It took Severus a long while to finally get to Draco's side after the Quidditch game. There were loads of fellow Slytherins that were just determined to occupy his attention as much as possible. Hell, even Lestrange was warming up to him again. Also, there were students from other Houses that wanted to meet him; a lot of them still didn't know him or his story. They thought he was just some sort of transfer student. So, by the time Draco was able to pry himself free from some worshipful third years, he had black rings under his eyes and seemed paler than ever.
"Go on now!" Severus ordered the disappointed third years, "can't you see he's exhausted?" He shooed them away. Once they scurried off, Severus commented, "You look like shit, Malfoy."
Draco sighed, and felt the artificial energy he'd been using all day finally deplete. "I haven't eaten since breakfast," he said tiredly.
"I'm sure we can get something from the kitchen..." Severus suggested. "And then, we can talk."
They both walked down the hallway, though it was a bit late already. "Talk about what?" Draco asked with an edge to his tone.
"Just things, Draco." Severus answered. They reached a large painting that pictured a bowl of fruit. Severus touched the pear, and the painting swung open. They entered the huge Hogwart's kitchens. "Sandwich?" he asked Draco.
"Yeah. Roast beef sounds good." At those words, three house-elves hopped to it, providing the two of them with everything they could possibly want on a roast beef sandwich. Another bonus was the fresh-baked rye bread still warm from the oven. By the time Draco took a bite of his sandwich piled high with lettuce, onions and horseradish, he decided that this sandwich had been worth the wait.
"So! You won the match! What's next?" Severus asked Draco.
"No idea," Draco replied with a full mouth.
I see you met Drucilla Webster..." Severus observed.
Draco thought for a second. "Oh! She's the one who caught the Snitch, right? Wait a minute! You don't mean that she's one of the girls who...with you? God..." Draco frowned. He glared at Severus, who was wearing such a smug smile that he just had to do something. Severus laughed soflty as he got up to get something to drink. Draco immediately took out his wand, murmured inaudibly and waved his wand, then buried it back into his robe pocket before Severus even turned around.
"You just did something, didn't you?" Severus accused Draco.
Draco put on his best innocent face. "What could I have done?"
"Please, that face doesn't fool me, Draco. What did you do?" Severus asked. Then, it dawned on him. "Oh, I get it! You're mad at me because of the other night, that I told everybody that I did your prospective girlfriends?" Severus laughed a bit louder at seeing Draco's innocent facade melt. "I thought you didn't give a shit. So, now all of a sudden you care. And why? Because you like her!"
Draco stood up suddenly, and asked him, "Am I going to have to kick your ass in over her honor, or are you going to back off?"
Severus gaped for a second. "Kick my? Oh! No! It's alright, Draco. She and I; it was for fun, really..."
"You said that you 'cannot in good conscience turn Drucilla Webster over' to me. Why, has that changed?" Severus shifted in his seat uncomfortably. "'She has the nicest pair of tits' I believe you told me."
"Well, frankly, it's not her great mind that attracted me, Draco," Severus pointed out. "You mean you haven't noticed her many attributes?"
"No," Draco told him, "I mean that you aren't supposed to be noticing them any more. By the way, do you know who her best friend happens to be?"
"How the hell should I know?" Severus asked peevishly. "All I did was have a nice little titfuck with her, I didn't ask her life story!" he added in a hushed voice.
"Well, maybe if I told you that her best friend is your little red-head cutiepie Gryffindor, you'd change your tune!" Draco snapped.
Severus did not appear upset by this revelation. "Oh! That would work out perfectly! She and Lily are best friends, and I'm your friend, so..."
"So we can do a swapsie every so often..." Draco suggested.
Severus was in Draco's face again, this time with the blunt edged mustard spreader. "Bullshit we will..." he snarled.
"Do you see my point now?" Draco asked him.
"No."
"How you feel about me even suggesting that I have some sort of casual thing with your, Lily? Is that her name? Well, that's how I am feeling now when you talk about how you had this casual thing going on with Drucilla. If you back off now, I just might let you live..." Draco explained.
Severus sat down and snorted in amusement. "You kill me? I don't think so, somehow..."
"Do we have a deal?" Draco asked Severus. He was about ready to answer, when Professor Dumbledore strode into the kitchen.
"There you are, Mr. Malfoy! You're a very hard young man to track down," he said.
"I'll bet you anything I know what this is about..." Draco grumbled as he left his half-eaten sandwich behind, and rose from his seat at the small table by the huge hearth.
"You'd better believe it, young man! I want you in that hospital wing without another moments delay!" Dumbledore growled. Severus' black eyebrows rose in surprise; he never hears Dumbledore growl.
"D'you mean those two twits are still with Madame Pomfrey?" Draco gasped.
"This is about those two bastards?" Severus shrieked.
"You had better get yourself down to Slytherin House, Mr. Snape. It's past your bedtime," Dumbledore ordered him. "Now, then, Mr. Malfoy, let's be on our way..." They both left promptly, and Draco silently hoped that Severus would take his sandwich back down to the Slytherin Common room. But he hoped that his friend would have enough brains to watch over it; after all, someone might try to poison it if it was left unattended.
"I can't believe those two acting like such babies!" Draco spat. "I'm probably in worse shape than they are; I haven't eaten all day!"
"Mr. Malfoy, don't expect any sympathy from me. I want you to undo what you did to those two boys, and I want no nonsense from you."
"Undo what? I didn't do anything to them!" Draco protested.
