“You brought him here?” the woman with long magenta hair shrieked.

Draco staggered to his feet as Potter did the same beside him, and Lupin pulled the shouting woman through a door – presumably, to calm her down. He told himself that his head was spinning from the Portkey, rather than the image of giant, tear-filled eyes that was flitting in and out of his brain.

“Where are we?” Draco muttered, straightening up and looking around. They were standing in a rather dark and dusty foyer. Cobwebs hung from the ceiling and down the corridor, and things that looked nastily like house elf heads were mounted on the walls. He folded his arms against his chest, instinctively drawing into himself and as far away from the walls as possible.

“Number Twelve Grimmauld Place,” Potter replied mechanically.

“I’ve been here before,” Draco said slowly. “There were people everywhere...”

“I’m surprised you remember; I’m told you never left the room upstairs. It used to be Order headquarters,” Potter explained, motioning for him to follow through a different door than the one Lupin had disappeared through. Draco hesitated, but the thought of standing in the darkened foyer without any company was even less appealing than being led through the house by Potter. “But after Dumbledore died…” He trailed off, looking at the ground, and Draco was grateful that his tone was not accusatory.

“Anyway, the Burrow is headquarters now-”

“The what?” Draco sneered, old habits kicking in.

“It’s where the Weasleys live,” Harry replied quietly.

Draco sobered immediately, following through another darkened room into what appeared to be the kitchen. He inhaled sharply, not able to stop the visions of flaming red hair and milky, freckled skin from filling his head. He rubbed his forehead tiredly, squeezing his eyes shut. Breathing deeply, he opened his eyes again to find Potter watching him. Draco looked away, pulling a chair away from the scrubbed wooden table and throwing himself into it.

“So why didn’t we go there?” he asked into his hands. He felt as though if he didn’t keep talking she would overtake him completely.

Potter snorted. “You just saw how Tonks reacted to us bringing you here. Can you imagine how everyone in the Order would have reacted if we had taken you to headquarters?”

Draco nodded, taking the mug of steaming liquid that Potter slid to him from across the table. His heart pounded so loudly in his chest that he was sure Potter could hear it. His unspoken question hung in the air above them.

“I haven’t mentioned anything to the Weasleys about Ginny,” Potter muttered into his hot chocolate.

Draco nodded, gulping down some of his own. His head spun at the smell of chocolate, her laugh filling his ears. He lowered his head into his hands, feigning exhaustion. She chose the bastard sitting across from you. Don’t be weak.

“Come on,” Potter said, standing up. “You should go see your mother.”

Draco felt his heart jump into his throat, the fiery witch he had left behind driven completely from his mind by the thought of the one dying upstairs.

As the last of his nightmares released him, Draco stirred slightly in his sleep, feeling a hand over his.

“Ginny?” he murmured, not bothering to open his eyes.

“What was that?” a familiar voice crooned. Draco’s eyes shot open.

Draco sat up, realizing that he had fallen asleep in a chair at her bedside. “Mother?” he whispered, squinting in the dark.

His mother was propped up in her bed, her long, colorless hair tumbling in tangles down into the white sheets. White, everything was white: the sheets, the pillows, her hair, her skin. Her small, cold hand was resting on top of his.

“Oh, Draco,” she sighed. “My son. Why are you here?”

She was so pale and thin that it pained Draco to look at her. He pulled his chair closer to her bed and gripped her hand with both of his own. “I’m here…to help the Order.”

Her nearly colorless eyes went in and out of focus, a small wrinkle appearing in the middle of her forehead, her thin lips pulled into a frown. “With what?” she breathed.

Her hand was shaking slightly in his. “They need to look at something in Father’s library…so that we can save you.”

She shook her head wordlessly, over and over again, until Draco put a hand on her shoulder to stop her. “No,” she whispered. “No. You can’t do that. He would be fur-”

“I don’t give a damn what Father thinks about this,” Draco snapped. At the look on her face, he instantly regretted raising his voice. He squeezed her hand again, and added in a whisper, “He got us into this mess. And I’m going to get us out. Father would have wanted me to keep you safe…”

She nodded, her eyes filling with tears. She lifted his hand to her lips and kissed it, before her head slumped against the pillows and she was asleep again. Draco wiped a tear of his own from his cheek.

Shaking slightly, Draco rose from his chair. He would have to eat sooner or later, and, as Potter had put it, they were young men now. There would be no more pouting in his room.

He trudged down the creaking stairs and into the kitchen to find Potter and Lupin seated at the table, munching on toast and looking over the morning paper.

“There you are,” Lupin said wearily, looking up from his breakfast. His bloodshot eyes were darkened further by the heavy, purple bags beneath them.

Draco nodded, hesitantly pulling out a chair and sitting down. “I’m sorry if…my presence caused some sort of-”

Lupin waved him off. “Don’t worry about Tonks. She’s fine.” He passed Draco a plate of toast across the table.

