Recap: He held Harry's bandaged hands and let him know someone was there as Dumbledore hooked Harry up to a silver and red device Draco had seen only on muggle television (not that he would admit he'd ever watched that). Draco, with permission from Madam Pomfrey and Dumbledore, stayed with Harry for the rest of the night, as he seemed to have a calming effect on the bruised boy.

Chapter 14

Harry woke to a splitting headache. It was so strong, so bloody painful, that the first thing Harry did in the waking world, was throw up.

Now the interesting thing about vampire puking was that, since a vampire's stomach was basically empty except for blood, after about two rounds all a vampire is... expelling is bile and some stomach acid. I'm sure you can imagine how very painful that has to be.

Once Harry was capable of doing something other than vomiting, he curled up. He had no idea where he was; only that he hurt and the pain was not lessening. He curled tighter.

Then he felt a slight pressure on his shoulder. Since loosening didn't really increase or decrease the pain, he uncurled. He was now lying on his back. Something large was held in front of his face. His mouth was guided to it. He felt his canines touch it and lengthen, puncturing it.

What he felt then could only be described as ecstasy. All the pain in his body disappeared. All that existed was this wonderful taste, this wonderful feeling sweeping from his fangs through the rest of his body.

And then it ended. The pain came back.

He bent sideways and threw up again.

Then next time he became fully conscious, not just groggy like the second time they tried to feed him, he could tell he was lying in the hospital wing. He blinked a few times to try to clear his vision and then, realizing that his eyes weren't working properly, tried to sit up. A hand pressing lightly on his chest prevented him from completing the action.

"Don't. It was hard enough getting you to keep something down the first time. For our sake, Potter, don't do anything that might bring it all up again."

Harry shoved away the hand, realizing that it belonged to Malfoy.

"Where the hell am I, and why the hell are you here?" He rasped.

The pain had started to come back again so, against his better judgement, he obeyed Malfoy and laid his head back.

"In answer to your very rude question, Potter, you are in the Hospital wing."

Harry rolled his eyes.

"Now, Malfoy," his throat was very sore, he didn't know why, "please explain to me why I feel like I've been hit by a Semi."

Harry sensed, somehow, that Malfoy moved back and settled himself beside Harry's bed.

"In case you didn't notice, Potter, you were injured, that's why you're sore."

Harry made a derisive noise at the sound of the word "sore". That didn't quite cover it. Malfoy ignored the noise.

"What is the last thing you remember?"

"Why's it any of your business, Malfoy? Gonna run and tell daddy?"

He could feel Malfoy getting angry.

"Look, Potter, I understand that you're hurting, and the headmaster did assign me this job, but I will leave if you are just going to insult me."

Harry started to laugh at the thought that Malfoy was gonna run off and pout. Unfortunately, even when you're a vampire, if you have apparently crushed both your windpipe and chest after falling forty feet from an airborne broomstick, laughing is not the smartest thing to do.

Harry ended up in a coughing fit that brought up the little blood that had re-entered his system.

Draco was a little disappointed when Harry woke up as his usual insulting self, but he controlled it. Harry was in pain, as Draco had said, and that, coupled with the fact that Harry had saved Draco's life at the risk of his own, made Draco a little more forgiving.

He was rather startled when Harry broke into a coughing fit. Then he felt guilty because it was obviously something he'd said that had made Harry react this way.

When Harry bent sideways and started coughing and throwing up blood, Draco jumped to his feet. He was leaning over Harry in an instant with one hand holding up Harry's head and the other reaching for wet towels.

Once the spasms ceased, Draco leaned Harry back down and wiped his mouth. Reaching for a cool cloth, Draco proceeded to run the rag over Harry's entire sweat-soaked, blood-spattered, thoroughly bruised and cut up face, holding his short hair (Madam Pomfrey had cut it to keep it out of the way) back off of his forehead.

Harry looked up at him with still clouded eyes.

"Why are you helping me?" he half-moaned half-whispered.

Draco looked at him, really looked at him. He looked past the cuts, bruises and screwed up vision that were souvenirs only Harry had to endure. He looked past the stories and myths and lies that made up Harry's media face. He looked past, deep into the slightly clouded, emerald green eyes, and saw the skinny sixteen-year-old who never had a family and who the world expected to kill a Dark Lord. Harry didn't deserve the kind of life that was made for him.

