The problem, Draco had decided, with waiting for something wasn't the mounting anticipation, although he didn't care for that either, it was the annoying way that everyone could tell that he was waiting. He had relocated from the damnable bus stop filled with memories of a brighter life to a filthy alley across from one of the main entrances to the Ministry. At first he just stood there, waiting and watching, until people began to point. He then tried to sit, but people only pointed more. He was afraid of blowing what little cover he had, so he walked down to a coffee shop and ask for a cup of water.
He drained the contents of the cup on his walk back to his disgusting alley and propped the cup between his feet. He drew his hood up to cover his eyes and pretended to sleep. Fewer people pointed at the homeless. He knew that this had it's origin in a deep seated anthropological condition. The vagrant served as a cautionary tale, it was not the aim of parents to have their children regard these people with anything less than indifference and nothing more than contempt. The most obvious way to illustrate this point was to ignore the presence of the homeless entirely. It sent the right subtle message that they were less than people, undeserving of attention. Draco smiled at his own cleverness.
He then realized that his cleverness had a ring of truth to it. Since he could not feasible return to his own home, and he certainly didn't know anyone other than Harry who might put him up, he was in a very true sense homeless. He ruminated briefly on the rise and fall of Draco Malfoy, aged 23, before he tried to refocus his mind on something a bit more pleasant. Which he could not do.
The problem with captivity and torture was that it effectively robbed a person of untainted memories. It served as a pitiful kind of post script to every pleasant thought. It sure was great playing quidditch as a kid, then there was the torture, oh that wacky torture! Draco would have leaned on a defense mechanism to prevent himself from wallowing in guilt, but he was a spoiled rich boy masking his issues with his father behind years of cruelty to others. Cruelty is not a good defense mechanism for lifting one's spirits.
Draco leaned back and wished he had developed Harry and Ron's propensity for joking around instead of his own for hating joking around. In school he had kept a tack board hanging beside his bed. On this board he hung up quotes that he thought to be particularly wise or deep. One of these swirled up in his head, it wasn't from a known author, it wasn't from a teacher, it was instead from his father. The quote read; "Wasting time is the apex of your generations abilities, why don't you do something productive for a change?"
Draco smiled. If only his father could see him now, sitting in borrowed clothes, having recently escaped from a cult of crazy monsters and with no idea how to waste time. Wouldn't the old man be proud of him, or as proud as the callous on his soul would allow him to be, which is to say not at all.
* * *
Harry threw his hands up, sending a cascade of papers flying up into to air. They slowly fell about him as he covered his temples with his hands and planted his forehead on his desk. Hermione couldn't be sure, as she had little experience with children, but it looked very much like Harry was having himself a good old fashioned tantrum. She inched her chair forward and put her hand on his shoulder.
"What's wrong, Harry?"
He turned to face her, he didn't look angry. That shocked her, she didn't know why she had expected him to be angry, but she had. She didn't expect him to have a distraught look plastered on his face, she didn't expect him to be so pale, to have eyes that searched her faces for an answer they weren't sure what was.
"Harry?" She was concerned.
"I hate this." He confessed.
"What?"
"This goddamn case." He pointed to the papers he had thrown around, "I feel like I'm just being reactionary, and I am. I have no idea what's going to happen next! How can I stop them if they're so much smarter than I am?"
"I didn't know it bothered you so much, sweetie." She caressed his cheek, but immediately withdrew her hand when she heard the sounds of people moving about the office, "All police work is reactionary, though. Isn't it?"
"Yeah." He dropped his head, "But at what point does that go away? It should, at some point in this case. I should have a lead so promising that I can follow it to a source, to the head of this."
"Maybe it's time we looked into the Abby Slanton angle."
"I can't let you guys do that. I told you that."
"So are you going to?"
"I'm not in any great hurry to throw my boss' boss into the suspect pool, no."
"I know, Harry. I know." She bit her lip and looked carefully into his eyes, "Perhaps Ron was onto something when he suggested that you pursue the dating angle with Abby."
"Oh he was." Harry smiled, "It was an excellent idea. I'm just not going to do it."
"Thank Merlin." She let out a breath she didn't know she had been holding in.
"Do you not get it, Hermione?"
"Get what?"
"When I say that you matter to me, I mean that."
"I know."
"I couldn't go pretend to be with another woman and not want to be with you."
"Harry, you don't have to-"
"I do. I send mixed signals, I act like an asshole because I'm so fucked up inside that even I don't know how to just be a human being sometimes." He put his hand on the side of her face, ignoring the world around him, "You are what I want out of life. I thought it was something else, I thought it was so many other stupid things. I never thought, not for an instant, that it would be as simple as this."
