A/N: I'm sorry that it's been so long since I've updated. Real life has been crazy lately. I got a review from today, which was the kick in the pants that I needed, so thanks dear reader! Anyway, I'll do my best to have chapter eight out quicker than this one. Enjoy the chapter, it's a fun one!

-oOoOo-

Chapter Seven:

Alls Fair, So Long As You Win

The front page of the Daily Prophet the day after Draco's 'press conference' was all about the student's reconstruction efforts. The main article did focus heavily on Potter, but Draco wasn't surprised or even angry, because right beside it, above the fold was his own face smiling charmingly.

Rita wrote an absolutely beautiful article about a young man hoodwinked by the Dark Lord, and forced into his service with the threat of his parent's deaths hanging over his young attractive head. How that same young man had been integral to the Dark Lord's downfall, and was now making amends by organizing the reconstruction of his beloved school.

Draco loved it, because it was all about him.

The wizarding world, which had also been hoodwinked and bought into the Dark Lord's Ministry, and hadn't realized until it was far too late, had taken Draco into their hearts and held him up as an example of what they all should be doing now that they'd seen the error of their ways.

Fluffy bunnies, kittens, and rainbows. And lots of fan mail.

It was glorious. Draco knew she'd only done it so that he'd have farther to fall when she outed him, but he was sure he could deal with that when it came.

It was a doubly glorious day, because yesterday Potter had stuck to him like glue after their conversation, and hadn't let himself be drawn away by Blaise. He and Harry had spent the afternoon casting duplication spells on the water pump, and had set up four more. The first was still working perfectly, but slowly. The upper dungeon level was now down to two feet of water, but given that there was a whole other floor flooded, and the dormitory levels of Slytherin House, it would take a very long time for one pump to do the job. Draco hoped that five pumps would speed it along.

Draco slapped Harry's hand as he reached for one of Draco's letters. "Check them for hexes first, you silly git."

Harry chuckled. "I thought you were going to say, 'No, mine!' like some toddler."

"That's coming next, but there's no reason you can't help me check for hexes."

Harry ignored this, and opened the letter anyway (after having checked it). "You have a marriage proposal here from Margaret Chenoweth. Oh, and she sent a picture." Harry blushed. "Oh, my."

"Let me see," Draco demanded. "Ah, Miss Chenoweth is very well endowed, isn't she? Here's the pile for ones with naughty pictures."

"You have a whole pile?"

"Seven, so far. This one in particular may interest you." Draco selected the only one that had so far come from a man, and passed it to Harry who blushed furiously, and buried it under the photo of Margaret.

"I don't want to see any more."

"Liar."

"I don't even know if I'm… you know, or not."

"Maybe you should experiment with Blaise a little and find out."

Harry shrugged, and dropped his chin onto folded arms. "Maybe."

Draco wanted to kick himself. Harry was supposed to say something like, 'Draco, how could you ever think I'd use Blaise in such a fashion? That's ever so wrong.' But he hadn't, and now Draco had gone and put the idea into his head. He could almost hear the cogs moving. 'It wouldn't hurt anyone,' Harry would justify. 'Blaise is leaving for France anyway, so it wouldn't matter, and nothing would come of it. And if it backfired horribly, then at least Blaise would be out of the country.'

Draco bit his lip viciously so he wouldn't come out and say something like, 'Or you could experiment with me.'

Instead he dropped a stack of unopened mail in front of the pensive Boy Wonder. "Help me check these for hexes."

It was nice, sitting with Harry like this. It was how things should have been. Harry should have taken his hand on the train. Harry should have had five years to convince Draco that the Dark Lord's way was not the best way. They should have been friends. Draco shook the thoughts away. None of that mattered. He was just glad it was happening at all. Especially given how he now felt about Harry Potter.

Draco skimmed a letter, another marriage proposal, and tossed it aside.

-oOoOo-

Harry knew he was being stupid, clinging to Draco Malfoy in hopes that he would help him figure out what the hell was going on in his head, and what to do about Blaise. But when Draco had told him yesterday that he was gay, well, it was like having an expert on hand—if only you could get the questions out. Someone who had the answers was there, and it was comforting—even if Draco himself was not.

Draco hadn't helped much, but he had distracted Harry for the entire afternoon working on the flooding problem, and had forced Harry to stay with him in the evening while he was fixing the Slytherin Hourglass and replacing the enchantments. By the time they'd gotten back to the Den everyone else had gone to sleep.

