Chapter 6

Harry stared up at him and Draco stared right back. They both stayed like that for a few minutes simply staring at each other until Harry was interrupted by another round of violent coughing. Snapping out of his surprise Draco quickly moved the unresisting form onto his side and waited while he brought up more lake water until he was able to draw in shaky breaths. Now that he seemed to be breathing ok Draco got up and limped back down to the lake. Once there Draco knelt down, tore the bottom of his robes off and dipped the piece of black cloth into the water, then carried it back to where Harry lay now quiet. He bent down and roughly turned him over so he could get proper access to the wound on his face.

"Malfoy what?" Harry murmured shocked at the rough treatment.

"Shut up" Draco snapped starting to scrub the grit out of the wound roughly so it wouldn't get infected. Harry gasped from the pain and started to writhe weakly trying to get away.

"Stop moving or I'll sit on you." Draco growled out. To his satisfaction Harry heeded the warning and went still though, Draco noticed, he was biting down on his lip in still obvious pain. Unexpectedly Draco felt a small wave of pity and not really aware of what he was doing eased up the intensity to a more tolerable level. When he had wiped and cleaned the wound as best as he could he folded the material up and pressed it firmly against it to stop the blood flow. Harry simply stared at him the whole time seemingly surprised that he was even bothering to help him in the first place. Draco couldn't blame him he did not come across as the caring type.

After a few moments he lifted the cloth slightly to see that the blood flow had begun to slow considerably. Reaching down Draco grabbed Harry's hand and pressed it over the material.

"Keep pressure on it for a few more minutes." Draco instructed before getting up and heading back to the lake to wash some of Harry's blood that he had gotten on his hands off. He also noted that the blood from that dead animal he had previously been covered in had been washed off too. When he got back Harry had managed to push himself into a sitting position still keeping the cloth pressed onto the side of his face. Draco sighed and sank down near him absently rubbing at his still sore foot. They sat in silence for a couple of minutes Harry eventually peeling the bloody rag from his face. Gently probing the wound and satisfied that it was clotting well Harry now turned his attention to Draco who was still massaging at his foot.

"Are you ok?" Harry asked pointing at what seemed to be the source of Draco's discomfort.

"Fine" Draco answered curtly then added in a voice that suggested he didn't really care "are you?"

"Yeah feel a bit dizzy but otherwise ok." Harry looked around a bit looking confused. "Where's the dragon gone?"

"Flew away shortly after he knocked you out." Draco answered leaning back against a large rock wincing at the still burning pain shooting up his leg.

"Are you sure you're fine?" Harry asked again crawling the short gap between them "because you don't look it."

"I'm just bloody peachy." Draco snapped and then yelped when Harry poked him quite hard right in the spot where all the pain was radiating from. "What the hell is wrong with you!" Draco yelled pulling away from Harry's grip.

"I knew you weren't all right." Harry replied calmly "Let me look at it, it could be broken."

"It's not broken."

"You don't know that." Harry said "just let me look."

"Bloody persistent aren't you." Draco grumbled but gave up and let Harry look, he was too worn out to argue any further.

Harry gently checked the area being as careful as possible. Draco's shoe had a few puncture marks in it; blood was slowly oozing out from them. A couple of minutes later Harry stopped his inspection and sat back shaking his head slightly.

"I can't be sure." He started slowly "But I think the side of your foots been crushed a bit, there's a bit of blood on that side of your shoe and it doesn't feel real good."

"Great" Draco muttered.

"I wont take your shoe off though" continued Harry "because by the looks your ankle has swollen up, and I doubt we'd be able to get it back on if we did take it off." Harry suddenly looked thoughtful for a moment "Actually I'm surprised you managed to walk as much as you did today with your foot in that state."

"Yeah well I'm surprised your still even alive, you hit the water that hard." Draco answered still grimacing, now that he had a fair idea of how bad his foot was hurt it had begun to ache ten times as much.

Harry shrugged "Lucky I guess." Then paused looking at him "Hey Malfoy?"

"What?"

"Thanks for um... saving my life back there."

Draco stared shocked, he hadn't expected to be thanked, he shrugged himself then replied coldly "yeah well I shouldn't have."

Harry looked surprised "why not."

"For pushing me off the cliff." Draco said now glaring.

"Oh" Harry said smiling as he remembered the look on Draco's face when he pushed him.

"It's not funny." Draco snapped "Haven't you heard all those stories about people falling onto submerged logs and rocks, it was dangerous I could've been killed."

"Hence the reason I pushed you first." Harry said laughing.

"I should've let you drown." Draco muttered before flopping onto his back and staring up at the sky. The sun was beginning to make its descent the sky slowly changing hues from deep blue to a soft pink laced with a red tinge.

*Great* He thought *Another night stuck in this hellhole. *

"Hey Malfoy?"

"What?"

"Why did you save me?"

"Huh?" Draco turned to face him.

"I mean you don't like me, I would've thought you'd be happy to see me drown." Harry said looking as if he wasn't upset or offended at the thought.

"Just because I don't like you doesn't mean that I want to see you killed." Draco answered simply.

"Oh well thanks anyway." Harry said lying down next to him, Draco didn't complain at the closeness, though he knew that Harry probably expected him to. Usually he would've of but right now it bought a sense of security for them both and made them feel that little bit safer.

They both lay in silence, uncomfortable on the rough ground but far too exhausted to do anything about it. Draco was beginning to feel drowsy and soon found himself drifting off when.

"Malfoy?"

"What now?" Draco said getting annoyed.

"...I'm hungry."...