"Harry." She put her hand over his, "You don't need to tell me these things. I get it. I know that being you isn't always the easiest thing in the world, I knew it was going to be hard at first."
"That's my point." He smiled at her, "The challenge I've been looking for my entire adult life was you. I became an Auror because I thought that the challenge of it would make me feel complete, but it doesn't not all the way. I would go home and feel empty. I don't feel that way anymore. I don't know why I was so scared of this, for so long."
"Because you're a dumb boy."
"All boys are dumb. I was retarded."
"I wish I could just kiss you."
"I know. Me too." He turned abruptly back to his desk, "Okay, now that I'm through embarrassing myself I better get back to work."
Hermione reached out and turned his chair toward her. She leaned forward and kissed him. It was a chaste kiss, but it wouldn't have mattered if she had undressed him, the signal was clear. She didn't care that people knew. She didn't care that people saw. She loved him. Harry, for his part, was happy to be on the receiving end of that love.
* * *
Draco had no way to keep time. He was aware that it was getting late because the sun was going down, and more and more people were vacating the Ministry. He figured that less than a third lived close enough to the Ministry to use the physical entrances, so he guessed that most of the employees were gone but had used the floo network. He knew Harry would use the physical exit, he remembered Harry telling him, in Draco's other life as a functional human man, that the Floo Network freaked the hell out of him. Harry hardly ever used the Floo if he could help it.
So Draco sat and watched the entrance, occasionally jingling his cup, now filled with several muggle pounds worth of loose coins and bills. Draco was glad he had thought to try his hand at panhandling. He now had enough to afford to get a bite to eat tonight. He could feel his stomach complain with every additional second he spent sitting on the cold cement. He also knew he couldn't leave until he spotted Harry, that was the only way to stay safe.
He had thought about just walking into the Ministry and announcing himself, if only to put an end to the waiting. However he knew that the Brotherhood had spies in the Ministry, and knew that course of action would likely be more deadly than useful. It occurred to him once more how few people in the world he could actually trust. He pulled his hood down a little lower and fell back against the wall. He waited.
* * *
Andrew was nobody. The son of a security guard and nothing more. He would never be anything more. His father was more shell than man since Andrew's mother had died. It had torn a hole in what had been a pretty happy family. At a loss for anything else to do Andrew had begun to rebel, but he had nothing to really rebel against. His father didn't care where he was, didn't notice when he wasn't around. He just sat in the living room of their small home and cried every night at a portrait of his late wife.
The old man made Andrew sick. Some nights he would sit on the edge of his bed and seethe. Fantasizing about walking into the living room, yanking the picture from his father and demanding that he grow up and be a parent again, like he used to be. He never did though. As much as Andrew was angry at his father, as many times as he had thought about saying something, he would always back down and go to sit silently in his room.
Because more than sick, his old man made him nervous. Uncomfortable. He didn't know how he was supposed to handle a man so broken by grief, he didn't know what he could say that would make it better, that would even get through. So he gave up trying. He fell in with a crowd of kids at school, they hated people of muggle descent. Andrew had never had any real problem with the muggle born, he hadn't thought of them as anything but people. Classmates, sometimes friends. Though all of his old friends had abandoned him. He knew why. He would feel that sick, nervous feeling in his stomach when he looked at his father and he knew why his friends stopped talking to him.
So he made nice with his new friends. They were always there with a kind word, with a helping hand, with the right joke, the right gift, the right sense of family. A family he didn't realize he had missed so much until he'd had it again. He could never lose his new family. They meant the world to him, and he was certain that he meant the world to them. He belonged.
He shifted his weight as the broom handle behind him twisted into his back. He focused on what he had to do. Visualized it. Practiced what he would say in his head. What he would do. He ignored it when the broom moved again, poking him lightly in the ribs. He thought about his family. Not the old man and is sad photograph, but the family that loved him. The family that didn't need blood to connect them, that didn't need death to remind them, that didn't need excuses to love him. He set his jaw, drew his wand and began to control his breathing. He was ready. He had only to wait for his opportunity.
* * *
Ron had gotten tired of the clock, tired of his thoughts and tired of the growing fear of getting off work. He decided that the best way to cure these problems was with the old Weasley standby for troubling times. He was standing in front of the vending machine, inserting coin after coin, and purchasing one of most things, two of others. He gathered up his motley collection of junk food and walked back to his desk. He placed everything on his desk and began sank his teeth into a Jaffa cake, then a few biscuits, bags of crisps, candy bars, mints, gum, and everything else.
