Harry Potter and the Slytherin Spy

Harry Potter and the Slytherin Spy

Christine Morgan

Chapter Twenty-Eight - Malfoy Maleficum

An hour later, Jane returned to the deserted Slytherin common room.

Harry, through the mirror, had watched the rest of the events unfold, still hardly able to believe what he had seen.

Snape had performed a series of Coagulating Charms on himself, and when they proved insufficient to entirely close the wounds, had gone begrudgingly off to visit Madame Pomfrey. He had impressed upon the Slytherins that he would be exceedingly displeased with anyone who mentioned "this little incident," and the look in his eye would have quelled a basilisk.

Once he was gone, however, the Slytherins spent several minutes exclaiming over what had happened. They treated Jane with an odd mixture of celebrity, notoriety, admiration and apprehension - a mixture that Harry had endured a few times in his own checkered school career. She had slipped away as soon as she could, obviously speechless at what she'd done, and gradually the rest of them had either left the dormitory or gone to their own rooms.

She took down the mirror and peered into it, almost as if hoping she wouldn't find him still looking back.

"Hi," he said softly.

"You saw everything, didn't you?"

"Yeah."

Jane bit her lip, and raised her fingers toward the glass.

"Wait!" Harry said. "Wait. Jane. Can you meet with me?"

"Harry, you saw what happened," she whispered. "I'm in trouble. I don't dare. If I'm seen with you, after this -"

"You won't be. I swear. Just for a little while. I need to see you in person. To know you're all right."

"But I'm not all right," she said.

"Snape's gone to the hospital wing," Harry said. "He won't know. Meet me on the stairs to the Owlery in ten minutes, please."

She nodded, then trailed her fingers down the glass. Harry's mirror went dark and showed him only his own reflection, still in the fourth-floor study carrel. He grabbed his books, dashed to Gryffindor tower, blew through the common room where several games of Exploding Snap and Gobstones were in session, grabbed his Invisibility Cloak and the Marauder's Map, stuffed them both under his robes, and headed out again before anyone could engage him in lengthy conversation.

Five minutes later, draped in the silvery shimmer of the Invisibility Cloak, he was outside the door to the Owlery. He could hear the rustle and hoot of the owls, smell the musty attic-smell of their feathers and dry droppings.

On the Marauder's Map, he saw a dot approaching. Jane came up the stairs, looked both ways, and then, thinking herself alone, folded into a sitting position on the steps and put her head in her hands.

Harry drew the cloak off in a ripple, mussing his hair. He walked silently down to her. "Jane?"

"How did you ...? Is that an Invisibility Cloak?"

He sat beside her. "It used to be my dad's. If anyone comes by, not that they will this late on a Sunday, we'll put it on. So you won't be seen with me. Like I said."

"I've ruined everything. I didn't mean to attack him -"

"He deserved it," Harry said savagely. "If I'd been there, I'd've done the same thing."

"But I can't meet with you any more," Jane said. "Here. I've brought back your mirror." She held it, wrapped in a cloth, out to him.

Harry shook his head. "I want you to keep it."

"Harry, I can't. It's too much. I've dragged you too far into this mess already. I never should have ... I knew it was a mistake ..."

"What are you talking about?" He took her hand, felt her resistance, and wouldn't let go. "What mess? If anything, I'm the one who's made your life difficult."

"Then we have to stop," she said. "Someday, maybe someday soon, you'll understand how wrong this is. How dangerous for you."

"For me?" he laughed. "Jane -"

"I don't want you to get hurt."

"I'm tough," Harry said. "I can take it. What are friends for?"

"We can't be friends anymore," Jane said despairingly. "We can't, Harry. I'm not worth it."

"I think you are."

"It's better to stop now. I never should have let it go so far."

"Why, Jane?" He tried to lift her chin and make her look at him, but she turned her head away. "What do you think is going to happen?"

"Something terrible. Something that'll make you hate me, and realize that you never should have gotten involved with the likes of me."

"I've told you, it doesn't matter!" Harry said. "It's not who your parents were. It's who you are and what you choose to do with your life!"

Now she did look at him, a deep and soulful look that rocked him to the core. She raised her hand as if to touch his face, but stopped inches away from contact. "If I could go back and choose to do things differently, I would. But that's impossible. No one can change the past. All we can do is ... is muddle along, and try our best to do what we have to do. And hope that the people who really matter to us - people like you, Harry - can eventually find it in their hearts to forgive us."

