Chapter 3: Beyond the Aggression

A/N: Here it is, the chapter you've all been waiting for, or the chapter I like to hope you've all been waiting for. Time for awkward and tense dinners and some very intense glances across the table. Oh, how I love those.

Harry glanced nervously from Remus to Sirius, hoping against hope that they would loosen up after a glass or two of wine. If they were still like this... well then he might just have to do himself in with one of the nice knives he had set out earlier that evening.

Right now, the two men were not exactly making him comfortable. Remus was currently looking at anything but Sirius, his lashes lowered over his intelligent hazel eyes, and his lips drawn into a tight, grim line. And Sirius, well, he was staring at Remus with an intensity that quite frankly was rather worrying Harry. What the fuck had happened between the two of them?

Not only were the two men scaring the shit out of him, but—and this was the straw that breaks the camel's back—Malfoy hadn't shown up yet. He was already fifteen minutes later than Harry had requested, but the Gryffindor refused to go up the stairs to get him. If the wanker was going to live in his fucking house, then he was going to have to abide by his fucking rules.

Suddenly Sirius glanced at Harry, startling the younger man. "Where the fuck is the blond brat?"

Harry sighed. "You know, calling him that isn't exactly going to make this dinner easy. I know he isn't the easiest to get along with, and in fact I'll agree with you that he's a prick, but I need you to tolerate him, just for a little while. Please."

Remus nodded, still not looking at anybody. Sirius simply made a short, non-committal grunt, which Harry was going to optimistically assume was a yes.

A shadow fell across the kitchen floor and Harry glanced up, opening his mouth to say something scathing to his unwanted house guest... and stopped.

For several moments, in fact, he could think of nothing to say at all. Draco stood illuminated by the light from the hall, his slim frame leaning casually against the door frame. He wore a thin grey turtleneck of Remus's, and a dark pair of trousers, probably one of the only nice pairs that Remus owned. The snug material of the shirt left little to the imagination of his lithe and firm torso, and the black pants seemed to hug his long legs and fell tantalizingly low on his hips. His platinum hair fell into his eyes slightly, and he reached up with one elegant hand to brush it away from his face.

For several moments, Harry forgot to breathe. Now, Malfoy was standing there, just looking at him, in an expression that was distinctly predatory, but that Harry found... disturbingly exciting.

Malfoy pushed slowly off the door frame and sauntered to the table, taking his seat with unrivaled grace. He looked up at Harry, pinning him with grey eyes that were less cold than they had been. "I apologize for being later than requested."

Harry only nodded, not trusting his throat to work properly. This was becoming fucking ridiculous. For fuck's sake, he'd seen Malfoy naked, had washed him with his two hands, and now the sight of him in actual clothes had him harder than the fucking table leg. His fascination with the blond's looks didn't seem to be getting better. In fact, he noted, realizing that the room was in fact much hotter than he had previously thought, particularly when Draco was looking him up and down like that, this strange attraction only seemed to be getting worse.

Remus spoke, breaking the uncomfortable silence that had settled over the table. "I'm glad you could join us, Draco."

Sirius let out a snort, and Harry glared at him.

Malfoy smiled, the model of civility. "It's a pleasure. I admittedly haven't had much of a chance to speak with anybody but Po—Harry."

Harry sat stunned for a few moments, realizing that the Slytherin had actually said his name. And without a great deal of revulsion.

Once again, Remus was forced to dispel the uncomfortable quiet, saying, "Please, have a seat. We're dining rather simply tonight, just a roast, some potatoes and vegetables."

Malfoy sat slowly across from Harry at the table, gracefully easing himself into the chair. His face was, if not exactly friendly and open, then less hostile than it usually appeared. Or, Harry thought with more disappointment than he thought he should, perhaps that hostility only applied to him.

"How are you this evening, Ma—Draco?" Harry asked, wondering why his heart seemed to stop when the grey eyes lifted to his.

"Absolutely delightful," the blond replied. A gentler than usual smirk graced his face. "And yourself?"

Harry hesitated for a moment. He wasn't fine, and he hadn't been fine for a long time, but for some reason, he felt closer to fine than he had been in months, maybe even years.

He smiled anyway. "Just fine." It took more effort than he felt it should to tear his eyes away from Malfoy's, but he managed it, and turned his forced smile to Remus. "How has the research been going, Remus?"

The werewolf's smile was tense, and he still refused to look at Sirius. "It's... progressing. I've found a few more leads, and Tonks and Kingsley are looking into them. If there's strong evidence that they're... genuine, then we'll let you know."

Harry nodded. "Thank you. I just don't want anybody else to, you know, suffer the effects."

