Splitting Hairs

Harry awoke with a start. He was sweating and cold at the same time, shivering under the damp blankets.

What had he been dreaming about? He felt shaken and tired, the same as he'd been for the past week. But...he'd just woken up, hadn't he? He sifted through garbled dream sequences. Nothing. He tried to pin down his present mood. He felt...bereft. Like he'd been snatched away from something nice, near completion. But what? Harry couldn't for the life of him remember. He sighed softly as he snuggled back into the covers, angry with himself for some reason.

He lay in complete darkness, and the air was absolutely still. He realised his head hurt. No sound could penetrate the heavy drapes around his bed, and he lay making no movement besides the rise and fall of his chest as he breathed consciously calmed breaths, letting the thickness of the air around him build until it was nearly unbearable. He was playing a game with himself; he squeezed his eyes shut, counting to ten, and forced himself to still, until he could no longer breathe. Harry whimpered.

Then he jumped up, yanked open the drapes, taking a huge gasp of air, smiling as relief rush through his veins. He breathed deeply and quickly, and calmed himself, listening for any other movement in the dormitory. He looked up. Ron was sitting at the edge of his own bed, grinning wickedly at something, Harry didn't know what. None of the rest of his dormmates seemed to notice him - Dean had the same expression on his face as Ron, and Neville was also awake, only he looked distinctly uncomfortable.

Then Harry gasped again, but for a very different reason.

He blushed and ducked his head back into his drapes as he made out, through Ron and Dean's unsuccessfully stifled sniggers, the unmistakable sound of something very intense going on in Seamus' bed. But who.? And how.? He buried his head in his pillow, blocking out the unwelcome images that came unbidden into his head. Sound, it appeared, had less inhibitions about getting out than in, and Harry sank (thankfully) back in, head whirling, resolving now to make as little noise as possible within the privacy of his own bed.

Harry ventured out again five minutes later, feeling a little more stable, and, to his relief, Seamus appeared to have been quick. He grinned sheepishly around the dorm, embarrassed for Seamus' sake and then at his own embarrassment. Who is it? He mouthed at Dean, And how did he...?

Dean shrugged, looking all at once hurt that Seamus hadn't let him in on the big secret, completely baffled, and proud that his best friend had pulled off something like this. Harry shook his head at Dean's simplicity - and disregard for rules.

Then Seamus poked his head through the curtain and grinned, looking, Harry thought, remarkably unruffled and...clothed. Clothed? They turned expectantly to him.

"What d'you think, then?"

Four mouths dropped open. Seamus grinned even broader, and retreated back into the drapes, only to emerge seconds later with a small object in his palm. Ron, Harry, Dean and Neville looked warily at each other, wondering what this had to do with anything. Then, deciding to play along, they peered at the object in Seamus' hand. It was a curious little thing, completely square - it looked almost like it was made of a silvery metal, except that beneath its surface some sort of silver liquid was swirling about, and when Seamus turned it this way and that, different shades of brown and purple and green glanced off it.

They watched it nervously.

Seamus leaned down close to it, and murmured, "Revoicera."

Immediately, the silvery object began humming, and the humming gradually grew into a sort of rhythmic heavy breathing, followed by an equally rhythmic thudding sound, and the heavy breathing was cut off as it moaned -

Seamus tapped it once with his wand, and the noises stopped, just as they were getting very loud. He looked around at them all, expecting some sort of reaction, no doubt. Harry found himself blushing again.

"What," whispered Dean reverently, "is that?"

"Not what you're probably thinking, unfortunately," Seamus gave them all a sly grin. "It's a Revoicer."

They looked blankly back at him. Seamus didn't seem to mind, he looked immensely excited about his revelation.

"You know how Muggle bugging devices and things don't work around here?" He raised his voice, warming to his topic now that he was done showing off, "This is a bugging device, only it's magic, see, so it doesn't operate on frequencies or anything. And you can't erase what's been recorded unless it was you who recorded it, which is handy for blackmail." Seamus' eyes twinkled. "I got it in Hogsmeade a week ago, thought I'd reveal it in style..."

"so...it records things?"

Seamus nodded. "And stores them up, yeah."

A look of realisation settled on Ron's face, followed by Dean's - there was, unfortunately, no other word for it - squeal.

"So...what we just heard - you recorded it? From where?"

At this Seamus launched into an animated story about the boys bathroom on the third floor, too eagerly, Harry felt - like he'd been waiting for someone to ask. Harry smiled to himself. He decided not to tell anyone about the strange feeling he'd had when he'd first woken up, dismissing it as some sort of early morning confusion. He nodded to himself. He would start worrying if it, whatever it was, started manifesting itself in other ways. More direct ones. The cheerful mood that morning was too infectious for Harry not to be affected. They fooled about with the Revoicer for a while, until each of them had had a turn with it and mastered handling it, before they finally dragged themselves out of their dormitory and down to the Great Hall for breakfast.

