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How To Train Your Auror 2: Family Ties	By : Alcoholic_Rootbeer Category: Harry Potter > Het - Male/Female > Draco/Hermione Views: 7990 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 1
Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, and I will not make a profit from this story

Chapter List
- 10
- 11
- 12
Waymay rocks my toe socks. XD

Look at you now - you don't talk so loud
Your eyelashes have all run out
From making them wishes
and pulling them out
Screaming so loud,
Why don't you save me
Just save me tonight
I'm on your side
"Save Me" by Bob Bradley
Highly recommend this song on youtube before or after you read this chapter.
Draco stared into the cold, unimaginable eyes of Abraxas Malfoy, crestfallen and bewildered. No. This was impossible. This had to be some sort of trick; this person must be a Metamorphagus. Because there was no way in Hell that Abraxas Malfoy, his grandfather, could be alive, standing before him at this very moment. Especially since he appeared only a handful of years older than Draco himself. The similarities between the generations were startling: Draco never noticed how many of his genetic traits he inherited from his grandfather until he saw them all in the prime of his life; same sharp nose, same shape to their eyes. Even their high cheek bones ran strikingly similar. He forced himself to close his eyes and push down another spout of vomit that threatened to make its way up his throat, breathing heavily through his nostrils. "Impossible," he muttered to himself. "You're not real."
He heard the Abraxas imposter give a chuckle that so resembled Lucius Malfoy's; it was frigid and held contempt in every tone. Then there was a shuffle around the dirt in front of him, and he felt cold fingers grab at his jaw and force his face upwards. Fingernails dug into his cheeks as he opened his eyes once more, meeting the silver flecks in Abraxas's irises. "I assure you, my grandson, I'm as real as you."
Draco's eyebrows drew together, and he searched over the ivory skin of Abraxas's face, looking for any imperfection that would give the imposter away. He found none. An exact copy, down to the scar at the tip of his chin (obtained from a Quidditch accident when he was sixteen.) Whomever this pretender was, he was good. Too good. Draco snapped out and sunk his teeth into the skin between Abraxas's thumb and pointer finger. The older man cried out in pain and backhanded the Auror across the cheek. Draco welcomed the pain; perhaps it would wake him up from this nightmare.
"I don't know who you are, but I'll have you know it's bad form to take on the appearance of a dead man."
"Even if I happen to be said 'dead man'?" Abraxas sneered.
Draco smirked as his cheek pulsed with pain and blood. "As I said: impossible. No such magic exists."
"I grow tired of this," his grandfather grumbled, running his long fingers down his face in frustration. "When you were seven years old, you came to my doorstep, covered in mud and grime, and your father's broomstick broken in half. I didn't have to ask you to know you had stolen it. You were sobbing, and I called you my puffy-eyed goldfish. Do you remember, Draco?"
Draco's heart sped up, but he dared not speak.
"Your grandmother was out for tea, and I took you in. We went to Diagon Alley, replaced Lucius's broom, and then I gave you your first shot of fire barrel whiskey and a chew of taffy to calm your nerves."
Despite his apprehension, Draco felt a subtle smile slip across his lips as he stared down at Abraxas' feet. "It was licorice flavored taffy, as I recall. Awful stuff. I think I preferred the whiskey to it."
"Yes." Abraxas' voice softened. "Your grandmother, gods rest her soul, was cross with me for a month…" He chuckled. "Tell me, how would I know that if I were not Abraxas Malfoy?"
Draco shrugged. "Pensieves are wonderful looks into an individual's memories…"
The elder Malfoy's mood changed in an instant, and he snarled. "I am me, Draco. And that is it." He crouched down before his grandson and searched over his face. "You've grown into a handsome man. As do all Malfoys." Abraxas gave a gentle smile. Gentler than Draco ever recalled him. "And you've done the Malfoy family proud. A pureblood heir."
If it were two years ago, Draco would be proud of that statement, but… now, it felt irrelevant if his son was pureblooded or not. "Leave Scorpius out of this."
