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Chapter Text

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18 June 1996



"Pressure of examinations!" the old OWL's conducting wizard said sympathetically, and quite loudly, patting Potter on the shoulder. “It happens, young man - "

Draco looked up from his place, eyes narrowed at Potter. He was half falling out of his chair - had he slept while the exam? Draco wouldn't put it past the attention seeking  hero.  Though, why he looked like he had seen a boggart, Draco didn't know, and as amusing as it was to watch Potter flounder about, he had a paper to score an O in.

(Only O's are fit for a Malfoy heir, Draco.)

" - I suggest you go and have a nice lie down," the old wizard said, as Draco muffled a snort. He didn't know what Potter was upto, in all his  golden gryffindor glory  - but sleeping was not on his schedule.

Obviously.

Potter nodded vigorously, to a point where Draco gleefully pictured his head falling off, and after quite clearly lying about doing  just that, professor, yes,  ran out.

Draco looked after him with a quirked eyebrow - wondering with a sneer - how many points Gryffindor would get after this little adventure of his.





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19 June 1996

 

It was his mother's letter that reached him first.

He cursed loudly, hands shaking, disbelieving, at first - until Crabbe and Goyle came back to the common room, Pansy right behind them - all with pitying, and sympathetic faces.

(Pity doesn't become you, Draco. Malfoys are respected, and envied by all, feared by most. But we are never pitied. By anyone.)

He crumbled the letter in his hands, before chucking it into the fireplace -

His father was in Azkaban.

He yanked off his tie, which was choking him, all of a sudden, as Pansy rubbed his shoulder, in a manner which was supposed to be soothing.

His trial was tomorrow.

That's where Potter went, he thought, with dull resignation, before sheer fury engulfed him.

The trial was just a formality.

It was Potter's fault. It was all  fucking Potter's fault,  his meddling in business that shouldn't be meddled with his constant spurring of the Dark Lord.

The Dark Lord was in the Manor.

He tried breathing slower - the ashes of the letter flying above the kindle - his mother was all alone, with her deranged sister and fucking werewolves and -

He wanted retribution for Lucius's mistakes.

Draco would pay it. He would have to. It would be an honor, he told himself firmly, to start off so young, something he had been trained his whole life for. But, there was a sinking,  sickening  feeling in his stomach, his mother's letter was unclear, and if Draco dared to read between the lines -

Draco didn't know how, but he was going to kill Harry Potter. Right fucking now.





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It was surprisingly easy to find them, Draco thought savagely, his wand in his hand - grip white, as he spotted Granger and her pet Weasel sitting under the tree near the lake.

They were three people, and Draco didn't really know what he wanted to do - but he just wanted to see Potter's stupid face, once -  and hex his stupid balls off  -

Oh. Wait. Potter wasn't there.

He glanced around - they hadn't seen him yet, so that was good - but Potter was definitely not there. That was suspicious. Where was he right now, if not with his sidekicks? Shouldn't the "Holy Trinity" be together right now, what with their whole Ministry fiasco - life threatening situations bringing people together?

His mother hadn't known exactly what had happened last night, but she had told Draco about the way Potter had been falsely lured into the Ministry - he didn't know how Potter could be stupid enough to fall for that - and he had heard vague rumours of Potter having a breakdown. 

Draco - frankly, had no idea why - and he didn't care enough to find out.

He walked back from the grounds, with a twinge of disappointment, and reached the East Wing corridor. He could barely think straight, and preferring not to think at all about his father's condition or about how his mother would be -

Crash.

He straightened up immediately, spinning around to his left, from where the sound had come, as another shrill crash came from the same direction. He walked slowly to the should-be-empty classroom, and pressing his wand to the lock, opened it with a whispered  Alohomora .

And promptly felt like breaking his skull open, as he came face to face with Potter, who was very clearly wiping tears off his face -  why was he crying?  - and glaring furiously at Draco, from where he sat on a table, shards of broken glass lying under his feet.

"What the fuck are you doing here, Malfoy?" he spat, angrily - an embarrassed flush on his face - but it didn't have the same bite to it, probably because Draco knew he had been crying.

"Just wondering who was causing damage to school property," Draco drawled, forcing a smirk on his face, and tapping his badge. "Prefect, you see."

"Great," Potter snapped, looking away. "Now you know. And you can get out."

"Not quite," Draco snarled, his anger finally taking hold, and swiped his wand downwards, as Potter leaped off the table to duck, scrambling for his wand. "You're fucking  dead,  Potter - "

"Funny," Potter said, sending a sharp curse volleying towards him. "You'd think I'd have stopped walking around - "

"You're going to pay," Draco said, as he ducked Potter's severing curse. "I'm going to  make  you pay - "

"Well, I'm  terrified  now," Potter said, sarcastically, as Draco's curse scraped him lightly by his shoulder blade. "I guess Voldemort is just a warm up act, compared to  you -  "

"You can't land my father in prison - " he began, sending a disarming curse.

