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Admissions Office, Le Fey College of Witchcraft and Wizardry, Department of Healing and Magi-Biology, Cambridge University

August 1999.

Dear Mr Malfoy,

Thank you for your interest in Le Fey College of Witchcraft and Wizardry. As you are no doubt aware, this is one of the most popular courses at our establishment and competition for places is fierce. However, this letter brings positive news.

We would be delighted to welcome you to the Department of Healing and Magi-Biology Degree five-year programme. You were selected on the basis of your outstanding N.E.W.T. results, the excellent references provided by Headteacher McGonagall and Professor Horace Slughorn, and the outstanding essay that you offered in support of your application.

Your attendance at the college is required from Monday the sixth for Library, Laboratory and St Mungo’s inductions. Lessons will begin the following week.

Furthermore, we are pleased to inform you that you have been selected to receive a full scholarship. Your award will include all tuition fees, all meals, and a monthly stipend of forty Galleons for the purchase of textbooks, potions ingredients and Healing equipment as required. These funds will be replenished on the third of every month, and tuition fees will be paid directly to the university.

Your scholarship also includes a shared room at the university. Please fill out the application form on the additional page at your earliest convenience.

Your scholarship is funded via the charitable donation of a Mr J. Evans. He wished to convey the following words to you in this letter.

“It is my greatest wish that the wounds of the recent wizarding war begin to heal and I do not believe this will be achieved by denying gifted wizards such as yourself the ability to be of service to the community. A famous Muggle philosopher wrote that ‘life can only be understood backwards, but it must be lived forwards.’ I agree with this sentiment. We must strive to build a happier future for all the wixen of Britain. That number includes yourself. Please accept my scholarship, Mr Malfoy. Your prodigious talents deserve to flourish, and I cannot think of a more powerful symbol of a truly united magical Britain than seeing you graduate at the head of your class.”

Mr Evans has made the decision to not place any grade requirements on you keeping your scholarship and only asks that you work hard, practice good self-care, and take advantage of every opportunity that life at Le Fey College can offer.

Furthermore, Mr Evans has made the decision to remain anonymous, as is his right and privilege. Any communications about your stipend can be made via the Main Office, and our staff will owl out your letters on your behalf and contact you with any reply.

Here is a preliminary copy of the syllabus and compulsory modules. Further details, book lists and contact details for your tutor will be sent out closer to September.

We look forward to welcoming you to Le Fey College of Witchcraft and Wizardry. This is a challenging and difficult, but also very rewarding course. The Healers and Mediwix of St Mungo’s are well known as some of the finest practitioners of curative and therapeutic magic in the world, our academics and researchers as some of the crucial driving forces in Magi-Biological science, and you have the opportunity to join their ranks.

Please know that abundant conversation and debate has gone into every single one of our student selections and we are very confident that you will excel to become the Healer of your ambitions. Of all the essays that our staff read this year, all were of the opinion that yours was the most elaborate and well considered. Your private research project, The Healing and Magi-Biological attributes of Elach Maidenhair and Vervain Mallow in the successful treatment of Dragon Pox, was fascinating and warrants a more advanced investigation during the coming years.

Congratulations once again. We look forward to meeting you in September.

Yours sincerely,

Ms Louise Mulvaney.

Director of Healing and Magi-Biology, Le Fey College of Witchcraft and Wizardry.

September 1999.

Dear Mr Evans,

First, I must ask if that is how you would wish to be addressed. All I know about you is your surname which, I’m afraid, tells me very little. I don’t know anyone called Evans, although I’ll admit that I’ve wracked my brains and my memory since I first heard your designation. If you are a Wizengamot Minister or a Master Healer then I send my profound apologies.

If I’m being totally honest — and I really want to be — a not-so-small part of me wants to call you my glorious benefactor or magnificent patron. Please don’t think me very rude or childish, although I am fully aware of how facetious I must sound. I’ve always had a tongue that was slightly too sharp for my own good, though, if you know me, you likely already know about that unfortunate part of my persona. It’s a defence mechanism and one that I’m working hard to unlearn. It simply feels curious to be so deep in your debt and yet not to know who you are.

I have a small confession: when I first received news of your charity, I had so many conflicting emotions. At first, I thought the letter must be a clever fraud, made up to ridicule me and make me look pathetic. I must’ve Firecalled Ms Mulvaney a dozen times before I could accept that it was in earnest. The poor witch became tired of fielding calls from me.

Once I realised it was genuine, I struggled a little with internalised guilt. The idea that I might be in receipt of charity left me struggling with my own sense of self. It left me grappling with who I’d become. Was I somehow lessened by your offer? My father was a proud, arrogant man. He looked down on the poor, believing them lazy and somehow to blame for their situation. I spent my youth listening to him and believing his every word. Mr Evans, I had to force myself to look at your sponsorship of me from a very different angle. Perhaps your wish is simply kindness. To view me, Draco Malfoy, as more than the sum of my parts. Perhaps you think of me as more than the Dark Mark on my arm, and the choices I made before I knew any better.

So, secondly, I want to thank you. I really don’t have the words to convey how big an opportunity you have given me, Mr Evans.

I don’t mean that in terms of the scholarship or the stipend, although both of these are very generous indeed. What I really want to thank you for is the gift of a chance to make a life for myself, one where I’m not defined by my past. I want to make you proud of me, whoever you might be. You quoted Kierkegaard to me — yes, I always do my research — and I do intend to use my time at Le Fay College to leap into my future life at full pelt. However, I can’t — won’t — forget my dark past. It is with me every day of my life, burnt into my forearm, stark against my pale skin. Mr Evans, I want to redeem myself, both to the world, and to my own self. I want the name Malfoy to stand for something positive, something decent.

Mr Evans, do you know Le Fey College at all? If you do, then my awe at the environment I find myself in will not surprise you in the slightest. If you don’t, then please allow me a moment to wax lyrical about the university.

The Department of Healing and Magi-Biology is housed in the most wonderful Tudor mansion. The stone of the walls are the most wonderfully warm buttery yellow and the rooms are wainscoted with ancient oak. There are beautiful gardens where I drink my morning coffee and every single plant is used to brew healing potions. The library is simply vast; I cannot fathom how powerful the extension spells must be that are built into the walls. Every morning that I wake here is a pleasure. I’m waiting for the other shoe to drop, but it hasn’t yet. Cambridge itself is a wonderful town, although those damned Muggle bicycles are everywhere! I can't help but believe I’ll meet my maker in a collision with one of those contraptions.

I digress. I am sure that you don’t wish to read my fanciful thoughts on the state of Cambridge traffic. The fact is, I never believed that I would attend Le Fey College at all. I was encouraged to try for a place by my Hogwarts potions master, Professor Slughorn, but even as I was writing out my application, I knew that I couldn’t afford the fees to attend.

My family fortune and my inheritance were taken by the Ministry as war reparations. I’ve no doubt at all that you’re aware of my history — the name Malfoy is the most reviled in Britain — however, I readily accepted the punishment. The stark alternative facing me was no less than a cold cell in the depths of Azkaban, and I knew full well that I’d never have survived the experience. I have visited my father there twice now, and his mind has been broken by the unforgiving regime and the brutality of the guards. He isn’t the man he was when I grew up. That Lucius Malfoy is lost to me forever.

I was luckier. The Ministry showed me leniency; I was given a one-year probation period and I served that at Hogwarts, completing my N.E.W.T.s and finishing my education. My extra year at school flew past speedily, for I knew that I had to stand on my own two feet once I left. No longer could I expect to be a Lord of the Manor or an indolent aristocrat. I had to make my way in a world that loathed me. Keeping my head down and studying hard became my new way of life. My mother — Narcissa Black-Malfoy — has left England for the company of friends abroad, and currently lives in Provence, France. She lives in a tumbledown vineyard that hasn’t seen a decent vintage in a dozen years, but I think she is content. Lonely, perhaps. She and my father were never what you’d have described as a love match, but I believe there was companionship there. Mother is forbidden from visiting Father and — as he will never in his lifetime be released — their marriage is effectively ended. I only hope that, in time, she will find some measure of happiness.

Merlin, but you’ll be sitting there, reading this, and wondering who this chatterbox is that you have sponsored! I promise I’m not normally this loquacious but, like I’ve already mentioned, I’ve gotten used to keeping my own company and that of a few friends. It feels pleasant to talk to you and share a few of my thoughts.

My best friend is Pansy. She is the eldest daughter of the Parkinson family and is well known for her wit and beauty. The Parkinson estates weren’t many miles from the edges of our own, and when I was a boy, there was much idle chatter of the two of us being bonded when we reached the appropriate age. The pair of us played up to the idea, but neither of our hearts were in it. Pansy is being courted by another school friend now, Theodore Nott, whereas I don't have any time for romantic intrigues. Love isn’t part of my agenda, Mr Evans, and I assure you that your sponsorship money will not be wasted buying bouquets for any pretty young witches. I am a confirmed bachelor and my only care is for my studies.

On that note, I wish to ask you a question. Might I keep writing to you? I have enjoyed putting my quill to parchment and talking just a little bit about my existence. I presume you must have some interest in my life, or you wouldn’t have made such a generous investment in my future.

If you do not wish to receive my correspondence then please just relay that message to the office. Otherwise, I will try to write to you every few months and keep you abreast of my achievements. I intend to prove that I am worth every Galleon.

Yours sincerely,

Draco Malfoy.

January 2000.

