So, I suck. I know.

AN: I don't own Harry Potter and Co. because I'm not that creative. And I'll talk more at the end.


!!

Lucius Malfoy could hardly be considered a stupid man. Even the people that hated him the most could hardly insult his intelligence. His pride, arrogance, and fanaticism were other issues entirely, but at the moment the senior Malfoy was content with his intelligence.

And his money.

And his blood line.

But mostly his own brilliance.

He fingered the stopper on the crystal decanter, considering the implications of partaking in the indulgence so early in the day, but considering that most of his plans for the year were already well into play he felt he had earned a bit of said indulgence. Pouring himself a bit of the golden Hors d'age Lucius grinned at the now empty glass case nestled prominently in his bookshelf.

Decades ago, when Lucius had been first handed the journal, he had not know exactly what it was that he had held in his hands, but his Master had made sure that he knew it was of infinite importance. He knew now that this object would somehow harken the return of the most powerful wizard in history. And the time was quickly approaching; Lucius could feel it in the core of his very magic.

The book was in play and soon all of his other plans would work themselves out, there was just one more piece to set up. A check of sorts, for the one outlying possibility.

Harry Potter.

Lucius had to take another sip in order to rid himself of the bitter taste the name left on his tongue. But the senior Malfoy was not so lost in his thoughts that he would miss the shuffling of feet at the door of his study.

"You called for me, father?"

He tightened his fingers around the base of his glass, but instead of turning to face his offspring he took a moment to smooth the sneer from his face that often came unbidden to him at the sound of the small boy's voice. It was not that Lucius hated his own heir; it was simply that he had no desire to need one. Draco represented the things that he did not wish for in this life. Like marriage and his own mortality.

And so, at best, he treated the boy with polite indifference and at worst, down right loathing. Nevertheless, the boy was useful. Or so he hoped.

BCBCBC

There was the brief moment of absolute stillness in the air that Su Li had felt many times, it was the moment just before someone came out of a trance, left the mind of another voluntarily, or awoke from pure unconsciousness. Unfortunately for the petite Ravenclaw it was the latter. But the moment passed, as moments tend to do, and Su felt her senses come back to her. She kept her eyes closed and stretched the rest of her awareness as she had been taught.

The overall smell was antiseptic and the feel of the magic was sterile which indicated more than anything that she was in the hospital wing. There was the low murmuring of a female voice and the rumble of a chuckle in male tenors which indicated she was not alone, and it was the scent of rich earth and fresh air that informed her of who her company was exactly. She stretched her magic out, as she had seen Harry do countless times before, to feel for the presence of other magics around her, but could feel no more than the tingling of it in her fingertips. Disappointed but not surprised at her own limitations Su opened her eyes and gave up the thin façade of unconsciousness.

Harry was straddling a chair wearing his school uniform sans tie and robe. Across from him was a girl with flowing blonde hair held in a bun by her wand, which could be none other than Luna Lovegood. She held his right hand in both of hers and was tracing the lines of his palm.

In her best high-arching and lofty voice Luna prophesized, "mauled by starving Hippogriffs." Harry snorted and Luna frowned at his hand as if it had somehow failed her, "Or perhaps cuddled by bunnies, the lines are too similar to, oh wait, that's ink." She tilted her head and shrugged at him, "In any case, I wouldn't visit Albania if I were you."

Without looking at the girl in the bed, Harry turned Luna's wrists until he could cradle her hands in his own. "My turn," he grinned, "unless you feel up to talking, Su."

Stunned, the older Ravenclaw blurted out "I'm sorry!" as she came to a sitting position.

Harry's eyebrows raised and he quirked the corners of his lips in apparent amusement. Luna tapped the inside of his wrist and turned to gaze serenely at the dark-haired girl, "Well that certainly is an interesting way to begin a conversation."

Su felt a blush creeping up the back of her neck and mentally chastised herself for letting these two throw her so off kilter, even after more than five years of friendship. She settled herself by crossing her legs under the bed sheet and smoothing the wrinkles away from them. She looked down at her own fidgeting hands and willed the spreading redness to stop before it consumed her.

Luna gazed at the dark-haired male across from her and spoke in that silent language that most siblings seem to share regardless of bloodlines. He shrugged in response then repositioned his chair so that he was facing Su. The blonde took her cue from him and stood only to sit once more, cross-legged, on the end of her housemate's hospital bed.

"Perhaps we should begin once more, and this time we shall start at the beginning and works outwards towards apologies."

Su nodded solemnly. "I'm sorry," she repeated more sedately.

Harry grinned and touched her on the shoulder, "I thought we agreed to begin properly, Su. And that starts with: How are you feeling?"

She looked at them then, seeing that their faces were open and understanding and not clouded with the disappointment she had feared to find. Luna reached to grasp the smaller girl's hands in her own while Harry squeezed her shoulder once and Su felt the rush of gratitude that came often with their friendship. To Harry and Luna, and indeed to most of their tight-knit group, family always came first.

"I'm alright, I guess." She had meant to keep the answer at that but even as she started it all came tumbling out, "I mean, I'm not injured or physically hurt. I'm more confused, I think. I feel like I'm lost, like I don't know where I am. A little breathless, like the floor was moved under my feet and I wasn't ready for it, and now the world it still tilted slightly to one side," she paused to blink, breath and review what she had just said, "Does that make any sense at all?"

