Roll and fall in green

by Dontthrowsticksatme

Draco Malfoy starts Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry with high hopes. Then he discovers he's in the same year as the biggest celebrity in the country: The Boy Who Lived. (This is basically the Harry Potter series from Draco's point of view, with a Drarry-twist. It is also my other fic Crimson and Clover from Draco's point of view.)

6. Chapter 4-3: Draco's Secret Heartache

Chapter 4: Draco Malfoy's Secret Heartache

(Part 3 of 3)

It turned out to be difficult for Draco to be discreet about his infatuation with Harry Potter. He would have preferred to be with him every second of every day, but as usual, Potter was accompanied by Granger and Weasley around the clock. It had been over twenty-four hours since Draco had bolted from the Astronomy Tower and he was longing for his homeboy. Something had to give.

'Potter!' Draco yelled when he finally spotted Harry and his bodyguards near the library.

'What?'

With a jerk of his chin, Draco beckoned him over in his most defiant way. Potter told his friends to keep walking, and as soon as they turned away, Draco jumped closer to seize his hand and yank him behind a tapestry into a hidden passageway. Once out of sight, Harry took over. Pressing Draco against the wall, he shoved his hands under Draco's shirt and nuzzled his neck. 'Hey Dra,' he breathed with a smile in his voice.

Draco lost the ability to form words. His hands fluttered over Harry's body as if they couldn't choose the best place to land, but when Harry pressed their foreheads together and Draco felt the warmth of Harry's breath on his cheeks, Draco's muscles relaxed. His hands rested on Harry's chest, and he closed his eyes, feeling like he could finally breathe again.

'Hey Harry…'

. . .

In the middle of the night, Draco woke up from his bed moving as if somebody was climbing in. He bolted upright, but there was no one there. For a second he thought he'd dreamt it, but then he felt something again: hands on his legs.

Not a split-second too soon, an invisible voice from the dark whispered, 'Silencio,' and Draco cut his terrified scream short. 'Potter, fait chier – warn first!'

The blanket moved on its own – Harry Potter was in Draco's bed. 'I couldn't sleep.'

Draco got pressed down into the pillow as an invisible arm lay over his chest; invisible fingers played with his ear. Harry's sigh felt hot in Draco's neck.

Draco yanked the hood of the Invisibility Cloak away from Harry's face so he could press a little kiss on his forehead. He felt around some more and discovered Harry was shirtless, the way he'd been in the Hospital Wing. A small, excited shriek escaped Draco as he rolled Harry over to jump on top of him. That Cloak had to go.

'No – Draco,' Potter mumbled. 'Stop.'

Draco rolled on his back, looking up at the ceiling and breathing out slowly to calm down.

After a beat, Harry sat up, looking bewildered. 'Why'd you stop?'

Draco blinked. 'You told me to.'

'Yeah, well… since when does anyone listen?' Harry grinned awkwardly, as if his remark wasn't disturbing.

Draco raised himself on his elbows, frowning. 'Seriously? You know, I, unlike you, had an actual upbringing. So I, unlike you, have been taught that no means no.'

Harry flashed a half-grin that didn't quite reach his eyes. 'Right… Except when Ron says it.'

'Obviously.' Draco couldn't control himself and pressed his lips to Harry's side to make a farting noise. It made Harry snigger. 'So?' Draco drawled. 'What's it gonna be, boy? Want me to stop or not?'

Harry kept quiet for a while. Then he let out a tiny breath and muttered, 'Not.'

Draco snorted, climbing onto Potter's lap to cup his face and kiss him senseless while Harry's hands started exploring.

Suddenly, Draco gasped and pulled back. 'We need a secret code!'

Harry was breathing heavily, his eyes marvellously foggy. 'What?'

'I mean –' Draco tried to talk and kiss at the same time '– if your no doesn't mean no –' it was a little difficult '– we need a word that –' kiss '– does.'

'Why?' Potter mumbled, almost unintelligible from beneath Draco's lips.

With a heavy sigh, Draco backed away. 'So that you can keep saying no, you know, pretend you hate me or whatever, and I can pretend to be the bastard who bullies you, but I will listen and stop when you say the code word that means no for you. You see? It's brilliant.'

Harry started grinning, not looking up at Draco. 'Bullies me?' he repeated, stroking Draco's stomach.

'Well? Give me a code word,' Draco drawled. 'I haven't got all night, you know.'

Harry smiled with his eyes closed, nuzzling Draco's nose. Then he yanked at Draco's legs to topple him over backwards and climb on top of him. 'What sort of word, Mister Malfoy?'

Draco's breathing came in short little gasps now. 'Doesn't matter.' He yelped and moaned as Harry undressed him and got to work. 'It should be… easy – but, you know, not something – ooh, baby…' He sighed at Harry's handiwork. 'Not something – eeeh – Good Merlin… Wait.' He gasped loudly. 'Oof – Wait, Harry, I can't think.'

Harry's messy head popped into Draco's field of vision, not making it easier to think at all. He playfully kissed Draco's face. 'Yes?'

Draco lost his train of thought. 'Yes,' he sighed.

Grinning, Harry backed off, ignoring Draco's displeased sounds. 'What sort of word, Dra?' He softly asked, looking intently at Draco, as if they were in Potions class and Draco had all the answers.

Drawing a heavy breath, Draco sat up on his knees, his back straight as a line. 'Right… Well… you know,' he drawled, forcing himself to think straight too.

'It should be easy, you said,' Harry helped him. 'Not something –?' He tilted his head, eyes aglow. 'I didn't quite get what you said after that.'

Draco faux-glared at him. 'Yes. Thank you. The word should be easy enough to remember, but not something you would say during… well… moments like these.'

'Alright…' Harry frowned, his grin turning into a smirk. 'How about… Vernon?'

Draco raised a brow. 'Vernon? Who's Vernon?'

'My uncle. I don't want to think of him now, but I won't forget his name either.'

'D'accord,' drawled Draco. 'Lie down.'

Harry, who seemed delighted, dropped on his back and Draco got on top of him.

'No, don't move. Stop wriggling, lionceau. I said: stop!'

A tiny smile broke through Harry's face. 'Lionceau?'

'Hush.'

'Why?'

'Just do as I say, Potter!'

Studying The Boy Who Lived as if he was a test subject, Draco started softly biting every bit of Harry he took a liking to. It made the boy laugh. 'What are you doing, you vampire loony?'

'Marking you, of course.' Draco smirked. 'Turn around.'

To his delight, Harry obeyed without question, sniggering softly.

Draco bit into Harry's shoulder blades and climbed on top of his bare back. 'You are a gosh-darn treat, Potter,' he whispered, before biting into his earlobes.

Closing his eyes with a faint smile, Harry grabbed Draco's pillow, mumbling. 'I came here to sleep, Dra.'

Wrapping his arms around Harry's soft waist and burying his face in Harry's neck, Draco lay down on top of him. 'Alright then. Let's sleep.'

Harry threw the blanket half-heartedly over them, and Draco took over to pull it tight. With his eyes closed, the movements of Harry's breathing went through Draco's entire body. It felt like he floated on a calm river – a nice and warm river.

'Draco?' whispered Harry, his eyes closed.

'Harry?' Draco whispered back.

Harry just smiled.

It didn't take long until his breathing changed, and with one slightly louder exhale, The Boy Who Lived was clearly off to dream land. It felt more intimate to Draco than anything else they could've been doing.

He nuzzled Harry's hair. 'Je t'aime…'

. . .

'Professor Snape?'

Draco had stayed behind after everyone else left the Dungeons that Thursday afternoon.

'Mister Malfoy?' drawled Snape without looking up from the pile of essays they'd just handed in.

'You know how much I love Potions, right, sir? It is my favourite subject, you see. My father–'

'What do you want, Malfoy?' Snape cut in.

Draco was thrown off for a second to change tactics and decided to cut to the chase. 'Can you help me get these ingredients?' He'd copied the ingredient list of the potion in Magic For The Hopelessly Romantic that he'd wanted to make in summer. Now, he shoved the list under his Professor's nose.

Snape read it without moving a muscle. 'This is not for a Potion on the fourth-year curriculum,' he concluded.

'No, sir, it is – er – a private endeavour.'

Snape smirked. 'Is that so? Interesting… Show me the recipe.'

'Can you help me find the ingredients, sir?'

Snape looked into Draco's eyes. 'From this ingredient list alone I can tell that this is not a Potion for someone with your – how do I put it – skill set, Mister Malfoy. Let me help you.'

He took the ingredients list back from Snape. 'That's not necessary, sir, but thank you.' Draco's father told him to avoid looking Professor Snape in the eye, for some secret reason Draco was dying to know, so he looked away.

Snape lifted his eyebrows. 'Draco, let me help you,' he insisted.

'You'll just make fun of me,' Draco muttered, 'sir.'

'Don't be a fool.' Snape smirked. 'I will make fun of you regardless. Show me the recipe.'

Draco was torn. He really – really – wanted to make the Potion. He'd collected some of Harry's beautiful hairs from his pillow and everything. Contemplating his options for a while, he saw no other way out than to give in.

'Alright, Professor, but you cannot tell – You cannot tell anyone about this, sir.'

Snape's thin mouth curled into a mocking smile.

Bracing himself, Draco took out Magic For The Hopelessly Romantic and flipped it open at the bookmarked page. 'There, sir. Laugh.'

Snape read the description, then slowly lifted the cover to read the book's title. His smirk broadened. Clearly he was having his version of a laughing fit. 'Dear, dear, Mister Malfoy…'

'I know, Professor,' Draco muttered, his cheeks burning.

Suddenly moving so swiftly it startled him, Snape got up, took the ingredients list and started raiding his cupboard. 'You have a part of – ah – the other individual's body?' He turned to Draco with a mocking smirk. 'Or more specifically: do you have some crimson?'

Draco bit back a nasty retort. 'I do, sir,' he stiffly replied. His face felt hotter every second, but Snape went diligently to work regardless of any malicious mirth. At first, Draco wondered why Snape seemed so eager to help, but he soon realised Snape simply enjoyed making the potion. At a certain point, Draco would not have been surprised if his professor had started to hum or whistle.

'You ever made this one before, Professor?' Draco asked, sitting on his knees on a chair and leaning his arms on the desk to watch Snape crush Ashwinder egg shells.

'Once. A long time ago,' mumbled Snape.

'Did you make it for yourself, sir?'

'That is for me to know and for you to wonder.'

'That means yes, Professor,' said Draco smugly. It yielded him a scowl from the Professor, which made Draco laugh.

After Snape told him not to make a single sound as he carefully stirred the Potion seven times clockwise and thirty-one times counter-clockwise – Draco was counting along – he put everything down and suddenly locked eyes with Draco with such intensity that he forgot to look away.

'Before we do this,' said Snape, 'you need to be fully aware of what you are doing. If you are planning on actually using this object –'

'I'll use it on a ring, sir.'

'Right…' Snape stretched the word as if he was pondering something. 'Sit down for a moment, Mister Malfoy.'

Draco frowned, pushing himself up to dangle his legs down instead of sitting on them.

Snape pulled up a stool too. 'Listen to me, Draco, if you play with things like these – well, it would be… prudent to prepare yourself for the very real possibility… that, at some point, your – ring… stops beating.'

Draco blinked up at him, letting the words sink in. 'No way, is that what happened to yours, sir?'

Snape shot him an exhausted look. 'Just… head my words, Mister Malfoy. Consider the option before wearing it.'

Draco thought about it. He wondered if this meant that Snape wanted him not to wear it in case Harry died. That seemed rather silly to him. He nodded.

'Are you sure you want us to continue? We can still turn it into something else at this point.'

'I want to finish it, Professor.'

Snape nodded solemnly and got up. 'Cut the Hawthorne berries, then the Motherwort and the Turmeric. Don't let them touch, use different knives for each.'

It was almost time for dinner when the Potion was finally finished.

'Get your ring ready to be immerged,' Snape said. Draco pried the Malfoy signet ring from his thumb, and Snape raised his eyebrows. 'Your father's heirloom–'

'It's mine now, sir,' Draco interrupted. 'I'm the Malfoy heir, you see, sir.'

Snape leaned his hands on the table. 'Mister Malfoy, surely your father will–'

Draco flicked the ring into the cauldron. For a second, he thought Snape was going to explode, but then his Professor inhaled sharply and uttered through clenched teeth, 'You do realise that if your father were to find out about this, he would get me fired on the spot?'

Draco stared into the cauldron. 'Then we'll just have to make sure he doesn't find out, won't we, Professor?'

'I do not appreciate you talking to me like that, Draco,' Snape snarled. 'I sincerely hope you will be the one making sure he doesn't find out.'

Scowling, Draco crossed his arms. Of the two of them, Draco reckoned he was surely the one who had the most to lose here. He didn't tell his professor that. He'd already crossed several lines this hour.

After a loaded silence, Snape cleaned the desk with a flick of his wand. 'The ring will be ready in fifteen minutes.'

While Professor Snape tidied up the rest of the Dungeon and started grading essays, Draco waited. Restless within a minute, he took out A Walk With A Vampire, trying to read, but in reality reliving a particularly happy hour he had spent down by the lake with Harry at lunch-time.

Fifteen minutes later, Snape arranged his essays and got up. Summoning a ladle, he fished the ring out of the potion and Draco sat up straight in anticipation. When Snape closed his fingers around the ring, a satisfied smirk crossed his face.

Draco jumped up. 'Does it work, Professor?'

Without a word, Snape handed him the ring. As Draco put it around his thumb, he felt a calm pulse coming from it. The gold throbbed like it had a tiny heartbeat. He had to sit down. 'Amazing, sir…' He took it off to hold the ring between his hands, closing his eyes for a second. Harry Potter's heart was beating steadily in the palm of Draco's hand. 'Thank you, sir,' he softly said, looking up at his Professor with unconcealed gratitude.

. . .

'Darling,' Pansy hissed over Draco's shoulder, 'better stretch your legs somewhere private for a bit.'

Frowning, Draco looked round at her, but she simply winked, mouthing, 'Trust me,' and fell back into step with her gang of Slytherin girls.

Tapping his forehead at Vincent and Gregory, Draco continued doing his homework at a table in the library that they'd been occupying for over an hour now. It was the best table – the one in the corner out of everyone's way – and they should not give it up just for a walk.

Still, it couldn't hurt to stretch his legs for a bit. Ordering his friends to stay put no matter what, Draco grabbed his Arithmancy book – because he had a lot of work to do – and decided to take a turn about the Library.

As soon as he rounded the corner of a secluded section of bookcases, he heard hurried footsteps. A foot around his ankle made him lose his balance; arms caught him, but only to make him turn and cushion his fall. With a groan like an old man, Draco dropped flat on his back on the Library's disgusting carpet.

Laughing like the idiot he was, no less than Harry Potter fell sloppily on top of him. 'Hey Dra,' he whispered, grinning and planting his knees in Draco's sides, and in between hiccups of laughter, he kissed Draco's nose and mouth and hands until he had Draco gasping for breath.