"I thought I just had," Potter said, jeering as Draco yelled frustratedly and brought his wrist up in a smooth swish.

"You wouldn't understand much about fathers, would you, now?" Draco taunted, and Potter's smirk faltered as he avoided a ricocheting jinx. "Since nobody's ever cared about  you  enough to - "

"SHUT UP, Malfoy!" Potter shouted, his wand hand shaking as Draco struggled out of Potter's Incarcerous. "Your father is nothing but a - "

" Don't you dare speak about my father ," Draco said icily, belatedly wondering whether they were audible to the castle. "You know nothing about him or what he's done for me - its your fault he's in fucking  Azkaban  - "

"HE IS JUST IN AZKABAN!" Potter screamed, sounding extremely tired all of a sudden. "THERE ARE  NO  DEMENTORS LEFT THERE. Your scumbag of a father will be out in no fucking time. But because of him,  Sirius  - "

He broke off, his wand lowering.

Sirius?  Draco thought, distractedly.

"Grow up, Malfoy," he said, clenching his jaw and looking away. "This isn't some schoolyard fight between us anymore."

"You think I don't  know  that?!" he screamed, losing his temper once more. "The Dark Lord lives at my fucking house, Potter - you think - you think I'm glad my mother's alone with - with them, with  HIM?"

Potter stared at him for a moment, rubbing his forearm where Draco had struck him, as he tried to stop himself from shaking, and then chuckled darkly, bitterly.

"So, we're both screwed, huh?"





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Harry didn't know what had compelled Malfoy to sit down in the classroom, opposite to him at that particular moment, even Malfoy seemed surprised, but he did.

"Did you mean Sirius Black?" he asked, after a moment, as Harry stared blankly at his hands.

He jerked his head, startled, and looked at him for a moment, trying to see if the boy was just going to use that as fodder to mock him more. Malfoy seemed sincere.

Oh, what the hell.

"Yeah," Harry said, swallowing. "He is my - he  was  my godfather. He - "

Malfoy seemed to understand, as he gritted his teeth, Harry wondered how somebody could express  so much emotion  with just their eyebrows and lip purses.

"Did - did my father - " Malfoy asked, haltingly, like he still didn't want to believe that his father could do something like that. "Was he the one who - "

"No," Harry said flatly, resisting the urge to be spiteful by saying  he might as well had . "It was - Bellatrix. Your aunt, isn't she?"

Malfoy didn't reply, just tensed further.

"You know what the worst part is?" Harry said, smiling without an ounce of humor. "She just stunned him. And Sirius - he fell - though this Veil - this arch sort of thing - "

"The Veil of Death?" Malfoy asked, lifting his head. "In the Department of Mysteries, you mean?"

Harry nodded tightly, wondering why was it that he was always the last to know everything but the first to face them, in the worst conditions possible.

"Why was he near the arch?" Malfoy asked, frowning slightly. "The Hall of Prophecies is a completely separate chamber from - "

He broke off, his throat bobbing as Harry realized that he hadn't said anything about a prophecy, so there was only one way for Malfoy to know about it and suddenly feeling disgusted with himself for even entertaining Malfoy, started getting up and walking out -

He stopped as Malfoy grabbed him by the wrist, swinging around to glare at him incredulously.

"I didn't know," Malfoy said, lowly answering the unspoken question, his voice quiet but firm. "My mother wrote to me,  today morning.  I - I had no idea before this about - whatever trap the Dark Lord had set up for you.  I didn't know. "

Harry shook him off, suddenly tempted to shout again.

"And for what its worth, Potter, I'm sorry," he said, his eyes sincere. "I'm sorry about your godfather."

Harry felt incredibly pathetic,  as that particular line made him blink back tears , the way Malfoy was looking at him, not with pity or surprise that  Harry Potter was human too,  but the understanding in them. Either Malfoy was a much better actor than Harry had ever realised, or he truly meant his condolences.

Harry nodded, finally, as Malfoy stowed his wand in his robes, and leaned on the wall near the door.

"Voldemort is living at your house, you said?" Harry asked, remembering the way Malfoy had been trembling when he had talked about his mother.

"Going to tell your  precious  Order?" Malfoy asked, sneering in his normal way, like the last moment hadn't happened between them. "I assure you, Dumbledore obviously already knows. Malfoy Manor has always been the Dark Lord's main - "

Harry just waited as he snapped his mouth shut, quirking an eyebrow, and Malfoy huffed irritably and pushed past him, striding out.

