Madam Pomfrey was sent to check on Brogan and Draco the next morning, when she found the two teens (fully dressed) and cuddled up, silvery tear tracks on their cheeks, well she wasn't a monster -she let them sleep for as long as they seemed able. 

Pansy and Blaise knocked on the door while she was writing a note to go with the humongous breakfast she had on the table with a warming charm.  The students looked pale and lost when she let them in.  She wanted to hug them but aside from seeing Blaise for the occasional quidditch injury she didn't know them that well, instead she conjured two more plates and left them at the table to wait.

Pansy wasn't good with either sympathy or patience; she carried the fragrant plate of bacon to Brogan's door and used a wafting charm to rouse her friends.  As soon as she heard a loud thump she scurried back to the table and tried to look innocent, it was stupid but Blaise was smiling.

Draco didn't have any clean clothes to change into so he stumbled out barefoot and rumpled and went directly to the table.  Brogan of course had her whole wardrobe but she was too hungry to wait.  They ate all the food on the table; calmly dividing the too dark and the too fatty bacon amongst themselves like people who had been sharing breakfasts for years, and then at last they felt ready to talk.

"Teddy's dad was found at the foot of the astronomy tower wearing Teddy's clothes.  Nagini and Dumbledore were found dead at the top of the astronomy tower and Professor Snape is gone."

Apparently Pansy wasn't going to bother with conjecture or rehashing, it was a pleasant change from Ron and Hermione -not that Brogan could admit that out loud.  Draco was overthinking if that crease in his forehead meant anything but he didn't seem willing to share any thoughts yet.

"I hate the Dark Lord." Brogan announced, putting her pumpkin juice down with a thunk.  "He forced my da to leave us," she gestured to show she meant herself and the Slytherins in general.  "The plan the Dark Lord and Mr. Nott came up with was unfair to Teddy and has stripped the rest of us of our only protection.  Plus, it would no doubt have failed completely if my da wasn't there; Nagini is dead and Mr. Nott is dead.  If they had left it up to Da I'm sure he could have killed Dumbledore in such a way that he could have stayed behind to protect us, but they forced him to take part in their ill-conceived attack and now we have nothing.  They're fools and I hate them."

Draco felt a warmth blooming in his chest; every word Brogan said was mostly true and it garnered just the right sympathy for Snape, just the right disdain for the Dark Lord.   She was a genius.  All the nerves he had felt last night slipped away, suddenly the world was opening before him: they could save the Slytherins, they could defeat the Dark Lord, they could win this war, and then -what the hell, they could run the Ministry too.  Because now he saw that there was nothing this girl couldn't do.

Pansy and Blaise seemed every bit as impressed.  They nodded, with satisfaction.

"Well, glad that's sorted."  said Blaise.

"They want you to move into the Slytherin dorm too, that will add to your being persecuted angle."  Pansy added.

Brogan blushed, "it won't actually be a hardship, but if you don't want me to because I'm a... you know, I can probably talk to Madam Pomfrey or something."

Pansy waved her off, "No, don't worry about it, the year's almost over anyway.  It will be good for you to spend more time being distraught around the others.  We're already pretty protective of you, we can crank it up some."

"I don't want to use the students like that," mumbled Brogan.

"We know, don't worry we like protecting things it gives us something to do."

"Alright then," allowed Brogan, slumping a little in relief. 

"So, there's no classes today -obviously." said Blaise, "Draco get your shoes and I'll head back to the dorm with you so you can get showered and dressed.  Pansy will stay with Brogan while she gets dressed too and then we'll meet in the common room.  We have a house meeting this afternoon, McGonagall is the acting headmaster and they're still figuring out who will be head of Slytherin.

The Board of Governors is meeting tonight so we should be as prepared as possible in case your father shows up Draco.  There's talk of sending us home after Dumbledore's funeral, but we'll see."

Brogan had found Draco's hand about midway through Blaise's speech, it was so much.  Where would she go if they closed the school?  She needed more time here, more time with the Slytherins, more time with the library.

"Sounds like a busy day," Draco sighed dragging himself up.  He pulled Brogan up with him and gave her a hug and kiss on the cheek, for moral support. 

