Disclaimer: This story is based on characters and situations created and owned by JK Rowling, various publishers including but not limited to Bloomsbury Books, Scholastic Books and Raincoast Books, and Warner Bros., Inc. No money is being made and no copyright or trademark infringement is intended. J.K.R is God. Don't sue, I'm broke from watching the movie 9 times already. I plead temporary insanity.

Author's note
Special thanks to Mizzy and IvyBlossom for being my angst muses. *hugs* I nearly killed myself writing this chapter. To think that the next few chapters are going to be even more angsty than this. I'm never going to make it. I swear this is the last time I allow plot bunnies to take over my mind. Will retire and go back to being complacent fic reader after this is over and done. Geez. Anyways, do download the song "Don't leave" by Faithless, I had it on repeat while writing this. Well, enjoy and don't kill me.

Dragons exist only in fairytales

Part 6

By Altricial

       

Hogwarts 7th Year

The sun was just beginning to rouse, leisurely stretching arms of rays in preparation to wake the world with its radiant encompassing warmth when Draco Malfoy was very rudely jolted out of his troubled slumber by a sudden draft of chilliness, as his cushiony shield was ripped off his body in one swift forceful motion.

"Go 'way, Crabbe." He curled himself tighter into fetal position, desperate for rest. He had sobbed himself to sleep the night before, glad that the day was over and hoping he'd never have to wake up.

"Get the fuck out of bed."

Draco's eyes flew open, all previous plague of fatigue gone in an instant, as he came face to face with the reason for his illogical wish to never see daylight again. As blood-shot grey eyes met fiery green, Draco was rendered speechless and powerless. He sat up slowly and awaited his foreboding doom.

"What the fuck is the meaning of this, Draco?"

A flimsy sheet of parchment paper slapped him across the face and fluttered to the bed. Draco stared down at the smudged crimson words bleeding on the fallen paper. He didn't pick it up. He didn't have to. He knew what it was; he'd written it last night. And there was nothing more to say.

"Don't dare to read what you've written, is that it? Here," The letter was snatched off the bed. "Let me read it for you. 'I love you, Harry. Goodbye.' How very thoughtful of you, Malfoy, informing me of a breakup via a five-word letter. Don't you have anything else to add? Talk, you bastard. I deserve a fucking explanation."

Merely five words but it had taken him everything and more to pen it down. The moment he had shakily slipped the note under the blankets of its intended reader, Draco understood what it meant to be cursed with a fate worse than death. He'd felt the intensity of a phantom hand tearing through his ribcage, ripping out his sodden heart and crushing it pitilessly to oblivion.

Still not saying a word, Draco reached over to his night table and retrieved another crumpled parchment from the drawer. He handed it over to his irate intruder, his fingers trembling against his will, suddenly glad that he hadn't destroyed the letter in his rage the night before. He waited for a reaction.

Harry opened the thoroughly rutted letter and read the three simple words that were powerful enough to force the first brick down from a crumbling wall. 'Break it off.' An icy lump formed at the back of his throat as he tried to swallow the impending realisation of what was to come. Lucius Malfoy. He knew.

"He knows." Draco finally spoke, his voice hoarse and thickened by remorse. "I'm sorry." Harry looked down at the pale boy and his heart softened. He looked so...defeated and he truly was sorry. Clutching the parchment in his hand, Harry sat down on the bed next to Draco. Close enough to touch yet distant. So near yet so far. He sensed something precious was slipping away right in front of him. He placed Lucius's letter next to the other and reached out blindly for Draco.

The raven-haired boy touched his fingers gently to his love, yearning to entwine their fingers and souls in an unbreakable bond. All the nerve-endings within his body awoken and boiling, screaming for completion in a single contact of flesh-to-flesh, heart and soul. But before he could close his hold over what was his, Draco recoiled away hastily, as if burnt by the intensity of a simple touch. "Don't." He choked out. "Please don't."

"Don't what, Draco?" Acid poured out from his words, anger rising once again, emerging within depths of masked insecurities. "Don't touch you? Don't love you? Tell me what the fuck you don't want, Draco. Me?" Harry lurched off the bed, grabbing the two pieces of parchment papers with him and drew himself up to his full height.

