A/N: Sorry about the wait. Real life has gotten in the way recently. Thanks to all those who reviewed and marked this fic for alerts. You're wonderful!

-oOoOo-

Chapter Four:

Civility and the Art of Tongue Holding

Pansy could not fall asleep, and it was all the fault of that Weasley girl, who was sniffling into her pillow—no doubt distraught at the discovery that her one true love was a poof. Pansy shook her head. She could almost sympathize with the girl as she'd once had a terrible crush on Draco, and all her dreams of becoming Mrs. Malfoy were shattered when she'd caught him kissing Blaise. Pansy made a gagging motion at the memory of those old feelings, and tried a silencing charm to drown out the girl Weasel, but that made her bed hallow eerily quiet. When she took the ward down that Lovegood girl was crooning in her sleep.

That was it, she thought, throwing the blankets aside and fetching up her pillow. She decided to pull a Draco and sleep in the common room. Halfway there she changed her mind. Why should she sleep on a sofa? Her back would ache in the morning, and she'd have under eye circles from tossing and turning.

She plowed into the boys' dorm, lighting up her wand and found the last empty bed. She raised her eyebrow at seeing Potter's wild hair darkening a pillow. She wondered just who had gotten him to sleep there, as Blaise had grumbled yesterday about Potter moving to share sleeping quarters with Ron Weasley and Longbottom.

She sighed in relief as she lay down, reveling in the blessed near silence, very glad that none of these boys snored.

Pansy woke in the morning with her face buried under her pillow, as was usual, and the knowledge that there was someone pressed against her back, which was not usual, and that that someone was kissing her neck.

She groaned in annoyance. What ignorant fool thought she would be up for morning nookie? First of all, morning, which really should say it all, and secondly, that there was no one at Hogwarts she wanted molesting her while she slept.

Unfortunately her groan was mistaken for something else, and whoever it was at her back had wandering hands.

"Get the fuck away from me," she grumbled.

"Oh, you don't mean that," the someone said, inching his hand up her back and under her shirt.

Unfortunately, Pansy knew that voice, and she was pretty sure she knew exactly why the boy attached to the voice was trying his game on her this morning. Pansy, like someone else in the room, had jet black hair, and it always looked a terrible fright when she woke up, much like that boy's hair looked all the time. Blaise was a fucking idiot.

"You might be interested to know," she said, pulling her face out from under her pillow, "that the body you're molesting right now has tits."

She glared at Blaise, whose eyes were wide with shock.

"Pans…" he said.

"Get the fuck out of my bed, Zabini."

"I am so sorry."

"Yeah, I'll bet you are. Go take a shower and wash the girl germs off."

Blaise departed like hell hounds were at his heels, and Pansy buried herself in the bedclothes and pillows once more, drifting easily back to sleep.

-oOoOo-

Draco didn't know why Blaise blushed every time he looked at Pansy, and he was pretty sure he didn't want to know. He also did not care, because he had a dormitory to un-flood.

He'd sent Potter off with vials of potions for the day, and ordered him to go off and play with his friends in the library, and do something useful with himself instead of sitting around watching Draco work. Draco had not yet cleared him to use magic, so the only thing Potter could do was research glass-making with Weasley. Potter had grumbled and growled, and Blaise had pouted, but Draco did not care. He could not stomach one more day of this infatuation Blaise had with Potter, and did not want to see his friend making cow-eyes at the Boy Who Lived when Draco had to concentrate on the flooding problem.

He sent Blaise and Theo down into the depths with one end of the hose, and he and Pansy led the other half through a window and outside so the water could dump back into the lake.

It was then a simple matter of making sure the pump worked.

Later, he would curse himself for calling the matter simple.

-oOoOo-

Ron smacked Harry upside his head.

Hermione was glad he did, because she wasn't close enough to do it herself.

"You almost drowned?" she repeated shrilly.

"I was fine. I'm fine," he protested.

"How is almost dying from not having enough oxygen in your blood make you fine?" she said. Ron smacked Harry again, seemingly unable to form coherent words.

"Ron, stop it," Harry said.

"No."

"You are so lucky Malfoy knew what to do," Hermione said.