"It probably makes more sense to us than it does to you," Harry offered with a half-smile. Su frowned deeply, not at all comfortable with that response and began to voice her displeasure when Luna stopped her.

"What did you see? When you were in Ronald's head?"

The petite girl released a sigh like steam from kettle, "It's hard to explain. It was things that had happened, but from another spot or with different people and different outcomes." Luna and Harry shared a look over Su's head as the darker Ravenclaw began describing examples of Sirius Black in hiding and Harry Potter in Gryffindor robes. She dropped her head into her hands as Harry moved to sit next to her and slipped a comforting arm around her shoulders. "But the oddest thing was Weasley himself, he was still him, but he wasn't, I don't know, him," she gestured weakly to a couple of beds down the row where the boy in question rested.

She groaned at Luna's twitter-like laughter and leaned more heavily into Harry's side, "Even I don't know what I'm saying."

He squeezed her in a brotherly fashion and replied, "It's alright, we won't tell any one."

She grinned into his side and missed the look between her two friends. A thought crossed her mind and Su pulled away, "Am I in trouble? Shouldn't there be a Professor here?"

Luna touched her lightly on the knee, "There will be repercussions, of course. What you did was not exactly safe, nor was it very legal, but the rules in the arena have always been 'nothing someone can't recover from' and there should not be any lasting damage to Ronald, which may be enough to curtail the more severe consequences. Especially if we can convince him not to push this much further. As for a Professor, we have managed to convince the Headmistress to give you until after dinner to adequately recover."

"And you?" she glanced from Luna to Harry, watching him more closely of the two, "Are you upset with me?"

Harry sighed, but took his cue from the blonde, "We're not upset, but you did scare us. I know you and I know you must have had your reasons, but your mind works so much faster than mine that I just haven't caught up yet. You put yourself into a situation where you didn't have anyone to watch your back and I was, well, it scared the hell out me. Just be more careful next time."

She blinked back tears at the concern in his voice and nodded jerkily, throwing her arms around his neck, "I'm sorry."

"I know, now let's get the Madam to check you out and we'll head down to dinner together."

He waved a hand as Madam Pomfrey approached from her office. She nodded once and began shooing at them, "I see our patient is awake. Let me check her over and see if she's well enough to join you for supper."

Harry squeezed once more then released her while Luna leant forward from her seated position to kiss the other girl lightly on the cheek, "We'll wait for you in the hall, Sphinx." And with a final smile at Su and the Matron they walked out the door together.

BCBCBC

There was a gripping at the back of her robes where Padma Patil figured Su was hiding, but she couldn't seem to feel even the tips of her fingers. "I-" she croaked.

The six turned to look at each other and silent stare down began. Finally the blonde girl threw up her arms in frustration, "Hi!" she smiled brightly at the two Ravenclaws and stood to greet them. "I'm Hannah Abbot. This is Neville Longbottom, Hermione Granger, Gregory Goyle, Harry Potter, and Susan Bones. You're Padma Patil and Su Li, right? Ravenclaw?"

The dark-skinned Raven blinked owlishly at the energetic blonde and she could feel Su shaking behind her, but valiantly she swallowed the desire to run very far, very fast.

"Y-y-yes. I am. And she is. Um, hi?"

Harry chuckled and stood up behind his housemate, gently guiding her to the side so that he could offer Padma and Su a quick smile, "Sorry, she gets excited when it comes to meeting new people. I'm Harry."

Fingers quaking, she took his offered hand and was almost instantly calmed. Staring in wonder at his hand she felt that there had to be some sort of magic in the touch, "Padma" she rasped. There was a sharp nudge at her back and Padma stepped slightly to the side so that the oriental girl was half-visible, "and this is Su."

"Hi, Su," again he reached out to touch her comfortingly on the shoulder and Padma could only watch as the tension seemed to melt from her shoulders. He quirked his lips and both girls were instantly endeared to his boyish grin, "Would you like to join us? We were just studying for Binns' test next week. And Hermione says that if we finishing reviewing that we get extra dessert as dinner."

Su snorted in amusement at Hermione's scandalized "Hey!" and quickly hid her mouth behind a bright blush and both hands. Padma grinned for the both of them, "We'd love to."

BCBCBC

Harry slid heavily into a seated position against the stone wall outside of the Hospital Wing. His light-haired companion stood across from him, watching with unblinking eyes. It was perhaps Luna alone that knew exactly how much Harry had dedicated to the mission at hand.

More than they're adoptive siblings and maybe even more than Daphne.

He slid his fingers through his dark hair and settled his hands on the back of his own neck, pulling down until his forehead rested against his knees. A small chink in near-perfect armor, she reflected.

"How much does this change?"

His voice was muffled, but she had been expecting the question for some time now.

"Nothing," she shrugged. "Everything."

He sighed heavily, "I hate it when you say things like that."

She frowned as she stepped across the hall to kneel in front of him, "I'm sorry, brother, but the possibilities are endless. They have been that way even before the rip. Any small choice could shift the fabric in any number of directions."

He tilted his head back to look her in the eyes, not at all surprised by her proximity, "No, I'm sorry. I'm not upset with you, I know you can't control what you see or don't see. I'm just-"

"You are scared," she drew out the words as thought they were foreign to her, reaching out to touch him. With so many ways that the path of time could diverge, one small step in the wrong direction could be disastrous, they both knew this.

