Somewhere Only We Know

by Kris RL

Summer of 6th year? The wizarding world is at war with itself, and secrets, hidden pasts, biological fathers, staged deaths, broomstick rescues, band T-shirts, funerals, stifled laughter, new truths, and an old rivalry's new best friendship come into play

15. A Prophecy? A Cure? An Answer

Disclaimer: The story plot and the original characters are mine. You know what belongs to J.K., and so do I! The only thing intended with this story is for entertainment purposes.

Spoilers: I'll say the first 5 books, just to be on the safe side!

Somewhere Only We Know

Chapter Fifteen

A Prophecy? A Cure? An Answer.

Draco swallowed. His father was far gone—far, far, far gone. In place of him was a drunk man, whose guard was down. How much he had had to drink, Draco was unsure. He had seen the empty bottle of Firewhiskey, of course, but hadn't an idea if Cornwell had been the one to drink it all. Cornwell's face spoke volumes of his lack of sleep—tears, too. Yes, lots of wretched tears, and red cheekbones flushed over whiter, paler skin than had ever existed beneath those cheekbones on his father, which were so similar to his own. He stared, as Cornwell sat down on a shiny, dark wood grand piano-bench, which accompanied an empty, apparently, lonely piano the room held. It must have been some sort of hobby-lounge. It was filled with books and musical instruments, some of which were strung up on the walls. The place looked like it hadn't been fully used in years.

Draco shook his head, silently. He had found that he couldn't bring himself to speak.

Cornwell only continued to stare at his son, his eyes glazed over, "Ask me now or never ask me, again."

Draco turned away from him and faced a bookshelf, "There's part of me that wants to forget you or who you are."

"That's quite understandable, Draco, and if you would let me, I'd explain the situation."

"There is nothing that could justify why everyone kept you from Harry. He is dead, you know."

"Dead is one thing Harry is not, Draco. Not until he's defeated Voldemort—"

"That's not all he is, you know. He's a person, too." He turned his eyes over his shoulder, before he could stop himself, and he fixed a very set, pointed glare at his father, as if he must have forgotten that Harry was not just a thing. Everyone seemed to think that Harry was a thing, even though no one had ever specifically treated Harry like that in front of Draco. Draco was just drawing conclusions, by himself. If there was no other reason for his conclusion, it could be explained in just the fact that they had toyed with Harry Potter, brought him back to life in a different body, just so he could go and defeat Voldemort—they hadn't even let him die, peacefully. Peacefully, and with his parents.

"You're preaching to the wrong choir, Draco. I know perfectly well that he is human, as I've told this to myself since I was twenty years old. If you think, for an instant, that I've not had dreams about this—nightmares, even—being kept from Harry, from you, from everyone, you are mad—which would make you easily more of my son than you usually are, but, you must understand that I do care about Harry, Draco. I don't look at him the way you're insinuating. Maybe other people do—Dumbledore, included, and I acknowledge it."

Draco stared at the meaningless and wordless book titles his eyes were blindly searching, "There is no justification."

"I know that, Draco. Don't act as if I am below your level of intellect. I am not a heartless bastard, and if I've done something, solely, to you, in your life, to make you feel as if I am, then I feel I've failed in everything."

Draco turned around, immediately, shocked at what had left Cornwell's mouth, "I don't act as if you are below me—"

"You're suggesting that I went into this not caring it was going to, potentially, cost Harry his life."

Draco turned his back, again, immediately, feeling extremely emotional. The way his father was talking to him was breaking his heart. He was the most sincere, genuine, loving, beautiful person—man, at least—in the world. The way he spoke cut into Draco's body, into his heart, into his soul, like a clear, hot, sharp knife. It only pained him because he had been separated from the truth of his own father for so long. He didn't know if he could handle whatever it was. If it was not a good reason, Draco didn't want to become bitter with Cornwell. He loved Cornwell so much that it hurt him, physically. He wanted to share so much. He wanted to grab onto Cornwell's arm, one morning, and beg him to play Quidditch like they used to—in the rain, so they could be muddy—a favorite past-time of Draco's. He wanted to know nothing and everything at the same time, but he could no decide. Back and forth, back and forth, went his mind.

"You did cost him his life."

"No, I have not, Draco," Cornwell softly murmured. It was very quiet.

Draco cast his father a skeptical look, standing in front of the book-case, sideways, "His physical body, Cornwell."

Cornwell only nodded, once, as if to let Draco know he had already comprehended that point, "He's not dead, Draco."

"Not spiritually."

"Not at all, Draco. His body is fine. It's still existing. He's still breathing—cold and lifeless, but still very much alive."

Draco rushed away from the book-case, at last, and sat down, on his knees, on an ottoman, leaning over it to be closer to his father, to make sure that he had heard right, his eyes widened with awe—and, a bit of danger. Was it possible? It couldn't have been! But, could it? Potter! Back in Potter's body? The thrill rushed through him, and he tried to imagine the look on Harry's face when he found out, but he could not even begin to process it in his brain, "But, I saw him at his funeral, Cornwell. He was lifeless, and cold, and he wasn't breathing—"

"He was breathing, Draco. You just couldn't feel it. There was a spell cast to prevent his chest from rising and falling."

Draco's dried lips parted to an astonished flaw, and he just stared, dumbfounded, "Can he... can he... can he ever—"

"It will depend on if he defeats Voldemort, Draco, and how. If he dies, as Judas, he will die, completely, as Judas."

"Judas—I... If Harry is in Judas's body, where is Judas?"

Cornwell hesitated, but then glanced at Draco, who was just staring him down and waiting, impatiently, for things that he should have been told, at least, weeks earlier. So, he gave in with one very tortured sigh, and he began to ring his hands together. "This is the tricky part, Draco—Judas is in Harry's body—with a weak soul. He was actually hit that night, along with his mother and brother. His soul was not strong enough to carry on with his body after he was hit, so to keep Harry's body... warm, for a lack of a better explanation, Judas was put there, and Harry's soul was as strong as ever, so we put him in Judas, because we could bring him back—therefore, neither will die if things go as hoped. Before we brought either back, they were existing on some open eternal plane—where they had the chance to discuss what we could not with them. What was said, I don't know. But, Judas gave his consent to go forth. He probably still existing on that plane, very much alone and with absolutely nothing to do."

"You mean, he's... he's... not..." Not alive? Not well? Half-way there? Just not dead? Just existing, in the world? Not conscious or well, or able to think or exist, mentally. This news dragged him down, but the news that Harry's body was still somewhere, out there, being taken care of, was amazing. The idea of Harry defeating Voldemort suddenly overpowered Draco. With a great leap of relief, he jumped off of the ottoman he was sitting on, on his knees, and stood up. He clutched his face between his hands, his eyes searching the wooden floors. And, he swore, as he stood there, god-damnit, if it was the last thing he did, he would make sure Harry killed the bastard of a... a... thing—Voldemort! What a sick bastard! How little he knew! How little he knew. Of course, Draco knew even less, but he knew that Harry Potter was going to be extremely determined and re-inspired to defeat the dark lord— "Why did you get angry with Lucius for taking us into dream-state?"

Draco turned around, again, to his father, and dropped his hands to his sides, where he lightly squeezed.

"Voldemort easily could have sensed you, Draco. If he made no avail of it, perhaps not. I don't doubt that he ever thought Lucius would betray him by bringing others into dream-state, and to there, of all places." Draco walked around the ottoman, this time, and he sat down across from his father, heavily, with a completely straight face. Cornwell continued. "Dream-state is beyond dangerous. It's never guaranteed that anyone will come out of dream-state alive. It's so difficult to create, to begin with. It takes years and years of personal visualizing to even begin to create that sort of place. Men and women can get stuck in dream-state. In your case, you better count each one of your lucky stars that he didn't find you and murder you on the spot. Lucius was protected. You were not. You wouldn't have been able to come out of that in your right mind. You would have been altered in ways I can't even describe to you—no more trips into dream-state, Draco, and if someone ever tries to pull you back into his dream-state—including Voldemort, himself—you get out of there."

Draco's eyebrows furrowed. Hell, he was alone with his father. He could act however he wanted to. He could stand up and start screaming the lyrics to old rock songs. He didn't have an image to uphold to anyone. It was them, alone, and Draco wanted his answers. He wanted his world to be solved in one sentence. In two sentences! In three! Or four! He just wanted something more, to his current situation in live, than just what he had. He took in a deep breath, clapped his hands together, soundlessly, and leaned forward a bit. At last, he breathed, "Okay."

Cornwell just continued to watch Draco, with his hands folded. He was waiting, patiently, and in no apparent rush.

Draco hesitated, and then quietly murmured, "Voldemort wants me."

Cornwell wasn't nearly as shy or careful about it. Draco knew it was probably because he had had way too much to drink, which did make him seem a bit more human. He seemed so much more innocent than usual, just idly gazing at Draco and giving Draco the lead to ask or not ask. They were just sitting there, and that was all it had to be if that's how far Draco wanted the hostage-situation to go. He had free-reign over what he was going to be told, "That's an understatement. He more than wants you."

Draco found strange, odd undertones in his father's voice, "Care to elaborate?"

"No. I'll answer what you want me to answer. To elaborate would waste your time, tonight."

"Fine," Draco gave in, just as quickly, his voice eager and fast, "does he need me?"

The side of Cornwell's mouth twitched, "No, he desires you. He desires your power and possible loyalty to him--"

"Why."

There, point blank, straight from his entire point of existence, which seemed to be almost clear of static.

Cornwell blinked.

Draco refused to blink until he had an answer.

Cornwell cleared his throat and leaned forward, over his knees, motioning Draco in with his fingertip, "Are you sure you want to hear this?"

Draco leaned in, until the tips of their noses were only about an inch apart. He swallowed instead of answering.

Cornwell opened up his left palm and offered it out, "Give me your hand."

Draco rested his right hand down, immediately, in his father's huge palm. It was a palm that Draco's was similar to, "Memory or something?"

"No," Cornwell chuckled, thought uneasily, as his hand tightly wrapped around Draco's, "just want to make sure you don't flee."

Draco nearly saw a gigantic question mark, flashing with red warning lights around it, flash in front of his eyes.

God, flee? Cornwell thought he would flee after hearing the news? Well, it wasn't far-fetched, "Just tell me."

Cornwell stared into his eyes, "Draco, you know I love you."

Draco nodded, once, and felt a strong blush in his cheeks, "Yeah."

"And, you know I never wanted to hurt you in any way, at all."

"Yeah."

"And, to let Voldemort near you would make my skin burn."

"Yeah."

"I'd feel murderous. You're not ever to repeat what I tell you, unless it's to Harry, do you understand?"

"Yes."

"You and Dickie are the most important things in my life."

Draco felt on the verge of tears. Cornwell was whispering so softly, staring at him with such love, "I know."

God-damnit, he didn't know! He knew, but he didn't know! He knew Cornwell loved him! He knew he was important to Cornwell, but having Cornwell sitting there, holding his hand, staring into the deepest part of Draco's unrestricted soul, ripped and shredded at the core of his heart. It was raw. It was real. Being reaffirmed, by Cornwell, about anything and everything, in Draco's twisted, brilliant life, meant the world to him. It was just in the way that Cornwell stared at him, though his eyes were a bit glassy. Draco decided he didn't know whether to chalk the shininess up as result of alcohol or the result of Cornwell being slightly tearful to tell Draco what he had been trying to get to telling him—which, apparently, he was very hesitant about just blurting out.

"At Hogwarts, I was sorted into Slytherin."

Draco grinned a little, "Yes."

Cornwell paused, staring very intently at him. With caution, he continued, "By choice."

Draco squinted, "You were allowed to pick which house you wanted, right? Because you started Hogwarts so late?"

Cornwell nodded, "All right, give me your other hand."

Draco lowered his left hand into his father's right hand, and then both of his hands were being held, tightly.

