Draco knew it was her.

He could tell the minute she was dragged inside by that wild brown mane.

And to top it off she was accompanied by Potter and fucking Weasley.

It was so obvious, and he felt sick.

"Well? Is it him?!" His aunt Bellatrix had Potter by the neck, thrusting him into the light so that Draco could examine his swollen face.

He knew it was Potter behind the lumpy and grotesque face, the boy that had been his enemy for 6 years, and there was no mistaking those green eyes and still as untidy as ever black hair. And more to the point, his scar was faintly poking through the uneven surface on his forehead. It was a miracle his aunt hadn't called the Dark Lord the minute she laid her eyes on him.

"I… I can't be sure." He feigned inspecting Potter more closely, as the green eyes met his in a confused glare. Bellatrix hissed with impatience.

Behind him, his mother placed a hand on his shoulder. Although her face was masked into the same blank mask as she had taught him to do, he could feel her hand trembling.

His father, on the other hand, was beside himself with excitement.

"But look at him carefully, Draco! Just imagine if we were the ones to hand Potter to the Dark Lord, how we would be repaid - all would be forgotten!" He too clutched Draco as if to drill the importance into him.

"I hope no one is forgetting we were the ones who found them?" Greyback growled from the corner of the room, where Draco couldn't bear to look. He was clutching a struggling Hermione in his filthy claws, glaring at them.

"Yes, yes of course not." His father muttered absentmindedly, however to Draco's anguish Greyback had brought his father's attention to the girl he was holding.

"But, this is the Mudblood! The Granger girl! Bring her here." His father demanded, his voice rising in anticipation as he finally clocked her.

Draco felt like he was going to vomit as the werewolf dragged Hermione towards him, shoving past Potter to thrust her into his vision clearly.

Although he wanted to squeeze his eyes shut, he forced himself to look at the girl in front of him.

Hermione was gaunt, so much thinner than Draco had ever seen her before. Her cheeks were hollow and her under eyes dark purple. She was panting from trying to break free from Greyback's hold, and was grimacing in pain. Her usual self righteous expression that used to infuriate Draco was completely gone, and her eyes were wild as they met his.

He felt his heart lurch as she stared at him, her eyes pleading and desperate.

Draco had not let himself look into her eyes since the night at Slughorn's party, the last happy day of his life. A few days after, he had made a breakthrough with the cabinet, and realised that he now had no choice but to complete his mission. And therefore effectively condemn the girl he had just passionately kissed just days before, to die at the hands of the Dark Lord or one of his followers. Maybe even Draco himself. And even if she survived, she would hate him forever.

So he had locked the memory in a box in his head, and avoided her like the plague for the next few lonely months. He had found that even looking at her made him feel sick with guilt and remorse, and when eventually the job was done, he had been happy to flee Hogwarts like the coward he was.

"Draco, you must recognise her. Even I do, from the Prophet! It's her, Draco, the Mudblood, isn't it?!" His father's voice grated eagerly in his ear.

Draco was at a complete loss for what to do. He helplessly stared at her brown eyes, trying and failing to convey all the guilt and sorrow he felt in one gaze without the rest of the room picking up on it.

He swallowed the lump in his throat. "I.. It could be…" He said half heartedly. He couldn't say much else when it was so obviously her. Especially now that Bellatrix's suspicious eyes were burning a hole between him and Hermione.

Just as he felt his legs were about to cave in from panic, he heard Bellatrix shriek.

"WHERE DID YOU GET THAT?" His aunt had whirled towards Greyback, who released Granger in shock, and she collapsed on to a heap on the floor at Draco's feet.

Before he could register what was going on, Bellatrix had grabbed an ornate silver sword from the werewolf.

"Found it. And we're entitled to keep what we find, I'll have you know, so it's not for grabs." Greyback responded, backing away from his aunt.

Bellatrix's answering shriek was enough to make the hairs on the back of Draco's arm stand on end. He knew what was to come next, he had seen his aunt angry before and it always ended the same way.

