A/n: This story is dedicated to DobbyRocksSocks. I hope you like it, Bex.

This was written for Round 2 of the Quidditch League Fanfiction Competition finals. My prompt as Keeper for the Falmouth Falcons was to take an overused cliché and be as original as possible with it. The cliché I had to work with was the Marriage Law, which I hate (yay). Hopefully I was able to pull it off.

All in the name of…

"It is our choices, Harry, that show what we truly are, far more than our abilities."

—Albus Dumbledore

He shivered as the cold clung to him. He could barely feel his extremities anymore, yet he continued to stand before the marble headstone, the brisk winter breeze unable to freeze his hollow heart. No longer did trivial things like the frost creeping up his toes or the numbness overcoming his senses bother him, for he had lost another one of the only people in this twisted world that had mattered to him.

Perhaps if he had done things differently—made different choices and walked down a different path—then, maybe things wouldn't have been the way they were. Then, maybe he wouldn't have had to live the life of a wanted man, all alone, with no one to lean on when his knees gave way and he fell to the ground.

-oOo-

He could feel the cold glares of the Wizengamot focused on him as he sat in the lone chair at the centre of the courtroom. He remained absolutely still as the Chief Warlock droned on, his words falling on deaf ears as Draco focused all his energy on not being sick.

After what seemed like an inordinately long time, there was the sharp sound of wood against wood, and he slowly raised his head to see that the Chief Warlock had slammed his gavel down, signalling that the final verdict had been decided. He felt numb fear spread through him as he broke out in cold sweat and closed his eyes, awaiting his fate.

Just as he heard the group of Aurors behind him shift, a familiar voice broke through the haze that surrounded him. He opened his eyes to lock gazes with a bespectacled, emerald-eyed wizard he knew all too well, and his heart began to race as Potter had what seemed like a rather heated conversation with the Chief Warlock.

After their brief, hushed argument, the old wizard glanced at the members of the council seated behind him and then turned towards to Draco, an almighty scowl on his face.

"The council finds Draco Malfoy…" He paused for effect, and the entire courtroom held its breath, awaiting the verdict that would determine the course of the wizarding world's, and his, future. "Not guilty."

There was a moment of absolute silence as the Warlock's words sunk in, followed by exclamations of outrage from several members of the council while several others whispered hurriedly among themselves.

He didn't have enough time to calm his rapidly beating heart or even rejoice, because the Warlock began to speak again. "Even so," the old wizard said over the chatter, "considering the nature of his crimes, he shall not be exempt from punishment."

"The punishment," the Warlock continued as the murmurs died down, "is that Mister Malfoy shall be the first to undertake the newly instituted Marriage Law to help repopulate wizarding Britain." The Warlock then frowned down at Draco and said, "You shall be informed of who your partner will be within a week's time. That is all."

Several members of the Wizengamot leaned down to speak with the Warlock, but he ignored them as he stepped away from the podium and turned to Potter. They exchanged a few more words, shook hands, and the two exited the courtroom. Draco slowly turned to meet his mother's eyes, needing to see the reassuring smile spread across her tear-stained cheeks before he could exhale the breath he hadn't realised he was holding.

One of the Aurors standing behind him tapped him on the shoulder, and he rose to his feet in slow motion, as though his limbs had forgotten how to perform their function. As he made his way to the exit, he couldn't ignore the voice in his head that kept repeating the fact that Harry Potter had saved his life yet again.

-oOo-

"This is simply preposterous."

He eyed his mother from over his teacup as she frowned down at the official letter that had just arrived from the Ministry, detailing who his betrothed would be.

"How uncouth, using this as a means to execute revenge," she spat, anger flashing in her dark eyes.

"Dare I ask?" his father murmured from the seat opposite his.

His mother sighed and handed over the letter, pinching the bridge of her nose to contain her irritation. His father skimmed the letter, expression growing darker, and he finally threw it down and said, "This is blasphemy! Which fool was allowed to make this decision?"

"It can't be all that terrible," Draco muttered as he picked up the letter and scanned its contents. As he saw the name of his betrothed-to-be, his eyes nearly popped out of his head. "Ginevra Weasley? What new form of cruelty is this?"

"This is ridiculous." His father began to pace. "I would go and speak with them, but—"

"You will do no such thing," his mother interrupted. "What I'm more concerned about is how the Weasleys allowed for this to happen. As though they haven't suffered enough at our hands already."

"Narcissa," his father hissed, but she ignored him as she turned to Draco.

"You must go speak with Harry Potter at once."

"What? Why? No!"

"Draco, this isn't the time to be stubborn," she said, her voice strained. "Ginevra Weasley is his girlfriend, if I'm not mistaken, yes?" Draco nodded. "Then all the more reason for you to speak with him! If he could help avert your Azkaban sentence, then he should be able to help with this, too."

He grit his teeth as he deliberated over that, but he was sure that Potter wouldn't want to talk to him. "He's going to be furious," Draco muttered, but his mother wouldn't hear it.