"James—Potter—James Potter, he was born powerful. He had great talent—a natural."

Draco said nothing. Suddenly, he wished Harry was right beside him, just so Harry could hear what he hadn't ever, before.

"When Voldemort rose to his full power, I was only twenty or so. James and I were the best of friends, you know that." Cornwell paused. He seemed to become very solemn and sobered as he began to look down at his tightly squeezed hands, over his son's, for the right direction to begin in. He found Draco's eyes, once more, guiltily. "James knew something about me that no one knew, including me. He didn't know what it was until we were sixteen, when I first attended Hogwarts. He would look at me strangely, sometimes, when we would duel for fun. I'd look at him the same way."

Draco had no idea where the trip down memory-lane was taking them, but he didn't mind.

Cornwell didn't let his eyes move from Draco's hopeful, intent gray set, "After we discovered what we did, we kept it quiet."

Draco didn't bother to scoff or make a noise—he knew it was coming. A vampire? Werewolf? A prophecy? A curse?

"I suppose you know about the Order of the Phoenix..." After all, they were at Order headquarters. Draco simply nodded, without any hint or bit of sarcasm or smugness crossing over his features, nor his mind. Cornwell, in return, gave a slight smirk at himself and drew in a deep breath as he spoke. "James and I created the Order of the Phoenix when we were nineteen—it was an idea we had for fun, and Dumbledore made it official a year later after James blurted something out about it."

"You and... the Order... you and James? But... I mean, why? Why would... why would you be involved in that or this—now, here, right now?"

"I'm getting to that," Cornwell laughed, at Draco's tiny, tiny voice. He gave Draco's two hands another squeeze, and when he did, he got one right back. "Voldemort rose as the heir of Slytherin before he rose as Voldemort, the Dark Lord, and when he was at the top, the prophecy about Harry came about—a prophecy no one thought was known about until the night James and Lily were murdered... but, that wasn't true. No, that wasn't true at all."

Draco could hear his own heart pumping. His head gave a, most minute, tilt to the right, and he whispered, "What?"

"James knew about the prophecy at least two years before—just not by name. He had a summer internship at the Department of Mysteries in the Ministry—a high-placed and distinguished job for a kid nearly fresh out of Hogwarts—when we were eighteen and developing more about what he was, what I was—and, he came across the prophecy. At the time, there was no baby for the prophecy, and he forgot about it until Lily was pregnant with Harry, and he realized, then, that this man, the Darkest Lord, had risen, and the prophecy that he remembered had spoken of the baby to defeat the Dark Lord. He went back to check it, broke in with some risky wand-work, to say the least, and found out it was Harry that was needed—mostly based on the birthday and Lily's due date. They had been in hiding, at the time, because Voldemort was after the Order members—all of us—as we had been the only ones to oppose him—the only ones to battle it out, while the ministry battled it unsuccessfully, sometimes ignoring that he was even there at all, as if the threat did not exist."

"James and I knew of the battle that was to come, from Voldemort, and that was why we started the Order."

Draco was staring, still, trying to remember every last bit of recollection, "How did you two know of his plans?"

Cornwell smiled, laughed to himself, with his lips closed together, "We had done a lot of research, James and I."

"But, why? What was it that made you two so powerful? James was born powerful, and what were you?"

Cornwell took in a big deep breath and lifted their hands up a bit, "I was born powerful, too."

"Were you?" He asked, trying to get Cornwell to spit it out, but he didn't seem to be ready to.

Cornwell nodded, "A prophecy was actually made about James and I meeting when we were boys, and we did."

"By name? Cornwell Black and James Potter to meet in a park? Power ensues?"

"No, it was more along the means of the powerful wizard to give seed to—"

"Yeah, I don't need to hear that," Draco found himself laughing, embarrassed.

Cornwell chuckled, too, but very worriedly, "I was about two sentences from telling you."

Draco bit into his bottom lip and concentrated on his father's dark eyes, for a long moment. But, he could no longer take the intense stare, and all of his rushing blood, so he burst with anxiety, "Tell me!"

"I can't just come out and say it. It won't be right."

Draco blinked at him, at last, because his eyes were becoming exceedingly dry, "Okay, then continue."

"If you insist," Cornwell agreed, imitating Draco, which earned a very boy-ish smile from his son. "James was born to be a massively powerful wizard. He had a huge ego, and he was known for it. I'm sure you've heard." Draco nodded. "It was true, he was very, uh... inflated, at least before I got to Hogwarts." He suddenly trailed off and his eyes lowered. He began to chuckle, under his breath, as if recalling something from his past that her still treasured dearly. He looked up. "We used to laugh about what happened after I attended Hogwarts. He used to call the days before the taming of the lion—you know, like Shakespeare and the shrew?—anyway, even with James's exceptional power, his ego was not based on that. He didn't use his power, or his talent, in the way he used Quidditch, his looks, his friends, his charm or his sarcasm. He kept his power to himself—he was wise, that way. Very wise. But, no one understood what was beneath the layers of egoism, because none of them had access to see—aside from the Order, I suppose."

"James was born with power, and you were born with it, too."

Cornwell looked at Draco as if he hadn't been listening at all, but Draco immediately flushed and gave a sheepish smile, which he meant for Cornwell to take as an admission of being impatient, but still having been listening, "Yes, Draco."

"I think we're going in circles, here, dad."

Cornwell blinked, "What did you just call me?"

Draco coughed, but did not back out of the question or shy away. He had no reason to, "What... you are my dad." That was what Draco had always called Cornwell—papa or dad, whereas Lucius had always been daddy or father. Things had just worked that way. Draco's first words had been, to Cornwell, "Papa." He had identified, even then, Cornwell as being his father. He had had two father figures in his life—both were very different, but he didn't love one more than the other. He felt like there were two very co-existing parts of him trying to find a balance—Draco Malfoy and Draco Black. He liked being Draco Black when it was only he and Cornwell. He was free to be the same little boy he had once been—free of every damn restriction that being a Malfoy had ever given him, which was truly ironic, because the restrictions, to everyone else in the world, to being a Malfoy were very slim. Except, he wasn't only a Malfoy at heart.

Cornwell sighed with great trouble, "I don't want to tell you, anymore. You'll curse me, Draco. You'll curse me dad—I mean, dead—you'll curse me dead."

Draco felt a very strong tug at his chest. Cornwell was very overwhelmed at Draco having called him dad. He had not heard that word in long, long time, it seemed, and Draco hadn't said it, for just as long, in the context he just had. It did not feel awkward to say. It felt good. It felt right. It felt like it had felt all of his life. He sighed, too, though, sensing that Cornwell was now distraught over what he had to tell Draco after Draco had called him dad, "You're making it worse by telling me that. Come on, tell me."

Cornwell sighed and breathed, in one breath. Perhaps Draco's suggestion had finally come through, loud and clear, because Draco distinctly saw a very wired, truthful flush wipe away any distance in Cornwell's eyes and then in his entire expression, "James was born to be powerful, but when Harry's prophecy came about, he was not only a powerful wizard, made that way by birth, but also the man responsible for the birth of another powerful wizard. He was going to bring the boy into the world who would defeat the Dark Lord. Naturally, to defeat the dark lord, James and I combined forced and decided to turn what we did best—just being best friends—into something for the greater good, as it made sense. He was going to bring the boy into the world to defeat the Dark Lord, the heir of Slytherin of whom a blood-rage war carried on from centuries earlier to me—to James, to Harry—to you, Draco." He paused and flinched, staring right into Draco's equally hesitant face, as if he were facing a monster that was about to pop out of his father and swallow him whole. And, then Cornwell raised their hands and cupped them around Draco's face, and he partly covered Draco's ears. He whispered instead of announced. "The reason I have anything to do with Voldemort, at all, Draco, is because I am the... God, damnit, you know I don't want to tell you this—the heir of Gryffindor."

Draco just barely heard, but he had fully seen his father mouth the words to go along with the quiet admission.

All was silent and perfectly still.

After a few minutes of Draco being in somewhat of a shock, he finally spoke, "You're the heir of Gryffindor."

Still, holding Draco's hands, and still bent toward Draco, who had since straightened his posture, Cornwell nodded.

Draco looked down at the floor, chewing on his bottom lip, "You're the heir of Gryffindor."

This time, Cornwell didn't answer.

"You, Cornwell Black, are the heir of Gryffindor."

"Funny, isn't it?"

Draco's eyelashes fluttered.

Silence pulsated between them.

"You are the heir of Gryffindor," he repeated, in a whisper, and then felt himself become a little disoriented.

"You look a little pasty."

Draco swallowed down a giant lump in his throat, beginning to blink himself back to reality, "You..."

Cornwell was horribly awkward and even more horribly hesitant, "This doesn't make you any less of a Slytherin."

Draco blinked, "I've spent... my entire life saluting Slytherin, and I have the blood of Godric Gryffindor? WHAT!" And, before he could control himself, he had thrown himself up and away from the ottoman he had taken a seat on. He went to pull himself away, his mind in fifteen-million different places, lost in mixes of fury, denial and pure outrageousness. For a second, as he pulled away, there was a force that kept him from tearing away, completely—it was Cornwell's hands. But, shortly after the tug, Cornwell's hands left his own, giving Draco the ability to freely move as far away as he wanted to—and, he did. He walked, and that was all he did. He didn't know where he wanted to go or what he wanted to say—just... just.. GRYFFINDOR!

Draco Malfoy was the epitome of a Slytherin. He had grown up as a Slytherin! His favorite color had been imbedded into his brain as being green! He had the Slytherin characteristics! The sorting hat had put him in Slytherin—sure, there had been a little gibberish that it had spoken, but Draco hadn't paid that any attention! It had barely even touched his head before he had been declared a Slytherin! Ridiculous! It was absolute insanity! TO HAVE THE BLOOD OF A GRYFFINDOR! No, not a Gryffindor—Godric Gryffindor? Was that it? How was it even possible? His father was a Black! Blacks had always been Slytherin's—well, no—no. No, shit, they hadn't!

Draco mustered a groan and he threw himself against a book-case, front first, and banged his head on a row of old Encyclopedias. NO, NO. Everything in his life had been complicated. The summer had trenched his life and his life's scope into more than what he had ever known existed. The world had lied. He had lied to the world. But, through all of that, he had still been Draco Malfoy, the Slytherin. It was not trivial. It was important. It was very, very important. And, gone, just like that! So much for being a full-prided Slytherin! He could never feel the same way about it, knowing that he had the blood of Salazar Slytherin's enemy carousing and perusing with bravado and hot-headed-ness. No! It was a tragedy!

Draco Malfoy was not a Gryffindor! Draco Black was not a Gryffindor! No Draco was a Gryffindor! It was simply not acceptable. There had to have been made a mistake. Maybe it had not been passed onto him. Maybe his blood—maybe his blood was all wrong. Maybe he... maybe he... no, no, no, no. He gave one last, miserable bang against the solid, thick shelf of books with his forehead, his opened palms resting on books on one of the shelves below. He stopped moving, completely, with closed eyes, feeling as if he had been beaten and left for dead, "I am not a Gryffindor—no part of me is a Gryffindor. My BLOOD is not SUSPECT to GRYFFINDOR BLOOD. I am pure-blooded Slytherin."

"Your blood is not of Slytherin, Draco, but your heart is. Don't let this take over your head."

"Don't let it take over my head!" Draco almost cried, as he sighed with disbelief. He gave another bang of his forehead onto the wall of books. It was a soft bang, because the binding of the Encyclopedias were soft leather. Soft, brown leather, it seemed, with little green imprints for the letter of which each Encyclopedia held contents of. Green! Green! Oh, God, his lovely green—his ties, his sofas, his pajama pants, his childhood toys, trinkets in green, Potter's eyes... God, everything green had always spelled home for Draco. Home, home—and... and then some Gryffindor comes along, and—"But, you were in Slytherin."

