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After a long winter of comfort and an early spring of wandering and freedom, of course Draco's comfort was rudely splintered one afternoon when he heard someone whooping and shouting near the ruins.

Draco walked slowly towards the edge of the forest. He still carried his wand with him, although now he used it for hunting more than anything else. But he knew enough curses to defend himself if it came to that.

He wondered for a moment why someone had come to the ruins after leaving them alone for seasons, but the minute he saw this person, he knew. This was the first really warm and sunny afternoon of spring, with a light breeze to put up a little resistance.

Perfect for broom-flying.

Draco gaped as he watched the boy who rode above the ruins. Well, "boy." He was really a teenager probably the same age as himself, but Draco didn't feel young anymore considering what he'd gone through. And he doubted this boy had ever been almost—by his father or spent even a moment clad in the shed, gifted skin of a thestral, let alone a winter.

Still, he had an undeniable grace on a broom. Draco watched as he doubled back on himself so fast that it looked as if he were trying to catch his own bristles, rose to a height Draco had attained only when he escaped the wards and dived back down, twisted around in a perfect Wronski Feint and caught an imaginary Snitch, and laughed and laughed.

When he came slanting down to land on the lakeshore and collapse, panting, Draco could see him better. Hair as dark as a thestral's coat, his skin bearing a fading tan.

The boy rolled over and sat up, and Draco gasped aloud. Eyes as green as the grass in the Manor's gardens—no, as green as the new leaves unfolding on the trees—no, more than that, as green as—as life—

The boy gasped back, and Draco realized abruptly that this stranger could see him. He immediately retreated, and felt Moonshadow press up behind him. Draco looped an arm around her withers and let her lead him away.

Thrashing and the breaking of branches erupted behind him, the boy calling, "Please! I won't hurt you! I'm just—I never saw anyone near the ruins of Hogwarts before! Come back!"

The ruins of Hogwarts. Now Draco knew why the castle site shimmered so with expended magic, and why the building had been so big. He shook his head. He wouldn't abandon the forest that had become his home, but he wouldn't be venturing back into civilization, either. Not near the place of the last magical battle between Dumbledore and the Dark Lord.

The boy continued trying to follow and call to him, but his voice was hidden by the curtain of branches, the soft and steady noise of hooves beside Draco, the cool exhales of carrion-scented breath in his face as Moonshadow stopped to nuzzle him.

No. I've found where I belonged.

Draco was riding Moonshadow above the woods when he saw the boy again.

Suddenly there was a broom beside him, and the boy sat there, crouched over the handle, staring straight ahead over the bristles. Draco froze for a second and nearly pulled Moonshadow back to the safety of the woods, but the boy didn't turn to look at him. He seemed utterly content to fly on beside them, gaze fixed on the distant horizon.

Draco relaxed muscle by muscle. The afternoon was lazy, late, golden, sunny. The other thestrals had wandered away to bathe in a shallow pool, but Moonshadow had wanted to fly, and Draco couldn't see much reason to change his plans just because there was another human being around.

It was even sort of nice to have another human nearby. One who didn't want to—

Draco cut the thought off, and sneaked a glance at the boy. The boy never did the same. He really did seem to see only the horizon, to have hypnotized or seduced himself into never looking at anything but it.

And Moonshadow wasn't spooked, either, which Draco thought interesting. He had to wonder now if perhaps the boy had spent time near the woods and the ruins of Hogwarts before, and that had somewhat accustomed the thestrals to human presence. Draco probably couldn't have expected to find them so friendly otherwise.

That would mean he owed something to this stranger. Draco's whole being revolted against it.

But they never spoke, not that afternoon, and when the boy finally broke away from them and swooped towards some other destination, Draco was able to go back to the main herd and sleep with an untroubled heart.

The next morning, the boy was sitting off to the side of the clearing and feeding Ungainly and another foal, whom Draco called Rustle from the noise he made crunching through the leaves, from a basket. The scent of the meat made even Draco's nostrils twitch. It smelled like cooked chicken.