Then he disappeared to find his shoes and the next thing Brogan knew Pansy was gently herding her to the bathroom.  "You need to shower my dear, and we might need to burn those clothes and your sheets -it smells like you were swimming with corpses."

Which was too horrible to laugh at.

Brogan's position statements got spread around the school in record time, every student who had a parent or relative on the school board mentioned how they really wanted to finish their school year, how Dumbledore (or Snape, depending on the house) would have wanted the school to stay open.

It really was rather magnificent how no matter which side people were on they all felt bad about Brogan.  She got dozens of offers to stay with people over the summer, none from the Burrow though.

They weren't able to slip away to meet with Ron and Hermione until the morning of Dumbledore's funeral.  When Draco sent the note to set up the rendezvous he warned them that the locket was a fake, deciding it was worth spending the time to carefully code it out so that they wouldn't waste precious meeting time gnashing their teeth.  There was nothing to be done now, the trip, the cave, the inferi nightmares Brogan was still having, all of it was for almost nothing.  Not quite nothing because Draco guessed that RAB were likely the initials of his cousin Regulus and conveniently Brogan had inherited all of Grimmauld Place so they could poke around over the summer.

Ron managed to sneak Bill to the Room of Requirement too; when Brogan saw him she launched herself into his arms.  Draco thought he had been useful and comforting to Brogan the past few days but maybe not. 

"It was a plan Bill, it was all a plan, Da was supposed to kill Albus because Albus was already dying and he wanted to use that to get Da in a better position.  Please, you have to convince the Order, please don't let them hurt my Da, please."  Bill was nodding, although he didn't know and he had no idea how he could ever convince Minerva McGonagall but whatever.

Brogan was crying so hard and so wretchedly that Hermione was threatening to start, Ron wrapped an arm around her again and they gave Brogan and Bill as much room as they could.  Draco tried to get a hold of himself too and pulled out the fake locket for Hermione and Ron to examine.

Hermione read the note about fifty times (a combination of the note being short and Hermione being Hermione) while Draco explained about his cousin Sirius having a brother named Regulus Arcturus Black.  They spoke in soft voices about the benefits of keeping the school open for as long as possible and then Draco would bring Brogan to Headquarters, if Bill knew whether or not it was in use.  Draco figured they could lay low there until Brogan's birthday and the trace dropped off her.  They spoke about getting apparition licenses, if the Light side controlled the Ministry they could get arrested for being the children of known Death Eaters and if the Dark Lord was controlling it they would be worse than arrested for abandoning their Death Eater fathers.

Ron thought that a letter addressed to the Minister and signed Harry Potter might get a license for Harry -not that it would do Brogan any good really; and why waste the Minister's favor that way?

Eventually Bill and Brogan joined them.  Bill told them how he was now the only person in the Order of the Phoenix who knew where Harry was and there had been a huge overwrought meeting because everyone wanted Harry to attend the funeral.  Brogan had been carefully avoiding thinking about the headmaster requiring a funeral.  The thought of them demanding Harry attend gave her a hot surge of anger, but it quickly left as she thought more about the bond between Harry Potter and Albus -they meant well.  Still, she wanted to sit with Draco at the funeral.  But what would others think to see the daughter of Dumbledore's murderer at his funeral?

"Albus would want you to be seen at the funeral Brogan." Bill said after reading her expression, "it would be important to him that nobody judge you on what they think your father did."

The others nodded and shuffled closer.  "Besides, I told them there was no way I could get Harry Potter to attend on such short notice and they bought it.  We're going to have Tonks impersonate Harry; it's kind of stupid but I can see how it will help morale."

"It's a good compromise," Ron offered, "I'll warn Ginny that it's Tonks and you can tell her to sit with us, yeah?"

Bill nodded.  "Minerva told us how Slytherin has closed ranks around you Brogan, and how there are whispers about what the Dark Lord has done to hurt the Slytherins.  How the attack on the headmaster was just short of a complete failure.  Minerva was shocked that Slytherin managed to reach that conclusion, I think she was blessing Merlin's pants, but I know that if she had any sense at all she would be giving you and Draco all the points in the universe."