"Scorpius… yes… a fine name, as well." Abraxas wore a smirk worthy of Lucius Malfoy. "He will make a fine addition to my pack."
"Your… pack?" Draco searched his eyes around the woods, to the archer and the little fox he could only assume was the annoyingly sadistic child. "You mean this bunch of brats?"
"Brats or not, they are family."
He snorted a laugh. "Family? What do you know of family?"
"Seeing as how we are bound by blood, I would say quite a bit."
Taking his time with his words, Draco wracked his brain for something intelligent. "A pack. Of Animagi, you mean."
"You catch on quick," Abraxas said pleasantly, joy dancing in his eyes. "Though I suppose, that's how one becomes an Auror, yes? Quick thinking. Fast reflexes. A cut above the rest. But I do recollect a phrase my father passed down to me, and I passed down my son, and he to you. Do you recall, Draco?"
Fear strummed along Draco's heartstrings. "Aurors never age. "
"Aurors never age. Yes." Abraxas tucked his arms behind his back and began to pace a straight line in front of his grandson. "It is the reason why our family has stayed out of Auror affairs for centuries. We are self-preserving. Tell me, what example do you set for your boy if you were to die in the name of some great justice? Do you think he'd believe you a martyr?" He laughed. The bastard all out laughed in Draco's face. "We both know you are not innocent. After all, you sold your soul to the devil, didn't you, to try to rid yourself of some vanity on your arm?"
"How do you know about that?" Draco whispered, glaring. At the end of the Takeover, Potter had guaranteed Draco's immunity to the courts and buried his sins with Greg Diggle as a means of thank you for stepping up and giving information. It still haunted Draco to this day, owning the fact that he was indebted to Potter for the rest of his life.
"Because I, too, have been in the fires of the devil's hold, and come out victorious. -It was he, after all, who raised me from the dead. Bastian Cane, I mean to say."
"Where is the stone now?" Harry's voice was grave. "What did you do with it once you realized you could bring people back?" Diggle stared hard at him, never speaking a word. Hermione could feel the table shake, and knew he was fidgeting with his knees in apprehension. "Damn it!" Harry slammed his hands down on the table beside her, making her jump. "Do you know what kind of chaos you've unleashed by doing this? Who else knows about this?"
"No one," Diggle said tersely, "Well, aside from Abraxas Malfoy, of course."
"That better be fucking all," Harry snapped. "Do you realize what kind of Hell you could have unleashed if someone found out? Imagine if someone brought Voldemort back!"
"Harry!" Hermione interjected, throwing a warning glance. "Calm yourself."
"I'm sorry, Hermione. It's just… Jesus!" He cast his hands up in the air. "Gregory fucking Diggle, you'll be the greatest thorn in my side yet."
"I wanted to bring my father back," Greg said coldly. "Surely, you can understand that, Potter."
"The messed up thing is; I do! I do know where you're coming from." Harry fought to calm himself. "But that doesn't give you the right to play with people's souls. -Tell me. Where's the stone?"
Greg gave his answer quickly -too quickly, Hermione noticed. "Destroyed."
"Destroyed?" Harry's eyes glistened with disbelief. "There's no way."
Diggle shrugged. "Believe me or don't. It's the only answer you're going to get." His eyes flickered over to Hermione, and then down to the letter. Pointed. Telling. "And besides, you have bigger fish to fry, don't you? Now that Abraxas is out and about, you're going to have to deal with him, and his plight."
"But it doesn't make any sense," Hermione said definitively. "Abraxas is a pureblood. The white wolf clearly wants to make an example of Death Eaters. What's the connection?"
"Tell me, Hermione. Are you proud to be muggleborn?"
She furrowed her eyebrows. "Of course."
"Are you proud of Hitler, or any of his followers?"
"Of course not. I don't condone a mass genocide of people who are different than myself."
"And there, you now understand, is the epitome of Abraxas Malfoy."
