Archive of Our Own ^beta

Harry loved his job. He really did. It was hard work, but he had a knack for it, and he actually felt like he was doing something, actually helping people, using his experience to make the world safer. And if he got a little adrenaline-related rush now and then, what of it?

There were days, however, where he had to remind himself of this fact.

"Got another one for you," Auror Skadden said, dropping a file into Ron's lap and smirking when both Harry and Ron jumped guiltily. It had been a long day – a long week, really – and they'd been so close to heading home for the evening.

"You must be joking," Ron groaned. "What've we turned into, the two-man missing persons department? Or is it at least something exciting?" He perked up a little. "Dark artefacts going berserk, or rogue Death Eaters, or even mental Centaurs trying to break into Muggle stables again?"

"Oh, I'm sorry, does the concept of investigating wizards and witches gone missing and being able to console their family members with the safe return of said wizards and witches not appeal to you? Did you not get into the Auror Corps with the intent of helping the wizarding world, on whatever level you were most needed and assigned?" Auror Skadden countered, as Harry reached over and snagged the unopened file from his partner's lap. If they weren't going to be able to leave yet, they may as well do what they could to familiarise themselves with the new case.

Ron muttered something that sounded a bit petulant, but was indecipherable, and Harry shook his head as the senior Auror walked away, muttering something of his own under his breath as he went. "Do you really have to get him going?" Harry asked tiredly.

"He's going to assign us these cases whether or not I irritate him, you know," Ron responded with a shrug. "So, anything good in this file? Or just someone else who went missing with no bloody trace?"

"Pretty much just that," Harry said, flipping through the few pages the file contained. Photo he didn't recognise, description of a man five years older than they were, nothing that stood out as significant. This was their third missing person in the last two weeks, and exceptionally little linked the missing in any way anyone could pinpoint. It was, in fact, entirely probable that the cases weren't linked at all. No one had come out and said they were, and there wasn't anything approaching a pattern. The only similarities were that the victims were male, were under fifty, and had gone missing sometime between mid-afternoon and early morning. No physical resemblance, no occupational consistency. Level of income or family wealth was grossly varied, and even the location of their last confirmed whereabouts didn't link them. "This one has a smaller window of time between last being seen and when someone thought it was odd he wasn't around, so we've a more exact idea of when and where he disappeared, but that's it."

"So what do we do?" Ron asked, sighing hugely and standing, cracking his neck as Harry got up. "Head out to his last known location and scout around for clues that aren't there again?"

Snorting, Harry reached for his cloak. "For tonight, anyway."

Waiting for Ron to grab his own cloak, Harry stood by the door that led out of the Auror Department and towards the nearest Apparition point out of the Ministry. It was late enough that the evening shift crew were settling in, and most of the day shift were already gone, or at least wrapping up and trying to get the hell out before anyone dropped more case files into their laps. Off to Harry's side, he could see the witch on the desk shoot an irritated look at the charm they used to take emergency calls and reports – not unlike a Muggle switchboard in function, but in the form of a notepad and quill that wrote as the voice on the other end spoke. He caught her eye, and she mouthed "prank call" at him. When he raised his eyebrows, she tapped her wand to the enchanted notepad, silencing it from her end, and whispered "someone's claiming Dementors are about, popping willy-nilly through full Patronus charms", before tapping the pad again and addressing the voice on the other end.

Ron threw his arm around Harry's shoulders, cutting off his annoyance at the fact that anyone could think it was funny to call in false alarms to the Aurors, because they were too young, too drunk, or just too self-absorbed to really remember the fear that was ever-present during the war. "C'mon, mate. Let's get out there and do our duty, or we'll never get home for supper." He tossed a little wave at the witch behind the desk. "And while we're out, let's thank Merlin we're not the poor blokes in charge of dealing with rambunctious little brats and drunkards like that, or the unlucky bastards who are currently stuck on nothing but night shifts."

Harry huffed a small laugh, remembering how unpleasant it had been at the bottom of the totem pole when they'd started, no matter how much a role they had played in ending the war. "Right. Thank Merlin for small favours."

If Harry and Ron were the unofficial two-person missing persons department of the Ministry, they were an unfortunately unproductive and unhelpful department.

Seven missing persons in three weeks. All vanished without a trace, virtually nothing left as a clue. And though there was still nothing significant linking them, Harry couldn't help feeling they were related in some way. There had to be someone behind the disappearances, and it may be that whatever pattern they were following wasn't yet showing as a pattern, that they just couldn't make it out, and Harry knew Ron was thinking the same thing he was – that maybe they were all victims of the same person (or group), and said responsible party just had no pattern, and these were all based on opportunity. The latter option would make ever getting the upper hand considerably more difficult, especially with the lack of forensic evidence, physical or magical.

But three and a half weeks after receiving the first case file, things changed. Missing person number six in the recent spate of disappearances – a Melvin Urlacher, of Bournemouth – went un-missing.

Un-missing. That's what Ron called it, anyway, and Harry had to admit that it was more accurate than saying anyone had found him.

Urlacher had reappeared in his own front garden roughly three days after his wife had reported his absence. She'd opened the door to let their pet Kneazle in, very much surprised to find her husband sitting in his favourite spot, looking out on their garden. She'd said that if it hadn't been for the mostly barren foliage and the lack of his usual pipe, she might have thought she'd hallucinated him ever being gone at all. And though he recognised her once she finally got his attention, and even gave her a peck on the cheek when she'd sat down beside him, trying to process this development, she maintained that something was wrong.

Everyone's first thought, of course, was the Imperius Curse.

It was the logical conclusion, when you looked at the available information, Harry admitted. They'd already checked for Polyjuice, a possible replacement by a Metamorphmagus, or any sort of other imposter, all with negative results. Melvin seemed to possess all of his previous memories, though he couldn't tell them anything about where he'd been, nor what had happened. But despite the supposed proof that he was, in fact, the same person who had gone missing, there was no doubt that something about the man was simply off. Even if his wife hadn't made that perfectly clear, it was something both Harry and Ron felt after only a few moments of interaction.

"I dunno what it is, exactly," Ron muttered as they left the Urlachers alone in the room at St Mungo's, "but something about that bloke is... creepy."

Harry made a noise of agreement. "I can't put my finger on it, but you're right."

"Healers say it's a mental thing, y'know, some sort of self-preservation, functional shutdown, but I think it's more than that," Ron pressed. "We've dealt with witnesses and victims in mental shock before, right? I mean, it's a bit similar, I'll admit, but I don't think that's the full story here."

"Agreed." Harry sighed. "I know the staff here says they've no evidence, but does it seem sort of like a memory thing, to you?"

Ron shrugged and pushed past the front doors of the hospital. "What, like the accident with ol' what's-his-name at Hogwarts? Lockhart?" He was quiet for a moment. "I mean, it doesn't seem like that, but for just a second, I thought about Neville's parents, you know? Driven mad by what they'd been through, with the torture and all? But it can't be that, right? This guy just seems..."

"Flat?" Harry supplied, pulling his cloak tighter around himself. This autumn was a bit sharper than the last few, almost like the seasons had decided to skip from summer straight into the beginnings of winter. It was colder than he liked, and the weather was that bland grey colour Harry associated with sleet and impending snow.

"I was going to say 'a bit stunned', but yeah, I guess that works."

Two days later, Harry was still thinking over their conversation after leaving Melvin and Bernadette Urlacher's room, as he and Ron were once again entering St Mungo's. The eighth missing persons file assigned to them had come the day before, a twenty-two-year-old named Sebastian Flout, reported missing by both his girlfriend and his sister. Less than twenty-four hours after the Ministry had been informed of his disappearance, he had popped up, sitting dazedly in one of the wizarding war memorial parks. The passer-by who had spotted him had noted his general unresponsiveness and called for Mediwizard assistance. Four hours later, Harry and Ron had been summoned.

Flout was considerably less himself than Urlacher had been (and Urlacher still was, as there had been no change in his state). Whereas Melvin Urlacher had seemed to be running on some sort of mental delay, and was, by accounts, duller than he had been before his disappearance, Sebastian Flout appeared barely cognisant of what was going on around him, and given to the occasional faint tremble in his hands, or unprompted, silent tears. Getting useful answers out of him was virtually impossible.

Ron had just slumped against the empty reception desk, groaning at the lack of helpful information they'd managed to extract, when a very thin, small older wizard in Healer's robes popped out of nowhere and cleared his throat, startling both Ron and Harry. "Excuse me, sirs?" he said, looking apologetic. "Nicholas Allan Ward. May I have a word with you?" He looked around, as if checking for anyone who might overhear them. "It's about the gentleman you were just attempting to question."

Harry caught Ron's eye, and they led the tiny man into an empty hall, with Ron casting a Muffliato around them all. "Go on then," Ron said, raising his eyebrows expectantly.

"Well, you see, I've not always been a Healer," he began, fidgeting nervously. "Well, not this kind of Healer. To be frank, I spent the first twenty-odd years of my life mostly amongst Muggles, when I wasn't at school. Muggleborn, you know. No magic at all in the family before I came along."

"And?" Harry asked, after the man had paused for a few moments. He really didn't want to be here all day, listening to long, meandering stories that might or, more likely, might not actually help, especially if there was something he might actually be able to do in the meantime.

"Oh, yes, well. See, I was a medic in the Great War. Awful time, but it was in the service of my country, and I don't regret it a whit. I don't know if you chaps are familiar with what happened to soldiers on the front line what they first called 'shell-shock'?" When Ron only shrugged and Harry's reply was no more informed, the man continued. "It was an epidemic of sorts. Had all the doctors and higher-ups a bit confused, and none too pleased. No one could really figure out if it was related to the concussive blasts, or something psychiatric. They got it sorted much later, and the Army was forbidden to use the term in later wars and situations. Gave it some clinical-sounding thing – 'combat stress reaction,' I believe."

Ron blinked at the man when his pause lengthened on. "You're saying this Sebastian Flout bloke is suffering from battle-related mental complications?"

"Well, no, not exactly. What I'm saying is, this reminds me of that. There was another fellow brought in two days ago who reminded me of it as well – older gent by the name of Melvin Urlacher? Mostly, it's what the Americans later dubbed the 'thousand yard stare' – that dead-eyed gaze, where they don't actually appear to be seeing much of anything. Lamps are lit, but no one's home, if you catch my meaning."

"Yeah, we do," Harry said with a nod. Flout definitely had that sort of look. Like he wasn't a part of reality. Like he'd seen something awful and had retreated within himself. Harry had seen some of that in the aftermath of the Battle of Hogwarts, looking around at the survivors. He thought about what Ron had said, about Neville's parents, and being overwhelmed with terrible things. Perhaps there was someone out there inflicting some sort of torture on those they'd captured. It made as much sense as anything else they'd come up with. "What's the treatment for this involve?"

Healer Ward sighed. "Unfortunately, we don't have a prescribed treatment plan for whatever is wrong with this fellow. None of the tests we've run have followed any patterns, or identified any poisons or spell damage. We're still trying our options, of course. And I promise to contact you gentlemen, as his wife indicated we ought, should we find anything useful."

"Thank you," Harry said, shaking the man's hand. Ron followed suit, then stepped alongside Harry as they made their way out of the hospital and back to the Ministry.

"What d'you suppose the chances are of them finding anything useful in solving what happened to that bloke? Or any of the others who've disappeared?" Ron murmured as they headed back down to their department.

Harry sighed deeply. "I honestly don't know. But that Healer didn't exactly seem to hold a lot of hope himself, did he?"

Ron shook his head. "I don't know if I'd rather that was just a part of his sub-par bedside manner, or if it was specific to our case. Because if it's just our case, mate, I can't say I hold a lot of hope for anyone else who comes up missing."

"Auror Potter, could I see you a moment?"

Harry looked up from putting the finishing touches to his report on the raid they'd completed two days ago, in which he and a handful of other Aurors had managed to confiscate nearly two dozen Dark artefacts. Auror Skadden was standing over him, looking slightly impatient. Hastily, he scrawled his name at the bottom of the form, tapped it with his wand, sending it to the appropriate division for review, and stood. "Of course, sir."

He followed alongside his silent supervisor, wondering what in Merlin's name he'd done to garner a private meeting. Skadden generally had no problem discussing things at Harry's and Ron's desks, and any sort of sensitive case information had always been relayed in their supervisor's office, with both of them present, or with a quick combination of privacy spells anywhere in the office where they could find the room. The only exception to that so far had been the one talk Harry had got when he'd first started with the Auror Corps, about paying his dues and not expecting special treatment, no matter how many strings Minister Shacklebolt had pulled to get him and Ron into the Corps.

Come to think of it, where was Ron? Harry hadn't seen him in the last half-hour or so.

His question was answered the moment he stepped into Skadden's office. Ron was standing against one wall, and when he grinned at Harry, Harry dropped his guard a bit. Ron wouldn't be smiling like that if they were about to be lectured or punished for something.

"Sit down, Potter," Skadden told him, slipping into the seat behind his desk. "Weasley, you stay put for just a moment, since this first part concerns you." He leaned back in his chair, regarded them both for a moment, and took a deep breath. "Well, gentlemen. While I freely admit you are both quite competent in your roles here within the department, would it be fair to say the last few of your assigned cases aren't progressing with the usual speed and development we've all come to expect?"

Up against the wall, Ron fidgeted a bit, and Harry tried to find a way to answer that wasn't immediately defensive. Ron answered first, clearing his throat. "I suppose that's a fair way to put it," he said, nodding. Harry agreed.

"That's what I thought. I don't blame you two, specifically. I think it's simply the unfortunate facts of the cases themselves. Either way, recent developments render it easier to make a few decisions on the matter. First off, Potter, Weasley here has put in for a holiday. He'll be taking off mid-next week, and gone for two weeks, per departmental approval."

When Harry turned to look at Ron, the question on his face before he'd even formed it into words, Ron rubbed the back of his neck and grinned a bit sheepishly. "Sorry I didn't mention it beforehand, Harry. It just sort of popped up. Hermione sent an owl at lunch, and she sounded quite insistent for some reason."

"Oh." Well, Harry couldn't really fault him. Hermione was a planner, not really much for spontaneous trips, and if she was suddenly pushing for them to go away, Harry imagined Ron was surprised enough to give it a go. And, quite honestly, Ron hadn't taken a holiday in the last two years. It had been almost four, for Harry. They were overdue, really. "No worries, Ron. I understand."

"And with that being set, there's the other point of this conversation. As Weasley here is leaving for a bit, and your luck with the missing persons cases you've been assigned is frankly non-existent, the Ministry has decided it might be time to try a new tactic. Potter, you're to be assigned a new partner."

"What?" both Ron and Harry asked at once. "Sir, I hardly think removing me as Harry's partner just because I've –"

"Calm down, you two. I'm not breaking you up permanently, for Merlin's sake. But the fact that Weasley will be gone and you've not been able to get anywhere with the department's resources means that a different sort of partnership may not be uncalled for. Potter, you'll be teamed with someone else here in the Ministry, with a different skill set and different resources at their disposal. It's simply a temporary measure, solely for the purpose of working out what's going on with the increase in missing persons, and the odd things surrounding the current four who have reappeared." Skadden's eyes locked with Harry's for a moment before they flicked up to Ron. "Understood?"

"Yes, sir," they both answered. Neither sounded exceptionally pleased, but the temporary nature of the change was reassuring. They worked quite well together, and Harry had never once doubted that, of all people he could possibly be working with in so many dangerous situations, Ron had his back, in many senses of the phrase.

"Good. Weasley, you're dismissed. You may go home as soon as your reports on the raid are filed. Potter here has already finished his." Once Ron had left the room, Skadden turned to look at Harry. "So, I suppose you're curious who we've selected to work with you on this case, if not another Auror?"

Harry couldn't think of anyone off the top of his head. Admittedly, most of those he knew here in the Ministry were part of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement. He knew a few others here and there, but no one he could think of who would have any sort of useful resources or skills for solving missing persons cases. "Unless you've got someone who's actually mastered on-demand Divination, or you're hiding some supernatural bloodhound, my only other guess would be someone in the Department of Mysteries."

"There's that deductive reasoning we like to see," Skadden said, grinning and settling back into his chair, his hands laced over his sternum. "No one currently working here who's that good at Divination, I'm afraid. There are those in the Ministry's employ who have that gift, but nothing so useful to us as being able to solve a case simply by waving a hand over a case file. No trained beast who could help locate the victims, though I'm certain the groundskeeper at Hogwarts would be willing to find and attempt to train something if we asked."

Harry stifled a laugh at that. He was sure of it as well. He thought of trying to corral Fluffy and command all three heads at a crime scene. That was a headache he didn't need – balancing keeping evidence untainted and contained while also trying not to be eaten or fatally drooled upon.

"You will indeed be partnered with one of the Unspeakables," Skadden continued. "We had to find someone who was up for the physical task of tagging along with you to crime scenes, socially adept enough to be able to help you conduct interviews and deal with people in general, grounded enough to keep the scope of the case in mind and not worry about research or observation for its own sake, and at a point in their own work where they could devote a few days or a week or more to the new assignment, without letting anything in their own department suffer. It left fewer candidates than you might think." Auror Skadden raised his eyebrows in a way that made Harry slightly uneasy, a feeling which was borne out when he uttered the next sentences. "I need you to remember that this person was the best match for the case. Put aside any past personal issues and focus instead on how you can help each other, for the sake of those missing and those so far returned."

Harry tried not to wince. If he was being warned about someone he may have had past issues with, he could only think of a few people Skadden might be about to shackle him to. And only one of them was an Unspeakable. "You're talking about Draco Malfoy, aren't you?"

One corner of Skadden's mouth lifted in something vaguely like a smirk. "The one and only."

Harry nodded, trying not to feel like he was taking some sort of punishment, or that this assigned partnership wasn't a test of his adaptability or capacity to function as an Auror amidst strain. He was twenty-five years old, and fully capable of being professional. He hadn't spoken to Malfoy other than the occasional 'hello' or exceptionally minor small talk in a Ministry lift in the last several years. He hadn't really seen him much, period, since he'd testified at the Malfoys' trials in the months after the war's end.

At least, Harry thought as he was dismissed from Skadden's office and headed for home, he could be fairly certain that if you put him and Malfoy alone in a room together these days, Harry wouldn't try to hex him or throw a punch, and Malfoy wouldn't attempt to break his nose.

Fairly certain. He was only assuming this, given their civility for periods of forty seconds at a time, scattered approximately once or twice every few months for the last five or so years. Being side-by-side, for potentially hours at a time, for days (or weeks, he was reminded)... well, that might be another story.

The look on Malfoy's face when he walked into the Department of Magical Law Enforcement the following day, eight minutes earlier than scheduled, was an expression Harry recognised easily. He'd seen it in his own mirror this morning. It flickered just slightly between grim determination and resignation, with tiny glimmers of something like hope. In Harry's case, it had been hope that Malfoy wouldn't say something that would make Harry want to strangle him, coupled with hope that the cases before them would be solved quickly with the added resources Malfoy could provide.

He didn't know what was behind the possible flashes of hope in Malfoy's expression.

"Unspeakable Malfoy," Harry said, stepping forward and offering his hand. He had decided last night that the best approach was to be strictly professional, so they both knew where they stood and had something to fall back upon. No different than the times he'd had to work with Aurors and related professionals from other countries over the years.

Malfoy hesitated for a split second, briefly enough that no one else would likely notice, before clasping Harry's hand and giving it a firm shake. "Auror Potter."

That accomplished without any undue hexing, Harry mentally patted himself on the back. "Auror Skadden's in his office, where he'll brief us together. You're a bit early. Would you care to grab a coffee or some tea beforehand? The staff kitchen's just over there," he said pointing. "At your disposal while you're working with us."

Simple courtesy. As long as Harry thought of Malfoy on the same plane as any of the other liaisons and dignitaries and law enforcement he'd worked with over the years, it was easy to do. It was a script with which he was familiar.

"I.... No, I'm fine, thank you," Malfoy said, his eyebrows betraying his momentary surprise. The expression was gone quickly, schooled into something neutral that lacked the haughtiness Harry remembered seeing for so many years back in school. "But don't let me stop you from getting something yourself."

Harry shrugged just a little. "I've had mine for the morning. Got here a couple hours ago." Not that there weren't days he relied on more than one coffee – or energy potion, at that. But he thought it best not to give himself quite that much of a boost before spending the next several hours with Draco Malfoy.

"Is that hour usual for you?" Malfoy glanced over Harry's shoulder, towards Skadden's office. Harry couldn't read whatever expression came with the question.

"Sometimes." In truth, his schedule was dictated mostly by his current case load and whatever new developments were happening, plus the random occasions something urgent came up that prompted a call to arms for any available Aurors. This morning, however, he'd come in earlier than he'd been due for the simple fact that he couldn't stand staying in bed and staring up his ceiling any longer. He'd even had time to go for a run, take an extra-long shower, and still get to the Ministry almost three hours early, beating even Skadden there, and surprising a few of those on overnight duty. "It depends a bit on what I'm working on. I figured I may as well wrap up some other work and file reports before we delve into the missing persons cases fully. Couldn't hurt to make certain everything else is taken care of and my focus isn't split."

Malfoy nodded, opening his mouth to say something before he was cut off by the door to Auror Skadden's office swinging open. "Looks like he's ready for us," he said instead. "Shall I follow you in?"

Thankfully, Auror Skadden seemed to believe in a streamlined, to-the-point style briefing this morning, following the briefest of pleasantries. Harry always found his supervisor to be exceptionally efficient on the days he beat the man into the office. He privately wondered if Skadden believed that a more junior member of the squad showing up before his superior was personally unacceptable, acting as a kick in the arse and spurring him to be more productive in some sort of assertion of his place within the Ministry.

Not that he'd ever ask the man directly. Harry had seen Skadden in duelling exercises and on his own in the practice room. Aside from the fact that he found it unwise to anger the man who assigned his cases, and who was Head Auror via Kingsley Shacklebolt's personal appointment, he had no desire to incur the man's wrath, should they end up facing one another in the next duelling demonstration.

Despite what others said, Harry did possess some measure of self-preservation.

As Ron was sitting at his own desk, catching up on the paperwork end of things before he left on holiday, Harry gathered all their current missing persons case files and hauled them into one of the interrogation rooms, where Skadden had suggested they settle for the morning.

"Ah, interrogation room five," Malfoy muttered so quietly Harry almost missed it as they approached the door and it swung open at Harry's spell. "Starting off the assignment with fond memories."

Behind Malfoy's back, Harry winced. He'd actually forgotten Malfoy had been brought into the DMLE the day after the war had ended, all three Malfoys greeted at their home by a handful of Aurors who had a very long list of questions and were willing to spend quite a lot of time waiting for their answers. Harry had been at the Burrow, himself, but he remembered the photo in The Daily Prophet the morning after it had happened, underneath the headline "Suspects in War Crimes Brought in for Questioning."

When he'd found a moment to sneak away four hours later, Harry had been at the Ministry, asking to speak to Kingsley.