"Well, he did, and I am all right, thanks to Malfoy and Blaise."

"Why the bloody hell didn't you say anything yesterday?" said Ron.

"There wasn't time. I didn't want the rest of the DA to know about it; they would have assumed the Slytherins did it on purpose, and it would have just made things worse," Harry said. "And then everybody went to bed, and Malfoy was shoving more potions down my throat, and making me sleep with them so he could wake me up in the middle of the night, and make me take more. He's worse than Madam Pomfrey, I swear."

Harry laughed as if remembering Malfoy's own brand of Mother Hen-ing, and Hermione shook her head, quite unable to believe that Harry had nearly died (twice) again, and she and Ron hadn't known about it until well after the fact.

"If this ever happens again, which it had better not," warned Ron, "You had better tell us straight away. I don't trust Malfoy to make sure you're all right."

"He did everything he could, Ron."

"But I'm sure Hermione could have done it better," he loyally insisted. Hermione smiled. "Just promise us you won't keep us in the dark with stuff like this?"

Harry smiled at them. "I promise. I'm sorry it took so long for me to tell you this time."

"You're forgiven," said Hermione. "I'm just so glad you're all right."

It hadn't been all that long ago that Harry had pretended to be dead, all for the sake of winning the war, but Gods if that hadn't been an awful ten minutes. Later, of course, he had apologized profusely, and had hugged Hermione when she started to cry. She hated to even think of those ten minutes.

"What have you guys found out about making glass?" asked Harry.

Hermione blushed, and Ron grinned. "Nothing, mate. We haven't started."

"Why not—Oh. I see."

"Right," Hermione said, briskly. "We'll get started on that then."

The house-elves were happily flitting back and forth along the shelves, sorting and alphabetizing the books according to Hermione's specifications, so she was free to work on research with the boys—or more accurately, she knew, do all the research while Harry and Ron grumbled about it.

But honestly, reading up about magical methods of making glass was better than researching dark spells and Horcruxes, so she felt they had no room to complain.

They still did, of course.

It didn't take Hermione long to find a book that was all about glass (the wizarding world was filled with seemingly useless, random information like this) and Harry stumbled onto something else, and around lunchtime they had devised a plan for mass producing panes of glass using a combination of Muggle assembly lines and a healthy dose of magic.

"We're going to need a lot of sand," said Ron, pointing out their main problem.

"I'll talk to McGonagall about it," Hermione said. "I'm sure she has a budget for the repairs. Perhaps she'll be able to order the supplies or knows where we can get them."

"It all sounds sort of dangerous," said Harry. "Maybe we should see if the glass can be bought."

Ron nodded fervently. "Easier too."

"Yes, all right," said Hermione. "I'll bring it up with McGonagall."

The library doors flew open, slamming against the wall, and Draco Malfoy stormed in. He ignored the group of Gryffindors entirely, but yelled, "Those Muggle Studies books had better be shelved properly!"

There were 'eeps' of terror from the house-elves, and they scattered every which way as Malfoy plowed through their midst.

He began grabbing books from the shelves, flipping through the indexes, and tossing the books aside when they didn't pass muster. Hermione winced as the books hit the floor.

"Malfoy, stop!" she cried.

"Yeah, what'd those books ever do to you?" said Ron.

Malfoy glowered at the Gryffindors, pulled another book from the shelf, and deliberately let it fall from his fingers.

"What are you looking for?" Hermione asked irritably.

"Water pumps."

"The pump isn't working?" asked Harry.

"No, Potter. It's working perfectly, and that's why I'm here in the library looking for information, preferably design plans, on water pumps," the blond said dryly.

Harry scowled and rolled his eyes.

"Did you take your you-know-what?" Malfoy asked him.

"I told them," said Harry, to which the blond shook his head as if that should have been a given. "And yes, I took the potion."

"Good."

Hermione offered to help Malfoy, but he waved her off, suddenly absorbed in a book on Muggle engineering.

Ron watched him, lip curled in disbelief, then abruptly shook his head as if to shake the confusing thoughts away. Hermione felt much the same, and Harry seemed oblivious to the strangeness of Malfoy's reading material, and was just watching the blond silently.

