begrudge the way he is with you." He made a small face. "Are you quite certain some Demiguise doesn't possess him every time you and he interact? It wouldn't even need to borrow his Invisibility Cloak to infiltrate Hogwarts."

"No!" she exclaimed, laughing and throwing a blueberry at him playfully; as his body reflexively tried to dodge the projectile, he gritted his jaw to restrain an automatic cringe. "He does have a wonderfully soft side, you know. You just have to be patient enough to coax it out of him."

He snorted. "Then I'm quite certain no one else will ever see it, Pans. Not a single person on Gaia's green earth has that amount of patience except you."

"Well, growing up with my father, I didn't have much of a choice."

Draco looked up quickly. Like Evans, Irenaeus Parkinson had been, in the words of Draco's mother, 'a difficult man to try to reason with and an even more different man to try to like.' But Draco remembered the few times he'd seen him and Pansy together — the love Irenaeus had felt for his only daughter, and vice versa, had been palpable. Pansy had never mentioned him since they'd been reunited, and Draco had assumed the elder Parkinson had died during the last days of the suppression. But he hadn't actually asked.

"Your father. Is — Is he…?"

"Dead?" She shook her head. "No. He's a - a House-Wizard. Here, actually." Her shoulders drooped slightly. "It isn't the… the best of situations, but at least he's still alive." Her face brightened. "Harry's going to help me try to see him, once everything with the Hangar calms down."

Draco smiled, genuinely happy for her. "I'm so glad, Pans."

"I asked Harry about Hermione," she added as Draco began to clear the plates from the table.

For the briefest of seconds, he stopped moving, then continued on his way to the sink. "What about her?" he asked when she said nothing more, trying to sound somewhat detached.

"Apparently she was invited to run The Haunt again. That's where she's been this whole week."

A flood of memories abruptly assaulted Draco, of darkness, pounding music, flashing lights, suffocatingly thick smoke, raucous laughter, unwanted, grasping hands, curses and pain.

So much pain.

"Draco?"

He blinked and his vision cleared; he found himself back in the safety of the Chamber of Secrets. He gripped the edge of the counter and choked in a shallow breath of relief, swallowing hard.

"Erm… yes," he forced himself to say, scrambling to rejoin the conversation without arousing concerned inquiry. "That — erm… that does explain why we haven't seen her at all."

"That's what I thought as well. I can't believe it's Halloween already." Pansy joined him, drying the dishes he had begun washing. "Last year My spent more time planning that one party than she did on all her homework for the entire year combined. Even with Gi - Ginevra—" Pansy stumbled over the name, suddenly looking quite ill — "co-chairing the planning committee with her. This year Harry says she refuses to work with Hermione, to which all I can say is 'thank Merlin' for Hermione's sake, but it's probably doubled her workload."

Of course, Draco thought, his mind returning to its normal function, though his heartbeat hadn't quite slowed. Gryffindor-run and invitation-only, "The Haunt" was Hogwarts' biggest — and most raucous — unofficial party, a nearly twenty-year Halloween tradition started by megastar Sirius Black himself when he was a Hogwarts student. In his time as a student neither Draco nor any Slytherin he knew had ever received one of the highly coveted invitations, but his time in captivity had been another story altogether.

And no doubt My Evans would be the undisputed Mistress of Ceremonies.

"Illegal drugs, sex, potions, alcohol…" Though he certainly felt for Hermione's plight, he couldn't help but shake his head and chuckle weakly at the thought of her mentally cursing over the planning of it while having to pretend to be wildly enthusiastic. "Merlin, she must be hating every second of it."

He finished the last bit of dishes and flicked water off his hands at Pansy; she squealed and ducked out of the way. He grabbed his cane. "I'm off. I'll be back in a bit."

"Draco," she said suddenly as he headed toward the door and the lush landscape outside it. He slowed and turned back toward her, his eyebrows raised slightly in question. "Do you remember, back in… Merlin, it must have been fifth year, when you turned down Daphne Greengrass for the second time and I asked you to describe a girl you'd actually date?"

Draco blinked in confusion. "What about it?"

"Do you remember what you told me?"

He thought for a moment, then froze. "Not… particularly," he said slowly.

"Draco, you do know that when it comes down to it you're a horrible liar."

Draco suddenly wanted to tear out of the Tribute; his grip on the cane tightened, but he couldn't bring his feet to move. He tried to swallow, but his throat was dry.

"Oh, Draco," she sighed. "Why don't you just say—"

"Pansy, you can't tell anyone about that." He took several quick steps back toward her and met her searching gaze urgently, willing her to see the utmost importance of it in his. "Not - not her. Not anyone. Do you promise?"

Pansy stared at him, confusion in her wide blue eyes. "I — I don't mean — that. I mean - Yes, I promise, but… if you fancy her, you should just tell her."

Draco shook his head and let out a heavy sigh. "It's a bit more complicated than that, I'm afraid." In ways I can't even fathom facing now, he thought. "Anyway, I rather think we've all got far bigger things with which to occupy ourselves than my love life, or lack of it."

The corners of her lips twisted downward sadly, her gaze concerned. "I just want to see you happy."

"I am happy," he replied earnestly. The automatically optimistic words left his mouth before he could think about them, but the moment they did, he realized they were true.

At Pansy's doubtful expression, he tried to put in words what he felt. "I won't lie. Of course life isn't… easy right now," he said, searching for the clearest way to express the warmth that, despite everything, still more often than not managed to pull at his chest. "There are obviously plenty of moments when I'm not… always… happy." He held out his hands, gesturing around him. "But look at us. Look how far we've come in - in a matter of months. I mean —" he let out an incredulous laugh, "—you're alive, and so's my father, and the one man on earth who can legitimately challenge Dumbledore, and we're all here, together, in this incredible place… And — And Hermione, by some inexplicable force of magic, is here from another world…" His brow furrowed thoughtfully, "And you and Evans are living out your bafflingly harmonious and merry relationship…"

Pansy let out a small laugh in spite of herself, and Draco trailed off, smiling at her with all the love he would have held toward a sibling had his parents given him any. "That, Pansy. That is why I'm happy."

She blinked rapidly, her eyes glistening, but then she returned his smile with a wavering one of her own. "And that is how you've survived unspeakable things the rest of us can't even imagine." She sighed. "I just wish you'd be a little more forward when it comes to some of the things that matter most to you."

"I'll have you know I am as forward as the front of your shoes," Draco retorted, feigning indignance. His eyes crinkled in the slightest of teases. "I do believe this is a case of what the most advanced of Mediwitches call, 'pot kettle black-tosis.' "

She tilted her head, her face pulling into the gentle pout she usually gave him when he deflected their conversation off himself. "You know what I mean. More — oh, I don't know. More selfish."

Guilt abruptly twisted painfully through his abdomen. He quickly shifted his gaze from her face, staring sightlessly at the grand staircase spiraling upward to the floors above. The smile faded from his eyes.

"I am selfish, Pans," he murmured, exhaustion settling into his bones like a heavy weight. "So much more than you might ever expect."

A/N: Guys, Tributes are real! Check it out: Google Image search 'Montaña Mágica Lodge.' I was so tickled when someone sent me a link to this place after I wrote the last chapter; I felt a (very little) bit like Jo must have seeing Hogwarts come to life on the big screen!

Also, note to Guest - Yep, Dumbledore mistook the remains of Universe A's WW Wheezes for Feorge's inventions in this universe! Wizards have the same magical signature in both, it would appear. And for those who were a bit unclear, the first part of last chapter was indeed a flashback all the way back to the mid-1980s! The second half ways in present time.