* ~ The Eighth Year Universe Series ~ *
PART THREE
The Eighth Year
Chapter 7: Mirror Charms
"I hate this door!"
Ron, Hermione and Harry emerged onto the landing to the common room after dinner one night to find a small crowd there. Eight people were crammed into the landing, and none of them could figure out the riddle. Seamus was nursing a painful foot, having just kicked the door.
Hermione sighed, "What is the riddle?" she asked.
"A man moves into a new house. After the journey, he is exhausted and turns off all of the lights before going to bed. The next morning he wakes up to discover that he has killed 365 people. He does not sleepwalk. How could this be?"
"Stupid door," Seamus mumbled with a glare at the door for good measure.
"I can't work out a lot of them either," Ron said to Harry.
Harry shrugged, "Some of them are just common sense."
"The answer is easy anyway," Hermione said, "The man lives in a lighthouse."
"Ah, clever girl!" Said Dumbledore's voice, and the door swung open.
"What the hell is a lighthouse?" Asked Theo.
"It's like a muggle tower. There is a big light that helps the ships see where they are going so they don't crash into the rocks," Draco said. Quite a few people seemed surprised that he knew the answer to a muggle related question.
"Well, it's a stupid riddle. How are we supposed to know about muggle towers?" Theo asked no one in particular.
Draco just shrugged and grabbed a book before getting comfy in front of the fire. Harry and Ron sat at the desks to get on with their Divination homework. Hermione, however, sat down next to Draco by the fire.
"I had a dream about getting chased by a murderer with an axe, and it means that…" Ron trailed off in thought.
Harry finished for him, "That your life is going to be in danger from someone you consider a friend."
"Yeah, that will be right if you keep flirting with Daphne in Potions," Hermione muttered from her spot next to Draco.
Harry shot his friend a brief glare, and Ron grinned, "Woah, you have a thing for her, Harry? Still?"
"How long have you been harbouring it for again, Harry, since sixth-year Potions?" Hermione teased.
Harry's cheeks had reddened, and Draco smirked, "Daphne Greengrass? Good luck with that one, Potter. They call her the ice queen for a reason."
"She doesn't seem that icy to me," Ron mused, "And I wasn't flirting with her, Hermione. I was just talking to her; she seems friendly."
"I bet she does," Hermione mumbled, and Draco smiled slightly at the comment, but nobody saw this because his face was hidden behind his book.
Ron rolled his eyes, "Oh come on, you sit next to Nott, and I'm not saying you're flirting with him or that Harry's flirting with Malfoy!"
Draco scoffed, "That is certainly accurate, Weasel."
Harry sniggered, "The extent of our conversations are 'can you pass me that armadillo bile?' and 'oh, by the way, my Aunt told me to tell you that your Godwolfchild ate some food today'."
Draco nodded his agreement, "Precisely."
Ron shook his head, "So you and Nott then?"
"He's the Head Boy, Ron," Hermione said irritably, "We patrol together, and we're friends, so of course, we talk in Potions."
"You're friends with a Slytherin?" Ron asked in surprise.
"Have you still not understood the point of this year?" Hermione asked hotly, "House unity; to make friends with people who aren't in our houses! Harry and I have both made new friends, and you still won't talk to anyone in Slytherin!"
Ron shrugged, "Yeah, well, I just don't want to be friends with their lot."
"Have you ever considered that we don't want to be friends with you either, Weasley?" Draco asked coolly.
"Stop it," Harry sighed, "Hermione's right, house unity means no arguing. Come on; we need to get on with this homework Ron."
Ron pulled himself away from the argument and looked back down at his dream diary.
"I think I'll put one real dream in here," Harry said thoughtfully.
"You remember one?" Ron asked as he shut the book and put it in his bag.
Harry nodded, "Yeah, last night, I had a dream that my broomstick got annoyed because I insulted it, and it wouldn't work for me in the game, so Slytherin won!" He seemed annoyed even as he spoke about it; he was determined that Gryffindor would win this year.
