A week after their first experience with the dueling club, Draco and Theodore sat at the expansive breakfast table aching slighting from their magically hidden wounds. Almost every night since that first meeting, the boys had met in the deserted common room and worked on their dueling skills.

Draco winced as he extended his arm to reach for more pumpkin juice while Theo peered out across the Great Hall from a badly hidden black eye.

Laughter peeled from the Gryffindor table and both boys rolled their eyes.

"Wel,l I think we can officially assume that Potter isn't being expelled," Draco said.

"I tried to tell you that three days ago, mate."

"It's just because he's a damn celebrity." Draco's voice dripped in anger.

It was then that the morning post arrived. Draco looked up hoping (but not hoping) to see his owl flying in. He would love to hear from his mother but knew that any correspondence sent would be accompanied by questions from his father asking about how things were going with Potter.

Draco barely noticed when Theo's barn owl landed heavily between them. All of his attention was trained on the six large screech owls carrying a long, thin package that looked unmistakably like a broomstick.

Draco seethed when the owls delivered the package to the Gryffindor table and even more so when it dropped directly in front of Potter.

"First years aren't allowed their own broomstick," Draco seethed. "unless…"

Draco turned to Theodore with a look of pure rage. That rage only intensified when he realized his best friend wasn't paying attention at all. Theo was lost in his letter from home and hadn't noticed the commotion that Patter's parcel had caused all throughout the Great Hall.

Draco elbowed Theo in the side to get his attention. He obviously hit a bruised rib from the night before because Theo winced and drew in his breath sharply.

"Bloody Hell, Draco!"

"Potter—he—"

Theo just shook his head, grabbed his school satchel, and stood.

"I'll see you in class."

…

"Draco was late for History of Magic since he had stayed in the Great Hall to confront Potter and Weasley about the package.

Binns deducted 10 points from Slytherin for Draco's tardy arrival and then continued with his lecture on ancient Egyptian wizards who had served as advisors to several well-known muggle pharaohs.

"Potter's on the quidditch team," Draco growled under his breath to Theodore as he took his place at their table.

Theo rolled his eyes and continued taking notes. It was as though Draco hadn't even spoken.

"Father expected me to have Saint Potter expelled by now, and instead he's on the fucking quidditch team." Draco huffed sigh. "Can't wait till father hears about this."

Theo continued to scratch away at his scroll.

"Are you even hearing this? The bloody quidditch team. A first year!"

Theodore's fist visibly flexed around his quill and for a split second Draco imagined it splintering into shards.

"Shut the fuck up about bloody Harry Potter."

Despite the fact that he wasn't necessarily yelling, Theo's voice echoed around the large domed room. Binns' voice halted and all eyes fell on Theodore. The room sat in a stunned silence. It wasn't very often that Binns' lectures were interrupted.

"Nott! Fifty points from Slytherin! If you cannot respect those trying to learn, I would ask that you leave."

Binns' translucent eyes widened as Theodore did just that. He grabbed his school satchel, threw one last scathing look at Draco and stormed out of the room.

…..

Theo did not show up for their next class. When Severus Snape asked Draco and Blaise where their third group partner was, Draco just shrugged.

"I think he fell ill, Professor," Blaise said.

"Hmm," Snape mused. "I was under the impression he stormed from his last class after losing our house a significant amount of points. I'm glad to hear he's just under the weather."

Snape gave Draco a knowing look before moving on, clearly not happy with being lied to by two of this star pupils.

Draco and Blaise sat in silence as they worked together. Draco mulled over the events of last class as he minced the giant slugs to add to the mixture. This wasn't the first time he was on the receiving end of Theo's anger. While usually very level-headed and cool-natured compared to his best friend, Theo did have a temper to rival Mr. Nott's when he had a good reason.

However, Draco could see no reason for Theo's outburst today. Draco was the one who had the right to be furious. His father was going to be impossible when he found out that Potter had been rewarded for his infraction. On top of that, Draco was now going to have to watch everyone's favorite hero zoom around on the best broomstick on the market every time Slyterin played Gryffindor.

"Hey Draco!" Zambini's voice pulled Draco from his thoughts. "The instructions say to mince the slugs, not to mutilate them."

Draco looked down and realized that amidst the slugs he had managed to mince successfully there were quite a few that were smashed beyond recognition. He was going to have to ask Snape for extras and that was not going to make his professor happy in the slightest.

"Shit," he muttered.

It seemed as though Snape was already aware of the slimy mess that Draco had made because he was walking towards the table with a jar of freshly petrified slugs.

