Draco sent very few letters nowadays. Lyra was worried he was hiding something from her. Whenever she'd ask both him and Snape how they were doing, they would either simply not respond to her letters, or they'd send one with a completely different subject matter. 

Summer was approaching and there was no word on when Draco was planning on killing Albus Dumbledore. Lyra didn't want her old headmaster to die, of course. He was the leader of the Order of the Phoenix, he generally fought for good. Those were qualities she appreciated in any person. And he certainly didn't deserve death. 

But if he didn't die, then Draco would. She'd probably be killed for it herself, if Bellatrix and Rabastan wouldn't suddenly intercede on her behalf. If they were to attempt to do so for anyone, she hoped it was for Draco. She wished they'd let her die if it meant her son would live. 

Lyra was sitting impatiently by the fireplace at Malfoy Manor, staring into nothingness. A glass of firewhiskey was sitting delicately between her fingers, though barely touched. She had hoped it would soothe her nerves, but she couldn't get herself to take a single sip. 

"Lyra," Rabastan said from behind her. He hadn't been in living in the house since Christmas, but he still stopped by a lot. This was one of those times, but as she saw how pale and tense he looked, she was sure it wasn't a visit for pleasure. "It's time."

Lyra straightened up in her seat as she clenched her jaw. He didn't have to say anything more for her to know what was about to happen. They both knew it had been the only thing on her mind for the past year. "Now?"

"Yes, now. I just got word from the Dark Lord himself," he told her, walking further into the room. He didn't look concerned, but he was obviously tense, wondering how the night was going to go. "I just thought you might want to know."

She quietly put her glass on the coffee table, unsure of what to think. This was the night that would either make or break her son. Though Snape had made a vow for his survival, it didn't mean something couldn't go wrong.

Part of her hoped a little bit would go wrong. She didn't want Draco, her little boy, to become a killer. She would never want that hanging on his conscience. She herself had done horrible things that still  plagued her but she had never taken somebody's life. 

 "Are you going to be there?" she asked carefully. She knew Rabastan didn't care much for Draco. He only cared that he was her son, though she wondered if part of him detested her son for also being Lucius's. She wasn't sure if she'd want him there when Draco would complete his task once and for all. 

"No. No, he's got another mission for me. One I'll be going on with the Dark Lord himself. It's a big honor for me." Rabastan smiled, as if it was something to celebrate. He walked closer to where she was sitting, grabbing her face and looking her deeply in the eyes. "After tonight, things will be good. Draco will be honored and so will I be. And I'll make sure you will be as well."

Lyra could barely force a small smile at him, trying to keep herself from crying once again. A few minutes ago, she had been concerned that Draco wouldn't ever follow through with the task. Now she could only be concerned that he would. That when he came home, her son would be a far cry from the sweet little boy he once was.

Rabastan quickly leaned down to kiss her, a manic smile on his face. He was once again caught up in the insane joy of feeling like his master needed him. It always frightened her when he looked like that. He looked sick. And then his kisses felt wrong, more than they usually did. 

"I love you," he said quickly. If she hadn't gotten so used to him saying those words then she wouldn't have caught them. 

As always, she wished she didn't hear them. And as always, she didn't say it back.  "You need to go. You can't be late."

"You're right. I'll see you soon." He nodded quickly, turning on his heel and running off without even another glance back. Lyra watched as he slammed the door behind him, a strange spring in his step he only had when he was going out on missions.

Lyra looked at the glass of firewhiskey in front of her, grabbed it and swiftly downed all its contents in one gulp. Salazar knows she needed it at that moment. All she could do was sit, watch the fire and hope that Draco would come home safe soon. Oh, how she hoped he would be safe. 

▹▹▹

Albus Dumbledore had known this was coming for a while. He was old, frail and weakened from the ring on his finger. And he was very sure that would be the last night of his life as the Dark Mark hovered over the Astronomy Tower at Hogwarts. 

"Good evening, Draco," the headmaster greeted his student, who had just disarmed without any trouble. He found himself wishing to glance to the side, where Harry Potter sat underneath his invisibility cloak, quietly immobilized. 

Draco took a step, looking around to make sure that he was alone with the older man. There were two brooms on the ground, he noted. There must have been somebody else there with them. "Who else is here?"

Dumbledore stayed calm as he deflected the question. "A question I might ask you. Or are you working alone?"