The image of a shrunken-looking Lucius Malfoy standing in front of his wife and son, their hands all bound and one of the Aurors holding all three of their wands at the front of the group, had stayed with Harry for days. It was the way Narcissa Malfoy kept her back straight and head up, even while she placed her hands gently on her son's arm, as if her touch could dispel Draco's dead-eyed stare or loosen his stiff movements, that had driven Harry to the Ministry, really. Harry knew things no one else did – he knew of severed allegiances, sacrifices made without hesitation, and even if those things didn't excuse the Malfoys, Harry knew that their new Minister of Magic needed to know them as well. The thought of more punishment being meted out while crucial evidence was kept private made Harry's stomach turn.

It reminded Harry too much of what had happened to Sirius, even if his godfather had been completely innocent, while the Malfoys had indeed been at least involved in what they were being accused of.

"... I could see if there's somewhere else we could go," Harry said uncertainly. Now that he'd put things together, he was actually a bit surprised Malfoy hadn't thrown a fit when Skadden had given them their directive, or made his displeasure openly known, or threatened to go to the Minister with a complaint. "The conference rooms are in use, but maybe there's another room, or a table away from everyone else where we could use privacy charms?"

Malfoy shook his head and stepped through the door, pausing at the table for just a moment before pulling out one of the chairs and sitting down a little more roughly than looked natural. "It's fine, Potter. Let's just get to work, shall we?"

"Yeah, uh, right. Let's start with the first missing person in the series, I guess." He took Nigel Billingsworth's file off the top of the stack and pulled it in front of him, glad to have something else to look at other than Malfoy's face right now.

They eventually worked out a system, Harry reading bits of each file while Malfoy jotted notes of his own. Malfoy wasn't interested in hearing any of the theories Harry or Ron had been bandying about, insisting he wanted to let any links form organically in his own mind before hearing other possibilities. As much as it irritated Harry and made him feel like a second-class citizen whose opinion mattered very little – if at all – he had to admit it was a logical approach.

The problem with working in an interrogation room, aside from the fact that one of the two of them had some unpleasant associations with the environment, was that they were designed not to give away the time of day. Harry had never found a problem with this before, and had used it to his advantage when questioning suspects. But when his stomach made a noise reminiscent of a mother dragon protectively guarding her clutch of eggs, he realised it did have its downsides.

"I assume that means it's time to find ourselves something for lunch," Malfoy said, not looking up from the parchment filled with notes scrawled across its surface in neat handwriting. "Unless you'd like to wait just a little while longer, and see if your stomach learns to develop its protestations and vocalisations into actual human speech."

Harry suddenly remembered why he'd not been absolutely positive he and Malfoy could get along for extended periods of time.

"It's been nearly seven hours," he said after casting a quick Tempus charm. Wait. He cast it again, with an identical result. How on earth had they been working that long? Harry supposed it did explain why his throat was slightly sore. Thankfully, Malfoy took such extensive notes and did enough scribbling of his own at some points that Harry hadn't had to speak nearly as much as he had for some speeches and lectures he'd given in the past.

"I suppose completely missing lunchtime explains the noise," Malfoy said, stretching his arms up over his head, one shoulder giving a muted pop. "How much longer should we give this, today?"

Harry shrugged. "Normally, I'd head home around now, given how early I got here. But I think we should talk some of this over first, don't you?" In truth, he was curious to hear Malfoy's theories. He wasn't trained to think like the Aurors were, and the fact that he had managed to obtain a position in the Department of Mysteries and keep it for the past five or six years meant that he had to be fairly intelligent, no matter what Harry had thought of him when they were younger.

Malfoy massaged his left shoulder a bit, seeming to consider what Harry had said. "While I understand that you're eager to compare notes, I have to admit I'd really like to be able to ruminate overnight and start a plan of attack while fresh. What would you say to meeting for a quick bite to eat in the morning and discussing our respective theories then?"

Harry hesitated. While he wouldn't be knocking off early, given how many hours he'd actually worked today, he really had thought he and Malfoy would have done more on their missing persons cases than they'd accomplished today. Really, Harry hadn't done any actual work at all. Malfoy had begun the process of getting acquainted with the amassed details, something Harry understood would take some time, but it was tedious, slow going, without the ability to simply bottle all the knowledge he had on the matters at hand and having Malfoy drink it down and retain it all. Even Malfoy's rumoured Legilimency wouldn't do much for him in this particular circumstance.

"I suppose we could do that," he answered eventually, trying to muffle his stomach's insistence that going home and getting some food into his body was priority number one, and cases be damned.

"Seven a.m.?" Malfoy suggested. "There's a quaint little patisserie hidden near Flourish and Blotts. Very good breakfast items, potent coffee and tea, and plenty of privacy available, I assure you. Fantastic way to wake up and fuel your brain and body for a day of critical thinking. What do you say?"

Harry could think of very little to say, in fact, that wasn't agreement. It was nothing like how he and Ron would have approached a case or new series of assignments, but he did have to admit that his and Ron's approach hadn't yet yielded any results. "Sounds good."

"I'll see you there, then," Malfoy said, standing up and heading for the door. He was walking through the hallway before Harry could even gather all of the files from the table, and it wasn't until Harry watched him walk past the long window that was usually charmed to be opaque that he realised how much Malfoy's posture and expression seemed to ease once he was out of the room.

Though the scent of someone's late lunch sitting on their desk distracted him once he was near enough to catch it, Harry couldn't help but ponder that change, and what it meant that it had been significant enough for him to notice its occurrence.

Seven o'clock the next morning found a perplexed (and increasingly irritated) Harry Potter standing outside Flourish and Blotts, staring at the spot where Malfoy had suggested they meet.

Malfoy wasn't there. Neither, in fact, was the patisserie he had mentioned. Any patisserie.

If he had intentionally sent Harry there to harass him or prove some point or just get him good and angry, then he was at least moderately successful, no matter how much Harry told himself he wasn't getting upset. Harry also couldn't help but think that it was an incredibly stupid move, given that they had been assigned to work together by the heads of their departments and the Minister for Magic himself. Actively making your partner visualise Stunning and otherwise hexing you was generally not the best way to build a sense of camaraderie. And, much as Harry hated to admit it, he was fairly certain he did actually need Malfoy's help – or, at the very least, whatever resources the Department of Mysteries might have.

"Potter!" Malfoy's voice rang out behind Harry, startling him slightly, though he did his best not to jump. "What are you doing just standing th– oh. You didn't actually act as if you'd been here before when I suggested it, and I neglected to give you the password yesterday, didn't I?"

"Yeah," Harry said, trying not to let any sarcasm or irritation show in his voice as Malfoy drew up even with him. It was entirely possible Malfoy had planned this, to make Harry frustrated or even to show him that he needed Malfoy for help, that he didn't know everything on his own. But then Harry remembered how Malfoy had managed to dash out of the interrogation room in a way that indicated he was trying very hard not to appear as though he were in a rush to leave it, and sighed. It was also possible that it had been an honest mistake. Short of dosing Malfoy's morning beverage with Veritaserum and asking point-blank, there was little Harry could do to prove ill intent.

"Rather eccentric owner of this place, which accounts for the fact that he keeps a perfectly legitimate storefront secret, relying upon word of mouth," Malfoy said, tapping his wand against the thigh-high stone statue of a stretching cat. The statue sat back on its haunches and tilted its head, ears going back just a little as if curious about who stood before it. "Gateaux," Malfoy said, scratching under its chin.

A small staircase appeared behind the statue, winding behind the storefront of Flourish and Blotts, and Harry followed Malfoy up and through the door of a place bright with sunlight, where the air was so fragrant with the aromas of butter, sugar, chocolate, and baking bread that he almost stumbled over himself.

Whatever his reason for not giving Harry the password and other instructions yesterday, Malfoy was forgiven.

As they entered, the wizard behind the counter gave Harry a squinty-eyed look before seeming to notice Malfoy standing there as well. "Ah, Monsieur Malfoy, I was not expecting you on a Wednesday! And who is this handsome young Auror who accompanies you?" The baker (which is what Harry could only assume he was, given the streaks of flour and chocolate and icing adorning the front of his robes) gave Harry a very obvious once-over, lingering over the top of his Auror robes and slowly making his way up to Harry's face before widening his eyes comically. "You've brought Monsieur Harry Potter, have you?"

"Uh, yeah," Harry said, blushing a little. At his right, Malfoy had also turned the slightest shade of pink, but remained silent. "Nice to meet you?" He hadn't caught a name yet, but he supposed they'd met. "Malfoy said this was the best place for croissants and coffee around." He chanced a glance over at Malfoy, who was still looking a little flushed. "Perfect for an early morning meeting."

The man beamed at him. "I like to think so, and I'm glad my patrons do, too. Work, you say? Well, I won't intrude. Just let me know what I can get for you this morning."

"The usual," Malfoy said, finally speaking when Harry was too overwhelmed by the things visible in the glass case in front of them to answer right away. He looked over at Harry, who caught the movement out of the corner of his eye while he wondered if it would be uncivilised to order one of everything. "Make that two, if you would, Marcel?" Malfoy nudged Harry, who finally looked away from the pastries, only just aware his freedom to order had just been taken away. "Don't drool on the glass, Potter," Malfoy murmured. "It's rude, not to mention unhygienic."

Harry followed Malfoy to a table in the back corner of the place, though they had their pick of any in the currently empty shop. He couldn't think of any appropriate comeback, and instead settled for "I can order for myself, you know", as he sat across from Malfoy and watched him pull out the roll of parchment from yesterday that was covered in his notes.

"You seemed to be having trouble deciding, and I wanted to get to work sometime before noon," was Malfoy's dry answer. "Besides, you'll like what I've ordered. And you can always get something to take with you before we head to the Ministry, if you're so inclined."

It was hard to argue with that last point, though Harry thought he could if he really wanted. "Fine." He tapped the parchment Malfoy had laid neatly on the table. "So. Now you've slept on it. Tell me what you've got."

As if to prove that he was still capable of being insufferable, Malfoy waited until after Marcel had brought them their order to say anything related to their cases. Harry was torn between getting the thirty seconds to truly savour his still-warm sweet cheese butter croissant and almond-flavoured coffee concoction, and wanting to strangle his new partner for his tendency to make Harry wait.

In the end, he settled for munching on his croissant and giving Malfoy his best 'get to the damned point' look.

"I think your department's eventual conclusion, that these missing persons cases are all related, is correct," Malfoy finally began, which was perhaps the least useful bit of analysis Harry had heard in a while – besides "that bloke's drunk," from Ron last week, when they'd arrested a man who'd been singing slurred odes to his pet goldfish as he stumbled around Diagon Alley just shy of midnight. "The party behind orchestrating these disappearances is very good at evading detection, as you're well aware, which speaks of some very specialised skills. If they're able to hide virtually every trace of evidence, it's likely they know what to conceal, what you'll be most reliant upon in discovering them. Have you considered anyone who might either be a former Auror, or someone who perhaps wanted to be one, but was rejected for one reason or another? Or even someone who was or wanted to be an Obliviator, given the apparent memory issues of those who have turned up again, after being missing?"

Harry put down the last third of his croissant, suddenly less hungry than he had been just a moment ago. "No."

"I'm not saying that's my gut feeling on this, understand," Malfoy said, sitting back and sipping at his own coffee. "It's just a possibility I don't think you should discount, and one it may not hurt to consider. Whatever is going on has a very... dark feel to it. Something sinister. Someone who feels slighted might stoop to such methods."

"Is it anything you recognise?"

Malfoy shook his head. "Not at this juncture. And I'm speaking both as someone who has seen things in his line of work we are not generally allowed to discuss with the public and that most people cannot fathom, and as someone with... a bit of first- and second-hand experience with the Dark Arts." He scoffed lightly at Harry's raised eyebrows. "Did you think I was unaware my personal experiences played a role in the Ministry selecting me to assist you? Or did you just expect me to deny that I'd ever known anything about any sort of Dark magic, despite being my father's son, and what my family went through, including essentially being forced into housing and aiding an utterly mad Dark wizard, for fear of being used as his next example of what happens to those who did not obey?"

"I..." Harry honestly couldn't figure out a response to those questions. Of course it had crossed his own mind that Malfoy's family history had played a part in why he'd been selected, even if no one had come right out and said it. But as to Malfoy's admission that he'd had said experiences, well... Harry had rather thought he would dance around the subject, demand that it be dropped, or give a blanket 'the Ministry hired me; if it doesn't matter to them, it shouldn't matter to you' sort of statement. After a moment of stammering and utterly failing to come up with any response at all, let alone a good or appropriate one, he sighed and gave up. "What other theories do you have?"

"Nothing else good, I'm afraid, given the stunning lack of evidence in each file. I'd like to be able to start going through some of the Ministry archives, especially those the Department of Mysteries keeps. There are some bureaucratic hoops to jump through to even gain access to that sort of thing, but I think it would help us, especially if this person is using some older form of Dark Magic, or we're able to find anything on former Ministry employees being let go for any sort of unusual reason. I know there are files on... underground groups, as well."

"Underground groups? Like, factions of Dark Wizards? Other versions of Death Eaters?" Harry asked. Not that they hadn't broken up a number of other rings of Dark Wizards (and one group comprised entirely of witches) in his time with the DMLE, especially in the two years or so right after the war's end. There were more pureblood-obsessed nutters out there than Harry had realised, especially as virtually everyone he knew had been so relieved the war was over, or was friends with someone Muggle-born or half-blood, if they weren't one themselves.

"In some instances, yes. Whole societies in some cases, made of dozens of groups, spread throughout Europe and even some of the other continents. Our ministry is not the only entity to deal with such things, and the phenomenon is not restricted to one geographic area. Think on a global scale, Potter. How do we know this isn't someone who's come here from another country, who found magics largely or completely unknown to us? If Voldemort fled to Albania for the Dark magic the place held onto, to be found by that vermin of a servant, then what's to say someone from a place like that, where Dark and otherwise questionable things haven't been expressly banned, couldn't have made his way here to us, who would have no known line of defence?"

Harry pushed away the remaining few bites of his breakfast. "Thanks for that lovely little bit of doom and the gloomy prophecy," he said with a snort.

Malfoy shrugged. "It's what we're partnered for, isn't it? To consider things from angles the other might not? To put both of our minds together and see what becomes visible then?"

"I don't like it when you're right," Harry muttered, after a moment. It challenged his world views in a very disconcerting way, and he felt his eleven-year-old self glaring indignantly from wherever he was tucked away.

"Then be prepared to dislike a lot of things," Malfoy countered, and Harry was surprised to see there might have been a real smile underneath that smirk. "Though nothing that's made in this patisserie. Now finish your food. We need to start the process of requesting access to an awful lot of Ministry files and resources." He finished the last of his coffee, rolled up his parchment, and tucked it into a pocket inside his robes. "I do hope you've got a good, quality quill of your own, and you can make your penmanship more legible than usual if you focus, or this is going to be a very rough road."

Harry stuffed the rest of his croissant into his mouth and stood. He was partnered with Draco Malfoy. What in Merlin's name suggested the road would be easy?

The road was definitely not easy.

Actually, if there was a metaphorical road here, Harry was possibly in favour of shoving Malfoy into it, in the path of an oncoming lorry.

"This is a waste of our time, you know," Malfoy whispered, sounding as irritated as he possibly could with his voice kept low.

Harry elbowed him in the ribs, earning a look that matched Malfoy's tone of voice. "Shut up. She'll be back any moment." He kept his eye on the door to the kitchen, idly playing with the full cup of cooling tea sitting in front of him. He and Malfoy had both tried to decline, but no amount of standing behind professionalism or polite refusal had deterred the woman living here.

"Yes, but you are aware this isn't a real –" Malfoy pressed, clamping down on his commentary abruptly when Moira Delaney reappeared, carrying a photo album.

"Sorry for the wait, dears," she said, dropping the book rather triumphantly into Malfoy's lap and utterly missing (or perhaps ignoring) the smothered 'oof' he let out. Harry tried his best not to snicker.

"It's no trouble, ma'am. Really, I think we'll have all we need from you at this time, once you give us a recent photograph," Harry assured her. He wasn't eager to get back to the Ministry, and was wondering how long he and Malfoy could feasibly stay out of the office after leaving here, as it was solidly within the lunch hour. But he also didn't feel like spending all day in the Delaney home, trapped in the kitchen and at the mercy of this woman and her hospitality.

"Oh? Oh. Well, then, let's just see what I've got here," she said, hoisting the book back out of Malfoy's lap and thudding it onto the table. She opened to the first page, which was a photograph of her and a gentleman Harry assumed to be Mr Delaney, though it appeared to be a good twenty or thirty years old, as neither of them looked old enough to have quite left Hogwarts yet. "This is me. With Conor, of course. See how good we look together? This was taken when he came to visit me at my parents' over the summer."

"Charming," Malfoy said, and Harry would have kicked him under the table if he thought he'd be able to do it without Mrs Delaney noticing.

"That's very nice," Harry tried, "but we really would need something more recent than –"

"And this is us on our wedding day," she said right over him, flipping to another page. Harry glanced down and saw the couple in front of a garden, and the bride leaning over and giving her groom a kiss on the cheek. The groom smiled, looking a little awkward.

"That's also –"

"Oh, and here we are ten years ago, on holiday to Stonehenge," she went on, completely ignoring Harry again. "See? It's not my best side, but the Muggles who offered to take our photo had such trouble with our camera, it's a wonder it came out at all." The couple in front of one of the large stones indeed looked a little flustered, and Mrs Delaney appeared to be trying to give instructions to someone while her husband stood there, looking impatiently at his pocket watch. When his wife moved in to put her arm around his waist, Mr Delaney set his mouth in a grim line and stood still, looking uncomfortably rigid.

"Do you perhaps have something from the last year or so?" Harry asked, looking at how many pages were left in the album, all of which appeared to be full.

"What? Oh, yes, of course," Mrs Delaney said, sounding disappointed he hadn't asked to be able to look through the entire album in order to appreciate every single photograph. She flipped to one of the last pages. "This is him, six months ago. I think I caught him when he was tired," she said, frowning a little. "It's not his best picture. But you can see him clearly, I think."

Harry looked down at the photo, feeling Draco lean in a little closer to do the same. In the picture, Conor Delaney looked up from where he was sitting on the couch, reading the paper. He glanced up, gave the camera an annoyed look, and seemed to mutter something as he lifted the paper and essentially hid behind it.

Harry had to agree. He could see Mr Delaney clearly before he ducked behind the paper. Unfortunately, he thought the man's wife could not.

"That one will work just fine," he assured her, tucking it into his robes when she removed it from the album and handed it to him, before he and Malfoy made their way to her front door. "We will keep you updated on any developments with your husband's case."

"Oh, thank you, gentlemen. I'm just so worried something's happened to him. I woke up this morning to find his side of the bed empty, and when I couldn't find some of his favourite things, including his father's old watch, and I saw his wedding ring on the bathroom sink, I thought the worst. I hope nothing terrible has happened to him."

Harry tried to keep his face neutral. "I'm sure nothing like that's happened. As I said, we'll inform you of any developments. Thank you, Mrs Delaney."

"You know exactly what happened, don't you?" Malfoy muttered as they walked out of her garden and onto the street. "He got tired of that woman and decided to make a bid for freedom."

"I think she's the only one who doesn't know that," Harry said with a sigh. "But do you really want to look her in the eye and say 'I'm sorry, ma'am, but your husband's probably not been abducted. We think he's left you, on purpose'? Wait, never mind, don't answer that."

Malfoy huffed. "The man packed a bag, Potter! You saw those photos, same as I did. He's a miserable bastard. I'm not saying she deserves it, or that she wasn't a decent wife, or didn't try to make him happy, but the man just got up and left her, for whatever reason. Maybe he found some young pretty thing, or decided to explore the possibility of a relationship with a bloke instead of a woman, or just got tired of being nagged about leaving his pants and socks on the floor. The reason doesn't really matter, here. This isn't like the other missing persons cases, and I really don't see why we had to waste our time!"

"Because she wanted to file a report, and it's our job. Well, my job. Also, when we were sent out to take her statement, the only information we had to go on was that a woman was calling to report her husband missing."

"That's the only information we have on any of these cases!" Malfoy snapped.

Sighing, Harry shrugged. "I don't want to get into this again," he said, knowing that wasn't likely. He was quite aware that when Malfoy felt like whinging, very little could stop him. They'd been bickering more and more steadily for the last few days, their apparent unspoken agreement to act professionally degrading by the day. There wasn't any real animosity behind it at this point, and Harry had yet to get more than moderately irritated by anything Malfoy said or did. He did, however, want to throttle him a bit whenever Malfoy suggested they focus on the old Ministry archives they were being given sporadic access to, instead of going out and actually doing something.

Of course, the fact that there wasn't really anything for them to do – no real evidence to examine, no witnesses, no leads to track down – made Harry irritated in and of itself. And when Malfoy pointed out the lack of Auror-specific things for them to do, Harry really just wanted to bang his head against the nearest wall for a while.

"Of course you don't," Malfoy said, flailing his arms a little. He caught himself, composing himself and looking somewhat embarrassed he'd reacted ungracefully in public, and grabbed Harry by the arm. When Harry's body settled itself again a few short seconds later, they were standing on a corner in Diagon Alley, and Malfoy was tugging his sleeve in the direction of a small cafe. "You don't want to face facts – which is purely a metaphor, because there are very few actual facts in these cases. Come on, lunch," he said, as if it was completely normal for him to drag Harry along to a completely new location with no warning, and to keep the argument going as if nothing had happened.

Harry shrugged mentally and followed along. He could eat. It was lunchtime, after all, and he really didn't want to be shut up in one of the creepily quiet and oddly lit rooms the Unspeakables were letting them use to go over the slowly-growing pile of files the Department of Ministries was giving them access to while they considered the request to review said files in the relative comfort of a more private, welcoming location. In some regards, being cooped up in there reminded Harry of being back at Hogwarts, sneaking around the library and Restricted Section with Ron and Hermione, and all the time they'd spent researching things. In most of those cases, they'd been looking for a way to save people, or help Harry not get killed. At least the former was true here, too.

When their waiter stopped at their table not five minutes later, Harry knew he wasn't going to be trying the day's special, after all. Malfoy was still in deep contemplation over the menu, on which he was apparently trying to focus his frustrated energy instead of arguing some more in public over confidential matters. "I'm sorry, Mr Potter, Mr Malfoy. This has just come for you," he said, handing over an envelope with the Ministry seal. "If you gentlemen stay, please just let me know, and I'll be happy to take your orders."

Harry nodded a thank you, opening the envelope as Malfoy looked up from his menu. "From the Ministry?" Malfoy asked, getting a look at the envelope. "It never really ceases to surprise me that they interrupt at the most inopportune times. It's like they track their employees and wait until the worst times to get in touch. Tell me this isn't another missing person we have to take a report on."

"It's not," Harry murmured, reading the message from Skadden. It was short – quite short. "Look."

Malfoy took the offered note, eyebrows going up a little as he read the contents. "'Someone else has turned up. Report to St Mungo's immediately.' So, what, we've got another memory-impaired or mute or catatonic person to ask questions of, coming away with no answers, yet again? We've had six, in total, and two that I've been present for."

Harry shook his head and stood, gesturing Malfoy to follow him as he walked out of the cafe. "I don't think so," he said once they were on the sidewalk outside. "The wording's not typical of messages from Skadden, even the immediate requests. Something about this is different."

"Different? Like someone else sent it, and signed his name?"

Harry shook his head. "Not like that. But something about this doesn't give me a good feeling."