"Why does it always come back to Gregory fucking Diggle?" Draco sneered, after having just listened to Abraxas Malfoy's tale of being risen from the dead. Of course Diggle would be involved. Of course he would. Because why not? Why wouldn't Bastian Cane be the reason for Draco's adult destruction every. Single. Time.
"Yes, I heard he worked under an assumed alias. I've only known him as Cane, but you knew him on a personal level, didn't you? Building weapons against muggles. I have to say, quite impressive."
Draco's face flushed with heat; shame filled his core and made him grit his teeth. "Don't assume to know me."
"Oh, I don't, Draco. I don't. I only know what I've been told, and what I've seen. And that's why you give me such confliction in my soul. I'm not sure whether to sing your praises or reprimand you for your foolishness." His voice grew cold. "Lucius was foolish."
"Ha. Tell me something I don't know."
Abraxas' palm smacked Draco hard across the face. "Never speak ill of your parents, Draco." His eyes glared daggers down at his grandson. "Have you forgotten traditions?"
"Oh, but you can talk about the bastard any way you want?" He snarled.
"Of course I can. He's my son. -And what a disappointment he turned out to be. I'm brought back from the dead to see my legacy left crumbled in ruins. To see that the Malfoy name besmirched in the eyes of all wizards…" Abraxas trailed off. He was silent for a time. "I never raised him to be a coward, to cower in fear before the Dark Lord as if he was some commoner. Traitorous… it's no wonder the Dark Lord looked at him as muck beneath his feet."
Mixed emotions stirred inside of Draco. He'd thought the same words time after time when the War ended, but hearing it said aloud made it sound wrong. "Is that why you attacked him? You think him weak?"
"I know him to be."
"How did you do it?" Draco thought of the stone tucked safely inside his pocket, and a question burned inside him.
"Do what?"
"You stripped him of his powers. How did you do it? You had no access to the Pandora Stone."
Abraxas raised his eyebrows, and a smirk played across his lips. "My dear boy, did you think there was only one?" When Draco didn't reply, Abraxas strolled over to the tree and plucked a walking cane from the side. He removed the capstick from the hilt to reveal a glowing, blue stone held in a setting. Holding it out before him, he approached Draco, stone outwards, threatening to touch him. Draco flinched and turned his head as the stone grew brighter. Abraxas held the stone there, at the tip of his cane, and chuckled. "Oh, my. You have the other, don't you?"
"No," Draco said, too quickly to be convincing. Abraxas pushed the stone into Draco's personal space, inches from his cheek.
"Give it to me. Unless you'd like to receive the same fate as my son."
"I don't have it!"
"Do you really want to test my resolve, Draco?"
"You're going to do it, either way. Why should I make it easy on you?" He smirked, eyes glistening heatedly back at his grandfather.
"I don't want to harm you. I want to help you." Abraxas pulled the cane back, placed the bulb back on the top, and leaned against the cane like it was intended for. "We share a common interest, you and I."
"Yeah?" Draco snorted a laugh, disbelieving. "What's that?"
"To restore the Malfoy name from the ashes your father left it in."
"How long has he been alive?"
"Three years. A bit more." Diggle turned his hands this way and that, observing every line and crease of his skin.
"Three years?" Harry choked out. "He's been alive all this time, and he's only now coming out of the woodwork?"
"In all honesty, I thought him dead. I locked him away, you see. Once I realized my experiment was a success in bringing the body back, I needed to know if the mind was sound."
"You kept him prisoner," Hermione said quietly, and Diggle nodded. "That's barbaric."
"Is it? Tell me, should I have let him loose on the streets, my sweet Hermione? To roam? To be recognized?"
"And caging him was any better?" she snapped severely.
Diggle conceded, nodding his head. "I'll admit, perhaps my methods were a bit… harsh."
"Harsh?" She laughed. "You're lucky there are laws protecting you, because if there weren't, I'd mop the floor with you right about now."
