"Big Brother"

January 1996, 1 month later

After the visit from the one woman with sole claim over the nervous state Lucius Malfoy spent the remaining weeks of the christmas holiday in, Circi suffered from much more vivid dreams and nightmares. Some nights, in her dreams, she told her mother everything and confided in her all of her worries. Other nights, however, her mother was in her dreams but she looked much healthier than she did on Christmas Eve; her face was almost distorted and she was decked in a black robe with her forearm revealed to show off the dark mark on her arm.

Oh yes, the knowledge of her mother having been a death eater in the first war made her nervous. Her father may have lied to her but all good lies come with an element of truth. Perhaps Serenity really had been ruthless, maybe she was a killer...

Returning to Hogwarts was all the more dreadful. Umbridge was rising in power thanks to the ministry and it was evident they were attempting to hunt down her mother as the denied threat of the rising dark forces dragged itself into the light. After the introduction to her legilimens uncles, she was anxious of any new ministry official in the school- especially now she had been in direct contact with the woman they were searching for.

After the students had settled in to the new term, it seemed to Circi that her interrogation would cease.

She worked harder in Harry's lessons, determined that she would be able to protect herself if her deepest fears came true. The DA was becoming harder to keep quiet now that Umbridge and her inquisitorial squad suspected members and began following them.

Draco had taken the liberty to question Leslie before Circi, an action which irritated Circi considering she had not spoken to her brother properly since the last summer and he had the nerve to question her best friend about her personal life. Leslie, of course, knew nothing and had returned to his opinionated and bluntly judgemental mannerisms.

As a result, Draco resisted questioning Circi so she could only assume that was why Umbridge had summoned her to her office once again.

The room seemed to stink of pink these days. The walls were still the same horrid shade of pink as last time, decorated all over with portraits and photographs of cats which mewed and crawled between their frames. On the desk, next to a self-standing framed photograph of a flat-nosed cat, was a photograph of the minister Cornelius Fudge.

Behind the desk sat Umbridge and a few members of her inquisitorial squad stood behind her. Circi sat adjacent to them and could feel Draco watching from his position by the door.

She shuffled in her seat nervously, comforted only by the knowledge that she was unlikely to be physically harmed in the presence of other students.

"We have been patient with you, Miss Malfoy," she began in her sickly sweet voice, "we gave you the opportunity to talk to Dumbledore alone and have asked nicely in person but I am done with being nice." She reaches out and pushes the photograph of Fudge face down on the desk. "You have been a naughty girl and as we know, naughty girls must be punished." Gripping the arms of the seat and leaning back as Umbridge stood up, Circi glanced over her shoulder at Draco who was trying his hardest to look stoic as usual. "You have one more opportunity to tell me what you know of Serenity Rier or I will be forced to use other methods of persuasion which I do not like using." She hummed, a half giggle, and looked on expectantly.

"I haven't spoken to Serenity Rier. I don't know where she is."

"I don't believe you." Umbridge sighed, raising her wand. Circi squeezed her eyes shut, biting her lip to stop it from trembling. Her heart rate sped up in anticipation of what was to come. What would she do? Nothing legal, perhaps, and that was more terrifying.

Her ears started to ring and as she counted her breaths she felt her consciousness transcend away from the situation at hand. She stayed away until she heard a screech. Opening her eyes, blinking away light spots, she observed Umbridge scolding Draco as one of the other students picked up her wand for her. Draco, face stern but with fear in his eyes, grabbed Circi's arm and pulled her from her seat.

She looked around, dazed, and let him drag her from the room. They continued to walk until they were in an abandoned corridor and Draco tugged her close and wrapped his arms tightly under her arms.

"You're okay," he mumbles, trembling slightly. Shocked, Circi feels herself obliged to hug him back and wraps her arms around his neck.

"Yeah, what happened?" He pulled away, running a hand through his hair.

"She was going to crucio you, I had to stop her... father will hear about this." Resolving his murmerings, he tugged her along again and back into the common room.

They sat in his dorm room on his bed, the one place unlikely to be searched for in the wake of their departure. Especially considering Crabbe and Goyle would be leading the search and they were narrow-minded enough to think 'boys dorm' was exclusive like the girls' dorms. Draco was writing a letter addressed to their father, Circi reading it upside down as his quill scrawled all over the parchment.

She noticed his exclamations of her innocence in the subject and she had to stop him.

"Draco," she put her hand over the parchment to halt him, "I have been in contact with my mum."

"But," his eyebrows furrow slightly, "you're a terrible liar. You weren't lying." She shook her head.