He didn't react even as she slid the pads of her fingers along the worry lines forming around his eyes, "He could help, you know. He may be the tipping point that we have been waiting for."

Harry snorted, but even Luna could tell it was more out of reflex than any real distain for what she had said, "I find it hard to believe that any Ron Weasley could be of aid to us."

BCBCBC

Harry watched horrified as one of his best friends flinched to just out of his touch, "Hannah?"

She was blinking down at his fingers, tears welling in her eyes, "I'm sorry, I just, I can't." She stepped away quickly without turning her back on him.

"Hannah!" he was shocked and made to follow her but the timid form of his other best friend stopped him. "Don't tell me you're going to run away too, Sue. Please don't tell me you're afraid of me as well."

She twisted her neck to look him in the eyes, but could not hold the gaze for long, "Why didn't you tell us you could talk to snakes?"

"I didn't think it was that important, that it was that different," he was hurt by their reactions and he knew that it leaked into his voice.

"But it is, Harry. The way Hannah and I were raised, well, Parseltongue is a mark of evil."

"But I'm not evil, Susan! You know me!"

"I do know you, Harry," she reached to touch him on the shoulder but pulled back quickly before she could make contact, "and Hannah knows you, too. But you have to understand that you just rocked her world views. You have to give her time to adjust."

"And you? Do you need time as well?"

She smiled weakly at him, but still looked just passed him, "We'll come back, Harry. Just give us some space."

!!

Three days without speaking to Hannah and Susan was beginning to take a toll on Harry physically. Sitting at his own table during meals had proven to be painful and even though he had been offered spots at both Ravenclaw and Gryffindor with his other friends he just couldn't seem to find his appetite.

Hermione and Padma had worried over his health, but there was little they could do when they were not with him. During classes he had taken to sitting in the back with Su, who, when asked why she wasn't afraid of him like the others, had offered him a half-smile, removed his glasses and touched his cheeks beneath his eyes.

Neville was another surprising constant who merely given the reasoning of "you never judged me" and sat with him in the library.

As for Greg, Harry had never been given the chance to ask him before his large friend laughed at him, patted him condescendingly on the head and called Harry out for being a child, not a dark wizard.

But none of that could be substituted for the fact that the rest of the school, and his own house, skirted around him like he was a Horseman of the Apocalypse. Even Gilderoy Lockhart seemed skittish around him.

Presently Harry sat at his customary table in the back of the library, alone. The Ravenclaws and the Gryffindors were together in a charms lesson and Greg was serving detention with their Defense professor for laughing hysterically at his explanation of how he defeated a horde of goblins in some South American country.

He laid his head on the table, finding that without real nourishment he was getting back to being at weak as he was before came to Hogwarts. A body slid noisily into the sat next to him and Harry looked up excitedly, but was disappointed to find a dark-skinned boy in Slytherin robes rather than a blonde or red-headed girl in Hufflepuff black and yellow.

Dejected, he laid his head back down.

"Somebody piss in your cornflakes, mate?" the voice was as aristocratic as it could be coming from a boy who hadn't reached puberty yet.

"No."

There was a nudging at his side and when Harry twisted to glare at the interloper he found a bright red apple shoved in his face.

"You should eat."

The Hufflepuff glanced up at him, brow creasing in confusion.

"You look like shite," the boy shrugged and shook the apple in Harry's face and rubbed his own stomach with his free hand, "Yummy."

Harry snorted and bit back a smile, but took the apple anyway.

"Name's Blaise, by the way, Blaise Zabini," Harry shook the pre-offered hand and swallowed a bite of apple.

BCBCBC

Tracey Davis watched the way her best friend's fingers flitted nervously above the table, tearing restlessly at the roll on her plate. The seats on either side of the duo of Slytherins were usually occupied by Harry and Su, so the girls were slightly isolated from the rest of the group, which, at the moment, suited the light-haired girl just fine.

Daphne had always been fascinating to watch, even when they were children. She proposed such a dichotomy in personality that it had taken years for Tracey to figure her out and even now she wasn't so sure she knew everything there was to know about Daphne Greengrass.

Their friendship had been a long time in the making as it was practically a tradition passed down among their maternal lines. Their mothers had sat side-by-side at the Slytherin table as their mothers had before them and so on. Annaleigh Sommers and Juliet Rindalt had done everything together. They were raised together, Sorted together, married their respective husbands within the same month and were even pregnant with their eldest children at the same time.

To make a short story unnecessarily long, Tracey and Daphne had been nigh inseparable since they were born, thirteen days apart, which is why it was ridiculously easy for Tracey to see through that mask of indifference that her Godfather had worked so hard to instill on her best friend.

She reached across her own plate to fold her hands over Daphne's fidgeting ones and squeezed them to gain the attention she desired. When the dark blue eyes of the girl she had know her entire life finally lifted to meet her own Tracey was only marginally amused by the annoyance she fond there.

Harry was really the only one she liked touching her. Anyone else's hand on her made her feel uncomfortable, even Tracey.

"Yes?" she asked, taking the cue from the way Tracey leant in close to keep her voice at a minimum.

For a second the blonde just looked at her, taking in the darkening circles under her eyes and the bottom lip that was slightly bruised from her worrying it. "Is Harry sick or something?"