She got up to leave.

Harry rose and held her arm. "Jane -"

"Whatever comes next," she said brokenly, "I never lied to you. That much was real, Harry. That much was truth."

"Don't go."

"I have to. This has to be good-bye."

Abruptly she turned, slipped from his grasp, and dashed down the Owlery stairs fleet and quiet as a wraith.

What was he supposed to do now? Ginny or Hermione would be able to tell him - acting all the while as if he were the world's biggest idiot for not knowing - whether, in this situation, he should go after her or not. He wanted to go after her, but she'd made it pretty clear that she didn't want him to. Or had she? Was she already wondering why he wasn't rushing down the stairs after her, calling her name?

"Damn it," Harry grumbled, and bent to pick up his Invisibility Cloak where it lay on the steps.

The cloth-wrapped mirror was there, too, in the very spot where Jane had been sitting. She'd left it after all.

He picked it up, shoved it in his pocket with the Marauder's Map, and set off after her. Maybe it was the right thing, maybe it wasn't, maybe she wanted him to, maybe she really had meant it when she said good-bye. He didn't know. Couldn't know. All that he did know was that he had to follow her.

Almost at a dead run, he burst into the hallway at the bottom of the stairs and there was Mrs. Norris, directly in his path. The cat wheeled, arching her back, hissing and yowling and spitting, yellow eyes lambent, teeth bared. She tried to run as Harry tried to jump over her, and wove a crazy path between his feet.

Harry made an ungainly leap without kicking her or stepping on her, landed badly, turned his ankle, and crashed full-length on the floor. He bashed his chin, skinned his elbow, and heard Filch hurrying toward them.

"What is it, my pet?" Filch asked as Mrs. Norris, fur bushed out on end, streaked to him and sprang into his arms. Her tail snapped back and forth. "Who's given you a fright? Is it that nasty Peeves again? I'll have the Bloody Baron on him, so I will ..."

Filch's beady gaze scanned the corridor, passing over Harry, who had managed in the very nick of time to pull his Invisibility Cloak over himself. He lay huddled beneath it, holding his breath, knowing that if Filch came this way, he would be bound to step on or trip over some part of his body. Mrs. Norris glared balefully, directly at Harry.

But Filch, stroking Mrs. Norris' ears and crooning to her, walked the other way. Harry waited until he was sure that the caretaker had gone, then got to his feet. His ankle gave a twinge and his chin and elbow stung. And it was too late to catch up with Jane.

Somehow, by breakfast on Monday morning, news of Snape's injuries had spread through the castle despite his injunction to the Slytherins. The most reliable source seemed to be the last couple of students who'd still been in the hospital wing after falling victim to Peeves' latest grease-on-the-stairs prank. Harry was relieved that Jane's name was not mentioned in connection with the pinkish line of healing scar visible on the Potion Master's cheekbone.

He tried to catch her eye a few times during the day, but Jane seemed determined to avoid him, and he didn't dare be too blatant in his efforts or else other people would have noticed.

Dumbledore returned to Hogwarts as afternoon lessons were wrapping up, once again arriving on the spinning disk of fire accompanied by his honor guard of aureliphim. He was also accompanied by two people, one of whom was a stern older woman with iron-grey hair and the straight-spine bearing of a military cadet, and the other of whom was Remus Lupin.

Not many of the students were overjoyed to see Lupin again. While he was widely regarded as one of the best Defense Against the Dark Arts teachers they'd ever had, his status as a werewolf tempered the warmth with which most of them had viewed him.

To his credit, he was not so generally shabby as usual. He was still a bit too thin and careworn, and perhaps not entirely recovered from his encounter with Macnair. But, wearing new robes of dark blue, neatly groomed, and carrying a fine leather case instead of the battered old one from before, he looked more prosperous and respectable than Harry had ever seen him.

Harry, Ron, Ginny and Hermione crowded forward to greet him, making sure everyone else saw that they weren't afraid to shake his hand. Gwenna Golden did, too, though she also supplemented the handshake with a more-than-sisterly kiss on the cheek that made eyebrows go up all over Hogwarts.

"What are you doing here?" Harry asked him, offering to carry his case. "It's excellent to see you!"

