A/N: Gah, I can't remember if I replied to the last reviews or not. If I didn't, then I'm sorry, and I appreciate them. Enjoy your oddness.

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"What are you, a nymphomaniac? You come straight from your master, and then your old enemy is the nearest piece of meat. Straddling a starving boy that you've been yearning to throttle since that first year? That is low, Potter."

"Yeah? Want me to show you something? Let you in on a little secret?" Harry's smile was disturbing, neither happy nor amused, yet broad and genuine. His eyes were burning again, flashing in the light. Draco couldn't help it. Making him so emotional, so fierce, was addicting. It was fascinating. He'd never met anyone this intense.

"Oh, I already know you're a poof," Draco said, his smile very different. This was better than Quidditch. "Don't worry, times are changing. Except I'm not queer, so keep your pants on until we go and see your master."

In jerking, furious gestures, Harry unhooked his thumbs from the material, tore it over his head, and threw the fishnet shirt to the floor in a darkened, confused heap.

"You don't listen well, do you?" Draco mused. So he was looking. So what. It was a damn nice chest.

Harry climbed to his feet, face dangerous, and turned his back on Draco. His arms were folded against his chest. He hated displaying himself, but the anger overrode even that. He couldn't think, wild only with the need to prove him wrong, win one goddamn argument, hurt him.

Draco's smile that was more of a smirk than anything froze in place. His eyes were the only thing that moved or changed. They widened, taking in the sight of his back. From below the nape of his neck to just above the hollow that signaled the end of his back, it was a mess. Dull, smooth bone gleamed white as it caught the light, and deep, angry gashes flashed raw. They were spattered all over the expanse of his skin. It was a sight to elicit goosebumps and chill the mind.

Draco took a moment to lick his dry lips and try and think. It wasn't from a whip, he knew that much. Wounds from whips could certainly be deep, but this was the work of some sort of blade. It was cleaner, more precise, in a perverse sort of way. Whips did not have this kind of control.

"He did this," Harry said tersely, as though daring him to make light of it. His next words were tight and clear, in quick succession. "I do not like him. Let's leave it at that."

"Let's not," Draco said, before he could stop himself. He'd never been good at dealing with victims. "What did he do it with?"

"His claws," Harry said stiffly.

Draco made the attempt to sit up. Maybe Harry knew a little more than he had given him credit for. Maybe a lot more.

"Well, that's sick," Draco remarked without any tangible sign of compassion.

Harry turned, and his face was different again. It was colder, now. Completely collected, and utterly hostile in a blank, icy way. "Don't."

Draco sighed without meaning to. "Look. I take it back. I misjudged the situation. I was stupid, okay?"

"Is that an apology? Could it be the spoiled one from the holy line of arrogant uptight bastards is attempting to give the lowly peasant words of regret?" Harry asked witheringly.

Draco's mouth twitched, though he knew he had to remain serious. "Yes. I don't do it often."

"I'm so grateful," Harry said scathingly, turning around. He turned on the shower with a stiff gesture. The spray of water was immediate, precisely falling upon the flawless walls of the shower.

Ah. He was genuinely angry. Still. And with due cause.

With effort, Draco tried again. "I'm sorry."

The words came out serious and sincere, surprising both of them.

Harry didn't turn around. He grasped the glass bottle of shampoo resting on the edge of the bathtub, wrapping his fingers around it tightly, but Draco had seen the shiver. "You should have killed yourself."

Draco decided not to point out that he hadn't, either. He didn't know how to reply to that. "What did you do to warrant the, uh, marks?"

"Take off your clothes," Harry said, reminding him of why they were there in the first place. He hesitated, and then said, "It's what he does."

"For fun?" Draco asked, and his voice was deceptively level.

"Yes," Harry said, voice almost normal by now, but rose, slightly hysterical, with his next words, as though it were so obscene it was almost amusing. "If we do something 'wrong', we are punished. But mostly he just gets off on it. It's his hobby. It's his goddamn hobby. Some people go hiking. Hades cuts people up."

