Both Harry and Malfoy were quiet as they walked – or rather, hacked – their way through the dark, ominous jungle. Anubis was also strangely somber, trudging alongside Harry. If it was possible, which Harry had sure it hadn't been just a day ago, it was hotter than it had been yesterday. His skin was slick with sweat. He'd abandoned his own robes, leaving them somewhere in the jungle. He had plenty more – besides, those ones were old and were tattered by the jungle anyway to the point where they had practically hung like shreds from Harry's body. The cuffs of his sleeves were pushed up past his elbows. His shirt stuck to him, and his pants felt as though they were dragging him downward and he was very tempted to turn them into shorts.

Malfoy had also abandoned his robes somewhere along the path they had cut through the jungle. He hadn't been keen on leaving them and had tried to pawn them off on Harry to carry. Harry had taken the robes and tossed them into the underbrush. He had been strangely satisfied by this action, especially when Malfoy made a squabbling noise that sounded like a dying turkey. After that, Malfoy had taken it upon himself to ignore Harry, which Harry didn't mind a single bit.

They had been walking for what felt like hours before they walked into a clearing. Harry was thankful, because he wasn't sure if they had been heading in the right direction for the past half hour since they couldn't see the sky through the thick canopy of jungle trees. The sun seemed to be directly overtop of them, and Harry was suddenly slinking back into the shade of the trees as it baked his exposed skin. Malfoy looked as though he wanted to die and said something about his skin being ravaged.

"You look fine," Harry said exasperatedly when Malfoy came near, glancing over at the blonde boy. He did seem a bit – different looking, now that Harry's attention was drawn to it. Malfoy's skin had turned a light peach colored tan, which contrasted with his unusually blonde hair.

"I do not," Malfoy simpered, conjuring a mirror. Harry rolled his eyes. Only Draco Malfoy could care about his appearance when they were stranded in a jungle with no way of getting home. "Ugh! I look like an onion!" Harry sighed, and pressed a palm over his eyes. "This is going to take ages to get rid of."

Tired and worn from the long hike, Harry stomped over to where Malfoy stood, grabbed the mirror out of the other boy's hand and tossed it into the jungle. He then grabbed Malfoy by the shoulders and shook him, as though that would stop him from whining. "You look fine!" Harry said loudly, causing Anubis, who had been bounding through the tall green grass of the clearing, to bark. Suddenly, a grin broke out across Harry's face. "You have freckles."

Malfoy looked affronted, as though he had been greatly insulted. He looked about to dart off into the jungle to search for his conjured mirror, but since Harry still held his shoulder's tightly, he was unable to do so.

"Freckles?" he said, his voice cracking as though he'd just been told his favorite relative had died.

"Dye your hair red, and you could be an honorary Weasley."

Malfoy gasped.

"Take that back!" he said, looking greatly insulted. "Weasley!" he added with an indignant 'harrumph', but looked very concerned about the idea of freckles – which happened to be smattered across his cheeks. They were very light, and could hardly be seen unless one is up close, such as Harry was. A slight blush swept across Harry's cheek as he realized just how close he was, and he let Malfoy go.

"We should keep going," he said, looking upward and away from Malfoy. His eyes scanned the sky for smoke. It took him a moment, but he spotted the faint trail of white smoke slithering up towards the clouds. Malfoy was unusually quiet, but Harry quickly attributed this to his freckles comment. And indeed, when he glanced over at the once pale boy, he was rubbing at his cheeks as though that would get rid of them and Harry chuckled under his breath before leading the way back into the jungle and towards the wisp of smoke.

The jungle became more dense and dark as they walked on, and Anubis stayed a few feet in front of Harry, his ears pinned back as his wings were (and had been for the past few days. In fact, Harry was beginning to wonder if they were even functional). His tail was lowered, not completely between his legs but close to. Harry didn't know much about dogs, but he did know enough to know that if Anubis was being cautious, then they should, too. It didn't help that Malfoy liked to tromp through the jungle loudly, snapping this twig and that. Probably to stave off the eerie silence, and Harry couldn't really blame him.

It took five minutes for Harry to realize that Malfoy wasn't walking behind him anymore. Anubis was walking as silently as could be ahead of him, growling at the slightest of shadows. Harry's footsteps were heavy, but not careless and therefore were a good deal quieter than Malfoy's. Except now Malfoy wasn't making a single sound. In fact –

Harry turned around, almost expecting to see the blonde just a few feet away, smirking wildly. His stomach plummeted when he couldn't see anything – just darkness and the beaten path he and Anubis had created. Since he had stopped moving, Anubis had halted, too, and the jungle grew quiet. Before long, however, Harry heard the faint sounds of something moving and branches cracking. His shoulder's sagged in relief.

