Questions and Answers

Victoire dashed up the stairs, her heavy bag bumping against her back. She jabbed her wand at Teddy's door, and darted inside, closing it with her foot. She dropped her bag in front of the door and let her coat fall on top of it. 'Oof!' Teddy all but ran into her.

'How much time have you got?' he asked, gathering her jumper in his hands.

'Four hours,' she breathed, unbuckling his belt.

'Oh, that's plenty of time.' Teddy pulled the jumper over Victoire's head.

Victoire tipped her head back and smiled. 'But what are we going to do with the remaining three hours and fifty-five minutes?'

'Having doubts about my stamina already?' Teddy mock-growled.

'Prove me wrong,' Victoire challenged.

'Is that a dare?' he asked, towing Victoire toward his bedroom.

'Of course it is.' Victoire let got of Teddy's hands long enough to pull off her trainers off. By the time she'd caught up with him, he'd already undressed down to his boxers and was kicking his jeans across the floor.

'Catch up, eh? You're falling behind.'

xxxxxx

Victoire lifted her head and peered at the alarm clock next to the bed. 'Impressive,' she murmured with a hum of pleasure, noting the amount of time that had passed.

Teddy lay facedown in a pillow. He didn't bother to raise his head as he patted Victoire blindly. 'Told you,' he groaned. He managed to roll over to his side and gazed sleepily at her. 'Just don't ask me to move any time soon.'

Victoire wriggled until she pressed against Teddy, wedging one knee between his thighs. 'I heard they caught the other person,' she began.

'Yeah.' Teddy's eyes hardened briefly. 'Kieran Sampson,' he spat. 'He helped train me,' he added in disgust. 'I'm going to go to his trial,' he said.

'When is it?'

'Couple of weeks.'

'Why do you want to go?' Victoire asked.

'To see it through to the end,' Teddy replied, toying with the ends of her hair. 'The idea that someone in my department could do something so awful... Sort of undermines any belief you might have in the integrity of people who lived through the last war.' He shook himself a little. 'Who are you shadowing tonight?' he asked in an effort to change the subject to something less dismal.

'Hmmmm. McGowan. On the magical bugs floor.'

'Sounds stimulating,' Teddy deadpanned.

'Oh, I don't know,' Victoire replied with a shrug. 'I've heard there's a man with a raging case of dragon pox in there now.'

'You mean a boy,' Teddy objected.

'No. I overheard McGowan discussing it with a few of the other trainees who actually want to specialize in magical bugs.' Victoire's pale red brows drew together in a frown as she recited the details. 'Male, age thirty-nine, was brought in Monday afternoon with a severe case of dragon pox. At that point, he'd been ill for five days. He's still running a fever - thirty-eight degrees Centigrade - even after two days of intravenous infusions of Fever Reducing Potions.'

'Ugh. Almost want to feel sorry for the poor blighter.'

'Yeah. McGowan says it's almost like he doesn't want to get better, because most people, even adults with bad cases like this, usually aren't contagious after a week. But he's under all sorts of quarantines and there're loads of procedures about what you're to do after you do anything with him.'

'So he's dying?'

Victoire shrugged. 'Could be.'

'Do you know who it is?'

'No. I haven't been on the second floor yet this week.'

'Wonder if it's someone we know...'

'Could be anybody...' Victoire shifted and pressed her mouth to side of Teddy's neck. 'Have a quiz tomorrow on anatomy... Help me revise for it.... I'll make it worth your while.'

'Okay...' Teddy pulled away from Victoire a little. 'Bones?'

'All right.' Teddy reached down and traced a finger up Victoire's shin. 'Tibia,' she murmured.

'And...' His hand drifted higher.

'Femur...'

'What about this?'

'That's not a bone,' Victoire said primly.

'But what is it?' Teddy teased.

Victoire looked down at him and sniffed, 'Gluteus maximus.'

Teddy wound his hand through her hair and pulled her mouth down to his. Any thoughts of revision were quickly banished to the side.

xxxxxx

Draco wandered through King's Cross, looking for the entrance to Platform Nine and Three Quarters. When he finally managed to find it, he pushed through the barrier, not caring who saw him. The platform was empty, but shrouded heavily in fog, reminiscent of the day he'd put Scorpius on the train for the first time. He looked around and found a bench against the wall and settled on it, leaning against the wall, ignoring the rough brick against his back. Draco closed his eyes, enjoying the silence.

'You've always been annoyingly obstinate.'

'And your point?'

'You also always choose the path of least resistance, because it's easier than trying to do something unexpected.'