"No," Draco answered nervously. He glanced between the man and the Dark Mark lit up in the sky. The Dark Mark meant to say that somebody had been killed by the Death Eaters.  "I've got back-up. There are Death Eaters here in your school tonight."

Dumbledore almost looked proud as he gazed upon the young boy, who's wand was still pointed right at him. "Well, well, very good indeed. You found a way to let them in, did you?"

"Yeah." Draco's breathing was getting rather heavy, though he wasn't sure if it was because he was nervous or because he had just run up several flights of stairs. "Right under your nose and you never realized!"

"Ingenious," he complimented him with a kind twinkle in his eye. "Yet... forgive me... Where are they now? You seem unsupported."

The Malfoy boy glanced over his shoulder for only a quick moment, obviously waiting for his reinforcements to arrive. "They met some of your guard. They're having a fight down below. They won't be long... I came on ahead, I've got a job to do."

"Well, then you must get on with it, my dear boy." They kept watching each other. Draco knew he was supposed to make his move then, kill the man. But something was holding him back. Dumbledore smiled. "Draco, Draco, you are not a killer."

"How do you know?" he snarled childishly, only wishing to defend himself. "You don't know what I'm capable of. You don't know what I've done!"

Dumbledore continued to look unbothered by the situation. "Oh, yes, I do. You almost killed Katie Bell and Ronald Weasley. You have been trying, with increasing desperation, to kill me all year. Forgive me, Draco, but they have been feeble attempts... So feeble, to be honest, that I wonder whether your heart has been really in it."

"It has been in it! I've been working on it all year, and tonight-" Draco cut himself off at the sound of a nearby, muffled yell accompanied by the sounds of spells being thrown around. He glanced over his shoulder quickly once again. 

"Somebody is putting up a good fight. But you were saying... yes, you have managed to introduce Death Eaters into my school which, I admit, I thought impossible... How did you do it?" Draco didn't respond, seemingly paralyzed by his own fear. "Perhaps you ought to get the job done alone. What if your backup has been thwarted by my guard?

"As you have perhaps realized, there are members of the Order of the Phoenix here tonight, too. And, after all, you don't really need help. I have no wand at the moment, I cannot defend myself," Dumbledore pointed out, though getting no response as Draco only stared at him. "I see. You are afraid to act until they join you."

"I'm not afraid!" Draco snarled aggressively, pointing his wand at the man with much vigor, though making no moves to actually attack. "It's you who should be scared!"

"But why?" Dumbledore asked nonchalantly. "I don't think you will kill me, Draco. Killing is not nearly as easy as the innocent believe... So, tell me, while we wait for your friends... How did you smuggle them in here? It seems to have taken you a long time to work out how to do it."

Draco felt nauseous, like he was going to throw up at any minute. Here he was, with someone many people considered the greatest wizard alive at his mercy... And yet he found himself wishing to stall as much as possible. "I had to mend that broken Vanishing Cabinet that no one's used for years. The one Montague got lost in last year."

Dumbledore let out a sigh that sounded much like a groan. He closed his eyes, either in realization or from pain. He did look like he was struggling to keep upright. "That was clever. There is a pair, I take it?"

"The other's in Borgin and Burke's," the blond boy revealed. "And they make a kind of passage between them. Montague told me that when he was stuck in the Hogwarts one, he was trapped in limbo but sometimes he could hear what was going on at school, and sometimes what was going on in the shop, as if the Cabinet was travelling between them, but he couldn't make anyone hear him. In the end he managed to apparate out, even though he'd never passed the test. He nearly died doing it. Everyone thought it was a really good story, but I was the only one who realized what it meant. Even Borgin didn't know. I was the one who realized there could be a way into Hogwarts through the Cabinets if I fixed the broken one."

"Very good," Dumbledore praised him, looking rather impressed. "So the Death Eaters were able to from Borgin and Burke's into the school to help you... a clever plan, a very clever plan... And as you say, right under my nose."

Draco raised his chin a little higher, as if the praise from the headmaster was making him more confident in himself. "Yeah. Yeah, it was!"

"But there were times, weren't there, when you were not so sure you would succeed in mending the Cabinet?" the former Gryffindor asked sympathetically. "And you resorted to crude and badly judged measures such as sending me a cursed necklace that was bount to reach the wrong hands, poisoning mead there was only the slighest chance I would drink..."

Draco fidgeted where he stood, trying his best to stay strong. He didn't have another choice but to stay strong. "Yeah, well, you didn't realize who was behind that stuff, did you?"