He grinned, chuckling. "I love it when you go all threatening on me." He blew her a kiss, and Hermione singed the bottom corner tip of the letter with just a thought. Diggle's smile immediately dispersed, and she patted out the fire with the back of her sleeve.
"You keep it up, Greg. See what happens."
"My apologies," he replied quietly, shifting dejectedly in his chair.
"So you cage him up," Harry said, finally finding the time to chime in, "Abraxas, I mean, and throw away the key? That doesn't sound like you at all."
"I tortured him, alright? Is that what you want to hear?" Diggle snapped, losing to his anger for the first time tonight. "I showed him how far his family had fallen. I told him all of the things I was going to do to those who detested muggleborns. I wanted to break him down to use him as a weapon against his son, when the time was right." He shook his head, eyes in a daze. "But he wasn't one to be broken. No matter how hard I tried, he stayed true to the only mission he deemed worthy."
"And what was that?"
"Restoring his family honor. -Not only his family, but all of the Sacred Twenty-Eight. -He made me a promise; if he were to ever escape, he'd take down every individual who tainted his legacy. I, of course, am now at the top of that list, seeing as how I threatened his grandson and great-grandchild. When you arrested me, I had no choice but to leave him caged away to stew in his own madness. I have no clue how he escaped, but I can guarantee you one thing." He leaned forward, casting glances to Harry and Hermione. "He'll come for me. Mark my words. It's just a matter of time until I'm dead."
Hermione swallowed hard, fidgeting with the sleeve of her robes. "You don't mean that."
"I do." Diggle nodded. "Why do you think I made that offer to Draco to give up the stone? It's your only way of defeating him." His eyes traveled down to the letter. "I've made my peace. What I've done is unforgivable. I'll welcome death, when it comes for me." He looked longingly over Hermione's face. "I only hope I can make amends for my misdeeds."
She turned her eyes down on the letter, suddenly very curious. Her eyes flickered back up to his. Chocolate met emerald. "I will never forgive you for killing Ron." She stood up, tucking the letter in her pocket. "I take it all back, Diggle. I can't forgive you. Not after knowing all you've done."
"Hermione…" he pleaded, but she pointed her wand at him, and he fell silent.
"If Abraxas Malfoy does have his way with you, perhaps you'll finally receive true justice." She felt the tears trickle down her cheeks. She didn't mean it -she only wanted him to hurt, the way he had hurt her time and time again. "I have to go. I need to warn Draco." She turned to leave, but Harry caught her by the arm and stopped her.
"Hermione, you're not going to Hogwarts."
"Of course I am," she replied, brushing tears from her eyes, "I'm going, Harry Potter, and there's not a damn thing that you can do about it."
"What about training? Or have you forgotten about tomorrow?"
She sighed, the tears now freely falling. "Give it to Dean. I'll take over watching the Malfoys. They can… they can stay with us, until this is all through." She felt Harry's arms wrap around her, and felt him kiss the side of her head.
"Mione, I'm right here with you. You're not going through this alone." He spoke as her best friend, and not as the Lead Auror. "But I know you. Maybe this isn't the way you want to end this conversation with Diggle."
She cried into his chest, shaking her head and whispering, "You're right." She choked back a few hard sobs, wiped her cheeks on his robes, and pulled away. "You're absolutely right." She turned on her heels, stormed right up in front of Greg, and thrust out her left hand- or, more noticeably, her engagement ring. "Draco and I are getting married. I love him, and he loves me, and we're going to be a family."
Diggle's eyes fell on the ring, his eyebrows furrowing together. "You're going to marry that twat?"
"Hey," she snapped at him, "That twat is my fiancé. Watch your tongue.- We'll get through this. We can get through anything. And when it's over, and we've married, I'll be sure to send you pictures of the wedding." She spun on her heels, smiled to Harry, and said, "You coming?"
"Lead the way," he smiled back.
"Well, Draco?" Abraxas narrowed his eyes. "What say you?"
Draco stared at the forest floor, mulling over his grandfather's offer. "And you'll leave Scorpius out of this? You won't try to recruit him anymore?"