"Well, you were right about it being different," Malfoy said quietly as they stood alone in the large, cold room on the bottom level of St Mungo's.

"I wish I'd been wrong." Harry looked down at the man lying on the table in front of them. Nick Harrington, a man reported missing by his wife four days ago. He was thirty-two, had been in apparent fair health and of good cheer the last time anyone had seen him, and was a beloved member of his small village community, working as a tutor for a small group of families who had children too young to yet attend Hogwarts.

And now Harry was going to have to go and inform his wife that she was now a widow.

Having to deliver news like this was never something Harry took well. It reminded him of how ineffectual he'd been in comforting people after the battle, how he'd not been able to think of anything to say to Mr and Mrs Weasley or Ginny or Ron or especially George, or any of the dozens of others he knew who'd lost someone. The department had a few people who made most of those sort of house calls, and they'd all been through seminars led by wizards trained in grief counselling of all kinds – a year ago, they'd even had a two-day course taught by a woman with several certificates in both Mind Healing and Muggle psychology. But sometimes you had to deliver the news yourself, and Harry remembered every single one of those times.

"Stop."

Harry looked up, startled out of his thoughts by Malfoy's firm order. "What?"

"I don't know exactly what you're thinking, Potter, but I don't need to use Legilimency to have a good idea. I can see it on your face. You're thinking about having to break the news to his loved ones. Stop it."

"I wasn't –"

"Potter, I will use Legilimency on you if I have to, and if you think I don't have methods up my sleeve that will shut you up for a few moments, you've underestimated me. Seriously, stop. I overheard Skadden speaking to one of the Healers outside. They're already taking care of informing his family. What we're here for is to figure out what happened, to be able to give answers. It's how we can help, even if it is too late for this fellow."

Harry took a deep breath through his nose and let it out as slowly as he could. He was dimly thankful that wizarding morgues smelled nothing at all like the Muggle equivalent. "Help?" he murmured after a moment, trying to press thoughts of the man's family from his mind. "By solving these cases, right?"

"Yes."

"But you heard the Healer – they've run all the diagnostic spells they can think of, and Skadden's gone over the initial findings from the Aurors who were dispatched to the scene when he was found. The Aurors haven't found anything more than we've already got in the other files. And the Healers are absolutely positive that Harrington died of dehydration and starvation. There are no physical signs of torture or that he was held in captivity, or evidence of self-defense, and no spell damage or poison or anything else that could leave a trace," he said, his own frustrated words sounding much like Malfoy's own frequent complaints. "So, tell me, exactly how are we supposed to figure any of this out?"

Malfoy was silent for a long moment. Finally, he looked away from Harry and down to the man lying before them. "I don't know."

Harry should have known Malfoy's answer to "work harder on these cases" involved more time holed up in the Ministry, thumbing through increasingly older and more obscure files, half of which had charms in place that still left the occasional word – or sentence, or even paragraphs and pages – blurry and unreadable.

Fucking Unspeakables.

Harry did have to admit that at least being stuck in the Department of Mysteries, sometimes even in Malfoy's office (that he actually had his own office was something Harry thought both unbelievable and completely unsurprising), was more comfortable than being on patrol. The weather had been dreary for the last several days, and this autumn continued to be colder than Harry could remember others being. He'd whinge at Ron about that and being stuck with Malfoy most of his waking hours, only Ron had left on holiday, and there was no way Harry was interrupting Ron and Hermione on their impromptu trip.

It also appeared Malfoy was trying to make the time more bearable for them both. After their short talk in the morgue yesterday, Malfoy had been quiet, which had suited Harry just fine. This morning, Harry had walked into Malfoy's office to find hot coffees and a ham and cheese croissant sitting on the desk. Malfoy had given him a brief, neutral greeting, pulled one drink and a small stack of files towards himself, and nodded at the food and the remaining cup. "That's yours. Just don't get buttery fingerprints on the files, or whatever the Department of Mysteries archivist thinks to do to us will probably keep other Unspeakables employed for decades, as they document the results," he'd said, not even looking up to see Harry's blatant stare.

"Thank you," Harry said after a moment, opting for that over "who are you, and what have you done with Draco Malfoy?" He opened the file closest to him – something only two-thirds readable, on a handful of wizards who had gone mute after scorning the siren-like being who inhabited a river outside of Carlisle nearly three hundred years ago. It looked promising for a bit, until Harry got to the paragraph about the men having distinguishing scars in the shape of an X over both their throats and their chests, and how half of them had come back home missing a very noticeable bit of their anatomy.

They had only been reading and jotting the occasional note for an hour at most when a small violet paper aeroplane sailed underneath Malfoy's door and came to hover between them before poking Harry in the back of the head. "Someone else has been found," he said, wincing as he got further into the message.

"Dead?" Malfoy surmised, probably from the look on Harry's face.

"Yes." He tapped the message and murmured a spell, and two more paragraphs appeared. "No struggle, no other signs of foul play. This one 'succumbed to exposure to the elements'."

"What, he... froze to death? Hypothermia? I suppose it's been cold enough some nights for that to be possible..." Malfoy said, apparently to himself. He gave his wand a complicated little flick, and a thick file slid itself out from underneath a pile on top of the cabinet behind Harry and floated over onto his desk, opening itself to a page midway through. "Not that it's likely related, but you never know..." he murmured again, finger trailing over the words as he scanned them. It was obvious he'd forgotten Harry might have anything further to say, or might want to discuss the fact that they'd been requested to appear at St Mungo's within the hour, though it seemed pointless, really.

Harry actually had to shake Malfoy's arm a little to snap him out of it enough to relay that they had somewhere to be. The entire time they were in the hospital, from the moment they entered and walked through the halls, to the time spent looking over Kevin McGreggor's unmarked body after speaking to the Healer on duty, and even as they walked back out into the late morning drizzle, it was obvious Malfoy was preoccupied. And it seemed to be the final straw in Harry keeping his composure, as far as accepting their partnership went.

"If you think for one minute that we are just going to hide ourselves behind those old papers and blurred-out files back in your office, just because you can't face the fact that your methods aren't helping, either," Harry bit out as they watched Auror Skadden Apparate away at the end of the walk, "you've got another thing coming."

Malfoy blinked slowly at him, eyes seeming to finally come into focus a bit. "I'm sorry, is that a threat of sorts?"

"No. It's me telling you that sitting in your office, hiding behind all those bloody papers, isn't going to solve this case, either."

"Then what, exactly, do you propose we do?"

"We're headed to Acle."

That seemed to be enough to pull Malfoy into the present moment, which made Harry feel a little better, even if he was having trouble telling himself that the anger he was feeling wasn't actually Malfoy's fault.

"And why in Merlin's name are we headed there?" Malfoy scoffed, and there was the haughty I-know-better-than-you-because-clearly-you're-an-idiot tone Harry had grown so used to in school. "That place isn't exactly populated, Potter. It was damaged by a group of Snatchers who were a little overzealous in their attempts to collect bounties. You may not have heard about it, as you were likely avoiding packs of them yourself, at the time, but Hogwarts was not the only place damaged badly enough to need rebuilding. All these years later, and that village is just now beginning to make headway."

"And you don't think a mostly-empty village in Norfolk that hasn't had many inhabitants over the last several years isn't a good place for a bunch of Dark Wizards to assemble and hide out?" Harry shot back. "Not everyone who's up to something is able to relax in a large, overly pretentious manor, you know."

That... might have been taking things a little further than Harry'd intended.

"I am not going to rise to that bait and demonstrate the things I learned while living in said manor," Malfoy said through gritted teeth. "Nor am I going to show you exactly how many interesting things I've been able to study and perfect in my years with the Department of Mysteries. I am simply going to ask, one more time, why you think it would be a good idea to rush into that village without some sort of lead, with ourselves only barely protected."

"Barely?" Harry asked, unable to help himself. "I don't know about you, Malfoy, but I'm a fully-trained Auror. That's more than barely protected."

Malfoy glared at him, his grey eyes narrowed so severely Harry wondered if he could still see clearly. And then he laughed. Not a loud, solid thing, but at least a chuckle, and Harry had to admit that wasn't at all what he'd expected. "Yes, fine. You're a trained Auror who's made it though seven years on the job without significant injury or death, and who managed to defeat the most evil wizard of our time at the ripe old age of seventeen. I suppose I'll consider you 'moderately protected'."

Harry just stood there for a moment, trying to process that Malfoy had just defused the argument with humour. He shook his head. "Don't you ever just get feelings – gut instincts – about something you're working on in the Department of Mysteries? You just have this insight or whatever you might call it?"

"I tend to leave the prophetic moments to the few Unspeakables who actually possess that gift," Malfoy said, but there was still that sense of something like a small smile underneath that smirk. "But yes, I do know what you're getting at. You're saying something about this location makes you think it holds the key to a piece of this puzzle."

"Something like that, yeah. I've been thinking about it since last night. If you map out where all the missing persons live, where they were last seen, and where the ones who've reappeared have been found, a number of them aren't too far from Acle. Sure, there are some from other places in Britain – there was the bloke from Wales, who'd been staying with his friend's family for the last few months, and there's the one from Hogsmeade, and the other from the next village over. But at least this is a start, right? We may not find anyone to talk to, but that doesn't mean we can't keep our eyes and ears open for something that seems out of the ordinary."

Malfoy sighed. "So help me, Merlin, if you get me killed, Potter, I will come back to haunt you. I can't believe I'm saying this, but you might have something. We'll go take a look at your decrepit little village. But if this doesn't yield anything, don't be surprised when I decline joining in on your mad little field trips."

Harry nodded. He could persuade Malfoy later, if it came to that, but he had a feeling Acle held some answers.

It wasn't until they'd walked down the main street of Acle that Harry placed the feeling of deja vu.

He'd never been here before, not even before the village had been damaged by Snatchers and anything that came after. It wasn't that the buildings looked familiar, or the layout was one he recognised. It was a combination of things that did it. The place was deserted, as Malfoy had said it would be. There were signs that people had been here recently – new-looking foundations, repairs done to walls and roofs, that sort of thing – but there was no evidence anyone was around now, as if they'd seen Harry and Malfoy arrive and had run away to hide somewhere.

It was as he was walking slowly by the old church yard, murmuring charms for retaining warmth and keeping dry, that Harry was hit by the last time he'd been somewhere that felt like this:

Godric's Hollow.

It had been snow then, not drizzling rain that sometimes let up to heavy mist, and everyone had been inside because it was Christmas Eve, but there was still that same eerie empty-yet-not feeling about the village. As Harry picked his way through rubble-strewn paths leading away from the town square, he thought of photographs he'd seen years ago of places like Pripyat and Hashima Island – buildings left to crumble, belongings left lying about as their owners had left abruptly, concerned only with their immediate safety. Muggles called places like this "ghost towns", and Harry could feel the uneasiness that led to such a label.

"We may as well go back," Harry said after nearly an hour of wandering around the town. They had seen two cats and a Crup skulking around, but no other inhabitants. Malfoy had said that the town was just starting to be rebuilt, and Harry figured most people doing that kind of work tended to do so when the earth was less wet and everything was less slick and dangerous to handle. "If there's anyone here, they're hiding well. I don't know why I'm surprised – if they haven't left any clues up until this point, it makes sense we haven't found any here."

Malfoy opened his mouth to say something, then closed it and cocked his head slightly to the side. "Is that... is that someone taking a nap between rebuilding projects?" he asked, squinting over Harry's shoulder. "Or is it some beggar leaned up against that wall, trying to stay dry?"

Harry turned around, catching a glimpse of dark grey robes and leather shoes. There was indeed someone leaned up against a mostly-intact brick wall, but, as Harry crept closer for a better look, one hand on his wand and ready to draw if needed, his stomach sank.

"They're not napping," he said, shaking his head and looking at Malfoy, who was cautiously approaching, his own wand already drawn. "They're dead."

The fact that the body slumped at their feet appeared to be that of Marius Romilly, the fourteenth person to be grouped into the string of increasingly-likely-to-be-related disappearances, did very little to boost Harry's mood. In fact, he felt worse now, casting the spells necessary to secure elements of evidence at the scene, than he had when he and Malfoy had arrived in Acle only an hour ago, despite being proven correct in his feeling that they might find some answers here.

"How many is this, now?" Malfoy asked quietly, standing back a short distance as Harry finished up the preliminary spellwork required by the Department of Magical Law Enforcement in this sort of case.

Harry cast a glance over his shoulder to see Malfoy staring at Romilly's unmoving form. His initial spells indicated that the man had been dead for more than a day, but under five. He didn't appear to have been moved at all, looking as if he'd sat here under his own power, but that wasn't much in the way of helpful. "Marius Romilly," Harry said, keeping his voice neutral, so that Malfoy couldn't hear the tinge of hopelessness that wanted to creep in. "Fourteenth reported missing person in the series of the current seventeen." He did some quick arithmetic, going over the last month in his head. "Eighth to reappear. And third deceased."

And they still weren't anywhere near finding the people responsible. At least the Ministry had somehow managed to keep the recent spate of missing persons quiet. Harry wondered how much of that had to do with departments being run more competently, by people appointed because they had the necessary skills, who had proven themselves in some way, and were more than just power-hungry bureaucrats interested in advancing within the Ministry for personal gain, and how much was due to the public's shared mentality of relief and celebrating the positive in the years since the war's end.

"Seventeen missing people," Malfoy said, shaking his head and looking as low-spirited as Harry felt. "Three dead. Five come back damaged or changed in some way, with no one aware of how to help them. That leaves nine still missing."

"But only one found with his wand," Harry murmured, crouching down at Romilly's side.

"What did you say?"

"This one has his wand on him," Harry said, voice louder now that he was certain. "Look." He pointed to the tip of the wand sticking out from underneath Romilly's damp robes. He removed it carefully, then stood and moved back a few steps, Malfoy now hovering close behind. "Prior Incantato!" he spoke firmly, only half-hoping the spell would yield anything of use.

A small stream of silver light trickled from the tip of Romilly's wand, looking ghostly as it spread into an unidentifiable shape before settling into something looking like a wispy cloud. Harry furrowed his brow. "A Patronus Charm?"

"Not an especially strong one," Malfoy added. "Non-corporeal, and barely visible. He doesn't seem to have been practised at it."

"It's an odd thing to have been cast," Harry said after a moment, trying to think of it all in context of the larger case. The people who had shown up again after a period of being missing had been odd, but in a way no one could quite understand, in relation to a cause. "But virtually everyone we've recovered has had some sort of memory problem, or has been a bit out of their head in some way, so this might just be more of the same. Maybe he was trying to shield himself from the rain, or create light in the darkness?"

Malfoy looked doubtful. "But why something so complex, that isn't taught in most schools? This bloke went to Beauxbatons before moving here with his wife, didn't he? I don't know the details of their curriculum, but I'm fairly certain that spell isn't part of it. Maybe he mis-spoke? Or perhaps he was trying to send a message to someone, via his Patronus. That was an invention of Dumbledore's, wasn't it? For the Order?"

"Or he just thought he saw a Dementor, out in the dark," Harry said, gesturing around them. "The ability to send messages in that manner isn't exactly common knowledge, Malfoy, and I probably don't want to ask how you even know about its existence. But there are a lot of canvas drapes and even protective tarps where things are being rebuilt. It's not hard for something covered in dark material to imitate the appearance of one, is it? Intentionally or unintentionally?" Harry gave Malfoy a pointed look, the incidents of a particular Quidditch match not quite forgotten.

"I suppose it's not," Malfoy allowed, a brief twitch in his jaw the only thing to indicate he remembered the same incident. "Well, what do we do now? Is there more evidence to gather?"

Harry shook his head, sending a message to the DMLE via the charm on his Auror's badge before turning back to Malfoy. "Not at the moment. Now we wait for backup. Someone will be along shortly to take care of the body, and others to help comb the site for clues we might have missed."

"Oh." Malfoy sat on a short stone wall nearby – what looked like it would eventually be a fence or garden wall, once completed – facing just slightly away from the body still on the ground. "Wonderful. So we sit here, in inclement weather, being completely useless. Are you certain there isn't anything I can assist with? Because I have to tell you, Potter, even with this little discovery here, which we stumbled upon more than anything else, I don't exactly feel helpful."

Harry shrugged. "You're not the only one." It was a thing Harry hadn't actually felt much as an Auror – that hopeless, impotent sensation, where he started to question things about himself and what he was doing with his life. He leaned up against the same stone wall, looking out at the eerie landscape that was Acle, and saw Malfoy shiver beside him. "Cold?"

"Oh, please tell me you're using stronger powers of observation and deduction in these cases than you did with that comment just now," Malfoy muttered. "Yes, of course I'm cold. It's been grey and dreary for the better part of six weeks, and, if you hadn't noticed, it's been drizzling since we got here. Pardon me for not remembering to grab a more efficient cloak. I swear to Merlin, once we are no longer working together on this assignment, I am taking a holiday to somewhere warm and pleasant." He pulled his arms around himself and sighed. "Not that I expect to ever be fully warm again. Probably because we'll never solve these damned cases."

Harry couldn't think of a suitable response, and stayed silent until a handful of Aurors and the coroner Apparated nearby, giving them something to do.

He didn't want to – couldn't – admit how much he shared Malfoy's sentiments, anyway.

Harry woke with a jolt, the feeling of heavy, suffocating darkness and bone-deep cold chasing him up towards consciousness, lingering for a moment as he broke the surface. It took him a long moment to realise where he was, to shake the feeling of being pulled down into something unfathomably deep, and to catch his breath. He reached for his glasses in the dark room, kicking away the blankets tangled around his torso and legs, and as he shoved the last of them off, he realised part of the reason he was shivering was that he'd somehow managed to leave the window alongside his bed open, and a breeze had blown in the light rain, dampening his blankets, making them both heavy and cold.

He didn't remember much of the dream even now, only a few seconds later. It was more the feeling than the plot – whatever plot his dreams ever had, anyway, when they weren't being deliberately influenced by a Dark Wizard and their unintentionally shared mental link – but it was enough to make him thankful he was awake.

It wasn't until Harry heard someone banging quite loudly on his front door that he realised he'd had a bit of a hand in escaping his vague nightmare.

A quick spell revealed it was only midnight, and Harry had been in bed perhaps four hours after an unusually early attempt at turning in for the night. He threw an old T-shirt and pair of flannel pyjama bottoms on, tugging them on over clammy skin, then made his way to the cause of all the commotion, hoping all the spells he'd put into place upon moving in had held, and his neighbours weren't in the process of submitting complaints over the noise.

"About sodding time," Malfoy exclaimed once Harry had yanked open the door. "I was starting to think you weren't home, and I really wasn't relishing the thought of having to track you down elsewhere. Tracking people is more your department than mine, Potter. Literally, even."

Harry blinked, still trying to wake up fully enough to process this development. "How do you know where I live?" he asked, still standing with his hand on the doorknob. "And what the hell are you doing here, this late at night?"

"We're bloody morons," was Malfoy's reply. "Merlin, Potter, invite a bloke in, would you? It's freezing out here."

"You show up – unexpected, at my home – which I don't know how you found in the first place, call me a bloody moron, and then expect me to ask you in?" Harry asked, unsure whether perhaps this wasn't a dream that had somehow wound in with the first. Somehow, he found himself stepping aside, gesturing to his living room as he opened the door wide enough for Malfoy to pass through. "I must be going mad," he muttered to himself.

"I doubt it," Malfoy said, looking around as if trying to locate somewhere to hang his cloak and leave his wet shoes.

Harry sighed, took the wet garment out of Malfoy's hands, headed for the kitchen, and tossed it across the back of a chair. "Tea?" he asked, resigned to being kept up for a while yet. He wasn't exactly warm, himself, and short of demanding Malfoy leave so Harry could change his bedding for something dry, hopping into the shower to warm himself up, and try sleeping once more, this seemed like the most feasible option.

"Yes, thank you," Malfoy said, appearing slightly surprised at the offer, wandering into the kitchen behind Harry. He looked around the room, seeming to take it all in, as Harry set about putting the kettle on and retrieving two mugs from the cupboard.

"So," Harry said, dropping gracelessly into one of the chairs at his kitchen table as he waited for the tea to steep in the pot. "Why, exactly, am I a moron?"

Malfoy cleared his throat and slid into the chair across from Harry. "We're both morons, actually," he said matter-of-factly. "It's been sitting right in front of us."

Harry sighed. "I'm tired, Malfoy. Get to the point, would you? Today's events were draining, and I'm not up for games."

"Draining!" Malfoy said, smacking his hand onto the table hard enough to make the empty cups rattle on the tabletop. "That's what I'm talking about! We were so stuck in one way of thinking that we couldn't see outside of what we expected." When Harry just let his head drop into his arms atop the table with an irritated noise, Malfoy made an irritated noise of his own. "Do you not see it?"

"The babbling, irritating prat sitting at my table, keeping me from sleep?" Harry mumbled into his forearm. "Yeah, I see that, all right."

"Dementors!" Malfoy shouted, making Harry jump at the unexpected force of it. "For the love of Merlin, I know you're not this stupid, no matter what I said when I arrived. Not even you could have the amount of dumb luck required to keep you alive this long if you didn't have brains of some sort to go along with it."

"Oh, I don't know," Harry said with a yawn. "I might. You never can be sure." Malfoy's words finally made their way into his conscious brain. "Wait. Dementors?"

"Oh, fantastic, you've finally woken up," Malfoy said, rolling his eyes. "Welcome to the conversation. Yes, Dementors! Don't you see?"

Harry blinked slowly, looking through Malfoy as he reviewed details in his head. Some of it fit with the evidence – or lack thereof. No footprints or tracks of any kind found near anyone who'd been found, other than their own, even for those who were dead. The lack of any indications of physical struggle. The worst of the living victims being little more than shell-shocked, hollowed-out versions of their former selves. At least two victims dying of exposure or lack of nourishment, as if they had stopped caring for themselves – or were unable to.

And Marius Romilly's wand, showing an attempt at a Patronus Charm.

"But it doesn't all fit," Harry said after a few moments, pouring them each a cup of tea with movements that were automatic. "Some of the victims came back different, but they obviously haven't received the Kiss. And who would be controlling the Dementors?"

"Are you, of all people, telling me you've never worried that Dementors could get out of hand of anyone trying to control them? Even I know that Dumbledore objected to the Ministry allowing them onto school grounds. And weren't you attacked in a Muggle residential area? That wasn't really just a story to get out of an expulsion, was it?"

"No, that happened," Harry said, mind fully chugging along now. More and more things were starting to slide into place, including the unusually deep chill in the air the last several weeks. He remembered the night he and Ron had been given one of the first missing persons cases – the receptionist at the desk that night had complained of a prank call – someone claiming there had been Dementors who didn't respond to Patronus Charms.

That it might not have been a prank call now seemed all too possible.

There was a sharp rapping at Harry's kitchen window, so sudden and loud that both he and Malfoy jumped, the latter so hard that half his tea sloshed over the table. Harry got up to retrieve the message from the large, irritated-looking wet owl that was perched outside as Malfoy cleaned up the mess with a muttered spell.

"Well," Harry said, giving the Ministry owl a treat from the bowl near the window and sending it on its way. "I don't know if I should congratulate you on your theory, or be irritated you hadn't come up with it while we were still in Acle."