Dear Mr Evans,

Of course, the first thing I must do is wish you a very happy new year and a new millennium. Goodness me, but what a palaver it was for the Muggles! They seemed to believe that the end of the world was nigh. Luckily, the Millennium Bug turned out to be naught but a lot of silliness. None of their contraptions turned savage and none of their aeroplanes fell from the sky.

As for me, I spent the festive season with my Aunt Andromeda and her young grandson — my cousin — Teddy Lupin. Don’t worry, his given name isn’t actually Teddy. That would have been an unbearably twee name for the poor child to have carried around for the rest of his life. His name is really Edward, and he was named after his grandfather.

If I’m being truthful, the whole holiday felt a little surreal to me. I hadn’t planned to leave university, but Aunty Andi — as she insists that I call her — wrote to me and told me that I was invited. “After all,” she wrote, “we are the only family you have left in England.” She wasn’t in my life when I grew up, even though she was my mother’s sister. Andi was disowned because her husband didn’t come from a Sacred Twenty-Eight family. Merlin, but it feels odd to actually write those words.

Sacred Twenty-Eight sounds like it comes from a different century, doesn’t it? I grew up believing in their superiority — grew up believing in our special, flawless blood status — but now I know it was all just a fairy tale. It was a lie, built to preserve the power of a small elite. That was the first thing I learnt here at Le Fey College: that magic doesn’t discriminate. It comes from the world around us, comes from the very earth itself. Muggleborns are no more or less magical, Mr Evans. It is simply that the magical centre of their brain develops in utero.

Even so, it was hard for me to cross Aunty Andi’s doorstep. I knew that my blond hair and my sharp, pointy features are all my father's; I don’t have much of my mother in my appearance, and I hated that my appearance might have put her on edge. It didn’t seem to, though. I was welcomed inside her cottage with open arms and an even bigger heart.

Despite my nerves, I felt welcomed and wanted. Andi’s small cottage with its vast, decorated tree and lines of enchanted fairy lights felt more immediately homely than the ice splendour that was the background to my childhood Christmases at the Manor.

Best of all was little Teddy Lupin. He was a revelation, Mr Evans. I’ve zero experience with small children and haven’t any siblings of my own, so I was worried that I’d come across as distant and wooden to the toddler.

I needn’t have worried. The clever little wizard brought me books to read, rolled his ball towards me, and made the most darling of giggles when I made a light show on the wall with my wand. Aunty Andi suggested I focus my attention onto Paediatric Healing as I seemed to have a gift. I hardly think for a moment that she was serious, but the children’s ward is the area where I will have my first work experience after Easter, so perhaps I will feel differently afterwards. I will, of course, report back via my letters.

Overall, I enjoyed Christmas far more than I had expected. I missed my mother very much, but we did have an enjoyable conversation over Firecall on Christmas Day afternoon. She was cheerier than I’ve seen her since the end of the war, and said that the Bordeaux air was suiting her. There was only a single fly in the potion that was my holiday, and that was our fine Saviour, the great and glorious Harry Potter. He is Teddy’s godfather, and he came for sherry and luncheon on Boxing Day.

Reading that paragraph back to myself, it would seem that I’ve fallen back into bad habits. I spy the re-emergence of my sharp tongue, and I expect that you’re sitting with this parchment in hand, shocked that I might describe Potter in such negative terms.

A wise man would Evanesco his words, but I’m not going to. My preference is that you know I’m fallible and that I’m learning. I’m a work in progress, Mr Evans, and Harry Potter has a propensity to bring out the worst aspects of my personality. It had always been thus, ever since I was a wet-behind-the-ears boy of eleven.

Don’t worry, I’m not about to treat you as my own personal Mind Healer. I won’t force you to read a dozen lines explaining how I spent my teenage years both equally jealous of Potter and enraged that I wasn’t part of his coterie of close friends. Both facts are true, and I bullied Potter dreadfully as a result. Our relationship reminds me a little of your Kierkegaard quote: life can only be understood backwards.

All I knew when I was a child was that I was awash with hatred, and only now do I have a clear idea of why I behaved as I did. Would you believe that there were some nights where I actually used to dream about the wizard? Whenever I woke, I’d feel exhausted; I’d carry a feeling of discombobulation and frustration around with me for the rest of the day, and—

Merlin. It seems further apologies are in order. I’ve let my quill run away with me, Mr Evans. Like I said, Harry Potter brings out the parts of myself that I loathe the most.

So yes, Boxing Day.

It was quite the trial. Andromeda placed the two of us beside each other, and we were forced to make small talk. The pair of us have a relatively cordial relationship nowadays — we survived an eighth year sharing a dormitory and nearly all of our classes — and Potter knew all about my course at Le Fay College. Some of our mutual acquaintances have obviously been blabbing.

The Prophet loves to describe Potter as some sort of latter-day Prince Charming but the truth is, our Saviour is actually quite the dunderhead. Some of the questions he asked! Honestly, they bordered on the absurd. One of them was ‘how many wixen have you healed yet?’ (None, I’ve been studying for four months!), and the second was ‘if I told you my symptoms, could you cure me?’ (I had to laugh at that one, the only symptoms Potter has ever suffered from is being an insufferable arse. He is ridiculously hale and hearty.)

Potter Apparated away after luncheon, no doubt to spend time with his more fashionable friends and to get himself photographed for the cover of Witch Weekly with the comely Miss Weasley. I’m sure they’ll announce their wedding date soon, and then the media will discuss nothing else.

It's of no importance to me, of course. All that matters to me is my course, achieving good grades, and making your sponsorship worthwhile.

I must say, the coming modules look fascinating, especially Evolution and Behaviour of Wizardkind and other Magical Beings. I have quite an interest in the biological mechanisms of werewolf transformation and how the lunar cycle affects the makeup of the nervous system… I’ll stop there, I think. Once I get started on such subjects I can ramble for hours; I’ll have run out of both ink and your patience before I cease!

I’ll leave you be, Mr Evans, and let you enjoy your evening in peace. In my mind's eye, you are the grandfatherly type, perhaps with a wife of many years and a batch of grandchildren. Before I go, let me assure you that I’m cutting a swathe through the required reading and am excited for lessons to begin again.

Work experience begins at St Mungo’s shortly, but I shall write again as soon as I have spare time and keep you up to date.

Yours sincerely,

Draco.

June 2000.

Dear Mr Evans,

Firstly, thank you so much for the wonderful birthday gift. A first-edition copy of Hummel’s Treatise on the Development of Adolescent Magic, in the original Latin, and illustrated with the hand-drawn woodcuts? It’s an item of such rarity and thoughtfulness, and I simply can’t stop leafing through it. I only mentioned it once to you and in passing. I’ve already learnt so much! I don’t even know where one would source such an item, and the price it must have set you back… I can't think how many Galleons you must have spent. Thank you. I don’t know what I ever did to deserve your attention, Mr Evans, but I will keep it safe and study every word of the text.

As you know, my birthday was last Monday, and I made sure to complete all my reading and essays on the preceding days so that I might have the evening off. Pansy, Theo, and another old friend from school, Blaise Zabini, took me out to dinner. The restaurant was a small, family-run place on the outskirts of the wizarding quarter of Cambridge — the Petulant Pixie, I believe the place was called, I mentioned Pans had booked it in our last letter — and quite honestly, I did have the most fantastic time.

Pansy — hand in hand with Theo the whole evening, might I add! — told me all manner of gossip about some of my old school friends. Daphne Greengrass — another Slytherin — has only eloped with an Italian wizard twice her age. Perhaps you have even heard of the scandal, Mr Evans?

Apparently, the gossip is on the lips of every wixen in the whole of London. I hadn’t heard a word, but I am a bit of an egghead nowadays, holed up in my tower with my books. You might not know this about me, but I was, once upon a time, betrothed to the younger Greengrass sister, Astoria. That arrangement all came crashing to an abrupt end after Father was arrested. It was absolutely for the best, though. I couldn’t ever have been the husband Astoria merited or loved her the way she deserved. Pansy says I’m not the marrying kind.

Of course, my good luck never lasts that long. The fates seem determined that Potter and I are destined to run into each other at every opportunity, which means the Wonder Auror himself happened to be eating at the same restaurant.

Sometimes I curse the wizarding world for being so tight-knit! Truthfully, Mr Evans, I left my room for one night and there Potter sat, as bold as brass and twice as shiny! Potter was eating dinner with a gang of sycophantic Gryffindors, and even had the audacity to send over a bottle of champagne to my table! Well, I was entirely livid, of course. I didn't even send a thank you to him via the waiter.

Potter must know that I live a thrifty life since my family wealth was seized by the Ministry, so I expect this was just a cheap laugh at my expense. I didn’t make a scene — I’m not the silly boy I used to be back at Hogwarts — but I felt belittled. I know that I must live under charity, but for one single, solitary night I felt like I was the Draco of old, laughing and light-hearted with my best friends.

Perhaps I’m not even allowed that.

I’m sorry. I’ve come back to my letter after a short break and reread my last thoughts.

You must think me such an ungrateful fool, and you wouldn’t be wrong. I take too many liberties in these letters, don’t I?

Once, months ago, I wrote that I shouldn’t make you my Mind Healer, but I do believe that I’ve made you my father instead. My father, or my confessor, and I’m not really sure which one is worse. It’s exceptionally lonely, being Draco Malfoy. My friends all have their own lives, and Mother would only worry if I spoke to her of my problems. I must protect the visage of success that I’ve projected these many months.

