Harry flooed Trelawney the next morning and, twittering, she agreed to come that night. Harry had his doubts about her abilities, but there was no one else he knew to call and Binns had recommended her. If he didn't know, who did?

Draco was nervous all day. He spent most of the day talking with his father and then the two of them chatted with the portrait. The sound of two Lucius Malfoys raised in argument was too much for Harry, and he escaped into the gardens, found some house brooms, and spent the day flying, just circling above the estates.

Evening fell and Trelawney finally flooed in, carrying a large bag that jingled when she walked. She looked around at the large rooms and made strange huffing sounds as she walked, excited by everything.

Harry was anxious to get on with it. "Where's the best place to set up?" he asked, helping her carry the bulging bag.

"A room that was most important to the deceased. His bedroom perhaps?"

Harry looked at Draco and Draco motioned for them to follow. They departed for the other wing and into another enormous suite. This wasn't as well furnished as Draco's rooms because Harry wasn't as concerned about the Malfoy parent's suite. He had no intention of sleeping in Lucius and Narcissa's bed and so it didn't matter to him.

As it was, Dobby had managed to get the bed and some of the furniture and there was plenty of room to set up what Trelawney said was a 'portal'.

She instructed Draco to move a small round table to the center of the room and told Harry to drop the bag where he stood. She reached inside and took out a ginger jar. Reaching in, she took out a handful of white powder and proceeded to draw a circle around the table with the powder onto the carpet. She wiped her hands down her skirts and reached into the bag again and retrieved her crystal ball. She placed it in the center of the table and then drew her wand from a pocket in her skirt. "Nox!" she said, waving it. The candles went out, and if it weren't for the bright moonlight in the room, it would have been too dark to see anything. "Be so good as to get the candle from the bag, dear boy," she said to Harry. Harry rummaged around in the lumpy bag, drew out a scented candle, and handed it to her. She placed it on the table and whispered, "Lumos." The candle flared to life and cast a yellow halo over the table, reflecting an eerie, wavering light into the crystal ball.

"Now gentlemen. If you will gather chairs and place them around the table we can begin."

Draco and Harry each grabbed a chair and scooted it up to the table. Trelawney eased down into her chair. "Professor Malfoy, will you summon your father?"

"Sure. F-father?"

Instantly, the form of Lucius Malfoy stepped through the wall as if he were only waiting for his cue. "I'm here."

Trelawney giggled and touched her throat. "Oh my! You must be Lucius Malfoy. I am Sybil Trelawney and I will be your medium tonight."

Lucius made an elegant bow. "Enchanted, madam."

Trelawney giggled again before starting in her breathless voice to intone, "Now. Yes. Let us concentrate and allow our auras to align with the motions of the universe. Give yourselves over to it- Oh, not you, Mr. Malfoy. Just us mortals for now."

Malfoy said nothing. He merely stared nervously at the proceedings.

Draco looked from Trelawney to his father. He didn't look too certain either, and then Harry was beginning to have his doubts. He'd spent too much time with Ron making up predictions for Divination homework to believe much of this, though she did make two actual predictions that came true. One was the dreaded Prophecy and the other when Pettigrew would return to Voldemort. It was possible she had other skills, but Harry rather doubted it.

"Since the difficult part of any séance," said Trelawney in that lecturing tone of hers, "is to call the deceased, we will dispense with that and consider ourselves fortunate that the deceased has deigned to join us. What we must now do, is to concentrate on the astral plain and invoke the spirits to lead Mr. Malfoy to his intended destination. Are you ready, Mr. Malfoy?"

But Lucius said nothing.

Trelawney opened her eyes and turned to him. "Mr. Malfoy? Are you ready, dear?"

If Malfoy could sweat, he would have been doing it. He looked once at Trelawney and once at Draco before he spun on his heel. "No! I'm not ready!" he declared, and he stalked through the wall and out of the room.

* * *

Draco took one look at Harry before jumping up from his place and running out the door.

"Father! Father, where are you?"

A shimmer of white, but Lucius would not appear. "Father. I see you there. Show yourself. For God sake! What's going on?"