"What do you mean?"

Harry held out the letter from Auror Finchley, who was just below Skadden when it came to rank within the Auror Corps, and was often found in the office in the evening, heading the night crew. "The Ministry received a call not an hour ago from someone who reported a Dementor attack."

"They saw one happen?" Draco asked, reaching for the parchment.

"No – they escaped one."

Having access to someone who had almost been a victim of whatever else had happened to a number of others, but who still had his wits about him, was a godsend, Harry had to admit. It wasn't going to solve every case, or even come close, but could put a lot of things into a logical pattern they'd been missing the pieces of. And though quite rattled, Victor Ellerby was fully coherent and eager to tell the Aurors what he had experienced, so that they could stop the Dementor still out there from going after anyone else.

"Tell us, Mr Ellerby, exactly what happened this evening?" Harry asked gently as Malfoy brought the man a cup of hot chocolate. "Any details you can remember. Don't assume anything's unimportant."

Ellerby glanced at his wife, who was sitting in the chair beside him, her hand laid atop his. With a small nod of understanding, she stood, kissed him on the forehead, and left the room. "Sorry about that," he said, clutching his mug more tightly. "I just... I don't want to upset her, especially when she's in such a delicate state."

"Is she ill?" Harry asked, concerned.

"You mean she's expecting a child, don't you?" Malfoy said, directing the question at Ellerby, though he shot Harry a look that conveyed a thought like "don't make me regret saying you're not stupid."

"Yes, that's it," Ellerby said, the thought seeming to bolster him a bit.

"Congratulations," Harry said, refusing to be embarrassed that Malfoy had picked up on the meaning before he had.

"Thank you." Ellerby paused. "Actually, that's the reason I was even out this evening, you see. She'd just confirmed it with a midwife two days ago, and waited until last night to tell me over a nice dinner. I was over the moon – it's our first child," he added.

"Of course," Harry said, nodding and gesturing for him to go on. He had a dictation spell running, much more reliable than a Quick-Quotes Quill, against which he still held a bit of a grudge. Despite this standard practice, Malfoy sat with his own quill inked and at the ready. Harry already knew it would be used not to note exactly what Ellerby was saying, but to jot questions and draw little diagrams or charts. He'd got a look at Malfoy's other notes over the last few days and, since they'd seemed to help Malfoy make particular links and logical jumps, Harry wasn't going to complain.

"I was out later than I'd expected," Ellerby said after taking a sip of his hot chocolate. "Celebrating with my mates, who wouldn't take no for an answer. They're all very happy for me, and having something to actually celebrate while out at the pub only makes the drink that much sweeter, they say. I know we were skirting the line of excess, perhaps, but I was careful not to overdo it – I didn't want to come home to Zamira in that sort of state. I was just too drunk to safely Apparate home, but not so drunk I didn't know it and try anyway, so I decided to walk home from the pub."

"And how long a walk is it from there to your home?" Harry asked, watching Malfoy's quill move in small, quick strokes. Even written quickly, his notes were more legible than anything Harry ever produced. Harry wasn't sure if it was a natural result of Malfoy's long, nimble-looking fingers, or if he'd had a private tutor as a child who had forced that sort of trait upon his student.

"Oh, I'd say it's an hour's walk, but more than an hour's stumble," Ellerby said, chuckling in a way that still gave away his unease with what had happened. "The crisp air was actually a bit of a blessing, because it helped clear my head, and then I got to think about how lucky I was to have a wife like Zamira, and how we were going to have the baby we've been waiting for since we were married three years ago, and I guess I got so caught up in that, I didn't notice right away that it had got even colder out, or that I couldn't really see the stars. Not the normal cold for this time of year, but... something deeper. Sinks right in to you.

"I remember stopping to do up my cloak, and I guess I wasn't as sure on my feet as I'd thought, because I fell a bit. Nothing I wouldn't normally laugh at, but I didn't feel like laughing then. In fact, all that good cheer had gone, and all I could do was worry about what Zamira would think of me coming home this late, and obviously coming from the pub, and what if something went wrong with the baby after all, and I almost didn't notice the things in the air above me, higher than the trees."

"Things?" Harry interjected, and even Malfoy paused. "More than one?"

"Oh, yes. I saw at least three, but only one seemed to be aware of me. It swooped down closer, and I had my wits about me enough to remember that Patronus Charms were supposed to keep them at bay. It took a few tries, but I finally managed. My little lovebird –" He stopped, flushing. "My Patronus isn't particularly masculine, I'm afraid, but it's nearly identical to my wife's own lovebird Patronus, and we take that as a sign. Anyway, he wasn't quite as bright as usual, but he was doing his job. The two that weren't particularly menacing were pushed further away, and the one I was aiming at retreated a bit as well. But then it pushed past the charm, somehow."

"And what happened then?" Harry asked, watching Malfoy's quill move rapidly in his peripheral vision.

"I got the bloody hell out of there, is what happened," Ellerby said with another nervous laugh. His hands shook slightly, and he put down his hot chocolate and laced his fingers together in his lap. "I wasn't terribly far from home at that point – we have a little cottage just outside the village, a wedding gift from my wife's grandmother, who is funny about privacy – and I ran. I remember thinking that whatever was wrong, things were always better with Zamira there, and I told myself to remember that I had a baby on the way, which meant things couldn't be as bad as they felt. I either outran the thing, or it got bored, or I passed a point it couldn't cross. I honestly don't know. But I made it home, and Zamira had kept dinner warm for me, and was still up, reading, and I... I just remember never being so relieved in my entire life," he finished, shaking his head. "She contacted the Ministry, got routed to someone with the Aurors, and here I am."

Harry was quiet for a moment. He'd had his own experiences with Dementors in school, from the first time on the train during third year and then trying to save Sirius, to the incident in Little Whinging, and the few times he'd been around them after that, even if only nearby while he, Ron, and Hermione sneaked their way through the Department of Mysteries to get the Horcrux from Umbridge. He'd relied upon his Patronus to keep them at bay so many times. What would he do if that no longer worked?

He could see similar questions whirling around Malfoy's head.

"We really appreciate you taking the time to come and give a statement about this," Harry said as they wrapped things up a few minutes later, after Ellerby had shown them his route from the pub to his cottage on a charmed map and agreed to lead them if needed, once it was light out. After Ellerby and his wife had been escorted out, Harry turned to look at Malfoy. "How much do you actually know about Dementors?" he asked, unable to keep the exhaustion out of his voice.

"Surprisingly little," Malfoy admitted, tucking his parchment of notes into his robe. "We weren't exactly taught much about them in school, were we? Which, given that they were actually roaming the grounds for a period, seems a little odd, and a definite failing of the Ministry of the day." He stretched and yawned, causing Harry to yawn in return. "Tomorrow, we remedy that problem," he said, trying to hide a second, larger yawn behind his sleeve.

Harry nodded. "Much as I hate sitting behind a stack of books and files, I don't see any other choice. Even I'm not stupid enough to try to go out and get answers from something like that, directly. Almost that stupid, but not quite." He grinned a little at seeing Malfoy's surprised, small smile at the attempt at self-deprecating humour.

"I shall sleep more soundly, knowing there is indeed a limit to your stupidity," Malfoy said as they walked out of the department together, headed to one of the more restricted Floo Network access points. It was closer than the Apparition Point, and Harry was so exhausted he didn't feel much like chancing an accidental splinching.

"Oh, good," Harry said, dipping his hand into the small bowl of Floo Powder and pausing before tossing it into the flames and speaking his address. "I feel better knowing I can help you get a good night's sleep."

Malfoy looked at him with an odd expression, equal parts amused and considering. "Do you, now?" He laughed softly. "Good night, Potter. I'll see you bright and early." The last thing Harry saw before the green flames swallowed him up was Malfoy's crooked grin, and the way he shook his head as if he'd thought of something particularly ridiculous.

It occurred to Harry that, despite their differences – both those in the past and the current ones, dealing more specifically with their work preferences – working with Malfoy wasn't as bad as he might have expected. He fell face-first into bed only minutes later, thinking that if the Ministry ever thought pairing an Auror and an Unspeakable together again might be a useful arrangement, he might not object.

Harry was well aware there was only so much that could be learned from books. He knew it was a belief not everyone shared – over a decade of friendship with Hermione had taught him that a statement like that had to be tempered, and examples had to be given – but he knew it was true, without a doubt. Umbridge hadn't wanted to hear about things like practical knowledge and the difference between information gleaned from a page versus internalising something when you experienced it outside of the covers of a book, but it was also likely she'd known that, despite what she'd insisted. Her current residence in Azkaban supported that, and Harry held no illusions that she'd ever really meant to look after students' best interests; whether due to sheer delusion or force of will, he wasn't entirely certain.

Harry was also aware that the best of his teachers had made the lesson stick with practical application, and that the best teacher of all was simply experience – no offence to Lupin or any of the other good ones.

It turned out, however, that when it came to learning about Dementors, Harry didn't even really have the luxury of having books to ignore.

"There has got to be more information than this out there," he groaned, letting his head thud against Malfoy's desk, earning him a look full of disapproval. They'd been through every book they could possibly think of, and Harry thought that, once he told her about it when she and Ron were back from holiday, Hermione would even be impressed with all of the sources he and Malfoy had thought to check.

Their hunt for information was bringing up unfortunate memories of fruitless searches about Nicholas Flamel and Horcruxes.

"Perhaps this is why we never learned much about Dementors in school," Malfoy grumbled, nudging Harry's head with his wand. "No one has a bloody clue what they're talking about, so they just glossed over it all." He sighed. "You obviously were taught more than the rest of us. We all had to make do with this –" he tapped the copy of Confronting the Faceless they'd both been over three times apiece, reading every word of the chapter on Dementors, "– but you had to have had more information than that fed to you. What was your source?"

"Remus Lupin," Harry said quietly. Malfoy's face went a little pinched at that. "Almost everything I know about them was what he told me, and the majority of the rest is what I learned on my own, while dealing with them." He gestured to the short stack of other books and files on Malfoy's desk, which had replaced the rather large piles of other information that had done them no good. "And half of what we have in the other resources contradicts our evidence. I've been thinking," he said, biting at his lower lip. "I've always sort of taken what Lupin said at face value. But now that he's not here to answer questions or offer advice, I have to wonder – what if he hadn't had all the information, either? Or he had things wrong, because he'd been taught wrong?"

"Are you having a resurgence of the teenage belief that authority figures aren't always right?" Malfoy asked, rubbing above one eyebrow as if fighting off a headache. "Because, well... I think we're both aware of those lessons. We both had our fair share of epiphanies in that regard."

"Unfortunately." It still felt a bit odd, now and then, to agree with Malfoy. "Sometimes we were lied to deliberately, but..."

"But sometimes those with authority didn't have a damned clue what they were talking about, or they couldn't admit they might be wrong about something," Malfoy finished, the bitterness plain in his voice. "Which has me thinking – the Ministry has to know a fair amount about Dementors. They used them as guards for Azkaban, for the love of Merlin. Why aren't there more files on them here?"

Harry thought about it for a moment. "We've been going through the Department of Mysteries' paths to get this information. The Ministry's a bureaucracy, so all the forms and procedures aren't exactly unexpected. But maybe they're not exactly interested in helping us find certain bits of information. Maybe... we just haven't been asking for the right things?"

Malfoy nodded. "I've been beginning to suspect that. Look, the public's attitude about using Dementors as prison guards has never been all that positive. I get the feeling that whatever deal was struck, however long ago, has some very... morally ambiguous roots. Perhaps whatever went on is like a dirty family secret. It doesn't ever really disappear, but the family will try its hardest to keep anyone from finding out, and deny it until confronted with proof. We've been searching for sources about Dementors as creatures, and what they've been like, out in the world, as if they're Mermaids or Centaurs. But what if we search more directly for the shared history of Dementors, Azkaban, and the Ministry?"

"That's not a bad idea." Harry Summoned a fresh pot of ink and quill, which Malfoy promptly snagged from him. "All right, fine, you draft the request to the archivist," he said, rolling his eyes. "And then we're going to go out and get some hands-on, practical experience."

"If you're proposing we head out to that island where the Ministry's got hundreds of the things contained and has supposedly rendered them mostly impotent before leaving them stuck there, I'm going to have to tell you exactly where you can shove that idea," Malfoy said, staring at Harry in something like horror.

"Not that," Harry said, rolling his eyes. "There have been odd weather reports near a village in Northumberland. Sudden cold snaps, an unusual amount of fog and mist, that sort of thing. I want to take a look."

"Oh, now you're a weather enthusiast," Malfoy sighed, waving his hand when Harry opened his mouth to protest. "Yes, yes, I get it, I understand the suspicion that perhaps there's a concentration of Dementors there, as there probably is around Acle, even if we didn't see any while we were there. Fine. We'll get the paperwork done, and then we'll do your thing, and go and risk life, limb, and sanity." He began writing upon a fresh piece of parchment, while Harry stood and tried not to pace around Malfoy's office. "Honestly, Potter, how I've even come to find..."

"Find what?" Harry asked after a moment, standing in front of a shelf full of small, locked wooden boxes that were begging to be prodded at, though he knew doing so would get him hurt – either by the contents, or by the owner of this office, who was within very easy hexing distance.

"Never mind," Malfoy said brusquely. "And don't think I don't see you eyeing those boxes."

Harry's guilty jump backwards didn't earn him any bonus points, he was certain, but it at least had the effect of making Malfoy write a little faster.

Well, it was something.

"You do realise how foolhardy it is that we've shown up here at night, which is the very time most of our victims have been theoretically attacked," Malfoy said from just behind Harry's shoulder as they got their bearings. Apparating somewhere new was always somewhat disorientating, as it took more focus to make sure you didn't land halfway down a staircase, or up to your waist in a river, and it was even more so when it was done in the dark. Having not had the patience to wait for a Portkey, which required even more paperwork, Harry had chanced it anyway.

"Well, if you hadn't taken so long with those forms, we'd have been here hours ago," Harry pointed out. Even after a moment, his eyes didn't want to adjust, and he realised there wasn't the aid of moonlight or starlight above them. "Lumos!"

"Yes, well, you know how the Ministry is with their paperwork on a good day," Malfoy countered, drawing in close enough that they were nearly arm-to-arm. He cast his own spell, the light from two wands enough to help them see more than a few steps in front of them. "I know you've caught hell from your own Department from improper filing and inadequately-filled-out forms. If it's bad for the Aurors, how do you think it is in a department where we have to sign a stack of waivers as thick as some textbooks before being allowed to walk into the department, and then more on top of that each time we're given an assignment? Also, do try to keep in mind that we've decided it necessary to request files that someone within the Ministry may not be thrilled we're poking around in, whether or not our suspicions are founded. A thing like that requires a well-crafted and diplomatic request, with all the proper citations, not some casually scrawled note demanding we receive everything the Ministry has."

"Yes, but four hours?" Harry insisted, trying to figure out which way the village was before giving up and using the Point Me spell. "This way, Malfoy."

"You'll thank me when my careful wording not only gives us the files we're after, but keeps us from being hauled in for interrogation by the Minister himself – or worse, my supervisor."

Rolling his eyes, Harry sighed. "Fine." He wouldn't admit it, but this really was a bad time to be out here. He couldn't see any Dementors – not that he could see much of anything. His field of vision was perhaps ten feet in any direction, and it was taking a bit of concentration to keep from walking straight into low-hanging tree branches, taking out his own eye or ruining his glasses. He could keep track of Malfoy, though, and he laughed when he realised why.

"What's so funny?" Malfoy asked suspiciously.

"I've just noticed – it's nearly impossible to see out here at the moment, but I've no trouble locating you, because you're so pale you nearly glow. You reflect any available light."

"Oh, yes, make fun of my appearance, thank you," Malfoy sniffed. "I'll remember that when you're reaching for something you ought not to touch in my office. Or perhaps I'll just grab myself a little something for breakfast tomorrow at Marcel's patisserie, and leave you wanting."

"Now that's just cruel."

Malfoy let out a little 'hmph' of triumph. "It would serve you right, for being insulting."

"I didn't mean it as an insult," Harry said, gesturing to the left when the path they were on forked sharply. "More a statement of fact."

"Right. Just couldn't help pointing out that I'm funny-looking, I see."

Harry gave up. "You're not funny-looking. You're just really pale, okay? Not that you can help it, I'm sure. Both your parents are pale –"

"Fair," Malfoy corrected.

"– fair," Harry amended, to keep the peace, "and you have your mother's very nice silvery-blonde hair, and light eyes."

Malfoy laughed. "You think my mother's hair is 'very nice'? Why Potter, I didn't realise you were attracted to older women, no matter how regal and beautiful they may be. Perhaps I'll let my mother in on that little secret, that she's got an admirer in you. Maybe my father will even be jealous."

"I like it better on you," Harry said with a snort, before he'd thought it through, and then immediately regretted it. While it was true he'd had the occasional interest in the same sex and wasn't ashamed by it, now that he acknowledged it, it wasn't something he went around advertising. And in any case, it wasn't as if he looked at Draco Malfoy, of all people, and thought "hey, now there's a bloke I'd like to explore things with in the dark corner of a pub."

"... Well, that was an unexpected compliment," Malfoy said a long moment later, which only made Harry regret the slip more. "Don't worry, I shan't tell my mother and dash her hopes."

"Oh, just shut up, would you?" Harry muttered. He heard something rustle behind him and stopped, going completely still. "No, really, shut up," he whispered to Malfoy. "I heard something."

They stood in absolute silence, neither of them daring to move, for another fifteen seconds before Harry caught the sound again. Judging from the way Malfoy's eyes went wide, he'd heard it, too.

Whatever it was, it was fair-sized, and low to the ground. Harry could track the way it moved – slowly and gracefully, as if it was taking its time for the moment. It rustled in the bushes, shaking the heavy, damp leaves; a few moments later, Harry heard the muted sound of a wet branch snapping. Walking, then, whatever it was, and not slithering, and definitely not a Dementor. He cast one of the charms he'd learned from Hermione after sixth year, one he'd surprised the Auror Recruit Instructors with during the unit on stealth and tracking, making sure to include Malfoy in its reach. "Follow me," he whispered, mouth almost against Malfoy's ear, exhaling just enough that his words could be heard. He received a nod in response, and felt Malfoy at his back, moving with him as best he could.

They moved for perhaps a minute, creeping carefully off the path, the charm helping them to remain virtually silent amongst the leaves and twigs, and then they both heard a wet, startled snuffle. Harry berated himself for not using a charm to mask their scent, though he'd not wanted to risk a verbal spell that close to whatever was moving around in the dark.

"Go!" Harry hissed as the creature raised a head and looked their direction, its eyes glowing bright orange in the dark; Malfoy got the point without needing clarification. They moved quickly, Harry just wanting to get enough space between them that he could pause that extra second to focus on Apparating them both away and to the same place without ending up with a set of teeth in his leg or throat for his trouble. They couldn't quite get far enough ahead, and the two spells he threw over his shoulder went just barely astray, though he knew his aim had been good.

Whatever it was that was chasing them, it moved like nothing Harry had ever seen before.

He was just gearing up for a third attempt, trying to anticipate the thing's movements while still running in the opposite direction, when he nearly ploughed into Malfoy, who had cut across him and hit something very solid. He hadn't even had time to process it when he felt Malfoy's fists in his robes, and Harry found himself shoved though an opening of some kind, Malfoy just behind him.

Harry let out an involuntary grunt as he hit the ground and something slammed shut. He tried to raise himself up and found his palms meeting a dry, slightly warm surface. Malfoy lit the end of his wand, looking down at Harry and extending his arm out. "Good news and bad news," he said, hauling Harry up once they'd clasped hands. "Good news is, we're safe from that thing. Bad news is, we're stuck here until something else tasty gets within range, or it goes to sleep at mid-day."

"What is that thing?" Harry asked, wincing as he dusted himself off. "And where are we?"

"Gillespinura," Malfoy answered, as if that meant anything to Harry. "Bloodthirsty bastards. Sort of a cross between a wild boar, a large cat, and a dragon. You haven't heard of them?"

"I'm having trouble even figuring out how one crosses those three animals," Harry snorted. "No, I've never heard of them."

"They're rare these days," Malfoy said, stooping to pick up Harry's wand and hand it to him. "They really only appear in full form for a week every fifty years or so. Should be gone with the full moon on Tuesday night. They feed on as much as they can while they're here, never seeming to get full, leaving only a small bit of bones where they've fed on each meal."

"Charming."

"I admit, I hadn't known they were real until I'd seen a preserved specimen two years ago, while at a dinner party hosted by another of the Unspeakables. Trust me, you're better off not having got a good look at the thing. As to your second question, well, that's a much easier answer. Look around."

Harry lit his own wand and spun in a slow circle. "We're inside a tree, aren't we?"

"Of a sort, yes. Muggles have... what are they... bomb shelters, right? To hide in and keep safe when they fear a world-ending event?" Harry nodded. "Old wizarding equivalent," Malfoy said, shrugging. "And I do mean old. No one's used these things in centuries. Although, I have to say, the maintenance charms used in this one were very good. It's still warm and dry, and even the insects have been kept out. Which, while it means the beast outside who's irritated that his dinner's fled out of reach is unable to get in, it also means no one can Apparate in or out. We go out the same way we got in – front door, accessed by a drop of blood from someone of Pureblood status."

"You've got to be kidding me," Harry said, staring.

"Unfortunately not. And look, don't start with any nonsense about the Pureblood stipulation. I didn't invent these shelters. I just happened to have learned about them in one of the Malfoy family histories I found in our library as a child. So, for now, sit back, relax, and be grateful you're not out there, being devoured by something that likes its dinner to fight back as it's being eaten. Find some way to keep yourself entertained." He sat down on the curved bench that was carved into the wood and leaned his head against the tall back. "I'm going to sit here and think of ways to tell you no, when you want to go somewhere dangerous at night again."

Harry sighed and settled in, himself. He really hoped they'd be out of here before mid-day. After a while of letting his mind wander while he kept an ear out for the sounds of the unpleasant thing waiting outside, he gave up on keeping quiet. "Hey, Malfoy?"

"What is it?"

"What form is your Patronus?"

Malfoy opened his eyes and looked up at the ceiling. "What makes you ask?"

"Curiosity. I was thinking about what Victor Ellerby had said – that his Patronus is the same as his wife's – matching lovebirds. I've seen Kingsley's Patronus, which fits him. I've seen Tonks's, after it changed, and I've seen McGonagall's, which is the same as her Animagus form. I've seen a number of our schoolmates' Patronuses, some of which make a lot of sense. Same with the other Aurors. I've seen Snape's, and I know why it's what it is. And I know what my parents' Patronuses were, and how they fit together. I know the connection mine has with its form. I was just wondering what yours was, if I'd see the connection to the animal and what I know of you, now that we've got to know each other a bit better." Harry shrugged. "If you think it's embarrassing, you don't have to tell me. But I'll probably see it before the end of our partnership, given the nature of the assignment."

"You probably won't," Malfoy muttered, slouching and looking away from Harry, which seemed a little childish, all things considered.