'I need to do my homework,' Draco groaned, desperately clutching his book. 'You illiterate bastard, get off me.'

Harry snorted. Burying his face in Draco's neck, he grumbled, 'Don't call me a rat bastard.'

Smirking, Draco wrapped his arms around Harry's neck and closed his eyes. The next half hour, instead of Arithmancy, Draco practiced French kissing. Harry wasn't as naturally gifted with the skill as Draco'd expected from a celebrity – quite sloppy, in fact – but rapidly picked up on what Draco liked.

The library floor was hard beneath Draco's back, but it didn't matter, because Harry felt soft on top of him. Feeling entirely blissful, Draco ran his fingers through the tangled, black hair, and every now and then, he peeked through his closed eyes to take in the marvel that was Harry Potter. The boy was wearing Muggle short sleeves, as always, and lying on top of Draco with closed eyes, leaning on his forearms. With one of Harry's mighty arms on each side of his face, Draco felt weak in every possible way. He traced his fingers along Harry's shoulder blades. Drew letters on his back. Je t'aime.

Potter rolled on his side to gaze at Draco, stroke the hair from his face or touch his nose or his lashes. When Potter was staring at him like that, Draco couldn't even meet his eyes; he would certainly die of euphoria if he tried. So he shifted a little, got up on an elbow and cupped Potter's face to kiss him some more. It was the weirdest thing how he didn't get bored of something so idiotic as moving his lips against this specific boy's ones. He would only let them go to quickly bite Harry's nose, but got back to kissing immediately after. In return, Harry pulled away to bite Draco's lip – and Draco's eyes rolled back with delight. Before he could prevent it, even a moan escaped him. Thinking fast, he dramatically spread an arm and fell back on the stuffy library carpet, burying a hand in his hair. 'You are killing me, Mister Potter.'

Harry's grin did nothing to calm him. 'Why? With this?' And he all but chew on Draco's bottom lip – further encouraged by Draco's hands clutching his hair – until it started bleeding. 'Oops… Sorry Dra, I –'

'Don't you dare apologise.' Draco's voice sounded feeble. He felt feeble.

Potter laughed like he'd won something. Then, he pressed a little kiss on the bleeding spot.

Suddenly, Draco heard a noise and shot up, thereby slamming his forehead into Harry's. Muffling their cries, they glanced around, but there was no one to see. Still, it left Draco nervous. At any moment, other students might walk in on them.

So he quickly heaved himself up on his arms. 'Enough, Potter… I have homework, you know.'

Harry pulled one of Draco's arms away, making him lose his balance and fall back again. It made them both laugh.

Groaning, Draco untangled his legs from around Potter's waist, threatening to kick him when the boy tried to stop him. Harry just kept on laughing. It made it hard for Draco to keep his grin down.

Standing up, he dusted himself off, looking down on Harry. 'I need to study, Potter. You see, some of us have ambition.'

Harry leaned back on his hands, locking Draco's legs between his. 'Some of us have bravery.' He reached out to pull at Draco's hand, ignoring his derisive snort.

Picking up his Arithmancy book, Draco allowed himself to be hauled down. 'Fine,' he drawled leaning his arms on Potter's shoulders to read. 'Compromise.'

Harry made himself comfortable, and while Draco read, Harry kept pressing little kisses on the skin of his forehead, temples, cheeks, jaws, neck... Then he started slowly unbuttoning Draco's shirt, as if it was the wrapper of a fragile piece of art.

When Draco got to a particularly difficult question, he put the book down to mull it over, but Potter seemed to see it as encouragement and wrapped his arms tightly around Draco's waist, pressing their bodies together.

An E was always 5, Draco reasoned while absentmindedly kissing Harry, but the T could mean 2 or 4 or 100… He ran the three different options in his mind. The first one meant a zeppelin would crash, which was oddly specific. The second one pointed to a tall, dark stranger, which was not specific enough. But the third…

'Four hundred and twenty-three!' Draco swiftly pulled loose from Harry's arms to check the answer in his book, and Harry burst out laughing so suddenly that Draco jumped and buttoned up, nervously glancing around.

Potter didn't seem concerned about being caught. He kept on laughing as he pulled Draco close again to gleefully kiss him over and over and to push him back to the floor again. He mastered the art so skilfully that Draco lost his mind entirely.

. . .

Too soon, classes started again, which meant getting dragged back in the rut of normality.

After brushing his teeth for the second time, Draco strolled through the stone wall out of the Slytherin Common Room. He never liked going out to breakfast with bad breath, but he hated the taste of breakfast in his mouth all morning too, so he compromised by brushing his teeth twice.

'Boo.'

Draco screamed at the voice coming out of nowhere, then furiously pointed his wand in the direction of it. 'Potter, I will hex you.'

Potter pressed a kiss on his cheek, and Draco fired a haphazard kissing charm, but Harry's laughing face appeared somewhere else entirely.

'Don't laugh, you rat bastard,' Draco snarled.

Potter turned serious, going from zero to a hundred in a second the way only he could. He curled his pinkies around Draco's. 'When are you off today?'

'Same as you, dip, we've got Potions.' Draco tamped down his smile as he put his forehead against Harry's, eyes closed. Stupid idiot Potter…

'You promised to show me the Dungeons,' Harry reminded him.

Draco took a deep breathe, pulled away and walked off. 'Promises are for the lower classes,' he drawled, 'but if our local celebrity gets a kick out of it, I suppose I have no choice but to obey. What's next, Potter, want me to brush your hair? Carry you on my back between classes?'

'Well, if you're offering…'

Draco glared at him.

Grinning, Harry became invisible again, but he kept his pinkie around Draco's all the way back to the Entrance Hall, while Draco howled like a wolf in the echoing corridors of the Dungeons and Harry chatted about werewolves as if he personally knew one.

. . .

That afternoon, Draco and Harry were in luck. Snape paired them up to make Alihotsy Draught.

'Kid's stuff,' declared Draco as he joined Harry at the back of the Dungeon.

While Draco read the instructions, Potter shoved his stool as close to him as physically possible. He glanced around at the class and back at Draco, and whispered, 'I dare you to kiss me.'

Smirking, Draco instantly planted a wet, sloppy kiss full on Harry's mouth, not holding back in the slightest, and Harry backed away so fast he fell of his stool, manically looking around for witnesses.

The people at the table next to them looked down at Potter with worried expressions, but he managed to half-heartedly grin at them while Draco laughed scathingly.

Staring at him with wide eyes, his face bright red, Harry jumped up and pushed Draco. 'Rat bastard.'

Draco leaned on Harry's leg with his most seductive look. 'Dare me again, Harry.'

Smiling and blushing, Harry pushed Draco away, hissing, 'No! Not here.' When Draco raised his eyebrows, Harry blinked and smiled. 'Vernon, Dra.'

Draco's overly disappointed sigh made Harry snigger. Smirking to himself, Draco got up to start filling their cauldron.

Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Potter fidgeting on his chair. Within minutes, the boy had gradually inched closer to Draco again. His heartrate was unnecessarily high against Draco's thumb as he touched the Snitch-shaped cufflinks on Draco's blouse; his nail trailed the seam of Draco's pants; he hooked his finger behind Draco's waistband and traced the bare skin of his hip. Something warm tingled down Draco's spine, and he glanced down at Harry, who didn't notice, because he was too busy checking out Draco's butt.

'For crying out loud, Potter, how can I work like this?' hissed Draco.

Harry looked up at him, slowly blinking away the misty look in his eyes until it faded to a bashful smile. He backed away. 'Sorry, Dra.'

Draco smirked. 'Get it together, Potter…'

Harry's face went red like never before. 'Yes. I'm sorry.'

Draco checked to see if Snape was near, but their Professor was having a field day with Neville's attempt at the Alihotsy Draught. He bent down to Harry, whispering, 'What were you thinking about?'

Harry's hair started growing in front of his flushed face. 'Nothing. I – I'll get more ingredients.'

'Oooh, no no no no,' Draco hauled him back, smirking. 'Do not make me beg, Potter, I will make a scene.'

The students on the row in front of them looked around curiously.

'Shut up, Dra,' Harry hissed, holding back laughter. Quickly glancing around, he sat down on top of the table so their heads were level. 'Why are you like this?'

'Spit it out,' Draco ordered in his most authoritative voice. It worked: Harry started stammering unintelligibly. Draco could scarcely make out a word. 'Swimming?' he repeated.

Harry nodded, not looking at him. 'I wondered… In the summer… You'd look – I mean… I-it w-would be nice… I suppose. That's all.'

Now Draco was blushing. He had to sit back down for a second. Harry was practically picturing him naked in the middle of their Potions class. 'Merlin… Go get the ingredients or something. Mince, you are completely ruining my focus.'

Grinning stupidly, Potter did as he was told, and the rest of the hour they hardly spoke. Harry crossed his arms and made a point of looking away, while Draco focused with all his might on the Alihotsy Draught. It wasn't his best work, but it had to do.

When he'd handed it in and returned to their table, Draco's shoe slipped in a large puddle of muck. 'Potter! Yuck, what did you do?!'

'Oh no,' Harry deadpanned. 'I knocked over our cauldron.'

Draco quickly mirrored his expression, laughing on the inside. 'Oh no, now we have to clean all this up. How terribly inconvenient…'

'I forgot how to use my wand,' said Harry, his hands helplessly in the air.

'I forgot my wand altogether!'

Potter laughed.

'Harry! You need a hand?' interfered the Mudblood, popping up uninvited from way out of nowhere.

'No,' said Harry quickly. 'Er, Snape said he'll give me a D if I don't clean it myself.'

Granger huffed indignantly, and further down the Dungeon, Snape turned to raise an eyebrow at Draco, who just smirked and shrugged.

'You go ahead,' Harry told his friends. 'I'll meet you guys later.'

And so Harry and Draco crawled under their table, surrounded by muck, to give their fellow students a head-start at leaving the Dungeons. It took a long time, but that didn't matter, as it gave them a nice opportunity to release some of the built-up tension.

A knock came on the door. 'Severus, do you have a moment? Madame Maxime –'

Snape cleared his throat. 'Crimson and Clover.'

Draco rapidly peeked around the table and saw Snape nodding in their direction. The other students appeared to be gone.

Hands touched his back and he felt a little kiss in his neck. He shuddered, but forced himself to leave their private spot. With one swift spell, Draco cleared the floor.

'Pfew,' he loudly exclaimed as he resurfaced. 'All cleaned up. Not thanks to you, Scarhead. Useless morceau de merde…'

'Mister Malfoy,' said McGonagall sharply, 'watch your tongue if you don't want to lose your house any points.'

A thump and a groan told them Harry'd hit his head as he got out from underneath the table. With a disdainful look, Draco fired an inconspicuous kissing charm, at which Harry beamed up at him, so Draco quickly shoved his hands in his pockets to prevent himself from doing anything that gave them both away. With a hint of sarcasm, he pretended to tip his hat at McGonagall and strolled out of the classroom.

Hurrying footsteps; arms around his neck; laughter in his ear. 'You should have seen your face, Dra,' Harry said. 'Have you ever considered theatre school?'

'Please, don't be daft, lionceau, that's for, you know… boho's,' and that was putting it nicely. Harry felt nice against Draco's shoulder. 'I mean: my family would not approve of the lifestyle, you see.'

Harry snorted. 'Right.'

Looking over his shoulder to see if no one was listening, Draco confessed, 'My aunt is a boho, you know. Well, she was before– When she was younger, I mean.'

'Really? What was boho about her?'

'She used to draw all the time and wanted to go to acting school. My father said she could make people laugh with just a look on her face. She was gifted, he said.'

Harry seemed to pick up on the past tense. 'What happened?'

Draco shrugged. 'She changed, I suppose.'

'Just like that?'

'Well… Her parents burnt her sketchbooks, you see. They forced her to get a respectable marriage.'

Harry stopped dead in his tracks to stare at him; instant anger flared up in his eyes. 'Burnt her sketchbooks?'

Draco shrugged, quietly adoring Potter's temper. 'Well, Mother said it was a rite of passage, you know, a maturing ritual.'

'Did they burn your mother's stuff too?'

Draco furrowed his brow. 'Well, no, but…'

'But your mother was already perfectly respectable,' Harry said hotly, as if he himself had been personally victimized by Draco's deceased grandparents time and time again.

Draco furtively looked at him. 'I bet you wouldn't be so offended if you knew who I'm talking about.'

'Why? Who're you talking about?'

Draco hesitated a second, then answered, 'Bellatrix Lestrange. Prisoner of Azkaban. Prime confederate of the Dark Lord.'

Harry tensed up and looked away, shoving his hands deep in his pockets.

Draco hated the tension between them. So he whistled – not a nice tune, but as shrill and off-key as he could, louder and louder until Harry told him to stop and tried to cover his mouth. Draco snapped his teeth at Harry's hand to make him laugh; it worked.

Their hands found each other at the same time.

'Well, here we are,' said Draco when they turned a corner and reached a dead-end. He kicked the wall, just to have something to do.

'What?' said Harry, stopping in the middle of the corridor. 'We are where?'

Draco smirked. 'Well, you know… far enough for no one to hear us.'

Harry narrowed his eyes. 'What are you up to, Dra?'

Draco turned his back to him, faced the top corner of the wall and shouted, 'HEY!' He took a breath. 'AAAH!'

Harry cracked up. 'What are you doing? Calm down, you tiny psycho.'

Draco grinned. 'Try it.'

'What, screaming at a wall?'

'Yeah, do it.'

Potter looked incredulously. 'Why?'

'It'll set you free.'

Harry scratched his messy head, frowning.

'Think of something that pisses you off. So, well, anything, in your case,' Draco jeered.

Harry shot him a look, but grabbed Draco's hand and faced the wall too. Draco side-eyed him. He seemed to be concentrating and slowly, his face turned angry. He took a breath and yelled, a quick shout, like Draco had done. A small smile crossed his face, before he turned even more serious than usual – and then he truly started screaming.

Startled, Draco froze. Harry seemed to put all of his heart and soul into the exercise.

Then Draco joined him.

At first Draco's screams were more out of happiness and bottled up love than anything, but soon enough he started thinking about all the troubles the two of them faced. The tournament, the suffocating Gryffindors, the mutual hatred between Draco's family and Harry's friends and the way everyone was trying to keep them apart. In the end, it was hard to say whose screams were the most heartfelt.

After a while they became hoarse and Draco started laughing when his voice broke. It got Harry out of his concentration too. Laughing, he turned to Draco, who pressed a quick kiss on his hand before Harry wrapped his arms around Draco's neck to hug him tight. It made Draco feel weird, feel too much. The feelings startled him so that he took out his wand for a swift Trip Jinx –

Harry's feet yanked out from underneath him and Draco quickly pulled away so he wouldn't fall too, but – growling like a Blood-Sucking Bugbear – Potter shot up to bite Draco's shins.