Draco cracked an eyelid and promptly closed it when he saw who sat next to him. 'Why do you care?'

'I don't. Not particularly.'

Draco let his shoulders slump. 'I'm so tired,' he admitted. 'I'm tired of feeling as if I ought to apologize for the way things have turned out.'

'So why don't you?'

'Why don't I... what?'

'And I thought Potter was thick. Why don't you apologize?'

'Because the list is long and apologizing to some people would be nothing short of humiliating.'

'Your decision, then.' Draco heard the bench creak as the other person rose. 'Live or die, you have to, well, live with it, if you'll pardon the expression.'

'That's what I'm afraid of,' Draco murmured, listening to the other person walk away. He opened his eyes just as the form of Severus Snape disappeared into the billowing fog. 'I could just stay here,' he muttered. 'Not decide anything...'

xxxxxx

Harry opened the vial with Remus' memory. He'd read the report and figured he could do with only using three of the memories - Remus', because he thought it was less likely to be colored by a strong opinion one way or the other; Dorcas Meadowes', since she was the last person to have seen Lavinia alive; and Lavinia's own memory.

He tipped the open vial over the Pensieve, lowered his face into it.

He found himself in a sun-dappled meadow. Late summer sun streaked over the grass, waving in the breeze. 'It's too quiet,' Harry murmured. Birds should have been singing, but the only sound he heard was the whisper of the wind through the trees bordering the meadow. He turned to see four men clustered around two bodies lying in the grass, their sightless eyes staring up into the sky. A woman huddled on the grass next to one of the men, one arm thrown across his chest, and her face buried in his shoulder.

Harry edged around Fabian, and crouched to examine Lavinia's scraped and bloodied hands. She stared at the button of Fabian's shirt under her nose with dull eyes, oblivious to the conversation flying over their heads. She burrowed into Fabian, her fingers stroking the skin under his jaw. Frank reached down and attempted to hoist her in his arms, and it was quite clear Lavinia was unwilling to leave Fabian's side. She whimpered, clinging tighter to Fabian. Remus pried her hands away and Lavinia's eyes rolled into the back of her head, as she fell into unconsciousness. Mad-Eye and Sirius conjured stretchers for Fabian and Gideon, flicking their wands at them, thin ropes gently settling over Fabian and Gideon, binding them to the stretchers. Sirius reached up with a trembling hand and delicately closed Gideon's eyes, letting the back of his hand rest briefly against Gideon's cheek, before he wrapped his fingers around the rope over Gideon's chest.

The scene faded into grey mist as the group Disapparated

Harry dove from the Pensieve and stared meditatively into the rippling silver surface. He used his wand to gather the strands of Remus' memory and neatly decanted them back into the vial.

He picked up Dorcas' vial and poured her memory into the Pensieve, following it as the last bit of the silvery strands disappeared into it. He hung back in the background, choosing to merely observe and not insinuate himself into the action this time.

Frank carried Lavinia into Dorcas' small cottage and followed Dorcas into a small bedroom and lowered the unconscious woman onto the bed she'd turned down. 'Do you want me to send Alice to help get her settled?' he asked softly, as if he'd wake Lavinia up if he spoke too loudly.

'No, thank you. I can handle it.'

'Right.' Frank gestured to the woman lying on the brightly-patterned quilt. 'What will you do if she doesn't wake up soon?'

'I'll send word if I need something. Better get home before Alice starts to worry.'

Frank nodded and strode out of the cottage, leaving Dorcas alone with Lavinia. Dorcas went to a cupboard and rummaged through it, emerging with several vials, gauze, and a stack of face cloths. She waved her wand over Lavinia, murmuring spells, checking her over for further injury. Dorcas nodded in satisfaction that Lavinia wasn't seriously hurt, and filled a basin with warm water, and dipped a face cloth into it. She swabbed the face cloth over Lavinia's palms, cleaning the worst of the dried blood from them, then dabbed the scrapes with a dark green potion. Dorcas Vanished the water from the basin, then refilled it, and swiped a clean face cloth over Lavinia's face, cleaning the smudges of dirt and tearstains. She repeated the process, exchanging the soiled face cloths for clean ones until Lavinia was as clean as Dorcas could make her under the circumstance. Finally, she drew her wand down the length of Lavinia's body, changing her robes for a clean nightdress, then draped the quilt over her.

The scene shifted and swirled around Harry. He wondered how much time had passed when he heard Dorcas speaking in her fireplace.

'...three days now, Alice. I don't want to take her to the hospital, it's too risky.'

'Maybe we can have Madam Pomfrey come down and examine her?' Alice Longbottom asked anxiously. 'Once she's awake, the Order can actually figure out what to do with her.'