"Let's try not to mutilate these ones, Mr. Malfoy," he said as he plopped three additional slugs on the boy's table. Their fat, slimy bodies smacked the wooden surface with a splat.

"Yes, sir," Draco replied, reaching for one of the new slugs and his knife. He began mincing with renewed concentration which received a laugh from Blaise.

"Did Nott's outburst shake you up that much?" Blaise teased. "I thought you were made out of tougher stuff than that."

"He didn't shake me up," Draco growled. "I just don't see what the fuck his problem was."

"It was probably the letter he got this morning," Blaise explained as though it was common knowledge. "He was fine until the post came. Of course that's becoming more and more common."

"What the hell are you talking about?" Draco tried to sound annoyed while he thought back to breakfast that morning. Post had come and then—Potter. He didn't seem to remember anything else.

"Well, he's been getting more and more letters from home, and he always seems like he's in a bad mood after he reads them. Remember after the first week of classes, when Theo stormed off after his owl arrived—oh wait, no you were more interested in your sweets."

Draco thought back. That must have been the day that his mother had sent the No-Melt Ice Cream. It was also the day that his father's infamous letter had arrived. No wonder he didn't remember.

"Of course he played it off well. He was fine in Potions later, but he looked livid reading his letter that morning. Then there was the one about a week ago. He looked worried all through breakfast but managed to play it off ok. Don't you remember—Oh no, wait you were hitting on Parkinson all through breakfast that morning."

Draco could remember lots of mornings talking to Pansy, but he didn't remember one where Theodore looked worried. Of course there was that night a few days after their dueling club meeting where Theodore had annihilated him during their secret practice session. It was almost as if he had taken it easy on Draco all the other times they had dueled since. Almost as if that fight had been fueled by something else—worry? Anger?

Draco felt guilt well up in the pit of his stomach. Had he been that wrapped up in his life that he hadn't noticed something wrong in his best friend's? It angered Draco that Blaise had noticed something was wrong with Theodore before he did, someone who had known him his entire life.

"Oh course, you've been preoccupied," Blaise broke into Draco's thoughts.

Draco opened his mouth to protest, but could think of no retort. He had been preoccupied, Draco thought. But now that excuse just sounded lame.

As soon as potions was over, Draco cleaned his station quickly and made his way to the dorms where he hoped Theo would be. As the stone wall gave way to the entrance of the common room, Draco was pleased to see his friend lounging on one of emerald green sofas with his nose in a book.

"There's an invite for dueling club laying on your bed. You should grab it before anyone else gets back and sees it," Theo said without looking up.

Draco hesitated for a moment in the door way. He had so much to say to his best friend, but keeping the secret of what they were up to from those who weren't invited was important. Especially if he didn't want to be brutally murdered by Marcus Flint. Figuring it would take all of a second to grab the invite from his room, Draco hurried upstairs. Surprised, Draco found a miniature mahogany broomstick, no bigger than his ring finger, sitting on his pillow. He picked it up slowly and turned it over in his hand. Carved into the wood in very fine script was a single word.

Tonight

As if the wand knew that Draco had received the message, the words disappeared and the broomstick became translucent and floated in the air. He could still tell it was there, but only just. Draco reached out a gentle hand to test if it was still a solid object, but before he could, it zoomed out of his room towards the sixth year dormitory, no doubt returning to Flint after doing its job.

Although the message was short, Draco could guess that the time and place of the dueling club would be the same. As it was only early evening now, Draco had plenty of time to talk to Theo before they needed to leave for their secret meeting. However, when Draco returned to the common room, Theodore was nowhere to be found. Draco checked the giant grandfather clock in the corner and saw that the large hand was resting on the symbol for dinner. He would just have to talk to him there.

…

Draco walked to dinner rehearsing what he would say to Theo. His explanation bounced back and forth from things that were entirely too selfish ("I'm too preoccupied right now to have to worry about your bad temper") to things he was far too uncomfortable to admit freely ("I'm an arse and a terrible friend"). He figured that there might be raised voices involved in their conversation however it went, and he was hopping that they didn't need to stay in the Great Hall to have it.

Much to Draco's surprise, dinner was extremely uneventful. The sole reason being that Theo was nowhere to be found. He scanned the Slytherin table from one end to the other several times before he finally realized that Theo was simply not at dinner. When he took a seat between Blaise and Pansy and asked if they had seen him, they both shrugged and shoot their heads.

"I don't know, but did you see Professor Binns' face when Theo yelled today? I thought he was going to drop dead from being interrupted, but then I remembered he already is." Laughter peeled out around the table and Pansy smiled in appreciation. "It's so good of you to want to find him and console him, Draco. You're such a great friend."

