Rating:
R
House:
Schnoogle
Characters:
Draco Malfoy Harry Potter
Genres:
Drama Slash
Era:
Multiple Eras
Spoilers:
Philosopher's Stone Chamber of Secrets Prizoner of Azkaban Goblet of Fire Order of the Phoenix Quidditch Through the Ages Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them
Stats:
Published: 09/02/2003
Updated: 06/01/2004
Words: 97,555
Chapters: 13
Hits: 86,243

Windfallen

Cinnamon

Story Summary:
A new Unforgivable is spreading like wildfire and only Harry Potter is immune to its power, and only he can soothe its effects. When Draco is hit by the curse and left for dead by his own side, a misguided sense of duty compels Harry to care for him, and in doing so, he learns more than he ever thought possible about nightmares, hatred, love, and above all, the true nature of forgiveness. Harry/Draco, semi-consensual Charlie/Harry, Ginny/Lucius, and Ron/Ginny. Post-Hogwarts, post OotP, and very dark.

Chapter 13

Chapter Summary:
A new Unforgivable is spreading like wildfire and only Harry Potter is immune to its power, and only he can soothe its effects. When Draco is hit by the curse and left for dead by his own side, a misguided sense of duty compels Harry to care for him, and in doing so, he learns more than he ever thought possible about nightmares, hatred, love, and above all, the true nature of forgiveness. Harry/Draco, semi-consensual Charlie/Harry, Ginny/Lucius, and Ron/Ginny. Post-Hogwarts, post OotP, and very dark.
Posted:
06/01/2004
Hits:
7,360

Windfallen

Chapter 13: Shining Now, So Bright

Maybe I've been here before
I know this room, I've walked this floor
I used to live alone before I knew you
I've seen your flag on the marble arch
Love is not a victory march
It's a cold and it's a broken Hallelujah.
*
There was a time you'd let me know
What's real and going on below
But now you never show it to me, do you?
And remember when I moved in you
The holy dark was moving too
And every breath we drew was Hallelujah...

***

August, 1991. Diagon Alley

Draco had known. He had taken one look and known, without knowing how, that he had fallen completely, madly, and dizzily in love. Oh, it wasn't like that. He had not wanted to tackle Harry, snog him, shag him, or anything at all, really. He'd just wanted to sit there and stare at him and try to figure out what it was about him that did not seem to want to let Draco look away.

He would not even notice it then, and it would only become clear in retrospect, that Draco had been dizzy for him... It had been Pansy who had realized it, who had noticed Draco glaring at Harry, sneering at Harry, hating Harry with his eyes, unable to look away, who had brought up the idea. It was not something as soppy as 'soulmates' or as messy as 'true love'. It was something darker, deeper, some tangled need that bound them, made them need each other. Not in love, but in anything. Hate or love is the same to the soul because it still keeps the other soul just as close.

Which was why it was so easy to come to hate him as a child and so easy to come to love him as a man. His soul had gotten it right from the start and it only took his heart all those years to catch up.

It hadn't mattered. In things like this, the heart was almost an afterthought. Draco had never put much faith in his heart, anyway. It beat and it pumped his blood and every now and again it fluttered weakly when Harry looked unguarded across the Great Hall and accidentally met his eyes and automatically smiled. Those moments were easy to ignore.

That first moment, however, when Harry had walked into the robe shop and Draco had, for some inexplicable reason, felt like he'd been there for a thousand years, waiting for this, that moment was unforgettable. It was always there in the back of Draco's mind in all the years to come, shimmering like an image seen through a thin sheet of running water, raindrops on a window. That one day when Harry Potter wasn't Harry Potter, but was just the Boy From The Robe Shop that made Draco's heart beat faster and faster though he did not know why. It was defined, in his mind, as excitement. The opportunity to meet someone new.

Except that the dark-haired boy did not seem new. It seemed like he'd known him forever and had been waiting, breathless, to see him again.

It was not meant to be love. It was just meant to be.

It was only chance, an accident, a random twist of fate that turned whatever it was that bound them into love.

But it had happened and Draco had come to love Harry as much, if not more, than he had hated him before. He hadn't thought about it, though, because he had a job to do, a father to please, a war to win, and Harry was easy (almost) to forget, in the heat of battle, the drive to survive. It had always been a subconscious thing, however, lingering in the back of his mind ever since that day in the robe shop. The urge to prove himself better than Harry, to get Harry's attention. To make Harry proud?

To make Harry anything. To make him look, even. With Harry, even the smallest reaction was worth everything to Draco, because it meant he was aware of Draco.

And that was all that mattered.

That was why it had been instinct to move forward to intersect the spell meant to steal Harry's conscious, to pollute it with nightmares and madness. He had fallen then, tripped, stumbled, ungraceful in his desperation to fall for Harry, to protect him. He'd been falling for Harry his whole life, and didn't see why this should be any different. So he fell and then the curtain of dark had fallen as well and Draco had slipped away.

The madness had first been like the deepest, heaviest crush of the darkest, coldest water. It had sucked at his skin and his eyes, pulling him down and sending him swirling madly through a vivid and terrible world of nightmares and terror. And then it had faded, ebbed away like a tide, and every time the tide rolled off of him like hands coated in feathers, he'd open his eyes and it would be Harry bending over him. Harry looking worried, concerned, soft around the edges and hesitant but there, looking at Draco, aware of him... And that was all that matters.

It was waiting for the waves of madness to drift away, focusing on the brief glimpses of Harry waiting for him on the shores, that had given Draco the strength to beat back the madness so quickly, to be so lucid in his waking moments. He would not allow himself to be near Harry and be weak, delusional, vulnerable. Both because he did not trust Harry and more because he did not want Harry to see him like that.

The days spent with Harry in his flat and then later, in the caves, were like a richly woven tapestry, flashes of scenes and smiles and words that made no sense alone but twisted together with the others to create a dark, intricate woven scene that did not seem real. Mad nightmares entangled with the most bittersweet moments with Harry, seemingly cut from the same fabric, telling the same story... threads of such darkness and light wrapped up in each other, tangled together, the way Draco was entangled with Harry, by the end of it. He lived for him, breathed for him, suffered for him, and realized that it had always been that way.

And then Draco had let Harry go... To save him because he did not dare to break him. It happened like this:

***

Before

How many days had it been? Draco couldn't remember. It didn't matter, how many days had passed or how many would pass, until he was driven to madness and could no longer tell the setting of the sun from the rising of it. Because he had let Harry go, let the world's salvation go, had doomed them all do die screaming and mad-- and he didn't care. Harry would be alright.

Granger had wanted to tear him apart, when she woke up that morning, after Draco had returned from leaving Harry on the most gorgeous hill he could find, in the light of the rising sun. When she asked him where Harry was and Draco had said defiantly, "Gone," she had wanted to kill him. But there had been relief there, too. She hadn't wanted to destroy him, Draco had known that. Pansy had known that. Pansy had said, "Some people will risk everything, Draco. For the greater good. Granger is one of them. Are you sure you're strong enough to be one of them too? Doing good was never your strong point." And then she had smiled.

