Chapter Three: To Anger a Snape.
A knock on the door pulled him from Draco reverie and he sighed, thinking it was Hermione again. Opening the door, his eyes widened as he saw Dumbledore standing there watching him.
"Good morning Draco, we are having a meeting. Would you be so kind as to join me?" Draco knew that saying 'no' was not an option so he nodded and followed the Headmaster into what looked like a study. It was filled with people, including the Weasley Clan and the golden trio. Dumbledore offered him a chair by a wall and he sat down valiantly ignoring the stares he was getting, instead he deigned to check his nails.
"Now, I am sure you all know why we are here at the moment. Lucius Malfoy has been found as a spy for the Light and Draco has been sent here for his protection." Dumbledore began before he was cut off by lots of protests. It seemed that not many people wanted him here. Dumbledore held up a hand and silence fell in the room.
"The boy should be put under veritaserum." Draco's head snapped to face the person who suggested this, it was Moody, and he was glaring at Draco.
"That won't be necessary Alastor." Dumbledore said cordially. This statement was met with another round of protest. Draco looked around the room. The only few who were not glaring at him or protesting were Hermione, Lupin, Black and surprisingly Potter, Potter however was staring at him as if he were a particular interesting puzzle. He looked away blushing as Draco looked pointedly at him.
The doors suddenly slammed open and in stormed a rather angry looking Severus Snape, his robes billowing around him. Silence fell in the room; Severus ignored it and walked over to Draco. He placed his hands on Draco's shoulder and looked into his eyes. Draco could feel him going through his memories but he didn't resist, he knew that is godfather needed to see what had happened to his Father. He saw a flash of pain cross over his godfather's face as he saw the memory of his father being hit but then anger took over.
"You didn't feed my godson?" He snapped as he stood straighter. "You kept him quarantined and didn't give him medical attention even after he fainted."
"I'm fine." Draco muttered, Severus just gave him a glare and Draco quietened.
"I checked him over and saw no need for immediate medical attention." Molly Weasley spoke up.
"You are not a qualified Healer, your opinion means nothing." Severus said scathingly and Draco couldn't help the small smirk at the slight flinch the woman gave.
"Be calm Severus, as you can see Draco is in perfect health." Dumbledore said and Severus glared at him but said nothing. He summoned a chair and placed it next to Draco's before sitting down and glaring at the whole room.
All of a sudden everyone went back to protesting about the fact that Draco wouldn't be questioned. He felt Severus stiffen beside him as he realised what they were arguing about.
"I'll do it." Draco said standing. Severus grabbed his arm and forced him back into the chair his face impassive.
"You will do no such thing." He said.
"Why not Severus, does the boy have something to hide?" Moody shot at him and Severus raised an eyebrow.
"I will not have my godson questioned under veritaserum. He is still a child and until such a time that his Father returns I am viable for him. He will not do it." Severus said folding his arms and glaring at the Auror who glared back.
"He will if he wants to join us." Moody snapped.
"I won't allow it." Severus said.
"Fine then, occlumency should do the trick." Before anyone could say anything Moody had grabbed Draco by the shoulders and Draco flinched as he felt the stab of an unwanted invasion. He forced barriers up, forcing Moody out but the Auror was persistent, he was almost better than Snape at breaking down the mind's barriers, but whereas Snape was subtle at his art Moody felt in comparison like someone with a battering ram. Draco was vaguely aware of yelling around him but he was too busy trying to stop the invasion.
Then with a sudden push his barriers fell and Moody was in his mind. Memories bombarded him. He was in the kitchen with Dobby making cookies for Daddy. Daddy always liked his cookies, he said they were even better than Mippy's and Mippy was the Head House elf cook. He was in his parents' room. Mummy was wrestling with a man he didn't know. Mummy was angry at him, his cheek hurt. He was offering a hand to Harry Potter, he was turned down. He was before the Dark Lord; his red eyes were boring into his soul. Hands were all over him, pain was lashing through him, and he was told he would become a Death Eater. Uncle Sev and Father were standing over him, both were upset.