"As a matter of fact, I did," Dumbledore responded, looking even more like he was struggling to keep standing as he barely slipped a bit where he stood. "I was sure it was you."

"Why didn't you stop me, then?"

"I tried, Draco," the bearded man sighed, like he felt sorry for him. "Professor Snape has been keeping watch over you on my orders-"

Draco scoffed. He felt like it was extremely obvious that Snape was working for the Dark Lord. He didn't see how a man as supposedly brilliant as Dumbledore couldn't have seen that. "He hasn't been doing your orders, he promised my mother-"

"Of course that's what he'd tell you, Draco, but-"

"He's a double-agent, you stupid old man!" Draco spat in response, wondering if he had lost it. "He isn't working for you, you just think he is!"

"It would be rather simple for me to prove to you that Professor Snape has no particualar allegiance to the Death Eaters," Dumbledore informed him. "And that all rests upon your mother and the secrets she has kept from you that he has never revealed."

"My mother?" the Malfoy boy asked, his grip on his wand loosening a tiny bit as he frowned in surprise. He hadn't  "She has no secrets from me. Stop acting like you know anything about her."

"Although it may hurt for you to hear this there are ways in which I believe I know your mother better than you ever have," Dumbledore said, taking a deep breath as he struggled with keeping his footing. 

Draco's hand was shaking and his mind was whirling. He had no idea what "I know what you're doing. You're trying to buy yourself more time so I won't kill you. It's not working."

The headmaster shook his head, a soft smile on his face. "I think we have established that I do not believe you will kill me, Draco. What reason would I have to lie to you?"

"What is is then? What secrets do you think my mother's been keeping from me?" Draco asked, looking torn between wanting to know and being afraid of the answer. "What would you and Professor Snape know that I don't?"

"Several things, I'm sure," Dumbledore said calmly. "But the largest secret of all... the one that Professor Snape, as a double agent for whatever side you believe, has been able to keep is... for instance the fact that Lyra Malfoy was, until only a year ago, an active member of the Order of the Phoenix behind yours and your father's backs."

"Oh, that's rich." The Malfoy boy was obviously not convinced, thinking it was a clear lie. His mother? A member of the Order? In what world would that work? "If you're going to lie to me then you might as well try to make it convincing."

"Whether or not you find it convincing, it is still true, Draco." Dumbledore's eyes shone through his half-moon glasses. "Lyra Malfoy has always been a good women despite her upbringing telling her to be cruel. But in the end she has always been temped by the powers of love."

"Love? What love?"

"These are secrets that have been kept from you all your life, from your mother and your father alike," Dumbledore mused, making Draco furrow his brows at the mention of his father. Had he known about these things? "While still at Hogwarts, your mother fell in love. With James Potter?"

"Potter?" the blond boy repeated, as if the name tasted sour on his tongue. "Harry Potter's father? You've got to be kidding me! My mother would never have fallen for him. She's got some sense."

"And yet she did. They were quite the lovely couple if you ask me. I'm sure Professor Slughorn and Professor McGonagall would say the same. You're welcome to ask when we leave this tower," stated Dumbledore, which made Draco look a bit more unsure of himself. "And if you have the opportunity, then your former Professor Lupin would probably love to tell you all about them."

"Lupin?" Draco asked, confused as to what his old Defence Against the Dark Arts Professor had to do with anything. It wasn't as if he had been around to teach at the time in question.  "What's he got to do with my mother?"

Dumbledore smiled fondly at what must have been memories from the past. "They were, as some would call it, best friends."

"My mother? Best friends with a werewolf?" Draco asked, as if that must have been some funny joke. She was a Malfoy, born a Black. They weren't the kind of people to hang around half-breeds and the likes of them. 

"Yes, it happens that he was the one to convince her to join the Order of the Phoenix. Along with the help of the late Sirius Black, her cousin, as you well know," he told him. "Lyra left James many years ago after threats had been made to her own life and his. In hopes of protecting him, she married your father."

The young Death Eater trailed off, though he supposed part of it made sense. He had always wondered why his parents had married one another when they didn't always get along swimmingly. "No, that can't be why she..."

"She joined the Order after Lord Voldemort's return." Draco winced at the mention of his master. "She was hoping to make a better world for you. She left after your father's unfortunate tenure in Azkaban, as she realized the only way to attempt to protect you was to make sure she made no mistakes and if anybody were to find out what she had been doing... then harm would come to you."