I ought not to moan to you about Potter the way I do. After all, I’d be rotting my life away in a cell in Azkaban if it wasn’t for his testimony at my trial. The Ministry and the Wizengamot wanted me locked away forever, but Potter begged the court for mercy. He asked for my freedom when all anyone else could see was my Dark Mark and my dark deeds. Potter was charitable, wasn’t he? He gave me this future, Mr Evans.

I suppose that’s why I’m always so horribly nettled whenever I see him. I can’t ever repay that debt, especially after I made so much of his younger life vile. However, I’m due to spend my summer holidays with Aunty Andi, and I’m sure that I’ll have a chance to speak to him during the course of those weeks and even ask if he wishes to accompany me to the pub. Life, as you told me once, must be lived forwards.

I feel better for making that decision. Even on my birthday, I knew deep inside that Potter didn’t mean the bottle of champagne to be insulting. It's simply that Mother and Father always used to toast every celebration with a flute of the stuff when I was a young boy, and as an adolescent I'd be given my own glass. The heady scent of champagne or the fizzy taste on my lips, and I’m transported straight back there, Mr Evans. I’m transported back to the Manor and a world before the war. Potter couldn't have known this, could he? Perhaps I should send him a short note, thanking him for his kindness on my birthday. It would be the least I could do.

Let me change the subject to more positive things.

Professor Hayes gave me an Outstanding on my paediatric work placement at St Mungo’s. I enjoyed it thoroughly, though those nights in the Spattergroit clinic were an eye-opener. Some of those sick little tots could barely open their eyes and I felt genuine terror that they wouldn’t pull through the night. Hayes says that’s the mark of a decent Healer — empathy — but it’s very hard to believe that such an attribute could ever be applied to myself.

Thank you once more for my present. I shall treasure it always.

Yours sincerely,

Draco.

September 2000.

Dear Mr Evans,

I hope this letter finds you well. I can scarcely believe that this is my second year here at Le Fay College. I know I’m guilty of moaning too often in your ear about the workload, but I wouldn’t choose to be anywhere else in the world and for that, I’ve only you to thank. Remember last year, when I called you my magnificent patron? I was flippant then — I’m still sorry — but it’s true. I don’t think I realised what a truly charitable act it was, taking a chance on Draco Malfoy. You really have been magnificent to me, Mr Evans.

Did you have a good summer? I know you won’t answer, but in my imagination, I’m going to assume that you’ve enjoyed yourself every bit as much as I did.

My first couple of weeks were spent in Bordeaux with my mother, practicing my schoolboy French with the locals and drinking far too many glasses of red wine. We were blessed with fantastic weather and I’ll admit that my face and arms got rather speckled with freckles.

The old me — the Hogwarts me — would have rolled his eyes in disgust at the image presented to the world in France; lazing in a deckchair in my mother’s back garden, sunglasses on my face and a copy of Witch Weekly in my lap. It felt wonderful, though. Like I could finally take a breath after a year of working hard. I’m not complaining — far from it! — I’m simply amused at myself. I’m amused, and even surprised at this unfamiliar person I’m becoming. Don’t laugh at my purple prose, please, but it’s as if I’m emerging from a chrysalis. I’ve spent almost two decades of life trying to be the person other people wanted me to be, only to discover an entirely different one hiding beneath the façade.

My father had huge expectations of how a pure-blood person like myself ought to conduct themselves. There were rules about the clothes that I wore, the books I read, and even the food that I ate. Looking back, I believe that I carried this narrow mindset with me, even after the war and during my eighth year. I was so worried, Mr Evans, always so worried about never losing face or letting the world see even a sliver of vulnerability. The truth is, vulnerabilities are all that we are.

Mother seems to be of the same mindset as I. Losing the Manor and all the accoutrements of an aristocratic life was an overwhelming and huge event in her life, and I’ll confess that I feared greatly for her health. This past year has proved how low my expectations of her were. Narcissa Black-Malfoy has far more resilience than I believed. There is a lightness in her bearing now and a readier smile than I've ever seen before. Even her clothes are different now, for as she says, one cannot attend to the practical tasks of running a vineyard in a corseted gown!

I do believe that the loosening of the bonds of social expectation might, in time, make the two of us closer, for we are free to be ourselves without artifice. Mr Evans, the two of us talked — talked properly — for what feels like the first time in our lives. Next summer I shall visit again and I find that I am excited to see what else has changed about Chateaux Malfoy.

Mother wasn’t the only face that I was reacquainted with over the holidays. As predicted, I also met with our Chosen One, Harry Potter, once again.

You’ll notice something a little different in my future letters, Mr Evans. From here on in, I’ll be describing him as Harry. Mark this date in your diary and hang out the bunting: Harry and I shall henceforward go by first names! Ostensibly, it is at Aunty Andi’s request: she doesn’t want Teddy confused now he’s begun talking. It sounds like a daft excuse to me, but I’m a polite chap, and I’ll do as I’m told.

I suppose that now is as good a time as any to tell you that the relationship between Harry and I isn’t quite as black and white as the Prophet likes to make out. I haven’t been dishonest with you, but perhaps I’ve not been as candid as I ought to have been.

It wasn’t a fib when I told you that I’d bullied Potter — Harry — badly at school. I was cruel and foul, and if he so chose, Harry would have reason to hate me for the rest of his life. I’m quite sure he would have done, had I not made one single choice differently during the course of the war.

You’ll remember the chaos of those short years, Mr Evans, I’m sure of it. Harry was lost to the wizarding world for a time, and many were even suspicious of whether he was even alive. I — and all the other residents of Malfoy Manor — didn’t share their uncertainties. He-Who-Shall-Not-Be-Named had some manner of psychic bond with Harry, and the delivery of him — alive — was His greatest wish.

The gist of it: Harry — bedraggled, hair overgrown and matted and emaciated — was captured by a band of travelling Snatchers and brought to the Manor.

Merlin, but the wizard looked like a state. Some hex or curse had swollen his face beyond almost all recognition. Not for me, though. The verdant green of his eyes was the colour of the envy that always coursed through my veins, and I would have known them anywhere, any time.

When Bellatrix Lestrange screamed at me to identify and name Harry, I simply couldn’t. The words wouldn’t leave my mouth. Even though I’d forfeited my soul and my future on the altar of my family and taken the Mark, I couldn’t betray him.

Harry told me later that I’d saved his life in that moment; that I’d changed the course of the war, but I could barely believe his words. It was such a small, trifling thing compared to Harry’s vast sacrifices.

Please, don’t get me wrong. I don’t believe for a minute that this negates any of my past. It doesn’t, and I shan’t ever deny that I was an active participant in a reign of terror — life can only be understood backwards, after all — but it explains how Harry and I were able to become more than passing acquaintances during our eighth year at Hogwarts.

The two of us… Well, we developed quite a complicated, fractious friendship in those odd few months. We shared dorms, played one-on-one Quidditch, and were often in each other’s company when our friends went on dates. Harry was even my partner on the potions project that helped me gain my place here at Le Fey. Don’t worry, Mr Evans: I assure you; I was the brains behind the research. I think Harry only participated because he needed a well-rounded CV to apply for the Auror Training Programme. My enthusiasm used to make him beam sometimes; apparently, he’d never realised I was such an egg-headed potions nerd whilst we were schoolboys!

Gracious. Once again, my quill and myself have gotten carried away and written a million words where a hundred would have been sufficient. To cut a long story short, Harry apologised for his distance and quiet over the course of the last year, and he said that he had missed our friendship. “I can’t be as frank with other people,” Harry admitted. “You’re one of the few people in my life that sees past all that Boy Who Lived bosh.”

Harry admitted life as an Auror trainee hadn’t been the bantering barrel of laughs that he and Ron Weasley had imagined it would be. My impression is that Harry is tired of raising his wand against other wixen, for he even said he was envious of me.

“You cast spells and give people back their health,” were Harry’s words on the subject. “There’s honour in that. There’s value. All I am is a mouthpiece for the Ministry. Just their Golden Boy in another guise.” Well, that’s a compliment and no mistake. When he offered me his hand, I shook it with alacrity. Perhaps I shall see Harry again during the Christmas vacation.

I’m yawning, Mr Evans, and I must finish this long letter if I’m to concentrate in my lecture tomorrow. Dark Curse Treatment is my current module. It is my great hope that I rarely have to remedy such evils during my career.

Yours sincerely,

Draco.

January 2001.

Happy New Year, Mr Evans!

Would you believe that I’m writing to you from St Mungo’s Obstetrics department? I know, my life is the height of glamour! Still, it would seem that some wixen babies do have the audacity to arrive when the rest of the world are out celebrating and somebody needs to be on duty to catch them. Pans, Theo, and Blaise have gone out into Muggle London tonight, and they are watching the fireworks light up the sky over the Houses of Parliament; I can see the tail end of them from the window.

They invited me, but I’d already agreed to cover my colleague Fabian’s shift. Truth be told, I don’t really mind so much. Don’t think of me as some sort of dreadful sap, but seeing babies arrive into the world? I can’t imagine a bigger privilege than that.

Gracious, but I was apprehensive about this placement; I doubted that any parent would allow their new-born babe to be examined or inspected by me. That hasn't been the case, though. Most wixen are so besotted and relieved with their new little ones that they barely raise a glance towards the Healer. It’s a humbling experience to witness such pure, unadulterated love.

Did you have a good Christmas? When I was out and about in Diagon Alley on Christmas Eve, I half wondered whether I’d walked beside you or even brushed shoulders with you unknowingly.

