I am back! For Corona-related reasons, as you might have guessed already. I've been super stressed ever since September as I started my first full time job as a teacher. But they've closed all schools and universities in Austria (2 weeks ago, actually, but I didn't get to write much because I had to figure out distance learning not only for me and my students but also for my mum and her students). I have a bit of unexpected free time on my hand now and I'll use it to work on this story. But looking at the number of views on my stories and all the alerts for updates to my favorite stories – I'm definitely not the only one who uses their free time this way. I hope you all are safe and healthy. #stayhome

And happy birthday to everyone who, like me, had/has to spend their birthday locked up in their house. Here is chapter 84. Read, enjoy and review :)

Draco longed for his bed and a night full of restful sleep. But he hadn't gotten any rest since the night the Dark Lord had returned and when he passed the library on his way to Regulus' old room and heard a wistful sigh from the other side of the door, he knew that this night would be no different.

He stopped and took a deep breath, clearing his mind. His own emotions were a mess, his thoughts in disarray. Astoria breaking up with him, the death of Cassius, the hunt for the Horcruxes,… All of it had happened within only a few days, turning his already rather turbulent life upside down once more. But he knew that no matter what he was feeling, Sirius, who he assumed was the person in the library, was feeling worse. And he wasn't the kind of person who let their friends suffer alone. Not anymore.

He pushed open the door into the dimly lit library, where the smell of old books and Firewhiskey greeted him. Sirius sat on a sofa in front of the fireplace, the only source of light, his head buried in his hands. He seemed to be alone. The confrontation with the elf and the discovery of the real locket had happened ages ago and Remus had most likely already left. By the looks of it, whatever Remus had said to cheer up Sirius had had little effect.

Sirius looked up from his hands. His eyes, swollen and tired, briefly fell on Draco, before he let his head fall back on the backrest of the sofa. He sighed. "I am an idiot. A colossal idiot."

Draco hesitated. "Don't- don't say that." He walked up to him and sank down own the sofa right next to Sirius.

"It's the truth, though," Sirius sighed. "And not just that. If I were only stupid… it wouldn't be that terrible. People are born stupid; they can't help it. But I'm also a giant, arrogant twat. A toerag," he laughed bitterly, "Lily used to call us that. Me and James. Arrogant, bullying toerags, she used to call us. She had the right idea, she had."

Draco didn't reply. Nothing good could come from engaging Sirius' self-loathing. But Sirius continued anyway.

"R-Reggie sometimes said that, too, that I was an arrogant little shit," Sirius sat up straight as he said that, "and I'd call him all sorts of names. Tell him how disappointed and disgusted I was… We… It never used to be like that. We used to be best friends as kids, you know, but we grew apart. During… During his last years we only ever yelled at each other."

"You were on different paths…" Draco replied carefully. "It's normal for disagreement to turn into an argument."

Sirius laughed bitterly. "That's what I thought, too. That's how I justified turning my back on him… But, as we now know, our paths weren't quite as different as I thought they were. I… I should have known."

"But your paths were different. He wanted to be a Death Eater. Maybe he wasn't cruel, like many others. But he believed in their ideology. He didn't have doubts, not before this special mission." Draco observed Sirius, observed something silently eating away at him. Something about his brother's decision to join the Death Eaters seemed to bother him. But he had always known that his brother had been one of them. That had not changed. Draco reconsidered what Sirius had said. That's how I justified turning my back on him. "You don't blame yourself for what he did, do you? Whatever Regulus chose to do – his actions weren't your fault. He made his own decisions."

Sirius averted his gaze, looking into the flames rather than at Draco. "Perhaps," he admitted. "But perhaps he would have never joined Him in the first place, had I been a better brother… He was a good kid with some wrong ideas. I knew that. I… If this has shown us anything, it's that he's always had this good inside of him. He's always had the potential to be brave and fight for what is right. Had I talked to him instead of…Had I listened… Had I listened instead of reprimanded... Like you do-"

Draco sat up straight. "W-what?"

