Author Notes – This is the beginning of a new fic that I'm writing, and the pairing this time is Draco and Harry (because every Harry Potter slash writer has do at least one, right?). For those who read my other series, I intend to continue Signs and Wonders but am taking a break because I want to take some time to think about where exactly the story is going. Meanwhile, I thought I'd try something a bit different, and this fic is set ten years after the Battle of Hogwarts. I hope that people enjoy the start of this story. It was a challenging opening to write but I'm happy with the way that it turned out. Please review and share, follow and favourite as well, as it all helps with the motivation. It's good karma as well.

Additional Note – The title of this fic, Blue Divide, is taken from the name of an album of one of my favourite musicians, the folk artist Richard Shindell. His songs provide me a great deal of inspiration.

Rating – T (There will be more adult content later).

Disclaimer – I did not create the Harry Potter universe sadly. That privilege will forever remain with JK Rowling.

CHAPTER ONE

A Night-Time Visitor

Ten years. Ten years since the world changed. Ten years since I changed. I sometimes think that those of us who survived have seen it all. In many ways I've been dreading this day. It brings back all the memories of the people we lost, the sacrifices we made in order to defeat Voldemort. I don't need reminding of all the people who gave their lives to protect me. I see them in my dreams all the time. Mum and Dad, Sirius, Dumbledore, Remus and Tonks, Fred, and all the others. I try to tell myself it was worth it, but that seems like a pretty delusion. Who would have guessed that the triumph of good over evil would come at such a cost? But I suppose that's kind of point isn't it?

They diagnosed me once I remember. About seven years ago, I couldn't focus on my work, I wasn't eating properly, I wasn't sleeping. Ginny was worried of course. I went to St Mungo's and they diagnosed me with delayed post-traumatic stress disorder. They gave me a whole load of potions that seemed to deal with the symptoms, but the bouts of depression have come and gone ever since. Even after they promoted me to Head of the Auror Office it didn't go away. I guess I'm still searching for answers, even after all this time.

Harry looked over at the clock on the wall of his office, and saw that it was two minutes to midnight. He glanced back down at his diary and saw that the ink had smudged a little on the last sentence. He sighed, opened one of the drawers to his left, removed a clean quill, and scratched out the offending sentences. He then set about rewriting it, and found that the words came out exactly the same way as the first time. It was clear that there was some feelings in there that needed to escape.

One minute to midnight now. In a little under sixty seconds it would be exactly ten years since the Battle of Hogwarts. They were having a commemoration, of course. He would be travelling to Hogwarts the next morning. There would speeches, ceremony, and a lot of laughter and tears, he expected. He would be required to say a few words. He had spent most of the evening trying to come up with the right thing to say, but his usual way with words had not been forthcoming this time. As that didn't seem to be working, he had decided to write an entry in his diary, hopeful that expressing how he was feeling about the whole occasion might make it a little easier to find the right turn of phrase. It hadn't.

He had only remembered about the event that afternoon when his secretary had reminded him. Clearly he was trying to put the whole thing out of his mind. He remembered the quizzical look she had given him when he told her to expect him early in the next morning. "But sir," she had said. "You're not in the office tomorrow. You've got the ceremony at Hogwarts. You know, the one commemorating the Battle of Hogwarts."

"Of course," he had replied, trying to stop the sinking feeling he had experienced his stomach from registering on his face. "I remember now. How could I forget?" He had looked at her with sudden interest. "You didn't fight in the Battle, did you Sarah?"

"No sir," she had said quickly. "I was only in third-year at the time. They evacuated us to Hogsmeade before the Battle started. My parents came and took me away before I could come back to the castle after it had finished."

"You didn't miss much," Harry had said with a small smile. "I can only apologise that nothing as interesting has happened in the Auror Office since I took over. And I thought I told you about calling me 'sir'."

"Sorry Harry. Your predecessor always insisted on me calling him 'sir'."

"Yes but he was a twat, so you needn't worry."

"I couldn't possibly comment."

Harry grinned, remembering the exchanges. He tried hard not to disrespect his predecessor as Head of the Auror Office, but the man had been so obnoxious during the hand-over period, it was difficult for Harry to feel anything other than contempt for the man. Jonathan Powell had made it very clear that he resented handing over the office to someone as young and "inexperienced" as Harry. But the Minister for Magic had insisted. Harry wouldn't much have liked to be in the meeting where Shacklebolt explained to Powell that he had been running the department for far too long and it was well past time that he retired.

