Red Sky at Night

A/N:

I wrote this chapter with my good friend, AnimagusButterfly, in mind. I do hope you enjoy it. This is my little way of saying 'thank you for the extra userpics.

A/N:

Once again, thank you to Lina for a fabulous beta job. (Sorry it took so long to get it back to you ... )

Chapter 1: Hermione's Good Intentions

She came into the bedroom while running a brush through her long, tangled hair. She smiled at him, knowing he was watching her every move.

"Come, sit," he urged, patting the mattress next to him.

She obliged, leaning in to kiss him as she did so.

Devon curled his fingers into her long tresses. "I love you, Ginny."

Ginny nodded against his lips. "I love you too."

He pulled her to him and she rested her head against his chest.

Devon took the brush from her hands and continued running it through her hair. Ginny sighed contentedly and closed her eyes. "That feels so nice," she whispered breathily.

He brushed her hair for a long while, finally setting the brush down on the nightstand. "There. How's that?"

She smiled and kissed his chin. "That was perfect, thank you."

Ginny crawled over Devon's lap, falling into her side of the bed.

He was looking at her hesitantly. "What is it?" she asked. "You look...concerned."

Devon shook his head. "It's not that I'm concerned ... it's that ... you haven't heard the news, have you?"

She adjusted the pillow beneath her head, not thinking much of the tone in his voice. "What news?"

Her fiancée looked away uneasily. "Draco Malfoy was released from Azkaban today."

Ginny felt her heart stop. Start beating heart, Ginny reminded herself. "Oh," she finally choked out, hoping she wasn't going to be sick. She felt like she was going to be sick, with the way her stomach roiled around inside of her.

Devon reached out and touched her cheek softly. "I know how much you hate him, and rightly so, but it seems that he was innocent all along."

Oh my God

. "How? How did they find out he was innocent?" Ginny asked, shocked.

He shrugged. "It seems your husband left a journal recording his thoughts down which led to Malfoy's innocence. It did, however, prove that that woman was guilty all along," he informed her.

Ginny nodded weakly. She didn't know what to say.

Devon -- sweet, people-pleaser Devon -- leaned down and kissed her forehead. "I'm sorry, love; I know you had put this all behind you."

You have no idea how badly I wish I

had put it behind me. She was still struggling to breathe properly. "I love you, Devon," she whispered finally because she did love him--he was a lovely person. He would be the perfect husband.

His hand cupped her chin. "I know you do."

She continued smiling until their bedroom lights went dark and then she rolled over on her side and stared into the blackness.

It was a long time before she fell asleep.

***

"Thank you for coming to see me," Ron said evenly, closing the door behind Draco Malfoy.

The Malfoy that walked into his office was still as thin and gaunt looking as before, the bones in his wrists stuck out horribly. His clothes were clean though and his hair was growing back (Ron figured he used a potion for that), so he looked a little better than when Ron had seen him last.

Malfoy sat across from Ron looking bored. "It wasn't as if I had anything better to do," he drawled.

"Trouble in paradise, Malfoy?" Ron hedged.

Malfoy crossed his arms over his chest. "Are you baiting me, Weasley? Because if you are, it is not going to work. Prison will do that to a person."

"What will it do to a person?" Ron asked.

"What do you think it will do to a person?" he replied bitingly. "It'll make a person wary and tired of fighting."

Ron raised an eyebrow, interested in hearing what else the ex-prisoner had to say regarding his tenure in Azkaban.

Malfoy's gaze intensified, as if he thought he'd said too much. "Never mind that; what is it you want?" he snapped.

Ron bit back a scathing remark. "Actually, it was your prison sentence I wanted to discuss with you."

"What of it?"

The redhead leveled his gaze with Malfoy. "Why did you plead guilty to a crime you didn't commit?"

Malfoy's left had twitched in his lap, but he didn't say anything. Ron knew he had struck a nerve with the man.

"You knew all along Dakotah was responsible for those deaths, didn't you? If you knew that, you must have realized she murdered Harry as well. I don't understand why you led everyone - me, Ginny, your mother, the world - to believe you killed Harry. Why would you take the blame for something that severe, Malfoy?" Ron asked with sincerity in his voice. He hoped Malfoy realized that he was simply curious about his past motives. He wasn't trying to get anything else, he just wanted to understand Malfoy's twisted psyche.

Malfoy's gaze shifted to the open window and within seconds, he was looking back to Ron, a schooled look of boredom in his icy steel eyes. "First of all Weasley, if you mention your sister to me again, I will be put in Azkaban for a crime I am not afraid to commit. I've been there already; I know I can survive."

