Chapter Text
There were voices around him, loud and strident and a little high-strung.
“…told you the Stone shouldn’t have been at Hogwarts but you wouldn’t listen!”
He stirred. He knew that voice. Potter’s anger had been a towering rage when the Wizengamot brought up that Snape had helped Draco escape Hogwarts. That Snape had murdered Dumbledore in cold blood. Potter had yelled them into silence in that voice.
“Mr. Flamel explicitly told you the Stone should be kept far away from where people could get hurt because of it. It was why he’d suggested destroying the Stone once he’d decided to die.”
Draco twitched. That wasn’t something he expected. Maybe he was hearing things. Sirius Black was dead. Another voice, warm and ancient and familiar and sending prickles tingling down the back of Draco’s neck, said something Draco couldn’t quite hear. Boots clicked on the stone floor, as if someone was pacing, cagey and agitated.
“And you didn’t listen!” Potter insisted. “Now look what’s happened! My son is hurt, and two of his friends nearly died! If you’d just listened to us, Ms. Granger wouldn’t have nearly suffocated from that curse, and Mr. Malfoy wouldn’t be at death’s door. Just because the boy is an orphan doesn’t mean his life is expendable, Albus!”
…Albus? Did Potter mean Albus Dumbledore? But he was dead too! Draco had watched him die. Had watched Snape’s curse hurtle from his wand and sent the old man falling from the Astronomy Tower. Aunt Bella had laughed.
“I regret the events that transpired surrounding the Philosopher’s Stone, Mr. Black, but given the break-in at Gringotts and the unique capability of this school to protect artifacts of magic, I can’t agree that bringing the Stone to the school wasn’t the right choice. I daresay young Mr. Potter would not be alive without it.”
Draco supposed they were bringing everyone dead back to life now. Next thing he knew, the Dark Lord was back and Potter’s decisive victory in Hogwarts had been nothing more than a smokescreen.
“Harry would not have been hurt had the Stone not been here in the first place,” Black said sternly. “Nor would Ms. Granger. Nor the Malfoy kid.”
That was rude. Granger got to be Ms. Granger and he was just the Malfoy kid ? Was it because he was a Death Eater? Black sounded exactly the way Draco’s father could never call Potter and his friends by any polite name. Dumbledore’s people liked to pretend they were better than Draco’s ilk, but were far too similar to Death Eaters than they probably thought they were.
“On the contrary, Mr. Black, I fully believe Mr. Potter would have met a potentially more dangerous turn without the Stone. Lord Voldemort lingers in places and among people we least expect. Had the children not somehow managed to retrieve the Stone from the mirror and feed it to Mr. Potter, he would have certainly died and there would have been no bringing him back.”
“Gentlemen, perhaps it would be better if you had this conversation in an office instead of a sickroom!”
That crisp, no-nonsense voice was definitely Madam Pomfrey. Was he in Hogwarts? Why on earth would he be back at the school? He hadn’t been back in Hogwarts since… since the war ended. What was going on?
He slitted his eyes open. The brightness of the infirmary was blinding. He gurgled out a moan and struggled to sit up. Gentle hands pushed him back into his pillows.
“Mum?”
His eyes fluttered open and Professor Sprout’s plump face was smiling kindly at him. She tucked the blanket up his chest more firmly… wait, what?
He blinked awake, shooting out of the bed and nearly colliding with Sprout, who sat in a chair next to his bed.
“Mr. Malfoy, please, you need to rest,” she said. There was warmth as such he hadn’t quite heard from her before, hadn’t heard from anyone save perhaps his parents.
Draco whipped his head, taking in the faces around the room. Dumbledore stood at the foot of another bed, a tuft black hair peeking from under a mound of blankets. Potter—or what looked like a reasonable facsimile of Potter because this man was entirely too tall and too handsome to be him—stood with a clean-shaven Sirius Black next to the bed. Beside them, Granger’s cloud of frizzy hair was unmistakable in another hospital bed. The two men conversing with Dumbledore stopped talking abruptly, their eyes zeroing in on Draco, who stared back, dumbfounded.
Then, memory returned.