Sirius glanced up sharply and spoke. "Suffer the effects of a poisonous potion or the betrayal of one of his own students?"

Remus sighed. "Don't, Sirius."

Harry glanced over at Malfoy. The blond's customary smirk had returned to his face, but there was a danger behind the ease of his pose. Harry briefly wondered where the coward he'd known had gone, where the arrogant but frightened boy had gone, and where this threatening man had come from.

"He's entitled to his opinion of me. As I am entitled to my opinion of him."

Oh fuck. Oh fuck and bloody fuck. It had been going so well for an entire seven minutes. And now...

"And what is your opinion of me, little ferret boy?"

Harry winced. He'd forgotten that he'd told Sirius that story. This could not possibly end well.

"I think that you're nothing more than a pathetic excuse for living. You don't know why you're here, you don't know what to do with yourself now you've come back, and you don't appear to even be a proper lap-dog for your werewolf lover over there."

Harry stood suddenly. "Malfoy, that's enough!"

"Oh no, please, let's keep going." Sirius was standing now, too, his roast and potatoes forgotten. "Please, keep going. Because I can totally respect the opinion of the little Death-Eater-that-could. Why the fuck are you even here? Go back to your charming group of friends—"

"Bitter that I actually managed to do something useful for my side, Black? Simply because the most useful thing you managed to do for the fucking Light was die? I imagine that must be rather disappointing."

Harry lunged forward and grabbed Sirius as he made to leap across the table at Malfoy. Remus rose from his seat as well, his hand deceptively relaxed about his wand.

"No, Sirius!" Harry shouted. "No! Leave it alone! You provoked him, he provoked you, we're all bloody even now! Just sit the fuck down and eat dinner!"

"I am not eating dinner with this—" Sirius broke off, as if searching for a word that could possibly describe the scum he felt Malfoy qualified as. "I'm not eating dinner with the boy who bends over for the Dark Lord."

Malfoy froze at these words, and his eyes were no longer angry. They were perfectly calm, but Harry thought he saw flashes of memory cross those grey pools as the blond leveled his gaze at Sirius. "And I'm not eating dinner with a dead man who bends over for a half-breed."

Harry stared after Malfoy as the Slytherin swept from the room. What the fuck was that about? Harry was quite certain that he hadn't really understood what had gone on in those last few insults, though now that he saw Remus's flushed cheeks and Sirius's furious expression he was pretty sure he had more of an idea than he really wanted to.

He sighed. Not even one fucking dinner. What was Malfoy doing to his life?

Angrily stalked from the room, determined to find Malfoy and—he wasn't quite sure yet. Make him apologize? Shout at him? Beat him to a bloody pulp? He didn't know. In fact, he was quite certain that when it came to Malfoy he didn't know anything anymore.

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Draco halted momentarily at the top of the stairs, wishing he had something other than the objects in his own room to destroy. He could, of course, go to Potter's room and ruin every inch of that, but he was quite sure that he did not want to be anywhere near the place Potter slept and showered and—did whatever else he did.

True, he could also destroy things in the other rooms, but as not quite all of the rooms were curse-free, and only a handful of the many rooms were inhabitable, he did not really want to take chances with his life and extremities because of a tantrum.

Fucking Black. Draco shook with fury he hadn't known in a long time, adrenaline coursing through his body. He had wanted to punch something, to hit something, to take out everything he'd felt for the last year on somebody who probably didn't really deserve it. Though in Draco's mind the simple fact that Black was alive was probably reason enough.

That accusation had been... it had been something so horrible that Draco had never even considered it before. He had thought, at one time, that such a thing might be one of his punishments for failing, as the pain without any preparation was really quite extreme, but fortunately or unfortunately for him, it hadn't been the Dark Lord to carry out that particular part of his punishment. He wasn't sure the Dark Lord had even been aware of that little... additional atonement for his crimes.

A memory assaulted him, a laughing face and eyes that were eager and full of hatred, and hands pulling at him and the sting of a slap across his face, and the burning agony of a knife against his skin. He opened his eyes and one of his hands stole into his shirt. He had been careful to cover the scars when he had escaped.

Shakily, he leaned his head against the wall. It was strange that the one coherent thing he had managed to do after escaping, other than come here with knowledge that Snape had give him, was to cover the evidence of his punishment.

"Malfoy!" A harsh voice invaded his thoughts. Speaking of punishments...

He opened his eyes. "What the fuck do you want?"

Potter's green eyes narrowed in anger. "Do you really have to ask that question? What the fuck was that about at dinner?"

