"I still can't believe you're celebrating Yule with the Malfoys," Ron grumbles. Hermione rolls her eyes and reaches over to swat his arm. It's more for show than anything. Ron doesn't even wince.

"You got a problem with us, Ron?" Draco asks, raising his eyebrows with an amused grin.

"No," says Ron, still in the complaining tones from earlier, "I'm just mad I couldn't join."

The asserted students laugh.

They're gathered at the Hogsmeade train station, waiting for the Hogwarts express to arrive to take some of them back to Platform Nine and Three Quarters.

Hannah and Susan, both packed up with thick coats and yellow scarves, are holding hands – they're both going to Susan's aunt's house to celebrate Yule, and if one is to judge by the gleam in their eyes, they're both very excited.

Hermione, Theodore, and Luna are all staying at the castle. Everyone pretends not to notice the long glances between Hermione and Theodore in respect for their not-yet-confessed feelings. Harry covers a wince. Poor Luna, stuck third-wheeling the two of them. …Then again, she'll most likely spend the weeks searching for some of her creatures, so maybe it won't be so bad.

Neville, standing over by Ron opposite of Harry, is going home to his grandmother, and has left several gifts for the three staying at Hogwarts, with promises of presents over owls to the remaining five.

Harry looks over the group and smiles, a soft warmth blooming from behind his heart and spreading throughout his body. These people are his friends – and they have, in some ways, become his family.

And now they're safe.

The train ride is spent in a comfortable and warm silence, the air bursting with untold stories and withheld hearts all loving each other. Harry spends it all staring out through the window and smiling softly, feeling caught up in such a short moment while taking in the beauty of the world just as it moves past. It hits him that they all live as long as candleflames, in truth, compared to the mountains and the rivers.

And he thinks – this, – to the sounds of quiet murmurs of love behind him, – this is hope.

When they step out to platform Nine and Three Quarters, they share quick hugs, fleeting moments of closeness in a time where it's not truly needed, before Harry and Draco Floo over to Malfoy Manor. There they go separate ways: Draco gives Harry a small smile and disappears out of the room to reunite with his parents, while Harry exits the room and makes for Tom's office.

Tom is there, waiting for him, and when Harry sees him the urge becomes to big and he smiles a smile that could save the world alone.

They spend the days before Christmas in one of the calmest atmospheres Harry's ever encountered. They read in the library, often from the same book, and they're pressed shoulder to shoulder in a beautiful silence. They cuddle – on couches, in bed, in quiet corners of their minds. They walk through the gardens in an unexpected and sappy move from Tom, and their fingers are intertwined as they stroll and talk and grow like the roots underneath their feet.

This, Harry thinks, to the feeling of a heart beating against his palm, this is love.

It's Boxing Day. Harry wakes up first, as seems to have become the norm, and brings Tom to consciousness by sitting on him until he begins to complain.

"Act your age," he mutters, swatting Harry's bare shoulder with his bare hand, and sparks fly at the contact.

"I am!" Harry replies cheerfully.

Tom groans into his pillow. "Why did I even get married to you?" he sighs, and when Harry laughs the noise echoes throughout the room.

"We aren't even married yet!" he thrills, and Tom groans again.

Later they sit in front of the fireplace, flames roaring within the hearth, and they open and exchange gifts. Tom has received gifts from all of Harry's friends, much to Harry's joy and Tom's disgruntlement, while Harry has received many gifts from several Death Eaters – including Bellatrix.

They sit and share and enjoy, and Harry, though he's already warm enough, cuddles into Tom's side and feels whole.

The last night before Harry is to return to Hogwarts, they lie in bed underneath rays of molten silver bleeding from a crescent moon. They rise and fall like waves on a stormy midnight sea, somehow perfectly in synch and yet different enough to be terrifyingly enthralling. And Harry looks down at Tom, disheveled and coming undone underneath his fingertips, skin pale in the glow of the ghostly moon, and sees a world, sees the world, sees his world, unmapped by any but him. He trails paths between his freckles, brushed dark against soft shoulders and chest, and feels this broken child who will never know what it is like to heal fall apart beneath him.

And this, Harry thinks, to the sounds of two hearts beating like one in the cold winter night, this is happiness.

the end