Gate of Ivory, Gate of Horn

I. And Joseph Said Unto Pharaoh

In a dream, in a vision of the night, when deep sleep falleth upon men, in slumberings upon the bed; then He openeth the ears of men, and sealeth their instructions.

- Job, 33.15

For the Days of the Lord are coming.... And it shall come to pass afterward, saith God, that I will pour out my Spirit on all flesh; and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, your old men shall dream dreams, your young men shall see visions. Even on my servants and handmaidens I will pour out, in those days, my Spirit; and they shall prophesy.

- Joel, 2.28-30; Acts, 2.16-18.

Even sleepers are workers and collaborators in what goes on in the Universe.

- Heraclitus

A sixteenth-century alchemist wrote of the philosopher's stone, 'One finds it in the open country, in the village and in the town. It is everything which God created. Maids throw it in the street. Children play with it.'

- American authoress Annie Dillard, in Pilgrim at Tinker Creek

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i. Draco Agonistes

This way,

Malfoy thought to himself, lies madness. Nightmares were not new to him - how could they be, he being who he was, and whose son he was, and having witnessed what he had witnessed? Recurrent nightmares were not new to him. Recurrent, quite possibly precognitive, nightmares were not wholly unheard of, at that. But these dreams were deadly, unnerving, and the more nightmarish the less they resembled mere nightmares.

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ii. Harry Furioso

For Harry Potter, dreams, nightmares, and visions were all too common. What was frightening was being unable to know which was which, and being unable to know for certain that a given dream-future was not some unbearable precognition.

Harry had more in the way of deep-seated terrors than any one man ought have: and not without reason. The fear of madness was amongst the worst, and most closely guarded.

His usual recourse, when panicked, was to obsess over irrelevancies.

Had he thought of it at the time, it should have surprised him to have found, on first entering the magical world, that wizards shared so much as they did do with Muggles. Having been chucked off on the Dursleys for so long, he was as secular as could well be imagined, a typical product of Home Counties, ribbon-built, dog-kennel, dormitory-town sprawl; it had rather shocked him, later, when he began to sit up and take notice, that the top-drawer wizarding hospital was named for Glasgow's patron, St Mungo, rather than, oh, Asklepios, and that wizards had godparents. Not that anyone he knew was a religious nutter, mind: but the wizarding world, oddly, mirrored the Muggle in the social connotations that went with these things, no matter that no one Harry knew so much as went to Evensong in Hogsmeade.

He'd picked up that information idly: the inevitable comments about Seamus's RC Irishness, passing references to Dean's family's being chapel, offhand remarks about the Patils and about Anthony Goldstein ('useful chap to know, really, if you ever need a diamond merchant or a feller that's something-in-the-City. Jews, you know, and all that. Thick as thieves and clannish, to boot,' some utter shit - probably Malfoy - had once drawled, with plummy disdain). The social assessments that went with Church or chapel, or with Irish RCs as against people like most of the Blacks (Sirius, typically, hadn't cared a toss when it came to standing godfather to Harry in a C of E ceremony): 'up-market papists poncing about with their priest's holes and Douai versions like the sodding Norfolks.' It had been one of Malfoy's overheard social lectures, come to think of it, unless this also had been a painful dream: for Harry could remember, also, some other choice remarks. 'For being purebloods, the Blacks - Mummy excluded, of course - are a bit arriviste. Going over to Rome after Whitby. Real wizards always stood by the Celtic Church, if anything. But at least they didn't pull a Weasel. Poor red-headed buggers followed their pet Muggles into the C of E without even getting any ... dosh ... out of the Dissolution, and Agrippa knows they could have used some lolly....'

Given the dreams that had tormented him of late, though, Harry was beginning to wish he did believe in something, anything, so great was the measure of his fear. His concern was St Mungo's, not for its patron but rather for its purpose, and he had reached the point where he would have prayed to any God that would hear him, to avoid finding himself in the same ward as Lockhart and the Longbottoms.

____________________________________________

iii. Dumbledore, Buridan, and the Ass

It was maddening, Dumbledore reflected. Not merely provoking: literally maddening, fit to drive an elderly wizard altogether 'round the twist.

A pronounced and carefully honed skill in Legilimency, coupled with spies in every portrait and a decentish facility with charms, had by now left Albus Dumbledore in the position of being very nearly omniscient, at least within Hogwarts's bounds. And that was a fit and proper faculty in a wizard who was at once the Headmaster of Hogwarts and, however unwillingly and unofficially, the Commander in Chief in the fight against the Dark. He - and, in all the time of his headship, Hogwarts - had been on a war footing, since the 1930s, first in a hot and foreign war: Grindelwald's: and thereafter in a cold and civil one, against Tom Riddle. And Dumbledore was resolved never again to find himself in the position he had occupied in Dippet's day, of suspecting young Riddle but never being able to be sure.

But this was enough to make him mad, as raving mad as Aberforth and all his goats. He knew by his art - and by the fact that both boys were prone to muttering in their sleep - that Harry and Draco were dreaming the same dreams, and - on most occasions - dreaming the same dreams on the same nights. He knew, quite as well as they, waking, remembered, what those dreams showed. And clearly it must mean something when two of his most innately powerful young charges dreamt the same dreams. But the maddening thing about dreams that might be precognitive was that they showed, at best, a possible future. And this was a future that meant the safety and salvation of the wizarding world. The problem was in making it come to pass; and that wanted careful handling indeed, lest, in trying to effect the hoped-for result, he and they compassed instead the worst of the possible upshots, and lost all. Such dreams were very powerful magic - and very dicey. The only sure law they obeyed was Sod's Law, and the very act of trying to 'make them come true' was appallingly likely to achieve the converse, in the way in which Riddle, by trying to fiddle a prophecy of his own doom, had merely ensured it.

He had rarely felt so powerless. It was maddening.

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iv. Ivory, Horn, and Other Pointless Classical Allusions

The dreams were not always consistent. Notably when they seemed to show the post-war world, they varied in details: who had survived, mostly.

The dreams were disjointed, their narrative - factitious though it might well be - not linear: recursive.

But there were repeated, detailed scenes that recurred again and again, some of them nightly.

These were the shared dreams that haunted Harry and Draco, and the existence of which filled Dumbledore at once with hope and impotent despair.

____________________________________________

The dreams always began the same way, framed themselves with the same scene.

____________________________________________

They had been lain upon the turf and bracken, on the reverse slope of a small hillock. Behind them, on the slopes that fell away into the vale, a miasma sank, livid goose-green shot through with a more poisonous viridian. A cold and bitter wind blew, and the lurid, stinking green mists tore, dissipated, rolled away, leaving only the stark charnel stench of the dead and dying of both sides. This was victory; they didn't care to imagine what defeat would have been like.

They felt themselves injured, but not, now, in mortal danger. They had been placed somewhat aside from the others who had been brought here after triage, amongst whom the mediwizards and Healers still moved.

They had been lain together, Draco's head resting on Harry's thigh, as if this were meet and natural.

Harry spoke first, his voice thready, hoarse. 'Right, then.... What. Well. It's over, right?'

Draco's voice was as weary, and sounded as if it issued from a bruised throat. 'It's over. You won, old boy. Io, and all that. Ave, triumphator et imperator.'

There was a sharp intake of breath, a hiss of pain, as Harry's hand reached over to touch Draco's hair. 'We won. Okay. That's good. But. Er. Now what?'

'Mmm?'

'I never expected. Well. I've spent all my life preparing for this. The final battle. And. Well, now what?'

'You'd not planned on winning?'

'I'd not planned on surviving, I think.'

'Sweet Christ, Potter. I rather thought that was the point of all those prophecies and what-not: the loser died, the winner lived, Ultimate Good or Ultimate Eeeeee-vil triumphed, and all that. What part of "winning means living" did you miss?'

'Look, I just. I knew that. But.'

'You knew it with your mind, but not your heart?'

'Er. Well....'

'I know you, do remember that.'

'Yes, well. Having this whole Single-Combat-for-the-Fate-of-the-Universe lark hanging over one since the age of eleven tends to limit one's focus.'

'It must do. Good thing it wasn't dear old Neville, then, bless him.'

'So I never really thought about, well, after. I mean, what do we do now?'

'Whatever we damned well please. That was, I rather thought, the point. What you were fighting for. Saving the world so that wizards and even Muggles could do as they pleased and be free, so long as they pleased to live in peace and virtue and all that rot.'

'"What I was fighting for", did you say? What the devil were you fighting for, then?'

'You were fighting for everyone else, for their freedom to do as they wished, within the limits of law and decency. I was ... at the off, I was fighting for myself, and for my freedom not to do anything I didn't wish to do. That's the difference.'

'And later?'

'It was still not the same thing. You were fighting for everyone's right to do as they wished. I was.... I was fighting for you, and for whatever you wished.'

'And now, then.'

'Now we both have what we wanted. And we can do as we damned well please. That is what victory is, Harry. And that is what was worth fighting for.'

____________________________________________

'Bugger.'

The Draco Malfoy who was standing there swearing was hardly recognisable as the Malfoy of old. It wasn't merely that he had grown into his looks. It was that his character had changed, refining even his features, making his wit salt rather than acid, and sweetening his humour. His features were rather elfin than rat-like, his face longer and more mature; but, as Harry noted with daily and hourly pleasure, his mouth was as delectable and his spun-silk hair as alluring as in his youth, his body as supple, lithe, and long-muscled, and his grey eyes held wisdom now that tempered their arrogance.

Harry, leaning negligently against the doorjamb with an indulgent smile, had matured well. His hair was still hopeless, but fashion had adopted the look. His mouth was wide and generous, though pain and responsibility had thinned it except in rare, open moments such as these. His nose was fluted, his jaw firm, and his body carven of marble. There was something to be said for years of Quidditch and martial training, it seemed.