"Thank you, Harry," he said. "A favor for Dumbledore. He'll explain at supper."

"You look wonderful, Professor," Ginny enthused.

He smiled at her. "Thank you as well, Ginny. Ah, and there's Severus ... who laid his face open?"

"Dunno," Ron said, disgruntled. "All anyone'll say is that it was a Dark Arts Club accident."

Snape, for his part, looked as happy to see Lupin as he might have been to find half a worm in his apple.

Once they'd all taken their places in the Great Hall for dinner, with the aureliphim positioned in the same spots by the doors and at the ends of the staff table, Dumbledore went to the podium.

"I am very pleased to announce the appointment of two new temporary positions to the school faculty," he said. "Since my current duties keep me so much away from home, Mr. Remus Lupin has generously agreed to step in and assist your Acting Headmistress, Professor McGonagall, with the many countless boring and tedious administrative chores. Please join me in welcoming him back to Hogwarts."

Fervent applause came from the section of the Gryffindor table where Harry and his friends sat; scattered and diminishing applause came from the others. Snape leaned over to mutter something darkly to Lupin, which Lupin passed off with a wry smile and a shrug.

The woman with the iron-grey hair and the military bearing had taken a seat on Lupin's right, and as Dumbledore indicated that she should rise, she did so.

Speculative whispers and murmurs made the rounds. None of the other teachers had given any hints of leaving, they still hadn't managed to get rid of their latest Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher - it was only the middle of October - and aside from Snape's cuts and Dumbledore's hip, none of the faculty had been hurt lately. Even Hagrid, compared to the brutal battering he'd taken at the hands of Grawp last year, looked hale and well.

"Because these are such perilous times," Dumbledore said, a new note of seriousness in his voice, "I regret to say that even this school is not immune from threats. While I do not believe that any of you are at risk, I felt it would be best for everyone's morale to appoint a Head of Security."

Everyone looked nervously at the woman, whose robes were gunmetal blue with aggressively polished brass buttons. She carried her wand the way an army officer might carry his swagger stick, and seemed ready to whack knuckles or assign push-ups at the drop of a hat.

"And so," Dumbledore said, "I'd like to present an Auror in the employ of the Ministry, now on indefinite loan to Hogwarts, Madame Tonks."

"Tonks!" Ginny and Hermione cried in unison, sounding weirdly like the punchline of a vaudeville gag.

"Blimey!" Ron peered at the woman. "No. It's not her. Is it her, Harry?"

"Could be ..." Harry said. "She is a Metamorphamagus, you know."

The Great Hall was abuzz, but when Tonks marched to the podium, it fell silent again. She saluted smartly. "Thank you, Minister Dumbledore," she said.

"Of course," Hermione said as if talking to herself. "Well, that's good, isn't it?"

"What?" Ron asked. "What's good?"

"Having a few more members of the Order on hand," she said. "Just in case. At the Ministry, he's got your dad, and Kingsley Shacklebolt, and maybe Moody -"

"What about Mundungus Fletcher?" Harry asked.

"In Diagon Alley with Fred and George," Ginny responded promptly. "Keeping an eye on the seedier side of things."

"How d'you know?" Ron turned to her.

"Fred wrote to me. Mum's not happy about it."

"I can imagine," Harry said, remembering how Mrs. Weasley had railed at Fred and George, and at Mundungus, on many different occasions for many different infractions.

"Mum's got precious Percy back, so she can just wash her hands of Fred and George like she's always threatened to," Ron said grouchily. "And he's milking it for all it's worth, Percy is, I'll bet."

As the dishes filled with pork chops, mashed potatoes and gravy, creamed corn, carrots, salad and applesauce, Tonks moved around the room like a drill sergeant inspecting the troops. Harry couldn't help grinning at the way postures and table manners improved as she went by, or how many people studiously avoided Tonks' steely glower. His grin faded a little when Tonks recognized Jane and vice versa. The temperature around that section of the Slytherin table probably dropped a few degrees at the iciness of their exchanged glance.

Later, he joined Ron, Hermione and Ginny in finding the new office that Lupin had been given. Neville tagged along - he was still no great fan of Lupin's, not after word of the boggart had gone around school and earned him an even larger portion of Snape's wrath, but he had been there in the Department of Mysteries, and Lupin had been among the cavalry who came to their rescue. Luna Lovegood, much to Ron's discomfiture and Hermione's lip-tightening displeasure, caught up with them just as Harry knocked.