He knew that his stomach would not be kind to him later, his age causing his metabolism to begin what would become a lifetime of protests against his eating habits. He also knew that he had effectively killed an hour and a half without having to think much of anything beyond taste sensation and forcing things into his full stomach. That was more than enough to be thankful for.
Still time was the enemy to him that day. He knew how important the case was, he knew what was at stake should he or Harry falter in their work. He also knew that working on the case was killing him. He would move between horrible depression and blood curdling rage at a moments notice, depending on what he was looking at. He didn't want to be the ring that these two emotions were fighting in. He looked around his desk at the empty wrappers, he felt a cold emptiness welling up in his stomach, pushing the indigestion from his mind.
He didn't even have a picture of Sam. Not a single photograph, wizard or otherwise, was looking at him from on his desk. There was such a horrible finality to that. She would never exist beyond what he could remember, and regardless of what her life and death meant to him he would be lying if he said he could really accurately remember her face. He remembered things about it, glimpses, little nuances, but he couldn't jumble them into a coherent picture anymore.
A part of him was afraid to try, another part of him hated his own cowardice. Still another part wanted vengeance more than it wanted life. It was making him insane. He couldn't make himself concentrate on anything, he couldn't distract himself effectively, he felt small, tired and useless. He decided that there was little he could do in his condition to help the case.
He walked over to Harry's desk and told him to tell Mabel that he was going to be leaving work early, for personal reasons. Harry nodded and Ron walked away. He took the pay phone exit out to the London Streets, made it as far as the tavern on the far corner, walked inside, crawled into a bottle of something with a high proof, and dissolved there over night.
* * *
Draco watched as Weasley left the Ministry, he had even considered walking up to him, hoping that the friendship they shared with Harry would be enough to convince Weasley of his innocence. He quickly dismissed the idea, him and Weasley had never had any measure of trust between them, and with his life as the gamble it was a risky bet to make that he could form a bond that quickly with the man. Instead Draco watched as he sulked away to a bar and didn't come back out.
He turned his attention back to the Ministry itself, waiting for Harry. Knowing that any minute the one man that could save him would come strolling out, with his confident swagger. Draco saved the image in his mind, and felt the growing anticipation begin to turn into an uneasy kind of hope. But hope is a strange thing, and means different things to different people. Draco's hope was of salvation. A kind of hope that wells and soars inside you.
Ron's hope was one of desperation. He needed himself to forget the things that haunted him, he needed to not be the man he woke up as every morning. The man in pain. The man he had been for so long it didn't matter anymore what he had been before.
Hermione's hope on the other hand, was a completely different kind. She hoped out of love. She hoped for peace. She pictured a world wherein she and Harry could laugh together at the stupid inside jokes couples develop, communicate in the unspoken language of understanding, sleep beside each other in the comfortable places they would discover after months of sleeping together. She hoped for the day when she stepped in the scale and knew that she had gained the fifteen pounds that come at the beginning of every good relationship. Hermione hoped for life, and more so for a shared life.
Harry hoped for something other than failure. So much was riding on how he handled this case. He could stop a powerful Dark Arts movement before it gained the kind of steam that would incite war, he could clear the name of a friend he feared lost for too many years, he could make his best friend vindicated in the wake of a senseless tragedy, and he could make the world at large a safer place for the woman he loved. He just had to concentrate on not failing.
Andrew Bertham, a nobody kid hiding in a broom closet just off the main hall of the Ministry hoped for something much darker. He hoped for proof of his dedication to a group of people who made him feel like he belonged, like he was loved, like he was wanted. But he had failed them once before, he couldn't fail them again. He needed them to understand how committed he was, how much he believed, and to what lengths he would go for those beliefs. So he waited, as Draco did, for his chance to prove himself.
Hope is not always a beautiful thing. Often it is just the means that keep a human being from madness.
* * *
Hermione leaned over Harry's shoulder an peered at the notes he was looking over. She pointed to the spot where he had written down the Latin from the pendant, "That Latin is complete gibberish."
"What?" He looked back at her.
"It's just random words, it looks like. Something about building the past, and license and then a vague reference to the sky."
"You speak Latin?"
"No, I read Latin." She smiled, "It is often used as the primary root language for our spells, understanding it helps me to understand what it is I'm telling the magic to do."
"Of course you know Latin." He chuckled.
"Most people who invent new spells and whatnot have at least a cursory knowledge of Latin."
"So why is this just gibberish?"
"It reads like someone was looking up English words in Latin and just used the direct translations."
"That makes it gibberish?"
"Sure. Latin is the base language that the Romance languages came from. Each word in a sentence changes the words around it in subtle ways."
"That's not how English works."