Hermione suddenly had a flashback to sixth year. She sighed inwardly. At least Harry wasn't extremely suspicious of Malfoy, stalking the blond and calling it a preventative measure against future evil.

She left her boys to their respective activities: Ron dozing on folded arms, and Harry watching Malfoy, and found a Business Floo Book in an effort to find a company that could provide the glass to Hogwarts.

At lunch Hermione spoke with the Headmistress. McGonagall wasn't sold on Hermione's idea of making the glass themselves, and sent the trio around armed with measuring tape and parchment to make a list of the size and number of how many panes of glass would need to be purchased.

It was dreadfully dull work and they hadn't even neared being done by the time dinner rolled around.

-oOoOo-

Dean wanted to wring Seamus's neck. They were best mates, and he never would, of course, but Seamus would not shut up about the Slytherins. And Terry Boot, that idiotic Ravenclaw, kept agreeing with him, and it just egged Seamus on.

Dean tossed a few more scraps of metal into the crate they were using to cart all the broken pieces of armor up to the castle. Boot had made it light and had charmed it to levitate and follow them around—which was the only good thing Boot had done, and that was yesterday afternoon.

It was hot this morning. The sky was cloudless, and even though it was only mid-morning the sun was beating down on their heads. Dean thought about the dungeons, which were cool and flooded with lake water. It might be nice to go for a swim.

"I just cannot believe Harry can forgive them like that," said Seamus. "It's not as though they fought with us. In the end they all ran away like the cowards they are."

Boot nodded. Dean rolled his eyes.

"Malfoy came back," said Dean.

"Oh, yes," Seamus said darkly. "I saw him. Wandering about without a wand, telling every Death Eater he came across that he was on their side."

Boot started to nod again, and Dean had had it. "Well what did you expect him to do without a wand?" he snapped. "He's Slytherin. He was just trying to keep himself from getting killed. What would you do in the middle of a battle without a wand?"

"Taken one off one of those no good Death Eaters. There were plenty down."

"Yeah, all right, Seamus."

Taken one. Sure. Like it worked that way.

Dean had a very different year than his best friend. Unable to return to Hogwarts, and unable to go home for fear of putting his family in danger, he'd had to go on the run. It had been rough going for a while. He'd tried to make it work in the Muggle world, but he'd spent his teenage years as a wizard, and the Muggle world looked very different at seventeen than it did at eleven. He just didn't know how to assimilate, and had daily cursed himself for being no better than a Pureblood who didn't know the first thing about taking the Tube or checking into hostels. And London was a rough place to be when you were homeless.

Added to this, was that his family didn't understand why he couldn't go back to school, and why he couldn't stay at home. They'd reported him as a runaway, and after a few weeks of attempting to use his step-dad's credit cards, they'd nearly caught him twice, and he had to go at it alone. Hiding from the Ministry and the Muggles. It was awful, and led to a lot of sleeping in alleyways and on park benches.

Luckily he'd eventually taken up with Ted Tonks, who had a daughter who was an Auror and wife who was a Black. Ted had made sure they were safe, and always had something to eat, and he had a magical tent that was bigger on the inside. Ted called it the TARDIS, and when things looked particularly dire Dean would refer to Ted as 'the Doctor', and then things didn't look quite so bad.

It wasn't long after that they took up with Dirk Cresswell and two goblins. Dean didn't like Dirk, because he didn't believe in Harry, and he liked the goblins even less.

Things went well for a few months. And then Ted and Dirk had gone to a Muggle grocery for food, and the Snatchers had followed them back to their camp.

Dean didn't like to think about that day.

"Look," Dean said. "I know things sucked here. They sucked out there too. But Harry's right. This isn't the time to hold on to old hate. We have to put the world back together, and we can't do that without the Slytherins. Like it or not they are as much a part of our world as Hufflepuffs and Ravenclaws are. We need them."

Seamus didn't like it, and said so.