"Naturally, some people in the Ministry had second thoughts," Lupin told them half an hour later, after sharing around celebratory butterbeers and, in honor of their very first meeting on the Hogwarts Express, slabs of Honeydukes best chocolate. "They desperately wanted Dumbledore to take over because they reasoned - rightly so - that Dumbledore was the best man to take charge in this crisis. What they didn't count on was Dumbledore also coming and changing things."

"Like that anti-werewolf legislation?" Hermione asked.

"Not only that, but to further rub salt in the wound, he wasted no time hiring me," Lupin said. He ran a hand over his new robes. "I was happy to accept, and not only for the generous salary. So, tell me what's been going on at Hogwarts."

They took turns, talking about classes and homework and Quidditch and teachers, giving rave reviews to Gwenna Golden, though also assuring Lupin that her lessons, while informative and interesting, weren't as fun as his had been. The only bad moment was when Luna cheerfully explained that she and Ron were dating. Hermione cracked apart the slab of chocolate she'd been holding, and Ron went purple and looked like he was wishing the floor would open and swallow him.

Then Neville spoke up. "Do you think, Professor Lupin, that there could be a curse on some of the Slytherins?"

Lupin paused and lowered the bottle of butterbeer he'd been about to sip from. "I assume you mean this idea that the descendants of Death Eaters are somehow marked for disaster and misfortune?"

"You've heard about it?" Harry asked.

"From Dumbledore." The way Lupin looked at him told Harry that Lupin had heard a few other things from Dumbledore, too.

"Could there be?" Neville persisted.

"I find it highly doubtful," Lupin said. "Curses don't work that way."

"Like I told you, Neville," Hermione said.

"It's a run of bad luck and coincidence, most likely." Lupin sipped thoughtfully. "I suppose it's possible - on a purely hypothetical basis - that someone could have been behind the first three deaths, but the fourth was obviously not foul play. And the unfortunate boy in St. Mungo's was not acting under any spells or outside influences."

There was a series of sharp raps at the door. It opened, and Tonks looked in. When she saw Lupin's company, she beamed a broad smile that did not at all suit her severe new face.

"Wotcher, everybody, am I missing the party?" She came in, her features shifting as she closed the door. Her hair shortened and darkened, the frown lines and crow's feet vanished as if someone had flipped a Time Turner back thirty years, and by the time she sat down, she was her regular self. She picked up a butterbeer, clinked bottles all around, and slouched with a sigh to hoist her feet up onto Lupin's desk.

"Make yourself at home, Nymphadora," Lupin said.

She eyeballed him in a mock-scolding way that lacked real venom. "Thank you, Remus, don't mind if I do."

An hour later, with the butterbeers and chocolate consumed, Lupin ushered them out. "Could you stay a moment, Harry?" he asked. "I won't keep you long, I promise."

"Sure," Harry said, and nodded to the others. "Go on ahead. I'll catch up."

When it was just the three of them, Harry braced himself for the lecture he was sure would be forthcoming. Tonks had gone all solemn, which was never a good sign.

"I understand you've been practicing Astralmency," Lupin said.

Blinking - he had been expecting another topic - Harry said, "Yeah. Just the once, though. Why? Are you going to tell me it's too dangerous and I shouldn't do it?"

"Not at all," Lupin said comfortably. "I was going to tell you it's advanced magic beyond your years, good job, and keep it up."

"Really?"

"Really. You impressed me greatly by how swiftly you learned to summon a Patronus, so I shouldn't be all that surprised. Plus, you might not have known this, but your mother was an experienced Astralmens."

"She was?"

"I think I told you once that your mother was there for me at a time when no one else could be. In the years after we left school, obviously it wasn't possible for my friends to be with me every month on the full moon. Without them to keep me in check, I locked myself away in a sturdy cellar during my transformations. Your mother would look in on me, using Astralmency. Sometimes she was able to speak to me, or appear to me, visible though insubstantial. Even that small bit of human contact helped me maintain control."

Here, Tonks touched his arm, and Lupin smiled gratefully at her, briefly covering her hand with his own.

"I was always indebted to Lily for that," Lupin went on. "She saw me at my bestial worst, and never flinched from me. She was a true friend, Harry, and I'm glad to see you following in her footsteps as well as James'."

