Chapter 4
Despite the embarrassing run-in the night before and the restless night it had resulted in, Draco had had a pleasant morning. Their first class, astronomy, had been moved to midnight since it would be a practical lesson, and so he had spent his free period in the common room getting ahead on some of his homework. When the clock neared 10 he started packing up his stuff. Daphne was hovering by the door with Matthew Selwyn, an actual 7th year student that used to be in the grade below Draco, but whom they now had classes with. Draco got up from his chair and sauntered towards them just as Blaise appeared from the dorms.
"Gods, I've been slaving on my essay for magical theory, I haven't even looked at the assignments for today," Blaise said. "Have any of you read it?"
"It was a pretty short chapter, you can probably skim through it in the beginning of class," said Daphne.
She pushed the door open and they filed out into the corridor.
"How can you be behind on your schoolwork already?" asked Draco.
"I'm not behind on anything, I'm just prioritizing."
Draco laughed.
"I still think it's completely unreasonable to have us redo this schoolyear and then make us take the same classes all over again," added Daphne.
The others agreed and Draco savoured the feeling of the group clicking back into place around him, their careful distance and coldness diminished by sheer force of habit. Daphne was laughing and being charming all over the place, and he caught Matthew rolling his eyes at him when her giggles became too silvery. This was what he had to work with. His earlier popularity hadn't been entirely dependent on the former glory of his name or their knowledge that he would one day inherit all the puppet strings of his father – he just had to keep reminding them of that until they forgot why they had ever abandoned him. He had been stepping down on his dominance quite a bit, allowing Blaise to take more of the stage. Being second was not defeat after all – it could be rational victory. That was something his father had explained to him when Draco had asked why a powerful family like theirs would act as servants to the dark lord. The current problem wasn't that he was no longer the prince of Slytherin, but that his place in the hierarchy was unclear, and definitely not as close to the top as it ought to be.
"And Astoria keeps offering to have her Ravenclaw friends do my homework for me, which I would accept if it wasn't for-" Daphne cut herself off mid-sentence: "What are you rolling your eyes at?"
Matthew grinned.
"Nothing."
"It's just that you were turning all veela on us," Draco drawled.
"I was not!"
"You definitely were," said Blaise. "You should at least try to be discreet about it."
"Oh hush, I'm just naturally charming – isn't it better than Pansy being a bitch to you? You never tell her to tone it down," she said, still feigning indignation.
"That's because she's terrifying," said Matthew.
"Yes, everyone but Draco is scared of me," called a sharp voice behind them.
They all turned around to see Pansy climbing the stairs to catch up with them. Draco offered her his arm when she reached them.
"Please don't kill me," said Matthew.
"I'll take it as a compliment."
But her smile was that of someone who likes the idea of murder, not receiving a compliment.
"How was the interview?" Draco asked.
Pansy frowned.
"It went pretty well, I think. I'm not sure…"
"What interview?"
"I'm trying to get an internship on the Prophet next year. Just came back through the Floo."
"Oh, cool."
She shrugged.
"Yeah, I hope it works out. After the war there have been some unexpected complications."
Her eyes darted to him as she said it. Of course it was already obvious that the "unexpected complications" had quite a lot to do with house Malfoy losing what had previously been their almost absolute control over the paper, but he still had the strong, flickering impulse to hex her for being so indiscreet. She might have felt him tensing up, because she quickly continued talking:
"Anyway, did I miss out on anything important in astronomy?"
"No, class was moved to midnight, so we've just had a free period."
"Lovely."
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A couple of Hufflepuffs were heading in the other direction down the corridor, and the Slytherin group contracted to let them pass. But then one of the girls, the one who was talking, raised her voice in the middle of a sentence highlighting two words for their benefit: "Death eaters" rang out in the corridor, they stabbed through Draco and he ignored it perfectly as he kept on walking – which meant he was yanked backwards when Pansy stopped and was only inches from crashing into Blaise as he spun round, his wand already out and aimed at the girl's back.
"Take that back," he said evenly.
She hadn't even noticed his reaction until then, but when she turned around she looked suddenly nervous. Draco recognized the nervousness – it was the one that had grown on the face of every student last year and still surfaced whenever a voice was raised in a hallway or classroom. It testified to their certainty that something bad was about to happen and the knowledge that they couldn't run. She definitely regretted the insult.
"Blaise, calm down," said Draco, trying to sound bored. "They're puffs."
Blaise ignored him.
"Take what back?" asked the girl.
Draco watched her wand slide out of her sleeve and into her hand. That was bad, if she wore a forearm holster she probably knew how to duel – she might even have been in Potter's secret fan club last year.
"You called us death eaters. Neither my family nor I supported Voldemort at any point."
"Oh yeah? You didn't fight back either, did you? I'll call you whatever I want."
Blaise's wrist twitched and a sharp, blue light whipped out at the girl. Her wand snapped into place.
"Protego," she said, blocking his curse.
There was no counter attack, but neither lowered their wand either. Draco quickly surveyed the hands of the other Hufflepuffs as well as his fellow Slytherins, and no one else had their wands out yet, which was good. The last thing they needed was for this to escalate further. Of course usually he could just have asked his friend to step down, but Blaise didn't listen to him anymore and definitely wouldn't take orders. So Draco kept his mouth shut and watched.
"Blaise, put your wand away and let's go, people use this corridor, they're going to see you," said Pansy.
"I'm going as soon as she takes that back."
"I'll take it back when you take back all the times you've called us mudbloods."
"I have never used that word."
Blaise was a very graceful liar and, Draco decided, very bad at prioritizing.
"You did plenty of times last year."
"I might have," said Blaise slowly. "But I think we should make last year an exception, don't you? I mean, you snitched on twelve year olds to get out of detention last year. You crucioed that muggle born kid in dark arts - I heard you were good at it, that the spell seemed to come naturally to you."
Draco wasn't sure if Blaise even recognized the kid. He had probably never heard anything about her, but it didn't matter. Pick a random student at Hogwarts and the odds were very high that Blaise's accusations would be true. He flicked his wrist again, this time her protego came slower, almost too late.
"Shut up."
"Is this the last time you've called me a death eater?"
"I didn't."
He flicked his wrist, she parried.
"This is the last time you called me a death eater."
"Fine, she takes it back, whatever. Piss off, Zabini," said a skinny boy, who seemed to have finally found his voice.
"Yes, that is an excellent idea. We're leaving," said Daphne, grabbing Blaise's arm and practically dragging him with her.
Draco looked back at the Hufflepuffs as the rest of the group descended on their friend whose wand now hung limply at her side – was she crying?
"We should hurry before a teacher shows up," he said to the backs of the others.
They had gotten just a step ahead of him when he looked back. He watched Daphne running her hand soothingly down Blaise's arm; Pansy's shoulders still tense, and Matthew trying to act like nothing had happened. None of them turned. There was not the slightest acknowledgement that they had heard what he had said, and Draco felt a sense of dread spreading, a heavy, sinking feeling in his stomach.
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They didn't run into any teachers and their classes passed uneventfully. At lunch in the great hall McGonagall stood up at the head table as if to give a speech, and Draco tensed for a moment, but she just repeated the rules as they had been announced at the beginning of the year: That use of magic was not allowed in the hallways and outside of classrooms and study areas in general, and that duelling was prohibited at all times. She said nothing else, so he assumed no one had told the teachers about Blaise's little outburst, even if they had detected the magic. He couldn't help feeling a bit disappointed, but it was likely he would have been dragged into the mess and blamed for the incident anyway, so perhaps this was all for the best.