Draco Dormiens IMPROVED FANFICTION

by WhatIWish

Fanfiction of a fanfiction. An "improved" version of Cassandra Clare's famous fanfiction "Draco Dormiens." An experiment for educational purposes. At the end, I have some questions for anyone who actually reads the whole thing and how they think it compares.

Intro

This is a fanfiction of a fanfiction.

Well, not quite. I'm not a "fan" of Cassandra Clare's work. This is an "improved" version of her famous fanfiction "Draco Dormiens," which I'm afraid I didn't like at all. It's more of an experiment for educational purposes. At the end, I have some questions for anyone who actually reads the whole thing (IF anyone actually reads the whole thing), and would highly value any opinions.

What were all the changes?

Tightened writing overall

Some grammar/spelling changes

Smoothed out plot

Added foreshadowing

Added connections to various plot points

Added connective tissue and some description

Added some jokes and other various improvements

Constructed an actual ending

Removed awkward similes

Removed general melodrama

Removed melodramatic romance

Removed love triangle

Removed redundant adverbs

Removed overdone banter

Removed unnecessary awkward/perverted scenes

Tweaked other miscellaneous cringe

(such as Draco being cool and hot, the word

"sex" a hundred times, and the tendency

to think swear words are very impressive)

FAQ

Why did you bother doing this?

Now that we have technology, if you're going to read something, you might as well fix it as you go. Plus it was 2020.

Will you do the rest of the Draco Trilogy?

If I'm bored, but it might take a few years. Or another quarantine.

Credits

Harry Potter: J. K. Rowling

Original fanfiction: Cassandra Clare

Some writing for the end battle

was taken from Charles de Lint's

Moonheart and used as a base

(since Cassandra Clare didn't

write a satisfying one).

Editing: Me

Dedicated to Harry Potter and storytelling extremists

Note: If this story seems even slightly normal (not even good) always remember how horrible it was before. Just one glance at the original brings shivers to my spine. Much sweat and hard work was dedicated to making it slightly okay. The story is reduced by more than half from filtering all the cringe scattered between every sentence. Now maybe you can't tell it was originally a super awkward melodrama, consisting of inappropriate, lame, muggle-ish redundancy and overdone feels. Never forget.

Chapter One: The Polyjuice Potion

It was boiling in the Potions dungeon, but Snape didn't care.

"Can anyone tell me what this is?" he asked his class, all of whom were stifling in their robes. He lifted a beaker of glutinous brown liquid so they could see.

Hermione's hand shot into the air. "Polyjuice Potion," she said, shuddering. Three years ago she, Ron and Harry had drunk the bad-tasting shape-changing potion and turned into replicas of Slytherin students so they could sneak into the Slytherin common room.

"Anyone?" Snape scanned the class, ignoring her.

Draco Malfoy raised his hand in the air. "Polyjuice Potion," he drawled.

"Very good, Draco," said Snape. "Five points for Slytherin. Now," he went on, "Can anyone tell me what it does?" He rounded on Ron, who blinked. "Weasley?"

Ron, startled in mid-yawn, said, "It, err, changes you into somebody else."

Snape, looking disappointed, said, "That's correct." He did not give five points to Gryffindor.

He picked up the vial and dispensed measured amounts into paper cups. "Now," he said, straightening up, "I'll be splitting you into groups of two. You'll each be drinking half a cup of Polyjuice Potion with a hair from each of your heads in it...no, you don't have to swallow the hair, Miss Brown...there's enough potion to turn you into your partner for half an hour exactly. No more, no less. That'll give you an idea how the potion is supposed to work. Tomorrow, you'll try making it yourself, then drinking it. I warn you, however," he said, directing this last bit to Neville, "that making a mistake with Polyjuice potion can have… unpleasant consequences. You might end up half yourself and half the other person, never able to return to your true appearance."

Neville squeaked.

"Right then," said Snape, "Miss Patil and Miss Brown, come up."

Lavender and Parvati came up to the desk, took a cup of Polyjuice potion, and sat down, giggling. Snape quickly paired off Crabbe and Goyle with each other, put poor Neville with bulldog-faced Pansy Parkinson (who cast a longing look at Draco). Ron was paired with Hermione, and Harry…

"Potter," said Snape, strangely pleased, "and Malfoy, come up here."

Draco's jaw dropped; so did Harry's. "No!" they said, in unison.

"I won't be Malfoy," said Harry.

"Get up here, both of you," said Snape.

Malfoy was the first to get to his feet. Casting a glance at Harry, he stalked to the front of the room, grabbed the potion, and stalked back to where Harry was sitting. Harry cast an anguished glance at Ron and Hermione, who gazed back in sympathy. Ron shook his head; Hermione mouthed something at Harry that he didn't catch, but he knew Hermione well enough to know that she was saying, "You'd better go along with it Harry, it'll count towards your final marks!"

All over the room, students were drinking down the potion—there were gasps and giggles from Lavender and Parvati, a yell from Neville, who, having transformed himself into the much larger Pansy Parkinson, found himself being choked by too-small robes, and helpless laughter from Ron and Hermione.

"Here," Draco thrust the cup at Harry. "Well, I haven't poisoned it, Potter, drink it," he said.

"I'd rather drink poison than turn into you, Malfoy," said Harry between his teeth.

"And I'm not looking forward to being a speccy git for half an hour, but you don't see me whinging on about it," said Draco.

"Then let's get it over with." Harry pushed his chair back, and grabbed the cup, into which Draco had already put one of his silvery-blond hairs. He pulled out one of his own black hairs, took a mouthful of potion, and dropped his hair into the cup. Draco had drained it when he handed it back.

At the same time, they swallowed.

Draco doubled up, gasping, as a horrible feeling, as if his skin were melting, washed over him. He threw out a hand to steady himself, and another wave of nausea broke over him as he saw his skin turning less pale, his own fingernails turning into Harry's bitten ones. From somewhere above his head, he heard Harry say, "Urrrgh!" and he threw his head back, tears leaking out of the corners of his eyes, and saw—

—A pale, pointed face looking back at him, his own grey eyes blinking behind Harry's round spectacles. As he gazed, his vision blurred, and he realized Harry couldn't see without his glasses—and now, neither could he.

"Give me your glasses, Potter," he said, and Harry, obviously shaken, did so.

Harry, feeling ill, looked down at his new body. In real life he wasn't much shorter than Draco, so his robes fit all right, but he felt strange without his glasses. He looked up and saw his own face staring back, chalk-white with surprise, but with a bit of a grin on it.

"Wha - what's funny?" he winced to hear Draco's voice coming out of his mouth.

"I was just thinking how good looking I am," said Draco.

"You're a stupid prat, Malfoy." Harry walked away. He crossed over to Ron and Hermione, who were busy laughing, although they stopped abruptly when Harry walked up, and gaped at him.

"It's me," said Harry.

"Oh, Harry!" said Hermione, screwing up her—Ron's—face, "how awful for you!"

Ron shook his head. "I dunno if I can talk to you while you look like that. It's...creepy."

"Well, you look pretty stupid yourselves," said Harry.

"Now you even sound like Malfoy," said Ron, and Harry, even more irritated, went back to sit by Draco, who was staring into space.

As soon as Harry sat down, Malfoy muttered, "Enjoying being me, Potter?"

"No one can stand me like this," said Harry. "But I suppose you're used to that, Malfoy."

Draco turned his eyes upon Harry, who squirmed. It was difficult to look at Draco and see his own face with green eyes screwed up with dislike. "Do you remember what I told you that time on the train, Potter?" he asked.

"Which time?" said Harry boredly, "The time I turned down your offer to become one of your sidekicks or the time we stopped you from trying to steal Neville's toad?"

"The time I told you I could help you out," he said. "Anytime you want to throw over that Weasley git and that puffy-haired Mudblood you hang around with, I can show you how to get your hands on some real power."

"Let me think about that," said Harry, slowly. "Right, I've thought about it. No."

Draco's now-green eyes sparkled behind Harry's glasses. "Are you sure?"

"Quite sure," said Harry. "You can take me off the evil mailing list, Malfoy, I am not interested. What are you looking at?" He glanced down. "Am I changing back?"

"That's just it," said Malfoy. "You're not. Everyone else has. Look."

Harry glanced around and saw that this was true. Everyone had resumed their seats, back in their own bodies. Snape had gone back to lecturing about the uses of Polyjuice Potion, confident all his students were back to their rightful selves. Harry looked wildly down at himself, then back at Draco.

"How - how long's it been?"

"Forty-five minutes," said Draco, consulting the clock. "We ought to have changed back by now."

"Well, what's going on?"

Malfoy shook his head. "I wish I knew."

Harry's heart began to pound. "Did you do something to the Potion?" he hissed. "Malfoy—"

"Of course not, Potter." Malfoy scowled. "D'you really think I want—"

Harry grabbed Draco's robe and yanked him forward. "Turn me back!" he said. "Do it now, or I'll jinx you!"

His foot landed in a puddle of potion, and he slid backwards, hitting the desk and bringing Draco with him. Quills and books rained down around them. The heavy cauldron fell onto Draco-Harry's head, knocking it hard against the stone floor.

"Harry!" yelled Hermione. "Are you all right?"

Draco stared at her blankly. She thought he was Harry. He looked up, and saw the stunned faces of the Gryffindors watching him and the scowls on the faces of the Slytherins. They all thought he was Harry.

Snape strode toward them, shoving Ron and Hermione aside. He peered into Draco's face. "Potter," he said. "Can you explain this to me?"

Draco opened his mouth to say, "I'm not Potter, the Polyjuice Potion isn't working, it should have worn off by now and it hasn't—"

But what came out was, "I don't know, Professor, he slipped."

What happened after that was a bit of a blur for Draco. He was marched up to the hospital wing by Snape, who was carrying Harry's limp body, the sight of which gave Draco a queasy feeling.

He kept feeling his own face and hair, to see if he'd begun turning back into himself, but he hadn't. Nothing happened.

Madam Pomfrey was waiting for them; she instructed Snape to lay Harry down on a bed surrounded by curtains, into which she vanished. Draco sat in a hard chair across from Snape.

"If Draco dies," he said in an undertone, "you'll be a murderer, Potter. How do you like that?"

Madam Pomfrey emerged and shook her head at Snape. "Draco Malfoy is not going to die," she said severely. "He's got a nasty bump on the head and he'll probably be out until morning, but he's otherwise perfectly fine."

"I'm not even going to bother taking points from Gryffindor, Potter," hissed Snape. "I'm going straight to Dumbledore." He walked out of the room.

Madam Pomfrey snorted. "I wouldn't worry, Harry," she said, "Dumbledore knows what Draco Malfoy's like. Now sit still." She began sponging the cuts on his face. "You'll have a lovely black eye, Potter, and a cut lip. What did you—"

The door of the infirmary burst open and Ron and Hermione leapt in, their eyes lighting up when they saw Draco. Madam Pomfrey jumped to head them off, and Draco took the opportunity to sidle over to Harry's bed and look down at him.

It was a horrible feeling, like a dream in which he was dead and looking down at his own body. Harry lay with his arms crossed, still looking exactly like Draco, his white-blond hair bloody where his head had hit the floor. Draco stepped back.

"It was shocking, wasn't it?" Ron was saying. "The way he just flew backwards!"

Madam Pomfrey shooed them towards the door, which Ron was now holding open. Draco gave a last glance back at Harry as they left.

Draco trailed after Ron and Hermione as they hurried to Gryffindor Tower. Ron kept up a steady stream of chatter, the topic of which seemed to be how pleased everyone in Gryffindor would be that Harry had nearly killed Draco Malfoy in Potions. "Fred and George are thrilled," said Ron, "they hate that slimy git, because he never plays fair at Quidditch—"

"No more do they!" shot Malfoy, but they had reached the portrait of the Fat Lady and he had to get busy looking like his head hurt so no one would look to him for the password.

"Boomslang," said Ron, and when the portrait swung forward, Draco followed him into the common room. Fred and George Weasley, sitting by the fire, greeted them with shouts of welcome. Draco looked around the room—it was much nicer than the Slytherin one, which, being in the dungeon, was cold and had a tendency to drip during the winter. He would definitely be complaining to his father about this when he got his body back.

He followed Ron and Hermione slowly to the fire—he hated Fred and George, not just because they always hit the Bludgers right at him during Quidditch matches, but also because they'd become especially obnoxious ever since they'd opened up their own mail-order joke shop, the stock for which was now trading at over a hundred Galleons a share on the MSE (Magical Stock Exchange). They'd even taken a year off school to run the thing. Draco had not missed them.

"HARRY!" George thwacked Draco hard on the back. "Heard you had a go at Malfoy in Potions, good work."

"He's been asking for a nice hard thumping for years," agreed Fred.

"Pity you didn't kill him is all," said George.

Draco felt his face working, and, knowing it'd be a giveaway if he pulled out his wand and cursed Fred and George, he took deep, calming breaths instead.

"Head...hurts," said Draco with difficulty, and sat down hard in a chair.

"Not your scar?" said Ron, looking green. "Your scar doesn't hurt?"

"No, idiot," said Draco, through his teeth, "just my head where that—where Draco banged it against the floor. I'm tired, I'm going to bed."

It was strange going to all of Harry's classes, but a relief when they got to Care of Magical Creatures, which the Gryffindors had with the Slytherins anyway. They were currently studying grindleflerberts: nasty little amphibious creatures with big, tooth-lined jaws. When Hagrid went back to his house to get more flobberworms to feed them, Crabbe and Goyle took the opportunity to abduct Neville's toad and hold it over the cage of grindleflerberts, who slavered hungrily.

"Har har," sneered Goyle, who was gripping Trevor the toad while Crabbe held off Neville with one arm. "Do you want me to feed your toad to the monsters, likkle boy?"

"Please, no!" Neville begged. "Leave Trevor alone!"

Draco watched, sniggering, until he became aware of Ron's eyes on him. Oh, right, he recalled, I'm Harry Potter.

"Goyle, give him back his toad," he said to be convincing.

Goyle's piggy eyes narrowed. "Make me," he said, tightening his grip on Trevor.

Draco was used to Goyle doing everything he said, so this sounded strange to his ears.

"Goyle," he lowered his voice now so only the two of them could hear, "did you know I can read minds?"

Goyle stared at him.

"It's true," said Draco. "It's the magical power of my scar," he added, wondering if even Goyle was dim enough to believe this.

"I don't believe you," he said slowly, but there was fear in his small eyes.

"For instance, I could tell everyone here that you sleep with your night light on, and you wear underwear with hearts on them."

Goyle let out a yell, and shoved the toad at Draco, running away. For a big fellow, he moved fast and was soon out of sight.

"Here you go, Longbottom," Draco thrust Trevor at Neville, who looked at him gratefully.

Slightly disgusted, he trod purposefully on Seamus Finnegan's toe and was pleased to hear him howl with pain.

Chapter Two: Harry at the Manor

After lunch, Harry had Quidditch practice. Draco got to the practice field early and sat in a patch of sunlight, twirling Harry's Firebolt in his hand—it was pretty to look at, he had to admit that. His dad had refused to buy him one until he beat Harry at Quidditch—which, Draco had pointed out, he wasn't likely to do until he got a Firebolt to match Harry's.

He was nervous about this practice session. Harry had a very distinctive flying style, and, well...Draco didn't like to admit this, but Harry was, in fact, a better flier than he was.

If Harry had known that Draco Malfoy was at that moment holding his Firebolt and about to mess up his reputation on the Quidditch team, he might have been upset. But as he was unconscious, he wasn't.

On the Quidditch field, Draco swooped and dove on his broom, trying to look like he knew what he was doing. When they had a practice game, he couldn't manage to catch the snitch, but learned he could do loop-de-loops in the air with the Firebolt easily while Harry's Gryffindor teammates clapped and whistled. Hermione and Ron who had come to Quidditch practice cheered as well.

"Nice one, mate!" called Ron as he and Hermione waved.

Draco waved back.

There was a glint of gold Draco thought was the Snitch, and he bent Harry's Firebolt into a spectacular dive, shooting towards it like a bullet. A Bludger struck him hard in the stomach, knocking him off his broom and onto the ground, now only three feet away. The Firebolt clattered on top of him.

Draco lay flat for a moment, sucking in great wheezing gasps of air. He heard the thuck-thuck of feet hitting the ground and the Gryffindor team landed and raced over to see if he was all right.

Slowly, he raised himself on his elbows—his stomach hurt, but nothing seemed to be broken.

Harry's team crowded around him. Draco managed to extricate himself enough to stand up.

"Right, then," said Fred, who was the team's captain, "go on back to the castle, Harry, you've had enough excitement."

"Ron and I will walk you to the castle," said Hermione.

When they got to the Gryffindor common room, Dean Thomas and Neville Longbottom gestured them over with yells of welcome. Draco wasn't in the mood, though. He pushed past them and headed upstairs, where he sat for a long time staring at the photo album full of wizard photographs of Harry's parents, who waved at him, beamed, and smiled in a way he could never remember his own parents doing.

That night, at the Gryffindor table, Draco sat between Ron and Hermione, feeling oddly not hungry. He pushed his food around his plate with his fork and listened to them laugh and babble. His mind buzzed with questions. Why had nobody noticed he wasn't Harry? Surely he couldn't be acting like Potter, he hated Potter, he couldn't act like him if he tried. He just looked like Harry, so everyone assumed he was Harry, and so they liked him. Not just Gryffindors, but Hufflepuffs and Ravenclaws, students whose names Draco had never bothered to learn, came up and joked with him easily. It was disorienting.

Something that had been nagging at the back of his mind suddenly crystallized into a sharp and painful thought. What if Harry died? What if he never woke up? Would he, Draco Malfoy, be doomed to be Harry Potter forever?

"Harry," came Hermione's voice, "What's wrong? You look a million miles away."

Draco pushed his chair back from the table and stood up suddenly. "Got to go," he muttered, and, pushing his way past a startled Ron and Hermione, he ran out of the dining hall, through the front hall, and up the stairs to the hospital wing. He banged on the closed door until it was opened by a harassed-looking Madam Pomfrey, whose eyes widened when she saw him.

"What's wrong, Potter, are you ill?" she demanded.

"I'm here because… I need to see… Malfoy," he gasped, out of breath. "Is he still knocked out?"

Madam Pomfrey gave him a look of deep suspicion. "I suppose you might as well know," she said. "Draco Malfoy is no longer with us."

Draco's vision dissolved into a swirling blur of colors, and he gurgled, in a sticky sort of voice, "Is he… is he.. .he's not dead?"

Madam Pomfrey looked shocked. "No, Potter, of course he isn't dead!" she snapped. "Really! He's been sent home temporarily. His father came and picked him up this afternoon." And she shut the door in Draco's face.

There was light, faint at first, sharpening to a sudden, stabbing beam. Harry groaned and rolled over, opening his eyes.

He wanted to sit up, but amazement kept him pinned to the bed. He was lying in a bedroom, but a bedroom the like of which he had never seen before. The walls were carved out of unpolished stone, and the ceiling rose so high it disappeared into shadow, despite the bright sunlight that was pouring through the arch-shaped leaded glass windows that lined the room.