The other Gryffindors beamed too, "that really was well done mate" said Ron,  "and since Hermione is known to be friends with you she was just like, of course poor Brogan and a lot of Gryffindor slid right in too.  I mean they already disliked the Dark Lord of course, but it made them think about how this impacted the students.

Luna doesn't have quite the same clout in Ravenclaw but I think Flitwick is helping her nudge them in line."

Brogan wiped her eyes, stupid tears, "If Cedric was...  well I guess Hufflepuff hates the Dark Lord enough anyway."

Ron patted her a bit, "Of course they do.  And it hasn't come out with Slytherin being the victims or anything, you all are too pissed off for that.  I heard that you don't even have an acting head now."

Draco gave a smug grin, "That's true, there aren't any professors left that were members of Slytherin and the common room won't permit anyone else entrance.  If Professor McGonagall wasn't just the Acting Headmaster she might be able to force someone through but there's so much going on that they're just leaving us be for now.

And of course we're so defensive about everything that we have taken a house oath to be fucking perfect for the rest of the year."

"Da will be so pleased when he hears about it."

"I still can't believe that a professor can't get into your common room.  That just doesn't seem safe."  Hermione mused.

The others discreetly ignored her even though it was a really good point and had in fact been the biggest sticking point when Brogan was arguing with the snake carvings in the Slytherin common room about how they didn't want or need a new head of house.  But really some random head of house would have disrupted the carefully orchestrated Slytherin bonding that was going on.

And then they had to leave and get ready for Albus Dumbledore's funeral.  Ron swept Brogan up in a huge hug, "I'm so sorry," he whispered, "I wish I could be with you today."

"Don't make me fucking cry again," she whispered back but it was too late already.  The funeral was going to be outside near the lake and Brogan had so many memories of Dumbledore and Hogwarts and the lake and everything.  She knew it was going to be awful.  At least nobody present would be able to shake their finger at her for attending, her grief would leave no doubts.

Brogan and Ron or Harry and Ron had stayed up countless nights together discussing Albus Dumbledore, his many faults, his reckless positioning of Harry, and more recently, his exploitation of Severus Snape.  Dumbledore was always a complicated subject, Ron tempering Brogan's exasperation with his perspective as a pureblood light wizard and Brogan pointing out the things he did that were just daft but unquestioned.  By all rights after so many years together they should have been able to attend this funeral side by side, to lay it all to rest and make their peace with the man. 

Ron thought briefly of bringing Tonks in on the secret, she could be Brogan and they could polyjuice Brogan back into Harry and then he could have his mate with him.  But he didn't really want Harry sitting next to him; he wouldn't be able to pull Harry on his lap, wouldn't be able to bury his face in Harry's curls and breathe deep.  Harry was becoming a memory to him, Brogan was his best mate now.  This funeral was going to really suck.

Hermione and Draco stood there awkwardly for a moment, they were each learning to accept Ron and Brogan's uncomfortably close friendship.  Hermione gave Draco a smile and bravely suggested, "we need to find a hobby that we can do together Draco."

Surprisingly Draco took her hand, "It does appear that way.  Have you read any good books lately?"

He startled a laugh out of her and she squeezed his hand quickly before letting him go.  Ron lowered Brogan to the ground and she skipped over to Draco with a look of gratitude.  Draco made a note that being nice to Hermione did not result in death or cooties and resolved to try it again sometime.

Pansy gently sent away the Greenglass sisters who wouldn't have really understood Brogan's grief and walked with the other girl to her old room to get ready for the funeral.  Pansy still didn't know exactly what had happened on the astronomy tower but she trusted Snape no matter what, trusted that above all he wanted his Slytherins to be safe and his daughter to be safe.  As long as they continued to act to keep Slytherin and Brogan safe they were sure they were helping, there was no need for details at this point.

Luna had even less information but she turned up outside Spape's door anyway.  She was dressed somberly if not soberly, nobody pretended that the headmaster would have cared.

Brogan hugged the Ravenclaw fiercely and Pansy found herself impressed with Luna's bravery for visiting.  "I hope you haven't come with fashion advice,"  Pansy greeted with a smile that was a lot less shark-like than she thought.