Including Blaise and Ron, who no doubt had a lot of questions for Harry. He hoped to avoid them for at least a little while longer, because he had no idea what to say to either of them yet.

"You know what we should do today?" said Harry.

"Hm?"

"We should check on the Room of Requirement."

"Why?" Draco asked shrilly.

"The fire? It might have destroyed more than the Room of Hidden Things."

Draco shook his head. "I don't want to. How about the Acromantula? Wouldn't you like to fight a nice Acromantula instead?"

"Why don't you want to—oh. Sorry."

"It's all right. Maybe some other time, I'm not ready yet."

Harry could have smacked himself for being so thoughtless. Crabbe had been Draco's friend once, no matter how he had turned out.

"Do you know how to fight an Acromantula?" asked Harry.

"Oh, like you've fought an Acromantula," sneered Draco.

"There was one in the Tournament," said Harry. "And in second year, Ron and I faced a whole nest of them in the—"

"Oh, spare me the stories. How do you fight an Acromantula?"

Harry told him, and Draco blanched. "We have to get that close to it? What if it bites me? We should make sure there's some anti-venom on hand, just in case."

"You'll do it?"

"Well, someone's got to go with you, and make sure you don't get yourself killed. And Weasley's not going to go toe to toe with a spider. He's scared of them, isn't he?"

Harry smiled. "This is going be fun. You'll see."

Draco muttered something derogatory about Gryffindors, and terror, and their crazy ideas of what constituted as foreplay.

-oOoOo-

Blaise was not happy. And he was confused. Was Hero really just trying to pretend the whole thing had never happened? He was avoiding Blaise like he was a plague carrier. It wasn't fair. Hero was supposed to be nice, and well, not acting like a Slytherin all of a sudden.

"What's wrong, darling?" asked Pansy.

"You know what's wrong," he said sullenly.

She poured herself a cup of coffee, and topped off Blaise's. "There, there," she said. "He'll come around. Just as soon as he figures out what to say."

"You don't know that. He might try to avoid me for the rest of the summer."

"Pouting does not suit you."

"Yes it does. I look beautiful no matter what I do." She sniffed. It was true and she damned well knew it. "What's he doing hanging around with Draco anyway? Last I knew they could barely tolerate each other."

Pansy hummed. "I wonder…"

"You wonder what?"

"Well, Draco was awfully angry yesterday morning, wasn't he? Do you suppose he was angry about you and Potter?"

Blaise frowned. "Why should Draco care? He hates Potter!"

"Yes, he hated him quite a lot, didn't he? Maybe a little too much."

"You don't think…"

She shrugged. "Draco's always very angry when he doesn't get what he wants."

Blaise did not like what Pansy was saying. He did not like it at all, because it felt like the truth. Draco had always been very passionate in his loathing of Harry Potter, and if he'd somehow turned his passionate loathing into something else then things were not looking up for Blaise's plans of a summer fling with Harry Potter.

Harry Potter was a committer, like Pansy had said, and unfortunately for Blaise, so was Draco. And since Draco was his friend, and one of his best, he would have to defer to Draco's feelings.

"Here darling, have a croissant, and I'll help you scope out your next conquest."

Blaise ripped off a piece of the flaky bread and tossed it in his mouth. "What do you think of Finnigan?" he said. "On a scale of one to ten?"

They looked at the sandy blond Irish boy together. "Oh, I'd say about an eight if we're just talking about looks, but if we're going overall then I'd have to mark him down to a six. He's rather loud."

"I like it when they're loud," said Blaise, and Pansy laughed.

-oOoOo-

"Retreat, Potter, retreat!" Draco yanked hard on the back of Harry's t-shirt. "Get the fuck out of here, you insane bastard!"

Finally, Harry took a step backwards, and Draco all but jumped through the trap door and scurried down the ladder, Harry not far behind. He was laughing.

"What is wrong with you?" Draco demanded. "Did you even see that thing? It's enormous!"

Harry's laughter had become slightly hysterical, and he was doubled over. He reached out and wrapped his fingers around Draco's wrist.

"I know," he managed. "I've never seen one that big! Are you all right?"

"I am fine, because I have a fight or flight response. You, clearly, do not."