He was in the hospital wing because he and Granger had ventured into the forbidden third floor corridor because Potter had gone missing. There had been a gauntlet of enchantments, spell protections to keep the Philosopher’s Stone out of thieving, prying hands. Quirrell had been behind it all; luring Potter, and by extension, Draco and Granger, into danger so he could use them to obtain the Stone from the Mirror of Erised. Quirrell, not Snape, had been the one working for the Dark Lord, had allowed himself to be possessed by the Dark Lord’s wraith. And the mirror… Potter—the real Potter, the one Draco knew from his timeline—had hidden the Stone. And then the Dark Lord had—
“Potter,” he rasped to Sprout, his small hands gripping the edges of his blanket. “The Dark Lord! He was there! He’s possessed Quirrell and he killed Potter! There was the mirror and there was an adult Potter in it and he told me the Stone was in Potter’s mouth! But Quirrell and I fell in—”
Dumbledore turned to Draco and he shrank back into the sheets. The old man’s eyes narrowed a little behind his half-moon spectacles, and he seemed so much older than the spryness he exhibited before when he spoke with Potter’s father and Sirius Black.
“Mr. Malfoy, I’m glad you are awake,” he said. There was a soothing calmness in the headmaster’s voice, but it served only to agitate Draco even more. He reached out, unseeing, and grasped Sprout’s hand. “Perhaps you would be so kind as to recount to us the details of your and Mr. Potter and Ms. Granger’s adventure. I confess, I have my conjectures as to the events of the previous evening, and Mr. Potter and Ms. Granger have both provided their accounts, but alas. There are gaps in all our knowledge, and we would be grateful if you can help us understand how it is that Professor Quirrell’s body cannot be found.”
“Quirrell killed my son?” James Potter’s voice shook with that same towering fury Draco remembered of Potter during his trial.
“He… he told him to look in the mirror, that Potter knew how to get the Stone out.” He swallowed and gripped Sprout’s hand painfully. “Potter told him he didn’t, and the Dark Lord… I mean Quirrell… he put his finger to Potter’s forehead and he just collapsed. He wasn’t moving after… I thought—the mirror said he was alive because the Stone was in his mouth but…”
A splash of liquid dripped onto his hand. Draco was surprised to realize he was crying.
He looked up to Sprout, his fingers digging into her hand, a boulder lodged in his throat, making his breath tight and belabored. “He’s not dead, is he?”
Mr. Potter and Black exploded into shouts at his question. Black looked furious as he flung accusations at Dumbledore. Mr. Potter looked as if he was two seconds from hexing the headmaster, propriety be damned.
“Gentlemen, that’s enough!” Pomfrey declared sternly. “This is the hospital wing, not the Wizengamot floor! If you want to shout at each other and assign any blame for these injured students, you can yell all you want away from my infirmary! ”
The three men subsided at last at that. Mr. Potter was still red-faced, like he would very much tear the school stone by stone if it assuaged his rage that his son was hurt. Black looked positively murderous as he shot to his feet and stormed out of the infirmary.
“After you, headmaster,” Mr. Potter said curtly.
Dumbledore gave the man a long, measured look full of tiredness and worry, before he swept past him, pausing only to wish Draco a speedy recovery, and left the room. Mr. Potter followed, his fists clenching and unclenching. He stopped at Draco’s bed as well, and for a moment, the towering rage clouding his face receded and a look of infinite gratitude tinged with pity entered his eyes.
“He didn’t die, Draco,” he said quietly. “Harry and Hermione both woke up a few hours before you did and told us much of what happened. We don’t know how you did it, but your timely intervention putting the Stone in Harry’s mouth was what saved his life.”
“How did we get the Stone into Potter’s mouth?” Draco asked. It had been a lucky break that the Potter in the mirror had told him it was there. “And how did I… I fell in to the mirror, sir. That’s why I disappeared. And then I got out. Why did that happen?”
Mr. Potter frowned. “I’m not sure either. Headmaster Dumbledore told us about the enchantments he put on the mirror to protect the Stone. It would have relinquished the Stone to someone who wanted it but not wanted to use it. I suppose… I suppose it’s possible that because you thought to hide the Stone in a place you didn’t think Quirrell would know, the mirror relinquished it to you in Harry’s mouth. As for falling into the mirror…” He shrugged. “I’ve never heard of these things happening, and I should. I was the one who lent that mirror to Dumbledore.” He sighed tiredly. “That was a mistake, clearly.”
