Chapter Six: This Perfect World  

Hermione had taken to calling it The Plan; Draco called it Just Your Run of The Mill Bog-Standard Scheme For Robbing A Museum And Stealing A Priceless Artifact, What? Harry didn't call it anything; he just rolled his eyes when they talked about it, and capped that off with a shrug. Not that he wasn't nervous, or determined – he was, Ginny thought, just as nervous and determined as the rest of them. He just wasn't spending as much time in the library as the rest of them were: Draco, Hermione, Ginny were there for hours every day, and even Ron, who evidently disliked having to spend so much time around Draco, was quite patiently putting up with it – Ginny was proud of him. It had been two weeks since they'd begun carving out The Plan, and he hadn't complained once.  

They had commandeered a corner library table where they would not be disturbed, and in between classes Ginny knew Hermione would always be found there, usually with Draco sitting across from her. Most of the books that Hermione had wanted were not available in the Hogwarts library, not even in the Restricted Section. Books on dismantling Ministry wards, A Thief's Guide to Looting and Plundering, books on how to conceal the trace evidence left behind by theft spells – Hogwarts carried none of them. Draco had to Summon them for her from the bookshelves back at the Manor, which he did, along with something that had made Hermione shout in glee: the blueprint floorplans for the Malfoy Wing of the Stonehenge Museum. It amused Ginny to see the way Hermione tackled this project with the same gusto with which she had attacked their exams the week before.  

“You should have seen her second year,” said Ron, chin on hand and pointed nose stuck inside a tome entitled How To Get Away With Practically Anything. “I remember her handing me and Harry two drugged pastries and ordering us to go off and knock out Crabbe and Goyle for her. She was a terror.” He looked up and over at Hermione, “Isn't that right?” he asked, but Hermione was not paying attention. She had just leaped out of her chair with a shriek. Hands on her hips, she shook her head in annoyance. “Draco! Honestly!” She glared down at the blond boy, who as looking up at her with large, innocent eyes and holding something quite revolting-looking in his outstretched hand.  

“I Summoned it from the Manor this morning,” Draco said, waving what looked like a mummified human hand at Hermione. “I almost forgot to give it to you.” 

“Well, I wish you had forgotten,” Hermione said, wrinkling her nose up. “What is it?”  

“It's a Hand of Glory,” said Harry, appearing out of the shadows between the bookshelves. “Best friend of thieves and plunderers, right Malfoy?”  

Draco twisted around in his seat and looked at Harry. “I wouldn't have expected you to know that, Potter.”  

Harry smiled faintly. His cheeks were flushed as if he had been outside in the cold, and his scarf was wrapped around his neck. Ginny wondered where he had gone after breakfast while the rest of them had trooped up to the library. Classes were over for the term while everyone studied for exams, but Harry these days often seemed to have all sorts of places to be that he just had to go to alone. “You'd be surprised what I know, Malfoy.” 

“Would I?” said Draco, a small smile playing about his mouth. “What's all this about you knocking out Crabbe and Goyle during second year, then?”  

Everyone looked horrified. Ginny, who vaguely recollected hearing this story from Ron during her third year, choked on a giggle.  

Draco raised an eyebrow politely at Ron. “You want to elaborate, Weasley?”  

Ron had stuck his nose back in his book, but the tips of his ears were red. “Not really.” 

Draco gave him a measuring look, then put the Hand of Glory down on the table. It scrabbled across the table like an oversized spider and fell into Ron's lap. With a yowl like a scalded cat, Ron leaped to his feet, brushing frantically at the hand clinging to his belt. It fell to the floor, and Ginny put her foot on it. “Malfoy!” Ron choked, looking furious.  

Draco grinned lazily. “Oh come on, Weasley. Like that isn't the closest to a sex life you're ever going to get.”  

Ron picked up his copy of How to Get Away With Practically Anything and threw it at Draco. Draco ducked, and the book bounced off the back of his chair. 

Draco sat back up, and dusted off his shirtsleeves ostentatiously. “You know, Weasley,” he remarked, poker-faced, “violent hostility is just sublimated sexual attraction.”  

“Ah, well,” said Ron bitterly, “I suppose that explains why you always hated Hagrid, then.”  

Draco actually flushed, and once again Ginny choked on a giggle. Harry cleared his throat with an impatient noise. “This,” he said flatly, “is accomplishing nothing – are we going to have to split up so we can work on this?”  

”No,” said Hermione unexpectedly, standing up. “We're done for now.”  

Everyone blinked at her. “Done for now?” Ron echoed, forgetting to be furious.  

“With the research part, yes,” said Hermione firmly. “I just need something to Transfigure, like I said last night. Harry?”  

Harry shrugged slightly. “You said you didn't need it until this afternoon.”  

“Yes,” said Hermione, her voice tense. “And it's three o'clock.”  

“Fine,” Harry said shortly. “I'll go get it. Ron, can you come with me?”  

”With pleasure,” said Ron, shooting a nasty look at Draco, and getting to his feet. He picked his scarf up off the back of his chair, and stomped after Harry – had Ginny been a less generous sister, she would have said he was flouncing.  

Apparently Draco had a similar thought. “Drama queen,” he remarked coolly as the library door shut behind Harry and Ron. 

“Don't start,” said Hermione, sounding thoroughly exasperated. She reached out over the table and began shoving parchments and maps into her ever-straining bookbag. “Really, Draco, if you two won't try to get along, can't you just go out in the woods and poke each other with sharp sticks until you figure out who the dominant male is?”  

Draco chewed thoughtfully on the end of his quill. “But that would be so much less fun.” 

“Fun? This is your idea of fun?” Hermione began winding her hair back into a tight bun, and ruthlessly jammed a hairpin into it to hold it in place. “Why do you have to keep poking at Ron? Be a man. Just ignore him.” 

“I don't want to be a man,” Draco said, tilting his head back and lazily slitting his eyes like a cat in the sun. “I want to be a depressed, angst-ridden teenager who can't confront his own inner demons, so takes it out verbally on other people.”  

Hermione sighed. “It's too bad you weren't born a girl,” she said. “Otherwise all you'd have to worry about is whether you were the prettiest one in school.”  

“Hey,” Draco said. “I am the prettiest one in school.”  

Hermione flopped back down into the chair next to Draco and disconsolately surveyed the papers that still littered the table. “This is just too stressful,” she said in a weary voice. Ginny resisted the urge to reassure her; she had the feeling that both Draco and Hermione had forgotten that she was there several minutes ago. “I can't do this all by myself, and Harry won't help, and you and Ron keep fighting, and I've been up for three days straight. And my hair is starting to frizz up again, did you know that?”  

“Some days it's all I can think about,” said Draco gravely.  

“Oh shut up,” said Hermione, but she smiled.  

“I'll make you a deal,” Draco said. “I'll go through the rest of the anti-alarm-spell book if you tell me what that business about knocking out Crabbe and Goyle second year was.”  

Hermione's smile deepened. “Deal,” she said, sounding relieved. 

Ginny cleared her throat loudly and stood up. As she had expected, they looked at her with identical pairs of startled eyes: one pair dark brown, the other silver. “I have to go,” she said.  

Hermione's smile vanished. “Ginny –” she said. “Oh, I – I mean, thank you for helping out –”  

“No problem,” said Ginny stiffly, picked up her bookbag, and walked out of the library. Only when the door had shut behind her did she allow her shoulders to slump. Was she doomed to be invisible forever? Was it some kind of Weasley Curse? Then again, Bill and Charlie had always been anything but invisible, nor were the twins, or even Percy in his own annoying way. Perhaps it was simply the two youngest Weasleys who were doomed to feel always overlooked.  

With a sigh, she set off down the corridor. She clattered down the stairs that led to the second floor, turned several corners, and found herself at what looked like the dead end of a hallway. It wasn't, as Seamus had shown her the week before. If one walked all the way to the end and then turned sharply to the left, a small open stone archway was revealed. 

She ducked through it. Beyond it was a small oval room, the walls and floor of which were honey-colored blocks of stone. There was no furniture. The west wall was a leaded glass bay window, fronted by a ledge just wide enough to be a window seat. Curled up on the seat, legs folded under him, head bent over the book in his lap, was Seamus. His hands were pulled inside the sleeves of his dark red pullover, and the cold winter sunlight filtering through the window turned his dark blonde hair to a fringe of golden grass. “Hey, Ginny,” he said, without looking up.  

She laughed. “How'd you know it was me?”  

“Know your footsteps,” he said. He put the book down and smiled at her. “Come over here.”  

She came and sat down next to him on the ledge, feeling slightly nervous. In the week since she had kissed Seamus on the Quidditch pitch, he had not tried to kiss her again, or indicated that he was awaiting a repeat performance. Instead he was simply quietly present much of the time, walking with her when they had classes near each other, bringing her hot tea in the common room. She had begun to expect to see him when she came out of class: she wondered how she had never really noticed he was around before. There was something oddly appealing about Seamus, something about his generous nature and uncomplicated smiles. They held hands now when they walked in the hallways. It felt easy, natural. She tried not to think too much about what she was doing. She didn't want to analyze it.

“Are you going on the Stonehenge visit?” he asked.  

“Mmm.” She nodded, playing with the cover of the book he'd been reading, Dream Country. Seamus was obsessed with comic books, both Muggle and normal ones. “Are you?”  

”Yeah, I thought I would. I'm not in History of Magic but Binns said it would be fine. There's an exhibit on archaic Quidditch that I've been wanting to see.” Seamus put his hand over her hand where it lay on the book cover, and cleared his throat. “I was wondering…” He looked as nervous as he ever looked, which meant his blue eyes darkened to a slate sort of color and his mouth tightened. “About Christmas holidays. I'm going to be at the Manor for the wedding, of course…and so will you…but after that we've got two weeks of holiday before term starts up again, and I'll be going back home to Glyn Caryn...”  

“That's nice, Seamus,” said Ginny agreeably. “I've heard it's lovely there.”  

“I want you to come with me,” he said.  

Ginny stopped playing with the book cover and stared. “What?”  

“I think it would be fun,” said Seamus determinedly. “We've got a castle, you know – nowhere near as big as this one, but quite sizeable, and you wouldn't have to see me for days if you didn't want to. I've got tickets to the Puddlemere/Cannons game in Dublin, and we could go to that, and there's ice skating on the grounds and tobogganing…” he sighed and tugged distractedly on a loose curl of his hair. “You know, this sounded a lot better when I was rehearsing it in my head than 'Come to my house; I've got a toboggan.'”  

Ginny, who had been looking at him wonderingly, laughed. “You rehearsed this in your head?” she demanded. “Why?” 

“Because I think you really need a holiday,” he said. “And you're not going to get one with the friends you've got – they're mad.”  

“I thought you liked Harry and Hermione,” said Ginny.  

“I do, but they're mad and these days all they do is glare – don't give me that look, everyone's noticed. And your brother spends most of him time sulking as well. Go ahead and tell me that spending time with them is a crazy whirligig of fun, but I'm not going to believe you.”

“And I suppose if I go visit you in Ireland, that would be a crazy whirligig of fun?”  

“I can promise you fun,” said Seamus. “Crazy whirligig might be pushing it.”  

She grinned. “Will you show me your action figure collection?”  

Seamus looked airily at the ceiling. “I might do.”  

“Have you got the Harry and Draco ones they made over the summer?” 

Seamus nodded, his eyes glinting. “I've got two of the Malfoy one – one in its original packaging and one for decapitation purposes.”  

”Seamus, that is just wrong.”  

“I'll glue his head back on if you come to visit,” said Seamus contritely.  

Ginny hesitated. “I don't know,” she said slowly. “I do have to check with my parents, but I can't see why they'd say no. I – I'll think about it, Seamus.” She checked herself as his blue eyes darkened. “But I want to – and I appreciate it. I really, really do.” She leaned forward and kissed his cheek, and then put her head on his shoulder, closing her eyes. Of course, she thought, if the great museum caper didn't go as planned, she wouldn't be able to make it to Ireland anyway – not without a side-trip to Azkaban for a few years beforehand.

 

*** 

“You know, I've missed this,” said Ron in a conversational tone, as Harry tried the door of the Trophy Room. 

“Missed what?” Harry asked, his mind only half on what Ron was saying. The Trophy Room door tended to squeak when it was opened, and although Harry had the Invisibility Cloak in his pocket he didn't feel like using it. He pushed down slowly on the handle and the door slid soundlessly open. Harry slipped through, and turned to wait for Ron to follow him.  

But Ron was lingering in the doorway. “Missed this,” he said, and gestured from himself to Harry and back again. “Missed you and me.”

Harry cocked his head to the side. “That's...” He chanced a tired smile. “I didn't know you cared.”  

But Ron didn't smile back. He looked grave. “Maybe you don't know what I mean,” he said. “I mean us, sneaking around, going on missions, getting in trouble...like we used to.”  

“We're not in trouble,” Harry said. He didn't know why he was refusing to acknowledge what Ron was really saying, but he was. “Although if you keep standing in the doorway...”  

Ron's mouth tightened. He came into the room, and shut the door behind him. “Fine,” he said. “Let's get what we came for.” He walked into the center of the room and began industriously studying the display cases, behind which the rows of trophies, shields, and plaques gleamed dull gold and silver. Ron's hair gleamed too, a darkened bronze color in the half-light. The set of his shoulders was tense, and Harry knew of old that this meant Ron was feeling hurt. He knew why he couldn't acknowledge what Ron was saying...he didn't miss their loss of adventure the same way, because he had not really lost it. He still crept around school under the Cloak, still evaded the teachers to sneak off school grounds. He just did those things alone now. Alone, or with Draco.  

He sighed. “Ron,” he said slowly. “I'm sorry. I know what you mean. I've missed it too, I've just been ... caught up in other things.”  

Ron glanced back at him. The faint light washed the blue out of his eyes. “I've noticed,” he said. “I've offered before, but if you want to talk about it...”  