"Is that a threat?"

"Why don't you try it and find out," he responded darkly.

Their eyes met and that was when Ron noticed something else in Malfoy's gaze: looking at his steel-colored eyes, he realized he could see into Malfoy's soul. Behind the snapping heat in his eyes, he saw sadness.

Ron chose to ignore Malfoy's barb. He also chose to ignore what the reasons might be that Malfoy didn't want to hear Ginny's name.

"Just answer the questions," he spat out, annoyed that he was allowing Malfoy to manipulate the conversation.

Malfoy stood up and began pacing the length of Ron's office. His pacing didn't put Ron at ease, but he knew the man wouldn't try anything on him, and if pacing got him to answer his questions, he could wear a hole into the carpet for all Ron cared.

"The answers to your questions are easy enough, I suppose. I led you to believe I murdered Harry because it was easier for you to believe I did--"

Ron interrupted him with a look of disbelief.

"Let's face it Weasel, you'd rather have believed that I, as someone who clashed with Potter frequently in our younger years, was capable of murdering Potter as opposed to someone that worked by his side day in, day out."

The man in charge could not find an appropriate response to Malfoy's argument because, well, it was a damn good argument.

"You have a point," Ron replied softly, not wanting to admit that Malfoy might possibly be correct too loudly.

Malfoy looked smug. "Let's leave it at that then, shall we?"

Ron nodded, but only because he didn't want to have to talk to Malfoy any longer than was necessary. If Hermione had her way, which she almost certainly would, Ron knew he would have plenty of opportunities to continue this conversation with Malfoy. Not that he was looking forward to any of those opportunities.

"Are we done then?" he asked, boredom in his eyes and sarcasm in his voice.

Ron wanted to say yes, but he was afraid of Hermione. Damn his wife and her brains. "Not quite," he answered in a low voice. He worked hard to swallow the lump of disdain that had formed at the back of his throat.

"Oh?" Malfoy prompted, his eyebrows raised.

Ron shot up from his seat and the chair skidded back, finally banging against the metal filing cabinet.

"Do keep in mind that if it were up to me this would never come up, but Hermione insists and...we have a four-bedroom rambler, Malfoy. You're welcome to stay with us, if you want," he said in a rush of words.

"I don't need your charity, Weasel," Malfoy snarled.

Ron folded his hands and put them on his desk. "That's fine, of course. If you would rather take charity from your mother, that is your own business." Ron smirked when he practically saw the dark cloud pass over Malfoy's head. He had figured bringing up Narcissa Malfoy would do that to Malfoy. Ron didn't know any wizard their age who actually wanted to still be living with their mother. Malfoy was no different.

Their eyes were level with one another as they stared each other down. Malfoy was the first to break contact and Ron resisted the urge to shout, "Ha! I win!" like he had when he was a boy.

"I'll think about it," Malfoy grumbled, keeping his eyes averted from his nemesis.

Ron smiled to himself, knowing he now had the upper hand. "You do that," he urged.

Malfoy spun on his heel then and slammed the door behind him.

The tall redhead sat down, chuckling to himself. "And just as I was about to wish him a good day, too..."

***

Draco returned to his mother's home from his meeting with Weasley nearly immediately after exiting the man's office. His skin crawled with hatred; whether that hatred was toward Weasel or himself, he could not tell.

"But why would I hate myself?" Draco wondered aloud. He was lying on his bed, the same one he'd slept in as a child, staring up at the stark white ceiling. Because you're considering leaving your mother's home in favor of the Weasel's home, a voice from the back of his brain whispered.

"Well, it's not as if I want to live there. It's that I don't want to live here anymore," he argued reasonably.

Draco sat up, put his head in his hands and groaned. Life was no longer easy for him, now that he had been in Azkaban. It did not matter that he'd been found innocent; the stigma attached to his name still followed him around, causing fellow wizards and witches to balk when he entered their shop or pub. And as difficult as shopping was, seeking employment or decent housing was worse. No one wanted to hire a wizard who had been released from murder charges. It was enough that he had been considered suspect, let alone actually pled guilty. No... it really didn't matter that he was innocent now. They had reason enough to look his way in the first place. No one wanted to hire him. Looking for an acceptable flat or home to rent was even more mortifying. Landlords heard his name and he was practically laughed out of their office. He could not buy a home because they had frozen his Gringotts accounts once he was imprisoned. According to the goblins, they were still awaiting papers from Azkaban to re-open his account. Draco was certain that under a normal circumstance, this wouldn't be such a hell of an ordeal and would not take so long, but he had killed Harry Potter and therefore, this was not a normal circumstance.