"You only have a few hours left before you're officially under house-arrest and can't have any visitors. I suggest you make full use of it," she said, and that was the end of it.

-oOo-

He wasn't entirely sure why Potter had agreed to see him, and he had half a mind to walk in with a shield charm up, but, since he didn't have access to his wand, he had no choice but to stride right in and hope his head wasn't blown off.

Potter was standing by the far window, hands in pockets, jaw clenched, and a murderous expression on his face. Draco was debating if he should turn around and walk back out when Potter looked up. Emerald eyes met silver ones, and Draco felt his stomach plummet as Potter stormed over to him.

He closed his eyes, ready for a punch or a shove, but the other man only grabbed him by the collar, pulled him close, and hissed, "I should kill you right now and save everyone the trouble."

Draco cleared his throat and held his hands up, waiting till Potter pushed him away to say in as calm a voice as possible, "While that would be the logical way to go about this, I don't think it's all that good an idea."

"Oh, yeah? And why not?" Potter demanded, eyes flashing angrily. "Here I am, trying to save your sorry arse because I know you wouldn't last one minute in Azkaban, and the next thing I know, you're off getting married to my girlfriend!"

"Trust me, if it were up to me, your girlfriend wouldn't be on the top of my list, either," Draco replied before he could stop himself, and took a step backwards when Potter glared at him. "Look, what I mean to say is that I didn't make this choice. If I had any say at all in the matter, it would be the two of you getting married, and I would be halfway across Scotland by now."

"Yeah, well, you should've thought of that before letting Voldemort imprint on you," Potter spat.

"I didn't have a choice," Draco replied, his voice low and tense, but Potter couldn't have cared less.

"Right, of course," he said, throwing his hands in the air as he began to pace. "You never had a choice. You were forced to do everything against your will—bullshit."

He rounded on Draco and jabbed him with a finger. "No, you did have a choice, and you chose to be the Death Eater's errand boy. You chose to not go to Azkaban and agreed to the Marriage Law. If your reasoning was right, then I would be dead, Voldemort would be ruling the world, and you would still be whimpering in a corner like the coward that you are!"

Potter was yelling by the end of his little speech, accentuating each of his points by jabbing at Draco, and by the end of it, the latter knew there was nothing he could say in defence, because everything Potter had accused him of was true.

"You're right," he said, head bowed. "And if there's anything I can do to make this situation any better for either you or the Weasleys, I would, but—"

"But you can't because you have no choice," Potter finished for him, the disgust clear in his voice. He turned away and walked back to the window, leaving Draco with a mammoth-sized knot in his stomach and crushing guilt weighing down on him.

Inhaling deeply, he strode over to where Potter was and stood a safe distance away. When the silence was too heavy to bear, he said quietly, "I would apologise, but I think that would only make you hex me to next May."

Potter snorted, still refusing to look at him, and in a final, desperate attempt, Draco asked, "What do the Weasleys have to say about all of this? If they were to refuse, I'm sure the Ministry would consider it, seeing how much they've done and everything."

Potter's expression changed to one of immense sadness, and Draco immediately regretted asking that question. After a long moment, the other man said, "They don't know about it."

Draco blinked. "Excuse me?"

"You heard me," Potter snapped. "They don't know!"

"Why not?"

"Because I insisted that I be the one to tell them!" He turned to Draco, eyes swimming with emotion. "How do you think they would react if I told them that their only daughter and sister would be taken away from them as punishment for their enemies' crimes and my pissing off the council by preventing your sentences? Especially after they just lost a son and brother because of said crimes?"

Draco swallowed thickly, his eyes burning. It was becoming harder to breathe, and the edges of his vision were clouding over, but he couldn't give up now. "If there was anyth—"

"Maybe you should just disappear." Potter shoved past him, and Draco stood staring at nothing till he heard the door slam shut. He winced and sank to the floor, wondering if his disappearing really would solve everybody's problems.

-oOo-

"Thank you for coming."

When Potter only glared at him in reply, he cleared his throat and said, "I didn't think you would come, after our previous…conversation."

"Neither did I," Potter said coldly. "But when I told the Aurors outside that I wanted to give you a piece of my mind, they willingly complied."

"Look," Draco began before Potter decided to walk back out the way he had come, "if the Ministry really isn't willing to change who my betrothed-to-be is—"

"They're not. I just got spat in the face before coming here."

"—then why not just go along with it?" he finished, holding up his hands before Potter pounced. "And by that I mean it would all be taken on face value, and the two of you can still be together, as long as—"

"As long as you can sleep with Ginny and get her pregnant?" Potter snapped, and Draco winced at his bluntness.

"No," he said slowly, "as long as you get her pregnant and let me legally claim the child as mine."

Potter scoffed, shaking his head. "And you actually thought this would make me want to hex you any less?"

