After the events of the Second Wizarding War, Draco was forced to reconsider all the beliefs he grew up with. He defected by not participating in the Battle of Hogwarts. As an adult in the Cursed Child canon, he seemed to have renounced most of his prior prejudices and have a semi-cordial acquaintance with Harry.

The Good Son

Prison. Dementors. Screams. The Mark on his arm glowing… He had to get away! He scrambled on his hands and knees trying to reach that elusive sliver of light. Hoping…

A shadow drifted closer. Cruel laughter… His parents dead…

Draco startled awake. His heart was pounding.

"Oh goody, you have decided to join us," a sour-faced mediwitch sneered in a way that would have put Pansy Parkinson to shame. He was in a spartanly furnished room. Perhaps one of the holding cells used for holding prisoners awaiting their trial before the Wizengamot. It was none too clean. There were dark stains on the floor and walls that no one had got round to vanishing. It reminded him too much of the stains back in the Manor. His gut twisted and before he knew it, he was being sick over the side of the metal-framed cot he had been lying in. The mediwitch rolled her eyes as she summoned a bucket for him to empty the contents of stomach into.

Draco then noticed the bandage on his forearm. Watching him staring in confusion at the bandage, the mediwitch snorted.

"Now, I can't blame you if you were trying to remove that tattoo… but perhaps less drastic methods next time? You're lucky still have your hand…"

It came back to him then.

They had brought them in with a group of Death Eaters to await trial at the Ministry. If it was any comfort his mother had been released earlier without charges. His father had rallied enough to hold his head high despite his shackles, keeping close to his son. Yet they had been separated. The senior Malfoy was to stand trial with the other senior Death Eaters like the Lestranges, Yaxley, and Dolohov. His son with the rank and file. The reporters were already waiting in the lobby when they were brought in.

"Malfoy, I will strongly advise you not to run," an Auror had warned when Draco flinched away from MacNair and Rowle. Draco's skin crawled at the leers MacNair shot him. Walking down the corridor, the brutish Rowle managed to evade the guards' notice and lean close enough to whisper what awaited the pretty Malfoy brat if they ended in the same holding cell that night. His knees had given out then.

He had plead illness. Seeing how pale he was, they allowed him to use the bathroom, unaccompanied. He had been sick into the basin. Suddenly the Mark on his skin disgusted him beyond all reason. He wanted it gone. Wandless, he smashed the bathroom mirror with his fist. He grabbed one of the larger shards and plunged it into his arm repeatedly, slashing that hated Mark, barely feeling the pain of his mangled flesh. There had been so much blood, his blood… The rest was a blur.

He vaguely recalled the door being blasted open. The shouts of the Aurors and above that, screams… His father? The screams were cut off as he lost consciousness.

A blood-replenishing and nutrient potion later, Draco finally managed to screw up the courage to ask about his father.

It was the scarred, dour-looking guard assigned to watch him who replied.

"Your old man? In St Mungo's. Took two Stunners to the chest before he went down. Trial's postponed until he wakes up. The press is disappointed. Bloody vultures."

"I need to see him…" Draco's heart sank. He tried to leave his bed, but his feet seemed stuck.

"Sticking Charm. Or would you prefer the shackles? Your mother has been notified."

Mother. Draco fought the tears. He ached for them, wanting to rush into their arms like a little child to be comforted.

"Don't expect to see her any time soon. No visitors. They might allow a solicitor or healer for starters…"

After all he did with the mirror, the Mark remained dark and ugly on his now scarred forearm. The bespectacled healer that came in place of the snarky mediwitch assured him the scars would fade. As for the Mark itself… only Voldemort knew what dark magics went into it. It would likely stay until the end of his days. He glared at it in disgust. He had been so proud back then to wear it. Aunt Bella crowing her encouragement as he knelt before that monster, pledging his fealty. Did he not notice how his parents hung back? Naïve fool. He had been given an impossible mission to carry out. He could not do it, even with Dumbledore weakened, wandless, and helpless before him. Some Death Eater he was.

He had not meant for Katie Bell to get hurt, or Weasley. If there was one thing he could thank Aunt Bella for was his Occulumency. He learnt quickly to hide behind a mask. Not to react as they tortured poor Professor Burbage, old Ollivander, and little Luna, among others. His godfather offered to help him, and he had pushed the man away, accusing him of working against his father. It was too late for apologies now. Uncle Sev is dead. Utterly miserable, he pushed aside his dinner and sank into the thin mattress wishing he could disappear.

He was returned to the holding cells a week later. They had started on the trials already and he was the only one in his cell. He need not fear what the others had planned for him, at least until he ended in Azkaban. For two weeks, he saw no one else apart from the guards, healers, and the family solicitor. Mister Crewe informed him his father had already been discharged from St Mungo's and sentenced, not to Azkaban, but to house arrest given his poor health. All those Crucios inflicted on him courtesy of his master added up. He would live out his remaining days a near-invalid. The solicitor was hopeful they could get the sentence further reduced to probation. Lucius had been cooperative with Ministry in testifying against his former comrades.