Draco gaped at her words and tried to find a hint of sarcasm in them, but as far as he could tell she was serious. The light touch of her hand on his leg, higher than the last time it has been there, and her shift to be closer to him made it obvious that she was completely ignoring that Theo's outburst had been caused by none other than Draco himself.

Draco glanced over at Blaise who was chuckling quietly and shaking his head. Draco opened his mouth to speak, but Blaise interrupted him under his breath.

"She's got it hard for you, mate. The way she talks it's like you weren't being a giant prat."

Draco's face turned red at this statement and even redder when he felt Pansy's hand inch higher. Why were choices so damn hard? He wanted to rip Blaise a new one. He wanted to stay here with Pansy and see just where her hand ended up by the end of dinner. But he knew he could do neither.

Turning away from Blaise, he put his hands on Pany's stopping her assent.

"I have to go find Theo. I'm sorry." Draco squeezed Pansy's hand gently before getting to his feet and grabbing his things.

Pansy's face fell slightly before her smile returned, eyes meeting Draco's with adoration.

"What a great friend," Draco heard her coo to her friends as he turned away and walked away from dinner.

…

By 11 o'clock Draco had still not found Theo. He had checked the library, the owlery, and some of the grounds. He had even returned to the common room to see if Theodore had just stepped out. It was empty except for the jar of floo power sitting by the fire that hadn't been there when Draco had left for dinner.

At that point, Draco was losing the drive to keep looking. He had to be in dungeon 518 in a little less than 30 minutes, and he couldn't think of anywhere else that Theo could possibly be.

When he walked into the crowed dungeon ten minutes later and immediately saw Theodore talking to some upper classmen, anger boiled just under the surface.

He had just spent all evening looking for Theo and there he was chatting with a smile on his face like nothing was wrong. As he approached the two boys though, Draco could tell that the smile was a façade. He had seen it many times, especially after a tough day with his father. The smile was there, but Theo's true emotions shone through the cracks.

Theodore glanced over at Draco from the middle of his conversation with a cold look, but before either boy could approach each other, Flint had called for the attention of the room.

"Thank you for coming to our first official duel," he started. "I hope you enjoyed your little messenger booms. They were charmed by our very own Marcus Belby."

Marcus pointed to a boy who surprisingly wore the blue lined robes of Ravenclaw. He stepped forward with a smile and a nod of his head. It was then that Draco looked around the room and realized that there were more than just Slytherin students in attendance. There were a smattering of blue Revenclaw robes, a few yellow Hufflepuffs, and maybe one or two Gryfinndors. It surprised Draco that the club wasn't exclusively Slytherin, although the majority of the students were from his house. A detail he failed to notice last time, probably because of how overwhelming the whole experience had been.

"Those broomsticks will return to your dorms each time we have a meeting scheduled for the day. You don't get a lot of notice, but we expect you to be here if you have committed to it," Flint explained. "Last meeting we placed you in the brackets. Starting with this duel, things get serious. You will have one dueling partner per meeting and your performance will determine if you either move up in the brackets or are transferred to the loser's bracket. Peter Murton is charge of all bets. After each fight the winnings are divided up between the winning duelist and those that bet on him—"

Someone cleared their throat in the audience and Marcus smiled at the blonde girl that the sound came from.

"or her," he corrected. "The standings at the end of the night will determine the fight order for the next meeting. Questions?"

Apparently there were none because the room was unnaturally quiet.

"Alright. Let the dueling begin."

….

Before Draco had a chance to approach Theo, they were divided up into their dueling pairs. Draco was paired with a second year Ravenclaw boy named Robert Hilliard and Theo with a Roy Accrington, a third year Slytherin.

Dueling started quickly after that, and Draco and Hilliard were the third pair to go. As Draco pulled out his wand and bowed slightly to the thin boy across from him, he felt a confidence that had eluded him at the last meeting.

Before Robert could utter even a syllable, Draco had cast his first spell, sending the boy to the ground with a quick flipendo. The crowd cheered instantly, and Draco's confidence was bolstered. That seemed to be all he needed as he walked towards his target preparing to finish the fight in record time.

Before Draco could get halfway across the open circle in which they were dueling, Hilliard was shouting his first spell of the night.

""Impedimenta," Robert bellowed from the ground.

Draco cursed as his movement slowed considerable as if we were walking though the slug entrails he had cleaned from his potions table earlier that day.

"Oppugno!" Draco shouted in response. Pointing his wand at various objects within the room and sending them soaring at his opponent.