The boy didn't look at him. Draco took a few hesitant steps towards him. The boy then put some of the meat on a plate, along with sliced strawberries and some melon that was more golden than the sunlight, and put it on the ground. When Ungainly tried to sneak forwards to grab some of the chicken, the boy prevented him.

Draco edged up, snatched the plate, and ran away to the side of the clearing with it, shaking a little with how daring he felt, and how much like a thestral striving to trust someone.

But when he glanced over his shoulder, the boy was smiling. "I'm Harry Potter," was all he said, and then he picked up his basket, dumped out the rest of the chicken on the ground for Ungainly and the other foals, and went his way.

The fresh fruit tasted even better than Draco had thought it would, and satisfied a part of his hunger he hadn't known was there. He spent the rest of that afternoon waiting, without acknowledging it, for Harry to come back.

Draco sat silently next to Harry, listening to him play a flute that looked like it was made of bone. But if it was bone, then it shone softly silvery in the sunlight, and made a hollow noise that reminded Draco of wind blowing through caves.

Or the way that wind blowing through caves was described in books, anyway. It reminded Draco again, hard, of how little he'd experienced outside the walls of the garden.

The song ended. Harry put the flute on his knee and leaned against the trunk of the tree behind them, staring into the distance. Draco shifted. He hadn't wanted to talk before this, but now he wanted to know things: where Harry actually came from, what kind of bone the flute was made of, why he kept coming here.

"What kind of bone is that?"

Harry glanced at him with a small smile. "Wyvern. A lot of them have come back to Britain since the wild magic was unleashed. It's easier to kill the young ones, but the old ones are pretty bold, too."

"Wild magic?" Draco hated the small words that popped out of his mouth. They sounded pathetic. But Harry just nodded as if he could accept them and looked back into the distance, towards the burgeoning leaves of the trees.

"When Voldemort and Dumbledore fought," Harry whispered, "they called up all the Dark and Light magic they could against each other. But there was another power here, one that the Founders of Hogwarts wove into the foundations of the school as protection against anything ever destroying it. Wild magic. It rose, and it met the Light and the Dark, and it…exploded. There's not very many Muggles left in Britain anymore, either. They can't fire their guns. They can't run their machines. The wild magic won't let them."

Draco disregarded the fact that he didn't know what guns were, and only had a vague idea on machines. There were more important things. "How do you know that?"

Harry blinked at him, then glanced aside. He never seemed to want to look at Draco too directly, in case he sent him fleeing back into the forest. "My mother and father used to be soldiers for Dumbledore. They were at a distance enough to survive when the wild magic exploded, but they didn't know what happened at first. My mother is a Charms expert. She's researched for years to figure out what the difference is in magic between when they went to school and now."

Draco shivered. It sounded—strange. "Then your parents are Light wizards?"

Harry raised his eyebrows. "Where did you grow up, that you make that distinction?" Draco immediately shifted and started to withdraw, and Harry softened and reached out to grab his hand. "No, never mind. It doesn't matter. There's no more Light or Dark magic, Draco. There's only wild power. You can do spells that have a very focused end result, and you can do magic that doesn't rely on spells, like flying a broom. Some humans are also learning to harness their innate will to do certain things, like the magical creatures can. But that's all."

"That can't be true. I've cast curses. And seen them cast."

Harry shrugged. "If you have powerful wards up and they were cast prior to the war, then you can do Light or Dark magic in a protected area. But my parents have never been interested in hiding like that. So I wasn't raised that way."

Draco closed his eyes. To him, it was so utterly strange to think that he might have grown up hiding from the world instead of holding it at bay that it made his skin prickle as if someone was poking him with dozens of needles.

But it also eased a fear he hadn't known was still there. He was free. He didn't have to go back to Lucius's house to survive as a human being, if he ever wanted to leave the company of the thestrals. He didn't have to marry the man who had tried to—hurt him. There were more options.