Chaos ensued. Something about a stolen sword and his aunt's vault. His aunt slashed her wand through the air with every word, as the snatchers scrambled to leave. Draco hardly heard a word, he was hyper focused on the girl collapsed at his feet, willing her to get up and run.

But Hermione was too exhausted. It took everything not to let the terror show on his face, even more so when his aunt demanded Weasley and Potter be dragged to the cellar, so that she and Hermione could have "Girl Time".

And then Draco experienced the worst moment of his life.

…

Hermione's body convulsed with excruciating pain as she lay sprawled on Draco's drawing room floor.

She fought desperately to stifle her screams, her entire body looked consumed by agony. Bellatrix hovered above her, the sharp blade of the knife digging mercilessly into her arms, carving the same pattern over and over again.

"SPEAK, MUDBLOOD! HOW DID YOU GET IT?" Bellatrix's shrill voice pierced Draco's ears relentlessly.

Draco stood at the side of the room, frozen in place. His mother was a statue beside him, one hand placed still on his shoulder. He focused on the weight of it, grounding him, as Hermione's cries once again filled the room.

"Please," She sobbed, "I didn't take anything." Another blood curdling scream of pain.

"Don't look, Draco." His mother's voice ghosted his ear.

He must have been showing how much of a wreck he was. His occlumency walls, that he had been trying so hard to keep in place for the last year, had well and truly crumbled.

Draco was watching the girl that had been his only salvation for more than a year be tortured by Bellatrix, and he was letting it happen. He was cowering in the corner while his own aunt mutilated Hermione.

Desperation flooded through Draco, and he found that despite his mother's warning, he couldn't tear his eyes away from the scene no matter how much he wanted to. It was as though wanted to burn it into his brain, as a self inflicted punishment. After all, he had doomed them all, himself included, when he hand delivered Dumbledore, the only man who could do anything to fight the Dark Lord, straight to his death.

Every scream that escaped from Hermione's lips carried the same message to Draco - your fault.

He didn't know how long he had watched, doing nothing, but finally Bellatrix relented, screaming "Get the goblin!" at a figure positioned behind her. As Draco watched, Bellatrix threw the girl to the floor once again, and Hermione's body seemed to go limp with exhaustion.

It was too much for Draco, he had reached breaking point. He stepped forward in a desperate daze, his wand in one hand pointing at Bellatrix, ignoring his mother trying to pull him back to her. He wasn't even sure what he was going to do, only that he knew he could no longer watch without helping, and that he had the advantage of his aunt being distracted.

At that moment, however, two things happened. The goblin that had been trapped in Draco's cellar was hauled into the room, and Hermione turned her head, eyes scanning the room, before landing on Draco.

She looked firstly at his wand, outstretched towards his aunt, and then to Draco's face. In her eyes, where Draco had expected to see hatred, he instead saw a hollow emptiness. The emptiness seemed to ebb to understanding as it dawned on her that Draco was about to curse his aunt. Hermione's brow furrowed as if in pain, before she softly shook her head once at Draco, and mouthed the word 'Don't'. A tear was streaming down her face on to the floor and she could barely lift her head.

Draco's mother yanked him towards her, hissing at him to put his wand down before he was seen. His aunt had focused her attention on the goblin,who was now experiencing his own torture test. Hermione's eyes had fallen shut, and she lay passed out from pain. She looked so still, and it was horrendous.

Suddenly, a crashing sound erupted from behind them, and Draco finally tore his gaze from Hermione's crumpled form to find Weasley and Potter had stormed into the room, unleashing spells in all directions.

Draco never thought he would see the day, but he felt that he could cry with happiness at the sight of the pair. He had no idea how they had escaped, but he thanked the stars for the seemingly never ending 9 lives of the great Harry bloody Potter.

Green and red flashes illuminated the space with ferocity. Draco threw a few shielding charms around himself and his mother, but made no effort to fight back. His aunt and father were firing curses left and right, and he subtly expanded his shield to include Hermione's collapsed form. Unfortunately, Draco's lack of counter spells caused Potter to disarm him quickly, leaving them unprotected.