"Stop joking around, old man!" Draco snarled, though the hand which was holding his wand was shaking intensely. He was pale as a sheet by now. "There's no way I'm going to believe any of this!"

"Think, Draco," the headmaster commanded, though softly and not at all stern. "Hasn't it always seemed like she has kept secrets? Has it not seemed like she has a personal hatred towards Peter Pettigrew, though you may know him as Wormtail? I believe we both know what he did to the Potters. Did she disappear several times to go somewhere secret at strange times? Did your parents not fight more than usual about Sirius Black's escape? Just think about it."

"But- but..." Draco stuttered as he thought it over. Ever single thing he was saying was true. There were many reasons as to why he should have doubted his mother before. He just hadn't wanted to. 

"Professor Snape knew all of these secrets and has never breathed a word of them to the Death Eaters. Not even your father knew she was a member of the Order." "Therefore I believe it is safe to say that I trust him."

"Well, you're losing your grip then!" Draco said, though not as confidently as before. "Fine, he's kept these secrets for my mother. But... he's probably doing that because he respects her or for me or for my father. Not for you!"

"I see we will not disagree."

Draco glowered at him. "No, we won't! Snape's one of us. He's been offering me plenty of help, wanting all the glory to himself, wanting a bit of the action. What are you doing? Did you do the necklace? That was stupid, it could have blown everything. But I haven't told him what I've been doing in the Room of Requirement. He's going to wake up tomorrow and it'll all be over and he won't be the Dark Lord's favorite any more, he'll be nothing compared to me. Nothing!"

"Very gratifying," said Dumbledore. "We all like appreciation for our own hard work, of course. But you must have had an accomplice, all the same. Someone in Hogsmeade, someone who was able to slip Katie the- the... Ah... Of course. Rosmerta. How long has she been under the Imperius Curse?"

"Got there at last, did you?" the teenager taunted him. Once again, there were loud noises coming from the floor below, making Draco barely jump a bit, though he glanced over his shoulder nervously. 

Dumbledore didn't seem to pay attention to the noise. "So poor Rosmerta was forced to lurk in her own bathroom and pass that necklace to any Hogwarts student who entered the room unaccompanied? And the poisoned mead... well, naturally, Rosmerta was able to poison it for you before she sent the bottle to Slughorn, believing it was my Christmas present. Yes, very neat, very neat. Poor Mr Filch would not, of course, think to check a bottle of Rosmerta's. Tell me, how have you been communicating with Rosmerta? I thought we had all methods of communication in and out of the school monitored."

Draco continued talking, though not sure why. He just knew he didn't want the talking to stop because then he would be forced to deal with his task. "Enchanted coins. I had one and she had the other and I could send her messages-"

"Isn't that the secret method of communication the group that called themselves Dumbledore's Army used last year?" asked Dumbledore, as if he was unsure, though he very much knew. He may have been old but he wasn't senile. 

"Yeah, I got the idea from them." He smiled bitterly. "I got the idea of poisoning the mead from the Mudblood Granger, as well. I heard her talking in the library about Filch not recognizing Potions..."

"Please do not use that offensive word in front of me," stated the former Head of Gryffindor house sternly, a strict look in his tired eyes. 

The young Slytherin let out a laugh, though without any hint of humor. "You care about me saying Mudblood when I'm about to kill you?"

"Yes, I do." He nodded a single time. "But as for being about to kill me, Draco, you have had several long minutes now. We are quite alone. I am more defenseless than you can have dreamed of finding me, and still you have not acted. Now, about tonight, I am a little puzzled about how it happened. You knew that I had left the school? But, of course, Rosmerta saw me leaving, she tipped you off using your ingenious coins, I'm sure."

Draco nodded, tightening his grip on his wand proudly as he received more praise. "That's right. But she said you were just going for a drink, you'd be back..."

"Well, I certainly did have a drink... And I came back, in a fashion," Dumbledore mumbled. "So you decided to spring a trap for me?"

"We decided to put the Dark Mark over the Tower and get you to hurry up here, to see who'd been killed." Draco let out a pleased breath, obviously a bit proud of himself. "And it worked!"

"Well... yes and no..." Dumbledore tilted his head, crouching a bit as his knees seemed to struggle in holding him up. "But I am to take it then, that nobody has been murdered?"

"Someone's dead," Draco managed to squeak out, his voice unnaturally high and shaky. "One of your people... I don't know who, it was dark. I stepped over the body... I was supposed to be waiting up here when you got back, only your Phoenix lot got in the way."

"Yes, they do that."