Luna smiled back as they walked in, "oh of course not, just moral support.  I'll probably sit with my house or maybe Neville and Ginny but I wanted to stop by with my condolences while I could.  The headmaster loved you very much Harry, he loved your father too.  I'm sure someday all of that will be reconciled."

Brogan smiled and nodded,  "Thanks Luna, and I think the headmaster would be very impressed with your ensemble.  It's a nice tribute to him."

Luna bowed her head, secretly pleased, and they went to raid Brogan's closet together. 

"Okay, I get that you're a boy Brogan, but really is that reason to not have any dresses at all?"  Pansy exclaimed with exasperation later.

Draco handed Brogan a black handkerchief after the tufty-haired wizard started droning and he saw her getting teary.  No Gryffindor in the history of the house had ever considered charming their handkerchief black so it would look proper at a funeral and so of course that was what really broke her.

All the Slytherins were present, they were present and impeccable.  Brogan was one of the only ones sobbing, a few first years were frightened by her grief and sobbed a bit too, but really it was apparent that the house was there for her.  Even though their presence could be taken as a protest of the Dark Lord, they were too stoic with their straight backs and level shoulders to be considered Light but they were also too respectful to be considered Dark.  Brogan had provided them the perfect compromise path and they were all smart enough to follow her.  Their loyalty was to Slytherin House, Professor Snape and Snape's daughter; nobody could fault them for those choices.

Most of the house didn't really want to be at the headmaster's funeral but they weren't going to let Brogan go alone, who knew what might happen to her without them?  Or worse, if she had just Draco with her, they could all picture Draco flying off the handle and blasting ministry officials at a state funeral.  Perhaps that explained all the tense shoulders.

Ron was just tall enough to see Brogan half on Draco's lap from where he was.  Hermione and Ginny were sobbing steadily and poor Tonks looked like she might cry too but Ron kept giving her fierce looks.  Harry would not be bawling, manfully keeping himself from bawling -of course, but not actually bawling.  Ron felt it was important to keep his friend's image intact.

Draco would have been shocked to learn he was thinking almost the same thoughts as Ron.  He cast a muffliato charm on them and leaned over, the speeches were interminable, "you stopped taking your potion didn't you?"

Brogan nodded miserably, "I thought it would help with the... the everything.  Make me seem different from before and more wretched and all, you know."

"Silly princess, you really are wretched, you didn't need to stop your potion too."

"I was almost out anyway and I didn't want to go check Da's lab to see if there was more."

"Darling, I can check for you, or even brew more if you need it.  Are you ever going to learn how to ask for what you need?"

Brogan shrugged, "maybe, hopefully, I don't know.  Oh look, the mermen; I always meant to ask how the headmaster learned mermish.  I wonder if it's part of the headmaster duties because they live in the lake, you know?" she rambled while blotting her eyes.

"And there's some centaurs, remember how we met Firenze in the Forbidden Forest first year?  Bane was so mad at him that night."

"Alas, I executed my strategic retreat before the centaurs showed up."  Draco reminded her, chagrined that he had bailed on the adventure.

A honk like a foghorn interrupted Brogan's reminiscing, she craned around to the giant figures in the back row.  "Poor Hagrid," she murmured, "I've been avoiding him all year, he's rotten with secrets and I couldn't bear to lie to him.  Kind of like Ginny and Mrs. Weasley I suppose.

I wonder if Grawp would recognize me?  I don't think he could verbalize it to Hagrid anyway though.  Best not to check now, Hagrid is probably furious at my da."

"Did you babble when you were nervous before?"  Draco asked with a fake suffering look, people were starting to disperse, finally, thank Merlin.

"No, it's new this year."  said Brogan with a blush.

Draco twined their hands and started to pull her away, back towards the castle.  Brogan didn't follow, she was looking back at the white tomb.  Draco stopped and felt the beginnings of concern, it wass obvious that she actually wanted to go up to the tomb and do something; something respectful of course but there were people everywhere and some of them, possibly most of them, knew her as Snape's daughter. 