The sound didn't grow closer. Malfoy didn't appear, as Harry expected he would. And quite abruptly, the cracking sounds stopped and the only thing Harry could hear was the slight panting of Anubis and his own heart beating wildly in his chest. He had started running before he was even aware that something horrible could have happened to his enemy. He knew he shouldn't have cared. Anubis ran ahead of him, barking and howling all the while. This was Malfoy. Even though Malfoy would rather run than kill Harry, he was still a Death Eater.

Hell, Harry should have left him there to rot.

He might not have noticed it if it weren't for the dragon half-breed leading the way. In fact, he had nearly run past it before realizing Anubis had stopped and had dove into the jungle away from the path. Harry turned quickly and headed after the dog, instincts kicking into overdrive. There were drag marks and – Harry's heart leapt into his throat – claw marks along one or two of the trees.

Suddenly, vines had entangled themselves around Harry's feet and caused him to fall to the ground, and he very nearly hit his head on a very large rock. At first Harry had thought of snakes, as he felt the vines creeping up his legs, before he realized exactly what it was.

Devil's Snare.

Anubis turned and attacked the wriggling vines, chewing them off of Harry's legs, before scampering off again. Soon enough, Malfoy came into his line of view, hovering a few feet off the ground, vines wrapped around his body like a cocoon. Not entirely, since his upper body was still moving, pulling at the thick vines that wrapped around his arms. Harry soon realized, with horror, that Malfoy was dangling from the neck, not his arms or his torso as Harry had originally thought, and even in the dim light he could see the other boy's face turning a light shade of violet.

The best way to get rid of Devil's Snare, everyone knows, is to set it on fire. Of course, this is not a very good option when one's comrade is dangling in the air from it. The fire would kill the living vines, but it could also burn said comrade alive, and that just wouldn't do. Anubis was barking and gnawing on the nearest vines, just a few feet away from Malfoy, as though this would help.

"Come here," Harry said quickly, snapping his fingers to catch the half-breed's attention. Anubis, a broke vine still hanging from his mouth, loped over. Harry placed the animal just beneath Malfoy. Anubis was just barely tall enough to support Malfoy on his massive head, but Anubis seemed to know exactly what Harry wanted, and he sat back on his hind legs, still chomping on a vine, but now supporting Malfoy so the boy didn't strangle to death. If there was one thing to be said about the half-breed, it was that he might have inherited the loyal personality of a dog, but he had the brilliance of a dragon.

Unfortunately, by this time Malfoy had fallen unconscious, and Harry was beginning to feel the start of panic rising in his throat. He hacked away at the Devil's Snare, using dead bits to climb towards Malfoy.

"Malfoy," he said quickly, bile rising slightly in his throat when Malfoy's only response was swaying slightly. Grabbing the vine that was being used as a noose, Harry quickly severed it and nearly grabbed it to keep Malfoy from falling before realizing that if he did, he'd probably break Malfoy's neck. Instead, Anubis leapt upwards, his wings unfolding and flapping slightly, and Malfoy landed in a heap on the half-breed's back.

Harry dropped to the ground and quickly began cutting the vines that were wrapped unnervingly tight around the unconscious boy. Anubis was keeping the deadly vines away by snapping and chewing them apart with his vicious teeth. Once the vines had been tossed away, Harry cringed at the state of Malfoy. He soon realized that the claw marks he'd seen on the trees were no animals, but Malfoy's. His fingers were bloody and three nails off his fingers had been torn away.

After being in a war with Death Eaters, Harry was slightly used to seeing unconscious and the dead being very clean. The Death Eaters wasted no spells on people they didn't know or care about, and with one quick Avada Kedavra, they were dead. Or a stupefy sent them unconscious. So seeing Malfoy bruised and bloodied and looking very much as though he'd been in a war sent his stomach into tight knots.

"Draco," he said again, gripping his wand tightly and shaking the boy. When that didn't work, he pointed his wand at Malfoy's head. "Ennervate." When that didn't work, Harry checked Malfoy's pulse. It was faint, but there, and Harry breathed a very slight sigh of relief. Then, Harry realized Malfoy wasn't breathing, which was why he hadn't woken up with the spell. A lump formed in Harry's throat as he wracked his brain, trying to think of what to do.

CPR. It was muggle, not magical, but practical. He'd taken courses during the summer; when Aunt Petunia insisted Dudley go. Dudley had, naturally, skipped out on the courses and Harry was simply a tool used to explain what Dudley had "learned" without anyone ever being the wiser. Harry had actually found the course very useful, especially with an oncoming war. Thinking quickly, Harry sorted through all the life-saving techniques he'd learned and tried to remember how to correctly perform CPR.