"Okay, so they're kind of personal," Harry said, sighing. "If you don't want to share, that's fine. I mean, you sort of risked your own safety, shoving me in here first, so I thought maybe we were on better terms. Thank you, by the way. I know that's not the sort of thing you'd probably expect me to say, but... I don't know. With the others in the Auror Corps, it's expected that we risk our lives for and with each other. But you're not one of them. You have no real obligation to do it. So, I guess ...just know I'm aware of that, and I appreciate it." He let his own head thud back against the smooth wood.

Out of the corner of his eye, Harry saw Malfoy sit up, looking down at the wand resting across his lap, held loosely in hand. "You don't have to thank me for that, Potter. I'm absolutely positive that if you'd recognised this tree for what it was and had the means to get in, you'd have shoved me in ahead of you, whatever oaths you've had to take regarding the protection of others not withstanding." He shook his head. "I'm... I'm not keeping the information from you to be difficult, or because I don't trust you with it, or because I'm holding onto the remnants of some childhood grudge. I'm not sharing what form my Patronus takes, because I don't know. I've never managed one. There. Happy?" The look on Malfoy's face was frustrated resignation, and Harry felt a little floored that Malfoy had admitted a personal failing of that nature without being threatened or otherwise forced.

"No," Harry said, sitting up. He took a deep breath and acted before he could overthink things. He nudged Malfoy's shoulder with his own. "But if we're stuck in here, I could try to teach you."

Malfoy just stared at his wand for several long seconds. His gaze drifted up, to the spot between them, where their shoulders still made the barest of contact, before he looked at Harry directly. "All right," he said after a moment, giving a very small nod. "I'm game if you are."

Much to Harry's frustration, he wasn't some fantastic teacher who could get Malfoy's Patronus to appear with a few encouraging words and some tips on technique. It was all the more frustrating because he'd been able to do exactly that for other students at Hogwarts while they'd all still been underage. And here he was, a seasoned Auror, unable to instruct an experienced Unspeakable – someone who had mastered Legilimency, for Merlin's sake, if the rumours were true – in how to achieve a functional Patronus charm.

It wasn't that Malfoy was completely unable to produce any sort of Patronus – Harry'd at least been able to coach him into producing a stronger stream of silver light than he'd been able to get when they'd started. It was just that Malfoy could never seem to get enough power behind it to push it that extra step, no matter what approach Harry took.

By the time they were certain that the thing that had fancied them as its dinner had moved on – hopefully preoccupied with some other wild animal it found delicious – they were both exhausted. They checked in at the Ministry, Malfoy displeased to find that he'd received no clearances for other files in the time they'd been gone, and Harry at least relieved to hear there had been no other bodies found.

They parted ways after only fifteen minutes within the Ministry, Malfoy heading for the Apparition point as Harry made for the Floo Network access, trying to keep from yawning as he walked down the corridor. Harry was so tired, he didn't even notice that Malfoy had clapped him lightly on the back as he'd bid Harry a good night until several seconds after Malfoy had rounded the corner. When he did catch the fact, he stared the direction Malfoy had gone, his brow furrowed.

Whether it had to do with Harry thanking Malfoy for potentially saving their lives, the fact that Malfoy had done it of his own accord, looking out for more than just his own safety, or Harry's statement that he'd thought they'd been closer than either had expected, and Malfoy's admission that he did, in fact, trust Harry, something had shifted, just a little. This was no longer a forced pairing, both parties playing nice simply because they both enjoyed the careers they'd managed to secure for themselves and wanted to get through the duration with as little friction as possible.

It was, Harry was starting to believe, an actual partnership.

"I could swear I told you last night that I was going to come up with a way to say no when you wanted to go traipsing around."

Harry sighed. Blossoming partnership or not, it wasn't as if everything was perfect between the two of them, or that they didn't bicker. Malfoy actually seemed to enjoy pressing on Harry's nerves just so, and Harry had to admit that he'd almost grown used to it over the last week. In fact, he might even be enjoying it himself, if the number of times he'd deliberately led Malfoy into such conversations was any indication.

It was such a worrisome thought. It was like he was in a parallel universe, one where he and Malfoy traded insults and egged each other on, and the result was smirking and laughter, instead of hexes and thrown punches.

"You said you were going to think of ways to say no, when I wanted to go out and do dangerous things at night," Harry pointed out. "It's not even dark yet, and this was less my idea, and more Skadden's, since two blokes went missing this morning and, as far as anyone knows, it happened while they were together."

"Why is it, do you think, that the Dementors keep going after men, when they've never really shown any discrimination before?" Malfoy asked several minutes later, after stooping to check what at first looked like a bit of tattered Dementor's robes, but instead turned out to be a scrap of Muggle black plastic bin liner.

Harry thought about it as they followed the footprints they'd identified as belonging to the most recent missing persons. "Maybe the men are happier, post-war, and that's why they're being targeted? Maybe it's the surge of hope after the danger appeared to be over, that they could keep their families safe?"

"Perhaps," Malfoy allowed. "It's not as if we have much in the way of other information, though Rosalie assured me she'd have more files to us by the time she went home this evening. Maybe men and women... taste different, in so far as Dementors taste things? Or they store different types of happy memories, and these Dementors simply prefer one type over another?"

"What, like people who prefer chocolate over strawberry?"

"Well, I don't know!" Malfoy said, throwing his hands up into the air in exasperation. "We're just brainstorming here, Potter. Until we get something useful out of the Ministry archives, or some Dementor comes up to us with a sign around its neck that gives us a coherent explanation, we're really just tossing around theories that have very little in the way of evidence. We still haven't entirely discounted the possibility that they've found someone else to take orders from." He stopped. "Do you feel that?"

Harry looked up from the path they were following. "Feel what?" He'd no sooner uttered the words than he felt something vibrate around him, like strong, bass-heavy music. He and Malfoy both looked to the right of the trail they'd been following, past the small line of trees at its border, and noticed the clearing that lay beyond it.

"It looks really familiar," Malfoy said softly, stepping towards it. "Feels that way, too, like I've been here before."

Harry had to agree with him. There was something familiar about it, something he just couldn't quite place from this distance, though he was sure he could if he just got a little closer. He took his own step forward, closing his eyes and feeling the early evening sun on his face, rare to behold these days. The air smelled like wildflowers and honey, with something even better underneath that, and Harry couldn't help but think of the patisserie Malfoy had introduced him to.

He'd taken another few steps forward, his eyes still closed as he drank in that blissful light and that aroma, and then it hit him. "Malfoy, wait!" he said, reaching out a hand to tug him backwards by the robes.

Not quite fast enough.

Harry felt the wand being ripped from his hand, watched it go sailing over his head and outside of the small clearing. The light in front of him glowed a brighter gold before seeming to swallow him up entirely, and he stumbled to his knees, wincing against the brightness. He could hear Malfoy land beside him, and Harry took a moment to catch his breath as the light faded back to normal, losing all but the barest hint of gold.

"Unbelievable," Harry muttered, still not trusting his legs to support him entirely. "We were both just fooled by a fairy ring."

"I don't think that was your run-of-the-mill fairy ring," Malfoy said, his voice sounding as wobbly as Harry's legs felt. "Give me a minute, and I'll take a better look, but there would be music and food and, you know, fairies, if it were."

Harry looked around. "You're right." There was none of that here. There was just a clearing perhaps ten feet across, in a perfect circle. He could still see the path they'd been walking along. And just outside the circle, near the trees bordering the path, Harry saw their wands, Malfoy's caught in a groove near the base of the thinnest tree, and his own stuck, tip-down, in the tall grass.

"It's old magic," Malfoy said a few moments later, having got up and made a brief inspection of the circle and its borders. All attempts to retrieve their wands, through means manual and magical, had failed. "Old as in 'ancient', as well as in 'long-abandoned'. Once a human enters, they can't leave until the sun evaporates the circle."

"But it's still light out," Harry pointed out.

"Yes, but after official sunset." Malfoy sighed. "Well, at least I've learned the answer to one question."

"And what's that?" Harry asked, unsure how anything related to their cases had become clear in the last few minutes.

"Harry Potter's not a virgin."

Harry stumbled, nearly getting bounced off the border of the fairy ring when he almost fell into it. "What the hell, Malfoy?"

"It's the magic used, Potter. The ring may be abandoned, but it's not as if the fairies who created it just upped and vanished without a trace. They just moved on, found a better location. But this sort of ring has a feature built in – if a virgin stumbles into it, they'll be transported to wherever the fairies are currently living, to join in the revelry. Think of it like a forwarding address: the important post gets directed on to the new residence, but the adverts and such just sort of float around until someone tosses them into the bin." He grinned smugly. "So, you're not a virgin."

"I'm twenty-five years old," Harry said, plopping down onto the grass. "No, I'm not a virgin. And neither are you, if you hadn't noticed."

"Oh, I've noticed," Malfoy said, smirking some more. "I noticed, and I'm fairly certain that bloke I spent that month with in Paris noticed, as well."

Harry snorted. "Elegant way of putting it." He'd actually not given a thought one way or the other to Malfoy's orientation, but hearing it put in so frank a manner made him think back to the previous night, with the expression Malfoy had made when Harry had said he'd liked his hair better. He really wished he knew how to keep his mouth shut more firmly.

An hour later, Harry'd had enough. "This is even worse than being trapped in that tree, last night," he said, changing the position in which he sat for perhaps the twentieth time. "At least we were out of there within a few hours, and we spent the time doing something constructive. We're trapped here until sunrise, and it's only now getting properly dark."

"I don't exactly consider this a picnic," Malfoy said from his spot on the ground, where he was sprawled out, head resting on the arm he'd tucked under his head. "Actually, a picnic would be nice, right now. We didn't eat supper. You know, if this were still an active fairy ring, there'd be food."

"Yeah, and beings trying to trick us into staying forever, dancing until we died. Not exactly a fair trade-off, if you ask me."

"Perhaps not, but I'd be happier with a meal, and I wouldn't object to a good-looking bloke flattering me all night to get on my good side, because he wanted me to stay."

"That makes two of us," Harry muttered, picking at the grass beside his shoe. He hadn't had a date in a very long while, and the last three people he'd been in bed with – and there had only been three, after Ginny had left for good almost four years ago – had all seemed to consider it something to put a tick mark next to on their life's to-do list. Sleep with one famous person/bloke with a dangerous job/war hero: done. It would be nice to have someone show some interest in him, as a person.

"What?"

"I said, that doesn't really surprise me," Harry said, ripping out a bigger clump of grass and shivering. Even with the little bit of warm golden shimmer the fairy ring radiated, it was growing darker and colder as the evening progressed, and neither of them was wearing anything heavier than their uniforms. While Harry's was outfitted with a number of moderate temperature-regulating and durability charms, they were more of a measure to keep the Auror inside them safe in an emergency – to reduce the chances of hypothermia or heat stroke if they were temporarily incapacitated and unable to immediately remedy the situation with the appropriate spells. When Malfoy sat up, hunching over on himself, Harry realised the Unspeakables – who, as a general rule, never really left the Department of Mysteries while they were working – probably had not invested in robes with such charms.

"If you had to pick a place to go on holiday," Malfoy said what felt like a long time later, startling Harry out of his half-doze, "where would you go?"

"Other than somewhere warm?" Harry asked, crossing his arms and tucking his hands into his armpits. He really wished it was morning already. Or that it was still summer, and not the middle of autumn.

"Well, obviously somewhere warm," Malfoy said, huffing, his breath a just-visible puff of white. "I said as much the other day."

"I don't know."

"Well, where did you go for your last holiday?"

"Romania."

"Romania?"

"Charlie Weasley works at a dragon preserve. He invited me a few years back."

"You didn't get your fill of dragons in the Triwizard Tournament? Or after you half-destroyed Gringotts with one?" Malfoy snorted. "Besides, that's no good. Romania's not warm this time of year."

"There was plenty of fire to combat the cold."

Malfoy looked at him, eyebrows raised. "Was that a joke?"

Harry shrugged. "Maybe." He didn't feel much like joking.

"Wait, you said you were invited years ago. You waited years to take someone up on their offer? That's not exactly good manners, Potter."

"I didn't wait," Harry explained. "He offered, knowing I was being ordered to take a holiday, and I took him up on it. I just haven't taken a holiday since." He felt a bit depressed about the whole thing, really. It had been just after Ginny had left, and Charlie had been trying to give him the option to get away from things. It had worked a little, Harry supposed, but he'd still had to return, and he'd probably rather have just thrown himself into his work to distract himself, instead of being reminded of why he'd been forced into a holiday. The fact that he'd not really had anywhere to go since, nor anyone to share a holiday with, was only more depressing.

"That's so sad that even I'm feeling bad for you," Malfoy muttered, blowing into his hands to warm them. "And here I was, upset that I couldn't think of a proper place to go where I wouldn't have to be stuck watching couples walking hand-in-hand down sunny beaches." He sighed. "Maybe I should accept how hopeless that endeavour is, and sign up for a singles' cruise." He paused. "No, that's even more dispiriting."

Harry shrugged again. How they'd got started on this spiral of feeling sorry for themselves, he didn't know, but it was like opening a floodgate. He didn't have anyone to share an escape with, anyone to share his life with, unlike almost everyone else he knew. Ron and Hermione had each other. Molly and Arthur had been together for decades. Neville was engaged, Luna was married and had just had twins, Dean and Seamus were looking for houses together, and even Ginny was now married.

It hurt to be this alone. And it hurt even more that he couldn't see a way out of it. His last few attempts to date someone had proven that it wasn't something anyone else wanted from him for more than a single night.

"Do you ever wonder why you even bother with things?" Malfoy asked, cutting into Harry's thoughts. "When nothing you ever try seems to yield the results you hope for?"

He hadn't, really, but now that Malfoy mentioned it, Harry could understand, especially when he thought about their lack of progress in their assignment. "I think –" he cut off abruptly. Their assignment. "Malfoy, look," he whispered, pointing up.

Malfoy lifted his head up to the sky, his face going from morose to something approaching terrified. "How many of them are up there, do you think?"

Harry stared up above the fairy ring, where Dementors swarmed, moving in lazy circles. "I don't know. At least a dozen." It made sense, now he thought about it: the increasing cold, more extreme that it should be, the focus on unpleasant thoughts.

But realising the cause didn't stop the effect.

"Can't you –?" Malfoy began, before looking back over his shoulder towards the trees beside the road. "Oh. Our wands. Of course. I don't suppose with all the training the Aurors give you, and all the things you've done that defy expectations, you're able to conjure a Patronus wandlessly?"

Harry's heart sank a little more. "I don't know."

"Try," Malfoy pressed.

It turned out that a wandless Patronus was not on Harry's list of special skills. "I can't tell if it's the lack of wand," he said after four utterly failed attempts, "or if I just can't... you have to... and I..."

"Spit it out, Potter."

"You have to really focus. That's what I was telling you last night. You have to have a really strong, happy memory to put behind it, and I... I can't think of one, or keep focussed on it." He dropped back down onto the grass, pulling into himself, as if that would keep him warm, or keep the things above them from advancing.

Malfoy shook his head, as if trying to clear it. "We can't do nothing. Because I don't know about you, but if they don't leave soon, I'm going to wish they'd just Kiss me and get it over with."

"Given our recent leads in the case, I'd say we won't have to wait long," Harry countered, trying not to verbally acknowledge that he felt something similar, and that maybe it would just be better for everyone.

"They won't Kiss us, I don't think," Malfoy said, looking more miserable by the minute. "It doesn't appear they can get through the fairy ring, either. Which means they'll likely just circle above us until we go mad, or wish we would." He pulled himself together with visible effort. "We may not have wands, but I really can't take this for another several hours. We have to do something."

"Like what?" Harry couldn't think of a way out of this. Half the time, he went charging after things, but as he was wandless and physically incapable of charging at anything other than Malfoy, or an enchanted shimmery wall that would bounce him right off it, he was at a loss.

"Think of something happy, I suppose," Malfoy said. His voice sounded anything but happy.

"I've just told you, I can't think of anything good enough to –"

"Start smaller, then. Anything happy. There's got to be something you can think of."

"Think happy thoughts," Harry said, laughing bitterly. "Fairies and happy thoughts. What is this, Peter Pan?"

"Who's he?"

"Muggle story for children," Harry said, feeling his chest ache. He'd never had such stories read to him when he was younger – at least, none he could remember. His parents had been dead long before that point, and his aunt and uncle had given him the minimum care required. Stories at bedtime weren't part of that. Dudley, of course, had got whatever he wanted.

"Potter, focus. Anything. I'm serious. Tell me one good memory."

"Why don't you tell me one?"

Malfoy looked up above them, his face paler than usual, before staring at the hands clenched in his lap. "Unspeakable Croaker hired me, despite what I'm certain were giant warning stamps all over my application. He said I passed the assessments with flying colours, then shook my hand and welcomed me aboard, never once mentioning my past." He let out a shuddering breath. "That... that actually seemed to help. Now, you."

Harry racked his brain, trying to push back everything else he wanted to focus on – all the nightmares, all the tombstones he'd stood beside – and latched onto the first thing he could find. "I remember spitting the Snitch out into my hands at the end of that first match." It wasn't a memory Remus had deemed powerful enough to produce a Patronus but, either way, Harry felt just a little of that feeling of despair lift. Malfoy was right – it did help.

"Tell me another," Malfoy said, his eyes closed. "Anything."

"Being told I was a wizard on my eleventh birthday," Harry replied after a few moments of thinking, trying to shut out the cold and the feeling that things were more awful than they'd ever been, courtesy of simple proximity to the damned things circling above their heads.

"You hadn't figured that out before then?" Malfoy asked, an emotion other than hopelessness finally in his voice.

"I was raised in a world where that wasn't even a possibility," Harry said with a sigh. "Magic was something only children believed in, and my family hated it. I was told nothing about my parents, or their lives. I'd never known any of their friends, or my father's family. All I knew was that sometimes, odd things happened around me. And then Hagrid showed up, broke the news, and took me to Hogwarts all at once." He let out one single huffed chuckle. "The look on my cousin's face, and my aunt's and uncle's, when he gave Dudley a pig's tail – that's another memory we can put in the positive column."

Yes, talking about happier things was definitely helping. It wasn't nearly so effective as a Patronus, but it was like taking paracetamol for a particularly bad headache or moderate injury – you could tell a difference, even if it didn't fix the problem or hadn't fully kicked in yet. "You tell me another," Harry asked, visualising Dudley running away, clutching at his bottom and squealing, and the memory of the way he'd made a point of moving around Harry the next time he'd seen him, with his back always pressed up against a wall or otherwise protected.

"I – I can't," Malfoy said after a few moments of silence. Harry found it incredible that he could actually feel the effect fade as they sat, could feel the Dementors' presence seeping back into him, leaching out the warmth and leaving behind only bone-deep chill and depression. "It's hard to think of them in the first place, and when I think I finally have one, it just gets... stuck."

"Stuck?"

"I can't figure out how to convey..." he trailed off, looking at Harry with eyes that were almost pitiful. "How's your Legilimency?"

Harry thought back to his disastrous attempts at Occlumency lessons with Snape, then realised that was doing the opposite of helping the situation. Thankfully, he'd had better luck with the Auror Corps' brief bit of basic Legilimency training. He wasn't great, but he was definitely better than a few of the others had been, people who couldn't ever correctly guess a number selected from one to five. "Somewhere between weak and moderate?"

"That might be good enough," Malfoy murmured. Before Harry could ask how that might be good enough, and for what, exactly, Malfoy had reached out and snagged Harry's hand.

Harry was too surprised to yank it away, and before he could get over that surprise, his head was filled with an image of a much younger Narcissa Malfoy, reflected in a large, ornate mirror. In her lap was a little boy with white-blond hair, just long enough that it could be tied back. As Harry watched, Narcissa gave a few more slow, gentle brushes to that hair, then pulled it back and secured it at the nape of the child's neck. Almost like your father's, Narcissa murmured into the child's ear, before pressing a very small kiss onto the top of his head.

Harry's breath actually caught in his throat. It wasn't just the shock of Malfoy's memories playing before his eyes, of Malfoy's own doing, or even how personal the memory itself was – it was that, despite his having no connection to the memory, not even a related memory of his own to identify and align it with, he felt it, as if he, too, were remembering. He could nearly smell Narcissa's perfume – something light and floral – and it was almost as if the kiss had been dropped on his own head.

The bit of warmth that displaced the cold was even stronger than it had been when Harry had recalled his own memories.

"Did it work?" Malfoy asked quietly, and Harry realised his own eyes were closed, and Malfoy still had hold of his hand.

"I saw it," Harry whispered. The memory. It was..." He couldn't figure out how to explain it. "I felt it." He opened his eyes to find Malfoy peering at him curiously. "That wasn't my Legilimency skill."

Malfoy gave him the ghost of his usual smirk. "No, that was mine, fed into something I've learned while working in the Department of Mysteries. The fact that you have at least some Legilimens potential made it easier. As did the physical contact." He dropped his hand. "I didn't realise it was such a powerful memory, though."

Harry nodded and looked up above them. The Dementors were still there, still close but keeping a consistent distance, as if they were bound by the same fairy magic that kept Harry and Malfoy firmly within its borders. He counted thirteen before he lost track of each one. Several minutes later, Harry noticed the warmth Malfoy's memory had bestowed had faded considerably. "Can I try?"

Malfoy's eyebrows went up, but he nodded. "I don't know how well it will work in this direction, since you aren't really a true Legilimens, but it won't hurt anything to attempt it." He extended his hand cautiously, and Harry couldn't read the look on Malfoy's face when he clasped their hands together. "Just... focus."

Closing his eyes again, Harry took a deep breath and concentrated. It was a little easier, now that they'd had some luck cheering themselves, and weren't at the complete and total mercy of the Dementors' effects. He thought of the young girl he and Ron had rescued from the man who'd been keeping her captive for three days: the way she'd thrown herself at him, wrapping her arms around his waist and repeating her thanks into his torso; the way her eyes had lit up when Ron had conjured a small, stuffed bear and given it to her, for something to hold onto while he sent the man off to the Ministry holding cells; the way she had told them both, very seriously, that her new bear's name was going to be 'Mr Weasley Potter', as Harry picked her up and prepared to Apparate them away.

"Did I do it right?" Harry asked, opening his eyes a few moments after he was done. He saw Malfoy looking up above them in something like awe. "What?"

"You did fine," Malfoy said, blinking and looking at Harry. "I... I see what you meant about feeling it. I swear I could feel that bear under my chin and that girl's head on my shoulder with her in my arms. But, Potter, look. They're not as close."

Harry looked up at the sky. Malfoy was right. The Dementors hadn't decided to leave, but they weren't nearly as close as they had been. He let go of Malfoy's hand to shift position, supporting himself with his hands as he leaned back to get a better look. Once he broke contact, one or two of them drifted closer. "Did you see that?"

"I suppose that means we're in for a night of shared memories via physical contact," Malfoy said, his voice uncertain. "I mean, unless..."

"No," Harry said, shaking his head. He couldn't think of a better alternative – or any alternative, really – and he most certainly didn't want to sit here until sunrise, letting the feeling the Dementors brought with them eat at him. "I don't think we have much choice. We might as well settle in."

Malfoy nodded. Once they'd positioned themselves in the closest thing they could get to a comfortable arrangement, which ended up being with them both lying alongside each other on their backs, he reached out. Slipping his hand into Harry's, he curled his fingers just slightly, keeping them linked. "Your turn."