Daphne very nearly jerked back, but at the last nanosecond stopped herself to prevent the scene. "What," she hissed, leaning forward to speak even lower, "would possess you to ask me that?"

"You're anxious about something and there are very few people that get that reaction from you." She jerked her head slightly so that the other girl couldn't break the contact, "If it were anything to do with your family, you or my mother would have told me and as far as I'm aware there's nothing wrong with me, which leads me to logically conclude that Harry is the cause of your worry."

They held still for a moment, both trying to figure out who held the power in the conversation. Tracey tried to push more of her own worry into her eyes while the blue-eyed girl attempted to look defiant. "I think you're spending too much time with Ravenclaws," she spat out finally. She tried to pull back but the look that she received in return warned her about that course of action, and after a pause she airily breathed, "He's not sick." A beat later she added, "And I'm not worried."

Tracey felt her lips quirk downward in an almost involuntary manner and pressed her hands tighter around Daphne's still shaking ones, "Please don't insult seventeen years of friendship by attempting to lie to me."

The dark-haired Snake tightened her jaw and forcibly broke eye contact. Her best friend, realizing that she was dangerously toeing a line, released her hands immediately and watched as the girl unconsciously reached up to touch the coin that hung around her neck on a thick black cord. The silver sickle was both an incredibly sweet relic from her and Harry's first date and her biggest tell, as the imprint of the dragon and the moon on either side had been nearly worn away from her caressing it.

"He's not sick," she whispered and Tracey had to strain to hear her over the boisterous laughter of their friends. "But something's off, something's been off for a while." She flicked her eyes around the table and to any outside observer the group was as light as they've always been, but there was a tension that had been building for well over a year.

"That was some pretty powerful magic in Defense today," Tracey commented, trying to offer suggestions for odd behavior, "I didn't think anyone could break the barrier considering how much of each of us went into it. And Snape was acting even queerer than normal."

"He's always been very powerful, especially in the way that he manipulates magic, but he's pushing himself and I don't know why." She watched Draco and Ginny toss insults about lovingly, but noticed the way he was angled to watch the entrance way, "And Snape is finally coming to realize that his godson is part of a real family now and has people that are strong enough and willing to protect him."

She finally turned to look at her lifelong friend once more, "It's a good feeling and he has never had to deal with good feelings before. It takes some accommodating, I assure you."

"You should talk to him."

"I highly doubt I am on the list of people that our esteemed professor would wish to discus his feelings with. In fact, I highly doubt that anyone has a place on such a list," she deadpanned.

Tracey scowled in response, "That not who I meant."

BCBCBC

Walking passes a statue of a one-eyed hag in a third floor corridor Harry could hear the muffled sobbing of someone who was desperately trying to keep their grief to themselves. He paused, weighing his options, but realized that there really was only one.

He found her huddled down behind the statue, face folded into her sleeves and shoulders shaking violently. She was small, probably a first-year, with dirty blonde hair twisted up into a messy bun with her wand holding it in place. She looked up as he approached but made no attempt to stop the tears nor try to hide them from him.

He crouched down in front of her and hesitated for a second before he gently touched her on the shoulder, "Are you alright?"

She shook her head in a manner that was both resolute and pitiful and quietly confessed, "I don't know where I am."

He frowned as he looked into her bright blue eyes that seemed to look right through him and then to his absolute shock they shifted suddenly to a steely grey color and back. She blinked and tore her gaze from him, looking down in shame. Her shoulders shook once more and slowly she shrunk into herself.

But she had not tried to pull from his touch and Harry took that the mean something. He straightened slightly from his slumped position and looked around. He was in a free period and had at least an hour before he was to meet his friends from the other houses for lunch, but even if those weren't the circumstances he knew there was really one thing he was going to do.

So he shrugged off his shoulder bag and scooted into the small alcove, side-by-side with the small blonde girl. He slipped his arm around her shoulders and hugged her in an awkward sideways manner. At first she tensed up and made slight movements to pull away from him, but Harry merely loosened his hold without releasing it. Slowly, and without really thinking about it, he pushed the calming magic from his hands into his whole body.

She stopped trying to struggle and with a deeply affected sigh melted into his side.

"I think it's normal," he struggled for words, not used to comforting people. When Susan or Hannah or Hermione were upset they usually just told him what to do. Just sit here. Come back in an hour. Could you bring me my homework? It was easy and he was grateful for the instructions, but this girl seemed unwilling to help him, "I mean I know I was late all the time last year. I don't think the teachers mind all that much if you're a little late, and you know, if you don't make a habit of it."

She shook her head drew her knees to her chest, "You don't understand."

And there was something in her tone that suggested that it was deeper than getting caught on the wrong moving staircase or taking a shortcut though an abandoned corridor. "I can try," he shrugged, "if you want."

Her eyes were closed but the young boy could feel the tendrils of magic stemming from her. He didn't think she was paying any attention to him, but slowly she released her legs and leant further into him, "I knew where I was going and I was in the right place, but no one else was there. Professor Jundo has her class in this corridor, third door on the left passed this statue."

He brow furrowed in thought, but could not think of who Professor Jundo was or what she taught. Harry was tempted to ask but she cut him off before he could form the question.