McGonagall for instance was glaring at Draco as if she could shoot spells with her angry little eyes.  Mrs. Weasley didn't look too pleased either, and Hagrid -actually Hagrid looked strangely okay with it, which was good because apparently Draco is walking up to the tomb with Brogan.  Because apparently Draco got so distracted by all the people glaring venomously at them that he forgot to unlink their hands and stupidly followed.

Draco didn't pull out his wand or anything provocative like that, he just kept their hands linked and his head down, wondering if he should muster up a tear or two or if that would be too much.  And he distracted himself again because now Brogan is drawing her wand, he can hear Ron's mum gasp.  He wanted to glare at her because seriously, what does she think Brogan is going to do?  And even if Brogan did do something absolutely horrid the man deserves it from her, stupid light side with their black and white vision; this great and pure white tomb should be gray -it should be gray and complicated like the man inside of it.

Brogan holds her wand aloft for a long moment, as if she's trying to think of a spell but then it looks as if she's waiting for a spell.  Standing there like a conduit of magic, like magic was going to come out of the the clear sky like lightning and crack down on her (and the person stupidly still holding her hand) and... 

Magic does not crack out of the sky but Fawkes does, he appears suddenly near them circling low.  Brogan flicks her wand (Mrs. Weasley gasps again as if Brogan could harm the immortal bird) and red gold sparks fly out, a maelstrom of harmless lights that sweep up into the sky twisting and turning together until they form a phoenix.  The magic sings; just a few notes but they resonate with everything, with the earth and the forest, with the lake and the castle.  And then the magic fades away but something lingers, some bit of peace remains.

Fawkes lands on Brogan's shoulder and runs his beak through her hair like Hedwig does.  Her hair seems curlier again and the bird is tugging it a little, watching the coils spring back.  Draco's pretty sure his mouth is open.  Fawkes gives a final tug and flies away before he can get his mouth to close. 

Brogan has her head down demurely but she slants her eyes over towards Draco, "Did they change?" she asked.

It takes Draco a moment to process the question and then he looks and nods, but one slow blink from Brogan and her eyes are back to the lesser green.  Brogan relaxes and smiles at him then, "I hope Mrs. Weasley is as gobsmacked as you are."

"Don't," Draco splutters, "don't even begin to pretend that you did that as a show for Mrs. Weasley or the Ministry or McGonagall or, or anyone."

Brogan gives him a ‘who me?' look and Draco's knees might give out.  "You couldn't have known that his phoenix would fly down like that, you couldn't have summoned it.  You couldn't..."  He falters as Brogan continues to just look at him as if he doesn't understand magic at all.

Flitwick arrives then, McGonagall dabbing her eyes and close behind him.  "Miss Snape, that was beautiful.  I'm tempted to award points but," he looks at the white tomb and shrugs eloquently.  "Perhaps it's enough to just say thank you."

"You're welcome sir."  Brogan mumbles and then McGonagall is stepping forward.

"Miss Snape, I'd like to see you tomorrow, I'll send you a note in the morning with the time."  She looks deeply into Brogan's eyes, glances at her wand as if double checking something and then strides off to the castle.

As soon as McGonagall is a decent distance away Brogran staggers a little, "She knows!" Brogan moans almost forgetting that Prof. Flitwick is still there.

"She probably does," Flitwick answered patting her arm,  "I'm sure she's looked at your student file by now if only to try and reach your mother."

"Damn," muttered Draco.  "Do you really think the headmaster would have left something that incriminating out?"

Flitwick shook his head, "Some of the documents are charmed to be self-updating and such, I wouldn't be surprised if something slipped through.  Minerva is very shrewd."

Brogan slumped a bit and started rubbing her forehead.  "Come on," said Draco, "let's head inside and think about this."

They went back to Brogan's room and Draco watched his friend carefully.  He honestly wasn't sure if she was going to collapse in her bed and pull the covers up or if she was going to unveil another brilliant plan, he was definitely hoping for a plan though.

It ended up a little bit of each, there was a plan but she looked like she wanted to pull up the covers instead.  The plan was to leave as soon as possible.

"Dobby!" she called and the little elf appeared.  Brogan crouched down so she was closer to his level, "Dobby, they told me that Sirius Black left Grimmauld Place to Harry Potter, do you know if that's true?"

