JKR owns HP, I just pwn. Got it:P

Ch 7 Trust Issues

Draco woke up for what felt like the hundredth time in the smallish stone-walled room, whose only door led to a bathroom. He poked his head out from under the plain blanket, trying to look around without being seen. He was alone. All alone. When he realized that Potter wasn't in evidence, the memory of his previous awakening hit him. How many levels of hell was he going to go through in this place? First the drunken night, which was still pretty fuzzy, then the morning after...

He remembered very clearly, dashing into the other room, he remembered puking, he remembered Potter walking in. Potter, who found The Draco Malfoy hefting for all he was worth, and crying.

Oh, god, he thought. If my father knew Potter had seen me like that... he couldn't finish the thought. There'd be a special kind of hell. The very idea caused fear to flood his veins. Not fear of death, or even physical punishment, but the terror that always accompanied his father's frequent rejection of him. Any deviation from perfection amounted to disgracing his entire family.

And in a Malfoy mind, getting so drunk he was unable to control himself and in front of an enemy, well... Death first, was supposed to be the response to that. Hell, the way they talked about it to Draco, it was literal; like they were actually going to die if such a thing happened. Whenever that crossed his mind unbidden, he tried to tell himself he didn't believe it, but he did. Just a little, but it felt real.

He could imagine Potter's reaction to this – There'd be a snide remark about not being able to hold his liquor, then some mock-puking, and as soon as they got out of this stupid room, he'd tell every one of his lame friends. Draco would never hear the end of it.

So what do I do now? He was all by himself. He could strike first, make sure he got the first attack, so anything Potter said would be just retaliation. He could act like it never happened at all, blame it on the fire whiskey Potter drank, call it an hallucination, or something. Where was Potter?

One more time the events rolled over his mind. Potter walking in, saying something, the Draco had screamed at him to leave. Overcome by his own misery, Draco had hidden his face. His brain had felt like it was being sqeezed by a metal band, and it was made twice as bad by the puking and crying. When he'd looked up, there was a bottle and a cup. Potter must have been the one to bring it in. Come to think of it, he didn't remember getting the blanket, just waking up with it, and thanks to the pills, his headache was almost completely gone. There was just an echo of it.

Where was Potter, anyway? The question had been repeating itself in his mind since he'd woken up. He must be in the bathroom, Draco reasoned. But then a terrible thought occurred to him. What if he'd escaped? What if a door appeared while Draco was asleep, and Potter had left him here to rot all alone? The more he thought about it, the more possible it seemed. After all, just because they'd been civil so far, didn't mean that the Gryffindor boy had forgiven Draco for all of the things that had passed between them over the years. Working himself unconsiously into a panic, Draco leapt up and rushed for the bathroom door. If he was stuck here alone, maybe forever, he'd go insane. He knew that, with a certainty that scared the hell out of him. If I'm all by myself, I'll die, I know I will...

"Potter!" He yelled, throwing open the door and plunging through. "Potter!"

Harry heard the yell, and instantly dove for his towel. He wasn't quite fast enough.

"Potter! Harry!" Draco whipped the curtain aside. There was Harry, frozen in shock in the act of picking up the towel. Draco's face went through an almost comical progression of emotions. The first expression of panic gave way to almost a full two seconds of relief and joy, until he realized that Harry was stark naked, and dripping wet. Then his eyes widened and his jaw dropped.

Harry finished his grab and deftly swung the towel around his waist, holding it closed with one hand. "Is-is something wrong?" he stuttered.

"You're still here," said Draco his voice falling away. His brain had shut down completely. He could only think of why he'd come in to the bathroom shouting in the first place. Then he began to process again, and his face flushed, all the way down his neck. "I'll wait outside." He turned and walked unsteadily out of the bathroom again. Draco sat down on a bare patch of floor with his face in his hands. This was just too much.

"Good grief," muttered Harry as he hurriedly dried himself. This was just not his day. Draco was probably still mad about the whole hangover thing, and now he had seen Harry naked. Great. Once he was in the plain brown clothes the Room had provided, he hesitated. What was he supposed to do now? How was he supposed to respond? It wasn't deliberate, that seemed clear. Draco had obviously been upset about something when he burst in. Harry wondered at himself, that finding out what had bothered Draco meant more to him than being exposed to the other boy. Well, it was just another thing that would have to wait until later, when there was time to sort all this out. Harry sighed. The list was getting rather long, for all that there seemed to be nothing but time in this place.

So what to do now?

Harry decided to just see what was going on with Draco, and figure it out from there. He walked through the door and saw the blond boy holding his head again. Here was the first question. Sit down near, or far? Harry's stomach did a somersault. He felt heat flowing up through his innards and surfacing in his neck and face. Lifting his chin, a bit defiant of his body's bizarre behavior, he sat down on the bare floor an arms length away from Draco.

"Are you okay?" Harry hated the stupid question; if you have to ask, isn't the answer usually no? But it made for a comfortable ritual, or as comfortable as a situation like this could get. There was no response. Harry tried a different tack. "What did you mean, you're still here?"

"I thought you might have left me here alone," muffled but understandable.

A little shocked, Harry said, "I wouldn't do that!"

Draco lifted his head. His eyes were reddened, but dry. "Wouldn't you? If I've been so terrible, and then this morning…" he stopped.