Suddenly more memories of the Dark Lord were brought up. Moody was searching for evidence of him being a spy. He was bowing in front of the Dark Lord, the back of his neck cold with sweat. He was pushed to the ground. The Dark Lord was hovering above him, his robes were torn away.
Harry couldn't bare it, Severus was being held back by the Aurors and Dumbledore did nothing to stop it. The screams started and he instantly threw a stunner at Moody. The Auror fell backwards and hit the ground with a dull thud. Draco was crumpled on the floor, breathing heavily, as if he had just run a marathon. Harry and Hermione ran over to him. Draco blinked heavily for a few moments before he seemed to realise who were kneeling above him.
"Are you okay?" Hermione asked gently. Draco took a deep breath before nodding. Severus was released and he stormed over to Dumbledore.
"How could you let that happen?" He hissed.
"The only way the people in this room would stop bothering Draco was if they had proof." Harry frowned as he heard this. He saw Draco try to stand and both he and Hermione helped him up. Hermione kept an arm around Draco causing Harry to feel angry for some unknown reason.
"Professor Snape?" Severus turned to face Hermione who had spoken.
"Should we take Draco back to his room?" She asked causing Draco to give her a strange look for calling him by his given name. Severus turned briskly and nodded walking behind them as they led Draco out of the room. Draco winced as the ringing in his head suddenly grew louder, an after effect of a forced entry into someone's mind.
"Draco, I shall be back and bring you a potion." Draco frowned as he realised that he was in the room he had stayed in last night. Since when had he been there? He blinked a few times to try and clear his head and he realised that Potter and Granger were talking about him.
"-keep him awake. Invasion of minds can be likened to a concussion if it was forceful enough." Well that was true enough, Draco thought, but then again Granger was the smartest witch of their generation so of course she would know that. He frowned and closed his eyes. He was just going to rest for a bit. It would surely help his headache.
"Malfoy! Wake up!" His eyes opened and he glared into bright green ones which he had never noticed were so green before. Those hideous glasses surrounding them should be destroyed though. He told the person so. They should really be proud of those eyes.
His eyes were dropping before he knew it though and someone shook him. "Malfoy you have to stay awake!"
Draco groaned and pulled away from the shaking, why should he have to stay awake? That green-eyed person couldn't order him around no matter how pretty their eyes were.
"Draco." Now that voice had the power to make him jump away. His Uncle Sev was not to be disobeyed. He blinked a few more times and looked up to see his godfather standing in front of him with a vial of something that was a sickly pink colour and would most definitely taste much worse than it looked. His mouth was opened by his godfather's hand and the potion was poured into his mouth before he could protest. He didn't know whether to be angry, at his godfather for the foul potion or grateful that his head instantly cleared and he flushed angrily as he realised that he had let down his guard in front of Potter of all people.
Speaking of the devil, at that moment he was standing at the foot of the bed along with Granger. He let a glare fall across his face, more angry at his self than anything else, for letting his guard down. Sev seemed to realise how annoyed he was for he too turned to the Gryffindors and ordered them to leave in his best 'Potion's Master' tone of voice. The two left quickly.
"Draco." Turning, surprised at the soft tone of his godfather's voice he bit his lip as he realised how distraught the potion's master really was. "Your Father will be fine."
Draco didn't know who the statement was meant to comfort but the unexpected smarting of tears in his eyes forced him to turn away from his godfather in embarrassment. He realised with a bit of trepidation that he still felt exhausted.
"The potion I gave you will make you drowsy for a few hours. You might as well get some rest." Draco nodded, knowing not to even try and deny Sev. "I must go speak with Dumbledore. I will place my locking charm on your door so that no one bar you or I can get in or out without permission."