"Dobby doesn't know for sure Miss Snape, are there elvses there?"  Brogan nodded, "Miss Snape could call the elvses and if she is the mistress they will come."

Brogan patted his shoulder and straightened up, "Kreacher!" she called imperiously.

A wretched looking elf appeared, he seemed completely malevolent.  "Mistress called?  Kreacher can't believe that horrible master left the wonderful House to a disgusting bastard like this.  Others will be interested in this new disguise, how loyal does Kreacher have to be with a mudblood bastard mistress?"

"Mistress was shocked too Kreacher," Brogan did not crouch down for this elf, "Kreacher do you know who this is?" and she pointed at Draco.  Draco quickly assumed his best Malfoy sneer, a shadow of what it would have been a year ago.

"Kreacher can see it's a Malfoy, a proper pureblood heir.  More Black than you are nasty halfblood mistress."  Draco's sneer improved remarkably.

"Kreacher, would you prefer to belong to Mr. Draco Malfoy?"  Dobby felt a frisson of horror and then remembered that Master Draco was nicer this year and on their side now.

Kreacher nodded and Brogan snapped, "Fine, Kreacher you are now the property of Draco Malfoy -may you serve him well."  Kreacher bowed low to her before he realized that this might separate him from his beloved house, but just as he seemed to be catching on Brogan kept talking.

"Draco, can you please ask your elf to pack all of my things up and bring them to Grimmauld Place?  And Draco if you're going to be shacking up with me there we're going to need a good elf to make it bearable, do you have one that can be spared?"

"Certainly, Princess.  Well, Kreacher, you heard our mistress?  Pack up her belongings -and pack them well mind you, I don't want a single item damaged, and then take them to the cleanest, sunniest bedroom at Grimmauld Place.

It shouldn't take you too long, except for the shoes of course, so then you can stop by the Slytherin dorms and gather my belongings.  I'll take the bedroom next to our mistress -and you can spend the rest of your time making sure that it's as clean as the other."

Brogan smiled, "And Kreacher, perhaps you can warn Mrs. Black that her great nephew is coming by tonight?  I would like to talk to her about how good elves keep the secrets of their house."

Kreacher bowed low and swept into the bedroom to start packing.  Brogan put her hand on Dobby's shoulder and sank down next to him again, "well Dobby?  Will he be loyal this time?"

Dobby considered, "He is happy to be serving Draco, he is happy to have a Black in the house again, I think it will work."

"Good, you know Dobby that I would rather have you with us but we can't let Kreacher slip away to serve Bellatrix again."  Dobby nodded absently.

"Youse is leaving tonight then mistress?" Dobby asked.

"Yes."  She stood up to address both Draco and Dobby, "I know that we can't really do anything until the trace is off me but I feel like the whole Brogan deception is unravelling and I don't want to be here when the truth comes out."

"Fair enough," said Draco.

Brogan wrote a note to Ron and Hermione which Dobby delivered for her.  They were in Snape's potions lab gathering whatever Draco thought they needed when the others arrived.  Ron still had the bit of parchment clutched in his hand and Hermione gave Brogan her very most worried look.

"What is this?" Ron asked crumpling the parchment more.  "You're leaving?"

Brogan put her hands up in a placating gesture, like she was trying to slow him down until she could figure out what the hell was going on.

"What the hell is going on Weasel?" asked Draco.

Ron glared at Draco, crossed his arms and then ignored him, focusing everything on Brogan.  Brogan's anger grew to match his but then she seemed to calm a bit, a little bit at least. 

"Professor McGonagall wants to meet with me tomorrow, Flitwick was there when she mentioned it and we figure that she must have looked at my file or something and saw my real name."  Brogan explained.

"So what?  Loads of people have known all year, loads of Slytherins have known all year and it hasn't bothered you.  Do you think she'll tattle on you or something, Gryffindors are more loyal than snakes."

"Oh yeah, my whole life is proof of just how honest and trustworthy fucking Gryffindors are Ron.  My mum and Peter Pettigrew were shining examples of that, what the hell?"

Hermione cringed a bit at that but Ron was unimpressed.  "What the hell is, you can't leave like this.  Sneaking off in the night when everyone suspects your father of killing Dumbledore, it makes you both look more guilty.  If you stay then people might wonder less."

