A picture sits on many mantle pieces, eight teenagers sit together on the green grass of a school field, they smile and laugh at the camera and each other. If it weren't for the serpents on their robes, no one could know they weren't Gryffindors. They were just teenagers, what was the difference?

Pansy, Draco, Millicent, Theodore, Daphne, Vincent, Gregory, Blaise. If you wanted to work it out, you would see that they're not heartless. Three of them were marked. Draco, Theodore, Vincent. Did they want to be? Maybe they did. Did they have the option not to want to be? No they didn't. Death eater fathers branded their sons, and everyone died for them.

Vincent was killed last.
Theodore was the first fallen.

Theo didn't stand a chance against the world. His father was elite, high in the circles around the Dark Lord. A powerful father, with only one son, one heir. His dark magic and iron will gave his son the mark even before Voldemort's wand.
A seventeen year old, smart, but not that smart, was sent to war. Really, with only six years of magic, and none of it lethal, he didn't stand a chance. Even if he had been willing to kill.

Daphne didn't recover. No one expected her to. She didn't even make it to the funeral. Everyone tried their best for her, but only Theo's best would've been good enough for her. It was better that way, the way she died. He would've disagreed, he would've wanted her alive. But she had had a heart, she couldn't take her classmates mocking her over her love's death. None of those good little Gryffs even stopped to think that it had been them who killed Daphne, even if the knife had been in her hand.

Vincent's death was horrible. There are those who say he earned it, but he had less hope than Theodore. Theodore at least had had a brain. Vince didn't have a girlfriend, so who died for him? Have you ever said their names apart, Crabbe and Goyle, they were like one person. More like Crabbe&Goyle than one separate person. People pity George for losing his half; no one cared about Gregory for losing his, or wrote about what became of him. George had a support network for his rough times, Gregory had a hate network. It was the opposite thing to George so it produced the opposite result. George lived.

No one but the eight, the four now, knew why they cared about the two. Outside eyes had seen a mindless lackey for the two, cruel and stupid. And they had been stupid, well, they certainly weren't smart. But Greg was funny and kind and sweet like no one else knew. And Vince told the best jokes, always made sure everyone else had the best time. They always did.

Gregory had had a girlfriend, but no one cared about either of them so Millicent was spared Daphne's torment. She was stronger than Daphne too, stronger than anyone. The three remaining were lost when they saw her cry. No one else would ever see it. They would see the heart rate monitor's little zigzag lines of her heartbeat slow and stop, settling to a long straight line as her large heart gave up. Internal injuries the report said, it didn't say where she got them. It didn't want to know.

Three were left. Draco and Pansy and Blaise.

Not for long.

Those three were the strongest, the most resilient. They already knew how to put up with being hated and trashed in every paper, by every mouth.

Blaise coped with a very long succession of one night stands. They kept his heart hard so that it would not soften and he could not hurt. He built up a successful business (that was never traced to him, no one would buy his products if it had been) and turned his mother's millions into billions.

Draco and Pansy coped together. Draco took over his father's interests and built them up, slowly and laboriously. Pansy was there for him, but it was hard. Draco had endured people all his life, whispering (and not always being so quiet) about his father, about how they were both evil bastards and cold hearted scum. Pansy hadn't. It hurt her, bit her, dug into her. She was falling apart and breaking Draco too.

No one ever found out what happened to her. One day, she just vanished. She left a note, it explained, apologised, begged to be forgiven, demanded to be forgotten, then ended.

Draco followed her instructions, but refused to forget. His hard heart became bulletproof. His business soared, he married something pretty and had a child. He watched that child leave home for school, thinking about his blonde hair. His child should have had dark hair, jet black hair and chocolate eyes. But both he and Astoria were blonde with blue eyes. There was no way Astoria's child would look like the only person he could love.

That night, Draco met up with Blaise for the first time in twelve years. After Pansy had vanished, he had cut away from everything. All her clothes burned, her contacts severed. But now he met with Blaise.

"I've lived my life. I've done everything I need." He said to his only friend.

"I've been waiting for you to say that for seventeen years." Came the reply.

"What now?"

"I don't know about you, but I rather miss Theodore."