Ron laughed loudly at the dream, "What do you think it means?" he asked through his laughter.
"That you are going to crash and burn against us in the first game of the season," Draco smirked from the sofa.
"You wish Malfoy," Harry snorted.
Draco raised an eyebrow at Harry, "We'll see about that," he said as he looked back down at his book.
Harry shook his head as he pulled out his Herbology essay. Regardless of his acquaintanceship or whatever the hell it was with Draco, he wasn't going to let it get in the way of the Quidditch cup. They had been back at Hogwarts for nearly two weeks, and he would be holding Quidditch trials at the weekend. He was determined to make sure he picked the best team yet; this was his final chance to watch Slytherin crash and burn after all.
"How do you know about lighthouses?" Hermione asked Draco out of the blue as she held her quill in her mouth and balanced her essay on her lap.
Draco watched her in amusement but was careful to hide his smile, "Why do you care?"
"I'm just curious," Hermione said honestly.
Draco rolled his eyes, "Nosy, more like it. Is that why your hair is so big because it's full of everyone's secrets?"
"Ugh!" Hermione exclaimed as she dropped her quill onto her essay and looked up at him, "Would you stop playing games with me, Malfoy? I can't be bothered trying to figure you out! Either you hate me, and I'm wasting my time trying to become your friend, or you like me and the only way you can think of to show it is by constantly insulting me! So which one is it?"
Draco stared at her in disbelief, and the common room had gone hushed too. Hermione, in the course of her rant, had thrown her essay and her quill to the floor. She was standing up now with her arms crossed as she glared down at Draco.
"I have no idea what you are talking about, Granger," Draco said after a few minutes of silence. His cheeks were slightly red, and he looked remarkably flustered.
"Of course you would say that," Hermione muttered irritably as she gathered up her supplies, "Because you can never just answer a question simply. I'm going to the library; I'm not playing any more of these stupid games with you, Malfoy."
Draco was silent as Hermione stalked out of the common room. The moment she was gone, everyone talked very loudly, and Hermione's bodyguards advanced on Draco.
"What was that about?" Harry asked.
"How am I supposed to know, Pothead?" Draco scoffed, "She's the one who lost the plot!"
"Is it true, what everyone is saying?" Ron asked with narrowed eyes, "That you like her?"
"No," Draco drawled, "And even if it was, which it isn't, I would hardly tell you two, would I? What are you, Granger's personal bodyguards?"
"Pretty much," Harry said as his hand gripped his wand. Draco paled slightly at the motion.
"Leave Hermione alone," Ron said hotly.
"I barely even talk to her," Draco remarked as he slung his bag over his shoulder, "But I have better things to do than stand around talking to you two idiots anyway."
Harry and Ron didn't stop him as he walked swiftly up to his dormitory.
"Do you think he has a thing for Hermione?" Ron asked Harry.
"I dunno," Harry replied honestly, "I mean, all he's ever done is insult her. It would be a bit out of the blue if he did, wouldn't it?"
"Nope," Susan said as she popped up behind them.
Ron raised an eyebrow at her, "Do you eavesdrop on everyone's conversations or just ours?"
"It's not my fault that you two oafs speak so loudly," Susan said matter of factly, "And it wouldn't be out of the blue. He insulted her because it was the only way he could think of to show her he liked her. It's weird, I know, but this is Draco Malfoy. He didn't exactly have a conventional upbringing; his Dad is a complete dickhead."
Ron snorted in amusement, and Harry asked, "How come you know all of this, Susan?"
"My Aunt was friends with his mother," Susan said offhandedly, "I went to a lot of the little shits birthday parties when we were younger as a result. He was spoiled rotten, which probably didn't help, but he copied everything his Dad did."
"So you think he does like Hermione?" Ron asked.
"Probably," Susan replied.
"But Hermione doesn't like him," Ron said.
Susan smirked, "You're still holding a torch for her, so of course, that's what you want to believe, but she comes back with insults just as good as his. She also goes out of her way to talk to him despite his insults. I think she might well like him."