Harry walked across the room, to the largest display case, and looked into it. There was the gold shield that bore his father's name, and his house and position: Gryffindor Seeker. “If there was something I could tell you,” he said, seeing Ron's face reflected in the display case glass, “I would.”  

“Is it about Hermione?” Ron asked diffidently, looking down at his feet.  

Harry twisted around to stare at him. “About Hermione?”  

“Let's just say I can see why you're wearing your scarf indoors,” Ron said. “The climate between you two is somewhat arctic.”  

“Yeah,” Harry said. “She feels neglected.”  

“That would be one of those funny side effects of neglect,” said Ron. He raised his eyes from his shoes. “Do you not love her any more?”

Harry started, as if Ron had pricked him with a pin. “Do I not what?” 

“You heard me.” Ron was looking at his feet again. “Sometimes you, ah, just stop feeling a certain way about a person, and there isn't anything you can do about it. But you should, you should tell her, because it isn't fair to make her wait around and wonder what's going on with you, and not tell her, and –”  

“Is this sentence going to end anytime soon?” Harry said rather sharply.  

Ron swallowed his next words, looking mutinous. “You should tell her,” he said again.  

Harry shook his head. “If there was something to tell her,” he said quietly, “I would. But I love her, and I always will love her, and to tell her anything else would be a lie.”  

Ron looked surprised, so much so that Harry in return was surprised. “But lots of people do...just stop feelings things,” he said. “Don't they?”

“Do I look like I've got the faintest idea what lots of people do?” Harry rubbed his hands over his face. He felt tired again. Tired and worn down. “Look,” he said, more quietly. “I appreciate you looking out for Hermione, and for me as well. I know how it looks from the outside. I'm sure it looks bad. But of course I still love her. In fact sometimes I worry...”  

“Worry what?” Ron said quickly. 

“That she doesn't love me.”  

“Oh,” said Ron, and then again, “Oh.” He paused. “I'm sure she does.”  

“I know.” Harry raised his head and looked at Ron, really looked at him, for the first time in days. At the steady blue eyes, the set mouth, the familiar face. “It's just that I can't talk to her about my parents,” Harry heard himself say.  

“Your parents?” Ron looked astonished. “Did something...happen with your parents?”  

No, Harry thought acidly, they're still dead, thanks for asking. But he didn't say that. “Not exactly. I've been thinking about them a lot, and I guess that's what's been on my mind. And I know it seems like I should be able to talk to her about that, but I can't...and I'm not the only one who's been distant lately,” he added firmly. “She seems distant too. Distant and kind of...strange.” 

“Strange?” Ron echoed.  

But Harry didn't want to elaborate. His gaze had lit on what they had come to the trophy room for. “Hey, there it is.”  

“There what – oh, right,” said Ron, and got down on his knees just as Harry did. Harry reached out and flipped open the glass case in front of him, and took out a tall bronze-colored cup, to the front of which was affixed a shield inscribed in flowing script: For Special Services To the School: Harry Potter, Hermione Granger, and Ronald Weasley. In the year 1992. “We going to use that?” Ron asked.

“Sure,” Harry said. “It's ours...we can use whatever we want. Hermione said something that looked as much like the cup in the picture as possible, and this does.”  

Ron grinned. “I was kind of hoping we could use Tom Riddle's award for special services.”  

Harry laughed. “Now that's a brilliant idea. But...Hermione said it had to be a cup.”  

“Why? What's the difference? It's getting Transfigured anyway.” 

“Yeah,” Harry said, “but it has to be a very, very low-level transfiguration spell, because a stronger spell would set off the detectors in the museum. So it'll start fading over time. The more it looks like what it's supposed to be, the longer it'll take anyone to notice.” 

Ron shook his head. “Does anyone have all the details of this robbery plan besides Hermione?”  

Harry shook his head, standing up. “No,” he said. “But I trust her.”  

An odd spasm went across Ron's face. Then he smiled, and reached out and touched the cup in Harry's hand. “I remember when we got this,” he said. “Second year.” 

Harry looked at Ron narrowly; there was something in Ron's tone he didn't like, as if his best friend were mourning some lost, elegiac Golden Age. “Yeah. I remember.” He held the cup out. “You want to carry it?”  

But Ron shook his head, hands in his pockets. “No. It's all right.” He looked towards the door. “We should go,” he said, and ducked his head as Harry swirled the cloak over both of them, and they vanished from sight.  

*** 

When Ron and Harry returned to the library, Ginny had gone, and Draco and Hermione were sitting together at the table. Hermione had her head on her arms and appeared to be asleep; Draco was reading. He lifted a finger to his lips as Harry and Ron approached.

Harry looked at Draco, then set the cup down on the table and crouched down next to Hermione's seat. She was indeed asleep, her head resting on her crossed arms, her eyes shut. He could see how tired she must be: her eyelids had a waxy, pearlescent sheen, and there were shadows under her eyes. Her lips were parted softly and the tumbled hair that has escaped from its bun stirred with her breathing. He forgot that Draco and Ron were there as he knelt next to her, forgot that anyone else was there besides the two of them, and for that timeless moment hung in a space occupied only by Hermione and himself. He could never forget how much he loved her, but now he was reminded again and forcefully, and he felt it as an ache inside himself, a hard pain in the depths of his soul. If she only knew...

He had not spoken, but her eyelids fluttered open as if she had heard him. She smiled slowly, her clear dark eyes focusing on his face. “Harry...”

He leaned over and kissed her cheek. “I didn't realize you were so tired,” he said gently. “I brought the cup.”  

“Oh!” she said, and sat up, rubbing at her eyes. “Thank you.” She yawned, and touched the cup with a smile. “It's adorable, isn't it. What a shame we have to use it for something like this.”  

“It's a good cause,” Draco said, without looking up from his book.  

Ron was chewing the side of his lip thoughtfully. “Remind me again how this is going to work,” he said.  

Hermione looked vexed. “We're gone over this...”  

“It's, just, won't it be surrounded by guards and things?”  

“The cup? No more than any of the other objects in the museum. Remember, they don't know what it is – it's just a historical curiosity to them, not part of an immensely powerful magical equation.”  

“Are you sure?” Ron said. “I mean, maybe they just don't want to make it clear to everyone else that they do know how powerful it is...maybe they're just trying not to attract any attention to it.”  

Hermione blinked, and for a moment looked surprised – Harry realized that this had honestly not occurred to her. “No,” she said slowly, and then more swiftly, “No, because there's no reason then that they'd have to put it on display, they could just hide it away somewhere. It's only by chance that we even managed to suss it out. If Draco hadn't had the dreams he's had, if it hadn't connected back up to Nicholas Flamel, I'd never have twigged that the cup in the museum was one of the Four Worthy Objects.”  

“Might be one of the Four Worthy Objects,” Ron corrected, dropping his voice.  

Hermione nodded. “I know, but better safe than sorry.”  

“Ah,” said Ron, nodding. “This must be some newfangled usage of the word 'safe' that I hadn't previously been aware of.”  

Harry laughed. “I thought you were missing all our adventures,” he said. “If robbing a museum isn't an adventure, I don't know what is.”

Ron flushed, then grinned crookedly. “You have a point,” he replied, then glanced at his watch. “Herm, we're meant to be down in Flitwick's office going over the student list for the trip right now...”  

“Oh. Right.” Hermione got to her feet, stifling another yawn, smiled at Harry, and picked up her books and cloak. “See you at supper then?” she said.  

He got to his feet, and nodded. “Have fun being Head Boy and Head Girl.”  

Hermione made a face. “Don't knock it...we wouldn't have a museum trip otherwise.”  

Ron tapped his watch. “Hermione...”  

She picked up the cup, put it in her bag, and kissed Harry's cheek. “See you later – oh, and Draco, remember what we talked about.” And with that, she left with Ron, both of them chattering animatedly.  

Harry looked down at Draco. “'Remember what we talked about'?”  

Draco, who had his long legs stretched out on top of the table, shrugged. “We were just trying to think of different ways to create a diversion at the museum tomorrow.”  

“Come up with anything?”  

“Few things. Probably better if you're surprised though.”  

Harry, accepting this, threw himself down in the chair next to Draco. “I'm flipping exhausted,” he said. “I don't know about you.”  

“Well, six midnight meetings and intensive robbery-planning will do that to you. Fortunately, I manage to maintain my radiant glow without sleep.”  

“Yes, fascinating how you do that,” said Harry, reaching for a thermos of pumpkin juice that Hermione had left at the table. “So, Rhysenn not bothering you in the middle of the night any more?”  

Draco gave him a shrewd look. “I haven't seen her,” he said. “Have you?” 

Harry shook his head, alarmed. “No.”  

“I suspect she can't come into the castle,” Draco said. “I think you're safe.”  

Harry unscrewed the thermos cap thoughtfully. “What do you think she wants, anyway?”  

Draco shrugged. “Ultimately that's anyone's guess. Other than wanting in your pants, apparently.”  

“Glargh.” Harry moaned. “Don't say that.”  

“I'm just offended she doesn't want in my pants.”  

“Maybe she does,” Harry suggested placatingly.  

“I don't think she's ever really tried it on with me...not like she did with you.” Draco paused thoughtfully. “Lucky me, I suppose.”  

“She does have quite an...effect,” Harry said, feeling himself blush.  

“Must be six hundred years of pent-up frustration,” Draco said.  

Harry choked, and spit pumpkin juice out all over the open book in front of him. “Six hundred years,” he said, and goggled. “She's that old?”  

“Remarkably well-preserved, isn't she?” Draco remarked. “And don't spit on that book – it's antique.”  

“So is she,” said Harry. He bit his lip. “Not that it helps much...” He looked up at Draco with wide eyes. “What is she, Malfoy?”  

“I think,” Draco said slowly, “she's some kind of demon. Or something. She seems to have the ability to, ah...well...what exactly does it seem like to you?”  

Harry felt himself turn bright Gryffindor red. “I think she's some kind of, um, sex demon,” he said.  

Draco looked as if he were trying very, very hard not to laugh. “Well, it could be worse,” he said. “She could be a nailing-people-to-the-wall-with-sharp-spikes demon.” 

“I can't help thinking that'd be a bit easier to fight off,” said Harry. “She just makes me feel so...powerless.”  

“Well, my dad always said when that happened you should try picturing the enemy in their underwear,” said Draco, then added hastily, “but given the nature of the problem, in your case that might not be a good move.”  

“You're not helping, Malfoy...” 

“All right, then, let's talk about something else. Like what I'm supposed to get Seamus Finnigan for Christmas.”  

Harry smiled. “Yeah, Hermione told me you drew his name.”  

“Who did you get?”  

“Eloise Midgen.”  

“Ah. New nose, then?”  

“Shut up, Malfoy. Eloise is a very nice person.”  

Draco grinned. “Guess who Blaise got.” 

Harry shook his head. “Me?”  

Draco looked as if he were enjoying himself. “Hermione.”  

“Oh, no.” Harry shot Draco a mistrustful look. “Don't you let her get Hermione anything sharp, or explosive...”  

Draco put his hand over his heart. “I solemnly swear,” he intoned.  

“Thanks.” Harry's eyes went to the clock on the wall, and he sat up straight. “Time to go down to supper,” he said, and stood up, grabbing his bookbag off a nearby chair. He was halfway to the door when he paused and turned. “Aren't you coming with me?”  

Draco, who was still sitting at the table, raised his head, surprised. In the half-light, Harry couldn't make out his expression, only the vaguely defined shape of his face: the planes of the cheekbones, the sharp chin, the shadowed eyes. “We can't go down there together,” he said.  

“Oh,” said Harry. “Right, we can't – of course we can't.”  

“You go – I'll head down in a bit.” Draco gave Harry a curious look. “You all right? You look like you're about to sneeze.” 

Harry sighed. “It's nothing. Just...”  

“What?”

“Don't come down too soon after I do.”  

Draco nodded. “Good point. I won't.”  

“Thanks,” said Harry, and left feeling irritable, but not knowing why.  

*** 

She's not coming.  

He had already told himself this three times, but it didn't seem to be making a difference. Ron stood up, easing his cramped muscles, and leaned against the wall, staring sightlessly into the middle distance. It was three in the morning and he was meant to be up in a few hours. In six hours, in fact, he was meant to be robbing a museum. Right now that all seemed distant and unreal: what was real was the fact that she wasn't here, and it didn't seem like she would be arriving any time soon.  

He had sent her a message...several messages, telling her to meet him in their usual place. And he had waited. The night before, and the night before that. But she hadn't come. It wasn't the first time; there had been other nights she hadn't shown herself, but never three in a row.  

He took a step forward and leaned his hands on the table. The four squares of light from the colored windows: blue, red, green, and gold – splashed across the center of the room, painting the floor. They glowed all the time, even at night. There was no need for other lighting in the prefects' room, another reason it was such an ideal meeting place. And only someone with the password could get in. Of course, there had been that unfortunate Malcolm incident...  

Ron pushed that to the back of his mind. Malcolm didn't remember what had happened – an unexpected stroke of luck, that. Not that he felt very lucky right now. He had felt lucky, often, these past months, had felt he was the luckiest person in the world. But now...he looked down at his own hands, resting on the table. The nails were bitten down to bloody half-circles.  

A surge of anger washed over him. He got to his feet, feeling suddenly energized by fury – she had no right to act like this. The least she could do was send him a message. He knew they were prevented from speaking about this to each other in public, but she could have scribbled a note. He grabbed at the door and wrenched it open, stepped out into the hallway – and hesitated.  

The hallway was filled with faint morning light. It must be later than he had thought. In which case...well, there was no point going to bed then, was there? And if he waited...well, perhaps she might come. They'd met later than this before.  

He went back into the room, and shut the door behind him. 

*** 

Waking up was like swimming through black cold water towards a distant light. Draco's head broke the surface of sleep, his eyes fluttering open, and then the rest of his body followed, shuddering awake in a series of uneven jerks. He sat up in bed, letting his breathing still slowly. 

