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With a mild yawn, Draco moved the magenta file off the pile, centred it on his desk and started to read. This particular patient had finally unbent enough to deign to see him. Apparently. Draco snorted under his breath. It was amazing how much more receptive his mindhealing patients were to see him after the realised the length of the waiting period before seeing a fully qualified mindhealer. Most eventually unbent their dignity enough to submit their paperwork to St. Mungo’s and do a minor amount of grovelling after their temper tantrum about being seen by a Death Eater.
Dilys Derwent woke up from her portrait and frowned at him. “Former Death Eater, dear.”
“You’re the only professional who was willing to be my proctor when I started this.” Draco’s voice never raised itself over mild when he spoke to the former headmistress and venerable healer. “And we’ve talked about rooting around in my head without asking first.”
Healer and former Headmistress of Hogwarts, Dilys Derwent settled back in the frame of her portrait with a frown, adjusting the shawl around her shoulders. “I wish you’d stop being quite so hard on yourself though, dear. Messes with my naps.”
He looked up at the portrait with a small smile. “I thought the only reason you volunteered to train me was because I was so hard on myself.”
“Being hard on oneself is one thing dear, consistent self-flagellation is quite another.” She sniffed primly, tugging a smile onto Draco’s face and went back to her very important napping.
Pushing his fringe away from his forehead Draco leaned backwards in his chair, ignoring the open file on his desk and looked around his office. This had been his home for the last six years as he’d gone through his apprenticeship at St. Mungo’s. His office was right next to the stairs, tucked away in a dusty corner of a dilapidated floor, but it was all his. Office and bedroom rolled into one, as he’d refused to move back into the manor after the war.
He sighed and spun in the chair. It was a small cell of a room, with a spelled window and without enough room to swing a kneazle, but it was his. A thin bookshelf with books added in to every inch and a tiny stuffed dragon one of his child patients had gotten him as a thank you perched on the windowsill the room spoke of a student who spent the majority of time studying, rather than socialising.
Which was fine. That the other students didn’t want to spend time with Draco just meant that he got to spend more time asking Dilys’ portrait questions about esoteric healing spells and pick her brain for his case studies. He'd never met a more capable mind healer and he'd been very lucky that she'd both rescued him from his own and agreed to take him on as an apprentice.
Pounding steps ran down the corridor and Draco turned back to his work, lifting one of his diagnosis reference manuals off the small shelf above his desk just as the door to his room was flung open and Harry Bloody Potter was standing in his doorway.
Draco’s jaw dropped open. He hadn’t spent much time in Potter's presence since he’d saved his life at the battle of Hogwarts. War heroes don’t often hobnob with convicted Death Eaters in any case.
He was still wearing those stupid looking glasses. "It's Hermione." That voice. Exactly as he remembered.
Potter had saved his life in the room of requirement, spoken at his trial recommending leniency and then fucked off for the eighth year Draco had had to take at Hogwarts in favour of the Auror academy with Weasley and never looked back. Only Hermione had come back to finish her NEWTS with Ginny. The girls had kept to themselves, sharing a dorm and being a team of two that didn’t invite conversation unless you were one of the defenders of Hogwarts as they’d come to be known.
Draco, of course, had never defended Hogwarts.
His history was seeped in death, destruction and the ruination of everything Granger held dear. A fact that stabbed at his heart even as it salved it.
Potter reached out a hand to grab his wrist, impatient when his friends needed him, dragging Draco behind himself as he rushed back out into the hallway. “Come on, Malfoy. We need you.”
As Potter dragged him into the stairwell Draco squirmed out of his grasp, staggering backwards and drawing himself up. “Unhand me, Potter.” The words echoed up and down and Draco winced. Just what he needed advertised around the building. A refusal to help the Chosen One.
Potter paused, breathing heavily, reaching out to grab at his wrist again and Draco squirmed away from him. One seeker shouldn't try to grab another. “I’m not taking another step with you until you tell me what’s going on.”