Dean just shook his head, and walked a few hundred feet away to collect more metal scraps. Seamus had spent his year fighting, which was very different than just trying to survive. Dean understood all too well what the Slytherins had gone though, the narrow line they'd walked, and he understood why Seamus didn't understand. Dean too was a Gryffindor, and couldn't imagine being at Hogwarts with those Death Eaters teaching classes and torturing students, and not wanting to stand up and make it stop.

But sometimes your hands were tied, and you were damned if you do, and damned if you didn't.

Dean understood. He didn't like it, but he understood.

-oOoOo-

Justin Finch-Fletchley, heir to the Finch and Fletchley fortunes, had spent the past year on the continent. He was pretty sure the Ministry wouldn't be able to find one Muggle boy who was traipsing across Europe with matching Louis Vuitton luggage, and he'd been right. Justin had spent a fair amount of time in Ibiza, soaking up the sun and getting laid.

He'd done a wonderful job of acting like he was nothing more than a rich Muggle, living off Daddy's money, irresponsible and carefree.

He wasn't, exactly. He drowned his cares in alcohol and sex, and tried to ignore that persistent feeling that he no longer belonged in the Muggle world. Sometimes, though, it was hard to even remember what magic felt like. He hadn't used any, not even after his seventeenth birthday when the Trace was gone. His name was on a list of Muggleborns wanted for interrogations, and he was scared that even the use of a tiny thing like 'Lumos' would result in his capture.

The only wizarding items he'd brought with him were his wand and his DA coin, which kept him appraised of the situation at Hogwarts. It was lucky that at the time Neville had sent that last message he was just on the other side of the Channel in France, and he was able to Apparate to London and then to Hogsmeade with ease.

He'd been soft. Winded from the fight, and spells came to him sluggishly, bogged down by a year of museum tours, white sand, and tanned slick bodies.

He'd come out of it alive though, and wouldn't have traded his year of city-hopping to live in Neville Longbottom's shoes for all the gold in Gringotts. Not even if it meant he could understand Neville's anger, which was bewildering.

Justin had never liked the Slytherins. He was a Hufflepuff. The Snakes thought the Badgers were beneath their notice or just there for ridicule. Justin didn't quite understand why the others were so upset with the Slytherins though. From what he'd heard the Slytherins had only acted as he'd suspected they would act: Snakes first, everyone else a distant second. Perhaps it was disappointing that the Snakes hadn't risen to the occasion, but honestly, Gryffindors always expect that those not on the side of evil should always act the hero. It just doesn't work that way.

Bad times bring out the best in some, and the worst in others. There wasn't any cause to be upset about it. But that was the Hufflepuff way. Keep your nose to the grindstone, and if you're looking at what others are doing you just aren't working hard enough.

Justin pushed his sweaty blond curls out of his eyes, and drove the shovel into the ground next to the Snargaluff that had taken root in the lawn. Somewhere, not far away, Padma and Neville were working too, but Justin would not look to check their progress. He would keep his nose to the grindstone, and he would not look up.

-oOoOo-

Draco needed help. He didn't want to admit it, but he did. There it was. And worse still the help he needed could only be given by one person.

The water pump wasn't working, and he had no idea what was wrong with it, other than it wasn't pumping water. It was trying, the pistons were moving, and the magic making the handle push down worked like a charm (Blaise's contribution to the cause, the lazy bastard), but no water came out. He'd found a Muggle book on engineering in the library, and while it was fascinating—he'd shamefully admitted to himself—it had not helped him to discover where he'd gone wrong in his design for the pump.

He needed help. He needed someone who innately understood the way Muggle things worked. He needed—

"Granger."

She looked up from her book. The members of Potter's trio and his little defense club had retired to the common room of the Den for the evening, while Draco and his friends had been run off to the dorm they were staying in. While the others were engaged in games of Exploding Snap, Chess, and a heated game of Truth or Dare (fueled by Butterbeer), Granger was curled up in front of the fire with a novel.

"Something wrong, Malfoy?"

Draco resolutely, painfully, shoved his pride to the side. He could do this. For Slytherin, he could do this.

"The pump. I can't get it to work. I was hoping you could put your Muggle-ness to good use and tell me where I went wrong."

She sniffed. "Well, the first thing you did wrong was insult me when you needed a favor. Bad form." Granger went back to her book.