The bangs and noises from the fighting going on seemed to be getting louder, meaning they were getting closer. The time for Draco to either complete his task or abandon it was drawing ever nearer. 

The moment of truth was just around the corner. What truth that would be was yet to be revealed, even to Draco himself. Only Dumbledore seemed to know what would happen, as he always did. "There is little time, one way or another. So let us discuss your options, Draco."

"My options!" Draco exclaimed, as if the notion of him having any options was stupid. He knew his only options, it was to kill Dumbledore or be killed himself. "I'm standing here with a wand, I'm about to kill you-"

Dumbledore smiled sympathetically once again. "My dear boy, let us have no more pretense about that. If you were going to kill me, you would have done it when you first disarmed me, you would not have stopped for this pleasant chat about ways and means."

"I haven't got any options!" the blonde boy yelled in his headmaster's face, though he wishes he did have options. It would be so good to actually be able to make a choice. He had been too naive when he had wished for the Dark Mark. He should have grabbed his mother and ran off when they had the chance. "I've got to do it! He'll kill me! He'll kill my whole family!"

"I appreciate the difficulty of your position. Why else do you think I have not contronted you before now? Because I knew you would have been murdered if Lord Voldemort realized I suspected you." Draco winced at the name once again. 

"I did not dare speak to you of the mission with which I knew you had been entrusted, in case he used Legilimency against you. Though I know realize you have inherited your mother's gifts for Occlumency. It was a great asset for us for a time," Dumbledore told him. "So now we can at last speak plainly to each other. No harm has been done, you have hurt nobody, though you are very lucky that your unintentional victims survived. I can help you, Draco."

"No, you can't." His voice was shaking as badly as his wand by now. "Nobody can. He told me to do it or he'll kill me. I've got no choice."

"Come over to the right side, Draco," the old man offered kindly. "And we can hide you more completely than you can possibly imagine. What is more, I can send members of the Order to your mother tonight to hide her likewise. The Order would be pleased to have her back. I'll send Remus Lupin himself. He would rather die than see her hurt, if that eases your mind at all. Your father is safe at the moment in Azkaban, when the times comes we can protect him too. Come over to the right side, Draco. You are not a killer."

Draco seemed to consider it for a moment. It would be great to hide, to get all this pressure taken off his shoulders. His mother would safe and if his father were to ever get out, he would be too. 

But there was also an ambitious search for glory that had overtaken him, one which he wasn't sure Dumbledore could understand. "But I got this far, didn't I? They thought I'd die in the attempt, but I'm here. And you're in my power... I'm the one with the wand. You're at my mercy."

"No, Draco," Dumbledore denied carefully. "It is my mercy, not yours, that matters now."

Draco seemed at a loss for words at this, his mind working through a thousand different meanings for his words. And in that moment, he seemed to have decided his own fate. Slightly, he lowered his wand. 

If not for the great ruckus of four Death Eaters breaking into the Astronomy Tower, Draco would have lowered his wand completely. Their billowing black robes flew past the young boy, who felt frozen in place. 

Amycus Carrow was the first one to see the shape in which Dumbledore was in and looked rather gleeful at this, looking at Draco with a certain pride. "Dumbledore cornered! Dumbledore wandless, Dumbledore alone! Well done, Draco, well done!"

"Good evening, Amycus," Dumbledore greeted him, sounding strangely friendly for a man cornered by people who detested him enough to want him to dead and the young boy they had manipulated onto their side. "And you've brought Alecto, too... How charming."

His sister jeered at the man. "Think your little jokes'll help you on your death bed, then?"

"Jokes?" Dumbledore repeated, as if he was confused that she would consider his work a simple joke. "No, no, these are manners."

"Do it." A gravely voice had spoken up, accompanied by a large man who's Death Eater robes seemed to be several sizes too small for him. He had long, yellow claws out, as if prepared to rip out throats. This was Fenrir Greyback. 

The school headmaster showed no sign of dislike to thefamed  werewolf. "Is that you, Fenrir?"

"That's right," he rasped. "Pleased to see me, Dumbledore?"

"No, I cannot say that I am..."

And then Fenrir Greyback grinned, showing his sharp teeth. Though usually yellow, they were now red, with blood trailing down his chin as he licked his lips. "But you know how much I like kids, Dumbledore."

"Am I to take it that you are attacking even without the full moon now?" the old man asked, his back now against the wall of the Tower in hope of holding himself up for a while longer. "This is most unusual... You have developed a taste for human flesh that cannot be satisfed once a month?"

