Stars in the Moonlit Sky

Fate slew him, but he did not drop;

  She felled—but he did not fall—

Impaled him on her fiercest stakes—

He neutralized them all.

She stung him, sapped his firm advance,

  But when her worst was done,

And he, unmoved, regarded her,

  Acknowledged him a man.

            Draco carried a limp Harry with his invisibility cloak draped over his arms as he headed towards the school. The Gryffindor had passed out as soon as he had tried to stand up in order to walk and Draco had found the cloak on the ground.

            Before the Slytherin head boy could get far, a figure seemed to suddenly materialize in front of him in the shadows of a weeping willow that was near the lake shore. Draco had his wand pointed at the figure in an instant but two pale hands were raised in a showing of wanting to do no harm. The person then stepped out of the shadows of the tree and came forward and Draco instantly recognized the vampire from the night before with his brown hair tied back and his light brown eyes gazing at him.

            "Do not worry," the creature said softly. "I am not here to hurt him, only to help. He will need much of it in the coming week or so as he processes the information that has come to him through the turning ritual. I believe that you do know the truth about vampires from all books that you do read, do you not?"

            The blonde was shocked. "How do you know about my interest in vampires? You haven't been spying on me, have you?"

            "I have seen you reading by this very tree before. About a century ago, I had nothing to really do so I decided to go back to Hogwarts again as a student for the third time, concealing my age. This tree was a favorite spot of mine, although it was quite a bit younger then." The vampire answered back calmly. "You always read books of vampires that I am thinking aren't in the Hogwarts School library. Although, I must warn you, if you think of becoming an Eradicator, or Slayer as the present term goes, I will kill you. If you harm the person in your arms, I will torture you very painfully before killing you."

            "I can assure you that I've never planned to kill vampires!" Draco stated indignantly. "I think that the entire race is fascinating and mysterious. It's the fact that no one knows much more than nothing about your race. I bet that almost all of the school does believe the whole idea about vampires being evil and unable to walk in sunlight."

            The vampire just gazed evenly at him. "Of course they do. Humans, Muggle or magic, I find, have always believed themselves to be the superior race and have done anything possible to make sure of that. If they should here of a superior race they either set out to destroy it or just ignore it. What gives a human that right? What gives you the right to capture a pure, innocent, and powerful unicorn and place it into a zoo? How can your people justify the killing of hundreds of vampires? We have not always been a solitary type of people. Vampires used to travel in large groups and larger clans but then wizards would come through killing every last one of them. And that Voldemort came to the vampires saying that if we joined him he would let us live unharmed—but to join was to become a slave! Remember this fact right now, a vampire, whether fed a potion or put under a spell, can only bow to those who deserve their respect or when they truly want to."

            Draco nodded. "Will you be coming up to the school? Today is a Saturday so Pott—Harry and I aren't expected to be in classes today or tomorrow. I may know a bit about vampires but you really are needed. Isn't it a vampire tradition that the sire tells the heir about your race?"

            "I must go somewhere for now. But I will come by tonight at the head boy dormitory where you live." The vampire said looking at the head boy badge on Draco's robe. "Be there by eight o'clock and I will explain what I can in the hours I can stay. Just make sure that you tell no one about his turning. Vampirism is impossible to find when it isn't the new moon and we don't need to have his secret told to anyone or even remotely hinted at. Make extra care that his red headed supposed friend does not find out."

            "Weasley Weasel-Brain?" the Slytherin asked, distastefully. He and Ron had worked on the same side during the war but they had never even attempted to actually get along. "Harry and that idiot have been attached to each other at the hip since their first year. Why would he not be kept in the loop of things?"

            "The Weasley has let envy, greed, and his supreme jealousy to take over his life. He resents the one in your arms for his fame and power. He strives to become a Slayer to try and prove his worth to the world. I have read it in his mind."

            "Always knew Weasley would never know a good thing or person when handed to him on a damn platinum platter." Draco whispered, looking down at Harry before turning to look at the vampire again. "What is your name?"

            "I go under many names but you may call me Gabriel as it was my first. Now go." The vampire then turned and Draco stared as he saw that the vampire was now about a hundred yards away from him and was walking into the Forbidden Forest.

            Draco shifted Harry in his arms to a more comfortable position before walking quickly towards the school to get to his dorms before the early risers saw him outside with an unconscious Harry Potter in his arms.

*

            Harry groaned as he woke up from the slumber that he had fallen into after coming back to the world of consciousness. He shifted around and tried to snuggle up into the warm blankets before realizing that he didn't know where he was. He still had a minor headache he assessed quickly as he sat up to look around but it was as bad as before when all those visions went through his mind.

            Green eyes blinked blearily for a moment before focusing on the room he was in. Yet again, Harry had to thank his lucky stars that he had had his vision corrected by a mixture of Muggle laser surgery and magic after his fifth year. Harry gasped however as he looked around. He was in a bedroom decorated in green and gold colors with a golden framed mirror directly in front of him. The bed he was on had gold sheets and a green comforter. The floor was wood with a green rug on top of it and all the furniture, including a bedside table, wardrobe, desk, chair, and a small bookcase was made out of mahogany. A large window looked over the Hogwarts grounds, including the lake and quidditch pitch.