The huge four-poster he was lying on, canopied in black velvet printed with silver snakes, was the only piece of furniture in the room apart from a wardrobe propped against the far wall, the front of which was covered with an ornate design of gilded letter "M"s.

It was the M's that did it. Harry sat up, staring down at his hands—they were not his hands—long, pale, and unfamiliar. He touched his forehead and felt no scar. Finally, in desperation, he yanked out a handful of his hair and stared down as the silvery-white strands sifted down to the black bedclothes.

He was still Draco. And what was worse, he was, somehow, in Draco Malfoy's house. He must have been passed out cold for a long time, and someone must have brought him here.

On cue, the door burst open, and Lucius Malfoy stood framed in the doorway. He was wearing black, as he had been every time Harry had ever seen him.

"So," said Lucius, striding over towards the bed. "Do you know who you are now?'

Harry stared. Surely Lucius couldn't know who he really was. If he knew he had Harry Potter in his house—

"Draco Malfoy," he said. "Your son."

Lucius' face split into a cold smile. "I told that Pomfrey woman she didn't know what she was talking about," he said. "There's nothing wrong with you, boy. No Malfoy has ever forgotten who they are."

Harry looked into Draco's father's grey eyes and said nothing.

"Well, since you're here," said Mr. Malfoy, "We might as well have some fun."

He drew his cloak aside and Harry saw a wand encased in a sleek case with a silver snake head strapped to his side. He doesn't believe I'm Draco, he thought desperately. He's going to hex me to bits.

"How about a spot of dueling practice?" Lucius Malfoy went on.

"All, right, Father," said Harry, striving for Draco's drawling tones. Mr. Malfoy was looking impatient, so Harry swung his legs over the side of the bed and nearly yelled when his feet touched the ground—it was like ice. Mr. Malfoy didn't appear to be worried about his son, however—he hurried out of the room, and Harry, still barefoot, followed.

He found himself running to keep up with Lucius Malfoy as he glided down a long corridor lined with Malfoy family portraits. There were a few hags, some pretty women who were definitely vela—possibly where Malfoy got his fair hair—some pale men who could have been vampires, and a rather unpleasant-looking wizard who was pictured riding an enormous spider, a bridle fastened around its poison-dripping pincers.

Yech, thought Harry, what a horrible lot.

Lucius Malfoy opened a great stone-bound door with a wave of his wand and went inside. He and Harry stepped into another huge room; this one had a smooth stone floor and was decorated with tapestries depicting various scenes of wizard battle.

Angry wizards ran at each other, using their wands to decapitate, disembowel, and set fire to their victims. As Harry watched, a goblin with a long, flaming sword chased a screaming wizard across one tapestry into another.

Lucius, following Harry's gaze, nodded. "Yes, I just got the tapestries cleaned, the blood was starting to look dull. Shall we begin?"

Harry raised his wand. Fortunately, at that moment a knock sounded on the wooden frame of the stone door, and it swung open. A tall wizard in dark green robes strode into the room.

"McNair," said Lucius, lowering his wand and turning away from Harry. "Narcissa let you up?"

"She told me you were in here, yes," said the man, who Harry recognized as a wizard who worked for the Department for the Disposal of Dangerous Magical Creatures. He was also, Harry recalled grimly, a Death Eater.

"I came with some news -" he broke off as he saw Harry, "Hallo, Draco, didn't know you were back home."

"His mother wanted to see him," said Lucius smoothly. "You know how she is. Misses him while he's away at school."

Madwoman, thought Harry.

"Well, the news I have actually has to do with Hogwarts," said McNair. "Lucius..."

He looked from Lucius Malfoy to Harry.

"You can say anything in front of Draco," said Lucius. "He is entirely obedient to me."

"Of course," said McNair. "I had not meant to imply otherwise." He turned to Harry. "How goes your work at the school?" he asked. "Are you spreading the word of the Dark Lord?"

"What?" Harry stepped back.

"You know," said McNair, "Keeping the Dark Lord's message alive among your generation. Making sure the right sort of people get the right kind of message. Holding Death Eater meetings." He winked. "Keeping the Mudbloods down."

"Oh, yeah," said Harry, who was shaking and hardly knew what he was saying, "me and the Slytherins, we all got together and had a bake sale, raised loads of money."

McNair did not seem to have heard this. "I remember when I was in Slytherin," he said. "Those were the days." He turned to Lucius Malfoy. "Now, Lucius," he said. "I wanted to talk to you about Harry Potter."

Chapter Three: Narcissa Malfoy

Harry dropped his wand; it clattered to the ground, causing Lucius and McNair to glance at him.

Lucius glared. "Yes, Draco? Did you have something to add?"

With an effort, Harry forced himself to speak. "What about Harry Potter?"

Lucius looked at him hard. "Draco," he said to McNair, "talks about young Harry all the time, don't you, boy?"

"I—I have to play him at Quidditch," Harry said stiffly.

"Where, if I recall," said Lucius coldly, "he has beaten you every time."

Harry couldn't restrain a broad grin, "Yes he has!"

Both Lucius and McNair stared at him; finally, to Harry's relief, Draco's father turned back to his friend. "You said you had news for me, McNair," he said. "Is it another idea to kill off the Potter boy?"

McNair toed the ground. "It's a really good one this time, Lucius," he said.

"Indeed," said Lucius. "And you said the same thing about the plan to kill off Harry by sending him a poisoned birthday present at his relatives' house where, I might remind you, he is protected by Dumbledore's Familius Charm. All that happened was that his cousin Dudley wound up eating the chocolates and vomited out the window on the Death Eaters who'd come to collect Harry's body. Do you recall that, McNair?"

McNair raised a finger.

"And then there was the time Nott tried to sneak into Hogwarts and abduct the boy, and was decapitated by the Whomping Willow. And when Zabini tried to send the boy an exploding broom, Dumbledore intercepted it and sent it right back in a different package." Lucius waved his wand for emphasis as he spoke. "More Death Eaters have been killed by stupid plots to murder Harry Potter than by Hit Wizards from the Ministry of Magic!"

Thinking back on it, Harry remembered he'd thought he'd heard yells of horror from the front garden that time Dudley had been sick out the window, but he'd assumed it was nosy Mrs. Figg from next door.

"Come on Lucius," said McNair, "just hear me out."

Lucius crossed his arms over his chest. "You have five minutes."

"It's true the boy is protected while in the care of his family," said McNair hurriedly, "and it's true he's protected at Hogwarts. We've tried before to lure him out of the castle—remember that time we sent him Arsenal tickets?—but Dumbledore's never let him go."

"And that," said Lucius, "is not going to change."

"No," said McNair, "We know that. And we've thought before of abducting someone close to the boy, so that he'd have to leave the castle to rescue them, but almost everyone dear to the boy is at Hogwarts. He loathes his Muggle family, and the Weasleys are protected by powerful charms."

Lucius examined his fingernails with lowered eyelids.

"But," McNair went on, "that has changed. We've got someone now—someone the boy will do anything to protect."

Lucius's grey eyes flicked upward. "You've got someone close to Harry Potter in your clutches?" he asked. "Who?"

McNair was smiling, the same unpleasant smile he'd worn when he'd come to Hogwarts to execute Hagrid's pet hippogriff.

Draco found his way back from the hospital wing to Gryffindor Tower.

"Boomslang," he said dully to the Fat Lady, and stepped through the portrait hole. Out of habit, he walked over to the fire and sat down by Hermione, who was sitting on a chair with her mangy feline, and Ron, who was reading something entitled The Chudley Cannons Canon.

"Draco's dad came and took him back to Malfoy Manor," said Draco.

"Took him where?" Ron lowered his book.

"Malfoy Manor. It's where they live."

"Brilliant," said Ron, starting to read again. "With any luck they'll never bring him back."

Draco made a choked sort of noise. Hermione looked at him sideways.

"Harry," she said, '"it's not your fault he got knocked out."

Draco did not reply. His mind was full of the image of his father, glaring at him. If Harry didn't play along—if he resumed his normal appearance, if Lucius Malfoy somehow found out that the boy he'd brought home was not his own son, but the famous Enemy of Lord Voldemort—he would kill Harry, and perhaps Draco as well. What was it his father had told him Voldemort had said?

"Whoever brings me the dead body of the boy Harry Potter will be honored above all other Death Eaters."

Draco stood. "I have to go upstairs," he fled, heading for the stairs to the boys' dormitory.

"We've long known Sirius Black is the boy's godfather," said McNair.

At the mention of Sirius, Harry had a hard time containing a chill. Show nothing, he told himself. Show nothing.

"The trouble has been finding him. We've tracked him down, actually Wormtail tracked him down, and it was most ingenious of him. He remembered a cave he had gone to with Sirius as a child, when he visited the Blacks. He returned to the site and put a Binding Curse on Black—"

"Get to the point, McNair," said Lucius. "Where do I come into this?"

McNair let his hands fall to his sides. "Well," he said, "it's simple, really. Wormtail is bringing Black up from Cornwall tomorrow, and we need a place to keep him, just for a night or two, while we wait for the boy to come. We can't leave the Binding Curse on him or he'll die, and you have the best dungeons of anyone—"

"Oh, yes," said Lucius. "Well, it's a stupid plan and an obvious one, but still miles better than any of your others. I'll keep Black here. I haven't seen him," he smiled, "since we were at school together. It'll be like a reunion."

He and McNair laughed. Harry felt as if he were going to be sick.

The door opened and a slim blonde woman came in. She was wearing not robes, but a long, black dress with a green streak up the side. Harry recognized her immediately: Draco's mother.

"Narcissa," said Lucius. "Is anything wrong?"

The woman smiled, looking very similar to Draco when she did so. "I wanted to borrow Draco," she said. "I haven't seen him since you brought him home, Lucius."

Lucius Malfoy waved a hand. "Take him," he said.

Harry shook his head. He was desperate to stay and hear more about Sirius. "But, I—"

"Draco." Lucius Malfoy's voice deepened. "Go with your mother."

Slowly, Harry followed Narcissa out of the room. She walked down the corridor as Harry trotted after her, keeping his eyes open. It would be a good idea to learn as much about the layout of Malfoy Manor as possible.

Narcissa paused in another corridor full of portraits of what at first looked like a number of dolls in differently colored outfits. These were pictures of Draco as a baby and little boy.

Harry looked from one portrait in which Draco, aged about three, was wearing a pair of green shorts and a silver bonnet, to another, in which he was about five and had been dressed in full Malfoy regalia, including a black cloak and had blond curls.

The Draco in the picture had a mutinous expression and kept tugging at the collar of his ruffled robes.

Narcissa led the way down a number of halls to a dining room half the size of the Great Hall at Hogwarts, where she gestured for Harry to sit down.

Harry seated himself at an enormous dining room table, feeling very small. It stretched for miles, bare except for a silver candelabra holding seven green candles carved in the shape of lizards.

More ugly Malfoy family portraits hung on the wall. One featured a grim wizard in a ruff who glared at Harry, then drew a menacing finger across his throat. Above it hung a silk tapestry bearing the Malfoy family crest, which showed a green snake twisting itself into the letter M, while in the foreground the figure of a hooded man snuck up behind another man and stabbed him in the back. The Latin phrase SERPENTES VINCENT SEMPER wound around the feet of the attacking man.

Narcissa came back from a passage into which she had ducked, bearing a silver tray on which rested a plate of biscuits. She set them on the table, and seated herself opposite Harry.

"So, Mum," Harry made himself say. "what've you been up to?"

"I've been embroidering a blanket for you to take to school," she said eagerly, "it's got the family creed on it in gold, your father suggested it. He thought it was time you learned it by heart. Would you like to see it?"

"Sure."

She rushed out of the room and came back with a length of green velvet. There were words picked out across the front in gold lettering:

PUNISHMENT LEADS TO FEAR. FEAR LEADS TO OBEDIENCE. OBEDIENCE LEADS TO FREEDOM. THEREFORE PUNISHMENT IS FREEDOM.

"Lovely," said Harry.

Double doors at the end of the hall cracked open and Lucius Malfoy and McNair strode in.

"Narcissa, get McNair here a cup of tea, would you?"

Narcissa hurried away, while McNair sat down near Harry and grinned. "Draco," he said in a fatherly tone. "As I was saying, I remember when I was a Slytherin at Hogwarts, we did have some fun. I bet you're always stirring up trouble, aren't you?"

"Well," said Harry, "you know, we're kept pretty busy having Young Death Eater meetings, and then we spend a lot of time advocating for more rules against mudbloods."

"A fine boy you have here, Lucius," McNair smiled at his father. "You must be proud of him."

"He was an unpromising baby," said Lucius. "I told my wife in the old days, the Malfoys would have left a child like that on a windswept crag to die."

McNair laughed.

Narcissa came back with the tea-tray. McNair went over to her and said, "Sorry, Narcissa, I'm going to have to take this with me. Got to go. Business." He took a cup off the tray. "See you tomorrow, Lucius," he said, and Disapparated.

Draco sat in the dark library. His elbows were propped on an open copy of Most Potent Potions, which seemed ironic to him, since it was on account of Polyjuice Potion that he was in this mess in the first place.

His mind kept running down options, but none of them seemed workable. He could send an owl to his dad, explaining what had happened, in which case Lucius Malfoy would realize that the boy he had in his house was Harry Potter, and would kill him. Draco was secretly a bit too cowardly to let that happen to someone he knew, and he did not want to be in trouble himself.

He could work on reversing the spell, which would turn Harry back into Harry, and Lucius would see who Harry was and would still kill him. He could go down to Malfoy Manor himself and try to spring Harry, but if his dad caught him he would think Draco was Harry and he'd wind up being murdered by his own father.

It did not occur to Draco to go to Dumbledore with his problem. He was still a Malfoy.

The library door opened, and a girl came in, carrying a wand. "Lumos," she said, and the room was bathed in light. It was Hermione. She looked directly at him, and said, "You're not Harry Potter, are you?"

Draco stared at her, inexplicably relieved. "Of course I'm not," he said. "I'm Draco Malfoy."

Chapter Four: The Veritas Curse

Hermione disarmed him, then punched him in the face. "WHERE IS HARRY?" she screamed. "Where are you keeping him? You can't have killed him, you need him to keep making Polyjuice Potion -"

"Granger - I swear to you, I haven't hurt him -"

She fumbled in the sleeve of her robes and pulled out her wand.

"Look," said Draco, "I did not give your speccy little friend so much as a haircut. Although he could use one. I haven't been making Polyjuice Potion. This is the same potion from Snape's class, it just never wore off."

Hermione's grip on her wand did not falter. "You expect me to believe that?"

"My father taught me Dark magic, you know," he said.

"Don't change the subject."

"Put a truth spell on me," he said. "I'll show you how to do it."

"That's advanced Dark magic," said Hermione. "Its use is strictly controlled by the Ministry—"

"Fine," Draco reached up, and grabbed her hand where it held the wand pointed at his heart. "Veritas," he said.

Black light shot out of the wand and hit Draco in the chest. He had seen his father use the Truth Spell on plenty of people before but had never imagined how it might feel. Now he knew, and knew why it was considered Dark Magic—he felt as if two enormous silver hooks had been driven into his chest, just under his ribs, and was ripping it open, leaving his heart bared.

"Ask me quickly," he croaked. "It hurts."

"Harry, is Harry all right?"

"Yes," said Draco. His voice was different: clearer and more transparent.

She blinked. "Why is it you've taken on his appearance?"

"When we drank that potion in Snape's class, we didn't turn back when everyone else did. Harry thought I had done something to the Potion, but I hadn't. He slipped and knocked himself out. Then I realized that everyone thought I was him. I played along with it."

"Why?"

"I wanted to see what it would be like," said Draco. Each word felt like it was being torn out of him.

"Where is Harry?"

"When I told you that Draco Malfoy's dad had come to take him home, that was the truth. Only instead of me, he took Harry."

Hermione grasped the import of this immediately and shuddered, but she held the wand steady. "What makes you think he's all right?" she demanded.

"I can feel it," said Draco. "I didn't realize that's what it was until now... It's like Harry's scar. He and Voldemort are connected by the curse that failed; now I'm connected to Harry by the failed spell of the Potion. I could feel it when he left the castle, that's why I went pelting upstairs during dinner. I could feel it when he woke up."

"What were you going to do?" she said. "Keep on being Harry? Someone would have caught on. I did. You were acting totally unrealistic. What was your plan?"

"Didn't have one," said Draco. "I was trying to think of a way to get to Harry."

"What do you care what happens to Harry? What do you care if he dies?"

"Look, I'm telling you," said Draco. Every word was an effort. "There's some part of Harry in me now. It makes me do things I'd never normally do. Right now I think it's fighting for self-preservation. Harry's got a really strong will, I think. There's a voice in my head that keeps saying get to Harry, get to Harry. Cause if it was just me," he said, "I'd probably let him die."

He opened his eyes and looked into Hermione's. They gazed at each other with identical expressions of amazement. Then, a sly grin spread over her face.

"Malfoy," she said, "What's your most embarrassing memory?"

"No," he said, and then yelled at the top of his voice, "HERMIONE, TAKE THIS SPELL OFF ME RIGHT NOW!"

"All right, all right," she said, "Finite incantatum!"

The pain and the feeling of being split open vanished. Draco sucked in air, gasping; he felt like he'd just run a marathon. "Hermione," he choked, "that was really vicious!"

She stood up and offered him a hand. "We'd better go. There are sensors all over this castle that can detect the use of Dark magic. Some teacher's probably on their way here right now."

"Right…" he said. "One more thing. How did you know it was me?"

"Well, you know," said Hermione. "It's not as if you were very well written and didn't keep making obvious, cliche mistakes."

After McNair had gone, Lucius Malfoy disappeared as well, telling Harry and Narcissa that he had work to do. Harry, not wanting to hang about and make awkward conversation with Draco's mother, decided to explore the Manor and see if he could find the entrance to the dungeons. Sirius would be here tomorrow, and Harry wanted to be prepared.

First he went outside and walked around the Manor, trying to get a feel for its size and shape. This turned out to be a mistake. At first, it was interesting in an eerie way. The Manor was almost entirely carved out of one continuous slab of black granite. He discovered a rock garden, some horse stables (empty), an extremely depressing-looking gazebo, and an elaborate maze which Harry avoided. After his fourth year at school, he did not like mazes much.

Around the back of the maze, he found a garden where the bushes were meticulously carved into the shape of animals. Magical creatures, he corrected himself: there was a hippogriff, a phoenix, a unicorn, a troll holding an axe, and a dragon, as well as some more nasty-looking ones Harry didn't recognize.

Absently, he reached out and poked the troll-shaped bush with his finger. Harry yelled as the troll turned and sank its teeth into his hand. He ducked aside just as it lifted its axe and swung it at Harry's head. It might have been made out of leaves and twigs, but it made a very solid-sounding THWACK as it hit the ground.

Harry felt into his sleeve for his wand, pulled it out, and pointed it at the troll. "Stupefy!" he yelled, and the troll froze mid-movement.