He'd assured her he was strong enough. He had lied. But then, he had not realized that being strong enough would mean crushing, breaking, and tearing Harry apart, and then abandoning him in the pit of the curse. And when Granger had told him that was the only way (to teach Harry to hate and hurt enough that he'd be able to cast the Dark Patronus, to break him so badly that he may never heal, to take from him the one thing he had ever had that was truly his own and belonged to no one else), he hadn't been able to do it. So he had taken Harry and set him free and then returned coldly defiant.

Granger had shouted; Draco hadn't listened. Finally, when her lectures had grown louder and more tiresome, and Pansy had looked pale and disappointed in him, Draco had snapped, "Some things are worth dying for."

There was a ringing silence, and then Pansy had said softly, "Draco, you've condemned him to a worse fate now, by letting him go. Do you realize what is going to happen? We will all go mad, day-by-day it gets worse, and we will all seek death as an escape from that. We will all die; he won't. He's the only one immune to the curse, because of his scar. Like tempered steel, he was made resistant to the Unforgivables when Voldemort cast that curse on him as a child and his mother saved him. So he won't go mad, at least not magically. But he will be alone. Until he dies."

Draco's eyes had stung with tears at the images those words brought to his mind, but he fought them back, because like hell Granger would ever see him cry. "If he comes back," he spat, "you can do whatever you like to him. But only if he comes back. I will not abandon him to your fucking plan without at least a chance to escape."

And then Harry had come back.

They'd been in the library, researching other plans (though there weren't any. Nothing was working, nothing would work. Harry was the only one who could do it, was the only one strong enough to kill the Dementors), and Granger had been lecturing him again on how he had doomed the world to madness. Pansy was gone, and Draco was worried, though he had tried not to think about where she might have run off to. She'd be back.

"None of this would have happened if you hadn't taken him away," Granger had snapped. She went on and on for a while longer, and Draco grew tired of it.

"Shut up about it, Granger," he'd said, feeling listless and drained, like pieces of him were missing. Leaves pulled from branches by an unforgiving wind and fallen in senseless patterns all over the cold ground.

"I will not shut up about it, Malfoy! I just still don't understand how you could do that without consulting us! And now Pansy's run off as well and no one knows where Harry is and we need him if we're to--" Her voice, which had risen with every word, cut off abruptly.

Draco filled the silence, because silence was something he'd come to loathe. "I've told you a thousand times, Granger, I won't go along with it, but if he comes back, it's his own sodding fault and you can do whatever you like--"

And then the wind had picked up again and tossed the leaves wildly, swirling through the air, and all of Draco's pieces were rearranged again, and more senselessly than ever.

"I'm right here."

It was Harry and the world stopped spinning for just a moment. Draco looked up, felt ill, wanted to die, wanted to hide, anything to make this not have happened, anything to make it not be true. But Harry was standing there, tall and windblown and-- and bloody? No, no, it didn't matter, it was Harry and Draco wanted to die. What was a little blood? Nothing and he forced it from his mind and could only look at Harry's green green eyes and wish he was dead.

Granger was crying because Harry was back and that meant the plan would have to be done. Draco had known she hadn't wanted to do it, had been grateful to him for setting Harry free because honor had committed her to breaking her best friend. And she ran from the room in tears. Draco hardly noticed, only stared at Harry's throat, at his jaw, his cheekbones, his scar. Anywhere but his eyes, which were so heartbreakingly green that Draco knew he'd fall apart if he looked into them for another moment.

He was cold, everything was cold, and when Harry looked at him again, he said, "Well. I thought I made myself clear. I don't want you here."

And Harry's heart broke a little, Draco could see it. The world started spinning again, but dizzily so. "Pansy said--"

Draco was burning, aching, and the mention of Pansy hurt because she was lost to him too, and he did not know where she had gone. He snapped, "Pansy? Did she go to fetch you? I had wondered. And where is she? I'd like a few words with her."

Harry was going to cry and Draco turned away because he did not want to see himself reflected in anyone's tears, especially Harry Potter's. "Didn't... didn't you miss me?"

He was getting angry. It was not fair of the world to expect this from him. Draco Malfoy was not a hero, was not even trying to be. "Missed you?" he spat, as if there could be any doubt that he had.

"I'm sorry, I thought--"

"No, you didn't! Thinking is so fucking beyond you that it never even occurred to me that you would have done so and come to the conclusion that coming back here, after I specifically told you to stay away, was at all the best idea!" His heart-- if he had one, and he wasn't sure he did-- was breaking.

"Draco..."

"What, did you think I sent you away for my own health and safety? Of course not! You're so fucking dense and I told her she could do whatever she wanted if you came back but you weren't supposed to! You're fucking stupid, Potter, I can't believe you! Where's Pansy? I swear, I fucking want to kill her, I--"

And then the world stopped again, and Draco wasn't ready for it, was thrown off balance by it. Harry was holding a leaf, a velvety leaf, one that Draco recognized.

"She said you'd understand," Harry said gently, and Draco did-- but god, he didn't want to.

"Where is she?" He was whispering. This was not a conversation he wanted to have, none of this was supposed to happen.

"She said you'd understand." Harry started to cry, just a little, and Draco stared at him blankly, wondering if he could possibly understand what Pansy had done, and why.

"No." Draco whimpered. "Harry, where is she?"

Harry's eyes were wide and teary, and he sat down on the stone floor, as if his legs could no longer hold him up. "She didn't come back. I don't know where she went, but she didn't come back." He pulled his knees up to his chest and hugged them, looking small and lost.

It was a trembling sort of fury that made Draco fall before him, unable to stand. He wanted to scream and destroy things; instead, he gently took the leaf and studied it, trying to make sense of something he should have seen coming. Nothing made sense, however. Not the poisoned leaf in his hand, or Pansy being gone. Or Harry coming back to him. He looked up at Harry, into his eyes, and a fragile pain started to grow inside him, somewhere deep where nothing had ever existed before, except darkness, terror, and rage. It was the place he drew his Dark Patronus from.

He kissed Harry very carefully, because it was a kiss that resembled very thin ice, or glass, waiting to shatter. "I did... miss you, I mean," he whispered, because he could not leave Harry there alone, looking so small and afraid. Then he walked away, because everything was broken and bleeding and he could not fall apart in front of Harry.

He cried and didn't think he'd ever stop. He threw things, broke things, wished he was anywhere else in the world but there, in those caverns in the dark with Hermione Granger and Harry Potter, while Pansy was off somewhere dying of a poison that Draco had been too stupid to see. Punishing herself for creating the curse that was going to force Draco to destroy Harry Potter in an attempt to stop it. He wanted to kill Pansy himself then, but only for a moment. He crushed the leaf in his hand, and the edges were like broken glass, and slashed his skin.