Draco once again nodded, his dropping eyelids making it difficult to do anything else. He was just so tired. The last thought that crossed his mind was that he was really glad that his Godfather had created his own locking charm since he didn't think he would be able to relax knowing the door would open with a simple Alohomora.
Harry was sat on his bed frowning into space. After going back and sitting in the kitchen for a while where most people were silent do to their actions they had all gone to bed on the insistence of Mrs Weasley. Harry couldn't sleep however. He couldn't get the helpless look on Malfoy's face out of his head. He had seemed so vulnerable when he was half asleep and his aura was such a wonderful colour. At first he had thought that it was simply a deep blue but being so close to the blonde had made him realise that it had many different strands of different shades of blue, even a few threads of green and silver. Even when he shut his eyes the colours drifted in front of his eyes. It didn't help that while Malfoy had been out of it he had told him he had pretty eyes. The flood of pride that had followed that statement had to be to do with the fact that his rival had just complimented him and nothing else, right?
He lay back and sighed heavily resolving to at least get some sleep. He forced himself to relax. Trying to rid his mind of all of his thoughts, a cynical voice told him that he had gotten better at this after Snape had taught him but he ignored the thought in an effort to become completely calm. Soon after he fell asleep, his body tired even if his mind were awake.
He gasped as he awoke abruptly. He realised that something was wrong as he shifted to sit up. His pyjamas were suddenly very tight, all around him. For a long moment he panicked thinking that someone had cast a constriction spell on him. Then he remembered what Remus had said about growing a foot in one night.
He climbed from his bed and looked at his ankles to see that the pyjama bottoms which had been around his feet, slightly big, even despite the shrinking charm Mrs Weasley had used to shrink Dudley's huge pyjamas. Now they were up to just below his knees, even after Ron's growth spurts his clothes had never looked this small. He tugged pulled off the shirt, it constricting the movement of his arms and he ran to the mirror.
The person in the mirror could not be him. He didn't believe it. He had always been incredible short, something his dorm mates had never failed to tease him about, he had barely stood above Hermione at five foot five. Now he must have been at least six foot two, he almost matched the twins' height; still nothing compared to Ron's gangly six foot six. He glanced out of the window glad to see that it was still dark, he couldn't do enlargement charms and he refused to be seen looking like he had climbed into a child's pyjama pants.
He ran from his room and to where he knew Remus' room was. Remus wouldn't laugh at him. He was sure of it. After hesitating for a moment he knocked on the door and after a minute of knocking the door opened to reveal a dishevelled Remus whose eyes widened as he saw him.
"What happened?" Remus asked in seeming disbelief.
"I don't know, I woke up and I was like this." Harry said only a small amount of panic creeping into his voice. They had said it would take weeks for this to happen, not hours.
"Its okay calm down Harry. I'm sure there's a rational explanation. Inlargo." Remus cast the enlargement spell on his trousers and they grew to his ankles, he sighed in relief. Things that weren't meant to be getting constricted were now okay. "Let's go back to your room and I'll go get Sirius."
Harry nodded and made his way back to his room while Remus got Sirius. A few minutes later and they were all in Harry's room. Harry sat with his knees up to his chest feeling very out of sorts with the extra length he now had.
"Do you have any idea Remus?" Sirius asked a frown creasing his forehead after a moment of staring at his godson who was now only a few inches shorted than him.
"Maybe his magic has something to do with it. I mean Harry's never had weak magic to start with so maybe it made his inheritance speed up." Remus theorised and Harry nodded, that seemed to make sense at least. He ran his hands over his face and froze. "Harry?"
"My glasses!" He exclaimed his head spinning to face the bedside table where his glasses lay folded innocently. He picked them up and tried them on, his eyes instantly blurred, he realised that this must have been what Ron had seen that one time he had tried Harry's glasses on for a joke. He had said that Harry's eyes were so bad that he couldn't even look through the glass it distorted everything so much.
He took them away and stared at his guardians who both seemed just as perplexed.