Harry, who I’d met for coffee and shopping, thought me utterly ludicrous whenever I pointed out a particularly kindly-looking older gentleman and wondered aloud whether he might be my benefactor.

“How do you even know Mr Evans is older?” Harry asked me at one point. “You’ve told me that you know next to nothing about the man. He could be any wizard in London! Merlin, for all you know, he mightn’t even be a wizard! He might be a witch. That might simply be a ruse, and if so, you’ve fallen for it hook, line, and sinker.”

I rolled my eyes at my shopping partner. “It stands to reason,” I explained slowly — Harry can be such a dolt and his Muggle sayings do make him sound terribly daft — “I hardly think a young person, just setting out on their life, would spend a considerable wedge of their vault sponsoring a besmirched reprobate like me through Healer school and not tell a soul of their identity."

Harry didn’t answer me, Mr Evans. He simply stuck his tongue out in my direction and then he carried on looking at the children’s books. After all, that was why we had entered Flourish and Blotts: to buy an extra Christmas present for Teddy. Harry had insisted that he needed my advice on what to buy, a statement which I found highly dubious. My cousin hero-worships the very ground Harry steps on, and were he to buy the little mite a book about cauldron lead, the child would doubtlessly adore it.

Overall, Harry and I shared a very pleasant afternoon. If anyone was surprised to see an ex-Death Eater and the Saviour of the Wizarding world out together, they didn’t say a single word. It’s an oddity, really, but the two of us have actually developed a rather startling friendship since the summer, one based on rambling and drunken Firecalls initiated by the Golden Git himself.

Harry has many dozens of complaints about the DMLE and the Ministry whom he believes are corrupt, devious and bigoted, both in the crimes they investigate and the marginalised groups they criminalise. Lycanthropes, for example. The DMLE will arrest and prosecute those found to be hiding their condition, but those who are open are subject to losing their job and their housing.

Furthermore, Harry is RIGHT, Mr Evans. I ought not to say it, but it’s true. It’s a grotesque situation, and we Healers see the tail-end effects of such prejudice. I was observing a clinic today. One pregnant witch was in floods of tears because there was a magical creature inheritance within her family. She begged the Healer not to mention it in her medical records.

Anyway, Mr Evans, I've digressed, a habit that I’m sure you’ve gotten used to by now.

Harry was in a confessional mood when the two of us went to the Whistling Teapot after Flourish and Blotts. I treated him to coffee and cake — Merlin, but that wizard does relish the sweet stuff — and he told me that he’d been thinking a lot about the conversation we’d shared in the summer. Harry told me he doesn’t want to be an Auror anymore, but he doesn’t quite know how to change the life situation he’s found himself in.

“It’s all your fault,” Harry revealed, between bites of carrot cake. “When you talk about Healing or the patients that you’ve met… You get this glow about you, Draco. I can see the satisfaction you get when you make even the slightest little difference to a person’s life. I want that feeling too.”

“It’s there for the taking,” I told him, astounded that Harry Potter of all people could feel this dreary about his life. “You’re a wealthy chap. Find the thing that gives your life passion.” Like the cliché that I am, I reminded him that life must be lived forwards. “Think about the gift that Mr Evans has given me,” I continued. “I’m not talking about the Galleons that he’s paid for the course fees. I’m talking about his kindness. His one single act of kindness opened up a whole new universe for me.” I swallowed the last of my coffee, looking at the sparse Christmas tree in the corner and the glittering baubles decorating it. “Show yourself the same kindness, Harry. You don’t have to be an Auror. You only have one life and, Merlin knows, you’ve already given enough of it to other people. Perhaps you need to show a bit of charity to yourself.”

Harry didn’t speak much after that. Perhaps you think I spoke a little too candidly to him, Mr Evans, but I do worry that others in his life would be less than honest.

Ron Weasley was always too fond of enveloping Harry into his family fold, in my opinion. Having him as both work partner and brother-in-law seemed his whole objective during eighth year. Indeed, Harry himself seemed to follow his best friend willingly. He was engaged to Ginevra with a speed that bordered on the ridiculous.

Even Harry gave a good impression of being astounded by his sudden proposal in the Three Broomsticks, a woebegotten place and no mistake. It always appeared to me that Harry flung himself so aggressively into domesticity to make up for everything the war had cost him, but whatever do I know? I’m not a Mind Healer.

Mr Evans, I must end this letter. My break is over and I believe that the first baby of 2001 wishes to make their arrival!

Yours sincerely,

Draco.

June 2001.

Dear Mr Evans,

I don’t know what to say. We’ve never met, have we, and yet you’ve changed my life so completely. Even if I live to be a hundred, I’ll never forget this generosity. I promise to pay it forward, every day that I’m alive.

Hawthorne Heights is a beautiful, serene place and the staff are kind and respectful. I’m not entirely sure that father can comprehend much about his surroundings — the haemorrhage was very serious and he spends much of his time confined to his bed — but please know that your Galleons are being well spent. However, many months or years my father has left in this world cannot be foretold, but I know that, however long he lives, he will be safely looked after.

First, I ought to apologise for not writing the very moment I was given the news that you’d paid my father’s nursing home fees.

My only excuse is that I really was in no fit state to write a single word. My hands were shaking so hard that I couldn’t form letters. Please know that I pleaded with the Office to let me Firecall you. Of course, they refused.

“Mr Evan’s charitable choices are his alone,” was their only answer, and I suppose that I’ll have to respect that.

Merlin, but I don’t even know how much you even know of what had happened.

Looking back, the whole of the last month has felt like some awful black nightmare that I haven’t been able to wake from, however hard I willed it. I remember I was working hard in the Alchemical Remedies lab when Professor McLean came to my side. She held a note that had come directly from the hospital.

The words swam on the page, and I could barely comprehend what I was reading. My father had been beaten, Mr Evans, by two newly convicted felons who were looking to build a reputation for themselves. Time was of the essence, the letter said. I was advised to leave for St Mungo’s emergency ward as soon as I could.

I can hardly remember what happened next. The whole of my world tilted, and raw scratchy shock rushed through me.

Lucius Malfoy was many things, and many of them were reprehensible. He was a would-be murderer. He was a sycophant, covetous of power, wealth, and status. I’m not a fool, Mr Evans. Father would have sacrificed both Mother and I at the whim of He-Who-Shall-Not-Be-Named. All of this was clear in my brain, and yet still I am so overwhelmingly devastated. He is still my father. The man who taught me shaving spells. The man who taught me how to ride horses and to mount a broomstick. Perhaps I had already grieved for that man — the one I had idolised above all others — but now I knew he was lost to me irreconcilably.

Professor Mclean led me from the room, concern etched across her face. “You shouldn’t have to make this visit alone,” she said once I had told her why I must leave. “Is there a relation I can call? A partner or a friend?”

Harry’s name fell, unbidden, from my lips. I don’t know why, Mr Evans, for I know that there hasn’t ever been any love lost between my father and him. My asking for Harry was perverse. Father, who had so often wished for Harry’s demise so gleefully, was the one hovering between life and death.

Even so, Harry came to my side without hesitation, mere minutes after I’d Flooed to the emergency ward. He was clad in his red Auror uniform, and his unruly black hair had been tamed with a stretchy band. I had the direst, most urgent desire to laugh. It was shock, of course, and embarrassment, and the odd experience of meeting a person in the wrong environment.

A Healer met the pair of us, and they led us to my father’s bedside. Harry didn’t speak, but his presence was reassuring beside me.

Father looked ghastly, withered and so old as he lay marooned in his white hospital sheets. His skin was waxy grey and there was a bandage wrapped around his white matted hair. The Lucius Malfoy that I’d once venerated beyond all others wasn’t here. This was a mere shell of a man.

“There’s very little we can do at this point,” said the Healer, breaking the silence. “There was a time lag between the injury being inflicted and Mr Malfoy being side-Apparated to the hospital. By the time he arrived, much of the damage was done. The severe brain haemorrhage has injured his magical cerebral cortex. Right now, we’re on a wait and see. I wish I could offer more in the way of good news. All we can do right now is wait."

Her voice seemed very far away, Mr Evans. Two years of a Magi-Biology Degree has taught me a thing or two, and I knew that she was giving me the same patter that all Healers are taught to use on patient’s family members: never offer false hope, but never tell a person it’s irreversible either. Always remember that you’re meeting a person on the worst day of their lives.

“I’ll have to give up my university place,” I told Harry afterwards, as my fingers trembled around cups of watery tea in an empty cafeteria. “Father won’t recover from injuries that severe. He’ll need full-time carers. There isn’t anyone else who’d be willing to look after him. Those— those are life-altering injuries.” I shook my head, feeling the future that I’d worked so hard for slipping through my fingers. “I could still try my hand at making potions,” I suggested. That’d been my plan back in eighth year, when the door to every apprenticeship had shut in my face. “I’d have to find a place for us both to live, and— and—“

My words shuddered to a halt. My whole life was unravelling around me. Harry placed his hand on my forearm, and I felt the heat of it, felt the thrum of his powerful magic. I was centred by Harry and comforted by his presence.

“Don’t make any rash decisions,” Harry answered. “Remember what you told me on Christmas Eve? You only have one life, and that must be lived forward. We’ll find that way forward, Draco. Your father will get good treatment here, I’ll see to that. You have my word.”

Harry was trying his best to make me feel better, and he was being as thoughtful as always, but the daft dolt had no idea about the long-term ramifications of Father's injuries. Harry has a vast family fortune and a house that he inherited from his godfather. “Father will eventually need full-time care,” I replied, digging my nails into the side of the paper cup. “He’ll need specialists. None of that will come cheap and neither of us have a Groat to our names. I live on a stipend, remember? I'm a charity case.”