Potter turned the page of his paper, not bothering to look up. “Did your mother wake up at all?”

Draco nodded again, biting into his toast. “When are we going to go-?”

“That’s going to be tricky business,” Lupin said. “Your Manor is being watched constantly by Death Eaters. Even though it’s under the Fidelius Charm, they still have one or two outside it. I assume you’ve been told its location?”

“I’m…I’m the Secret-Keeper,” Draco murmured.

There was a clatter as Potter promptly dropped his knife into the jar of marmalade, his mouth wide open.

“You – you’re the Secret-Keeper?” Lupin sputtered.

Draco nodded, his heart pounding. At the sight of their surprise, he wondered if he could really go through with it. Could he really betray his father’s trust, letting the bloody Order into his home and his Father’s library? But he thought of his mother, passed out upstairs in her bed, and clenched his fists under the table.

“Well, then…I suppose it will be much easier than we thought. The – the three of us can go,” Lupin said. “Sometime in the next few days.”

Draco nodded mutely. As he looked past Potter, he saw a photograph taped on the window behind the sink. The flash of red had caught his eye. Not bothering to hide what he was doing, Draco shoved the chair out behind him and strode across the kitchen.

Granger and Weasley were sitting on a dock, laughing and swinging their legs over the blue-green water below them. Ginny was wading along the edge, clad in nothing but a yellow bathing suit, kicking water up at her brother. Draco felt his breath catch as Ginny turned to the camera and blew a kiss. His head swam, and he inhaled sharply at the feel of tears prickling his eyes. Potter was swimming around in the water, laughing as he watched Ginny. She turned and laughed as he dunked under the water.

Turning away, his throat burning, Draco found Lupin immersed in his paper again. But Potter was watching him, his face unreadable but his eyes curious. Not bothering to make an excuse, Draco turned and fled the room, his head pounding and Ginny’s laughter ringing in his ears.

It was surreal, walking through his house with Potter and Lupin on his heels, the once gleaming surfaces of the Manor thickly coated in dust. His strides were deliberate but his mind dreamlike, as if he had fallen into one of his nightmares.

His chest constricted painfully as they passed a portrait of Narcissa with a blond baby in her lap. Draco inhaled the musty air hard through his nose.

After what seemed like hours, Draco turned down the final corridor, long and cold, just like he remembered it. They came to a halt in front of the blank stretch of grey wall, where his father had last sealed the library. Draco held out his hand and Lupin wordlessly handed him a dagger.

Trying not to think about it, Draco ran the silver blade along the length of his palm. His stomach lurched at the sight of the dark redness blooming from the cut and spreading web-like across his hand.

He pressed his hand firmly against the cool stone, waiting with bated breath. The wall slid back, and then to the side, and Lupin clapped a hand on his shoulder in what was meant to be a reassuring gesture, making Draco wince involuntarily.

Stepping into the room, Draco shuddered at the sight of the aging bookshelves and massive desk. He took a shaky breath. “Take it away,” he muttered weakly to the two men standing beside him.

He ran his wand over his hand, healing the wound effectively. Lupin was running his hand along the bookshelf, muttering titles under his breath, while Potter was unfurling the scrolls that were lying on top of Lucius’s desk.

Draco was tempted to collapse into the green armchair in the corner, but instinct kept him standing awkwardly by the door, his hands shoved into his pockets, as if he couldn’t kick the old habit of staying as far away from this room as possible.

An hour later, Lupin was still sorting through books, and for lack of having anything else to do, Draco had joined Potter as he read through scrolls. It was when Potter began to read an early detailed record of a meeting held by Voldemort over two decades ago that Lupin let out a strangled cry.

Draco whirled around to find the man writhing on the floor, one of the books he had been going through lying flat open at the top of his pile. Lupin was coughing and sputtering, unable to breathe.

“Remus!” Potter yelled, dropping the scroll and hurrying to his side. “Remus, what is it?”

Draco lunged forward and slammed the open book shut. He was unsure why he had the sudden impulse to do so, only that he was so completely convinced that it was necessary. As it snapped shut, Lupin gasped loudly, gulping for air. Potter helped him sit up, throwing Draco a grateful glance over his shoulder.

“What was that?” Potter demanded when Lupin had finally began inhaling normally.

“A book on possession and binding,” Lupin said, still breathing deeply from his position on the floor. “I had just reached a part about undoing binding when I couldn’t breathe. There were voices. I heard…awful things…” He broke off, shuddering.

Potter gave Draco a meaningful look. “Binding? But then…how do we open it again?”

“The enchantment might be broken, now that I’ve already suffered from it,” Lupin suggested.

Draco shook his head. “No. I think…I think I might have to offer it blood again.”

Potter looked at Lupin, who shrugged. “It’s worth a try, I suppose. We can always shut the book again if you can’t breathe.”