Draco saw the fine tremor running through Harry and decided now was not the time to delay further. He stood, head still airy, and had no trouble shrugging off his pants. They were all he had, disgusting and hanging from his flimsy body.

"So," Draco said softly. "He really does make use of the dungeon."

"You…have no idea," Harry said with a strange smile. "He's going to fuck you. He's fucked people to death before. I've—I've…" he stopped, throat closing up. His eyes were glittering, hands shaking uncontrollably. He felt like he was going to start screaming any second now, had to bite his lip to shut himself up.

He hated, hated, that he couldn't control himself. Hades may be a sick and twisted fuck, but he was right on one thing:

Harry James Potter was weak.

So incredibly vulnerable, unable to protect himself or lie or cope. No matter how hard he tried, he always ended up like this. He hated that Draco could be so calm, could laugh—albeit somewhat maniacally—at his own "brush" with death, and handle this all so naturally. He tried so hard, so incredibly hard, and he never seemed to get anywhere. Gods, he was practically sobbing!

He roughly removed the garments adorning his lower half. The metal of the straps clinked against the floor as they fell in a heap near to the discarded shirt. He gritted his teeth, disgusted with himself, and spat it out.

"I've seen it done."

Draco closed his eyes. No wonder he seemed so fucked up. He was every bit as fucked up and more. And it was no wonder. Gods.

"Saying that…it doesn't do it justice," Harry continued, talking quickly. He was talking now to get himself to keep from breaking down and screaming. He didn't want to say this. He didn't want to say this to anyone, but the words were spewing from his mouth, masking wordless and pathetic keening.

"From a nice, safe distance, where it's just words. You can't tell someone that. You can't just tell someone any of this. They can't imagine any of it. It's too much. There was a muggle…a mass murderer, really…Stalin. Joseph Stalin, he was the dictator of Russia. He killed thousands of his own people. No, millions. He said something like, 'one death is a tragedy. One million deaths is a statistic.'"

Harry was sure he was babbling now. No sense. He'd been talking for too long. But he really didn't want to start screaming. It already felt like someone was crushing his lungs, stealing his breath. It felt like the material beneath his feet might slip away and he would fall and fall and Hades would be there, too. He spoke faster. "That's kind of like how it is here. You can understand, or absorb, that Hades is a rapist. That's one term. But then there's so much more. There's the torture. The mind games. The beauty. He's a demon. It becomes too much to really comprehend, and to outsiders, it's a story. It's a horror story, and it's too much to be real. But we have to accept that it's real. We're forced to."

Harry stepped into the shower, leaving the curtain open. Water was collecting on the tiles nearest to the tub, but neither boy noticed.

Draco ran a hand through his hair. He hadn't just underestimated every bit of the situation; he had made light of it. That was how he tended to deal with what life dealt him, but it wouldn't work here, not right now. He wasn't any good at comforting anyone, never had been, but he could at least stop making things worse. He had probably been saying almost every word that would hurt Harry the most. This, he'd always been great at.

"I'm coming in," he said softly. The potential for teasing and banter, or fighting or awkwardness was gone. He didn't even think of anything but what Harry had just said. I've seen it done.

If he was the type to feel guilt, he would most definitely be experiencing it now.

Harry's POV

Harry let the warm water drown his face, shroud his tired body. If it was in his mouth like it was now, then he couldn't talk. He was afraid of what he would say, if it would be words at all. He'd already said so much. It had been far too much. He'd never done that before. But then, he'd only had Hades to speak to, these past months. It wasn't an excuse.

He heard Draco step in behind him and didn't care. There were moments when he felt everything so strongly, cared so much, and then there were blessed moments where he didn't care at all. He envied Malfoy. He envied his ability to be so goddamn ambivalent and casual and cool about everything. He'd seen the huge house of his new, terrifying master, and had said, "Not bad".

Harry was the exact opposite of him. He really was. Hot-headed and angry to Draco's cool and calculating insults. Emotional and weak to Draco's collected demeanor and surprising strength. It was no wonder they didn't get along.