'AUGH! You –' Trying to get away, Draco lost his balance, tripped over Harry's legs and hit the ground hard. Pain seared through his body as he sat up, moaning and rubbing his shin. 'Ouch, Potter! You bit me!'

'Yeah, because you tripped me!'

Harry seized him around the waist to pull him close and Draco couldn't stop smiling. He wanted to inspect his leg, but Harry tightened his grasp so he couldn't move, making Draco laugh. He leaned back against Harry's chest in defeat.

'Harry Potter bit me,' he said, the smirk clear in his voice. 'And that really hurt.'

Harry just laughed, burying his face in Draco's neck. 'Draco?'

'Harry?'

'Do you remember the Veela? At the World Cup.'

'Yeah. Mortifying how they make people behave.' Draco smirked. 'My father's weak for them, doesn't go near any. He sat with his ears closed for half the match.'

Harry was silent for a long moment. Then he asked, 'Do you have any? In your family, I mean?'

'Potter!' Draco laughed mockingly. 'As if!'

'What? It's just, you have the same –'

'No. Stop. I'm not asking you if you descend from Pan either, am I?'

'Who's Pan?'

Draco groaned. 'Oh, you know nothing…'

'I know Peter Pan,' said Harry.

'Well, that's something, I suppose,' Draco sneered. 'Hey, how about Wuthering Heights? Do you know Wuthering Heights?'

'Er, is it in Scotland?'

Draco huffed. He wrapped his arms around Harry's neck and hooked his chin on the tangling, black hair. Then he grabbed the excuse of Potter neither knowing the book nor the song Wuthering Heights to start singing, supposedly to himself, supposedly out of boredom.

'Out on the wily, windy moors we'd roll and fall in green. You had a temper –'

'You had a temper,' sang the Dungeons.

' – like my jealousy. Too hot, too greedy…'

' – greedy, greedy…'

'How could you leave me? When I needed to possess you. I hated you. l loved you, too.' Draco leaned his head against the cold stone wall and listened to the echoes: 'Loved you, too – loved you, too…'

'Bad dreams in the night,' sang Draco, and the Dungeons chimed in, 'Night, night, night, night…'

'They told me I was going to lose the fight… and leave behind my wuthering, wuthering, wuthering heights…'

They slouched against the wall for a long time, and Draco could feel Harry sigh.

He felt perfectly happy.

. . .

It was a lazy Sunday afternoon; the sun was out and so were most of the students. Draco roamed the grounds around the castle in search of Harry. He spotted him, accompanied by his usual Gryffindors. To draw him out, Draco fired a vicious Leg-Locker Curse.

It worked a little too well: in half a second, Potter had freed himself and was chasing after Draco, who hadn't even turned around yet. Laughing, Draco almost tripped in his effort to get away. He bolted across the lawn, delighted to be moving after sitting in the castle for so long. Harry's heavy footsteps sounded closer and closer as a massive spell made Draco land flat on the grass, beating the air out of his lungs. Harry, who couldn't slow down in time, charged into him and with a loud yell, he tumbled over Draco with such force that he rolled over three times in one second.

Draco couldn't breathe from laughing. He felt Harry's heartbeat racing in his ring and rolled over to see him. 'Merde, dingo, you all right?'

Potter shot up, bent the frame of his glasses back into shape and ruffled through his hair to shake out most of the grass, leaves and twigs. He granted Draco a half-smile. 'Course I am.'

Draco'd propped his chin on a hand to watch in awe. 'You'll be the death of me, Potter.'

Harry glanced around. They were largely shielded away from the other students by a big oak tree.

In the split second it took Draco to turn and sit up, Harry'd crossed the space between them to untuck Draco's shirt and swiftly put his head underneath it, cracking Draco up so that he fell flat on his back again. It tickled, and he tried to push him away, but Potter was firmly holding onto him.

'Oh Harry – nom d'une pipe,' Draco moaned as Harry kissed and bit his way around Draco's waist, his hip bones and his belly. Then suddenly, he popped out again, eyes glistening, and pulled Draco's legs around his waist. 'Hey Dra, remember when those Veelas attacked the Leprechauns?'

Draco needed a second. Blinking away his arousal, he smirked, feeling entirely happy with Potter between his legs. He sat up straight. 'Height of the game,' he drawled hoarsely, still breathing rather heavily. He cleared his throat and shook his head. 'Those Ministry dweebs failed miserably.'

Harry's fingers played with the buttons on Draco's shirt, but his sparkling eyes were fixed on Draco's. 'And Krum's face when they all entered the Top Box? Do you remember that?'

Smiling, Draco nodded. 'It was awesome.' He pulled Harry close with a finger under his chin. 'And do you remember that monumental diversion Krum did?'

'The one that ploughed Lynch?' Harry grinned. 'The Wronski Defensive Feint?'

Draco shrieked with glee. Potter knew the correct nomenclature! 'Yes!' Smirking maliciously, he rubbed his hands together. 'I'm going to use it on you some time, you know. Prepare to be ploughed, Potter.'

'Bring it.'

Draco pulled away as Harry snapped at his nose like a puppy. 'Oh, I will.'

Harry lowered his voice. 'I think it was the best night of my life.'

'Krum was such a mess.'

'Covered in blood like he'd slain a dragon.' Harry laughed. 'Hermione looked so worried.'

'Oh right, you'd know all about slaying dragons now, don't you, Mister Champion?'

Harry dropped his eyes with a bashful smile. 'I didn't slay any. I only…'

'Survived one,' Draco drawled.

Harry squinted, a smirk playing around his lips. 'Were you worried?'

Draco glared at him. 'Oh hey, let's talk about the World Cup again.' Harry laughed, but was quickly distracted when Draco asked, 'I still don't understand why Krum caught the Snitch when it meant they'd lose.'

'Me neither. Did you see that dive though?' Draco gestured wildly to re-enact the moment, while Harry raved on, 'I've never seen anyone dive like that! He seemed to be weightless, as –'

'As if he didn't use a broom at all!' Draco added excitedly.

'Yes!' Harry moaned. 'I wish I flew like that.'

'You know, we did that Porskoff Ploy too,' Draco said smugly. 'Well, Pucey and Flint did, remember? When –'

'Oh, I know,' Harry said grimly, but the light was still in his eyes. 'Wood made us analyse it for hours so we would never fall for it again.'

'He did?!' Draco laughed loudly. 'I'm going to tell Flint, he'll love that!'

'Troy and Moran did it better though,' Harry taunted.

Draco was over the moon: Harry remembered every detail of the match, just like Draco! He leant onto his homeboy's knee. 'That moment changed my life; I rewatched it on loop for an hour straight, it looked so effortless – I dreamt about it!'

Harry laughed with his eyes closed; it was Draco's favourite, he only ever laughed like that when he was truly carefree. Taking advantage of that moment of weakness, Draco jumped on him like a fox, so Harry toppled on his back and got covered in kisses before he could open his eyes or catch his breath. He didn't seem to mind. In one swift move, Draco pulled off Harry's shirt. He'd planned to go a lot further, until he remembered they were still in a public place.

With a heavily disgruntled sigh, he sat up on Harry's belly the way explorers posed for pictures on newly discovered land. Now that he thought of it, Draco really ought to plant a flag on Potter.

Their fingers intertwined and Draco pulled Harry upright again, shoving back to the boy's lap. A streak of dark hair ran from Harry's belly button down to beneath his waistband. Draco wanted to trail his fingers all the way –

'I dreamt about Krum's dive,' Harry said in between playful kisses.

Draco tried to ground himself, focussing with all his might on the words instead of the body.

'That it was me with the broken nose, taking over Lynch who was miles ahead of me, with my blood flying behind me… It looked wicked.' Harry nuzzled Draco's nose. 'We're gonna get there, Dra. We'll just keep practising and one day it might be us flying in that stadium.'

'Well,' Draco drawled, ignoring the hands on his skin or the skin under his hands, 'we're just gonna have to see more matches then.'

Harry agreed. 'For observation.'

'Yes, training material,' Draco jeered. 'Purely educational, you see.'

They grinned. Draco played with the little hairs on Harry's stomach, his mind going off on a trip of its own.

Harry leaned back. 'What are you thinking, Dra?'

Draco woke up and squinted. 'Do you actually know a werewolf?' he blurted out.

'Well, Professor Lupin,' said Harry with a small shrug. 'Snape told the Slytherins about him, right?'

'Yeah, I know about him, but you don't know him, right? I mean –'

'He was my dad's friend,' Harry said, scratching his armpit and following a bird's flight with his eyes. 'He taught me how to do a Patronus. And he's pretty close to my godfather. We write sometimes.'

Draco gaped at him. 'You have a godfather?'

'Well, yeah…' Harry looked Draco up and down. 'But I can't tell you anything about him.'

It made Draco laugh. Harry looked terribly sincere about it. 'A werewolf friend and a secret godfather… What's next, your grandfather's a vampire?'

Harry's eyes sparkled. 'Well no, not my grandpa.'

Draco would've fallen off Harry's lap in surprise if Harry hadn't held him so tight. 'Pas vrai. You actually know a vampire?'

'Of course.' Harry grinned. 'There's one sitting on my lap right now.'

Draco felt ridiculously happy and cupped Harry's face for a kiss. 'Je suis si fou de toi.'

Harry pulled away to no doubt hit Draco around the head with some marvellous Parseltongue, when he suddenly seemed distracted – by Draco's crisp, white shirt.

'Oh no,' Draco squealed, sliding off Potter's lap, 'do I have a grass stain?'

'Well… no,' said Harry with a quizzical expression. 'But I'd like to do a little experiment… It involves –' He flew up and grabbed Draco's ankles. 'THROWING YOU IN THE LAKE!'

Draco's screams sent Vincent and Gregory running, and if it weren't for Draco's rapid Shield charm, Harry would've no doubt ended up in St. Mungo's.

. . .

On one of the first mornings in February, Ulysses dropped a red envelope on the Slytherin breakfast table, landing next to Draco's orange juice.

'Is that –?'

Smoke started curling up from the edges.

'Open it, OPEN IT!' screamed Pansy at the top of her lungs, her voice breaking, before Draco could even process what was happening. 'NOW!'

His fingers trembling with panic, Draco struggled to obey, so Vincent dived across the table and tore the entire envelope in half. For a moment, Draco thought it had exploded; a roar of sound filled his ears, making the table tremble.

'A most remarkable rumour has reached our ears,' boomed Draco's father's voice as Draco cowered, ducking his head under his arms. Still, it wasn't half as bad as Weasley's Howler had been. 'Some of our friends made it sound like you have been – against my wishes – getting closer to a certain – ah – someone…'

The words pounded into Draco's head, like a heavy bass. He wanted to hide under the table.

'It makes me wonder, Draco, did we not make ourselves perfectly clear? About who to befriend and – in particular – who to avoid? Did I stutter,' the voice grew steadily louder, 'when I specifically told you not to even mention this person's name? WAS I UNCLEAR?!'

For a short moment, Draco thought his father had finished, but then –

'Tell me, Draco.' Father had merely gathered himself. 'Did I raise my only son to blatantly disobey his own father's orders? Did I not pay for everything you ever asked for? Did I not! Encourage! Your every interest?! Well?!' Deep breath – 'THEN HOW?! WAS IT THAT HARD?! TO MIND! MY ONE! REQUEST?! ONE – SIMPLE – REQUEST!'

Draco squeezed his eyes closed against his father's voice, ten times louder than usual, that was making his eardrums throb and shaking dust from the ceiling.

'IF YOU THINK YOUR MOTHER AND I WILL STAND AND WATCH, DRACONIUS LUCIUS MALFOY, AS YOU SQUANDER! AND PRODIGALIZE! ALL OF OUR GIFTS! TO STRUT ABOUT! WITH THAT BLOOD-TRAITOR, MUGGLE-LOVING, ELF-STEALING SCUM OF THE EARTH! YOU – MY BOY – ARE SORELY – SORELY MISTAKEN!'

A ringing silence followed, but Draco knew better this time than to hope it was over. He covered his glowing ears with his hands, wishing he could evaporate on the spot.

'If I hear,' his father continued in a lower, yet somehow infinitely more frightening voice, 'one more word about my only son associating with Dumbledore's favourite pet…' Draco could almost hear the gnashing of his father's teeth. 'I will personally come to collect you from that wasteful excuse of a school and send you straight to Durmstrang where they will teach you proper respect and obedience!' Father took an almighty breath. 'WAS THAT UNAMBIGUOUS ENOUGH?!'

Draco fell off his chair.

Finally, his father's voice dropped to a business-like tone: 'We will expect a letter at your earliest convenience in which you explain your actions, or I will be forced to come over there and ask you in person. Compris?'

Pulling at his hair, Draco nodded ferociously at the letter. The red envelope burst into flames and curled into ashes, and Draco felt like crying from fear and shame. Father'd never been so angry with him before, let alone in public.

Vincent and Gregory lifted him back to his feet and filled up his plate with their favourite sweets, while Draco sat stunned, as though a tidal wave had just passed over him. A hush had fallen over the Slytherin table. Some people laughed, but most of them seemed as staggered as Draco felt.

'He knows,' he hissed in a blind panic. 'How did they find out?'

Crabbe and Goyle didn't answer. Gregory's face contorted in confusion as he put an extra raspberry donut on Draco's plate. 'Here.'

'A letter,' Draco muttered, remembering the last thing his father had said. He had to get it together to write them back. 'What do I even write? Do they – Should I –' He felt like crying. 'Oh Merlin, I don't want to break up with him.' While muttering to himself, he'd been trying to get a quill and parchment out of his bag, but his shaking hands were making it hard. Frustrated, he yanked at the bag and almost tore the parchment apart, but finally, he got it out. 'What do I say? What do I say?'

'Attack is the best defence!' Pansy plopped down next to him, wriggling herself between Crabbe and Draco. 'Take the Malfoy-road; say something like… needlessly flashy. Vulgar! Disrespectful and embarrassing you in front of your peers. Oh! Oh, and about them being "tragically susceptible to gossip" – mom always tells me I am. Yes: tra-gic-ally sus-cep-ti-ble. Alright, and write something like "I can only hazard a guess who you are talking about," because it sounds fun. And… er… oh, and, and "I assure you I – I…"' Pansy chewed on her lip, thinking hard. '"I would not shed a tear to see my useless Potions partner go."' She laughed.

'That is a lie,' Draco squeaked, eyes big with panic while writing furiously along with her. 'They will find out it is.'

'Let them bring it, I will beat them up. What are you writing now?'

While he made up some stuff of his own, Draco slowly read aloud, '"You are absolutely right. The boy positively drags me down in Potions and it is high time I demand from Professor Snape to stop pairing me up with the fool. I will do so promptly."' Draco dipped his quill in the ink. '"However,"' he wrote, straightening his back now. '"I will not apologise for falling victim to rumours. Your wild allegations are founded upon nothing but absolute falsehoods.' Draco actually started to smirk as he wrote the next line. 'I… did not have… extracurricular social intercourse with Harry J. Potter.'

Pansy shrieked with laughter. 'What does that even mean?'