Harry made a soft sound beside him. Draco opened his eyes and turned his head.

Harry was gazing at him from a short distance away, and his eyes were wide and there was a play of shimmering light in them that made Draco tense instinctively, even though his own breathing remained calm and relaxed.

"I know one thing about the place you grew up," Harry whispered, and his voice was so soft and wondering that Draco didn't take fright or offense. "It must have been lonely."

"Why do you say that?" Draco whispered back. There was no noise louder than Moonshadow's hooves as she shifted behind a tree, and stamped her way into the soft soil.

"Because your eyes are so haunted," Harry said softly, and lifted a hand and brushed it timidly down the sleek side of Draco's head. Draco couldn't even feel the touch of his individual fingertips. "I sometimes see something similar in my parents' eyes when they speak of the world before the war, and the friends they lost. But it's only similar. They had something else, and they lost it. You've—never known anything else. You grew up with that loneliness."

Draco sat there, his lips parted, staring openly at the boy who had named things he hadn't known about himself. Harry leaned closer, his eyes fluttering a little.

And Draco knew what he wanted, and the terror that flooded him was blacker than a thestral's skin. He stumbled to his feet and ran into the forest, aiming away from the tree and Harry, even though Harry called for him to come back.

He ran until he was surrounded by the shifting shadows of the herd, and then he wept soundless tears with his face pressed into Moonshadow's hide.

No, he wasn't going to experience that again.

And if Harry's loss felt acuter than the loss of his beloved father, a strike like a unicorn's horn between his ribs—Draco needn't speak of that, and thestrals could keep a secret.

"Draco?"

Draco immediately twisted to his feet, his hand shooting out. His wand was there before he could call for it, and he did open his mouth then, to shout, to scream, to chase away the ghost of Lucius that hung around him—

"It's just me."

A soft flicker of light traveled through the trees. Draco stared. Harry was sitting at one side of the clearing, his body cradled between three of the great tree-roots in a place that Draco had often spent his time sitting, too. His hand was outstretched, and a ball of softly glowing green light floated above his palm.

"How are you doing that?" Draco whispered without voice.

Harry seemed to hear him, though. He shook his head. "Magic is what you're used to now," he said. "That's probably why your wand works for you. My parents taught me wild magic. That comes more easily to me."

"Wild magic?"

"Will. And power." Harry grinned and squeezed his fingers, waggling them. The green light floated back and forth in obedient circles. "My particular talent is light-based spells. I can call fire a lot more easily than water."

"And how did you find me?"

Harry cleared his throat, looking a little embarrassed, and touched his glasses. "At night, I can see the heat that bodies give off. The thestrals don't give off much. I just had to look for the glowing human shape."

Draco closed his eyes, tired of fighting, and put his wand away. He sat down. Ungainly snorted at him and flicked his tail out of the way. Apparently, Draco had been about to sit on it. "Why did you come to find me?"

"Because I wanted to apologize for what it seems I've done." When Draco glanced up again, Harry's face was averted and he was staring into the distance. "I set you off somehow. Brought up bad memories. I didn't mean to do that."

"The bad memories are nothing you can help. You didn't cause them."

"I know. But I still wanted to say I'm sorry."

That baffled Draco a bit, the notion of anyone apologizing for what they'd done. Of course, he knew what it was, since the house-elves had, but neither Lucius nor Mother would ever have done it. He honestly hadn't thought they were words that humans used.

He studied Harry in the glowing green light. Harry kept looking away, as if he knew how uncomfortable Draco would be if he studied him directly.

That was another new concept—someone understanding his discomfort, and trying to help him with it.

When Draco spoke, it was in a whisper. "My magic's let me survive winter with the thestrals. I don't need to spend time around humans again."

"I know."

"Your parents might hate me."

Harry's muscles tensed, but he seemed to notice the emphasis Draco placed on the word "might." He nodded. "I know."