Harry scrambled to his feet and dashed out of the garden. If there was one thing he prided himself on, it was his hexes, but even he wasn't sure how well a Stunning Spell would work on shrubbery.

His hand was bleeding where the troll had bitten it. By the time he reached the house, the sleeve of his shirt was soaked in blood. Narcissa, who was passing through the front hallway, shrieked.

"Draco!" she cried. "What happened?" She turned his hand over, examining the wound. Serrated leaves stuck out of it like jagged teeth. "Draco, you know better than to go into the topiary garden! Your father would be so angry if – if –" She dragged him into the kitchen, where she bandaged his hand, first smearing it with a purple ointment that stung.

"You're going to have to wear your gloves tonight, Draco," she said. "If your father—"

"Tonight?!" asked Harry, his bitten hand forgotten. "What's tonight?"

Narcissa straightened up. "You know we have company on Saturday nights," she said. "Your father's...colleagues will be here soon."

"Er, right," said Harry. "I forgot."

He couldn't help picturing dinner at the Dursleys' with Uncle Vernon's colleagues from the drill company. He had a feeling a big Death Eater dinner would be something else again.

"Do I have to dress up?" he asked, without thinking.

"Draco!" Narcissa scolded. "You always have to wear the Malfoy family dress robes."

"Right," said Harry. "I'd better start getting dressed, then." He edged towards the door, backed out of the kitchen and sped down the corridor to Draco's room.

Telling Draco to wait in the Gryffindor common room, Hermione bolted upstairs and invaded the boys' dormitory, something she had previously done only in emergencies (and on Christmas mornings). Dean Thomas, in a fluffy pink towel, yelled and dived behind his bed.

"What do you think you're doing, Hermione?" he demanded, poking his head out.

"Sorry, I just ran up to get something for Harry. I'll be right out of your way."

She opened Harry's trunk and tore through it, grabbing James' invisibility cloak, the Marauder's Map, and some sweaters in case it got cold. She looked around for something to stuff everything in and caught sight of Harry's school bag lying under the bed. It said: HARRY POTTER GRYFFINDOR SEEKER.

She remembered putting spells on it for Harry in the past: a spell so it would never tear, a spell so it could be locked, a spell so it could be found if it was left lying around. It was certainly something that would come in handy.

Hermione returned to the common room and found Draco sitting in one of the overstuffed armchairs, asleep. She walked up to him and yelled, "WAKE UP!"

His green eyes opened. "I'm awake."

"I'm going after Harry," she said. "I thought about taking his Firebolt, but I'm pretty sure you can't fly a broomstick off Hogwarts grounds like that. So I'm walking to Hogsmeade. There's a train at midnight that goes to Platform 9 3/4 at King's Cross Station—"

Draco got to his feet. "You'll never find Malfoy Manor, it's unplottable, just like Hogwarts. And even if you found it by some miracle, there are seventeen hexes on the front door alone, and each one requires a specific Disarming spell."

"Malfoy," said Hermione, "I was not even thinking of going without you. In fact, I was going to threaten you with the Veritas curse if you didn't agree to help me get into your horrible house."

"You can't do the Veritas spell," he snapped. "There's more to doing Dark magic than just saying the words."

"I wouldn't be so show-offy about my knowledge of Dark magic if I were you," Hermione said shortly. She swung Harry's bag over her shoulder and went to the portrait hole. Draco hurried after her.

Soon they were sitting on the platform at Hogsmeade station, waiting for the train, when Draco began to laugh. Hermione twisted around to look at him. "What's funny?" she asked.

"Harry," said Draco. "He's going to have to wear my clothes and...Hey! I do not look like a girl."

"Malfoy, stop channeling Harry," said Hermione. "Can he see what you're doing?"

"He can, a little," said Draco, "but he thinks he's just dreaming it."

The train chugged into the station. It was painted bright red and had HOGSMEADE—LONDON picked out in sparkling letters across the side. She and Draco hopped to their feet and boarded. They were the only passengers in their compartment.

Draco stared out the window. They were leaving the heavily wooded area around Hogsmeade now and rolling into an area of dark fields dotted with farms. A white moon had risen. He glanced at Hermione edging away from him on the other side of the seat and hoped he would get his body back soon.

Harry was sitting on the end of Draco Malfoy's bed, rubbing his eyes. He'd fallen asleep for a few moments and had a dream he was half-walking, half- running down a dark road with Hermione. It had been a vivid dream, as if he were right there beside her.

He forced himself to get up and go to the wardrobe, where he searched for the "Malfoy family dress robes." This was difficult. Draco had lots of clothes, from long velvet cloaks in every shade of green to pristine, linen shirts.

In the muggle world, Draco's collection of imported shoes alone would have run about six hundred pounds.

"Draco!" Narcissa's voice echoed from somewhere above his head. "Are you ready yet? Your father's friends are already here!"

"Uh..." said Harry. "I can't find my dress robes."

"Well, then just wear black!" she said. "I'm sending Anton to fetch you." There was a loud snap, like a switch being thrown. Harry assumed she had switched off the spell that allowed her to converse with him in his room.

He selected a black pair of satin trousers, a long ruffled shirt, and a pair of high black boots from Draco's closet and put them on.

There was a knock on the door and Harry went to open it. A man stood outside his door, wearing an immaculate butler's uniform and carrying what looked like a black and silver velvet cloak. He was also transparent.

A ghost servant, thought Harry. He was used to ghosts.

"Your mother wanted me to bring you this," said Anton the Ghost, handing Harry the cloak. It was long with a silver clasp at the throat in the shape of a snake. After this, Harry would be happy if he never saw another snake-shaped ornament in his whole life.

"You left it in the drawing room last time you were here."

Harry stopped in the act of pulling on the cloak. What the ghost had just said set off something like a firecracker in the back of his mind. The drawing-room. There was something significant about that phrase, something huge. What was it about the drawing-room that was important?

"I suggest, young Master Malfoy," said the ghost, "that you fasten that clasp in front of the mirror. It's complicated."

Harry went over to the mirror, pondering the question of the Malfoy drawing-room. His reflection, he thought, looked very stupid indeed.

Harry would never have imagined a big gathering of Death Eaters could have been so fantastically boring. They were a grim-looking bunch of men and women, even with their masks off. Lucius Malfoy presided at the head of the table; Harry recognized some of the names: Crabbe and Goyle were there, just as big and ugly as their unpleasant offspring; there was Nott, Zabini, Rozier, and Franz Parkinson as well.

He had hoped there would be some talk about Sirius, but there was none. It seemed likely McNair and Draco's father were the only ones who even knew about the plan. And Wormtail, of course. They probably didn't want to share the glory.

Harry sat squashed between Hugo Zabini (brother of the Zabini who had tried to send Harry an exploding broom) and Eleftheria Parpis, an enormous woman in black satin robes.

Zabini talked to Harry about all the fun he must be having as a Slytherin at Hogwarts. Harry, to whom the idea of fun now seemed a faint and distant memory, was kept busy inventing all sorts of activities for Draco and his Slytherin pals.

"Well, we study a lot, of course," he said, "and we play with the torture instruments in the dungeon, and, uh, someone gave us a basilisk egg and we're trying to get it to hatch."

"Is that wise?" said Rozier, an old man with pencil-thin eyebrows.

Harry, thrown by the fact someone had actually paid attention to what he was saying, stammered, "Well, McNair said he'd kill it for us if it got too big."

"I, for one," said Eleftheria, "like to see children learning for themselves. That is why I sent my sons to Durmstrang where they have already mastered Level Five of the Dark Arts."

"Is it true they chain the Durmstrang students to glaciers for days if they do badly on their O.W.L.s?" Harry asked curiously.

"Not overnight," said Eleftheria, waving her fork airily.

Zabini turned to Harry. "Is Severus Snape still head of Slytherin House?" he asked.

"Yeah," said Harry.

Lucius Malfoy suddenly turned and spit on the floor. "Draco," he said between his teeth, "is quite friendly with Severus. Despite the fact that Severus betrayed us all. I have told him it is unseemly, but he does not listen."

"Severus will get what's coming to him, Lucius," said Rozier in a voice that made Harry's blood run cold. "When we put the plan into action."

"Father," said Harry, before he could stop himself, "I'm not feeling well. Can I be excused to my room?"

This was the wrong thing to say. Lucius turned a gaze on Harry, full of rage. When he spoke, however, his voice was even: "Certainly, Draco."

Harry pushed his chair back and made his way from the table. As he passed Lucius, Draco's father shot out a hand and grabbed his arm. His grip was firm. "You will come and see me in the drawing-room after dinner, Draco," he said. "You will not be late."

"Yes," said Harry. Freeing his arm, he sped to the hall.

He collapsed against a wall in the corridor, holding his head. Lucius saying the words drawing-room made him recall the day four years ago when Draco had told Crabbe and Goyle his family kept their most powerful Dark Arts objects under the drawing-room floor. At the time, Harry had thought he meant there was some kind of secret compartment under the floor. Now it occurred to him what Draco might have meant—and he could not be sure why he felt this—was that the entrance to the chambers underneath Malfoy Manor was in the drawing-room. Perhaps the dungeon entrance as well.

"Anton," he called softly. "Anton."

The ghost materialized before him, carrying a tea-towel and giving him an inquiring look.

"Anton," said Harry in a whisper. "How do I get to the drawing-room? I've forgotten."

"Follow me, Master Malfoy," he said, wafting down the corridor. He led Harry to a large room filled with overstuffed green chairs. A portrait of a woman wearing a choker of rubies hung over the fireplace and a pale Persian rug covered the floor.

"Thank you, Anton," said Harry, and the ghost vanished.

Harry dropped to the floor and dragged the Persian carpet aside. Underneath was the clear outline of a trap door with a looped iron handle. Harry grabbed the handle hard, and pulled.

The door lifted easily. Harry caught a brief glimpse of a set of gray stone steps disappearing into darkness before his head was nearly split open by the most ear-piercing scream he had ever heard.

"MASTER LUCIUS! MASTER LUCIUS!" It was the woman in the portrait, her mouth painted with red lipstick open wide. "THE TRAP DOOR IS OPEN! MASTER LUCIUS! THE DRAWING- ROOM!"

Harry let the trap door fall as he staggered back, hands over his ears, but even with the door closed the woman continued. "MASTER LUCIUS, COME QUICKLY!"

On the train, Draco opened his eyes with a start. "Oh, no," he said. "Harry, you stupid prat, what have you done?"

Chapter Five: Reunion

Over the portrait's screams, there came running feet in the corridor outside. Harry looked around wildly. There was only one exit from the room and it led straight into the hallway. If only he knew how to Disapparate!

The fireplace, said a voice in his ear. Harry spun around; there was no one there. He flung himself into it as the drawing-room doors opened. There was a ledge at chest height inside the flue; he climbed onto it and braced himself, panting.

Through a crack in the bricks, the figure of Lucius Malfoy entered the room, followed by the Death Eaters and Narcissa. He was posed to kill with curled fists and a white face. His pupils were small in wide eyes, and nostrils flaring. He took in the disarrayed rug and the exposed trap door. Then his gaze fell on the portrait.

"Mona," he said. "Who committed this… this outrage?"

"A boy," said the woman in the portrait as Harry braced himself. "A boy unknown to me."

"Not – Draco?" said Narcissa. Her expression was as set and angry as her husband's, but her eyes were darting frantically around the room, giving her a weird, almost schizophrenic look.

"The intruder had no Malfoy blood in him," said the portrait.

"Did he enter the dungeons?" asked Lucius.

"No," said the portrait, "He fled when I screamed."

"And where did he go?"

There was a pause. The portrait said, "I do not see. I only sense. I do not know where he went."

"Then you have failed in your guardianship," said Lucius, and raised his wand. "Incendium!" he shouted.

The woman in the portrait screamed as green flames consumed her. A fine drift of ash sifted to the floor.

"Lucius—" Narcissa began, but Lucius spun to glare at her. Her expression didn't change, but she turned and left the room.

One of the Death Eaters cleared his throat. "My, look at the time," he said. "Lucius, thanks for a lovely evening, regards to Narcissa." He Disapparated.

One by one, the other Death Eaters Disapparated, until Lucius was left standing alone with Eleftheria Parpis.

"Now, now, Lucius," she said. "It was probably just the portrait making a fuss over nothing, they do that sometimes when you ignore them. I'm sure there was no one in the house."

Lucius was still eyeing the exposed trap door.

"Master Malfoy," said a whisper in Harry's ear.

Harry opened his eyes a sliver and saw Anton suspended before him, not in the least astonished to find the heir of Malfoy Manor hanging halfway up a chimney flue by his fingernails.

"Master Malfoy, might I suggest you climb a bit higher up the flue? You will find yourself in a disused second-floor bedroom, if I am not much mistaken."

Harry nodded his thanks and climbed quickly. It took him three minutes to reach the empty fireplace; he clambered through and rolled onto a bare stone floor, coughing and retching soot.

Harry put on Draco's pyjamas (they had something that looked like basilisks on them) and returned to his bedroom, where he found Lucius and Narcissa waiting for him.

"Boy," said Lucius the moment Harry walked in. "Where have you been?"

"I was getting ready for bed, Father," said Harry, who was glad he had wiped off all the soot with a towel he had left in the bedroom.

"Come here," said Lucius, and Harry warily approached him.

Lucius grabbed him by the arms and stared into his face. "I'm not stupid, boy," he said. "You're up to something, and I want to know what. Going into the topiary garden!"

Harry glanced at Narcissa, who looked away.

"Not knowing about the family dress robes! Asking to be excused from one of MY dinners!" he shouted. "And if I even thought you had anything to do with that fiasco after dinner..."

Lucius scowled. "Your mother is worried that you're going mad, young Draco. There is of course madness in our family, as we descend in nearly a direct line from Uric the Oddball, but I confess I hadn't thought about it popping up in you. Now, however..."

"I am NOT mad," said Harry shortly. "I got a bad bump on the head yesterday, that's all. Honestly! It's not like I've started talking to myself."

"Not yet," said Lucius. Then he bent close to Harry's ear and hissed, "I sometimes ask myself what I did wrong, to be cursed with an idiot for a child instead of the heir I should have had."

Drawing back, he added, "If you put one toe out of line after this, my boy, it's St. Mungo's Hospital for Magical Maladies for you. They can toss you in with the Longbottoms and you can spend the rest of your life strapped to a bed, frothing at the mouth."

The door burst open, admitting two men in travelling cloaks. One of them was Angus McNair. The other was a short man in a dark green cloak, the hood pulled low over his eyes. From one sleeve of the cloak protruded a black-gloved hand; from the other, a shimmering hand made entirely of silver metal. Wormtail.

"Sorry to barge in," said McNair, pushing back his hood. "Anton told us you were up here."

"Back so soon?" said Lucius.

"Yes..." said Angus, glancing around. "The journey from Cornwall took less time than expected."

"And Sirius Black?"

Please let him have gotten away, Harry prayed.

"Is here," said Wormtail. The last time Harry had heard his voice, he had been screaming for Voldemort to heal his severed hand, which Voldemort had done. He had given Wormtail a hand of metal, which now winked in the light as he raised it and pointed it at the door, as if it had been a wand.

"Everriculum!" he shouted and a bolt of white light shot from the palm of the metal hand. The light rose and expanded into the air until it was a net of silvery strands, like a spider's web. The filaments of the web broke apart, and something crashed through them, landing hard on the ground.

It was Sirius.

He was in animal form, a black dog. All his limbs were rigid, sticking straight out; only his eyes were moving, rolling back and forth between Wormtail and Lucius.

"Very impressive, Wormtail," said Lucius, but his eyes were on Sirius.

"My Master has given me a hand of great power," said Wormtail, gazing at his metal extremity with fondness. He waved it carelessly in Sirius' direction, and the black dog went skidding across the floor towards Lucius.

Narcissa screamed.

"That's enough," said Lucius sharply.

"Turn him back," added McNair in a harsh voice.

Wormtail snapped his metal fingers. "Sapiens," he hissed, and the black dog gave a sudden twitch and was Sirius again, Sirius dressed in torn rags, with vicious cuts and scratches up and down his arms that had not been apparent behind his fur. He still could not move, but his black eyes fixed on Lucius with hatred.

Lucius walked across the floor and kicked Sirius in the ribs with a booted foot. Harry rushed forward, but tripped on the leg of Draco's pyjamas and fell to the ground.

He scrambled to his feet when he was stopped by the sight of Narcissa, who suddenly, silently, and to everyone's great surprise, had fainted dead away on the floor.

"We're here," said Draco, standing up. They were looking out the window at a lamplit station whose wooden signpost described it as the town of CHIPPING SODBURY.

"I didn't expect the town where you lived to have such a quaint name."

"Come on," said Draco, and she followed him off the train and down onto the platform, where he turned left and walked towards the end of the platform.

"Wait, Malfoy," said Hermione, trailing after him with the bag bumping her leg. "The station's this way..."

He made another sharp left and walked through the concrete wall at the end of the platform.

"Blast," she said, running up to it, "how'd he do that?"

Draco's arm came through the wall. He yanked her forward, and with a whoosh, she slid through and fell, sprawled onto the ground on the other side.

"Ow," said Draco. Her bag had caught him a sharp blow to the head.

"Sorry," said Hermione, standing up. They were at the foot of a wrought-iron gate whose arch bore the inscription Malfoy Park.

"I guess we're not in Chipping Sodbury anymore?"

"Certainly not," said Draco, starting to walk. "This is Malfoy Park, it's the village at the foot of the hill where our house is. You can get there from Chipping Sodbury, though, if you know how to go."

"You have a whole village named after you?" asked Hermione.

They came out of the lane into a wider thoroughfare where there were shops and pubs. It was in many respects a magical town just like Hogsmeade, but there was a difference: everything here either had the word "Malfoy" on it or was somehow related to Dark Magic—it was Knockturn Alley imagined by Lucius Malfoy.

There was the Malfoy Market sandwiched between Helga the Hag's House of Horrible Hexes and a pub called The Cold Christmas Inn that offered a Malfoy lunch special (toasted bat sandwich).

"They must really like you here," Hermioned laughed.

"Ha!" said Draco. "They hate my family, we've been oppressing them for generations and every once in a while my dad comes down into the village and does some horrible Dark Magic that terrifies everyone and keeps them in line. Why don't you be quiet now? ...The last thing we want is for anyone to see me here and tip my dad off that Harry Potter is hanging around the village."

Draco turned and trudged up the road that led out of town. Hermione followed him, and they walked in silence; Draco was lost in thought. Finally, he turned right at the top of the hill, and they came out from the tree-lined road into a wide open space. Hermione gasped; it was just what she had imagined Malfoy Manor would be like. A spike-topped fence stretched away in either direction. In the center was an open gate shaped like an M. Pillars topped by statues of moving silver serpents flanked the gateway, and through the gate was the hulking black shape of a big house.

Hermione started forward; she had taken only a few steps when Draco seized her arm. "No," he said sharply. "What did I tell you?"

"Oh," she said. "Seventeen hexes. Right."

"My father invented the one on this gate," said Draco proudly. "It's called the Jigsaw Hex, because if you try to go through the gate uninvited it'll chop you into pieces."