Harry pulled himself somewhat upright. "That was fun."

Draco goggled. "That was not fun. That was the opposite of fun."

Harry dropped to the ground and pulled Draco with him. "Let's just rest for a minute and we'll try again."

"We will do no such thing!" Draco shouted. "We've tried it your way, which very clearly did not work. Now we shall try it my way, which will be much better."

"Oh, all right," Harry said, smiling widely. "What's your way, then?"

"First, we need it incapacitated before we enter the room. Some kind of gas… a smoke bomb with Draught of Living Death in it?"

"But how will we make sure that we don't get knocked out as well?"

Draco gave him a look, which communicated that Harry was simpleton. "A mask, of course."

"A gas mask? Do wizards have gas masks?"

"Potter, you are a wizard. Quit acting like you're separate."

Harry shrugged. "Sometimes I still feel like I'm a Muggle. Like I don't belong here, but then I never really belonged there either."

Draco waved this away. "You're ridiculous. You're a wizard and that's all there is to it. You belong here. Now, we can get the masks from the Potions classroom. They're used for brewing some NEWT level potions, and I'm sure there are some in the storage closet."

"Do you know how to make a smoke bomb? Because I don't."

"It's incredibly simple. Or it must be if the Weasley twins can do it."

Harry shook his head. "The Weasley twins are very clever." His face fell a bit. "Were very clever… Maybe I'll owl George and ask him if he can help."

Draco had forgotten that one of the twin terrors had died. "Right," he said. "You should do that. We can leave the spider for another day." He wasn't eager to get back in that classroom any time soon.

"Yeah, okay."

Ah, and now Potter was all down and depressed, and just a moment ago he'd been laughing like he'd never stop.

"There are other things that need to be taken care of before Monday anyhow," said Draco, trying to be practical. He hoped another mindless chore would bring Potter out of this instantaneous funk he'd stumbled into. "Come on, let's check the List and see what's left. I'm sure there's something terrifying and dangerous that you'll enjoy doing."

-oOoOo-

Lavender Brown stifled giggles behind her hand, and Parvati Patil put up a quick silencing ward.

"Oh, my god," she said, "They'll hear you!"

They'd gone up to scout out the Acromantula situation in the Divination Tower, and heard Harry and Draco Malfoy trying and failing to deal with it.

"What is it with boys? Must there always be a battle involved?" Lavender said, still laughing.

Parvati cracked a smile. "I know, they're ridiculous, but how were you planning on us dealing with it if even Harry can't?"

"Oh, it will be easy. We'll have to go shopping though. It might be a giant spider, but it's still just a spider."

Parvati shuddered. "I think I'd rather do just about anything else."

"But our mission requires shopping, Parv. Shopping!" Parvati still looked dubious, though she was just as eager to get the spider out of Professor Trelawney's tower as Lavender was, so Lavender brought out the big guns. "We're going to go shopping in the Muggle world."

"Really?"

Lavender smiled. Her best friend was hopelessly pureblooded sometimes, and didn't understand a thing about the Muggle world Lavender had grown up in. The girls had bonded long ago over a makeup kit Lavender had smuggled to Hogwarts under her mother's nose, and as luck would have it, Parvati had brought along a similar magical version of the same. Since then Lavender had shared her Muggle beauty magazines with Parvati—who'd been enamored, as there was no such thing in the Wizarding World, and kept her happy with bringing large boxes of the latest beauty products from the Muggle world at their returns from each holiday for them to test on themselves and each other.

"While we're there," said Parvati, mock casually, "will you take me to that place? Oh, what's it called? Sephora?"

Lavender grinned. "Ah, yes, the Mecca of beauty. We shall certainly have to make a stop there."

Parvati squealed happily. "You know what we should do? We should ask Pansy if she wants to go. I'll bet she's never been either."

"I like the way you think, darling."

Lavender and Parvati linked arms and went off in search of their new friend, and comrade in the love of makeup and fashion.

-oOoOo-

Pansy took back every negative word she'd ever uttered about Muggles upon entering Sephora. She had clearly been wrong, wrong, wrong. Muggles were wonderful. Muggles were brilliant. Muggles had a better skin care regime than she had.

"Parvati, have you seen this?" she said, thrusting a wand of lip-gloss in the other girl's face. "There's sparkles in it!"

Parvati cooed appreciatively. "Oh, you must get it!"