Harry had spent the last twelve months as Head of the Auror Office. And yet sometimes it felt like he had barely scratched the surface of what was really going on within the Ministry of Magic. He had dedicated a lot of the year to trying to sort out the bureaucratic mass that the Department had become, and finally give the Aurors a little of the autonomy that they had been craving for so long. It wasn't easy to catch dark wizards when you were head to foot in paperwork, a complaint that Harry had a great deal of sympathy for. He had tried to reform the systems of checks and balances to make sure that the Aurors couldn't go round killing people's innocent grandmothers for looking at them the wrong way, yes, but were also not hamstrung in their attempts to catch those followers of Voldemort who had not been apprehended at the end of the War. These reforms had made him very popular.

Now that he had the respect of the witches and wizards that worked under him, the next task was to reform the Department so that it was better able to cope with the problems of the twenty-first century. Dark wizard detection had changed substantially in the ten years since the fall of Voldemort, but Harry couldn't help feeling that the techniques used by the Aurors were stuck in the past. He believed that it was time to make use of the better working relationship that had been established between the wizarding and Muggle governments. Greater co-operation between the two would make apprehending these dark wizards a great deal easier, and mean that Harry could go home in the evening occasionally.

The clock struck midnight. Harry reached forward and grabbed the calendar that he kept on his desk. He ripped the page that read '1 May' from the stack to reveal the next page underneath. It was now 2 May 2007. Ten years since the Battle of Hogwarts. He sighed, and put the calendar back on his desk. In a few hours he would have to make his way to his old school, to face all those people who had lost family and friends protecting him.

He was snapped out of his reverie by a sudden knock at the door. He looked up surprised. Surely there was no one else still at the Ministry at this time of night. He glanced round the office. It was hardly what you might call presentable at this time. There were piles of parchment strewn across the desk, and the filing cabinet was crooked and several of the drawers were open.

It was at this moment that it occurred to him that someone was knocking at his door in the middle of the night, and here he was worrying about how presentable his desk was. He remembered that, as the Head of the Auror Office and the man responsible for the fall of Lord Voldemort, he was something of a target for dark wizards. But, then again, in his considerable experience, homicidal maniacs intend on killing him didn't tend to knock first. He decided to play it safe and took his wand from his robes, pointing at the door.

"Come in!" he commanded loudly. There was a moment's silence, as though his visitor was considering his request, and then the door to his office opened.

The man standing on the threshold of his office was probably one of the last people Harry expected to be visiting him at midnight in the Ministry of Magic. It had been many years since he had last seen Draco Malfoy, but it looked, if anything, longer for the Slytherin. He looked haggard and tired, as though he had not had a good night's sleep in some time. But he still had his striking features, and his sleek blond hair. Although, Harry noted, he now had a dark beard to accompany it. Harry would never admit it to Malfoy, of course, but this new facial hair actually suited him. Malfoy was carrying a dark brown satchel, that was dangling from his left shoulder. Making a split-second decision, Harry lowered his wand.

"Well, well, well," said Harry. "This is a surprise."

"Believe me, I'm as surprised as you are Potter. Can I come in?"

Harry considered this for a moment. It was true that, over the years, his anger at Draco Malfoy had dissipated somewhat since the Battle of Hogwarts, but seven years of enmity and hostility were hard to just move on from immediately. Even if he could never admit it in public, there was still a large part of him that despised the man standing in front of him. Despised him for every attempt to make Harry's life a misery, despised him from every insult he threw at Harry's best friends. But, Harry reminded himself, thinking about his own father, people can change from when they're children. And in the end, Malfoy had played a part, however small, in the downfall of Voldemort, and Harry was grateful for that.

"It's very late," he said in the end. "But why not? Come in and sit down."

Harry could have sworn that Malfoy almost smiled as he closed the door behind, moved across the room, and sat down in the chair on the opposite side of his desk. "Nice place you've got here," said Malfoy, gesturing to one of the untidy stacks of parchment on Harry's desk. "It's bright, gaudy, and depressing. Very much like your home in Gryffindor tower."

"Yes," Harry shot back. "I apologise for the lack of chains. It must be difficult to see me in such an environment after my brief stay at Malfoy Manor all those years ago."