"Your father sounds like he must be a lot of fun at parties," said Hermione.

In response, Draco took a gobstone out of his pocket and rolled it across the ground toward the gateway. As it passed under the arch, there was a blinding flash of green light and a sharp clanging sound. There was a pause, then the pieces rolled back to Draco, severed in two neat halves.

"So," said Hermione faintly, "one of those simple, two-piece jigsaw puzzles then."

"It's not funny," he said, and took out his wand. He pointed it at the gate. "Raptus regaliter."

There was another flash of light, this time blue, and Draco walked through the gate. Hermione braced herself, but he remained unscathed, so she trailed after him.

They were now on the property of Malfoy Manor. Dark grounds stretched every way for miles, and she could see the lights of the house in the distance.

"We can avoid most of the hexes just by skirting them," said Draco. "This way."

They followed the fence for a while, then Draco pulled her behind him along a narrow path that snaked through the trees. There were occasionally loud thumping and bashing noises from something crashing through the shrubbery near them.

They came right up against the house. The shrubbery ended, and a narrow white path wound towards the Manor wall and then alongside. It glowed faintly in the night. A black tower rose above their heads, spangled with sequins of light where windows broke up the darkness. Draco pointed upward, to a single row of lit windows. "That's my bedroom," he whispered.

"Is Harry in there?" she asked.

Draco nodded.

Hermione darted onto the glowing path. He reached out to grab her, but his hand closed on air. He heard, rather than saw, the small metal gate opening in the base of the tower - he knew what was going to happen, of course, seeing as he'd put the attack mechanism in place himself. "Bloody Hell," he said, running forward, and pushed Hermione aside, hard.

There was a loud whistling that ended in a great thump, and Draco fell to the ground next to Hermione.

She scrambled to her knees and looked around; the path was empty except for her and Draco, who was sitting on the ground, looking down at himself with an expression of surprise. The shaft of an arrow, four inches long, was sticking out of the upper part of his thigh. Blood was darkening his trousers.

"Blast!" said Draco. He put his hand on the arrow's shaft; it was cold to the touch.

Hermione fumbled for her wand, pulled it out, and put the point against the torn, bloody hole in his trousers. "Asclepio," she said. The tension in his body relaxed as the wound healed, pushing out the shaft of the arrow, which fell aside.

She picked it up carefully. It was sticky with blood and a gluey, glowing substance. Quickly, she tossed it into the bushes.

Draco did not say thank you. He felt his leg gingerly, then straightened up, and said, "Let's go."

After a whispered conference, Draco and Hermione decided to use Lifting Spells to get themselves to Harry's window. Draco would go first with Hermione performing the spell. If it went well, he would bring her up after him.

"Okay," said Hermione, "here we go. Wingardium leviosa," and she pointed her wand at Draco.

He rose steadily into the air, twisting and turning as if he were being pulled up by a string.

She gestured that he should bring her up as well, so Draco pointed his own wand at her and whispered the words of the spell.

He was, however, not as good at that particular spell as Hermione. Instead of rising slowly, she rocketed up as if she had been shot out of a cannon. Too startled to scream, she crashed headlong into Draco. With nothing to brace himself, he flew backward, slamming into the Manor wall. Hermione took a handful of his hair, pulling him with her as they spun wildly in midair.

"Make it stop!" she screamed.

Tears came out of Draco's eyes as he tried to steady his wand. The spell was still propelling Hermione skyward; even her hair was lifting into the air as she continued to yank his own out of his scalp.

"Leviosa!" he shouted hysterically, and they plunged sideways like a hang glider, then flew upward again, rolled over, and shot towards the Manor with the force of a bullet.

Harry was indeed in Draco's bedroom; he didn't have much choice in the matter, since he was tied to the bed.

It was fortunate Narcissa had fainted when she did, since Harry's attempts to get to Sirius had been interpreted by Lucius and the others as struggles to get to her instead. Otherwise Lucius would most likely have been even more angry when he had tried to prevent Harry from getting past him and Harry, losing his head completely, had hit Lucius in the eye.

In a fury, Lucius had thrown a Binding Hex at Harry that had wrapped around his wrists, fastening them to the bedpost. Then Lucius had magicked up a stretcher for Narcissa and walked out of the room with her, barking at Wormtail and McNair that they should take Sirius down to the dungeons and lock him in.

Harry had been trying to squirm out of the Binding Hex for several hours now. Everything has gone wrong, he thought before the window exploded.

Draco yelled as they came through the window, spraying flying glass across the floor, and struck the ground.

Harry Potter's voice spoke from above.

"What –?" it said. "How –?"

Hermione sat up. "Harry!"

"But… But how?" asked Harry.

Hermione, her hair dusted with bits of shattered glass, sat on the floor next to Draco Malfoy, still looking exactly like Harry in every particular.

Hermione staggered to her feet, and limped to where he was sitting. "You're alive!"

"I told you he was alive," said Draco, shaking debris from his hair.

"Is that –?" she asked, pointing at his wrists.

"Binding Hex," said Harry.

Hermione took her wand out and pointed it at Harry. "Finite incantatum!"

Harry's wrists dropped to his lap. Over his friend's shoulder he could see Draco getting to his feet and brushing glass off his clothes.

Draco stepped forward. "Look, Potter," he said sharply. "I know you don't like me. I don't like you either. I would have let my father toss you in the dungeon to die if it were up to me. So get out of my room, and let's get going!"

"I am not going with you."

"Why not?" asked Hermione.

Harry sighed. He explained about Sirius and McNair's plan to trap Harry at Malfoy Manor and hand him over to Voldemort, and about Wormtail. Finally he added, "And I think there's something wrong with your mother, Malfoy."

"What are you talking about?"

"I mean there's something really wrong with her. She seems really unhappy and she fainted this afternoon when they brought Sirius in."

"Alright," said Hermione. "We're on a rescue mission. We'll just have to get Sirius as well."

"That won't be easy," said Harry. "I tried to get into the dungeon today and it set off all sorts of alarms—"

"There's spells on all entrances to the chambers under the house," said Draco. "You have to have Malfoy blood in you to even get the doors open. We don't like strangers."

"Or anybody else," said Harry. "That's about all I've learned being here. That, and you really need better heating."

There was a knock on the bedroom door. They all froze, staring at one another with wide eyes. As the knocking became louder and more insistent, the door began to shake on its hinges.

Harry pointed at Hermione and Draco. "You two," he hissed, "Into the wardrobe! Now!"

Chapter Six: Hiding in the Wardrobe

Hermione and Draco dove for the wardrobe and threw themselves inside, shutting the door behind them. Harry pointed his wand feverishly at the window and whispered, "Reparo!" and the smashed glass flew up and rearranged itself in the frame. He flung himself on the bed and grabbed one of the bedposts as the bedroom door, strained to the breaking point, burst inward and Lucius hurtled into the room.

Harry had the feeling he could have opened the door via sorcery, but had chosen to take his rage out upon it instead.

"Draco!" he shouted. "Why didn't you open the door?"

"You tied me to the bed," said Harry.

"I'd forgotten about that," he admitted, and pointed his wand at Harry. He barked, "Finite incantatum!"

Harry let his hands drop to his lap. "Thanks," he said. "How is—my mother?"

"She's fine," said Lucius. "I need you to help me with something. I've got to go down into the dungeons and I need you to come with me."

This was just the invitation Harry had been hoping for—to be able to go and see where they were keeping Sirius—only he would have to leave Draco and Hermione in the wardrobe.

Refusing Lucius Malfoy wasn't an option. "Okay," he said, and went with Lucius out the door.

It was pitch black in the wardrobe. One side of Hermione's face was squashed against its rough wooden back, and her arm was pinned under Harry's bag and going numb. Faintly through the wardrobe door, she could hear Lucius and Harry talking. Lucius told Harry he was taking him to the dungeons, Harry agreed; then they left the bedroom, the door closing behind them.

Hermione spoke first. "I think we should get out of the wardrobe now. My arm is killing me."

"We can't get out of the wardrobe," said Draco. "It locks from the outside."

"What do you mean?"

Draco could be heard slapping his face. "What part of 'it locks from the outside' didn't you understand? Honestly. I thought you were meant to be clever."

"A simple Opening Charm—"

"No," said Draco, "this wardrobe's proof against that sort of thing. My father used to lock me in here when I misbehaved as a kid, so I should know."

"Your father sounds horrible."

"Leave my family out of this, Granger," said Draco. "Lumos."

Light blossomed from the tip of his wand, illuminating the interior of the wardrobe. Talking to Draco in the dark, she had been imagining his face as she remembered it from school. Now she was face to face with Harry again, his green eyes catching the wandlight. He did, however, still have Draco's annoyed expression.

Draco lowered his head and she could just see the light reflecting off Harry's glasses. "I'm hungry," he said. "I haven't eaten since yesterday's lunch."

"I brought food...I've got Chocolate Frogs, butterbeer, and pickles."

"Well, hand me a butterbeer, then. We're probably going to be in here for a long time."

Harry and Lucius paced down the corridors of the Manor until they reached the drawing-room, where Lucius pulled the trapdoor open and gestured for Harry to come after him.

Harry went, being careful not to touch anything. He didn't want his lack of Malfoy blood setting off any more alarms.

The gray stone steps led to a cold and damp darkness lit by Lucius' wand. It was a maze of narrow passageways winding like snakes. Harry tried to keep track of where they were going by muttering left, right, right, sharp left, to himself as they turned but knew it was futile.

Lucius spoke only once, as they were passing from one narrow corridor into another, this one decorated with a mosaic of broken marble. "This will be good for your education," he said.

They reached the entrance to the dungeon, a stone archway sealed off by a rusty iron gate that had a lock in the shape of twining serpents. Lucius put his hand on it and it popped open, allowing the gate to swing inward. They went inside.

Lucius walked along the rows of barrel cells in the walls of the dungeon, and stopped in front of one, gazing in. Harry stopped behind him, already knowing what he would see.

The cell was a narrow room with drippy stone walls and a straw-covered stone floor. On the far side of the cell was a low stone bench, on which a man was lying.

"Hallo, Black," said Lucius, and Sirius sat up. They had taken the Body-Bind curse off him. "Comfortable?"

Sirius growled, long and low.

"Right," said Lucius. "It's nice to see that you're proud of the fact you've been an Animagus so long you can no longer speak like a human being."

Sirius turned his head away.

Lucius shook his head, glanced down, and pulled up the left sleeve of his robe, bearing a black skull-and-serpent design: the Dark Mark. He raised it to his face and spoke into it, as if it had been a muggle walkie-talkie. "McNair," he said. "Peter. Where are you?"

The skull on Lucius' arm moved its jaws, and a tinny voice emerged. "We cannot get into the dungeons without you," it said. "We need someone to open the trap door."

Lucius cursed. He glanced down at Harry. "Have you got your wand, Draco?"

"Yes," said Harry, taking it out and showing Lucius.

"Very good, Draco," said Lucius. "I'd like you to watch Black until I return with Peter and McNair. If he moves, put the Leg- Locker curse on him. You're old enough to take some responsibility now," he added. "It's time for us to see what you're made of."

Harry suspected this had less to do with giving Draco an opportunity to show what he was made of than the fact Lucius needed help and Narcissa was in no shape to pitch in.

"Right, Father," he said. "I'll be here."

Lucius left Harry in the dark. As soon as he heard the gate shut behind Lucius in the distance, he ran to the bars and called, "Sirius! Sirius, don't be scared, it's me—"

Sirius raised his head. "Harry," he said. "What have you done to your hair? It looks awful."

Harry choked. "You recognize me?"

Sirius chuckled. "I'm a dog, Harry," he said. "I can recognize your scent faster than your appearance. I've known you were here since I got here."

"I have the same scent even though I'm in a different body?"

"Some wizards can. Disguising yourself as Lucius Malfoy's son was awfully risky, though," said Sirius disapprovingly. "What did you use? Polyjuice Potion?"

"Sort of," said Harry, and in a rush, he filled Sirius in as quickly as he possibly could on everything that had occurred in the past few days. Sirius listened in silence, occasionally nodding or making an exclamation of surprise, until Harry got to the part where Wormtail and McNair had brought Sirius into Draco's bedroom and Narcissa had fainted.

"Narcissa," said Sirius. "Now there's a mystery."

"What?"

"Narcissa Hardesty," said Sirius, "was the most beautiful girl in her year at Hogwarts. She was two years older than James and Lily and the rest of us, she was a very good student, and she was very popular. And then, in her last year, she got engaged to Lucius Malfoy. No one could understand it. It was the mystery of the year, she'd never been able to stand him before."

"Did you know her, Sirius?" he asked.

"I did a little," said Sirius. "She was a good person, I would have bet anything on that—but then I would have said the same about Peter, and look what happened with him."

"So are you saying I should—" Harry began, but Sirius interrupted.

"Just keep an eye on her, Harry, that's all I'm saying."

"Sirius, we need to get you out of here."

Sirius shook his head. "Not now. Malfoy will be back any second."

"I know that," said Harry. "I was thinking of coming back down here later tonight. I've got my dad's cloak in my bag upstairs. It'll fit over all of us. I'd leave Draco behind," he added, "but I need him to open the doors. They only open for Malfoys."

Sirius raised his right hand to run it through his hair then, and Harry saw his left wrist was shackled to the bench.

"Harry," he said. "I know you don't like the Malfoy boy, but be sure he wears the Invisibility Cloak, okay? Because if they catch him, they'll think he's you. And that'll be the end of him."

Harry's throat was dry. "They're planning on killing me, aren't they, Sirius?"

"Worse," Sirius said grimly. "I heard McNair and Wormtail talking about it on the way here. Their plan was to try to use me to lure you to Malfoy Manor, and when they trapped you, to summon Voldemort. He wants to use the Lacertus Curse on you—" Sirius broke off. The dungeon gate creaking was audible through the walls.

Harry backed away from the bars, and stood with his wand out as Lucius, McNair, and Wormtail came into the dungeon.

Lucius nodded once, curtly, at Draco. "Stay here," he said. "I want you to watch this."

Harry tightened his hands into fists. He knew they weren't going to hurt Sirius—a dead hostage was no hostage—but he didn't like the sound of this.

Lucius was holding his wand in front of him. McNair took out his own, and touched the tip to Lucius'; then Wormtail raised his hand and put it on top of both wands.

"Dominus vocare," he said in his hissing, squeaky voice.

A jet of green light flowed from the wands' tips, and from Wormtail's hand. It coalesced into the shape of a head and pair of shoulders. The face was blurry, but Harry knew it at once—flat and evil, with slitted cat eyes: Voldemort.

"Master," Lucius whispered.

"Why have you summoned me?" said the image of Voldemort.

"We wished to show you that we have succeeded in capturing Sirius Black," said Wormtail, his fat face broken into a wide grin. "Do you see him there?"

The image of Voldemort turned its head towards the cell that held Sirius. As it did so, its gaze swept over Harry and there was a familiar stabbing pain in his forehead. He dug his nails into his palms, but didn't move.

"I see him," said the Voldemort-image. "And the boy Harry Potter? Has he been notified?"

"I sent an owl to his school, Master," said McNair.

"Well then," said Voldemort. "You have done good work. You shall be rewarded," and, as they all smiled, he added sharply, "when you have the boy in your custody, that is."

Their smiles faded.

"That will be soon, Master," said Lucius.

But Voldemort was looking at Harry again, and the pain in Harry's forehead increased. "Is that your son, Lucius?"

"Yes, it is."

Voldemort's gaze didn't waver. "He has the look of you, Lucius," he said finally. "When he is old enough, you will bring him to me?"

"Of course, Master."

The image of Voldemort vanished along with Harry's throbbing pain. At least it meant he was still himself—underneath the disguise, he was still Harry Potter.

Lucius put a hand on Harry's shoulder as they left the dungeon. Harry twisted around to try to get a glimpse of Sirius as they went through the gate—but Sirius had turned to face the wall, and did not see him.

"What if your speccy little friend never comes back?" said Draco gloomily. "It would be very depressing for me to die trapped in my own closet."

It was four in the morning and they hadn't slept in twenty hours.

"What's he feeling now?" asked Hermione.

There was no need to answer as the doors of the closet swung open.

Hermione sprung out violently the moment they were free, sticky from butterbeer that had spilled from her bag.

"Come on out of the wardrobe, Malfoy. I need to talk to you."

Draco crawled out looking apprehensive. "What did my father say?" he asked.

"We'll both have to go," Harry said flatly. He told them Sirius' situation, and soon he and Draco had their heads bent over a sketchy map Harry had drawn of the Manor and its underground passages.

"You have to let me in down there, because I need someone with Malfoy blood to open the doors. We could both fit under the Invisibility Cloak, but it's probably easier if you wear it and I go a little after you. If doors start popping open all over the place with no one operating them, questions might be asked. And stay under the cloak—you're Public Enemy Number One around here, the way you look."

Draco nodded. "It's better if we go soon," he said. "Pretty soon they'll be expecting Harry Potter to show up and if you don't..."

"Yeah," said Harry. "I was thinking we'd go right now."

"What about Granger?"

"I'm not staying in the wardrobe," said Hermione. "I'm coming with you."

Harry drew her aside. "I'm not pleased about working with Malfoy," he muttered. "After all, this is the Draco Malfoy who tried to get Hagrid sent to Azkaban a million times, the one who called you a Mudblood, the one whose father got Ron's dad fired from the Ministry of Magic, taking his dad's job away and practically bankrupting his whole family. If it wasn't for Fred and George's joke shop the Wealseys would be out on the streets."

"Don't worry about him. We will get out of this, Harry," said Hermione. "We will get Sirius out of the dungeon, and we'll get the spell off you, and everything will be back like it was before."

"What good am I going to be to Sirius like this?" said Harry bleakly. "And what if the spell won't ever come off?"

"Then we can take it up with the Ministry when this is all over," said Draco from the bed where he'd gone to sit. "And would you stop with the insults Potter? You know I can hear everything you're saying."

Harry sighed fiercely, stood up, grabbed the map, and said, "If we're going to go, we should go now."

And so they went, Draco grabbing up the Invisibility Cloak and Hermione taking her wand, which had fallen inside the wardrobe during all the confusion.

The first part of the plan went remarkably well. Draco, in the Invisibility Cloak, went into the drawing room, checked that no one was around, and opened the trap door for Harry and Hermione. They scrambled down the stairs with Draco behind them.

Using a combination of Draco's memories of the underground passages and Harry's incomplete map, they made their way slowly through the tunnels. They passed underground rooms the size of tennis courts, some with sparkling stalactites hanging from the ceiling that looked like jewels.

"There are more rooms under your house than in your house, Draco," said Hermione.

"I know," said Draco's disembodied voice to her left. "The Manor is only about six hundred years old, but these passages have been here for a millennium at least. My mother says she reckons it once was some sort of underground city."

Soon he said, "We're here. Hold on."

They were at the dungeon entrance, now tightly barred and locked with the snake-shaped lock. There was some rustling as Draco presumably did whatever it was he had to do to get the lock open. It fell to the side, and the gate squeaked open.