Pansy was even beginning to appreciate the Muggle clothes Lavender had transfigured for her. The Muggle girls were looking enviously at her shoes and handbag. Lavender had modeled them after pictures in one of her Muggle fashion magazines, saying that she couldn't afford designer things, but she was able to transfigure herself perfect imitations of them.

The three girls had Apparated to Diagon Alley, and from there taken a taxi to Sephora. The taxi ride had been nothing short of harrowing for Pansy, but she thought she'd handled it well.

After two blissful hours in the beauty store, they left with three large bags of makeup and accessories, and stopped briefly at another store, which was less interesting. Lavender bought three cans of something she called, 'bug bombs,' and they found an alley to Apparate to Hogsmeade from.

Feeling charitable after the shopping trip, Pansy accompanied the girls up to the Divination Tower to take care of a spider.

-oOoOo-

There was something funny going on with Harry, and Hermione intended to find out what it was. Ron had told her that Harry and Ginny had broken up, and all Ginny would say on the matter was that they were finished for good.

She suspected there was a Slytherin involved. Namely Blaise Zabini with a side order of Draco Malfoy.

Hermione liked to think of herself as being an enlightened and intelligent individual, who was capable of forgiveness. She could and would forgive Malfoy for all the slights he had dealt her in the past—the word 'Mudblood' didn't ruffle her feathers nearly as much as it bothered Ron, mostly because it didn't mean anything to her. So that was easy enough. Ron seemed to have been able to put aside his anger towards Malfoy as well, and Harry had done even more than that. He'd gone and tried to befriend the blond. So she could accept all these things, and leave them in the past.

She could and would not accept any harm that was coming to Harry now. She would not allow Zabini or Malfoy to hurt Harry. Especially not at the level that Zabini seemed to be playing at. She would not allow that boy to toy with Harry's heart. It would not be borne.

So with these thoughts in mind, she went to find her best friend, while a far corner of her mind dreamed up appropriate punishments for Zabini if she found that Harry had already been hurt.

She found Harry with Malfoy in the Great Hall. They were examining the rather large crack that had been made in the stone floor from spell heat.

"Can't we just fill it in with concrete?" said Harry.

"We could," said Malfoy. "But the break might have affected more than just the floor. It could have upset the foundations of the walls when the floor snapped apart. The crack is more than six inches wide in the middle, which could cause a lot of problems, and I don't know how to check for that, so we're going to have to leave the floor for the engineers to look at."

"Oh. I thought this would be an easy one."

Malfoy smirked. "Pick something else."

"I'd say we should start on the windows, but the glass hasn't been delivered yet, so that's out. I don't know. What do you want to do?"

"I need to check on the pumps again, and make sure that the spells are holding in the common room. Are you up for another trip into the deep?"

Harry smiled. "Course I am. What's a little water compared to an Acromantula?"

"Knowing you they're equally dangerous."

"I'm not planning to drown again," he said.

"You never do. I think someone cursed you with luck at birth—good and bad. There's no in between for you."

Harry laughed. "Yeah, you might be right."

Hermione watched the two boys from the doorway, trying to figure out what was going on between them. They were very friendly. It was still strange to see Harry with Malfoy without either of them hurling an insult or a hex, and even stranger to see them smiling at each other. Very, very odd things were happening in Hogwarts, she thought. The war had changed things, but fixing all that was broken was changing them even further. She'd never imagined that something like this could happen.

She cleared her throat, and the boys turned to look. "Harry, could I talk to you?"

"Sure, Hermione. I'll meet you in the dungeons?" he said to Malfoy.

Malfoy nodded, and didn't say anything to her as he passed, but gave her a look like he knew she was up to something, and he didn't think he liked it.

Harry sat at the table, and gestured for her to join him. "What did you want to talk about?"

"I talked to Ginny."

"Oh. I see. What did she say?"

"Just that you'd broken up, this time for good. She wouldn't say anything more. What happened?"

He shrugged and ran a hand through his hair. He was nervous about something.

"Harry, I'm not angry, or siding with Ginny or anything. It just… well, I don't understand, and I think there's something else going on with you lately, and I wanted you to know that I'm here to listen, if you need me to."

He almost smiled, but it didn't seem quite sincere. "Thanks Hermione. I don't know if I'm ready to talk about it just yet."