He crushed the letters firmly in his hand and glowered down at Draco's gravely white face. "Talk," He commanded, his wavering restraint evident. "Fucking talk to me, Draco! Is this it?" He unfolded the letters and waved them in front of the other boy. "Just three words is enough for you to write me a fucked up five word breakup letter. Just three words and you're willing to throw away everything we've ever had. Just one night is all you need to stop loving me. How dare you..." His voice quavered, exhaustion roughened his words. His hands drooped back down resignedly to his sides. Purpose was a forsaken thought, lost behind a mountain of fatigue. "How could you stop..."

"I couldn't," Draco murmured, not daring to lift his chin to meet the eyes of foreseeable hatred. "I didn't," A whisper chained down by affirmations of love left unsaid. "But I have to." His own words rang in his ears and numbed his senses with the stabbing echoes of loss emitting from his broken, pulsating heart. "Please try to understand, Harry. He's my father."

"Fuck that, Draco. Your father?" Harry flung the ill-fated letters back at the other dejected teen. "Big fucking deal. What do you want me to understand? Tell me what the fuck I have to try to understand! That I mean nothing to you next to your precious Lucius? Is that what I have to understand?" The weight of his words sank and his face crumbled in disbelief.

"That Malfoys may have the riches to buy the world but never enough to control our own destiny. I'm sorry," Draco slumped back against the pillows, his breathing shallow and urgent, stubbornly refusing to look into the same green eyes that once made his existence whole. "Just go, Harry. Don't make this any harder for me."

"Harder for you?!" Harry launched forward, grabbing the other boy by the collars of his nightshirt. "What about me? Do you think about me at all? Why do I have no say in this, you selfish jerk?" Tears burned from the corners of his emerald eyes and he choked out a strangled sob, "I fucking love you, Draco. How could you just destroy everything we've had because of your fucked up preoccupation with being a Malfoy?!"

Harry loosened his grip on the collars and brought his hands downwards, drawing tender caresses on Draco's neck. He leaned in, brushing his cheek against the silver strands, memorising the unique minty smell of Draco for one last time. "I'm only at the start of loving you..."

Draco closed his eyes and allowed himself to wrap his arms painfully tight around Harry's neck. He prayed for the world to end that very instant, with his lover in his embrace, with his heart in one piece; but it didn't. Brushing his lips against the scarred forehead, he whispered the first and only promise he'd ever keep, "I'll always love you, Harry." And he pushed him away.

A pair of watery green eyes looked back up at him from where they had fallen, marred by hurt and confusion, and Draco drowned in guilt. He was exhausted. He was in pain. The emotional strength he'd mastered to shove Harry away, from where he really wanted him, had hurt him immeasurably more than the reproach pouring from his lover's eyes. And in that very moment, Draco hated Lucius Malfoy.

He watched as Harry picked himself up from the bedroom floor. He felt sick. Internal conflicts wrecking havoc through his turbulent mind, edging him to follow his heart, to fight for the only thing he ever wanted and had, to surrender to the torrents of true love. But blood ran thicker than water. His unfounded loyalty to his family and the years of desperate need for acceptance from his father won over his ongoing struggle between love and pride.

"I need to be a Malfoy. It's who I am, I can't change that, neither can you." He pushed himself wearily off the bed and draped his robes over his shoulders. "You may be The Boy Who Lived but you can't save me from my own blood. Just like you can't trade in your infamous scar for the lives of your parents. It's one thing to dream and quite another to believe in them. That's life, Harry. Reality does not disappear just because you can't stomach it."

He picked up his wand and stood face-to-face with the boy he lived for, numbly reciting the speech he'd been miserably practicing the night before. "And from now on, you lead your path of righteousness, basking in the light and glory, and I'll walk in the opposite direction where underhanded power and unimaginable riches awaits me." He tore his eyes away from the other boy. With his head held high and a rock-bottom soul, he moved purposefully towards the door. "Goodbye Harry, may we never meet again."

"Draco Jaden Malfoy, don't you even dare step out of that door." Gryffindors never give up without a fight, even if they had to risk it all. And Harry knew, if there was one chance in hell to make things right again; this is a risk worth dying for. "Do you think I'd just let you walk out of my life like that? I thought you knew me, Draco. I don't care what you think and I definitely don't care what Lucius thinks. We can make this work, Draco, it doesn't have to be this way."

