You and Draco finally make it to Dumbledore's tomb.
~~~
You had been correct about one thing regarding the trip: it was, in fact, taking forever. You were on day four of your trek, and you were sure by now that your shins were the strongest they'd ever been. You hadn't even walked or run this much for Quidditch practice, and Draco knew as well as you did how much Arlie liked to make your team run.
You were finally nearing the end of your journey, however, which was one of the only good things about the whole situation. The other good thing was that you'd finally found a spring the night before, and you'd gratefully taken your time in washing up, loving the refreshed feeling the rushing water gave you.
So now, cleaned up and fed and hydrated, you entwined your hand with Draco's as you walked the final stretch of the path Dumbledore's mourners had pounded out with their feet months before at the dead professor's funeral. The two of you were mostly silent, only breaking through the quiet of the afternoon air to point out an animal scampering past, or when Draco asked you to kiss him. (That was your favorite reason to stop mid-step.)
The sun was just beginning its descent again when Draco froze, his hand stilling within yours. You followed his gaze, and your own blood turned to ice at the sight of the unmistakable tomb before the two of you. It was still easily half a mile away, but it was unmissable. The large, white marble tomb commanded attention, and you were honestly surprised at how stupid it was to make something so noticeable. Anyone could rob Dumbledore's tomb at any point, and they'd chosen a giant marble casket to put the man to rest?
You didn't voice this concern, however. You simply remained silent, standing in place and watching the white-haired boy beside you.
Draco took a breath as he strode up to the exquisite marble chest, holding your hand tightly so you had no option but to stumble along behind him.
You stopped right before you reached it, so close you could reach out and touch it.
"Stay here," he whispered, his voice quiet and slightly hoarse from having remained silent for as long as the two of you had.
"But Draco—" you started to protest, cutting yourself off once you saw the look he gave you.
"Stay here, y/n," he repeated, his tone much more commanding this time. You rolled your eyes in response. He could be so dramatic.
"Ascendio," Draco whispered, and you watched as the charm pulled him up into the air, landing squarely on top of the pristine white coffin.
He looked back at you. "Move back, y/n," he ordered.
"Draco!" you cried in irritation, taking a step forward instead.
"MOVE BACK!" he shouted, startling you into taking several steps backward. You watched as he then turned his wand towards the top of the coffin, shouting, "Bombarda!"
You shrieked as an explosion sounded from his wand, causing the coffin to crack loudly. The spell shot dust into the air, flying up and blocking your view of Draco.
"Evanesco!" you cried, frantically waving your wand to cause the dust to evaporate as immediately as it had appeared. Draco stood on top of the coffin still, his face blank.
Before he could cast the explosive spell again, you raised your own wand, casting "Ascendio!" to propel yourself up and join Draco on the coffin.
He glared, opening his mouth to yell something, but you cut him off.
"Have you got cotton balls for a brain??" you demanded angrily, watching as his expression changed to surprise at how upset you were. "You are going to kill yourself if you keep trying that." You huffed, running a hand over your own hair as you pulled your wand back out. "Honestly, Draco," you said with an air of annoyance, "sometimes I wonder if your parents Flipendo'd you as a baby."
Draco let out a squeak of indignance, but you ignored him. You turned around, pointing your wand at the large crack that now covered the entire top of Dumbledore's coffin.
"Locomotor," you said then, waving your wand to cause the broken-up parts of the top of the coffin to move away, falling to the ground below and revealing the dead body of the former Hogwarts headmaster, lying in his coffin with his wand tucked into his folded hands.
You shuddered at the sight of the dead professor beneath you, and you hesitated to reach out to take it from him. Draco didn't make any moves from behind you either, and you absentmindedly wondered if seeing the body of the headmaster the two of you had worked together to kill had been as unnerving to him as it was to you.
"Go on, y/n, just grab it," Draco muttered from behind you, and you took a breath. You decided to use magic instead, brandishing your wand to summon it to you.
"Accio Dumbledore's wand," you said then, waving your wand in the movement necessary.
But the wand didn't move.
"It's also called the Elder Wand, according to Voldemort," Draco pointed out, and you nodded. "Accio Elder Wand," you said, watching as the wand sprung out of Dumbledore's hands and flew into your own.
