Chapter Nine

The First Full Moon

Lupin looked liked crap. If it wasn't for that, Draco may have forgotten altogether about the fact that he was a dirty animal. That and he overheard them talking about the full moon, though he pretended that he didn't. They were wondering what they were going to do with him. He hated that he actually wanted to make things easier on them.

Living the last three weeks in Gryffindor was odd. The level of camaraderie was almost enchanting. Or it would have been if one didn't know the marauders were harboring a rat and two of the sixth year boys turn deatheater.

For now he lay on his bed in the red in gold hell and listened to Potter the senior give excuses about Lupin having to visit his sick mother. He didn't know where the other three had gotten off to. James must have drawn the short straw. Or it was just he was the best liar. Peter stuttered worse than Longbottom when lying, Black turned all red faced and well Lupin really had looked like crap while going down to breakfast.

Draco just nodded and decided to change the subject. "Have you decided when you are holding the quidditch trials?"

"They are coming up in the next week or so. You said you played, are you going to try out?"

"Which positions are open?" Draco asked though he doubted he would actually play. No matter how much he missed the game, red was just not his color.

"None really. We have the entire team that played last year but since four of us are graduating this year, we are going to have to put together some reserve players or the house will be screwed next year."

"I thought you were the only one in the dorm who played."

"I am... now. Sirius was one of our beaters but he got into some trouble during fifth year and was banned from the team."
"So how can four people be graduating?"

"They're girls idiot. The other chasers, the keeper and the seeker. Drives Lily crazy being surrounded by all those quidditch players."

"Lots of things drive Lily crazy."

"So I've noticed. You ready to go down to lunch?"

"I'm meeting up with the others."

"Why do you give up every Saturday to people you say you hate?"

"I don't know but I might not come back tonight. You know Scarhead has that private room, I think I'll just hang out there."

"You hate him."

"Yes I do." Draco thought that for as often as he thought it, it would be nice if it were true. But it was hard to hate someone who he owed a life debt to. "Anyway, Hannah and Luna aren't so bad."

"Which are you shagging?"

"How do you know it's not both?" Draco wiggled his eyebrows. "Tell the other guys, I'll see them tomorrow."

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So far, this Saturday lunch was going pretty much exactly like the two previous. The other six were all filling each other in on the gossip and crap that he really didn't care about. They sat around the conference table in Founder's suite. The chair to his right was the only empty one at the table. Hannah sat to his left.

"I have to go and harvest some mooncalf dung. Would you like to go with me tonight?" Longbottom said to Hannah, "I went and talked to Hagrid and he said there is a whole herd of then that live in the glen in the forest."

"Now there is a romantic date. Hey, would you like to go pick up some shit with me." Draco imitated Neville's soft stutter. "Wait, you can't."

"Excuse me?"

"Tonight's the full moon."

"Yes, I know. That is when you harvest mooncalf dung." Longbottom said as if to a small child.

"And who is it I share a dorm with? Snape told me those stories of them out roaming the forest."

"Crap, he's right. It isn't safe for you, Neville." Potter agreed.

"But I promised the Herbology Professor I would do it."

"You're not even in Herbology." Weasley said.

"You're not on the quidditch team but you were out flying yesterday."

"Had to use a school broom, too. It was awful."

That led into a long conversation about quidditch that Draco tuned out. He had finished eating was about to get up to go to the lab when Granger actually brought the conversation around to what they were supposed to be discussing.

"I finished comparing out timelines. The problem is that none of us remember any specific details about attacks and stuff. I mean Moody once showed Harry a picture of the original order of the phoenix and told Harry what happened to each of them but not the when and where. Like we know Fabian and Gideon die but we can't exactly follow them around to try and stop it."

"So what do you suggest? After all, Weasley said that you could actually kill the dark lord." Draco said. After everything that bastard put his family through Draco truly wanted him dead. Preferably, very painfully.

The trio looked at each other giving off those annoying, 'we know each other so well we don't need words' vibes. Potter just nodded and started talking, "Do any of you know what a Horcrux is?"

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Draco bottled up the potion carefully. Sirius wanted to prank the OWL years as school had barely started and they were already starting to get on everyone's nerves. It wasn't anything too bad. Just a simple color change potion. So simple that working on it had kept Draco's hands busy while he thought over the Dungbomb of information that had been thrown at them after lunch.

Voldemort was crazy. No doubt about it. That he had done something so dark as split his soul wasn't surprising. That he had a muggle father was. All that time, all that talk, his father knew it. Potter said that the night Voldemort returned, his dad was there, and Voldemort had talked about his muggle father.

Draco crossed to the sink to wash any potion residue from his hands then rubbed the small of his back. It was late. He was glad he wasn't returning to the dorm tonight, he really was sick to death of red. He moved to Slytherin's bedroom. Potter was asleep in the large bed.

Draco would have closed the door but he caught sight of his mother in the viewing pane. She was sitting in the Slytherin common room talking to Regulus and Severus. Draco quietly moved into the room over to the picture. He ran is fingers down the glass. He missed his mother so much. He had tried to talk to her but she was overly polite and then moved off. She wasn't his mother.