"I had no idea who I was when I arrived there, Draco. I chose Slytherin."

"Slytherin chose your son—oh, FUCKING GOD, why are you doing this to me?" He interrupted himself, knowing better than to ask any more questions than he needed answered. He continued to find a pattern and rhythm to the pound his forehead made against the books. His right hand clutched over the top of the encyclopedias, too, to feel them move. He just didn't know how to process what he had been told. He didn't know what to feel, at all! He didn't know whether to be mad. He didn't know if it justified anything, but it probably, easily, could have. He just didn't have the potential capacity or focus in his brain to set thought into analyzing. "This makes absolutely no sense." He stopped banging his head and pulled it away.

Draco's body turned. A blanket of automatic motion had taken control of his brain and functions, at least for that very moment. He did not want to think about himself. Thoughts of his life went out the window, and the more important questions came flocking in, instead. Draco was mostly in shock—shock that wasn't just going to fizzle down within a few minutes. He could barely adjust to having been told, much less having had to begin to take it in for what it was. Instead, his eyes locked onto the only other soul in the room, his dry lips separated as he watched the other man.

Cornwell was still sitting, but he was looking at his hands, rubbing them together, awkwardly.

Draco's eyes squinted, hard, until his vision was a fraction of his usual. This man was the heir of Gryffindor? His father... was... the heir of Gryffindor. Good fucking GOD. The last thing Draco ever thought Cornwell to have been was an heir of anything, much less the heir of Godric Gryffindor! The feud between Salazar and Godric had been carried down, through the years, and into Cornwell and Voldemort—who, just as, centuries before, their ancestors had fought over the exact same blood-rights as Voldemort and Cornwell had supposedly battled—but, Cornwell had gone into hiding, and Voldemort had been reduced to nearly a living spirit, leeching on people. And, after all of that time, they were both back—with Voldemort trying to avenge and finish the same exact war that had been started years before—magic and pureblood.

The Ministry didn't matter. They didn't have a say.

It came down to power. Only Cornwell could battle with Voldemort, and only Voldemort could battle with Cornwell over something that had been existing through-out generations and years. Their feud was just as powerful and ten times more relevant than any other feud that had been existing about pureblood, because their hate for each other, their distaste and differences were imbedded in them through their blood.

Cornwell looked up, silently.

Draco had his arms tightly crossed over his chest, "He thinks Harry is dead, so now he can finish you."

Cornwell did not nod, he only quietly spoke, "With both of us gone, nothing else could stop him—not a thousand powerful wizards, not a thousand killing curses. He thinks he's done away with Harry, and he's after me, now, because when I am gone, the fight is gone. I figured that if he was busy trying to get to me, he'd be too distracted to realize that Harry is very much alive. Harry is, also, very much, the only person who can kill Voldemort—at least by way of prophecy. The only thing I could do to him was battle him until we were both out of power and shaking. Because he rose as the Heir of Slytherin and into the Dark Lord, only the one to defeat the Dark Lord can defeat him. Harry's war is my war. The feud between Salazar and Godric is the war Voldemort and I face today—same thing. Only, I can't bring him down. It's me he wants—it's me who stops him. It's me who the war wages on with. It's the differences in opinion. Except, it is not me who can be the one to bring him down, because he's not only the Heir of Slytherin, anymore. It's far greater than that—he has risen into something... so... brilliant."

Draco's eyes were very, very, very soft.

"He's far beyond powerful. But, wherever there is active power, there is always a counter-balance."

"Harry."

"Yes, Harry," Cornwell responded, his voice raspy and low. "His power is... I... can't even imagine what he'll turn into."

Draco felt as if he had been stabbed by a blunt wand-tip, "What do you mean?"

Cornwell looked up from his hands, again, helplessly. He was perfectly still, as he had been. His hands had been folded and unfolded over his lap, many times. He spent his time looking down at them when Draco looked away from him. He shook his head, barely, "His power, Draco... it'll be unlike... anything... any of us have ever seen, or... could even ever imagine. Dumbledore has restricted him—played down his power by not speaking about it. He's been called powerful, but he doesn't realize to the extent of which he is, of which he will be. If he had any idea, now, he would be different. If he acknowledged his power, it would begin to evolve within him. No one ever wanted to tell him, because... you know, Draco. You know. He is a weapon."

Draco's teeth slammed together, "He's not a weapon!"

Cornwell abruptly stood and started for Draco, with such intensity in his eyes, "Draco, I know that! I am the one who knows of his power! I'm the one who knew of his father's power the best! The fact is, no one wants him to know, because once he knows, he will no longer be under Dumbledore's thumb. He will realize his power. He will branch out. He won't listen to those who think they know what they're doing—Dumbledore, Gregarold Cliffdale, Adonis Halite—so many men, Draco. This goes over Harry's head, and it has for his entire life, and he's had no idea. When, in actuality, none of it should have gone over his head, and, I know... I know," his voice cracked as he acknowledged what he began to, "the day is going to come when Harry is going to learn all of the things that have been kept from him—all of the lies and deceit, and he's going to run with his power—but, where he runs to, and what he does with it, Draco, will effect everyone."

Draco could not stop shaking his head, extremely knotted inside, "He could never turn into a monster. He could never be Voldemort—he doesn't have anything in him that would turn him against anyone other than the world, in general."

Cornwell reached Draco. He reached out and took Draco's upper arms, with the most tender hold Draco thought he had ever felt, and he gave Draco a slight nudge with his hands, but it just barely moved Draco. He dropped his eyes until they were level, exactly, with Draco's, the inch or so, "I'm not suggesting that he would become anything remotely like Voldemort, and I'm probably the only one who doesn't believe so. Harry and Tom Riddle have very similar beginnings. Harry has been avenging death, as a weapon, for six years now, and before that... well... just... his power is very overwhelming, Draco. His potential to do things—to our world, to the muggle world... people would fall at his feet if they knew. But, he hasn't been allowed to know who he is, fully, because he does have something he needs to do for the good of our world—he needs to be the weapon they want, and he needs to be lied to and talked-down to. He needs to be under someone's thumb—Dumbledore's, obviously—which means he can still be controlled."

"Stop referring to him as a weapon if you don't want him to be one."

"Draco, whether or not I want Harry to eventually know his potential, he needs to defeat Voldemort, or he will die. If he dies, we're left with Voldemort."

Draco swallowed, "You want me to lie to him, now, Cornwell? Every time I look at him—into his brown eyes?"

"No," Cornwell whispered, barely at all, seriously, "I believe Harry knows of his power better than Dumbledore thinks."

Draco could not deny that discussing Harry's power sent shivers up his spine and placed goose-bumps on his limbs. Harry's legend was something far greater than just the Boy-Who-Lived, and perhaps, Draco had not realized it. He had heard of Harry's great power, from Lucius, at times, but he figured that power to only be great power—not something so far beyond great power that it consumed the energy of power to begin with. Harry—his broken Harry Potter, in someone else's body. He couldn't keep secrets from Harry. He didn't see Harry as a big, powerful entity. He saw Harry as Harry, simply, and hearing about him, any other way, was somehow strangely unbelievable. He believed that Harry had great power, but to think that Harry would run with it, as Dumbledore and men far more hidden and in control than Draco knew, was ridiculous. Regardless of Harry's past, regardless of what might happen when the truth was leaked out to Harry, Harry just wasn't the sort of person to fly off of the handle and suck up power—he had spent his life trying to rid of that. He had spent his life knowing, exactly, what power did in the hands of the wrong men—"What if he wants to do something great with it?"

"I don't think Harry would ever do anything bad with it, Draco."

Draco just watched his father speak, intently, carefully, "He might."

"He wouldn't," Cornwell assured, under his breath. "He may have desires, but he wouldn't hurt innocent people."

Draco knew that.

"Do you understand, though, the hesitance against Harry knowing? It'd be a young kid calling the shots."

"And, that scares the old magic community," Draco surmised the obvious.

Cornwell simply nodded his head, "Harry knows he is powerful, already. I've tried to tell Dumbledore. Harry seems to have coped with his power—you know, like the planetary alignment of his life, and every single second that things happened in his life, ended up just right, and ended up turning him into such a well-adjusted, unusually calm young man, whereas the events of his life wouldn't shock him when he found out he had the power he does, where he wouldn't fly off of the handle. Maybe he'd be a little riskier, sure, and not be threatened by those who threaten him back. But, Dumbledore believes Harry is just a normal teenage boy, and that he knows not an ounce of his true power."

"I don't think he does, either, Cornwell," Draco whispered. It came from no where. Draco blinked at himself.

Cornwell did not argue with Draco. His eyes hooded, and he whispered, quietly, "Next time you're alone with him in a room, watch him, Draco. Every minute I was in the same room with him in the manor, when no one else was around, I watched him. It's there. It's in his goal. If it's in him, and he knows, Draco, you're going to hear it when he talks about bringing Voldemort down. He's going to be very focused, and very optimistic, and you're going to wonder why he is that way without a set plan—and, you're going to realize that he's not worried about a plan, because it's his power that's going to help him—as it has been for the last six years. He does not think about plans. He thinks about what it's going to be like when it's over, and do you know why he's like that, Draco?" He patted Draco's cheek, softly, because Draco was staring at him, very intensely, with sharp eyebrows. "Because, he already knows he's going to succeed, but he doesn't know how, or why, or when. He just knows."

Draco had rethought his position. Cornwell was right. Harry had always been mostly optimistic—even when it came to things like flying through a field, in the middle of the night, to get to Cornwell's house to get he and Dickie out, safely. He didn't have a plan. He just went by what was in the moment. Time and time, again, when Harry spoke about his past, there was an underlying layer of hope. Cornwell was right. Even in the church, the day or night before, Harry had told him that he was looking forward to them sitting in a class, at Hogwarts, after Voldemort had been defeated, and just smiling at each other in a way that no one else could understand.

Cornwell's words stuck in his brain.

He just knows.

To question it, otherwise, Draco realized, was a lousy, misguided, misinformed, ignorant way of looking at Harry—especially by Dumbledore, of all people in the world, who should have known Harry best. But, "Dumbledore truly doesn't believe Harry knows?"

Cornwell shook his head, "Dumbledore wants nothing but the best for Harry... but, only after Harry has done the best for everyone else."

"Do you suppose that Harry knows the depth of this—how little he knows that you all keep from him?"

"No, Draco," Cornwell admitted, and his eyes lowered. "No, sadly, I don't."

"You do understand that I am going to find Harry and speak about his power with him, don't you?"

Cornwell looked at him. For a moment, he paused, but then slightly smiled, "He already knows, Draco. He knows that he is powerful. Didn't you hear him, last night?" Draco's eyes flickered, as if he had just remembered, and then he nodded, giving a "hum" of interesting observation. "However, I do think it is good that you let him know you're knowledgeable in the extent of his power. I think..." He laughed. "I just don't think he cares about power, Draco. I think it just doesn't matter to him—it doesn't register."

Draco hummed, again, "He does know he's powerful."

Cornwell gave a slight nod, and he led Draco away from the book-shelf, "You should know something else."

Draco followed his father until the were standing to the left of a small group of sofas. He had taken in every word that Cornwell had spoken to him. Draco did not doubt Harry's power, and he never had. He just hadn't really thought into the issue of whether or not Harry understood his own power. It didn't matter, in the end, to Draco, because... well, Harry was just Harry! They were seventeen years old. Harry wasn't just a ball of raging hormones and a life of lies waiting to be destroyed! He was Harry! Funny, charming, innocent, cute, sometimes naive, sometimes sexy, smart Harry—which his own happy memories and his own friends. His life had been tragic, yes, but it was still a life and not a thing—he was not a thing which would combust. He was not a fictional character who would turn from a sensible, well-balanced young man into an extreme of evil—he was just as just as Draco was.

Draco sighed, "What should I know?"

"Voldemort—he wants you, too. You were born powerful. You're not a little sunshine cup in a field, you know, even though you look like one, sometimes."

