A few days later and Danny felt almost completely better. His arm and ribs were still a little sore and achy and there were still a few scratches from his larger cuts, but he was able to phase off his cast and get back to work. He felt that he'd relaxed enough. He pulled on his new Hufflepuff robes, suddenly grateful for them after the crisis the previous week. The uniform had come with a ready-made excuse despite a few issues in keeping his presence secret from Professor Sprout. It was the first time he was actually glad to have had the robes.
He then changed into his ghost form and phased out of the door and floated to the kitchens. Dumbledore had been kind enough to organise Dobby to deliver his meals while he recovered. The kitchens, as usual, were bustling with activity as the house elves prepared breakfast for the castle. Kreacher, sour as ever, was on dish cleaning duty. Dobby was collecting a plate of food, obviously on his way to Danny's room. Dumbledore had sworn the elf to secrecy on Danny's halfa status. It was nice to know that one of the kitchen's staff actually understood why Danny came down to the kitchens to eat in the first place. The first few days of the first year Danny was there had been weird. The elves gave him a lot of confused and uncertain looks when he asked for food. Now they were used to the odd coloured ghost.
"Hey Dobby," Danny called. The house elf squeaked in surprise and turned to Danny.
"Master Danny! Dobby was just coming," Dobby informed the halfa in his high voice. Danny shook his head.
"Thanks Dobby, but I'm better now. You don't have to do that anymore. Thank you for doing it the last few days though," Danny assured him, having given up on dissuading the elf from calling him Master Danny. Danny had gotten very well acquainted with the elf over his time at Hogwarts. He had learned that Harry had been the one to set the elf free from the Malfoy's service. Danny had asked a few questions about the Malfoy family to help him understand Draco Malfoy better and even get an idea of what the manor the teen lived in was like. It was good knowledge to have.
"Are you sure Master Danny? It isn't an issue. Professor Dumbledore told Dobby to care for your needs while you healed," Dobby asked. Danny nodded.
"I'm sure Dobby. I have stuff to get done and I can't do that in bed. How's Winky?" Danny confirmed, taking the plate Dobby had finished preparing with a smile. Dobby shook his head sadly, flapping his large ears wildly.
"Winky is not well Master Danny. Dobby fears Winky will never recover from being freed," Dobby muttered sadly as they drifted to a few seats beside the large fire. Winky, a female free elf, was sitting on one chair holding a half-empty bottle of butterbeer in her hand. Butterbeer was very strong for house elves and the female house elf had become an alcoholic after being released by her former owner. Danny sat beside the elf, having resorted to the action to prevent the elves staring too much. Acting more human than ghost around them limited the stares he got during their company.
"Hey Winky," Danny greeted her. The house elf looked up at him with bleary eyes before dropping her head to her tiny chest and taking a swig of butterbeer.
"Hmm, bad day huh?" Danny commented softly. Dobby nodded.
"Afraid so sir," Dobby agreed.
Danny ate the plate of sausages, eggs and fried bread, he found fried bread was much nicer than toast, not unpleasantly dry at all. He took a sip of pumpkin juice.
"Thanks Dobby, great as always. Did I miss anything over the last few days with the students?" Danny inquired, getting to his feet and handing the cleared plate and emptied glass to the elf. Dobby shook his head.
"Nothing we house elves know of Master Danny," Dobby replied. Danny smiled gratefully.
"Thanks Dobby, for everything. See you at lunch alright," Danny concluded. Dobby happily nodded taking Danny's dishes to Kreacher and then turning to Winky's bottle collection. Danny left the kitchen, turning invisible, and flew up into the Great Hall to find Malfoy.
For the rest of the day, Danny followed Malfoy dutifully, only leaving the teen's side to eat or use the restroom. In Malfoy's Potions lesson, Danny allowed himself to drift through the room and was surprised to hear his name. He turned to the voice and saw Harry, Ron and Hermione talking below him. The Hufflepuff at their table was busy working on his potion only making a small comment on the trio's conversation every now and again. Danny floated closer invisibly.
