Life after Hogwarts - A Hermione & Draco x Dramione Story

Chapter Twenty Four

You have a minute?"

Draco nodded, waving Harry into his office without bothering to look up. Harry shut the door behind him and sat down on the couch. It wasn't until Draco looked up from his desk that he saw Harry with a completely disturbed look on his face, holding his wand horizontal with both hands at his knees. Tossing his quill on the desk, Draco stared at his friend. "Everything ok?"

"Not even close."

"Is it Ginny? The kids?"

Harry quickly shook his head. "No - nothing like that." With a flourish of his wand, he threw a silencing charm around Draco's office. "I uh...I just came out of a meeting."

Draco was nervous at the sight of the silencing charm. "I've got to admit, Potter - you're kind of unnerving me right now."

"Well, I'm not much better," Harry confessed. "I uh, we had an interesting report cross the desk today in the auror office. Kingsley's office really - that's how it got to me - and I...I could hardly believe it at first. I honestly though Kingsley was yanking my chain."

"Harry. You're now scaring the shit out of me," Draco stated. "Just spit it out."

Harry looked up at Draco. "You're going to think I'm barking mad. Completely mental."

"Try me."

"The Ministry has received information that claims that your father might not exactly be dead."

"And by not exactly dead you mean - "

"Alive."

The room was silent before Draco's uncontrollable laughter cut through the air like a knife. Harry sat, stoically watching Draco as he doubled over, smacking a hand on the desk a few times for good measure as he wiped the tears away with a thumb and forefinger. "I've must tell you," he managed to speak in between chuckles. "If that's your idea of a joke then you need to spend more time with George. Hilarious, yes, but completely unbelievable."

Harry uncomfortably cleared his throat. "I wish I were kidding, Malfoy."

Draco's laughter died down, his eyes locking with Harry's, seeing the seriousness across his face. "This isn't possible. He died. At St. Mungo's. The man died. I was at the funeral."

"Did you see a body in the casket?"

"Of course not!" Draco screeched. "I wasn't even at the hospital. Mother was. She arranged the entire thing. I doubt she cried that many tears over an empty casket."

Harry swallowed hard before continuing. "The hospital report says that no one was in the room when he died. Your mother had stepped out to speak with a nurse - or - she was berating a nurse about something. When the healers rushed in to check on him and told her he passed, she refused to see him."

Draco vehemently shook his head, holding his hands up. "This is rubbish, Potter. There is no way my father has spent the last three years hiding. If he were hiding, he would have been hiding in squaller. It's positively beneath him!"

"I know this sounds insane - believe me. I spent forty-five minutes in the past hour saying all of this. But the raid - the one I was injured at - during the interrogations of some of the former death eaters captured, two of them mentioned Lucius Malfoy and that he wasn't dead. Ever since then, there's been a team looking into hit, and yesterday, well...they claim they found him."

Draco looked at Harry. "Where are they claiming they found him?"

Harry cleared his throat again. "A cottage in a secluded area of Normandy, France."

He felt like he'd been punched in the stomach, and it took everything he had to suppress the urge to vomit. His memory recoiled to a moment right before the rise of Voldermort, overhearing a heated conversation between his parents outside of their father's study.