Malfoy looked like he was ready to retort himself, but he just opened his mouth and closed it again. There was a moment's silence. "Isn't it strange," said Malfoy in the end. "How quickly we've fallen into this pattern again. It seems that whenever we come near each other, we can't help but fall back into our old points-scoring routine."

Harry considered this for a second. It was true that some of the old anger that he felt towards Malfoy had flared again at the sight of him. "It's different now," he said.

"How so?" asked Malfoy.

"This time I've got one hundred and twenty highly trained and extremely dangerous Aurors that work for me, and are willing to do whatever I tell them. I win every argument we have as a result."

There was a moment's silence and then Malfoy actually laughed. To Harry this was simply remarkable, Malfoy was laughing at something that he had said. "A fair point. I didn't come here to argue with you anyway. I came to ask you for something."

"Is that so?" asked Harry, the sarcasm that he was clearly displaying in his voice disguising the interest that this statement had roused in him. "And what could you possibly want with me? We've never exactly been friends."

"No, we've never been friends," agreed Malfoy, shaking his head slightly. "And we probably never will be. There's far too much history between us."

There was another moment of silence. "What is it that you want?" asked Harry in the end.

"We've all changed a lot in the last few years," said Malfoy. "It's been a very hard time. You know that I lost my father a few months ago."

"Yes," replied Harry. "I read about it in the Daily Prophet. I'm...sorry." He said that because that was what you were supposed to say about such things, but the reality was that Harry struggled to summon up a huge amount of sympathy for the man. The only way he could was by concentrating on the fact that he had had a wife and child, and the help that they had given Harry in his final struggle with Voldemort.

"Thank you," said Malfoy. "I kind of figured that you would understand what it's like. I've spent a lot of the last few weeks sorting out my father's affairs. And it occurs to me that I never thanked you for what you did to keep him out of Azkaban. We both know that without your testimony in favour of him, the Wizengamot would have found him guilty."

"I don't need your thanks," said Harry, resenting the painful memories that Malfoy's words stirred in him. Those few months following Voldemort's death had been difficult ones. A lot of people had lost a great deal, and trying to pick up the pieces and put lives back together had been a terrible struggle "I didn't do what I did for his benefit, or for yours. I just thought that enough families had been torn apart. There was no need to add more."

"You might not need my thanks," replied Malfoy. "But it's there anyway."

Harry looked Malfoy straight in the eyes. It was clear that this was not the main reason why he had come to Harry's office in the dead of night. "Was there something else you wanted?"

"Yes," replied Malfoy, looking away from Harry, and around the office once more. "I've been doing a lot of thinking recently. About the War, about the mistakes that I made during it, about the people that died because of those mistakes." Harry waited patiently during this speech. It was clear that Malfoy was trying to avoid saying what it was. "Basically, the bottom line is that I want to start making up for those mistakes. I want a job."

Whatever Harry had been expecting Malfoy to ask of him, this was not it. "A job?"

Malfoy nodded. "You're a man with a long and dangerous past Potter. I wasn't on the right side during those times. I hope to be in the future. I hope to do better."

"Why?"

"Because I learned during the War that it's almost impossible to tell who the enemy is. I had always trusted my family more than anything, but after all the things that they did in the name of the Dark Lord, I didn't know if I really knew who they were anymore. But I've always known who you are. And I respect that. I want to help you."

Silence fell between them again. A moment later, Harry reached forward and opened one of the drawers on his desk. He withdrew a bottle of fire-whiskey and two glasses. "Drink?" he asked. Malfoy nodded, and Harry poured two measures of the amber liquid and passed one of them to Malfoy, holding the other in his right hand.

"It's an interesting proposition," said Harry. He had been taken totally by surprise by Malfoy's request, so much so that he had completely forgotten about all the other things that had been bothering him. This new intriguing mystery now had his complete attention. "I would have thought that the last thing in the world you wanted to do was work for me."

"Maybe a long time ago," replied Malfoy. "But times change. And so do I."

Harry thought for a moment. There was no doubt that Malfoy was one of the most magically gifted of their generation, perhaps second only to Hermione Granger. If he was part of the Auror Office, he would no doubt a highly valuable asset. But there were years of anger and resentment simmering away at the back of Harry's head.