He grieved, though he hadn't ever had much experience with grieving. Grief, he had experienced plenty of that. But never expressing it.

And then he'd gone back to Harry, because he was broken and bleeding and Harry was the only one in the world he had left.

He wondered if it would be enough, and at the same time knew that of course it would be. It was Harry....

He was worried Harry would have gone, and could not bring himself to hope he had. When he found Harry sleeping in the library, in the same position he'd been left in, Draco was relieved.

"Harry," he called. "Harry?" Harry looked up, sleepy and confused. "I wasn't sure you'd still be here."

"I had nowhere else to go. Besides, I'd rather be hurt with you than empty without you." Something crumbled a little inside Draco at that. Then Harry noticed his bleeding hand and started to panic.

Draco explained about the leaf, and Pansy's death, and all of it, while Harry held his hand and stood close to him, warming him with his own warmth and giving him the strength to stand just by standing beside him.

Then Harry was falling to the ground, to sit there again, and Draco followed, because it was alright to fall if Harry fell with him. So they sat there, close together and leaning against the wall and Draco kept whispering, trembling, as he told Harry about Pansy leaving him. Harry held him, and Draco tried not to think about it, about how much he needed it, because Malfoys did not need to be held (except sometimes, like now, Draco rather thought he did). And when Harry started stroking his hair, Draco decided that if a Malfoy did not need this, he must not be a Malfoy, and that did not seem to matter, as long as he was Harry's.

Draco could not, could not, help it when the tears returned, and he hid his face in Harry's shoulders and clung to him as he sobbed. Harry rocked him (like a baby, but Draco did not care) and held him, whispered to him, and Draco cried for everything. For Pansy and Harry and his father and even Ginny. For himself as well, though he didn't really know it.

And then the tears stopped, because they ran out and Draco did not think he had the energy to find more inside himself to cry. He was shaking though, and that took so much energy anyway, so he thought maybe it was alright.

He opened his eyes, feeling weak, drained, and tired, and looked at Harry, really seeing him for the first time since he'd come back. Not looking at him with horror or need, but just looking.

There was blood all over him, and Draco wondered how he could have forgotten.

"Harry?" he whispered, not sure he was ready to know if Harry was hurt or bleeding. He didn't have the strength for it.

"Yeah?" "There's blood all over you."

Shock ran through Harry and he jerked a little, and a pained sound at that movement made Draco wince. "Oh, Harry, what have you done?"

Harry smiled, a wane, fake, painful smile. "Nothing," he lied

Draco was suddenly furious at himself, for not even seeing the blood. He scrubbed at his own tears with his sleeve. "Harry."

Still, he wasn't prepared when Harry whispered, "Charlie..."

Again, everything spun, and he was dizzy with the need to cry or scream or something. Instead, he hissed, "Oh god, Harry, don't tell me I set you free and you went to him. What did he do to you? I'll kill him, I'll fucking kill him."

Harry was crying and wincing and hurt. Draco panicked and Harry finally showed him where it hurt (the side, the one Draco had been leaning so heavily on just moments before).

Draco pushed up his shirt and the bruise there was new, and so, so dark. "What did Charlie do?" he whispered, because there was a strange look in Harry's eyes that he had not noticed before... shock or something like it.

"Tried to get me to say that loving you was a lie."

"I meant to cause the bruise, Harry."

"But I did. I did say it. I told him it was a lie. I told him I loved him. I told him...told him he could have me... that...that you raped...Tell me it was okay..."

But it wasn't, oh god, it wasn't, because had it been rape? Draco was terrified that it could have been, because what if Harry hadn't wanted it? Had only let Draco do it because he felt...felt like he owed him something...

Terrible, terrible rage made him tremble and want to scream.

He wanted to kill Harry. He wanted to rip him apart and scream and scream and scream because how dare Harry reduce what they had done together (or what Draco had done to him?) to rape? Maybe it was rape, maybe it was, maybe Charlie was right. Thinking that Charlie could be right after everything that prick had done to Harry, Draco's Harry, made Draco want to rip something apart, if only Harry. Especially Harry.

How could Harry think that, say that? Believe that? Because sometimes when Draco was afraid that he was using Harry like the rest of the world had used him, he thought it, but he would never, never say it out loud.

It was a blur, those few seconds after Harry had said that, said he'd agreed with Charlie that it had been rape. Draco wanted to die or scream or fall and burn, burn, because everything was already burning (his skin, his heart, his eyes-- were those tears? Oh god he would not, could not, cry over this). Burn like molten heat or fire, consume like fire, consume himself and Harry and

that would teach them all. Would teach Harry for saying that and Pansy for leaving him and the world for fucking him over like it had done.

Everything was a blur, a crazy, painful blur and he was shouting and Harry was crying and bleeding and nothing mattered, until finally...

"The blood, it isn't mine."

Everything stopped, for just a moment, and then, trembling, Draco whispered, "Whose is it?"

"It's Charlie's." Harry was crying then, and for a long moment, Draco wanted to walk away, to leave him, and to go somewhere dark and quiet and stay there forever where no one in the world could find him or hurt him or make him cry. Instead, he slid closer, whispered soothingly, tried to calm him, because it was Harry and he could not hate Harry for all the world. Harry fell against him and cried even harder and finally told Draco what had happened.

Charlie was dead and it had been Charlie, Charlie had said it was rape, had said it was all lies, had made Harry hurt, and had covered him in blood as if he had a right to cover Harry in anything and it wasn't true because Harry was Draco's.

And Harry was panicking and of course Draco understood why Harry had said that, had lied to Charlie, because Charlie had made him think he owed him...

"You don't owe the world a single fucking thing," he growled possessively, holding Harry against him.

"I don't?" Harry asked, curling up next to him.

"You don't."

"Not even you?"

Draco flinched. "This isn't like that, Harry."

"What's it like then?" Harry was falling asleep and Draco could not explain it now, because now was too broken and raw and Harry was too sleepy. So instead, he tucked him into bed and kissed his forehead and left.

He was still angry because Harry did not understand, still hurt because Pansy was gone, and still terrified because Harry had to be broken, and he spent the night in the library, frantically researching for any sort of plan that did not involve breaking Harry Potter.

Then, around dawn, when the sun was rising everywhere else except for in the dark caverns, he started practicing the Patronus Charm, though silver mist would do nothing against an army of Dementors...

***

He had done it, though. Hermione's plan. Draco Malfoy had held a Muggle gun to his head, looked into Harry Potter's teary eyes, had told him that he was dying because Harry loved him, and then he had pulled the trigger.

Draco knew there was nothing in the world that would hurt Harry the way that would have. And so he did it. And then he had died... or had seemed to.