'I'll send an owl to Dumbledore tomorrow.' Dorcas pulled her head from the fire and pushed herself to her feet. She went into the kitchen and presently returned carrying a tray of tea and toast. She passed by the bedroom Lavinia occupied, but something made her go back to the door. Perhaps it was the sound of the sea. It seemed louder than it had before. Dorcas pushed the door open a bit wider. The bed was empty and the small door that led to the garden creaked softly in the early morning breeze. The tray slipped from Dorcas' hands and the teapot shattered on the polished floor. Dorcas ran into the garden, looking wildly through the riot of flowers and herbs. 'She didn't have a wand... Where could she have gone...?' Dorcas slowly turned and gazed at the cliffs, her eyes widening. 'Oh... No...' she breathed, blundering through the gate and pelting to the edge of the cliff. She fearfully looked over the edge, her heart in her throat, but the shore below was empty. She pulled her wand from the sleeve of her robes and closed her eyes, swinging the wand in a wide arc. A silver wren took flight, lost in the morning sun. Within minutes, she was joined by Frank and Alice Longbottom.

'What do you mean, "she's gone"?' Frank demanded.

'After I finished talking to Alice, I made some tea and toast. When I passed by the room where she was sleeping, something didn't feel right, so I took a peek inside and she was gone!' Dorcas huffed.

'We'll split up,' Alice said calmly. 'Do you have a copy of the Sunday Prophet from, oh, two weeks ago?' she asked Dorcas.

'I think so. In the kitchen, next to the owl perch...'

Frank started to say something, but Alice held up a hand, shushing him. 'There's a photograph of her at some society do. We ought to have one, so we can ask people in the village if they've seen her.'

'Yeah, I remember seeing that article,' Dorcas murmured. She darted into the cottage and returned carrying torn-out portion of the newspaper.

'Brilliant, 'Alice said, performing a Freezing charm on the photograph, so the figures no longer moved, then made two copies of it. 'Dorcas, you go to the village and Frank and I will search up here.'

Harry followed Dorcas to the village, while she fruitlessly asked dozens of people if they'd seen the woman in the photograph. It seemed hopeless until finally one witch nodded.

'Yeh, she run intah me this mornin'. Lost me wand, too.'

'Did you find it?' Dorcas inquired.

'Nah. She migh've ta'en th' wand. 'Twasn't in th' street when she Disapparated.'

'Are you quite certain she Disapparated?'

'Can' mistake it, luv. Loud crack an' all.' The woman cocked an eyebrow at Dorcas. 'Yeh know her, then?'

'She's a cousin,' Dorcas lied smoothly. She dug into the pocket of her robes and pulled out a money bag. She shook out several coins and handed them to the woman. 'To replace your wand.'

'It's no' necessary,' she objected.

'It is,' Dorcas insisted. She folded the photograph and stuffed it into her pocket. 'Thank you...' She trudged back to her cottage.

Harry blinked and stepped out of the Pensieve, feeling as if he was going to hit countless dead ends. 'She could have gone anywhere or done anything with a wand...'

xxxxxx

In spite of the cold, Scorpius settled on what he'd come to consider as "his" bench in a secluded alcove of the courtyard. He pulled the large book from his bag and opened it to where he'd marked his place with a worn quill. He'd avoided reading this chapter for several days, as it was concerned with his grandfather's involvement in the first war. Avoiding it wasn't going to make it suddenly disappear. He took a deep breath and with the sensation that he was about to do something unpleasant, he began to read the first page of the chapter dealing specifically with Lucius Malfoy.

While Lucius Malfoy was not considered one of Lord Voldemort's most ardent supporters - that title belongs to Bellatrix Lestrange - he was one of his most loyal. His activities during the first war are somewhat murky. Many of instances of tortures and Muggle-baitings cannot be immediately attributed to Malfoy, as he maintained during his trial that he had been operating under an Imperius curse. However, the trials of Death Eaters convicted in the days after Voldemort's disappearance in nineteen eighty-one contained testimony that Malfoy orchestrated some of the more heinous instances of Muggle-baiting, Muggle-born witch and/or wizard torture, as well as the death or disappearance of members of the Order of the Phoenix. Malfoy vehemently denied all allegations, including those that claimed he was not only a member of the Death Eaters, but that he belonged to Voldemort's inner circle of supporters.