“It’s Hermione. They found her in the Time Room at the ministry.” Potter’s voice was steady as he stared through those stupid-looking glasses. “We need a mindhealer and you’re the only one here at the moment.”
Draco twitched down his sleeves again. No sense reminding the saviour of the wizarding world that he was arm’s length from a Death Eater. Reformed, yes, but a Death Eater all the same. “I have a full caseload, Potter. You can’t just take me away from patients who need me. I’m a specialist.”
The frown on Potter’s face was deep and cut at Draco, who swallowed and edged away from him reflexively. “The only reason we spoke at your trial is because Hermione convinced us it was the right thing to do. The only reason you got to go back to Hogwarts is because Hermione wrote to McGonagall. The only reason anyone even considered you at St. Mungo’s was because Hermione spent time with Derwent’s portrait and convinced her to take you on. You owe her, Malfoy. Whether you knew it or not and the debt’s come due.” Potter grabbed him again, this time by the elbow and forced him up the stairs towards spell damage.
His mind raced as Potter yanked him along the corridors. Whirring against itself. Why had she helped him? Potter’s red auror cape whispered against the floor and whipped against Draco’s calves through his lime green healer’s robes. His hair still stuck up in a hundred different directions. Hadn’t he ever heard of a brush?
There were a few grim-faced unspeakables and aurors clogging the hallway on the way into Granger’s room. None of them seemed thrilled to see Draco. He could feel his cheeks heat as Kingsley Shaklebolt stared at him, his eyes sweeping up and down, his lip curling against his teeth in disgust. Draco used what was left of his will to stop himself from bringing a hand up to smooth his hair. He knew what they must be seeing. Gangly, too thin yet put together. A living Death Eater where a defender should have been. His flush deepened as Potter tugged him forward again and the crowd parted deferentially for him.
Potter finally released his elbow, propelling him forward towards the bed in the room where Hermione Granger was sprawled. Draco took a moment, assessing the patient, refusing to think about the kind things that Potter had said she’d done for him.
His stomach clenched. This reminded him of when Granger had been petrified by the basilisk. Stiff. Unyielding. Her fist clenched around something. A flicker of movement in the corner of his eye and he watched Dilys sidle into the frame that hung over the bed. Her hair was as bushy as he remembered it being. The expression frozen on her face, however, was one of yearning and he found it moved something deep inside the cockles of his heart. Maybe the subcockles. So deep he nearly refused to acknowledge that anything had changed.
“What did she do to herself, Potter?” There was a commotion in the hallway, but Draco refused to be distracted by it.
“She was working in the time room, studying some kind of … divergence stone.” Potter shifted his weight side to side. “Apparently it can show you what happens if you’d make a different decision. I’m not sure what went wrong but she just… stopped.” Potter looked awful. Unshaven. Bags under his eyes.
“Potter…” Draco modulated his tone to be low and soothing, his attempt at channeling Dylis when he was in one of his moods. “How long has she been like this?”
“A week.”
“A week?” Draco felt his eyebrow rise in surprise.
“We tried three other mindhealers before we stooped as low as you, Malfoy. Foreign ones.” The door slammed as another auror entered and Draco didn’t need to turn around to identify the voice as that of Ron Weasley. “Every single one of them took one look inside her and suggested we contact you.”
“Me?” Whatever training he was trying to use at this moment to project an air of confidence and competence was shattered. “I’ll need her next of kin’s permission to begin.”
Potter cleared his throat. “That’s me. I consent.”
Weasley gave a strangled grunt and Draco whipped around. “Not Weasley?”
The redhead looked anywhere in the room aside from Draco but Potter... Potter’s green eyes burned into his. He’d put on weight since he’d been an auror, no longer slight when standing next to Weasley. Finally growing into his titles. “Not Ron. Me. And I consent. When do we start?”
With a nod to Potter Draco swallowed. Hard. “Now. No sense wasting daylight.” Draco transfigured the stool next to Hermione’s bed into an armchair. “I take it you don’t know much about what the stone does, do you?”