There had been a Confundus Charm in the coffee Granger had given Harry, to blur his mind just slightly to accept the illusion more easily. The gunshot, the blood, had all been a charm, cast by Granger at the appropriate moments. Draco's stillness, his coldness, had all been side-effects of more charms, illusions, that Granger had cast on him when Harry had been too busy begging him not to do it. And then Granger had given Harry the ring that was coated in his blood and Harry had been taken, broken and hysterical and so hurt, to the den of the Dementors.

The charms had taken hours to wear off, and Granger had waited by his side, though she had wanted to follow Harry to battle. It would not help him, however, so Draco had forced her to promise to wait for him. If Harry lost the battle, they would not be able to help him anyway. Whether this battle was won or lost rested solely on Harry's shoulders.

They had gone to him as soon as the charms had worn off and Draco had healed Hermione's cuts and bruises, had gotten there mere seconds before Harry had fallen.

The second when Harry's knees had crumbled and he had melted into the ground was forever engraved in Draco's mind, like a living painting on the backdrop of hundreds of Dementors turning into dust and ash but none of that mattered because Harry was falling and Draco was too far away to catch him before he hit the ground.

There were dirt and bruises and maybe blood on Harry's face by the time Draco got to him. It was hard to tell because of the shower of ashes that was falling, and the shadows, strange shadows, cast by the light that was so unreliable and about to flicker out and die and it couldn't because some irrational part of Draco's mind had fixed on the idea that if the light stopped flashing, Harry would die.

Which made no sense because Harry would not-- could not-- die.

But he was so still.

And Granger was shouting or maybe he was shouting, he couldn't tell, and then... and then Harry's eyes had opened and they had still been green which meant the world to Draco, suddenly. Because everything had to be alright if Harry's eyes were still green, despite the ash and dirt that had turned his body and his hair and his lips gray.

Draco lifted him, cradled him, and begged, pleaded. I will not let you die.”

And Harry had looked at him with dark and empty eyes (green eyes) and then his lips had moved, though he didn't speak.

Kissing him was more instinct than anything, more out of frustration than desire (because Harry tasted like dirt and Dementor and that seemed, to Draco, to be a good way to describe the taste of terror, if terror should have a taste), but he had done it and Harry had fought him and then Harry had slipped away, fallen again, and... and something had broken. Though Draco would not know it until later.

***

The next days were worse. The days in which there was no falling rain of ash and there was no physical terror, no reason to tremble and act on instinct without thinking because all there was time for, in those next days, was thought. So Draco thought and he worried and he fell apart. His mind (or his heart?), the very darkest part of it that he'd always thought was invincible and so strong and so...so brave, the part that no one had ever touched until Harry, started to crumble, bit by bit, until Draco couldn't tell where the darkness of madness and nightmare ended and the love for Harry began, because it had all become one and the same.

Harry was... Harry was broken. Draco stared at him through glass that seemed as fragile, soft, as a sheet of rain. He lay very still, on white, white sheets, in a white, white room, and nothing moved. Not Harry, not the glass, not the sheets, and certainly not Draco. He did not, could not, look away.

There was still blood on Harry's hands, on his face. His own blood. Or maybe that's the only way Draco could see him now. Draco wondered how he had made himself bleed. It had been a magical battle, and still, Harry had come out bloody. It made no sense, but then, nothing did.

Nothing made sense, and nothing moved. Nothing even breathed, not even Draco. Nothing would make the fragile chaos, fragile silence, shift or change or fade, because if it did, it could take Harry with it.

They still did not know if Harry was Harry any longer, or a shell that lived (hopefully) but did not feel, think, or move.

Harry could be dead and Draco did not know it, because the healers kept saying he was still breathing.

Draco wasn't (or at least, if he was, he couldn't tell), but Harry was, and therefore he was still alive. Maybe. Unless he was lost in the curse... kissed by the Dementors he had destroyed.

It made no sense.

"Malfoy."

He jumped and turned away from the glass. It was Granger, and she was holding a mug of coffee. Draco did not speak.

"Drink this," she said.

"Not thirsty," he said, throat raw, aching, with tears he would not cry. He stared at her blankly.

"Malfoy... don't do this."

"I have to," he said, because really, what else was there to do except watch and wait and... and beg. But no one was listening.

Panic threatened and he closed his eyes. Granger sighed and left again, to shout at healers, plead with Dumbledore, it didn't matter. Turning back towards the window that looked into Harry Potter's hospital room, Draco kept his eyes closed, and forced himself to breathe and recognize that he was breathing.

His eyes flew open a moment later, terrified that Harry would have faded away when he was not looking.

He hadn't, though, and Draco wondered desperately, guiltily, if it would have been better if Harry had.

He had not wanted to come to St. Mungo's, and only Harry's desperate need for medical attention could ever have brought him into the heart of Dumbledore's army, because if he did not stand at Harry's side as his guardian angel, who would? They'd cut up their hero into pieces and sell them off to the highest bidder for funds to rebuild the world that Draco and Pansy had shattered and that Harry had shattered to save.

He did not trust them, despite the fact that Granger had reassured him a thousand times that the war was all but forgotten and that he would not be punished for his part in it. The two sides, so intent on destroying each other mere months before, were working together now to rebuild the world.

Voldemort's whereabouts were unknown or perhaps kept secret. Draco didn't care.

All he cared about was that they did not take him from Harry's side.

He stared into the white room at Harry's bloody face (which wasn't really bloody at all, though Draco couldn't see through the blood in his memories and on his hands), and waited for Harry to breathe, so he could mimic it to reassure himself and Harry. Come back to me because I'm still breathing, but only for you...

***

He slept, finally, against his will, because he could not remain awake for a second longer. Everything hurt and his mind was more exhausted, even, than his body. So he sat at Harry's side (they'd finally let him into the room rather than making him wait by the window and he was finally reassured that Harry wasn't bloody on the outside, just the inside) and rested his head on Harry's bed and slept, not touching him because he was afraid of breaking him.

He dreamed, little bits of conversation-- remembered and not fantasized-- whispering through his mind, of darker times, better times, when madness whispered in his mind but Harry whispered in his arms and that made the madness worth it.

Granger spoke first, in the mixture of words in his dreams, and she said, "You underestimate him if you think he hasn't got any darkness in him," and then, to counter it, there was a memory of Harry Potter smiling at him and the smile was what Draco needed, in those caverns where there was no sun, because the smile was the colour of sunshine. "Give me something good," Draco had whispered when he'd seen that smile, because that smile was worth every bit of goodness Draco had ever possessed. And then the image of Harry smiling melted away and Harry was instead underneath him, eyes wide and frightened and yet... dark with something more and Draco was hissing "I do not want you," and Harry was replying, in a whisper, "You don't have to." And Draco melted into him then though Harry would never know it, until later, much later. And then the images came faster now, words melting into images they did not match, and Draco was inside of Harry and Harry was crying out softly and someone whispered, "They never really saw you..." and then Harry was inside of Draco and no one had ever been inside Draco before because he had not let them, and someone-- it was Draco-- said wistfully, "Are you scared? Because this doesn't mean a thing if you're not scared."