Draco stopped in mid-stride and turned back to face Harry, grey depths awash with futile passion. "Yes it has to be, it has to be this way. I wished I had a choice, Harry, but shadows and light can't exist together. We can't help who we are."

"What are we, Draco?" A heart-wrenching plea for a glimmer of hope.

"Over."

Nothing could have prepared them for the multitude of grief that overpowered the pair of star-crossed lovers in that split second, drowning them, breaking them, embedding them with scars destined to haunt them till their dying breath. Faced with their darkest fear, both rendered helpless. This moment hadn't held any element of surprise, they knew one day Lucius would find out and everything they've built would be torn apart by mocking hands of destiny. Still, knowing didn't serve to reduce the vile stinging after-taste when stripped of the safety net between nightmares and reality. But Harry fought on.

"Fuck that bullshit. Everyone has a choice; not making one is a choice in itself. But you chose to run at the drop of a hat. I suppose you'll be getting the Dark Mark now? To join your dear father in kissing Voldemort's feet?" He scoffed, lashing out his pent up frustrations. "I wish I could say I'm surprised, but I'm not. Not in the slightest bit. You've always hidden behind your Father, letting him dictate your life. I was stupid enough to believe in us. I thought you got over it. I thought you wouldn't turn back to being just a Malfoy, and stay with being Draco."

His voice dropped to an anguished whisper, "Being my Draco." For the first time he noticed the tears shining, unshed, in Draco's eyes. But Harry was hurting bad and now he wanted him to ache like he ached. His face hardened and shot a glare at Draco. " But I was wrong. You're weak, Malfoy, don't even confuse that with pride. Weakness. That's what you've always been."

The words slapped him hard across the face, digging into his stinging wound. But he decided an angry Harry was easier to deal with than a heartrending one. He was used to being a disappointment. And so he played the game, "At least I'm not a bloody hypocrite, Potter. You say I build my Father up on a pedestal? At least he has something to be proud of - a beautiful manor, the perfect wife. And power. Real power. Your parents, however? The ones you idolised into puppets of perfection? Here's the thing, Harry." He spat the name out like poison. "They got killed. That's weakness. They got killed, and Voldemort survived. Who's the stronger of the two?"

"Don't fucking drag me into your self-pitying act, Malfoy." Harry reeled with bitter unrestrained rage. "I know my parents are dead, no chance of resurrection whatsoever, didn't need you to remind me. But I live with it. Your parents are still more alive than they deserved to be and yet you behave like they're not, worshipping their every word like a pathetic spineless slave." He laughed grimly. "I'm sure you've made Lucius proud. Not many pretentious scumbags can say they've had a son who fucked the famous Harry Potter. Just like I'm sure you wouldn't have even laid eyes on me if I weren't The Boy Who Lived."

That hurt. It really did. Draco stared wild-eyed at Harry, not believing his ears. Harry had doubted his love. The only thing he'd ever had and given from the very core of his soul, torn to shreds by the boy he loved. It hurt. But the play must go on.

"I'm no more of a slave than you are, Potter." He lifted his wand and pointed it towards the door. "Accio Harry's photo album!" A brown worn dragon-hide bounded book came sailing through the air and Draco deftly caught it with his free hand. He thumbed the pages and flipped the album open. A photograph of a dark-haired bespectacled man and his wife with hair the colour of autumn cooing a messy-haired gleeful baby boy who was hugging a caramel-coloured Puffskein, lay upon the random page. He closed the album with a loud snap and held it up in front of Harry.

"Recognise this?" Draco sneered, a sinister gleam veiled over his stormy greys. "Of course you do. You sleep with it under your pillow every fucking night, don't you? Who's the pathetic slave here, Potter? Who is the worshipping fool? Idolising the parents he never had, crawling after memories of people he didn't even know? Who's the fucking hypocrite lecturing me about my priorities? You have no goddamn right to judge me for what you are!"

"Give it here, Malfoy." Harry closed the distance between them and reached for his album in blind panic.

"No," He shoved the struggling boy roughly away and held the photo album out of reach. "You know what? Perhaps I should help you face up to reality faster by putting your meaningless memories back where they fucking belong!"

There will come a time in life when one is faced with making a choice between right and wrong, to take the path towards the light or to go down the road of self-destruction. A wrong decision or a right one, it can't be that hard. But the second the word left his tongue, Draco knew he'd taken the wrong one, "Erado!" And it was gone. The wretched photo album exploded in flames. Ashes to ashes, dust to dust.