Potter made a distressed sort of sound in his sleep and Draco turned toward the bed. Potter's hair was thrown back over the pillow and his scar shown clearly on his forehead even with only the low light from the viewing window shining through the room. Draco didn't realize he had moved closer to the bed till his knee brushed the coverlet. Potter was gorgeous. He looked so much better now that he wasn't wearing those awful glasses. There were three empty potion bottles on the night stand. He lifted one to smell. Dreamless Sleep. If he had taken this, he shouldn't be moving or dreaming. Potter shifted again. Maybe these bottles were old. Even incompetent here should know you can't take the potion that often. Draco wanted to reach out and touch his scar. It had always fascinated him. Potter rolled over and Draco moved out of the room.

Red and Gold it is.

Or not. As Longbottom was already asleep there snoring loudly and sprawled all out covering the whole bed.

He then tried Ravenclaw but Weasley and Granger were curled up around each other. Ugh. That was so something he could have lived his entire life without seeing.

Hufflepuff was the only choice left and while yellow was worse than red, a bed was a bed. And that bed was occupied also. Hannah and Luna also slept. There was a large space in between them and Draco wondered what they would do if he just crawled up between them. They were definitely a better option than Longbottom.

Hell, he wasn't really all that tired. He moved out and closed the door slowly. Maybe he would just read. He went over the door that lead to Ravenclaw's study and went up the stairs to her tower room. Next to the potions lab, this was his favorite room in the Founder's Suite.

It had large comfortable couches and walls lined with books on every subject. Though now that he was up here, he didn't really feel like reading. He moved out to the balcony that ran around the circumference of the tower. Several telescopes were set up along the walkway but Draco just moved to the battlements and stared down at the lake.

He was glad he didn't scream in fright when someone touched his shoulder but he did almost jump over. "Luna! I didn't hear you come in."

She moved to stand beside him, "You don't have to avoid me. Or isolate yourself so much. If you gave us a chance, you might even like us. Or at least some of us."

Draco couldn't bring himself to look in those too big eyes of hers, "I don't see me being friends with Potter."

"I don't see you even trying to be. That's where you are going wrong."

"You've never told them about what happened, did you?" He asked quietly.

"Why would I?"

"So they could beat me to a pulp and splash in the puddles of my blood."

"I've never held you responsible for what happened, Draco. I thought you knew that. You and your mother protected me as best as you could."

"I don't understand where this forgiveness is coming from. If I had been the prisoner I would plan out a wondrous revenge plan."

"You were as much a prisoner as me. Look, a falling star. Did you make a wish."

"A wish... I don't know what I'd wish for." The night was cold. His breath made little puffs of clouds. A thestral soared up above the canopy of the forest before flying back into the thick woods. "When I was little all I had to do was wish for something and my parents would get it for me. Once the Dark Lord came back, no matter how hard I wished for anything, it all went to shit. I could wish us home but I don't think I want to go back, ever. Live when all those people are dead. Be sent to Azkaban. Have to look my father in the eye. I feel like everything he told me about our world was a lie. I like it better here. I wish my seventh year had been like this. Fighting with Potter. Pranking the underclassmen. Playing Quidditch. I wish we never had to have a war. I wish I had never had to hurt you." Draco couldn't believe the words that were tumbling from his mouth. These were things he had never said even to himself. He could feel the tears running down his face but he didn't try to wipe them away.

"You were a much better option than Dolohov. I was so happy when Harry and the others got me out before Dolohov came back to take up where he left off."

"He couldn't have. Mother slipped an impotence potion into his tea."

"I do like your mother."

Luna lay down on the stone balcony and crossed her arms across her chest. Draco moved into the study and got a couple pillows and a throw blanket. He went back out and handed one of the pillows to Luna before lying down next to her and covering them both with the blanket but being careful not to touch her.

"Why are we here, Loony?"

"I don't know. But I like here, too. It's weird being in Hufflepuff. They really are that nice. No one in Ravenclaw was ever that nice to me. The only real friends I ever had were Ginny, Harry and the others."

"I never had any real friends at all. Just people who wanted my influence, or protection."

"I told you. Try with Harry, Hermione and Neville. They are great."

"I notice you didn't name Weasel."

"Harry and Hermione first. Ron will be a hard case, even I'm not so out of it to know that. Actually, he may be the reason the Puffs are so nice to me. The first night in the dorm, one of the boys didn't like a story I was telling about the pink skinned enrumpt. Ron stood up for me and told the guy to back off. Haven't had a single problem in the house since then."

Draco was glad that she had someone to protect her, "Not exactly cute and fluffy is he?"

"No, but he is fierce and loyal. Like a good Hufflepuff should be. Get him on your side and you'll never get rid of him."

"That almost sounded like a threat."

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A/N I have quite a bit to do this weekend so probably won't have time to work on this till next week. Next wed at the absolute latest.

Hope you like it. The conversation between Luna and Draco came as a surprise to me too. I love it when the characters I'm writing about reveal secrets even I didn't know.