"Because you, weather knowingly or not, saved my life. No," he said when Harry started to respond, "Don't say anything. I'll tell you what happened.

"We had a Quidditch match, you remember, Gryffindor verses Slytherin." Harry nodded. "Well, as most of the players headed to our end of the field, You and Weasley were circling your goalposts. Apparently, someone planted a series of bombs at that end of the field and, while you two were closest, they went off. Everyone was knocked to the ground except you. You brought your broom up and flew through the airborne debris. You then did something weird, you made Weasley glow blue. Things stopped hitting him. Slowly at first, but gaining speed, your blue light covered everyone there in a great wave of protection. No one else was injured after that, but some of us had been hurt before. You, according to Dumbledore, poured some of your life force into the spell and the few of us who were hurt badly started to heal. Weasley was one, I was another.

"You nearly killed yourself to heal me from a javelin-like piece of metal that pinned me, through the chest, to the stands."

Harry started to protest but Draco cut him off.

"Dumbledore said you might not remember, but, even so, I'm grateful. Thank you for doing it, even if you don't exactly remember what you did."

Harry still looked unsure, but there was really nothing Draco could do about it.

Harry was released two days later. He was excused from all classes until the following week and Malfoy was appointed as his keeper. Madam Pomfrey didn't trust him to rest and she was furious with Dumbledore, Snape and McGonagall. See, they had decided that, since the two seekers would be at the same level of health (Harry would have healed reasonably), the re-match was going to be held that upcoming Saturday.

I think Fate likes to laugh at us, often. Either that, or there are gods of irony up there moving us around however they like. How else do you explain the infuriatingly ironic events so common to our lives. You know, like when you search the whole house over for the keys and then, three hours later, find them hanging neatly on the wrack for the first time in history.

Well, Draco was certainly starting to believe in irony gods. They were just about the only way to explain why, the second Draco decided to ask for Harry's friendship, he was unable to speak.

It happened like this.

It was Thursday night, and Harry was sitting on the long couch, bored. To be precise, it was eleven-thirty-one and twenty-seven seconds and Harry was so bored he was rationally considering going up to Malfoy, sitting on the short couch reading, and asking for his ideas on entertainment. He thought D-Malfoy must be pretty bored as well. His eyes weren't moving and he hadn't turned the page in, Harry checked his watch, thirteen minutes and forty-seven, no, eight, seconds.

Harry suffered in silence for another three minutes and twelve seconds before he decided to approach Dra-Malfoy. It was eleven-thirty-six.

Harry started to stand at the same time Dra-Mal-,Ah Hell, Draco looked up and opened his mouth to speak. They stared for about half a second before Draco collapsed.

Harry stared for a moment before jumping to Draco's side.

"What the Hell? Malfoy are you alright?"

Draco had wrapped his arms around his middle and was trying his best not to scream. Rocking back and forth, all he could do was glare and yell.

"Do I look alright, Potter!!!"

Harry didn't miss a beat.

"How can I help? What's wrong?"

Draco gave up on keeping back the screams.

"I'M BEING BLOODY TORN APART!!!"

It was only then that Harry used his head. Draco had said that new shapes came about once a month. His first shape had come around the twentieth of July. Stands to reason that his next shape would have been about the same time in August and then again in September.

In case you haven't guessed yet, today was the twenty-third.

Harry, not knowing what to do, really, sat down next to Draco and held his hands as he writhed on the floor. Harry didn't know what he'd done during the match, but he tried to do something similar. He let his mind drift.

What would Draco's new shape be?

He was answered almost immediately. For a few moments, Draco had been relatively quiet, only moaning rather than screaming. Now however, he started to scream again. Harry watched in astonishment as Draco's back arched. His arms swiveled forward, tearing muscles as they went. Draco's shirt was torn, as were his pants when his legs moved and his.... tail appeared. The last thing to change was his face, so Harry got to see it horribly twisted in agony for quite awhile.

After the screams died, however, Draco was gone. In his place was a beautiful timber wolf in the shreds of Draco's clothes.

The wolf's feet were white as new fallen snow. As his gaze traveled up the legs, the fur took on a tan tint. Its back was mostly black and gray, meshing perfectly with the other colors. The lower half of the wolf's face was white, with the top of its nose tan and streaks of gray and black going up to cover it's head and ears.

It was breathtaking.

It's silver-gray eyes, Draco's eyes, looked up at him.

Harry couldn't speak.