Sometimes what Harry needed was a push, and then he wouldn't be able to stop talking about what was bothering him. This was always a risk, though, because it could make him clam up further and she'd spend weeks waiting for the opportunity to ask again.

"Does it have something to do with Blaise Zabini?"

His head jerked up, and his cheeks flushed. Jackpot. "Why would you say that?"

"He's been flirting with you a lot lately. Has, um, anything come of that?"

"No—Hermione, I—"

"Harry, I hope you know that there is nothing you can tell me that would make not want to be your friend. There is nothing you could do that would make me not want to be your friend."

"I might be gay," he blurted.

She nodded, only surprised that it had taken so little for him to tell her. "Might be?"

"Yeah, I'm not sure, you see. Why aren't you surprised? Has it been obvious that I might like boys for so long that you've known for ages? Dear God, Hermione, why didn't you tell me?"

"Harry, calm down. I didn't know anything. I only started to think about it when I noticed how Blaise was acting around you, and that you weren't exactly… unreceptive to his efforts."

"Oh, good. I'm so confused. I mean, I was drunk when he kissed me, and…" He blushed. Hermione expected there was more than a single kiss involved. "Well, I was drunk, but I liked it. I liked it a lot. But it hasn't happened again, and I don't know if it was just because I'd been drinking, or some weird astronomical alignment made me go temporarily crazy, or if it's because I really do like boys."

"But you still like girls, right? I mean, you're still attracted to them?"

"Yes! I mean, Ginny's still… wow, and… But Blaise is pretty wow, too."

"He is very handsome."

"Yes, he is! Almost unnaturally so." Hermione laughed.

"Maybe you're bisexual. I suppose you won't know unless you experiment a bit, though I hope you'll be careful. I don't want you to be hurt."

"Malfoy said the same thing."

"Malfoy knows!?"

"He saw Blaise kissing me."

"Oh," she said, mollified. If Harry had told Malfoy before he'd told her, well, then she'd be right to be upset.

"I don't know though. I'd feel weird using Blaise as a test subject like that. I mean, I like him, but I don't think I like like him."

"I know what you mean," she said. "And you can't really be sure if you don't have feelings for the person. I mean, I like boys, but kissing Cormac McClaggen did nothing for me."

Harry made a face. "I still can't believe you did that."

Hermione shrugged unrepentantly. "I was angry with Ron."

"I know."

"Does Ginny know about what happened with Blaise?"

"Yeah, I told her. She was pretty cool about it."

"When are you going to tell Ron? He really wants to know what happened with Ginny."

"I don't even know anything for certain! I don't want to tell him I'm gay and then find out that I'm not."

"Harry, it's not like there's some test that we can perform to tell you for sure or not. It's all a matter of how you feel."

"Are you sure there's not? Nothing you've come across in all that time you've spent reading?"

"I'm sure. I know that would be easier for you, but it just doesn't work that way."

He looked grumpy at this, and Hermione patted his hand. "It'll be fine. I don't think Ron will take it quite as badly as you're imagining he will."

"Maybe not," he said. "But I don't know that for sure either."

-oOoOo-

"All right," said Blaise. "I'm just going to come out and ask."

"Ask what?" said Draco.

"Do you want Harry? Because if you do, I will back off. Bro's before ho's, and all that."

Draco just raised an eyebrow at his friend. "What on earth would make you think that?"

"Oh, just answer the question, Draco. I don't want to play these games."

"Answer mine, first."

"I asked first."

Draco shrugged indifferently and turned back to the water pump, and checked to make sure it was still operating properly. He'd been letting too many people see his feelings on this particular subject, and he was not ready to let anyone else in on the secret. It was bad enough that Theo and Rita Skeeter, of all people, knew how he felt about Harry (even if Rita had gotten it mostly wrong). He wasn't going to willingly give up the goods.

"I'm going to assume you said yes, because if the answer really was no you'd have bitten my head off for even suggesting it, and I am telling you that I am backing off of Hero. He's all yours."

"Why would you do that?"

Blaise sighed. "Because I just want a bit of summer fun, and Potter isn't the type to be into something like that. He's a relationship bloke, and you are too, no matter what you might say on the matter, so if you like Hero then you should be the one trying to catch him." Blaise made a show of examining his nails. "I think I'm being very magnanimous."

"I think you're being an arsehole."