"Other times it's Professor Feathertop on the fourth floor, left corridor, first door after the tapestry that looks like a polar bear and a flying boar. Or Professor Giles, Andrews, Auror Flack, Domic and so on and so on, and sometimes I forget where I am and where I'm supposed to be and who is supposed to be there, and I just, I just," she sighed once more, sounding defeated, "I just don't know where I am."

She glanced at him finally, as if to gage his reaction, but the only thing he could think of was, "Are you even allowed to take all of those courses?"

She grinned weakly and in her best serious voice answered, "I think so, because technically they are all the same class. Sort of. They're all Defense, in any manner."

"But Lockhart's the Defense professor," he countered, wondering why she had so many professor's for the same class.

"In this time and place, I suppose, if you can call what he does teaching," she jerked her chin so that he could not see her eyes but he easily recognized the shameful slump of her posture.

"Oh," he breathed out, not really understanding the implication but definitely relating to the oddity of the semi-confession, "So you see…" and he wasn't sure of how to finish the thought without offending.

"Yeah," she agreed, sounding bitter, "I See."

"Well, that's different right?" he could have smacked himself but figured in for a penny, "I mean, the whole lot of this is weird, you know? Magic and all that. But seeing worlds and people and things that don't actually exist or take place, that's different, right?"

She gaped at him, jaw dropping in indignation, but the look of confusion on his face stopped her short. He was merely curious and quite obviously trying not to embarrass her. "Yes, it is different. And it's weird and very freakish."

He flinched at her choice of words and she felt sorry for them. "I talk to snakes," he told her in a hushed voice, like she had not already heard the gossip, "That's different, apparently. Is Seeing something like that?"

"No," she felt a smile steal across her lips, the first in many months, "seeing worlds and talking to snakes are two very different things. But," she hastened to add at his crestfallen face, "they are both very weird."

He grinned at her, struck with a familiar kinship, "Then we'll just have to be weird together, won't we?"

She blinked once, feeling tears pool in her eyes once more, but these did not burn and instead filled her with a hope that had previously been unfathomable. "Yes," she agreed, "I suppose we must."

BCBCBC

Tracey never did get a response from her friend as the white-blonde boy on the other side of the table straightened marginally and the blue-eyed girl immediately swiveled to watch as her Badger boyfriend practically stalked through the arch, shaking his head and hitching Su Li further up onto his back. Su, on the other hand, looked to be laughing so hard that tears were sliding down her face as she commanded the beater to take her to her seat.

He halted behind the two Slytherin girls when the tiny Ravenclaw pulled on the shoulder of his robe and called, "Halt, pony!" amidst her giggles.

Daphne lifted one sculpted eyebrow and Harry rolled his eyes skyward in mock exasperation. "Steed," he corrected in a whiney sort of voice, "and a rather noble one at that, missy."

His girlfriend snorted in a rather unladylike manner and Tracey hid her smirk behind her hands. Harry narrowed his eyes at them playfully, but then furrowed his brow just slightly as he caught Daphne's fingers on the coin around her neck.

"Of course," Su gushed as she tightened her arms and legs around him in a full body hug. "And what a pretty horsie you are!" she babied causing his face to flare up brightly.

She was busy ruffling his hair to the tune of their friends' snickering and Blaise pounding the table in hilarity when said pretty horsie pinched the undersides of her thighs and caused her to shriek. "Steed," he huffed once more.

She smiled softly then. "Thank you, noble steed," she pulled herself to lean over his shoulder and kiss him on the cheek, "Now will you please put me down. I feel like everyone can see up my skirt."

He turned so that she could stand on the bench and set her down but she kept a hand on his shoulder until the slight wooziness passed.

"Not that I don't like seeing people treat you like the pack animal you are, but why exactly are you giving out piggyback rides?" Draco leant back as Ginny took a swipe at him.

"Madam told me to take it easy and not to overexert myself," Su explained, ducking under Tracey's worried gaze.

"Which apparently meant she shouldn't walk the three flights of stairs from the Infirmary and I was offered as means of transportation," Harry continued as he took his seat next to his girlfriend and reached for the water pitcher. He held it in Daphne's direction, offering to refill her glass but she kept her eyes averted and the coin pressed against the hollow of her throat.

"Do we have to sign up for this service, or is it more of a 'first come, first serve' type of thing?" Susan grinned from down the table, unaware of the tension between the couple.

The dark-haired Slytherin quirked an eyebrow at the Badger girl and forced a smirk to her lips that looked genuine, "I should think that this was a once in a lifetime opportunity and that no one, save me, will be given rides from my boyfriend from here on out. Isn't that right, dear?" she turned to grin cheekily at him, making the comment into more of a joke than a command, but it didn't take years of knowing her to realize that she was far from kidding.

He ghosted his fingers along the arch of her delicate cheekbone, watching the way her eyes stilled at the touch and strained himself not to frown at the small revelation. Instead he nodded solemnly, "You heard the lady. The Harry Potter Pony Express is officially closed for business."

His friends ribbed him good-naturedly for the next few minutes and the thickness of the group seemed to lessen noticeably when they all could see for themselves that the two members of their party were indeed fine. Ginny turned to look a few seat down from her to ask Luna how she felt about the test earlier in the day, but found her usual seat on Harry's other side empty. "Hey, Harry! Where's Luna?"