In the interim between the first and second wizarding wars, many people believed Malfoy was able to dodge the complaints and allegations lodged against him by bribing Ministry officials, most notably, Cornelius Fudge. When those charges were investigated, Malfoy and Fudge both claimed that Malfoy merely donated sums of money to St. Mungo's. An examination of St. Mungo's financial records for the period between nineteen ninety and nineteen ninety-six, Fudge's tenure as Minister of Magic, reveal no donations made in either the name of Fudge, nor Malfoy. In fact, during Malfoy's trial after the second war, he admitted to bribing Fudge, with a promise that more gold would follow, if Fudge would maintain the status quo. Fudge himself corroborated this assertion, and confessed to taking the aforementioned bribes.

After the first war, Malfoy kept a clandestine collection of Dark objects in the dungeon of his Wiltshire mansion, hidden under the drawing room floor. Occasionally, Malfoy managed to sell off a few of items from time to time when rumors of Ministry raids reached his attentions, but the majority of them were not discovered until after he was imprisoned in Azkaban in June of nineteen ninety-six, following a pitched battle between Malfoy, Bellatrix and Rodolphus Lestrange, Antonin Dolohov, Walden Macnair, Augustus Rookwood and six students from the Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry - Harry Potter, Ron Weasley, Hermione Weasley (née Granger), Neville Longbottom, Luna Scamander (née Lovegood), and Ginny Potter (née Weasley) in the Department of Mysteries in the Ministry of Magic. Occasionally, Malfoy was known to foist off Dark artifacts on unsuspecting witches or wizards, then tipping off the Ministry in an anonymous note the said witch or wizard possessed an illegal object.

Malfoy's involvement in Voldemort's activities lessened considerably during his imprisonment. His son, Draco, was hand-picked by Voldemort to replace him. (The younger Malfoy's activities as a Death Eater shall be addressed in a following chapter.) He was released from Azkaban by Voldemort following the death of Albus Dumbledore, along with his other cohorts from the Department of Mysteries.

By all accounts, the following year was one of endless humiliations and degradations for Malfoy. His home was taken over as the headquarters of the Death Eaters and parts of it were heavily damaged due to skirmishes that took place there. Wandless, due to his wand being appropriated by Voldemort, and subsequently destroyed in the battle to capture Harry Potter when the Order of the Phoenix removed him from his former home, Malfoy was unable to do participate in the subsequent capture of the Ministry. Indeed, many historians believe he was a near-prisoner of his own home.

The question that rests uneasily in most people's minds is how Malfoy avoided a lengthy prison term, unlike the other surviving Death Eaters. By all accounts, his behavior preceding the second war certainly deserved one, and yet, he remained free, albeit under heavy surveillance by Aurors, a surveillance that continued for many years, even after he and his wife relocated to Nice. At the time of Malfoy's trial, a large, quite vocal group, protested Malfoy's lack of a prison sentence. Harry Potter, the primary witness in Malfoy's trial, insisted a prison sentence of any length would be merely gilding the proverbial lily. Malfoy had no wand, and part of the conditions of his probation mandated he not acquire one, so he was unable to Apparate and was confined to either subjecting himself to Side-Along Apparition - a most injurious mode of transport to a fully-trained wizard - or utilizing the Floo network or a Portkey. The latter two forms of travel are hardly furtive, considering the Floo can be scrutinized and Portkeys need Ministry approval. Potter argued that the stipulations of Malfoy's probation - the prohibitions on travel, who he could see, rendering him unable to perform magic - all but rendered Malfoy a virtual prisoner.

Scorpius slowly closed the book, and stared sightlessly at the part of the courtyard that was visible from his perch. His right hand brushed over the inside of his left forearm. The article had been accompanied by a sketch of the Dark Mark. The memory of the one time he'd seen the inside of his own father's arm stood out in stark relief. Had Draco willingly accepted the Mark or had he been forced? The desire to discover the truth clawed at him, but he resolutely shoved the book into his bag and wrapped his arms around his knees, watching the snowflakes that fell with almost agonizing slowness. He didn't hear Al slide onto the bench next to him. 'Makes you feel a bit queer, doesn't it?' Al said idly. 'Like you're looking at something you oughtn't, but you can't make yourself look away.'

'Yeah.'

xxxxxx

Harry rolled Lavinia's memory between his palms, the vial clicking softly as it came in contact with his wedding ring, feeling the liquid inside shift and roll unevenly. He shifted the Pensive so it sat squarely in the middle of his desk, and cracked the wax seal of the vial with his thumbnail. He steadily poured the viscous fluid into the Pensieve, ignoring his inner qualms. Instead of merging gracefully with the contents of the Pensieve, it swirled in a chain of clotted disarray. Harry gently nudged it with his wand, but it refused to integrate smoothly into the rest of the liquid. He began to lower his face into the Pensieve, but Ginny's voice from the doorway made him pause, nose hovering a bare inch from the surface. 'Are you sure you want to do that?' she asked nervously. It had been years since he heard any sort of uncertainty regarding his job in her voice.