Harry scoffed at that, "No offence Susan but you barely know Hermione. We've known her for years; there's no way she likes Draco Malfoy."
"Whatever you say," Susan winked before disappearing once more.
"She's a bit odd," Ron said with a slight frown, "Reminds me of Luna."
"Yeah," Harry said distractedly, "You don't think she's right, do you?"
"Nah," Ron said, "Definitely not. Like you said, why would Hermione like Malfoy?"
Draco and Hermione did not sit together in any classes, which was probably a good thing because of how icy the air around them had been since Hermione's rather public rant on Wednesday evening. Ron and Harry hadn't asked her about it because she had seemed to calm down, and they didn't want to make her kick off again. It certainly didn't seem like Draco and Hermione liked each other; all they seemed to do was glare at each other when they passed in the common room or the hallways; they had both been giving the other the silent treatment.
Harry ended up speaking to Daphne about the situation in Transfiguration. Draco and Hermione glared at each other across the room, and Harry muttered, "Those two are doing my head in. They are squabbling like a couple of children."
"Or they like each other," Daphne whispered.
Harry scoffed, "No, Hermione doesn't like Malfoy. She punched him in third year."
"That was years ago, Potter," Daphne remarked, "Things change."
"Not that much," Harry muttered.
"I think he likes her," Daphne murmured, "But I can't be bothered with people who dance around the subject like that. If you like someone, why beat around the bush, right? Just grab them and drag them behind a greenhouse."
"A greenhouse?" Harry asked, turning his head to look at her.
"Greenhouse three," Daphne said; she raised an eyebrow at him, "Great make-out spot."
"I'll take your word for it," Harry said as he tried to concentrate on his work.
"Suit yourself, Potter," Daphne said suggestively.
Harry had cleared his throat as a blush rose in his cheeks at those words and the image they invoked.
As the days wore on, Draco even spoke to Harry less in Potions. The icy air was still there on Friday afternoon in their last class of the day, Charms. It had begun as a very standard lesson and had descended into chaos as things only could at Hogwarts.
"Today, we will be performing mirror charms," squeaked Professor Flitwick. Thankfully in Charms, they had been allowed to sit where they wanted, which meant that the awkward air surrounding Draco and Hermione had temporarily dissipated.
They each had a rat on the table in front of them, and Flitwick continued, "The mirror charm creates a mirror image of something. For example, the use of a mirror charm on your rat should mirror it so that it faces the other direction."
Everyone had started talking, so Flitwick raised his voice, "However! If the mirror charm is used on humans, it can have strange effects, so please be careful!"
The room was loud and full of flashes of light, bangs, and the smell of burning. The trio talked under their breath about plans to have a party on Saturday night after Harry had picked his Quidditch team so that they could christen their new common room. Harry was in the middle of telling Ron about how they should sneak out to Hogsmeade and smuggle some butterbeer back into the castle when the chaos began.
Mandy and Annie screamed at the front of the classroom; their mirror charms had bounced off an actual mirror as Annie fixed her hair. Three jets of purple light rocketed around the room with a loud bang before eventually hitting three people. Those three people happened to be Draco Malfoy, Harry Potter and Hermione Granger.
Draco Malfoy opened his eyes to nothing but a dull grey fog. As he squinted, the fog began to clear, and the place he was standing in became recognisable. This was Kings cross station. It was duller than he remembered, yet still in colour. It was as if he was in a memory, but he couldn't have accidentally fallen into a pensieve.
Draco frowned as he walked around the crowded station. He was walking right through people. This couldn't be real but then if it wasn't real and it wasn't a memory, what was it?
"BOY! Hurry up, or you'll miss your train to freak school!"
Draco turned at the voice and saw a man he was distantly related to. He was a muggle cousin that his father had pretended hadn't existed. Standing with this man was Draco himself, or at least a small 11-year-old version of himself who looked terrified of the Muggle man.