He was freezing cold. He sat up slowly, the icy air striking his skin and making him shiver even more. Lately he had been waking up soaked in sweat, his pajamas drenched and sticking to him, so he had taken to sleeping only in the thin cotton pajama bottoms he usually wore during the summer, the covers kicked down to his feet. Now, however, this was backfiring and he was frozen solid. His bones felt like ice. 

He got up, and, taking the blanket with him, went to the window and sat down on the ledge. He wrapped the blanket around himself and looked out at the cold winter night beyond the misted glass. 

The word outside was white and wreathed in silver ice. It looked fragile, as if it would ring like a glass bell if struck. The hollow black sky seemed painted with a thousand diamonds, although there was no moon at all. The night was breathlessly quiet. 

Draco looked down at his hands. There was a faint bluish tinge to the nails that might have been cold or shadow; he curled his fingers in against his palms. Images from the dream he had been having moved behind the skin of his eyelids: the castle again, rising from its black nest of pine trees, the diamond-like windows, the echoing empty rooms. The tower, and in the tower the shelf on which sat the mirror, the dagger, and the scabbard. Tonight, a table had been pulled up to the window and at it had sat his father, absorbed in a solitary game of chess. The chessboard was gold and ivory, and the pieces were carved out of whole rubies and emeralds: one team scarlet as blood, the other green as poison. 

By the window stood Voldemort, looking out over the landscape, the trees spilling their autumnal colors down into an empty valley. “Lucius,” he said. “Surely the time is nearly at hand?” 

“Yes, my Lord,” said Lucius, moving the bishop. “In two weeks if I am not mistaken.” 

“That is good news. Time hangs heavily, here. I grow increasingly bored.” The Dark Lord turned away from the window and looked down at Draco's father. “I find I prefer these more old fashioned chess sets that capture rather than destroying,” he said thoughtfully. “It is quite novel.” 

“I thought you liked killing,” Lucius said, and moved a red pawn. 

“Sometimes capturing is a better tactic,” said the Dark Lord. “Why destroy what you can use, or make an example of?” He smiled. It was as unpleasant a sight as always. “How is the boy?” 

“As well as can be expected,” said Lucius, and moved the knight. “It is as I told you, my Lord. It is now a matter of waiting.” 

Draco was pulled out of his memories and back into the present by a tapping sound against the glass. He realized he was shivering violently enough that his hands were knocking against the window. He pulled the blanket tighter and murmured a Warming Spell, which helped slightly – if only he could sleep, he thought, but he was wide-awake. He let his head fall back against the wall, and his eyes trailed to the clock by his bed, whose numbers flared and faded in different colors every minute. Right now the violet numerals told him that it was five in the morning. 

In two hours they would get up to have breakfast and go to the museum. As a prefect, he would have to be there early, waiting with the professors. Harry, Hermione and Ron were meant to meet him in the entry hall before breakfast even started. He had not expected to be so nervous about what they planned for tomorrow, certainly not so nervous that it would keep him awake. Yet he was dreading it in several ways. Certainly it was hardly the most dangerous thing he had ever done, but it wasn't from fear for his own personal safety that his anxiety sprang.  

He wondered idly if Harry was awake yet, the thought lighting a flicker of curiosity in his brain. Without stopping to analyze what he was doing, he sent a tendril of thought out, searching the dark space outside himself for the familiar color and shape of Harry's thoughts. He felt nothing at first, which almost alarmed him. He let himself reach out farther, as if he were stepping from a bridge out into deep water, the darkness rising formless around him.  

Then there was a burst of light. He paused, his eyes shut tight, and reached forward again. The light refracted, splitting into various colors, which pinwheeled around him like a shower of falling stars. He seemed to look through a doorway into another world: he felt heat, saw shimmering air and blue sky.  

Alarmed, Draco tried to draw away, but it was as if someone had reached out and clasped his hand; he felt himself pulled forward, and then the empty space above him hollowed itself out into a pale blue sky, and the formless air beneath him became a strip of golden sand. He knew it was not real: everything around him had the soft, melting look of a dream, even the house that rose in the distance, gabled and shuttered in blue and white, looked like a dream house: faint and half-remembered. That's it, he thought, I'm in a dream, Harry's dream, and then he took a step forward and something appeared in the sand in front of him. He almost yelled out loud.  

It was a boy, perhaps eight years old, perhaps seven, kneeling in the sand, a plastic bucket at his feet. Very thin, with a shock of untidy dark hair, draped in oversized clothes from which his thin wrists and ankles protruded like bundles of twigs. Harry. A child-Harry, Harry just a few years before Draco had met him. And not just Harry, but Harry the way he saw himself.  

The dream-Harry raised his head, and looked up at Draco. He looked as Draco would have imagined Harry to look at that age, but the scar on his forehead burned there like a livid brand of fire. There was a lost look in his green eyes, as if he neither knew where he was, nor how he had gotten there.  

“You have to help me,” said Harry, his child's voice wavering like a voice heard under water.  

Draco opened his mouth, then checked himself. Could his voice be heard in a dream, a dream that wasn't even his own? “Help you?” he asked, and to his relief, his voice was audible, if odd-sounding. “Help you with what?”  

“My mother built me a castle,” said the boy who was Harry, looking around at the sand. “To protect me. But I've knocked it down, and now I can't find the pieces. Can you help me build it back up?” 

Draco dropped down to his knees in the sand. It was neither warm nor grainy like real sand, but almost cloudy in its texture, as soft as dust. A dream of sand from the imagination of someone who had never been to the seaside. “I'll do whatever I can,” he said, and reached for the plastic bucket with the shovel in it; but before he could take hold of it, the dream-Harry had moved it away. Draco stared at him. He seemed even younger up close, younger and afraid; the burning mark on his forehead was almost too bright to look at. “Don't you want my help?” 

Dream-Harry dropped his plastic shovel; it rattled against the side of the bucket. He shook his head. “I waited and waited for you to get here,” he said. “But now I think you might be too late.” 

“Too late?” Draco asked, and then he heard something – a loud clanging noise, like the tolling of a bell – it was a bell – some sort of alarm? An alarm clock? Was Harry waking up – and before he could even complete the thought, the sand vanished from under his feet, the blue sky spun away, and he tumbled back into himself, into his own shivery-cold body huddled in a milky spill of starlight on the window ledge in his room. 

He clutched at the blanket, his heart pounding. The faint dizziness of dreaming clung to him like cobwebs. He felt strangely guilty – surely it was a violation of some sort to go walking into someone else's subconscious, even if he had been pulled in against his will. He wondered if Harry would recollect his dream in the morning, and how it might have seemed to him. It was almost as if they connection between them was growing stronger these days; he could find Harry as simply as breathing, and speak silently as easily as he could speak aloud. Perhaps it was the ease that came with practice, but it was almost beginning to be frightening. He wondered if the day would come when he could not tell Harry's thoughts and dreams from his own. 

*** 

The Stonehenge Museum is one of the greatest museums of the wizarding world. It was founded by an Act of the Ministry in 1653 and is now governed under the Stonehenge Museum Act 1793. General management and control are vested in a Board of twenty-five Trustees (one appointed by the Minister, fifteen by the Ministry Board, four nominated by Learned Societies and five elected by the Trustees themselves.) 

The Museum now holds national collections of antiquities: alchemical tools, enchanted curios from around the world, rare cursed objects, a library collection (Printed Books, Manuscripts, Maps, Music and Stamps), and items of historical interest to the wizarding world. Its natural history collections were transferred to South Kensington in the 1880s, becoming the J. Natural History Museum.  

The main Museum buildings are unplottable. The core consists of buildings of a floor area of about 600,000 square feet, designed by Sir Sidney Smirke and erected during a long evening in 1650 after Smirke had consumed a bottle of Giant beer; some say this is why the roof lists to the east. Major subsequent additions totalling about 340,000 square feet consists of the Whisp Gallery of Quidditch History (1850s-1870s), the Cantwell J. Muckenfuss Exhibition of Implements of Indeterminate Purpose (1884), and the L. N. Malfoy Gallery of Cursed and Abominable Artifacts. There is also the Hall of Bright Carvings (1979/80).  

Guest Information: The museum is built in a circle, hollow in the middle where a small garden has been planted. In the center of the garden is the raised platform where museum visitors find themselves after being Portkeyed in; it also serves as a Portkey out. A limited amount of Portkeys are produced by the Museum, and because of this, the Museum curators always know how many visitors are in the museum, and who they are. This is for the security of museum visitors as well as the safety of the museum; security trolls patrol the corridors so it is best to stay with the guided tour group...wands are not allowed inside the museum, and are collected from patrons upon entry. 

“So,” said Ron, when Hermione had paused in her reading aloud, “are you testing whether it's possible to be both panicked and bored to death at the same time, or what?”  

Harry was scratching his ear in a thoughtful manner. “Hermione, darling, don't you already know all this?”  

Hermione looked up from the pamphlet she'd been reading as they traipsed down the corridors of the museum. She depended on Ron and Harry to keep her steered along a straight path so that she didn't bump into the other students while she was walking. So far, they seemed to be doing a decent job, although she suspected she'd stepped on Pansy Parkinson's toe. Not that she regretted this entirely – Pansy was almost always underfoot. 

“I know,” Hermione replied, “but there's no harm in being extra prepared, is there?” 

Neither Ron nor Harry replied, and she stowed the pamphlet in her bag as the group of Hogwarts students (there had wound up being about twenty five of them in total) was instructed by Professor Flitwick to stop in a high-ceilinged room whose gold plaque proclaimed it to be the Manfred Scamander Room of Artifacts from the Natural World. She could barely force herself to pay attention, however, as Flitwick pointed out items of interest – a knife made from dried dragon's blood, a basket of ashwinder eggs, the tailfeathers of a cockatrice, a vial-containing phoenix tears. In the corner of the room stood a gray-skinned security troll, dressed in dark blue work boots the size of small boats, and wearing a grim expression. Hermione looked at it and shuddered; when she looked away, she saw Draco looking at her from across the room. He smiled faintly, and turned back to talking with Pansy and Malcolm Baddock, both of whom had come along because they were prefects, and thus required.  

She cast another look towards Draco as they left the Scamander Room, because they were passing a sign that denoted that the Exhibition of Dark Age Artifacts was to their left. She knew what was in that room: the remaining three Keys of the Founders. Her Lycanthe, Harry's scabbard, and Ginny's Time-Turner. They had all of them been there at the dedication ceremony over the summer: the four Heirs, and Ron as well. But Draco did not look back at her; he was deep in conversation with Malcolm, so Hermione turned to look at Ginny instead. There she had better luck; Ginny, hand-in-hand with Seamus, returned her glance with a rueful look and a smile. Hermione winked back, and thus almost missed it as they passed under an arch which declared that they were entering:  

The Cantwell J. Muckenfuss Exhibition of Implements of Indeterminate Purpose 

“Ooh,” whispered Hermione, “this is IT,” and in her transport of excitement, she punched Harry in the arm.  

“Some women get excited about earrings,” he whispered, wincing, “Others get excited about grand-scale larceny.”  

“Hmph,” said Hermione, and fell silent as they entered the room.  

The glass display cases in this particular exhibit were filled with all the magical objects the curators had never been able to identify an express purpose for. There were enchanted watches that always told the wrong time (but why?), stone tablets engraved with magical runes that could not be translated, enchanted bells that probably did something when rung, but nobody had ever had the nerve to ring them, and a spinning pen that Hermione well knew would be spinning in perpetuity because there was a magnet in it, and not because it was magical – some wizard obviously didn't quite understand Muggle artifacts. This cheered her up, as it meant the museum curators were hardly infalliable. And there – there it was, the Cup, smaller than she had imagined from the illustrations, glimmering silver behind a glass case. She detached herself from the rest of the students and went to stare at it, drawn as if in a dream. It sat between a long bone-handled knife and a stone pestle of some sort. A plaque was affixed to the base of the display case:  

Cup/Goblet, Uncertain workmanship, circa 1100 AD. This cup is believed to have belonged to Gareth Slytherin, although all evidence to that end is largely apocryphal. The cup rates a startling 8.7 on the IMP scale, although what purpose it might be put to is entirely unknown. The interior of the cup is carved with a pattern of waves and scales. It may perhaps have served as a tool for use in various alchemical preparations.  

“Come on,” said a voice, and then Harry's hand was on hers, drawing her away. The students had already begun filing out of the room after Flitwick, who was still chattering away in his clear little voice. She cast a last glance at the cup, sitting quietly behind its thick sheet of glass, and her heart quailed. She tightened her hand on Harry's, and followed him out of the room.  

*** 

Drink of this
And take thy fill
For the water falls
By the wizards' will. 

The inscription was carved onto the base of a stone fountain containing the statue of a bearded man spitting water. When Harry looked at him, he waggled a stone eyebrow. Harry looked away hastily, and examined the placard at the bottom of the display, which proclaimed it to be the Fountain of Brisingamen, whose waters had magical healing properties -- and, the placard added helpfully, were rumored to make freckles vanish. 

“Best not stick your head in,” he said to Ron, who was standing at his side. “We might never see you again.” 

“Bah,” said Ron, by way of a rejoinder, and glanced around the room. They were in the high-ceilinged Room of Enchanted Statuary, which was pretty much what it sounded like. There were statues of mermaids singing and playing harps that actually sang and played harp music, although not particularly well, and a carving of a sleeping centaur that snored aloud, and some statues of what Ron had described as “tall Greekish looking chaps in nappies” in the corner, who had flipped their togas up at Lavender Brown and made her scream. “Those people still staring at you, Harry?” 

“Yeah,” said Harry dispiritedly, changing a glance to the side. They had all assumed that the museum would be closed to everyone but students on the day of the trip, given the limited amount of Portkeys usually dispensed by the curators. But it was not empty. A visiting contingent of Canadian witches and wizards was there, and many of them had hung back from their own tour to stare at Harry with curious eyes. “How are we going to get away?” he muttered under his breath to Ron, close to despair. “They're all staring at me.” 

Ron shrugged. “I know,” he said. “Maybe Hermione and I ought to try to get away on our own, you could give us the cloak...”  

