Lucius Malfoy stood for a moment, and Harry distantly saw his right hand twitch as though he desired to reach for his wand. Instead of giving into the longing Malfoy wiped around to face his house-elf.
"We're going Dobby!" He ordered the house elf who had still been twisting his ears as punishment for giving Harry a hint.
Despite everything (and that everything was a long and miserable list) that had gone wrong because of Dobby's attempts to protect Harry something in Harry broke - no, snapped at the sight of Lucius just kicking Dobby through the door.
While Dumbledore and Harry could no longer see the abuse of the house elf they could hear the pained squealing. Harry stood for a moment or maybe two, thinking hard. Then it came to him-
"Professor Dumbledore," he said hurriedly. "Can I give that diary back to Mr. Malfoy, please?"
"Certainly Harry," Dumbledore agreed calmly. "But hurry. The feast, remember..."
Harry grabbed the diary and dashed out of the office with the speed seekers were renowned for. Quickly, wondering if his plan would work, Harry took off one of his shoes and pulled off his slimy, filthy, reeking sock and stuffed the diary into into before he continued running after the pair.
He caught up to them at the top of the stairs of the dark corridor.
" ," he gasped out as he skidded to a halt. "I've got something for you-" and he forced the smelly sock into Lucius' hand before taking in some deep breaths.
"What the-?" ripped the sock off the diary and carelessly threw it aside.
He furiously glared at the book and Harry. It was indeed a good thing that the Malfoy before Harry was not a basilisk and looks could not kill otherwise Harry would be quite dead.
"You'll meet the same sticky end as your parents one of these days, Harry Potter," he vouched softly. "They were meddlesome fools too."
He turned to go. "Come, Dobby. I said, come." But Dobby didn't come as ordered. He was holding Harry's disgusting, slimy, stinking sock and looked upon at like man in the dessert would look at a lake of water: as though he stumbled on a priceless treasure.
"Master has given a sock," said the elf in wonder. "Master gave it to Dobby."
"What's that?" Mr. Malfoy spat out.
"Got a sock," Dobby murmured in shock, more to himself than the wizards before him. "Master threw it, and Dobby caught it, and Dobby- Dobby is free!"
Lucius Malfoy stood there frozen, staring at the elf. Then with no warning he lunged at Harry.
"You lost me my servant boy!"
But Dobby shouted, "You shall not harm Harry Potter!" And with a loud bang Dobby had once again saved Harry. Mr. Malfoy was thrown back and he crashed down the stairs, three at a time, before landing into a crumbled heap below them.
He got up, his face livid, and with flair the older wizard pulled out his wand only to freeze as his former slave raised a long threatening finger towards him.
"You shall go now," Dobby ordered his former master. "You shall not touch Harry Potter. You shall go now."
Lucius, with no choice, glared at them one last time before he swung his cloak around him and practicality ran from their sight.
"Harry Potter freed Dobby!" Exclaimed the freed slave shrilly. "Harry Potter set Dobby free!"
"Least I could do, Dobby." Harry said, grinning. "Just promise to never save my life again."
The elf's ugly brown face split suddenly into a wide, toothy smile.
"I've got two questions though Dobby. You told me all this had nothing to do with He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named, remember? Well-"
"It was a clue sir," Dobby admitted, his eyes widening as though this was obvious. "Was giving you a clue. The Dark Lord, before he changed his name, could be freely named."
Before Harry could respond with a meekly right Dobby spoke once again. "What is the second question?"
"Do you got a place to go?" Harry had to ask even if he did want to go to the feast that Dumbledore mentioned and check if his friend, Hermione, was not indeed awake. "You know. Since you've been freed?"
Dobby threw his boney arms around Harry's middle, which was as far as the elf could reach, and hugged the young wizard.
"Harry Potter is greater by far than Dobby knew!" The freeded elf cried out before sobbing.
Before Harry could react to his question not being answered there was a final loud crack and Dobby disappeared leaving Harry alone in that dark corridor.
A/N: Surpise! I made another fic dealing with obscurus. There are two reasons why:
1.) Harry you freed a house-elf and I know you're a just a kid but a house-elf is a slave. Why didn't you ask if he had a place to go?
2.) The reason JKR gave us on why Harry isn't an obscures isn't...well completely true I guess is the way to put it.
JKR told us the only reason why Harry isn't an obscurus is because the Dursleys never acknowledged his magic whilst being abusive towards Harry. Yet (if I remember correctly) Aunt Petunia almost hit Harry with a bloody frying pan because Harry was joking about using magic on Dudley in CoS and Vernon choked Harry in OotP because he thought Harry had used magic when it was just Mundungus apparating. So does that reason truely work?
Originally posted on ao3.
Also, damn auto-correct to hell.