As the wolf whimpered and tried to free itself from Draco's clothes, Harry got closer. Oddly enough, the wolf welcomed the help. Once the wolf was free, it sat there, staring at Harry. He carefully reached out to touch its beautiful fur.

After a few minutes of permitting Harry to pet it, it insisted on going out.

"But we can't, it's after hours."

The wolf whined at him, trotted in a quick, small circle, and whined again.

"Oh." Harry said. "Oh. Well, I guess if I take my invisibility cloak."

The wolf growled softly at him, clearly telling him to get a move on, now!

A few halls and secret passages later, the timber wolf was romping through the grass at the edge of the lake. As they drew closer to the forest, the moon came out from behind a cloud and the wolf let loose with a happy howl.

The next morning, Draco woke late (well duh). He woke to find himself naked, save for a sheet, on the floor next to the larger of the two couches. His head was being pillowed on something very comfortable that rose and fell every few seconds.

For a moment, he just lay there, enjoying the peace. Then the memories hit him and he turned his head and looked in horror at his pillow.

It was Harry Potter's chest.

Apparently, Harry was also on the floor. The difference was, he was still asleep and fully clothed.

Draco started to sit up, and realized that Harry's arms had snaked around his waist. He tried to turn and Harry turned with him, keeping them close.

With mounting terror Draco realized that he had to sneeze. He was going to sneeze and wake up Harry, who would realize he was holding a naked Draco Malfoy in his arms.

Harry woke to the sound of someone very close sneezing. He was quite warm, content and, for a moment, he thought he was still dreaming. Harry was still a virgin and he'd never really woken to anyone before, so he was just acting on instinct born of dreams and his vampire nature. That little place in the back of his mind that told him things like "there is a dark wizard behind you, spin and curse him" and "Krum is firing high, you should drop low" and most importantly "that second-year has a crush on you, avoid her at all costs", was telling him that he liked this position and should snuggle deeper into the embrace. Opening his eyes slightly, he buried his face in the crook of the neck of this thing in his arms.

He smiled into the delightfully soft platinum-blonde hair...

Wait a moment.

OH SHIT!!!

Harry jumped back with a squeak, dropping Draco on his head. Unfortunately for both of them, the sheet was tangled around Harry's legs so that, when Harry moved, he dragged it off of Draco. Draco would have been completely mortified were it not for the fact that, when Harry jumped backwards, he hit a chair and now boy, chair and sheet were so tangled you couldn't tell where one ended and the other began.

Draco took that moment to dash, completely naked you remember, for his bedroom.

Harry, in the meanwhile, was fighting tooth and nail with the chair and sheet. His vampire instincts had taken over and he found he really didn't like being unable to move freely. By the time Draco re-emerged, the chair was little more than toothpicks, the sheet little was more than lint, and Harry was one pissed off vampire.

His anger at the furniture turned to embarrassment when he caught sight of Draco.

They looked at each other for one awkward moment before the both opened their mouths and Draco beat Harry to speaking.

"Tell anyone, Potter, and I'll kill you."

Harry glared.

"I'm a vampire, Malfoy, I'd like to see you try. Anyway, I won't tell if you don't. Agreed?"

Draco glared for a moment.

"Agreed."

They stared for another moment before Harry spoke.

"I guess this makes us friends."

"What?"

"Well," Harry tried to explain. "We've both seriously helped each other out in times of pain and we are keeping some of each others larger secrets...."

Draco thought about this for a moment.

"Alight. Friends."

They shook on it.

"You know," Harry added as he headed into his room to change, "You could call me by my given name, if you like."

Draco smiled a real, genuine, smile.

"Alright, Harry, maybe I will."

He turned to go down to breakfast, but then looked back.

"Harry?"

Harry turned.

"Yes?"

Draco grinned.

"You can call me Draco, if you like."

Harry smiled too.

"Alright, Draco, maybe I will."

And with that, Harry and Draco started a friendship that would be put to the hardest tests known to muggle or Wizard kind.

A/N: I am such a screwed up person. You do realize, I hope, that, despite being a freshman in her first week at a college prep school, I am still writing fanfiction when I have about twelve geometry assignments that, mind you I haven't even started, are due tomorrow.

Shit but I'm in trouble.

-Leif

PS: Don't worry, you fans of friendship before love, the actual slash doesn't start for a good few chapters yet. Heck, Harry and Draco don't even know they're gay.