Slowly, Lucius formed, his back to Draco. Draco gazed hungrily at that tall back, that elegant form that he longed to embrace, to comfort. "Father," he said softly. "Tell me. What's wrong?"

He slowly shook his head, his platinum hair waving across his back. "It won't work. She won't take me back. I know it."

"Who won't, Father?"

"Your mother." He sighed fathoms deep and turned. His pale eyes took in his son. Draco was almost as tall as Lucius, but not quite. He felt he could never measure up in so many ways. Yet Draco had found his happiness and his father seemed so sad and forlorn.

"What about Mother?"

Lucius took dragging steps to the wall and stared at the carvings in the oak panels of bats and trolls. "I was so proud when you became a Death Eater, son. So proud. In Azkaban, I held you up as the last of a great line. 'See!' I told the others. 'See how brave my son is. See how loyal. A true Malfoy.'" His eyes flashed with momentary triumph until they dulled again. "But your mother was horrified. She felt you were too young and the burden the Dark Lord placed on you too great. I didn't know, couldn't know the intricacies of what Lord Voldemort planned for you. I was too far away, out of the inner circle. But she knew. And she was…right. You never should have been put in that position, having to choose between your own life and that of your parents. For this, too, did I begin to question the wisdom of following Lord Voldemort." He fell silent. He pivoted and faced Draco. Draco felt the tears on his face, saw his father struggle to maintain composure. "But ultimately, it was I who encouraged you, forced you into this decision when I should have told you to flee. She blamed me. She…never forgave me. And so I do not think she would welcome me to this…other plain I am to achieve. If I go and she does not want me, I will disappear forever into oblivion. And…I am afraid."

"No, Father," he whispered. "You can't be afraid. You've never been afraid of anything."

"I am afraid! I am afraid of this. Draco. You are a good son to do this for me. But I can't. I won't…I won't trouble you two anymore. I will stay in the east wing where I belong. I promise not to come near you unless you call. But I won't continue this charade." He floated away, even when Draco called after him.

He dragged back into the room and slumped into the chair. Harry touched his hand. "What happened?"

"He said he won't go through with it. He said Mother wouldn't want him…because of me."

"What?"

"Oh dear me!" said Trelawney, sighing melodramatically. "He is quite right. If she will not accept him and he attempts it, he will simply cease to exist."

Harry looked from one to the other. "Cease to exist? But Draco. Why because of you?"

"He said it was because I became a Death Eater. Mother never forgave him for that."

"I thought they both wanted you to become-"

"Once, yes. But Mother was getting second thoughts about it, I guess. She and Aunt Bellatrix had a lot of arguments about it."

He saw Harry's face darken ever so slightly at mention of Bellatrix. He knew his aunt was responsible for getting Harry's godfather killed, but she was gone, too, and he doubted she was haunting any houses. "What are we going to do, Harry? He's worse off than he was before."

Harry looked at Trelawney. "Is there anything we can do?"

"Well. It seems to me that we must call upon Mrs. Malfoy to see how she feels."

Harry paled. "You can do that?"

"Of course, my boy. Any medium worth his or her salt can achieve the simplest of communication with the dead. Shall we make the attempt?"

"Doesn't Father have to be here for it?"

"It would make it easier."

"Father! Father, come back! We have a solution!"

Lucius's disembodied voice seemed to come from the rafters. "What is it now?"

"We're going to summon Mother."

Silence.

"Father?"

"You may do so without me."

"But don't you want to talk to her?"

"NO! I said leave it!"

Harry was looking at him again with concern. "Let's just do it anyway. We've got to find out."

"We're going to talk to her no matter what you say, Father. So you might as well stay."

Silence.

Draco nodded to Trelawney. "Do it."

Trelawney looked ecstatic. She closed her eyes and leaned back, humming. "Everyone," she said in a breathy voice, "place your palms flat on the table and splay your fingers. Now. Be sure to tough the tips of your fingers to the person sitting next to you. Do not break contact!" She moaned and rocked back and forth. Harry watched her with disdain, but Draco hoped the old bat could do this right for once. And then he noticed the crystal ball. Something was swirling inside of it and he motioned with a nod of his head to Harry. Harry stared at the ball wide-eyed.