"You have my word," Abraxas nodded.
"I want immunity for Victoria Crabbe, as well."
His grandfather sneered, but said, "Fine. The girl as well."
"I want to take Lindy's body back with me. She… she deserves more than what your minions did to her."
"As you wish." Abraxas nodded to Bruno, the archer, and Draco felt the shackles around his wrists slacken. His arms fell forward, and he caught himself before he hit the ground. His arms ached, but it was nothing next to the pain in his stomach from horror and dread. "Do we have a deal, Draco?"
Draco Malfoy glanced up at his grandfather, silver meeting silver. "Of course, grandfather. You have my word."
"Your word will not be sufficient, my boy. You know what I require."
Draco closed his eyes. "I do."
"Then go. And see that it's done in three days' time. Until then, I'll keep your wand. Call it…an insurance policy. -And should you fail, know that I will unleash the fury of my wards down on you just as I will all of your weak-minded brethren." He gestured down to the Dark Mark hidden beneath Draco's robes. "Now, up on your feet, Auror Malfoy. You have a Ministry to con."
McGonagall jumped as Harry and Hermione unexpectedly arrived through her floo, and she slammed her quill down on the table, agitated. "Another Auror, Potter? By all-" Her eyes softened when she realized- "Miss Granger. Oh, how good to see you dear." She stood from her chair and offered her hands out. Hermione smiled, crossed the room, and hugged the elderly woman with adoration.
"It's wonderful to see you, Minerva," she said, "It's been too long."
"It has, child. That it has." McGonagall peeled Hermione off of her to get a proper look at the young witch, and then trailed her eyes over to Harry. "Did you bring her to me as a gift to make up for all of the unexpected guests in my school?"
"Actually, she's on duty," Harry replied, shuffling his hands in his pockets. "We're here to see Auror Malfoy."
"Auror Malfoy? I haven't seen he or Auror Bolt since they escorted Miss Crabbe back to her room."
Hermione exchanged worried glances with Harry. "Do you think they're sleeping?"
"Argus said he saw Lindy leave out towards the lake."
"The lake." Hermione nodded. "Excuse me, Headmistress." She left out the door at once, surprising McGonagall by her boldness. Harry pointed in Hermione's direction, smiling apologetically.
"I'm just going… to follow her out, then…"
Draco cradled the lifeless body of Lindy Bolt as he stepped out of the woods, eyeing the lake and the moon that reflected back in it. His legs ached, and he'd already stopped twice to vomit (carrying a dead body could have that effect on someone.) He shuffled his feet, numb with the cold, eyes heavy with the need for sleep. He heard someone shouting off in the distance, but all he could do was glance down at Lindy's blue lips, resisting the urge to cry.
Stupid, Draco. You're such a fucking idiot. This was all your fault.
"Draco!"
He heard his name, but it hardly registered. He collapsed at the side of the lake, Lindy's body in tow, and set her gently down on the grass. "I'm so sorry…" he whispered, moving his fingers over her eyelids to shut them. "I fucked up, Bolt. I'm sorry." One tear came, and then another. "I fucked up bad."
"Draco!"
There was his name again. He turned his eyes forward, though his vision grew blurry. "Hermione?" He pushed up off his knees and stood straight, stepping over Lindy's corpse. He squinted, tired and hungry and in so much pain -not just physical, either. Someone was coming towards him at an alarming speed, and, suddenly, someone ran smack-dab into his chest, arms encasing him like a vice.
"Draco. Oh, my God. What happened? Is… is that Auror Bolt?"
"Hermione." He closed his eyes and wrapped his arms around her. He buried his face in her curly brown hair and inhaled her perfume. "I fucked up." And for the first time in a long time, Draco began to cry.
We will catch up with Dean, Lucius, and Narcissa, not to mention Astoria and Scorpius, next chapter!
Much love,
A.
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- 12
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How To Train Your Auror 2: Family Ties