He scowled, screwed his eyes shut and said, "Please?"

That got her attention. She was so startled, in fact, that Draco was offended. As though she'd thought he didn't even know the word was commonly used in the English language. He irritably pushed the roll of parchment with the pump schematics in her face, and dropped into a chair near her.

"Well, go on," he said.

She rolled her eyes, but began to examine the design. Draco studied his nails, and then the fire, and wondered what was taking her so long. Shouldn't her Muggle-ness take over and reveal hidden Muggle secrets to her?

"Well, Granger?"

"I—" She sighed, with what Draco would learn was a massive blow to her pride. "I can't help you."

"Why in Merlin's name not? I said 'please' for fuck's sake."

"I didn't say that I won't, I said that I can't!"

"Oh," he said, and smiled a blinding, enormous smile. "Oh, I see."

"Shut up," she snapped, and threw the scroll at him.

Draco smirked delightedly. While Granger may have failed him, she had given him a golden opportunity. He stood on his chair, blew the parchment up with an Engorgement Charm so it could clearly be seen across the whole of the common room, and said in the manner of a circus ringleader, "Gryffindors, Muggle lovers, disgraced Ravenclaws! I ask for your attention!"

When the group was looking his way, some looking mighty violent, he went on. "Now is the time for you to get one up on Miss Hermione Granger, whose encyclopedic knowledge has just failed her for the very first time!"

At this, the disgraced Ravenclaws sat up and took notice.

"Here's your chance, boys and girls, for if you can answer my question correctly, you and you alone will be able to lord your superior knowledge over Her Brainy Bushiness for the rest of the summer. Are you interested?" he called.

There were some titters, and more than one person called out, "Yes!"

Draco pointed to the poster-sized parchment he'd floated in the air with his wand. "Who here can tell me why this water pump won't work?"

To his surprise, they actually seemed to be considering his question. Padma Patil was even coming in for a closer look. There was no Ravenclaw in their year who didn't hate Hermione Granger just a little bit—for she made the members of the house of books and studying look like lazy, illiterate fuckwits.

Granger on the other hand was glaring with a look so filled with hate that it took Draco back to simpler times. He wanted to call her 'Mudblood' one more time, just to make the moment complete. But he didn't, because he was horribly outnumbered, and because Granger had a wicked temper, which sometimes led to physical violence.

Potter's inner circle, unlike the others, were not amused by Draco's attempt at getting answers by targeting Granger. Both Weasels were scowling, Longbottom's face was hard, and Lovegood was off in la-la land as usual. Potter was frowning at the diagram, though, eyes flickering over it in contemplation.

As time stretched on, Draco's heart fell, and the hope that there was some innate Muggle magic (for lack of a better word) residing in his classmates began to wane. There was no hope. Slytherin House would be closed, forever underwater, and all those future ambitious souls would be forced into Ravenclaw or, Salazar forbid, Gryffindor or Hufflepuff.

"Draco," said Potter, stunning the blond boy momentarily. "It's not water tight. You need a rubber ring around the piston, see?"

Draco just stared at his nemesis. What had Potter called him?

"There's no suction," Potter explained, as though that was the problem. "No force to pull the water upwards?"

Draco blinked, and his priorities righted themselves. Ah, Potter was right. How had he missed that? Draco hopped off his lofty perch, and left the Den in a hurry. He was going to get the damn pump working if it was the last thing he ever did.

It was always like this. Some tiny, seemingly inconsequential thing that he forgot about, which in turn cocked up his entire plan. It had been like this with the cabinet too. He'd been missing a fucking screw, and that had caused him months of anguish. And this time, a simple ring of rubber.

Always something simple, something obvious, that he missed and caused everything to go pear-shaped.

Story of his fucking life.

-oOoOo-

"How did you know that?" Hermione demanded, as Malfoy ran out of the Den.

Harry shrugged. "I had to mow my aunt and uncle's lawn. The lawnmower broke down all the time, and I had to fix it." He'd made the mistake of telling Uncle Vernon about the broken mower once, and his uncle had blamed Harry and his 'freakishness'.