He glanced up at her over the rims of his glasses. 'Not really,' he confessed, sitting back in the chair. 'It looks more than a bit dodgy,' he said, prodding the memory once more with his wand.

Ginny moved to the desk and waved her wand, conjuring a chair. 'Do you want me to go in with you?'

Harry grabbed her hand. 'Yes, but I'd think I'd like you to stay here. I don't know what could happen with that in there...' He felt Ginny stiffen under the implications of his statement. 'To pull me out in case something goes wrong,' he added. 'I should have asked Teddy about all this before I jumped in. Knows more about these things than I do,' Harry said ruefully.

'Well, seeing as how I don't think tying a rope to your ankle will work, how much time should I give you before intervening?'

'Five minutes...' Harry suggested. 'Maybe ten...'

'All right.'

Harry took a deep breath and closed his eyes tightly, shuddering when the tip of his nose met the surface of the liquid coiled in the Pensieve. Normally, the liquid was the temperature of his skin, but this was cold, nearly frigid. If he'd been expecting a complete memory, he was mistaken. Harry could hardly hear what was said over what sounded like his pulse pounding in his ears. He was inside the Malfoy mansion. Someone's bedroom to be exact. He turned slowly, and saw Lavinia in front of a mirror, carefully teasing the knots out of her hair, dressing for the day. She was already clad in the formal robes that the older generations of old wizarding families favored when the door burst open and Lucius strode into the bedroom. Harry strained to hear what he said, but he could only catch bits of the words through the rush of blood in his ears. Lucius was obviously furious about something. He held his wand under his sister's chin, screaming something about a blood-traitor. Spittle dotted Lucius' lips, his face was red, and the tendons of his neck stood out above the high collar of his robes. Harry had never seen Lucius lose control like that. Not even during his trial.

Lucius' wand slashed through the air, and Lavinia's eyes widened and the pulse in Harry's ears grew more rapid. Her mouth moved, but Harry realized she was no longer able to speak. Lucius had set a Silencing charm on her. Lucius reached out and grabbed her arm, gripping it so tightly his knuckles turned white. Harry was sure he'd left a bruise on her arm.

The memory swirled around Harry and presently, he stood in a clump of trees next to Lucius and Lavinia. Lucius held her wrists behind her back, his fingers biting into her flesh. She tried to pull her wrists from Lucius' grip, but he merely squeezed harder, yanking her back against him. The tip of his wand pressed into the skin under her jaw as he spun them around toward a clearing. 'You will... watch... die,' Lucius gloated. Lavinia's mouth was open as she sobbed silently, hair sticking to her wet cheeks. The eerily silent weeping made Harry feel as if he'd been kicked in the groin. It was painful to watch. The memory jumped and Lavinia fell to the ground on her hands and knees, head bowed against the sight of Gideon and Fabian's still bodies marring the pastoral scene below. Lucius' fingers wound through her hair, wrenching her head back, speaking in a low tone that Harry couldn't hear under the roaring in his ears.

Hoarse weeping filled the meadow, loud in Harry's ears, even though he knew from Remus' memory, the sound could barely be heard under the rustling of the grass and leaves in the wind. The next thing Harry knew, Lavinia had managed to make her way down the steep hill. Vivid smudges of blood streaked over her face, where she'd swiped her hands over her cheeks, mixing with the tears that were already there. The memory telescoped to a mere pinprick, consisting of Fabian Prewett.

Harry felt an insistent tug on the back of his shirt and let himself fall backward from the Pensieve. He met Ginny's eyes, wide and dark with fear. 'You wouldn't come out,' she said shakily. 'It's almost like you were trapped in there...'

Harry shook his head slowly, stunned by what he'd seen.

xxxxxx

Victoire deftly changed the empty potion bottle for a full one in the rack floating above Draco's bed, then recorded the time on his chart. She wrinkled her nose at the sour scent of sweat emanating from the man lying in the bed, then her head flew up in recognition. She waved her wand over his head, comparing the temperature that hovered over his head to the one on her chart. She looked down at Draco and lightly ran a fingertip over his sweat-glazed face. His eyes opened, he blinked at her bemusedly for several moments, then said in a ragged ghost of a voice, 'Is this unexpected enough for you...?' His head lolled to the side as his eyes fluttered shut and he went back to sleep, his breathing slow and even in the still hospital room.