After All TBGC

Updated: October 6, 2006

Summer 7: Part H

He was going to kill Dumbledore.

Draco had been transported back to the Tower well before dawn, but he hadn't managed to force himself to leave the sofa in the living room. Voldemort wasn't going to mark him, but he wanted proof that Draco was loyal to him. He'd expected that he would be told to capture Harry or to get Harry in a position where he could be captured. He had not expected Voldemort to tell him to kill Dumbledore.

Was that even possible? Voldemort himself hadn't been able to do it. In fact, Voldemort didn't even dare to invade Hogwarts because Dumbledore was there. How the bloody hell was Draco supposed to kill him?

"Draco?"

He looked up to see Harry standing at the foot of the stairs, his hair mussed and a sleepy trail of dried drool next to his mouth. Draco couldn't help but smile as Harry yawned and rubbed the back of his hands over his eyes. "Morning, Harry."

"What'r you doing down here?"

Draco rubbed the smile off his face. "Waiting for you to wake up, git. Get dressed, I'm bored."

Harry mumbled something and stumbled back up the stairs. Ten minutes later he came back down, dressed, but still rubbing sleep from his eyes. "What did you want to do?"

Draco looked him up and down critically. He was wearing those stupid muggle jeans again, the ones that he'd been wearing all summer. Draco had tried to convince to wear something else, anything else, but Harry had insisted that all of his other clothes were becoming absolutely threadbare and besides, they were comfortable. The only good thing about them was that they did show off Harry's arse rather well. At least, they did when he wasn't wearing t-shirts that covered said arse.

"Could you at least put on a nice shirt?"

Harry raised an eyebrow and plopped down on the sofa next to him. "You're one to talk. Are those the same clothes you wore yesterday?"

It took all of Draco's efforts to keep from blanching. "Of course not, I own more than one grey jumper and black trouser."

Harry shrugged and dropped his head back. "Merlin, but I am tired. What's wrong with me, I must have slept a good ten hours."

"You need juice."

"What?"

Draco was already up and moving towards the table. "It's the mushrooms from the steak last night, they're known to make people groggy the first few times they eat them. You need some kind of acidic juice to help wake you up."

With a great stretched, Harry shoved himself off the couch and sat heavily in his chair, looking at his glass thoughtfully. "Orange juice."

It filled with pale orange liquid and Harry took up the glass, draining it in several large gulps, then sat it down and watched it refill as he called for Dobby and ordered breakfast. Draco just drank water, and ate a few pieces of dry toast. He felt too sick to his stomach real food.

The meeting had been a nightmare and it kept replaying in his head. What bothered him the most, was his father being there. He'd thought that Voldemort was too angry at the failure to procure the prophecy to rescue his Death Eaters just yet. Worse, Voldemort had mentioned that he had a plan for Lucius as well, but that it would come later. All Draco needed to worry about was staying close to Potter and proving his loyalty.

What plan? Did it have to do with Harry? Draco looked up at Harry through his lashes and watched him shove a bit of sausage in his mouth. Then again, even if he knew was there anything he could do to stop it? He'd been on the receiving end of his father's punishments, both magical and physical, and there were Death Eaters that were far more vicious than Lucius Malfoy, Death Eaters that liked to get their hands really dirty.

He stopped mid-bite as an image of Walden McNair flashed through his mind. No, there wasn't anything he could do to stop it, even if he knew what it was, so perhaps it was better that he didn't.

"Are you not feeling well?"

Draco looked up and realised that he was still sitting with his toast half in his mouth, staring forward without really seeing. He shrugged, "I'm a bit queasy."

Harry reached forward and put his hand on Draco's forehead, "You don't feel warm. Maybe we shouldn't go out today. I know, we haven't played chess in ages."

Reluctantly, Draco found himself smiling at the prospect of spending a day inside, playing chess with Harry. There was just one thing wrong with it. "Make it strip chess and you're on."