The image dissolved, and the fog obscured everything, just as it would in a pensieve when memories were being recalled. Yet this couldn't be what this was because these were not his memories; they couldn't have been. When the fog cleared once more, Draco found himself standing in the Great Hall, waiting to be sorted. His name was called out, and he sat on the stool.
He waited for the hat to shout out 'Slytherin!' as he remembered, but instead, it placed him in Gryffindor.
"What the hell…" Draco muttered as the scene changed again. It was now a dark stormy night, and a hooded man was walking up a pathway. Draco instantly recognised the path, with its high, primly trimmed hedges. He frowned and hurried after the hooded figure as it walked up the path towards Malfoy Manor. The man reached the house and broke through the wards with ease. He walked into the hall, where he was pulled into a duel with Draco's father. It did not last long, and the hooded figure then killed his father.
In confusion, Draco followed the figure, who by this point he could only assume was Lord Voldemort, upstairs to his own childhood bedroom. He watched in shock as his mother used herself as a shield and was killed for doing so. He stood, frozen to the spot, as the man attempted to kill the baby version of himself but failed.
Draco realised that this wasn't his life; these memories were not his own. They were Harry Potter's, and this revelation caused him to remember what had happened before he had blacked out. A mirror charm had bounced off in all directions, and one of those beams had hit him. This charm showed him a mirror image of his life; it showed him how his life would have been if he had been the boy who lived.
The scene changed again, and this time when the fog cleared, there was a battle going on. It was surreal for Draco to see Harry Potter in the midst of it in Death Eater robes, but that was precisely what he saw. The battle was raging in the Great Hall, and in the centre of it was himself battling Lord Voldemort and ultimately defeating him.
When Voldemort crumbled to the ground, Draco watched himself run to his 'friends'. He hugged Ron Weasley and kissed Hermione Granger. The former made his stomach churn, and the latter did something entirely different to his stomach, but he refused to call it butterflies.
Draco shook his head in disbelief and wished that he could get back to his own life. He was unsure if it was part of the spell or not, but it worked because the scene slowly started to dissolve with the image of himself and Hermione kissing burned into his brain.
He tried to push it away as he heard muttering around him. Draco opened his eyes to find himself in the hospital wing with Daphne and Theo talking in undertones around his bed.
"Draco!" Daphne exclaimed, "Are you alright?"
"Ugh!" Draco said, shaking his head to rid himself of the memory, "I was Potter!"
"What?" Theo asked, looking utterly perplexed.
"I had some weird vision or something…" Draco said with a frown as he tried to recall, "I was Potter. Voldemort killed my parents, and I lived with muggles. Then I killed Voldemort. It was like Potter's life was my life."
"You were hit with a mirror charm," Daphne informed him, "Professor Flitwick said it would mess with your head and show you an alternate universe. That's obviously what happened."
Draco was quiet for a moment, and Theo got up to leave, citing that he had only stayed because Daphne was worried about him. When they were alone, Draco turned to Daphne and said quietly, "Don't tell anyone that I'm saying this, but after seeing that, I feel sorry for Potter."
Daphne looked sympathetic, "I know how you feel. When you find out someone else has had a crappy life too, you kind of have to relate."
"Exactly," Draco said, glad that Daphne understood. He glanced to his right, where Harry and Hermione lay unconscious. Ginny and Ron were sitting nearby, talking amongst themselves.
"They haven't woken up yet," Daphne explained, "Madam Pomfrey says you'll wake up in the order you got hit, so Granger should be next."
"I wonder what's happening inside their heads…" Draco muttered as he looked at the two sleeping figures.
When Hermione Granger opened her eyes, she wasn't in the Charms classroom.
She was at platform 9 ¾ with her parents, who were dressed in robes which implied that they were magical. But she knew that couldn't be right because they were Muggles; they were dentists.
"Have a good year at Hogwarts, darling," said her mother.
"You'll be in Slytherin just like us, I expect!" said her father.