Draco didn’t think so. The mirror had protected the Stone exactly how Dumbledore had enchanted it. And it had saved his life, possibly even Quirrell’s life by separating him from the Dark Lord’s wraith when they fell in. Of course, Quirrell’s life may be forfeit anyway since Draco had not managed to pull him out of the mirror.
“What happens to the Stone now?”
Mr. Potter was surprised. “I thought you knew. The Stone is gone. I don’t know what happened to it; Dumbledore thinks its use to save Harry’s life has completely consumed it.”
Draco blinked. That was the power of the Stone? But that was incredible! He was so sure Potter had been dead when he fell. Quirrell killed him. This meant putting the Stone in his mouth had brought him back to life. No wonder the Dark Lord had tried so hard to obtain it.
Mr. Potter smiled down at him, a strained twist of lips, like the kindness he wished to portray could be snuffed out by the anger he had momentarily set aside. “You were very brave for what you did for Harry. And that was very quick thinking with Hermione’s injured arm too. Sirius and I are in your debt for saving my son.”
“Mr. Potter, please, my student needs peace and quiet,” Sprout said, though she was not as irate as Pomfrey, who glared at Mr. Potter as if she would sooner push him out of the infirmary herself.
“Take care of yourself, son,” said Mr. Potter, patting Draco’s foot under his blanket before striding out of the hospital wing at last.
Draco watched him leave. And then he turned to Sprout, who pushed his tangled hair back and helped him back into bed. His eyes sought out Potter and Granger on the beds across from him, trying to ascertain if he could see their blankets move from their breathing.
“They’re really okay? Potter and Granger?”
“Yes, Mr. Malfoy,” Sprout said. “Madam Pomfrey says they need to spend only a night more in the infirmary, and then they’ll be back in their dorms. You need to get some sleep too. You were going gray when Mr. Nott and Professor Mcgonagall found you in that basement.”
“Quite,” Pomfrey said crisply, pouring a potion into a cup and handing it to Draco. “Come now, Mr. Malfoy. You need to calm down and get some more sleep. Else you won’t recover on time to join your schoolmates for the leaving feast.”
Draco obligingly drank the potion, a Sleeping Draught from the vaguely minty taste of it. He settled back against the pillows, his eyes heavy as the potion coursed through his system. “What happened to Quirrell? I heard Dumbledore say you couldn’t find his body.”
Sprout heaved a sigh. “No, they didn’t. Ms. Granger says when you stumbled out of the mirror, it was just you. The headmaster thinks he is lost forever. The mirror was not meant to be a portal but it became so through strange magic none perhaps would ever understand.”
Pomfrey harrumphed. “And good riddance to him, I say! Honestly! Rehiring someone he knew harbored You-Know-Who! What is this school coming to now?”
Sprout said something more but Draco was too sleepy to hear and he settled himself to a deep, long, dreamless sleep. Whatever else explained what had happened between him, Quirrell and the Dark Lord could wait.
Potter and Granger were discharged while Draco slept off his injuries. Once Pomfrey was satisfied there were no lingering effects to the curses Quirrell had lobbed on them, they were allowed to return to Gryffindor Tower.
Draco was not so fortunate. The effects of the Dark Lord’s possession of Quirrell and the pain of whatever esoteric magic had caused Draco to writhe and recoil from him when touched had been so traumatizing, he suffered repeated nightmares.
At first it had only been dreams of unending pain. Draco could have lived with that. He’d been subjected to the Cruciatus Curse before. All the Death Eaters at Malfoy Manor had been when he let Potter get away, and the Dark Lord’s curse had been far more potent than anything Aunt Bella had ever subjected him to when teaching him how to control his bodily responses. The pain from Quirrell touching him had not been so different.