"That doesn't happen even in hybrid inheritance's Remus." Sirius sounded worried. Remus nodded.
"We should ask Dumbledore about it in the morning." Remus said as Harry yawned. Glancing at the tempus charm Molly had placed on his bedside table he saw that it was four in the morning. He lay back down in bed as Remus and Sirius bid him goodnight.
When he woke the next morning the tempus told him that it was half nine. He rubbed his eyes which were slightly itchy. He figured that it had to be to do with the fact that they had healed somehow last night. He had asked about having his eyes fixed but Hermione had practically cut him off in her answer that even the Wizarding World couldn't fix eyesight since the eyes were such a delicate part of his body.
He had to chuckle though, what are the odds that the day Malfoy told him to get rid of his glasses because they hid his eyes, he magically got better eyesight. He froze completely as the thought crossed his mind. That was just a coincidence right. There's no way the two could be related.
He froze as another memory came to mind. Remus had told him that mates were suited to one another in every aspect of the word. That meant that his mate would have to find him attractive. He shook his head, it was impossible! But then, he remembered the wonderful smell that had followed Malfoy around, and the beautiful colours that had swirled around him. If Malfoy was his mate, then wouldn't his Creature want to look like Malfoy wanted him too? So if Malfoy told him he didn't look good with glasses, would his blood fix his eyes?
He shook his head. This was all too much to take! A knock on his door broke him from his musings and he ran to open it to reveal Hermione. Before she could even muster a greeting he had pulled her into the room.
"Harry calm down!" She exclaimed as he began pacing. "Tell me what's wrong!"
As she didn't seem surprised by the fact that he was now a foot taller Harry assumed that she had been filled in by either Remus or Sirius.
"I think Malfoy might be my mate!" He exclaimed and Hermione's eyebrows shot into her hair.
"And why would you think that?" She asked in a voice which suggested that he had lost his mind.
"Well I woke last night and I realised that along with the obvious my eyes had also been fixed." Hermione opened her mouth but he didn't let her interrupt. "And then that got me thinking on the fact that it was a really, really big coincidence that my eyes changed when Malfoy told me that my eyes were pretty but hid behind hideous glasses. Then I remembered that Remus told me that my mate and I would be completely suited to each other and then I remembered that I really liked the colour of Malfoy's aura and he smelled so good-"
"Harry!" Hermione cut him off and Harry took a deep breath. "Calm down."
"What if it's true Hermione?" Harry cried.
"Then it's wonderful Harry!" Hermione exclaimed causing Harry to look at her like she had lost her mind. "Don't you realise? If you have found your mate then you'll grow old at the same rate as us! You won't live for eternity! You'll be able to spend your life with someone who you are matched to in every way possible!"
Harry sat down heavily on his bed and held his head in his arms.
"Even if this is true. I don't love him and he sure as hell doesn't love me! Hell he doesn't even like me!" Harry yelled. Hermione moved to sit next to him and wrapped an arm around his shoulder.
"Harry, being bonded to a soul mate is something girls dream about. Even when I didn't know that I was a witch, my friends and I used to dream about our perfect match. But for you this is reality!"
Harry sighed and leant into his best friends shoulder.
"I'm going to have to tell him aren't I?" He whispered.
"I don't think that's the best idea at the moment to be honest." Hermione said and Harry looked at her confused. "He's been through so much in the last couple of days you suddenly declaring that you're meant to be together isn't going to help him. Just…try to get to know him. Become his friend, God knows he's going to need one before we go back to school. Most if not all of the Slytherins will shun him purely on the fact that he isn't a follower of Voldemort anymore."
Harry nodded as he thought about what she had said, it really did make sense, even if he felt like his chest was constricting at the thought of not being able to be with Malfoy in that sense. He shook it off; he didn't want a relationship where he didn't feel anything solid either. He would do what Hermione said and be Malfoy's friend first; if it grew into something more then Harry would let it.
He ignored his instincts