Potter shook his head ruefully. “To be honest, Hermione has tried to explain it a couple of times but the theory is just…” he shrugged.
“I don’t like it. This git…” started Weasley but Potter nodded at one of the aurors and Weasley was removed from the room with prejudice, swearing all along the way.
Potter looked at Draco flatly and he felt panic grip him around the middle. It was just the bloody Chosen One, the Golden Girl and him in this room. “I was on assignment in Romania when this happened. Ron hasn’t been her next of kin for over a year and he stalled telling me that and hid that this had happened. I got back as soon as I could, and I consent for her. Get to it, Malfoy. Just know that I will make your life more miserable than it was when Voldemort lived in the manor with you if something happens to her.”
The threat was flat and absolutely serious. Draco could see it in his eyes.
Behind him, Dylis cleared her throat. “I think you have seen something like this before, trainee.” Both Draco and Harry snapped to attention. “I remember a young wizard trying to make a change to their own timestream and didn't appreciate what the stone was for. He got caught up until he let go of the idea of changing the past.” She sniffed, her nose rising in the air. “Like anyone could actually change the true nature of the past. You’ll have to convince her to let go." Her focus turned to Potter. "The stone is just supposed to help you learn to accept your actual future, dear.”
Potter chuckled nervously against the tension in the room. “Hermione never lets anything go.”
Draco nodded. “Of course.” He tapped a foot against the floor.
“You’ve seen a patient with something like this stone before?”
“Yes, Potter. It’s most of the reason I chose mindhealing. Accepting the things we don’t like about ourselves takes introspection you know.” He could hear the wryness in his voice as he arranged himself in the armchair comfortably. “I don’t know how long this will take, Potter. I don’t even know if she will let me in.”
“I understand.” Potter's voice was quiet.
Draco felt himself hesitate, and decided for honesty this time. ”You should know that it took Dilys six months to get me out when I used one.”
Grey eyes met surprised green. "You're sure you won't get sucked in again?"
"No. But the Chosen One has told me that the alternative is me being more miserable than I was when Voldemort lived in the manor." He watched Potter flush slightly and he reveled in it slightly. Draco took a deep breath, extended his wand and squinted in concentration. Cast with purpose. Backwards. Yarnwards in time.
legilimens
He started as he always did when he entered a mind these days. He imagined a door, the path up to it made of gravel that centred him and reminded him of the gravity of the situation. He walked up to the door. It was circular, formed onto the side of a hill, painted green with a great gold knob in the middle.
Draco tipped his head to the side. Something about this was familiar, but he couldn’t put his finger on why. Raising a hand he knocked on the door, hearing the beat echo into the home that was Granger’s mind.
The door was jerked inwards though there was no one there. Interesting. Granger was hiding, but was fine with him entering.
He stepped over the threshold and watched the walls form into bookcases around him. “I’m in the kitchen!” Her voice floated out of a doorway and Draco wandered in the appropriate direction. “Took you long enough to get home, Draco. How was the hospital?”
Draco peeked around the doorframe. There was Granger, a smear of flour across one cheek and a faint smile plastered across her face. Beautiful. Grown into herself the way he'd imagined that she would be.
“Took you long enough to get here Draco. I’d nearly gone mad.”
She was wrapped in a floral apron, a tea towel pulled through the ties and hanging over her left hip. The chocolate curls that cascaded down her back were only slightly frizzy. Just enough to catch the light that streamed into the kitchen from everywhere all at once.
Draco tipped his head to the side. “How did you know I’d be coming?”
She laughed as though he’d said something funny. “We’ve been living together for three years and you’re just now asking how I always know when you’re on your way home?” Her eyes sparkled with mischief. “I bribe the welcome witch with scones if you must know.”
“Agatha?” Draco blinked.
“That’s her name. Agatha.” The smile was wide and free. “I’d nearly forgotten.” He watched her take scones out of an oven he could swear hadn’t been on the wall before.