Draco snorted.

Cornwell's warm eyes just continued to warmly radiate, and he softly smiled, too, "You're not a force to be reckoned with, yourself." He reached up, patted Draco on the top of his blonde head, with appraising eyes, as if proud, and he dropped his hand, then, to Draco's shoulder. He squeezed it. "You're my son, after all. You're a Black, and a Malfoy, and if you keep on using your Draco-Malfoy-ness with Harry, you might end up halfway a Potter. You light up a bit when he walks into a room. I noticed it."

Draco felt his entire face fall, when he hadn't even given it permission to do so.

Cornwell smiled at him, silently, his whole face scrunched up, "That's a telling reaction, Draco."

"I do light up, I'll admit it. I like him better than I like myself, sometimes."

Cornwell chuckled, "He's a good friend to you, isn't he?"

Draco's heart ached at the question, "You have... no... idea what he is to me—what he means to me, I mean."

"I might."

"He's my best friend, you know," Draco blurted out in a very proud way, somewhere out of left field, and then felt his face begin to flush. "At least, he's the best friend I've ever had." Before he could continue to go on about how much Harry's friendship meant to him, Draco closed his brain off and he leapt forward the couple of inches, lifted his arms, and tightly wrapped his arms around his father's shoulder. He hadn't hugged him in a million years, it seemed, and he wanted nothing more than that. His father had just shared with him a huge secret. It was a huge deal to Draco—hell, to their entire world. He loved Cornwell with all of his heart. He just wanted the secrets and lies to stop, all around the world. His really clutched tight onto his father, and rested his cheek, hard, against Cornwell's shoulder—he did it quickly, and he made himself pull back pretty quickly, as well, not wanting it to be more awkward than it already was—he had practically jumped his father, after all. He was hardly satisfied with the hug, as Cornwell hadn't really had time to respond, but that was okay. He just needed to have done it.

Once Draco pulled away, he was looking at the floor and going to turn around to leave.

Cornwell laughed, once.

Draco stopped. He didn't know what made him stop. He just did, and he turned back around.

Cornwell was still only about a foot away from him, and he was grinning, widely. Draco quietly murmured an insecure, "What?"

"Would you come here, Draco?"

Draco squinted, "No."

"Come here."

Draco felt his cheeks warm, "No."

Cornwell paused for a moment and reached out his left hand, "Come here, Draco."

Before Draco could protest, Cornwell had grabbed his arm and pulled him into a hug—a real hug.

The best hug, ever, that he could remember.

"Merlin," Draco suddenly hissed, "I'm turning into SUCH A BLOODY GRYFFINDOR. I'm going to kill Potter."

Potter and his damn affection spread more rapidly than Draco's Sexually Transmitted Delusions!

On his way out of the room, not much later, Cornwell stopped him with a light mention of his name. Draco turned around, from the center of the open door-frame he was standing in. It had felt good to be hugged as Cornwell had hugged him. He had been sure, when he was little, that Cornwell gave the best hugs in the world, and he hadn't just been a childhood illusion of a father being a hero and the best at everything. Cornwell's hugs were world-class. They were warm, strong, and completely affectionate, and Draco was glad he had been able to feel it, again. He was glad Cornwell had told him about being the Heir of Gryffindor. Sure, a lot of questions and analyzing came along with that, but it didn't matter, to Draco, as he stood there. He was the son of his mother and father, and he was a Slytherin. He was a Slytherin at heart—well, aside from the way he had somehow come in contact with affection, and it had rubbed off of in him.

Harry had rubbed off on him.

Not that Slytherins weren't affectionate. They just weren't affectionate and pathetic about it, like Draco felt he was.

"What?"

Cornwell was looking through a book, "Do restrain yourself from talking about orgasms around breakfast-time, especially in front of your brother."

Draco quickly closed the door, without having said anything. He stared at the closed door in front of him, his left hand still wrapped around the cold doorknob. He slowly let go of it, carefully, as if when he let go, it would pop back open. He could feel the embarrassment creeping up on his chest. How awkward. How awkward, in general, for Cornwell to have noticed anything about the way Harry and Draco had interacted in the first place. Granted, Draco was a little adoring and doting of Harry, but he wasn't obvious about it—hell, he barely even thought about it. And, if his eyes did light up when he was in a room with Harry, was that such a bad thing?

"Oh, there you are! You're still alive." Two fingertips pressed up against his neck. "You still have a pulse."

Draco slapped Harry's hand away, and Harry laughed—boyishly, innocently, and completely clueless. So, for a small moment, Draco's eyes latched onto Harry as deeply as they could, awed. Harry backed up a couple of steps, as he laughed. He was holding something in his elbow—a journal, his journal from the Malfoy manor that he had been writing it. In his other hand, he was holding a glass of orange juice. He was different. His cheeks were just as glowing and vibrant as they had been in the kitchen, after Harry had been seized by Lupin. It was like he hadn't stopped glowing. He was innocent, and happy, and... and, he seemed completely... like... "Harry?"

Harry squinted, his laughter winding down, "What?"

Draco stared at him, blankly, for a moment, "You want to hear something ridiculous?"

Harry laughed, nodding, his eyes taking in the way Draco was so cutely standing there, all awkward and insecure. It was a rarity to see Draco ever portraying anything other than confidence, so Harry took the moment in with great interest, "You have no idea..."

Draco stepped away from the door and toward Harry, starting to laugh, "My father, Cornwell?" Harry nodded. "He's the Heir of Gryffindor."

Harry's last sip of orange juice became raindrops between them.

Draco looked down at the orange-tinted teardrops of liquid that had seeped through white shirt. He slowly looked back up at Harry.

Harry blinked.

Draco sighed, "This is my only shirt, here, you know."

"S'all right, I have shirts you can use until you can get some new ones—I'm sorry, did you say what I think you said?"

Draco linked his arm through Harry's and knocked the journal out of Harry's elbow and into his free left hand, "Yes."

Harry let himself be led toward the bottom of the stairs, still gape-mouthed and staring straight ahead, stunned.

"Also, in other news, my father thinks I look like a buttercup, and you're going to be the most powerful wizard to have ever existed, supposedly."

Harry's eyes slanted from the stairs before him, and he looked at Draco, "You do look like a buttercup, sometimes."

"I think you look like a pansy, ha!"

"The most powerful pansy ever, ha!"

Draco turned to him, abruptly, and just stared right into Harry's eyes.

Harry's eyebrows lifted, but he allowed the intense lock, "What's wrong?"

"Do you have any plans—I mean, about how we're going to bring Voldemort down?"

Harry rubbed his fingertips along the skin of his throat, over where his orange juice had slightly been choked on. Where were they going? Upstairs. Why? To be. How? Just. For how long? He didn't know. All he knew was that he hadn't waken up so wonderfully in a long time. He had seen Remus, and Tonks, and Mad-Eye Moody, and other members of the Order he had become close with over the last couple of years. Regardless of the state of their world—which was not very good, at all—Harry was thankful for what he had. He was lucky. They were lucky. Some of his friends had lost homes—lost family members, even more than one—sometimes two or three. Times were hard, and he did mostly keep himself away from listening to reports of the battles, as to not discourage himself. It wasn't the best thing to do, but it certainly helped him focus.

"Plans?" Harry asked, and then he felt a tiny smile take over his face. Malfoy was asking him about plans? If only it could have been that easy. "No plans. I don't know how I'm going to do it."

Draco's eyes shaped into alert half-moons.

Harry watched him, almost worriedly, and then quietly finished his explanation, "I'm just going to do it."

Draco's top teeth bit over his bottom lip before broke into a commendable smile, "I need a new shirt."

"Malfoy... you're kind of a Gryffindor."

Draco started up the stairs, "Only by blood!"

Harry followed right behind him, and he couldn't help but let out an awed laugh, "This is blackmail for centuries!"

Harry could only chalk-up Draco's cheeriness as shock. He hadn't processed it, yet, and when he did, Harry was sure he would hear about it.

"The only thing I relate to a Gryffindor on, Potter, is my uncommon and nontraditional love for you."

Harry stopped, momentarily, on an odd-numbered step, before he continued up the stairs, with a slow, hidden smile.

"SLYTHERIN IS THE BEST, Gryffindor is the worst. ALL HAIL SLYTHERIN!"

Harry just stared as Draco took off up the wooden stairs. He ran up them, and Harry could hear him singing, loudly, the Hogwarts school song, reciting the Slytherin parts, and only the Slytherin parts. By the time he caught up to Draco, Draco had arrived on the last year's Slytherin rhyme, but couldn't seem to put it together. He was standing in the room they had slept in, the night before, shirtless, with his left hand holding the balled shirt and his right hand suspended in mid-air as he repeated a line and attempted to magically pull the next out of the air, as if it would come to him, "Where'd you put my journal?"

Draco pointed at the bed, without turning around, "What is that line, Potter?"

"I think it actually goes something like this—Draco Malfoy is in denial, he says he's a Slytherin but he's got the Gryffindor smile. His father's the Heir, Draco's proud of his hair, and word has it he and Potter make quite a good pair—of Gryffindors—hey, I did pretty good! Not a flaw in that!" Harry collapsed down onto the bed, with his chest, and took a hold of his journal. He climbed up onto the bed and opened the journal, smiling as he watched Draco's reaction.

Draco glared at him, as he tossed his shirt onto a chair, "Charming, Potter, but inaccurate."

"No, but really, come on, sit down and tell me what he said."

Draco climbed up onto the bed, next to Harry, so they were both facing the end of it, and so they were both on their stomachs, "I'll tell you, but only if..."

Harry smirked at him, "Fine, I'll play along—only if what?

"Only if you let me tell you something without thinking I'm just... talking."

Harry's eyes softened, and he lightly smiled, "Malfoy, when you talk, I'm usually listening! I take what you say to heart."

"No, but I want you to really hear this."

Harry pushed himself up, further, on his elbows, his eyes intently fixed on the hazy, beautiful eyes opposite his, "Okay."

Draco gave a nod of his head, simply, staring right back at him, "You're the best friend I've ever had."

Harry smiled.

Draco looked away from him, quickly, "It all started when my dad tamed your dad with his powers of utter perfection..."

Harry laughed, quietly, but said nothing to argue with Draco. He rested his cheek down on his arm and listened, happily.

It was going to be another interesting night—just, this time, Harry was somehow feeling much more at home, and much more eager to spend another night laying on a bed and listening to Draco Malfoy—or... just being with Draco Malfoy, "Malfoy."

Draco stopped talking, for the first time in about a minute. He laughed, "What? What'd I leave out?"

"Nothing," Harry assured, with a grin, "I just want to know—what's your favorite holiday?

Draco relaxed a little more, as he had been tense from talking, "Halloween." Harry smiled. "Why?"

Harry smiled even more, his eyes half-closed, "I don't know, Malfoy. I just felt like asking."

Draco watched as Harry's eyes fully closed. He waited for about thirty seconds, enchanted by watching Harry do absolutely nothing, "What's your favorite holiday?"

"Christmas. I've had bad luck on Halloweens."

"That's because you've never been to a Malfoy Halloween Masquerade. At least, not yet."

Harry forced his eyes to open. When they did, his smile softened, and he made himself choke a laugh.

Draco was resting his cheek on the backside of his hand, too, and he was staring right at Harry, as if trying to figure him out.

"Not yet?"

Draco leaned in to the side of Harry's face, after lifting himself a bit, "Go to sleep, Potter."

Harry felt warm contact on his forehead. He murmured something—he didn't know what it was, but he was reeling.

Draco didn't know what it was, either, but it sure made something in his chest feel fuzzy—damnit, fuzzy, "Damn you, Potter."

Harry peeked open one eye, "Huh?"

"You're like a damn magnet. Harry's forehead, Draco's lips. Harry's eyes, Draco's eyes—"

"Draco's mouth, Draco's regrets the next morning."