Harry and Hermione entered. It was even harder to see than before. Harry pulled Hermione with him, and Draco's footsteps came faintly after.

Harry dropped to his knees before a row of bars, and Hermione did the same.

"Sirius," whispered Harry. "Sirius, are you awake?"

There was no answer.

"Sirius," repeated Harry urgently.

There was a firefly sized light in the pitch black. As it blossomed it became clear it was from a wand. Soon it expanded to illuminate the whole cell, showing the bare, straw-covered floor, dank walls, and Lucius and Wormtail, sitting together on the stone bench where Sirius had been lying an hour before.

Lucius' eyes bored into Harry, holding the glowing wand in his right hand.

"Draco," he said through his teeth. "What are you doing here?"

The real Draco gasped, but Harry was too stunned to speak. His eyes moved wildly from Lucius to the bare stone bench where he had last seen Sirius, and back.

Hermione stood up quickly. "Mister Malfoy," she said. "This is all my fault."

Disbelief spread across his face. "And who," he said slowly, "are you?"

"I'm Draco's girlfriend," she said. "I'm… Lavender Brown."

She bit her lip and sent out a silent apology to Lavender, whose name she had picked because the Browns were an old and well-respected wizarding family. This fact, Lucius Malfoy would be sure to know.

"Draco and I were having an argument," she said. "He said your family had the biggest dungeons in Britain, and I said that the Rookwoods did, and, well..." She glanced down. "I made him take me down here, and…Oh, it's all my fault!"

She burst into tears, which was not hard to do since the situation was already so stressful.

"Stop that," he said quickly. "How did you get here?"

"F… f… floo Powder," said Hermione in a purposefully high-pitched voice like Lavender's, and cried harder than ever. "I… I just missed Draco so much when he wasn't at school...And… And I wanted to see Sirius Black, because he's one of the most feared wizards in England, and I just couldn't believe you had captured him, Mister Malfoy… I… I never expected to run into the esteemed Mister Lucius Malfoy of Malfoy Park..."

"Well… I must say," Lucius said even more slowly, turning to Harry again, "I'm relieved to see you actually have a girlfriend, Draco." His eyes stayed steadily fixed on the boy he thought was his son.

"Why don't we all go back upstairs and get… a little better acquainted?" He turned to Wormtail. "Peter, you stay with the prisoner in the other room until he gets here."

Wormtail saluted him, watching the scene with a confused expression on his face. With a swoop in her stomach, Hermione realized he was probably wondering where he had seen her before. The truth was, he had seen her once with Harry. She had been thirteen then and was sixteen now. She was a foot taller, had somewhat managed to tame if not straighten her hair, and of course her teeth were different.

"We will go upstairs and talk," said Lucius. "Draco, get off the floor."

He swept out of the cell, taking Harry and Hermione's arms, propelling them forcefully upstairs as an invisible Draco ran after them.

A fire was burning in the drawing room grate, but the room was empty and a new portrait was hanging above the trap door. It was of a short, angry-looking man with an obvious toupee whose name read OCTAVIUS MALFOY.

Somewhere by the wall, Draco was standing wrapped in the Invisibility Cloak.

"Good news, Draco," said Lucius. "Harry Potter was spotted in Malfoy Park by the owner of the Cold Christmas Inn. He just sent me an owl."

"That is good news," said Harry faintly. "Was he with anyone?"

"At least one person that we know of. Some girl."

"So he'll be here soon."

"And will find a welcoming party ready to receive him." Lucius smiled as Eleftheria marched into the drawing room with McNair and Rozier behind her.

"Excuse me," Lucius told them coolly. "I was just having a chat with my son and his girlfriend, Lavender Brown."

"Excuse me!" said Eleftheria. Her huge black eyes looked like caverns in her pudgy white face, holding a rounded top-like object with colorful patterns swirling behind its see-through cap. "A Sneakoscope I modified to detect enemies of the Dark Lord," she stated. They usually only detected Dark Magic. "You," she said to Hermione. "What did you say your name was?"

"Lavender," said Hermione. "Lavender Brown."

"I know the Browns," said Eleftheria, coming closer, her skirts rustling. "And I know their daughter, Lavender. You are not Lavender." She turned to the Death Eaters on either side of her. "Seize hold of her," she said.

Several things happened at once. The Death Eaters started forward. Hermione backed away in terror. And Harry dropped the corner of the rug he was holding, stepped sideways, and put himself between Hermione and the Death Eaters.

"Get out of the way, Draco!" Lucius pushed him sharply. A chain with a clear charm slipped from the inside of his shirt as he did so.

"No," said Harry, struggling back. "Leave her alone."

"She's a spy," said Eleftheria. "She is a friend of the Enemy. She was recognized, Draco, by the owner of the inn in Malfoy Park. She came here not to visit you, but with Harry Potter. The innkeeper saw her at the reception and told us as much."

"I advise you to step aside, Draco," said Lucius, quickly shoving the pendant down his collar. "I don't want to hurt my heir, but I will."

He nodded at the two Death Eaters in front of Harry who grappled for his wand. He had time to hit one of them with the Impediment charm, but the other never even reached for his own wand.

Instead, he seized Harry, and threw him to the ground. As Harry tried to get up, the Death Eater kicked him in the side of the head with his steel-toed boot.

Harry crumpled, and the Death Eater kicked him again.

"Careful," drawled Lucius. "As I said, that's my only heir."

The Death Eater glanced down at Harry. "He's alive," he said. "But he won't be getting up any time soon."

"Bring me the girl."

The two Death Eaters seized Hermione by the arms. She tripped past Harry's head in a widening pool of blood. They brought her to stand directly in front of Lucius.

"Hallo, Lavender," he said. "Shall I bother to ask you your real name? I think not, since we're not terribly interested in you. We're interested in the Potter boy. Where is he?"

Hermione squeezed her eyes shut. "You killed him," she said.

"Draco will be fine. You came here with Harry Potter. Where is he?"

She shook her head.

"Fine," said Lucius, taking out his wand. "Crucio."

She was being burned, cut, sliced, torn open, wrecked and ravaged; her body would never be the same again. She cried loudly and yet seemed to have gone deaf and blind. The world was white; she screamed, dying.

The pain stopped as Lucius took the wand away. Hermione slumped to her knees, the Death Eaters letting go of her arms, and covered her face in her hands.

Lucius took a step forward, put one booted foot on her shoulder, and pushed. Hermione fell sideways and lay on her back.

"You don't have to die," said Lucius. "Just tell us where Harry Potter is."

Hermione said nothing.

Lucius sighed and raised his wand again. "Cru–"

"Stop it! Leave her alone!"

Draco had pulled the invisibility cloak off and was holding it in visible, unprotected hands. All the Death Eaters turned to stare; an expression of triumph spread over Lucius' face.

Draco was white as a ghost, and sweat had plastered his black hair to his forehead. "It's me. Harry Potter. I'm here."

Chapter Seven: Malfoy Blood

There was light, and it moved beyond the skin of his eyelids like darting points of fire. Harry groaned and opened his eyes.

He was, once again, in Draco's bedroom, lying spread-eagled on the bed—he couldn't have laid any other way, since each of his wrists was tied to a bedpost. His head ached with a booming pain as if someone were striking a gong behind his temples.

"Hold still," said a voice.

Harry whipped his head to the side and stared. It was Narcissa. She was holding a large, bone-handled saw.

Harry shut his eyes. He opened them again, but Narcissa was still there. She had applied the edge of the saw to the ropes that bound his left hand to the bed and was sawing away at them. She was very pale, and her eyes were twitching from side to side in a weird little tic that made him wish she wasn't holding a saw so close to his artery.

"Narcissa," he said. "...Mum. What…?" His left arm came free, and he turned on his side to watch her slice the ropes on his right.

"Your father," said Narcissa, "doesn't want you trying to get into the dungeons to get to your friend." She held up a hand as he opened his mouth. "She's fine. He put her in with Sirius Black. He'll look after her."

His right arm came free. Harry sat up and massaged the blood back into his hands. The last thing he remembered was being knocked to the floor by one of the Death Eaters. "They didn't hurt Hermione, did they?" he asked. "Because Lucius was about to..."

"Oh, he would have killed her," said Narcissa woodenly. "He did the Cruciatus Curse on her to try to get her to tell him where Harry Potter was. But she wouldn't."

"Wh… What happened?"

"Your father," she said, "says that Harry Potter was there. Apparently he has an Invisibility Cloak of some sort. He revealed himself and the Death Eaters took him."

Harry struggled to sit up. He put his numb hands on top of Narcissa's hands, which were as cold as ice. She was still holding the knife. "Mum," he said. "Please believe me, this is really important. I know it's hard for you, but… is Harry still alive?"

She nodded.

"Where is he?"

"In the fencing room," she said. As she spoke, two tears slid out of her eyes and down her thin face. Harry felt horribly sorry for her, but his mind was on getting to Draco. He slid off the bed, tested his legs—they worked—and raced out the door as Narcissa watched him go.

Hermione screamed.

"Enervate," said a voice in her ear. "Come on, Hermione. Wake up!"

She opened her eyes and saw Sirius' face.

"Sirius," she said in a croaky voice.

His face split into a tired smile. "You're awake," he said. "That's good. Sorry about yelling at you. I don't have my wand, so I had to do the best I could."

Hermione raised herself on her elbows. Every part of her body hurt. She looked around at a dank rock-bound cell with one barred wall. A stone bench ran along the opposite one. She was alone with Sirius.

"Oh no!" she said, sitting straight up. "Harry. And Draco! Where are they?"

"I don't know," said Sirius. "I was hoping you could tell me that."

She shook her head wildly.

"A group of Death Eaters brought you down here," he explained. "Harry and Draco weren't with them. They tossed you in with me and left. Do you remember what happened, Hermione?"

Hermione teetered as she regained herself. "The Death Eaters took Draco. They think he's Harry. And Harry..."

She quickly filled Sirius in on the evening's events.

"And then Draco took off the Invisibility Cloak and they sort of… closed in around him. I didn't see what happened after that, I didn't see what happened to Harry or Draco. I think Lucius hit me with the Stupefying Hex."

"Hmm. They won't kill Draco," said Sirius. "They think he's Harry; they're going to put the Lacertus curse on him. And for that, they need Voldemort. So we have a little time."

"The what curse?" Hermione frowned, skimming over the knowledge of curses in her mind for a reference. Vaguely, she recalled something she'd read about for Defense Against the Dark Arts.

"Is that... some sort of weapon?" she asked.

"That," said Sirius, "is a very advanced form of sorcery, in which a metal arm crafted by Dark

Magic is grafted onto the arm of a living human man. I heard Lucius and the others talking all about their plans while I was in the cell."

"For what purpose?" asked Hermione.

"When the arm is grafted onto a human being, it becomes a powerful and selective sorcerous weapon. In essence, its touch destroys any person who is nonmagical."

"It kills Muggles," said Hermione flatly.

"And muggle-borns," said Sirius. "They want to put the spell on Harry Potter. Not Lucius personally. Voldemort will, of course, assist him. Once the Lacertus Curse is on him, they'll place Harry under the Imperius Curse. Think how it will look, the great Harry Potter going around using Dark Magic to slaughter Muggles and half-breeds. They think many will come running to Voldemort for protection. And he will give it, at a price."

"Why Harry?" Hermione wondered. "Why doesn't Voldemort just kill Harry Potter and put the arm on someone else—someone he won 't have to use the Imperius Curse on?"

"To bear the Lacertus Curse is deadly," said Sirius. " It drains the energy of the bearer and kills him slowly. So Harry will die, but he will die in their Master's service. An irony Voldemort would be sure to savour."

"How much time does it take to summon Voldemort?" asked Hermione. "How long does it take him to get here?"

"Well..." sighed Sirius. "It's not like he takes the muggle bus, Hermione. Voldemort can probably Apparate here instantly. But," he added, "if I know Lucius, he'll want to have everything prepared and perfect beforehand—no nasty surprises for the Dark Lord when he gets here."

"I hate Lucius," said Hermione. "He's pure evil!"

"He's a lot more than that," said Sirius, with a half smile. "He's—" He broke off and looked at her thoughtfully.

"What?" said Hermione.

"What did you say about Lucius wearing jewelry?"

"He has this really ugly pendant he wears," said Hermione.

"Describe it," said Sirius.

Hermione described it: a gold chain with a clear glass charm, in which an object was suspended, an object that looked a little like a human tooth. When she got to the part about the tooth, Sirius jumped to his feet and paced across the cell.

"I thought so..." he muttered. "It's been in the back of my mind all this time… I just didn't know how he was doing it."

"Doing what?" said Hermione, turning her head to follow Sirius' anxious progress.

"Controlling her," said Sirius.

"Controlling who?" demanded Hermione.

"Narcissa," he said, sitting down heavily on the bench.

"What are you talking about?"

"I don't know how he got her to marry him in the first place. She always hated him. I think he must have used some kind of Coercion Charm on her, if not the Imperius Curse itself."

"Are you saying he forced Narcissa to marry him?" said Hermione. "Oh, that's just the sort of thing he'd do, isn't it? But it doesn't make sense… he can't have kept her under the Imperius curse or something like that for seventeen years; she'd be dead, or mad."

"He wouldn't have needed to after the first year or so," said Sirius. "He had something much better." He met Hermione's gaze. "Have you ever heard of an Epicyclical Charm?"

She shuddered, and shook her head.

"They're spells that have to do with transferring the essence of people and animals into things. It's hard to explain, but a lot of it is Dark Magic for reasons that should be obvious. You can take something from a person… the younger they are, the better… like hair, or a tooth, and turn it into an object. Like a pendant. And that object will contain the essence of that person, what the Greeks called the life-spark. If you destroy or damage that thing..."

"You kill the person?" said Hermione.

"Exactly."

"So Lucius… you think he took one of Draco's teeth when he was a baby?"

"I think," said Sirius, "he's been wearing Draco's life around his neck since the day Draco was born. Draco wouldn't know about it, of course. But Narcissa would. All Lucius would have to do is break the pendant, crush it, and Draco would die. If Narcissa left him… if she defied him..."

"But Draco is his son," said Hermione, "his only heir, he said so."

"He's just a possession to Lucius," said Sirius. "You don't know him, but I knew him at the Ministry. He was a master manipulator, a pure careerist. Draco would just be a thing to him, something to own and control."

Hermione shuddered and felt a little less bad about having boring dentist parents.

Harry hurtled down the corridors, praying not to be seen, ("Hey! You! Slow down!" yelled the portrait of one of Draco's vampire ancestors as he passed) and darted in through the oak doors of the fencing room. It was just as it had been when Lucius had brought Harry on his first day at the Manor—or nearly so. The tapestries showing scenes of wizard battle were unchanged, so was the fencing ring, but in the far corner a weird structure had been erected. It was like nothing Harry had ever seen before.

Glittering bars of light, each about five inches apart, ran from floor to ceiling. They were in the shape of a rough square, about five feet by seven feet. It was a cage, Harry realized, a cage made of light, and inside the cage was Draco.

Harry approached the cage cautiously. It was evident that whatever else it was, it was a powerful magical object.

Draco was lying on his back on the floor, staring at the ceiling. For a moment Harry was afraid they might have put the Body-Bind Curse on him, but he turned his head as Harry approached.

He had a black eye and his upper lip was cut. Under his left sleeve cuff, Harry could see one of his wrists was swollen to the size of a tennis ball.

Harry knelt beside the bars. "Malfoy," he said. "Narcissa told me what you did. Look. I came up here to get you out. Then you can let me down into the dungeons and we can get—"

"Not possible," said Draco. "I know this Imprisonment charm. It would take a really powerful dark wizard or an Auror to take it off. And the bars are physically unbreakable."

"Oh really." Harry tore a fencing sword with an emerald hilt from the wall and poised it over his shoulder. He brought it heavily at the bars, only to be met with a vibrating clang, and it dropped from his hands. He scooped it up and quickly made the decision to put it through his belt to have an extra weapon. "Okay, maybe they're physically unbreakable, but there must be a way. Come on, Malfoy… think."

Draco sat up and crawled to where Harry was kneeling, taking care not to put weight on his sprained wrist. "Alright. It's pretty simple, really," he said. "I need you to kill me."

"What?"

"I can teach you to do Avada Kedavra," said Draco. "It won't be hard."

"You're mental," said Harry. "I'm not going to kill you, Malfoy."

Draco was now kneeling opposite Harry, and looked at him intently. "Think about it, Potter," he said. "It'll just be dying a little earlier than I will anyway when they get their hands on me, and do that Lacertus thing—and what'll happen if it works? They'll put the Imperius Curse on me and use me as a tool to kill Muggles and Mudbloods. I might not last long—but I'll last long enough to kill the first Muggle-Born I come across. And who do you think that will be?"

"What are you talking about?" asked Harry, and Draco explained the plans he had overheard.

Harry shut his eyes. "Oh, no."

"My dad," said Draco flatly, "will think it's pretty funny to make Harry Potter murder his friend."

"I hate your father, Malfoy," said Harry.

"Yeah," said Draco. "Me too."

Talking came from down the hall, and pain struck Harry's forehead like lightning.

"Get out," said Draco. "It's my father."

Flailing, Harry stepped back to look around, and scampered into a hallway before the footsteps came into the room.

When the door of the fencing room opened, Draco turned his head slowly.

Lucius wasn't alone. A tall man in long black hooded robes was with him. He was wearing red gloves and carrying a wand. He walked quickly across the room and over to the cage.

"Liberos," he said, his voice a horrible hiss.

The bars of the cage vanished and Draco sat up. The tall man came closer to him and peered into his face. He drew his hood back.

Draco stifled a yell at the sight: a bald, hairless skull the color of blood, yellow, slitted eyes with vertical cat pupils, slits for nostrils, and a lipless mouth.

"Lucius," said the hissing voice, which belonged to Lord Voldemort. "You have done very well here, very well indeed."

That was when there was a crawly feeling all over Draco's skin. His scalp tingled as hair felt like it was shooting back into his head. His vision blurred and he took off his glasses. He was himself again.

Chapter Eight: Lucius & the Death Eaters

"Hello, Father," said Draco.

"Draco?"

"Polyjuice Potion," he told them. "I was Harry the whole time."

"He really does look like you, Lucius," said Voldemort, giving Draco a cursory stare. "Especially around the eyes." He lifted his wand. "Pity I'll have to burn them out."

"My Lord," said Lucius desperately, turning to Voldemort. "Please believe me–" For a wild moment, Draco thought that his father was going to beg for his life. "Please believe me, I knew nothing of this."

"Strangely enough, I do believe you, Lucius," said Voldemort. "You have always been deeply stupid and it does not surprise me that you had no knowledge of your son's activities. But that does not change the fact that he is a traitor and must die."

"If I might make a suggestion, Master?" said Lucius.

"Father," Draco interjected.

"Make it quickly," said the Dark Lord.

"The Veritas curse," said Lucius. "It is possible, even likely, that Draco has some knowledge of the whereabouts of the real Harry Potter… if this is a Polyjuice spell, he must have needed to keep him nearby..."