“Granger…” he started and Hermione cut him off with a laugh.
“Hermione. I can’t remember the last time you last named me.” She turned with a swish and Draco watched a door open behind her into the backyard. He tried to scoot around Hermione as she whirled around the kitchen but she caught the edge of his robe, drawing him in and cuddling up under his chin, planting a kiss on his jaw. “We’re not at school any more you know.”
“I’ll be right back, Granger.” He extracted himself from her arms, ignoring how she made his heart speed up and sidled towards the door, throwing himself through.
This time he was carrying a stack of boxes with his wand, one hand underneath and concentrating as he went up a set of stairs.
Granger was at the top. “What are you doing Draco?” she hissed, breaking his concentration and the pile of boxes collapsed around him. “We’re in a muggle building. They have cameras.”
Instead of getting angry as he’d have believed he would, he watched as his alternate swept Granger into his arms, ignoring the boxes. “Come on - just a little magic in our new apartment, please?” Her teeth were white and even in her grin as she pulled him back into her arms.
Draco raced around them, up the stairs and through the door into the apartment building hallway beyond.
He found himself in the Hogwarts library.
Whispers from deep in the stacks drew him in and he stepped over the velvet rope that separated the restricted section from the rest of the library.
He blushed as he realised what he’d walked into. He and Hermione, both in the purple and grey ties they’d made eighth year students wear that last year in Hogwarts, were entwined together in the potions section. He had her back against the bookcase, one hand holding her head in place while he kissed her deeply and a second slowly - ever so slowly - inching up underneath her blouse.
That was not something he’d ever allowed himself to imagine with Granger. Anywhen outside the stone, that is. His heart clenched. He knew where she had to be. No wonder the other mindhealers had left this for him. They'd read his file after Dylis published. Six months and this had been a moment he'd come back to over and over again, hiding from the mindhealer who was trying to bring him out.
She lifted her hands, pulling at his hair and he smirked down at her before growling and pulling gently at her lip with his teeth. Granger groaned into his mouth and he moved, pressing her even more tightly between the bookcase and his body.
Draco swallowed hard, searching for the next door. Further into the past. There was a sliding door by the aquatic mammals section and he quietly passed through. One thing was certain - he needed to find the way to that moment - quickly. Tonks and Remus celebrating Teddy's first birthday came next. He'd gotten them a toy bear and Hermione a book about a Grumpy one, teasing that this bear reminded her of him.
Sometimes the doors to go further into the past were easy to find and as uncomplicated as stepping through an archway. Sometimes they required that he find a specific square of floor to jump through. On his way into the manor the way he found was through a hoop set high above the floor of the atrium in the ministry of magic.
His eyes were wild in this version of the past. Deep in the war. He pulled Granger behind him through the manor. “We just need to get them out. Dobby will take you the rest of the way.” He stopped, turning to kiss her desperately, their foreheads leaning together, out of breath but bound together somehow. Them against the world.
Draco backed away, searching for something further back, shying away. Oh, this was hurting. Seeing the way things could have been.
Moments flowed together like beads on a string where he chose not to insult Potter or his friends. Chose to go to them for help in sixth year. Chose to work against Umbridge. Chose to work with Potter during the triwizard tournament and Cedric survived.
This time as he opened the door he found himself at the Yule ball. The snowflakes were falling across the floor and he had Granger in his arms. She was dressed in that periwinkle dress, but they were swaying together, her head resting on his shoulder as he breathed her in. A glimmery smile on his face.
Back again. He had friends, not cronies around as he recovered from getting sliced by Buckbeak, including Granger who sat by his bedside to read to him in the evenings, the sunset painting the hospital wing gold.
Out the doors of the great hall. There they all were. First years, Hagrid behind them and McGonagall in front of the doors, about to be sorted into houses. He watched his younger self walk up to Potter and insult Weasley as a young and wide-eyed Granger looked on.
“No!” Granger’s voice was strained, her knuckles white around the divergence stone. “Again.”