"Ron, my father did kill Dumbledore.  If I leave now while people are at least confused then maybe they will keep questioning things.  If I stay and McGonagall knows who I am then she's going to try and make me Harry Potter again, poster boy of the light and all that shit."

"You don't know that."

"Yes I do, we both know that; she'll call a big order meeting and they'll decide that I need to hide out at the Burrow, or worse, they'll think about sending me back to the Dursleys and then that file will get opened.  Ron, I'm out of parents, I'm out of godparents, I'm out of guardians, I'm not going to let them make me a ward of the ministry or something."

"So skive off after you get on the train.  It isn't like you to run away from McGonagall, she isn't a bad person."

"I know she isn't, but I just don't want to face her.  She'll be hurt that we didn't tell her and then I'll act differently and the Slytherins will think I left them for her.  I mean is she really going to let me stay in the girls' dorm with no head of house?

And well, I'm not really loving the girls' dorm but they don't know that. 

I'm not actually loving anything Ron, I'm tired.  It's been a long fucking year and I want to go home."

Ron's anger had been fading for a while so he really couldn't help himself about wrapping an arm around her when she finally ended her rant with that confession.

Hermione had slumped herself on a stool and was holding her head while she tried to be reasonable and work through the situation for herself.  Draco was just staring at the potions vials while he listened too.  There was certainly nothing he could add to the argument, Hermione either.  This fight wasn't about telling anyone else or sneaking off in the night, it was about leaving Ron.  Brogan could stay and twist McGonagall around her finger, it would be hard though.  Draco could still hear McGonagall's screams from the top of the astronomy tower.

Dumbledore and Snape had chosen to not include her on their scheming, clearly Brogan was just trying to respect their wishes.  There was a whole arsenal of weapons to fight the Dark Lord with, the shield didn't need to know what the knife was doing.

It was quiet while he pieced his thoughts together, quiet enough to hear the muffled sobs start as Brogan burrowed into Ron.  And then she cut through to the heart, "I don't want to leave you, but I don't know what to say to McGonagall, I don't know which angle I'm supposed to play, I miss my da...  If I stay I could screw it all up, but if I go.  If I leave right now then the last thing they'll remember about me is Fawkes sitting on my shoulder, right?  What can I possibly do in the next few weeks that will be as good as that?

They'll wonder, is she evil, is she good, is it more complicated than that?"

Brogan stepped back and wiped her eyes, "Dumbledore's gone, there's nothing else he can show me.  If I make the students think, if I make them a bit more gray, that's all I wanted to do this year.  Learn from Dumbledore, help the Slytherins, that's it.  I don't need to be here anymore.

I don't have to avoid Ginny and Neville and Hagrid and even Hedwig.  I don't have to disguise myself every day.  I don't have to feel like I'm lying to every single person around, including me."

Ron looked completely miserable, "I'm sorry mate, I forgot.  I just don't want to spend weeks apart.  It could even be months, how am I supposed to cope with that?"

"It's just until term ends, then you can visit with your family a bit and then we'll be together again.  Then we can end this."

Ron made a whining noise, "But it's dangerous, and it will be just you and what Draco?  You didn't even say where you were going."

"We're going to Grimmauld, Sirius left it to me and if his brother was RAB there might be a clue or something there."

"What about Kreacher?  What if he tells the Death Eaters where you are, who you are?"

Brogan rubbed the back of her neck and looked very Harry.  "I gave Kreacher to Draco.  Draco's mum was a Black and Draco's pureblooded so Kreacher seemed happy with that, if he has a master that he likes we think he'll be okay.  We can forbid him from talking, but you know having him as an ally is better."

Ron sighed and Brogan worried that he might make that whining sound again, if he did -if he did that or Merlin forbid if his eyes got glassy, then she wouldn't leave.  She would stay and play mind games with McGonagall and do stupid hair things with her Slytherin dorm mates and walk past the shadow of the astronomy tower every day.  Leaving Ron behind sucked too, when choosing between bad and worse there really wasn't a lot of point in being selfish.

But Ron just held her close once more and then let her go.