“No.” It was Hermione, coming around the side of the fountain, a determined look on her face. She joined them and continued in a whisper, “We need Harry, because he can be talking to Draco out here – you know we need him.”  

“Well,” Ron said slowly, “and I can't believe I'm going to suggest this: we could bring Malfoy with us, and Harry could stay here. He could even create a distraction instead. Maybe he could start handing out autographs.”  

“No,” whispered Hermione, “the second Draco left, Pansy and Malcolm would notice.”  

“And nobody's going to notice we're gone?” Ron asked. 

Hermione gave him a dark look. “That's why we need Draco to distract them.” She looked at Harry. “Can you talk to him for a moment for us?”  

“To Malfoy?” Harry looked past her, towards the far end of the room, his eyes seeking a familiar lankily graceful form, crowned with silver-tinsel hair. He immediately found where Draco stood between Pansy and Malcolm Baddock, staring at a row of unicorns carved out of marble. “Yeah,” he said. “I can talk to him.”  

He shut his eyes and reached out; because Draco was so physically close, contact was instantaneous. Malfoy?  

Uh-huh.

I think it's distraction time.  

How distressing. I was really enjoying this exhibit.  

Oh. Harry checked himself. Well, we could wait...  

Something bubbled like soda water in the back of his head. Belatedly, he realized it was Draco laughing.  

You must be nervous, Potter. Normally you wouldn't be such a pillock.  

Of course I'm nervous. We're about to rob this museum, you know. 

Pfft. Draco actually shrugged, without turning around. And you call yourself the hero of the wizarding world.  

I never call myself that! Harry began indignantly, then cut himself off as something poked his ribcage. He looked down and saw that it was Hermione's quill.  

“Harry,'” she said warningly. “Do not get sucked into an argument please.”  

Harry made a face at her, and she smiled angelically. “I mean it,” she added.  

So, Malfoy. About that distraction – Harry began, but was interrupted by Professor Flitwick, loudly calling the students over towards the doors to the room that contained the Cursed Artifacts exhibits. The students began to move quickly towards him; this sounded like interesting stuff. Pansy and Malcolm detached themselves from the railing they had been leaning on and Draco followed them, hands in his pockets, not looking to the side.  

Hermione looked at Harry. “What did he...?”  

Give me five minutes once we get into that room, Draco said. Then put the Cloak on and run like hell.  

Harry looked at Hermione and Ron, and, inexplicably, felt himself begin to smile. “We're on,” he said.  

*** 

Eager to see the Cursed Artifacts exhibit, the students crowded through the doors, laughing nervously and bumping against each other as they pushed to be first. Draco insinuated himself into the center of the tight knot in the doorway, brushing past Lavender and Justin, moving towards the red-headed girl towards the front of the pack. As he brushed by Ginny, he whispered under his breath, so softly he was almost afraid she wouldn't hear him: “When you get in there, go and look at the book display. 

Her huge dark eyes flicked towards him, surprised. “Wh—“  

“Just do it.”  

He dropped back into the crowd, and found himself standing next to Malcolm Baddock, who gave him a curious look. Draco ignored him. Somewhere in the crowd behind them were Harry, Hermione and Ron. He was aware that they were watching him without having to turn around and look. God, I hate teamwork, he thought, as he emerged into the L.N. Malfoy Permanent Exhibit.  

The room that housed the Cursed Artifacts collection was different than the other museum rooms they had been in. This, Draco thought, was probably to be expected. The center of the room was empty: all the artifacts were displayed along the walls, and every one was inside a glassed-in case. He recognized quite a few of them. There was the usual cursed jewelry and household items: mirrors that twisted the face of anyone who looked in them, jewelry that carried blood curses. One could curse anything, if one had a mind to. Most of the class were chattering and humming near a display of medieval cursed items: goblets that turned anything poured into them to acid, jewelry that slowly poisoned the wearer. The voices of the students were hushed, echoing faintly off the high marble ceilings and stonewalls.  

Draco, having seen all these things before, hung back, watching. Ginny and Seamus were standing by the far side of the exhibit, hand in hand, and as he watched, Seamus bent and said something to her and she laughed. Then, to Draco's relief, she released Seamus' hand, and as instructed, went over to examine the books in the glass-fronted case that lined the eastern wall of the room.  

Draco knew what was on those bookshelves as well. A collection of Dark Magic books that even the Restricted Section at Howgwarts wouldn't carry: the Necronomicon, fragments of The Book of Eibon, the Unaussprechlichen Kulten by von Junzt, the Pnakotician Manuscripts, the Sussex Fragments, and the Cultes de Goule by the Count of Erlette – all books his father had owned. The titles came into clearer focus for him as he walked up to stand beside Ginny and look through the glass, but he didn't read them. He was very conscious of her standing next to him, of the group of students behind them, of the hushed and reverent atmosphere of the museum.  

“Ginny?” he said, and she turned around, and looked at him. 

It was now or never. Draco took a deep breath, reached out, and took hold of Ginny's wrist. She widened her eyes, surprised, opening her mouth to speak, and he pulled her hard against him and kissed her. 

For a moment, she went absolutely rigid in his arms. Her lips parted under his with a sort of stunned acquiescence, and for a single split second it was almost a real kiss. But it was only a second. Any illusions he might have had that she would melt into his arms evaporated as she wrenched her mouth away from his with a gasping sound. A moment later her hands were flat on his shoulders, shoving him away. “Let me go – let me go –” 

He let her go. It wasn't part of his plan, but he couldn't bear to hold her there while she tried to struggle away from him. Her dark eyes met his for a split second, full of pained shock, and then hands clamped around Draco's arms, dragging him backwards. “Get off of her!” yelled Seamus' voice in his ear. With a feeling of dark glee Draco wrenched himself free of the other boy's grip and spun around to see Seamus staring at him, absolutely livid with rage. “Malfoy, you – what do you think you're doing?” Seamus shouted, so incoherent with anger he sounded almost tearful. Draco nearly felt sorry for him for a moment. “You -- you filthy Slytherin!”  

“Jealous, Finnigan?” Draco said in a low voice, so soft only Seamus could hear him. “She doesn't let you kiss her like that?” -- and he might have gone on in that vein, but was prevented from doing so by the fact that Seamus chose that moment to punch him hard in the mouth.

The force of the blow snapped Draco's head back for a moment. His vision blurred and then cleared, and he saw Seamus staring at him, looking shocked. He smiled, and Seamus' look of shock intensified. Then he flung himself at the other boy, knocking him down onto the ground. The breath went out of Seamus in a startled gasp, and he twisted to get away from Draco, elbowing him hard in the ribs. Draco slammed a hard punch into Seamus' face, and then another; Seamus clawed at Draco's shirt, shoving him backward, and drove his fist up into Draco's stomach. He was swearing under his breath, very colorfully, his Irish accent blurring the words almost beyond recognition. Draco was visited by a sudden memory of knocking Seamus down when they had been six years old, and pummeling him with the blunt end of a broken broomstick. Some things didn't change, did they, Draco thought as he threw himself to the side to avoid another punch and Seamus went with him; they rolled across the floor together in a tangle of punching arms and kicking legs. Draco was faintly aware that everyone around them was screaming. Excellent.  

A voice spoke to him then, inside his head: Harry, sounding anxious. Have you caused a distraction, Malfoy?  

Oh, yes, Draco replied with some satisfaction, and ducked another punch from Seamus. Oh, yes, I have.  

The alarm, said Harry. I need you to trigger the alarm.  

Not a problem, Draco replied, grabbed hold of the front of Seamus' shirt, and flung him backward hard. against the side of the glass case holding the Dark Arts books. The breath went out of Seamus and he gasped, and Draco took that opportunity to draw his left hand back just far enough, and point it at Seamus. The other boy's eyes widened in fear, and then Draco whispered Stupefy! A white jet of light shot from his fingers; Seamus ducked, and the bolt went over his head and directly struck the glass case behind him, which shattered into a thousand pieces, sending glass flying everywhere. And over the sound of the shattering glass, and Seamus' yell of startlement, and the screaming of their classmates, Draco heard the sound of the museum's alarm. It was, probably appropriately, the scream of a banshee – unbearably loud and horrible. Everyone cowered and clapped their hands to their ears. Draco was about to follow suit when he felt strong a grip clamp itself on the back of his shirt, and he was hauled into a standing position. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Seamus receiving similar treatment at the hands of a burly museum security troll. He shut his eyes as he was dragged to his feet, and in his head he heard Harry say, “Thanks, Malfoy.” 

Sure, Draco thought back. Any time. 

*** 

“Harry, you give Ron a hand up,” said Hermione, looking around the deserted Cantwell J. Muckenfuss Exhibition of Implements of Indeterminate Purpose anxiously. All three of them had shrugged out from under the cloak; not that it mattered, as the room was entirely deserted. The sounds of screaming could be heard coming faintly in the distance, and all the security trolls had fled; whatever Draco had done to cause a distraction it had certainly worked.  

“Well, at least you can count on Malfoy to start a problem at the appropriate time,” said Ron, stepping into Harry's cupped hands and allowing him to give him a leg up. A second later, Ron's hands were pressed against the glass which shielded the precious cup. He drew his hand back.  

“Wait,” Harry said urgently. “Wait for the alarm.” He paused, a look of intense concentration on his face. “Draco says he can do it,” he added, and a moment later an ear-piercing shriek reverberated through the room: a howling, terrible, mournful sound. A banshee wail, Hermione thought. She almost screamed herself as Ron nearly tumbled sideways, catching at the side of the glass to steady himself. Only Harry seemed unperturbed. “Now!” he called up to Ron. “Now!” – And Ron drew his hand back, wrapped tightly in a fold of his cloak, then slammed it forward into the front of the display case.  

The sound of the glass shattering was completely buried beneath the howling wails echoing through the room. Ron reached into the case, pushing aside the other objects – the glass bottle, the bone knife, which flashed briefly blue when he touched it – that shared a shelf with the cup. “No, don't touch anything!” Hermione shouted loudly, but Ron couldn't hear her, her voice was muffled by the sounding alarm. He pushed the knife aside and took hold of the cup, tossing it back to Hermione, who caught it one-handed, and shoved it in her bookbag. She drew out the transfigured Cup, and tossed it to Harry, who handed it up to Ron. Ron placed it carefully on the shelf, then leaped down to the floor. Harry raised his right hand, and pointed at the case. Hermione saw his lips shape the word, Reparo, and the glass flew up and reorganized itself just as the sound of the alarm was mercifully cut off.  

The three of them looked at each other, all out of breath, with identical looks of amazement. “It worked,” said Ron, and whooped out loud. “We did it!”  

“I know,” whispered Hermione in disbelief, staring down at the cup in her hand. It was very beautiful up close, and strangely light, even the row of emeralds lining the handle didn't seem to weight it down. Very, very carefully, she placed it inside her bookbag, and snapped the bookbag shut.  

“We'd better get out of here,” said Harry, practically, and beckoned Ron and Hermione to his side. “Let's get back,” he added, tossing the Invisibility Cloak over all three of them. They hurried from the room, holding each other's arms under the cloak, moving on tiptoes. Almost at a run, they re-entered the Cursed Artifacts exhibition, huddled under the cloak...  

And came to an astounded stop. Ron dropped the edge of his cloak, and Harry made a grab for it, but fortunately no one in the room noticed the brief reappearance of Ron's head – they were too busy staring at the scene-taking place in the center of the room. Two huge, gray-skinned burly security trolls, the like of which Hermione had only seen stomping around in book illustrations, stood facing each other across the heads of startled and milling students. Each was tightly gripping the arms of a struggling figure in its huge hamfisted hands: the one of the left gripped Draco, and the one on the right seemed to be having difficulty controlling a kicking and squirming Seamus Finnigan.  

“I didn't know Seamus knew about the Plan,” said Ron.  

“He doesn't,” said Harry grimly. “Oh, hell.”  

“I don't think we need this cloak,” said Hermione, not even bothering to whisper, “nobody's looking at us, anyway.”  

She pulled the cloak off of them, and stepped forward, the Cup in her book bag banging against her leg like a guilty reminder. She was right, nobody noticed them. There was far too much excitement going on already: Professor Flitwick was running and fro like a garden gnome that had been subjected to the Tarantallegra curse, the museum staff was urging the students to stand away from the broken glass that covered the floor so that the Reparo charms could be performed, the Canadian tourists were screaming, and the students were gawking in awed wonder at all the chaos. Meanwhile, Seamus appeared to be trying to claw his way out of the troll's grasp in order to get at Draco, who was making no such effort, and was staring back at Seamus in bored amusement. He might have been in the middle of buffing his nails for all the expression he showed, except that he was covered in blood and scratches – and so, for that matter, was Seamus.  

Harry shot Hermione a look. “Did you know he was going to do this?”  

Hermione shook her head. “I don't even know what happened...”  

“He kissed me,” said Ginny's voice in her ear.  

Hermione spun around and saw Ginny standing behind her, looking very pale and startled. She paused for a moment to wonder how Ginny had managed to get behind them without her noticing, then dismissed it. “Who kissed you?” Hermione asked in surprise.  

“Draco,” said Ginny dolefully. She did not look pleased.  

“Oh,” said Ron, twigging. “I get it. So Seamus clocked him one, then?”  

“Actually, I think he hit Seamus first...possibly not. It was a bit hard to tell,” said Ginny glumly. “I feel terrible about the whole thing.”

Hermione was about to tell her not to be ridiculous when she was interrupted by Professor Flitwick's high twittering voice ordering all the students to get in an orderly line and file out of the room after the security trolls, heading towards the Portkeying platform at the museum's center. Hermione almost felt herself collapse in relief; the sooner they were back at school, the less the likelihood that anyone would notice their jiggery-pokery with the Cup. 

She caught at Harry's sleeve and pulled him forward; all four of them fell into step with the other students. Ron and Ginny were conversing quietly behind her and Harry seemed distracted. “Harry...are they all right?”  