The scene shifted, reversing until an eleven year old Draco walked over to introduce himself to the boy he'd been told about since before he could remember. The shame blossomed inside, just as it had when he'd first trapped himself in one of these divergence stones.
“Hullo Granger.” Draco leaned on the wall next to Hermione as she grit her teeth. “You can’t change this, you know.”
“I can. I can save Cedric. And Remus. And Tonks. And Fred.” She spun against him. “But we have to change this moment.”
“That’s not how this works, Granger. You can’t change what’s happened.” He reached out for the hand that was wrapped around the stone. “This only lets you know what a future could have been.”
She looked up at him through lashes that had tears clinging to them, eyes dark and deep.
"We can go anywhen in here. I can change it. I've changed the other moments but this one won't stay."
"There's something soothing in knowing that this isn't just my nexus point, but yours too." They watched him swagger and she pushed him back in time. "It took me a month to find this nexus. I'm not surprised you found it sooner. I wonder if it's Potter's too."
They watched together as Draco insulted Weasley, pushing Potter to stick up for him yet again. Granger grit her teeth and forced the time to loop again.
"We can stay in here and have this fantasy, Granger, but you can’t change anywhen but now. How long will the other moments last before they collapse, Granger? How often would you have to come back here and fight this fight with fate?"
She shook her head, hand trembling against the stone.
"I've changed every moment in your childhood and you still do this, you know."
"I know, I'm incorrigible and intractable at this moment." She gave a weak snort, wiping her eyes with the back of her hand, letting him continue. “Let it go, Granger.”
"No."
Draco ran a finger across her cheek and then skated it down her arm to clasp his hand around her fist. Stepping in he pulled her close, looking down at her with a sad smile. "It's time, Granger, let go."
"No." The smarmy blond git with far too much hair gel moved behind Draco's back again, puffed up and ready to be Potter's best friend, if only he could get rid of Weasley.
He ghosted his lips across her forehead and could feel her shudder against him. A bitter expression crossed his face and he was glad she couldn't see it with his chin on her head. He could feel her tense then relax. "I've been here before, Granger. Your friends are waiting for you, they just know I've found my way out of this hole before and can give you a boost out. Let go."
"No." The denial was weaker now. He had to stop himself from burying his face in the cloud of curls that whirled around them. He'd pinch himself but he wasn't the one that needed to wake up. To accept that they couldn't be anywhen. That they needed to be now. He pulled away slightly to study her mulish expression.
"It's time, Granger." His heart was tender now. “You know as well as I do that this isn’t the present.”
The world swirled around them as his magic pushed against the stone and she released it from her hand.
Potter startled as Draco opened his eyes, stretching against the tension in his shoulders.
Draco tried to give him a smile but only managed a grimace. “How long was I in for?”
“Ten hours.” Potter seemed remarkably pleased. "Far better than six months."
"True." Draco nodded to himself, shifting his hand to see the glimmer of the time stone against it. Tempting. "It took Dilys a lot longer to find me, but Hermione and I got stuck at the same Nexus, Potter."
Potter snorted. "Did she stop you from disarming Dumbledore? Joining the Death Eaters? Did you identify me when we were dragged to the manor? Was she able to make you less of a smarmy git?"
"No. Those aren't the important moments in time, really." Draco's voice was tired as he gave Potter a tired half smile. “Is there an unspeakable you could bring in here to take this from me?”
Potter gave him a contemplative look before signalling someone in the hallway. “What did you see in there? Is she going to be alright?”
“As right as she was before she tried the stone.” Draco nodded to himself as the unspeakable in the hallway came in behind Potter and had him drop the stone into a bag. “If she needs to talk to me about this after, please let her know I'm available. Charmed, Potter.” Their hands met and dropped again just as quickly. With a nod, Draco swept back out of the room, remembering only later before he drifted off into sleep that he hadn’t remembered to transfigure the armchair back into a stool and that Dilys was going to grumble at him later about that.