"DROP YOUR WANDS!" Bellatrix's scream pierced the air, her knife pressing against Hermione's throat as her sleeping head lolled to one side.

Draco saw red and furiously cursed Potter for his lack of wand. As small beads of blood pooled at the tip of the blade, Harry and Ron's frantic gazes darted around, their hands reluctantly releasing their wands to the floor.

"Well, well, well. Look who we have here. Harry Potter, all shiny and new again," Bellatrix taunted, her voice dripping with smugness. Harry's face had regained its clarity, his scar once again visible against his pale skin.

"Call him," Bellatrix ordered.

Silence enveloped the room, the death eaters hesitant to make a move.

"CALL HIM, DRACO!" Bellatrix's bark pierced the air, demanding obedience.

Draco stood frozen, and with a trembling hand, made a painstakingly slow pretence of rolling up his sleeve. He was stalling as long as he could, but for what, he had no idea. All he knew was that there was no way in living hell he was calling the Dark Lord here, with Potter and Weasley wandless and Hermione on the brink of death. He needed a diversion, he looked around helplessly, desperately sending a prayer to Merlin.

And then, an answer came.

A loud creak resonated from above, causing their eyes to slowly rise. The grand crystal chandelier, suspended in time, began its descent, heading straight toward Hermione and Bellatrix.

Bellatrix's scream filled the room as she forcefully shoved Hermione aside, fleeing to safety. Draco used his last shred of panicked sense to grab Hermione's limp body and drag her out of the way as the chandelier crashed to the ground with a shattering explosion of glass.

He watched in disbelief as his old house elf, Dobby, grabbed Potter and Weasley, who whirled around to find Hermione in the chaos. Draco realised what was about to happen, and he truly didn't care about the repercussions now.

He threw Hermione in their direction, shielding them as best as he could from where his aunt and father were gathering themselves off of the floor frantically.

Finally, Hermione had reached them. Weasley grabbed her wrist and roughly hauled her towards him. The last thing Draco saw before they disapperated was Harry's confused eyes meeting his as Draco jerked his head at them to leave, now.

There was a loud crack, a screech from Bella as she flung her silver knife, and then the house was once again silent.

Draco could barely look at them. Now Hermione and the others were presumably safe, he felt for the first time what these actions would cost them.

They had let Potter go. The golden trio had been in the Malfoy Manor, unarmed and alone with 4 death eaters, and they had once again escaped. And Draco had let them, even helped.

He tried to tune out his aunt's desperate screams as she further destroyed the room in her rage. His father had sunk to his knees, the same haunted look that had been with him since Azkaban once again returned. At least they didn't seem to notice that Draco had helped Hermione reach the others on time.

They would all be tortured for this, he knew. But he found he didn't care. He hadn't cared for a while now.

As his aunt and father wallowed in their own despair, Draco's mother once again brushed beside him.

"Draco," She whispered, her gaze on his a mix of terrpr and something else he couldn't put his finger on.

He stared down at her as she placed a hand on his arm, looking ghostly pale.

"The girl?" She asked him in a hushed voice. Her eyes were searching his own.

He knew then that his mother had seen him help Hermione escape. There was no point in denying it, not when they were likely about to be locked up or die at the hands of their master for their combined failure anyway. And he knew exactly what she was asking. She had seen him fall apart tonight, in a way he never truly had before.

"Yes." He muttered simply. There was no need to explain further, his mother knew.

She sucked in a breath as she continued to stare at him. Draco looked away, upon the upturned scene that was once his drawing room.

Glass was everywhere. Priceless artworks shred. His wand was nowhere to be seen. A puddle of blood on the floor.

His father and Bellatrix's combined panicked screams and raised voices continued to fill the room, but all Draco could focus on was the pool of blood. There, seeping into the carpet, was the reason they were all fighting, mudblood 'stolen' blood.

Draco continued to stare at Hermione's blood. Red, like his own.