Draco stared at Harry in unfathomable magnitude of horror as realisation dawned upon him. What has he done? He felt his insides crushed into infinite self-revulsion as he saw Harry kneeled down and collapsed next to the pile of sorry debris of his deplorable mistake. "Harry, I didn't- I'm-"

"Get the fuck out of my sight."

Harry scooped the vestiges from whatever remained of his only link to his haven in the past and stood up. Draco raised a hand only to let it fall away at his side. The weight of his shadow was enough to drag him down as he slumped to the floor. He could only watch as Harry squared his shoulders and walked out of the room. And then he was gone. And he was all alone.

Two lost souls once again lonely, forever broken on the day the glitter died out.

The days that followed could have been very sufficiently summed up as hell. Draco and Harry had given up on food and sleep; stealing rueful glances at each other during Potions classes was the only thing they really had any proactive participation in. Each feeling a jolt of faith whenever a look was reciprocated followed by an excruciating pang of despair as either broke the gaze, turning away in mulish pride. Their friends were not the least pleased.

In fact, Hermione lost her head one day after Professor Snape had taken ten points off Gryffindor (because she was a "waste of space") and slammed Harry against an unlucky wall, attacking him with a tediously long speech she had been dying to throw at her sulky zombie-impersonating best friend, "Harry, I'm going to say this whether or not you want to listen. Go talk to Draco. You know you want to. I'm not siding him but the sight of Draco in tears can melt hearts of steel. He's sorry, Harry. You know he is. You are just too much of a stubborn git to admit it. And he and his idiotic Malfoy pride. Honestly, you two are the biggest fools of this century and the next."

Harry looked down listlessly at his feet, no intention of giving a justified response. Hermione was relentless. "Don't throw away your chance of a happy-ever-after for fragments of the past, Harry. It's not worth it. Your parents love you. So does Draco. But only one of them can be really here for you. Your pride is a small price to pay for the course of this once in a lifetime love. This is the fairytale you've taught me to believe me. Destroy it and I'll never believe a word from you again."

Hermione never believed a word from him again.

Graduation week couldn't have arrived fast enough. The whole of Hogwarts went into a yearbook signing frenzy, everyone hunting down everyone else for a piece of token to remember the best days of their lives. Ron had very discreetly stolen Draco's yearbook and slipped it into Harry's book bag. Hermione had done the same with Harry's to Draco.

Harry took out a pendent in the shape of the Neptune sign from his side drawer and broke it into equal halves. 'Our dreams, fantasies and yearnings are born on the planet Neptune. It represents everything we cannot see or touch,' Professor Trelawney had said during the only Divination class Harry had paid attention in. He scribbled a quick note in the book, which was already filled with autographs from his fellow Slytherins with various encouragements for world domination, and sandwiched one half of the pendent among the pages.

'Always, Harry.'

His missing yearbook mysteriously turned up on his bed the night before graduation day. Harry nervously flipped through the pages in search of a trace of the only person who still meant the world to him. Then he saw it.

'Malfoys love for life. Still yours, Draco.'

And they never saw each other again.

Until today.

"Harry, if you keep missing turns I'll never make it back home in time for Christmas."

I looked out of the car window through the frosty February rain and spotted a road sign. Indeed, I missed the last turning again. But what he didn't know is that I've chosen to take the long route. "Sorry, wasn't concentrating," I lied. I don't want this journey to ever end.

Like sandcastles by the shore, this beautiful moment would soon come to pass. The transient beauty of bittersweet tales from hearts that once glowed with love. Torn apart by fate, reunited by chance. But this time, I'm keeping my sandcastle. For as long as fate allows.

"It's ok." Draco cracked a tiny hint of a smile at my reflection in the rear mirror.

I glanced back at my last passenger of the night and returned the smile, tears pricking at the corners of my eyes. Dumbledore once told me, "Never look down if you're trying not to cry." So I tilted my face up towards the starless night, wondering how a love so strong could have gone so wrong. Strange how laughter looks like crying with no sound, raindrops taste like tears without the pain.

Tonight, just tonight, I plead, let the glitters live again.

In a sandcastle where shadows and light exist as one.

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