“I do remember. You never let me forget,” Harry answered, giving my forearm a small squeeze. "This isn't the end you fear it is."

That is where you come in, Mr Evans. You must have read about my father being attacked in the Prophet. Merlin, but they didn’t rein in their vitriol, did they? I suppose they felt it justified. All of his many crimes were listed, and “a kind of natural justice,” they claimed, “had finally been served.”

Azkaban, of course, was quickly found to be blameless. The two felons were only given slaps on their wrists. A line was drawn beneath my father, once and for all, and I made myself ready to leave Le Fay University in order to find work that would support the pair of us.

It wasn’t to be. The first I knew of your charitable act was in a letter that I received from Hawthorne Heights, asking me when they might expect their new resident. Several Firecalls later and I had ascertained that you’d paid for Father’s full-time place, and that you planned to do so for as long as he required it.

That was that. Harry has helped me move Father over in the days since. He has little in the way of possessions left, but I placed a photograph of my mother, myself, and him beside the bed, one that was taken a few years before the war. Perhaps the sight of it will give him comfort; I can only hope so.

I don’t understand why you’ve made me the subject of your charity, but thank you, Mr Evans. Your charity — your compassion — has once more given me a life. I don't know how to thank you except by working hard.

Tomorrow I resume my studies. I’ve missed many tutorials and lectures during the past month, and I have to use my summer to catch up. I shall write soon and tell you about my progress. Next year is my final year of academic studies, and I wish to be fully prepared.

As ever,

Yours sincerely,

Draco.

September 2001.

Good evening Mr Evans,

Circe, but I’m tired. Tired but content. Sorry, that seems to be my constant refrain whenever I'm at university, doesn’t it? I’m turning into a broken record. They keep me busy here. The professors weren’t joking when they said that this year would be my toughest yet.

It seems there is always another essay to write, or another shift to complete at St Mungo’s. Right now, I’m placed in the Emergency Healing Department which keeps me on my toes and no mistake! Today I was observing a clinic. I was allowed to assist the Healer on duty with a Splinching injury, potion burns, and even a dragon bite. Granted, it must have been an exceptionally small dragon, but I’m not going to let that detract from my sense of pride. I’m starting to feel like a real Healer, Mr Evans.

The curative spells on the tip of my tongue and the wand movements that I’ve been taught seemed to flow so easily from my wand. It’s considered good practice to say them non-verbally, so as not to detract from the caregiving process, but I’m not quite there yet. I'll manage it, though; it’s simply a matter of time. Professor Blake says that I’ve a natural affinity for Emergency Healing, but I haven’t decided which direction I wish to take my career yet. I'm reserving that judgement until I finish all of my placements.

Please let me take this opportunity to thank you once again for my father's care. I’m sure that Hawthorne Heights have contacted you directly, but in case you don’t know, his condition as yet remains unchanged. His carers say that he is peaceful, and that he isn’t in any pain, and for that I’m profoundly grateful. He hasn’t regained consciousness yet, but I’ve been assured that he sometimes smiles and murmurs half-spoken words.

The Healer in me would assure you that it’s mere muscle memory or the misfiring of a random neuron; the son in me doesn’t want to believe it. He prefers something more fanciful. I would prefer to believe that Father is dreaming; his guilt and crimes washed away with the blood that he spilt across the tiles of the Azkaban showers. Mr Evans, the fact that Father is well-cared-for is a great weight off my mind.

Life, however, must be lived forwards, and I do have other gossip to share with you, Mr Evans. Let me turn the subject to happier events.

First, my mother's vineyard has seen a very successful summer, and her vines managed a satisfactory yield of grapes. Most were sold for a reasonable profit, but some have been put aside for an attempt at winemaking. Unfortunately, I haven’t tried her Cabernet Sauvignon yet, but I am more than a little impressed with her efforts. I never would have imagined that beneath her starchy pure-blood exterior there beat the heart of a true entrepreneur!

In other news, Pansy has gotten engaged to Theo. The two of them will have a summer wedding next year, and I've been asked to serve as best man. It will be the first time I've had a role in a wedding, and it is a very great honour. The engagement comes as very little surprise; I’ve known both Theo and Pansy since they were knee-high to pixies and I’ve always known the pair of them would end up together. No two souls in the universe are more perfect for each other.

I know the rest of the world consider them a bit of an odd couple — he’s a total bookworm Unspeakable who ought, blatantly, to have been sorted into Ravenclaw, whilst Pans is the flightiest, funniest, and most flaky witch on the face of Gaia’s green earth — but I know that they complete each other. They give each other their best life. It’s wondrous to see, actually, the way their faces light up when the other enters the room.

Bloody hell. Mr Evans, you must be scoffing at my prose, and rightly so. You likely think that I’ve turned into some old romantic. I haven’t, I assure you. Harry teased me via Firecall about this only last night. He said that I’ll be expected to bring a plus one to this wedding, and he wanted to know if I had anyone special on my horizon.

I, of course, said that a gentleman never tells, but the truth is there isn’t. I was burnt romantically — once, ages ago, it scarcely even figures in my thoughts anymore — so I shall be the solitary singleton at the Nott-Parkinson wedding reception. Harry will be there with his fiancée of course. Perhaps we shall be celebrating their nuptials next.

It's amusing, actually. I never thought that Harry and I would ever grow to be as close as we’ve become. I don’t think that there is a day that goes by where we don’t have some conversation, even if it’s just a rapid few minutes over Firecall or a series of jocular owl messages. He’s been my rock ever since July, and I don’t quite know what I’d have done without Harry's conversations. When I was at Hogwarts, I used to burn with envy over his close friendships with Hermione Granger and Ron Weasley. I know, I sound pitiable — they were the Golden Trio, fated to be best mates — but that was how it was. I used to stare at the three of them, eyes peeled for the rare moments that Harry would laugh or smile.

I’d have given my spell-casting arm to be the person next to him, making him happy, but there I was, stuck with my fellow snakes over in the green corner. Please don’t get me wrong — Greg and Vince were good lads, always up for a joke — but I always reckoned their parents put them up to being my friend. It was a boost socially, I suppose.

So yes. Excuse the impromptu trip down memory lane. My point is that Harry and I — and I’m not at all sure how it has happened — do seem to have become friends. Honestly, Mr Evans: those few minutes we spend chatting are the highlight of my day.

Whilst I still have my quill in hand, I’m going to take the opportunity to share with you a bit of scandal that will cause uproar when the rest of the world hears it. Harry is quitting the Aurors! It’s going to be all over the front of the Prophet tomorrow, so consider yourself forewarned. It’s something that he — that we — have been plotting for a while. It’s the corruption in the Ministry, and the cronyism: Harry can’t abide it.

Harry doesn’t think anything will change until a new generation of politicians are in place — those who fought He-Who-Shall-Not-Be-Named ought to be in charge rather than sitting on the side-lines — and I agree with him. One day Hermione Granger will be the Minister for Magic and then things might be different. I’m sure you think I'm an idle gossipmonger, Mr Evans, but I’ve Harry’s complete permission to talk to you about this matter, for the fact is that YOU are his inspiration. Harry is going to set up a charity and will serve as Chief Executive.

The big plan is to support young, magical people all over the globe; children who, like him, are growing up without the love of a family. Perhaps they’ll be orphans, or possibly they’ve been born with a creature inheritance. Your many acts of kindness have given me a whole different life to the one that fate planned, and Harry has witnessed how transformative it has been for me; how much I’ve grown and changed. He wants to help others with the same open heart that you have shown me.

Initially, Harry’s plan is to set up the charity with his own fortune, but he predicts that it will soon become self-sufficient. Donations shall make up a part of its income, but many Galleons will come from corporate branding. Every broom company in England will compete to slap Harry’s name on their products. Ministry personnel are banned from making such deals, but Harry will no longer be in their employ, so he can take full advantage. It is exciting, and I’ve seldom seen my friend so enthused.

“I’ve been thinking about it ever since January,” Harry admitted to me via Firecall last night. “Remember when you told me that I needed to find my passion? I realised then that I’ve been traipsing through my life, Draco, ever since the end of eighth year. I spent so many years fighting — so many years existing only from day to day, from minute to minute — that somewhere along the line I forgot to build a future for myself. I’ve let myself be carried along by other people’s expectations for years now, and if I’m not careful, I’ll do it for the rest of my life. What’s that catchphrase that you’re always spouting? Life can only be understood backwards-"

“But it must be lived forwards,” I completed, laughing at his earnestness. “The world will hate that you’re deviating from their expectations, Harry. You’re their Golden Boy. Their bright hope. The Prophet has you pegged as our next leader.”

Harry visibly winced at that idea. “When I left the DMLE — after I’d handed my notice in to Robards — it felt like I could breathe, Draco. For the first time in two years, I felt like myself.”

We’ll keep this fact between you and me, Mr Evans — the Saviour already has a big enough head! - but I’m proud of him.

He’s given more to the world than most people do in a dozen lifetimes, and he’s never asked for a single thing in return. I know he’s courageous, there’s not a single shadow of a doubt about that, but leaving the DMLE? This feels like a different sort of bravery.

Anyway, I’ve chewed your ear off for long enough. You must think me quite discourteous. I need to get my beauty sleep; I have a potion practical tomorrow, and the concoction involves Burlap, which, as I’m sure you know, is a notoriously tricky little weed.