The Slytherin raised an eyebrow, trying hard to look indifferent. "I'm fairly certain that I was being insulted, Potter, and then retaliating." He drew back from his position against the wall and folded his arms across his chest, carefully drawing himself up to his full height, which, though the difference was not significant, was definitely greater than Potter's.

Dark hair shivered slightly as the brunette shook his head. "You couldn't manage to be decent for one fucking meal. That's all I asked of you! It shouldn't have come as a surprise to you that he provoked you, after what you've done! So why didn't you just—"

"Why didn't I just what, Potter?" Draco demanded indignantly. "Let him insult me some more, let him make accusations about me that aren't and have never been true? Let him belittle me?"

When Potter spoke next, his voice was quiet. "I thought that you would have the maturity and balls to let it go."

Draco let out a soft laugh, one that he had learned from his father. "Let it go. You'll find, Potter, that letting things go is not something I'm good at, nor are you as far as I can tell. I realize that you expected a week in your presence to make a wonderful person out of my dark ways, but I feel I should inform you, Harry, that I haven't changed. I'm not going to sit there and be insulted," his voice was suddenly nearly a whisper, "I'm not going to lie down for anything ever again."

He noticed that Potter's eyes had widened again when he called him Harry, just as they had during the rather brief conversation at dinner, and he took a step closer. "Well, Potter?" As he spoke those words, he had a flashback to his first night in this place, when he had opened his eyes in hazy pleasure at the feeling of those hands washing him, and asked the same question.

Now, Potter simply studied him for a moment, his face carefully blank. "You know," he said finally, "I think I liked it better when he hated each other."

Draco blinked. What the fuck? Potter turned away and began walking down the long hall to his room. What the fuck? What kind of fucking answer was that? An irrational anger filled him, for all he had been through, for the thorn that Potter had been in his side since he was small, for the indignity of having to be cared for by the fucking Boy-Who-For-Some-Reason-He-Could-Not-Hate.

He strode quickly after the other man and grabbed him by the shoulder, spinning him around. Potter looked curiously at him, and Draco smirked. "Potter," he nodded, and with a swift movement of his arm, punched the Gryffindor in the face.

Harry stumbled back, clutching his cheek where Draco's knuckles had collided. The blond was pleased to see the shock turn to fury and the green eyes light up with it, burn with it. With a sound that closely resembled a snarl, Potter had launched himself at the taller man, tackling him to the ground with surprising strength. Draco felt a fist smash into his face just above his lip, and a splitting pain as another fist connected with his jawbone.

Draco deftly pushed the other boy over, straddling his hips so that he couldn't get away. With a small smirk of satisfaction, slightly marred by the blood dripping from his mouth, he sent another fist into the Golden Boy's face. Potter struck back, and in the flurry of fists and legs and the continual vying for control by pushing the other onto his back, Draco could feel some of his anger being satisfied, finally being taken out on somebody instead of being locked up inside and building and boiling. This was it, he was taking it out on his lifelong enemy, the one who had caused it all.

Suddenly he was on his back, and the smaller man was straddling his own hips, gripping his thighs with strong legs. Draco's arms were pinned above his head by one hand, and the other held Potter's wand to his throat.

"Enough." The single word came out as a gasp, and Draco noticed that Potter's nose was rather bloody, and his cheek and jaw were swollen in more than one place, and there was a slight tear in his shirt where a hint of golden skin peeked through.

There was silence for several moments, and Draco noticed with more than a little humiliation that certain parts of him were rather enjoying Potter's closeness. He gritted his teeth and willed himself to calm down, but the other man shifted slightly on top of him and instead his breath caught in his throat. Green eyes bore into his own, and a strange glint that he hadn't seen before appeared in Harry's eyes as he shifted again. Draco noticed with a certain amount of shock that he was not the only on enjoying their current position.

With one swift movement, Draco pushed the other man off him and got to his feet. Potter was still on the floor, looking strangely more beautiful than Draco had ever seen him, even with his face bloody and panting on the ground.

"I—" he began, but closed his mouth as he honestly didn't know what to say.

Potter smiled at him, a cross between a genuine smile and a smirk. "You punch pretty well, Malfoy, for a woman." He held up a hand as Draco opened his mouth furiously and continued, "And I have to wonder..." he trailed off and his expression suddenly became serious again. "Did you like it better when we hated each other?"

Draco opened and closed his mouth, still staring down at Potter. Then, with a small sound of frustration, he turned in the opposite direction and strode to his room.

Once inside, he slammed the door, wondering why all his aggression had suddenly returned.

One thing he knew, whatever was going on between Potter and himself, was quickly getting out of hand.

A/N: Ah, the continuing tension. I'll probably have the next one up in about a week. And do you know what I'd love? Some more REVIEWS!!!