Voldemort smiled. "An excellent idea." He took his wand out again and pointed it at Draco.

"Father—" said Draco again.

"Veritas," hissed the Dark Lord.

For the second time in his life, the hooks sank into Draco's chest and split it open, and he choked with pain and horror of being exposed. It was even worse this time, maybe because he was resisting. It was no use, though. Whatever he meant to say when he opened his mouth, he knew the truth would come out instead.

"What is your name, boy?"

"Draco Lucius Malfoy."

"Where is Harry Potter?"

"I don't know," he heard himself say. The cord that had bound him to Harry had snapped with the spell's dissolution; he no longer had any idea where Harry might be.

"Why did you take on his appearance and pretend to be him?" Voldemort looked faintly entertained. "Why don't you tell us, young Malfoy, how you came to be in this house, with Harry Potter's best friend, while Harry himself, presumably disguised as you?"

There was something wet on Draco's face; when he reached up to rub it off, his hand came away red. He couldn't get up. The pain in his chest was too intense, the feeling of being split open too strong. He fell back to the ground.

"Father, please."

Lucius stirred. "Perhaps you should hit him with the spell again, Master?" he said.

It seemed like hours before Voldemort was finished, but it was really only about fifteen minutes. Draco had managed to detach himself, and heard his own voice speaking as if from a long distance away, telling his father and the Dark Lord everything—from the first moment he had taken on Harry's appearance to his belief that Harry was now in the dungeons, rescuing Sirius.

Eventually, when he had no more to tell, the Dark Lord took the Veritas curse off him. The relief was intense.

"So," he heard his father saying, "Perhaps we should seek the Potter boy in the chambers under the house, Master?"

"No need," said Voldemort, looking pleased. "We must only wait. Harry Potter will come to us. He will come for your son."

Lucius Malfoy looked doubtful. "But my Lord… they are not even friends, Draco said as much..."

Voldemort shook his head. "I know Harry Potter," he said. "He is just like his father. He will come for your son, Lucius. I guarantee it."

Harry was nearly at the base of the stairs that led up to the drawing-room when he gave an almighty yell and pitched forward onto the ground. The feeling of polyjuice wearing off washed over him and his newly returned scar burned.

The figure of Hermione whirled around. She and Sirius had escaped from their cell. In his hurry to impress Voldemort, Lucius had forgotten the obvious task of checking the lock. Hermione and Sirius hadn't realized this themselves, until a good half hour had passed. Eventually Sirius had casually leaned against the door and fallen flat on his back.

He had insisted on going ahead in his animagus form to look out for enemies.

"Harry!" cried Hermione.

His response was muffled. He was bent over as if in pain, an unhappy lump huddled on the ground with his hands over his face. "Hermione? Is that you?"

She was about to respond when the light from her wand fell on his face, and her reply turned into a shout. She clapped a hand over her mouth. "Harry… It's you."

And it was: untidy black hair, green eyes, lightning-shaped scar and all. He dropped his hands from his face.

She gawked at him. Finally, she said, "You're back to normal! Your scar doesn't hurt, does it?"

He nodded. "Yes, but..." He trailed off. "I just wish I could see."

She knelt down next to him. "I can temporarily fix your eyes, Harry. Do you want me to?"

"I guess you'd better."

"It won't last for long," she explained. "A Correctivity Charm. Until we get your glasses."

"All right," he said, and closed his eyes.

Hermione took her wand out and touched the tip to each of his eyelids. Then she leaned forward and put her fingers against his temples. "Stay still," she advised, and said, "Oculus."

Harry jumped as if he'd been stung, and opened his eyes. A reluctant grin spread over his face. "Thanks, Hermione. By the way, I've found a weapon." He fingered the emerald hilt of his sword as she took in the weapon he'd stuck through his belt.

"You're not stealing that, are you?"

"What do you mean? I'm defending myself." Harry gazed at the sword. The blade had a faint tint of green, and although he'd believed he'd grabbed it by chance, he felt, all at once, attracted to it. For a second he thought maybe, just maybe, the sword had been the one to choose him.

"Really, I don't see what good a sword is when you're a wizard," said Hermione. "Just use your wand, Harry. That thing'll only get in the way."

When Harry didn't answer, she didn't see the use in pushing the issue.

When they came up into the drawing room, Sirius was waiting for them in his canine form. Harry opened his mouth, but Sirius shook his head quickly and indicated that they should follow him. They padded after him down the hallways to Lucius' study, the door of which Sirius opened with a paw, and went in.

Narcissa was sitting behind Lucius' desk, just as she had been when Sirius had found her there, only her head was on her arms.

Sirius turned back into a man so quickly there was an audible pop. He indicated Narcissa with a jerk of his chin. "I had to tell her everything," he said to Harry and Hermione in an undertone. "She's really upset." He glanced at Harry. "Turned back, have you? I thought you might've. Nice sword," he commented briefly.

"Oh? Why'd you think that about changing back?" asked Harry.

Sirius toed the ground, looking deeply unhappy. "Voldemort's already come," he said, looking anxiously at Hermione. "He went to find Harry..." Sirius sighed. "Well, I mean, he would have known right away that Draco wasn't you, wouldn't he? He probably took the spell off."

"I'm afraid that has happened," said Harry quietly. "My scar's been hurting now for about an hour. Besides, I saw him arrive. Do you think Draco's all right?" He shot a glance at Narcissa and dropped his voice. "Do you think he's alive?"

Sirius shrugged. "Don't know. The Dark Lord might have killed him in a fit of rage. Then again, Draco is the son of his closest and most powerful Death Eater. If Draco can convince them that he was acting under the influence of the Polyjuice spell… if he gives the Dark Lord information about you..."

It was quiet for a few moments.

"Is Narcissa going to be all right?" Harry asked.

"I hope so," said Sirius. "Lucius has had her under all sorts of spells and charms for so long—Coercion Charms, the Imperius Curse sometimes, she's forbidden to have a wand, forbidden to lie to him, forbidden by pain of death even to speak Lucius's full name in case she uses it in a spell."

"He should be in Azkaban," said Hermione.

"And we should be rescuing Draco," said Harry, rubbing the smooth hilt of the fencing sword.

Hermione shuddered.

"I'm going to have to face him," said Harry, looking grim.

"And do what, Harry?"

"I'll trade," said Harry, gripping his sword. "I'll trade myself for Draco."

"Harry," said Hermione, "Voldemort isn't exactly known for keeping his word."

"Hermione's right," said Sirius, "he'll just kill you anyway. In fact, I'm sure he's expecting you to do just what you suggested."

"Well, we can't leave him to Lucius and Voldemort," protested Harry. "And the Death Eaters."

"The Death Eaters are not with them," said a faint voice. It was Narcissa, now sitting up and wiping at her eyes. "They're in the downstairs ballroom, trying to get the Lacertus Curse prepared."

Sirius crossed over to Narcissa. "He'll be fine," he said firmly.

Harry looked at Hermione, but she was looking thoughtful. She walked to the opposite side of the room and took a fat green book from a shelf—Epicyclical Elaborations of Sorcery.

Sirius turned around. "Hermione, what are you doing?"

Harry put his finger to his lips. "Shush."

Hermione began flipping quickly through the pages. "I just thought… maybe… if we could make it work... It would be..."

Finally she put the book down and turned to Sirius. "I have an idea," she said.

"This is a good thing," Harry explained to his godfather. "Hermione has great ideas."

"But I'll need your help, Narcissa," Hermione added.

Narcissa straightened up in her chair. "What can I do?" she asked.

Harry, Hermione and Sirius sat nervously in the study, not looking at each other. Narcissa had been gone five minutes. When the door finally opened and Narcissa came back into the room, carrying a large bundled object, Sirius was so pleased that he turned back into a dog, then back into a man, then into a dog again in quick succession.

"Hang on there, Sirius," said Harry, though he was relieved as well. "It can't be healthy to change back and forth that fast."

Narcissa put the bundle on the desk and stepped back as Harry, Hermione and Sirius (back in human form again) crowded around.

"I told them I was taking it to Lucius," she said. "The more I resist, the easier it gets," she went on. "I feel like I could almost say his name now."

Harry, Hermione and Sirius stepped back quickly. "But I won't," she added.

Hermione scooted back to the desk and unwrapped the bundle, then sucked in her breath. A metal arm lay outstretched in front of her, grim and ugly. Each of its seven metal fingers ended in vicious blades and there were Dark Magic carvings all up and down its hollow metal body. Despite being hollow all through the inside, it was solid and heavy.

Harry asked, "Is that the Lacertus arm?"

"Horrible, isn't it?" said Hermione.

"It's a good thing he's not going to be using that thing on Draco after all," said Harry. "We only have a couple minutes with this thing before Narcissa has to take it to Voldemort. Let me work on it."

While Hermione worked, Sirius drew Narcissa into the corner of the room. "You've done very well," he told her.

She sighed. "When this is all over," said Narcissa, "you know I'll have to stay here, don't you? I don't dare leave. Not while Draco's father has that pendant."

"But won't Lucius already think–"

Narcissa shook her head. "He'll never think I've acted against him, not by my own will, not after seventeen years. But if I left with you–"

"I understand."

They turned back to Hermione, who was now their last hope.

Draco hardly heard the door open as Narcissa came into the room.

She went up to Lucius. "They wanted me to bring you this," she said, and handed him the Lacertus arm.

Lucius looked astonished. "What–why?"

"Harry Potter is in the house," said Narcissa, with perfect truth. "He is coming up here now."

This woke Draco up. He bolted upright and stared at his mother, who didn't look back at him. It didn't seem likely to him that the Death Eaters would have asked Narcissa to bring such a powerful and important magical object up to Lucius without them. Not unless they had a reason she wasn't stating.

Lucius was obviously suspicious as well, but didn't want to say anything in front of Voldemort. He had already shown once today that he couldn't control his own family. Instead, he lifted his left arm to his face and spoke into the Dark Mark: "Wormtail. MacNair. Come. Bring them all."

All over the room, Death Eaters began to Apparate: Wormtail, MacNair, Zabini, Rozier, Parkinson, and many others. People Draco had known since he was a child, had visited, whose children he had played with. None of them looked at him, sitting bloody and wretched on the floor.

Voldemort turned from the window. "Harry Potter is here," he said, flexing long fingers. "He is outside this room."

Narcissa backed out of the group and left the room through another entrance.

There were footsteps in the hallways. The double doors opened. First one, then the other. Draco gripped his hands together tightly.

Sirius came in, in the form of a dog. Hermione followed him, very pale. And after Hermione came Harry.

A sigh rippled through the Death Eaters, like wind through branches.

Harry was even paler than Hermione, an ashy white color, but looked resolute. He wasn't wearing his glasses and had the green sword at his side.

"I'm here," he said.

Voldemort stood in the center of his circle of Death Eaters and laughed. "And I know why," he said. "You have come for him," and he pointed at Draco.

"Yes," said Harry.

"He isn't worth it, Harry Potter," said Voldemort. "What do you think he has been doing here all morning while you were busy rescuing the dog? He has been telling us everything. Ever since I ended the spell that bound you two—and I really must find out how that was done, it was most ingenious—he has been singing quite an interesting song."

"You're lying," said Hermione. "You could have figured out Harry was here without Draco saying anything at all."

Draco himself was leaning against a wall, trembling, so white he resembled one of the ghosts from Hogwarts. He shivered and slid to the floor.

"No," hissed the Dark Lord. "He told me willingly, told me everything. It hardly matters, in any case." He turned back to Harry. "I hold all the cards, you hold none. I would hardly believe you could come here thinking you could fight me. Only I knew your father, boy… and it is just the sort of thing he would have done. More stupid than brave, the both of you."

In the corner, Draco sat up suddenly. There was a whispering sound in his mind. Somehow he knew it was the voice of Anton.

Master Draco, it said. I can aid you.

Draco sucked in his breath, and felt out with his mind. How is it you can speak to me in my head? he asked.

I am as old as Malfoy Manor itself, said the ghost. Since before it was a place infected by Dark Magic. After all these years, I am a part of it. If you allow me to open your mind to it, the Manor may yield its ancient power to assist you.

How do I know you're telling the truth? thought Draco.

It seems to me you don't have much choice, Master Draco. I simply need a Malfoy to say "enter" and if I join my voice with yours, the Manor will take its vengeance.

Then Draco heard another sound, a hissing. At first he looked around, but realized, it too, must be in his head. Nobody else was reacting to it. It was a voice, also a whisper, but deeper and mightier, like the beginning of a hurricane.

We crave permission, the whisper said. Permission to serve our master. To avenge all the evils which have strode our halls. We remember the days the Malfoys were not named after bad will. We promise hope for our family and their name.

A warmness fell over Draco, and strength replaced his fatigue. Something else not so unfamiliar after inhabiting Harry's body crept into him as well: a tiny bit of nobleness.

Enter, Draco and Anton said with the same voice.

The window behind Voldemort swung open by itself. Three troll shaped bushes from the topiary garden crept in through the windowsill. Unnoticed by all but Draco, they crossed the room and swarmed its far end.

"Down!" Lucius cried from behind him.

Draco dropped to the floor and an arc of power ionized the air above him, striking the first rank of trolls. The stench of burning leaves joined with the polished reek of the Manor. The trolls' howls filled the air.

They passed Lucius in a rush. One dropped on Voldemort, who blasted it off immediately. He flung the charred creature aside, but met a renewed attack.

Two more trolls leaped at him, the force of their momentum throwing both Voldemort and Lucius through a door into an empty room. Power aided by the Manor crackled from Draco's hands as he willed the creatures on. After a moment, his leg buckled under him and he fell.

Voldemort took a blow on his shoulder from a troll that bit deeply into his flesh, then another down his side.

"Master!" shrieked Lucius, but his spells didn't affect the Malfoy trolls. As Lucius was about to point his wand at Harry, the green blur of a blade whipped across his cheek. Blood dripped down Lucius' neck. Harry had sliced him with the sword deep enough to leave a scar.

Staggering to his feet, Draco made for the door, then pitched headlong down the hall with Harry and Hermione.

Master Draco, said Anton's voice, booming in his head. The Manor will trap the enemies to your good name temporarily, but you must make your escape as quickly as you can.

"See! I didn't need your help!" Draco shouted to Harry, Hermione, and Sirius when they fell, hyperventilating, to their knees outdoors.

"I can see that, as we've only fought off five Death Eaters from shooting spells at your back as we ran down the hall," said Harry when he caught his breath.

"Oh," said Draco, too tired to resist swallowing his pride. "Thanks."

"Draco, what's the fastest way off the property?" demanded Hermione.

"Huh?" his head, suddenly devoid of booming voices, was spinning. "Right, um. Not this way, unless you want to fall into the bottomless cliff."

"...The what?" asked Harry, straightening up and shoving his stolen sword back into his belt.

"Pick up the pace," said Draco, leading them to the left. "We have to get out of here. Yes, my father likes living by a bottomless cliff for security reasons."

"Does he push people in?" asked Harry.

"Might've." Draco shrugged. "But he could've just been saying that to make me obey."

"Merlin's beard!" Harry whistled, as their path took them against a ridge. "Is that it, then?"

"Careful," said Sirius, pulling Harry away from the precipice.

There was a deep expanse of blackness behind a couple feet of rubble hardly acting as a barrier against the cliffside. Harry chucked a pinch of debris into it, which made no noise and disappeared without significance. The darkness that appeared quickly inside the hole seemed to radiate from it somewhat, like light.

"What did I tell you?" snapped Draco. "Follow me unless you want to fall to your death, which maybe I should let you. Don't forget, you have to leave that sword with me, it's Malfoy property."

"Fine thing for someone to say who talked to Voldemort about us," said Harry, drifting close to the cliff again.

"Harry—" cautioned Sirius.

Draco hardly knew what to say to this. "I didn't actually—"

The spluttering of an engine interrupted them. Draco froze, pictures of Death Eaters and shrubbery dancing before his mind's eye. Above them was a scrappy muggle motor-thing with glowing eyes he had never seen before. The monstrous contraption let out another loud splutter and rattle. The muggle machinery filled Draco with the unanticipated terror of an unknown world, distinct from the other types of fear already filling him.

BEEP-BEEP, it said.

This was too much for Draco. Without another thought, he sped off just as he heard Harry yell.

Draco spun around to see Harry, close to the cliff again, trip backwards and scream as he rolled over the rubble barrier, sword still in hand.

Draco and Hermione screeched at the same time.

Chapter Nine: Epicyclical Elaborations of Sorcery

"Harry?" said a voice. "Harry, come on, wake up," and this time Harry knew who it was. He opened his eyes and stared.

He was lying in the backseat of a car and Ron Weasley was crouched over him, grinning like a madman. George was in the driver's seat, and Fred was sitting next to him. Both of them had turned around in their seats to goggle at him, which might have been a problem if the car had been moving. However, the car was just hanging there.

In midair.

Harry sat bolt upright. "What – what?" he stammered. "How? You? Here? Flying car?"

"That's right," agreed George. "Us. Here. Flying car."

"He seems to have an excellent grasp of the essentials, doesn't he?" observed Fred.

Harry tried again. "How did you—?"

"We caught you while you were falling," explained George. "It was the coolest thing ever."

"Good thing Dad upgraded to a convertible," added Ron.

"And I fixed your arm," put in Fred, twirling his wand like a baton. "No problem."

"But what are you doing here?" said Harry in amazement. "Don't tell me you were taking your dad's car for a midnight spin and you just happened to spot me toppling over a cliff."

"Not hardly," said Ron. "As to that..." He reached into his pocket and pulled out a folded piece of paper, which he threw in Harry's lap. "I was going to be really angry at you," said Ron, "but since you've just fallen off a massive cliff, I'll give you a break."

Harry unfolded the paper. It was a note, addressed to HARRY POTTER, and he had to scan it twice before the contents sank in. "It's the ransom note," he said. "The one Wormtail sent to me at school, telling me they had Sirius here." He stared at Ron. "How did you get hold of it?"

"Harry, you prat," said Ron. "I opened your mail, of course. What'd you think I was going to do? You and Hermione vanish, then I get this mad note from her—remind me to show it to you—saying she's gone off with you on some sort of rescue mission and not to tell anyone. Well, naturally I knew something was up, so when this nasty-looking black bird arrived the next day with a letter for you, of course I opened it."

"And a bloody good thing he did," interjected Fred.

"So I showed it to Fred and George right away, and we went rushing home and got Dad's new car that he bought with the money from the joke shop, which of course he'd enchanted to fly—and we blackmailed him by threatening to tell Mum, so he had to give it to us—and then we followed the instructions from the ransom note and came on here." Ron beamed. "And in the nick of time, I might add—we just managed to fly onto the grounds when we looked down, and there you were, dangling right off the edge of the cliff with a sword. It was a shock, I'll tell you. And then you let go and you fell, just hurtled down, mind, it was really terrifying, so George jammed on the accelerator and we rocketed straight down and swerved under you to catch you and the sword to boot." Ron sighed in satisfaction and showed Harry the weapon laying at their feet. "Better than the Wronski Feint, it was."