'It actually pains me to find out how little you think of me,' Draco went on undisturbed, 'and on top of that I am ashamed and disappointed how easily you fell for the slander of the – the…' He furrowed his brow, then shouted across the table, 'A fancy word for riff-raff, anyone?!'

'Scum!' said Flint, the simpleton.

'Rabble,' offered one of the Prefects.

Draco shook his head. 'Fancier!'

'Hoi polloi,' declared their Head Girl with a flourish.

Draco's mouth fell open.

'It's Greek,' she added.

'"The lies of the Hoi Polloi,"' Draco wrote, smirking smugly. 'Ah, they will feast.' He manically scribbled on, getting in the flow now: 'A Malfoy will always be slandered… dragged through the mud and humiliated – but we spring back… like punching bags.'

Pansy whooped.

'Needless to say,' he concluded the letter, 'I will not tolerate any more Howlers at my breakfast table… Love forever and -ever, your strictly obedient, well-bred son.' Draco crossly underlined "strictly obedient", folded the parchment and sent Ulysses back to the Manor. 'Now, if you'll excuse me,' he whispered to Pansy, 'I need to strut around with a certain pet, who's in desperate need of my respect and obedience.'

Without further ado, and under shrieks of laughter from his friend, he swaggered out, whistling across the Great Hall to beckon his homeboy.

Draco Malfoy would never obey. He was obeyed.

. . .

Until he wasn't anymore.

It had been a week since Draco had last met Harry in private. A full week. When he watched him cross the courtyard, green eyes fixated on that rotten golden egg, Draco hurt in places he didn't know the name of.

'Hey!' Pansy shouted, and Draco jumped.

Draco, Crabbe and Goyle had moved from the library to the chilly courtyard to get some fresh air, where they were quickly joined by Pansy and her friends. Now, all of them had gone to get food or extra clothes, leaving only Pansy and Draco.

'Spit it out!' she snapped.

Spitting anything out to his banshee of a friend did not come naturally to Draco, let alone spitting out the incredible hurt he felt. He didn't want to spit out his petty worries at all, to nobody.

Nimbostratus climbed on Draco's lap to be petted. It helped a little, but Draco still worried.

With a short grunt, Pansy changed tactics. She stroked Draco's cheek and chin, pouting a little. 'Aw, baby… I'm your best friend in this whole wide, rotten world. You can tell me, darling. You can tell me anything, I would never judge, you know. Trust me. Trusssst me…'

'He's avoiding me,' Draco blurted out, lowering his gaze.

Pansy dropped her act like a stone. 'He is not, you blithering fool. It has nothing to do with you. You know how busy he is with that darn tournament. He's carrying that egg around everywhere he goes, trying to figure out what to do. Myrtle says he even takes it with him in the bath. Give him some space. You of all people know he could die if he doesn't prepare well.'

Draco looked suspiciously at her. 'Since when are you so sensible?'

'Since I want you to focus on my homework.' She tapped her wand on the parchment. 'Spit-spot, it won't write itself.'

Even while calculating their Arithmancy homework, Draco still had enough mind space left to worry about Harry. 'Do you want me to stop seeing him?'

Pansy sighed dramatically. 'Draconius, please. I have no hidden agenda. I know everyone else has, but I –'

'What?' Draco shifted on the cold stone wall they were sitting on to face her. 'Other than my father? Are you serious? Are people working against us?'

'I wouldn't go that far… But… you know…'

'I don't.'

'Oh come on, Draco, it's made perfectly clear that you two…' Pansy's voice trailed off and she didn't seem intent on picking it up again. She made a show of staring at her textbook.

'What?' snapped Draco, pushing away the cat, who meowed loudly and ran off.

Pansy huffed like he'd offended her, then shrugged. 'Well, our families are against it, for starters. And, well, you know you and your family have a reputation. Your family does, mine, Crabbe's, Goyle's. Nobody likes seeing their Wonderboy straying from the light. None more so than our great friend Dumbledore. You know, I wouldn't even be surprised if he put Potter's name in the Goblet of Fire, just so Potter would be too occupied with not dying to grow closer to you. Everyone could see it happening.'

'Ça me fais chier,' Draco lashed out from the bottom of his heart. 'So, to recap,' he snarled, counting along on his fingers. 'Flint and Wood don't want us to play Quidditch together. Snape doesn't want us to work together. Harry's dumb friends are convinced I'll hurt him – like I would ever – and my parents can't even say his name.' Scowling, Draco crossed his arms. He felt miserable.

'Snape doesn't want you to work together?' Pansy asked. 'Since when?'

'Remember I wrote my parents that Snape paired me with Harry in Potions? Snape told me my father summoned him at the Manor to inquire why he'd been pairing me in the first place, and to demand he'd stop at once.'

Pansy's chin dropped. 'For real? Merlin! Your father is so strict!'

Draco sulked. 'Yeah, well, he wants me to be the best I can be.'

Pansy seemed to choose her words carefully. 'And that won't involve Harry Potter?'

A scornful sound escaped him. He wrapped his arms around himself. 'Can't make heirs with a boy, now, can I? And this boy won't even do well at parties either. I mean, he makes enemies where ever he goes with that incredible temper of his, and the friends he makes are the dregs of society, every single one of them. I mean, would you just look at the guy? He's not even clean.' Draco miserably motioned at Potter, who was shaking the golden egg now and putting it to his ear to listen, looking adorable while at it. His friends were packing up to leave and Harry followed them without even looking away from the egg. The frown on his face seemed to be stuck there permanently.

'He's forgetting me.'

Pansy leaned over their books to press a kiss on his head, but she didn't reply. Not to deny his claims either, Draco noted.

'Maybe I should find someone else,' he mused. 'Like… a girl.'

Pansy smirked. 'Yeah, plenty of fish in the sea.'

Glancing around, Draco's eye fell on a girl walking past with a butterfly net. He started smirking. 'You know, I always fancied Lovegood.'

Instantly, he got himself smacked around the head. 'I will murder you in your sleep,' Pansy grumbled through clenched teeth. 'I swear to Merlin, Draconius, if you come near her – I know twelve different ways to kill and get away with it – do not test me!'

Draco smirked. 'Liar. Well, go and claim her then… before Longbottom swoops her up.'

The last thing he had expected was for Pansy to pick up her chin, jump up and march off – straight at Loony.

Baffled, Draco watched as Pansy started talking to her. She made it seem so easy. Loony just talked back; they had a conversation. Loony handed Pansy the net. They smiled.

Scowling, Draco slapped the dirt from his trousers and went off in search of Harry.

It was easy enough to find him these days; he and his friends were practically living in the library. The only things Granger knew came from books, and apparently she had free reign in their friend group. The three of them sat huddled around a pile of books on a small desk. The golden egg sat on Harry's lap, one of his arms protectively around it.

Even though Draco walked up to them in full sight, Harry didn't notice him coming. His eyes were glued at his book.

'Hey,' Draco said, stopping in front of him.

Slowly, Harry looked up. It took a full three seconds, Draco counted. As Potter's eyes fixed on Draco and recognition slowly settled in, the lines in his forehead vanished and he showed Draco a smile – an exhausted smile, but a smile nonetheless.

'Hey Dra,' he said – and that was it. His gaze seemed to fade already, as if Draco was see-through and behind him were all the answers Harry needed, in very small print.

Needless to say, the conversation did not go as easy as Pansy'd made it seem.

'Let's take a walk,' said Draco, feeling the harsh eyes of Weasley and Granger on him.

Harry bit his lip and pushed his glasses higher up his nose. His eyes shot to his friends.

Draco felt humiliated, openly standing there in the middle of the library, feeling dozens of eyes pricking in his back. It was quiet enough for everyone to have heard him.

And Harry didn't answer.

He didn't need to.

For a second, Draco wondered if he should sit down and talk to him, but then the whole school would hear them. Could he whisper real quiet?

He scowled. The real question was: would there be any point?

'Je t'emmerde, Potter.' Hands in his pockets, Draco strolled out of the library.

. . .

'Come on, Malfoy,' grunted Vincent, pulling Draco back down when he got up from their place by the fire.

'Yeah, don't be annoying,' added Gregory.

Draco wasn't aware that he was being annoying.

'Just play Exploding Snap with us,' Gregory whined, putting the box on the coffee table they were sitting around. 'We don't want to follow stupid Potter anymore.'

'I want to punch him,' growled Vincent.

Draco glared at the two of them. Was there even a single person left to support him and Harry? He looked over at Pansy sitting opposite them on the floor, who was decorating her diary with moving, glittery pictures of the Ballycastle Bats' Chaser, Rob The Hearth, also known as The Hearth Rob. The guy liked to wear eyeliner and black nail polish; combined with their Quidditch uniform – black with a scarlet bat logo – and a killer smile, he was not someone Pansy could ignore. The man also happened to be a terrific Chaser, but that seemed to be of secondary importance to her. Since the moment she'd laid eyes on him, Pansy'd rapidly become obsessed with Quidditch, and was especially well-informed about all the qualities a Chaser should have – which happened to be all the qualities of The Hearth Rob, coincidentally.

'Is there a problem?' she inquired with an absent smirk.

'Do you want to go to the library with me?'

Her head shot up. 'Oh no, Malfoy, come on! The guy left you hanging! He might be busy, but that's no excuse! Either you make him talk to you or you let him go. I will not support stalking him.'

Sulking, Draco crossed his arms. 'I tried talking to him. He doesn't want to.'

'I really want to punch him,' Vincent reminded everyone.

'Forget him,' she said, shoving a glitter picture towards him. 'Here, look at Robbie, he's good for the soul.'

Draco could easily imagine hearts flying out of her eyes. She was positively swooning. 'What about Loony, then?' he snarled.

'I have a big heart.' Pansy smiled.

Draco couldn't stand her happiness. He stalked back to their dorm to slam a door and drown his sorrows with Rocket to Russia on top volume.

. . .

Draco's parents had given him the silent treatment ever since his snarky reply on their Howler. Draco hated it, and not just because he didn't get any candy. He missed the updates on what was going on at home; he missed feeling loved and cared for; he worried about his mum, he wanted her to be happy. Without their letters, it felt like a part of himself was missing.

Then one morning, Ulysses landed on his shoulder as if he'd never stopped doing it. It startled Draco so that a sausage slipped from his fork, flew across the table and landed in Flint's lap; who looked so murderous that Draco quickly made a show of looking the other way. Taking the letter from the owl's claw, he recognized his mother's handwriting at once. He slouched in relief.

'This is one for the scrapbooks,' Mother wrote, and underneath it, in the handwriting of Draco's father, it said, 'Perhaps we will get justice at last.'

Attached to the letter, Draco found a newspaper clipping about Rubeus Hagrid. He remembered a journalist asking questions about their Professor during spring break. Scanning the text, he found his name, and he eagerly started reading, smiling already.

"DUMBLEDORE'S GIANT MISTAKE

Albus Dumbledore, eccentric Headmaster of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, has never been afraid to make controversial staff appointments, writes Rita Skeeter, Special Correspondent. In September of this year, he hired Alastor "Mad-Eye" Moody, the notoriously jinx-happy ex-Auror, to teach Defence Against the Dark Arts, a decision that caused many raised eyebrows at the Ministry of Magic, given Moody's well-known habit of attacking anybody who makes a sudden movement in his presence."

This was already good, Draco thought, wreck the man, Rita.

"Mad-Eye Moody, however, looks responsible and kindly when set beside the part-human Dumbledore employs to teach Care of Magical Creatures.

Rubeus Hagrid, who admits to being expelled from Hogwarts in his third year, has enjoyed the position of gamekeeper at the school ever since, a job secured for him by Dumbledore. Last year, however, Hagrid used his mysterious influence over the headmaster to secure the additional post of Care of Magical Creatures teacher, over the heads of many better-qualified candidates.

An alarmingly large and ferocious-looking man, Hagrid has been using his newfound authority to terrify the students in his care with a succession of horrific creatures. While Dumbledore turns a blind eye, Hagrid has maimed several pupils during a series of lessons that many admit to being "very frightening."

'I was attacked by a hippogriff, and my friend Vincent Crabbe got a bad bite off a flobberworm,' says Draco Malfoy, a fourth-year student. 'We all hate Hagrid, but we're just too scared to say anything.'"

His own words cracked Draco up. A bad bite of a flobberworm, he couldn't even remember saying that.

'What's so funny?' asked Vincent.

Draco looked up to see a lot of his house mates watching him. Theatrically clearing his throat, he repeated the first part to them, and followed up with the rest of the article:

"As if this were not enough, the Daily Prophet has now unearthed evidence that Hagrid is not – as he has always pretended – a pure-blood wizard. He is not, in fact, even pure human. His mother, we can exclusively reveal, is none other than the giantess Fridwulfa, whose whereabouts are currently unknown.

Bloodthirsty and brutal, the giants brought themselves to the point of extinction by warring amongst themselves during the last century. The handful that remained joined the ranks of He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named, and were responsible for some of the worst mass Muggle killings of his reign of terror. If his antics during Care of Magical Creatures lessons are any guide, however, Fridwulfa's son appears to have inherited her brutal nature.

In a bizarre twist, Hagrid is reputed to have developed a close friendship with the boy who brought around You-Know-Who's –"

Draco's voice trailed off. 'Oh… This is about Harry.' How dare that trollop involve him in this?

The laughter of his house mates died away as Draco read the rest of the article in silence, frowning.

"In a bizarre twist, Hagrid is reputed to have developed a close friendship with the boy who brought around You-Know-Who's fall from power – thereby driving Hagrid's own mother, like the rest of You-Know-Who's supporters, into hiding. Perhaps Harry Potter is unaware of the unpleasant truth about his large friend – but Albus Dumbledore surely has a duty to ensure that Harry Potter, along with his fellow students, is warned about the dangers of associating with part-giants."

'Well, that's true,' he grumbled and continued to read it to the others as well.

'Heir, heir!' said one of the Prefects.

'Yeah, where's the lie?' said Pansy, quirking an eyebrow.

'Let's hope he will finally stop hanging out with the fat oaf from now on,' Draco muttered darkly to Crabbe and Goyle. He looked over at the Gryffindor table, where Harry was stuffing himself with toast and scrambled eggs. Clearly, he hadn't read this yet, or he wouldn't be looking so content.

'And join Slytherin,' Pansy jeered. 'Right?'

Draco smugly added, 'And finally come home.'

The clipping was still in his pocket when they arrived at their next Care of Magical Creatures class. Hagrid wasn't there. Instead, Professor Grubbly-Plank, their replacement teacher, stood in front of the group.

'Where's Hagrid?' asked Harry loudly. His eyes kept shifting to the hut, where all the curtains were closed.

'He is indisposed,' said Professor Grubbly-Plank.

Draco laughed softly. Harry turned around, squinting his eyes at him, but as usual, he seemed too proud to ask what Draco knew. He could be terribly stubborn, bordering at arrogant. Just ask me, Draco wanted to beg, talk to me.