Draco knew better than to look in the mirror and catch Harry's eye, or he would never get out of the bedroom, let alone the house.

'And today's fashion crisis is?' Harry was trying, with no conspicuous success, not to laugh. 'Can we not choose amongst our fifty-seven bespoke robes?'

'Harry -'

'Draco, love, no one at this beano of yours can at all possibly care what you wear. I rather suspect many of them would prefer you to wear nothing at all....'

'The rest of the world isn't quite so pervy as you are.'

'Good. The rest of the sodding world can keep its hands to itself. You're mine.'

'And you're selfish, aren't you?' Draco was basking in it.

'About you? Oh, you have no idea.'

'I think I do. No, damn it, not now, I'll never make the bloody meeting -'

'And that matters because?'

'Gerroff. And help me find my tie.'

Harry stared, and then laughed, helplessly. 'Find your tie? You've more ties than Liberty, Turnbull & Asser, and the whole of the Burlington Arcade - combined.'

'But I can't find the one I wanted to wear.' Draco knew his pout was his best weapon.

'And which one would that be? The Junior Reformed Death Eaters?'

'Don't be deliberately thick, Potter, it's most unbecoming. You know full well that Snape never would authorize a club tie.'

Harry chuckled. 'All right. Which tie were you set on wearing to this do? And tell me again why I'm not invited - is it an Old Slytherins piss-up?'

'No, it's the AGM of the Society of People Who Can Make Potions Without Blowing Things Up, which is why neither you nor Longbottom is on the list. You prat, you know perfectly well that you're staying here because Ron and Hermione insisted you do. It's difficult enough to surprise you as is, it would be hopeless if you were actually there.'

'All right. Just so long as it's clear that I am not putting up for any post and I am damned if I am standing for any office.'

'I know, darling. I know. I don't agree, mind, but I respect your decision. Now can we find my bloody tie?'

'You still haven't said which one.'

'Um. Well. My DA tie.' He caught Harry's look and flushed. 'Harry, they've all been perfectly accepting, I admit that. Don't get your knickers in a twist. I just. I just sometimes feel....'

'Insecure?'

'Well. No, of course not, A Malfoy Is Never Insecure.'

'Right.'

'Of course, I'm not a Malfoy any more, am I.'

'Well, yes and no....'

'Fine. Fine. Yes, I feel a little less out of pl- ... I feel closer to you, and them, when I wear it. It's a ... reminder.'

'I love you.'

'You know, that really ought be a non sequitur, but somehow, it isn't.'

'It never is. Well, sod this for a lark; I'm not seeing it, either. Which is rum, really, because I'd swear I saw it recently.... Oh, bugger.'

'What?'

Harry darted out and back, nipping into and out of his own rooms as quickly as a snitch. 'Wear mine.'

'All right....' Draco was obviously resisting the urge to question his lover.

'Off with you, love, you'll be late. I'll explain later.'

Draco looked at him with suspicion. 'If that bloody house elf has nicked my tie -'

'Er, no. Dobby took it, yes, but to clean it and, er, make a few repairs.'

Draco raised one elegant brow. Harry leaned in, and whispered, making them both blush.

'P- P- Potter,' Draco sputtered. 'When I come back -'

'I'll be at Madam Malkin's. Or possibly Gladrags, much as I hate Apparating.'

'See that you do go. We are not using the good ties for that ever again.'

'I don't recall your complaining at the time....'

'You -. Damn, I am going to be unfashionably late.'

'Well,' Harry laughed, leaning in for a kiss, 'you can just tell them you got tied-up at home....'

____________________________________________

'Mr Attorney? You are before me, I believe, with an application. The Ministry are making application for the forfeiture and/or escheat of the properties of Lucius Malfoy, et ux.?'

'Yes, m'lud, and of Draco Malfoy as his interests may appear.'

After the defeat of Tom Riddle and the Death Eaters, the Ministry and the Wizengamot had elected to separate the judicial and legislative functions of the wizarding government, although the Wizengamot remained, like the Muggle House of Lords, the court of final appeal. They had adopted, all but wholly, the Muggle system instead. Like most of the changes in the wizarding world after the War, their choice had been dictated by Harry's wishes. (Draco had commented to Arthur Weasley - with all the fervour of a convert - that it was nice to know they'd caught up with the Muggles after a mere eight centuries or so, but he hoped Riddle wouldn't eventually be seen by history as the Simon de Montfort of Wizengamot reform.)

Harry was adamant that he was Just Another Wizard, and certainly not some sovereign to be consulted and deferred to; he had insisted on staying far away from politics. But the post-War Ministry was the preserve of Gryffindors whose respect for Harry knew no bounds and whose acceptance of 'No' for an answer was non-existent, advised on the sly by A Certain Reformed Slytherin of great cunning. It had not taken long for the wizarding world to realise that, although Harry would never intervene on his own behalf and quite honestly believed he had no interest in the dirty business of government, he could be cozened every time into standing up for principle and protecting someone else. The simplest way to get something through the Wizengamot was for Harry to support it, and the simplest way to get Harry to support a programme was to float its opposite as a trial balloon. A well-placed suggestion that the Ministry were considering adopting the same tactics, for the war trials, as those that Barty Crouch had advocated in '80 and '81, had, predictably, brought Harry down to the Ministry and the Wizengamot in fire and wrath, pleading passionately for the very programme the Minister had intended all along.

There were times that Draco thought it was almost too easy. But even Ron and Hermione agreed that Harry sometimes had to be, well, managed, for his own good - and everyone else's.

'Very well, Mr Attorney. Is there any - Mr Sharpe-Quillet?'

'M'lud.'

'For whom do you appear?'

'If your lordship pleases, I appear in opposition to the application, on behalf of the Black Family Trust, the Trustees, and the Beneficiary.'

'Mr Attorney?'

'M'lud, the Ministry are unaware of any standing or any justiciable interest of which the Blacks might be possessed.'

'M'lud, if I may speak to that? I gather that my learned friend the Attorney General has included Mr Draco Malfoy - "as his interests may appear" - as a party to the application in order to account for any claim by him of entail. You lordship may take notice that the Malfoy entail was legally broken after Lucius Malfoy's father attained his majority.'

'M'lud, I am obliged to my learned friend for the information, but I cannot see that it alters the Ministry's position or in any way involves the Black Family Trust.'

'If your lordship will indulge me? Put simply, it is our contention that there are no assets or properties of Lucius Malfoy, Narcissa Malfoy (né e Black), or Draco Malfoy, to be forfeited. Put simply, m'lud, Lucius blued the lot during Tom Riddle's first rise to power. The Malfoy ménage has been kept afloat since by loans from the Black Estate.'

'M'lud, if I accept, as of course I must, the statements made by my learned friend, it would appear that the Black Trustees would properly be subject to an application for forfeiture, as having aided Lucius Malfoy in his collaboration with Riddle.'

'It would appear so on its face, certainly. Mr Sharpe-Quillet, I perceive, do I not, a certain knowing expression on your face that suggests these are deeper waters than they appear. Pray enlighten me.'

'As your lordship pleases. With respect, I would call my learned friend's attention to the marked inefficacy - persistent though these were - of Lucius Malfoy's efforts against the Ministry and decent wizardkind. I am prepared to establish that the Black Trust were responsible for choking off his funds so as to render him - comparatively - harmless. Nominally, the trustees of the Black Family Trust were Gringotts. Actually, the trustees at all relevant times became, were, and remained Albus Dumbledore, Remus Lupin, and Minerva McGonagall. Lucius Malfoy, and possibly Narcissa Malfoy, never knew of that, of course, and I am not sure that Sirius did, although he should doubtless have approved except as to being protected from himself.'

'And these trustees saw to it that...?'

'Your lordship has preceded me to the point, of course. These trustees saw their duty as providing for - and against the excesses of - the late Sirius Black -'

'Yes, I imagine that was something of an undertaking in itself.'

'Your lordship's perception is as keen as ever. They saw their duty as providing for Sirius Black and protecting him from himself, in choking off, so far as they could, the ability of the Malfoys and the Lestranges to do mischief, in providing for the distinguished Auror, Nymphadora Tonks, in keeping Draco Malfoy in Hogwarts where he could come under the influence of Albus Dumbledore and Severus Snape, and in preserving the Black Family properties for the Heir of Black. I would submit that they did rather well.'

'M'lud?'

'Mr Attorney?'

'I concede to my learned friend that the trustees appear to have acted with great prudence, not inconsiderable cunning, and a keen eye for what would benefit the wizarding world, and I applaud the results they seem to have achieved, not least in the saving of Mr Draco Malfoy for the side of good. There remains the unfortunate fact that Sirius Black died - or at any rate departed this life - without issue. Regulus Black predeceased Sirius. Presumably, then, the heirs of the Black family would be Bellatrix Lestrange, Andromeda Tonks, and Narcissa Malfoy; and, more remotely, I suppose, the Weasleys. I should want to take instruction from the Ministry on this point, but I should imagine that the Ministry would be willing to make some exemption on Nymphadora Tonks's behalf and possibly on that of Draco Malfoy; however, in the absence of an Heir of Black, the greater part of the Black fortunes will in any case escheat to the Ministry, and of course any portion that went to Lestrange or Malfoy -'

'One moment, Mr Attorney. Mr Sharpe-Quillet, you clearly have a battery in reserve. You may as well unmask it now and start firing.'

'M'lud. I have said that I appear for the beneficiary of the Black Family Trust. And I have not said that Sirius Black's estate ever saw a breaking of the entail, unlike that of the Malfoys. I would implore my learned friend to consider that there is indeed an Heir of Black, whose interests I represent.'

'And this real party in interest would be whom, precisely, Mr Sharpe-Quillet?'

'Why, Sirius Black's godson - and devisee, by Will - m'lud. Mr Harry Potter. It is a legally recognised relationship, and is within the terms of the Black entail.'