Harry blinked up from his cross table discussion with his housemates, his eyes flicked quickly from the empty seat to Draco and then to Hermione. "Good will mission," he grinned. Hermione and Draco glanced at one another over Ginny's confused face and beside him, Daphne slid further into the coolly disaffected mask she used to hide her more obvious emotions, like anger and hurt.

BCBCBC

Draco stared at the letter in his hands. It had to be a joke. Except that his father never joked. He never even smiled.

Behind him, at the Ravenclaw table, Blaise Zabini gave an indignant shout which was followed by the loud laughter of several others, including Harry Potter. Harry Potter, who was supposed to quell and wither under the rumor of being Slytherin's Heir. Harry Potter, who was supposed to be alone and miserable, but instead found in himself in the center of a complex web of friendship.

With people like Blaise Zabini, a Slytherin. The dark-skinned boy had such potential.

Oh, well. It was wasted now.

He looked back down at the letter and felt the yawning pit of hopelessness suck at his self-image. Perhaps now his potential was also being wasted.

!!

When the Christmas Holiday came upon him, Harry found himself sitting alone once more. The year before, when Hannah and Susan heard of his rather atrocious family life, they had stayed in the castle with him as a show of solidarity. But with his whole house not speaking to him and all of his friends in other houses having already made plans to be with their families, he found himself alone at the end of the one table set up in the Great Hall.

There were several small groups of students on the other end, but no one dare approach him with the loud whisperings of a group of red-headed boys between them and him.

With a sigh he put the finishing touches on a letter to Luna and prepared himself not to speak to anyone but professors for the next week and a half. Yet, there was a shuffling of feet as someone nosily set there books down across from him.

The dark-haired 'Puff blinked up at the shiny blonde head of the Prince of Snakes as he piled breakfast foods onto his plate, but did not look at the other boy. Finally, after taking a long drink of pumpkin juice, he looked up to find Harry Potter watching him with raised eyebrows.

"What?" he schooled his features.

"You're sitting with me," Harry pointed out, as if the fact was unknown to the Slytherin, that the boy who had tried to make his own life a living hell for the last year was eating breakfast across the table from him.

Draco Malfoy took a look down the table, noticing the way all the other students and professors were staring at them, "Did you think I was going to sit with those losers? Why? Am I ruining your reputation?"

He blinked, "Not much of a reputation, anymore."

"Is it because I'm a Slytherin? Because the way I hear it, you let just about anyone sit with you."

"It's not me I'm worried about. Won't your friends be upset when they get back and find out you were sitting with the Boy-Who-Lived?"

Draco frowned at the caustic tone and the other boy briefly caught some unnamable emotion pass over his face before a trademark sneer settled like a mask over his eyes and lips, "Maybe I'm looking into finding new friends."

The Badger did not understand the statement and would not dare believe that he understood the sentiment, instead he shrugged, "Ok."

The blonde's chin jerked in surprise, "Just like that?"

Harry smiled weakly, "Guess so."

"Are you the Heir of Slytherin?"

"Nope. Are you?"

"No."

BCBCBC

Ron moaned when he opened his eyes to the high ceiling of the Hospital Wing for second time that day. He sat up and pressed the heels of his palms against his eyes, muttering "Now I know how Harry feels."

"Oh, I highly doubt that."

The red-head yelped at the unexpected lofty voice on his left side. The wide blue eyes of Luna watched him over the top of a book and on reflex he drew the hospital sheet up to his neck. She lowered the book and Ron immediately recognized the 'and why exactly are you acting like a complete idiot?' look but couldn't seem to reconcile it with Luna Lovegood's normally serene features. "I had not planned on assaulting you," she told him, "So I think that you are quite safe in that aspect."

"I'm sorry," he stuttered out, lowering the sheet when he recognized that it just made him look more like a fool, "you startled me."

"I had assumed as much," in a blink her expression changed to one of amusement and she leant back into her chair, looking as comfortable as she would in her own home. He waited another tic to see if her expression would change to the dreamy and faraway one that he had assumed was as much a part of her as Hermione's frizzy hair and Malfoy's smirk were a part of them, but it never did. She merely contented herself to watching him, watch her.

"Um," he shifted uncomfortably. He leant forward and was almost taken aback by the slight roll stomach he felt, he poked himself in his pudgy belly but stopped at the twittering laughter from Luna. Leaving self examination for when he was alone, Ron tilted closer to the blonde and gestured her forward, "Um, are – are we friends?"

"That is a very difficult question to answer," she rested her elbow on her knee and leant to rest her chin on her curled knuckles.

"It is?" he asked, starting to worry about how many more layers to this world he would have to plow through in order to even think about finding some solid footing.

"Oh, yes," she grinned in a manner that was both pitying and encouraging. "Especially considering that you and I have never met before."

"…I don't understand." He knew where the timeline deviated, as he was the one to cause it, and he knew that he had known Luna since they were children. Right?

"No," she patted him consolingly on the hand, "I don't suppose you do."

BCBCBC

The morning Hermione was found petrified in a second floor corridor Padma had been in such a state of hysterics that she had to be taken to the Hospital Wing for a Calming Draught and no one could deny the anger in Harry's eyes. There was no way he could have done it, not to Hermione Granger. An apologetic redhead and teary-eyed blonde in Hufflepuff robes approached him in the hall outside of charms. He welcomed them back, as they all knew he would, but a wedge had been driven between them as he was working hard to figure out just who his real friends were.

