Cessation ⌁ Draco Malfoy [3/4] ✔

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A/N: Here is the third book of my Draco Malfoy series. If you're new, leeeeave immediately. You still have two other books to read before this one, hence the 3! And then after this book is the final book I'm currently working on, called Someday. (:

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The train ride back to platform 9 3/4 was a painful ride, full of tears and silence. Emma was sitting with Ron, Harry, Hermione and Ginny, who were all silent as well, and she was back in the habit of chewing her fingernails. She knew that if she didn't stop soon, she wouldn't have any fingernails left. But she could not stop thinking things over.

Her Mum was the biggest one. Dumbledore was murdered by someone she had been in a classroom with for the last two years. She dared to force what Draco had done out of her head. And then she thought about her Dad and what his reaction would be to seeing her, and what her reaction would be to seeing him without her Mum standing right beside him like she always did. She wondered if he'd even be there waiting for her, happy to see her, worried about her. If he had run off, left her, she wouldn't know what to do. She wouldn't go off with Harry since she was sure his aunt and uncle wouldn't allow it, even if she was their niece, and she didn't want to be a burden on the Weasley family.

Her thoughts soon went a little over the line, where she began to plan a bizarre future, where she could see herself blending in with homeless Muggles, dressing up in rags and sleeping on cardboard, just so others would bypass her and not give her a second look. She knew she couldn't do that, though. Not with Harry's face recognised everywhere, and if her Dad didn't want her anymore, after they were seventeen, she'd go wherever Harry went.

Emma ran in through the brick wall after Harry, Hermione, Ron and Ginny, and found herself at Kings Cross. Something about it made her feel homesick and desperate to go back to the beginning of the year, where all she worried about was having to complete a Defence Against the Dark Arts essay and attempt to impress Slughorn more than Harry did in Potions.

She spotted the rude Dursley's standing by another brick wall, looking uptight, bored and annoyed. Harry looked at her before she looked at him, and they quickly enveloped each other in an embrace, as though it was the last they'd ever give each other.

"Take care, Harry," she whispered to him, pulling away.

Harry's eyes looked over her shoulder for a moment before he looked back at her and said, "Be safe. I'll see you at the Weasleys'."

"What?" Emma said quickly, not remembering when exactly they'd discussed this. "When?"

Harry simply waved and jogged over toward the Dursley's with his trunk nearly slamming into his ankles. Emma nearly jumped when she felt a soft hand on her shoulder.

"Dad," she cried, relieved that he had come. She didn't hesitate to wrap her arms around him and bury her face in his chest, and she couldn't stop the tears from falling down her cheeks. Smelling his familiar scent and not her mothers only reminded her that it would never be the other way around again; she had been so used to her mothers perfume overtaking his lazy scent.

Emma held on tighter when she felt him caressing the back of her head.

"I didn't think you'd come," she said when she pulled back, looking up at him through glossy eyes.

"Why on earth wouldn't I have come?" he said quickly, and Emma had to blink twice to make sure that there was an amused smirk on his face. He began to guide her toward the car park. "Let's get out of here, quickly."

"It's going to be so weird without Mum," Emma sniffled, wiping her wet cheeks. The past few weeks she had avoided any conversation whatsoever that involved her Mum, but now it felt OK to talk about her again, especially with someone who knew her better than she did. "I'm going to miss all her jokes. I never caught any of them last summer."

"I know," her Dad said, giving her a pat on the shoulder as they arrived in front of his car. It wasn't anything fancy; it was a simple silver ford fiesta.

"Are we going straight home?"

"Yes," he replied, backing out of the car park. "But we can't stay there for long. Maybe a week."

"Why?" Emma asked. "Where will we go?"

"It's nothing to do with you." Emma raised an eyebrow. "OK, yes it's everything to do with you. Fortunately, your name isn't anywhere, and by your name I mean it isn't recorded anywhere that Ch-Chelsea...that Chelsea and I ever had a child."

Emma could feel her heart shattering at the sound of her Dad choking on the name of her Mum, and she heard him swallow and let out a very shaky breath.

"What happened to her?" Emma said quietly, staring out her window as to avoid his reaction.

"They're searching," he said quietly, hard eyes on the road. "Anybody who has a daughter, an only child, the same age as you - they're looking for you. Not to worry, I have everything planned out."

"That doesn't answer my question," she mumbled. "But, I get it. They were looking and they found the right person. So they know it's me."

"No, they don't," her Dad replied with a very strong voice. "They don't know it's you. Chelsea gave up her life to protect you, to keep you hidden. They had only suspicions that she had a daughter, and had she not been a wonderful Occlumens...who knows..."

This only made Emma feel worse. A woman had just given up her life for her, died for her, traded places with her. It should have made her feel gratitude toward this woman, but all it did was make her feel selfish and terrible. These people weren't even her parents, and now the man who was sitting beside her had lost his wife all because they had taken her in and raised her as though she was their own.

"So, what's happening then?" Emma said after a painful silence. "This summer, what's happening? I'm not going back to Hogwarts, am I? Not with Dumbledore gone anyway..."

"For your own safety, you will not be going back to Hogwarts. We have a few days to gather your things, and spend together, before you go with the Weasleys -"

"Why them?" Emma suddenly shouted. She didn't mean to; but she was just so sick of them having to take her in when they barely even knew her, especially when all she could think about was them being at risk. The woman she had grown to call Mum had already been killed. "I don't want to have to put that family in any situation that might -"

"There will be protection there for when Harry arrives, it is a safe house for the order," he boomed over her outburst. "We can't use Grimmauld Place anymore. I'll be there most of the time."

Emma, not noticing that she had leaned forward when shouting, exhaled and sat back against her seat. Unable to hate one person for too long, Emma was beginning to notice just how much she hated people.