And Draco woke on those words and he was still at Harry's side and magic was still measuring Harry's breaths and Draco wasn't able to catch his.

"Don't do this," he whispered, but his voice was the only sound in the room. Well, Harry's breathing was there too, hushed and soft and forced, measured, counted by magic.

Draco stared at Harry's face, so pale, and the dark circles under his eyes, which were closed and had not opened since that moment when Harry had fallen. He let his eyes wander away, because he could not stand to look at that face without wanting to break or scream, and it was all so fucking quiet. There was an accusation in that silence, because if it was not for Draco, it would not exist. But it did. It did and Draco hated it, hated Harry for it, hated the Dementors and the world and anyone who ever thought that some things were worth risking everything for. But mostly, he just hated himself. It was not an angry sort of hatred, it was a deep, dark, loathsome, painful hatred that made him want to rip open his own skin as if spilling his blood, ending his own life, would give Harry back his.

It wouldn't, of course, and it was a ridiculous thought besides. Draco took a deep breath, his gaze slipping down to rest on Harry's hand, because it was so white and small. He touched it with his fingertips, vaguely surprised to find it warm, the skin soft. He could feel the bones and veins beneath the skin, and he bit his lip, almost unable to fathom the idea that this Harry lying here was as warm as the Harry who had spent so long lying with him had been. Because this Harry might never move again, might never see or speak again, might never wake, smile, laugh... might not even be alive, though magic kept his lungs working, his heart beating.

He carefully let his hand rest on top of Harry's, protectively. He could feel the scars there, faint and hardly noticeable, the words I must not tell lies, and he wondered how he had only come to notice them after Harry might never be able to explain who had scarred him that way. But there were other scars there too. Harry's hand was covered in scars, in marks that other people had given him.

After a few silent moments, he turned Harry's hand over, though he did not, could not, touch his palm.

There was a scar there too, a newer scar, and Draco did not understand it and was sure he wouldn't ever want to.

He glanced at Harry's vacant face, and back at the palm, destroyed by scar tissue. Taking a deep breath, Draco slowly stroked it, feeling the slight bumps that marked him.

"So many scars," he mumbled to himself. Harry Potter was scarred all over, inside and out.

He pulled his hand away and studied the mark there, cut raggedly into the flesh but still recognizable. It was the Malfoy Family Crest, backwards so that the dragon's flame flew left instead of right, the direction it flew in the crests and shields that decorated the manor Draco had grown up in, the direction it flew in the golden image of it that crowned his family ring.

The one Harry had still been clutching in his hand when Draco finally got to his side, after he had fallen. He'd been holding it tightly enough to cut, to scar. Draco could not imagine what would have convinced Harry that, in the end, Draco's ring was the one thing worth holding onto.

It was very, very quiet, a quiet meant to be shattered with screams, but Draco was screaming and had been since Harry had fallen. It was just that no one else could hear the ragged sounds because they were locked up deep inside with every bit of self-loathing and fear he refused to let anyone know he was feeling.

And still, Harry slept...

***

Granger was not there. She was off explaining things to Dumbledore or coming up with announcements for the press or something that did not matter and never had. And the room was the same and Harry was the same except Draco wasn't looking and hadn't looked in days. He could not remember how long, but the thought of looking into Harry Potter's dead face, watching him waste away, trapped in fallout nightmares from the world he'd been forced to save, made him ill.

He had begun to measure his life by Harry's breaths, which were loud and rattling and, in Draco's mind, growing fainter. And days had passed, measured in false breaths inspired by magic and it was so bloody infuriating because Harry's breaths were not enough. He wanted his smiles and his voice and his touch and his laughter and everything else and it wasn't fair and--

Harry's breathing changed while Draco stared at the scars on his palm, and he tensed, because this was it, then. The magic was not enough and Harry was slipping away and this, this momentous event, the only change Harry had shown in all these days, meant he was dying and that meant Draco would have to look-- to watch over him and beg forgiveness for not being able to protect him and because no one else cared enough even to watch and Draco would watch him die if only because he would finally have something of Harry's that no one else in the world ever had.

So Draco Malfoy looked up to watch Harry Potter die and instead, startled gray eyes met green and Harry was awake.

"Harry?" Draco croaked.

Harry was very still for a long moment and Draco struggled to realize what it was about this sudden wakefulness that disturbed him, and then Harry snatched his hand back and started to whimper, his face white with absolute, mortal terror.

Draco was stunned, both wanting to be elated that he had not died, and wanting to shake him for scaring him. There was some part of him that worried rather frantically that something was not right, because Harry's eyes were blank and dark and odd and he was so scared, so Draco did not move or breathe or speak while Harry fell apart in front of him.

He hates me, he's afraid of me, he thinks I'm dead, Draco thought in quick, panicky succession. And then, he doesn't know who I am.

The last was compounded when Harry hissed, "Get away from me," and Draco stumbled out of his chair and backed towards the door, wanting to do anything to make Harry stop being scared, even if it meant running from him and never coming back. He doesn't know me, the voice in Draco's mind screamed. He wanted to fall apart, to die, something.

Instead, he turned and fumbled with the doorknob.

"Draco," Harry moaned. Draco tensed and slowly turned back. "Please."

"What-- what is it?" Draco whispered, coming back, aching to touch him.

"Scared." He started to tremble, staring at shadows that Draco could not see. "Make them stop, make them go away!"

Growing more worried now, Draco glanced wildly around the room. "There's nothing here!" he cried. "Nothing. What... what do you want me to do?" He reached out and hesitantly touched Harry's arm and Harry reacted violently, his hand lashing out and cracking across Draco's cheek.

"Don't touch me," he snarled.

Draco stared in shock, not even feeling the pain or the tears or anything, and then Harry started screaming something about being afraid and shadows and he was scratching at his own skin and Draco didn't understand. He reacted instinctively, climbing onto the bed though he did not understand what was happening, and grabbing Harry's hands, smoothing them flat and then holding them tightly, wrapping his arms around Harry's shoulders and holding him.

"It's alright, it's alright," he chanted, while Harry writhed against him and growled. Finally he tensed and then collapsed against Draco's chest weakly, whimpering and clinging.

"What's happening?" Harry whispered, voice broken.

Draco did not know, so he merely stroked his hair and tried not to cry.

The door flew open and Granger was there, the nurses behind her, and Draco could only look helpless when she clapped her hand to her mouth and stared.

"He's awake," she breathed.

"He's... he's broken," Draco whimpered. Then he started to cry.

***

Granger's arms were bony and skinny and Draco did not, would not, let her hold him, cling to him, or touch him. If she wanted to cry, she was welcome to it, but she would not ever cry on him.