"That's not what it looks like to me. They appear to be in a most frightful condidtion!" Dumbledore answered as they approached the Hospital Wing doors. Draco banged them open in a huff and rounded the corner. The first row of beds were filled with James Potter and Sirius Black, who both had rings under their eyes that were even darker than Draco's. James didn't have his glasses on, and his normally blue eyes were bloodshot. Sirius twisted the edge of his blanket in silent agony. To Draco's surprise, Remus Lupin was also there.
"Oh, what the hell is this?" Draco spat. "I twisted your noses, so you have to run to Dumbledore to wipe them for you?" he added with contempt. James shrank back, and Sirius bared his teeth.
"What exactly did you do to them?" Lupin asked.
"I gave them a psychic kick in the nuts, that's what I did. Everyone takes a knock in the balls, boys. You'll get over it..." Draco drawled.
"He asked you a question, Mr. Malfoy. I want you to answer him, right now," Dumbledore ordered him.
"I severed their psychic connection while they were speaking to eachother telepathically during the game. It's like interrupting a conversation, only more like a scream rather than a whisper."
"They were speaking to eachother telepathically?" Dumbledore asked. Apparently, he did not know this. "How did you hear them?"
"Uh..." Draco trailed off. "I, I don't exactly know..." he admitted.
"So, how did you sever their contact?" Dumbledore asked him.
"Um, it was like taking a sliver of power and slicing through the waves. That's all I did. Yeah, it's uncomforatble, but it's not nearly as fatal as these two are acting..." he sniffed. Sirius grabbed his sheets and began tearing them a bit, writhing in turmoil. James began actually crying, like he must have been before. Draco made a face; the two bloody gits... "Alright, alright, I'll fix them!" he agreed, though how he was going to do that, he had no clue. "But I want something from them in return."
They both gaped. Dumbledore snorted irritably, "You've got a lot of nerve, Mr. Malfoy! What do you want from them?"
"I want these two wretches to tell me what the hell happened Wednesday night! They know all about it..." Draco declared, as he watched James and Sirius squirm. Remus shot up from the edge of James' bed and faced Draco.
"I'll tell you, Malfoy. No, Sirius, I'll handle it!" Remus said to Sirius as he opened his mouth to protest. "He has a right to know what happened. Malfoy, you were attacked by a werewolf the other night."
Draco's jaw dropped. "A werewolf?" He remembered the dream he had the other night about the werewolf and how he was throwing books at it.
"There was a werewolf loose in Hogwart's the other night... I, I saw it too. Colton made me promise not to say anything!" Remus swallowed, as if recalling Colton's face. Draco could just picture it; that son of a bitch threatening Lupin, whom he despised anyway.
"Colton? What does he have to do with it?" Draco demanded. Out of the corner of his eye, he noticed that Dumbledore now was twisting his robes much like Sirius had been twisting his bedsheets.
"I don't know what he had to do with it," Remus said, a bit too quickly for it to be the truth, or all of it, anyway. "But he didn't want me to start a panic. If anybody had known that a student had been attacked by a werewolf..."
"How did I manage to survive it? I wasn't bitten, was I?" Draco breathed fearfully.
"No, you weren't bitten," Dumbledore answered. "And, as for how you escaped the werewolf, that remains a mystery."
"Severus thinks that Foxworth gave me a potion to make me forget what happened."
"Which was thought to be a good idea at the time. However, now that you know the truth, Mr. Malfoy, I must ask that you not tell anyone else. The werewolf has been secured, and there will never be another incident like this past one. There is no need to make people here afraid of something that will never come to pass." Dumbledore looked far more relaxed now that Remus had told Draco the "truth" about what had happened on that night of detention.
"Now, if you would please help Jim and Sirius," Remus said. Draco pursed his lips, and sighed. He wasn't thrilled with the answers he'd gotten. Attacked by a werewolf! But he had given his word, and maybe, just maybe, there would be a way to find out the rest of the story. He opened his mouth to spout out some sort of nonsense spell and wave his wand, but before he could, the hospital wing doors banged open.
"YOU! Fix me up NOW!" a livid Severus demanded of Draco. Everyone looked quite shaken by the disturbance. Even Madame Pomfrey emerged from another corner of the wing and tutted.
For a few seconds, Draco stared into Severus' face and had no idea what he could possibly be talking aobut. But then it came to him. "Oh! I forgot about that hex I put on you, sorry!" he babbled, then waved his wand. Severus only seemed slightly less angry, turned on his heel, and strode out.
"What did you do to him?" James asked breathlessly.
"He sure looked pissed," added Sirius.
Draco smirked. "Rather ironic way to put it, Black. Pissed, I mean. His eyeballs looked yellow..."
"Why was that?" Dumbledore asked.
"I put a hex on his jeans, sir."
"A hex? Oh, to keep him from undoing his jeans?" Remus asked with a twitch of his lips.
"Why did you do that, Mr. Malfoy?" Dumbledore asked. "It seems quite childish to me."
"Childish, yes, but I felt at the time it was necessary. After all, someone has got to teach that boy how to keep his pants zipped up, if you know what I mean."
All three Gryffindor boys burst out laughing. James leaned over to Sirius and said, "Sirius, he's a Marauder..."
Sirius gasped in outrage. "No he's not! He's a Slytherin!"
"That doesn't matter. He's a Marauder at heart."
"James...really," Sirius huffed.
"Look, he's cured us," James declared, rising from the bed and holding his wand out. "Lumos," he said, and light beamed from his wand tip.
"Excellent, Mr. Potter, Mr. Black. I suggest that you two and Mr. Lupin return to Gryffindor House if you have no more business here. Mr. Malfoy is going to be serving detention."
"What?" Draco protested.
"Right now, with me, in my office. Where I can keep an eye on you until I can get a pair of glasses for the eyes in the back of my head. With you around, I need them," Dumbledore explained.