Draco stepped forwards and laid a hand on Harry’s shoulder. His smile was so happy and light that Harry had to glance away. How in the world can he smile like that after he knows that he tortured people and skinned them and drew and quartered them?
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He’s changed. I know that. But is that enough to make up for what he did? Can anything ever make up for it? I don’t think so.
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No. He can’t atone for it. But that doesn’t mean it’s right to leave him here by himself, or reject him again.
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Those thoughts had been going through my head as well as I have been reading this. Is the reason *why* Draco changed not important in his redemption?
Did he change merely because he was tortured, and so he came to loath his tormentors, and their deeds as an extension of them? Or did he finally have an empathic epiphany, as a result of his suffering, about how it feels to be on the other side of the street, so to speak?


I love how amidst all the horror and angst you keep the humour coming:
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Harry returned to his meal feeling absurdly cheerful. Putting off a decision that would have been difficult always affected him that way.
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