He snorted. Once he'd been released from Azkaban, the guards had smirked and wished him luck. Draco wished he had realized then how hard this would be.

It wasn't that he wasn't up for the challenge; it was that he was sick and tired of everything in his life being a challenge. Even in his younger years, when things were easy, there was always some sort of repercussion to make it harder, but this time he couldn't get out of it by saying his name. It was his name that was the liability now. Not that he'd ever made life easy for himself, he pondered momentarily.

Draco shook his head, realizing that he needed to leave this...shell of a house. It wasn't that he didn't love his mother, because he did. In fact, it was because of his love for her that he had to leave. Him being here had to have affected her in a small way. He knew she ran with the high society. The high society didn't allow criminals, even innocent ones. She would never tell him she didn't want him to live here--that wasn't in her nature. But Draco couldn't allow her status to suffer the way his had. It was never far from his mind that if he'd never been to Azkaban, he'd be apart of that same society.

Besides, Draco considered, he wasn't really helping himself by staying here. He was settling, as usual, for what was easiest and what was easiest, his past proved, usually had dire consequences for him.

Not that living with Weasley wouldn't have dire consequences for him. He knew, or at least figured, that Weasley and his sister were close, which meant that Draco would eventually have to see her. Thinking of her, a tingle ran down his spine, making him shiver involuntarily.

He tried to rally up some amount of anger toward her, thinking that it would get him to forget about her, but the most menacing thing he could come up with was a deep sense of loss. He couldn't be angry with her: she hadn't done anything wrong. He was the one who'd committed all the crimes when he pled guilty.

Still, when Weasley had mentioned her earlier, it had brought up far too many things for Draco's comfort. It was hard enough looking at her brother without thinking of her; there were so many similarities between them, that hearing her name was a whole new level of...pain, although Draco would never tell someone that. So, he'd threatened Weasel instead, hoping to convey anger over pain.

Draco would still hate himself and who he had become, no matter which he chose, so he picked the lesser of the two evils. He let the Weasleys know he would be coming by owl the next morning. As he watched his mother sift through the society pages in the Daily Prophet, he knew he'd made the best choice.

***

Three days later, Draco arrived at the Weasel's home. It was a modest, two-story home with a large, green yard. If Draco had not been born a Malfoy, he mused, he would have thought it a nice, comfortable-looking home. As it were, he was a Malfoy and the home did not look like much more than servants' quarters to him. Still, it got him away from his mother's meddling, albeit loving, presence.

He hefted his rucksack over his shoulder. He hated to admit it, but he was glad none of his old robes and clothing fit anymore. If he had had to pack them, the pack would have been hard for him to lift without magic.

He walked methodically to the front door, a sense of trepidation growing with each step.

Inside his mind, his private thoughts were scattered and flying. What in the hell have I agreed to? Why would Granger, of all people, invite me into her home? Why would Weasley agree to it? What in the hell am I doing here? There was only one thought he refused to think on, and it involved a red-haired witch whom he'd pushed away years ago.

The door opened before he made it to the porch and a little face peeked out at him. He recognized the little girl as being the same one who had been there with Weasley and Granger on the day of his release. Or should I say Mr. and Mrs. Weasley now? It seems she's actually procreated with the King Weasel... Draco rolled his eyes. That was just what the world needed: more little redheaded brats running around.

The little girl started jumping up and down excitedly yelling to her mother and waving at Draco. Despite his worst of intentions, he laughed: she was rather cute.

Behind the girl, a small woman with frizzy brown hair appeared. Hermione Granger had not changed much, except that she looked older, more mature, and prettier somehow. She smiled, took her daughter by the hand, and came out to greet Draco.

He could see her smile waver the closer she got and he didn't blame her. He had been ruthlessly cruel to her while at Hogwarts. Though he had changed, the stigma, once again, was still there.

Just the same, she held out her hand and smiled broadly up at him. "Welcome, Draco," she said softly, astounding him when he heard his given name roll off her tongue.

"Mrs. Weasley," he returned awkwardly.

Her smiled faltered. "Please, it's just Hermione." She glanced down quickly. "And this is our daughter, Alexis." Affectionately, Hermione ruffled her daughter's hair and then she looked back to Draco. "She's the reason you're out of Azkaban, actually. She found Harry's journal."

The more he heard about this journal, the more curious he was to read it. He had not been aware of the fact that Harry had even been keeping one. "Well then," he started rather gruffly as he looked down at Alexis, "I guess I have you to thank. Thank you," he put with a nod. He felt silly, talking to a girl no older than four years old.