Draco snuggled his face into the comforter and muffled something else.

Harry distinctly heard pansy and buttercup. He could help but laugh, rather loudly, with a sigh, "Goodnight, buttercup."

Draco glared at him, from peeking out from his hiding place over the comforter, "You know too much about me."

"On the bright side, I'm a Gryffindor. Surmise what you can out of that, buttercup—ouch, sorry, abusive buttercup."

"No, I am a Slytherin buttercup, putting you, a Gryffindor pansy, in your place."

"Oh, Malfoy, I'm not even going to touch that one."

Draco moaned with tired, happy laughter, his eyes still closed, as he knew Harry's were, "You're mine, alas."

"I recall you already claiming me as yours in front of a piano some time in the decade of the last two days."

"It turns me on that you're so quick to remember that."

Harry smiled, "Play it, again." In his mind, he was having a rather vivid recollection. He, unintentionally, shivered.

Draco peeked open his left eye. Harry was pretty much about to fall asleep, which was clear by the way his voice was so distant and wavering, "Yeah."

"But, I'm not yours, Malfoy. I'm not anyone's."

Draco's eyes softened even more, and he was glad Harry could not see them, "I know, Harry." His left fingertips lifted from under his bare chest, carefully. They were both pretty tired, and even though they had slept most of the day, through, it didn't make up for the lack of sleep they had had. Plus, there was a new element of safety around them, there, where there were other people who knew about what was going on—where Cornwell was protecting Draco and Harry, both. Where the Order of the Phoenix was fully staffed and always on call. It was a good feeling. It was nice to be able to have the option of just sleeping without having to wake up and be the only person to know the truth. Yes, the truth. The lovely truth.

The pads of Draco's fingertips shakily touched down against a soft, warm cheekbone, and then stroked downward. It turned loving and adoring, and Draco caressed his touch, as softly as he could, down Harry's cheek and to the corner of his mouth. But, he didn't fully touch the flesh. He couldn't. He gazed at the interaction of his own fingers to Harry's new face. It didn't even matter, anymore, who he was seeing, because he was so attached to Harry, as Harry the soul, that it was like he was seeing Harry al of the time, anyway. He gave a very soft, broken, distracted sigh, and he lifted his fingertips away from Harry's skin and up to his hair.

Draco smoothed his thumb over a thick lock of shiny, dark brown hair and then leaned over. He placed a kiss over that very lock, which ended up resting somewhere around Harry's hairline. Sometimes he just wanted nothing more than to shake Harry and demand Harry tell him all of the stories of his life. He really, really had come to care for Harry. It had started off so easily—so simple, though the situation hadn't been. He had always just figured they would tolerate each other, but things had evolved so much further past that.

Draco closed his eyes and pressed a deep kiss against the side of Harry's head, and deep into his hair. His nose wound up snuggling into the sweet, warm, clean sent. How did he manage to smell so good? How did his hair stay so smelly? Oh, it was such a little thing—probably a thing that most people wouldn't have given a damn about. But, Draco cared. Draco liked it, and he liked it so much that he gave a shy nuzzle of his cheek against it, because it was so soft and smooth, thick and light. He pulled his lips away, however, and stared down at Harry's close-eyed profile, intently, his left hand smoothing over the back of Harry's head. He cupped the back, for a moment, with a strangely protective, confident palm, and he felt his eyes squint with seriousness that he hadn't shown or felt in a long time.

Harry was not anyone's. Harry was Harry. Sleeping, peaceful, sweet-smelling Harry, "I know you're not the world's, Potter. I won't let the world have you."

Long after Draco had moved away and thrown a spare blanket over them, both of Harry's eyes flickered open.

It was dark. And, cold, due to the air-conditioning spell he knew Draco had produced.

His eyes fixed onto Draco, and he smiled. He reached out and gave the back of Draco's neck a small, feather-light, long, wonderful stroke of his warm index fingertip above the chilly skin, "I might be a little bit yours."

The days of that week flew by in a time-warp that Draco didn't think he had ever previously experienced. They were hardly days, rather seconds in an hour, quick and seemingly great, but on the ultimate scale, not very long, at all, and gone before it could be realized. He had spent two days laying in a bed, catching up on sleep and dealing with the news, from his mother, and from the wizarding world, at large, that the Malfoy Manor had been torn apart. It was still standing, and from images that Draco had seen, looked just as flawless as ever from the outside. But, the inside, said his mother, was not the same place.

Draco had not yet been to the manor. He was not that brave to forgo his childhood with a simple glance of eyes over broken memories and ruined gadgets. In the back of his mind, he had hoped that his study was left unharmed, or, if not unharmed, at least not destroyed completely. He had thought, as he lay in bed, by himself, dozing in and out of sleep which no one bothered to wake him out of, of what it would be like to walk into his study and not see the one place, in the world, where he felt safest. The one place he could walk into and always feel good. He hadn't wanted to deal with that not being reality.

But, those two days had faded. He had gotten himself up, on the third day, and started to walk around the infamous number twelve, Grimmauld Place. Strangely enough, no one had seemed to bother Draco, including Harry. But, when Harry would come in, at night, to crash, or when he would randomly walk into the room and fall onto the bed to join Draco in some hazy, misguided, deluded state of peace, he didn't seem to be very feeling or emotional, happy or thankful. He had been when they had first arrived, before, but it had since faded.

Harry seemed to talk to Draco as little as Draco talked to everyone else. Which was never.

Draco rolled over in his sleep. But, he wasn't asleep, because he could feel himself doing it. He sighed to himself, letting his eyes flicker open. It was hot in the room—too hot, and he wanted to attack his covers from trying to smother him. His eyes angrily began to move to the blanket over his shoulder, but halfway into it, his eye-contact was intercepted by a pair of startlingly awake brown eyes.

Harry cracked a light smile, "Sorry, but I had to wake you up."

Draco groaned, "You mean to tell me that you're the reason this room feels like it's sitting over a smokestack?" Harry's innocent smile turned a bit guilty, though he didn't nod. Draco sighed and finally moved his eyes away from Harry. So, what was the reason for making him miss out on his only escape of his life? He pushed his covers off, turning on his left side so he could face Harry. He kicked the covers off of his pajama-pant covered legs and rested halfway on his back and halfway on his side. God, his body was on fire. He irritably set his eyes back onto the alarmed, strained pair looking right back at him. "What, Potter? Why do you wake me up in the middle of the night when you've barely spoken to me for the past four days?"

"It's my birthday."

Draco debated on what to say, before deciding on, "Oh, happy birthday."

Harry pushed himself up onto his right elbow. He had spent a lot of time laying there, on the bed, on the right side, closest to the door. Even at night, Draco turned away from him when they slept, which was probably because Draco ended up going to sleep before Harry ever entered the room. He could hear the biting edge in Draco's voice, but Harry wasn't playing innocent to anything. But, he also wasn't guilty of anything, either. He had spent the last couple of days hiding in the one place where no one could find him—a room on the third floor of house. It wasn't a bedroom, a study, a library or a hobby-room. In fact, Harry didn't know what it was. All he knew was that he was drawn to it, and no one had bothered him, there, which he made sure to keep that way by rare walks across rooms where the Order members could see him and not panic as to the state of his entire well-being.

Neither really knew what to say, about anything.

Draco glanced at Harry, after a couple of minutes.

Harry looked back at him, "What?"

Draco stretched his toes out, tearing his eyes away from Harry. He fixed his eyes on his feet, feeling his muscles stretch, but not strain. It was then that Draco realized he was very much shirtless, and his pants were set very low. He almost went to correct them, but then figured it wasn't worth it. He was perfectly comfortable, and nothing was showing that Harry shouldn't have seen, and even if he did, it wasn't like he would be seeing something he had never experienced before. He dropped a hand over his forehead and rubbed it down his face, down his throat, his neck, and then over his chest, where it gave a circular rub before resting, "I wasn't going to say anything."

"Oh."

Draco heard the quiet misery, "Any news on the manor?"

"None that I would have before you, Draco."

Draco hummed, staring out a window which was diagonal from the end of the bed, "Have you been okay, Potter?"

Harry's nose nuzzled into the cool pillow he was resting against, "I'm not sure what I've been."

"Yeah," Draco drearily returned, very lowly, deadly gazing out the same window, "me, either."

Harry watched Draco's profile for awhile, wondering what was going on inside of his head. That he had heard, Draco had done about as much socializing as Harry had with the others in the house. When he saw Cornwell, here and there, he would ask how Draco was, as if Harry had been seeing more of him than anyone else. But, Harry hadn't. It had reached a point, however, that Harry began to regress in the point of conversation. He had realized that he and Draco hadn't been speaking, both lost in their own minds and agendas, depressed about war and death, helpless and defeated over different matters. But, luckily, Harry had come to his senses and realized that he had been abandoning Draco, and even though they both wanted space to deal with their own problems, "Did you eat dinner?"

Draco yawned into the back of his hand, "No."

Harry lifted his head. It was dark. There was no moonlight which could have tinted Draco's face and revealed his truest expressions. All Harry had was the sound of Draco's voice and the faint outline of his profile and darkened features, where black spots made up for Draco's eyes and his mouth lined in different tunnels and levels of gray. He pushed himself up onto his hands, on his right side, and then managed to sit back on his knees, facing Draco, "Let's go find something to eat."

Draco's face heavily fell onto its left cheek, and he glanced in Harry's direction.

"You can't tell me you're tired. You've been sleeping every time I've come in to talk to you."

Draco didn't argue, because at the mention of food, his stomach yearned. He needed something in his stomach, true. He was surprised that he hadn't found his appetite in the last couple of mostly food-less days. It was just that he slept so often that he had kind of been forgetting about food. He had snuck into the kitchen here and there, but not for meals or for anything of substance. He didn't push himself up, however, "I'll get something in the morning."

Harry licked at the corner of his mouth, his eyebrows furrowing down. There was a long pause, "What'd I do?"

Draco blinked, and immediately questioned, "What?"

"You're being icy."

"Icy?"

"Yeah, you're being icy with me. Cold. A bastard. Distant. Emotionless—who you used to be, Draco Malfoy of Slytherin."

"I am Draco Malfoy of Slytherin, and I am cold. I am a bastard. I am distant and unfeeling."

Harry scoffed into the pitch blackness of the room. He didn't want to deal with that answer. It was true, he wasn't in the mood to listen to Draco revert back to being the same arrogant, disillusioned prick he had once been. He could hear it in Draco's voice, and it infuriated him. He pushed himself off of the bed, landed on his bare feet and walked around to the foot of the bed, heading for his bookcase, for his journal. He had just put it back before he had woken Draco, but he needed it, again, to write down all of his miserable thoughts. The journal had, originally, been intended for Harry's plans, but it had become much more than that. It had become his only way of staying sane, "Is this what you've been doing for the last five days, Draco? Analyzing your existence, brooding? Telling yourself that you ARE Draco Malfoy, the same Draco Malfoy you've always been? Well, you're fucking NOT, and to sit there and go back on everything you've changed is a really weak thing to do—not only weak, but selfish and... just... dumb."

Harry gave a careless wave of his wand over a candelabra at the foot of the bed. He hadn't originally intended to do so. But, he felt strangely pissed off at Draco. Instead of concentrating on getting to his journal, he turned around and faced Draco. He went to say something, but then closed his mouth once the image in front of him settled into his mind. Draco was just laying there, in the same exact position he had been in for a good few minutes. His light eyes, where silver always played on gray, were cold. They were listless. They were dull and blank, and Harry nearly foamed at the mouth, "WHAT THE FUCK IS WRONG WITH YOU?"

The left side of Draco's mouth pulled upward.

Harry watched it. Oh, it was not a friendly grin. It was nasty. Very, very nasty. Very vindictive.

Draco watched Harry, in return.