"Is that why I didn't have any trouble with it?" Harry asked. "Because of my mother?"

"Some types of magical talent do run in families," Lupin said. "But then, so do other talents. Your flying, your ability at Quidditch, those come from James, obviously."

"I had a granny who was a Metamorphamagus," Tonks volunteered. "It's kind of a legacy."

"What ... what about Dark magic? Is that a legacy, too?"

They shared a troubled look.

"Never mind," Harry said hastily. "Forget I brought it up."

"It isn't that," Lupin said. "What I meant to say was that certain spells just more naturally come easier to some people than to others."

"If Dumbledore told you about the Astralmency, he must've told you about Nox," Harry said, changing the subject.

Tonks nodded. "He's not the only new Death Eater recruit, but he's probably the youngest."

"So there've been others?"

"A dismaying number," Lupin said. "But, happily, we've had some luck of our own, gathering supporters and even some new members in the Order."

They talked about the Order for a while, and then Tonks pointed out that it was getting late, and she and Lupin still hadn't unpacked.

Harry took the long way back to Gryffindor tower, and was nearing the portrait hole when he spotted someone skulking about in the shadows.

"Hsst! Potter!"

"Who's there?" Harry challenged, feeling for his wand.

Draco Malfoy emerged from the darkness, his white-blond hair slicked back and seemingly glowing with its own pale, spectral light.

"Malfoy." Harry said the name as he often did, like it was a dirty word.

"I want to talk to you, Potter."

He could see Malfoy's hands ... at his sides, empty. And there was no one else lurking, ready to spring a trap.

Warily, he moved nearer. "I'm listening."

"Not here."

"You think I'm going anyplace with you, Malfoy?"

"Afraid?" sneered Malfoy. "The great Harry Potter?"

"I'm not afraid of you. But I trust you as far as I could spit a rat. Anything you need to say to me, you can say right here."

"Fine," Malfoy said. "I want you to do something."

"What?" Harry asked suspiciously.

"Here." Malfoy reached into his pocket.

Harry drew his wand in a blur of motion.

"For God's sake, Potter!" Malfoy said, annoyed. "You must think I'm really stupid Attack you? Right here outside your own common room? You'd have all your Gryffindor pals on me in a heartbeat, and I'm here with no one at my back. So don't get your knickers in a twist."

"What do you want from me, Malfoy?"

"I want you to take this." He held out the item he'd pulled from his pocket, which was not a wand at all but something small and flat, edged in gold, and faceted like a jewel.

In fact, it was a jewel, Harry saw, the kind of thing that a lady might wear as a choker, threaded on a wide band of velvet ribbon. The gold setting was a pattern of Celtic knotwork. The gemstone itself was the size of a bottlecap, and glowing with a deep, cool green light.

"You want me to take that."

"Yes."

"Right, Malfoy," Harry said. "You must think I'm really stupid. Take that from you? A magical jewel that could be jinxed with anything? And I'll just pluck it right from your hand, shall I?"

"It's not jinxed," Malfoy said. Now he looked embarrassed, ashamed and hotly mutinous all at the same time. "It's a Maleficum."

"A what?"

"Oh, the teacher's pet, the master of Defense Against the Dark Arts, and he doesn't know what a Maleficum is?" Malfoy made an exasperated noise. "I never should have even bothered. What in hell was I thinking?"

"Why not just tell me what it is?"

"It's been enchanted with the Maleficus Charm," Malfoy said, in a tone he might have used to explain to a five-year-old. "You do know what the Maleficus Charm is, don't you, Potter?"

Harry in fact did not, though he was loathe to admit it to Malfoy. What he did know was that with a name like that, it sounded like Dark magic, and he wasn't about to take it from Malfoy without further explanation and a damned good reason.

"Okay," he said.

"The charm is bound to me," Malfoy said. "As long as it's green, like it is now, I'm fine. If it turns yellow, it means I'm in trouble."

He thought of the clock that Mrs. Weasley kept, the marvelous clock that had a hand for each member of the family and, in place of numbers, designations like "home" and "work" and "traveling."

"But if it turns red -" Malfoy continued.

"Mortal peril," Harry said.

"Mortal peril."

"What if it turns black?"

A muscle twitched in Malfoy's jaw. "Then, Potter, it's too late."