Harry made a quiet noise of acknowledgment, trying to come up with something. He thought about when Remus had asked him to be Teddy's godfather, the surprise and pride he had felt, the way he'd been so happy for Remus and Tonks, knowing how good a father Remus would be, especially now that he'd finally accepted that he actually could have the things he'd thought had been ripped away when he was a young boy – a family, someone to return his love, some degree of normality.

He tried very hard not to think about the fact that Remus had never really got to experience those things before his death, or that Harry still hadn't managed to find those things for himself, either, when he'd really thought he'd been so close before.

A few moments later, Harry watched as Snape took a first-year version of Malfoy aside in the Slytherin Common Room, standing by the giant window that looked into the lake. The water was dark this time of night, too dark to see if the Giant Squid or anything else was swimming nearby, but the coolness coming from the submerged glass and the warmth from the dwindling fire made for a surprisingly pleasant level of comfort. Keep up your studies as you are, Snape said, his voice low, as if this was an intensely private thing, a deep secret to be guarded carefully, and you'll be one of the top in your year, academically. You show much promise, Draco, and I know your father will be proud to hear it. His voice held emotions Harry had never heard before – pride, hope, and a distinct lack of vitriol among them – and one he had heard, though never directly. It was something he'd only heard in Snape's voice through memory, and Harry ignored the ache that wanted to come though at the realisation, letting Malfoy's emotions and experience of the memory wash over him instead.

Harry supposed it could best be termed 'affection' or 'warmth', and it made him think of his mother, of Snape's literally undying devotion to her and everything she represented to him.

It was easy to think of his next happy memory, in the wake of Malfoy's. It wasn't entirely unlike the memory he'd used in third year, to be able to produce his first successful Patronus charm. Back then he'd had the vision from the Mirror of Erised. He had no real memory of his parents holding him, happily looking down at him for any particular reason, but that image of his parents' hands on his shoulders, smiling silently, their faces filled with love, shown to him in that enchanted glass had been enough. Now, though, he recalled a night several years later, in woods that were just as quiet and still as the Room of Requirement had been – the night he had accepted his fate, given in to the prophecy, not because it had been a prophecy and he felt compelled, but because he'd known it was what had to be done. He remembered the forms of everyone around him, mixtures of love and pride in their eyes as they had begun the walk through the Forbidden Forest right alongside him. His parents, Remus, Sirius. Their forms had given him so much strength that night, given him the ability to go on.

How fitting that he could use that memory to help him do something similar, tonight.

Harry had no idea how much longer after that it was he began to doze. He only knew he was tired, and that the memories he and Malfoy traded back and forth came a bit more easily as the night wore on, making it possible to relax just enough to let his eyes drift shut for longer and longer periods. The last thing Harry really remembered was sharing the memory of the toast he'd given at Ron and Hermione's wedding. After that, there might have been a glimpse of his hand clasping Malfoy's little more than a week ago, in the DMLE, but it seemed more likely to only be the awareness of their hands joined together, lying in the cool grass underneath them, as they shared whatever they could to keep themselves afloat.

Neither of them said anything, come morning.

Harry woke up what had to have been just after sunrise, his glasses just slightly askew, to find himself still on his back, one arm over his torso, the other still at his side and slightly extended. Malfoy was at his right, now lying on his side, facing Harry. His left hand, which Harry had been holding last he could remember, was was pillowed under his cheek. His right hand, however, was loosely wrapped around Harry's.

It was surprising how awkward Harry felt about it all, in that he didn't.

Malfoy woke as Harry sat up, rolling over and stretching, popping his left shoulder similarly to the way he'd done after their first day of work together, in interrogation room five. Harry supposed it was an injury of some sort, his brain logging it for future reference in case it ever presented a problem out in the field. As an Auror, they were trained to notice that sort of thing, to catalogue weaknesses of those they were working against, as well as of those they depended upon in potentially life-threatening situations. Sometimes, those little details made a world of difference.

"Back to the Ministry?" Malfoy asked, not looking Harry in the eye. "Or do we get to shower, first?"

Harry retrieved their wands, thinking it over. He felt like they should go back to the Ministry, at least to check in, but the thought of a shower and a change of clothes appealed to him too strongly to ignore. "Head home," he told Malfoy. "Clean up. We can meet back at the Ministry at nine." That gave them just under two hours to themselves before having to be back at work, trying to get somewhere in this case.

Malfoy checked his wand for damage and nodded in response, Apparating away without another word.

They'd probably have to discuss what had happened last night sometime soon, but Harry honestly didn't even know what to say. Was there anything to say? They'd found a way to minimise the effects of the Dementors, even without their wands available, and with only one of them capable of producing a fully-powerful Patronus in any case. Perhaps Malfoy had gleaned something from the experience. Harry remembered his insistence he go home and sleep on the knowledge he'd gained that first day of working together, before discussing his theories. He hoped that was what had happened here – that Malfoy was simply turning over possibilities in his head, and preferred to do that on his own, with no one to interrupt him.

Harry made his way into the DMLE a few minutes before nine, finding that he was musing over the events of last night himself. He was just starting to piece together the fact that, of all the happy memories Malfoy had come up with during the night, the vast majority of them centred on Malfoy pleasing someone else. It could be argued that the recalled events were all times he'd been complimented or flattered or otherwise had his ego stroked, but it was the feel of those memories that had Harry surprised – that little burst of warmth in hearing or seeing someone else was pleased with him. There hadn't been dozens of memories of toys or other gifts he'd been given, or purchases he'd made, or orders he'd given Dobby or any other hired help the Malfoys may have had. It was hearing praise from his mother, or Snape, or Professor McGonagall, or his ancient-looking grandfather that stood out the most starkly.

And one thing Harry couldn't help but feel more certain of, as he thought things over and recalled the events of the evening, there was that briefest of moments on the first day they'd been assigned to work together – when they had shook hands solidly in the DMLE before Harry had offered him coffee and told him he was welcome to use the department's kitchen, as if he belonged there as much as any of the rest of them.

Harry rounded the corner to his desk, only to find Malfoy already sitting in Harry's chair. There were two large cups of steaming liquid in front of him, and Harry caught the distinct aroma of coffee, plus something that smelled like buttered toffee. "I had time to stop on my way in," Malfoy said before Harry could say anything, his voice dismissive. "Given that we didn't get much in the way of sleep, I felt I could use something to keep myself alert. I assumed you might be in a similar situation."

Harry's own surprise was mirrored in the incredulous, startled noise Auror Vladstock made from his nearby desk. He knew Vladstock – a former Durmstrang student who had transferred in about the time Harry and Ron had started, a few years older than they were – had been subjected to a number of Ron's stories about their days fighting Voldemort. Draco Malfoy (and his father, of course, given Lucius and Arthur's long-standing distaste of each other) had been mentioned in a handful of them. For Vladstock to remember any of those stories, and see the Unspeakable before him bringing Harry coffee, probably was somewhat unexpected.

And perhaps also amusing, given the look on Vladstock's face when Harry glanced in his direction. The other Auror covered his expression quickly, but still subtly tapped over the small chest pocket in his uniform where they all carried one bezoar and two doses of an antidote that would counteract (or at least pause) the effects of nearly three dozen poisons.

Harry rolled his eyes before turning back to Malfoy. "Thanks," he said sincerely, picking up one of the drinks and bringing it to his mouth. He heard Vladstock's pointed cough and ignored it, taking a careful sip, so as not to burn himself. This wasn't the first time Malfoy had brought him coffee or breakfast, and Harry had even reciprocated once, though he'd ended up just asking Marcel for Malfoy's usual, rather than hazard an incorrect guess at something Malfoy might like.

Besides, Harry thought, taking a second sip, he trusted Malfoy.

Well, count that as a statement he'd never really thought he'd make, even if only in his own head.

"Unless you have reason to suggest otherwise, I thought we might head to my office this morning," Malfoy said, his voice still casual in a way that finally caught Harry's attention. It was the tone of someone trying very, very hard to seem uninvested or neutral, when they felt otherwise. Harry knew that tone, but wasn't entirely certain what it was Malfoy was covering. If Harry had to give an answer, he'd guess 'embarrassment', given the way Malfoy had avoided eye contact before Apparating away a few hours ago. What they'd gone through last night had involved a measure of intimacy, of vulnerability. It had been necessary, Harry acknowledged, but it had also been more quickly effective at establishing a measure of trust and honesty in the moment than almost all of the team-building exercises the department taught during the Auror Corps training period. "There's a rather promising-looking stack of files on my desk, and I thought we could start there."

"Sounds like a good plan," Harry agreed, blowing on his coffee. It really was heavenly – the toffee flavour was a perfect complement to the flavour of the coffee, and it was sweet without being overly so. And the caffeine boost wasn't undesired. "After you," he said, gesturing to the door of the DMLE and earning another little snort from Vladstock.

They walked through the corridors of the Ministry together, occasionally greeting other employees they knew, though neither of them said anything to the other. Harry could feel an underlying tension, and he hoped it was more a product of their shared tiredness than anything else. They settled into Malfoy's office quickly enough, Harry getting comfortable in what he now thought of as 'his' chair. When he'd arrived here the first time, it had seemed far less comfortable than it was now. This morning, it seemed even more comfortable than it had before, as if its properties had been adjusted, and Harry simply chalked it up to his body's desire to sit still for a while and maybe sneak in a nap or some other form of restorative down-time. It didn't occur to him to ask Malfoy if he'd deliberately charmed the chair in any way, or if it had intrinsic properties of its own – if Harry went around asking questions about every little thing within the Department of Mysteries that seemed a little unusual, the personnel included, he'd never get anything else done and would likely end up with far more questions than answers.

When they had spent nearly two hours skimming through old, heavily-edited documents that looked like they may be both useful and increasingly disturbing, Harry couldn't take it any more. While he'd once hoped Malfoy would keep silent and to himself so that Harry could ignore him and get on with his own business, whatever was the cause of this particular quiet was maddening. "Okay, look," he said, pushing the file away from himself just a little. It was a report from an old Healer, brought into Azkaban to treat some of the prisoners there, and more than a handful of the details Harry'd already come across made him feel uneasy. "This can't go on."

"What in Merlin's name are you talking about?" Malfoy asked, that trying-too-hard-to-be-casual tone still in his voice. It might fool some, but it didn't fool Harry, and the way he'd flinched said he was quite aware he'd been caught in something.

"There's something up with you this morning. Something that's been wrong since we woke up, I think. I get that you don't want to talk about it, but we can't ignore it, especially when it might be so important."

Malfoy sat very still, eyes on the thick stack of parchment he'd been skimming. "You think it's important?"

Harry sighed. "Yes. We have to talk about last night. What happened between us." Another flinch from Malfoy. "I didn't expect it..." He paused, trying to figure out how to get the words right. "But somehow, stuck in that fairy ring with you, I... we... we were able to negate some of the Dementors' effects."

Malfoy's shoulders relaxed a small fraction. "And your thoughts on the matter? Because as far as I can tell, we used a tactic with its roots in the power behind a Patronus Charm – counteracting the Dementors' effects by surrounding ourselves – no, channelling – something happy from our memories."

"Well, yes," Harry said, relieved they were finally going to be able to discuss it, because he knew there was something important about it, something they'd been unable to properly analyse at the time. "Like you'd said at the time, 'think happy thoughts'. But it was more than that, wasn't it? Whatever little Unspeakable trick you managed was a major factor. Because when I was thinking about the memories on my own, even telling you, I felt things get... less awful. But when you took my hand...." He paused again, this time closing his eyes as he gathered his thoughts. What exactly had it been like?

He could remember the surprise, at first, that Malfoy had reached for him. He remembered the flood of images that had hit him suddenly, the feelings of warmth and gentleness and uncomplicated happiness, amidst the details of things like the scent of Narcissa Malfoy's perfume, or the way the soft-bristled brush had felt in his – well, Malfoy's – hair. He thought about how much easier it had been to recall his own memories after that bit of warmth, how they'd flown out of him with far less effort as each one was exchanged. He remembered the way Malfoy's hand had tightened around his at a particularly strong memory, how it had felt so good, just then, to have someone to share these things with, to help him focus on the good and forget how badly he'd felt not an hour before that, with the Dementors getting the better of them both.

"When I took your hand...?" Malfoy prompted after a several moments of silence, his voice very soft in the quiet office.

"When you took my hand, it was like... like..." He sighed harshly, and then something came to him. "There's an old proverb, Swedish, I think. Hermione mentioned it once, and I think she wrote it into her wedding vows. 'Shared joy is double joy, and shared sorrow is half sorrow.' It was sort of like that." He opened his eyes. "Like when we shared the good things, it was twice as good, and it made all of the bad stuff less awful." He shrugged, feeling suddenly self-conscious. It occurred to him that his experience might not have been the same as Malfoy's, as he'd been facilitating the exchange with his Legilimens abilities and whatever other thing he'd learned while working for the Department of Mysteries. "I mean, at least for me."

"No," Malfoy said slowly, appearing to think things over. "It was something like that for me, as –" He cut off abruptly, eyes going wide. "What was that proverb, again?"

"'Shared joy is double joy, and shared sorrow is half sorrow'," Harry repeated. "Something like that, anyway." Malfoy jerked, and Harry sat up, alarmed. "What's wrong?"

Malfoy just looked at him for a moment. "Dementors feed off the positive feelings of others."

"Yeah, and?"

"Double – shared – joy."

Harry raised his eyebrows. Malfoy had that look, the wide-eyed, startled one that said all the pieces were clicking into place in rapid fashion. Harry'd seen it on Ron's face during their years as partners, had seen it on a number of other Aurors, and was especially used to it flitting across Hermione's face. Right now, though, he didn't share in the epiphany. "What?"

Malfoy made a small, incredulous huffing noise. "What joy is more pure, more shared, more extreme, than that of new parents?"

Blinking, Harry put it together. "All the blokes who've been attacked – you think they've all –"

"They've all been expectant fathers. We know for a fact that the one who got away – Victor Ellerby – was. That Devereaux bloke, whose wife popped in three days ago to let us know the Healers couldn't figure out what was wrong with him, but that she'd been allowed to take him home and asked us to keep in touch, if we learned anything – she ran off to be sick and apologised when she came back, citing morning sickness." He shook his head. "And those two who went missing together, the ones we were looking into before we got stuck last night?"

"Hiller and Ashby?" Harry asked, mentally reviewing what they'd had in their files. It hit him like a sack of bricks. "They were a couple. The person who reported them missing first was the woman who was managing their adoption case, when they didn't arrive for the appointment they'd been so eager to keep, to go over more documentation." He rubbed at his forehead. "And every other missing person was reported missing by their wife, or their girlfriend. Damn it."

"Still don't like it when I'm right, Potter?" Malfoy asked, only there was no smirk this time.

"Not in this case," Harry said with a sigh. "Though if you're right, it just makes me more determined we figure out exactly what's happened to these men, and if there's anything we can do to help the ones already attacked, while stopping it from happening to anyone else."

The files they had finally been given access to were nothing like the others, Harry realised after going through only a few. The others had been full of odd happenings, things that seemed like legends he'd heard while still in Muggle schools, and there was a tone of detachment to most of them, as if the reports had been written by people who found the information nowhere near as interesting as half of the things contained within the Department of Mysteries itself.

The new files made Harry's skin crawl, especially those written with an air of interest apparent in their words.

He stretched the muscles in his neck, thinking that perhaps he ought not to have had lunch today. The basket of chips and sandwich he'd eaten weren't sitting well with him at all, though he suspected it had much more to do with the reading material than with the food itself. Harry couldn't decide how fortunate it was that what they'd finally got their hands on did, in fact, seem to be leading them in the right direction.

He was about to ask Malfoy if he'd mind if Harry left for a bit to walk around and give himself a bit of respite from their task, but a simple look across the desk showed that Malfoy wasn't handling the unpleasant reality in the files any better than Harry was. He was a sickly greenish-grey colour, and Harry noticed that the file Malfoy had been reading through for the last hour contained a large number of photographs. Harry shuddered, just thinking about it.

"Malfoy." When Malfoy didn't answer, Harry cleared his throat and tried again, but still got no response. With a small sigh, Harry leaned forward. Malfoy still didn't seem to notice him. Reaching out and placing his hand gently atop Malfoy's forearm, Harry tried a third time. "Hey. Draco."

Malfoy looked up then, blinking, his face thoroughly confused for a brief moment. "Sorry, Potter. What is it?"

"You look awful." Before Malfoy could retort with something sharp to level the insult, Harry pushed on. "You look like I feel, actually."

Swallowing hard, Malfoy closed his eyes. "It's... horrific, isn't it?"

Harry snorted. "If what you're reading is anything like what I've been reading, yes. No wonder they didn't offer up these files right away."

"Have you ever heard of anything quite like it?" Malfoy asked, eyes still closed, his eyelids fluttering just a little.

"Yeah," Harry admitted, wishing otherwise. "When I went to school in Little Whinging." There were far more similarities in what the files contained to the things he'd learned about German concentration camps than Harry liked to think about.

"Prisoners," Malfoy said flatly. He looked like he wanted to be ill. "It wasn't bad enough they used Dementors to guard them. They... experimented." He shuddered violently, and Harry didn't have to be a Legilimens to know Malfoy was thinking of the time his father spent in Azkaban, or the very real possibility that had existed of him having to spend time there, himself.

"All right," Harry said, making the executive decision. "That's it for the night. No more first-person accounts, no more notes from Healers, or human prison guards, or long-ago Unspeakables, and definitely no more photographs." He stood up and pushed in his chair. "Get up, Malfoy. You're coming with me."

"Where are we going?"

"Your choice," Harry said, grabbing his cloak from the back of the door, then snagging Malfoy's as well. "Pub, or my place. Either way, away from the Ministry for the night. We can discuss some of the relevant case information if you like, but we're not burying ourselves in this any more tonight."

Malfoy stood and took his cloak, and Harry surmised Malfoy's compliance had more to do with the recognition they needed time away from this than the options Harry had given. He assumed that Malfoy would want to drink the worst of the details from his focus, or perhaps sit somewhere with so much noise and movement that they wouldn't be allowed to dwell on things, and was thus somewhat surprised when Malfoy looked at him for a moment, and said simply, "Your place."

Harry nodded, trying not to let that surprise show. "All right. Floo point, then," he said, heading for the lifts.

Neither of them felt up for dinner and Malfoy seemed opposed to alcohol, and so Harry ended up making them tea in the same mugs he'd made last time Malfoy had been over. This time, at least, they didn't leave before it was cool enough to drink.

"I don't know what the things you read today included," Malfoy eventually said, putting his half-empty cup down carefully. "But mine.... Mine detailed a few significant developments within the last three centuries. Did yours say anything about the period before that?"

Harry drained the last of his tea and poured himself another cup before answering. "Yes. The origins. They weren't something wizards came upon in the wild, after all," he said, trying to tell himself he could relay the information without letting it get to him too much. "There's some stuff that's still blurred out, that we still don't have access to, but I don't think those particular details are important to us right now. There were..." He paused, trying to pick and choose the necessary bits. "Suicides, within Azkaban. A few of them had belonged to a set of brothers, who'd had unusual abilities I couldn't make out through the censoring charm. But there had been experiments done after their deaths, and apparently things went wrong, and three unreadable pages later, there were mentions of faceless beings who wrapped themselves in tattered clothes, a little like Inferi. But they brought coldness with them, and dampened light where they went, and cast a pall over everything and everyone. Five unreadable pages later, there was mention that they were breeding, though none of the guards ever saw actual breeding behaviours. There would just... be more of them, now and then. Fully developed, identical to the others."

"All identical?" Malfoy asked, biting at his lower lip.

"That's what I read. Why, what did your files say?"

"Nothing at all on the origins. But there were a few files that specifically mentioned anomalies."

"What kind of anomalies?"

Malfoy hesitated. "They were... more human, one guard put it. Just slightly shorter than the others, and they seemed more powerful, more upsetting." He looked at Harry, then dropped his head. "How much do you know of the Dementors' purpose in Azkaban, in the few decades before the war ended?"

Harry's chest went unpleasantly tight. "Only a little." There was what he'd heard from Hagrid, about eventually thinking he'd prefer to just die in his sleep. But there was also what he'd learned about Sirius, and the time he'd spent in there, and the few details about Barty Crouch Jr's stay. "I know they were used as sentries, to keep prisoners from escaping, and as direct punishment when someone decided the Kiss should be administered. I know that even having them there was indirect punishment, that a lot of prisoners went mad. They traded the ability to stand guard and keep their captives from clear thought for the ability to feed off all those locked within Azkaban." He thought a little harder, and something else came back to him. "And some reported back to those in charge, about what prisoners were thinking, or planning, though they couldn't do it if the person in question was very sick, or... in a form other than totally human."

"And do you know anything about how they conveyed that information?" Malfoy asked, running the tip of his finger around the rim of his cup.

Harry shook his head. Dementors had no faces, no voices. He couldn't imagine them gripping a quill, with their rotting fingers, and the thought of them communicating through charades was ridiculous. "No."

"The anomalies," Malfoy said, after a moment. "The ones who were more human than the rest. Some of the guards said it was almost as if they were part human. They could not only understand speech, but sometimes read thoughts directly. And it went both ways. They could transmit limited information, telepathically. One of the guards on record said it was particularly hard to watch the anomalies give the Kiss, because it was as if there was an extra intent behind it, an enthusiasm and desire, as if they were trying to regain some lost humanity."

Harry felt sick to his stomach. "Regain lost humanity?"

"No one ever saw them breed," Malfoy pointed out. "You learned as much. There were rumours the anomalies were humans who had been transformed in some way. Some of the files I read through were more like... case studies. In that Healers and a few Unspeakables basically devoted their careers to watching the Dementors at work, both the regular ones, and the anomalies. The interesting thing is – well, you know what a Dementor's Kiss does, don't you?"

"Sucks out the soul of their victim, leaving behind an empty living body, with no trace of the person it used to be, other than the physical," Harry murmured, thinking of seeing Sirius kissed out on the grounds, Harry's Patronus too weak to save him.

"That's the effect, yes," Malfoy said, standing and putting his empty cup in the sink, before leaning against the counter. "But not necessarily the intent."

"Spell it out, Malfoy," Harry sighed. He felt something not entirely like a mild form of despair over it all, and he really wished he could forget all of his dealings with Dementors in the past.

"There were a few Unspeakables and one of the Healers who theorised the Dementors weren't trying to divest someone of their soul at all. They'd invented this spell – something censored, of course – that allowed them to see the soul itself, a small blue ball of light. It was always removed by the Kiss. But it wasn't the only thing. No one ever proved it – and I'm not certain how they even would, but their theory was that all the Dementor's Kiss was meant to do was to concentrate those positive feelings and memories in their victims, to encapsulate them in a compact form, and take those for themselves. One of the Unspeakables painted it. Little swirls of silver and pink light. Only the soul somehow got tangled within that, and one could not be removed without the other."

"So the soul-sucking was a by-product of the Dementors trying to take someone's happiness in a pure, more powerful form?" Harry asked, shaking his head. It didn't make him feel any better about the process or intent, as the result was the same.