"I'm sorry Malfoy," he said in the end. "But I don't think you working for me is a good idea."

"Why not?"

"Because I can't trust you." Malfoy opened his mouth, clearly to protest this statement, but Harry held up his hand. "Please, let me finish. I don't doubt what you say. About having changed and all that. But you're still the same person. You've still got all that greed and ambition that you had when I knew you before. I can't guarantee that that side of you won't flare up at the worst possible time."

"That's not me anymore. You've got to believe that."

"I can't," replied Harry. "It's been a long time since we saw each other. But you're still Draco Malfoy. Until you can prove to me, tangibly, that you've changed, I can't take that sort of risk." Harry was choosing his words very carefully, not wanting to cause Malfoy to fly off the handle. Contrary to what others might have expected, the last thing he wanted to do was to hurt the Slytherin's feelings too badly.

"How am I supposed to prove to you that I've changed?" asked Malfoy, a faint hint of desperation in his voice. It was clear that this was not the reaction he had wanted.

"I don't know Malfoy," said Harry honestly. "But until you can, I can't risk you working for me. I'm sorry."

Malfoy looked at him for a moment, and then looked away. He downed the whiskey in his glass, set it back down on the desk and stood up. "I understand," he said tersely. "Stupid of me to even ask."

"I don't resent you asking," said Harry, also standing up. "You're an incredibly talented wizard Malfoy. You can do anything you set your mind to. You don't need to work for me."

"Maybe you're right," replied Malfoy. "I just thought, after everything we'd been through..."

"I understand." Malfoy nodded and started to walk towards the door. As he opened it to leave, Harry couldn't resist saying, "The beard suits you by the way."

Malfoy turned and smiled slightly. "Thanks. Father would never had let me get away with growing a beard, but as he's not around anymore, I thought I'd try it out."

Malfoy walked out of Harry's office, closing the door behind him. Harry sat back down at his desk, taking a deep breath. The encounter with Malfoy had left him a little rattled. He had a nasty feeling of guilt in his stomach. Perhaps he had been too harsh on his old rival. Perhaps what he said about having changed was all true. He certainly sounded like he meant it.

Harry looked at the clock once more. It was now half past midnight. He sighed heavily. He still hadn't made any progress on the speech that he was supposed to be giving at Hogwarts. He supposed that he should go home to try and work on it there. But the thought of returning home didn't fill him with much joy either. It was not a particularly welcoming place to be anymore. Finally deciding on a course of action, he stood up, tucking the bottle of whiskey back inside the drawer of his desk, and walked slowly out of his office.

Harry apparated just outside his own front door. He looked around quickly to check that no one had seen him appear from thin air in the street. But, as one would expect at this time of night, there was no one around in the leafy little village in Hampshire that Harry now lived in. His Muggle friends were always impressed when he told them that he commuted to London every day, but of course he was holding back the key bit of information that his commute was shorter than all of theirs, even if they worked just down the road.

He took his keys from his jacket pocket and opened the front door. The house, as always, was dark and empty. He turned the light on in the hall and looked around. It was clear that the cleaner had been that day, as Harry never left it looking this tidy. He guessed it was a symptom of once having been confined to a cupboard under the stairs, but he had no sense of cleanliness or perspective when it came to big, open spaces, and this three-bed detached house in the countryside certainly counted as a big and open space.

He walked into the kitchen to pour himself a glass of water. He looked at the wall opposite the door and saw that a picture that he had recently taken down was back in its place. Clearly the cleaner had been confused by its absence and, assuming that it had been moved by accident, had put it back. The reality was, of course, that Harry had moved the picture quite deliberately to somewhere where he would not see it. He walked over to it and took it down from the wall again, making a mental note to remind the cleaner not to put it up again. He looked at it for a moment, and the face of Ginny Weasley frowned back up at him, before tucking it away in one of the drawers beside the oven. The last thing he needed right know was a reminder of that particular aspect of his past.

Pouring himself that glass of water, he retreated into the living room and lit the fire with a wave of his wand. Settling down in his favourite armchair, he tried again to get inspiration for the speech that he would have to deliver in a very few hours time. He stared at the piece of parchment for several minutes, thinking hard. Then, he reached into his robes, withdrew his quill and a bottle of ink, and began to write, thinking about his diary entry.

Ten years. Ten years since the world changed. Ten years since I changed.