Harry didn't share Ron's enthusiasm. Instead he put his hands over his face. "Oh," he moaned. "Hermione. Where is she? Oh, no. We've got to get back to the path. Hermione and Sirius, they probably think I'm dead. And Malfoy—he ran off—"

"Bloody hell. What on earth is going on exactly, Harry?"

"Just bring the car back up," said Harry. "I'll explain on the way."

It took a little while for them to rise to the top of the Pit. On the way, Harry described the events of the past few days. Fred and George were a good audience, booing, cheering and yelling in all the right places.

"We're here," said George, and indeed they were pulling level with the walkway. The Weasleys leaped out of the car, and Harry, on legs that were still wobbly, followed them.

At first it looked to them like there was only one person sitting on the path. Then, as they drew closer, they realized it was Sirius and Hermione.

Sirius glanced up. He sniffed as he recognized Harry's scent, and a huge grin lit his face.

Hermione followed his gaze. She gasped and leaped to her feet, sobbing. "Ron, oh Ron, Harry's dead, I'm so sorry, it's my fault, I really tried—"

Ron patted her head. "Dead, did you say?" he said, not sounding the least bit sad. "Well, it was bound to happen."

Hermione pulled back and looked up. "What?"

"Well, he led such a risky sort of life," said Ron, ignoring the shocked look on her face. "Don't you think? I suppose the only thing for us to do is dedicate the rest of our lives to making sure the memory of Harry never fades from the recollection of the wizarding world. Perhaps a zonking great monument is the way to go. Some huge block of marble with a statue in glasses right on top. We can get Fred and George to fund the construction." Seeing her expression, Ron said with a grin, "Hermione, look behind me."

Fred and George were also grinning like mad. Between them with his hair sticking up every which way and his glasses on crooked, but very much alive, was Harry.

"Hermione," he breathed.

"I am glad he's alive, though," said Ron.

"Me too," said George. "We've got a match against Slytherin coming up next week and we'd be flattened without him."

They got in the car and drove back up to the top of the cliff, where they parked in the middle of a grove of trees and Sirius made a rather startling announcement.

"We're not leaving," he said.

"Oh, right," said George. "We'll just hang around a bit, shall we, have a campfire. Toast some marshmallows. Wait for the Dark Lord to return and kill us all."

"We're not leaving," Sirius clarified, "without Draco."

"Come on, Sirius!" said Ron, sounding horrified. "For six years it's been my dream to leave Malfoy stranded on a barren plain full of giant spiders. Now I finally get the opportunity and you want to take it all away?"

Sirius crossed his arms over his chest. "I am not leaving without Draco," he said again.

Harry had turned and was looking away from them, back in the direction of the Manor. "He won't come, Sirius," he said. He had tucked the sword back at his side.

"You'll have to believe me that it would be a very wrong thing to do, not to at least give him the chance," said Sirius.

"Wrong?" said Ron angrily. "First chance he got he turned right around and stabbed you all in the back, didn't he?"

"Only because Voldemort used the Veritas curse on him," said Sirius, sharply.

"Wait? What? How—" Harry and Hermione both started talking at the same time, and Sirius held up a hand.

"Draco didn't tell me," he said. "I guessed. And I wasn't going to tell you, because I figured it was his business, but you might as well know."

Hermione and Harry looked at each other with expressions of horror. Then Harry stared at his shoes. "Go and get him, Sirius," he said.

"Be practical," protested George. "How're we meant to find him?"

Sirius tapped his nose. "You forget, I'm a dog," he said. "I can follow his scent. Chase him down."

"That's kind of disturbing," said Fred.

"But very effective," said Sirius. "You five wait here. I'll look for him for twenty minutes and no more. I've a feeling he hasn't gone far."

"But Voldemort and the Death Eaters—" began Harry.

"—are trapped inside Malfoy Manor for the time being, thanks to Draco," said Sirius then added when they goggled at him, "Dogs can hear more than high-pitched noises, you know. They can also hear seemingly silent conversations with ghosts—I'll explain more later."

Sirius loped swiftly over the dark grounds, skirting anything that looked like it might be a nasty obstacle of some sort. Although he was fairly sure he was safe in dog form, he didn't want to run into anything that would slow him down.

His suspicions that Draco hadn't gone far were confirmed as he neared a stand of trees, shadowy and spectral in the darkness. Sirius turned back into a man and ducked under the outer branches.

Draco was sitting with his back to the trunk of a tree. His white-silver hair stood out in the night.

As Sirius approached him, Draco's arm shot out, holding his wand. He directed it at Sirius and said, "Don't come any closer."

"It's me," said Sirius calmly.

"I know who it is," said Draco, raising his head. "And I said not to come any closer."

Sirius reached into his pocket, drew out his own wand, and laid it on the ground. "You have great reflexes," said Sirius, straightening up. "You're on the Slytherin house team, aren't you? What position do you play?"

"Seeker," said Draco.

"You should be a Beater," said Sirius. "You're quite strong, as well."

"Why are you here, anyway? You didn't chase me down to talk about sports."

Sirius sat down and leaned his back against a tree trunk opposite Draco, who was still holding the wand on him. "I guess I wanted to tell you," said Sirius, "that you remind me of someone I knew when I went to Hogwarts."

"Really," said Draco, without much interest. "My dad?"

"No," said Sirius. "Me."

Draco laughed. "I don't believe that," he said. "You? My father told me all about you and James Potter. You were in Gryffindor house, just like Harry."

"Maybe James was like Harry," said Sirius. "But I hadn't always been quite as good, and came close to being in Slytherin. My parents… well, you don't want to hear about that. Suffice it to say, I didn't have the happy home life James did. We were roommates my first year, in Gryffindor, and at first I hated him."

"You hated him?" Draco itched behind his ear.

"Sure. He was an excellent student, nice, great Quidditch player, everyone liked him, and he seemed to be able to be good without trying. Whereas I always went with my first instinct, which was sometimes very bad. I beat up Severus Snape more times than you can count. Dumbledore almost expelled me."

Now Draco looked astonished. "You were in trouble with Dumbledore?"

"All the time," said Sirius.

"Now don't tell me," Draco interrupted, "then one day James saved you from a horrible fate, and you realized what a great guy he was and you were best friends after that."

Sirius leaned closer to the tree. "Actually, one day we got into a huge fight, and it turned into a duel. Dumbledore forbade Madam Pomfrey to fix our cuts and bruises, so we just had to heal the old-fashioned way, locked up together in the hospital wing. When we came out, we were friends, and stayed friends."

Sirius was very still. "I learned a lot of things about myself in Azkaban," he said. "I thought about James a lot, as well. I realized that part of the reason we were such good friends was because we both shared a tendency for getting into trouble. We also had common enemies to defeat..."

"I do see what you're getting at," Draco admitted. "But I'm not like Harry. I should know. When the Polyjuice spell was working… It was like someone switched a light on inside my head and I could see into every part of my mind, knew why I was doing things, knew what I wanted, knew what the right thing to do was, and wanted to do it. And now..." He snapped his fingers. "It's gone."

"What you're saying," said Sirius, "is that when you had Harry in you, you could be good without trying. Now you'll just have to try harder. Like me."

"There's still no point in my going back with you," Draco said. "They hate me now."

"If you want to know what Harry and Hermione are thinking, you'll have to ask them," said Sirius.

"Why are you being so nice to me?" asked Draco.

"I told you, you remind me of myself. And besides, I think Harry needs you. He needs you a lot more than you think. Now come on." He reached down a hand, and Draco took it. Sirius helped him to his feet. "I should tell you, the Weasleys are here," he said.

"Okay, I know they hate me," said Draco.

"No, they don't," Sirius began, and stopped. "Okay, they do. We're going to have to work on that one."

Harry and the Weasleys crowded around the car, which was parked near the edge of the chasm. George claimed the car was making a funny grinding noise, and he and Fred were messing about under the hood, trying to figure out what it was. The Weasleys had brought food with them, so Harry was stuffing a jam sandwich into his mouth, in between swigs of pumpkin juice.

Hermione, after saying she was exhausted, had retired with her sandwich and juice to the edge of the clearing, and was lying down in the grass some distance away.

"Hey, look," said Fred, pointing. "Sirius is coming back. And he's got Malfoy with him."

"I was wrong," said Harry. "I was about to say things couldn't get any worse."

He straightened up reluctantly. Sirius and Draco walked towards them, Sirius in human form and Draco looking like a beat-up, tired ferret.

The Weasleys jumped out of the car as Draco and Sirius approached. Harry followed more slowly.

Up close, Draco looked different and less ferret-like. Harry wasn't sure how, exactly. He just did.

Ron, Fred, and George all had their arms crossed over their chests. They were looking at Draco as if he were a bomb that was about to go off. "Malfoy," said Ron, nodding guardedly.

"Weasley," said Draco. "Weasleys," he added, glancing at George and Fred. He turned to Harry and stuck out his hand.

Harry stared. Draco continued standing there with his hand out. Over Draco's head, Harry could see Sirius glaring at him.

He put his own hand out, took Draco's, and shook it. "You're welcome," he said.

They dropped each other's hands quickly. Draco turned to the Weasleys. "Look," he said. "I know you don't like me. A lot of people don't like me."

"I completely believe that," said Ron.

"And I..." Draco frowned. "Weasley, you broke my train of thought."

"You were just telling us how nobody likes you," offered Fred.

"I didn't say nobody," snapped Draco. He looked at Sirius.

"Better quit while you're ahead," Sirius advised.

George snapped his fingers, remembering something. "Sirius," he said. "Could you come here and look at the car for a second? It's been making a funny grinding noise… and I thought, since you have that flying motorcycle..."

"Sure," said Sirius. He followed the Weasleys to the car.

After just a few minutes of tinkering, Harry, Hermione, Sirius and the Weasleys were all sitting in the car, ready to go.

Draco got in and sat next to Harry, who didn't turn around. "Out of room?" said George cheerfully. "Ron, you and Malfoy will just have to sit on someone's lap."

"Couldn't you have made this space bigger with magic?" Ron whined to George as they backed up.

"And your point is?" he said airily, and revved the car. It shot forward and upward with a loud bang, and George shouted in glee. Harry complained loudly in Ron's ear that he was squashing his leg and to be careful of the sword, and over all the noise, made a sound very much like a yell of pain.

Then Harry rose out of his seat. In fact, he wasn't rising so much as it looked like he was being lifted by invisible hands—hauled up by the collar of his shirt and dragged backwards, out of his seat. He had his hands at his throat, trying to keep his shirt from cutting off his air supply.

"George!" screamed Hermione. "Stop the car!"

They were ten feet off the ground now. George turned around, saw Harry, his eyes grew wide, and he slammed on the brakes. The effect of this was that Harry sailed into the air, hurtled over the back of the car and fell twenty feet to the ground.

George slammed the gas on again, whipped the car around in a circle, and propelled it back toward the ground. They landed with a bone-jarring thud and piled out the doors.

Harry was kneeling on the ground, hands behind his back.

Lucius Malfoy was standing a few yards away from Harry. He was holding his wand in an outstretched hand, pointed directly at Harry's heart.

"All of you," he said, not looking at them. "Stay where you are."

"How did he find us?" Hermione hissed at Sirius. He had caught up to them even before Voldemort.

"Epicyclical Charm," Sirius whispered back. "Acts as a homing device. Plus, a Malfoy could probably escape from the Manor before the others."

Lucius stepped closer to Harry, keeping his wand trained on him. "Harry Potter," he said. His hair was standing wildly out all over his head and his robes, where they weren't slashed, were smeared with blood and mud. The cut Harry had put on his face was shaped like a sideways grin. "You have caused me a great deal of trouble." He lifted his head, to the others where they stood by the car, open-mouthed. His eyes lingered on Draco. "All of you have caused me a great deal of trouble."

"Leave him alone, Lucius," growled Sirius.

"Why should I?" said Lucius. He had put some sort of Binding Hex on Harry's hands; the ropes twisted around his wrists.

"Because you can't kill all of us," said Sirius cooly. "And if you touch Harry—"

"I am a Malfoy! In my veins runs the blood of Salazar Slytherin!"

"It does not," said Harry. "Dumbledore told me there were no descendants of Slytherin left alive besides Voldemort!"

Lucius snapped his head back toward Harry. "It is beyond my comprehension how all of our efforts to kill one stupid little boy have come to nothing," he said. "But no more. My master wished to have the pleasure of killing you, but as he's being too slow, he will have to content himself with the pleasure of being presented with your dead body."

He pointed his wand at Harry. "Avada—"

Draco darted forward, placing himself between Lucius' wand and Harry. He faced his father, panting.

Lucius frowned. "Get out of the way, Draco," he said.

"No," said Draco. "If you want to kill Harry, you'll have to kill me first."

Lucius shook. "Don't be a fool," he said.

Behind Draco, Harry struggled to his feet.

"I know you would have let the Dark Lord kill me," said Draco. "But I don't know if you can do it yourself."

"I assure you I can," said Lucius. "And I will. Move out of the way."

"Kill him and you lose Narcissa, too," said Sirius. "Your whole family."

"Shut up, Black." Lucius' hand went to his throat and closed over the pendant. He lifted it over his head.

"You are my son and my only heir," said Lucius to Draco. "For the last time, will you move out of the way?"

Draco shook his head.

"Oh well," said Lucius. "I can marry again. I can have more children." He tightened his hand on the pendant in his fist, digging his nails in.

Draco yelled and crashed to the earth like a tree that was cut down. As he fell, he collided with Harry, who was knocked to the ground with Draco on top of him, blue in the face, but still breathing.

Lucius released his tight hold on the pendant, and Hermione saw it glimmer in his fist—dented, but not broken.

Lucius strode across the grass towards Harry and Draco. Hermione, Ron, Fred and George all had gone for their wands, and had them pointed at Lucius.

Something silver flashed in Harry's right hand. It was the sword. He slashed, and cut Lucius' wand in half. Harry jumped to his feet as Lucius yelled and fell back, the fingers of his right hand pouring blood, his other hand still gripping the Epicyclical charm.

Harry turned his head towards Hermione and she knew immediately what he wanted her to do.

"Hermione!" he shouted. "Now!"

Hermione pointed her wand. "Accio!" she cried, and the Epicyclical pendant shot out of Lucius' left hand and flew through the air towards her. She caught it carefully and turned to the Weasleys, who had their wands trained on Lucius.

"Stupefy!" shouted Ron, Fred and George.

White light shot from their wands and struck Lucius head-on. Hermione had seen what the combined force of several Stunning spells could do before, but it was no less impressive this time. Lucius was blasted sideways and flew through the air, fetching up against the trunk of a tree, where he lay still.

Harry dropped to his knees next to Draco, still holding the sword. Hermione and Sirius ran to join him, while the Weasleys hurried to see if Lucius was conscious.

Draco was still bluish, but his breathing seemed to be regular.

"I think he fainted from the pain," said Sirius.

Draco stirred, and his eyes opened. "I did not," he said. "I don't faint." He looked at Hermione. "My father?"

"He's alive," she said quickly. "We Stunned him."

"That's good." There were black shadows under his eyes. Draco looked at Harry. "How did you get those ropes off?" he asked.

Harry lifted the sword. "Sliced them off on the edge of this," he said. His wrists were cut and bleeding a little. "And you know what else?" he added, and turned the sword over. "I think your dad might have been right about you all being related to Slytherin." He turned the blade so the others could see the words inscribed on the handle, just above the green gems: Salazar Slytherin.

"Good Summoning Charm, Hermione," said Harry. "Thanks."

She nodded at him.

At that moment, Ron, Fred and George came up. Ron was walking ahead, Fred and George were dragging Lucius between them.

Sirius glanced up at them. "Put him in the back of the car," he said.

Although Sirius had doubtless meant them to put Lucius in the back seat, the Weasleys commenced stuffing him into the boot instead. Sirius watched, shrugged, and turned back to Draco.

"And when we get back to school," said Draco, turning to Sirius, "you're going to tell me what was with that pendant thing?"

"Sure," said Sirius, anxiously.

"And Potter, you're going to give me that sword back? Cause it isn't yours, you know. It's been in my family for years."

"Malfoy," said Harry, "you never even noticed it until today, did you?"

"Maybe, maybe not," said Draco. "But the sword of Salazar Slytherin belongs to me."

Chapter Ten: Magids and Mirrors

"Whatever you say, Malfoy," said Harry, and laid Salazar Slytherin's sword in the crook of Draco's arm.

Draco closed his hand around it.

The others exchanged worried looks. Sirius got up and walked over to the flying car. The Weasley brothers had just finished stuffing the unconscious Lucius Malfoy headfirst into the boot, and were looking at each other in a satisfied manner.

"Sirius," said Ron as he approached. "We put Lucius in the back, like you said."

"Thanks," said Sirius. "But he isn't the Malfoy I'm concerned about at the moment."

Fred shook his head. "I never thought I'd feel sorry for Draco Malfoy," he said. "But I kind of do now. Mind, I still don't like him. But his own father trying to kill him like that..." Fred shuddered. "Makes me feel lucky by comparison."

"You are lucky," said Sirius.

Ron bit his lower lip. "Was Lucius really trying to kill him?" he asked.

"Oh, yes," said Sirius. "Nearly succeeded, too. And might still, if we don't get Draco back to Hogwarts soon. He's dying."

George dropped the car keys. "Dying?" he echoed.

"Get the car ready," said Sirius, and walked back to Draco. He knelt beside him and said, "Can you walk?"

Draco answered with a faint look of surprise, "Actually. No."

"Never mind." Sirius bent down, and picked Draco up. As he lifted him, the sword fell out of Draco's grasp and thudded to the ground.

Harry picked it up and held it out to Sirius, who reached out his free hand and took it by the hilt.

He dropped it again, immediately, as if he had been burned.

When Sirius spoke again, it was in an oddly constrained voice. "Harry. You take the sword."

"Okay," said Harry, surprised.

"And don't let anyone else touch it," said Sirius, walking with Draco to the car.

As Hermione followed Harry back to the car, she glanced at the Epicyclical Charm in her hand. It was nastily beautiful—white gold outlining a pendant of glass, inside which was a single one of Draco's baby teeth. She could see where Lucius' nails had dented the soft, pure gold, where his hand had bent the glass until it curved like the lens of a telescope.

Sirius put Draco in the back of the car, where he slumped against the window. Sirius and Hermione got in next to him. Harry was sitting up front, with the Weasleys.

They sailed over the inky black Pit under a brightening night sky.

Hermione fiddled with her hair as she had a thought. Wherever the Charm was it would always be a danger to Draco, vulnerable to damage and breakage. However, if flung into the Pit of Infinity, it would fall forever, untouched by any force other than wind.

Hermione turned to the back of the car, gripping the charm. She pulled her arm back and reached to open the window. Before anyone could ask what she was doing, she had pitched the Charm into the night.

The sky had lightened to slate blue by the time they landed on the Hogwarts grounds, and Draco was now unconscious and could not be shaken awake. As soon as they touched down, Sirius jumped out of the car. "I'm going for Dumbledore," he said, dropped to all fours in his canine form, and bolted for the castle.