Ronald Weasley came to St. Mungos when he heard (how he heard, Draco never knew, for the newspapers were only running in limited numbers and no one cared that Harry Potter, Hero, was still alive because so many were dead and what, really, did one boy matter?), and he rushed to Granger's side and tried to hold her, and that was when Draco jerked her into his arms and let her cling and cry and ruin his shirt, because better she cry on him than Ronald Weasley still exist. He should have died, should have disappeared, should not be allowed anywhere near Harry because Harry was broken and had gone mad and Weasley, where had Weasley been the whole time? Calling Harry a traitor, shouting at Harry, hating Harry, and now he'd come crawling back with his filthy Weasley blood-- and Weasley blood was worse than mixed blood, to Draco now, because at least Granger had been there.

Granger didn't care who held her, she was falling apart-- Draco decided grudgingly that maybe she had a right to, after everything she'd-- they'd-- done-- and Weasley's eyes were shuttered and dark, his face pale.

"What are you doing here, Malfoy?" he spat. "Shouldn't you be dying in a cell in Azkaban?"

Draco looked at him coolly and then looked away. He did not lower himself to reply.

If Weasley stuck around, Draco was not aware of it. He was curled up on an armchair with Granger beside him, and she sobbed for hours and hours, and Weasley did not matter and never had and if he'd fallen over and died right then, Draco would not have cared.

He was so angry. They had not let him in to see Harry in hours, trying to find out what was wrong and how to fix it.

Draco knew what was wrong. He'd broken Harry. Granger had decided the only way to make Harry hate enough, hurt enough, to cast the Dark Patronus was if Draco betrayed him. Broke his heart. Died and blamed him. And Draco had and now Harry would never come back and Pansy had told him some things were worth risking everything for and Draco had risked everything for the world and he'd lost and he wasn't strong enough but he certainly wasn't crying anymore. That had been a moment of weakness that was gone and his eyes were dry, so dry that they burned and Granger was crying and somewhere, Harry was broken, and Draco was broken because if anyone thought... if anyone thought that Draco would be whole after he'd broken Harry's heart, they were mad. Absolutely fucking mad.

Hours passed in which the healers tried to calm Harry, or to sedate him, or to convince him that there were not monsters and demons in the shadows waiting to destroy him.

Finally, they gave up.

As with anything related to the new Unforgivable, it was difficult to define what was happening to Harry, though the healers certainly tried. Some merely thought he'd lost his mind, while others decided that it was a magical side effect of so much of the curse being filtered through him. The fallout effect was blamed, as the negative magic had to go somewhere. It had gone into him and had stayed there, plunging Harry into a permanent state of semi-awareness, mixed with nightmares.

The entire world's curse had hit him and broken him.

The World was too busy burying its dead and cleaning up the chaos and the aftermath to really notice the destroyed shell that was left of Harry, who had saved them, and Draco found it rather morbidly amusing. He'd always thought that there would be confetti and balloons and candy floss and carnivals after Harry Potter saved the world.

Instead, there was only mourning and a gradual clearing of the skies.

Harry did not change. There were times when he recognized Draco, though distantly, as one would recognized safety and shelter yet not have a name to put to it. Those were the times when Harry would whisper his name pleadingly, yearning for Draco to save him from nightmares that Draco could not see. Draco's touch did not soothe Harry the way Harry's had soothed him, and more often than not, Harry would react to it violently. In his new state, Harry needed to touch but could not stand to be touched.

Draco, though, needed to touch him, because Harry was still Harry even if at times he was all animalistic and terrified and strange.

He took Harry home (his new home, a white, clean, pristine, untouched townhouse in London that was very, very white) and Harry slept in Draco's room, though sometimes he'd get angry and attack Draco and Draco would have to close and lock the door and sleep on the couch (though he rarely slept those nights).

Weeks passed and Harry did not get any better. He was seeing a reality that Draco was only sometimes a part of, and even then only able to offer the barest sort of shelter.

The world healed, the dead were buried, the skies lost the gray haze that had been more an effect of terror than the weather, and the sun shone again. Those who had survived had buried their ghosts, their nightmares, their dead, had mourned and cried, but had moved on, because if anything serves to inspire one to get over a loss of a loved one, it is the secret guilty feeling of relief. Muggles and Wizards alike, those who were still alive and whole of mind enough to have any thoughts at all, thanked God and Merlin for taking somebody, anybody, other than themselves.

Children forgot all about the curse in a matter of days, flying kites and giggling in the streets, and less of them had been lost than anyone, because a child's mind is the most resilient.

The adults were still shocked, walking around with shadowed eyes, as they struggled to get things back in order again, restore order again, ignore that order had ever been lost.

And in Draco's townhouse, Harry Potter screamed and scratched wildly in a mad attempt to get out of his own skin, out of his own head, and people were too busy watching the kites and the skies to hear. Except, of course, for Draco.

He'd never particularly cared for kites and skies, and now had even less patience. If Draco had been lost before Harry, he was destroyed without him. It made the pain all the more sharp that Harry was still there, in some ways, but not in anyway that mattered.

Days slipped by unnoticed, and Draco cared for Harry, fed Harry, held him when Harry let him, and gradually, Draco began to fade away. The world moved on and Draco couldn't and the only thing that broke the cycle was when Granger came to visit.

Each time she did, she brought with her news of the outside world, the rebuilding of the ministry, the peace between Voldemort's followers and Dumbledore's, the Muggles recuperating from the devastating epidemic. Draco did not care, but a part of him was desperately glad for her company, because it was so unnerving, looking into Harry's tortured eyes.

Sometimes, when Draco looked into Harry's green eyes, though, they looked almost as they used to. Darker and wider, but still Harry in an indefinable way. And sometimes Draco lost himself inside of them, a little more, and by the time the end came, Draco felt as if he'd lost all of himself in haunted green eyes.

It happened as Harry leaned against him, calm and soothed and sleepy, nightmares distant memories as he drifted off to sleep. Draco was holding him, smoothing his hair, grateful for these moments when Harry was not fighting him. He was exhausted but would not sleep when Harry slept, because someone had to watch over Harry, and there was only Draco...

Except that Harry did not fall asleep this time. He shifted away from Draco's chest and looked up at him with wide, dark, thoughtful eyes and there were no reflections of dragons there, for once Draco could see his own reflection and he lost the last bit of himself then, and could not help himself for all the world. He let out the last bit of his soul with a soft breath and leaned down and kissed him.

It was sweet and light and so fragile that his breath caught and he nearly died right then from needing this, needing Harry, and Harry, for half a second (a half second that would last forever in Draco's mind), kissed him back.

The other half of that second was all the warning Draco got, as Harry tensed and then, in the next second, tore away with a growl, one hand coming up fast, instinctively, and cracking across Draco's face, dragging Harry's nails and leaving four red gashes that, as Draco stared at him, stunned, started gently to bleed.

Harry's eyes narrowed on the blood and he looked lost and confused and he flinched away and started to cry.