Alexis grinned and did a sort of curtsey-thing with her skirt that caused Hermione to laugh. "You're such a silly goose!" she exclaimed with a laugh. Alexis' grin widened until it looked like the young girl was nothing more than freckles and teeth.

Her mother smiled at him somewhat apologetically. "Ron is inside. You'll have to forgive him; he was less than enthralled with the prospect of you staying with us, as I'm sure you are as well." She blinked a couple of times in the bright sunlight. "You are welcome here, of course," she added hastily.

Draco nodded. "Yes, of course."

Hermione released her daughter's hand just then and little girl turned and ran into the house screeching, "Daddy! Daddy!" the whole way into her home.

The two adults followed the enthusiastic girl nervously in the house.

***

"If you don't mind, I think I'll go lie down now. Thank you for opening your home to me," Malfoy expressed deliberately. Ron knew the blonde felt as awkward as he did and that made him feel slightly more at peace with the whole situation.

Thinking back on that last weird interaction, Ron had to ask Hermione the same question he had been asking for a week now.

"I still don't understand why you insisted on having him stay here," Ron argued later that evening. He leaned against the kitchen counter, waiting for Hermione's counterargument.

Hermione shook her head and flicked her wand, making a glass appear next to her right hand. "We've been through this a million times already, haven't we? I told you: it's the right thing to do, Ron. Since you're the one who jailed him, you should be the one to help him back on his feet."

She went to the sink and filled her glass up with cold water.

"See, I don't see it that way, dear," Ron added with a touch of derision. He stood behind his wife and looked into her eyes through the reflection in the window. "I think of it more along the lines of he put himself in Azkaban by claiming guilt for a crime he didn't commit, so now that he's out he can figure out how to get back on his own two feet."

Even in the reflection, her eyes conveyed exasperation. She shook her head. "Love," she began cynically, "Draco said it himself: would you really have believed him if he said he was innocent and Dakotah was guilty? Admit it Ron: you weren't out for blood concerning Harry's murder, you were out for blood concerning whatever vendetta we had with him more than ten years ago."

"I was not!" he argued back.

Hermione rolled her eyes and turned in his arms. She placed her forefinger on his chin. "Just admit it, Ron; you were hoping Draco was guilty!"

Ron walked away from her, annoyed. "Why do you keep calling him Draco? Stop that," he demanded.

She raised her left eyebrow and crossed her arms over her chest. "Why do I keep calling him Draco? Because that's his given name."

"Why not Malfoy?" he spat the last name out.

She shook her head again. She'd recently taken to shaking her head almost throughout every conversation they had regarding Malfoy. "Because we're not ten anymore," she replied caustically. Hermione turned away from him again. "You, of course, are welcome to call Draco whatever you want, as long as you aren't being crass in front of Alexis. That's all we need, for her to grow up with your mouth."

Hermione must have sensed that he was going to argue again, because soon she began talking again. "We're parents, Ron. I do not want to teach Alexis to hate anyone, even if he is your old school nemesis. Did you see the way Alexis was looking at Draco earlier today?"

Ron grumbled a yes.

"She's taken him under her wing simply because she knows she got him released from jail. She's such a shy girl that I don't want her to feel uncomfortable around him." Hermione smiled sadly. "Besides, I feel bad for Draco...we didn't give him a chance in the beginning, maybe we can give him a chance at the end." She made her way to her husband, putting her arms around his strong neck once she got there.

Ron pulled away so that his chin wasn't bumping her forehead. "What are you doing?" he asked suspiciously, a frown playing across his lips.

She grinned and kissed him on the chin. "Hoping to persuade you," she whispered while her small hands played with the hair at the base of his neck.

He closed his eyes. "I think you might be failing," he said faintly, distracted by what her hands were now doing, running up and down his chest.

"Do you?" she asked, flirting.

When Ron opened his eyes again, he saw her twinkling eyes looking up at him mischievously.

She reached up on her tiptoes and kissed Ron fully on the mouth, her kiss chasing all other thoughts from his mind, except one. "Hey, Hermione?" he asked between soft kisses.

"Yes love?"

"Do you...think...that maybe...tonight...we could...?"

Hermione laughed, already pulling him toward the stairs that would lead them to their bedroom. "Oh yes, I think we could manage that..."

***

From the next room, Draco turned away and ambled to his new bedroom, feeling uncomfortable at having witnessed such an intimate moment. Once he got rid of feeling so uncomfortable, he was inexplicably jealous of what Weasley and his wife had.