"Look, Draco, if you want Potter then you should have him. You're my friend, and I'd like for you to be happy. And if that's with Hero, then so much the better. You really can't do better than Harry Potter."

"I could so do better than Harry Potter."

"I'm ignoring you. That's old Draco talking."

Draco sniffed. "Fine. I have a crush on Harry Potter. Are you happy now?"

"No, but I will be as soon as I figure out if Finnigan is a pillow biter."

Draco snorted. "Finnigan, really?"

"Hey, I'm conceding the field to you with Potter. There's not much left bloke-wise around here."

"Maybe you should go back to dabbling in girls."

Blaise waved this away. "They're too emotional. I want an easy summer."

"All class, you are," Draco muttered.

"Now that you've admitted it, what are you going to do about it?"

"I don't know. Nothing. He's still confused."

"Remember how I relieved you of your confusion?"

"You shagged me until I forgot there was even a reason to be confused."

Blaise nodded, smiling. "So I did. Have fun, and know that I completely envy you."

Blaise left, and Draco adjusted his trousers. Just thinking about it had left him hard.

-oOoOo-

Theo didn't know what he was meant to be doing. Blaise was off pouting with Pansy, and Draco was with Potter, and Theo knew better than to insinuate himself into either situation. He was fond of his friends, but their romances and intrigues grew tiresome. Mostly because the other three were such attention whores and drama queens.

Theo was neither. He was a special class of Slytherin (the true kind, he liked to think) who knew how to watch and wait, and better still, knew that he ought to keep his own council on all things.

Most people called it being shy.

But Theo came by it honestly, having been raised by a father who'd been getting on in years and didn't have the time or inclination to pay much attention to a child anyway. He'd grown up in the company of house-elves, and hadn't so much as seen another child until he'd come to Hogwarts.

Needless to say, his first year was a bit of a transitioning period, but by that time he'd established himself as Quiet Theo Nott, or Creepy Theo Nott, if the speaker wasn't a Slytherin and didn't understand such things. Being Quiet Theo had come in handy, it turned out, but having a Death Eater for a father had been much less so, and he hadn't been able to avoid the Carrow's attention.

This summer, he thought, was going to be a bit of a transitioning period as well. His father in prison, facing The Kiss, and Theo finally out from under his influence. He could finally be his own person; he wouldn't have to be Quiet Theo for the rest of his life. He could be Fun Theo, or Studious Theo, or Unspeakable Theo, or Ace Reporter Theo. The possibilities were endless and intoxicating. He didn't really know how to go about changing, and he didn't really know what he'd like to change into, but he wasn't worried. That was what transitioning periods were for.

He had taken a look at the List during breakfast, and paid attention to what the others said they were working on that day, but hadn't decided himself what he would do. Perhaps he wouldn't do anything, perhaps he would be Lazy Theo.

This thought made him smile slightly, and he left the Great Hall where Draco was trying very hard not to stare too long at Harry Potter.

He wandered the castle, casting cleaning spells whenever he found something that needed cleaning. True, most of it wasn't caused by the battle, but accumulated dust and dirt from centuries of use, but Theo was at least doing something, and if anyone asked he could say that he'd been helping.

He'd wandered all the way up the seventh floor and came upon a wall that still bore the DA's graffiti. "Dumbledore's Army: Still Recruiting" the wall proclaimed in bright red and gold paint. Theo shook his head at the brashness of Gryffindors, and wondered if this sprawl of messy paint had brought them more members, or if it had just been there to give hope to those who'd been fighting.

Theo conjured up a bottle of olive oil and a scrub brush, and started to scrub the paint away.

"How did you know?"

He turned. Ginny Weasley and Luna Lovegood were standing nearby holding buckets and scrub brushes and bottles of olive oil. "How did I know what?"

"That it only comes off with extra virgin olive oil?"

Theo smiled to himself, and imparted a great secret. "When your brothers started up their shop, the Slytherins knew that we'd be victim to lots of their pranks, and we made a list of the counter-curses and cures for each of your brothers prank items. It's required reading for first years now."

Ginny smiled slowly. "That's very clever. Do you think I could have a copy of that list?"

"I'll see what I can do."

"You knew all along," said Luna suddenly. "You knew how to remove the signs, and none of you ever said anything."

Theo shrugged. "There wasn't any point."