A small line of concentration had appeared between Harry's eyebrows. “Draco says he's fine,” he reported after a pause, “and he says Seamus is fine as well, they both look worse than they are.” 

“I'd no idea when we asked him to cause a distraction that'd he'd go quite that far.”  

Harry laughed low under his breath. “That's Draco. Never does anything by halves.”  

They were passing through the Enchanted Objects room now. Hermione tightened her hold on Harry's sleeve. It looked perfect, untouched, as if they'd never been in there at all. She resisted looking towards the transfigured cup behind its sheet of glass. “When we get back to school,” she whispered softly, “I've got to go hide the cup, right away.” 

Harry nodded. “You can borrow the Cloak, then,” he said. “Draco says he's meant to go straight to Dumbledore's office; after that, I was supposed to meet him in the armory for fencing practice anyway. I mean, it is Monday. I guess I'll just go wait for him there.”  

Hermione nodded. “Make sure he's okay.” They were in the center of the museum now, in the small garden. In groups of five the students were being herded onto the platform, handed their wands back by museum staff, and hurriedly Portkeyed back to school. Draco and Seamus must have gone first; they were nowhere to be seen. “I feel like we ought to...”  

“Celebrate?” said Ron, from behind her. “Massive post-caper booze-up?”  

“Ron, shh,” she said, but she smiled. “Yes, exactly. Celebrate.” She paused. “Before we figure out what on earth to do next...”  

“I'll meet you guys in the common room before supper,” Harry said. “We can celebrate then.” They were up on the raised dais now, about to step onto the platform that was the Portkey out of the museum. Harry looked towards Hermione, and checked at her hesitant expression. “Hermione...?”  

“Harry,” she said, very quietly, and glanced back towards the museum. “You don't think that maybe...”  

“Maybe what?”  

“Maybe it was a bit too easy?”  

“You must have a different definition of 'easy' than I do,” said Harry, stepping forward, and took her hand as the Portkey whirled them away.  

*** 

That much wounded pride ought to put a slump in anyone's upright posture, Draco thought, but it didn't seem to in this case: Seamus glared at him from the other side of Dumbledore's office, standing rigid and upright against the far wall. His face was a colorful relief map of bruises: blackened eye, bloody nose, bruised chin, swelling lower lip.  

Draco smiled at him pleasantly. They had been herded in here by Professors McGonagall and Snape and told to wait for Dumbledore to arrive. As soon as they had left, Seamus had commenced glaring at him and hadn't stopped yet. Smiling at Seamus hurt Draco's split lip, but it was worth it anyway just to see his hands clench against his sides in impotent fury. He supposed it was interesting to note that he hadn't lost his joy in malice via his association with Harry. He wasn't sure if it was a good thing, but at least it was interesting.  

Surprisingly, it was Seamus who broke the silence first. “She would never kiss you back,” he said. “Never. Never. Never.”  

Draco picked up a crystal paperweight from the desk and held it up to the light that poured through the window. “Never never never?'” he echoed. “That's right, Finnigan. Because if you say it three times, that'll make it true.”  

“What do you want, Malfoy?” Seamus demanded, his voice thick with dislike.  

“What do I want?” Draco echoed with a laugh. “Let's see...I've always wanted to own a Quidditch team. Maybe the Appleby Archers. And I want to be old enough to get a tattoo. And I'd like a really nice suede jacket that won't get ruined in the rain –”  

“No,” Seamus interrupted. “What do you want with Ginny? Why her?” His eyes slid away from Draco, and fixed on the floor. “You've got everything already. Haven't you? Why do you want her too? Just to show...that you could have her if you wanted?”  

The crystal paperweight felt heavy in Draco's hand. It was shaped like something, he couldn't quite tell what, it seemed to move fluidly under the touch of his fingers. “You're in love with her,” he said, feeling some surprise, although he thought he might already have known it. “Aren't you?”  

Seamus raised his eyes from the floor. They were intently blue, the one beauty of an otherwise ordinary face. “If you take her away from me just to show that you can,” he said, “and then you hurt her again, I swear I'll kill you, I don't know how yet, but I'll find a way and I'll kill you. You can die, you know – even if you are a Malfoy.” 

Draco just stared at him. Behind them, the door to the office opened with a click, and Dumbledore came into the room. He regarded both boys silently for a moment before he spoke. His voice was grave and quiet. “Sit down,” he said. “Both of you. Please.”  

Draco looked down at the paperweight in his hand. It was a rose, he saw, with a heart carved out of a chip of emerald. He wondered why he hadn't seen it before. Setting the crystal flower on the desk, he sat down, and Seamus sat down beside him, leaning as far away from Draco as he could get.  

Dumbledore looked from one of them to the other. His expression was one of tired resignation. “So,” he said. “I have heard what transpired in the museum. I suppose it would be a truism to state that I am surprised at you both. Neither of you seems the type to employ physical violence.”  

“They took our wands away,” Draco said. He heard his own voice with surprise. That wasn't what he had meant to say at all. “Sir,” he added, weakly.  

Seamus shot him a look of grave disgust. “It was just a scuffle, Professor,” he said. “It got a bit out of hand.”  

“I started it,” said Draco, and batted his eyelashes at Seamus.  

“That's true, sir,” Seamus said, steadfastly ignoring Draco. “He did start it.”  

“Yes,” Dumbledore said. “Yes, I'm sure he did.” He looked at Draco, and Draco's heart dropped into his shoes. “You have disgraced the school,” he said, “and more importantly, you have disgraced yourself. Both of you.” He looked down at his folded hands, and then back at the hangdog boys slumped in their chairs. “Twenty points from Gryffindor,” he said, “and thirty points from Slytherin. You will both serve detention. A month of it for you, Mr. Finnigan. And for you, Mr. Malfoy – a month.” He saw their horrified expressions, and for a moment it looked as if he might smile. “You will serve your detentions together,” he added. “By the end of it, I expect you to be able to write each others' life histories.” 

“I could already write Finnigan's life history,” drawled Draco irritably. “Was born, ate a potato, sucked at Quidditch, almost got shagged but not quite, ate a potato, died.”  

“Thank you, Mister Malfoy,” said Dumbledore coolly. “Let me make that two months of detention for you.”  

“Good,” interjected Seamus, and shot a glance at Draco. “And I think you should have to pay the bill for the damage to the museum, you smug git, Malfoy.”  

Draco looked at Seamus. Then he smiled politely. “That was the Malfoy wing of the museum,” he said. “I'm hardly going to have to pay off my own Foundation, am I?”  

Seamus turned an unbecoming shade of scarlet, and was silent. Dumbledore cleared his throat. “Thank you, Mister Finnigan,” he said. “I believe that will be all I need from you.”  

Seamus got to his feet, still puce, and stalked out of the office. Draco could feel Seamus resisting the urge to slam the door as he went out, and smiled to himself. When he turned back to Dumbledore, however, his smile melted like snow in April. The Headmaster was looking at him with a gaze so piercing Draco felt as if Dumbledore were drilling into his head.  

“Mister Malfoy,” he said. “I am quite sure you had your reasons for doing what you did. And Merlin knows they are opaque to everyone but yourself. However, there is no excuse for ruthless use of other people's sincere emotions. No matter what your intended ends might be.”  

Draco swallowed hard and looked down at the ground. In his place, Harry would likely have felt terrible. Draco merely felt terribly confused. Surely, if Dumbledore knew what they had been trying to accomplish... “I understand, sir,” he said. “I'm sorry--”  

“Don't apologize to me,” said Dumbledore in a clipped voice. “You will apologize to Mister Finnigan. In public. And furthermore...” The Headmaster's voice trailed off then. Draco chanced a look up and was startled at what he saw: Dumbledore was looking at him with an expression of unutterable weariness. He seemed old in that moment, almost frail, his face very lined. “Draco,” he said at last. “I understand that I have put you and Harry in a terrible position. I know that. And I am sorry for it. I wish that there were more that I could do, but I am afraid that I cannot.”  

“Headmaster...” Draco said in a sudden burst. “What you told me last week – about my father and Harry's parents – do you think I should tell him?”  

Dumbledore shook his head. “I am afraid that is your decision to make,” he said. “But I would say that yes, you should. It is never wise to hide things.” He sighed, and shook his head again. “That is all, I suppose,” he said. “And you will not go to Madam Pomfrey to have her attend to your wounds – I wish you to bear your bruises. And, when you have a moment, give a thought to what they mean.”

Draco nodded silently, not exactly sure what Dumbledore might mean, and the Headmaster smiled at him. It looked like a real smile, if a tired one.  

“Very well,” Dumbledore said. “It is Monday afternoon, and I know you have an appointment in the armory. Go along, and give Harry my regards.”  

*** 

Outside the door to Dumbledore's office, the only sound was the ticking of the brass grandfather clock in the corner of the hallway. Ginny tried to ignore the insistent noise as she waited, nervously, for the office door to open. The moment they'd all returned to school everyone had scattered -- back to their respective common rooms to gossip, she didn't doubt. Hermione had fled somewhere, Cloak in hand, Harry had gone off to wait for Draco, and Ron – well, she didn't know where Ron had gone, but he'd scarpered pretty quickly as soon as they'd arrived back at Hogwarts. Not that she minded; she'd heard Harry tell Hermione that Draco and Seamus had been taken to Dumbledore's office, and she'd headed there without a moment's thought.  

A quarter hour later and she was still waiting. A vague and displaced sense of guilt assailed her. She felt as if somehow the fight were her fault. Probably because she had been its catalyst, however unwilling. The worst part, she thought wretchedly, was that some part of her, some small part, had liked the fight...she'd never thought Seamus had it in him to get quite so passionately angry, and as for Draco –  

She broke off and looked up as the door to Dumbledore's office opened, wondering which of them it would be, or if it would be both of them. It was Seamus. She felt her mouth sag open a little bit – she hadn't realized quite how bad he would look. She hadn't seen most of the fight, and had somehow assumed that it was, had been, mostly staged and not sincere. But Seamus' injuries looked quite sincerely inflicted. The skin around his left eye was bright purple, and his bottom lip was swelled up to twice its normal size. “Oh,” she gasped, involuntarily. “Seamus...”  

He glanced down at himself. His white shirt and gray sweater were spattered with blood. “Yeah,” he said. “Not so pretty, huh. I should get to the infirmary.” 

“You look great,” she said firmly. 

Seamus snorted, then winced as if this had been painful. “I do not,” he said. “I look like I've been playing tonsil hockey with a paper shredder.”

Ginny laughed. “Well, you're still making jokes,” she said. “So I'm not so worried about you any more.”  

Now he did look at her. “You were worried about me?”  

“Well, yes,” she said. “I mean – look at you.”  

“I thought you said I looked great.”  

“I lied,” she said. “You look horrible.”  

He looked as if he would have smiled, if he'd been able to. Something tugged at her. He looked so different like this. Bruised up of course, and bloody, and it gave him a slightly dangerous air that he'd certainly never had before. Even his voice sounded different...“Remind me why I hang around you again,” he said.  

“Because,” Ginny said, and went up to him, and put her hands on his shoulders. “Of this,” and she kissed his chin, “and this,” and she kissed his cheekbone where the bruising wasn't too bad, “and this,” and she very gingerly kissed his mouth.  

He looked at her wide-eyed, and touched her face lightly with the tips of his fingers. “I thought –” he said. “I figured you'd be angry.”  

“I'm not. It was Draco's fault.”  

“Yeah, but everything you said before –”  

“Look, Seamus—“  

“About not wanting me to protect you –” 

“I know, but –”  

“And I don't want you to think I don't respect that, because –”  

“SEAMUS!” she yelled, and he broke off, startled, and stared at her.  

She took a deep breath before she spoke, but when she did, her voice was firm.  

“I want to go to Ireland with you,” she said.  

*** 

Harry looked up as the door to the fencing room opened, and Draco came in. Harry hopped down off the table and came towards the other boy, smiling. “I wasn't sure you'd make it,” he said. “You're pretty late.”  

“Sorry,” said Draco, shutting the door behind himself. He was still standing in the shadow and Harry could see only the outline of him, and the faint glint of silvery hair in the darkness. “I got detention. And I had to do some quick talking...and a little bit of kissing."  

“Dumbledore made you kiss him?” Harry snorted. “Malfoy, what kind of detention did you get?”  

“Not Dumbledore,” Draco clarified. “He was actually pretty understanding. Blaise, however...she wasn't.”  

“Blaise?” Harry bit his lip. “You know, I forgot all about her.”  

“Yeah,” Draco said. “Apparently so did I.” He sighed. “She was waiting for me when I got back to the dungeon. So was everyone else as a matter of fact. I had to do some quick talking.”  

“She forgive you?”  

“Not exactly,” Draco hedged. “I promised to talk to her about it as soon as I got back from detention.”  

“I'm detention now?” Harry suggested, a laugh building under his voice. “You know, you didn't tell me you were going to punch Seamus in the face.”  

“You wouldn't have let me,” said Draco, finally coming forward into the light. As he did, Harry saw that he had the beginnings of an impressive black eye, as well as a cut across one cheek. Oddly, it suited him. Only Draco, Harry thought wryly, could manage to give the impression that he had gotten up in the morning, decided a black eye might add to his ensemble, and punched himself in the face. His shirt was also ripped where he had skidded across the floor on broken glass, and even that looked intentional. “Anyway, it wasn't like I planned it,” Draco added. “It came to me in a flash of inspiration, you might say.”  

Harry raised an eyebrow.  

Draco grinned. “You told me to create a distraction.”  

“You,” said Harry, “have been wanting to belt Seamus in the face for weeks. You think I can't tell?”  

“Oh, come on,” said Draco. “Don't you ever want to belt Seamus in the face? He's so damn smarmy.”  

“No,” said Harry. “I happen to like Seamus.”  

“No accounting for tastes,” said Draco. “Did you want to practice, or not?”  

Harry nodded. “Sure I do. It's been a while.” He went back to the table and retrieved his sword, and when he turned back to Draco, Draco already had Terminus Est in his hand and was looking down at it almost quizzically. His face was oddly blank, expressionless, his eyes shining with a strange light. “Malfoy...?” Harry said.  