Nobody could think of anything to say. The Weasleys went to make sure Lucius was still unconscious in the trunk. Hermione and Harry sat, making sure Draco was breathing.

Soon Sirius was back, with Dumbledore and Madam Pomfrey, and everything was a blur. Madam Pomfrey ordered them all away from Draco, magicked up a stretcher, lifted him onto it, and they hurried away without a backward glance. They all watched her go with various degrees of misgiving.

"Professor," said Hermione, "Did she say whether he was going to be all right?"

Dumbledore shook his head. "As to that," he said heavily, "I cannot, at the moment, say." He turned to the Weasleys. "I know you must be tired, boys," he said, and added, with a slight twinkle, "And I know your father must want his car back. But I would like to ask you if you would do one more favor for us."

They nodded in agreement.

"We need you to take Lucius to the Department of Magical Law Enforcement and turn him over to the Aurors there," said Dumbledore. "I have spoken to them, and they will be expecting you." He said to Sirius. "Give them the details. I need to go to the hospital wing and see if I can be of assistance to Madam Pomfrey. Harry and Hermione… Come with me, please."

"There is one more thing, Professor," said Sirius quickly. "The sword I told you about—Harry has it."

Dumbledore put a hand on Harry's shoulder. "May I see it?"

Harry handed it to him, and Dumbledore examined it. "I see," he said, after a long pause, and then handed it back to Harry. "Don't let anyone else touch this," he said, just as Sirius had. He turned and headed back towards the castle, and Harry and Hermione hurried after him.

"How is he?" asked Dumbledore when they arrived in the Hospital Wing, staring at the pale boy in the bed. Harry and Hermione, on either side of him, looked on with unhappy expressions.

"He'll live," said Madam Pomfrey. "I gave him several Strengthening Draughts and an Energy Potion. There's no lasting damage, and he may well wake up soon."

"I want to be notified the moment he is awake," said Dumbledore.

The door to the ward opened, and Sirius came in. "They've gone," he said to Dumbledore.

Madam Pomfrey was frowning. "This is a hospital wing, not a train station," she told them. "This boy needs to rest."

"You're right, Poppy," said Dumbledore. "Harry, come back to my office with me, I'd like to talk to you. Sirius and Miss Granger, you may remain here."

"Sirius..." said Hermione when they'd left.

"Yes?"

"Why won't you let anyone but Harry touch that sword?" she asked.

In answer, Sirius held up his hand and she saw what looked like an angry red burn across his palm. "That's why," he said. "If I'd held it any longer it would have charred away my hand."

"But Draco touched it, and he's all right," she said.

"Yes he is," said Sirius, turning to look at Draco again. "Which opens up all sorts of interesting possibilities."

"Harry," said Dumbledore, after a long pause.

"Yes, Professor?"

Harry had just finished telling Dumbledore his version of the past week's events. They were sitting in the Headmaster's office, a beautiful circular room of which Harry was very fond. This was lucky, since he seemed to end up there quite a lot.

Dumbledore was obviously thinking much the same thing. "I had been hoping this would be the term that did not end with you sitting in my office looking as if you had just survived a goblin rebellion. Alas, this appears to have been too much to hope for," he said. "As for Lord Voldemort—" Dumbledore sighed. "We have no idea where he may be."

"I'm really sorry about all this, Professor," said Harry.

Dumbledore smiled. "Come, Harry," he said. "You must know that I don't blame you any more than I blamed you for having your name put in the Goblet of Fire."

"Yeah," said Harry, listlessly. "So tell me whatever it is you wanted to tell me."

"I plan to," said Dumbledore. "But I am waiting for young Malfoy to wake up first, as it concerns him as well," he added.

Harry stared. "What's it got to do with Malfoy?"

Dumbledore was peering at him consideringly. "You don't like him, do you?"

"Not much," said Harry, gazing at the floor.

"And yet you offered your own life for his, by your account and Sirius'," said Dumbledore. "And he offered his for you. Why is that?"

"I–don't know," said Harry, startled. "Professor—"

"Yes?"

"Lucius Malfoy said his family was descended from Slytherin. And this sword, here, was his. But you told me there were no descendents of Slytherin left besides Voldemort."

"I was wrong," said Dumbledore cheerfully. "It happens. Salazar Slytherin lived many hundreds of years ago. Certainly there are some descendants of his still living. None with a really significant concentration of Slytherin blood, though. Or so I thought. It's rather like you, having Gryffindor blood—"

Harry upset the ink-bottle he had been toying with. "I've got Gryffindor blood?"

"Oh, dear," said Dumbledore more cheerfully. "That was meant to be a secret."

"Well, no wonder Malfoy and I don't like each other, then," said Harry. "Gryffindor and Slytherin, they didn't like each other, either."

"You and Malfoy put me in mind of two other boys I knew once," said Dumbledore. "I had them in my office more times than I could count. How they detested each other! And yet. By the end of their acquaintance, they would have died for each other. That I know."

Harry gave Dumbledore a questioning look.

"James Potter and Sirius Black," he said.

Harry was about to protest, when the door opened and Sirius stuck his head in. "Professor," he said. "Draco Malfoy's awake. I think you should see him."

"It's too bad Dad couldn't be here," said George Weasley, using his wand to direct an unconscious Lucius Malfoy's progress up the stairs of the Magical Law Enforcement building. (Ron had been left at the curb with the unenviable task of preventing passers-by from bumping into the invisible car.) "He's always wanted to see the Malfoys get it in the neck."

"Quit bashing Lucius into the pillars, George," said Fred.

"Sorry," said George unrepentantly. "My wand hand's a little shaky."

A small crowd of Law Enforcement Wizards was waiting for them inside the building. Among them was Mad-Eye Moody, standing next to a tall witch whose hood was pulled down. He winked at them with his magical eye as they came in.

George took his wand off Lucius, who fell to the ground in the center of the circle of wizards and lay there, snoring slightly. "Here you go," he said merrily. "Lucius Malfoy. He's all yours, gentlemen."

The wizards goggled at him.

Mad-Eye Moody took the lead, "Dumbledore said you caught Malfoy with an illegal Epicyclical Charm," he growled. "Is that true?"

Fred and George began talking at once.

"He kidnapped Sirius Black—"

"Used the Cruciatus Curse on Hermione Granger–she's a Hogwarts student—"

"Loads of Black Arts stuff in his house—"

"Tried to kill his own son with that Epicyclical thing–we saw him—"

"He's a criminal!" said George in conclusion. "Toss him in the clink." He looked beatific for a moment. "I've always wanted to say that."

"Witnesses?" asked one of the wizards, sounding irritable.

"What?" asked Fred, jumping.

"Witnesses," rumbled Mad-Eye Moody. "It's not that we don't know Lucius Malfoy is a bad lot. We've known that for years. But there's never been anyone who'd testify against him."

Fred and George looked at each other. "Well," said George. "Us. We're witnesses."

The wizards looked dubious. "And Sirius Black," added George.

The wizards still looked dubious. Although Sirius had been cleared the year before of the murder charge against him (aided by Dumbledore and the fact that it had become evident that Peter Pettigrew was still alive and a cohort of Voldemort's) he was still far from being considered an upstanding member of the magical community.

"And Harry Potter," said Fred desperately.

There was some muttering at this. Most of the magical world considered Harry a hero, but there were plenty who distrusted his still-mysterious history and powers. George caught the words "Parselmouth" and "Always full of some mad story, isn't he?"

Fred and George looked at each other again with dawning anxiety.

"I'll testify," said a voice.

Everyone turned to see who had spoken. It was the slender witch standing next to Mad-Eye Moody, who until now had been silent. The witch raised her hands and pushed her hood back.

It was Narcissa.

Mad-Eye grinned. He had obviously been expecting this. Fred and George, however, were floored.

"I'll testify," she said again. "I am Narcissa Malfoy. Lucius Malfoy was my husband. I can confirm that he is indeed guilty of all the charges laid at his door. In addition, I will open Malfoy Manor to the Department of Magical Law Enforcement and allow your Aurors free rein over all its passages. There should be enough Dark Magic material there to keep them busy for a year. I will also," she went on, now speaking directly to Mad-Eye Moody, who was looking as if Christmas had come early, "give you all of Lucius's papers. There is much in there regarding Lord Voldemort and my husband's plans. It should make for interesting reading."

"But–but why?" stuttered one of the wizards.

"Because I want something from you in return," Narcissa replied.

"Oh?" said Mad-Eye Moody, looking as if he already knew. "And what is that?"

"I don't want Lucius sent to Azkaban," said Narcissa.

George and Fred were horrified.

"Why not?" cried Fred.

"You can't mean they should let him go?" protested George.

Narcissa looked at the figure of her husband for a long moment. "I do not ask for myself," she said. "I would be happy to see him in Azkaban for life. But we have a child. Draco. My son." She spoke to Moody. "I don't want him thinking about his father in Azkaban. Thinking of him suffering, going mad." She turned to the rest of the wizards. "I ask that you send him to St. Mungo's Hospital for Magical Maladies instead. To the section for the criminally insane."

"I think we can agree on that," said Mad-Eye quickly.

There was a long silence. Then the other wizards nodded agreement.

"Is it really horrible there?" asked George hopefully.

Mad-Eye laughed, but the other wizards were busy talking amongst themselves and ignored the Weasleys. One of the wizards magicked up a stretcher and levitated Lucius onto it. Several of the other wizards broke off from the group to escort Lucius away, presumably to a holding cell.

The rest of the wizards seemed interested only in talking to Narcissa, but she stepped away from them and walked over to Fred and George.

"I wanted to thank you," she said. "Dumbledore sent Mad-Eye to me and he told me what happened. I wanted to thank you for everything you did for Draco."

"Would you do me a favor?" she went on, and held out an envelope to them. "I wrote Draco a letter, since I can't be with him right now. Will you give it to him?"

"Sure. Of course," said George, taking the letter.

"Thank you," she said.

Harry, Dumbledore, Hermione and Sirius walked into the Hospital Wing.

"Feeling better, Mr Malfoy?" Dumbledore said, eyes glinting merrily. He took a seat next to Draco, and Harry and Sirius sat down opposite him. Harry was holding Salazar Slytherin's sword across his lap. It looked incongruous in the hospital room.

"Harry," said Dumbledore. "And Draco." Dumbledore looked from one to the other over the rim of his gold spectacles. "Do either of you," he said, "know what a Magid is?"

Harry and Draco stared at him blankly.

Dumbledore turned to Hermione, who had the expression she usually got in class when she knew the answer to a question and nobody else did. "Miss Granger?"

"Well, Professor Binns told me that a Magid is a rare kind of wizard, born with special talents," said Hermione promptly. "Salazar Slytherin was one. So was Rowena Ravenclaw. You are, Professor. And—" She hesitated. "The Dark Lord is one."

"A Magid is indeed a rare kind of wizard or witch," Dumbledore agreed. "Rare and very powerful. A Magid can perform magic without the use of a wand, can resist many curses and hexes, and can survive spells that would easily kill any other wizard." He turned to Harry. "Do you remember, Harry, when you asked me why Voldemort wanted to kill you when you were a baby?"

Harry nodded. "You said I couldn't know then, but you would tell me eventually."

"I'm telling you now," said Dumbledore. "You are a Magid, Harry."

Both Draco and Hermione whipped around. Sirius didn't look surprised at all—it was obvious he had already known.

"I am?" asked Harry.

"Yes, you are," said Dumbledore. "You are a very powerful Magid indeed."

"Oh, typical," said Draco. "Now Potter's a Magid, on top of everything else?"

Dumbledore turned to Draco, who blanched for a moment, thinking the Headmaster was about to tell him off. Instead, Dumbledore said, "You are a Magid as well, Mr Malfoy. And, if I am not mistaken, just as powerful as Harry."

Draco turned even paler than Harry had. "Are you sure?" he asked.

"I wasn't," said Dumbledore. "I have always known it about you," he said, turning back to Harry. "We knew it when you were born. It was why Voldemort wanted to kill you, why your parents had to go into hiding with you. He did not want a Magid child born to two of his greatest enemies, two of my greatest supporters. He knew that when you become old enough, you would become a weapon with which we could strike at him."

"What about me?" interrupted Draco. "Why didn't he try to kill me?"

"Why should he?" said Dumbledore reasonably. "You are the child of his closest supporter. Think what a weapon you could have been in his arsenal! You could have been the greatest Death Eater of them all." Dumbledore shook his head. "Your father kept it very quiet, Draco. Parents with Magid children are supposed to register them with the Ministry at birth; he never registered you. I doubt anyone knew about you besides Lucius and Voldemort himself. Various tools of divination that I myself employ indicated to me that there was another Magid at Hogwarts, but I never knew who it was."

Draco was quiet, remembering something his father had said to him that morning: "The Dark Lord had such high hopes for you, Draco."

"How do you know?" he asked Dumbledore. "How do you know I am one?"

"That sword, for instance," said Dumbledore, pointing at it where it lay across Draco's lap. "That is a very powerful magical object, Draco. Only a Magid could touch that sword. Then there is the fact that Lucius made an Epicyclical Charm from your teeth when you were a baby. He used it to control you and your mother, that's true, but it also allowed him to draw on some of your Magid powers. It made him a much stronger wizard than he would have been otherwise."

Hermione said, "Professor Dumbledore?"

"Yes?"

"Is the reason the Polyjuice Potion affected Harry and Draco in the way it did … is that because they're Magids?"

"A good guess, Miss Granger. In some ways, an accurate guess. The Polyjuice spell lasted the way it did, in fact, because Mr. Malfoy caused it to."

"Lucius did what?" said Harry blankly.

"He means me, idiot," said Draco. "And I did nothing of the sort!" he added, glaring at Dumbledore.

"Oh, yes you did," said Dumbledore, eyes gleaming. "If I might be so bold as to make the statement that you and Harry have always had, shall we say, a rivalry of sorts..."

"I'm not jealous of him, if that's what you mean," interrupted Draco. Harry rolled his eyes.

"Indeed," said Dumbledore. "Well, I posit this theory. When you took the Polyjuice Potion, Mr. Malfoy, and it turned you into Harry, you immediately saw the advantage in the situation to yourself. To be Harry. To live his life. See as he saw. Learn his secrets. Your father has taught you to find weakness and exploit it as a matter of course, has he not?"

Draco looked ashen. "I..."

"Professor," protested Sirius.

Dumbledore ignored them both. "He has taught you other such things," he went on in the same measured tone. "To see evil when good is offered, to slight those beneath you and fawn on those above you. To favor nothing over immediate personal gain."

"I never..." said Draco weakly. "Not on purpose..."

"I said he taught you," said Dumbledore. "I did not say you learned. I think there were other advantages to you in becoming Harry. You have always thought of Harry as someone to whom goodness comes easily. In Harry's skin, you could allow yourself to follow the natural, better inclinations which as yourself, you stifled. You could be good. Brave. Heroic." He met Draco's eyes, staring very hard, over the top of his spectacles. "I am not saying that you consciously affected the Polyjuice spell," he went on. "I am saying that you willed it to continue, no ordinary wizard could have done that. You made the charm last as long as it did. You used your own magic as a Magid, to keep the spell from expiring. And, as I understand, it took another Magid to take the spell off you."

Draco's mouth was open.

"It is a trait that does not usually show itself until late adolescence. It can be random, or it can take various stimuli to activate it."

"Like what?" asked Harry.

"Danger works, too. In fact, in the old days, if a Magid child hadn't shown any sign of ability by the time they were eighteen or so, the Ministry would usually send them up against a dragon or some other such monster."

Harry squinted. "I've already faced a dragon, and I haven't shown any signs of being a Magid, Professor..."

"That's all right, Harry," said Dumbledore, smiling. "We'll give you another two years, then we'll feed you to a basilisk. I'll talk to the two of you at length about this later," he said. "I fear that if we overstay our welcome any longer, Madam Pomfrey will have strong words for me."

Harry laid the sword down on Draco's bed, where he could put his hand on it if he wanted to.

"Later, Malfoy," he said.

"Is there any chance, Professor," asked Harry, as they left the room, "that my Magid blood comes from Godric Gryffindor?"

"Oh, I doubt it, Harry. He wasn't a Magid. Not at all. Great warrior, of course. Very brave. Always shouting. That was how he terrified the enemy, you know, with his dreadful battle cries. But not a Magid, as far as we know."

"One more thing, Professor," said Harry. "I understand Draco and I can both touch the Sword of Slytherin because we're Magids. But at Malfoy Manor it did something else. It… It kind of appeared for me at a certain moment, similar to what happened with the sword of Gryffindor in the Chamber of Secrets. I'm not a Slytherin or related to Salazar Slytherin, so why…?"

Dumbledore let out a long sigh. "I'm afraid I do not have a straight answer to that, Harry," he said. "It could have been the effects of the Polyjuice potion still in your blood. The sword could have appeared for you because you had ties to Draco, its real master. Or…" Dumbledore looked distant now.

"Yes?" pushed Harry.

"Alas, that is only guesswork. It's possible some kind of magic is at play that we have yet to understand."

Sirius and Dumbledore headed back to his office to talk, and Hermione and Harry, both of whom were exhausted, walked slowly back to Gryffindor Tower.

As soon as the others had gone, Madam Pomfrey set to work healing the last of Draco's cuts and bruises. Half-asleep, eyes shut, he could feel light touches on his face, his neck and shoulders, as she healed the grazes and gashes there, the black eye and cut lip the Death Eaters had given him. She moved down to his sprained wrist and fixed that, too. Then she reached for his cut-open hand.

"No," said Draco, pulling it back. "Leave it alone."

"Don't be ridiculous," she said. "That's quite a deep cut, you'll have a scar there."

"I said leave it alone," said Draco, giving her what he hoped was a threatening look.

"You want the scar?" she asked in disbelief.

He brought his hand up to his chest and curled it into a fist. "Just leave it," he said again.

"Fine," said Madam Pomfrey, shaking her head. As she moved on to the scratches and cuts on his legs and feet, Draco brought his hand up to his face and squinted at it. Harry had cut a deep and jagged line across his palm, slashing side-to-side. It was hard to say in the dim light, but if he squinted at it, it looked a little like a bolt of lightning.

The End

Lessons Learned from Editing this Story

It truly takes talent to ruin a world as good as J. K. Rowling's. Cassandra Clare reaches her highest points the deeper she immerses herself in Rowling's world and the closer she parrots Rowling's voice, if not when she blatantly plagiarizes. Any trace of her unique voice or reliance on her own imagination is detrimental indeed. Scrubbing the tale clean of any trace of her perverted, melodramatic hand goes to show quality source material can pull up even the biggest idiot by her bootstraps. Never underestimate the value of creating a good world and characters. Anything worthwhile in the story is a testament to J. K. Rowling's sheer brilliance.

Questions I would like to ask anyone if they ever actually reads both versions:

Was this version better or worse?

Did it seem like anything was missing?

Were the decent parts worth it?

Was there anything else I should have changed?

Could you tell what was missing? (which characters had formerly been in love, etc).

Any other feedback or insight is welcome.