"Look he must be fine because he's not in the hospital wing. And Peeves isn't depressed so he must still be in the school," Hermione reasoned.
"But how did he get so hurt? And what if Snape did something? We all know he doesn't like Danny," Harry hissed as he chopped a few ingredients.
"Harry, Snape isn't going to do anything to Danny," Hermione sighed.
"Besides Wulf would stop anyone hurting Danny," Ron added.
"Didn't stop Danny getting hurt in the first place," Harry muttered.
Danny frowned. He didn't recall everything that happened. Honestly he didn't really remember Wulf grabbing him. But Harry at least must have seen him, if not the other two as well. He was just concerned which Danny they were talking about. Did they see him change as well?! If they knew, he was sunk! Harry was connected to Voldemort and if Harry knew, Voldemort could know. If Voldemort knew, then his family was in danger. He paused. Wait, they were talking about Peeves and being in the castle. That was Phantom, not Fenton. But if they knew the truth, that mightn't matter. He'd have to check. Dumbledore did say that Snape covered for him, but if Harry and his friends saw something, then there was nothing to cover, his secret would be blown.
"Twenty minutes left!" Slughorn called, stopping further conversation as the students rushed to finish their potions.
Malfoy left the moment class was over and Danny rushed after the teen. Around the fifth floor, he lost sight of the blonde student and caught sight of him later on the seventh floor as the halfa predicted. Danny watched Malfoy go into the Room of Requirement and huffed in disappointment as he turned to look for Harry. It didn't take long for Danny to find Harry. He was with Hermione in the library and he sensed he knew where Ron was, Lavender Brown would likely be nearby the wizard. Danny bit his lip and spotted a piece of parchment and quill with ink beside Hermione. As discretely as possible, Danny took them and scrawled a quick note to meet him in the corridor outside the library, he really didn't want it to be common knowledge that he could turn invisible. He waited a few seconds before Hermione gasped in surprise.
"Harry, Danny must be close by, look," she whispered and passed the quick note to Harry to read. They quickly packed up their belongings and left the library. Danny flew into a secret passage and turned himself visible before phasing down through the floor and into a lower corridor. He turned a corner and phased back up to emerged almost directly in front of the two students.
Hermione squeaked in alarm.
"Sorry, didn't mean to startle you," Danny quickly apologised.
"It's fine," Hermione breathed.
"You look a lot better Danny," Harry remarked with a relieved smile. Danny nodded.
"Thanks to Wulf and Severus," Danny confirmed.
"What happened to you? Can you say?" Hermione whispered. Danny gave a grim smile.
"Let's just say Voldemort is starting to really dislike me and sent a lot of ghosts to try and get rid of me," Danny answered softly. Harry frowned.
"What do you mean?" Harry asked.
"Wulf found a ghost for me and took me there. It was an ambush. Wulf got knocked out and I was completely out numbered. I don't really remember exactly what happened but Wulf got me out of there. Severus told Dumbledore and Dumbledore got the story from Wulf," Danny explained carefully.
He really didn't know how he was going to approach this. He had to check his secret was safe without blowing it. He bit back a smile.
"How was your Christmas though?" Danny inquired.
"It was really good. I went home this year," Hermione answered.
"I was at Ron's. A lot of the order came around. What about you?" Harry informed the halfa. Danny smiled, his secret was safe. If they knew what he was, they would already know about his Christmas.
"Not much. Mostly looking for those ghosts," Danny replied dismissively.
"I'll let you two get back to your homework or whatever you were doing. Wulf let me know you guys saw me while I was kind of out of it. Thought I should let you know. You'll let Ron know too right?" Danny concluded, hoping that Ron had been there at the time. Harry and Hermione nodded and returned to the library and Danny flew to the seventh floor to wait for Malfoy invisibly.
Back to business again.
Let me know what you think so far.
Until the next chapter.