But then, the dreams morphed. Now, the dreams were once more about his parents, the terror they had been subjected to during their time living with the Dark Lord, the horror Draco had witnessed when they were cut down. Night after night, he dreamed of entering the mirror world again. This time, he would not listen to Potter. He didn’t care if he no longer belonged in that world. It was the world where his parents lived, the world where they were shamed but still breathing. That, more than anything, was still all he wanted. Dreams of seeing their faces, hearing his mother’s voice singing lullabies in the dark and his father spouting the same misguided rhetoric both tormented and comforted him. Some nights, he woke screaming and Pomfrey would run into the infirmary and fuss over him until he quieted enough that she could get a Calming Draught into his system.
During the day, he obsessed over what Mr. Potter had told him about Stone, how Dumbledore had been almost certain Quirrell had succeeded in killing Potter, and how Potter was nonetheless alive because Draco had gotten the Stone into him. How the Stone had granted Potter back his life but had been consumed in the process. Pomfrey worried that he may be too traumatized to be released back in time for the leaving feast. That was when it dawned on Draco that he had not at all thought of what he would do once the school term formally ended and they would have to leave for the summer.
He asked Sprout about this when she visited to give him his final marks. He hadn’t done too shabbily, with Outstandings all around, save for History of Magic, which was when he’d caught up on sleep on the days he kept awake with the same dreams that plagued him now. He didn’t remember what his marks had been the first time he’d gone to first year, but he was sure he had to place better and higher than Granger now. That prompted a different round of internal questions, because while he still considered Granger an academic rival, she was his friend now. He couldn’t imagine pretending they did not share some kind of bond after how much they had relied on each other, how they had saved each other’s lives once they fell in that trapdoor.
“I’m very proud of you, Mr. Malfoy.” Sprout beamed at him as he checked his grades. “Never have I taught a student who has outperformed his peers, not only in our house, but across Hogwarts. All your teachers, even Professors Mcgonagall and Snape, agree that they have never encountered a student quite so brilliant. For that alone, I believe you should be awarded twenty points.”
Draco preened. Twenty points was massive. Gryffindor and Slytherin were at the top, with Potter’s Quidditch wins for Gryffindor pulling them five points shy of Slytherin’s 472 points. The awarded points put Hufflepuff nowhere near their scores, but it was the first time Draco had actually been recognized for something he had done all on his own, and with the handicap of his shitty wand. Perhaps now, the rest of his house would be more appreciative of his industry and genius.
Still, that did not erase the trepidation he felt over the looming train ride back to London.
“Professor, is there any way students might be granted to stay in the school over the summer?”
He fidgeted with the hem of his infirmary robes. Sprout’s bright smile dissolved into a curious pucker of lips at the question. He did not want to speak of Walburga Black and the misery of going back to Grimmauld Place, but with his wand improving at accepting his magic and somehow still falling short, he did not think he could use it at all to Apparate. Besides, where would he go if not Grimmauld Place? Malfoy Manor was in ruins; the Dark Lord had seen to that when his Killing Curse rebounded off Draco. Perhaps Theo might invite him over, but having him live with his friend for two months was shameful. And Draco may no longer have his parents, but he hadn’t lost the pride they’d instilled in him.
“I… thought you might ask this when that Howler arrived for you after the Sorting,” Sprout said softly. “Unfortunately, the school cannot house students during the summer. Us teachers, and even our caretaker, Mr. Filch, will return to our own homes so we can also take the time to return to our lives.”
“But I’m… I’m good! I can take care of myself and I won’t need any supervision while I’m here! I won’t get into any trouble! There are house elves in the castle and they won’t be leaving Hogwarts, would they? I can just stay with them! My great aunt leaves me with Kreacher all the time anyway—”
Sprout smiled gently at this. “Yes, you are right. The house elves do live in Hogwarts and consider it their home, but our magical laws require our children to grow up with your rightful and legal guardians. I am sorry, Mr. Malfoy. I do wish I can help you, but there’s very little of wizarding law that allows a teacher to do where a magical child is placed. You will have to return to your great aunt. Perhaps with the months you have spent getting along with your peers, you’ll be better equipped to deal with your great aunt now.”
Draco thought about how venomously Walburga had threatened him if he did not Sort in Slytherin and brought shame to her family. Fat chance of that ever happening.