'Indeed. Then it is your contention that Mr Potter is, as a matter of law, possessed of the properties that the Ministry seek to confiscate? Very well. Mr Attorney, do the Ministry wish to proceed?'

'M'lud, I do not conceive that it is necessary that I take instruction on this point. Based upon my learned friend's representations, the Ministry of course withdraw the application.'

'Very well. I shall adjourn the law docket until after luncheon. The next matter - shall we say ten past two?'

'Be upstanding!' the usher cried, and the courtroom emptied.

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v. A Little Touch of Harry in the Night

The dreams proceeded, snatches of a possible future, sometimes contradictory, never linear, moving from year to year, memory to fantasy, past to future, with the unpredictable rapidity of a demented snidget.

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'Harry! Harry!'

'Love?'

'We've owls.' Draco's hand trembled as he held his opened post in one hand and passed Harry's unopened post to him with the other. But his eyes shone like pewter.

Harry looked at the envelope, stiff, official, with the Hogwarts seal.

Harry Potter, OM

The Back Garden

Wyvern House

Devon

'Is this what I imagine it to be?'

'No,' Draco said, quivering with excitement. 'It's better.'

My dear Potter,

I have been charged with adverting you to the news that the Ministry and the Board of Governors, having it in command from the Wizengamot, have elected to reopen Domdaniel....

'It gets better,' Draco said.

... will share the grounds and facilities of Hogwarts School. A place is being held open for you in Godric College. Draco has been offered a place in Blaise -

'That,' Harry said with a twinkle in his eye that rivalled any of Dumbledore's best efforts, 'was a possibility I used to worry about a good deal.'

'Zabini is dishy,' Draco smiled, 'but he has nothing on you. It's not my fault he shares a Christian name with Merlin's old master who founded the damned university.'

'Hush, you. I have long since learnt to trust you, you know. Though if we ever did consider a threesome....'

'Oh, get bent, Potter.'

'Perhaps you've not attended to the past few years, darling, but I already am.'

'And I cannot tell you how grateful my libido and I are for that small mercy.'

- and it so happens that the rooms booked for you and Malfoy adjoin and are a common set. (Ahem.) Mrs Weasley, late Miss Granger, has accepted a place in Merlin -

'Oh, of course. Swot.'

- although I regret that her husband has chosen to remain in his current position. However, he will be living in Hogsmeade during term-time and working from there, so I quite imagine you will be seeing more of him than is good for either of you.

'Ah, there's the true Minerva touch of acid. Amazing how it gets passed on and never fades.'

'There are worse people after whom to model oneself. Lucius, for example.'

'Well, the old bastard did give the world one worthy gift. You.'

'Bin the sappiness, love, and finish your letter.'

Macmillan has accepted a place in Thomas, and Longbottom, in Albertus Magnus, although he shall continue to serve as Adjunct Herbology Master at Hogwarts. You may gather from this fact that your studies, although rigorous, will not leave you wholly without time to get into mischief. In order to prevent that, the Governors have asked that I further extend you an invitation to take up the post of Adjunct Master for Defence Against the Dark Arts, with the hope on their part that you might upon completion of your MMA -

Draco rolled his eyes and cut Harry off before he could ask. 'I know, I know. Raised-by-Muggles and All That. "Master of Magical Arts," of course, you ass. Sometimes, my love, you are as thick as two short planks.'

'"Master of Magical Arse,"' Harry muttered, and ducked a playful slap.

- take up the post on a permanent basis. As I have advised Malfoy, a similar offer in Potions is being made to him. Corner is to be in Godric with you, as, God save us all, is Lovegood, so it seems that many of the old DA are being reunited. I myself will be combining my present duties, which are much less onerous than my stipend would suggest, with a place in my namesake coll., as is Finch-Fletchley, wh is rather convenient, as he and I are now together.

'Well, well.'

'I stand corrected. If we were ever to consider a foursome -'

'Prat.'

I don't care to embarrass any of us by noting that all of us owe these futures of ours, and the fact that we

have lives and futures, to you, so I suggest you take that as read.

'Good God.'

As a personal aside, however, I do wish to urge you to consider taking up your place here. Aside from the historic excitements of seeing the wizarding university reopened after so many centuries, the fact is that by our time, Hogwarts had, for obvious and vy necessary reasons, become a sort of junior, magical Sandhurst, and I cannot say that any of us emerged from it as well-rounded as previous generations of Old Hogwartians had done.

'He's right there, I'm afraid.'

I shd further add that the University is not intended to replace, but rather to complement, the traditional apprenticeships, wh is one of the reasons it is slated to share space with Hogwarts itself, and that the MMA course is one year in length. (We do, after all, have to show ourselves capable of beating the Muggle universities at

something.) I imagine that both you and Malfoy are eager to get on with your lives, but a year, to a wizard, is hardly any great imposition. (To Nicholas Flamel, it would have been the blink of an eye.)

On a purely personal note, I have greatly missed the both of you, and wd be much rejoiced to have you back within hail. Whatever you decide, however, know that you both have the support and affection of all of us who have been privileged to know you, and that I, in particular, remain

Yr obd't and affectionate friend & servant,

B. Zabini

OM (3^d)

Bursar, Hogwarts School

'Well, that makes it impossible to say, No,' Harry laughed. But his eyes were suspiciously moist.

'Blaise as bursar and Tony Goldstein on the Board of Governors together comprise the best thing to happen to Hogwarts in years. With their ties to Gringotts - and thank God for Bill, there - and both the magical and Muggle sides of the City, the old school is sound as Gringotts itself and no one ever again can do what Lucius tried to do by fiddling the purse-strings.'

'You're being evasive, love.'

'Merely giving you a moment to collect yourself whilst I flannelled away.'

'They've made considerable accommodation here, as far as our being together.'

'Yes. They have.'

'And it would give us ample time to let the renovations at Grimmauld Place and the Manor get stuck in, and perhaps even for rebuilding to start at Godric's Hollow.'

'It would.'

'And, well. Hogwarts has always been ... home, to me.'

'Yes, I know.'

'But what about you, hmm?'

'Harry. You are the most powerful wizard of the age. You defeated Riddle repeatedly and finally.' His chin came up. 'But if you ever repeat what I am about to say, I shall find a way to hex you into next year.'

Harry grinned. This should be good. 'Mum's the word.'

'Right, then.' Draco turned casually away and lowered his voice. 'Mhmswrvryuar.'

'What was that, love?' Harry was chuckling openly. 'I'm afraid I didn't quite altogether catch that.'

'I, er. I said, well, that. My home is, um, wherever you are.'

It was a good hour before they resumed their discussion.

'Whatever you choose,' Harry said, with the post-coital earnestness that sometimes made Draco want to cry from happiness. Which, of course, Malfoys Do Not Do.

'Let's. Let's go, then, yes. Please.'

'Your wish,' Harry murmured, closing what little distance there was between them, 'is my command.'

After which, for some time, the nearest Draco came to coherence was in his shouting Harry's name.

____________________________________________

In Hogwarts days....

The DA were in session. The Room of Requirement was sealed. But all doors opened to Albus Dumbledore, and his students fell silent as he stood in the doorway, surveying them with a mild, grandfatherly amusement that was infinitely remote and infinitely inscrutable.

'I shan't keep you,' he said gently. 'There is a ... new recruit ... who would join your ranks. I have questioned him, by Legilimency and under the influence of Veritaserum, and I believe him to be honest, loyal, and trustworthy. Nonetheless, it is for you - all of you - to decide. I shall be in my office should need arise.'

And with that, he stepped aside, and a chastened-looking youth, who nevertheless kept his spine ramrod-stiff, stepped slowly into the room.

'Bloody hell,' Ron spat out, ' 's the Ferret!'

'Malfoy?' several others cried.

'If you'll have me.' Perhaps only Harry, Luna, and Hermione noticed that his voice was steady only through great effort. Hermione was irresistibly reminded of a French aristocrat in the tumbrel, on his way to the guillotine.

'I see Blaise spoke truth,' Anthony Goldstein said to no one in particular. Zabini had not formally joined the DA, but served as a useful conduit of information, through Goldstein. Harry shot Tony a look, but said nothing. Rather, he turned to Malfoy, and nodded, curtly. 'Right, then. Find a seat.'

There was a clamour.

'No sodding way -'

'But Harry -'

'Harry's not bloody infallible -'

'He'd damned well best be, or, Malfoy or no Malfoy, we're all going to die, or worse -'

'Dumbledore vouched for Malfoy -'

'Dumbledore also said it was for us to decide -'

'Right! All of us, not just Harry -'

'QUIET!'

Everyone fell silent, mostly in shock. No one had thought Neville could achieve that parade-ground bellow.

'L-look, let's. I mean, there's no need for a, a, a bear-garden,' Neville said, blushing.

'Right you are, Nev,' Dean Thomas said, loyally. 'But. Harry. I think we do all need to talk about this.'

'Too right, mate! I mean, this is Malfoy here - and we're to believe that the slimy git's reformed? Balls!'

'Ronald. Bilius. Weasley.' Hermione had never sounded quite so much like Molly Weasley in her life. 'If and when you are wiser and a better judge of character than Albus Dumbledore -'

'May I speak?'

'NO!'

'Ron?'

'Yeah, Harry?'

'Put a sock in it. And that goes for all of ... us. All of you clearly want some answers. So do I. I suggest we get them, and I think that's going to require our letting Malfoy speak.

'So. Malfoy?'

Draco looked at Hermione. In the absence of any Slytherins, she was, presumably, the brains of the group.

'I'll start with the facts I think we all know and agree on, shall I? Then we can talk about their implications.'

Hermione nodded, imperceptibly, and Harry waved Draco to continue.

'Vold- - Riddle - is going to lose. The money's against him.'