The rumors that Harry Potter was the Heir of Slytherin finally slowed to a near trickle and Draco Malfoy began to feel a curious sick-like rolling sensation in his stomach.

BCBCBC

It was more due to Tracey's pointed looks and non too gentle nudging than any sort of maturity that had Daphne agreeing to let Harry walk her to their evening Astronomy class nearly an hour early. Blaise made some lewd remark, as he was wont to do but neither paid him much attention as he was focused on trying to catch her eye and she did everything to avoid it.

The dark-haired girl snatched up her bag before he could carry it for her and Harry shot Tracey a look over her shoulder. Her response was to pantomime talking with her hands and he could do little more than sling his own bag over his shoulder and rush to follow his girlfriend out the open doors.

He caught up to her as she approached the first stair case, "Would you wait up for a second?"

She stilled but did not turn to look at him, and instead crossed her arms across her chest in an almost defensive gesture. He ducked around to her front, trying to catch her gaze to no avail. "Tell me why we're fighting."

She shifted her shoulders, not used to the weight of her bag and grumbled, "We're not fighting."

"Really?" he reached up but to his credit did not touch her when he saw the way she tensed, "'Cause this feels a lot like fighting." He dropped his hands to his side and she clenched her jaw reflexively. She looked up, but just over his shoulder. "You're mad at me."

"I'm not," she replied petulantly, now angry at her self for acting so childishly as well as him for a reason she couldn't actually think of at the moment.

"Then why won't you look at me?" he asked, wanting to know what could have possible changing between the beginning of Defense and now. Being with Daphne had always been a bit like walking a tightrope in a wind tunnel, where sometimes he slipped and sometimes she pushed, but to his knowledge nothing overly dramatic had happened to her so there was really only one other option. "What did I do?" he implored so quietly, so heartbrokenly, that she had to turn to see if he had spoken at all.

He was watching her with those damnable innocent, little-boy eyes that she had fallen in love with. Eyes that she was very nearly defenseless against them, which was precisely the reason she did not want to look at him in the first place.

They stared for a second, stuck in that moment and she could feel that worked-up anger dissipate like smoke in a breeze and all that was left was the hurt that he would keep something from her. Their relationship had taken some hits in the past but they were stronger now than she had ever thought possible. At least that was what she had thought.

She uncrossed her arms and when her shoulders sagged under some imagined weight her bag fell onto the steps with a dull thunk. She reached up with her left hand to cup his cheek and with the tips of the fingers of her right she smoothed away that marginally crushed look he was giving her. "You're hiding from me," she accused softly, stepping so that her hips were nearly flush with his front and she could feel with every part of her

His hands twitched in desire to touch her in some way but the searching way that her eyes darted across his face had him holding back, waiting for her okay.

"What are you hiding from me, Harry James? What's going on that you won't tell me?"

His chin jerked as he tried very quickly to look away, but her hands on his face prevented the motion. He averted his eyes and she ducked down this time to catch them. "Don't," she warned and beneath her palms his jaw tightened as tried to control his emotions from her.

For her.

She swallowed heavily, remembering that sweet little boy that wore his heart on his sleeve, who asked her and Tracey to join him and his friends at Hogsmeade. And she stood there, realizing just how much he had changed to become this man who tried to control the emotions that stole across his ever-expressive eyes. He had changed because of her. She knew it was a natural occurrence when you spent so much time with someone, but she had not realized just how much he had changed for her.

He had changed for her.

"Don't hide from me," she pleaded, slipping her hands down neck, across his chest and around his waist. She hugged him tightly to herself, tucking her head to where it fit perfectly under his chin and breathed in the fresh scent of him. "Please, don't ever hide from me."

She felt the muscles along his back shift as he raised his arms to hug her back just as tightly. "Ok," he whispered, kissing the top of her head, "Ok."

BCBCBC

Draco felt his back hit the rough stone wall of the abandoned classroom and the forearm press tightly across his chest just below his neck. For a second he flashed back some years to the worst of his father's tantrums and he felt the fear and helplessness that he had always resented about himself.

But the eyes that where glaring at him were not the cool grey of Lucius Malfoy, but the raging green of Harry Potter.

"Do you think I'm stupid, Draco? Did you think I would just accept you and not question your motives? Nobody changes over night!" he repeated Blaise's words of caution

The blonde briefly entertained the thought of going for his wand, about fighting back, but realized that he didn't want to fight back. Despite his words, Harry had welcomed him with near open arms. He had defended Draco against the people of both their houses and even Harry's own friends.

The Hufflepuff had treated him with respect and trusted him as a friend and Draco had betrayed that trust. He felt sick at the thought of it and even the fact that he felt sick made him even more nauseous. He was a Snake, dammit! Ambitious to the point where it didn't matter who he stepped on as long as he got what he wanted in the end.

He was a Slytherin, wasn't he!

Wasn't he?

!!

With poise that belayed her demeanor the young Ravenclaw helped the Slytherin back to his feet and dusted off the shoulders of his robe. "Such interesting choices you made tonight, Draco Malfoy." Her eyes were a steely grey, which made Draco feel like even though she was looking at him she wasn't really seeing him. "The night is not over, however."

He shrugged her hands off. "What more do you want from me. I played my part, now I'm done," he sneered in her face but she did not flinch back and Draco felt a little of his own defense crumble.