He did not pursue the issue though, knowing when he was defeated and bowing out rather than make a fool of himself. If his father had been alive, Lucius would have made these people move heaven and earth to keep the school manned and open so Draco could stay. Of course, if his parents were alive, Draco wouldn’t have to stay in the school or with Walburga in the first place.
Theo visited him shortly after Sprout, roundly chastising him for his bone-headed idea to agree with the Gryffindors to go after the Stone themselves.
“I would have gotten to you with Sprout and Mcgonagall if you’d just waited a few hours,” he muttered into Draco’s hair. He grumbled and whined, but he wouldn’t let go of the tight hug with which he greeted Draco until Draco complained of his ribs creaking. “Don’t do that again, you knob! We’re not heroes here and we don’t have to be. Let the adults deal with the Dark Lord. That’s what they’re here for.”
Draco squinted at his friend. Theo had changed with how he treated him since the last time they fought over Snape. It was a little strange, but Theo had been so much nicer, and Draco wasn’t about to complain.
“I know. You have to admit though: it’ll be useful having Granger and Potter around now that we’re all properly friends. They’re a damn sight better than Vince, Greg and Pansy at the very least. Less people to help with homework.”
Theo rolled his eyes. “I can’t believe I’m doing the rubbish you had to do before. Blaise has them lumbering after him all the time but won’t help them with any homework. Did you know Greg has trouble even reading his own handwriting? And Pansy thinks homework is optional! I’ve never met a bigger group of idiots!”
Draco laughed. Vince and Greg’s abysmal performance at just about everything had been part of why Draco had forced himself to be so studious, so he could teach the class lectures over again to his friends in the common room. And convincing Pansy that a magical education was more important than finding a Pureblood husband at twelve years old had nearly been an insurmountable task. He wished he could be with them again in the dungeons, but decided, after Sprout’s gentle letdown about staying at school, Hufflepuff wasn’t quite so bad.
He spent the rest of Theo’s visit recounting the events leading up to the fight with Quirrell. Theo was smug and gratified that he had turned out to be right: Snape hadn’t been after the Stone. In fact, he’d actively been trying to prevent Quirrell from getting to it. And he had protected Draco when Quirrell sought to kill him by burning him alive with his own experimental potions.
“You know what I don’t get?” Draco said after finishing with Mr. Potter’s parting words to him when he first woke. “Potter’s father told me it was because that image of Potter I saw in the mirror put the Stone in his mouth, and that’s what brought Potter back to life. Granger and I both saw him die. I can’t have been mistaken about it. He was dead. And then suddenly, he wasn’t. Dumbledore thinks it’s to do with the Stone. Said restoring Potter back consumed it.”
“Remains to be seen then, whether Potter’s all still up there—” Theo knocked a finger to the side of his head meaningfully “—after being resurrected.”
But Draco wasn’t thinking about what Potter was like since they were rescued from the basement. He hadn’t seen him and Granger since they were discharged. No, it was the ramifications of what the Stone had achieved with Potter that held his interest. Potter was dead. And then he wasn’t. That had to mean something.
Theo frowned. “I’m not liking that look. That’s the same face you made when you told us you wanted to make badges to piss Potter off back in fourth year.”
Draco rubbed a hand over his face and scowled. “I’m not making any sort of look. I have the perfect poker face, I’ll have you know.”
Theo snorted. “You wish. You kept losing your shit over the littlest things when Potter didn’t fail at the Triwizard tasks!”
“I did not! Anyway, it doesn’t matter. All of that doesn’t matter!”
“I don’t follow…”
“Think about it! Potter was dead, and then he wasn’t! The Stone brought him back to life!” He grabbed Theo’s wrists, excitement brimming in his throat at the possibilities. “If the Philosopher’s Stone can bring people back from the dead then I don’t need to go back to our timeline! I just need to make a Philosopher’s Stone and I can bring my parents back!”