Draco looked up quickly, his gray eyes lighting. “Yeah. Sorry,” he said, came forward, and met Harry in the center of the room. They saluted each other and moved apart, and then back together, Draco advancing, Harry backing away and parrying as he did so. He wondered if there would ever be a time he wouldn't hear Draco's voice in the back of his head as long as he had a sword in his hand. He had been quite patient in the beginning, explaining attack and recovery, parries and lunges. But Harry knew perfectly well he'd never have become as good as he had, as quickly as he had, if some measure of Draco's own knowledge and skill hadn't bled over to him through the Polyjuice Potion.  

He slitted his eyes now as Draco came forward quickly with a beat-feint-feint-thrust. Harry riposted swiftly, then began retreating, drawing Draco out. Draco knew what he was doing; Harry could tell by his smile, but they were just practicing so it hardly mattered. Often they simply went on and on and on, until both or one of them tired, with nobody winning. Now Draco ducked and tried to get through Harry's guard, low-line, and Harry smiled at the anticipated move and replied with a stop-thrust which the other boy should have been expecting – but Draco did not move at all to block the thrust and Harry, realizing this almost a split second too late, wrenched his arm to the side. The blade made a sound like a whisper as it opened a slash along the side of Draco's sleeve. Harry, nearly overbalancing, crashed into Draco, who caught him and pushed him away, steadying him. 

Harry jumped back as if Draco's touch burned him. He realized he was shaking and the hand that gripped the hilt of his sword was slick with sweat. “Draco,” he said. “What – why did you – I could have killed you, why didn't you block me?”  

Draco's expression was almost completely blank. He looked down at his shoulder, where the rip in his shirt was already reddening with blood. Then he looked back at Harry, and Harry realized with a slight start that he was very pale, and that his white-blond hair, his shirt, his clothes, were drenched in sweat, as if he'd been running a marathon. “I don't know,” Draco said in an unusually quiet voice. He walked across the room, and laid Terminus Est down on the long wooden table there. Then he put his hands flat on the table, and made a sort of gasping, hitching noise, as if he were having trouble breathing and only leaning on the table was holding him up. “I don't know,” he said again, his voice almost too faint to be audible.  

Seriously alarmed now, Harry went over and dropped his own sword on the table. “Draco,” he said, “are you all right?”  

Draco didn't say anything. Harry stood where he was, and waited, and finally Draco lifted his head and looked at Harry. His eyes were gray tunnels, going on and on without ending, and Harry could see into and through them – could see Draco's bewilderment and rising panic. And his pain, not emotional pain, but physical pain. As if a light had been switched on he realized what was happening, the knowledge passing from Draco to himself like light passing through a crystal. “You're ill,” Harry said. “Aren't you?”  

Draco took another breath. His shaking seemed to have eased a bit. “There's something wrong with me,” he said. “My reflexes – they're off. I'm slower than I was. And I've been feeling dizzy a lot.” 

“Well, you got shot in the shoulder two weeks ago. You lost a lot of blood. Could it be – I mean, it would make sense if –” 

Draco looked unconvinced. “Maybe,” he said. “I've been waiting for it to get better. But it's been getting worse.” 

“For how long?” Harry said. “How long have you been ill?”  

Draco shrugged. “Two weeks. Since the accident.”  

“Then it must be the injury – they must not have fixed it right – or maybe you were supposed to rest, and you haven't been resting properly –” Harry realized he was beginning to sound hysterical, and stopped with an effort. “This is why you lost the game Saturday,” he said. “Isn't it?”  

Draco nodded. “Uh-huh.”  

“You have to go to the infirmary,” said Harry. “Right now.”  

Draco shook his head. “No.”  

“Then I'll bang you over the head and drag you,” said Harry, in a decided manner. “I wasn't asking you. I was telling you.”  

A slight flicker of amusement lit Draco's eyes. “That's touching,” he said. “But I'm not going. I'm not so slow I can't duck a punch from you, Potter.” He held up a hand at Harry's furious expression. “Look,” he said. “I already told Hermione and she's looking into it, in case there was some sort of – well, something on the shaft of the arrow that hit me.” 

Harry felt as if someone had walked up and kicked him in the back of the knees. “Like poison?”  

Draco hesitated for a split second, then shook his head. “That's impossible. I'd be dead already. There's no poison that takes this long to work. It could be a Slowing Potion or an Enervation Spell – annoying, but fixable. And look – we're going home in four days anyway. If it doesn't get better, I can get the best mediwizards in the country to come to the Manor and have a look at me. I'll owl Simon Branford himself if I have to. So don't get your knickers in a twist about it.” 

“Why didn't you tell me?” Harry said, crossing his arms over his chest.  

Draco looked him up and down, then, rather grudgingly, smiled. “I figured you'd freak out,” he said.  

“I'm not freaked out,” said Harry.  

“Right,” said Draco. “And I'm the Balinese Goddess of Plenty.”  

“I think there was a statue of her in the museum,” said Harry thoughtfully. “Doesn't she have six breasts?”  

Draco choked on a noise that was unmistakably a laugh. “Sod off, Potter.”  

Harry ducked his head, and when he looked up again, he was relieved to see that Draco looked almost back to normal, no longer pale and strained. “I'm assuming if there was cause for concern, Hermione would have told me,” he said. “So I am not, actually, going to freak out.” This was something of a lie. “But I am going to expect you to see the mediwizards when we get home.”  

He saw Draco blink, and felt the slight jolt of gratified surprise that came from him – it was still more than slightly odd to realize that home was now, for both of them, the same place. “All right,” Draco said, and straightened up. “I said I will. So I will.”  

And Harry realized he would have to be satisfied with that.  

*** 

She was waiting in his room when he got back from the armory. Sitting on the foot of the bed, in an emerald blazer and short black skirt, one long leg crossed carefully over the other. As usual, from the top of her perfectly groomed red-gold head to the tip of her Jimmy Floo stiletto heels, she was perfect.  

“Blaise,” Draco said, feeling the exhaustion that had been haunting him seep like a cold pain into his bones. He felt dirty, in need of a shower, and the blood that had dried on his shoulder itched. “Now really isn't the...”  

She launched herself off the bed, and stalked towards him, her green eyes blazing. Before he could move or react, her open palm cracked across his face in a stinging slap. “Bastard,” she hissed.  

Draco fought not to wince. It had not been a good day so far – punched in the face by Seamus, stabbed in the shoulder by Harry, now smacked across the cheek by Blaise. He wondered what else the gods had stuffed up their sleeves as far as harm to his person was concerned. “Do that again,” he said, “and I'll hit you back.” 

She glared at him. “Draco Malfoy,” she snapped. “I will not let you make me look stupid.” 

“You look stupid?” he said. “Impossible.”  

She gave him a hard look. “Why?” she said. “Why did you do it?” 

“Why did I kiss Ginny Weasley? Is that what you mean?”  

She nodded tightly. “Have you got...” She looked sick to her stomach. “Feelings for her?”  

Draco considered. “Define 'feelings'.”  

“Are you in love with her?” 

“No,” he said. 

“Then why the –”  

“I wanted to hack off Seamus Finnigan,” he said. “It seemed the simplest way.”  

“And why would you want to hack off Seamus Finnigan?” 

Because he's a smarmy little bastard,” Draco said. “Because he grabbed your broom last Quidditch game, and I –”  

She looked disgusted. “You expect me to believe that? Nice try.”  

“He annoys me,” Draco said with a shrug. “Make of that what you will.”  

Blaise bit her lip. Her internal struggle was visible on her face. She wanted to believe him, and yet her inner cynic would not let her. When she finally spoke, her voice was carefully slow. “You're using me,” she said. “I just don't know what for, or why.”  

Draco was jolted. “No—“  

She cut him off. “Give me one good reason to stay with you, Draco Malfoy,” she said. “One.”  

He glanced down, and was greeted by the sight of her feet in their silver strapped shoes, her toenails painted silver to match. Her toes were curling under, which always happened when she was nervous – everyone, he thought seemed to have one mannerism that always betrayed them – Hermione's biting her lip, Harry's twisting his hands together. “I'll buy you something pretty,” he said.  

She laughed. It wasn't a happy laugh. “Like what?”  

“Whatever you want.” He looked up from her feet, and saw her staring at him, her cheeks flushed. He took a step forward and put his hands on her waist; when they'd been children, he'd almost been able to span her small waist with his hands. “There was that bracelet you liked in Diagon Alley...”  

“I don't want any jewelry, Draco,” she said, cutting him off.  

“Then what do you want, darling?” he said, chancing an endearment.  

It worked; she almost smiled. “When I was a little girl,” she said, “I always wanted a pony to ride.”  

He laid his hand against her cheek. Her skin was soft under his touch, her eyes enormous and lambently green. She was gorgeous – probably the prettiest girl he'd ever seen – and he felt nothing for her beyond a distant unfocused desire. “I bet I could help you make do without one,” Draco said softly into her ear.  

Her eyelids fluttered down, her long lashes shading her gaze, and for a moment she rested her cheek against his hand. Then her eyes flicked back up to his face, and she stepped back and away from him, pushing his hands away. “I don't think so,” she said. “You don't get to touch me yet.”  

Draco wasn't sure whether he felt snubbed or relieved. “Blaise...”  

“Make me look like a fool again and I'll rip out your kidneys and wear them as earrings,” she said. “And that's a promise.” 

“I thought you said Slytherins don't keep their promises,” Draco said.  

“I'll keep that one,” she replied, and turned on her heel. “You can count on it,” and she stalked out of the room, slamming the door behind her.  

*** 

Night had already fallen when Harry left the armory and trudged upstairs to Gryffindor Tower. He was late to supper, and was sweaty, tired and in need of a shower. He spoke the password (“Ashwinder!”) and stepped into the common room, which was filled with flickering firelight. His eyes lit up when he saw that the room was empty save for Ron, who was sprawled in one of the fat armchairs pulled close to the fire.  

Ron looked up as Harry came into the room, and waved him over. Harry came and dropped into the armchair next to Ron's, and for a moment they sat and stared into the leaping orange flames in a companionable silence. It was Harry who spoke first. “Sorry I'm late,” he said. “I was –”  

“With Malfoy,” said Ron. “I know. You had fencing practice.” He was looking into the firelight; the vivid flames painted a dark gold shadow over his already bright hair. “Hedwig brought something for you while you were gone,” he said, as if remembering something, and began rummaging beside the armchair. “I put it back here...”  

“Thanks...where's Hermione?” 

“She went off to stash that cup thing. Said she had a perfectly brilliant hiding place for it.” Ron sat back up, a small package in his hand, addressed to Harry. “Here you go.” 

Harry sat up straight and took the package. “I'd almost forgotten I bought this,” he said, tearing it open.  

Ron looked curious. “What is it, then?”  

Harry smiled. “You want to see?” He had succeeded in getting the package open now, and tipped something out of it into his hand. He held the hand out to Ron, opening his fingers to reveal something that glimmered blue in the center of his palm.  

Ron stared at it. “A ring?” he said. “I didn't know you cared.” 

“It's not for you, pillock,” said Harry easily. “It's for Hermione, of course.”  

Ron sat where he was, staring down at Harry's hand. He made no move to touch the ring. “Is that a sapphire?”  

Harry glanced down at the delicately worked blue circlet in his hand. “No, it's Venetian gl—“  

“Is it a Christmas present?” Ron interrupted.  

Harry blinked, looking slightly flummoxed by this hard line of questioning. “Well, it is but it's also...” he hesitated. “I suppose it's an I'm-sorry present. Sorry for being distant, for being difficult – you know. What we talked about before.” He bit his lip. “I just want her to understand that my recent behavior doesn't have anything to do with whether I love her.” He looked down at the clear blue jewel. “I guess I couldn't think of the right way to say it, so...”  

“No.” Ron was shaking his head. “No. Harry. That's stupid.”  

“Stupid?” Harry blinked at his friend, then very slowly closed his fingers over the small box, and retracted his hand. “Why is it stupid?”

“Because,” Ron said roughly. “Because you're supposed to give a girl an engagement ring when things are going well in the relationship, Harry, not when they're going badly.”  

“It's not an –” 

“It's manipulative,” said Ron, and then flushed to the roots of his red hair.  

“Manipulative?” Harry echoed in disbelief. “Because I want to give Hermione something that I think she'd like, that's manipulative?”  

“Tell me you're not trying to tie her to you,” said Ron. “Go on, say it. But I won't believe it.”  

“She's my girlfriend,” said Harry. “We're already tied together. And frankly, I think you're being kind of an ass about this.” 

“Am I?” Ron had begun tapping the point of his quill against his knee. As he spoke, he tapped it more quickly and with greater force. “When are you going to do it, Harry?” he asked.  

Harry shook his head. “I was thinking Christmas Day,” he said. “You know. When people usually give Christmas presents.”  

“It's not just an ordinary Christmas present,” said Ron. “I think you should wait.”  

“Oh, really.” Harry's voice was irritable. “Why's that?” 

“Look, Harry – it's a ring. And no matter what, you give a girl a ring, she's going to think you want to marry her –”  

“Well, maybe I do want to marry her,” said Harry, then checked at the astonished expression on Ron's face. “Well, not bloody now, I'm seventeen, it would be ridiculous. But that doesn't mean that I –” 

“Marry her?” Ron echoed, and there was a strange tense note in his voice. “You can't.”  

“What do you mean I can't?”  

“Hasn't she talked to you lately? Don't you listen to her? Your relationship is falling apart!” 

Harry stared at Ron. His jaw was set, his shoulders rigid. “And I suppose you think you know more about my relationship with Hermione than I do?”  

“Bloody anybody would,” said Ron angrily, “the amount you pay attention!”  

“You know what I think?” Harry burst out furiously. “I think you're jealous.”  

Ron went white. “What?”  