*        *        *

Potions that same afternoon was shaping out to be one of their most memorable. They were learning a Staining Potion and its counter - the aptly named Unstaining Potion. They worked on the Staining Potion first, and were expected to test it on flowers provided by an uncharacteristically sentimental Filch, Snape's reasoning being that they would then have greater motivation to master the Unstaining Potion. Neville had so far managed to melt his ladle on his cauldron, and knock a bowl of peeled Hemseed into the potion, which promptly turned a bright orange and shot out of its cauldron. Midway on its descent over a quivering Ron, Neville, in an effort to improve the situation, shrieked an unintelligible 'Wingardium Leviosa!' and pointed his wand at it; the entire mass of liquid froze, and Ron, instead of turning orange, had to be brought to Madam Pomfrey unconscious.

The lesson, however, continued, although not uneventfully. Snape seemed to take comfort in the fact that both the guilty party and the victim were from Gryffindor, and taking points off a red-faced Neville.

"Longbottom, you have surpassed even yourself," he snapped, as he looked at the dungeon floor, which was littered with what looked like lethal blocks of orange ice.

The potion, though simple in theory, was infinitely trickier to make. Ron was not the only casualty. All around the classroom, potions seethed and blew up, and the walls were streaked with rainbows of colour. The students were no better off. Snape, in particular, looked very colourful indeed, Harry was secretly pleased to see.

By the time the class had got round to making the Unstaining Potion, each student was covered in a veritable kaleidoscope of colour. They'd never had so many cauldrons blow up before, and they'd certainly never had as much fun in a Potions class where everything went wrong - most of their assignments were far less harmless than a Staining Potion. They'd laughed and laughed when they'd looked up from their cauldrons and at each other, and then laughed some more when faced with descriptions of themselves. Snape had lost all authority in the classroom, and, after his threats to take off House Points had been ignored by every offender, was reduced to calling people whose Unstaining Potions had failed to his desk to clean up with his own Potion after the lesson. The Staining Potion that got on material or hair, however, was harder to take off, and would take longer to remove, he said, the thicker and the darker the Stain was. Seamus and Dean had purposely Stained their shirts a bright purple and were clapping each other on the back as they surveyed the other's handiwork, and Lavender was sobbing as she tried to get orange out of her new skirt.

"Harry," whispered Hermione, as she leaned over, laughing, "look at Malfoy!"

Harry turned. Malfoy stood in a corner with a pot of Snape's Unstaining Potion, trying to Unstain in front of a mirror. The potion on his face came off well, but Harry saw that his hair remained jet black, almost the same shade as his own, as Harry's. And then Harry noticed something else, as Malfoy smiled slightly sheepishly at his reflection. Something that made him feel slightly sick inside. With the black hair and the near-human mirth, Harry noticed that Malfoy, Draco Malfoy, looked very fetching indeed.

* * *

Ron was back in the Gryffindor common room by evening - Neville's potion, contrary to what everyone thought, had not touched him; he'd fainted.

Sitting in a corner of the room, Harry laughed along with the rest of them as they recounted Potions for Ron, who looked gutted that he'd missed it. But Harry was only listening half-heartedly - the tiredness he'd been feeling had returned full force after the hilarity of the afternoon, and he'd nearly collapsed while walking up the stairs with Hermione and Ginny after dinner. He couldn't understand it - he'd been eating well, sleeping well; nothing had changed in his day-to-day activities. Other than the dreams he couldn't remember and a vague feeling of unease when he woke up in the mornings, he couldn't think of anything unusual that he'd been doing. Perhaps the dreams had something to do with it. After all, he'd had visions in his sleep before. But these dreams were not terrible, or frightening. They were actually pleasant, Harry knew that from the reluctance he felt when he woke up.

What Harry feared most was the interference of Dark Magic, this was the only explanation he could think of. But Voldemort no longer had anything to fear from him, and Harry knew better than to overestimate himself in the eyes of his enemy. Perhaps it was someone else then...but who? And why? Why would anyone want him drained of energy, unable to concentrate? It was too difficult to think, Harry thought tiredly, and his eyes drifted shut.

"...Didn't you, Harry?"

He jerked awake.

"What?"

Seamus was grinning at him, the whole common room was.

"Your potion exploded right in Snape's face. Did you see him at dinner? His hair was still streaked in red!"

Harry nodded and smiled. Thoughts of Potions class led to thoughts of Malfoy with his black hair. The image made him smile. He imagined standing behind Malfoy and running his fingers through his hair, watching his expression change in the mirror. He imagined dipping his head and kissing Malfoy just behind his ear. He imagined Draco's whispered groan as he tightened his hands around his waist and drew him against his body...

He opened his eyes and met Hermione's questioning ones, and was suddenly immensely thankful for the cushion on his lap. He saw Hermione look at him oddly, and while everyone else chatted, she crawled up beside him on the armchair and whispered, "Are you alright, Harry?"

"I'm alright, just really..."

He yawned.

"...tired."

"You look tired. And you nearly fell down the stairs today, if me and Ginny hadn't caught you..." she shook her head softly. Then she hesitated, as though not knowing where to start. "You've been like that the whole week, you know. Is something wrong?"

Harry shook his head sleepily.

"I'm fine, Herm. Just need to sleep, that's all."

"Ok, but if there's anything at all..."

"Thanks, I know."

Then Hermione grinned, un-Hermionely.

"That was some Potions class, huh?" she said, before running off to join Ron.

"Yeah," Harry murmured, as he closed his eyes again, "yeah, some Potions class..."