Greyback seemed to take pride in this, as if he was the greatest werewolf to have ever lived because of it. He wore his Death Eater fit with pride. "That's right. Shocks you, that, does it, Dumbledore? Frightens you?"

"Well, I cannot pretend it does not disgust me a little." Dumbledore was eyeing the blood still covering Greyback's face as he spoke. "And yes, I am a little shocked that Draco here invited you, of all people, into the school where his friends live."

"I didn't," Draco breathed, though unsure of why he felt the need to defend himself. He refused to even glance at Greyback, if only in pure fright and disgust. He didn't want to know who's blood he was covered in. "I didn't know he was going to come-"

Greyback cut him off before he could continue. "I wouldn't want to miss a trip to Hogwarts, Dumbledore. Not when there are throats to be ripped out... Delicious, delicious... I could do you afters, Dumbledore."

"No," said the last Death Eater sharply, looking rather done with Greyback's games. "We've got orders. Draco's got to do it. Now, Draco, and quickly."

But Draco couldn't. As he looked into the eyes of his old, frail headmaster he knew that there was no way he could cast the killing blow to him. He didn't want to kill anyone. He tried to motivate himself to do it, by thinking about his mother (but she had supposedly been lying to him for long) and his father (who was safely tucked away in Azkaban either way). And it became much harder to even consider it. 

"He's not long for this world anyway, if you ask me!" Amycus laughed to himself, looking at Dumbledore's pale face and the way he had to lean against the wall to stand even close to upright. "Look at him. What happened to you, then, Dumby?"

"Oh, weaker resistance, slower reflexes, Amycus," he responded nonchalantly, as if it was no important matter at all. "Old age, in short. One day, perhaps, it will happen to you if you're lucky."

Amycus suddenly seemed to feel very offended at his words, trying to make sense of it. His voice came out as a crude yell that did not suit his voice at all. "What's that mean, then, what's that mean? Always the same, weren't yet, Dumby? Talking and doing nothing, nothing. I don't even know why the Dark Lord's bothering to kill yeh! Come on, Draco, do it! Now, Draco, quickly!"

Sounds of struggle reached their ears once again, sounding like members of the Order of the Phoenix attempting to fight their way into the Astronomy Tower, hoping to save Dumbledore and Harry alike, as the latter still found himself struggling underneath his invisibility cloak. 

It was becoming quite clear that Draco would do no such thing. His hand was shaking so badly he couldn't even make out a point he was aiming at anymore. He wouldn't be killing anyone that night. 

Greyback reached out and pushed Draco away, standing in front of him with a crude expression on his face. "I'll do it."

"I said no!" Amycus shouted. He reached for his wand and with a flash of flight, Greyback was thrown backwards. He hit the ramparts, staggering as he glared at the wizard with so much hatred that Harry shivered underneath his cloak. 

Alecto was getting rather impatient, walking up to Draco and staring at him with cool and calculating eyes. "Draco, do it or stand aside so one of us-"

But then the door opened, and in came Severus Snape. His head was held high as he took in the situation. He found himself focusing in particular at Draco and his terrified shakes. He knew immediately what he must do that night. 

Amycus seemed relieved that the high-ranking Death Eater had joined their ranks for the moment. He must know what to do in such a situation. "We've got a problem, Snape. The boy doesn't seem able-"

Dumbledore's pleading voice rang through the air. Though it was far from loud, it overpowered the Death Eaters quickly. "Severus..."

Snape looked at his boss, his leader, with such strong faux hatred that he would have almost believed he hated the man if he was watching himself. Because he had made a vow to Lyra and a promise to the headmaster himself. Draco Malfoy was not about to be hurt and he was about to be forced into becoming a killer.

Snape took a step towards Dumbledore, pushing Draco out of the way as he did so. All the Death Eaters surrounding them stepped back, even Greyback. They were all watching expectantly, waiting for what he was about to do. 

"Severus... please..."

"Avada Kedavra!"

And so Severus Snape fulfilled the vow he had made, ending the life of Albus Dumbledore at the same time. If Harry hadn't been immobilized, he was sure he would have screamed as the green light filled the room, making Albus Dumbledore no more. 

▹▹▹

A/N: I got this out a lot quicker than I thought, wow. So, now Draco knows... So it'll be interesting to see how he deals with this information. And what about the secret mission Rabastan is on? What could that be about? All those questions will be answered next chapter.