"Wait a minute," Harry said as comprehension washed over him. "You want me to take that? You want me to ... to ... what, keep an eye on you? Safeguard you? This is about that ridiculous curse idea, isn't it? You think you're in danger from the curse, and you want me to protect you."

"Do you think I'm happy about asking?" snapped Malfoy.

"I think you're mental! Why would you give this to me?"

"Because I know you, Potter. I know that you, so high and mighty, so noble, so good, couldn't stand by and let even your worst enemy just die, not if you could save him. So you'd have to help me."

Unsettled by this perception, Harry was speechless.

"Because you're trustworthy," Malfoy said. "I can't understand it myself, but what I can understand is that if something does happen to me, and you don't prevent it, everyone would blame you. And you can't handle that. So you would have to do it, just to keep your shining image untarnished."

"You've got a peculiar way of asking for my help," Harry said. "Not to mention a lot of nerve."

"It sticks in my throat, believe me!" Malfoy said. "But there's nobody else I can trust."

"If you're that concerned, why not go to a teacher? Why not Professor Golden? Or even Dumbledore?"

"Oh, that would be rich!" scoffed Malfoy. "Me, go to Dumbledore! After all the times he's been at odds with my father? As for that amazon island tart -"

"Watch it, Malfoy!"

"Believe me, I've thought it through and you're the only one."

"You know," Harry said, "there's an Auror here now. You could go to her."

"That's why I had to wait for you tonight," Malfoy said. "With her here, whoever's behind it is going to act fast. I'm the only one left, so it's got to be soon."

"What about Snape?" Harry asked.

Malfoy hesitated for several beats before answering, and when he did, it was not before he'd cast an anxious look around and pitched his voice so low Harry could hardly hear.

"Because there's a ... there's a chance he might be behind it."

"You've got to be ... Snape ... why would he ..." sputtered Harry.

"Come on, Potter. You know he was a Death Eater. My father's said all along that Snape has only been pretending to turn from the Dark Lord and go over to Dumbledore's side ... that he's really still loyal ... but what if he isn't? What if Snape really is against the Dark Lord now, and wants to punish his supporters for going back to him?"

"By killing their kids?" Harry asked, askance.

"He's the Head of our House," Malfoy said. "That's where we all wound up, and of course he's known all about us from the very beginning."

"Then why now? Why not smother you in your sleep on your very first night at Hogwarts? Why wait six years?"

"There wouldn't have been any reason to, not until the Dark Lord returned and called them back to him."

"Which was over a year ago," Harry said. "Look, it's no secret that I don't like Snape, but even I have a hard time thinking he'd -"

"You don't think there's a curse or a plot at all," Malfoy interrupted impatiently. "You think I've gone paranoid. If you're right, Potter, then I'm not in any danger. This gem will stay green, I'll be fine, and you wouldn't be obligated to do anything. So, take it. You're only gambling with my life."

Except that wasn't true, Harry thought. If he was wrong, and so was Dumbledore, and Lupin, and everyone else who'd dismissed the idea of a curse or a plot ... if they were all wrong and Malfoy was right ... it wouldn't just be his life on the line. It'd be Jane Kirkallen's as well.

It galled him to be so neatly mousetrapped by Malfoy, of all people. Caught in the chains of his own honor. Because, yes, damn it, Malfoy had him figured. He couldn't, as much as he might think he'd like to, stand idly by while someone else got hurt. Not a rival, not even an enemy.

The only thing that made it at all bearable was the knowledge that, as much as he hated doing it, Malfoy hated it more. To be backed into such a desperate corner that the only one he could think of to turn to for help was Harry Potter? To swallow his pride like a tincture of bitter wormwood and ask Harry to save him?

He took the Maleficum.

He tensed as he did it, and Malfoy did too, as if both of them were braced for a jolt.

Harry anticipated the gem to be a cold and slimy weight in his hand, like a gelatinous eye or a dead frog or the head of a fish. But it was warm from Malfoy's grasp, and somehow that was worse. He shuddered.

Malfoy was similarly revolted, and wiped his palm on the front of his robes. "This doesn't change anything," he said.

"Wouldn't expect it to."

"It's not like I owe you."

"Absolutely not," Harry said.

"I don't need your charity."

"Never."

"Good," Malfoy said.

"Good," Harry replied.

They studied each other a long moment more, and then Malfoy walked away.

**