Harry's brown eyes were so angry. His face was clenched in all of the right ways. There were bones protruding, skin pulled over sharp angles, dark shadows flickering over his face. It wasn't easy to see the very expression of Harry's eyes, because he was turned away from the candelabra, but for a very fleeting second, it was almost as if some fire had been ignited in front of Harry's face, giving Draco a perfect view of the sudden disgust that Harry was feeling.

Still, Draco said nothing.

Harry fought with himself, physically, by continuing to press his lips together and place his hands on his sides as if to soothe himself and keep himself from flipping out. But, he couldn't help it. Why was Draco acting like he was? It was like everything that they had accomplished had gone out the fucking window! It didn't make sense! He had done nothing wrong! Draco just—no, "No," Harry repeated, quietly, with a sigh at himself, and he made himself turn his back to Draco and set his attention back on the bookcase. "You're a bitch, Draco Malfoy."

"A bastard."

Harry turned around from the book-case, "Your name is Draco Malfoy. You belong to Slytherin."

Nothing washed over Draco's face. Still, he was staring at Harry in a way that sent shivers down Harry's spine and a knife stabbing into his gut. He could not explain his disdain and frustrating with what he had walked into. Everything had been fine the last time he had seen Draco—and, then this? He approached the end of the bed, narrowing his eyes at Draco. "Except, your father is not Lucius Malfoy. Your father is Cornwell Black. By blood. You're a Slytherin, because your bastard father Lucius Malfoy raised you to be that way. You may have Gryffindor blood in your veins, but you could never feel that, no. You are just as cold as you've ever been, aren't you. Unfeeling. Loveless. Dry. Friendless. Miserable. Rich. Sadistic. Wry."

Draco watched and listened, unblinkingly.

"Have you been putting on a front, then, Malfoy? Malfoy. Malfoy." He paused, snarled his nose and spat, harshly, "Malfoy. You know, I think I've missed spitting your name—Malfoy. Doesn't it sound right with that little extra bit of disgust thrown in there?" He stared right back at Draco, trying his best not to blink. He was completely trying to pull a reaction out of Draco, but he didn't have to dive far into himself to get material or words. He was pissed at Draco for having reverted right back to the cold bastard he had been, which had never even been real, as they had discussed, because Draco had never hated Harry. But, this Draco Malfoy, Harry was beginning to realize, never had to do anything with him. This side of Draco had to do everything with how he had been raised. "You're miserable."

Draco sat up, fully, his shoulders tensed, "Do you think I care what you're saying to me? I don't."

"Grow a pair, Malfoy." He grabbed his journal and turned back in route for the door, extremely disturbed.

"What's that supposed to mean, Potter?"

Harry stopped.

Draco stared holes through the T-shirt covered back in the distance, "Come on, Potter. Tell me what you think I think."

Harry turned around, slowly, and then just gave a hopeless, half-ass laugh of annoyance, "I'm not playing a game—"

'Fuck you, Harry Potter, because neither am I—get out of here, you jackass."

Harry's jaw dropped, and he approached the bed before he could stop himself, "I'm the jackass?"

Draco, at last, turned his eyes away from Harry, who was standing against the left side of the high bed, leaving a giant gaping whole of space between them. If it hadn't been there, Draco was half-sure Harry would have started at him. But, he wasn't in the best of places, mentally, and he hadn't a reason to deny that. He pushed the covers off of his legs and then pushed himself right off of the bed. He waked around the corner of the bed, with narrowed eyes, and Harry did the same on the other side.

They met, two feet apart, at the center of the foot of the bed.

"The fact is, Potter, everything is about you. This fight is about you. I grew up hearing Harry Potter this and Harry Potter that. Had I been any other ugly wizard kid—like any of your Gryffindor losers or any other damn kid who might have grown up the same way—perhaps things would have been different. But, it's not that way. You're an intricately great part of my life. You were made that way before we were born. You've spent your whole life not liking me, while I spent my whole life just trying to deal with you, and what is so damn bloody great about you. I grew up knowing that your father was a part of my father's life. You were always part of my life, and you were that way before I even met you. It's like... I mean, Potter—you have more of my life than I do, sometimes, because you have so much of my god-damn attention! Just get out of here. Go, go find Cornwell, and discuss how you're going to be a bloody pair of heroes. And, when it's all over, you two can go off and leave me with Lucius, who is my father, and Cornwell can be your new father. It's fitting, isn't it? You two are so much alike—Gryffindors. Hell, Cornwell was your father's best friend! I am cold, Potter, and I am mean. I am a bastard, and I hate mud-bloods, and I don't really fucking GIVE a damn about your fight, and THAT is what I've spent the last five days thinking about. I am a Slytherin. I am a bastard. I am Lucius Malfoy's son, and the whole point of this damn fight of yours, I disagree with. I hate mud-bloods! Voldemort may be evil, but he's brilliant. I'd never join his ranks, but he's hardly ever done anything wrong to me—hell, look at the way I grew up. And, then, I find out who Cornwell is, and I think about it, and it doesn't really matter, because I'm not a Gryffindor. I'm not a Black. I was raised a Malfoy, and I was put into Slytherin."

"I've been missing the point the last year. I've been forgetting that I am me—cold, mean. I don't like you. And, I don't want you to win."

Harry's hands were limply at his sides, and all he could do was stare at Draco's face, all over it, with slightly dry lips.

"You go on your way, now, Potter, and I'll go my way."

"It's not about blood, Draco. The fight is far past that. It's about Voldemort abusing his power and killing innocent people."

"Killing mud-bloods, and I don't really care."

"You... don't... care."

Draco stared Harry right on. He took a step closer and sneered, "Yes, Potter, I don't care."

"You don't care about me, either."

"I did. I do. But, I don't care about your fight, Potter, because everything has always ever been about you."

"All I am is a fight, Malfoy," Harry hissed back at him. "You've just made that very clear."

Draco's smirk was cold and hard, "We're all just something, Potter. I'm just a pawn, and being only a fight is better."

Harry's eyes stayed glued to the spot which had just been occupied by Draco, but which was currently empty of any other presence. Draco had walked around him. He was so serious. He was so calm. It sent shivers of dread through Harry's—Judas's—blood. He didn't know how to process anything Draco had told him. The only thing he felt he was capable of doing was pulling his elbow back and then slamming his hand into Draco's face, and then his stomach, and then his face, again. He was just so angry. He just wanted to hit something. But, instead, he calmly turned himself around and saw Draco heading for the bedroom door. He scoffed, loudly, "I can't do this without you, Malfoy."

Draco turned around, with dead eyes, "Potter, I don't want anything to do with your damn fight. You've done everything, your whole life, without me. You're the one who has to bring Voldemort down. That has nothing to do with me. Nothing about Draco Malfoy has anything to do with Harry Potter, do you understand that? It's not the same for us, anymore, Potter. Originally, I thought that the lines had been blurred, because it was war-time, but everything cleared. You will always be a part of who I am—and, I hate that. I have always hated it, because your damn fight tracks back to me, but why? There is no reason. I am just Draco Malfoy, Harry Potter, and regardless of if I care about you or not, I don't care about bringing Voldemort down. I don't care about ANYTHING, anymore, because NOTHING makes sense to me. NOTHING. Not who I am. Not what I want. Only who I've been happiest in being, and who I've been happiest as is Draco fucking Malfoy, proud Slytherin, so if you have a problem with that, there is nothing you can do about it."

"And, if Voldemort kills me, first? What then, Draco Malfoy, proud Slytherin?" Harry got in Draco's face.

Draco didn't budge, just stared eye to eye with Harry, "He won't."

"If he did, Malfoy."

"I don't know, Potter. Is being dead such a bad thing? I'm not sure living is so great, especially when nearly every damn day of your life has been a lie, and you'd rather throw yourself out a window than face the rest of the world. If you feel like I do, Potter, you wouldn't ask me that question. Of course, if you knew anything about me, you'd realize that I don't care about your fight, and why? Because, you've not given a damn to put yourself in my shoes, as you've pointedly made obvious that everyone has never put themselves in your shoes—as if your shoes are so hard, anymore, Harry Potter. Good for you, you have a purpose in life, and it's sad, your parents are dead. But, your life purpose is so much more great than mine. I don't even know my parents. I don't like Lucius. I feel as if I have no idea who Cornwell is, and I don't, and I never have. And, my mother? Well, has she been up to see me? No. Have you? No. Have they? No. Has anyone EVER cared to ask about how Draco MALFOY is, or is it all about Harry Potter? HA, ha, ha, ha, let me LAUGH—so, go on, Potter. Go, leave, go be miserable about how sad your life has been, as if you're the only one who's had a sad life. Go. Avenge. Kill. Be the hero that you are. I just don't give a damn."

God, but he did give a damn! Damnit, Potter! Fuck-you, fuck-you, fuck-you, fuuuuck you!

Draco slammed the bedroom door in Harry's face, locked it, pointed his wand at the candelabra and let the room fade.

Almost as soon as Draco had fallen asleep was he awoken—just, not physically.

"Hello, Draco Malfoy."

Draco blinked. His heart jumped into his throat.

It was a place Draco had sworn to himself he would never, ever find himself in, again.

The single figure in the room stood up from sitting on a table, "We've never been introduced, and for a reason."

A hand reached out to Draco, and Draco stared down at it.

"I'm Lord Voldemort."

Draco looked up from the hand.

"I don't bite."

Draco said nothing.

"Oh—cold, Draco Malfoy. So cold."

"I am cold," Draco stated, and held his head high, his eyes sinking into those opposite his. It was a thrill that Draco could have never imagined. It sent sparks through his body in the worst way possible, and it was so terrible that it nearly felt good. It felt good to feel so emotionally capable in Voldemort's presence, which he had never been in. He knew this had to do with the last conversation he had had with Harry, but that just made it so much more sweet, satisfying and controlled. At the same time, he immediately took back every word he had said to Harry. Harry's fight was Draco's fight, and Draco's fight was Harry's fight. Draco stood tall, with only Harry on his awakened mind. It gave him a little extra something, inside of him, to pull out bravery and smugness that he never thought one Draco Malfoy could ever possess in front of Voldemort—a man most people quivered in front of if they even survived long enough to react. "One time will I tell you this, and one time only, and don't try my patience."

Voldemort waited, patiently.

"I am not interested."

Voldemort seemed like he had just been set on fire with water, his eyes glinting furiously, "Even colder, Draco Malfoy."

Draco did nothing. Everyone seemed to have the same opinion of him that day, good and evil alike. Cold.

"I like cold. And, I like stubborn. I like pure disregard for my existence from pretty young men."

"You have no power over me," Draco assured, lazily.

Voldemort's eyes were nearly enthralled, and his expression echoed it, "You're frighteningly brave."

"Yes," Draco returned, arrogantly, still unwavering, somehow, "I am, after-all, a Gryffindor."

Voldemort's eyes flashed, "You are, are you."

Draco smirked at him, carelessly, "Do you know what else I am?"

"The son of Cornwell Black, is that what you're going to tell me?"

No, "I am not a sad, searching soul looking for somewhere to belong. I know where I belong."

"Oh, do you?"

"Oh, I do, and I know to whom I belong," Draco assured of his loyalties. His mother. His father. Lucius. Dickie. Potter. "And, I know where you belong, and before I die, I'll smile down at the knowledge that you are burning in hell."

Voldemort said nothing, just backed away from him one step, with a pair of enchanting eyes Draco could not explain.

"Making death wishes, are we? And so early in conversation, too."

"I do not wish you dead." He paused. "I wish you destroyed and infinitely suffering. Morsmoreda."

Draco promptly woke, and just as quickly was he off of the bed and shaking. He hadn't been shaking in dream-state, no, but he was definitely feeling a strange buzzing in his veins, in his blood. He grabbed his wand from his pocket and pointed it in the direction of one of the candle-holders on the wall, muttered a spell and was relieved when the room was so brightly lit that it looked like it was day time. He spun around in a circle, with his wand out, just for his own sake and to rid of his own paranoia. When he saw nothing and no one, he sighed and lowered his wand. He sat down on the end of the bed, pocketed his wand, and paced himself with his hands on his knees.