If Harry had been in his right mind, he might have had qualms about doing mouth to mouth. But currently, he was only worried for Malfoy's life, and it didn't feel significantly strange. Covering Malfoy's nose, he blew into the other boy's mouth, watching for his chest to rise before moving and placing his hands on Malfoy's chest. He pressed down hard – too hard, since he heard something crack and had to keep himself from leaping back. This was normal, he told himself. It happens. He applied pressure again, this time gentler.

Repeating this several times, Harry's hands began to shake when the thought of Malfoy dying there came to him. His foremost thought should have been that he would have to figure out how to get back to Hogwarts on his own, and with his limited knowledge of what had happened back in the forest, he couldn't very well do it by himself. But it wasn't, and that was the least of his worries. He worried more about the fact that he didn't want to be alone, and he didn't want Malfoy to die. He was only eighteen, for Merlin's sake! And it would be unfair to Malfoy that he died in a place like this.

Harry had given up hope. He was pressing on Malfoy's chest in vain, and with one last thrust, he went to sit back on his heels. His cheeks were wet and he couldn't understand why. Almost unnoticeably, there was a small intake of air, and Malfoy quivered slightly. Harry had a hard time refraining from hugging the other boy. He could just imagine what the Slytherin would say, "Most undignified!" or "Gee, Potter, I didn't think you cared."

But he really, really did.

This was beginning to sink in and it startled him, but he hadn't time to think about that, because Draco started coughing loudly, and Harry quickly pushed Draco so that he was lying on his side, as was procedure. They both stayed like that for some time before Draco rolled back onto his back, his eyes wide and shiny, his breathing erratic and clearly painful. Eventually, he spoke in a hoarse raspy voice.

"I had a strange dream," he said, placing a hand against his chest as though it would help him breathe, before he pointed at Harry and the two spaces beside Harry. "You were in it, and you were in it, and you were in it."

"Malfoy, there's only one of me here," Harry said calmly, though he had to struggle to keep his voice from squeaking in relief.

"I know," Draco said, a slight smirk coming to his features before he began coughing again.

"What did you dream about?" Harry asked, sitting backwards. Anubis seemed to be taking a break from attacking the very dead Devil's Snare, and lay down beside Harry, panting. It was a strangely calm moment, despite the fact that Draco had very nearly died.

"You called me Draco," Draco said, staring up into the canopy of trees, looking very dazed. "Then you kissed me."

Harry choked, sitting up straight. Anubis tilted his head slightly. Harry's mouth went dry, and he suddenly became very, very confused. Especially since Draco seemed to appear blissfully content, which scared him more than anything. And then suddenly –

"Ugh, Potter, you kissed me!"

Draco was struggling to sit up and began vehemently wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. Harry suddenly realized what Draco meant, and although he probably should have been relieved, he felt a strange feeling settle into the pit of his stomach. Disappointment.

"I didn't kiss you," Harry denied, watching as Draco tried repeatedly to sit up, but couldn't, and instead pawed at his chest. "Stop moving, you're going to hurt yourself. I was performing CPR. I saved your life."

"CP-whatsit?" Draco said, sticking his tongue out as though he'd just swallowed something disgusting and was trying to get the taste out of his mouth. "In any case, it was disgusting! Saving my life? Ha! With a kiss? What am I, Sleeping Beauty?"

Harry groaned and put his head in his hands. Only Malfoy.

Realizing that they had spent quite a good portion of the hour in this dismal spot, Harry decided it was probably best to leave, just in case the Devil's Snare wasn't completely dead and decided to come back for revenge. Glancing down at Draco, Harry was sure that he wouldn't be able to walk on his own, especially with the rib that Harry had probably cracked. Pointing his wand at Draco, he quietly murmured a weightless spell.

"What are you doing?" Draco demanded, ever so arrogant and bossy, even when he lay half dead on the jungle floor. Harry ignored him, and preceded to pick the boy up, who was now very light because of the spell Harry had cast. "Put me down this instant!" Draco shouted. "I'm not some damsel in distress, you know! You can't just pick me up and carry me around whenever you like! This is so undignified."

"Fine," Harry said with a shrug, and set Draco on his feet and letting go. Draco wobbled, and painfully clutched at his side, before whimpering.

"I can hardly stand."

"I know."

"So why'd you put me down?"

"Oh, for the love of Merlin."

"Why would anyone want the love of that old codger?"

This was going to be a very, very long day.