Hermione frowned deeply as her 11-year-old self hugged her mother and kissed her father on the cheek before getting onto the Hogwarts Express, where she immediately found a compartment with none other than Draco Malfoy.
Before Hermione could figure out what was going on, fog obscured the scene like it would in a memory. When it cleared, she saw herself getting sorted into Slytherin rather than Gryffindor.
Her confusion mounted, but she knew this wasn't real. Still, she watched her younger self rush over to the Slytherin table and sit down next to Draco.
When the fog obscured her vision once more, the scene changed again. This time she was in the Slytherin common room, watching herself with Draco. They looked to be around fourth year age, he was sitting on the sofa, and she was lying with her head in his lap.
"He thinks he owns this school," Draco was saying, "Harry Potter, with his fancy broomsticks and his worldwide fame."
"Calm down, Draco," Hermione said, "He's hated by practically everybody this year."
"Well, if you will enter yourself into a tournament that you are far too young for," Draco sniggered, "He will probably get himself killed, of course."
Hermione realised how unsettling it was to watch Draco talk to her and stroke her hair affectionately. She had cottoned on to what this was. The mirror charm was showing her a mirror image of her life. Had she born into a pureblood family, this is how things could have gone. She had effectively taken Pansy's place, and for some insane reason, she felt jealous.
Hermione wasn't stupid; of course, she understood her own emotions better than many people, and she knew that she had conflicting feelings for Draco Malfoy. She always had. In some ways, she found him admirable; she was attracted to his intelligence, and yes to his sarcastic nature and his wit too because he could challenge her, and she could snark back without it causing an argument as it would with Ron. But in other ways, he was arrogant and nasty, and he didn't think about how hurtful his words could be. He was dangerous, he could, and he had hurt people, but ultimately underneath it all was a good person; Hermione just had no idea how to get that person to come out.
Draco leant down and kissed her, and her stomach did flips. Hermione cursed herself because this wasn't real, and it could never be real even if she wanted it to be.
She was grateful when the fog obscured the vision and transported her somewhere else. This time she saw herself duelling Dawlish in the final battle. She was wearing black robes and Slytherin colours, and the Auror was far superior to her. A ray of red light hit her, and she fell to the ground; this caused the fog to obscure everything for a final time.
With a gasp, Hermione's eyes shot open in the real world, and she breathed a sigh of relief when she saw the ceiling of the hospital wing come into focus.
"You're awake," Ron said in relief, "Are you okay?"
"Fine," Hermione said weakly, "That was just…very surreal."
"What happened?" Ginny frowned, "You were sort of thrashing around like you were having a nightmare."
Hermione took a deep breath as the two redheads came into focus. She was about to launch into an explanation when somebody else spoke.
"It was some kind of alternate reality," Daphne's voice said from where she was sitting next to Draco, "The mirror charm shows you a parallel reality to your own."
"That makes sense," Hermione said as her head finally began to clear, "It shows you an image of what could have been if a few things were different."
Daphne nodded, and Ginny asked, "So what did you see then, Hermione?"
"I was a pureblood…I went to Hogwarts and got sorted into Slytherin, and I…" Hermione trailed off, a faint blush crawling up her cheeks, "…I was dating Malfoy."
Draco peered around Daphne to look at Hermione, "In mine, I was best friends with Weasel and dating you, Granger. It was clearly a very parallel world."
Hermione nodded, fighting her blush and trying to ignore the look that Ginny was giving her, "Clearly," she said quickly.
Ginny raised an eyebrow at her friend, and Ron was still frowning at the fact Hermione had dated Draco in the parallel world.
"I wonder what's going on inside Potter's head," Daphne voiced.
"Well, if what you say is true and these alternate worlds are completely parallel to our own,…Then I expect Harry will probably envision himself as a pureblood and a Slytherin, much like Malfoy," Hermione reasoned as she looked at her unconscious best friend.
"I don't envy him if that's the case," Draco said quietly so that only Daphne could hear. He lay back against his pillows, feeling like he had run a marathon.