Sirius smiled sadly at Draco. "In many ways, we are alike. You and I. Both born into pureblooded, bigoted families. Both fighting for the Order, even though our families would rather see us fighting for the other side. But instead of turning your back on where you've come from, instead of telling everyone around you how wrong they are every chance you get, you accept them. You try to understand them. So, instead of antagonizing them, of pushing them further away from what's right and good, you make them think. And for some, that does not change much. But others… others start questioning. They start reconsidering. You are a good person Draco, better than I ever was. Had Regulus been your brother… had I been more like you…" he sighed and trailed off.

Draco shifted uncomfortably where he was sitting. This was a compliment he did not deserve. He had learned the hard way that he was not a good person, a painful realization. Had he been Regulus' brother, Draco wasn't sure if Regulus would have changed sides like he had.

"I've done some thinking since… you know…," Sirius continued, "and… I have always blamed others for my terrible life. I've been giving Snape a hard time for ages. Just for existing. For being a Slytherin. For trying to find friends in his own house! I thought Remus was the traitor and I sure didn't keep my thoughts secret back then. What kind of friend does that make me? I told Cissy and Reg how wrong they were every chance I got. And how disgusted I was by their behavior. By them. I even expected the worst of you, when we first met. But you know what?"

Draco gulped, "what?"

"I am the problem," Sirius said, sitting up straight. "It's never been any of you guys. Snape's been protecting Harry while I stupidly got myself arrested. It should have been me! I should have been there for Harry!" He had nearly shouted the last part, his breathing growing erratic. He got up from the sofa and started to pace through the room.

"Remus was a loyal friend. He was always there for me, even when I used him to threaten Snape. He was always there for me, always a good friend, while I accused him of the worst and handed Lily and James to You-Know-Who on a silver platter. It's been you and Cissy who've been there for me during my trial even though I often treated you like scum. And Reg? Reg-" Sirius broke off, unable to continue. He had stopped pacing as well, now standing in front of the fireplace, staring into it.

"If you push people, they push back. If you tell them you think they are terrible people, they don't agree with you and change their ways. They push back. Perhaps that's why Regulus joined them in the first place. Maybe that's why Snape did. But once I was out of the picture, once I stopped pushing, they changed and switched sides."

Apparently, Sirius was projecting his guilt onto every other relationship he had, blaming himself for other people's choices. Through his experience with time travel, Draco could relate. He remembered a conversation he had had with Dumbledore about this – one of the first of many such conversations. It was after the Quidditch World Cup, when Draco blamed himself for Theo's unexpected deviation from his original path. But Dumbledore had been right, people still made their own choices. Others might influence those choices, might show alternative paths, but ultimately, everyone had to make their own choices. And Sirius made this complex matter sound so simple. Had he changed event A, event B would have been the result. But humans were more complicated than that. Life was more complicated than that. Draco had changed enough to know that his actions, even with foreknowledge, did not always lead to the desired results. He had thought that stopping Cedric from entering his name would save a life. But it hadn't. It had merely changed which life was lost. And had led to the arrest of Auror Tonks.

"You don't know any of that," Draco finally replied, his attention back on the man in front of him. "Maybe without your influence, Regulus would have made better choices, yeah. It's possible. But maybe he would have made even worse ones. He betrayed the Dark Lord – perhaps not despite your influence but because of it. Maybe all you had said to him did make a difference."

"That's a nice thought," said Sirius.

"And even though I don't know about Regulus, I am pretty sure that Severus would have joined the Death Eaters either way. It took a great personal loss for him to have his eyes opened. And my mother… by the time you entered Hogwarts, she and father were already as good as engaged. Anyhow, they all made their own choices. You are not responsible for anyone's choices but your own."

Sirius sighed. "My own choices haven't been that great, either. I should have been there for them. Maybe you are right, and it wouldn't have changed anything… but it would have been the right thing to do. They are my family. Cissy, Reg,... you and Remus. You guys are my family. I abandoned you all, but you still believed in me. Because that's what family should be all about. One shouldn't abandon their family. "

Draco inhaled sharply, the last sentence like an unexpected punch in the gut. It brought forth the ever-present feeling of guilt over abandoning his son. It had quieted down over time but was still always present at the back of his mind. Together with it came an overwhelming sense of loneliness that had reached its height when his father had disowned him. It took all of Draco's self-control to force his attention back to Sirius, who had continued talking.