Harry exchanged a look with Tony Goldstein, who nodded. The Goldsteins and the Zabinis were very much in the counsels of Gringotts, the goblins, and both the magical and Muggle sides of the City, and this clearly had underlain Tony's remarks.

'But money is only the sinews of war. There are more and better reasons why Riddle is going to lose.

'Potter here has defeated him again and again. Dumbledore has defeated him again and again. You lot are with them. I.' Draco swallowed, visibly. 'I can't but be aware that Granger, for example, is the most intelligent and talented witch of this generation. None of you is exactly a slouch, including Longbottom, who, I seem to recall having been told, is worth twelve of me.

'And I rather agree.

'The point is, each day, Har- - Potter and Dumbledore and all of you grow stronger. And each day, Riddle and his lot grow madder. Utterly stark raving mad, that lot, and incompetent with it. Here's a Dark Wizard, mind, of acknowledged power, unimaginable power, and in six years he hasn't accomplished a single thing except to raise up forces against him, and has been repeatedly and humiliatingly defeated by a school headmaster and a gaggle, forgive me, of adolescents.

'My f-. No. Lucius,' he corrected himself, with disgust, 'spent eleven sodding years dinning into me that Malfoys bent the knee to no one. He has spent the past five and a bit bowing and scraping like a house elf, crawling, blacking the bloody boots of, a raving monster loony who can't even mount a successful Death Eater operation against a handful of school-children. I cannot reconcile those actions with what I was taught.'

Harry's voice was neutral. 'Lucius is not precisely a fool, Malfoy. A total shit, yes, but not a fool. I presume he intends to displace and succeed his master in the moment of victory, should there be a victory.'

Draco's head snapped up, and it was obvious that he had gained a new measure of respect for Harry. 'Do you know, I had once heard that the Sorting Hat wanted to place you in Slytherin. But Lucius remains a fool. The sort of calculation to which you refer means fuck-all when one is dealing with Riddle. This isn't Muggle power politics. Rationality of that sort has no place in the world Riddle is trying to make.

'I know that now. Were Riddle to win, he would, necessarily, simply by doing so in the fashion he should then have won, become so powerful, so magically powerful, that no one could pull off that sort of coup.

'And he must not win. He really mustn't. What Lucius is too blind to see is that, were Riddle to win, there would be no lieutenants, no right-hand men, no trusted ministers. The Death Eaters, those whom he allowed to live, would be as much slaves as the rest of the world.

'Those are the facts, and I imagine we all agree on those.'

'A very orderly exposition,' Hermione said, in her most McGonagall voice.

'Do you always prose on like this?' Ron asked, still scornful.

'My father is Lucius Malfoy. All my adult role models are Death Eaters. They've spent their lives drunk on rhetoric, which may explain their success rate. I'm afraid it's ingrained. I mean, where do you think Snape got his annual "Welcome to First Year Potions" speech?'

'I wish he'd put a stopper in that,' Seamus snorted.

Ron was sufficiently stunned by the soft answer that he couldn't think of a retort in time. Malfoy was already speaking again.

'Now we come to the implications of those facts. You know who I am, what sort I have been, how I was raised to think.

'So. If you wish to believe that I am changing sides to save my skin, I can't stop you. But that's not it.

'Or you might conclude that I'm trying to save the family fortunes as well, by being Lucius's foot in the other camp, so that no matter who wins, we, the Malfoys, don't lose. I can't help your choosing to believe that, but that's not it.

'Or, again, you might wish to believe that I'd as soon be neutral, but have decided that that's just not on, and that I've therefore decided to throw in with you lot so that instead of being one of Riddle's slaves, I can go on poncing and swanking and lording it about after the war. There is some truth to that, in a twisted sort of way, but that's not the better part of it.

'The part of that that is true is, I do know there's no being neutral. Lucius was obviously flannelling when he said Malfoys bend the knee to no one. Sometimes, we do. And as I do have to follow someone, I choose to follow Potter, and Dumbledore as far as that goes, rather than that reptilian lunatic whose victory would only serve to enslave me along with the rest of the world. But I don't do so only because I know you lot are going to win, nor because your victory leaves me free. I have other reasons, but, with respect, I should prefer to share them, for now, only with Potter. Privately.'

'Which gets us back,' Dean said, without rancour, 'to the same problem. Trusting you and trusting Harry's judgement. No offence, Harry: we've already made it clear we don't trust even Dumbledore's judgement in this.'

'What can we do, though, that Dumbledore hasn't done? I mean, he's the best Legilimens there is, and he's questioned Malfoy under Veritaserum.' Luna was surprisingly dispassionate - and surprisingly lucid - about the matter.

Harry put up a hand. 'I think I have an idea. Malfoy, roll up your sleeves.'

With a wry smile, Draco complied. Both arms were unblemished.

'Right,' Harry said. 'I need to concentrate a moment.'

'Of course,' Hermione said, 'we're in the Room of Req- -'

'Hermione. Mind the talking a tick, will you?' Harry closed his eyes and thought, hard.

In a flash, trailing a whiff of rare incense, Fawkes appeared, and made straight for Harry, dropping the Sorting Hat onto the table before him. The phoenix circled them, trilling, and their hearts were lifted. Then he settled on Draco's shoulder, and nudged him with his beak. Draco raised his head, and Fawkes peered into his eyes. A single phoenix tear fell upon Draco's upturned face, and all the old lines of peevishness and hatred, of selfishness and arrogance, smoothed away. Trilling more loudly still, Fawkes ascended, and then softly touched down atop Draco's head, the great wings softly and protectively framing Draco's face. Hesitantly, tenderly, Draco raised his hand to stroke a crimson primary, and Fawkes sang. Then, rising, in a flash of fire, he was gone, the room behind him redolent of incense and spice.

When Harry spoke, his voice was newly deep, grave, regal: like but not like the voice they all knew so well. 'Draco Malfoy, you have honourably passed the judgement of Fawkes.' He reached into the Sorting Hat and drew out Godric Gryffindor's sword. 'Do you now reach into the Hat, and take out what you may find.'

With answering gravity, Draco put his slim, pale hand into the Hat. His fingers closed upon a rim of metal and a curve of wood, iron, and cloth. Slowly, he drew the object forth: tall, narrow, deep, lightly curved, vert a serpent recurvant argent: the Shield of Slytherin.

'Behold the Shield of Slytherin and the Sword of Gryffindor. The rift is healed. Let Hogwarts stand united and the Dark be defeated! Is there now any who doubts of him? Then, Draco Malfoy, do you place your hand upon the hilts of the Sword of Gryffindor, and swear. Do you swear upon your faith and your magic, your wand and your soul, your name and your honour, to be true to the Phoenix and the Light and the servants of Light, to bear true allegiance to that same, to reject the Dark and all its works, and to bear yourself loyally against Riddle or any who come after from the Dark?'

'I so swear,' Draco said, his voice ringing.

There was a sound as of thunder, and Malfoy and Harry both fainted.

'Bloody hell,' Ron said, and Hermione elbowed him in the ribs.

____________________________________________

The dreams shifted again, to the future that might yet be, after the War....

'You didn't warn me it was to be a family reunion,' Harry smiled.

Draco was sitting next to Tonks, on a slightly tatty chesterfield, across from Ron's disastrous desk; Ron had left the desk and was sitting on the arm of the chesterfield next Draco.

'He's your boyfriend,' Tonks said. 'But he's our very own ickle cousin.' Draco stuck his tongue out at Harry. Much had changed, indeed. But some things would never change, and while Draco might be a reformed character, his need to be petted and made much of was as great as ever it had been.

'Right,' said Hermione. 'Ron just wanted to get away from the desk before it collapsed on him. Honestly, Ron, if I'd known in school what we know now....'

'Indeed,' said Harry. 'For example, Snape could have said, "Mister ... Weeeeeeeeeasley. If the Chudley Cannons are - per impossibile - to have any chance at the Cup, what potion does their keeper want to sharpen his reflexes?"'

'Or McGonagall,' said Hermione, launching into wicked mimicry. '"Misterrr Weasssley. Can ye tell us hoo I maun transssfeeegure this garrrnet intae a blooodgerrr?"'

'Oh, leave it, you lot,' Ron said, trying to look affronted. 'If school had been half as interesting as Quidditch -'

'You'd have given Hermione a run for Head Swot?'

'Ferret.'

'Weasel.'

'Poofter.'

'Pauper.'

'They're regressing, Harry!'

'I don't see how, Tonks. If those two regressed past their actual mental ages, they'd be in nappies.'

'Well, I'm not changing them,' Hermione shot back.

'Shouldn't you be practising that?'

'Hold on, mate.' Ron actually blenched. 'Bin the nippers-and-nappies chat. No offspring for us, yet, ta ever so.'

'What are you waiting on?' Draco was exceptionally silky, preparing to pounce. 'The call to succeed Madam Pince as Librarian?' He waved carelessly at Ron's desk.

'God forbid,' Ron said. 'I'm not the academic type.'

Harry rolled his eyes. 'You didn't crack a book all through Hogwarts and Hermione is the one who keeps the accounts, yet somehow you now have more books piled up on that overburdened piece of furniture than Hermione ever read and are the font of all statistical knowledge.'

'Harry -'

'Balls, Ron. I'm proud of you and I don't care who knows it. You're the youngest wizard in history to be chosen as editor in chief of Wizden's Quidditcher's Almanack, and I've a feeling you'll be the best. Though how a man who can't add simple sums can keep track of all this -'

'Ha. You want to talk about maths and rum careers, look at Dean.'

'I know,' Draco moaned. 'It's frightful. Aurors and Hit Wizards make people nervous. Unspeakables terrify them. But for sheer, bowel-loosening terror....'

'What?' Tonks was looking at them with wild surmise. 'Sweet Dean Thomas has a job that terrifies people? As what, an abstract artist?'