Daphne smiled sympathetically at him and murmured, "I know what it's like to be trapped in your own head, remember?"
Draco nodded and looked over at her, "I know you do, and it was far worse for you. I'm just a bit wiped."
At that point, Ron loudly asked, "Do you reckon there will be any long term damage?"
Hermione shook her head, but Daphne answered, "I doubt it. Flitwick did say that when mirror charms are used on people, they are like some sort of bad trip. So you guys will probably feel awful for a couple of hours but nothing more."
"How does Flitwick know what a bad trip feels like?" Ron asked in amusement.
Daphne grinned, "I did wonder that. When I asked, he just said he was a younger man in the '60s."
Draco chuckled at that, and even Hermione smiled slightly, "So much for a drama-free year."
"This stuff always happens to you three," Draco remarked, "And I try to be nice to Potter a couple of times, then I get caught up in it."
Daphne rolled her eyes at him, "You have hardly been nice to anyone since we came back to school. You have just been slightly less nasty than normal, so go to sleep and wake up in a better mood," she ordered.
Draco grumbled but decided to try and get to sleep anyway; he did feel awful after all.
The moment Harry Potter opened his eyes, he knew that something was very wrong. The first sign of this was that everything was too bright. The second sign was that he didn't remember how he got here, and he didn't even know where 'here' was.
After a minute or two, his eyes had adjusted to the new lighting conditions, and Harry realised that he was in the back garden of the house that he had lived in at Godric's Hollow. The grass was green, the sky was blue, and the sun was beating down into the garden.
Harry frowned as he heard laughter from inside the house. Moments later, three teenagers emerged from the house, all of them wearing shorts and t-shirts and holding water guns. Amongst these three teenagers was himself, but he looked very different. Harry's face was the same shape, and his eyes were the same shape, size and emerald green colour. However, this Harry had jet black hair that stopped at his shoulders but was styled and wet from the water fight that had obviously just happened.
The other two teenagers were Draco Malfoy and Pansy Parkinson, which in itself didn't make an ounce of sense. Harry watched in bewilderment as this other him grabbed Pansy around the waist and kissed her while Draco jeered and sprayed them with water.
What the hell was going on here?
"Are you kids' hungry?" Called an amused voice from the house.
Harry watched in disbelief as his mother walked out of the house. Her long red hair was pulled back into a ponytail, and she was carrying a tray of food and lemonade. She levitated it with her wand and set it down on the garden table. She smiled fondly at them all, "Harry, your father is going to be home a little late tonight, but he promised to make your birthday party,'" Lily said before she returned to the house.
"So that's you 17 now, mate," Draco said as he took a sandwich off of the tray, "You're officially a man now."
Pansy giggled from where she was sitting on Harry's knee, "He's already a man," she said suggestively. Draco rolled his eyes and told them to get a room.
The scene then began to fade away as a mysterious fog obscured it. Harry realised what must be happening. This was sort of like a pensieve, but these weren't memories; they couldn't be memories because none of this had ever happened.
Harry, therefore, concluded that this was some kind of illusion, a hallucination of sorts. It was then that he remembered the mirror charm that had hit him, and for a moment, he wondered if this was what his life would have been like if he had taken Draco's hand on the train to Hogwarts in first year.
Then again, why would his parents still be alive? And why did he look different? The fog cleared away, and the next scene came into focus. It was dark now, and lanterns and real fairies were lighting a long table in the back garden of the Godric's Hollow house. At the table, Harry recognised Remus Lupin as well as Lucius and Narcissa Malfoy. His mother sat at the end of the table with a vacant seat next to her.
"He promised to be here, Harry," Lily said with a sigh, "He mentioned something about an ex-Death Eater that they needed to find."
So James was still an Auror then, Harry realised.
A pop came from the gate, and Lily turned around with a smile, "Here he is!"
Lily hurried over to the gate and wrapped her arms around the man who had walked in wearing a thick travelling cloak, "I was so worried when you mentioned old Death Eaters!" Lily said as she pulled the hood on his cloak down and kissed him lightly on the lips.