Yours faithfully,

Draco.

January 2002.

Dear Mr Evans,

Happy new year. I hope this new year finds you fit, healthy and happy.

I’m currently sitting at the table in Elvaston Cottage, home of Andromeda and Teddy. I do truly believe that this might be the first quiet moment that I’ve had since I left Le Fay College at the end of winter term.

Andi and Teddy have gone on a visit to the neighbours whilst Harry is snoozing in an armchair across the room from me. For reasons that you might already have inferred, he didn’t feel welcome at The Burrow this festive season. We’ve spent the last few weeks quietly and haven’t ventured far from the village. Neither Harry nor I wanted to court further headlines, Mr Evans, and so we have been keeping as low a profile as we can.

I’ll stop prevaricating now. I’m sorry.

I worry that I’ve caused you embarrassment over the last few weeks.

Sadly, the Prophet learnt long ago that if it painted the Malfoy name all over its front cover, then it would sell hundreds of copies. You saw the level of devious glee they took in reporting my father’s disablement, didn’t you? Venom spilled from every headline. I ought to have known that they were just biding their time before they came for me. I suspect that they’ve known I’m gay for a while. While I don’t broadcast the fact — my choice of lovers is nobody else’s business but my own — I don’t hide it either.

Mr Evans, much of what Rita Skeeter wrote in that series of articles was true.

I do go to gay Muggle clubs sometimes — jolly occasionally, I might add. I don’t have the top grades in my year because I drink every night. And yes, I have had Muggle lovers. Those photos, the ones splashed all over the front cover, weren’t charmed or doctored. They really were of me, kissing a man outside of Heaven nightclub in Charing Cross. I had no idea that I was being followed, nor that photographs had been taken.

I’m not sorry that I’m gay, Mr Evans. Being gay is as much a part of me as my blood and my bones. This was how I was born, and how I’ll die too. I was gay when I was six and I fell deeply in love with my cousin Jerome. I was gay when I shared my first kiss with a Beauxbatons boy on the night of our school Yule Ball. I'm only sorry that I didn't tell you before now.

Part of me feels like I've fibbed to you. I feel like I'm close to you, even though our relationship flows in only one direction. Pansy says it is nonsense to feel this way. She says that my private life is my own and that I don’t owe you information about who I consort with. She’s right.

Being gay doesn’t change how good a Healer I am, or how excellent the care is that I give my patients. It doesn’t change how loyal a son or friend I am, or how good a cousin I am to Teddy. Pansy reminded me that I got onto the course on my own merits, and that you sponsor me because of my talent, not because of some unattainable idea of how I ought to live or behave. At least, I hope that you don’t. If you withdraw your charity, then I’ll know that you disapprove of me. That is, of course, your choice.

Nevertheless, Rita Skeeter was wrong about several of her scurrilous allegations, Mr Evans.

I wasn’t the reason that Harry and Ginny Weasley split up. Yes, I knew that the two of them were having problems, but I didn’t mention anything to you because it wasn’t my secret to tell.

Yes, Harry has been sleeping over in my rooms at college — Skeeter was correct about that — but that’s only because Ginny still lives in the flat that they shared. Harry doesn’t like Grimmauld Place because the place is full of awful associations from the war.

Let me assure you that my rooms have hardly been the hotbed of seduction that the papers have alleged! Harry is very solicitous and concerned about my degree. The wizard spends all his time encouraging me to study, making me tea and working hard on his charity. The two of us are like monks: in bed by eleven o’clock.

I haven’t A) given him a love potion, B) cast an Imperius or C) coerced him to be my lover through blackmail.

The truth is so much more mundane. Ginny and Harry fell out of love. She wanted to play Quidditch and travel and meet new people. Harry, well… I think he needed different things as well.

Merlin, I’m very far from a love expert, but surely, they were both too young to commit to being together for a lifetime? Too many people needed Harry and Ginny to be their happy ending, didn’t they? Harry said I was the only person he could talk to, the only person in his whole life that wasn’t invested in their love affair. The Weasleys are the only family Harry has ever known and to give them full credit, they still invited him to visit for Christmas. Harry didn’t want to go there, though. The media would have been camped outside The Burrow, craning their necks for a sight of the Chosen One. They haven’t cottoned onto the fact that we’re here yet and for that I'm grateful.

I expect that Mother knows I’m gay. We’ve never had a conversation about it, but she always had an uncanny ability to know the inside of my mind, even when I was a little boy. I remember the day I was informed of my betrothal to Astoria; I wasn’t even ten. I kept a very stiff upper lip about it when talking to Father — I knew it was my destiny — but as soon as I was alone, I wept.

Mother came into my chambers and embraced me. “Perhaps in another lifetime,” were her consoling words. “In another lifetime you’ll be able to follow your heart’s desires.”

This is another lifetime, isn’t it, Mr Evans? Another lifetime where I’m free to fall in love with whom I please, to work as a Healer and to live the life I see fit.

I’ve been forcibly outed, and my private life is private no longer, but there is a freedom in that, isn’t there? A recklessness. At least I don’t have to hide anymore or play the pronoun game with strangers. I doubt I would ever have told you that I’m gay, but I find I’m pleased that you know.

I’m going to finish my letter here, Mr Evans. Andi and Teddy have returned from their visit, so that means Harry and I will be forced to imbibe cake until the pair of us are fit to burst. Gracious, by the time I return to college I’ll have gained a stone and my Healer robes will no longer fasten.

Yours sincerely,

Draco.

May 2002.

Dear Mr Evans,

It’s odd how normal everything feels here in Cambridge.

I can hear the sound of birdsong outside my window and see the thin spring sunshine dappling the whitewashed walls. Part of me feels somewhat insulted, I think; like the world ought to respect that I buried my father today. There ought to be hushed silence and storm clouds, rather than Harry realising we’ve run out of milk and rushing out to buy some from the shop around the corner.

Today ought to be momentous, Mr Evans, yet the truth is, it feels much like any other day. The world, it seems, is determined to be relentlessly cheerful. My predominant feeling is tiredness — I’m going to have a nap after I finish this letter and Harry returns — and my overarching emotion is relief. The Prophet kept their distance, which was a blessing, and the funeral went ahead without a hitch. No doubt there’ll be a spiteful obituary tomorrow, hot from the quill of Rita Skeeter, but that is only to be expected.

Again, I owe you my sincerest gratitude. I couldn’t have afforded the two hundred Galleons that even a simple funeral cost. Merlin, but you’d think that dying at least would be cheap!

When I was growing up, I never once thought about money. Sums such as the ones you’ve given me were taken from the Malfoy vault with no more effort given than a trip to Gringott’s and Father’s elaborate signature. As a child, I wouldn’t have thought twice about the cost of a thing. New broomsticks and fancy bound books were mine for the taking, even on the slightest whim. Father filled his cellar with expensive vintage wine. The three of us lived like such luxury was our birth right.

If I’m brutally honest — and I’m allowed to be, I buried my father today — I don’t miss the trappings of wealth. Nothing was ever enough, Mr Evans. There were always new clothes that one needed to buy or the next formal event that had to be planned for. Influence and power costs are expensive, so father constantly had his hand in his purse. There was always somebody that needed a bribe or buttering up. Money talked when I was a child. It was a measure of a person's worth.

I don’t know precisely what Hawthorn Heights told you when they contacted you to say that my father had passed away, so I'll use this opportunity to tell you what happened.

Lucius Malfoy died peacefully, whilst sleeping. It didn’t come as a surprise. Father hadn’t ever really recovered properly from the Azkaban attack last July, though in the end, it was a simple attack of pneumonia that ended his life. It was his third bout, and they’d become increasingly resistant to potions.

Father was only forty-eight, but when I saw his body in the chapel, I thought he looked like a man a generation older than his years. Truth be told, Father hadn’t been properly well for the entirety of his prison sentence. His sanity was only hanging on by a thin thread, which was compounded by his alcoholism. He was drinking heavily during the latter half of the war, which I choose to believe was his method of coping with his guilt. More likely, it was his method of blocking out the reality of what he’d done and the awful consequences of his actions.

It is mightily terrible, Mr Evans, to know you are on the wrong side of history, and when I looked at him, lying so unnaturally still in his coffin, I was hit with an awful realisation; there, but for the grace of the Gods, go I. Had it not been for Harry’s Wizengamot testimony and your charity, it could easily have been me lying there dead, a whole lifetime ruined by selfishness.

The Lucius I knew would have been distraught to see what a damp squib he was at the end of his life. There were only the four of us at the funeral: Mother, Aunty Andi, Harry and me, and it couldn’t have lasted more than half an hour. Harry never left my side, not even once, though when I told him I wouldn’t have gotten through today without him, he told me I was talking nonsense. “You’re stronger than you know,” were his words in reply.

Afterwards, we Flooed back to Elvaston Cottage and drank sweet tea. Mother plans to stay there tonight and then to return to Bordeaux tomorrow evening. I hope today can serve as the end of a chapter for her too.

Britain has grown too narrow for her, and she finds its manners too constrictive. Narcissa Black-Malfoy isn’t the same person she used to be. I’m glad about that. Her once refined hands are rough with hard work, her face is tanned and there is dirt beneath her fingernails. I love her more than ever, because I finally feel like I know her.

Harry has returned, Mr Evans, and I want to sit beside him for a while. I’ll send this letter out to you tomorrow when my head feels a little clearer. I appreciate everything that you have given me and, one day, I dearly wish that you’ll let me thank you in person.