"You could say it that way. If they were correct, of course. No one's ever been recorded as able to reason back and forth with a Dementor, or to get answers to more than simple questions. But they did note that, though this happened with every Kiss, the soul itself didn't always appear to be destroyed. The anomalies – they somehow kept it intact. They still removed it, of course, but it was like it... latched on to them. Still existing, still separate from the Dementor itself, just sort of... caught. They all had different theories as to why – innate magical ability of the wizard being Kissed, a drive or mission they had that was unfulfilled, or just the anomaly being too close to human to consume or destroy another human soul. But they all agreed, it remained."

Harry felt his hands shake, just a little, and he pulled them away from his cup to keep it from rattling against the table. "If the soul remains, and it's the anomalies we're dealing with – the ones that are actively seeking out men about to become fathers, which seems horrifically intelligent and purposeful – then there's a chance we might be able to help those who are still alive, if we could find them."

Malfoy stepped in front of Harry, taking both of Harry's hands in his to steady them. "Theoretically." He gave Harry a look that could not be entirely read. "Though attempted in the past, it's not once ever been successful."

Harry shook his head. "Then we'll just have to try harder than they did, won't we?" He stood, realising Malfoy still held both of his hands, and blinked at them dumbly. Malfoy dropped them in that instant, face flushing a pale pink, and stepped back. He began to murmur an apology, but Harry cut it off.

"Don't," he said, now aware that odd tension from this morning was back. Perhaps it was related to the feeling of vulnerability, after all, because Harry doubted it had to do with anything specific to their hands, themselves. He realised how the single word sounded, sharp and forbidding, and kicked himself. He didn't mean to say Malfoy couldn't offer comfort, or that he should be ashamed for being anything other than the stoic bastard his father had probably brought him up to be. "Don't apologise," he clarified, voice gentle. Malfoy's face softened, lost some of that pinched, miserable quality, as he looked directly at Harry in a way he most certainly hadn't done this morning.

"Why not?" Malfoy asked, scarcely louder than a whisper. Something flickered across his face then, an expression Harry placed as the one he'd noticed when Malfoy had first walked into the DMLE two weeks ago: hope, quickly hidden, as if to deny anyone else the knowledge it existed, a means of self-preservation.

Harry felt something in his stomach clench in a way that was nothing at all like the way it had done back in Malfoy's office not two hours ago, looking through all the horrifying evidence before them. This was something like nerves, a small shot of adrenaline, and it was both terrifying and thrilling to wonder at what it might mean.

"Just don't," he murmured, keeping Malfoy's gaze. He placed his hand on Malfoy's upper arm and let it rest there for just a moment. He could feel his own heartbeat pick up a little, amazed that this felt okay, this felt like something neither of them minded, this contact between them that wasn't directly related to survival. He smiled softly, Malfoy returning it with a tentative, almost imperceptible smile of his own. "Just don't."

There were a number of things Harry's career as an Auror had prepared him for. He was prepared for spur-of-the-moment duels, and counteracting hexes, and performing a number of emergency triage spells in the field, on himself, a partner, or a victim. He knew when to look for an attack before it was obvious, knew how to handle someone in physical shock, and could track people with surprising accuracy.

He was not, however, prepared when people dealt with tragedy in a way that was totally against the norm.

Malfoy seemed to be just as confused as Harry was, staring at the heavily pregnant woman before them, who looked calmly certain about everything. This was a woman whose husband had not come home at the usual time last evening, despite his rigid adherence to his schedule. This was also a woman who had walked fifteen minutes away from her home, where she came upon her husband's catatonic form in the middle of the empty street, Apparated them straight to St Mungo's, and then contacted someone at the Ministry, who had send Harry and Malfoy to speak to her. To say they'd expected possible hysterics, or some sort of shock, or at least a few tears would not be inaccurate. This was so outside of that, Harry felt like he'd walked into another reality.

"What do you mean, you know he's fine?" Harry asked slowly, as if she might correct him and say he'd misheard her. Her husband was nothing but an empty shell, as far as the Healers had informed them, and this woman – Colleen Murtaugh – had indicated she understood his condition just a moment ago.

"He's fine," she repeated, looking at Harry like he'd suffered a head injury, or was the victim of a Confundus Charm. "Don't give me that look, Auror Potter. Yes, I know he's been Kissed. I'm not a fool."

"Then what –?" Harry asked, feeling increasingly flustered, before Malfoy cut him off.

"Colleen Murtaugh?" he asked, a look of sudden recognition flooding his features. "Maiden name, Colleen Croaker?" She nodded, making a face that clearly said 'finally, now we're getting somewhere'. "As in, Unspeakable Croaker's daughter?"

Well, that explained the especially prompt and insistent note from the Ministry.

"What does –?" Harry tried again, before Malfoy flapped a hand in front of Harry's face, effectively shushing him.

"Tell us what you saw," Malfoy said, looking at her intently, as Harry tried to figure out the best way to remind him that she'd not been there when her husband had been attacked.

"I was in the kitchen, putting away the bread I'd baked, when it happened," she began, looking as if she were recalling an ordinary trip to the market. "One moment, I was closing the bread box, and the next, I was with Jerome a few miles from our home. He said goodbye to his friends, turned down the path where they all go their separate ways, and I saw it. It followed him."

"Saw it?" Harry asked.

Malfoy flapped a hand at him again, and Mrs Murtaugh gave another of those 'you're awfully special, for an Auror' looks. "The Dementor, of course. It followed him a bit, before Jerome noticed and cast his Patronus. It worked, but the thing punched right through after a moment. Then I watched as it Kissed him." Instead of breaking down, sobbing, as Harry assumed most wives might at this point, her face went serenely blank. "It was beautiful, if you looked past the Dementor itself," she said dreamily. "There was this bright blue ball of light, pink and silver tendrils wrapped around it, that came out of his mouth and went into the creature instead. I watched Jerome slump over, but the Dementor turned back, and I heard my husband's voice, saying he was all right, even through the cold, before it faded."

"And then what happened?" Malfoy asked, because apparently his questions weren't stupid or ill-timed.

"I put on my shoes, grabbed my warmest cloak, and went to retrieve him," Mrs Murtaugh said simply.

"... Could you excuse us a moment?" Malfoy asked, looking apologetic and nearly dragging Harry away by his wrist.

When Harry had told Malfoy last night he needn't apologise for the physical contact and familiar touch, and hadn't told him not to do such in the future, this wasn't exactly what he'd expected as the result. "What?" he asked, nearly slamming into Malfoy when he stopped suddenly, apparently far enough away to feel he could comfortably cast a privacy charm.

"Colleen Croaker. My supervisor's daughter."

"Yeah, I caught that much. What's the big deal, other than we really can't screw this up, now?"

Malfoy looked at Harry like he'd grown an additional, very stupid head. "You've no idea what the Croakers are known for, do you?" When Harry just looked back at him blankly – and growing impatient – Malfoy sighed. "They're Dream Voyagers, Potter. It's a particular form of Divination – which they also excel at, in general. Before you went and smashed hundreds of prophecies several years ago back at the Ministry, I'd say at least a hundred of them were from members of the Croaker family. All the blood relatives have the gift, and a few of them married partners who did, as well. Some of the most accurate, clearest ones came from the women who were expecting."

Harry didn't know what to think about that information. On the one hand, he'd had Divination with Sybil Trelawney. On the other, he'd also learned from Dumbledore that the woman had had legitimate prophecies, even if not one of them had ever shown in her instruction of the subject. As a whole, Harry hadn't had a lot of experience with anyone who was more than infrequently and randomly adept at Divination, of any sort. But this woman...

"She said something about the blue and pink light," Harry said slowly. "We haven't told anyone about that. And it took us ages to find that information in the first place."

"What part of the fact that this woman comes from a long line of legitimate prophets are you not getting?" Malfoy moaned, letting his head hit the wall behind him. "She's basically confirmed that the thing going around, attacking men over the last two months or so, is one of the anomalies – that, as long as it's – or they're – the one doing the attacking, then there might actually be a chance to retrieve the souls in question, and possibly figure out how to fix those first few victims, who don't appear to have been Kissed completely."

Harry raised his eyebrows, completely shocked to hear hope and excitement from Malfoy about this. He was the one who had cautioned Harry against getting their hopes up only the night before. "You put a lot of stock in this woman and what she claims to have seen," he said, shaking his head in wonder.

"Potter, we wouldn't even be having this difference of opinion if you were an Unspeakable," Malfoy sighed. "You'd simply understand."

"Excuse me, gentlemen," Collen Murtaugh said from just behind them, making them both jump. Malfoy quickly dropped the privacy charm. "I just thought I'd let you know I'm headed to my husband's room for now, in case you have anything else for me. And as for what I have for you..." She looked at them both critically, seeming to appraise them, before she shook her head and laughed softly. "My husband's going to be fine, you know."

"And how do you know that?" Harry asked, wincing when Malfoy elbowed him in the side.

She smiled. "My mother predicted that the person who delivered my first child would be the man I'd married. He'll be fine, I know it." She walked away, still smiling, before she stopped and looked back over her shoulder. "And you'll find what you've been seeking," she said, stepping onto the lift. "Here's hoping you know it when the time's appropriate."

"Does she mean the Dementor, about these cases?" Harry asked as the doors closed behind her. He felt unsettled somehow, like he was missing something important, that should be obvious. It was that, or she was messing with their heads – or she was absolutely mad.

"I don't know," Malfoy replied after a moment. "I'm not actually certain which of us she was even speaking to, or if it was both of us."

Harry stared at the closed lift doors some more, as if they would open up and she'd come back out and give an explanation that wasn't cryptic.

He'd find what he was searching for, or Malfoy would. What it was they were each searching for, if it wasn't the same thing, he had no idea.

In a turn of events Harry's younger self would absolutely have never believed, he was increasingly glad to have Draco Malfoy around.

It wasn't just that he had access to things Harry couldn't even hope to get on his own, either due to Ministry restrictions, or the simple fact that he wouldn't know where to look. It wasn't even that he was surprisingly intelligent, past actions aside. Sometimes it was because Malfoy possessed a particular brand of sarcasm Harry was starting to find amusing. Others, it was that Harry appreciated having someone willing to try to keep up with him, who didn't try to either show him up because of his reputation or simper around him and act appallingly star-struck. Malfoy didn't treat him either of those ways, instead acting as if Harry was just another person – which he was.

Right this very moment, Harry also appreciated that Malfoy, as an Unspeakable, could put people off-guard when his own exceptionally recognisable Auror uniform raised alarm flags. No one really knew what to make of an Unspeakable, especially outside the Ministry's walls, if they recognised them for what they were.

Jepson Plockett definitely recognised Malfoy as an Unspeakable.

He'd halted in trying to slam the door in Harry's face – a very unwise move, in general, as doing such a thing when any Auror appeared on one's doorstep rarely sat well with said Auror, who had a good many resources at his disposal – and had basically stood, gaping, when he got a look at Malfoy's robes.

"I, er, Plockett's not here," he eventually managed, trying to slink back behind the heavy door and hide. "Dunno what you'd want with him, anyway. Boring chap, nothing worth noting."

"We never said we were here for anyone named Plockett," Malfoy said, snorting. "And in either case, we've seen your employee file, which contains your photograph. We know it's you, Mr Plockett."

"Well, damn," the man muttered, looking away from Malfoy to eye Harry. "What's it he wants?

"We just want to ask you some questions," Harry began, already feeling the resistance.

"I don't know nothin'," was the sulky response, and Harry tried not to roll his eyes. "I di'nt do nothin' wrong. No need for anyone to call the Aurors on me."

"No one's called the Aurors on you, don't be daft," Malfoy said. Apparently he was not under the same rules of conduct the Aurors were. Harry was actually somewhat jealous. "We just wanted to ask you some questions about your old job."

Plockett visibly withdrew into himself. "I don't have nothin' to say about it," he said, situating himself further behind his front door. "Not a word. Unremarkable employment, y'know."

"We just want to know about your experience with the prison's Dementors," Harry tried. "No one's in trouble for anything, we promise."

Plockett shook his head. "I don't talk about that time. Now if you'll excuse me."

"We just want to know if the Kiss is reversible," Harry called, his voice raised to carry though the door that had just shut in their faces. At least Malfoy's Unspeakable robes had got them that far.

The door reopened just a crack. "That's not something you want to be messing with, m'afraid," Plockett's voice said, sounding sad. "It didn't go well. Truly horrifying thing, the attempt is. Destroyed the victim and the person trying to preform the ordeal. I'd forget the whole thing, if I were you. Doesn't matter who you're trying to save – it's not worth it. Even the Unspeakables stopped trying to unravel that mystery, eventually." The door closed again, very firmly, and nothing Harry or Malfoy said after that got any response at all.

"Well, that was useless," Malfoy grumbled as they made their way down Plockett's walk. He looked as irritated as Harry felt, and almost as disappointed.

In truth, Harry was feeling a bit beaten. Between them, they couldn't find any logical, workable way to go about trapping any anomaly they found, though Malfoy said he'd brought it up with Croaker, who was looking into the records he could personally access, to see if any Unspeakable in the past had had any luck. If there had been some of them working as guards at Azkaban at some point, Harry felt there ought to be someone who had figured something out. Anything more complex, like actually curing the Dementors' victims, seemed completely beyond their reach. "It just feels like we're chasing our tails," he said, sighing heavily. "Like the whole thing has been some impossible task, even before you and I were assigned to work together. I'm not even sure us working together has been worth it."

Malfoy's face went pinched, hurt clearly flashing across his features, and Harry winced. Good to know he could still bungle that sort of thing so quickly. "I didn't mean it like that," he said, thinking it was no wonder he'd not had a relationship in so many years, if he stuck his foot in his mouth like this all the time. "I just mean that even with two of us, and access to the resources of two departments within the Ministry, we're still missing a lot of important details."

"Oh, is that all you meant?" Malfoy said with a huff. "It's not the endeavour that's useless – it's me."

"That's not at all what I meant," Harry snapped, the last of his patience strained too far. He hated this sort of disappointment and the feeling of impotency – it set him on edge. "I've actually found myself thinking that I quite like you!"

They both stopped, Malfoy looking surprised and sceptical, and Harry wondering if that sounded as open-ended as it seemed. "You're not bad," he said lamely, and then wanted to kick himself for that, too. "What I mean is, look, I wasn't thrilled to find we were going to be working together, but I told myself I'd deal with it, and that you probably weren't going to be any happier about the situation than I was. I figured we could stay professional, tolerate each other, figure out this case, and go our separate ways, having learned a lesson in cooperation, or at least how to fake it for our supervisors. I didn't expect you to be..."

"Didn't expect me to be what?" Harry couldn't name that tone of voice at all, and the expression on Malfoy's face didn't reveal much. It was almost as if Malfoy himself couldn't figure out his own feelings on the matter.

"I didn't expect you to be... you," he said, throwing his hands up in the air. "I didn't expect to enjoy having coffees and croissants in that hidden patisserie. I didn't expect to sit with you at my kitchen table, drinking tea after a rough day. I didn't expect to laugh at anything you said, or to not want to strangle you when you were being sarcastic and an utter bastard, and I definitely didn't expect –"

"What?" Malfoy pressed, voice betraying his shock at Harry's little outburst. "What last thing didn't you expect?"

Harry shook his head, unable to say the words that were stuck in his throat: I didn't expect to want to get to know you better and hope to spend more time together. "I didn't expect you to be someone I trusted," he said instead, because that was true, too, and Malfoy had earned hearing it.

Malfoy blinked in surprise, as if that was the last thing he'd expected. If he was shocked by that, Merlin knew what he would have thought if Harry hadn't stopped himself from saying the other thing. "Oh," was all he said.

He might have said more, however, had a large grey-brown owl not swooped down in front of them, landing awkwardly and painfully on Harry's shoulder. Talons dug into his flesh, and he was too busy trying to free himself to notice that Malfoy had snagged the envelope from its beak, which at least had the effect of dismissing it, its duty done.

"There's been another victim arrived at St Mungo's," Malfoy said as Harry undid the buttons of his robe just enough to make sure he wasn't bleeding too badly from his shoulder. "Potter," he said, voice strained. Harry looked up, knowing from the expression on Malfoy's face that whatever he said next, Harry didn't want to hear it. "It's Weasley."

"Harry!"

He'd known it would be difficult, facing Hermione in light of what was happening, but he hadn't quite expected the way he'd feel like simultaneously breaking apart and smashing things to bits, seeing her tear-stained face in the few short seconds before she'd flung herself at him, her face pressed into his chest.

He put his arms around her and held on. "It's okay," he said, trying to keep his voice from shaking. They taught Aurors a lot of things – how to calm people down, how to appear confident when all you could really think was 'what the bloody fuck is going on?', how to distance yourself from the situation at hand, and even how to deal with the mixed bag of likely emotions in hearing or seeing your partner wounded, kidnapped, or otherwise in trouble.

Harry might have to tell those in charge of that training that either they weren't doing it right, or that they might want to consider driving the lessons a little deeper. Because he hadn't even seen Ron, and he was having the hardest damned time keeping a level head.

"It's not okay," she said into his robes as he held her. "Don't you Auror me, Harry. I know as well as anyone that they teach you to calm hysterical people. I also know you're not supposed to tell them things will be fine, if you aren't completely certain they will be." She looked up at him, and Harry forced down the urge to let everything get the better of him, to make him droop or collapse or give up the bit of control he was managing to retain. "He's been Kissed, Harry."

He'd known that, and yet it still hit him hard. He looked around the corridor and confirmed it was empty. Malfoy had Apparated with him to the hospital, but was nowhere to be found. "When's the baby due?" he asked quietly.

Hermione's eyes went wide. "When did he tell you? I've only known for certain a few days before we left, and just told him while we were on holiday. We'd agreed not to tell anyone until we could get them together for dinner next week, or the week after, and –"

"He didn't," Harry assured her, and that made everything all the worse, knowing he was right. "It's just... there were cases we were working on, before you left, and we've finally established what's going on, and –"

Hermione shook her head. "Don't tell me any more. I don't want to hear the details of how bad it is right now." She pulled away from him, straightening her robes and her hair, and Harry gave her a few moments to compose herself. When she seemed ready, she sighed and looked up at him. "I know what's happened to him. I mean, I know he was Kissed. I heard him shouting, and I saw his Patronus go running past our window, and I could feel it, when I went outside to see what was happening. I got him here as quickly as I could, but..." She took a shaky breath and pushed on, and Harry could see her forcing herself not to cry again. "I know what Professor Lupin taught us, what he said back in third year, about there being nothing that can be done for someone, once this has happened, but I can't accept it. I guess I know what you felt like, when Sirius went through that veil. But I can't give up the hope that maybe he'll get better. Not now. We've all been through so many impossible things and come out of it, and maybe the part of me that remembers it all won't stop believing it's still that way."

Something within Harry, wound tight the last two weeks, went tighter still. It hurt, an actual, physical pain in his chest, and he tried to make it loosen by force of will. But it wouldn't listen. "Where did it happen?" he asked, a plan of action coming to him, finally, something to do.

"Our new home," she said, and her lower lip quivered. Harry knew she was thinking about how they'd bought it to start their life together, to prepare for the family they both wanted to begin expanding within the next few years – that they would be expanding, now, in less than a year's time. "We're not entirely moved in yet, you know. It's been nice, being able to take some time with it and get it set the way we really like. We went there this morning, after getting back to England last night, and I remember kissing him before he went out to check the garden for gnomes and things, and I got busy organising the bookshelves, and... the next thing I knew..."

Harry took her by the shoulders, as gently as he could. "It will be okay," he told her, seeing his next step clearly. "It will."

Hermione blinked at him, and then it seemed to dawn on her what he was thinking, or at least the gist of it. "Harry, no."

Giving her shoulder a squeeze, Harry ignored her words. "It will, Hermione. I'll take care of it." Without pausing, knowing she'd only begin talking him out of it, he turned and walked down the corridor, heading for the nearest exit. He knew where their new place was, of course; he had helped them pick out a few pieces of furniture and figure out which of their old things were worth keeping, and what they wanted or needed to replace. He'd helped Ron with the wards protecting the house, until they were certain that they were as safe while in there as they could possibly be.

Not safe enough.

"Potter!"

Harry didn't even stop when he heard his name called. He had a mission, now, and it was soothing his raw nerves in a way virtually nothing else had in the last several days, being able to finally move towards something.

"Potter, damn it, wait!" With a frustrated sound, Malfoy landed his hand on Harry's shoulder and yanked. It was something Harry might have walked through under ordinary circumstances, but Malfoy's fingers dug into the spot left tender by the owl's talons not thirty minutes ago, and Harry was startled by the pain he'd already managed to forget.

He whirled around, letting the flare of pain fuel his anger and determination. "What? What do you want?"

"Don't do it. Whatever you've got planned, don't. I can see it on your face, Potter, clear as anything – you've got that self-destructive look I've seen on half your fellow Aurors in my five years at the Ministry. Sometimes we're called in to look at the corpse, afterwards, to see if there are answers the Unspeakables can give that the regular evidence can't."

"So?" Harry snapped. Whatever had been winding itself tighter had finally snapped. He had to act, had to, or he'd go mad. Something buzzed under his skin, itching and hot and painful, and if he didn't do something, he'd claw at himself until he was as shredded outside as he felt inside.

"Don't make me have to come in and stand over your body, too," Malfoy whispered.

It was like a hit to the chest, a well-placed hex that made his breath stop, made his heart jolt and stutter. This wasn't some general request that he stop and think before acting. Harry had heard dozens of those, hundreds, even. There was no sense of being ordered around, of general protest on principle, of someone convinced he was being irrational and needed it pointed out so he could back up and look at it logically.

This was something soft and quiet and hurt. Desperate.

Harry looked into Malfoy's light grey eyes, and it seemed clear, then, what Harry'd been unable to understand or identify in so many looks and tones of voice and cautiously-worded sentences: Malfoy felt something for him, was emotionally invested in some way. It might have simply been friendship, but Harry no longer would have bet on it.

And it wasn't as surprising as it probably should have been that Harry didn't mind – that he perhaps even wanted it to be true.

"Don't go." Malfoy's voice was still a whisper, but the look on his face, the emotion in those two words, the way his hand lay on Harry's arm, said everything quite clearly. He'd finally chosen to let everything show, to stop denying or hiding it, for whatever reasons he'd had. "Killed, Kissed, whatever the result, it won't go well. And I don't think I can take it, when it happens."

Harry's throat worked. He'd defied Malfoy plenty of times in all the years they'd been acquainted, had brushed off complaint and request and demand, and now he couldn't quite do it. How was this more effective than Hermione's "no"?

Hermione.

Ron.

"I have to," he whispered back, feeling that sense of determination and anger and need to do something flow back to him, partially filling up the hole Malfoy had just punched into his chest. "I have to do this."

"Potter, wait," Malfoy said, the brokenness in his voice plain even as everything pressed in around Harry as he Apparated away.

Harry felt the instant change in temperature the moment he landed. It was still cold, everything grey, and Harry hoped that meant that whatever had got Ron was still hanging around. He walked through the large garden at the front and side of the house until he made it to the back part of the property. There was a small lake here, populated with tiny, sparkling fish Hermione had once called pretty, and Harry spun in a small circle, unsure what to do next, other than wait. If this worked – and it had to – then Harry would prove he'd not lied to Hermione. And if it didn't, he thought to himself as he sat on a large rock near the shoreline... well, at least he wouldn't have to worry about ever looking at Hermione and seeing that wrenching sadness ever again.