Draco nodded, pulling the dagger from his belt and slicing open his hand once more. He pressed his hand into the book, which trembled for a moment before falling still. Draco opened it gingerly, opening it to the page Lupin had been reading. His vision blurred and then only one phrase stood out against the yellowing parchment.

Such a bond can only be broken at the cost of the victim’s gift of magic.

Draco’s hands shook, and he dropped the book, backing away from it.

Potter reached forward and took it, reading aloud, “If the bond is broken without the consent of the caster, the victim will be stripped of their magical powers for eternity. Sorry?” Potter finished, looking up at Lupin. “What does that mean exactly?”

Draco cradled his head in his hands, trembling all over. He couldn’t bear to answer Potter’s question, couldn’t bear to acknowledge what this meant.

“She – she’ll lose her magic,” Lupin said. “And without her magic…She’ll live normally for a while. But her body and mind will begin to decay within a couple of years, and she’ll die eventually.”

“But – but won’t she die much sooner if we don’t lift the bond?” Potter asked. Draco couldn’t breathe. He couldn’t stand to listen to Potter’s ignorance. He couldn’t accept his mother’s fate. After everything he’d done and everything he’d do to keep her safe, he would lose her in the long run anyway.

Ginny’s face swam into his vision, and Draco couldn’t help but think that he’d left her behind for nothing. If Potter had just stayed away, they could have been happy. And now, he was left with nothing. Not Ginny, not his mother – he was utterly alone.

Her long hair fell across the bed, bathed in the glow of the moonlight, which seemed to shine right through it, making her all the more transparent. Even with her hand pressed in between the two of his, she felt ethereal, as if one gust of wind would blow her away forever.

Her head was slumped against her pillow, her neck bent at an awkward angle in slumber. Draco ran a finger across her forehead and down her cheek to make sure she was still completely solid, only to find that she was damp with cold sweat.

Finally accepting that she wasn’t going to wake up tonight, Draco kissed her hand and left her room. He crept along the corridor quietly, not wanting to be confronted by Lupin about his decision on his mother’s fate before the morning came.

The door to the room he shared with Potter creaked slightly as he opened it, announcing his presence to his roommate with aggravating obviousness. Draco crawled into his bed before Potter could get a close enough look at his face to tell that he’d been crying, burying his face in his pillow.

“Did she wake up?” Potter asked softly.

Draco shook his head. He couldn’t understand why this was happening. His world was falling away, piece by piece, and he couldn’t seem to catch even one of them. She was going to die. She was going to die in a matter of years if they could manage to do this spell. And she would die sooner if they failed to complete it correctly.

She would wither and fade before his very eyes. He would be unable to help her or make her pain go away. After everything, Draco didn’t know if his soul could survive that.

Tears began to prick at his eyes again, his heart aching with every beat. He turned to look for something to distract him, anything at all. But his heart panged again as he caught sight of the pictures of redheads adorning the walls. Ginny.

And he couldn’t help himself. Her beautiful, lying face overwhelmed him. He wanted nothing more than to have her beside him, have her stroke his head and whisper in his ear. It made his head spin to think about it – that after everything she had done, after the lies she had told and the pain she had caused him, he still wanted her like the air he breathed.

For a moment, hot anger coursed through his veins as Potter watched him closely. He should just kill the bastard now. He needed her so much more than Potter did. Needed her so badly it hurt.

She invaded his mind again as the anger faded. Her voice, her laugh, her face surrounded him. What would she tell him? How would she try to fix this? He couldn’t help the thoughts. And all at once, an answer came to him.

You’re going to save her, Draco. She’ll be alive and well for years, able to be there with you, whole and beautiful. She will be so proud of you. I’m proud of you.

He felt as if his heart might burst. Her imaginary words filled his mind, making him wish for her more, hating what she’d done to him.

He pressed his face more firmly into the pillow, as if to suffocate himself. He could feel Potter watching him still. Potter was the man she loved. Not Draco, but Potter. The thought was raw and real in his head.

Just when he thought his heart and head would be claimed by his nightmares once more, Potter’s voice rang out in the darkness.

“She really loved you, you know.”

His heart banged to a stop in his chest. Slowly, not daring to believe what he’d just heard, Draco turned his head.

“What?” The word almost caught in his throat.

Potter was sitting at the edge of his bed, his eyes hard and blazing. “She only agreed to – to help me,” his voice cracked, “because she didn’t want you to lose your mother. She only agreed to help me because she…because she loved you.”

Potter’s eyes were wet too as he choked out the words, and amidst his own tangled feelings, Draco could vaguely appreciate how hard it must have been for him to let Ginny go.

But then the words sank in for real, and Draco felt his mind go blank, his heart beating at full speed again, his whole body going numb because he realized that Ginny had loved him, only him. And he, Draco Malfoy, had pushed her away, breaking her heart – and his own – in the process.

Author notes: Thanks for reading, please leave a review. :)