"… and I've grown arrogant. I had this sense of being better than everyone else. I thought defying You-Know-Who made me a good person. But I believed myself to be superior. Better than those around me. And that makes me no better than them."

Draco took a deep breath, trying to stay calm. The struggle Sirius was describing wasn't unfamiliar to Draco and that was what he had to concentrate on. He couldn't let his own feelings get the better of him. "It is hard to learn that a lot of what you've once believed was wrong," Draco started. "It is difficult when what you've always thought of yourself… of who you are… when you find out you're not that at all, that instead you're something so much worse…" he trailed off, momentarily lost in thought. This wasn't quite the motivational speech he had been going for. "You thought too much of yourself and too little of everyone else. But only a good man would be able to admit the things you did. You are a good man, Sirius. Perhaps not as good as you once thought, but still a good man."

Sirius sunk back down on the sofa. "I should have been there for my little brother." Sirius blinked rapidly; blinked away the sheen of gathering tears. "I should have opened that damned door."

Draco silently observed Sirius. After a while, he quietly asked, "have you ever mourned him?"

Sirius shook his head and a sole tear ran down his cheek. "There wasn't time. We were in the middle of a war... And there were so many other deaths to mourn and I was stuck in Azkaban… and…" he paused, swallowed, ran a hand over his face. "And I told myself he deserved it. That it was his own fault for being one of them. But he wasn't one of them, not really. And even if he had been… he was still my baby brother."

Draco had to fight to keep his own composure. "Perhaps you should. Visit his grave if he has one. Go cry your heart out or drink yourself in a stupor. Talk to that horrible portrait of your mother or to your house elf. Talk to Snape if you think it'll help. He seems to have known Regulus. Do whatever you think you must but do allow yourself the time to grief. Regulus was a good man and he deserves to be mourned by people who loved him."

And at that, Sirius began to cry, mourning his brother as if he had only died the day before. Draco stayed with him a long while longer, before he slipped out of the library.

In front of the door he found Harry, who had made a detour to the kitchen for some food and to write a letter to his friends, when Dumbledore had dismissed them.

"Is he okay?" Harry asked, worry evident on his face.

"He will be," Draco said, and he thought it was the truth.

Draco excused himself and disappeared in Regulus' old room. Even though he was incredibly tired, thoughts of Regulus and Sirius kept him awake for a long time.

The next morning, Draco lay awake in his bed, trying to figure out what day of the week it was. Saturday, he concluded after several minutes. The third task had been on Thursday – which Draco found hard to believe. So much had happened, he was sure weeks had passed between that dreadful day and this morning. Draco started to believe that if they kept up this pace, the war would be over two weeks into the summer holidays.

But this day seemed to be considerably less eventful than the ones before. As the Order's headquarters, 12 Grimmauld Place was filled with busy Order members who came to share new information and left in a hurry. Everyone seemed to be on an important mission.

Everyone but Draco and Harry, who for the first time in weeks had nothing to do. They sat in the kitchen – the dining room had become so busy that they preferred to stay away from it – nibbling on their surprisingly lavish breakfast, occasionally starting a conversation with a visitor who made a quick stop to greet them.

"We should be doing something, too," Harry commented once Remus, their third visitor of the day, had left the kitchen. "We shouldn't just sit around and do nothing."

"I don't think there is anything we can do," replied Draco. He felt restless, just as he assumed Harry did. The nervous energy in the house was contagious. "I'm sure Dumbledore will have some task for us if we ask him."

"Nothing actually useful, though. And he won't allow us to leave the house, I'm sure. Voldemort is back! We should be out there, fighting. Helping. I feel like one of those pawns in a game of wizard's chess, those who never even get touched during the whole game because there's just nothing you can do with them."

Draco laughed. "We should play, sometimes. I think you're underestimating pawns. You also got your analogy wrong. If you are not out there fighting it's not because you are an unimportant pawn, it's because you are the king. If you die, the game is over."