"Strip chess?" Harry cocked his head to one side. "I thought you weren't feeling well?"

"I'm not that ill. How about every time we lose a piece we lose an article of clothing?"

After several moments, Harry sat back in his seat and popped the last of his sausage in his mouth. "Alright, you're on, but be prepared to be humiliated, Draco. I've been practicing."

Draco doubted that there would be any humiliation involved, regardless of who won, but he nodded anyway.

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"You have to eat more." Harry poked his side and Draco scooted away from him.

"Shut up, Potter, you're starting to sound like my mother."

Harry grinned at him impishly and Draco felt his cheeks heat up. "No, I don't, Malfoy, your mother wouldn't have even noticed."

"How Slytherin of you to point that out."

Harry's smile never wavered. "If I thought you'd care, I wouldn't have said it, but I did mean it. You do have to eat more."

Draco rolled his eyes and continued shoving his things into his trunk. "If it will make you stop nagging me, I'll promise to eat three meals a day and desert for afters."

The past two weeks had been very close what Draco assumed the lower levels of hell to be like. Every time he looked at Harry, he wondered what Voldemort had planned for him and should he warn him and would it help even if he did, and the Headmaster, who had been so elusive since his arrival, was suddenly around every corner, asking Draco if he was well or if there was anything he would like to talk about. The old codger had even invited them to dinner on a few occasions and Harry had always said yes with an air of elation that made it next to impossible for Draco to tell him he didn't want to.

It was almost as if the man knew what Draco was planning to do and was set on making him feel as absolutely guilty about it as possible and, worse yet, if that was his plan, it was working. Draco was forced to watch as Harry talked with Dumbledore, smiling at him and doing and saying things that were obviously meant to earn his approval. Dumbledore wasn't a father figure, no, but he was a mentor and every time Draco thought of killing Dumbledore, he now thought of how Harry had reacted to having Sirius taken away from him and how much worse this would be.

He couldn't do it, but he couldn't not do it.

"Draco, catch." He was pulled from his thoughts just in time to catch something that was flying at his face. Then he nearly dropped it as sharp claws dug into his tender hand, nearly hard enough to break the skin. Opening his fingers he found himself looking at the miniature replica of the Hungarian Horn Tail that Harry had fought in fourth year.

Looking up, he saw Harry sitting on the bed, a faint blush at the tips of his ears. "You keep that, to remind you." He didn't even have to say what it was the dragon was supposed to remind him of. Just looking at it made the bottom of Draco's stomach drop out.

The dragon climbed up Draco's shirt and perched on his shoulder for a moment before leaning over and biting his ear. Harry laughed as Draco reached up, pulling the thing forcibly from his shirt and setting it down on the lip of his trunk. He looked at Harry reproachfully, but Harry just shrugged, "Forgot to mention it bites."

Draco picked it up and set it in his pocket so that he could close his trunk and the dragon stirred fitfully, but didn't try to set his robes on fire or otherwise rip its way through. He knew he'd be coming back the next year, he'd have to even if he did intend to follow through with Voldemort's order, but it felt like his leaving was going to put something between him and Harry. This dragon was only proof of that.

"I promised I wouldn't take his mark, Harry, and I meant it."

Harry frowned at the bed quilt, still refusing to look up. "I know, but with your mother home and your father…"

Word of the breakout in Azkaban had reached the papers days ago and then the letter from Draco's mother, requesting that he come home. Since then, Harry had been tetchy, going in and out of his moods like Draco's mother on a potion-popping binge. It was hard to watch and even harder to know that Draco had been the cause of it. If he were any braver, he would stay at Hogwarts, refusing to go home, but he wasn't, so instead he was packing his trunk.

"I, um… I told my mother."

Harry's head shot up, finally looking him in the eyes. "That you weren't joining Voldemort?"

Draco flinched, "Would you stop saying that name, Harry? And no, not that, I told her that we were… well, more than friends."