The man smiled, "I told you I was fine," said Severus Snape.
Harry's jaw dropped as he watched the man kiss his mother and smile at her like that. In this strange little world, his mother had fallen for Snape…this is how his life would have been if she had chosen Snape instead. They would have lived. Well, of course, they would have. Snape would never have heard the prophecy, so Voldemort would never have killed the Potter's, and if he was with Lily, he wouldn't have joined the Death Eaters. But then who would kill Voldemort? Who would be the boy-who-lived? Could it have been Neville?
"I'm sorry I nearly missed his birthday, Lil, but I promised I'd be back. It's not every day your only child comes of age," Severus said as he discarded the cloak and walked over to Harry.
"Dad!" Harry exclaimed when he saw him. He jumped up and hugged the man he was calling Dad, and a tiny part of Harry sort of wished for this easier, happier life, "I've not seen you all week."
"I know, Harry. I'm sorry, the mission was a difficult one, but I made it back for your birthday, just like I promised," Severus said, and with a grin, he handed Harry a present. It was a small box, and when he opened it, he found a watch inside, "It was mine when I was your age, but it's yours now."
Harry put the watch on his wrist happily and hugged Severus once more with a, "Thanks, Dad!"
Harry was so gobsmacked that he didn't notice the scene was changing until it had. He felt sick at the sight of his mother and Snape, but he longed for the idyllic simple life that they would have had. All the same, Harry would never switch his life for simplicity because everything that had happened had made him the person he was.
In the new scene, Harry was now at Hogwarts. He was in a Defence Against the Dark Arts classroom with a man that had to be an older James Potter. He was wearing glasses, and his hair was as messy as ever, but he had lost his boyish good looks and seemed slightly gaunt now.
"Mr Snape," Said James very unpleasantly to Harry, who was sitting at the front of the class and looked to be around seventh year age now, "I have had enough of your cheek. You are just as stubborn as your father was; detention with me on Friday!"
The bell rang, and an annoyed Harry stomped off with Draco, "I hate him so much," Harry was saying to Draco, who seemed to be his Ron in this warped version of his life.
"I know," Draco was saying with a glance behind him, "He's hated you since he first saw you. He's just a bitter bastard Harry; no one likes him."
"But he hates me most of all," Harry said bitterly, "And he's so biased! He's always giving his precious Gryffindors points."
"Yeah, well, he is head of Gryffindor," Draco said with an amused grin.
Harry growled irritably, "I'm going to go talk to Dad. I'll meet you in the great hall."
"Okay, see you!" Draco called as Harry diverted towards the dungeons. Harry followed himself as he walked through the dark corridors into Severus Snape's office.
Severus looked up with a smile when his son walked in. Harry found this incredibly surreal to watch, "Ah, Harry, come to complain?" He asked fondly.
"Yes!" Harry exclaimed as he slammed the door in annoyance.
"Sometimes, I think my job at the Ministry was easier than this one," Severus muttered jokingly as Harry began to pace the office.
"Professor Potter hates me!"
"Yes, he does," Severus said thoughtfully.
"He's hated me since he first saw me!" Harry added.
"You're quite right," said Severus ever so casually.
"For no reason!" Harry exploded.
"Well, you know there is a reason," Severus said as he gave an essay a D and placed it aside, "He hates you because you remind him of me, and I'm the man who married the woman he was in love with."
"Yeah, well, he's an idiot," Harry said weakly, and real Harry was watching this scene with mixed feelings.
Severus and James had switched roles here, and while Harry had half wished for this life, he didn't like the fact that his father was bitter and alone now because Severus had gotten Lily. Did that mean that James had become a Death Eater? Surely not.
"Yes, James Potter is indeed an idiot," Severus said as he put his quill down and stood up, "Shall we go get some dinner?" he asked.
Harry sighed, "Sure," he said as they left the office together.
"Don't tell your mother that I called him an idiot, by the way. You know how she is," Severus said. Laughter echoed around the room as the scene faded away.