Yours sincerely,

Draco.

August 2002.

Dear Mr Evans,

Before I begin, a word of warning. I’m writing this letter from the Avalon Hotel in Devon. and I’m a little bit worse for wear. The champagne at Pansy and Theo’s wedding really was excellent, and I might have imbibed a couple more glasses than I’d initially imagined I might.

Luckily, I planned ahead. I brought a hangover cure in my overnight bag. I’ll place it on the side of my bed, so that it's within reach when I wake tomorrow morning.

Circe, but today has been splendid. Truly splendid.

I mean yes, it was knackering, and yes, being a best man is quite the hardest work I think I’ve ever done, but it was worth every minute when I felt the sheer radiance that glowed out of Pansy. I felt the ripples of her magic rolling gently across the room as her unique magic combined with Theo’s own. The two promised their hearts and their souls to the service of each other.

I’m getting soft in my old age, Mr Evans, so I’m not ashamed to say I cried when she lifted her veil and kissed Theo for the first time as a fully bonded witch. I know that I wasn’t alone in doing so; Harry was suspiciously red-eyed as well. Allow me the luxury of using a prosaicism, but it was as if my best friend’s happily-ever-after had arrived. I never thought I’d admit this — and I’m only writing it now because I’ve drunk a belly full of Bollinger — but perhaps, one of these fine days, I might even be convinced to take the oath myself.

It was wonderful, and I feel…

I feel like I can talk to you. Feel like I can share my secrets. I feel like you understand me.

I’ll likely screw up this parchment and burn it into ash before I send it to you, Mr Evans, but right now I want to write it. I want to pluck the words from my brain. I want my quill to form the words:

I kissed Harry.

I kissed Harry.

I can scarcely believe it is the truth, and yet I know that it happened. We kissed, and I can still feel his lips on mine.

I’m aflutter, Mr Evans. Happier than I think I’ve ever been.

We stayed late, the pair of us. Harry was talking to Weasley cousins, and I was sat alone in the shadows of the top table, admiring the natural grace of Pansy as Theo twirled her in his arms. Suddenly I was suddenly awash with self-pitying grief. Thoughts of the huge parties in the Manor gardens filled my head; stacks of white roses everywhere and Father in the middle of it all, a stately figure, undiminished by Azkaban or his own greed. Deciding to take a breath, I navigated through deserted chairs and around the edge of the dance floor. Pansy was kissing her husband, oblivious to the world, overflowing with joy.

I made my way to the edge of the koi pond, holding my wand in front of me, a small illumination in the night. The water shone in the darkness, shimmering under a low moon. Gravel crunched under my feet and the sounds of the wedding — laughter, music — were muffled. I sat down on the steps that led down to the water, thinking of nothing else but my solitude. Leaning back, my elbows pressed against the rough stone and I looked up at the canopy of stars. I don’t know how long I was sitting there, my eyes searching out constellations I’ve known since before I could read.

My seclusion was shattered with the sound of footsteps behind me, coming from the path that I’d just walked along. “Draco,” came Harry’s voice from the darkness. “I came to find you… You weren’t at the table, and I thought that you must have left. Can I join you?”

That was very polite, at least for Harry, and I wondered whether he was nervous. He’d not been this formal with me in months. “Sit down,” I answered, waving a hand at the empty space beside me. “It’s just the koi and me.”

Harry didn’t hesitate. He sat down beside me, his long, lithe legs folded beneath him, and looked out across the water. Perhaps— well, I know I’d drank too much, for in that moment I felt the delicious delight of being alone with a wixen of the same persuasion as me. Don’t get me wrong, Mr Evans. The Muggles I’ve shared trysts with were glorious men, but there is something majestic to be known for what you truly are and still be desired. I chastised myself, Mr Evans. Harry wasn’t gay, was he? Even if he were, it didn’t necessarily follow that he’d want to be with me.

“You weren’t enjoying the wedding?” Harry asked, moving his knee so that it bounced against my own. “You’ve been quiet since the speeches. I noticed.”

Harry had noticed my silence. “It’s a stunning wedding,” I replied. “Pansy and Theo. They look like they stepped out of a dream, don’t they? Pans hasn’t ever been so happy, and I know that Theo feels exactly the same. Their love, it’s— it’s all-encompassing, isn’t it? I can’t believe that there’ll ever be a person who feels that way towards me.” I laughed then, embarrassed with myself. “Ignore me,” I said. ”Champagne and weddings. I’m a walking, talking cliché, filled with maudlin thoughts. You ought to go back to the party. There isn't a person there that wouldn’t give their wand to dance with you.”

“I don’t want to dance with any of them,” Harry answered, his voice calm and amused, and I realised that we were sitting so close that we were almost touching. He took my hand in his. “I want to dance with you.”

I didn’t answer. I couldn’t. I was too stunned to speak. With his other hand, Harry traced a line up my arm and across my shoulder, his fingers light and gentle. I hardly dared take a breath, fearing that if I made even the slightest noise, Harry might come to his senses and pull away.

Then Harry dropped my hand, and he raised his fingers to the nape of my neck. Slowly he combed them through my hair and the intimacy of it sent a sharp, sensual shiver down my spine.

“Harry,” I managed, my voice hardly more than a rasp. “Whatever are you doing?”

“Trying to show you how I feel,” Harry answered. His voice was close to my ear. “Trying to show you how much I want you. Is it working?”

It was working. Bloody hell, but it was working. Harry shone in the moonlight, all lithe muscles and untidy hair. He was beautiful, Mr Evans. The man I’d loved since I was eleven. There’s never been anybody else for me. It’s only ever been Harry. He pulled me to him then, brought his lips to my mouth gently, like the quiver of a Snitch’s wings. The two of us kissed long and lazily and somehow, it didn’t feel like a first kiss at all. It felt like we ought to have been kissing all of our lives.

When I came up for air, the words were out of my mouth before I could reign them in: “I didn’t think you liked blokes, Harry. I mean, Ginny. Cho... This isn’t some sort of game, is it? Some kind of experiment?”

Then Harry’s mouth was on me again, crushing away the rest of my words. It was a hard, possessive kiss, and I felt sensual warmth build inside my chest. It'd been a silly question, I supposed, when Harry chose to kiss me like he did. We tousled like this for a few moments, a back-and-forth parry of tongue and lips, before Harry pulled back, looking me in the face. “It’s not a game, Draco. You’re not a game to me. I’ve never been more serious about anything in my life. So, what about it? Will you dance with me?”

And we danced, Mr Evans. We danced, and we kissed, and it was as if the rest of the world fell away. Harry took me in his arms, and he turned and moved with me, our bodies moving as one, urgency and tension in the small space between us. The two of us fit together magnificently, and it made me think of the other things I wanted to show Harry.

Merlin, but I wanted to show him how good it could be between two men, how natural and pure and right. I wanted to show him all the myriad of ways we could find pleasure in each other, after a while, once we knew each other’s bodies better. Perhaps I’m nothing but a giddy, infatuated boy, yet I do believe that he feels the same way I do. There was heat in his eyes and a greedy hand on the small of my back.

I’m going to stop writing.

I won’t send you this letter. Tomorrow I’ll begin anew and I'll write you a beautifully polite piece of correspondence. I shall compliment the bride, the buffet and the wit of the speeches. Know this though, Mr Evans. Harry Potter — whom I can still taste on my lips — will be by my side.

Yours sincerely,

Draco.

March 2003.

Dear Mr Evans,

I’m afraid this will be another short letter. I’ve only got an hour break between shifts, and I have a multitude of things I must achieve in that short time. First, I really must eat, and then I really, really must nap.

In fact, I’m eating a salad sandwich while I’m writing, which is quite a feat by itself. Harry made me promise faithfully that I’d eat as soon as I got a chance — “You can’t help others, if you’re not looking after yourself,” were his words yesterday — so I’m doing as I’m told.

Honestly, Mr Evans, it’s still the oddest thing to have a person in your life that looks out for you like Harry does me. Nothing is too much trouble. I keep waiting to wake up from my dream, but it hasn't happened yet. Would you believe that Harry actually Flooed to St Mungo’s yesterday because I’d forgotten my lunchbox? The daft prat ought to have sent it tied to an owl or something, but I have to admit, the attention felt brilliant.

Of course, having the legitimate Saviour of the wizarding world turn up in the middle of the Potions and Plant Poisoning Ward caused quite the stir, especially when he kissed me in front of everyone! Goodness, but I’m blushing now just thinking about it.

Everyone here has been so supportive of us, Mr Evans. The university too. Even the Prophet has shut up a bit, now they’ve realised we’re a legitimate couple who simply want to live our best lives together.

Most exciting of all, we’ve finally found a flat where we both want to live. It’s close enough to St Mungo’s that I could walk to work and has a big office space where Polaris, Harry’s children’s charity, can be based for the moment.

Honestly, Mr Evans, it seems extraordinary that I’ll be leaving my university accommodation, but in four months I’ll no longer be a student. The fact that I’m almost ready to graduate feels preposterous. These four years have passed so quickly, and it hardly feels like any time has passed since I first stepped through the door. So much has changed, and not only for me. Everybody’s lives are so transformed as to be unrecognisable.

Teddy Lupin begins school this September. I don’t know where or when that chubby-legged toddler vanished, but he has been replaced with a very gentle, very thoughtful little boy. Teddy likes colouring, playing dolls, and when he’s happy — and he usually is — his hair turns the loveliest shade of cherry pink. Harry and I compete appallingly to be his favourite relation, and I can’t see that changing as he gets older and ready for Hogwarts. I’ve a sneaking suspicion that Teds might be playing the pair of us off against one another, which would be rather Slytherin of the little wizard and does rather sound like something I might have done.