"Hush now," Draco said in a shaking voice. "It's alright... Oh merlin, I'm sorry..."

It took awhile to calm him again, and Draco finally did, closing his eyes tightly and ignoring his stinging face, as Harry fell asleep. Once he was sure Harry would not wake for at least a short while, Draco slipped off the bed and went into the bathroom.

He stared into the mirror for a long time, at his shaggy, messy hair that had not been combed in days, at his wide and teary gray eyes, and at the bloody scratches on his cheek. Then, before he could think or calm himself, he angrily lashed out at the mirror, slamming his open palm against it. His own reflection shattered before his eyes, and his hand started to bleed.

He did not know how much longer he could do this. It was his secret, that he was faltering, that he, after all Harry had done for him, did not have the strength to care for Harry now. But he would. Until he faded away and died, he would be beside Harry, would care for him, because no one else would.

There was a knock on the door and he tensed, eyes flying to the mirror that had repaired itself. He hurriedly washed the blood off his face and wrapped his hand in a face cloth before going to the door. It was Granger.

Her hair was pulled back and her face was clean and seemed brighter, somehow, than anything Draco had seen lately, other than the sun. It infuriated him to know that Granger was healing, glowing, while he and Harry faded.

"Draco," she said sweetly. "How are you? How is he? Has there been any change?"

She was not a bad sort, really. She cared, but there was nothing she could do and she knew it. Draco knew it too, only he would not accept it. He wondered if that made him the brave one, or her.

"No change," he said curtly. It had become harder and harder to keep up his mask of abrasive dismissal.

She had already walked past, as if she'd expected that. "I brought you some groceries," she said, pulling out the food she'd carried in. She had a habit of bringing by leftovers she'd made and sometimes purchasing groceries, and never seemed to notice that Draco did not eat it. There was no time to eat, Harry needed him.

Putting the food away in the cupboards, she kept up her usual chatter that Draco was too exhausted to pay attention to. He sat at the kitchen table and stared at the veins in the wood and when she was done, she sat beside him with a cool cloth, still babbling. She pressed the cloth to his cheek without commenting, and then unwrapped his torn up hand and healed it.

Then, finally, when he was cleaned up and still tracing veins in the wood with his eyes, she said very gently, "Draco, there's nothing more to be done for him."

Draco looked at her sharply. "There's plenty to be done!"

"Like what?" she asked patiently.

"Like holding him when he's scared and making sure he doesn't do anything stupid and he doesn't hurt himself."

"Draco. Harry's.... gone." She said it very, very gently, with tears in her eyes, and Draco knew it was not easy for her. "There is nothing more for you to do for him except move on. Harry... Harry wouldn't want..." she was going to cry and Draco looked away coldly. Finally, after she'd regained control of herself, she said, "There are others who could do for him what you do."

Draco's eyes darkened dramatically. "What are you saying?"

"I'm saying that his place isn't here, Draco. I'm trying to care for you like Pansy said I had to, and like Harry would have wanted. He is not going to get better. His mind is... it shattered... from the fallout. You know as well as I do, you were there. He... he needs more than this. He needs help from people who know... know what they're doing. He needs to go to St. Mungo's, Draco. They can help him."

"You said there is nothing to be done," Draco snarled.

Her eyes were brimming with tears again. "Do you think I wanted this for him?"

"Some people sacrifice everything..."

"But I did not want this! I wanted the curse to end and that was the only way but I never ever wanted this! He was my best friend long before he was anything to you, Draco Malfoy! You think this is courage? Holding onto him this way?"

"And locking him away, that would be courage?" he growled. "Is that what happens when you're done with heroes, when they've nothing more for you to steal? You lock them away so you can move on? If that's all he is to you, then you don't deserve the world he saved for you! So fuck off, and don't fucking try to take him from me."

Granger was crying, sobbing raggedly, and she tried one last time. "Please..."

Draco sneered at her in complete disgust and left the room, going out onto the balcony. He knew she'd go into Harry's room to see him, to stroke his pale face and talk to him like he could hear, and knew that she would cry over him, she always did, and even now, he would not deny her that.

He stared blankly at the sky as the sun set and the stars came out and he sat on the balcony, lost in thought. Dark musings about the nature of heroes and the world and madness, as somewhere, he could hear someone playing a radio, and somewhere else, smell a barbecue. He wondered how long it had been since the curse ended, because it almost seemed like it had never happened at all.

Granger left, and still, Draco sat there, as the night slipped away.

She was probably somewhere with Weasley, planning to take Harry from him, and the Wizarding World had forgotten the nightmares that even now plagued Harry Potter. People smiled and laughed and the dead would turn to ash and the darkness would be forgotten because the light was shining now, so bright. Draco sat on the balcony and watched all of this and realized that the only spots of darkness left in the world, the only lingering and very faint regrets that would exist after the dead were ashes and dust, were Harry Potter, and himself, who still lived and breathed the decay and ash and dirt and terror. Which was when Draco realized the way all of this had to end.

The world was not made for darkness anymore, all shadows had to pass, and now the rising sun was just waiting for he and Harry to fade.

Maybe it was a last lingering hint of his own madness, maybe it was a new madness born of watching Harry Potter suffer the terrors of everyone else in the world, and maybe it was the same inner voice that had told Pansy that Harry and Draco were of the same soul. Whatever it was, watching the sun rise and the skies clear and the world move on, Draco knew it had left them behind, and they were the only ones clinging to it, to the darkness. Maybe there was something better waiting, somewhere light where they could forget the ashes that turned their skin gray and black. Maybe there was something else waiting.

He could not let Harry suffer anymore.

The flat was very quiet when he went back in, and Draco felt almost like he'd faded away already, like a ghost. He did not touch anything as he went back into the bedroom and to watch Harry sleep.

He watched him till nearly dawn, and gently shifted him, until Harry was on his back. Harry murmured in his sleep but did not wake, and Draco stretched his wrists above his head and bound them there. He was not shaking, though he was pale and filled with a grim sense of purpose. He was not afraid, and only distantly wondering if perhaps he should be.

Harry woke soon after, and he did not enjoy waking up to be bound this way. He shrieked and writhed against the bonds and Draco stood by the bed and watched, shaking a little now. He cast all sorts of protective charms around himself and then, he freed one of Harry's hands, pressed Harry's wand into it, and stood there and waited.

Then, when Harry's struggles had ended because he was exhausted, he channelled his rage at Draco, like Draco had known he would. He waited as Harry's hexes and curses bounced around like child's playthings, and then, when Harry had gotten so furious that he was pale and shaky and his eyes nearly black with rage, Draco stepped back, shaking more than ever.