“Jealous. And you're hacked off because I haven't been around much lately. And yeah, I'm sorry. But this isn't exactly the way to show me the error of my ways, you know. Because all this is making me realize is why I don't want to spend time with you in the first place,” Harry added furiously. “So maybe you might want to take a second and be a bit more understanding instead of acting like you know what Hermione wants better than I do!” 

“You think you know everything?” Ron threw back at him, and there was an odd hitch in his voice. “How much time have you spent with her these past months? I bet you couldn't tell me what classes she's taking. You've been so wrapped up in your little world, and you don't let anyone in except that fucker Malfoy, and if you don't see the way he looks at her you're stupider than you look.”  

Harry shook his head. His eyes were brilliant with anger. “Nice try. I know you hate Draco and quite frankly, I couldn't care less. I don't know what the hell has gotten into you, Ron. I am going to go upstairs now, and go to sleep, and on Christmas Day I'm going to give this ring to Hermione, and if you want to sit in the corner and glare at me, fine, but –”  

“You're so stupid,” Ron said, and his voice came out ragged, on a half-tearful gasp. “You're so stupid –”  

“Just shut up, Ron.”  

“You think you could just ignore her and she'd sit there and wait for you to wake up and start paying attention again? You think she'd be willing to let you treat her like she didn't matter –”  

“You mean Hermione? What are you talking about? Who are you talking about?”  

Ron sat bolt upright. “I'm talking about Hermione!” he yelled, so loudly that Harry flinched back. ”I'm in love with Hermione, and she's in love with me!”  

A dead silence followed this announcement. Harry stared blankly at Ron; Ron stared equally blankly back. The expression on his face was one of stunned incomprehension, as if he could not believe the words that had just issued from his lips. “My God,” he whispered. “Did I just...”  

“Say that?” Harry's eyes were icy. “Yes, you did. And it's not fucking funny. If you want to make jokes –”  

“I'm not joking.” Ron's eyes were still dazed, but his voice was firm, and so was his set chin. He raised his face to Harry's. “I wouldn't have chosen this way for you to find out. But it had to be sometime.”  

Harry shook his head, and his black hair flew around him like a cascade of shadow. “Right. Very amusing. You can really be a jerk sometimes.”

“I'm not joking,” Ron said again. He raised his eyes to Harry's. For a moment, the two gazes, blue and green, met and tangled. And finally, oddly, Ron smiled, a strangely luminous smile. “I wanted to tell you,” he whispered. “I thought about telling you. Every night I thought about it. I must have told you a thousand times, in different ways, in my head. And now...and now you know.” He took a deep, shuddering breath, and half-closed his eyes. “And now you know,” he repeated again.  

There was something in the simplicity of the words he spoke, in the expression of mingled relief and terror on his face, that was inarguable. Another silence followed, broken by the sound of an object striking the stone floor. It was the package that Harry had been holding; it had fallen out of his hand.  

“That's insane,” Harry said. His voice was also firm, but blank and colorless, lacking any music at all. A robot's voice. “It doesn't make any sense.”  

Ron's lips parted; he looked as if he were about to speak. Then the portrait hole swung open, and they both froze, and turned to stare. It was, as if inevitably, Hermione. She was smiling, flushed from the cold outside, her arms full of books and the fur collar of her blue cloak pulled up around her neck. “Hey, you two,” she said cheerfully. “What's all the yelling?” 

“Hermione,” interrupted Ron, his voice fierce and wretched, “he knows.”  

Hermione paused and blinked at him. “What?”  

Ron got to his feet. He was standing next to Harry now. Harry had remained very still, not moving. His eyes went from Hermione to Ron, and back again. “Harry knows,” Ron said. “I'm sorry. I know we were going to wait until New Year's.”  

The smile had begun very slowly to fade from Hermione's face. She looked from Harry's white face to Ron's set one. “Is this some kind of joke?” she said uncertainly. “I don't understand.”  

“Welcome to the club,” said Harry, speaking for the first time since she had come into the room. “I don't understand either.”  

“Hermione!” Ron said fiercely. “Don't you get it – there's no point pretending! Harry knows! I told him!”  

Hermione looked at him wonderingly. “Told him what, Ron?”  

“I told him,” said Ron, speaking very slowly, “about us.” 

Hermione's mouth opened slightly, and she stared at Ron. Then she stared at Harry. Her gaze went back and forth between them and she resembled nothing so much as a small creature trapped between two much larger predators. “I don't...” she said softly, and then her voice trailed off. “Are you two...” Her gaze finally came to rest on Harry. “Harry...” she began. 

“Ron says he's in love with you,” said Harry in a flat voice, and Ron flinched. “And he says you're in love with him.”  

Hermione looked stunned. “He said what?” she whispered, still staring at Harry. “No, he wouldn't say that – it isn't true. That can't be what he meant.” Her eyes, enormous in her pale face, went to Ron. “That's not what you meant, is it? Harry just misunderstood.”

Ron looked as if Hermione had hit him in the face. The blood seemed to drain out of his skin. He made a strange sound, low in his throat, and stood up, staring at Hermione. “You can't do this,” he said. “I know you're afraid but you can't do this.”  

“Afraid?” Hermione echoed. “Afraid of what?” 

Ron spun around, and stared at Harry. His eyes were huge, almost black with intensity. “I love her,” he said. His voice was thin, but defiant. “I love her, and she loves me. We love each other. And we haven't held back, either. We're together almost every night. Together in every way.” 

“Ron!” said Hermione, her voice exploding out on a half-shriek. “What are you doing?” 

Harry looked as if he were going to throw up. “This has gone beyond a joke,” he said. “Beyond any kind of game – one of you better tell the truth, and pretty fucking quickly.” 

Ron turned his head, and looked at Hermione. “For God's sake, it's time, Hermione,” he said. “Tell him you love me.”  

Hermione's hands slowly clenched at her sides. Her voice when she spoke was as fierce and cold as an ice storm. “I do not love you,” she said, and her voice rose and rose, brushing the edge of hysteria. “I do not love you and moreover I have no idea what you are talking about. I have never been with you. I have never –”  

“You're lying,” Ron said, his voice as astonished as it was angry. “How can you –”  

“How can you?” Hermione shouted back. “How can you stand there and tell such terrible lies?”  

“It's the truth!” 

“I would never do that! Never!”  

Ron spoke again, his eyes never leaving Hermione's, although his words were for Harry. “Where do you think she goes, Harry, when you can't find her? What do you think she's been hiding? Why does she always look so tired? You've had that feeling she doesn't love you any more? Now you know why.” 

“Why are you doing this?” Hermione's voice sounded shattered, a fragile glass bell buckling under strain. “Why? Why are you doing this, Ron?” 

“Because I'm tired of lying,” he shot back. 

“You're lying right now!” 

“I'm telling the truth!” Ron's voice was thunderous. He turned back to Harry, who was standing very still, unmoving, his face entirely blank. “You believe me, don't you?” he said in a harsh half-whisper. “You know it's true.” 

Harry said nothing. He glanced down and then back up at Ron, expressionless, as if he were gazing at a stranger. 

Then he looked at Hermione, who started towards him involuntarily. He held out a hand, arresting her progress. “No,” he said. 

She stopped where she was. “Harry—“ There was a pleading note in her voice. “You know I would never – you know I love you.” She turned and looked at Ron. “Tell him you're lying,” she whispered. “It's not too late – tell him –” 

Ron didn't look at her. His eyes were on Harry, the lines of strain around them very dark. “It's the truth,” he said. “I know what you want to do. Do it.” 

Harry raised his right hand and pointed it at Ron. “Veritas,” he said. 

Hermione shrieked out loud as the jet of black light shot from Harry's hand and hit Ron in the chest. Ron doubled over, gasping, then slid slowly down the wall, holding his arms tightly across his body, his legs splayed out in front of him. 

Harry looked at him, still with that odd distance on his face, as if he was regarding something that was happening very far away. 

“Ron,” he said, and Ron raised his head. His face was creased with pain. “What you just told me – is it true?” 

Ron took a deep and shuddering breath. The pain had its claws in him, and when he spoke his voice cracked. But it was strong, and there was resolution in it, and surety. 

“Yes,” he said. 

Hermione went white, and swayed on her feet. She put out a hand and steadied herself against the wall; she seemed to be beyond speaking.

Harry, however, was not. “You're in love with Hermione? You've... been together?” he demanded, his voice hard and sharp. 

Ron nodded. “Yes, like I told you.” 

The skin of Harry's face seemed to have tightened, pressing back against the bones. But his voice was steady. “How many times?” 

Ron flushed. “I don't know. A lot... I can't count... almost every night.” 

“Where?”

Ron ducked his head, struggled, and said, “The prefect's meeting room.” 

Harry's breath was coming quickly now, but his voice was still expressionless. “And does she love you?”  

Hermione found her voice. “Harry –”  

“Shut up,” said Harry, his tone cold and flat. He was still looking at Ron. “Does she love you?”  

“She said she did,” said Ron. He was looking down at his hands now. “She said she did.” 

“She said she loved me too,” said Harry and there was nothing in his voice: no anger, no pain, no love and no hate. Just a terrifying emptiness. He raised his hand and pointed it again at Ron, “Finite incantatum.”  

Ron jumped. The pain faded out of his eyes, although the tension remained apparent in every line of his body. Very slowly he began to rise to his feet, his hands behind him, flat against the wall. “I'm sorry,” he said, and looked at his feet. “I'm sorry.”  

Harry raised his head, and looked at Ron. Somewhere inside his eyes was the eleven-year old boy he had been, begging his best friend to say that he lied. Behind that child, the man that Harry had become knew that he did not. 

“How could you,” he said, his voice flat and utterly toneless. “How could you do that to me?”  

Ron said nothing. He couldn't seem to meet Harry's eyes with his own. All the color in his face had gone, and he stood stock-still, his back pressed against the wall. At the base of his throat his pulse beat, fast and hard and visible beneath the skin.  

“Harry.” It was Hermione, her voice a thin shell of itself. “Please. It isn't true.”  

Harry turned on her. “Don't talk to me.” His voice was fierce, his eyes like chips of green ice. “Don't talk to me, don't look at me. Don't ever come near me again.” 

Hermione's face crumpled. “Please listen—“  

“I said don't talk to me!” Harry yelled, his composure cracking at last. “He's telling the truth, how can he lie under the Veritas curse? Tell me that, since you're so goddamn clever! How is it possible that he's lying?” 

“Harry!” Hermione said, her voice a half-scream, and then Harry's hand went to his wrist and ripped away the watch she had given him, and he flung it at her, so hard that she cried out when it struck the arm she had raised to protect her face.  

“Get away from me,” he said, and his voice cracked, through and through like glass shattering. “Get away from me before I hurt you, because I will if you come near me, I swear to God I will.” 

Very slowly, Hermione bent down and picked up the watch. When she straightened up, there were tears on her face, although she did not move to blot them or wipe them away. She looked not at Harry, but at Ron, and her face was very white. “I hate you,” she said, “I will always hate you for this,” and then her voice broke and she turned and ran to the portrait hole, and it swung open and let her through.

 

*** 

It was a cold walk from the prefects' bathroom back to his bedroom in the dungeon, but Draco was not in a mood to hurry. He'd washed off the sweat of fencing practice, and had been soaking meditatively in the bath when he'd noticed that the blood that seeped from his injured arm, as it washed away down the drain, was slightly phosphorescent – it was glowing.  

This had killed his enjoyment of his bath. He'd gotten out and toweled off, and left the bathroom without bothering to dry his hair. He shivered in the cold air of the unheated dungeon, and turned the last corner on the way to his room with a feeling of relief – relief which faded quickly as he saw that the hallway in front of his room was not deserted. A cloaked figure stood there, hood pulled up, almost but not quite melting into the shadows. The figure was slender, and obviously female. She straightened up as he approached.  

Draco paused, and sighed. “Blaise?” he said. “Look, it's been a long day –”  

He broke off as the figure raised two slender hands and pushed the hood back: a cascade of brown curls tumbled out, framing a white face.

Hermione.

Draco gaped at her, all clever commentary flying out the window. “What are you doing here? Someone might see you.” 

She looked at him blankly, as if he were speaking another language. “Malcolm Baddock already saw me,” she said. Her voice was distant, and very calm. “He let me in. I told him you'd kill him if he said anything.” She paused. “I think you should let me into the room now.”  

He looked at her more closely. “Does Harry know you're here?”  

Her reaction to this question was unprecedented: she flinched violently, and her eyes filled with tears. Shocked, he reached out for her, then thought better of it, and unlocked the door instead. He pushed the door open, and ushered her into the room; with a last look up and down the corridor, he followed her in and shut the door behind them. 

He threw his towel over the back of a chair, and studied her. She had taken a few steps forward and now stood very still in the center of the room, between the bed and the fireplace, her hands at her sides. He felt vaguely relieved that he was generally a neat person – the room was extremely tidy: his fencing clothes, tossed across the back of an armchair, the only sign of mess. Then again, she didn't seem as if she would have noticed if he'd been collecting garbage on his floor since the start of term. She stared around her like someone in a distracted dream.  

Draco shifted his feet, wondering what to say, which rarely happened. He was also increasingly aware that he was wearing damp pajamas which were sticking to him. “Hermione,” he said slowly. “Would you mind telling me what this is about?”  

She turned slowly and looked at him. Her face, above the white-lined collar of her blue cloak, was very pale, her eyes like huge black coins. “Your room is very nice,” she said. “You never said you had such a nice room...”  

“Hermione,” he said, more sharply.  

“You have a fireplace... I wouldn't have thought you'd have a window... oh, the rooms are built into the cliff, aren't they? That's so –”  

“Hermione.” Without thinking about it, Draco crossed the room to her, and caught at her wrist. She looked away from him, her eyes wide and blank. A sudden horrible thought assailed him, and he tightened his grip on her wrist involuntarily. “Did something happen to Harry? Is he all right?” 

“I don't know,” she said, meeting his eyes finally. “Draco, do I seem...mad to you?” 

“Do you seem what?” 

