The Secret Between Us - Prt.2

Chapter Five.

The man noticed his friend standing in on the outside of the colosseum. She didn't seem at all too pleased having to travel so far to receive the news. "Well?" She lifted her brows, and threw her arms in the air a little annoyed. 

"Well?" Draco mocked. 

Hermione rolled her eyes; she walked towards the blond and hugged him, for she hadn't seen him since the battle at Hogwarts. Just as Draco hugged her back, she pulled away and lightly punched him on the arm. 

"Why must you hit every male you see?"

"You deserve it!" Hermione scowled; her look later softened, and a huge lovely smile spread across her lips. "Well don't just stand there, let me see it." Draco softly chuckled. As he pulled out the small black fuzzy box, he looked around the scenery in front of him. He was still deciding whether or not this part of Italy was the right place to set up the spells. "Oh, Malfoy!" Hermione cried, bringing Draco's attention back to her. "It's beautiful!" 

The man took a step back as Hermione jumped into his arms once more, almost knocking the ring box out of his hands. "You're too happy," he muttered. "I don't like it." 

Once again, Hermione playfully punched him in the arm. "Shut it!" Draco rocked his neck back and forth as a lovely laugh escaped his lips. "So tell me," she began, drawing back to the reason she had to come to Italy so absurdly early. "When are you proposing?" 

"Today..."

"What!?" Hermione shrieked. "Malfoy, what you're trying to do is almost impossible; I need more time."

"Is three hours not enough?" 

"It isn't." 

"Well, it's all you have." Hermione's eyes widened. "Don't worry," Draco reassured, pointing past the woman and on to the dark figure flirting with a tourist. "I brought help." She jerked her head back to Draco with anger when she identified the figure. "Zabini?"

Draco nodded. "Yep." 

"Absolutely not!"

"You don't have a choice, Granger. We need three people for this to work right." 

Hermione rolled her eyes. "Fine," she muttered. Draco smiled. At the moment he was over the moon with joy. He was going to propose, and even though he didn't know what Harry would say, he was just happy the time had finally come. He'd planned on proposing shortly after the battle of Hogwarts, but every time he tried to bring himself to propose he got cold feet and cloaked the ring; well no more, he was proposing no matter what happened. 

Draco quickly kissed Hermione on the cheek. "Thank you." 

"You can thank me after the spell works."

"Always a ray of sunshine," Draco replied with another soft chuckle. Hermione giggled a little, spun around, and walked towards Blaise.

She took his attention by pinching his ear and dragging him off inside the colsieum.

"Beautiful memory."

The woman's voice was a little squeaky, sarcastic, but at the same time high pitched. Her voice had changed a little, but Draco could still know who the owner of that particular voice was.

He cautiously turned around. As soon as he saw the woman's bright hazel eyes his eyes widened with recognition. The young witch standing in front of him was one that he thought was long gone from his life. "Accrington?" 

"Yes and no," Zoe answered with a small snort. "Surname isn't really Accrington." Draco arched a brow; he crossed his arms, waiting for Zoe to continue. She pulled Draco down to her level in order to hug him. "I'm your sister, silly," she whispered in his ear, making him push himself off her. 

The mad woman laughed wildly when she noticed Draco's terrified look. Her laughter ceased. She clicked her tongue and waited until Draco ordered her to explain herself. "Well, I'm not really your biological sister," she explained, playing with her locks. "I'm your sister-in-law." Zoe smiled and jumped a little as she said the last sentence. 

Draco searched Zoe's eyes for some sort of explanation. "What are you talking about? I'm not married; I'm--" He cut himself off, quickly circling around in search of any other form of life. However there was no one else with him; Hermione was gone, Blaise was too, and every other human being around him. 

The blue began to fade away from the sky, mixing in with the clouds. The gravel below his feet lost all color to the point he no longer felt like he was standing on the rocky ground. It seemed like everything around him was loosing all color, becoming nothing more than a fuzzy background. 

It wasn't until he could no longer feel his own fingertips that it all hit him. He jerked his head to face Zoe. "I'm married?" His eyes widened even more. "Wait, Harry married me?"

Zoe scoffed. She knew it would take some time for Draco to regain consciousness, but this was honestly pathetic.

Draco happily laughed. "Merlin! He said yes?"

"Mm-hmm." Zoe smacked her lips and looked at the ground quite disappointed. "But that isn't the point, Malfoy."

Draco suppressed the eye-roll  wanting to set in. He now knew the reason why when Ginny asked the hat about Accrington he said she didn't exist--because Accrington never really did. "I know it isn't," Draco sneered. "But I honestly don't care who the hell you really are." 

A small pout formed on Zoe's lips, only to quickly become a huge grin. "Aren't you wondering why I'm here?" She swayed her body back and forth as she intertwined her fingers together. Draco sighed, looking past the woman, and on to the scenery rapidly disappearing in front of his eyes. "Accrington--" he cut himself off to correct himself. "Sorry, Potter...the last time someone was in my head, they completely erased Harry from my mind," he said, then looked back down to the short woman. "I dated  Greengrass and almost lost my closest friends. I'm not an idiot; I know I'm dying....and frankly, there really isn't much you can do here but know my whole life story."

"What if I told you I could save you?"

"Then I'd say you were the one who killed me in the first place." 

"What?" Zoe's voice became even more squeaky. "Pff, no." Draco threw the woman a knowing look. "No, I'm serious, that wasn't me. I'm simply the third party." 

"Here we go again," muttered the man quite annoyed. "Cut to the chase. There is no 'third party,' not anymore. There is only those with the ministry and those that were subjected to the trials." 

"You're forgetting one more group." 

"Which is...?" 

"The forgotten," Zoe answered with a fake smile. "The third party are those forgotten by both wizarding and muggle worlds. We are those that weren't supposed to exist. I for one was just made to protect the chosen one..." The woman's happy expression saddened. "I was a mistake made by the Potters. They  loved me until they conceived a much healthier, special child. Do you know how traumatizing it is to watch your parents die in front of you? To have a dark wizard ink a mark in your skin to keep tabs on you even after his death?" Draco silently listened to her speech, soaking every ounce of information she was spilling. "And yet, after all that, make sure Voldemort is destined to fail just to protect him?" 

Zoe wryly laughed, knowing the reason why Draco was so quite. "It's taken me five years...five years and yet, Voldemort is still with us." 

It seemed like that comment made his heart stop. It was impossible, Harry killed Voldemort, he saw it. He saw every bit of Voldemort die more than once. Another smile reappeared in Zoe's lips. She said, "oh yeah, you missed a Horcrux; the ultimate Horcrux might I just add."

"Is that why you're here? To tell me you managed to bring the dark lord back?"

"Merlin, no," Zoe scoffed. "I'm here for the deathly hollows."