'This way, please,' said Professor Grubbly-Plank, and she strode off around the paddock where the Beauxbatons horses were shivering.

The class followed her, but Harry kept looking back over his shoulder at Hagrid's cabin. His growing anger was almost tangible. 'What's wrong with Hagrid?' he pressed on, hurrying to catch up with their professor.

'Never you mind,' she said.

'I do mind, though,' said Harry hotly, and Draco wanted to hug him. 'What's up with him?'

Cold fingers around his hand made Draco jump. 'You're drooling,' said Pansy.

He pushed her away, heat rushing to his face. 'Shut up.'

Of course he was bloody drooling. Harry's eyes were gleaming with fire, the heat he radiated could almost fog up his glasses.

'He's such a pain in the ass,' Draco drawled, like a liar. 'Obsessive as always.'

Professor Grubbly-Plank led them past the paddock where the huge Beauxbatons horses were standing, huddled against the cold, and toward a tree on the edge of the forest, where a large and beautiful unicorn was tethered. Many of the girls 'ooooohed!' at the sight of the unicorn.

'Oh it's so beautiful!' whispered Lavender Brown.

Pansy glared at her in disgust, as if Brown betrayed their entire gender by being excited about a unicorn.

'How did she get it?' Brown raved on. 'They're supposed to be really hard to catch!'

Draco huffed and looked smugly around at his friends. 'They're nothing special, really. Me and Potter saw one in first year, you see, before we even had this class.'

It was his favourite thing to say, "Me and Potter". If he hadn't been a Malfoy, he'd definitely have shortened it to "Me-n-Potter", as if it was just one word; as if the two of them were a package deal.

The unicorn was so brightly white it made the snow all around look grey. It was pawing the ground nervously with its golden hooves and throwing back its horned head.

'Boys keep back!' barked Professor Grubbly-Plank, throwing out an arm and catching Harry hard in the chest.

Furious, Draco inched forward, but Harry already rolled back his shoulders, glaring at the woman like he was picturing the perfect jinx for her. The only reason he didn't murder their teacher on the spot was the Mudblood pulling him away.

Draco felt himself smiling. Potter had such disregard for hierarchy, it was one of Draco's many favourite things about him. Draco randomly remembered Harry mentioning once, in a throw-away line, how he'd asked the actual Minister of Magic to sign his Hogsmeade permission form. It had cracked Draco up for minutes, only made worse by the fact that Harry genuinely didn't understand what he was laughing about.

'They prefer the woman's touch, unicorns,' the Professor explained. 'Girls to the front, and approach with care, come on, easy does it.…'

She and the girls walked slowly forward toward the unicorn, leaving the boys standing near the paddock fence, watching.

The moment Professor Grubbly-Plank was out of earshot, Harry turned to the Weasel. 'What d'you reckon is wrong with him? You don't think a skrewt–?'

'Oh, he hasn't been attacked, Potter, if that's what you're thinking,' Draco couldn't help but butt in.

Harry swirled around, and he smiled. 'Hey.'

Draco choose to ignore the face, for his own well-being. 'No, he's just too ashamed to show his big, ugly face.'

'What d'you mean?'

Draco put his hand inside the pocket of his robes and pulled out the folded page of newsprint. 'There you go,' he said. 'Hate to break it to you, Potter…'

He smirked as Harry snatched the page, unfolded and read it, with his Gryffindor buddies all looking over his shoulder.

After a while, Harry's head shot up. 'What d'you mean, "We all hate Hagrid"? What's this rubbish about him' – he pointed at Crabbe – 'getting a bad bite off a flobberworm? They haven't even got teeth!'

Crabbe was sniggering.

'Well, I think this should put an end to the oaf's teaching career,' Draco drawled. 'Half-giant… and there was me thinking he'd just swallowed a bottle of Skele-Gro when he was young… None of the mummies and daddies are going to like this at all… They'll be worried he'll eat their kids, ha, ha…'

'You –'

'Are you paying attention over there?' Professor Grubbly-Plank's voice carried over to the boys, so Draco strolled away, looking innocent. From a safe distance, he watched Harry stare at the unicorn like he wanted to set fire to it.

'Happy now?' said a low voice beside of him. It belonged to Zabini. 'You have a weird way of showing fondness, Malfoy.'

Draco didn't deem that remark worthy to reply, but as much as he hated it, he had to admit there was a certain truth to those words. From that moment on, he fell into a nasty habit of being mean.

'Missing your half-breed pal?' he kept whispering to Potter whenever there was a teacher around, so that he was safe from Harry's retaliation. 'Missing the elephant man?'

He made himself and his friends late for class by coming up with excuses to take detours through the castle, just so he could accidentally run into Harry to spite him. It drove everyone nuts, but Draco couldn't help himself. He loved the thrill of getting a rise out of Potter.

'Potter,' he hissed in passing on a moving staircase. 'We were just talking about your bloodthirsty friend. Is it true he went back to his mother? Is it true she forgot he was there and sat on him?' He laughed derisively and heard Crabbe and Goyle guffaw behind him, but out of nowhere, Harry lost it.

He harshly grabbed Draco's arm. 'D'you realize I like Hagrid?' he said hotly. 'And I will like him better than you if you keep this up.'

And with that, it suddenly stopped being funny. Potter might as well have pulled a knife for how much it hurt Draco. For a moment, Draco didn't dare speak, afraid his voice would break.

Harry's hand around his arm was going to leave bruises, he realized. A painful thought crossed his mind: at least he'd have something left of him.

As Harry let go, Draco drew a steadying breath. 'Alright, mate,' he managed. And that was that.

Harry Potter had successfully been turned against Draco Malfoy.

The worst thing about it was how easy it had been.

. . .

Draco pushed himself deeper into the chair by the fire, hugging Nimbostratus so tightly he probably wasn't comfortable. 'I don't want to go.'

Pansy was yanking at his arm, putting her entire weight into it. 'Yes, you do.' When he glared at her, she sing-songy she added, 'Don't want to miss it when he dies!'

Draco pulled his arm loose. 'Don't TALK about him like that!' The cat meowed in agreement.

'Come on,' Pansy begged.

'You know, I don't want to see him die.'

'You can't stay here, worrying, all by yourself.'

'I have Nimbostratus,' Draco sulked. 'And I am not worrying. I'm catching up on my homework. This whole… aberration has made me get behind on everything. I can't believe–'

'Draconius, please stop whining. You know you always start using fancy words when you feel bad. It's your tell.'

'I do not have a tell.'

She groaned. 'Come on, it'll be so boring without you. I'll be stuck with Crabbe and Goyle and the girls, and you know how they are.' To add onto her pleas, she fell on her knees.

'Parkinson!' Draco snapped, lowering his voice to a furious hiss. 'Get up! You know what that dirtbag Warrington tells everyone about girls with bruises on their knees.'

Pansy didn't even blink. 'I'll paint your nails.'

'Girl, your tights,' Draco snarled through gritted teeth, because Pansy was wearing the sheer tights with bats on them that Draco loved so much, but she still didn't budge. He sighed in defeat, closing his eyes in frustration. 'Well… what shade?'

Pansy grinned. 'Name it.'

Lounging back in his chair, he drawled, 'I want that shatter effect with the house colours.'

'Done. Come on.' Jumping up, she offered him her hand like she was asking a girl to dance in the 19th century.

Draco ignored her hand, slamming his book on the coffee table, to snugly put Nimbostratus on the chair by the fire. 'You be good now,' he murmured, while arranging its paws. 'Do not throw any parties and do not let in any strangers.'

Pansy's lipstick stuck to his cheek on their way out.

The Entrance Hall contained a few last-minute stragglers, all leaving the Great Hall after breakfast and heading through the double oak doors to watch the second task.

Draco chewed up a left-over raspberry donut from the breakfast table as they strolled down the stone steps and out onto the bright, chilly grounds. The heartbeat in his ring was going surprisingly slowly for someone who was about to potentially die. With a tightening of his stomach, he remembered Snape's words, so Draco took off the ring and put it in his pocket, deciding he certainly did not want to feel it when the ring stopped beating. He had no idea how he would ever cope with that.

As Pansy stifled a yawn, they noticed the seats that had encircled the dragons' enclosure in November were now ranged along the opposite bank, rising in stands that were packed to the bursting point and reflected in the lake below. The excited babble of the crowd echoed strangely across the water.

'Where is that dung-brain?' Draco wondered out loud as they shuffled along the chairs towards Crabbe and Goyle.

The judges were sitting at a gold-draped table at the water's edge. Cedric, Fleur, and Krum were beside the judges' table. There was no sign of Potter. 'Good grief,' Draco drawled as they reached the seats his friends saved for them, 'is he late?'

Pansy sniggered. 'Would not surprise me. 'Morning, girls!'

Tracey and Daphne turned around in their chairs on the row below them, and straight away launched into a discussion about Fleur's hairdo. Still standing up to look out over the lake, Draco froze in shock. 'Oh Merlin…'

Pansy followed his gaze, and so did the girls.

Harry Potter was flat-out running around the other side of the lake, charging toward the judges' table.

'Oh my,' said Pansy.

Potter skidded to a halt in the mud, splattering the robes of Fleur Delacour and the girls laughed scathingly. Pansy pulled at Draco's robes. 'He'll be fine.'

With his eyes fixed on Potter, he sat down, muttering, 'Bad start.'

Harry was bending over, hands on his knees, gasping for breath; he had a hand in his side as if he'd been stabbed in the ribs. There was no time for him to catch his breath. Ludo Bagman was already moving among the champions, spacing them along the bank at intervals of ten feet. Harry was on the very end of the line, next to Krum, who was wearing swimming trunks and was holding his wand.

Harry was not wearing swimming trunks. He came dressed fully in his school uniform.

'Stupid idiot,' Draco grumbled through gritted teeth.

Bagman gave Potter's shoulder a squeeze and returned to the judges' table; he pointed his wand at his throat and his voice boomed out across the dark water toward the stands. 'Well, all our champions are ready for the second task, which will start on my whistle. They have precisely an hour to recover what has been taken from them. On the count of three, then. One… two… three!'

The whistle echoed shrilly in the cold, still air. The stands erupted with cheers and applause.

Without even looking around, Potter pulled off his shoes and socks – nothing more than that –, grabbed something out of his pocket, stuffed it into his mouth… and he waded out into the lake.

'He– He just went in,' Draco stammered.

'He's still wearing his robes and everything,' Tracey exclaimed.

Waist-deep in the water, Potter stopped. The people at the stands started laughing, and Draco clenched his fists, swearing under his breath. 'He's a dead man. Dead man. He didn't prepare anything.' Pulling at his hair, Draco covered his eyes.

'I think he's waiting,' said Pansy, 'for something…'

'Lost your way already, Scarhead?!' yelled a sixth-year Slytherin, and the crowd roared with laughter.

Peeking through his fingers, Draco saw Harry shivering violently. 'That's it,' he snapped, and got up.

Pansy snapped to the edge of her seat. 'Where are you going?'

'Getting him out.'

If Dumbledore didn't take responsibility, somebody else had to, Draco reckoned, and he didn't see Potter's useless bodyguards anywhere either. As usual, it all came down to him again.

A loud splash echoed across the lake. Harry had flung himself forward into the water and disappeared. Draco fell down on the steps of the stands. 'Oh Merlin – he's in…'

And with that, the big wait started.

'What kind of game is this?' growled Vincent after fifteen minutes. 'Nothing's happening.'

Draco grumbled in agreement. They'd been staring at the Great Lake, smooth as glass, with nothing to entertain them in sight. This show simply wasn't for him, so he went back to the castle to do his homework, only to take it back to the stands and continue spending the entire hour fixated on the surface of the Great Lake, mindlessly tearing up a piece of parchment. Pansy, Vincent and Gregory were sharing food, cracking jokes, making bets and chatting about the contenders and their chances, but Draco hardly heard them. He couldn't stop imagining Harry deep, deep down in that lake, abandoned by everyone, gasping for breath and choking on dark, icy water…

There was no way Dumbledore could keep him safe when he was down there, Draco thought. They couldn't even see him. They didn't know what was going on down there at all.

'We should have stayed in the Common Room,' he growled. 'We'd –'

His complaints were interrupted when a haunting mersong pierced the air. 'An hour long you'll have to look and to recover what we took…'

Pansy shivered. 'Could they make this anymore eery?'

'Your time's half gone, so tarry not, lest what you seek stays here to rot…'

Draco sat up straight. 'Rot? Did they say rot?'

'I'm sure it's not literal,' said Pansy, although she didn't sound very confident. 'Right?'

After ages and ages, wrinkles appeared on the surface of the lake. Someone broke through it and Draco jumped up –

It was Fleur Delacour. There was an enormous bubble around her head, which made her features look oddly wide and stretched. Her leg was bleeding profusely.

Draco swallowed hard. This was fine, he told himself. Surely Harry Potter was more capable of defending himself than… than the best 18-year old, final-year student the entire country of France had to offer?

'I can't watch this,' he mumbled, shifting nervously in his seat. He pressed his fingers into his cheeks so hard they probably left markings.

They all watched how the Healers patched Fleur up, for lack of anything else to see. Pansy seized Draco's sweaty hands to paint his nails silver and after that, they waited some more.

'I could have been napping right now,' grumbled Gregory.

When the silver nail polish had dried, Pansy carefully applied the sparkly green crackle nail polish Draco loved so much. It took an experienced hand to apply it, so Draco didn't allow anyone but Pansy to touch him with it. Daphne and Tracey turned around in their chairs to watch her work with unconcealed awe.

'Don't blow on it,' advised Daphne.

'Don't move at all,' added Tracey.

It was nice to have something else to focus on. Not being allowed to move was incredibly difficult and demanded most of Draco's attention.

Pansy bit her lip around a smile as she inspected his hands. 'It looks so good.'

Draco jumped when the voice of Ludo Bagman echoed across the lake. 'An hour has passed! None of the Champions have succeeded in saving their hostage in time!'

Right as he was saying this, something broke through the surface of the lake for the second time – and again, Draco was foolish enough to jump up –

It was Diggory, wearing the same ridiculous bubble on his head as Fleur Delacour had been wearing. As he lifted Cho Chang out of the water, she started gasping and coughing and came to from unconsciousness.

The crowd went wild. Draco couldn't make out a word Ludo Bagman was saying. 'Does this mean,' Draco asked his friend with a feeble assumption of airiness, 'the others are left to rot?'

'I guess,' said Tracey, at which Pansy smacked her with her wand.

'No, it does not! They are fine!'

Not even ten minutes later, a monstrous being cut through the water: a human body in swimming trunks with the head of a shark. 'Krum!' shouted someone in the crowd, and everyone cheered.

Viktor Krum was carrying Hermione Granger, and Draco felt sick. 'If that Mudblood lives and Harry dies… Well, I'm gonna be so freaking pissed.'

They watched Madam Pomfrey fussing over Granger, Krum, Diggory, and Chang, all of whom were wrapped in thick blankets now.

