Furious, Harry began his descent down the Astronomy tower.

Malfoy had manipulated him. He had willingly and knowingly changed Harry's perception of him, all while making him come to feel emotionally strong for someone that didn't even exist. Malfoy loving him, Malfoy turning out to be the mystery boy . . . It was all too much for Harry to take in at once. He couldn't believe it.

When he had almost completed his journey, he heard a low moan coming from a nearby corridor to his left. Confused, he headed toward the noise. Another moan was emitted, then he saw a figure lying on the floor.

Gasping quietly, Harry rushed over to the figure, who was obviously hurt and needed help. In the dark, he couldn't make out a hair color or any other features.

"Shit," he murmured, turning the figure over onto their back so Harry could see what he was dealing with. What he saw made chills go up his spine.

Blood was pouring out of both arms and legs, and Harry followed the trail to discover little pools of the substance. His eyes moved back up to his head, and he did a double take.

It was Malfoy.

"Oh, fuck . . ." Harry leaned down over the motionless figure and shook him vigorously, knowing he wasn't injured anywhere life-threatening but by the looks of it had lost a lot of blood.

Another groan of pain, and Malfoy was twisting out of his grip and onto his side, panting heavily.

"Malfoy, hey, Malfoy, can you hear me?" Harry asked, all traces of anger at the boy vanishing into thin air.

"Mmm, hurts." Malfoy winced as he spoke, curling into the fetal position. Harry felt incredibly sorry for him in that moment. Whoever had hurt him clearly wanted to see him suffer, and they had succeeded.

"Can you . . . Can you sit up?"

Malfoy opened his eyes, and when they landed on Potter he immediately stiffened and uncurled his body, sitting up as far as he could go.

"Potter?"

Harry sighed. "I'm not going to hurt you, I just . . ." He shook his head. "We need to get you to the hospital wing."

"Yeah," Malfoy agreed, and Harry was relieved there'd be no argument there. At least the boy was lucid and sane enough to know he needed help. "Yeah."

"Can you stand?"

"M-Maybe."

As Malfoy began wobbly getting to his feet, Harry realized he hadn't asked a very important question.

"Malfoy, who did this to you?"

"I dunno, it was dark. I couldn't see."

"It's not that dark; our eyes are adjusted. I can see you just fine."

"I didn't know them," Malfoy said. "I had no idea who they were."

"What did they look like?"

"I dunno, Potter, I was a little distracted by the bloody knife in their hands to pay much attention to their looks."

Harry sighed. If Malfoy could snark, he was going to be fine.

"You have to report the incident to McGonagall. She can conduct a weapon search across the castle."

"If those arseholes know what's good for them, they'd have thrown the knife out by now."

"You don't know that," Harry said, and to his dismay he actually sounded pleading. "You have to at least try."

"I most certainly do not, and this is most certainly none of your business," said Malfoy.

"It is now," said Harry, reaching his hand out for Malfoy to take when he saw the boy was struggling in standing up.

Malfoy begrudgingly accepted the help and stood up, wobbling on his feet and pressing his hand against the wall.

"Malfoy? Can you walk?"

"Yeah, I'm fine. Just dizzy. Give me a minute."

"Okay . . ."

Malfoy stood bracing both hands on the wall, panting, as more blood continued to drip from his wounds.

"You're losing more blood," Harry said. "We need to get moving."

Malfoy whipped his head up at him, and the gesture was slightly wild. "Why do you care?" he hissed. "You made it quite clear how you feel about me. Apparently to you I'm worse than Voldemort. Why are you helping me?"

Harry sighed. "Malfoy," he said, "I didn't mean that."

Malfoy pushed both hands off the wall, but when he wobbled and Harry went in to catch him, he pushed Harry off him with an angry snarl and straightened himself out.

"Don't fucking touch me."

"Okay," Harry said, putting his hands up in surrender. "Okay."

Malfoy began limping away, and Harry followed him, which wasn't hard considering he wasn't walking very fast.

"Listen," said Harry, "just because you're hurt doesn't mean you get to-"

"I'm not doing anything," Malfoy argued back fiercely, then proceeding to moan in pain as he took another limp step.

"You're ignoring what you did to me," said Harry, watching Malfoy struggle wordlessly. It would be so much easier if the other boy just let him help him.

"I'm so sorry I tried to befriend you in the only way I could," Malfoy spat sarcastically, and was he not at all sorry?

"That's not the only way you could've befriended me!" Harry exclaimed, as Malfoy stopped walking and panted with his hands on his knees. "And will you let me help you walk, for Christ's sake?"

Malfoy nodded feebly as a relieved Harry swooped in and put Malfoy's arm around his own shoulder. "Lean on me," he instructed, wrapping an arm around Malfoy's waist.

"Of course it was," Malfoy responded as they set off again. "You wouldn't have even looked at me otherwise, and you know it."