Harry blinked owlishly. "Oh. What did she say?"

"I didn't really give her the chance to say anything." Draco slipped a hand into his pocket, letting the dragon bite him. "That's what all this is, I reckon. Father just wants to have a word with me about my predilections towards you. I'll be soundly beaten and sent back to Hogwarts for the start of term in a few weeks."

"You really think that's all?"

No. "Yes."

"Snape's coming back." Draco raised an eyebrow, but Harry had gone back to looking at the quilt. "I'm to move back in with him at the end of the week."

"I'm sorry." He didn't even know why he was saying it, but apologising to Harry had to become easy, even when the mere thought of doing so to someone else made him physically ill. He was Draco Malfoy and he did not apologise, unless it was to Harry, because Harry was… well, Harry.

"No, it's just that he was a right arse just before he left and somehow, I doubt he's gotten any better."

Draco slipped onto the bed across from Harry and rested his hand against the back of his neck. "Does he ever?"

"No." It was barely a whisper, because Draco had drawn him forward into a kiss and Harry generally shut up when he was about to be thoroughly snogged.

Pulling back, Draco rested his forehead against Harry's, "I have to go."

"I know."

He might as well have called him a traitor, because the tightness in Draco's chest was both unfamiliar and painful. "It's only for a few more weeks and then I'll see you on the train."

"I know."

"I'll drag you into a bathroom and snog you silly."

"I know."

"That is, of course, assuming you don't go trying to be heterosexual again."

Harry laughed, but it didn't sound right. "I won't."

Getting off the bed, Draco put his hands in his pockets, almost relieved for the pain of the little dragon biting his finger, because for some reason he thought he might have been on the verge of crying. Why would he be crying over something this stupid? He'd be back in three weeks, that wasn't so long.

Before he could lose his nerve, Draco turned around and stalked out of the room, practically running down the stairs in an effort to get away from his own cowardice. The problem was that his cowardice he was leaving behind, it was the thing that made him realise he was a coward. A braver man would never have left Harry alone, not for anything, but he as he'd said he wasn't brave.

Dumbledore was waiting for him in his office and Draco felt his guilt mount as he looked at the old man's kind blue eyes, twinkling with knowing. Damn, this wasn't any easier than being in the stupid tower. "I'm ready to go home, sir."

With a nod, Dumbledore waved towards the fire, "By all means, Mr. Malfoy, I can hardly stop you." Draco stopped mid step and looked back. What an odd thing to say. Dumbledore turned his chair to face Draco and crossed his hands in his lap. "Before you leave, however, is there anything you would like to tell me?"

Draco blinked a few times and felt his throat tightening. He knew. Merlin, he had to. The twinkle had gone out of his eyes, replaced by something far more stern. "I…" But how could he possibly know? He couldn't. It had to be a coincidence, or…

No, it was to do with his father again. It had to. This was just the same game of the Headmaster trying to get him to admit that he was abused at home and maybe he was, maybe his father's punishments did get out of hand, but he only had two more years and then he'd have finished school and he could get a job and he could move out and it would be over with. It wasn't so long and he wasn't going to risk leaving, not now.

"No sir, I'd just like to get going."

With a nod, Dumbledore turned around and Draco went to the fire, grasping the floo powder and throwing it in, watching the flames turn green as he said, "Malfoy Manor." He glanced back at Dumbledore one last time. Maybe he should say something, maybe the Headmaster could help him. Voldemort didn't dare go after Dumbledore and if Dumbledore could protect Harry, maybe he could protect him, too.

He bit his lip. No, there wasn't anything the Headmaster could do against his father. If Draco turned coat, Lucius would pull heaven and earth to get Draco brought back home and from there is was only a short trip to Voldemort where he'd be tortured and killed for the traitor he'd become.

Closing his eyes, Draco took a deep breath and stepped into the flames, letting them sweep him home.

-tbc-