'He's dead.' Draco hid his head under his arms. 'Dead as a doornail. I am certain. Ooh, why have I been so mean?'

Pansy stroked his hair while raving about Krum's shark head with Daphne and Tracey.

Every minute they had to wait, it became harder for Draco not to reach into his pocket and check the ring. It would have been such a comfort to feel it still beating – but it would be unexplainable if he touched an ordinary ring and broke down in the middle of the stands.

So he waited, and waited – and waited some more.

'This is taking years of my life.' Draco'd ran out of parchment to tear up and felt annoyed to his core now. 'I swear to Merlin, if Potter takes ten more minutes to show up, I will get in there and personally look for his body myself. This is ridiculous.'

It did take ten more minutes; Draco had carefully timed it, bopping his knee and watching the seconds tick away. So, never one to flunk out, he threw down his books, dropped his cloak – scattering a million tiny pieces of parchment – and stomped down the steps of the stands towards the lake.

Pansy followed at his heel. 'Draco, stop,' she hissed, 'you're making an arse of yourself.'

'I know this and I do not care,' Draco drawled. The judges, the Champions, the sounds of the crowd; they were all one big blur somewhere in the back of his consciousness, pressed to the back by his fear for Harry.

'Master Malfoy.' The voice of Albus Dumbledore resounded at the edges of Draco's red haze. 'Can we help you with anything?'

'He's going to get Potter, Professor!' Pansy blabbed with a panicky voice, while still holding onto Draco's sleeve to pull him back.

'Ah,' said Dumbledore calmly. 'Poppy? We require a little Soothing Spirit over here, please.'

As he said this, an invisible force pulled Draco back, away from Harry in the lake. It was the same spell Mad-Eye Moody had used, which only worsened Draco's anger. 'I do not need to be soothed,' he snapped, desperately trying to free himself from the magic. 'What I need is someone – anyone – to take proper care of Harry Potter.'

Pomfrey appeared at Pansy's side with the Soothing Spirit. 'Ah Draco, dear, I understand your concern.'

'You do not understand shit,' Draco muttered.

Pansy gasped. 'Language!'

'Not to worry, dear,' Pomfrey kept simpering. 'I wouldn't allow any of our students to get hurt at our own premises.'

'Tell that to Moaning Myrtle,' Draco mumbled, as a thick blanket and a bottle of Pepper-up Potion were pressed into his hands.

'Draco,' Pansy hissed, 'you are being so rude right now.'

'When Harry gets here, you make sure to give him this,' said Madam Pomfrey, pointedly ignoring Draco's rudeness. 'Can I trust you with that?'

Draco straightened up. He'd be damned if she couldn't.

With the Relics of Responsibility safely in his hands, he paced up and down around the judges table, the champions and along the banks of the Great Lake.

Just as he was glowering at Granger – who dared to look at him with something resembling pity – the crowd went wild. Whirling around, Draco finally – finally – saw the little head of his homeboy popping up from the water. The boy's entire body seemed to be reaching for air, making Draco feel suffocated himself.

Harry was pulling two people with him: his dumb Weasel and a little girl he'd never seen before. All around him, the wild, green-haired heads of merpeople were emerging out of the water with him. They were smiling. The crowd in the stands was making a great deal of noise; shouting and screaming, they all seemed to be on their feet. The girl looked scared and confused, but Weasley expelled a great spout of water, blinking in the bright light, and seemed to immediately reprimand Harry for something. While Potter and Weasley pulled the little girl through the water, back toward the bank where the judges stood watching, twenty merpeople accompanied them like a guard of honour, singing their horrible, screechy songs.

Draco felt a jab of envy when the Prefect-Weasley splashed through the water to drag his little brother back to the bank, and Delacour had broken free of Madame Maxime to hug the little girl, while Dumbledore and Bagman were pulling Harry upright. All while stuck-up Draco was standing next to the judges table with a blanket and some Pepper-Up potion, unable to move.

Something jabbed in his back. 'Go on then,' Pansy hissed.

Draco snapped out of his frozen state. 'He's fine,' he said, forcing a shrug. 'I knew it.'

'Sure you did.'

Trying tirelessly to push back the blanket and the potion into Madam Pomfrey's hands – who didn't accept them – Draco rambled, 'I didn't doubt it, you know, not really. He is – well, in case you forgot – he is The Boy Who Lived, after all. And, well, what's the use of worrying anyway, in the grand scheme of things? Think about it. I would never have come anyway, you see, if I weren't dragged here. I could have spent this time much more productively, actually. A-and for what? F-for looking… at a lake… Worrying, for naught –'

Madam Pomfrey turned him around and pushed him in Harry's direction. 'I need you to bring this to Harry, dear, I'm a little short-handed.'

'Right,' squealed Draco, looking at the crowd surrounding Potter at the lakeside, his stomach swirling with anxiety. 'Right…'

Fleur Delacour bent down to Harry and as Draco watched, she kissed him, twice, on each cheek – and Harry's face burnt as if she gave him the Pepper-Up Potion.

'That trollop,' Draco growled from the bottom of his heart, and he found himself storming over. Without looking at anyone, Draco pushed the Potion in Potter's hands and threw the blanket around his shoulders. 'Drink,' he snarled.

Harry did. His face heated up and steam came out of his ears and Draco couldn't contain a smirk. When a wild shiver ran through Potter's body and he violently shook his head, Draco felt his face grow soft.

'You all right?' Harry's eyes locked on Draco's, whose smile faltered.

'Me?'

Harry grinned, pointing at Draco's head. 'Don't think I ever saw your hair messy.'

Quickly, Draco tried to smooth it out, but it was no use without a mirror, and Harry just laughed. 'Piss off, Potter.'

Spotting a fresh collection of wounds on Harry, Draco took out his wand. 'You know, I'm not the one here taking – Episkey – way too long, while that French – Episkey – girl was covered in blood, and she's – Episkey – you know, three years older. That was not a – Episkey – well, a good sign. Merlin, look at you – Episkey – you're a mess.'

Grinning, Harry opened his mouth to no doubt reply with something brave or sweet, when Ludo Bagman's magically magnified voice boomed out beside them, making them jump apart, and causing the crowd in the stands to go very quiet.

'Ladies and gentlemen, we have reached our decision. Merchieftainess Murcus has told us exactly what happened at the bottom of the lake, and we have therefore decided to award marks out of fifty for each of the champions, as follows…'

Draco subtly bumped his shoulder against Harry's when he noticed him tense up beside him.

'Fleur Delacour, though she demonstrated excellent use of the Bubble-Head Charm, was attacked by grindylows as she approached her goal, and failed to retrieve her hostage. We award her twenty-five points.'

Applause from the stands.

'I deserved zero,' said Delacour throatily, shaking her head.

'Cedric Diggory, who also used the Bubble-Head Charm, was first to return with his hostage, though he returned one minute outside the time limit of an hour.' Enormous cheers from the Hufflepuffs in the crowd. 'We therefore award him forty-seven points.'

As everyone was staring at Bagman, Draco glanced at Harry, whose face clouded over while he furiously scratched his head with both hands.

'Viktor Krum used an incomplete form of Transfiguration, which was nevertheless effective, and was second to return with his hostage. We award him forty points. Harry Potter…'

Harry's fingers pressed suddenly into Draco's wrist with such force that Draco squirmed, happily.

' – used gillyweed to great effect,' Bagman continued. 'He returned last and well outside the time limit of an hour. However, the Merchieftainess informs us that Mr. Potter was first to reach the hostages, and that the delay in his return was due to his determination to return all hostages to safety, not merely his own.'

Draco yanked his arm away from Potter. 'What?' He looked to Weasley and Granger for back-up, but they just gave Harry half-exasperated, half-commiserating looks. Perhaps they were used to it, Draco thought. Or maybe they just hadn't been here, waiting for what felt like hours while the other Champions resurfaced in various states of injury.

'Most of the judges,' Bagman gave Karkaroff a nasty look, 'feel that this shows moral fibre and merits full marks.'

'Moral fibre, my arse,' Draco grumbled as he crossed his arms. He'd prefer a beating heart any day.

'However,' said Bagman. 'Mr. Potter's score is forty-five points.'

Draco's stomach leapt – Harry was now tying for first place with Diggory! Harry looked happy, so much happier than he'd looked at any point since the Yule ball.

'There you go, Harry!' Weasley shouted over the noise. 'You weren't being thick after all – you were showing moral fibre!'

Draco nearly cracked up; that was his cue to go, he reckoned. Without anyone noticing, he slipped away, trying his best to look casual and uninterested. Pansy, Vincent and Gregory fell into step with him as soon as he reached the stands, and they made their way back to the castle ahead of the crowd.

'You're sweet together,' said Pansy.

Relief did stupid things to Draco's face; he couldn't contain his smile.

Behind them, Bagman was talking about the championship and the next task, but Draco did not want to think about that just yet. As he slipped his comfortably beating ring back on his finger, Draco thought about the way Harry'd looked at him. The following weeks, Harry would have oceans of time again… oceans of time for Draco.

. . .

Harry did not have oceans of time for Draco those following weeks. Everywhere he went, crowds formed, asking The Boy Who Lived what had happened underwater, how he managed to save not one, but two hostages, how terribly brave he must have been…

Even Weasley was famous now. When they couldn't reach Potter, they tried to hear him out, and he was positively basking in the limelight.

One afternoon, while waiting for Potions class, Weasley was telling a tall tale of kidnap in which he struggled single-handedly against fifty heavily armed merpeople who had to beat him into submission before tying him up. 'But I had my wand hidden up my sleeve,' he assured one of the Patil-sisters. 'I could've taken those mer-idiots any time I wanted.'

Draco couldn't stand it. It was one thing to have Weasley be the person Harry would miss most, but seeing him boast about his made-up achievements in the Great Lake made Draco ready to vomit.

'One of these days…' he muttered at Vincent and Gregory. 'I will actually murder him. And it will be the height of my life.'

. . .

In line for dinner at the Entrance Hall, Draco felt warm fingers around his wrist. They curled his hand around a ball of paper. Without looking around, Draco put it in his pocket. He didn't open it until after dinner, sitting alone by the fire.

'Eight o'clock, Astronomy Tower,' it read, signed with Potter's signature heart.

Harry always signed his notes to Draco with a heart wearing little round glasses. These days, Draco wondered if Harry didn't just sign everything with it; he probably signed his exams with it too. He wondered how many other people in this castle got notes like these, now that everyone seemed to love Potter so much again. If he could keep Draco a secret, he could keep anyone secret, Draco reckoned. What else was he so busy with that he could barely find the time to meet Draco if not with loads of other hook-ups? If you asked Draco, Harry had means, motive and opportunity, and that didn't calm Draco's mind. It wasn't as if he hadn't noticed the mutual ogling between Harry, Chang and Diggory, and the Girl-Weasley was getting awfully close with him too – and if Ron Weasley was the most important person to Harry… Draco wondered what went on behind closed curtains in those Gryffindor dorm rooms.

'Aurgh!' he bellowed, trying to shake off the images of his homeboy entangled with all those nasty people.

'What's up?' asked Blaise, peering around a chair by the fire. Somehow, the guy was always there when Draco thought he was alone and in a mood to put his face in the fire.

'Potter's not the type to have threesomes, right?' Draco blurted out.

Blaise looked a little rattled. 'Malfoy,' he uttered. 'We're fourteen.'

'Right… right…' Pressing a clean quill into his skin, Draco scratched a lightning bolt on his forearm. He looked up. 'So is – well, is that a no?'

Blaise leaned forward in his chair, pinching his fingers together. 'For the record,' he said, 'we all hate the guy. All of us here in Slytherin. My mum would've poisoned him ages ago.'

Draco damn well knew that. 'Just because he's in Gryffindor –'

'Just because he's a jerk to you,' snapped Blaise, pointing aggressively at his temple.

Feeling uneasy under his house mate's gaze, Draco crossed his arms. 'Right.'

The snake clock on the wall hissed once. Draco shut his books and got up to drag himself to the Astronomy Tower. He'd gotten a lot better at sneaking around since first year and arrived unnoticed by anyone. He was fifteen minutes early, but he wanted to use all the time he could get from Potter. The guy had some serious explaining to do, Draco reminded himself. They really needed to talk this time; there should not be any snogging or undressing before they had talked. Draco scratched the lightning bolt wound on his wrist some more to keep his mind on track. No snogging.

Usually, Harry arrived earlier than Draco, appearing out of nowhere from underneath his Cloak or sneaking up on him for a surprise kiss. 'Potter?' Draco whispered as he stepped onto the top of the Astronomy Tower, but there was no reply, so Draco charmed a piece of the stone wall around the tower to be more comfortable, and sat down – to wait.

And wait.

At five minutes past eight, Draco jumped up to pace around, grumbling under his breath. 'Stupid Potter.' He needed to make amends and instead he was late?

Watching Potter use Accio to fetch his broom during the first task made Draco practice relentlessly on it too. It was a darn convenient spell. After another ten minutes of waiting, Draco shouted, 'Accio A walk with a vampire!' It took a while, probably because someone had to open the door to the Common Room to let the book through, but then it smacked into Draco's face. 'Augh!'

Reading it made the time pass faster, but still, at every sound, his head shot up and his heart jolted. Yet every time he was disappointed when it turned out to be an owl or a cat, or the wind, making the door creak, or the ancient tower just slowly falling apart. Draco wished it got on with it. The tower collapsing would at least spare him from sitting out the rest of this lonely, miserable life.

At nine o'clock, he gave up. Harry Potter had officially forgotten about Draco Malfoy.

. . .

For probably the first time in his life, Draco did not complain. Mainly because he would die of humiliation if anyone even pictured him sitting alone in the dark, waiting for a stupid celebrity. Pansy and her girls picked up on something though. Or rather, Tracey did.

During lunch, the fourth-year Slytherin girls were having the giggles over the latest copy of Witches Weekly. Usually, Draco would have been all over them, too curious to let it go, but today he wasn't in the mood.

'Draco! Get a load of this!'

'No,' grumbled Draco.

'You're so grumpy lately.' Tracey playfully booped his nose.

He slammed her hand away, snarling, 'Back off.'

It made Pansy's entire gang of girls stare at him. 'Oh, he is grumpy!' said Daphne.

'His aura's all red,' Tracey pointed out matter-of-factly. 'A clouded red; murky…'

'Je t'emmerde,' Draco muttered.

The girls giggled.

'Leave him alone,' said Gregory. It was directed at Pansy – being their leader – who put her hands in the air as if she was innocent.

Draco glared at her, for no particular reason, so she got up, saying, 'Alright, alright. Come on, Dacey Travis. We've better things to do than poking our nose in Draco's love life.'

'Since when?' growled Draco.

They had Potions again that afternoon and he was dreading it. He knew he needed to confront Harry about standing him up at the Astronomy Tower, but he really didn't want to. What was the point? It would not make Potter love him; it would only make Draco look pathetic. Nobody respected, let alone liked, someone pathetic. There was simply nothing to gain with talking about it.