"We already talked about this," said Harry. "I already asked you about the truce, and you admitted that you behaved wrongly and tried to fix it by apologizing to me and my friends."

Malfoy sighed, whining in pain again as they walked. "I thought it was a good idea at the time."

"What about manipulating me so thoroughly I completely changed the way I saw you?" Harry asked. "Did you think that was a good idea?"

"I never meant to-"

"I don't care what you meant," Harry growled, tightening his grip unconsciously on Malfoy. "You did it, and that's what matters. I can't trust another word that comes out of your mouth, ever again."

"I'm sorry," Malfoy said quietly. "I'm sorry I ruined things between us when all I wanted to do was get to know you."

"You could've gotten to know the real me, Malfoy," said Harry, all of a sudden feeling inexplicably sad. "Instead you lied and hid behind a wrist."

"I know," said Malfoy, and he sounded so ashamed that Harry suddenly wanted to forget all about their fight and wrap him up in a blanket, hug him close until he saw that smile again he loved so much.

Wait a minute.

He did not love Malfoy's smile.

What was going on with him?

Shaking his head, Harry continued to guide him along towards the hospital wing.

"It's a shame, too, because before I found out you were playing with my head I was actually thinking about giving us a chance."

Malfoy hung his head and visibly swallowed.

"I wish there was some way I could convey the sincerity of my apology," he said. "I know what I did was wrong, and I would do anything to take it back if I only knew this was how you felt."

Harry scoffed at his utter childishness. "Well, unfortunately, that's not the way things work, Malfoy. You don't get a do-over. You learn and move on, and that's what you're going to do now. You'll find someone who loves you, I'm sure of it. It just won't be me. It can't be me. Can't you see that?"

Malfoy nodded.

They walked in silence until they reached the hospital wing, and Harry dropped him off.

"Can you take it from here?" he asked Malfoy.

Malfoy looked uncomfortable, like he wanted to say something, but then thought the better of it and nodded his head.

"Okay," Harry said, and after an awkward moment of silence, he added, "I'll see you tomorrow."

Malfoy nodded at him again and disappeared behind the doors. Once he was gone, Harry put a hand to his forehead and sighed. What the fuck had just happened?

Draco was healed relatively quickly, but the line of questioning regarding his injuries was long and strenuous. Who hurt you? Did you see what they looked like? I know it was dark, but try to remember, Mr. Malfoy. The safety of our school depends on it. If there's someone going around carrying a weapon, everybody's in danger.

Yeah, right. Like they'd ever use the weapon on anybody except for him.

Once Draco was finished being questioned he was free to go, and he met up with his friends in the Great Hall.

"Darling, where have you been?" Pansy asked.

Draco sighed. "Hospital wing."

Greg gasped. "Why?"

Draco rolled his eyes. "Because I was perfectly splendid and wanted to pay dear Madam Pomfrey a visit. Why do you think, Greg?"

"You were hurt?" Blaise asked. "Where?"

"Legs and arms. I was stabbed."

Pansy choked on her pumpkin juice. "You were stabbed?" she exclaimed once she'd swallowed.

"Yeah."

"Oh my god . . ."

"Mate, that's awful," said Greg.

"No, I thought it was rather wonderful," Draco bit back harshly. Greg sighed.

"Who was it?" Pansy asked.

Draco shrugged.

"You didn't recognize them?"

"The one holding the knife was blonde. That's about all I know."

"Draco . . . This is really bad. If someone's going around carrying a weapon, we're all in danger."

That was exactly what Madam Pomfrey had said.

"I don't think so," Draco said. "They seemed particularly upset with me and the fact that I'm a Death Eater."

"You're not a Death Eater," growled Blaise. "So stop saying that you are."

Draco shook his head. "I can't just snap my fingers and undo what I did."

"No, but you can learn and grow from it," he continued. "You seem to demonstrate genuine remorse for your actions, which is all you can do because unfortunately you can't just snag a time turner and undo it."

"No one else seems to think I'm sorry," Draco said.

"We do," said Pansy. "Isn't that enough?"

"I guess."

"Doesn't help very much when you're getting stabbed, now does it?"

"No, not really."

"Draco, we have to do something about this," said Pansy. "You have to report to McGonagall. Then she can conduct a search for the weapon."

Draco, annoyed at having to repeat himself, bristled. "They've probably thrown it away by now, Pans."

"You don't know that," she responded, and that was exactly what Potter had said. Maybe they were onto something.

"By letting this go you're essentially telling yourself that it's okay to let other people hurt you," said Blaise. "Do you really want to move forward with that mindset?"

"No," said Draco. "But-"

"Do you really want to let them get away with what they did? If there's any chance- any at all, that they still have that knife, it's worth pursuing."

Draco sighed. They were absolutely right. The worst that could happen was nothing would change. At least he would be able to sleep at night content with the knowledge that he had tried to stick up for himself.

"Okay," Draco said. "I'll do it."