"You could have gotten points with the Carrows," said Ginny.

"I didn't want any," he said. "They would have expected me to earn more 'points', as you say, and I didn't want them to notice me."

"Oh."

Theo doused the wall with more oil, and the girls joined him in scrubbing away the paint that had brought hope in dark times.

-oOoOo-

Even after talking to Hermione about it, Harry didn't know what to do about the situation he'd found himself in. He'd spent the afternoon with Draco, who had been acting very strangely, and never quite looking him in the eye, inspecting the water pumps, and the charms on the window, and going around to make sure everything else was coming along. The school still looked like it had been a war zone, but he couldn't deny that it was looking much better than it had.

It had been two days since he'd been with Blaise, and he hadn't spoken to the other boy since. He knew it was stupid, and cowardly, but he didn't want to confront him until he was sure of what he wanted to say and do.

He still didn't know.

After dinner, he went up to Gryffindor Tower alone. It was the first time he'd been there in quite a long time, and there was indeed an enormous hole in the roof. It was easy enough to see what had caused it, because there was a large stone gargoyle on the common room floor in pieces, surrounded by broken beams and other rubble. His favorite chair had been crushed.

Harry picked around the mess, and went up the staircase to his old dormitory. It looked very nearly like it did at the start of each school year; only there were no trunks at the foot of each bed. It was like coming home.

Harry smiled, and threw himself onto his old bed. It was just as comfortable as he remembered it being all those nights he'd spent wishing for it when he'd been sleeping in that tent with Hermione and Ron.

Here he could think.

Harry lay back on the pillows and sighed. He'd spent a lot of time in this bed thinking about girls. First Cho, and then Ginny. Boys had never entered the equation then, but this seemed an appropriate place to consider it. With Cho he'd been enamored with her shiny black hair and her pretty face. He didn't really like her that much (at least not like that) once he'd gotten to know her. Maybe that wasn't fair, when she'd still been grieving over Cedric, but it was true enough. When he'd thought about Ginny here, it had always been with a tinge of fear—either Ron would be upset, or she was in danger from Voldemort. But the last wasn't a problem any longer. He was free to date whomever he liked and not fear for their lives, just because of their association with him.

He'd liked kissing Blaise, and he thought he wanted to do it again. He just didn't know if he should.

He liked Blaise, but the feelings didn't go any deeper than friendship and idle lust. Blaise was beautiful, and after kissing him Harry didn't think it was possible to look at the other boy and not feel a bit of lust. Blaise had woken him up to the possibility of lust being for boys too, and kissing and touching and being touched by a boy was just as pleasurable (if not more) as doing so with a girl. It was just so different with Blaise than it had been with Ginny. Rougher and sharper, and far more desperate. Harry had liked it.

Harry had liked Blaise's narrow hips, with bones that bit into his, and how close they'd been able to be without any breasts getting in the way. Like both of their sharp angles and cocks and smooth muscles could somehow fit together if only they could find the right configuration—like puzzle pieces. And really, the feel of Blaise's cock under his hand was reason enough to try again. He wanted to know what it felt like when someone else's naked cock rubbed against his. He wanted to know what it felt like to fuck and be fucked. He wanted to know what Blaise's cock tasted like.

He shivered, and pressed down on his growing erection with his palm.

Yes, okay, he thought, I like boys.

But he still didn't know what to do about it.

-oOoOo-

Blaise had come to the conclusion that Hero wasn't going to approach him any time soon, so it would be up to him to find the Boy Who Was In Denial and force him to talk. He saw Potter leave the Great Hall after dinner, Draco's eyes tracking his departure, and Blaise followed.

He wasn't all that surprised that Hero went to Gryffindor Tower. Blaise loitered in the hall outside for a bit, and eventually made his way inside. The house-elves apparently hadn't gotten around to clearing up the mess in the common room, either because they hadn't had time, or because they weren't able to do anything about it. Hero was nowhere in sight, so Blaise picked a staircase and went off to find him.

He nearly groaned aloud when he did, and almost turned around to leave and have the conversation later. But Hero was lying on a bed with his eyes closed, and his hand was teasing what looked like a very impressive hard on through his trousers.

Blaise was only human.

A very small voice in his head feebly reminded him that he'd conceded the field to Draco, but lust at this point was far louder and blood was rushing in his ears. Hero was gorgeous, and so completely unutterably sexy lying there completely at his ease and Blaise wanted… oh, he wanted.