But now, the water was shutting out the outside world. The shower, without Hades, could be a sort of sanctuary. Enclosed and safe from the outside and now surreal world, all that existed was warmth, water, and cleanliness. The pounding rhythm of the water to drown out thoughts. Hot water to soothe the bruises and cuts and aches, even when it stung. Even when he knew the water was falling on bared bone, gliding down the angry pinks and whites of older wounds and the healing reds and bone-white of yesterday's.

The scent of whichever soap existed there today (they seemed to change by the week, sometimes by the day, depending on what the master of the house's whims were then) and ruthless bristles to attempt to scrub away some of the filth. It never worked: Hades kept his slaves clean. The filth was something soap couldn't reach.

Harry held hands up to the spray of almost painfully hot water,

Now, he was cooling; breathing at last, shutting down. He had said something, done enough damage. And maybe, let just a little of it out. He was finally the matter-of-fact, uncaring person that he would have given anything to be countless times since he'd arrived. Or at least, a smidgen of his old self, a modicum of self control. The person he had truly needed to be only moments ago when he had been losing it. Around Malfoy, no less. The person that just never came at the right times.

"So how long have you been here," Draco said, penetrating the façade of the sanctuary that the shower pretended to be. It was a large shower, spacious enough for two people to easy move around in or bathe in.

"Ever since that night," Harry replied, and his voice was finally controlled, finally a normal speaking tone. Relief.

"Over a year," Draco clarified from somewhere behind him. Harry wasn't turning around to see him. Still, his voice was unreadable, completely free of anything one way or another.

"Really?" Harry realized he had been slumping, curled just a little against the wall and straightened. "I guess you lose track of time here."

When the two of them had finished washing, neither looking at the other—well, Draco might have been looking, but it was mostly at the rawness of his back—Harry began arranging the few bottles, the soap, cleaning up as he was accustomed to doing. Giving Hades an excuse for violence was something he tried to avoid.

"Hey, you want to hand me a towel?" Draco asked, standing on the deep red of the rather decadent bath mat. It was unbelievably soft beneath his calloused feet. "It's freaking cold."

Harry's head snapped up on instinct to answer and throw him the towel, and half-froze because he had forgotten that Draco was completely naked. He hadn't turned from the dark shower wall the entire time, hadn't seen him.

Harry's eyes followed the rivulets of water as they rolled down pale, almost pearlescent skin. Strengthening this thought, the light above caught the wet sheen to Draco's skin and made the droplets gleam like wicked jewels for a moment. He followed them down Draco's neck, down the cadaverous chest, down the long, pale legs, and irresistibly, between them.

Draco's sardonic voice awakened Harry, made him realize that he had forgotten the towel and more besides. He had most definitely been staring.

"Like what you see, Potter?"

The dry tone, completely free of arrogance, brought that damn flush to Harry's cheeks and his eyes flicked to the wall. With effort, he brought them back to Draco's face.

"I'm not into corpses, sorry," Harry said, finding solace in their old game. "I like my men with something more than bone and muscle."

Draco grinned anyway, and Harry had no idea whether it was genuine or not. Probably not. "That so? Do you usually look at corpses that way? I never pegged you for a necrophiliac, Harry, but I guess even I can be wrong."

"Come off it," Harry said, attempting to make light of it. "So what. You are—were, whatever—the Slytherin Sex God. You already know how you look. Thousands of people have probably told you how beautiful you are."

Draco was, for perhaps the first time, shocked into silence for a moment. He caught the large, fluffy towel Harry threw at him on reflex. Not one of them, he thought. Actually. Oh, he'd been called many things. Some of them "good". Drop dead sexy. A sex god. Gorgeous (with no real meaning behind it). Irresistible. But never beautiful. It seemed to fit in with the others words, and yet, something also set it apart. It was a foreign word on his lips.

"Probably," he said playfully.

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A/N: The plot thickens! To celebrate the end of dealing with the Something-Seriously-Enormous-and-Pointy-Up-Their-Asses-Who-Manage-The-Pit-of-Wantwits-and-Puppets-That-They-Call-School, I've been writing more on this story. Perhaps now I can actually post faster. Please do review and happy summer.