"English isn't a Romance language. It isn't derived from Latin. The feminine and masculine words in English are nuanced more by subtle body language and pronunciation than spelling."
"Why do you know this?" He shook his head, "Never mind, you probably have an answer for that."
"I do."
"Figures." Harry tacked the notes onto his cubicle wall, "So this means what?"
"It means that the True Blood Brotherhood is likely composed mostly of school children. Like I said, most serious students of wizardry know Latin well enough to form a motto in the language."
"Kids?"
"I don't see why that would be so surprising." She put her hand on her hip, "Voldemort started his uprising within the boundaries of Hogwarts, so did you, matter of fact."
"Yeah, I guess. So much for the idea that I'm special."
"What does this mean for your case?"
"Among other things, it means that School is about to be postponed."
"What?"
"These kids start back up in a few weeks, once their at Hogwarts we won't be able to keep tabs on them. Their magic use won't be tracked if used during the school year."
"Does this office have the power to postpone a school year?"
"No." Harry shook his head, "But I might. I need to talk to McGonagall." He sprang to his feet, grabbed his cane and began to shuffle quickly from his desk, talking the whole way to the main entrance, "We need to get out to Hogwarts, talk to McGonagall and convince her to postpone opening the school. It's the only hope we have!"
"But Harry, what will we tell her? She won't believe that it's children responsible for all of this!"
"She went to school with Tom Riddle, she taught while we attended, I think that woman is more than wise enough to have figured out the potential of children!"
"How do you intend to get there?"
"We'll take the Floo Network to Hogsmeade!"
"That's a long walk in your condition!" She protested, reaching out and grabbing him. They spun to a stop, her staring into the determined eyes of, no longer the wise cracking Auror she had come to know in the last several years, but into the dangerous Emerald eyes of The Boy-Who-Lived, "Harry, I can't let you hurt yourself this way. Look the Ministry is closed up, everyone's gone home. Let's refocus in the morning. Okay?"
"No time!" His shout reverberated off the walls, "Theres no time, Hermione. We have to do this now." He spoke more softly, "Every second we waste is one more second that gives them a chance."
"That's not a reason to throw yourself around like this. You're going to kill yourself, Harry." She put her hand to the side of his face, "Don't you understand? While we still live there is always hope."
Harry sighed, but the danger lurking behind his eyes only intensified, "I'm not after hope, Hermione."
"You're being reckless."
"Yeah. But I'm right, and you know it."
"I know."
Harry turned back around, clutched her hand with his own and set off once more. He only got three steps when a great chunk if the marble floor before him exploded. The shock wave knocked the two down, and from the smoke they could see a boy walking toward them, his wand drawn.
"You." Harry said.
The boy was fourteen if he was a day, he had light brown hair, an acne outbreak, and a row of like brown freckles on his nose. He had a cruel smile, too cruel for his age, "You should have listened to your little girlfriend."
"You're the kid that killed the Healer, the one that attacked me."
"One and the same." He made a slight bow, "My dad works here, runs security. It's easy for me to come and go as I please. It was supposed to be easy, last time, but you're just so full of surprises."
Hermione lifted her wand and pointed it at the boy, "Not another step!" She screamed.
"Sectum Sempra." He said.
A gash ripped across Hermione's forehead, blood gushed onto Harry's shoulder. He stared at her in abstract horror unsure of how he was supposed to feel. His jaw set.
"So full of surprises, but not today." The boy pointed his wand at Harry, "Avada-"
Harry leveled his cane at the boy, "Expelliarmus!"
The end of Harry's cane shot a red line that knocked the boy's wand to the floor. He looked from Harry to Harry's cane, before he suddenly put it together.
"You transfigured your wand." He mused.
"Full of surprises." Harry muttered. He threw his cane down and charged.
He hit the boy in the stomach with his shoulder. The wind was knocked from his opponent's lungs and they went down hard. He sat up on the prone body of the child and began to punch him. Again and again. His knuckles covered with cuts, his own blood mingling with that of his victim. Harry had lost any semblance of control. Hermione lay bleeding a few feet behind him as he wailed on the child, anger clouding his thoughts, fear choking his throat.
"I am so fucking tired of this bullshit! So fucking tired. You want a goddamn fight, you little shit! You fucking got it!"
Hermione rose slowly from the floor, clutching her forehead to keep the wound closed up. She saw Harry, mad with rage, sitting on top of the boy who had attacked them. He was hitting him, beating him senseless, not aiming his fists in any particular direction but down. Hitting the boy over and over, rarely in the same spot, up and down his head and neck. He was striking mostly glancing blows, but the ones that connected completely were devastating.