'Auditor, Department of Magical Revenue.'

'Oh, dear.'

'The taxman cometh.' Draco shuddered. 'I wake up screaming sometimes.'

'He's so nice,' Harry explained. 'And so sympathetic. And so damned insinuating.'

'And, worse yet, rather fit,' Draco mumbled. 'Those thighs. That remarkable arse....' Harry pinched his ear.

'And the next thing you know....'

'You're out another thousand galleons or so.'

____________________________________________

'Harry?'

'Hmm? Oh, splendid, you're home. I think I dozed off, rather. Come here.'

The next few minutes weren't terribly productive. Or not of narrative, at any rate.

Harry leaned back in Draco's embrace and looked at him, quizzically. 'A trifle more enthusiastic even than usual, love.'

'Today was. I mean, the Ministry. It was.'

'Darling?'

Draco took a deep breath and started over. 'The Court heard the Ministry's application this morning, the application to forfeit all my family's possessions.'

'Today? Love, why didn't you tell me? I'd've been there -'

'It's all right. It's all, all, all right. They withdrew the application.'

'That's super! But why? I mean, I know Arthur's old lot were against it, but the Wizengamot as a whole -'

'It turns out that Lucius was living off loans all that time, just managing to keep up appearances. He'd blued the family pelf, probably popped Mummy's jewels and his Old Slytherin cufflinks to the local pawnbrokers, and we were - I know, it's insane - we were actually down on our uppers. So it all went to the creditors.'

'But. What I have is yours, you know that, but. How can you be so blinking chuffed about it? Unless I'm missing something here, you still had it all stolen out from under you. I can't see it much matters whether it was the Ministry or you had the bailiffs in.'

'Well, it turns out I have rather a decentish relationship with the creditor in question. So I somehow think I'm not going to be short of the ready any time soon.'

'Oh?'

'Well, you see, the creditor that swept the pool happens to be the Heir of the Black Family Trust.'

'Um, Draco. In case you'd forgotten, I happen to be Sirius's heir.'

Draco nodded, beaming, and the penny dropped.

'Oh,' Harry said. 'Oh.' He sprang up - Draco admiring the lithe movement - and went to the cloak cupboard. When he returned, he pulled Draco to his feet. Harry had twisted Draco's Slytherin scarf and his own old Gryffindor scarf together. Carefully, looking Draco in the eye, he threw the scarves around Draco's neck, and said, solemnly, 'With all my worldly goods I thee endow.'

We may draw a line under the remainder of the evening.

____________________________________________

In Hogwarts days....

'Bloody hell,' Ron said, and Hermione elbowed him in the ribs.

The Headmaster walked into the Room of Requirement before the fainting Harry and Draco quite hit the floor, with his usual reassuring and maddening flair for timing.

'Give them a moment,' he said. 'They'll come 'round on their own.'

'Harry was -'

'If that was Harry -'

'I never heard Harry use the High Language before -'

'Ah.' Dumbledore raised a hand in mild admonition. 'That, yes. I don't conceive that any of you have, until now, had the opportunity, as I have had, to hear our Mr Potter when he is under the influence of the prophetic spirit. I assure you, Mr Weasley, that that was indeed Harry who spoke, and spoke truly. Voldemort was not using him as a sort of ventriloquist's doll, in order to gull you into trusting Mr Malfoy. Neither the Tom Riddle of old nor the creature Tom has since become, would have, in any case, the power to manipulate Fawkes or to cause Mr Malfoy to withdraw Salazar's Shield from forth the Hat.

'But I see your friends are beginning to return to you. Give them a moment to collect their thoughts, and then I trust you all will be able to resume your deliberations.'

And, in his usual infuriating way, he was gone again.

'That deus ex machina bit he so revels in is bloody annoying,' Justin said.

____________________________________________

Images of a possible future....

'This posh life of yours has its painful moments.'

Draco snorted. 'I can't see why you're whinging.'

'Can't you? I'll tell you straight, love, from here, I'm sticking to beagling for yales.'

'Oh, do stop grousing.'

'I mean, if you must go junketing off, racketing about the landscape this way after wyverns, I'd think you could do it on brooms.'

'You, darling, are incorrigibly, irremediably middle-class. One hunts only astride pegasi, or Stodd Withers's ghost help you if you don't. It's traditional - and it's a tradition that goes back to long before the smocked peasantry of wizardkind started footling about with snidgets in Queerditch Marsh. I'm the seventeenth successive Malfoy to serve as Master of Wyvern Hounds for the Norn & Witchley, thank you, and I've no intention of not hunting.

'Besides, I rather like the way you look in top-boots and hunting robes.'

'Do you mind? My inner thighs are going to be my death. I've not hurt this way since the War.'

Draco smiled, indulgently. 'I can't imagine why that is. I mean, all you've done is spend a day in the saddle, holding on by your knees, riding hard.... Same thing you do every night, love.'

Harry tossed a pillow at him. 'I always knew you were still cruel at heart. I'm in almost as great a muck sweat - sorry, let's use the posh term, lather - as your pegasus was, here.'

'Well, you can't blame the poor beast. You'd be sweating too if you'd been between my legs all day.'

Harry whined.

'Ohhhh,' Draco said, slyly. 'I know! I'll wager you'd like someone to work the knots out, hmmm? A cool and clever pair of hands to massage those poor, aching inner thighs....'

'You bastard, you know damned well that's what I want. And want.'

'Well, then. I might - just possibly - be prevailed upon to oblige....'

____________________________________________

'Lord,' said Draco. 'Or, under the circs, I suppose, Lawks. Our Very Own King Ron as editor of Wizden's. And doing utterly brill, I gather.'

'You of all people must have learnt not to underestimate him.'

'Oh, I don't, darling. Rather my point. I'd imagined that, after the cruel war was o'er and All That, he'd go on to a more adventurous life. Professional Quidditch, say, at least for the Cannons or some other Second Division mob. Or of course being a mildly terrific auror.'

'Ah. That's right, not even you had the full story on his war wounds.'

'Oh? Did I not? Might one ask, Why the devil not?'

'Not any lack of trust, so don't bristle at me. Had you known officially, you'd have been obligated to take official knowledge, and - officially -'

'- Officiously, you mean -'

'- To have Done Something About It. Such as moving him to a staff billet.'

'And that would hardly have suited. Not to mention that, in hindsight, it could have lost the whole sodding war as near as damn it.'

'That was rather where I was heading with this, yes.'

'He had a damned good war, did the Royal Ermine.'

'He was indispensable. You should know: so were you.'

Draco just looked at him, with a patented Raised Malfoy Eyebrow. 'We were the supporting cast, dear boy. You were the -'

'No.' Harry's tone brooked no argument. 'We were, all of us, a band of brothers.'

Draco reached over and loosely took Harry's hand in his. Softly, he began to recite.

'... Then shall our names / Familiar in his mouth as household words - Harry the Dux, Lupin and Dumbledore....'

And Harry joined in, equally quietly.
'Weasley and Malfoy, Granger and Finnegan - Be in their flowing cups freshly rememb'red. This story shall the good man teach his son / And Crispin Crispian shall ne'er go by / From this day to the ending of the world / But we in it shall be ... rememberèd....'

Their voices trailed off and they embraced, eyes brimming, on a midnight street in Hogsmeade, beneath the stars.

____________________________________________

vi. 'Eyeless in Gaza / At the mill with slaves'

The dreams did not let up. Glimpses of a future that could not possibly be yet somehow might be, memories of Hogwarts days that were and were not and never were nor could have been....

Inside the Defence Against the Dark Arts classroom, a massive and dog-eared tome lay upon a - literally - groaning desk. Albus Dumbledore surveyed the students, eyes twinkling annoyingly. For reasons no one wished to speculate on, Madam Pomfrey was standing behind him. Both, inexplicably, were wearing Herbology earmuffs.

'We have a guest lecturer today,' Dumbledore said, with a merriment that seemed positively obscene. That did make sense, the students thought: the fates of successive DADA teachers had been such that not even Harry would wish it even upon Snape. 'Feel free to mill about aimlessly and find such places as suit you.' That was typical of the Dumbledore approach to discipline, Malfoy thought, and as his classmates milled obligingly, he sidled over to the table and stretched out his hand. 'Just don't touch the book,' Dumbledore said, even as Malfoy flipped it open.

The noise was beyond credence: as if three hundred Howlers had been simultaneously opened in the Great Hall.

'M'godfather Arthur never said that the battle of Waterloo was won on the playin' fields of Eton -'

The students reeled and fell, ears bleeding, before Dumbledore could slam the volume shut. Madam Pomfrey sprang into action whilst Dumbledore cast a Susurrus charm on the book.

When everyone was settled, Malfoy avoiding the looks that even his fellow Slytherins were giving him, Madam Pomfrey withdrew, with a sniff, remarking offhandedly, 'You know them too well, Headmaster.' Dumbledore chortled, and beamed at the unnerved students. 'Now. Shall we try this again? Mr Malfoy. As you are so eager to assist me, perhaps you would oblige me by opening the book now, to the author's portrait opposite the frontispiece?'

Cursing his trembling hands, Draco did so.

From the opened book, a ghostly figure emerged, one and a half times life-sized, translucent as a ghost but sepia-toned rather than silvery. He was a man of late middle age, stout and fierce, Victorianly be-whiskered, with a complexion that suggested the workings of years of vintage port upon a naturally choleric disposition. He was dressed in full regimentals, as colonel of the Coldstream Guards, and wore his VC as well as the ribands and stars of the Bath and the Order of the Indian Empire. Even with the Susurrus charm in place, when he spoke, it was in a parade-ground bellow that could have been heard from Horse Guards Parade to Aldershot. Dumbledore hastily corrected the volume to a bearable level.

