Edited 20th February 2014 to remove review responses and superfluous author's notes.

5. False Colours

That one brief encounter changed a lot. Not for Draco Malfoy; it merely intensified the resentment that he felt for Fletcher. But Daniel could not shake the thought of the ice prince sitting alone in a vale of depression. It was against the natural order of things for a Malfoy to feel, he knew. So what was going on? Had Draco been deceiving everyone from the moment he started his first year? There was certainly more there than met the eye.

Daniel was not going to change the way he treated Malfoy. That would have been pointless; the boy did not want or need his pity, and would only have become still more insufferable. But that night had irreversibly changed the way he felt. Try as he might, he couldn't hate Malfoy. Not now he knew that the evil one could cry; now that he had shown that he was human.

"He's hurting, Blaise," he had told his friend the next morning, as they both tried to make sense of what he'd seen.

"Leave him." Blaise was bitter. As a half-blood surrounded by Slytherin snobs, he had passed through self-hatred himself, and he had no pity whatsoever for Draco. "He won't want our help. Even if he doesneed a shoulder to cry on, he won't pick mine, or yours. We aren't worthy." He spat the last word out with uncharacteristic venom. "So he's not what we thought he was? Death Eater or not, he's still a bully. I don't see him changing any time soon."

Daniel stared at Blaise. He normally responded to almost everything in monosyllables. Malfoy's pain had struck a nerve with him; that much was plain. Daniel didn't press for reasons. He knew that if you were a good and sympathetic listener people would tell you everything themselves in the end.

Blaise sat silent for a few minutes, his coal black eyes gazing fixedly into the middle distance, not seeing anything. Pain was rising in his eyes. It was old pain that he had banished to the back of his mind long ago, something he had never thought to speak of to anyone. But Daniel was his friend. Blaise knew all about Daniel's own past, about what he had suffered because of insane prejudices. He could trust him.

"He made my life hell." Daniel looked up, startled. He had thought that Blaise was in a sort of trance. He had befriended the younger boy for the last year, but still knew very little about him. He knew that, before they had been friends, Blaise had been almost part of Malfoy's crowd. He didn't know why the half-blood was tolerated, but perhaps it was something to do with the sickeningly grateful expression that always lingered on his face when he made eye contact with any of them. Daniel had only had to look once to know his true feelings; that he hated each and every one of them.

"I'm not going to talk about it," Blaise continued. "Not here." He gestured round at the Great Hall, packed with breakfasting students. And he got up from his seat, oblivious to the fact that he had eaten practically nothing, and stalked out of the Hall. No one turned round to watch him; perhaps no one had noticed him leave. Certainly no one on the Slytherin table would care much about Blaise. He was not a very popular person.

Daniel took a last bite of his honeyed toast, then got up and followed his friend out. Nowthe heads turned; the Head Boy might not be exactly popular, but at least he wasn't a non-entity. He ignored all of them. People staring no longer bothered him. He was used to that by now. It really wasn't his fault that people felt drawn to him. The gift of charisma was sometimes more of a curse than a blessing.

He found Blaise leaning against the wall in the entrance hall, trying to steady his breathing, as if he had just been running. There was a look in his eyes that cut Daniel down to the bone; the look of a puppy that had been kicked one time too many. He had never seen his friend like this before. Perhaps all Slytherins wore some sort of mask to hide their emotions. Malfoy's had slipped last night, and now Blaise's was gone, and Daniel could see him as he was, right down to his poor beaten core.

"As bad as that, eh?" he said, sympathetically, watching and waiting for Blaise to be ready to speak. He knew the boy well enough to know that he wasn't given to exaggeration; and besides, no Slytherin spoke lightly of Hell.

"As bad as that," Blaise echoed, his voice thick with emotion. There was a long silence. Daniel didn't say anything, and at length, he continued, "He thought that it was all that the poor lonely half-blood could want; to be friends with him, to be accepted into the circle. You know me, Dan, I get… dangerous when I'm alone. I thought it would be good for me. It made him feel good. But it tore me up, being grateful to a piece of slimy scum who thought he could buy me with his worthless comradeship.

"If he'd pitied me, I would've despised him for it, but I'd have understood him; it would've proved that he was human. But it was all just a bit of fun for them, seeing what the freak in their midst would do next, wanting to make me cringe like a house elf for their amusement. I hated them for what they'd done to me, but I hated myself more for letting them. Once or twice…" he paused and took a deep breath, then went on, "once or twice, I caught myself playing with knife blades, looking for a way out, trying to escape the place where the purebloods hated and humiliated me."

Daniel gasped. He had a shrewd idea what Blaise meant by 'playing'. But he had never even imagined this. Blaise was very reserved, normally, and had never spoken like this before. He had known that his friend hated Malfoy, and now he knew why. No amount of tears from the silver-haired boy, fake or genuine, would convince Zabini that he was anything other than the purest evil.

"God, Blaise," Daniel murmured. "I never knew."

"No one ever knew." Blaise responded with his eyes focused dimly on the past. "No one ever cared. Malfoy wanted to break me. Insulting me never did it, so he thought he'd try cruelty by kindness. Fiendishly clever, isn't he? And now you want me to feel sorry for him. I'm sorry, Dan, I'd do anything else for you, but not that. I can't stop hating Draco Malfoy."

"Even if it was all an act…" Daniel stopped when he saw the pain in his friend's face.

"Worse," he snapped. "If you're going to hurt someone, you might as well mean it!" Suddenly, his face froze in shock, the unshed tears glistening in his eyes. Daniel looked round and instantly realised why. Draco Malfoy stood there in the doorway to the Great Hall, smiling horribly. He had obviously heard some of what was being said, and it had pleased him. He had enjoyed hearing that he had tortured Blaise. That smile made Daniel feel ill. It just wasn't natural.

Malfoy sauntered over, alone, and placed his hand gently on Blaise's shoulder. The shorter boy flinched. "Aw, did I hurt poor little Blaise?" Malfoy asked; a false, cooing, sugary tone in his cold voice. "Did I make him want to cry?"

Malfoy had gone too far. Daniel saw the flash of vicious anger in the black eyes an instant before Blaise acted. He threw Malfoy's hand off his shoulder with a force that landed him on his back, on the floor. Before the silver-haired boy could move, there was a wand at his throat. Blaise was faster than he looked.

"You made my life hell, Malfoy," he snarled. "Now give me one good reason why I shouldn't send you there."

There was terror written all over the bully's face now; sheer terror for his life. He only had to look into those eyes to know that Blaise would kill him, if he could. The sheer enmity in his eyes made Draco shiver.

He didn't whimper. He knew that it would only irritate the unhinged Zabini further. Besides, he had no wish to die cringing. "Don't do it, Blaise," he said, quietly. "I know you don't really want to do it. It won't stop you hurting. I never wanted to hurt you." He felt the pressure from the wand slacken slightly as Blaise's resolve weakened. "Would you really become a murderer, just for me?"

"It isn't just you," snapped Blaise. "All you purebloods are the same. And your family is the worst, Malfoy." He spat the name viciously. "Your father… he nearly killed… her." Draco could barely hear him now; perhaps he was talking to himself.

"I'm not my father, Blaise." In his indecision, Blaise stared deep into the cold eyes, and saw nothing but truth. He got up, pocketed his wand and stalked off towards the dungeons, leaving Malfoy on his back, on the floor, in the dust, with one thought playing on his mind… who on earth did Zabini mean?