"Nar-cis-sa Mal-foy!" called Trelawney in an eerie voice. "We of the earthly plain call out to you to answer us! Narcissa! Come forth! Speak!"

The swirling in the crystal ball quickened and pulsed with the flickering candle flame. Could it be working? Draco sat mesmerized by it.

Suddenly, out of the ball rose something like white smoke in a curling line, rising up as tall as a person. It widened, reshaped itself, and slowly formed a woman with long silvery hair. Eyes appeared and searched and suddenly fell on Draco. He moved forward, careful to maintain contact with Harry's fingertips as well as Trelawney's.

"Mother?"

She turned. "Draco? My little boy! What am I doing here?"

"You have been summoned-" said Trelawney in her dramatic voice. But Draco cut her off.

"We need to ask you, Mother. Father is here. But he's a ghost. We want to know if you want us to send him on to you. Or…or if you're too angry with him for that."

"Lucius is here? As a ghost? Oh, my poor Lucius!"

Just then Malfoy appeared and slid forward, reaching for her. "I'm here, my love! Do you forgive me? Please! I want to be with you."

"Of course, Lucius. I forgive you. Our dear Draco is still alive and back in Malfoy Manor. I am happy, my love. Please join me."

"Well then," said Trelawney, a little more business-like. "It is a small matter to send you on, Mr. Malfoy. All parties agree, do they not? Excellent." She cleared her throat and proceeded again in her eerie voice. "Departed spirit, go hence to the astral plain in which you belong! Join your beloved and journey onward as you were-"

"Do shut up," said Lucius. "I know how to do this now."

Trelawney's jaw dropped open and she sat back, crossing her arms over her chest. "Fine, then. Go on, you ungrateful spectre."

Lucius ignored her and took Narcissa's hands. He looked surprised he could touch them and then glad. They both looked down at Draco. "Thank you, son," he said, and almost reluctantly he turned to Harry. "And…you, too, Potter."

The two spirits melded into one gnarled pillar of smoke and suddenly burst apart in a blinding flash of light. When Draco's eyes could see again, they were both gone.

Trelawney stood, and muttered, "Lumos," to the room. Candles flared to life. "It's done," she said, slamming her things back into her bag. "And a more ungrateful duo I have never met!" She continued muttering to herself as Draco got to his feet. He looked at Harry who came around his chair and closed Draco in his arms. He felt Harry's breath on his neck. "You all right, mate?"

Draco nodded, too full of emotion to speak. It was a good thing they had done. Draco was just getting used to the idea of doing good things. It was a heady experience. But of course, it was because of Harry. He turned his face enough to kiss Harry's cheek and he felt the Gryffindor's arms tighten around him.

"Clearly I am no longer needed!" huffed Trelawney. "Good night, Professors. I shall see you at Hogwarts."

"Um, thanks, Sybil!" said Harry as she made her way to the fireplace, waving him off dismissively. "We'll see you at-" The flames roared as she flooed away. "School," Harry finished lamely.

Draco drew out of Harry's arms. "If it's okay with you, I need to be alone for a while."

"Oh. Sure. No problem. I'll just…go to the kitchens or something." Harry retreated from the room, looking back at Draco once before he left.

Draco sighed heavily in the empty room. He found himself wandering through the doorway and down the corridor. The house really did feel empty now and he wondered if it would ever feel like home to him again. But what was home, really? Wasn't it the place you felt the most welcomed? So that place had to be in Harry Potter's arms. Wherever he was, that was home, whether at Hogwarts or the London flat or a hotel in Provence…or even Malfoy Manor. He came to the portrait but instead of the sleeping figures he expected, his parents were both staring at him wide awake.

"We heard what happened," said Narcissa.

"I'm proud of you, son," said Lucius.

He shrugged. "I miss him already."

"You still have us," he said.

"Yeah." And he cracked a smile.

"I suppose," said Lucius, rolling his eyes, "that you could have done worse than Harry Potter."

"So you approve?"

"I didn't say that. I simply don't…dis-approve."

Draco smiled. Better than nothing.


On to Chapter Nine
"Home"

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"Harry and Draco's Dilemma"

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