Draco told himself he was glad it was at least clear now: Harry was a snob, an arrogant, forgetful snob who did not like Draco the way Draco liked him. It was better to know, he reckoned, than to keep getting his hopes up, only to be disappointed over and over again.

Still, Potions was going to be agony.

He dragged himself down to Snape's dungeon, just following Vincent and Gregory's feet in front of him, but as soon as they arrived, he was hauled into Pansy's gang of girls, who shoved the article they'd been giggling about in his face without his consent.

In a quick glance, he saw it was about Potter and Granger. Startled, he looked away. 'I don't want to know.'

Pansy shrieked with laughter. 'It's not true, silly! We made it up! Imagine their faces!'

'I don't want to imagine their faces.'

'There they are, there they are!' Pansy giggled when Potter, Weasley and Granger descended the steps to the dungeons. 'You might find something to interest you in there, Granger!' Pansy said loudly, and she threw the magazine at Hermione, who caught it, looking startled.

The dungeon door opened, and Snape beckoned them all inside. Draco followed his friends to the front of the Dungeon, where they watched Granger rifle through the magazine under her desk, while Snape wrote up the ingredients of today's potion on the blackboard.

Granger's and Potter's faces didn't show any sign of distress as they read the article. In fact, Granger giggled when she was done reading, and she threw the magazine on the empty chair beside her. She gave Pansy a sarcastic smile and a wave, before starting on their Wit-Sharpening Potion.

'Merlin, she's so lame,' muttered Pansy.

Draco decided to focus on the potion and closed himself off from the others as he worked.

He was halfway done already when Snape's icy voice broke the silence. 'Fascinating though your social life undoubtedly is, Miss Granger, I must ask you not to discuss it in my class. Ten points from Gryffindor.'

Snape had glided over to Granger and Potter's desk. The whole class was now looking around at them. The whole class, except one: Harry stared at Draco.

Panicking, Draco flashed POTTER STINKS across the dungeon. Stupid Potter.

'Ah… reading magazines under the table as well?' Snape added, snatching up the copy of Witch Weekly. 'A further ten points from Gryffindor… Oh, but of course…' Snape's black eyes glittered as they fell on Rita Skeeter's article. 'Potter has to keep up with his press cuttings…'

The dungeon rang with the Slytherins' laughter, and a smile curled Snape's thin mouth. To Draco's dread, he began to read the article aloud, pausing at the end of every sentence to allow the class a hearty laugh. Draco suffered from start to finish.

'"Harry Potter's Secret Heartache"… Dear dear, Potter, what's ailing you now? "A boy like no other, perhaps… yet a boy suffering all the usual pangs of adolescence. Deprived of love since the tragic demise of his parents, fourteen year-old Harry Potter thought he had found solace in his steady girlfriend at Hogwarts, Muggle-born Hermione Granger.'"

'Steady girlfriend?' Draco hissed, his heart sinking.

Pansy turned around to whisper, 'I made it up!'

'"Little did he know that he would shortly be suffering yet another emotional blow in a life already littered with personal loss. Miss Granger, a plain but ambitious girl, seems to have a taste for famous wizards that Harry alone cannot satisfy. Since the arrival at Hogwarts of Viktor Krum, Bulgarian Seeker and hero of the last World Quidditch Cup, Miss Granger has been toying with both boys' affections.'

Draco shot the Mudblood a contemptuous look. 'She'll pay…'

'Draco, stop!' Pansy laughed. 'It's not true.'

Draco flushed, scowling at his crossed arms.

'"However, it might not be Miss Granger's doubtful natural charms that have captured these unfortunate boys' interest. 'She's really ugly,' says Pansy Parkinson, a pretty and vivacious fourth-year student, 'but she'd be well up to making a Love Potion, she's quite brainy. I think that's how she's doing it.'"'

Pansy wiggled her eyebrows. 'Pretty and vivacious.'

'It's made up, Parky.' Draco smirked and got a beetle thrown in his face.

'"Harry Potter's well-wishers must hope that, next time, he bestows his heart upon a worthier candidate."'

'Ha!' The short, scornful sound escaped Draco before he could prevent it. Thankfully, it got drowned in the sounds of laughter from the other Slytherins.

'How very touching,' sneered Snape, rolling up the magazine to continued gales of laughter from the Slytherins. 'Well, I think I had better separate the three of you, so you can keep your minds on your potions rather than on your tangled love lives. Weasley, you stay here. Miss Granger, over there, beside Miss Parkinson. Potter –'

Draco made himself as small as possible between Crabbe and Goyle.

'That table in front of my desk. Move. Now.'

Looking furious, Potter threw his ingredients and his bag into his cauldron and dragged it up to the front of the dungeon to the empty table, where Snape seemed to have a quiet heart-to-heart with him.

Draco focussed on his potion again. In fact, he focused on it with such force that he didn't notice everyone packing up until they were all ready to leave when the bell rang. 'Merde,' he muttered, grabbing his stuff to toss them in the cabinet at the back of the classroom. While doing so, one of the jars broke and muck dripped on the floor. 'Fait chier!'

Pansy touched his shoulder. 'You alr–'

'Piss off!' he snapped. 'Seriously, can you stop smothering me for even a second?'

Startled and sulking, Pansy beckoned their friends and they all left him alone. Draco glared at their backs as he cleaned the floor. 'Je t'emmerde…'

To let off some steam, Draco cleaned his table the Muggle way. It worked a little, at least in tiring him. Wiping his forehead, he felt a hand on his arm and looked up.

Harry Potter.

Draco backed away. 'Piss off...'

'What's wrong, Dra?'

'Don't call me Dra, Scarhead.'

'Draconius?' Harry smiled.

Draco straightened his back, scowling. He couldn't believe Potter's nerve, still using that nickname after all this time, as if he'd done absolutely nothing wrong.

Grabbing his bag, Draco walked out of the classroom, into the mass of students filling the corridor outside.

'Wait, Draco, why are you–?'

Draco turned around, spreading his arms while walking backwards through the crowd. He gestured at his ear, mouthing, 'Can't hear you.'

As he'd suspected, Potter remained at the doorway of Snape's Dungeon. He would never openly talk to him, Draco knew by now. Either because Draco embarrassed him or because Harry had a dozen other girl- and boyfriends he couldn't risk exposing Draco to.

Draco dropped his arms. They were done.

. . .

Sitting at the Slytherin table for breakfast on the morning of the third Triwizard Task, Draco kept his mind busy with the latest article about Harry Potter in the Daily Prophet.

'HARRY POTTER: DISTURBED AND DANGEROUS,' the banner headline read.

After Pansy had been such a help to Rita Skeeter, the reporter had asked the other Slytherins a few questions as well. Draco'd been feeling particularly spiteful when she'd approached him, so he quickly scanned the article to check out the damage.

"'Potter can speak Parseltongue,' reveals Draco Malfoy, a Hogwarts fourth year. 'There were a lot of attacks on students a couple of years ago, and most people thought Potter was behind them after they saw him lose his temper at a duelling club and set a snake on another boy. It was all hushed up, though. But he's made friends with werewolves and giants too. We think he'd do anything for a bit of power.'"

Perhaps the "lose his temper" part was a bit of a stretch, but Potter really did have a short fuse. Draco looked over at the other side of the Hall, where Harry Potter argued with his friends over the newspaper.

'Hey, Potter!' Draco'd jumped up in an impulse to shout across the Great Hall. 'POTTER! How's your head? You feeling all right? Sure you're not going to go berserk on us?' He held up his copy of the Daily Prophet.

Slytherins up and down the table were sniggering, twisting in their seats to see Harry's reaction, and over at the Gryffindor table, Potter was holding out his hand with that fierce look of his, so Weasley had no choice but to surrender the newspaper.

While Potter read it, Draco, Vincent, and Gregory were laughing at him, tapping their heads with their fingers, pulling grotesquely mad faces, and waggling their tongues like snakes.

To their confusion, though, Harry grinned and ate his breakfast, looking quite chipper. Falling back in his chair, Draco scowled. He caught Pansy rolling her eyes at him and he pushed away his plate, feeling furious and frustrated… and alone. There was no way he going to watch the Third Task, he promised himself. If his friends wanted him to go with them, they would have to drag his dead body.

. . .

Draco kid no one with his silent vow. That afternoon, he meekly traipsed after his friends to watch the Third Task. It turned out to be as boring and nerve-wrecking as the second one had been. This time, to be absolutely safe, Draco'd left his ring in the dormitory, locked inside the magically secured jewellery box that covered anyone trying to break into it with pitch and feathers that wouldn't wash off for days.

'I need to move my legs,' Pansy declared during the long, long wait for the Champions to find their way back out of a huge maze.

'Me, miss, pick me, please,' begged Draco with his hand in the air.

Pansy pretended to think, stroking an imaginary beard and checking all other contenders, who were slouching down and looking away. The competition was murderous. 'Convince me!' she said in a low-pitched voice with a bad American accent. 'Why would I choose you?'

Jumping up, Draco curled his imaginary moustache and offered Pansy an arm. 'Because I will treat you like a lady.'

Pansy shrieked with laughter and accepted his arm, so they started stomping up and down the steps of the stands, vigorously at first, racing each other, but soon they were catching their breaths, draped over the railing. Their walk turned into a saunter.

'Tracey says' – Pansy sounded overly casual, so Draco braced himself – 'that your aura is less red these days.'

'That's a relief,' Draco drawled. 'As you know, crimson does nothing for my complexion.'

It made Pansy laugh, and Draco relaxed. He bet his aura turned golden every time he made his friends laugh.

'So you're all good now?' Pansy prodded.

'Peachy,' Draco drawled. 'Well, you know, it is what it is… Potter and me just didn't match – clearly. You know, if anything, he did me a favour, really, by being such a bastard. I mean, it saved me the trouble of breaking up with him and I don't have to fight my parents or sneak around the castle anymore. You see, it's perfect. I'll just get over him and find myself a girl. A proper, pure-blood girlfriend.' Draco glanced over his shoulder to check if Har– if any of the champions got back yet. They hadn't.

Pansy snorted. 'Right. No fuss.'

They reached the bottom step, turned around, and strolled back up.

'Speaking of girlfriends…' Draco smirked. 'Is yours loony about you yet?'

She shoved him. 'Shout it louder, twat.' She glanced around and lowered her voice. 'Well, if you must know… I gave up.'

'What? Why?'

'She's too… foggy. I think she likes being alone.'

Draco shot her a look. 'Ah right, the way I like to bully my future husband, you mean? It means you need to try harder, you dumb wuss.'

She shrugged, peeking sadly over her shoulder to the girl in yellow with the giant lion on her head. Not replying to an insult must be Pansy's tell, Draco realised.

He didn't like it. 'Anyway, I'm sure you'll find a proper, pureblood boyfriend now.'

Pansy groaned. 'Yeah, they are lining up for me. You know, Primrose keeps trying to set me up, sending me pictures of boys she meets on the road to say I should write them.'

'Well, you should… I can write them for you!'

She shot him a tired look, but her eyes sparkled. 'Draco, for real…'

'What?'

'You are so incredibly gay.'

He flushed as she shrieked with laughter. 'Piss off, Pansy.'

'I don't mean it in a bad way.' She smirked. 'Gay is not a synonym for shitty.'

'It makes me feel shitty,' Draco said without thinking.

Pansy's face fell. She didn't say anything, but they sighed softly in unison. She linked her pinkie around Draco's. 'Want to hear something funny? Primrose says I should date Graham Montague.'

Draco smirked. 'Why in Merlin's name would you do that?'

An elaborate shrug was all the answer he got.

They made their way back to Pansy's chair, where she slumped down and Draco got pushed by a very annoyed Daphne when he climbed over her to get to his own seat on the row above them.

'Cauldron cake?' offered Blaise Zabini, who was out of the blue sitting next to him.

Draco sized him up. 'Why are you always hanging around us? What do you want?'

Zabini's disdainful look was a perfect mirror to Draco's. 'Fanculo, Malfoy.' He jerked the bag of Cauldron Cakes away and put his feet up on the chair in front of him.

Draco instantly liked him a whole lot better. 'Accio Cauldron cake,' he drawled, and when the cake floated towards him and he snapped it out of the air like a dog, Blaise almost smirked.

With pinched thumb and index finger Blaise drew a line in the air. The guy was always waving his hands about like he hoped to hit someone in the face, but the silly movements never told Draco much.

'Perfect,' Zabini clarified.

Before Draco could snarl at him, the crowd collectively gasped. There was an upsurge of noise as people jumped to see what happened. Draco climbed on his chair to look over the crowd.

Two figures had appeared out of nowhere at the entrance of the maze. They slammed to the ground and one of them was holding a large cup – the Triwizard Cup. The crowd went wild; the torrent of sound deafened Draco.

'They got back!'

'Who is it?!'

'Harry Potter!'

'It's Harry Potter!'

'They're not getting up…'

'Why are they not getting up?'

Something unpleasant was rising like bile in Draco's throat and before he knew it, he'd hurled himself down the stands. He was by no means the only one making his way to the Champions: when he reached the ground, a crowd had formed around the two already. Trembling with worry, Draco elbowed his way forward, but couldn't get past the tight knot of adults around Harry, who seemed to be lying face forward in the grass.

Whispers soughed through the crowd. They took a second to reach Draco's ears. He listened closely to make out the words.

'He's dead.'

He's…

Dead…

Arms were holding Draco. His legs had given up.

His ring – there was no heartbeat against his thumb.

He couldn't breathe. 'Harry–' His voice sounded like it belonged to someone else.

Vincent pushed someone out of the way, and finally Draco caught sight of the Champions: Harry was clutching a grey-looking Cedric Diggory to him; his free hand was around Dumbledore's wrist as he whispered urgently to him.

The arms were still holding Draco when relief washed over him. 'Not dead.' He breathed heavily now as if to catch up for lost time, clasping the arms when black spots appeared before his eyes. 'Years of my life…'

And with a pop he remembered: he wasn't wearing his ring.

'Merlin, I'm so stupid,' he groaned.

Dumbledore bent down, and with extraordinary strength for a man so old and thin, he raised Potter from the ground and set him on his feet. Harry swayed.

'He's hurt.' Draco's voice was drowned out by the noise of the crowd.

'He'll need to go to the hospital wing!' Cornelis Fudge shouted over the tumult. 'He's ill, he's injured – Dumbledore, Diggory's parents, they're here, they're in the stands…'

'I'll take Harry, Dumbledore, I'll take him!'

Draco's head shot in the direction of the voice. It had come from Mad-Eye Moody. 'No,' Draco mumbled, trying to free himself from the arms. 'Not him.'

'No, I would prefer –' said Dumbledore, too.

'Amos Diggory's running,' Fudge's shouts turned frantic. 'He's coming over! Don't you think you should tell him – before he sees – ?'

'Harry, stay here –'

'No,' said Draco, feeling helpless as he watched Moody half pulling, half carrying Potter, as if there was great urgency to take him away. Potter was pressing a hand to his scar, looking as though he was about to throw up. 'I don't trust him,' Draco snarled, but no one heard.