            It wasn't the room however that had shocked him. It was the color. He could see so vividly that every single color in the room seemed more vibrant than anything else he had ever seen. But it surprised him was that the sight of all these new colors didn't seem to make his head ache, in fact, it made it lessen a bit.

            Then Harry heard a soft voice from the other side of one of the two doors in the room. One of the doors was slightly opened and Harry saw that it led to a spacious bathroom; the other was the one that the soft singing voice was coming from. Harry quickly walked to that door and opened it quietly.

            He saw Draco Malfoy sitting on a comfortable looking dark leather loveseat, reading a book, and singing to himself.

"A thousand years, a thousand more,
A thousand times a million doors to eternity
I may have lived a thousand lives, a thousand times
An endless turning stairway climbs
To a tower of souls
If it takes another thousand years, a thousand wars,
The towers rise to numberless floors in space
I could shed another million tears, a million breaths,
A million names but only one truth to face."

            "It's a very beautiful song." Harry whispered softly as he walked quietly towards Draco and sat down next to him on the small sofa.

            Draco turned quickly and sharply before relaxing when he saw Harry. "Oh, it's you," he said before he smiled slightly. "I was worried that you wouldn't wake up at all. It's almost five o'clock in the afternoon, you realize."

            "What?" Harry nearly shouted, jumping. "Everyone's going to be so worried. I mean, they do notice when I'm gone most of the time…"

            "Don't worry about them." Draco said softly. "We have to talk about what happened this morning. Harry, I know that you and I have had a rather—bad past together in our first years here. But please, remember as I tell you what I have to that I am telling the truth and that I am willing to put all of our bad blood into the past."

            Harry just raised an eyebrow. "Did you cast a spell on me that made me have visions of things that have happened to vampires in the last eight hundred years or so? Because I can tell you that it has been giving me a migraine. As well as the knowledge of thousands of different spells that I have never heard of before in my lifetime."

            Draco looked slightly nervous, an emotion that Harry rarely ever saw on the Slytherin's face. "No, I didn't cast a spell on you, no one has."

            "Then how can I see and hear things like I've had a magnifier placed on my senses?" Harry asked, looking thoroughly confused.     "I mean, I can see from here that you have these sapphire blue streaks around the pupils of your eyes."

            The Slytherin looked around for a while before sitting back on his half of the seat. "I guess it starts last night when we both had nightmares. Or at least, I had these nightmarish flashbacks and decided to go on a walk to my favorite spot by the lake. At that time I didn't know that you were out there as well."

            "I remember having a nightmare and deciding to go on a walk. I don't really know what possessed me to go outside though. I do remember being grabbed by someone much stronger than me even though I was wearing my invisibility cloak." Harry suddenly remembered that he didn't know where the cloak was. "Did you happen to find the cloak out there?"

            Draco nodded over to a chair at a study table on the other side of the room that had shelves upon shelves of books. "Your infamous cloak is at the table." He then noticed Harry gaping at the sheer number of books. "Oh, they aren't all mine. They've been collected through the years by former head boys."

            "I was about to say!" Harry said. "If those were all yours then you would have even more than Hermione, which in itself is something."

            Draco nodded, "We've gotten a bit off subject though. Do you much about vampires?"

            "Vampires?" Harry asked. "What do they have to do with anything?"

            "Quite a lot." Draco said. "But do you know much about them besides all the crap about garlic, wooden stakes, holy water, and sunlight?"

            "I don't really know that much about them. Everyone always talks about them like their whole goal in life is to drink as much human blood as possible. I've never really believed it though. During the war, I saw no vampires on Voldemort's side although everyone said that they would be going to join him instantly. I have never heard about victims with bite marks dying from any type of news. I personally don't really believe all the crap about them being all evil. I mean, werewolves are looked down upon as well and they aren't all that bad."

            "It's good to hear that opinion coming from someone besides myself," Draco said. "I've always had this fascination of vampires since I was a really little child. I thought that the idea of them having to drink someone else's life force to live was amazing. So since I was about seven, I've read everything I could about them. Vampires are extremely sophisticated creatures and much more smarter than humans and the credit that we give them."

            Harry nodded to show his understanding and agreement. "They are fascinating in their own way I guess, if the visions in my head are true, but what does any of this have to do with me?"

            Draco looked rather nervous. "Do you still trust your friends in everything that you do?"

            "Why does that matter to the situation?"

            "Trust me, Harry, it matters a whole damn lot to the whole situation and to the rest of your existence."

            Harry looked quizzically at Draco. "I still don't understand how this affects the situation that you are obviously reluctant to discuss." Draco just arched an eyebrow. "Well, if you must know. I'm not exactly qualified to be best friends, or even close friends, with Ron and Hermione anymore."

           "I've seen and been through too much that they don't even want to try to comprehend. I'm too dark for them, rather. They, and most of the rest of the school, want to only see the good side of things and ignore the rest rather than accept it. And also, they still can't seem to accept that some Slytherins are good… Even though they know that Severus and—you saved me."

            "That's true. I was really frightened when I found you… I thought that you weren't breathing."

            "I technically wasn't, not for awhile anyway. But what—"

            Draco interrupted him. "You were bitten by a vampire."

            Harry started sputtering and coughing before laughing. "I swear if I had been eating or drinking something I would have choked on it."

            "I wasn't joking, Harry."

Poem—Part One: Life, CXIV (114) by Emily Dickinson

Song—A Thousand Years by Sting