Hilliard was able to block most of the projectiles, minus a few empty potion bottles that had been left in the room back when it was a functioning classroom. Glass exploded around him, and the audience stepped back.

The fight continued like this for several minutes until Draco was able to get a relashio jinx through, and Robert was unable to block. The boy's wand fell from his hand as though smacked away and was then thrown over the heads of the crowd and against the wall at the far end of the room.

Robert's eyes grew large and for a moment he looked like a cornered mouse, looking this way and that for a route of escape. Draco advanced on him, fist raised for the finishing blow when his opponent squeaked his surrender.

"I yield! I yield!" Robert's pleas were rather comical sounding after he had put up such a duel. Draco hadn't even touched him. The crowd around him seemed to snigger in unison at his cowardice.

"I thought Malfoy was the pussy," someone from the crowd commented.

"Things have obviously changed this week," Flint replied to the onlooker as he made his way into the circle. "Nice job, Draco. That was some improvement."

"Thanks," Draco said, slightly out of breath from the excitement of the fight. He silently thanked his nightly practice sessions with Theo as he felt Flint clap him on the back and told him to report his winnings to the sixth year Slyertin who kept track of the brackets.

Draco walked to the back corner of the room where he was to report. Many students stood around making bets or paying the older students for contraband fire whiskey and other prohibited substances.

"Nice job, Malfoy!" Terence Higgs, the seeker of the Slyterin Quidditch team stood amongst a group of upperclassman in the corner of the room passing around a flask and laughing. The older boy handed the flask to Malfoy as though it were completely natural to be handing a first year student alcohol and associating with him as an equal. "You showed that Ravenclaw twat what Slytherin is all about."

Draco lifted the flask to his lips and smelled the strong, pungent odor of fire whiskey. He had only drank it once before when he and Theo had snuck some out of his father's liquor cabinet. Both boys had been punished harshly for their theft.

He saw the boys watching him expectantly and swallowed, choked the liquid down, and then coughed harshly. Higgs patted him on the back, and the group of upperclassmen broke out into laughter again.

"We're proud of you kid. I don't know why Marcus is convinced we need to include the other houses in our little club. I keep telling him we don't need to dilute it with dirty blood, but he's in charge."

Draco ventured another sip of the fire whiskey as Higgs spoke. This time it went down easier, although not without the sting of the first drink.

"Well I'm happy to keep beating them down every time," Draco replied with a smile. "Theo and I have been practicing a lot. I think its helping."

"Hell yeah it is," one of the other boys said, reaching out to take the flask from Draco. "I thought you were going to be an embarrassment after the last meeting, but damn, that was some good dueling."

Draco felt his ears redden at the mention of his first duel, but before he could defend himself, Higgs broke in.

"Speaking of your friend, Theo seems to be doing a hell of job over there in the dueling ring."

Draco looked back towards the center of the room but couldn't see a thing over the crowd of cheering people. The cheers grew to the loudest they had been all night. Higgs and his friends, tall enough to see over the sea of others, pushed their way closer to the duel, their attention pulled away, even momentarily from their whiskey.

Draco shoved slowly through the bodies, but before he could get to the inner circle, the atmosphere of the room changed. Cheers turned to shouts. Shouts turned to worry and panic. Draco's heart pounded for reasons he didn't understand as he pushed faster through the crowd. When he finally emerged into the clearing, Flint was rushing the duelists and a dark haired Ravenclaw girl was shouting, near tears.

"Merlin's bear, he's going to kill him!"

Draco saw Theo's fist then, moving up and down with the speed and intensity of a jack hammer. If his opponent hadn't conceded, he clearly couldn't anymore. The third year was lying motionless on the ground, his face almost unrecognizable with the amount of blood and bruising.

Flint struggled to lace his arms through Theo's and pull them back to stop the assault. When he did finally manage, Theodore rounded on Flint, landing a blow to his jaw.

Seconds after Theo's fist made connection with Flint's face, a spell was cast. Although Draco could not be sure where the spell came from, it was obvious that it hit its mark. Theodore collapsed on the spot, his legs giving out from beneath him. He lay panting on the ground, as though he had run a mile. His head hung in defeat as he propped himself up on his elbow.

"What the fuck was that," Flint swore. "You stop when they give, Nott."

Theo raised his head and made as if to respond, but he was cut off sharply by Flint.

"Leave. Now. You will take the loss this week, and if this shit happens again you are out. Got it?"

Theodore nodded in understanding and got gingerly to his feet as though testing his own legs. Once he was standing, his eyes darted over to Draco. The look of anger that Draco had seen there earlier in the day was replaced by one of weariness and defeat.

When he turned to go, Draco followed.