The Flower and the Badger

Chapter 6

AN: For those of you who think you've read the chapter, I uploaded the wrong chapter XD. Sorry!

Days passed, and Draco was continuing to ignore Harry. Anna could see that this was tearing her brother up on the inside, and she couldn't let this go on. So when she passed Draco in the hall one day, she grabbed him by the collar, dragging him all the way out to the courtyard and pinning him against a tree.

"What the hell?!" Draco demanded, trying to get out of her grasp, but Anna's grasp remained firm. "What the hell is going on with you? You keep ignoring Harry. Why?"

"I don't know what you're talking about-"

"Cut the bullshit Draco! Right now my brother is up in his dorms, sobbing his eyes out because he's convinced that you don't love him anymore!"

"Of course I love him! Harry is my whole world!"

"Then why are you avoiding him like the plague? Draco...." Her voice softened a bit. "What's going on? I know that something's bothering you."

Draco sighed, biting his lip as he looked at her. "It would be better if I just showed you. But you can't tell a soul, not even Harry, understand?"

Anna hesitated a moment before nodding. Whatever it was that Draco was up to, it sounded like it was pretty serious. "Okay, I promise."

Draco led her into the Room of Requirement, where a large cabinet stood. He told her everything, about how he now wore the Dark Mark, about the task that Voldemort had given him. Anna was shocked. Voldemort wanted him to kill Dumbledore? To bring Death Eaters into the school? She understood now why Draco was avoiding Harry. Dumbledore was a pivotal person in her brother's life, and now the boy he loved was being forced to kill him. She pulled Draco into a hug, the blonde sobbing into her shoulder.

"It's gonna be okay." She whispered. "It's gonna be okay, I promise." She wished that she could find some way around this for him, but she didn't know how. She would figure something out though, she was determined to. A couch appeared in the room, and Anna led him over to it, taking a handkerchief out of her pocket and dabbing at Draco's misty eyes. She continued to hold and comfort him. Draco always acted like he didn't care about anything or anyone, but that was all that it was. An act. A act that he was forced to perform by Voldemort, bu his parents. Anna sighed softly. His parents should have been trying to help him, not drag him into the same shit that they had been roped into. He was sixteen for crying out loud, he had his whole life ahead of him, and they had tossed it down the drain. He didn't deserve this, he deserved to live a happy life, a life with her brother. "Draco, listen to me. You aren't going back home this summer."

"What?" Draco asked as he looked at her. "Anna, I have to-"

"No, no you don't. I may have a place for you to stay, a place that neither of your parents or any of the Death Eaters would think to check. Just give me some time, okay?"

Draco nodded as he finally pulled away from her. "Alright." He said softly, and Anna gave him an encouraging smile. "It's gonna be alright, just leave it to me." She gave him a quick hug, before scurrying to her dorm, jotting down a quick note to Sirius. She wrote the note in code, just in case the letter should be intercepted. She told him about Draco's predicament, asking if he would be able to stay with them at Grimmauld Place. She knew that not a lot of people trusted Draco, but she just had to hope that Sirius trusted her intuition enough. No matter what though, Anna wasn't letting Draco return to Malfoy Manor, not if she had anything to say on the matter. This wasn't just because he was her brother's boyfriend. Draco was a friend of hers, and Anna always protected her friends, no matter what the personal cost to herself might be.

Anna got a reply from Sirius a few days later. While he wasn't too happy about having a Malfoy under the same roof as him, he trusted Anna and said that Draco could stay with them, but whenever they had any Order meetings, he would have to be somewhere out of the house. They had decided that when there was to be Order meetings, Anna would take Draco to Remus' old cottage, which he still owned. Sirius had suggested that Draco just stay there full time at the cottage, but he would be all by himself, and Anna didn't want Draco to have to go through that. Anna wondered if Remus had told Sirius yet, but it didn't seem like Sirius was upset about anything in the letter, so he probably hadn't. Anna sighed as she asked Sirius to meet her at the Shrieking Shack the following Saturday before writing a similar letter to Remus and asking him the same thing. Since it seemed like Remus wasn't taking any further action on the matter, she would have to take things into her own hands. She could only hope that Sirius could forgive Remus.

That Saturday, Anna arrived at the just as Sirius arrived. She gave him a quick hug before ushering him inside, finding Remus already waiting there. Remus' eyes widened when he saw Sirius, and he quickly made to leave, but Anna forced him to stay, he couldn't keep running away from this.

"Sirius, I think that there's something that Remus wants to tell you."

Sirius looked at Remus expectantly, and the werewolf gulped nervously. "I haven't exactly been honest with you Padfoot. I, um," He looked down in shame. "I cheated on you."

Sirius gave him a sad smile. "I know Moony."

Anna and Remus both looked at him in shock. "You do?" Remus asked. "But how?"

"Tonks told me last week. Said that you were both drunk and she was the one to make the first move. Remus, why didn't you tell me?"

"I...I was scared. I was scared that you would leave me."

"Moony..." Sirius enveloped him in a hug. "You were drunk. You didn't even initiate it, Tonks did."

Remus started sobbing into Sirius' shoulder, and Anna decided that now would be a good time for her to make her leave. Her job here was done.