The sky darkened rapidly, as if nightfall had come back for a second turn, impatient with waiting the proper amount of time. Everything was quiet, and Harry shivered violently, staring out at the glassy smooth surface of the lake. He caught the reflection of something hovering above it, a dark shape gliding toward him, and even the Patronus he cast only held it up a brief second.

It was so cold out here on the water, he thought dimly, the thing in tattered robes drifting closer.

There was his mother screaming – always that.

But there was also Sirius falling through the veil, the soft, surprised look of his face fading into nothingness along with the rest of him. There was Snape's last intense gaze as Harry knelt over him and watched him die. There were Dumbledore's arms and robes and beard floating as he plummeted, and Hedwig falling out of the night sky, all her loyalty and help gone in a burst of green light.

There were the bodies of Tonks, Fred, and Lupin laid out, their blood and bruising still fresh, and then there was Ginny leaving him, tears on her face. It hurt, like someone had opened his chest and packed ice around his heart and lungs. It was colder even than when he went into the iced-over lake to retrieve the Sword of Godric Gryffindor, prickling and setting certain nerves on fire even as it deadened others. It was hard to breathe with that cold working through him, and Harry's lungs no longer seemed to work right, as if he was drowning where he sat, as he almost had when trapped under that ice several years ago. He tried to force air into them, knowing he needed it to keep living, to keep existing, but he couldn't manage it, couldn't relieve his body of the cold, of the crushing, painful feeling that had worked itself so deeply into every fibre of his being.

And maybe that was okay.

There was someone calling Harry's name, sounding muffled, distant, distorted, almost as if Harry really was back underwater. It wasn't Ginny's tearful goodbye, or Hermione's voice earlier in the hospital, but a voice he knew all the same, even if it was very, very faint. Harry thought that it meant something, but couldn't figure out what, couldn't even place it right away.

He knew it, suddenly, as if someone had shined a light on the name, on the face that went with it, but Harry couldn't bring himself to smile, to look in that direction. Harry knew it'd just be worse – something else that would drag him down into the cold and dark if he gave it the chance. He thought that if it did, he would rather just not know anything ever again, instead of having to feel that, to keep living with the hopeless, cold feeling. He wasn't even sure it was possible to live with this feeling, this icy ache, and that didn't seem as terribly horrifying as it used to, and he could accept that.

He didn't have the energy to resist, anyway.

And then something tugged at him, just barely registering past the feeling of being frozen, of every muscle in his body stiffening and becoming useless. Harry noticed something silvery-white in front of him, and the cold eased for just a second; it sank back in, deeper, as if it had reasserted its desire to claim Harry for its own once its hold had slipped.

He wasn't surprised when it did go deeper, either, and didn't fight the feeling of being dragged down further into its depths. Deep down, Harry knew he wasn't meant to have anything good, nothing that lasted, and that this was what he deserved, what he was meant to have.

Something broke through the shadows surrounding him, more silver and white and his name again, floating in the air and fading. It was desperate and pleading, like someone needed him to do something – something he was going to fail at, of course; someone else he would let down. It was a pattern in his life, as if someone had set it long ago, some prophecy no one had ever told him about, but that existed all the same.

There was a sensation almost like warmth on his shoulders, against his cheek; it would have been startling, if Harry wasn't so numb to everything. It enveloped his hand and his vision improved, some of the grey veil that had been over his eyes lifting, as if someone had cast a spell to banish it, and Harry blinked, forcing his body to obey at least that much.

He could swear he saw Malfoy casting a corporeal Patronus, which couldn't be real, because Malfoy had never done that. It had to be an illusion, no matter how real it looked, and Harry wondered dimly what it meant that, of all hallucinations to have, he was having this one. He couldn't work out an answer, brain still sluggish, and he'd given up trying when there was soft heat against his mouth, waking the nerves that had been deadened. The frigid cold relented, snapped like ice that had been run under hot water, started to break away, and suddenly things were clearer, colour replacing the muted grey shades of his world as images played before him.

He saw his hand in Malfoy's, as it had been when they woke the other night out in the clearing. He could see them leaning comfortably against one another like they were in the Ministry the week before, trying to keep each other upright and awake. He saw Malfoy standing in front of him in Harry's own kitchen, Harry's hands held still within Malfoy's, to keep them from trembling. They were memories he had, he realised, but there was something about them that was different.

He was just realising that when another image began, a very clear, intensely bright double-headed dragon that shot from Malfoy's wand and circled Harry's own half-slumped form on the rock where he was sitting even now – and then, with that image still in his head, the cold lifted entirely, making Harry's body tingle with the sudden change. He shuddered violently, unable to stop it, even though it felt like he might just break apart.

He was warm, finally, warm edging to hot; there was a tinge of pleasure deep in his chest, spreading out, pulsing with a rhythm that wasn't his own heartbeat. Harry opened his eyes to find Malfoy knelt in front of him, eyes wide and his hand clasped around Harry's. Harry couldn't come up with words for a moment, even after his eyes focussed properly, but he placed the other rhythm as Malfoy's heartbeat – he could see it in the pulse in Malfoy's neck, could swear he felt it through where their hands were currently joined.

And just as certainly as he knew things were hopeless – that he wasn't meant to have anything good and happiness was something that would never come to him again – Harry knew he would be okay. He was certain Malfoy had come to help him, come for him, despite their argument back at St Mungo's. Without that, Malfoy's own action in response to Harry's inability to do anything but what he'd done, Harry probably would have been counted as the next victim.

Instead of chilling him, that certainty had the effect of waking Harry completely, leaving him finally able to take control of his body again. He gasped, air making its way in and out of his lungs as he pulled it in as if he'd truly been without it for all this time. It hurt, but it was a good pain, and Harry would take it any day over the other sensation.

"Harry?" Malfoy said, and Harry could tell by the worry in his voice, sounding just short of panic, that it wasn't the first time Malfoy had called his name since he'd arrived.

Harry didn't answer when Malfoy whispered his name, not with words. He leaned forward instead and kissed him, almost desperate, and realised that this was what must have happened just a moment ago – a kiss between them, like the time Malfoy had shown him his happy childhood memories through Legilimency, only more than that, stronger.

Malfoy went rigid with surprise, his body spasming for a split second, and then he pressed himself against Harry, wrapped his arms around him and held on, as if he was afraid Harry was going to disappear. Harry heard the small sigh Malfoy made, felt the tension drain from the body against him as the fear was replaced with relief; it almost made Harry want to double-check that this was real, despite the very clear feeling of being held close, of Malfoy's hands fisted in Harry's Auror robes, and the pressure of his mouth on Harry's.

Harry had ignored the signs that they'd been growing this close, that they might want the same thing; that this was something he might be able to have, this imperfection that was better than the perfection he had imagined in a partner back in school and at the end of the war. It was almost funny how very clear it was now, how little he could deny wanting this, in light of it all, and he reached one of his hands up, sliding his fingers though the hair at the nape of Malfoy's neck. It was softer than he would have expected, which made him smile, the expression breaking the kiss they'd been holding.

Malfoy leaned back, looked at Harry with wide, disbelieving eyes. "Harry?" His voice sounded utterly wrecked, and Harry heard his statement from earlier, echoed back in just the single word of his name: it won't go well, and I don't think I can take it, when it happens. He realised Malfoy had come, hoping something miraculous might happen, but utterly terrified and certain he would be proved correct, and he'd be standing over Harry's lifeless body after all, the chance at anything between them gone before it had ever really existed. "Harry, are you all right?"

Harry grabbed the front of Malfoy's robes and tugged him down, resting his forehead against Malfoy's when their heads met, with Harry supported by the giant rock he'd been sitting on. "I'm fine, Malfoy," he whispered, a small smile rising to his lips. "I'm all here, I swear it."

Malfoy moaned, a small, helpless noise, as he sagged against Harry, who was thankful the rock was there to hold them both. He pressed his face into Harry's neck, and Harry could feel his body tremble, each exhaled breath shaky. "You said there was a limit to your stupidity," he finally said, pulling back to look Harry in the eye. "I don't know why in Merlin's name I trusted you."

Harry couldn't help it – he laughed, just a light, breathy chuckle, and it felt so good in a way he'd been certain could never happen again, just a few minutes ago. "You're the one who works in the Department of Mysteries," he said softly. "If anyone has the resources to figure it out, it's you."

Resources.

He'd almost forgotten what had brought them both here, how'd they'd come to be pressed so close, holding on to each other as if letting go might cause them to disappear forever. He looked around quickly, his head spinning with the movement and making him feel like he might fall down, even though he was still sitting. He made out a handful of other people around them, a combination of bodies in Auror and Unspeakable robes, before he felt something pressed firmly into his hand. "Eat this," Malfoy said, and his voice managed to hold some of that demanding tone Harry remembered so well. It was also authoritative, and Harry unwrapped the small parcel in his hand automatically, both surprised and grateful to see a large piece of chocolate sitting there.

"What's...?" was all Harry got out before Malfoy nudged his hand holding the chocolate and favoured him with a demanding look.

"I said to eat that, Potter," Malfoy said. Though his voice was firm, the words short, there was no anger or annoyance in his tone. Harry stuffed some of it into his mouth, sighing in relief when he felt it take some of that shaky, weak feeling away. "It's okay. Unspeakable Croaker was able to determine how to trap an anomaly. Nothing else is clear quite yet, but it's a start."

"They... arrived with you?" Harry asked after a moment, his mouth still partially full. It occurred to him that he knew at least half of these people by name, and they knew him. And that he was currently sitting on a very large rock with a very identifiable, blond, pale Unspeakable standing in front of him, much closer than any sense of propriety between two colleagues allowed for.

"Just after," Malfoy said, and the sheepish look on his face said he'd realised himself what Harry was putting together. "So... I hope you weren't planning on keeping this development between us a well-guarded secret. It didn't exactly occur to me, in the moment I tried to get that thing away from you to keep it from removing your soul from your body, that perhaps I shouldn't display my feelings for you, in case someone else noticed."

"I'm not exactly complaining, when it comes down to it," Harry said, snorting. He swallowed more chocolate and stood, only to have Malfoy press his hand against Harry's chest and push, forcing Harry back to sitting. "What are you doing?"

Malfoy's eyebrows went up, and if that wasn't assurance that he was still a snarky, sarcastic bastard, emotions and affection for Harry be damned, Harry wasn't sure what was. "You've just been though a Dementor attack," Malfoy said slowly, as if Harry had lost half his brain cells during the process. "You're going to sit your arse here while everyone else contains that bloody thing, and then you're not going anywhere that isn't St Mungo's."

"Like hell I'm not," Harry said, trying to stand up again, refusing to let Malfoy see that he still felt a little unsteady. "I'm going back to the Ministry with you and everyone else. There's more for us to figure out, you said so yourself, and I am not –" he broke off as a wave of dizziness washed over him.

"Potter?"

"I'm not – I don't –" Harry said faintly, trying to regain his balance and failing. This wasn't the normal after-effect of a Dementor attack, so far as he recalled. "I don't feel right." Something that might have been panic tried to rise within him, but he was too dizzy to tell. "I think something's wrong."

Hands guided him back down, gently steadying him. "Relax, Potter," Malfoy said softly. "Just relax."

"No, I... I can't... It's..." His voice sounded fuzzy, even to himself, and he was certain that without Malfoy in front of him and the rock behind him, he'd be splayed on the ground.

"It's the sedative, is all it is," Malfoy said, his voice soothing, and Harry tried to snap his head up to look him in the eye.

"Sedative?"

"In your chocolate," Malfoy affirmed. "My idea, and approved by Auror Skadden, not very long after we pieced together the Dementor affiliation, and discussed the likelihood you'd go after one of them on your own. I also have a liquid and a powder version, given to me with the Minister's permission, in case I ever needed to keep you safe from yourself. You've nothing to worry about, Harry. It's simply a measure to ensure you get the care you need that everyone who knows you was certain you'd refuse."

"You drugged me?" Harry asked, feeling his body go utterly limp. Once upon a time he'd be furious, but he'd seen the look in Malfoy's eyes, the expression on his face, and knew this hadn't been outright malicious. "You, my acting partner, along with my supervisor..."

"I'd apologise, but I'm not actually sorry, in this case," Malfoy said. His voice sounded like it was coming through a thick wall.

"You Slytherin bastard," Harry slurred, his eyes now half-lidded. They were going to have a talk about this once he came to, no bloody doubt about it.

Malfoy chuckled, his breath warm and pleasant in Harry's ear. "Yes, Potter. Don't tell me you thought those house traits all disappeared after leaving Hogwarts." Harry could feel his hand being patted, and then Malfoy's lips placing a soft kiss on his forehead as everything went pleasantly dim. He smiled in spite of himself and his irritation at the situation. "Now sleep, and you can read me the riot act later." The last things Harry registered were his hair being brushed back by a gentle hand, and a squeeze to the hand still being held, and then he was enveloped by a darkness completely unlike the one from not very long ago.

It took Harry a while to identify the noise around him, but it finally came to him, the answer floating up from somewhere he couldn't see: whispering.

It started to come back to him, then. He could feel the bed underneath him, something firm and supportive but lacking significantly in general comfort. He could hear the beeping of spells that monitored vital signs, and that meant he was in St Mungo's, the very place he'd insisted he didn't need to go just a little bit ago, until Malfoy had drugged him like the sneaky, snake-like Slytherin bastard he was.

Why the hell should that make him smile?

"Harry?"

The whispering stopped when someone said his name, and he strugged to make his eyes open. They felt sticky, dry, and when he did pry them open, he realised he was without his glasses and couldn't see much anyway. Then he heard the faint clicking of his glasses being unfolded, and someone slipped them onto his face, their fingers brushing his cheekbones and temples as they slid them into place and then stepped back.

"That better, dear?" Mrs Weasley asked, looking down at him with concern.

"Much," he tried to say, but his throat was even drier than his eyes. He looked around his bed to see Hermione and Ginny also standing there. Ginny had her arm around Hermione's shoulders, and it was very plain that all three woman were suffering from a drastic lack of sleep and an abundance of worry.

His first thought, now that his brain was clearing, was Ron. Was he all right? Had he taken a turn for the worse? He wasn't –? Harry couldn't even bring himself to think of the worst. "Is Ron...?" he tried, unsure how to finish that sentence.

His stomach dropped as Hermione burst into tears, and Harry forced himself not to panic, though he couldn't stop from clenching his hands around the blankets covering him. Molly made a tsking noise and pulled Hermione against her, stroking her hair and murmuring softly.

"He's not dead," Ginny said, gently, and he was grateful he didn't have to say it, because she knew what he meant anyway. "In fact, he's – he's going to be okay."

"Okay?"

"They figured it out," Ginny said, and from where her face was awkwardly pressed into Molly Weasley's bosom, Hermione let out a watery little sob that Harry was so very grateful to identify as one of utter relief. "The Unspeakables and the Healers. It took a while, but they've been working on fixing those who were attacked for a few days."

"Days?"

Hermione sat upright, pulling herself away from Molly's embrace. "You've been out for four days," she said, wiping at her eyes. "The Unspeakables and Healers have been at the process since the night before last."

"But it works?" Harry asked, trying to will his hands to let go of the blankets twisted within them.

"Yes," Hermione said, nodding, but there was something in her expression Harry didn't like.

"But?" he pressed. "Come on, Hermione, tell me."

"It works," she said, voice still a little unsteady. "But it's still dangerous. The Aurors have been out catching the – what they're calling 'anomalies', and the Unspeakables and Healers have been working on helping the victims. They've had a few already make full recoveries, but they – they've lost two people so far," she admitted, her eyes dropping to the floor. "One of the men who was attacked, and one Unspeakable."

Harry felt himself go pale. An Unspeakable. "Who was.... It's not...?" he managed after a moment, throat locking on him as if he had something stuck there, preventing him from swallowing or allowing words to flow out.

Hermione looked confused for a moment, looking at Ginny as if she might be able to clarify, and then everyone's eyes went to the door to Harry's room as it clicked and pushed open very slowly.

Harry caught a glimpse of pale skin and silver-blond hair and wanted to shout. What came out instead was a breathy, barely audible "Malfoy", instead. He'd had no idea how terrified he'd been in those few short seconds of uncertainty, but it did wonders for letting him know how much he'd cared about the answer to his unfinished question.

"You're awake," Malfoy murmured from the doorway. There were dark purple half-circles under his eyes, and Harry thought he might be even paler than usual, though it was hard to tell, especially from here. Malfoy caught all three Weasley women looking at him from their spots beside Harry's bed, and he stood up straight, opening the door a little further. "Do you think we might have a moment?" he asked Mrs Weasley, his voice carrying all the professionalism one might expect of a Ministry employee who was still working on their most urgent assigned task.

"Yes, of course," Molly said, nodding. She gestured to both Hermione and Ginny, gathered her shawl, and started to shoo them all out the door. Ginny gave Harry an awkward smile as she stepped outside, an expression that was warmer than any he'd got from her in months, but indicated things weren't as bad as he'd once feared, and Harry thought that was good enough for him.

Hermione leaned down to give Harry a hug before she exited behind Ginny. "I'm so glad you're both going to be okay," she mumbled into his shoulder. "I need you both, you know, with the baby coming."

He patted her back, half in thanks and half in reassurance. "We're not going anywhere," he said, feeling the tears threatening to appear in his eyes. "Ron's going to be fine, and I'm sticking around, too." It seemed to settle her a bit, and she nodded, waiting for Molly at the door, as Molly patted his leg through the blankets and told him she was glad to see him awake.

"But don't tire him too much," she instructed Malfoy as he made way for her in the doorway. "He's been through a lot, and work isn't as important as rest, right now. Give him some time to recover."

"Like four days of forced sleep?" Harry rasped, apparently not loud enough for Molly to hear as she stepped into the corridor.

The ghost of a smirk played on Malfoy's lips as he shut the door behind him. "Still sore about that, Potter?"

"It was four days," Harry pointed out. "And you drugged me."

Malfoy nodded, holding a glass of cool water out like a peace offering. Harry took it and drank it as slowly as he could stand, intensely grateful for the gesture. Even if he still wasn't pleased about being sedated against his will.

"I did, and I'd do it again."

"You're a bastard," Harry said, his voice much more normal now.

"Are you honestly going to tell me that you wouldn't, in a similar situation, hex or otherwise restrain me with whatever Auror tactic worked best?" Malfoy asked, sitting carefully upon the side of Harry's bed. He looked at Harry as if he were trying to convince himself he was really here, that they were both here, both close like this, both aware of what it meant.

"I don't suppose so," Harry said, giving up. He'd hex Malfoy in a heartbeat if it kept him safe, and he'd do it even faster if it kept him safe and got him out of the way of holding up the case they were working on. He reached out and took Malfoy's hand from where he'd placed them in his own lap. Lacing their fingers together, he looked up into Malfoy's face. "You look like shit, you know."

"Are you always going to be this much of a flatterer?" Malfoy asked drily, though he gave Harry's hand a gentle squeeze.

"Probably." Malfoy really did look awful, though. He looked like he hadn't slept or eaten since Harry'd last seen him, and there was an almost imperceptible tremble of his hands. Harry pulled Malfoy's hand closer, turning it over and rubbing his thumb along Malfoy's palm, as if he could work the tremor out. "Seriously, though. Are you okay?"

Malfoy shut his eyes. "There is not enough chocolate in the world to cope with what the process of of reversing a Dementor's Kiss – even a partial one – does to a person." He sighed, eyes still closed. "The process requires a small team of us to voluntarily spend time with, and in close proximity to, a Dementor. For several hours, and up to a full day. There are only a handul of us compatible with what it requires, and we're taking turns. I'm one of the lucky few."

Harry was positive that, before these last few weeks, he'd never have pegged Malfoy for the sort to be self-sacrificing, in any sense. "You really are giving a lot of yourself up for this case."

Malfoy opened his eyes and looked at Harry, his smile wan. "Yes, well, look who's talking about making sacrifices for others."

"Well, apparently, I'm an idiot, and there's not actually a limit to my stupidity," Harry told him, deadpan.

Malfoy chuckled softly, shifting closer on the bed. "I suppose that makes two of us, really. It's why we're perfect for each other."

"Maybe one reason," Harry allowed, using Malfoy's hand to pull him up onto the bed. It wasn't plush or even all that comfortable, but it was wide enough and sturdy enough to support them both. He leaned forward, pressing his mouth against Malfoy's.

Malfoy kissed him for a long moment, slowly but thoroughly, as if he were exhausted but unwilling to give in to sleep when he had the option of being this close to Harry, in relative privacy. "We'll find others," he said, his voice much stronger than it had been since entering the room. "Now that we've stopped being stupid in that one particular way and admitted there's something between us." He tugged at the collar of Harry's hospital gown with one finger, eyebrows raised suggestively. "You know, there is something better than chocolate for coping with Dementor-related side-effects."

Harry grinned. "We are not messing around in this hospital bed. I've been unconscious for four days, and you've been saving people and putting yourself through hell to do it. At the very least, we're showering and dressing in normal clothes before we get any further than this."

With a yawn, Malfoy shrugged and looked at the clock on the wall. "I suppose you have a point," he said, and Harry moved over to allow Malfoy room to lie with him, their hands clasped much the way they had been that night in the enchanted circle.

There was no golden glow this time, no threat of Dementors circling above their heads, but Harry thought of it just the same. He wished he could keep Malfoy here until morning once more. Only this time, there would be no avoiding looking each other in the eye, and denial of how nice it was to share something so closely.

"You're thinking about that fairy ring, aren't you?" Malfoy murmured, his voice soft around the edges with approaching sleep.

"Maybe," Harry allowed. He wasn't tired, having been asleep much too long for his own liking, thanks in large part to Malfoy's underhanded tactics, but it felt good to lie here, pressed against each other until a Healer or one of the Weasleys walked in and ruined the sense of calm contentment.

"We should go back," Malfoy said, after a brief lag. "We were alone there, at least, and no one could intrude."

Harry laughed softly and tugged Malfoy into place so that he could wrap one arm around his shoulders. "I was thinking maybe we could take a holiday together, after this."

"Not Romania," Malfoy slurred. "Appalling choice of holiday locations, Potter."

"No," Harry said, grinning as he extinguished the light. Someone would come looking for Malfoy sooner or later, or come to check on him now that he was awake, but right now, he'd let Malfoy rest, and enjoy the feeling of relaxing together in the dark. "Somewhere warm, I think."

Malfoy made a pleased humming sound. "See?" he asked, words barely audible at this point, almost as if Harry had drugged him this time. "I told you we'd find other reasons we were perfect together."

Harry gave Malfoy's shoulders a brief squeeze. "Right. Go to sleep, Malfoy." Malfoy's snore, quiet and muffled in Harry's collarbone, was all the answer he got. He thought of Croaker's daughter's prediction, that they'd both find what they were looking for. So she'd been correct, if not maddeningly vague at the time. Smiling softly in the dark, Harry closed his eyes and thought of golden rings, feeling content. He'd shared a lot of happy memories with Malfoy that night in the fairy ring.

Knowing he and Malfoy would be sharing their happiness between them, creating new memories, for a long time to come, however, filled him with a warmth unlike any other.