Draco threw up his hands. "Look, I'm trying to find a solution, and this was the best I could come up with. The Manor is humongous; nobody would even know if you were to spend every other weekend here."

"Why is this starting to sound like you're the one doing me a favour?" Potter demanded.

"Because I have had enough of making your lives miserable, and it matters more to you than it does to me."

Potter's eyes darkened, and after a moment, he said, "Ginny's never going to agree to it. She has too much pride to not only marry the one man she hates in this world, but to also be a mistress on the side."

"Have you tried asking her?" Draco asked, insistent. When Potter averted his eyes, Draco frowned. "You still haven't told them, have you?" The guilty expression on the other man's face was answer enough. "Potter, our wedding is to be held in less than a month! When do you plan on breaking the news to her? When she's at the altar and sees that her husband-to-be is not you but me?"

"There will be no wedding," Potter snapped, emerald eyes ablaze. "You will sign a few papers to register your marriage, and never talk to each other for the rest of your lives."

Draco sighed, running a hand down his face. "In the end, the one to lose the most is Weas—Ginny. I don't think any of it matters, at this point."

The two were silent for a long moment before Draco asked, "What if I really do disappear?" When Potter frowned, he held his hands up and continued, "What if me and my family disappear for good? Then you can be with Ginny, and the Ministry will have its work cut out for it."

Potter scoffed. "Then it would seem like we planned it, and the whole process would happen all over again."

Draco bowed his head, out of ideas. "Then I don't know what to say to you."

"At this point, it would make more sense for the two of us to disappear and let everyone live their lives in peace." Potter shook his head. "I've already saved the world, and the council will be more than happy to be able to do as they please without having to listen to my demands."

Draco sighed. "That's probably the best idea we've had so far."

"Never thought there'd come a day when I conspire with you and the two of us actually agree on something," Potter muttered, making Draco scoff.

"Well, my reasons are more selfish than yours, anyway."

Potter eyed him, a myriad of thoughts and emotions swivelling in those emerald orbs of his, and he finally nodded. "Let's do it."

Draco did a double take. "What?"

"Let's disappear. You and I. Not forever, of course," he said after seeing the boggled expression on Draco's face. "Only until the Ministry has other, more pressing matters to deal with."

Draco shook his head slowly. "If me and my family leave, it's for good, Potter."

"Got any other ideas, then?" Potter sighed when Draco didn't reply. "I'll write Hermione, Ron, Ginny and the rest of the Weasleys letters explaining why I did what I did, then once everything's died down, Ginny and I can settle down somewhere and go about our lives, and you can…" he trailed off, gesturing vaguely.

Draco bowed his head. "I would rather die a stranger's death than that of a wanted criminal."

"It's decided, then."

Potter nodded and began to make his way out when Draco asked, "Why're you willing to go so far for someone like me?"

The other man paused and glanced over his shoulder, a strange expression shimmering in his eyes. "I don't know."

And he was gone.

-oOo-

"The Ministry's still looking for you," Harry said as he tossed the Prophet onto the table and came to sit beside him. "And they still think I'm in rehabilitation. Never thought I'd be thankful that people believed I was mentally ill."

Draco scoffed as he sipped his tea. Feeling Harry's gaze on his face, he turned to meet his eyes and asked, "What?"

Harry only shook his head. "All of this seems so surreal, when you actually think about it." He motioned to the townhouse they lived in and the sprawling front lawn that was now covered in snow.

"Really?" Draco asked as he finished his tea. "It doesn't really bother me."

"Liar." Harry stood and held out his hand. "I can feel the regret and guilt emanating from you every time I'm near you."

Draco shrugged as he took the outstretched hand and let Harry pull him up. "You've got to learn to live with the choices you've made. Besides, it wasn't until recently that you stopped being bitter about Ginny deciding to move on."

"I'm the one that insisted," Harry muttered, a faraway look in his eyes. "I couldn't ask her to put up with my selfishness forever—especially when she and her family were finally getting over everything."

Draco squeezed his hand before saying, "I wonder how everything would have turned out if we had done things differently."

"Dunno. But I have a feeling our paths would've crossed no matter what choices we made. They always have."

Draco smiled at that, and as they made their way into the house, he couldn't help but wonder how many times it was that Harry Potter had saved him, and would continue to save him, from falling into the abyss of despair.

-oOo-

He felt something warm wrap around his shoulders and looked up into emerald eyes and a kind smile as Harry said, "It's time."

Shaking his head, he eyed the headstone that had his parents' names etched into it in elegant writing, the surrounding snow giving an ethereal feel to it. He felt warm hands wrap around him and pull him to his feet. Harry dusted the snow from his hair and shoulders, and they stood staring at the tombstone for a long moment before Harry reached out and squeezed his fingers.

"It's time to go home, Draco."

A/n: I hate the fact that there's a word limit. I wish I could've written this better, but oh well.

Any thoughts and constructive criticism are always appreciated!

Thanks for reading.

Lots of love~

Arty xx