'Ah. Sir Stentor. Allow me to present the students of Slytherin and Gryffindor houses who are studying Defence Against the Dark Arts. Students, this is Colonel Sir Stentor Bellowes, VC, KCB, CIE, author of Magical and Muggle Warfare: A Comparative Strategic, Operational, and Tactical History (Revised), now in its fortieth edition -'

'Forty-first, Dumbledore!'

'Ah. Yes. Well. Perhaps you could resume the remarks you were making earlier?'

'Right, then,' Col Bellowes roared. 'M'godfather Arthur is reputed to have said that "the battle of Waterloo was won on the playin' fields of Eton", which is rubbish. Utter rot! Damme, Wellington didn't give a tuppenny dam about his Eton days. What would be a true statement is that the Battle of Britain was won on the Quidditch pitch at Hogwarts. 'S a reason the RAF slang for "excellent" was "wizard", don't y'know. Fact is, your games here and your studies in Potions, Transfiggeration, Charms, and what-not, are all the trainin' y'need to wage wizardin' warfare - at the subaltern level.

'What I'm here to address is leadership! Leadership!' Harry suddenly wondered if Col Bellowes were related at all to Mad-Eye Moody. 'You there, lad - with the scar! Name?'

'P- Potter, sir. Harry Potter.'

The index pages of the volume from which Col Bellowes emerged could be seen to ruffle.

'Ah! Right, then. As you were. Where does leadership come from, Potter?'

Before Harry could answer, Malfoy stepped in, obviously determined to shore himself up, after the earlier disaster with the book, by showing off. 'Breeding, I should think,' he drawled, carelessly, 'and being born to command.'

Col Bellowes swelled up like a turkey-cock, his neck almost bursting the restraints of his collar. 'Silence in the ranks! Did I ask you, boy? Did I? Name!'

'Malfoy.' Draco was trying and failing to be nonchalant. 'Draco Malfoy, son of Lucius Malfoy, of Malfoy Manor.'

Col Bellowes snorted, alarmingly, making the desks in the room rock in the gale. 'Malfoy, eh? Y'would be. See here, boy, you'd best hope you're wrong, or you'll be junior to Potter and Weasley all your life.'

Draco's jaw dropped.

'Every family has its own comfortin' lies, I see. Well, no matter the rot your father has fed you - you did say, "Lucius Malfoy", did you not? Ah.' The index pages rustled again. 'Ah. Malfoy, Lucius. Married Narcissa Black, yes ... one child, son, Draco ... quite so ... Death Eater, lieutenant to Tom Marvolo Riddle -'

Hermione couldn't help it, her hand shot up.

'What? Speak, gel.'

'You are referring to, um, Lord Voldemort?'

Most of the class shuddered, Ron most notably. Col Bellowes glowered. 'The Dark Ass? His so-called lordship? By-blow of a Muggle father and a witch mother, left Hogwarts with an equivocal reputation, went off and consorted with Dark wizards, came back to try and set up as a petty tyrant. "Lord Voldemort", by God. You're all of you old enough to know that names have power in the magical world, and old enough to know that not callin' things by their right names only feeds the fear and strengthens the dark. "Lord", is he? Let's see his letters patent creatin' him a peer, then! No, by God, Riddle he is and Riddle he shall remain. Damn my eyes if I ever call him by a title he's no right to. Man's no more than a clever-dick with a knack for plottin', conspirin', and acrostics with his name!

'Now. Where were we - ah. Malfoy, Lucius. Death Eater, hanger-on of Riddle's, murderer many times over, peculator, and cad.' Draco was white with fury. 'Look at me in that fashion again, young Malfoy, and I'll break you and drum you out of the regiment! Insubordination borderin' on mutiny, by God! I don't give a clipped rupee what your father's stuffed you full of, I'm the historian here, and every decent historian in the kingdom - as well as the College of Arms - knows the facts. The Malfoys, for all their money and position, are the cadet branch of the Weasleys. Typical Whig placemen, the Malfoys.... And of course even a child should know that both those families, and the Longbottoms and the Blacks and the Prewetts and all the proud "purebloods", are merely offshoots of the three most ancient magical families in Britain: the Smiths, the Masons, and the Potters!'

Harry's head snapped up. His face was a study in wonderment.

'Good God, Dumbledore, who the devil teaches History of Magic here these days?'

'Binns, my dear Bellowes.'

'Good God. No wonder they're wholly uneddicated! The man's dead!'

Hermione couldn't help but blurt out, 'Aren't you?'

'Not so long as the book stays in print, m'gel. Damme, what author don't want immortality?'

____________________________________________

Hogwarts again, yet not Hogwarts, now, after the war, but the newly re-opened Domdaniel University that now shared its fabric....

'All right, Blaise, I can see that you and Justin are panting to give us the Grand Tour.'

Zabini cut a glance over to Finch-Fletchley and they exchanged a grin. 'Actually, Draco, if you and Harry really want us panting -'

'Oh, don't start,' Draco said. He smiled, but it was wry.

Harry put his arm firmly around Draco's waist and told their old schoolmates, in Very Confiding Tones, 'I made one joke about a foursome and he's been insecure ever since.' The wink that accompanied the statement ruined his careful attempt at being po-faced.

Blaise gave the two of them a genuine smile. 'Not really at all like you, Draco, old boy.' His hand sought out Justin's. 'You two are our inspiration in terms of fidelity, trust, and absolute, alarming, charmingly obsessive devotion. Did I mention psychotic, stalker-ish -'

'Get knotted, Blaise.' Draco was blushing and hiding a smile.

'Right, then,' Justin said. 'The great, wondrous, so-historic-we-can-expect-minor-royalty-at-the-ribbon-cutting reopening of Domdaniel after, um, yonks. However many bloody centuries, fuck me if I've the foggiest. Typical wizarding approach, really: all the old college rivalries and specialities have been preserved in amber and what-not. The Hogwarts house system writ large.'

They fell into a leisurely stroll beside the waters of the Lake.

'Merlin, of course, is for the clever-clogs.' Justin's voice was remotely amused. 'Granger - Weasley, now, of course - and that lot. Swots, but tony swots, mostly. Noted for Charms work and genteel duelling. Godric's a bit hearty, but don't underestimate the buggers, is the word. Quidditch, rowing, and -'

'Rowing?'

'Wizard rowing,' Blaise put in. 'Just like the Muggle 'varsity version except sans boat. The trick is levitating just above the surface of the water.'

Draco just shook his head. 'I'd steer well clear of that, then. Imagine catching a crab whilst rowing and ending up with a jet of lake water up your arse.'

'Hmmm,' Harry said, and grinned.

'Perv.'

'Well, if you don't want to row,' he said, 'you could - cox.'

Blaise and Justin snickered as Draco swatted at Harry.

'Anyway,' Justin said, 'Godric. Quidditch, rowing, Defence. Hearties, as I said. Their rowing VIII was head of the Lake for about three centuries running, back in the Year Dot. Plenty of cunning behind that front of brute-force-and-bloody-ignorance. Perfect for you, Harry. Then there's Blaise.'

'Ah,' said Draco.

'Decadent æsthetes with rather too much money and far too much side, I'm told.'

'We do fit in, then. Super.'

'Regularly de-bagged and tossed in the Lake by the Godric hearties.'

Draco stopped and levelled a look at Harry that would have stunned a hippogriff. 'Don't even think it.' Harry contrived to look innocent.

'The Blaise college traditions are Potions, poetry, and politesse. Though we are expected to uphold the corpore sano bit in a languid sort of way.'

'Oh? What's our traditional sport, then?'

'The wizarding version of real tennis,* and a long history of dominance at fizz racquets.'

Harry looked puzzled. 'It's the wizarding version of squash racquets in the Muggle world,' Draco explained. 'The ball's enchanted -'

'- And you really don't want to hit the tin.' Justin winced.

'Better than what can happen with the dedans or the grille on a wizard real tennis court, though,' Blaise said thoughtfully.

'I always wanted to live dangerously,' Draco muttered. 'What about - where's Neville to be, again?'

'In Albertus Magnus, isn't he? Highly practical lot in Bertie, they say. Solid place for a, er, budding herbologist. Sorry, sorry. Transfigurations are rather a speciality there as well. As for sport, well. I do hear they field a rather fierce bridge team....'

'Justin -'

'I'm sorry. Actually, their Quicket XI is traditionally their strength. Appalling game, really. Dicier than Quidditch, if you ask me: exploding balls, enchanted bats, and sentient bails that try to decapitate you. But that's their strength, mad as it is. Flannelled fools rather than muddied oafs and All That. Then there's Macmillan, over in Thomas. Historians and arithmancers, largely, very theoretical. Well, after all, named after the chap who wrote that huge Summa, what? Anyway, the Oxen run to heavy seriousness and Highland sports, so if you see a caber being tossed....'

'Seriously, darling.' Blaise was giving Justin The Look.

'Oh, all right. Actually, they are rather fearsome at Aingingein, I hear. And wizard golf. I suppose it's the Celtic fringe thing they have going. And there's talk of a new college's being founded if there are students enough in the coming years - Bacon and Dee's. I suppose,' Justin sniffed, 'Dee's can get a leg up on Divination and, well, Gobstones.'

'You're a worse snob than Draco and I combined are,' Blaise laughed.

'Is that possible?' All Harry got for his pains was a pinch on the arse from Draco.

'And finally, I suppose, there's Paracelsus, the wizarding All Souls. Dumbledore's Warden, of course, as well as Chancellor of Domdaniel, and it's a nice retirement plum, but with McGonagall as Senior Fellow (and Vice-Chancellor of the whole mob here) and all the Hogwarts staff as Fellows, there will be real work and real research done. As a pure research institution, it's almost enough to make Snape crack a smile.'

Harry tried to envision that, and failed, with a shudder.