Theo did not think his idea to make Philosopher’s Stones to bring his parents back to life was any sort of viable plan. Draco didn’t try to convince him. Theo had always annoyingly been a skeptic and a pessimist, never believing that Draco could achieve anything he set his mind to. That wasn’t true. Draco had achieved plenty. He’d fixed that blasted Vanishing Cabinet when Borgin told him there was no way to do it without seeing both ends, hadn’t he? Sure, it’d taken him months to do it, but he had succeeded. What that success led to was beside the point. Draco had achieved a complicated piece of magic with fixing the cabinets, and if nothing else spoke of his brilliance, that certainly did.
Besides, he would have plenty of time to research while he wrangled his wand into performing meaningful magic he’d need to create the Stone. He would just need to set aside his plans of toying with time. He would research alchemy and the production of a Philosopher’s Stone on his own. He didn’t need Theo’s help for that.
Madam Pomfrey released him just in time for the end of the school year feast. Draco stopped at the dorms to change back into his school robes. Everyone had already left for the Great Hall, so he was able to nip through the showers for a lick and clean.
Hagrid accosted him on the way back and blubbered an apology that Draco and Potter and Granger had all nearly died because he stupidly sold out information about his three-headed monster. Draco wanted to be snide but the half-giant was uncomfortably earnest and sincere in his apology and Draco was too tired to hold grudges the way he had done his life before.
“Hey, Draco.”
Truman, the seventh year prefect, popped his head into the dorm just as Draco was fixing his tie. He had a sympathetic smile when Draco startled at his appearance and hurriedly shoved his feet into his shoes. He never wanted to be late to a feast again after the incident with the troll. For all he knew, some other crooked teacher lurked in the halls waiting to spring another mountain troll on an unsuspecting student.
“Don’t hurry; everyone’s just getting settled in and I wanted to make sure no one’s left alone here, since we’ll all be going to the courtyards after to get to Hogsmeade Station.”
Draco didn’t want to have to walk with anyone; Truman was very nice, but he’d never been close to any of the Hufflepuffs, and he was still uneasy identifying himself as one. He felt like a snake wearing skin too tight for his body. Or perhaps it was just the wrong skin. He wasn’t a Slytherin anymore.
He and Truman fell into step as they climbed out of the basement. The other boy looked him over.
“I heard you were in the hospital wing for a few days,” Truman said casually.
Draco stiffened. So this was what Potter had to deal with every end of year, when people wanted to know what deviltry he had been up to that landed him in the hospital wing. Truman should really just mind his own business. He was a seventh year student and this would be his last day at school. He shouldn’t have to spend it gossiping about some first year’s misfortunes.
He nodded but didn’t reply, trying to be as small as possible so Truman would be put off asking some truly intrusive questions. Draco did not want people to know he, Potter and Granger had allowed themselves to be lured to the third floor corridor, breaking about every school rule Hogwarts had about venturing to areas the faculty had already mentioned as expressly forbidden.
But Truman only had a solicitous smile as he pushed the common room door open and let Draco precede him. “I hope you’re doing better after all that’s happened. There were some nasty rumors about Professor Quirrell dueling with some students before he disappeared.”
“He attacked me,” Draco muttered resentfully. He didn’t make Quirrell disappear. Quirrell made himself disappear by not crossing the back from the mirror world. That wasn’t Draco’s fault at all.
Truman looked at him with that same expression he’d seen from Mr. Potter. “I’m sorry, Draco. I hope you are doing better. It can’t be a good experience for you if a teacher attacked a student in their first year.”
Draco didn’t mention that he knew all of this before. Well, sort of. He and Theo only remembered the broad strokes of what had transpired between Quirrell and Potter. Half of what they knew had probably only been rumor. He didn’t know how Potter matched up to Quirrell and the Dark Lord. Draco wouldn’t have survived if Potter and Granger hadn’t been with him. If Potter had been alone then… he suppressed a shudder as they climbed the steps to the Great Hall.
“This has been a pretty odd year. A troll in the school back on Halloween, and now a teacher attacking students.” Truman shook his head. “I’m applying for a position with the Board of Governors. I hope, with this year’s experience, they’ll take some feedback from the leaving students and propose better reforms so everything that happened to you this year won’t happen to another first year in the future.”
Draco stumbled and nearly fell flat on his face on the stairs. “Really?”