You marveled at the wand you then held, looking over its intricate design and the odd way it seemed to bubble in and out the entire way up. It was certainly a wand design you'd never seen before.
"Come on, y/n, we have to get going," came Draco's voice from behind you, and you shook your head to snap yourself out of your reverie. You backed up quickly, using the same Locomotor spell to replace the parts of the coffin that you'd removed. Then, "Reparo," and you watched the crack in the coffin disappear, returning the marble box to its original, untouched state.
You hopped off the coffin, landing rather hard on the ground. You didn't make too much noise though, worried Draco would freak if he thought you were hurt.
"We've got the wand," said Draco then. His voice was full of wonder, like he couldn't believe the two of you had managed something so important.
You nodded, still looking at the exquisitely designed wand in your hands. "If it was really Dumbledore's though, why didn't it come to me when I called it Dumbledore's wand?" you wondered out loud.
Draco shrugged. "Maybe it doesn't really belong to anyone, and Dumbledore was just keeping it out of Voldemort's hands."
You sensed that that was as good a reason as any, and you opened your bag and tucked the wand safely inside. "Let's start back," you said with a sigh, not looking forward to the fifty-mile trek back.
Draco smiled slightly at you then, sticking his hand out for you to grab onto. "Let's go."
~~~
The walk back didn't seem like it was taking as long, but it was definitely still hurting your feet. Draco wanted the two of you to at least try to walk straight through the night, but you weren't sure how much farther you could go.
You finally whined when you stepped directly on a sharp rock, feeling the pain of the object through your shoe. Draco stopped, turning back to you, his eyes full of concern. "What's wrong?" he asked.
"I'm tired," you said then, fully aware of how pathetic you sounded. "I just want to sleep."
Draco sighed, nodding. He dropped his bag, pulling out the tent again, waving his wand and returning it to its normal size. He then waved his wand once more, and it magically flew into the air before settling down and setting itself up for the night.
You wasted no time in crawling in, pulling out your cot once again and setting it up in the tent, dropping onto it without even asking for Draco to pull out his healing potion again.
Draco came into the tent shortly after you, but you were already half-asleep by the time he did so.
"You're going to be the death of me, y/n," he mumbled, but that managed to cut through your sleepiness, and you rolled back over. "Hmm?" you mumbled, trying to keep yourself awake long enough to hear his response.
He chuckled. "I don't mean anything bad by that, of course," he said gently. "It just scares even me sometimes, how much I'm willing to drop to make sure you're alright."
You felt yourself smiling—or at least, you hoped you were smiling. You were too half-asleep by that point to really know what you were doing.
Because you knew by then, that that was the closest thing you were ever going to get to "I love you".
~~~
The morning came all too quickly. You had barely allowed yourself to fall asleep before the light making it through the tent walls reached you, causing you to peel open your eyes. You rolled over, finding Draco still asleep, his forehead uncreased for the first time in a while (at least, that you could remember).
You quietly packed up your things, being careful to allow him to sleep for a little bit. Instead, you went outside the tent, taking Dumbledore's wand back out of your bag, just to look at it again.
The intricate wand still fascinated you, even though it didn't belong to you. You turned it over in your hands a few times, mulling over what you and Draco had gone through together to be able to get it.
You also remembered the story your mother had read to you growing up, the urban legend about the Elder Wand that had ended up being true.
"That night, Death transfigured into a murderous wizard," you recited quietly to yourself. "He crept into the inn where the eldest brother was sleeping and slit the young man's throat, taking the wand for himself. That was how Death claimed the first brother."
A jolt went through your body then, as you realized that Death had had to kill the eldest brother to gain the allegiance of the wand.
And what had you done to Dumbledore?
You felt your blood run cold as you looked back down at the wand now sitting in your hands, the object now more formidable than you'd ever expected.
You made eye contact with Draco as he sleepily clawed his way out of the tent, and his expression calmed once he spotted you, but then changed to one of concern when he saw the horror painted plainly on your face.
It made sense now, why it hadn't come to you when you had Accio'd it by calling it Dumbledore's wand.
Dumbledore had died at your hands. The blood of the former headmaster of Hogwarts was on your hands.
And just as Death had taken the wand from the brother whom he had killed, the allegiance of the Elder Wand now laid with you.