On the first day of his trial, he saw his mother standing in the gallery with a witch who resembled Aunt Bella. He all but collapsed in the dock, recalling the times his aunt had Curcio-ed him on Voldemort's orders while his parents watched. He would later learn she was his Aunt Andi, who had been disowned by his Black grandparents for marrying a Muggleborn.

The trial was a nightmare. They brought in some of the others to testify against him. After his father's word against them, the Lestranges were not inclined to look kindly on him. Uncle Rab claimed he was a willing participant in the torture of their prisoners. Hermoine and Luna testified on his behalf against his uncles, that he had not hurt them in any way. He could not bring himself to look at the girls when they took the stand.

They allowed him to speak with his mother. The words would not come, only tears. Malfoys do not cry.

All he wanted was to be a good son to his parents, someone they could be proud of, worthy of the Malfoy name. He failed.

He barely heard the acquittal when it was announced. He felt numb as he traded his prison garb for the clothes his mother brought for him. For a time, they lived out of a suite in a modest inn, the better for him to attend the mind-healing the Wizengamot insisted he undergo at St Mungo's as part of his release.

Some days they met Aunt Andi and her grandson in the nearby teahouse. Aunt Andi always dressed Muggle but still he could not keep from flinching when he saw her, Aunt Bella's mad crackle as she Crucio-ed some hapless victim echoing in his ears.

The nightmares continued for months, kept only in check with careful doses of Dreamless Sleep prescribed by his healer. There were nights went they came all the same despite the potion.

I am so sorry…

You have nothing to be sorry for. It is we who should apologize for putting you through everything.

Some nights, he could only find sleep again in the safe circle of his mother's arms like young child. His mother had accepted him, broken as he was. Perhaps he never really appreciated his mother's love when he was younger, taking it for granted.

Pansy wrote, Blaise and Theo too. He replied to them the best he could, living out of a London inn that was not even the Astoria or Hilton. Headmistress McGonagall offered to arrange for him to take his NEWTS as a private candidate, given his unique circumstances. Many students had had their studies thrown into disarray by the War. Potter and the Weasel were joining the Auror programme while preparing for their NEWTS. Hermione was back in Hogwarts for the final year she had been denied. He politely declined. He was not yet ready. There were other more pressing matters he had to deal with first.

Draco froze when they Apparated before the Manor's gates. The Manor would not allow them to Floo or Apparate in. There were no peacocks on the lawn. The place looked dilapidated, almost a ruin. His father was inside the manor waiting. He could not bear to leave behind the ancestral seat after everything. He shivered as he entered the grand hall, noticing how his mother pulled her cloak tighter about her shoulders.

They found his father in the parlour, sitting wearily before the fire and attended to by a solitary house-elf. Their elves had suffered under Voldemort when he was their guest. Draco knew there were at least seven new elf-graves in the back garden courtesy of the Death Eaters. His mother discreetly left the room, requesting the elf to show her the menu planned and the pantry stocks. An excuse to grant father and son privacy.

"Welcome home, son." A harsh rasp. A wry smile. A proffered hand, skeletal and almost translucent in the firelight.

"I am home, Father…" Draco knew the words for a lie when they rolled off his tongue. The Manor had ceased to be his childhood haven a long time ago. He declined to take the hand offered to him.

A part of him was angry at his father for throwing their lot in with Voldemort not once but twice, inviting him to defile the sanctuary of their home. Yet the wizard sitting before him was the same one who took two Stunners trying to get to him the day the Aurors dragged him out of the Ministry's downstairs bathroom, his arm gashed to bloody shreds.

"I am sorry…" they both spoke at once, then stared awkwardly away. Malfoys do not say sorry.

"We will not stay long. I have an appointment to keep at St Mungo's…" Draco drawled. A half-truth. His father considered him carefully. Draco kept his mask in place. He refused to appear weak before his father.

"Yes, we will need our finances in better shape before we can restore this place…" Lucius sniffed and steeped his hands. The firelight caught the Mark stark on his pale forearm. Draco felt his gut roil at the sight. "Until then, it would be best if your mother stays in London…"

"Will you join us, Father?"

"No, someone has to keep the riff-raff out of our home, right, my little dragonet?" A tiny smirk and wink. A childhood pet-name left behind when he went to Hogwarts.

"Oh Father…" Draco murmured with a mix of exasperation, nostalgia, and love.

Things have changed. His father was too fixed in his ways. The Malfoy family's power was a relic of the past, perhaps they were doomed to fade into obscurity. His father was too broken and spent for the uphill fight ahead. It would be up to Draco Malfoy to restore the family reputation, if possible. The realization staggered him, but now it is he who must be strong for his parents' sake.

Author's Notes:

Draco's a mess in this chapter, but he is healing. Lucius is a worse mess. He probably needs mind-healing himself but is too proud to go for it. Not sure how believable my portrayal of Draco's thoughts and trauma are. Any issues between father and son will not be so easily resolved in a single meeting.