"Its none of your business, Scarhead," he called back, but it had no trace of his usual bite. "You can get back to your glass smashing."

It almost sounded like Malfoy was joking.

Harry didn't know why, but something about the way Malfoy spoke made him wonder if maybe Draco and Malfoy were two completely separate people, and maybe, just maybe, the git wasn't in as good a situation as he always made it out to be.

"Will do, Malfoy," he muttered, watching his platinum blonde hair glowing in the sunlight.





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It had barely been half a day, before Malfoy came up to him again, this time, looking oddly excited, which naturally sent bells ringing violently in Harry's head.

"Harry?" Neville called, confusion evident on his face as he came from the entrance to the Tower to the common room fireplace. "Er - Malfoy's outside. He's - um - he's looking for you."

Ron choked on the liquorice wand that he had been eating, as Hermione's hand jolted in surprise, the ink from her quill spreading on the letter she was writing home.

"Mate,  what?"  Ron said incredulously, still coughing as Harry got up, wincing.

"He's - well - he," Harry began haltingly, unable to explain. "I'll just see what he wants?"

Hermione and Ron exchanged a worried, and disbelieving glance, before exploding with questions that Harry promised to answer when he came back.

" If  you come back, you mean," Ron yelled as Harry stuffed his invisibility cloak and the Marauders Map in his robe pocket -  better prepared than dead  - and ran out.

Like Neville had said, Malfoy was indeed, waiting outside Gryffindor Tower for him, having quite a conversation with the Fat Lady, who was smiling fondly at Malfoy like he was her own son.

" - definitely darling, after all,  feather corsets  never went out of style, did they?" she's saying when Harry comes out.

"My mother always says - "

Malfoy broke off, flushing, and looked away as Harry swung open the portrait and grinned at him. "Do tell, Malfoy," he said, snorting. "Your opinion on victorian medieval fashion, I'm sure we all are - "

"I know a way to save your godfather," Malfoy said, abruptly.





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Draco congratulated himself on that wondrous delivery.

I know a way to save your godfather.

He should have built up on it, obviously.

Draco wished the Fat Lady, as the Gryffindors called her, apparently,  the heathens,  her name was Lady Elizabeth,  thank you very much,  would stop staring at him.

He also wished that Potter wouldn't pale as drastically as he did, before reddening just as rapidly in anger and proceed to shout at him about how he didn't need Draco coming and making a joke out of his godfather's death or about whatever had happened in the classroom that day.

He waited for Potter to run out of steam, before passing him a flatly unimpressed glare.

" - and you're really no different than I thought you were, you're still the  same,  selfish git that you've always been!"

"Can I speak now, Potter?" he asked, arbitrarily, before quirking an eyebrow and gesturing to a wide alcove on the side.

Potter mumbled furiously under his breath as they stepped near the outside window.

"If you would kindly," Draco drawled lazily, sort of enjoying Potter's suspicious narrow eyed glare. "not  assume  everything, then I can actually explain why I came all the over here from the dungeons - "

"Get on with it, Malfoy," Potter snapped impatiently, realizing what Draco was doing.

He smiled slowly, before saying, "You said that Black was stunned, didn't you?"

A flash of pain across his face, before he smoothed it out and nodded slowly. "And he fell through the arch."

"So, he didn't have any lethal curses perfomed on him before he died?" Draco pressed, not willing to believe that his half formed plan would work so easily.

"Not that I know of," Potter said, shaking his head, hesitantly at first. "He wasn't hit by anything else except that stunner, no. But I saw him falling through the, Malfoy, there's no way from the - "

"Wait, Potter, just, just shut up for a second, would you?" Draco said, trying to think,  there were just so many variables, so many people -  so many things that could go so wrong -

Potter stayed quiet for exactly a second, before starting to fidget with a yellowing piece of parchment in his hand, like he just carried that around in his pocket,  the uncultured barbarian that he was .

"I really don't understand what you mean, Malfoy - "

Draco looked at Potter, and saw that behind his casually impatient facade, there was so much pain, and exhaustion - and betrayed anger -

(Salazar, Draco, when did you become such a sap? a sly voice in own head asked.

I'm not a sap, its for my own purpose, he told the voice, firmly.)

"Alright," he said, exhaling. "Okay. Potter, its not a foolproof plan or - or very well thought out, right now. But - "

"Is there any chance?" Potter asked, quietly, distrust clear in his eyes - but desperation trumping his suspicions about Draco.

"Yes," he said, just as quietly.

"I'm in, then," Potter said, with a tentative smile.






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