When Harry opened his eyes, his breathing was incredibly heavy, and he was clearly in the hospital wing at Hogwarts. He had known it wasn't real, but it had been very vivid and realistic for a dream.
"Snape was my Dad…" Harry said in disbelief, more to himself than anything else.
A voice from his left said dryly, "And I thought mine was bad."
Harry turned to see Draco propped up in the bed next to his. It was pretty dark outside, and the gas lamps on the walls lighted the hospital wing. By the quietness, Harry assumed that visiting hours were over; the only people here were patients. Including Hermione, who was sound asleep in the bed to Harry's right.
"What?" Harry asked Draco in confusion.
"Daphne said that the mirror charms that hit us made us have some kind of vision of an alternate world completely parallel to our own," Draco said matter of factly.
Harry wiped the sweat from his forehead and was glad that he had finally gotten his breathing under control now, "Well, my Mum married Severus Snape instead of my Dad, and they didn't die. I was a Slytherin. You were my best friend, Pansy was my girlfriend, and my real Dad was the DADA Professor who hated me for being Snape's son!"
"Yeah, that's pretty fucked up," Draco agreed as he threw a bar of Honeydukes chocolate at Harry, "It was a tip from Weaslette, but it works."
Harry was too exhausted to tell Draco off for insulting his friend. He simply opened the chocolate bar and bit into it. He sighed as the instant calming effect washed over him.
"What was your vision about?" Harry asked the Slytherin curiously.
"The opposite of yours pretty much," Draco said thoughtfully, "Voldemort killed my parents, I was raised by muggles, and I was a Gryffindor," he looked rather disgusted just saying those words, "And as if that wasn't bad enough Weasley was my best friend and I was dating Granger."
"So in some respects…we switched lives," Harry said slowly.
Draco nodded, "It seems so," he reasoned.
"In some ways, I pity you, and in others, I envy you," Draco said honestly.
"I get why you'd feel sorry for me," Harry frowned, "The whole dead parents, abusive Muggles thing. But why would you envy me?"
Draco's eyes remained firmly fixed on his hands as he spoke, "You have some semblance of a family in the Weasley's. I may have had a real family, but it didn't often feel like that."
"Your mother seems nice," Harry frowned, "From the fact she saved my life in the war and from what Andromeda's told me."
"My mother is nice," Draco said quietly, "But she wasn't always that way. When she was under the Imperius Curse, things were different."
Harry looked sharply at Draco, "She was under the Imperius Curse?"
"Yes, for prolonged periods when my father thought she was being problematic," Draco replied darkly, "For the majority of the war, for example. My father is a difficult man to hate and a difficult man to forgive, Potter. He did not like to use the unforgivables on me personally, not until the Dark Lord got inside his head. However, he turned a blind eye when his Death Eater friends tortured me with the Cruciatus Curse, and he just stood by and watched whenever the dark-" he cut himself off and took a breath, "-whenever Voldemort did it."
"He did it more than once?" Harry asked quietly.
Draco nodded. He had not yet looked up from his hands, "I was 15 the first time. He punished my parents for their mistakes by torturing me. It was a standard practice of his."
"I'm so sorry, Malfoy," Harry said honestly, "I thought you were just a smarmy little git. I never thought about why you were acting that way."
Draco just shrugged, and they fell into silence again. However, after a few minutes, Harry said, "Why did you tell me all of that? What happened to us not being friends and not sharing?"
Draco frowned and looked up, "Seeing that today…it made me realise how similar we are, Potter. I don't think I can carry on with the act. I've been too proud to admit that I need a friend like you and that I want one."
Harry smiled slightly. Andromeda had been entirely right about one thing anyway, that was for sure. Draco did need a friend, and Godric knew Harry needed a change.
"Well, I'll metaphorically shake your hand," Harry smiled, "In response to your offer of friendship in first year."
Draco smiled very slightly, "Better late than never," he joked weakly.
* ~ TBC ~ *