Girls were screeching in his ears, sobbing hysterically. The frightened crowd was gasping, screaming and shouting.

'Come on, Malfoy,' said Vincent, and the arms pulled Draco backwards. They trudged through the mass of people and crossed the field to the now half-empty stands, where his friends sat him down.

Draco still had trouble breathing and wasn't ready to give up yet. 'Where did he take him?'

'Babe, Potter's fine,' Pansy assured him while Crabbe and Goyle pressed Draco firmly back in the chair. 'You're having a panic attack, silly boy. Breathe.'

'Darn right, I have,' Draco squeaked, craning to see where Moody was taking Potter and yanking at all the arms restraining him, suffocating him. 'Fous les camps! I can't bloody breathe.'

As he spoke, he noticed a weird, raspy sound. It came and went with his breath.

Blaise emptied the paper bag of Cauldron cakes in Vincent's hands and put it to Draco's mouth. 'Breathe in this.'

Draco slammed him away. 'Fanculo, Zabini.'

Blaise's eyebrows shot up, even more so when Draco drew a straight line in the air, mimicking his earlier gesture. It made the guy smirk. 'That makes zero sense, stupido.'

Running his hands through his hair, Draco slouched back in his chair and focused on his breathing. Bit by bit, realisation dawned on him.

'I'm fine,' he snarled at his fussing friends, while running a few more hands through his hair. He breathed out, slowly – then dropped his head in his hands. Pansy sat down next to him, stroking his neck as Draco rubbed his face. He steadied himself. 'I don't care about him… I shouldn't. I don't.'

'Well, none of us wish him dead,' said Pansy, 'per se.'

He pushed her away. 'Well, it shouldn't make a difference. He is dead to me. He is!'

His friends didn't say anything to that. For a while all Draco heard were the screams and cries of the crowd. People were sitting down everywhere around them, in rather the same way as Draco was.

'Oh, look,' Blaise deadpanned, watching the scene with his hands in his pockets, 'grandpa's pissed.'

They all watched as Dumbledore walked past in a hurry. The look upon his face as he stared in the direction of the castle was more terrible than Draco could have ever imagined. There was cold fury in every line of the ancient face; a sense of power radiated from their Headmaster as though he were giving off burning heat.

Following at his heel were Severus Snape and Professor McGonagall, and Draco allowed himself to feel comforted. Slouching back in his chair he drew another straight line in the air for Zabini.

Potter would be perfectly fine.

. . .

During the night, the rumour machine had worked overtime. According to the gossip, Cedric Diggory had been killed by the Dark Lord. And not by a fragment of the Dark Lord or by someone carrying the Dark Lord in the back of their head, as usual, but by the real deal this time.

In other words: the Dark Lord had returned. He had made the impossible possible: he had risen from the dead. Draco didn't know whether to be terrified or in awe at this.

Not everyone believed the rumours. Not everyone wanted to believe the rumours. It did sound farfetched, Draco admitted – so he went in search of proof. Karkaroff had left the castle on the day before the final task, so Draco made up an excuse to meet with Snape.

His professor appeared unfazed by current events. 'Mister Malfoy,' he drawled, 'here to complain about your mark, I assume?'

For a second, Draco was taken aback by this question. He choose to ignore it.

'Is it true, Professor?' he softly asked.

Snape raised an eyebrow. 'The disappointing quality of your latest essay? I'm afraid so, yes…'

'About –' Draco glanced at the empty classroom and the closed door behind them. 'About the Dark Lord returning, sir.'

There was a second of silence, in which Snape looked down his nose at Draco. 'Well, Potter seems convinced,' he drawled, proceeding to haul a large cauldron to the front of the class. 'Now, mister Malfoy, your dear friend Longbottom managed to ruin one of my best cauldrons and I have been burdened with the humble task to clean it up.' With a pointed look, Snape rolled up his sleeves, thereby showing Draco the Dark Mark on his forearm.

Draco's mouth fell open. The black ink was brighter than ever, almost sparkling in the dim light of the torches on the wall behind Snape. The snake looked real, almost 3D, as if it were crawling underneath Snape's translucent skin.

A shiver ran down Draco's spine. He glanced at his Professor's face, but it told him nothing. 'Did you see it happen, Professor?'

Snape shortly shook his head. 'Others did.'

Worry gnawed on his stomach, making Draco nauseous. "Others"… he suspected to know who Snape meant. Had Draco's own father been there when they'd tried to kill Harry?

He needed to know.

Back in his dorm, Draco sucked on the end of a Deluxe Sugar Quill while pondering how to ask his father about his whereabouts during the third Triwizard Task, without revealing anything if the letter fell into the wrong hands.

Eventually, Draco settled on some casual pleasantries, followed by:

'Some Gryffindor said he saw you not too long ago, with that guy we talked about last summer. How did that happen? Oh, and you want to know something cool? I found out one of my favourite professors owns a snake! Pretty cool, right? Do you think it is dangerous?

How is mum? I am doing well, although there is a weird vibe in the school since the end of the Triwizard Task. Looking forward to seeing you in a few days.

Love, Draco.'

He received a reply that night already.

'Draco,

It is bad form to refer to a person as "that guy," no matter their standing. I did, however, run into your friend, to answer your question, taking me quite by surprise, I must say. At the time, he was with that old friend of mine, so I didn't pay him much mind. They both looked surprisingly healthy, I dare say, given their circumstances. Me and my friend had quite a pleasant chat actually. Much of our old quarrels are water under the bridge these days. It was unfortunate, however, that your friend had to leave rather abruptly, but we might bump into him again to finish our conversation.

The idea of you near any snakes troubles your mother. She wants you to steer well clear of both the snake and the professor. Speaking for myself, I know some species can be dangerous and should be avoided. Do remember: snakes are not toys. However, if it is property of a Hogwarts Professor, I would say you can probably trust it.

Your mother is doing well. She is already busying herself planning our social events. It promises to be a fun summer. We are both happy and looking forward to your return.

Did you enjoy the Triwizard Tournament? I bet you loved the dragons. Your mother and I are eager to hear all about it when you get home. Now that it is all over, we are finally allowed to tell you some exciting things about it, too.

It is a shame the Tournament Committee did not consider me for the event organisation; I had no control over it whatsoever. Things could have worked out a lot better if they had just asked my advice. You know how much experience us Malfoys have in these matters.

Stay safe, study hard and we look forward to seeing you very soon.

Love,

Your parents.'

It didn't tell Draco much, but it was enough. His father practically confirmed the Dark Lord's return and had been present when it happened. Draco wondered how their "pleasant conversation" had went. Did his father mean the Dark Lord was not angry with the Malfoys, like his parents had feared? It sounded like it, especially considering the fact that Draco's parents were both happy and looking forward to a fun summer. That didn't sound like they were still worried.

His mother worried about Draco, but that was no news. Draco's father trusted Professor Snape, so that was enough reason for Draco to do too.

The last paragraph was harder to decipher. Draco wondered in what way his father meant that things could have worked out "better"? Judging from the first paragraph he found it "unfortunate" that Harry "had to leave rather abruptly," so Draco tried not to think about what "finishing their conversation" meant exactly. He was afraid he knew.

The letter made Draco's stomach ache. There was no way Potter would survive another "meeting" with Father's "old friend". And there was no way Potter would still want to be friends with Draco now that he'd seen his father as the Dark Lord's second in command. Potter would never understand. He simply didn't know the Wizarding World well enough.

Those last days before summer, Draco didn't see much of Potter, which came as no surprise to anyone anymore. Harry didn't just have no time for him or forgot him, like before, but he actively avoided Draco. As soon as he spotted him, his face would close off and he'd quickly turn around or round a corner. It was never even subtle.

One time, Pansy hollered after him as he jumped on a moving staircase, 'You're a cowardly little asshole, Potter!' Harry turned a shade darker, but pretended not to hear her, so Pansy shouted louder, 'AT LEAST HAVE THE BALLS TO END IT!'

She really was half banshee, the way she could scream.

Then she swore so profusely that Draco's ears turned red. 'He could have written a gosh darn letter,' she roared. 'How hard can it be?'

'You know, he might not want to break up,' offered Zabini, slurping on a bright green Slush Crup.

The sound quickly got on Draco's nerve. 'Maybe your mum didn't want to break up,' he snarled over the deafening noise.

Blaise snorted and handed him the last of the drink. 'Say what you want, but my mother knows how to finish a relationship.'

Pansy and her girls giggled, having read all about Mrs. Zabini's long list of husbands who died under suspicious circumstances.

Draco took off the lid of the Slush Crup to gulp down the last bit, then threw the cup down the stairwell. 'For the House Elves.'

'So considerate,' said Zabini.

Most nights, Draco couldn't sleep. He felt hurt and resentful and he hated it. He hated feeling like this. He hated how Harry'd forgotten him and how he didn't bother at all to fix things. And Draco didn't even want him to bother; he wanted to be done with him. He didn't want Harry anymore. He didn't want to want Harry anymore.

Groaning, Draco tossed and turned.

Most of all, he hated how he still didn't hate Harry Potter – because how was he supposed to be angry with someone he loved everything about? He missed Harry's stupid face and his stupid smile and his stupid hair and his stupid clothes and the stupid things he said and the stupid things he did. No matter how he tried, Draco just couldn't seem to get mad at him. He only felt pain. Pain, pain, pain, and it wouldn't get him anywhere. He could never move on feeling like this.

It made him wonder if he was doing it all wrong. Maybe he shouldn't let Harry go at all. Maybe he just couldn't.

But as the days progressed, Draco's resentment only grew. Harry was messing up Draco's happiness and he didn't even seem to care. He didn't even care enough to end things properly.

This alone angered Draco to his core. If that was true, Draco thought, then Potter was a careless, arrogant boy who took everyone's attention for granted, as if it was only natural for people to love him as much as Draco did. Who knew, he thought, maybe Potter was expecting Draco to patiently wait around until the big Gryffindor celebrity got bored again. It made Draco's blood boil.

He'd been hurting for weeks now and Potter clearly wasn't, even though all of this was his fault: he'd stood Draco up and he'd ignored him and he'd kept spending time with those nasty friends of his instead of with Draco. And yet, somehow, Draco was the one losing sleep over it while Potter moved on without a scratch – and it was not bloody fair!

Draco didn't like it at all, this situation he was in, and he wouldn't have been in it if it wasn't for Potter. Without him, Draco would still believe love was nice: a boy, a girl and a baby – a happy family – and not… this torment. He was absolutely sick and tired of it.

Anger and resentment had always been Draco's best drivers, so he gathered he should embrace the feeling. Maybe if he got annoyed enough, it would drown out the hurt and embarrassment he felt. And maybe if he declared his hatred loud enough, everyone would forget how embarrassingly he'd swooned all over The Boy Who Lived – everyone including himself.

At least, he reckoned, it was worth a shot.

. . .

At his end of the year speech, Dumbledore told the entire school about the Dark Lord's return, as if it was still news to anyone at this point.

'It is my belief, however, that the truth is generally preferable to lies,' he said, 'and that any attempt to pretend that Cedric died as the result of an accident, or some sort of blunder of his own, is an insult to his memory.'

'This speech is an insult,' muttered Draco to Vincent and Gregory.

Stunned and frightened, every face in the Hall was turned toward Dumbledore, who continued to make one big fuss. It took quite long for him to finish talking. When he did, he turned gravely to Potter and raised his goblet.

'You've got to be joking,' Draco drawled when nearly everyone in the Great Hall followed suit.

They murmured Potter's name like he was already dead, and now they drank to him. Draco and his friends snorted and rolled their eyes at each other. Like many of the other Slytherins they remained defiantly in their seats, their goblets untouched.

'This is ridiculous.' Draco slouched in his seat. 'The guy was a Hufflepuff, for crying out loud. Let's put it all in a bit of perspective, old man.'

Hearing the muffled laughter around the table following his words, Draco smirked to himself.

. . .

At the Hogwarts Express back to London, Draco decided Potter's time was up. He'd given the guy plenty of opportunity to apologize or to break things off, and he hadn't done either. Biting his bottom lip almost to bleeding point, Draco acted out all sorts of conversations in his head. In the end, his anger took over and he jumped up, startling Crabbe and Goyle. 'Come on.'

They found the Golden Trio in no time at all. A hot feeling of spite boiled under Draco's skin as he slid open the door of their compartment. The conversation inside lagged.

'So…' he said, advancing slightly into the compartment, a smirk quivering on his lips, and looking slowly around at the Weasel, the Mudblood and, at last, the Scarhead. 'Potter's Dumbledore's favourite boy again… Trying not to think about it then? Trying to pretend it hasn't happened?'

Potter still didn't look at him properly. He did get up though, but only to try and push Draco out of the compartment. 'Please, don't,' he whispered, avoiding Draco's gaze altogether.

Draco wanted to scream. He pushed Harry back in his chair and when the guy actually grabbed his wand, Draco snapped. 'You chose the losing side, Potter! I warned you! I told you, you ought to choose your company more carefully, remember? I told you not to hang around with riffraff like this!' He jerked his head at Weasley and Granger. 'Too late now! They'll be the first to go, now the Dark Lord's back! Mudbloods and Mugglelovers first… Well – second…' He smirked. 'Diggory was the f–'

For a split-second, it was as though someone had exploded a box of fireworks within the compartment. Then, everything went dark.

. . .

Draco woke up in an unfamiliar bed, his vision filled with white light. Blinking in the brightness, his eyes focused on the people next to him.

His mother, holding his hand. His father, pacing around the bed, circling her and Draco like a shark. He was muttering under his breath, 'It is simply a matter of time, my heartbeat. Rest assured, I will personally make sure –'

'Draco?' whispered Mother. 'Oh darling, how are you feeling? Do you have any pain?'

'What happened?'

'We found you and your friends unconscious on the train,' said his mother. 'Covered in bruises and boils.' Her mouth pressed into a hard line, her knuckles white around her wand.

In two large steps, Father reached her to put a hand on her shoulder. He looked livid. 'We brought you here, to St. Mungo's. The Crabbes and the Goyles are in the rooms next door.'

'Putain…' Draco let out a long groan. 'Oh, I hate Hogwarts… Can't I just get a job for the Dark Lord, so I don't have to set foot in that rotten place ever again?'

His father smirked. 'When you are older, Draconius. It would certainly make me the proudest father in the Wizarding World if you followed in my footsteps.'

'Let us not get ahead of ourselves, now, Lucius,' Mother said stiffly, squeezing Draco's hand. 'If you have any pain, darling, we can get you something. Anything you want.'

'Ooh, yes, I am in agony,' Draco moaned, adding a little theatre to the merely slight discomfort he felt. 'Only apple pie will help, I am sure. With whipped cream and ice cream. Three scoops at least. Ooh, the pain is unbearable!'

It made his father laugh – no small feat. 'Doctor's orders,' he jeered, snapping his fingers to summon a Hospital Elf.

Draco smirked. Things were looking up already.

He would be fine.