"Oh," she said. Talk of the Dursleys killed any impending argument flat. It was almost handy.

Ginny, who'd been ignoring him since their fight said quietly, "You called him Draco." And she went back to her game of Exploding Snap with Luna as if she hadn't said anything at all.

Had he? How odd, he didn't even realize.

"Malfoy's a git," growled Ron, nearly inaudible over the noise of the Truth or Dare game. "Cornering Hermione like that. Git."

Harry sighed, and looked at the chessboard. Ron was beating him soundly.

"I'm going to go see how Malfoy's doing," Harry said.

"Of course you are," muttered Ginny.

Harry sighed and decided to ignore her. He didn't know how to make up for their fight, other than apologizing and giving into Ginny's every whim. But he wouldn't apologize for making nice with the Slytherins, only for yelling at her, and that wouldn't be enough.

Malfoy was on his knees by the water pump, meticulously taking it apart.

"Was I right?" Harry asked.

The blond grumbled something, but didn't outright tell Harry to fuck off, so Harry took that to mean he could stay.

Malfoy conjured a length of string, measuring around the piston, and tied off a loop. With his wand he transfigured the string into a rubber ring. He replaced the piston and smiled in triumph as he put all his weight into forcing it down into the pipe.

Harry handed him bits of the dismantled pump, until it was reassembled. Malfoy pushed down on the lever and cheered when a small amount of water poured from the spout.

"I am fucking Merlin!" Malfoy proclaimed.

Harry laughed.

"Make yourself useful Potter, and reattach that hose."

Harry did as he was bid, and Malfoy reactivated the charm that kept the lever pumping up and down.

"How long will it take to drain the dungeons?" asked Harry.

"A long time. A very long time at this rate. I'll copy this one tomorrow, and then we'll have a few pumps running. It'll go faster."

Malfoy looked almost wild in his success, far from the Ice Prince of old. Harry liked it. This was a Malfoy he could have been friends with at eleven. But just as soon as he appeared, he was gone, replaced with the Malfoy who hated every breath Harry took.

In the hall there was silence, but for the squeak of hinges and the gush of water. Harry looked at Malfoy, who looked at a spot of grease on his hand.

"This is stupid," said Harry. "Can't we call a truce, or something?"

"Whatever happened to your dream of civility?"

"I think they go hand in hand."

"A truce is a cessation of hostilities between two opposing forces, while civility is a formal politeness. I can agree to the truce, but not to the civility."

"Why not?" Harry asked.

"Because I don't know how to be formally polite with you. Besides, you'd probably only think I was being sarcastic."

"Probably," Harry allowed.

"What are the terms of the truce?" Malfoy asked, giving a mocking sort of bow.

"Um, no offensive magic towards each other."

"Agreed. No offensive magic towards members of… our… forces?"

"I'm not going to hex your friends, Malfoy. I sort of like them."

"Blaise will be so glad to hear that," drawled Malfoy. "Anything else?"

Harry wasn't quite sure what he meant about Blaise, but he let it go. "Yes, you can clear me for using magic tomorrow."

Malfoy was suddenly all business. "Did you take your last potion?"

"Yes. Do you know any diagnostic healing spells?"

"I've heard Pomfrey say a few, but I don't know how to do them," he admitted. "I suppose you'll be all right to use magic tomorrow. If you get enough sleep."

Harry smiled. "Great, thanks Malfoy."

There was an awkward sort of moment where Harry decided to go back to the Den and asked if Malfoy was coming along as well. The other boy said he was going to just make sure that the water pump was operating correctly, and for Harry not to worry his tiny, little brain over it.

This scathing comment prompted an argument over whether insults were allowed under the truce, to which Malfoy said he would never have agreed if that were the case, so 'Potty' had just better learn to deal with verbal abuse.

Harry supposed a kinder, gentler Malfoy was too much to hope for.

-oOoOo-

A/N: Yay! They're starting to get along! I did some research, but honestly, I have no idea how water pumps work. I never took physics in high school, and science and engineering were never my forte anyway. So yeah, if I totally screwed that up let me know.

Reviews are love, and you know they make me want to work on this story… Just sayin.