"You have no idea what happened to me."

"I know."

Draco found himself drifting, at a loss. "And you still want me to come with you and meet your parents?" He found the strength to say the next words by looking elsewhere instead of right at Harry. "And you want to—kiss me?"

"Oh, yes."

Harry's voice was vast and soft and deep and nothing like the horrible words Lucius had uttered when he came into the bedroom. Draco swallowed and tried to ignore the sense of an equally vast and soft pit opening beneath his feet.

Then he said, "I need time."

Harry nodded and stood up. He drew something from his robe pocket that made Draco tense, but it wasn't a wand. He only said, "For you," and dropped it on the ground, then turned and walked out of the clearing without looking back.

Draco picked it up. It was a silver bracelet in the shape of what Draco thought was a serpent at first, and then he recognized the curving, long neck, and the gaping, fanged mouth, and even the wings that streamed over its back to form the delicate, embracing curves of the bracelet.

It was a thestral, with diamonds for eyes.

When Harry came back after drifting grey afternoons and others when Draco had soared above the forest with Moonshadow and risen high enough to see the sun, Draco had thought and thought, and still not made up his mind.

Harry merely sat next to him, watching the leaves open on the trees above them. Some were fully open by now, but more trees than Draco had thought at first still needed to finish unfolding them. Harry's hand rested on his and stroked in gentle motions as he lay there.

Draco found himself staring, since Harry's eyes were half-closed. He looked so different from the monster that Draco had begun to envision Lucius as. He was pale, but that was the only similarity.

And Draco wondered if he would rather spend the rest of his life afraid of waking from nightmares of what Lucius had wanted to do, or if he would rather take a chance and perhaps wake up beside someone who wouldn't mind, who would try to help him heal the damage caused by those nightmares.

"What is it?"

Harry's eyes were open, and although his voice was sleepy, he was watching Draco. Draco took his heart in both hands, and decided to offer it.

"This," he said, and bent down to kiss Harry.

Harry had good instincts. He didn't reach up and try to touch Draco. In fact, he kept his hands exactly where they were, one folded beneath his head and the other stroking Draco's, slowing only a little as their lips brushed. When Draco leaned back, panting as if he'd fallen off a flying thestral, Harry smiled.

"That's the beginning of a choice."

"It is the choice," Draco said. He was thinking—had been thinking for so long, but now one set of thoughts seemed stronger than the others. "I'd like to sleep in a bed again, you know. What I needed was…what I needed then. It doesn't mean that I'll need it for the rest of my life, that I can never get better."

Harry's smile was brighter than the light he could call with his magic. "Then you'll come with me to see home?" He still kept his hands motionless except for the gentle strokes his thumb placed on the back of Draco's. "To meet my parents?"

"Of course I will."

Draco could see it, now. The lighted path stretching ahead, the path that he had never thought he would walk. He'd needed this interlude in the forest and the thestrals and the skin draped loosely over his shoulders. He'd never thought he would come out.

But perhaps he'd even needed the conviction that he'd fled human society forever. It wasn't like he'd known there was any human society to join.

Harry stood up, and the leaves from last year crackled around him. Draco stood up, too, following the pull of his hands, and Moonshadow strode up behind him to put her chin on his shoulder.

"I'll always come back and visit," Draco told her softly, running his hands through her mane.

Harry laughed as Moonshadow glared and then turned and led them towards the edge of the forest. "I think she wants to come with us."

In the end, three thestrals did: Moonshadow, Ungainly, and a stallion that Draco hadn't bothered to name because they barely paid attention to each other. But as he flung his leg over Moonshadow's back, he thought Greywild might be a fine name.

Enough to start our own little herd of thestrals.

Harry caught his hand again as they rose into the air, and Draco looked at him with contentment. They were starting other things, too.

And as they soared above the ruins of Hogwarts and towards the future that Draco hadn't thought existed, he drew the thestral skin close about him and leaned against Harry's warmth.

The End.