"I haven't spoken to her, not really. But you know she sent me a letter in my first year and..." she paused for breath, weighing her options and wondering if he was to be trusted, "she visited the manor over Christmas." His eyes grew wide, whether out of shock or terror or both and he was ready to protest but she raised her hands and waved them to stop him. "She didn't hurt me! She's also not scary and- and father saw her too. I think they spoke, I'm not sure because he sent me away but she hasn't been arrested yet so father must believe her to be innocent."

"Circ," he shook his head in disbelief, "she made mother and father become death eaters remember? She's the reason they did all of that awful stuff in the war."

"Did she?" Circi was almost desperate now, her voice was exasperated as she searched Draco's face for some doubt. He was full of it. "You know as well as I do that father has gone back to him, that is not Serenity's fault. And what about that night at the Quidditch cup? He left the tent and suddenly everything was on fire-"

"He knew we were in that tent. If he was in on the plan why would he risk us being hurt?"

"It would look suspicious if we all left just in time," she shrugged, hesitated, and shook her head, "it just doesn't add up. If you saw her, if you could see how weak she is now, you'd know she isn't able to control father even if she wanted to... she isn't wholly innocent, but she's not guilty either."

Draco seemed to accept this and went back to writing his letter, a little bit more apprehensive this time in his words.

The Three Broomsticks inn was busy as usual for a friday night.

Professor Dexter Rier was indulging himself in his bi-weekly night out with a few of his colleagues. Often, they shared a bottle or two of firewhiskey between them but with the chilly weather outside and the current climate he reserved himself to a mug of hot butterbeer.

As two professors began to get roudier as their firewhiskey drained, his eyes cast over the rest of the patrons. Any one of these people could be a death eater awaiting orders and, yet, they were all equally loud drunkards. The line between good and bad blurred exponentially with each 'cheers!' and the though made him uncomfortable.

Across the room, sat alone at a table beneath the stairs that led to a few guest rooms reserved only for use of the landlady and her friends, was a familiar face reading the newspaper. Abandoning his table, Dexter made his way across the room, his dark robes flying out behind him and wrapping around the ankles of the patrons he passed.

"Uncle Chris?" Looking up from the paper, Christian grinned and motioned to the seat adjacent to him.

"Dex! Join me, please," he noticed the butterbeer in the Professor's mug, "you want to be careful with that stuff. I drank so much I lost my first tooth the other day." He opened his mouth to show the gap behind his top right incisor. Nonetheless, he raised his own mug of warm butterbeer and took a long sip. "Have you seen this?" He spins the paper around to show his nephew the headline.

The main article rambled on about the most recent breakout at Azkaban prison. A death eater, Voldemort said the rumours, had destroyed the outer wall of the cells that held some of the most notorious death eaters from the first wizarding war.

The photograph on the front cover switch from an arial shot of the prison reckage and the mugshot of Bellatrix Lestrange whom Dexter remembered to be insane before her stay with the dementors. He remembered the day Christian came home and announced her arrest- he had done it personally.

As the woman with deranged black hair shook her chains at the camera, her cackles echoed through Christian's mind still. Anyone would have though her happy to be locked up when, in reality, she had already been driven mad by her parents and the Dark Lord himself.

"What's the ministry doing about it?" Christian took another sip of his drink, taking a moment to gather his thoughts.

"Fudge denies that it's the work of You Know Who. I suppose his denial leads him to think they're just some evil people wanting revenge after the death of their leader but..." he sighs, shaking his head and half wincing at his thoughts, "it's happening all over again. It feels like it did last time and they're taking the minister's denial as an opportunity to infiltrate the ministry. Right now I have my team split between controlling the chaos at Azkaban, scouring known hotspots from the last war for the escapees and standing guard in case my own department turns on me."

They descend into silence, well, as silent as they could get in the middle of a pub.

"It's a fight for our lives yet again." Dexter tapped his fingers against the desk, his mind filled with events from the first war. "Two wars in one lifetime."

"Must be some sort of record." Smirking, Dexter glanced back at his table and watched the muggle studies professor, Charity Burbage, take a shot and high five one of her friends. He remembered the muggle wars she told him about and shook his head.

"The muggles beat us to it." Silence again.

Christian watched the foam slowly dissolve in his mug and thought only of the two woman back at the estate. His daughter and partner, both of them had been hidden in his home at one point in their lives and neither were the type to stay hidden.

"We'll get through it," he was sure of it, he wouldn't lose anymore of his family. Raising his mug, he proposed a toat, "to surviving."

"To winning." Dexter tapped his mug against Christian's and they finished what was left of their drinks.

A/N

I want Draco and Circi to be best friends again :(