Harry mulled this over. "I thought Dumbledore was the king. If he dies, the game is most certainly over."

"Life is not a chess game," Draco mused, "but if you want to stick to the chess analogy, I'd say he is the person playing the game and not one of the chess pieces at all." In the other timeline, Dumbledore had died, and it had most certainly not meant the end of the game. But then again, you didn't always have to finish a game to win. If you positioned every piece correctly, winning would become inevitable even if you were still a few moves away from a check mate.

"If we lose him, we are screwed," replied Harry, matter-of-factly. "What about Voldemort? King, queen or person playing the game?"

Draco shrugged his shoulders. "All of the above?"

Harry shook his head, probably at the absurdity of the turn this conversation had taken. "This just shows why we should be allowed to do something. We'll end up crazy otherwise."

"You're a lot like Sirius, sometimes," Draco observed. "It's not like we've done nothing so far. We've already destroyed three of-," he stopped briefly to look around the room, and even though he found it empty, he lowered his voice as he continued, "His things. We have another one in our possession. And we have figured out what the remaining two are. That's plenty. Now, all we have to do is figure out where they are."

"And kill Voldemort," laughed Harry, "you forgot that little detail."

"Your mere presence managed to destroy him when you were nothing but a baby. So, I'm sure we'll manage. And once we destroyed all of His things, anyone and anything can kill him. Doesn't have to be us."

"I'm sure he'll do us the favor and just fall of his broom," laughed Harry. "Or maybe his unhealthy diet will kill him…"

Draco laughed.

"But seriously, I know it will have to be me. It's always been me, whether I wanted to or not. Or maybe you. You seem to have the same luck I have in these matters."

"Oh no, I'll leave that honor to you."

Harry looked away. "I-I'm not sure if I can do it-"

They were interrupted by their DADA teacher's head poking into the room. "I have collected your things and left them with the elf. They should be in your rooms shortly."

"Thank you," they said in unison. "Do you want to eat here?" added Draco.

"As enjoyable as that may sound," drawled Snape, and Draco knew that there was little Severus would find less enjoyable than eating breakfast with Harry Potter, "I'm afraid I have a meeting to attend."

"Ah," said Draco, understanding dawning. "Take care."

Snape nodded his head and disappeared again.

After a short silence, Draco said, "One step at a time. There's still much else to do before we should even think about confronting him. And we may not be able to fight or spy to help the Order, but we could do other stuff. Research."

"Research?" Harry groaned, "You are worse than Hermione."

Draco laughed.

"What do you want to research?" asked Harry.

"We still have to find the ring and I think there's a decent chance Dumbledore will take us with him to get it if he deems it safe enough. There's also a decent chance that he already knows or at least has one of his "educated guesses" about where it could be. But finding out more about such locations can't hurt. We might also be able to narrow down possible hiding locations for him and his followers."

"Sounds good," said Harry, "definitely better than sitting around for a week, doing nothing but waiting for school to end and our friends to join us."

Draco nodded. It also gave him a good excuse to hang around the library, comparing the notes Snape had returned to him with what he had found with Bill Weasley. He turned his attention back to his half-eaten and by now cold breakfast. The sooner he'd finish it, the sooner he'd be able to dive into his notes.

TBC

Just like Draco, I had a really hard time figuring out what day it was (both in the story and in real life – life has been rather monotonous these days).

There's so much stuff I wanted to happen in this chapter but… it didn't. After rereading the last chapter, I felt that I could not leave Sirius and his feelings unaddressed. Addressing it then turned into about 2.000 words, making the chapter rather dialog-heavy and psychological. I hope you still enjoyed it, though. What do you guys prefer? Action-heavy chapters or chapter diving deeper into character's motivations?

By the way, the "It is difficult when what you've always thought of yourself… of who you are… when you find out you're not that at all, that instead you're something so much worse…" line is stolen from my absolute favorite story on this website. It's called "Beneath" by Ninepen and is about Loki (MCU). If you like the MCU, really long stories (1.6 million words by now!) that dive deep into psychology and are about morally grey characters, give it a go.

The next chapter shouldn't take too long – I know what will happen in it and I have little else to do right now.