Harry had to be honest. "The Draco Malfoy who enjoys watching me being harassed by teachers, the one who calls my friends names and treats people with contempt I might have left here. You've been so different since we got stuck here…"

A bitter laugh interrupted him. "Sure. In here I'm a drunk, and I puked my guts out, crying like a baby, and then I freak out and walk in and…" He stalled again, color rising in his cheeks like a thermometer. Turning his face away, he muttered "I'm surprised I've survived at all."

"What does that mean?" asked Harry, not displeased with the chance to avoid the scene in the bathroom a bit longer. "Is this sort of thing fatal for you?"

"It might as well be," said Draco, an edge to his voice. "There's a long list of things which the Malfoy family could be destroyed by, and if I do any of them, I might just drop dead to keep them from being discovered."

This surprised Harry a bit. Maybe the Malfoy arrogance wasn't genetic, but conditioned. "Do you want to talk about it?"

"Why should I? You have already made up your mind about me anyway."

"How can you say that? Didn't you hear me just a minute ago tell you that I already think differently of you?"

Draco scoffed but said nothing, his eyes still averted.

"I told you things the other night that even my friends don't know about, not in detail. Do you remember any of it?" Harry asked, leaning forward. After Draco nodded, he continued. "I allow myself to change my mind. Even if others never do, I am willing to listen. Besides," Harry laughed, "we can swear that whatever is said in this place won't be mentioned to anyone out there. Would that help?"

"Not an Unbreakable Vow," Draco said at once. Anything that could kill you for speaking was too dangerous to play with.

"Certainly not," agreed Harry, although his only memory of that particular spell was a warning in his Charms textbook. "There ought to be something less severe, but still effective. Could you talk to me, really talk, if there was something like that?"

Draco hesitated. But what did he have to lose, really? There was no getting out of here; at least, not yet. And he needed to talk to somebody. Once he realized this fact, he could feel it physically, like a fist closing around his throat. Only his fear and suspicion kept him from spilling it all out right now, and if a spell could fix that, why not?

"Fine, we'll do that," said Draco. Then he added, trying to add some of his old bravado into his attitude, "although I don't see why you're so interested."

"Good," Harry said with a smile. He stood and glanced around the room. Sure enough, a small bookshelf had appeared on the blank wall where the door had been, what, two days ago? Had it been so long, or so little time ago? Apparently the Room of Requirement could be helpful, but it just wasn't interested in letting them go.

The bookcase itself was old, and not very well made. It had one shelf in the middle, allowing for two rows of books, but it was only about half full, and the dusty tomes were leaning this way and that as if trying to fill the spaces. Harry ran his finger through the dust on the spine of a book titled Underground Creature Identification by Caradoc McClaive. Glancing at the rest of the titles, he spotted a thin volume bound in green leather called Let No One Hear: A Practical Wizard's Guide to Secret Keeping.

"Perfect!" Harry exclaimed. This could also be a useful book for the Order of the Phoenix, if there was anything in here that hadn't been tried already. "Here's just the book we need." He flipped through the first couple of chapters until his eyes were caught by a mention of the Fidelius charm. That was the spell his parents and Dumbledore had used, trying to keep his family safe. Very advanced, and not quite right for the current enterprise. He skipped ahead again, turning pages quickly.

"Hey, what about that one?" Draco's voice, almost directly in Harry's ear, made Harry jump. He hadn't realized that the blond boy had come up right behind him to read over his shoulder. Now that he knew Draco was there, though, he could feel the presence on his left side as a heat source. Harry's page turning became a bit erratic as he tried to find the one Draco had stopped him on.

"There it is," said Draco, reaching out to tap the page. He never made contact with Harry's shoulder, scrupulously staying an inch or two away from touching.

"Yeah, this one," Harry read the title of the spell. "Fidelentium, and we can limit it to this place. It needs both of us to work part of it. But it's not too advanced, is it?"

In spite of himself, Draco swallowed hard. The spell would make it so that neither of them could speak of anything that happened or was said in this place, without agreeing that it could be spoken. He was running out of ways to dodge talking. Fear surged up in him again; what would Potter think if he knew all of it, the whole truth? Could he even speak of it himself, after so long believing that no one wanted to hear anything he had to say? The fear rolled up through his body, but it met that new knot in his throat. His father's voice floated across Draco's mind. "Malfoys are not afraid; they will always do what they must, or die trying!" For once, it seemed to be the right thing to hear.

"Let's do the spell, and maybe this stupid room will feed us, I'm starving."

Harry laughed in agreement, and Draco smiled back. They read the directions in the book carefully, then followed the directions. They sat on the ground facing each other, almost knee to knee. In their right hands they held their wands, and they joined twined the fingers of their left hands together. At exactly the same moment, they tapped each other on the forehead with their wands and shouted the spell word.

"Fidelentio!" There was a flash of yellow light.

X x X

Definitely my longest chapter. So much is internal, I hope it's interesting, or at least understandable. Harry's taking this all awfully calmly, don't you think? What's up with that? Don't ask me, I'm just channelling this stuff. Once again, I put out the call for Reviews, even if it's a simple, "Meh." I'll keep writing till it's done, but it's a bit disheartening. So props to Arwen-Evenstar-Elf, Lucy Maimkill, and unforgivable curse caster, who have reviewed. Check out their stuff too, while you're add it, but be civil, please. I try not to do chapter-by chapter author's notes dissecting the story, but I'm planning to do one at the end. Thanks for making it this far with me!