"Your part if far from over, young Snake," she reached for him and gasped his face with both her palms. "Destiny is always intertwined with those that you have surrounded yourself with; that can not be helped. But nothing is written in Stone. There will come a day when paths will be laid before you. You may choose the one that has been paved for you, to follow and obey, or perhaps you will forge one on your own. Or perhaps you will choose something completely different."

There were flashes of possibilities across his consciousness and he wretched his face from her hold, "What do you want me to do? Be the hero? Save the girl? I'm not Harry bloody Potter!"

"No, you are not. But really, who is?"

"What do you want from me?" he asked again, shoulders slumped.

"What I want is a curious thing indeed. I want you to make a choice, which will happen even if you do nothing."

He blinked and glared once more at her, but the gaze lacked any real fire. "I'm going to get kicked out of my own House," the boy informed her.

She patted him condescendingly on the top of his head, "Good boy."

BCBCBC

After Madam Pomfrey cleared him, for the second time in less than seven hours, Ron sheepishly followed Luna Lovegood out of the Infirmary. "So you were expecting me?" he asked catching up to her as she neared the western staircase.

She waved a hand in an airy manner, "'Expected' implies a level of certainty that I'm not comfortable applying to this situation. Nevertheless, the increased number of visions and the disastrous turn the war was taking in your time dictated a high probability of your appearance."

He stopped abruptly in the hallway and she took another four steps before she realized that he was no longer with her. She looked at him with her head cocked to one side, "Is something the matter?"

"You're not Luna," he accused. Sure, she had all of Luna's features, but she wasn't Luna. There was no way she could be.

"I assure you that I am."

And there was that. The assured talk and the fact that she made sense, well, most of the time. There were no riddles, no made up words, no dreamlike lilt to her voice. No radish earrings or butterbeer cap necklaces.

He waved his hands, "You're not Looney."

"I should hope not."

"That's not," he shook his head and he felt instantly dizzy, "It's not what it sounds like. It was a nickname you had in my world. You were, I mean you still kind of are, a bit shy of a full deck-"

"Thank you?"

"- but you don't act like her. You don't even talk like her!" he was getting hysterical and beginning to hyperventilate. She tried to approach him with her palms up, like you would a frightened animal, but he backed away until he hit the wall.

"I understand that it is hard, but it is good that you are realizing this now, Ronald, before you get too ingrained in this timeline. That girl you knew, the Luna you were raised with was very nearly always alone. Her only friend was Ginny Weasley who withdrew into a diary their first year and did not reappear for some time. These visions we have, the power we know, it affects us in curious ways. Without anyone to help shoulder the burden she would have search for outlets to remind herself of who she was. She had her oddities to secure herself, which you have come to understand as who she was, as I have my siblings."

He slid to a sitting position and shook his head. "You're an only child," he countered weakly.

"Biologically," she agreed, standing alone in the middle of the hall.

He didn't bother acting like he understood. Instead he looked up at her and she was perhaps more shocked than she should have been by the tears in his eyes, "It's all different, isn't it? Everything and everyone I ever knew. Nothing is the same."

And she did not bother faking a smile for him or offering poor sympathetic words, because there was nothing she could do in that moment that could possible make him feel any better.

BCBCBC

Draco skidded around the corner outside the girl's loo and very nearly slammed into Harry.

"Harry! I just, I mean, I-"

The dark haired boy clasped him on the shoulder and offered a smile that didn't quite reach his eyes, "What took you so long?"

!!


AN:

Again, I suck. It's been months and I really am sorry. School is atrocious and boys suck and life apparently would stop, no matter how much I wish it would. Good things: my sister (finally) graduated from college! Bad things: my best friend is moving to Arizona for the summer and I won't be seeing the fireworks with him for the first time in four years . My boyfriend and I broke up because I'm pretty sure one of the things we have in common is that we both like boys, which is cool for him, but sucks for me.

Speaking of homosexuals (sort of?) I'm warning you guys now that I do plan on having some characters in same-sex relationships. You can probably spot one or two already if you look hard enough (ok, you don't have to look hard, because I'm not really trying to hide it). I like to think my stories are kind of representative of a whole and I've never been in a group larger than twenty people where everyone was completely straight. I'm sorry if this offends anyone, but yeah, it happens.

Honestly, it's not that big a deal in this story. It actually plays a bigger part in the story I have in my head which is kind of the 'How Harry and Daphne fell in Love' prequel to this one.

What else?

The flashbacks. Some people like them, some people don't. I'm personally a fan, because you know, I write them. But it's more for background, so that people can understand where I'm coming from and a little of how things developed into the way they are. This will probably be the last chapter with a lot of them and from here on out it'll they'll be a lot more sparse and short. Probably.

The nicknames. Ok, not a lot of fans on this one. I actually had this really complex story line in mind for them that I'm probably going to scrap because I don't actually know how I'm going to make them work. Instead their just fun little nicknames between friends. I'll actually explain them in the next chapter, I think. I can't really say because I haven't written it yet. My friends and I rarely use our given names with each other and you should see the contact list in my phone, it's actually really funny.

I think that's it.

Thanks guys.

PS: My MCAT is in the beginning of July and I'm told is a pretty big deal (I'm kind of freaking out about it) and hopefully I'll have something up before then.

GLuvr, any advice?