Regardless of how depressed and lost he was feeling, he hadn't actually meant what he had said to Harry, however long ago it might have been. He hadn't ever wanted to praise Voldemort. It had just come out of his mouth in the wrong way. Of course he cared about Harry's fight. Of course he cared about innocent people being murdered. He had just been needing to release some of the bottled-up emotions that he had been harboring for the last few days, and Harry had just found the wrong moment to wake him up. Waking Draco up was never, truly, a good idea, because it always had different consequences—most of them not so great!

Draco found himself standing in the doorway of the sitting room about thirty minutes later, holding an offering of peace in his left hand and his wand in his right hand. He had been searching for Harry for a few minutes, after he had searched through the kitchens in attempt to find something sweet—something that might have made up for the fact that there was no birthday cake in the house. He had found something. It wasn't quite up to par, but it would do. He walked into the room and closed the door behind him.

Harry looked over his left shoulder.

Draco held out the treat, in the dim room, where only about two candles were lit beside Harry.

"You know I'm in here, don't you?" Harry asked, still more than agitated. "You might want to leave."

Draco walked over, innocently, "I don't want to leave, Potter. I came to say... Happy Birthday, and here."

Harry's eyes slipped down to the contents of the plate Draco was holding out. He blinked, "What's that?"

"A doughnut with pudding on it."

"A doughnut with pudding on it?" Harry asked, more skeptically, and tried to hold back a smile. "You put pudding on a doughnut... for me?"

"All right, look. Potter, you can make fun of it or you can take it."

Harry snorted with soft laughter, as Draco turned to leave. He leaned over and caught the back of Draco's shirt. "Stay—and, I am hungry, so I'll take that." He stood up from leaning over the arm-chair, laughing as Draco turned around with some sort of strange expression on his face. Harry didn't let go of the back of the shirt, his fingertips lost in the material. It was cool and soft. Once he was standing slightly behind Draco, and he was sure Draco wasn't going to try and flee with his... um, makeshift cake, Harry let go. He reached around and took the plate. "Vanilla pudding, my favorite."

Draco slowly pivoted, with both of his hands still slightly elevated in front of his body. He watched Harry dip his finger into the pudding and then place it in his mouth, between his lips, with his cheeks sucked in. He glanced right at Draco, and Draco felt oddly shaky. No, it must have been his imagination. All Harry had done was look at him! Just no certain way, was all. Harry sat back down on the lounge he had been relaxing on, so Draco walked over and sat across from him, silently, playing with his hands after pocketing his wand, "For future reference, Potter, it's not nice to wake me up."

Harry swallowed down a decent mouthful of pudding. God, it was good, "I figured—albeit, I figured it rather late."

"Yeah," Draco said, under his breath. "I was a bit dramatic." A bit? Yeah, a whole fucking CHUNK dramatic.

"No," Harry said, quietly, bravely looking up from his doughnut, which he had not yet attempted to work on. Draco had really been super-nice with the pudding, and Harry was somewhat obsessed with it, because he hadn't had it in quite some time. It was excellent. Sweet. It was hitting all of the right spots when it was in his mouth. His eyes fixed onto Draco, after he took one last swallow. He lowered the plate, with both of his hands, and rested it on his knees, fixing his attention on Draco, fully, interested in the opposite expression. He looked so... apologetic. "I didn't know you felt how you do."

"I don't feel that way."

"Don't you? You hate dirty blood. You don't support Voldemort, but you support his stance. You're a Malfoy, not a Black. You're a pure-hearted Slytherin, and Gryffindor blows."

Draco squinted, but Harry did no such thing, just kept watching him, "I just needed to vent, Potter."

"Vent? You told me you could care less if I die."

"Harry, I could care less about a lot of things, but amongst those things I do care about, you're pretty close to the top."

Harry held out his plate, "Want some?"

"No, I made it for you."

Harry smiled to himself, pulling the plate back onto his knees, "You can still have some." He paused. "C'mere." He dropped his eyes from Draco, breaking the intense staring he had been partaking in. He motioned his head to his left, to the rest of the lounge. There was plenty of space, and though Harry was hungry, he wasn't sure if he could devour a gigantic doughnut with vanilla pudding on it. He could eat both, separately, for day and days, but, together, it was almost too sweet for him to fully comprehend. "The thing about your dad—Cornwell, I mean. You don't feel that way, do you?"

Draco carefully sat down next to Harry. He paused, at first, and then turned his serious attention to his right, "What way?"

"No, you..." Harry hesitated. He didn't know if he wanted to ask. Maybe Draco was just handing him a card, here, and on that card was just a simple line of excusing himself from everything he had said earlier. If he was just venting, surely Harry could have left it alone? But, where had his words come from? Had Draco had so much practice in perfecting his skills of verbal lashings and monologues that what came out of him was that of a role? An act? Words he pulled down out of no where, untrue and not, at all, reflective of what he actually felt?

"Fuck you, Potter. You're not getting my dad. Sorry."

Harry turned his face to Draco, a few seconds later, because he had been giving himself time to mentally laugh.

Draco was smirking at him, pointedly, with his light hair pushed back off of his forehead, suddenly.

"Taking that back, are you?" Harry laughed, impressed with Draco's calm, quick mind-reading tactics.

"If you let me."

"I'll think about it."

Draco smiled, leaning down over Harry's shoulder, snugly, looking at the plate, "Is it actually edible?"

Harry snorted, "Luckily, yes. If it wasn't, we wouldn't be speaking."

"Well, I can't cook, Potter, so next time we get into a fight, I'm going to need to know how to apologize—"

"Here's an idea, Malfoy—just tell me you're sorry, and there will be no need for... pudding... cake."

They both looked at the treat sitting on Harry's plate, as he held it up in the air in front of them. For a quiet moment, they both examined it. Still uneaten, but with marks from where Harry's fingers had been lashing for pudding samples, it looked quite delicious. Almost too good to be ruined and destroyed. It looked that way because of what it actually was and why it had been made—hell, who had made it in an attempt to apologize to who. It was a symbol. A milestone. A very strange happening in the lives of theirs, as they sat there, in the mostly-darkened room, side by side, staring at it.

Draco snapped his attention onto Harry's profile, "I can't apologize to you after those sort of... blow-ups."

Harry grinned and looked at him, suddenly, "It's funny, you know, because I don't think I would accept those apologies."

"Next time I'll make another doughnut cake, or something else just as sugar-filled and quick, but flawless."

"Surprise me."

"I will."

Harry laughed, and he, at last, tore off a piece of the doughnut. He reached it across his chest and held it out for Draco. He took it, not even a second later, leaving Harry's fingertips coated in dripping vanilla pudding. Amused, Harry pulled himself off a piece and rested back against the lounge. He looked at Draco, who was to his left, and held up his piece of doughnut. When Draco went to pop his in his mouth, Harry gave him a sharp elbow, "What are you doing—you can't eat it, not yet."

Draco nearly dropped his doughnut piece from the sudden demand and sharp elbow, "What the fuck, Gryffindor!"

Harry smiled to himself, smugly, "We have to make a pact. Here, now. On these doughnuts. They are our witnesses."

"You're aware that the doughnuts aren't capable of being witnesses, aren't you? Seeing as how they are... doughnuts."

Harry smiled, even more, as Draco's eyes set so happily onto his, innocent and completely genuine, "Uh—I realize."

"As long as you're acknowledging the blurred line of reality between—"

"Shut up."

Draco rested right back next to Harry, his shoulder slightly overlapping Harry's, "Fine, Potter. What's this pact?"

"Pact is—next year, on my birthday, it's just going to be you and me—and, these things."

Draco watched as Harry tapped his piece of doughnut to his own, "That's not a pact."

"The pact is—we spend my birthday together until one of us dies or gets married to someone the other hates."

Draco snorted with laughter, easily, and nodded, "Deal, Potter. I like the way you think."

"Yeah, well," Harry coolly responded, forcing it. He nudged Draco's shoulder with his own. "You like me, period."

"I like you, question mark."

"Shut up," Harry laughed, again, just as playfully.

Draco half-grinned at him.

Harry lifted his piece of doughnut up and tapped it to Draco's, "To Malfoy and Potter. May they survive."

"To Potter and Malfoy—may they eventually put away their angst, get drunk, and fuck."

"That, too."

Draco looked at Harry, once, before he shoved his entire piece of doughnut into his mouth.

Harry paused, amused, and then he mused, at Draco, "You liked that answer too much, Malfoy."

Draco smirked, his mouth full. He wasn't even going to attempt to say anything.

Harry took a small bite of his own doughnut, watching as Draco began to chew. There was a lot in his mouth, Harry knew, because it had been a rather large piece. He also knew that Draco would have responded to him had there not been the risk of showering them both with wet little crumbs of doughnut and muffled words. It gave them both a moment to gather their thoughts or their questionings. There was no surprise with the way that the conversation had gone. Things had been developing. What that actually entailed or meant, Harry was entirely clear on. However, Draco's mouth had taken way too much of Harry's attention over the last few minutes, and Draco had probably sensed it. Whatever was going on in Draco's head, Harry wondered if it was remotely like the things swirling through his brain—fearlessly, curiously.

Draco, eventually, swallowed, and then glanced at Harry, again, from looking at a bookcase, "I just like answers, is all."

Harry's cheeks began to ache. He looked away from Draco, simply, with a small shake of his head, "My mistake."

"You'd want to be careful with those. You're only allowed so many of them until I stop forgiving."

Harry lifted his arm up from behind Draco's back, suddenly. When Draco had fallen back against the back of the lounge, Harry's arm had been resting against the couch in that same area. It hadn't been awkward. They were used to strange, innocent, boyish touches of arms. They had been sleeping together. It wasn't like they hadn't woken up to mornings when they were sleeping side by side—usually with Draco's entire arm overlapping Harry's. He didn't know how it always happened. It just did. But, suddenly, his arm wanted freedom, but only for one purpose. He lifted it up into the air, and then dropped it down around Draco's shoulders. His wrist rested down over Draco's shoulder, and his fingertips dangled in the medium air of the room. He leaned in and up, suddenly, because he had the advantage of positioning, and he pressed his mouth, fully, on the soft skin right beside Draco's mouth—close. It was close. CLOSE. He quickly pulled his lips away and set back into the couch, as if it had not happened.

Draco looked at him. Once. With a hard smirk, a few seconds later, "What was that?"

"What was what?"

Draco squinted, "Okay, I'll let it slide this time."

"One time."

"You're lucky I hadn't gone to turn my head."

"Or unlucky."

Draco gasped. Not dramatically. It just sort of left his mouth, and he muttered, with a strange laugh, "Wow, Potter."

"Leave me alone, it's my birthday!"

Draco snorted at him, as Harry looked away, completely and totally flushed of color and bashful, "It is your birthday."

"I refuse to turn my head, because you just said that with a tone. Don't try anything, or I'll hex—"

"You'll hex my balls off—old threat Potter, one of which is no longer worthy of our friendship. Or... whatever... it is."

"A friendship."

Draco smiled, "I couldn't have possibly meant anything else, Potter."

"I was just making sure—"

"Are you going to kiss me or not? I swear, you're fucking killing me here, Potter."

"WHAT!" Harry nearly haggled, finding himself suddenly staring at Draco. "How do you—I don't want to—what are you on!"

"Oh, come off it. It's me, Potter. We're naturally attracted to each other. We need to get it over with so we can move on."

"Move on! You're delirious, Malfoy! I don't have those kind of—" Words, damnit! He needed to move! He needed to—!

"I don't know what's more amusing—you denying me or you denying yourself when you have the opportunity to try it."