____________________________________________

Hogwarts, in the dream-world's student days, the DA in the Room of Requirement....

'That deus ex machina bit he so revels in is bloody annoying,' Justin said, as Dumbledore departed.

Harry and Draco were sitting up, groggily. Hermione started to explain, but Harry waved her off. 'I think I remember, thanks. Malfoy?'

'All too well.'

Salazar's shield and Godric's sword remained on the table, near the battered old Sorting Hat, mute testimony of what had happened.

'So,' Harry said, flatly. 'Are you lot still deliberating? Or has this been enough proof for you?'

'That's not really fair to them,' Draco said, mildly. He turned to the rest of the DA. 'Look, I do realise I have years of apologising to do here.'

'You must admit,' Luna said, with equal mildness, 'this is all rather out of character.'

'Character is choice. Choices can be changed. That means character can be, well, re-formed. Reformed. If I've learnt nothing else, I've learnt that lesson from - from Dumbledore, from Bellowes, remember, and, well, from all of you.' Draco said 'all', but his eyes strayed towards Harry. 'But yes, I do see that.'

'You do also recognise that it will take some time for us to accept that these changes are real?'

'I know.'

Luna looked at him, with a deceptive appearance of misty lack of focus. 'Do you, though? It's not the day-to-day nastiness, you know. The fact is, you actually wished death on at least one fellow student.'

Draco paused, searching for the right words. 'I did say that. Tell me. Have you ever seen a small, spoilt child - a pampered five-year-old, let's say - in a snit? Red-faced, crying, lashing out at his mummy or at Nurse, shouting, "I hate you and I wish you were dead"?'

'You weren't five.'

'I may as well as have been. Being thoroughly spoilt doesn't actually conduce to maturity. People find a spoilt child, well, laughable, if annoying. But there's a certain level at which ... well, being that spoilt's much more serious than it seems. It's ... seriously disturbed.'

Luna nodded. 'I'll accept that. But there is also the fact that the five-year-old doesn't understand what it means to wish someone dead. He doesn't comprehend death, truly.' She looked gravely, unnervingly, at Harry, thinking of the days after Sirius fell through the veil. 'I've known people ten years older than that not to grasp it all that well. Or fifty years older, as far as that goes.'

Draco nodded in return, rather sharply. 'Spoilt implies sheltered, Lovegood. For what little it's worth, I had no more concept of death, of what it really entails, than any spoilt tot in a pram.'

'And now?' Harry's voice was neutral.

Draco looked at him, unflinchingly. 'I can see thestrals now.'

____________________________________________

Dream-Hogwarts again, and that memorable guest lecture in DADA.

'Smiths, Masons, and Potters? These are wizardkind's senior stock? Those are the names of, of artisans,' Draco sputtered. He sounded genuinely pained.

Col Bellowes glared at him with contempt. 'Were you under the impression that wizardin' surname conventions were the same as those of Muggles, boy? When knowin' in what lines magic ran was so imperative to us? Great God!'

'Perhaps you should explain, Stentor.'

'Someone demmed well must do, Albus. Good God. Right, then!

'Where d'you suppose magic began, eh? Who would first have sensed it, channelled it, learnt its contours? Who else save the first to have a mystery, a craft? The Smith preceded the prince and the warrior, for it was the Smith who learnt the alchemy of forgin' metals, it was the Smith who created the swords and the shields and tipped the spears and the arrows that allowed those who acknowledged him to carve out kingdoms and principalities and dominions. It was the Mason who made the walls the troops garrisoned, who raised the palaces and built the fortifications. And first of them all, in the dawn of civilised time, it was the Potter whose art and mystery, whose magic and craft, took earth and water and air and fire, and broke men free of the seasons, storin' the food for use, cookin' the meats, holdin' the first potions in vessels, allowin' men to settle and plan and store. It was the Potter who made it possible to do more than live from hand to mouth. It was the Potter whose art and mystery first freed men to watch the heavens and dig in the earth for ores, who founded alchemy, who made it worthwhile to sow and plant and harvest and irrigate, and so inspired others who learnt magic of him to take counsel of the stars for those endeavours.

'And from the Potter's kiln came the Smith's forge, and from out the Smith's forge came the Mason's tools. And the Potter and the Mason and the Smith gave rise to the second tier of ancient families of magic, the Bowyer and the Fletcher with the arrows tipped in metal and the Cooper with the Smith's bronze and iron, the Baker and the Brewer with the Potter's vessels, and the Granger once granaries were made possible by the Potter's and the Mason's art.

'It was then, young Malfoy m'lad, that the younger sons of these families of power, fitted out by the craft and mystery of their fathers, went forth to raise cities and castles and to wage war and establish power. Ares and Zeus and Apollo the archer and Athene with her shield and spear are unarmed without Hæphaistos, and Weyland Smith is ultimately the one without whom the Northern gods are lost: there's a metaphoric truth in the old myths.'

'Myths.'

'Don't look at me, boy. Churchwarden for seventy years and m'brother a Canon of Chichester.'

Ah. The Victorians,

Harry thought.

'Out they went, then, these younger sons of wizardkind, and founded, if they prevailed, families of their own, which took surnames from the founder's bye-name. The Blacks, for instance, named for an hereditary temperament. Or the ancient house of Weasley -'

'Named for the noble weasel?'

'Twenty points from Slytherin, Mr Malfoy,' Dumbledore said, rather curtly, 'and be glad if the Colonel leaves you a whole skin.'

'Named, Malfoy, for the weasel. Tell me, boy, as you know so damn' much. Of what beast is the basilisk the offspring?'

'The cockatrice. Sir.'

'And other than a crowin' cock, what magical beast is the bane and enemy and natural control of the cockatrice and the basilisk?'

Draco flushed. It was almost, Harry thought, as if he were at once enlightened and ashamed. But Malfoy, surely, was shameless?

'The - weasel. Sir.' Malfoy looked as if were about to be sick.

'And how, might you imagine, boy, would a wizardin' family get such a surname and bear a cockatrice as the charge on its coat-armour, as cantin' arms?'

Malfoy apparently could not speak. Hermione's hand shot up, her eyes wide with speculation.

'You, gel.'

'Would - would it be from being noted basilisk and cockatrice hunters?'

'It would and it was. An hereditary charge, nobly assumed, of protectin' the wizardin' and non-wizardin' worlds alike from those fell threats.'

Col Bellowes paused, and looked severely at them. 'And we were talkin' of leadership, what? Well, then. And if a cadet branch of such a family were to turn robber baron, exactin' mail and protection money from those whom they were charged to protect, and loosin' the basilisk and the cockatrice and the wyvern and the dragon on those who would not pay? They would gain power, yes. And riches. And fear, which some think the same as respect. And a name, I think, for bad faith, mala fides. For mal foi.

'Character, damme. Character is whence leadership springs. And character is the consequence of choice. Not blood or position, place or pelf. Choice, and character.

'There are but two components of leadership. Character -' and he looked very hard at Malfoy - 'operated upon and moulded by discipline.' And on the word 'discipline', Col Bellowes bent his glare upon Harry.

____________________________________________

Hogwarts in dreams, once more, and the DA deciding Draco's fate in the Room of Requirement.

'I owe,' Draco repeated, 'so many apologies to you I may spend my life in them. In a way, I also owe a mild apology to Riddle and to Lucius. I said that Riddle, as a villain, was incompetent - and he is. But I have to admit, also, that I never quite made it as a villain either. Even a panto villain: looking back, I have to say, as Abanazar, well, I made an excellent Widow Twankey.'

Ron sniggered. Draco looked at him without any notable ill will.

When Ron spoke, it is was equally notably without the usual rancour. 'Just imagining you in a skirt and wig.' He and Draco exchanged a tentative grin, and Harry, watching, smiled.

'As to Lucius.... Well. Look, I don't want any of you to think I came swaggering back expecting to admitted amongst decent wizards with no more to offer than my own sweet self. I brought a ransom, and in a way, it's partly why I am here, why I was able finally to see things as they are, and make the choices I've made. Because of those choices, and because of the ransom I brought to Dumbledore, I've burnt my bridges.'

Harry leapt instantly to the conclusion. 'What you brought Dumbledore is also what caused you to see things as they are?'

Draco nodded.

'Lucius's own?'

'Yes.'

'What?' Ron was thrumming with the tension of not knowing.

'I think,' Harry said, slowly, his eyes fixed on Draco, 'that Malfoy fled his home with Lucius's pensieve in his pockets.'

'Bloody hell.'

____________________________________________

'Discipline,' Col Bellowes had repeated, looking sternly at Harry.

'Rankers and subalterns and the more junior sergeants. We expect them to thirst for glory and count no costs. But the company commander, the field officers and general officers, the RSM and the senior NCOs, by God, are there to impose discipline. 'S the difference between an Army and an armed mob. Senior officers exist to impose discretion on the enthusiasm of their juniors, and to alloy cold wisdom with the heat of ardour in battle. And their juniors, mark me well, must learn the discipline of trustin' 'em, of knowin' they don't know and haven't seen the whole, larger picture, and acceptin' that the less they do know, the less they can balls up - or, especially in magical warfare, be required to divulge, if they fall into enemy hands.'

Harry blushed, furiously, unable to look over at the Headmaster, slowly feeling the resentment that he had carried in him since Sirius's fall begin to drain away, drop by corrosive drop.

'Discipline exists to assist in makin' the choices that establish the character that leadership requires. Learn that, and you may, just possibly, manage to be more than just food for powder.'

Harry managed to raise his head and look over towards Dumbledore, who was smiling sadly at him. And not at him only: incredibly, Malfoy was looking to Dumbledore as well, shyly.

In the end, that day may have been the most important DADA class in Hogwarts's history.