“Of course. There’s already so much danger we have to deal with in school; magic isn’t exactly easy to control and there’s always the danger of our spell practice going awry.” Truman grinned at him. “We really shouldn’t have to deal with trolls and bad teachers hexing students.”
“Right.”
“Come on, then. We don’t want to miss the House Cup announcement.”
Truman led him to the Hufflepuff table, already crowded with students impatient for their summer vacation to commence. He hated the idea of returning to Grimmauld Place and couldn’t help the gloomy cloud that cast over his optimism with researching the production of a Philosopher’s Stone. The only silver lining to Walburga’s horrible demeanor and general disdain for Draco was that he was reasonably sure her ancient townhouse had a library full of books on old, esoteric magic. That, at least, was a place to start. He could always camp out there so he need never encounter her and her horrid house elf.
The awarding of the House Cup went about as he expected. The hall was already decorated in Slytherin silver and green even though they were only a handful of points ahead of Gryffindor. But he remembered how Dumbledore had upended the scores at the end of every year, with some of the most egregious displays of favoritism for Potter and his friends. Gryffindor won the House Cup year on year until the old coot died.
Things didn’t change much this year. He’d gotten Hufflepuff points that pulled them out of the dumps and placed them above Ravenclaw.
At least Hufflepuff wasn’t finishing dead last, but he never really felt as if he was part of it anyway. He supposed there had been a few kind people through the year. Truman and Diggory had been nice. And Roper wasn’t too bad. His other classmates weren’t horrible either, except for Smith and Macmillan. This was certainly no Slytherin house. He would never be best friends with Finch-Fletchley and Hopkins, would never pretend to date Abbott or Bones the way he had Pansy so his friends wouldn’t learn of his long-time crush on Montague. But there were people who’d been kind to him even if he’d done nothing to earn it, and it hadn’t been a terrible experience, despite the long weeks of loneliness when no one in his house would speak to him.
Theo, he was surprised, had gotten points too. Apparently, remembering to tell a teacher if you were in trouble warranted ten points. He’d caught Theo’s gaze and they rolled their eyes at this.
The lion’s share of points went to Gryffindor, of course. Draco would not begrudge Potter and Granger the points they earned; they did work together to get through the enchantments protecting the Stone. But he could not help the sour taste in his mouth when they overtook Slytherin by a massive margin and usurped them for the Cup.
It would not have been so terrible if the Great Hall had not been decorated in Slytherin colors. What was the point of embarrassing school children that way? Sure, they were nasty pieces of work much of the time, but Draco was sure all children were nasty pieces of work at least one point of their childhood.
He sat in the train with Theo, who bitched and grumbled at the unfairness of it all. Draco only half-listened. The house cup was the least of his worries. He and Theo knew what would come in the following years and that was something they needed to prepare for too. But first, he needed to survive a summer spent consciously living with his mother’s horrid relative, and he was unsure he wouldn’t try to hex her in her sleep so she’d never wake. He did not bring up that he would use what time he had during the summer for research on his new project.
“You know, you can always come to my house,” Theo said in an attempt to cheer Draco up. “My father’s away half the time anyway. He’s chasing some obscure scroll out in Ireland or Wales, and my stepmother hardly leaves her rooms when he’s away.”
“That would be great if that blithering screech owl would ever open our Floo and let me travel,” Draco muttered glumly. “I told you: she refuses anything to do with the outside world and the three of us just putter around the house, trying not to kill each other. I’m half afraid she’ll confiscate my wand just to ensure I don’t try to skip out on her. Her eldest son ran away from home and she’s paranoid I’ll do the same.”
“You know, I’m sure there’s a proper healing term for that—being shut up in a house for two months. Can’t you befriend the house elf to help you?” Theo smirked. “I know you’re all about befriending everyone and everything you used to hate these days.”
“Shut up,” Draco muttered. Befriending Granger was one thing—it was just expedient and she wouldn’t leave him alone. But Draco drew the line at that nasty little boil that did Walburga’s bidding.
Theo would have needled him some more about Kreacher and Aunt Walburga, but the compartment door opened just then and Granger burst in.
“Draco!” Granger cried, throwing herself at him.