Pansy is complaining mightily and regularly. Apparently, her feet are now so swollen that she can’t get her shoes on. In my opinion, that serves the witch wholly right for returning from Mauritius pregnant with a honeymoon baby!

My godson is to be called Fabian Alexander, which doesn’t surprise me one jot: Pansy always was a follower of fashion and Muggle names are à la mode right now. I only pray that I’m not on duty in the maternity ward when baby Parkinson-Nott arrives. I love Pansy more dearly than a sister, but there are limits to just how up close and personal I’d like to get.

Still, I know I'll be enchanted when I meet him. He’ll be the first baby from my circle of friends, though I expect that Ron and Hermione won't be long behind. Did I tell you that they’ve moved into Grimmauld Place? They wanted somewhere with a little more space — and away from Molly's ever-present eye — and Harry was more than happy to let them live there.

Châteaux Malfoy goes from strength to strength. Mother has employed several local elves on a summer contract, and if everything goes as well as hoped, the yield of grapes will be significantly higher than last year. Andromeda and Teddy are to holiday there over the summer, and Harry and I shall spend a week in Bordeaux too.

I’ll admit that I was a little anxious about asking Harry to stay with Mother — to say that the two of them have a chequered history is an understatement indeed — but Harry never hesitated. “Narcissa is your mum,” he said, like it was perfectly obvious, and like the war and the trials hadn’t ever happened. “She’s important to you. That means she’s important to me too.”

In the end, it was as simple as that. Harry is good at forgiveness. It comes as naturally to him as breathing. It’s one of the reasons I love him as much as I do.

Goodness me. I never change, do I? Still as garrulous as ever and with handwriting that gets worse instead of better.

I’d better get a wiggle on and try to get some sleep. I have a shift working in the Accidental Magic section of paediatrics this evening, and that can be tricky. Often, it’s the first time those poor mites will have experienced magic, and it can leave them very disoriented and upset.

Thank you for everything, Mr Evans. I can’t imagine how different my life would have been without your charity.

Yours sincerely,

Draco.

Postscript:

Mr Evans, I was wondering if I might be so bold as to ask if you’d like to attend my graduation? I’ve been trying to pluck up the courage to ask for the whole of this letter, but my nerves have failed me up to now. Still, if I don’t ask you, I'll never forgive myself, and I really don’t wish to live with any more regrets. I already have enough for a lifetime.

We’ve each been allocated five tickets, so were you to come, you’d get to meet all the people that I care about most in the world: Mother, Teddy, Aunty Andi and — last but not least — my gorgeous Harry.

Professor McLean has asked me to make the commencement speech — not wishing to brag, but I've the highest marks in my class — and it is my dearest wish to thank you in person.

August 2003.

Draco, love. Please come home.

I’m not wordy like you, so writing out my feelings like this isn’t easy for me. Still, I know I must try. Blaise has closed his Floo to me, and you’ve refused three owls already. If I thought it’d help, then I’d hammer on Zabini’s door and not leave until you saw me and we had a conversation. I’m frightened, though. What if that made you hate me more? I can't take the risk.

Nothing feels right without you beside me, Draco. You’re the first person I want to tell my gossip to. A joke isn’t funny until it’s made you laugh. Food tastes better when you’re sat at the dinner table, and our bed is vast and empty.

Our new flat — our new start — is quiet and cold and absurd without your presence. I’m half a person, living half a life. Please come home.

If you’ve got this far, and you haven’t Evanesco’d the parchment, then that’s good. That means I’m in with a chance.

Please listen to what I’ve got to say. Hermione says if I just explain, then, perhaps, you’ll see that Mr Evans wasn’t some trick or con. He was real. The sentiments he expressed — that your prodigious talents deserve to flourish — were true.

Be brutally honest with yourself, Draco. If I’d have come waving a big bag of gold in your direction at the end of eighth year, you’d never have agreed to take a single Sickle of it. Your pride wouldn’t have entertained it, not for the briefest of seconds. You’d rather have laboured in filthy laboratories for years than be the recipient of Harry Potter’s charity.

I’ll be brutally honest, too. Perhaps you’ll laugh and say that I ought to have begun three years ago. All I can say to that is that, three years ago, I was a completely different person. Even in eighth year, I knew I was a rat trapped in a cage.

The last thing I wanted was to be an Auror and wear that tight, scratchy scarlet uniform. I didn’t want to be the Ministry’s lapdog, but I didn’t know how not to be. It was as if my life was predestined, prophesied and cast into stone. All I’d ever known was abuse, manipulation, and war. I wasn’t prepared to live a life of my own, Draco, so I didn’t. I set about living the life that was expected of Harry the hero, with his beautiful fiancé, the right career, and all the trappings of a long, tedious life.

I was so jealous of you, Draco. Don’t scoff. It’s true.

You’d lost everything. You’d lost your fortune, your good name, and both of your parents. Most people would have run to the hills, but not you. Never you. You came back to eighth year with a fire in your belly. You didn’t shirk or hide away, not even when bullies blacked your eyes and hexed your legs from beneath you. Your head never dropped. You owned your life, Draco, owned what you’d done and the Mark on your arm. You were braver than me, and what’s more, I knew it.

You didn’t care if people knew you were gay either. Not me. I was wracked with internalised homophobia and self-loathing. It was my belief that, if I just tried and tried with Ginny, I could convince myself straight. Suffice to say, it never happened. You were a bright shining star, while I felt as low as a worm. Oh yes, I put on a great act whenever there was an audience. Jolly Harry, full of back-slapping bonhomie. Inside I was cringing; a little boy, trapped in an adult body.

The first time I really got to know you — the real you, not the aristocratic sod you enjoyed pretending you were — was after the two of us were paired on that private research project. The only reason I was on board was to swipe a few extra credits for my Auror application, and, yes, I finally admit: I did let you do all the work.

You were brilliant, Draco. Fiercely intelligent and truly enthused about the real-life application of the work. Do you remember the night we walked around the shore of the Lake, collecting Elach Maidenhair and Vervain Mallow? You told me of your ambitions to be a Healer, and how you believed that such a career might go some way to mitigate the dark things you had done.

You were passionate and convincing, and I can still remember the way your hair seemed to glow in the moonlight. Part of me fell for you that day, Draco. I’ve been falling in love with you every moment since.

Not one person at Le Fay college knew that Harry Potter was your sponsor, Draco. Not a single soul. Your place at university was secured by you and you alone. It wasn’t some favour for the Chosen One, or some piece of pity. They saw your potential, exactly as I did, and I only intervened once I knew you’d been chosen for their course.

‘Mr Evans’ contacted the Department of Healing and Magi-Biology and offered to sponsor you, and I thought, fool that I was, that would be the end of it. I believed that you’d collect your stipend and go, do your degree and live out your dream. I’d marry Ginny, go to Auror college and live out my predestined life. It wouldn't be brilliant, but it'd be enough. I'd be happy enough.

I didn’t expect you to write back, Draco. I didn’t expect letter after letter, tied to the leg of an owl. A better man than I would have sent them back unopened, but I was curious, and so I opened them, intrigued, wanting to know everything about your life.

I’d expected short, terse notes, but instead I read rich, funny stories about the people you loved, the patients you met and how much you were learning. I didn’t expect you to take me into your confidence. Those days, every few months when your letters arrived, quickly became the highlight of my humdrum existence. Soon, though, they weren’t enough. I visited the restaurant you’d booked for your birthday, eager to glance at your face. I came to Andi’s when I knew you’d be there too.

Your letters helped me fall in love with you, Draco. I watched from the periphery as you grew in skills, knowledge and self-assurance, and they made me cognisant of how very small my life had become.

You weren’t my charity case, love. You weren’t a burden. Every Galleon spent on your tuition, on Lucius’s care and on his funeral was money that enriched my own life. Seeing you become the man that you are has helped me on my journey to become the man I wanted to be.

I never would have left the Aurors, set up Polaris, or been brave enough to live as an openly gay person without you showing me the way. The act of charity helped me to discover a deeper sense of self and I’m happier now than I’ve ever been in my life.

I love you, Draco. Please come home. You aren’t in my debt. If anything, I’m in yours.

Come home. I’m not even sad that you found your stash of letters, hidden in the bottom of my school trunk, not if it means we can have our fresh start without my deceit hanging over me like a shroud. Come home, and I’ll make this up to you, every day of our lives. Life must only be lived forwards, and I want to spend the rest with you beside me.

Harry.

[PICTURE TEXT:

SAVIOUR ENGAGED!

DRACO MALFOY SAID YES!

Harry J. Potter, the wizard who defeated He Who Must Not Be Named twice, Order of Merlin First Class announced their much-anticipated engagement on April 19th 2004.

We at the Prophet predicted it first – the scandalous romance of ex-Death Eater Malfoy and Harry Potter dates back to January 2002 when the pureblood Healer first lulled the Chosen One in (read on inside for our expert’s opinion about the clear signs of Love Potion intoxication).

The unlikely pair, however, claims to have found “true love” in each other, as Harry reported to one of our reporters. “Draco is brilliant. A brilliant person, and a bloody brilliant Healer.”

Professor McLean, instructor at St Mungo’s and professor at Le Fay College where D. M graduated last year confirmed, “Healer Malfoy had got both the knowledgeability and the empathy that makes a good Healer.”]