____________________________________________

'Bloody, sodding hell,' Ron repeated. 'Lucius's pensieve.' He stood up and walked over to where Draco was leaning against a chair, and slowly stretched out his hand. 'That took balls, mate.'

His eyes wide, Draco tentatively extended his own hand, and gasped when Ron drew him into a bone-cracking hug. Most of the DA sputtered and gasped. Luna, though, looked mazily over at Harry and Hermione, and observed, 'He's rather like his brother George, isn't he?'

Hermione returned her gaze, and quirked a smile. 'For someone who likes to give the appearance of flailing about aimlessly with a hammer, Luna, you do have an unnerving facility for whanging the nail squarely on the head.'

'Right, you lot,' Ron said, an arm around Draco's shoulders. 'This is my cousin Draco, and anyone who has a problem with him, has a problem with me and every Weasley living. Um, Harry? That does include you as an adopted, honorary Weasley, right, mate? Back me up here, Harry.'

'When,' Harry smiled, 'have I not?'

'Right. You,' Ron said, pulling Draco into his side, 'come sit by me.'

Draco's mouth worked a moment or so before he could speak. 'I. I haven't earned that yet. Um. Ron.'

'But you're family now,' Ron said, as if that settled everything - as, for Ron, it did.

'Ron?'

'Yeah, Harry?'

'Give him a moment, will you? He wants time to absorb this.'

Ron shrugged, but stayed standing next to Draco.

Draco shook his head, smiling, then turned serious. 'Ah. Well. All of you. Anyway. Dumbledore has Lucius's pensieve. He and Moody -' Draco shuddered, delicately, and they all had a brief memory of a bouncing ferret - 'have checked it out thoroughly, along with, well, something else I brought. W- Ron, your father is slated to come look at it this Saturday, though I think, wisely, Dumbledore plans to make use of it and the evidence in it himself for now, rather than entrust the Ministry with it.'

'I should think,' Ron snorted. 'I mean, Dad's one thing, and some of the others, but the Ministry as a whole couldn't organise a piss-up at Ogden's distillery. Honestly, that lot could fuck up a spanner.'

Draco grinned and ducked his head. 'Yes, well. I was saying. Lucius tried to drill me to believe that Malfoys bent the knee to no one. Balls, that, given the way he creeps and crawls and toadies. But, in fairness, he's right about one thing. There is such a thing as leadership, and it deserves fealty. And if it's at all worth doing, it's worth doing properly. I know I swore, just now, to be faithful to the Light, and I shall be, I really shall. But loyalty ... loyalty is a personal thing. Harry, it's true, isn't it, that the Hat thought of putting you in Slytherin?'
'Yes.'

'Do you remember what exactly it said? I've heard rumours.'

'Oh, yes,' Harry said. 'I remember it quite well. "A nice thirst to prove myself", it said.'

'Yes,' Draco said, meditatively. 'That's really it, you know. I know most of you think - and I can't blame you - that Slytherin is bad through and through. But the key to us is just that. Ambition, a thirst to prove ourselves. What that does not answer is, Ambition to prove what, exactly? And it's our not answering that question - not even thinking to ask it - that has plagued us for so long. I suppose, really, it's what Bellowes said - remember? About choices. I'm still a Slytherin, you know. Ambitious, cunning, and all that. And it's going to take a while for me to change some of my manner. Habit is second nature.'

'Blaise Pascal,' Hermione said.

'Quoting Montaigne,' Ernie Macmillan added. He could hardly let that chance pass, after all.

'Who was quoting Aquinas,' Corner said, smugly, determined that Ravenclaw should have the last word.

'Enough,' said Harry, gently. 'It's the ends you serve that matter, Malf- Draco. We understand.'

'Well, I am asking you, all of you, to let me prove myself. But whatever you decide, as a body, I am making my choice now, formally, just as much as I made it informally when I scarpered out of the Manor with Lucius's pensieve.'

He walked over to where Harry was seated, Ron trailing him protectively. 'Harry, all I ask - and you'll see why, soon enough - is, Please. Never ask me what I saw in that damned pensieve. Or what I saw with my own eyes that enables me now to see thestrals.'

'No,' Harry said, solemnly. 'I understand.'

Draco nodded, and dropped to one knee before a startled Harry. 'As I said: formally.' He placed his clasped hands before him, and Harry, prodded by Hermione, grasped them in his own. 'Not Dumbledore, Harry, not any Order or cause, though I will stand by my choice of the Light. But you. I, Draco Malfoy, do here declare my fealty to you, and my faith, so long as my life and magic shall last, and take you as my liege lord.' He rose and then bowed, gravely, as Harry and the rest goggled.

'And to you, Hermione, I pledge my loyalty, knowing as Harry knows that you are his conscience and his counsellor.'

He turned and addressed Ron. 'And to you - cousin. I pledge my duty, knowing as Harry knows that you are his protector and shield, and his strategist.' Ron stammered something indecipherable. 'No, Ron, it's true. It always has been. You have the chess-player's mind and the heart of a lion, just as Hermione has the wisdom. Just as Harry has the courage and the compassion, and the understanding of the heart. It's been so since the very beginning, remember? Take the Philosopher's Stone. It was Harry who saw through every deceit, and who knew instinctively how Hagrid was manipulated to give away Fluffy's secret, and, oh, a hundred such things. It was Hermione whose logic solved the riddle of the potions. But it was you who both checkmated the defences and were willing to sacrifice yourself for Harry. And every time since, it's been the same. Don't ever think you've been dispensable, or second-rate, or relegated to Harry's shadow. I know, Ron. I felt that jealousy myself and it drove and twisted me for years. But Harry has always counted on you, needed you. And you've never let him down and never will, neither in courage nor in that chess-playing cunning.

'I suppose,' Draco smiled, 'that, as it happens, and subject to my duty to Harry - I suppose Weasley is my king, after all.'

Everyone was silent, as Ron looked away from each and all whilst he composed himself.

'I think,' Susan Bones said, 'that we have a new member.'

'I think,' Terry Boot said, 'that we have a new counter-intelligence chief in this Army.'

'But I've not proven myself -'

'Draco?'

'Yes, Harry?'

'You're outvoted. You're stuck with us now, I'm afraid. And as an honorary and cousinly Weasley, you poor bugger, you're slated for just what Terry suggests. You're our Slytherin. Ginny - who keeps me honest by never hesitating to tick me off when I need it - has personal experience of the Dark, and of Riddle. Ron.... Well, as you say, he's the chess champion. And there's more to Gred and Forge than meets the eye, as you'll learn. I'd like you to work with them just as Terry suggested: you've the mind for it.'

'As my lord commands.'

'Draco, please. I'm just Harry. I don't want to be a budding Riddle.'

'I understand. But you understand my pledge, I hope.'

'Well, yes. But. We're not big on formality in this mob. "Sir" me and I'll have Ginny hit you with a bat-bogey hex.' They exchanged a grin.

'I think we've been here long enough. Is everyone on board with having Draco join us?'

'I think it's super,' Neville said. Everyone made noises of agreement.

'And I don't think,' Hannah Abbott added, 'anyone wants reminding that we keep this dead secret, no matter how loud the repercussions are from Lucius anyway.'

'Right,' Harry said. 'I think we're done here. Ron, Hermione, wait outside if you would. I think Draco wants a private word with me.'

They nodded, and followed the others out.

'Thank you,' Draco said, softly. 'I said everything would be made clear eventually. I. Oh, Moody's checked it, so. It's not dangerous or anything.'

'I thought we'd established that we trust you. How could we not after tonight?'

'Thanks. That's going to take getting used to. Anyway. I, um, don't wish you to feel that I expect, well. You'll understand. But I feel I owe it to you to be honest, completely. So.' He set a pensieve on the table before Harry.

'Not Lucius's.'

'Mine.'

'I thought it might be.'

'Shall I wait outside?'

'No. Stay.'

'All right. Remember. I don't at all mean you to feel, ah, well. You'll see.'

Ten minutes later, Draco's hand on his shoulder pulled Harry back from the surge and swirl of Draco's memories.

'Draco?'

'Yes?' Draco's face was averted, and he did not look up.

'Look at me. Please.'

When Draco did, there was a naked and desperate honesty on his face that Harry - and probably all of creation - had never seen before.

'I can't -'

'I know.'

'- Let me finish. I can't say, yet, what might come of this. But you're not alone, all right? And I think that as we get to know one another better, well. Look. Just. Don't be ashamed. Don't think it's hopeless. And don't think I'm offended, because I'm not. I appreciate your honesty. No, I honour you for it, come to think of it. And, Draco? You're not the only one who has wondered and thought about this ... possibility. Let's start as friends, but. We'll see where it leads, all right? Be patient, that's all I ask. Because I think that, just maybe, there's something here that I feel, too.'

____________________________________________

Ron and Hermione had waited for them just outside the door of the Room of Requirement. The Headmaster was with them, eyes merry and uncomfortably knowing.

'Ah,' said Dumbledore. 'Draco, my dear boy. Perhaps you would be so good as to accompany me to my office. We have much to discuss, not least your arrangements for the year. And I believe Mr Potter wants time to cross-examine Mr Weasley as to his ... uncharacteristic ... acceptance of you.'

Draco and Harry exchanged a glance of frustrated amusement, and then Draco sauntered away with Dumbledore, bowing to the inevitable. Ron was carefully looking into the middle distance, trying to whistle something nonchalant.

'Ron?'

'Hullo, Harry.'

Harry suppressed a smile. 'Ron, my oldest and dearest friend. You have some explaining to do.'

Hermione gave them a long look and edged away.

'Er, Harry....' Ron got no further before Harry took him firmly by the elbow and frog-marched him towards the Gryffindor tower, his other arm linked equally uncompromisingly with a reluctant Hermione's.

_______________________________________________

NOTE:

* 'Court tennis' in the US, 'royal tennis' in Australia, 'jeu de paume' in France.