"Hero," he said.

Harry's eyes shot open. "Blaise!" he said in a panicky caught voice. He raised himself up on his hands. "I—you… Oh, Merlin."

Blaise wasted no time crossing the room, and crawled over Harry, bringing the other boy's erection into contact with his thigh, and took Harry's head in his hands and kissed him. Harry groaned and arched into the contact. The kiss was fierce, harder and harsher than the ones they'd had the other night, and Harry was giving as good as he got. Harry's hand latched onto the back of Blaise's neck, not letting the other boy break the kiss.

Blaise snaked a hand down Harry's chest to palm his cock, and Harry gasped. Blaise bit his neck. "You're so fucking hot."

Harry moaned something unintelligible and rocked his hips into Blaise's hand eagerly. "I want," he said. "I want…"

Blaise kissed his mouth. "What do you want?"

"I—I don't know." Blaise smiled, and squeezed lightly. "More of that," Harry gasped.

He pushed Harry back so he was lying back on the pillows once more and brought their hips into perfect contact.

Surely, Blaise thought, it wouldn't count as betrayal if he and Potter kept their clothes on. Right? But Draco's face loomed large in his mind, looking angry and hurt, and how his friend's eyes had tracked Potter leaving the Great Hall.

"Fuck," said Blaise, and rolled off of Harry. The other boy whimpered at the loss.

"Why did you stop?" Harry demanded.

Blaise felt sulky, and unbearably turned on. It wasn't fair. Why couldn't he have waited to have that conversation with Draco until tomorrow? Or perhaps never?

"I promised someone that I would leave you alone. I just couldn't help myself for a moment there."

Harry propped himself up on an elbow and frowned darkly. "Who made you promise that?"

"I can't say," said Blaise. "I'm sorry about this." He gestured to their twin frustrated states.

Harry blew out a long breath. "Who?" he asked again.

"Harry, I can't say."

He narrowed his eyes, as though he could discern the identity of said cock blocker. "Was it Hermione? Ginny? Ron?"

"I can't say," Blaise repeated, and started to get up to leave. He did owe Harry a bit more of an explanation, but he wouldn't play this guessing game.

"Was it Draco?" That made Blaise pause for an infinitesimal moment, just at the fact that Potter had even considered Draco. Did Potter know, or suspect, that Draco had developed feelings for him? Potter noticed Blaise's twitch. "Does he want you back?"

"How did you know about Draco and I?"

"He told me," Harry shrugged. "So he wants you back?"

"I—no, definitely not."

"So why does he care?"

"Harry, just leave it okay?" Blaise ran a hand through the frowning Gryffindor's mop of black hair. "I, um, hope you're not too mad at me."

"No, no… it's fine. I shouldn't be doing this anyway."

"Not doing what?"

"Not… I mean, Blaise, I like you, but it's not—"

"Not a serious feeling. I know. I like you like that too." Blaise smiled. "But it's been pointed out to me that you're a relationship sort of guy, and I'm not."

Harry looked at his hands. "I guess I am."

"And I'm going to University in France at the end of the summer, so it wouldn't be smart to start something serious anyway."

"Yeah, Malfoy said something about that."

Harry looked disappointed, with a hint of rejection lingering in the set of his mouth. Blaise wanted to kiss it away, but he had promised. He repeated this to himself like a mantra, 'I promised, I promised, I promised', and somehow he kept himself from skimming his lips up Harry's neck, and licking into his mouth.

"Damn it," said Blaise aloud. Harry looked up at him, those damned green eyes asking Blaise what was wrong. Blaise smiled tightly. "I'll see you later, Hero. I'm sorry about all this."

Harry shook his head. "Don't be. I'm not. Except for whatever Malfoy said to you to make you stop. I'm sorry about that."

Harry looked fierce again, eyes blazing with lust and irritation, and Blaise so envied Draco for when he'd have that look turned on him. Only with Draco it would be tenfold, with a hell of a lot more anger, and all that old bitter rivalry the two had bubbling underneath it all.

Yes, Blaise was jealous. But he had promised.

-oOoOo-

A/N: Ah, Blaise. And the boys are that much closer to getting together… though there's a wrench in the works that will have to be dealt with. A cock-blocked Harry is not a happy Harry!