"I like teasing about it, Malfoy, obviously, but I wouldn't! I'm not gay—for anyone! I'm totally not—"

"You don't have to be GAY, Potter. I'm not gay. And, I know you want to kiss me. You stare at my mouth."

"I do not."

Draco watched as Harry pushed himself up off of the couch, with raised eyebrows, "Wow."

"Don't wow me, Malfoy. Okay—you know what, I do want to kiss you!"

Draco watched Harry, who was standing five feet away from Draco, who was still relaxed and intrigued, "What?"

"I do," Harry blurted out. "But, I won't. Never will. Can't. Could not. Will not."

"I'm going to go ahead and ask you what idiotic reasoning you have for not kissing me—go, give it to me, Potter."

"I like you too much, Malfoy—I mean, you know what we are. So do I. There are no words—I don't want to—"

"Kissing me would hardly fuck it up, Potter. We'd get it out of the way—"

"Yeah, Malfoy, and what if we didn't? What if it's... good-great-mesmerizing-perfect—fantastic?"

"Then it would be fanstastic."

"It's not as easy as it being what it is, Malfoy. There'd be more to it."

"Neither of us are clingy that way. Our situation prevents that level of attachment—we're already disturbingly close, aren't we, Potter? Tell me you were ever like this with Weasley, and I won't believe you. You are you, Harry. And, I am me. We are us. Obviously—if you want to kiss me, just kiss me. I want it. I welcome it."

"You shouldn't be saying this to me, not right now. We can't go down this path—no, Malfoy. No."

"What path? You want to keep denying you're attracted to me? Fine. All we'd be doing is experimenting."

"I don't experiment! That sounds like some cheap-out that idiot teenagers use to make themselves feel normal!"

"Fine, Potter, then it wouldn't be an experiment. We'd kiss—and, we'd kiss hard. And deep. And wet. We'd want it."

Harry clutched his head between his hands, completely mind-boggled, "I'm going to leave, now."

"Fuck you, Potter—the day you kiss me, this wait better be worth it."

"No, fuck you, Malfoy—and, why would I have to be the one to kiss you? Why wouldn't you kiss me?"

"Because you're the one who's trying to juggle the world. You're the one who doesn't want it—"

"I never said I didn't want it, Malfoy."

Draco stood up and turned around, to face Harry, this time not smiling or amused, "If you wanted it, you'd take it."

"I don't want to take it!"

"Why?"

"Because!"

"That is not an answer! That is not a reason! You're fucking yourself over here, Potter—we could have already done it!"

"I don't want to do it, Malfoy!"

"What are you so afraid of, Potter? You want it. But, you want it later? How does that work?"

"If I knew the answer to that, don't you think I'd give it to you? You should know I have issues, by now—! Don't move."

Draco smiled, "I'll leave this alone, if you'll answer me one question."

"Fine," Harry blurted out.

"The reason you won't kiss me isn't because you have... feelings for me...?"

"You're my friend. Exactly."

Draco shook his head, "Nicely played, Potter—but, I have to keep my word, so I won't point out how you just side-stepped the issue. Thanks for that honesty."

"You're welcome. I pride myself on honesty."

Draco laughed. He sat back down on the couch, "You're a cruel arse. Come on." He lifted up the doughnut.

Harry joined him in about five seconds.

Draco looked at him.

Harry looked at the plate, "Do you really want to go separate ways?"

"We already covered this, Potter. I was venting. Blabbing. Ranting. Lying. Trying to get a rise out of you."

"For your own sake."

"Yes."

"You're just delightful, Malfoy."

Draco rested back into the couch, with a demure smile, "God, we'd have explosive sex, Potter."

"Yeah, I know." Harry licked the pudding off of his index finger.

"Blatant."

"I know," Harry repeated, smirking coyly, with one last glance at Draco. "Are we done talking about our twisted side, Malfoy?"

"If you're done."

"Polite."

"I know."

Harry smiled to himself, lifting his finger from a slip of pudding he had collected. He went to move it back to his mouth, but his wrist was being led away from his mouth, and Draco was moving, too. His eyes flickered upward, in the moment, instinctively. He just stared and watched. The first couple of seconds seemed to have him stuck in time, where he could do nothing but view what was going on around him. Draco's lips had parted open, he was leaned forward a bit, his eyes attached down onto Harry's hand. A hot sensation wiped out the coldness of the pudding, just as the pudding, itself, was licked and sucked away, with a gentle, hot suction, which had meshed down over just the right amount of his fingertip to cause his entire stomach to knot, his heart to jump into his throat, his mouth to fall open and his shoulders to rise with his meaningful intake of breath.

It was wet contact, as Draco's lips closed over the tip, more fully, and he gave a soft suck.

Seconds later, casually, Draco lifted his face and rested back into the couch, with the plate in hand, "The pudding is good."

Harry blinked.

Draco didn't look at him, at first. But, after a bite and swallow of doughnut, he did, lightly, "Are you there?"

"No."

"Okay—well, when you get back, let yourself know that Draco Malfoy is fascinated with your fingers."

"I had no idea.'

Draco dipped his finger into the pudding. He placed the plate on the lounge, to his left, and then concentrated on his finger, innocently. He suddenly turned, however, and slashed down Harry's—Judas's—cheekbone with the sugary-sweetness they both seemed to take comfort in. Draco had always preferred vanilla over chocolate, which many of his Slytherin friends had thought was ludicrous. Most people in his life had, at least. It was fascinating that the only person to have never questioned his appreciation for vanilla was one Harry Potter. Yes, Harry Potter. There.

Draco's hand fell from Harry's face, under his chin, and then to Harry's other cheek. Draco leaned into the cheek closest, that he had access to see, because it was facing him. His left hand molded, strongly, over the right side of Harry's face, and he pressed toward him, at the same time as he indulged himself the honor and openness to lean forward, with hungrily curious lips, and kiss right beside Harry's mouth, like Harry had done to him, earlier. Fuck that sort of kiss!

It was teasing.

It was mean.

It was perfect.

Harry said nothing.

Draco peeked his eyes open, to see that Harry's eyes were closed—yes. Yes, yes, yes, "Potter."

"No, no, no—"

Draco's lips moved up the soft, warm skin, until his bottom lip skimmed across something cold and something wet. Something vanilla that he had placed there. It tasted good, but Draco suddenly wished it were not there, because the vanilla was tainting his moment. He just wanted to make Harry feel good, for fuck's sake. He didn't want Judas. He wanted Harry. He wanted to kiss him, and clutch him, rough him up a little, get him frustrated, get him high, get him hungry and powerful, riled up and demanding. He wanted Harry to explode with all of the things, at the same time, that Draco knew Harry was. He wanted every emotion, at one time—but, no, he would never get that. No, but he did like tasting the vanilla on the skin—it was sweet. He kissed it away, in three kisses, and then rested his cheek bone, squarely, against Harry's, so it was bone to bone, "I miss you, Potter. I never thought I'd miss you. It's not the same with you as him—I just want you—I mean, not just for the sake of how that sounds, but for everything—the friendship, most importantly. This isn't you—is that what you're waiting on? It's killing me, Potter—I know you want it. You know I want it. To try it. Get it over with. And, laugh about it in two months."

Harry rested his cheek against Draco's, but he never answered.

He didn't have to. The affection of their cheeks pressing together was an answer all in itself.

"You know I want you, don't you?"

Harry's eyes rolled up in his head. His lips were dry. They hadn't succeeded in ever closing.

Draco felt so good.

They felt so good, close together.

"Don't you?"

Harry's eyelashes flickered open, barely, in the moment. Draco kept nuzzling his nose and lips to Harry's ear.

"I know."

Excellent. Draco pulled himself back, saw that Harry was smirking, not at all awkward or shy, and smiled, "So."

"So."

"Happy birthday, Potter. May you never find a wife I hate."

Harry laughed, "Even if I do, you'll still have your cats."

Draco grinned, cheekily, at him, before he gave an open nod, as if to admit he had asked for that comeback.

"Here's hoping we don't die. If I do, and you're still alive, make these for the gathering afterward."

"No."

Harry elbowed Draco.

"Don't elbow me."

"I didn't elbow you."

They looked at each other.

Draco was the first to smile, before he looked away, "You're lucky it's your birthday, or I'd have you hexed by now."

"Or unlucky—no, wait. It doesn't work here, does it?"

"No," Draco snorted, having been giving Harry a strange look. "Seriously, though—happy seventeenth."

"Best one I've had in awhile. I have befriended my school rival."

"No, he befriended you."

Harry sighed, "Has anyone ever told you that you're very difficult?"

"I'm not difficult, just honest. See, Potter, I pride myself on honesty."

"Point taken, Gryffindor."

"Shut your mouth, Potter."

Harry threw himself onto Draco, playfully, so Draco couldn't get up and brood. He squeezed Draco, "You mean Slytherin you!"

Draco rolled his eyes, resting back. He casually patted Harry's upper back, amused, "Potter, get off of me."

"Sorry, can't," Harry immediately shut down, pulling his face back so his nose was in front of Draco's. "I'm feeling affectionate."

"You're going to regret it in five point zero twenty-five seconds."

Harry waited five point zero twenty-five seconds.

Draco rolled his eyes, "You're going to regret this in two point four seconds."

Harry waited two point four seconds.

"Three point two seconds and you're done, Potter! DONE!"

Three point two seconds later, Draco tackled Harry onto the couch, hard, and then onto the floor, where they both snorted with laughter and separated. Harry sat up, nursing an elbow, which had hit the wooden floor, and Draco pushed himself up, wrapped his arms around his knees, and smirked, fully.

"Don't mess with me, Potter."

"You're such an arse," Harry continued to laugh, in good spirits.

"Rightfully, as I am a combination of Slytherin and Gryffindor—explains a lot about me, you know."

"How do you figure, oh mighty?"

"Take our entire friendship, Potter. Think about it. Digest it. Lick it. Swallow it. Throw it away."

"Lick it?"

"Yes, lick it. Taste it."

"The sugar has gone to your brain."

"That's a myth, Potter. Sugar does absolutely nothing to hype people up—it's an excuse."

"Smart, too. You're a prize, Malfoy."

"I don't want to be a prize. I want to be a trophy."

"A trophy?"

Their conversation was extremely serious, but they were both hiding obviously knowledgeable laughter.

"Yes, a trophy. I want to be a trophy boyfriend."

Harry smiled, "You already are, Malfoy. Honestly. Don't you listen to... everyone? Everyone raves about you."

"I said I want to be a trophy boyfriend, Potter. But, I have high standards. The person would need to be brilliant."

"Oh, I see."

"Yes, and I would have to see a future with it. You know, sex. Rock and roll."

"No kids?"

"Kids. Them, too, but not until I'm ready to stop sleeping around on my significant other."

Harry tried not to laugh, "I don't think she would like that very much."

"Me either, so she would have to be someone who would understand my need for commitment, first and foremost."

"Yes."

"And, she would have to be brilliant—I mean, beyond powerful."

"That's limiting your choices!"

"Even so, I won't budge on brilliance. She also has to be sexy."

"Of course."

"I don't really care about hair color or eye color—I'd prefer curves or a bit of solidity, as I don't want to be holding bones at night."

"Brilliant, beyond powerful, curvaceous, sexy and understands you—yeah, sure you're going to find that."

"She also would have to be just the right height—you know, so we would piece together."

"Yes, that's, er—very important."

Draco set his eyes onto Harry, fully, and silenced himself for a brief moment, "She'd also have to be a man."

Harry smiled, softly, unthreateningly, with lifted eyebrows. Wow. He felt suddenly proud, "Really, Malfoy? You've decided?"

"Yeah," Draco admitted, under his breath, with a shrug. "I'm gay."

Harry laughed, hard, at the way Draco lazily sighed the confession, "Oh, God, what would I do without you?"

"Die."

"Scarily enough, that's probably true."

"What about you, Potter? What is your dream woman like?"

"She has a head."

Draco smiled, "Nice."

"I try."