"Beg me for your life! You fucking beg for it! You bastard!"
"Stop, please!" The boy shouted, scared to death of the anger he had unleashed.
"Why! Did you stop! Did you even fucking care! Did you!" But the boy couldn't answer. Harry had beaten him unconscious, and continued hitting him, his temper out of control. Hermione could see that Harry wasn't going to stop, that he might kill this boy.
"Harry!" She screamed, covering her mouth with her hand.
Harry's head jerked back. His eyes focused on Hermione, she could see the murder in them for a split second before they glazed over. He blinked a few times, as if he had forgotten where he was, what he was doing. As if he had forgotten himself. He turned back to the boy. He looked down and gasped. The boy's face looked more like raw meat than skin. He crawled off of the boy and back to his cane, which he clutched to his chest. He kept looking at the boy, as though he was trying to decide what he had done, if he had indeed done it, and if he ought to feel bad about having done it.
Hermione walked over to the boy, checked to be sure that his pulse was strong and then sat down next to Harry. She put her arm around him, still holding closed the wound on her forehead.
"Are you okay?" She asked.
Harry shook his head slowly, "I didn't realize I was so upset about all of this. It just crept up on me."
"I know." She said quietly, holding him as best she could, "What do we do now?"
Harry smiled weakly, nodded and began the gears of his mind again, "Get him to St. Mungo's. I'll go to Hogwarts. Then I need to talk to Ginny."
"Why Ginny?"
"He knew the spell the Half Blood Prince created. That's what he used on you."
"I see."
Harry got up slowly from the floor and started toward the Floo chimneys. Hermione stopped him with her hand.
"Why did you transfigure your wand?"
"Seemed like a good idea at the time."
"I guess it was."
"Go." He turned around, "I love you."
"I love you too."
With that the two parted ways.
* * *
Draco saw Hermione run out with the beaten boy cradled in her arms. For one horrible second he thought it was Harry, but when he looked closer he realized that the boy had light hair. He felt the adrenaline pumping in his veins. He felt the surge of power in his stiff legs, the electric snap that raised the hair on the back of his neck. He didn't know if it was that, or the look of terror on Hermione's face, but he found himself sprinting across the street to her. When he was close enough he shouted.
"What happened!"
She spun around, maybe she recognized the voice, maybe she was just so in need of help, he would never know. Her eyes lit up, he saw her jaw drop, her skin pale, her eyes widen.
"Draco?"
"Is Harry okay!" He demanded.
"Harry?"
"Is he okay?"
"You're dead."
"I assure you that I very much am not, Granger." He put his hands on her shoulders, "Where is Harry?"
"Hogwarts." She shook her head, "He's going to Hogwarts."
"What happened?"
"This kid attacked us. He must have been with the True Blood Brotherhood." She blinked, "Where have you been."
"I'll fill you in on the way. Where are we going?"
"To St. Mungo's."
"Okay." He nodded, weighing his options, "Okay. I'll stick close to you and keep my head down."
"What are you doing here?"
"I need to see Harry. He's the only one who can help me."
"I certainly hope you're right." She said darkly, "Let's go."
With that the three of them were gone, leaving only an empty street behind them.
* * *
Harry Was in Hogsmeade in seconds after he parted ways with Hermione. He was racing as fast as he could toward Hogwarts castle. He could feel the electricity in the air as he rushed forward, he knew how little time he had to waste. The sky was dark with oncoming night and storm clouds. He had survived yet another attempt on his life, he was tired, weak from the strain he was putting on his injuries, and upset with himself.
How had he made so many mistakes. They cascaded around his mind, bumping into one another. He could see them all. Pushing Hermione away, denying to be put under protection, letting all those innocent people get killed, talking back in court, lying to Ron, lying to Hermione, betraying those children. He had messed everything up so badly he could barely contain his own rage. The very same rage that had taken him over so suddenly, so completely. He had not been that mad about anything in a very long time, and he hoped he never would be again.
Even then he could feel it. The mask he had carefully crafted over many long years. It was slipping. He wasn't the carefree wise cracking confident detective he was supposed to be. He was something else, something darker, something more ruthless. He knew, somewhere in the back of his mind that he would need that ruthlessness for what was to come. He knew it. But he hated it all the same. He hated the way it crawled around in his stomach, colored the edges of his vision.
He stumbled when his cane hit a patch of rough brambles. He looked ahead of him. The gates toward the castle were only a few yards away, but in his condition it would take forever to get up there. He cursed himself for sending Hermione with the boy, she would be able to get to the castle faster. But he couldn't look at him anymore. He couldn't stand what he had done. What he was becoming.