Draco found himself with an armful of utterly relieved Gryffindor girl and a mouthful of said girl’s frizzy hair. Pomfrey had kept all of his friends out as he recovered after she chased Dumbledore and Potter’s guardians out, so Draco had not had a chance to talk to any of them at all.
“I’m so glad you’re okay!” she said feelingly, letting him go and climbing into the space next to Theo, whom she grinned at, buck teeth and all. “Thanks for getting the teachers there on time, too, Theo.”
Theo cast Draco an alarmed look, undoubtedly worried that Granger might subject him to her Gryffindor cooties as well. But Granger only talked and compared marks, because she was Granger and she was insufferable about school and books and her marks. But this time, Draco was smug in the knowledge he’d done much better than her.
Potter strolled in after her, shutting the door and sitting awkwardly next to Draco. “Erm, my dad said you saved my life.”
Draco remembered Mr. Potter’s earnest declaration of a life debt to Draco for something he wasn’t sure he even did. Potter had saved himself, his mirror image putting the Stone in his mouth. Draco had just been the idiot who’d seen him in the mirror.
“Yeah. Don’t try to hug me or anything. I still need to floss out Granger’s hair from my teeth.”
Potter laughed and shook his head, his awkwardness melting. “I’m glad you’re okay too. Hermione says you and Quirrell disappeared into the mirror and we thought you’d be gone forever.” He ducked his head, hiding the tiny smile that dimpled his cheeks. “That would be… er… yeah.”
“Yeah,” Draco agreed, thankful Potter didn’t make things any weirder than they already were. “It would be… yeah.”
They spent the train ride speculating about the mirror and Quirrell. Draco kept quiet about the Stone; Theo did not bring it up, even when Potter repeated Dumbledore and Mr. Potter’s explanation about how he hadn’t died because of the power of the Stone. There was no need to alert anyone of his plans. The less anyone knew of it, the better.
By the time the train pulled up to King’s Cross, Granger declared that they must all write to each other over the summer so she wouldn’t feel so disconnected from magic and their world while she fitted herself back into her muggle life. Potter was jealous because his father deemed him too young to join Mr. Potter’s and Black’s excursions into muggle society. And Theo gave a long-suffering sigh of agreement that he would be roped into this correspondence with literal children.
Potter caught Draco’s hand as he lugged his trunk out of the train and scanned the platform for any sign of his hated aunt and her equally detestable house elf. “You’ll write to me too, right?”
Draco blinked back at him. In the distance behind Potter, his father waved excitedly for his son. Potter’s dad was so unspeakably attractive, it wouldn’t be so bad having to write to his speccy git of a son. Draco supposed since they were friends now, it wouldn’t hurt to do so.
“If my great aunt ever lends me her owl, then sure. I’d better go. I see her polluting the platform with her horrid gloomy cheer now.”
Potter followed his gaze to a shadowy corner away from all the other waiting parents and guardians and gasped. “Mrs. Black is your great aunt?!”
“Er, yeah. Didn’t I tell you before? Merlin, she gets on my nerves all the time. Look at her scowling to ward everyone away. If I could, I’d put her under a perpetual Cheering Charm to get out the massive stick she has up her arse. I just want her to stop grousing about what a failure of a Black I am because I’m also half Malfoy.”
“Oh, I’m so sorry,” Potter said feelingly. “I had no idea Sirius’ mum was your great aunt.”
“Wish me luck that I’ll live through the summer.”
Potter squeezed his hand. “I’ll do you one better: I’ll ask my dad to invite you over instead and you and I can spend the summer together!”
Theo bumped them both from behind. His stepmother stood a little aways from Aunt Walburga and tried not to let the self-righteous air of the Black matriarch pollute her space. “Hey, get in line, Four Eyes. I asked him first.”
Draco shook his head as Potter and Theo got into a spirited argument about whom he should spend the summer with. Walburga was already screeching at the top of her lungs for him to quit dawdling. Returning to Grimmauld Place was such a miserable existence, but he supposed it wouldn’t be too bad whiling two months away from the school doing research that would bring his parents back. He wouldn’t even be lonely anymore. This time, he had letters from friends to look forward to.
THE END OF THE BEGINNING