He sat down on the edge of his bed wearily. It was something he had long ago given up on ever having.

***

The next morning, Draco appeared from his bedroom with his hair still damp from the shower he had taken half an hour ago. Lining the hall leading out of his bedroom were pictures. He had not noticed them before, perhaps because he'd been tired enough to go to sleep only two hours after arriving yesterday.

All of the wizards and witches in the photos he recognized. There was a picture of Ron and Hermione on their wedding day, and then there was a photo of Hermione holding Alexis. There were pictures of one of the twins and his wife, of nieces and nephews, of brothers and wives, of friends and their children. The last picture he came to stilled his breath.

For a long moment, his heart had ceased pounding in his chest and his blood ran cold. He had figured he would see her eventually; he just had not counted on seeing her so soon.

The photo was definitely recent, for she looked older, more womanly than she had the last time he had seen her. His eyes roved over her image: her hair was a dark red with gold-colored highlights. It was quite a bit longer than he remembered. Her skin though was as milky white as ever. Her curves were more accentuated and somehow softer looking. His fingers itched with the need to reach out and touch her and for a moment, he could feel her warm, pliable skin beneath his hands.

It would have been too much to bear, except that Draco was used to dealing with memories of her. He would think of her for a moment and then he would package the memory up neatly and put it back on the shelf of his mind, forgetting about it until something else struck him.

He licked his lips hungrily and turned away from the photo, pushing her to the back of his mind. Then he went to find Hermione; he had some things to ask her.

***

Draco found Hermione outside, sitting in the sunshine, half-reading the Daily Prophet and half-watching Alexis playing in the sandbox.

She smiled brightly when she saw Draco step into the brightly sunlight. "Good morning, Draco."

He leaned against the porch railing. "Good morning," he returned evenly, still wary of the reasons as to why he was here.

Hermione turned her sights back to Alexis, but continued talking to him. "Ron went into the office today; he does that periodically on Saturdays, so it looks like it will be just the three of us for at least the first half of the day."

Draco didn't know how to respond to that, so he kept his silence.

For a while, there was no sound other than that of Alexis playing in the sandbox, laughing and talking to people only she could see.

"Hermione," Draco began, swallowing hard. It was odd saying her first name. "Why did you ask me to stay here in the first place?" he asked without waiting for her to turn around.

She set the newspaper down and turned so that the small of her back was against the wooden arm of the bench. "Well, I suppose I did because I knew it couldn't have been easy for you to live with your mum again, after so many years of freedom."

Draco snorted. "I would hardly call Azkaban freedom."

Hermione had the decency to blush. "No, that's not what I meant. I meant before your...stay--"

"Please, call it what it was. I was imprisoned, plain and simple," he interrupted caustically.

Her blush deepened. "Yes, that." She gulped visibly. "I figured you were used to being on your own prior to your jailing and that being at your mum's, no matter how nice it might have been, was another form of that, albeit a more pleasant version of it," she finished weakly.

He shrugged uncomfortably. "My mother and I haven't always seen eye to eye, but she is the only one who believed in me when I was younger and she's the only one who believed my innocence these past seven years."

"She's not the only one," Hermione muttered under her breath, though not quiet enough for Draco to miss it.

"Oh?" he asked, interested.

Hermione looked uncomfortable. "Ginny did, too," she replied quietly. "She always did," she added.

Draco had to suck in a lot of air in order to keep from cursing.

Hermione made a vague movement with her shoulders. "I don't know what happened between you two all those years ago, I never asked and she never said. I just know that she was unbelievably angry with you for some time for claiming guilt. She never said why she was angry, or why she believed you were innocent, we all just knew that was what she thought.

"Soon after your trial, she quit her job and moved back in with Molly and Arthur, her parents. Not long after that, she got a position at the Ministry working with foreign relations and safety. She says she loves her job because she enjoys seeing the world; right now she's living in Germany. I think she loves her job because she doesn't have time to slow down and think." Hermione directed a pointed gaze to Draco. "Whatever happened between you, she never talks about it. A stranger would think she's perfect, but she's my sister-in-law and one of my best friends--I know different."

Draco looked down at his hands. He didn't know what Hermione meant to do in giving him this information.

From the corner of his eye, he saw Hermione smile weakly. "All that to tell you that if Ginny could believe your innocence, then so could I. I trust Ginny's judgment and she judged you as a good person, so how could I believe any differently?"

Draco shrugged noncommittally, finally saying, "A lot has changed over the years."

Hermione sighed and then nodded. "Yes it has, hasn't it?"