“Do I seem like I've gone mad?” Her breath was coming quickly now, in ragged gasps. His hand where it held her wrist was slippery, and he was suddenly even more conscious of his damp, half-dressed state. “Lost my mind?”  

He opened his mouth to say her name again, then realized it was becoming repetitive. Instead, he took her by the shoulders and propelled her towards the bed. She sat down obediently on the edge of the bed and folded her hands in her lap. He stared at her, and she stared back. 

“I need to change my clothes,” he said. “Sit right here and don't, uh, don't turn around.” 

She nodded dully. Any fears he might have had that she would be tempted to swing around and sneak a peek were relieved by her expression. She looked about as interested as if he'd just told her he was about to go work a very dull Arithmancy problem backwards in Japanese. 

Feeling as if he had wandered into a very strange dream, Draco went to his clothes chest, pulled out a pair of black trousers and a Knarl Lagerfeld dark green shirt, crossed to the other side of the room, and changed hurriedly, watching Hermione as he did so. She did not move from her place on the bed, only sat where she was, staring down at her hands. He pulled his shirt on, buttoned it, went back to the bed, and sat down next to her. “Okay,” he said quietly. “Why don't you tell me what happened?”  

She didn't reply, only stared past him, at a point beyond his left shoulder. He reached out, and took hold of her shoulders, gripping them tightly. “Hermione,” he said firmly. “I assume you came here because you wanted my help. But if you don't tell me anything, I cannot help you.”  

“I know,” she said, very softly, not raising her eyes to his. “I know, but how can I tell you what happened when I don't understand it myself?” His grip on her shoulders tightened, and she winced. “I've gone mad,” she said. “It's the only explanation.”  

He was silent for a moment. When he spoke, it was very steadily. “You,” he said, “have always been the sanest person I know. If you're mad, then we all are. I am. Harry is. Weasley is –” Her shoulders jerked violently under his hands, and he ducked his head to try to see her face. “Ron? This has something to do with Ron?”  

She nodded, a tiny nod. “Yes.”  

“Tell me,” he said. “Not what you think happened, or what you think might be wrong with you. Tell me the facts.”  

She took a deep and ragged breath, and raised her eyes slowly. They were so dark the pupil seemed to have disappeared into the iris; they looked like black tunnels, going on and on forever. “You won't believe me,” she said, and her voice cracked with pain. “Harry didn't believe me, and you won't either, and Ginny will believe Ron because he's her brother, and what will I do, I won't be able to stand it if you don't believe me, I won't be able to stand it –”  

“I'll believe you,” he said sharply, cutting her off. “I believe you already. Just tell me what happened.”  

“All right.” She nodded, and looked down again at her hands, balled into fists on top of her knees. “All right,” she said again, and then she began to speak, haltingly at first, then in a rush of words like a river undammed, telling him what had happened in the Gryffindor common room, what Harry had said, what Ron had said, what they both had done. And as she spoke, her small steady voice going on and on, Draco found himself at first unable to believe what he was hearing – and then, strangely able to. I knew there was something wrong. I knew there was something. 

“And then,” she finished, her voice unsteady, “a-and then, Harry said he never wanted to see me or speak to me again, and I should never go near him. I ran out – I saw McGonagall and Lupin rushing up, but I ran past them. I guess they ran into the common room – the Veritas curse must have set off the wards, they have those wards up, you know, the Dark magic ones, and –” 

“I know about the wards,” Draco interrupted her gently. “Sod the wards.” 

She nodded. “Of course. I'm sorry.” Her voice was empty and flat, and when she glanced down at her hands again he saw that she had something balled up tightly in her right fist. He dropped his hands from her shoulders, and slowly reached for her hand. She let him, offering no resistance as he pried her fingers open, and he blinked at the familiar glimmer of gold that was revealed. It was the gold watch that Harry always wore on his right wrist, his gold watch with the dark leather band. “He threw it at me,” she said, by way of explanation, and closed her fingers again. “He said I should never come near him again.” 

“I know,” Draco said. “You told me.” 

“He's right,” she said. “There's something wrong with me. I don't remember – I don't remember having done anything with Ron, but I must have done, mustn't I?” 

Draco took a deep breath. He knew his next words must be chosen with great care. “Hermione,” he said. “There is nothing wrong with you. I knew Weasley was developing some sort of – feelings for you. I just didn't realize he was quite this delusional about it.” 

Her head snapped up and she looked at him almost accusingly. “How do you know he's delusional? How do you know it isn't me that's delusional?”

“Because he's the one telling the bizarre story, Hermione, not you.” 

“You didn't see him,” she said, her voice rising, “he was so sure, Draco, he was so sure, and the way he looked at me – and he was under the Veritas curse, how could he be lying?” 

“Because,” Draco said firmly. “The Veritas curse makes you tell the truth, but it doesn't gift you with knowledge you don't possess. In other words, just because he believes it's true doesn't make it true. He could be under a Confundus curse – or have been Memory charmed – or just be a complete nutter, for all I know, although I doubt it. What I don't doubt is that the Veritas curse, in this case, doesn't prove anything. Anything.” 

He broke off, because Hermione was staring at him. Her eyes were enormous. “You believe me,” she said. “You really believe me, don't you?” 

“Yes,” he replied, because he did. “I absolutely believe you.” 

“Oh, thank God,” she said and burst into tears. He stared at her in alarm, but before he could do anything, she had thrown her arms around his neck and buried her face in his shoulder. She was sobbing in a way he would not have thought possible, every bit of the controlled reserve that had kept her so calm throughout this past half hour swept away as if by a flood. Very gingerly he put his own arms around her, and held her as she wept. He felt sure that there were Things One Did in these situations, soothing noises to be made, heads to be patted, but he had no experience with comforting people, much less comforting anyone he cared about. He could do nothing other than sit and hold her as the tumult of her grief spent itself.  

“I feel like I can't breathe,” he heard her whisper finally, her voice muffled against his shoulder. “I don't understand what's happening to me.” She still had her arms around him, her hands fisted in the back of his shirt. All of her softness was pressed against him, and he could almost taste the salt of her tears in his mouth. Against his will, he felt his body react to her proximity; after all, he was seventeen, and some things were beyond his immediate control. Quickly, he reached up and firmly detached her arms from around his neck.

“You should lie down,” he said, pulling away from her. “You're exhausted.” 

She shook her head swiftly, her hand still gripping his shirt. “No. No. I can't. I couldn't possibly sleep.” 

He sighed, his mind darting back and forth between various options. Holding her on his lap again was not a workable one. Neither, apparently, was she willing to lie down on her own. He slid off the bed and knelt down in front of his small bedside table; he slid the bottom drawer open, and drew out a bottle. The label on the bottle proclaimed it to be wine from the Archenland Vineyards, bottled in 1867. He looked at it for a moment – it was meant to be a gift for Sirius and Narcissa, and was worth more than he cared to remember. But, it couldn't be helped. “Apierto,” he muttered, and the cork popped out of the bottle with a faint sound.  

He handed the open bottle open to Hermione, and she took it and looked at blankly for a moment. Then, without hesitation, she raised the bottle to her lips.  

“Whoa,” said Draco, jumping to his feet. “You're supposed to...oh, hell, whatever,” he finished in a resigned manner as Hermione knocked back a healthy swig – then gasped and choked.  

She looked at him with watering eyes. “Draco, what is this stuff?”  

Gently he reached forward and took the bottle away from her, placing it atop the bedside table. “Archenland wine,” he said. “You're supposed to mix it with water, technically...it's very strong.”  

She made a face. “Tastes like oven cleaner,” she said, her words very slightly slurred. Draco was not surprised. Generally Archenland wine was consumed by the teaspoon. A whole glass could knock out a mountain troll. Already her eyelids were beginning to flutter down. “Draco,” she said softly, and reached out her hand. “Could you please...”  

Very carefully he took the proffered hand. It was soft and warm in his grasp, a small alive thing which he held as loosely as he could; in the back of his mind, as always, was the careful thought that he must not be disloyal to Harry, and yet at the same time her pain hurt him in a way he couldn't explain. As always, the narrow space between the two people he loved most in the world was a precarious place to stand.  

“Could you please,” she said again, and now she was definitely slurring her words, “find him for me?”  

He knew she meant Harry. “You want me to try to find him?” he echoed. “Make sure he's okay?”  

“Yes–” Her mouth trembled. “I just want to know that he's all right.”  

“I know,” Draco said. “So do I,” and he shut his eyes, and willed himself to concentrate. It was very difficult for a moment, as his mind was whirling. He forced himself to think of Harry, and his mind groped through the black space that separated them, searching for the familiar shape of Harry's thoughts, the known contours of his mind. He found him, finally, a vague shimmer of light in the darkness. Harry, he said. Harry, can you hear me?  

There was a long silence. Then a very faint, almost undetectable reply. I can hear you.  

Are you all right?  

Another pause. No. I'm a long shot from all right, Draco. I may never be all right again.  

Do you want me to come and get you? Draco asked, knowing that he would have to leave Hermione to do so; knowing that he would, if Harry wanted him.  

This time the response was immediate. No. I'm in Lupin's office. They brought me here. I'm in trouble, I think. I don't care, though.  

Harry –  

They're coming. It's all right, Malfoy. There's nothing you can do for me. Nothing anyone can do. 

And Harry's mind shut down like a door being slammed shut. The force of it seemed to knock Draco back into his body; his eyes flew open. For a moment, he blinked at the light, his eyes adjusting – he had been in such a profound darkness. He hurt, but it was not a corporeal pain – he was not even sure it was his pain. It was Harry's, but then Harry was almost his own self. It was the first time in his life that he had ever thought that if he could take someone else's pain and bear it himself, he would.  

“Hermione...” he began, in a half-whisper – and paused. 

She was asleep, her cheek on her hand, her body curled among the pillows. Her long dark lashes looked like ink strokes against her pale cheeks, and her chest rose and fell steadily with her breathing. He began to stand up, but realized that he could not – her outflung hand was tightly bunched in the material of his sleeve, and he could not pull away without waking her.  

With a sigh, he moved closer to her, and pulled the corner of the blanket up so that it covered her shoulders. Then he lay down beside her on the bed, and stared up into the darkness.  

*** 

The prefects' meeting room was freezing cold. He was freezing cold. Ron felt sure his fingers were turning blue, but when he looked down at them, they were the same color they had always been. It was hard to believe. Had he been able to take himself to a doctor or mediwizard, they could have told him that shock drops body temperature, but he couldn't, and wouldn't if he had been able to. He didn't want to see anyone. He wanted to sit in this room forever. He wanted to die.  

Over and over in his mind he kept replaying the scene in the common room. What he had said. What Harry had said. The look on Harry's face. He'd known it would be bad, but not that bad. Hermione had told him so many times, here in this very room, that she was quite sure that Harry didn't love her any more; that she suspected he knew that she no longer loved him either. And he'd believed her. Why shouldn't he believe her? Hermione had never lied to him.  

Only, apparently, she had.  

A spasm of nausea twisted his stomach as he recollected her words in the common room. I do not love you, she had said. I do not love you and moreover I have no idea what you are talking about. So she had lied. Apparently she never had had any intention of telling Harry: not at New Year's, not ever. Looking back now, he could see how she had put him off and put him off. He'd been too blinded to see it at the time.  

The sickness came back in a wave. This time, he was able to breathe through it. It was difficult, but he managed it by concentrating. In fact, he was concentrating so hard that he did not hear the door of the meeting room open quietly. It was only when he looked up again that he saw that she had come into the room, and was looking at him with an expression of alarm.  

“Ron?” she said gently. “What's wrong? You look ill.”  

He got to his feet and stared at her, and Hermione stared back. She looked the same – the same – the faint scarlet light from the glass window teased the gold-red glints in her tumbled hair. She wore it down because he liked it down. He'd told her that. And she was wearing her black school robes, and under them her blue pajamas that he had given her two years ago. “What,” he said, and his voice came out creaky and unfamiliar, “are you doing here?”  

Her lips parted and she looked at him in surprise. “I know I haven't come lately,” she said. “But please don't be angry – you know it isn't easy for me to get away.” She took a step towards him, and when he did not move away, she took another. She put her arms around him, and he let her, unresisting. “I have to leave soon,” she said. “Don't lets waste our time being angry.”  

He looked down into her face. Her familiar, beautiful face. He remembered the first time she had asked him to meet her there. And she'd cried on his shoulder. Harry didn't talk to her any more. He didn't love her. She wasn't sure she loved him either. She wasn't sure she ever had. She'd made mistakes, terrible mistakes. Would he ever forgive her. Could he still care about her. And she'd kissed him. He'd about fallen off the table in shock. It had been weeks before she'd tried that again. And he had marveled. How she'd been so able to behave in public as if nothing were wrong, or strange, or different. She'd told him she was terrified of hurting Harry. Harry had so many troubles these days, they'd driven him half mad. He wasn't the same Harry. He might even be dangerous. Help me, she'd said. You're the only one who can. His thoughts, his memories, broke up into whirling fragments and spun around his head like startled birds. He clutched at her. He heard his own voice as if it came from a distance. “Why did you,” he said. “Why did you lie to him?”  

Her voice sounded suddenly sharp, startled. “Lie to who?”  

“To Harry,” he said. “Why did you lie to Harry?”  

When she replied, her voice sounded defensive. “We both lie to Harry,” she said. “All the time. We have to. But, I told you. New Year's –”  

“New Year's?” Without any conscious recognition that he was doing so, he seized her shoulders and shook her, hard. He heard her gasp. “What's the point of bloody New Year's when Harry knows already?”  

She froze in his grasp. “Harry knows?” she echoed, her voice utterly shocked. “He knows?” 

He stared at her. All the whirling thoughts in his head came together like glass fragments under the Reparo spell. Everything seemed suddenly very obvious and very clear. He tightened his grip on her shoulders, and she gasped in pain, but he hardly noticed it. When he spoke, he marveled at the evenness of his own voice: its firmness and deliberation. “Tell me,” he said. “Who are you?”  

She tried to pull away. “Ron, let me go.”  

Chapter 7