"Harry?" he whimpered, because he was suddenly afraid. "I'm not sure--"

It was too late to be sure, however, because Harry's body arched off the bed with the force of his fury, and it was channelled into hate, directed at Draco. The Dark Patronus Harry had summoned, the same basilisk as before, coiled on the bed, raised itself up with a hiss, and then attacked. Its fangs ripped through Draco's protections, as he'd know then would, and sunk into his chest. Draco felt as if the basilisk truly still had the power to petrify with one glance, as he stiffened and seemed to turn to stone. It didn't, however, as it was only the shadow of a true basilisk. It didn't matter.

His head tilted back and he screamed with the agony of that, and then the world dropped away...

Draco's body, limp and pale, fell bonelessly onto the bed, lying across Harry's lap, as Harry, too, lost consciousness, the last spell having drained him. The spell that bound him dissolved, and Harry fell over, landing on Draco, and their breath, shallow and echoing, mingled in the sudden stillness.

***

Harry's nightmares encompassed the whole world, and Draco was plunged into them, the same way Harry had been thrown into his, all those days before. He fell, forever, and landed on the bed in his bedroom, but Harry was not there.

The room was darker than it was in Draco's reality, and there were shadows and whispers everywhere. Draco swallowed hard at the realisation that his clean and safe flat had been this to Harry, and he nearly lost his nerve, because there was something breathing heavily under the bed, and something watching from the closet, he could see something moving there, and outside the window, he could distantly see dragons, circling in burning skies...

Draco took a few careful breaths and sat up, wondering why Harry was not here, if this was Harry's world. He was alone-- but not quite alone.

The Dark Patronus, the basilisk that Draco had taught Harry to make which had destroyed him, was slithering out from under the bed. Draco watched, horrified (it was much easier to feel fear, here. Fear seemed more natural than breathing).

As it reached the door, which seemed to shimmer and shrink unnaturally, the creature raised up and looked back at him, flicking out a forked tongue, and waiting.

Following an instinct he could not explain, Draco got up to follow the basilisk, though his heart and his mind shrieked that it was madness. Draco did not care. That creature was the darkest part of Harry and this was the darkest part of Harry's mind, and that mattered some how.

The basilisk led the way out of the flat, and outside, the world bore no resemblance to London that he had known. It was an impressionistic painting of every nightmare that had held the world in its grasp, and Draco flinched back, repulsed. There were images of mutations, terrors, monsters, darkness, and other things he could not defined, that made no sense, that had come straight from the minds of the people Harry had lost his mind to save. It was a morbid, twisted carnivalesque atmosphere and it made him long to turn around and run.

There was a trail, however, that led through the madness, a glittering trail like shattered glass that had fallen in a path that twisted away into the darkness and terror. The glass seemed to effortlessly catch the hints of sunlight that barely made it through the thick clouds above, and they shimmered. Without a hesitation, the basilisk followed the twisting path of broken glass, and Draco, after a pause, stepped onto the ashy road and followed it as well.

He glanced down as he walked, and he could see in the glass reflections of the bright parts of Harry's mind. Bright memories, bright thoughts, bright smiles, everything that had shattered when the curse had slammed through him. His stomach tightened reflexively and he thought he was going to be sick. Nothing had ever prepared him for making his way through the shattered remains of Harry Potter's mind.

Still, he walked, and around him, everything shifted and shimmered with dreamlike inconsistency.

The basilisk led him on, towards the dragons, and Draco followed, losing hope and dying a little more with every step. What if there was no Harry left to find?

There was, though, and Draco did not have to walk long to find him. He stood under the dragons, in the rocky crater which had housed the hundreds of Dementors, where Harry's mind had shattered. He had never left.

The basilisk slithered towards him and coiled about Harry's feet, watching Draco pleasantly.

The dragons circled in the burning sky, and Harry stood and looked very small beneath them. His head was tilted back to a painful degree, and his eyes very dark and wide. Every now and again, a dragon would swoop lower, and Harry would flinch and cry. Though there was still ash from the Dementors who had died all those weeks before, Harry's robes were clean and very, very black.

Draco approached cautiously, because this was hell and he was not sure that Harry would recognize him. Harry did not acknowledge his presence.

"Harry?" Draco called softly. His eyes were burning with tears and the sky was on fire, reflecting with the dragons in Harry's eyes. "Harry."

It did not matter, then, that hell was all around, that Draco's shoes still had broken pieces of Harry clinging to them, that the ashes from the entire world burning up coated his face and hands. He reached out and touched Harry with dirty, stained fingers that left a tiny smudge on Harry's cheek, and Harry's breathing shifted a little. Draco could have died right then, because it was a sign that he was really there, that Harry was aware of him on some level, and it was more than he'd come to hope since falling into this nightmare land.

And then, before he could die right then from the purest form of relief, Draco wanted more.

"Harry," he said again.

Harry stood still, transfixed by the dragons, a sort of terrified enchantment that Draco's voice alone could not break.

Draco looked up at the writhing mess of dragons and felt hopeless once more.

A dragon blew fire and Harry hiccupped in fear.

It would not do to have Harry afraid, even now, when Draco was here in hell with him. So he stepped forward, carefully, into the coils of the giant serpent, and touched Harry's pale cheek with his ash stained hand. "Harry," he called gently.

Harry still did not look.

Draco did not mind so terribly. He was touching Harry and who cared if the world fell apart, if the world burned, if there was a basilisk coiled about his feet. He leaned forward and brushed his lips against Harry's other cheek, and then his jaw, and finally his lips, kissing him very, very gently, and this time, Harry did not pull away. He turned into the kiss and returned it, a soft and confused sound coming from his throat, that Draco shivered at.

He pulled away and looked hopefully at Harry, because if this was a fairytale, Harry would wake up now, Harry would be his again.

Harry merely stared blankly at him and then looked back at the dragons above.

Draco smiled gently and smoothed his hair back, studied his face, his green eyes wide with awe, and something inside him broke in the most delicious way he could imagine, because this was love. This was love without caring that hell was closing in on all sides, that serpents and shattered glass had led the way, that the world was on fire. This was not love because of a curse, because of forced circumstances, because of fate. This was love because Draco could stop breathing now, and it would still be the most complete he'd ever felt, because it was Harry and it had always been Harry and Harry was not looking, was not aware of him on any level that showed, but he was aware of him on other levels, hidden levels, and maybe he always had been, and it hadn't been rape before, with Harry, or with Draco's heart, and it hadn't been forced, it had been inevitable. Whether it started as hate or disguised itself as hate in the beginning, whether Harry could not stand to feel anything other than terror now, hate and terror and panic and fear were, to Draco, love.

Which meant all the darkness inside of him, the place where his Dark Patronus came from, the parts of himself that had never before been anything but shadowed, those parts were suddenly parts that Harry, he knew, loved. Because love to them was everything. Not just the broken glass parts that were so fragile that they shattered first without leaving enough to inspire a Light Patronus...

Hate was love and so was fear and Draco had always know that little boys like him weren't made of snakes or snails or puppy dog tails, they were made of hate and fear and suddenly that was alright because that hate and that fear had led him to love and it did not make sense but nothing in hell made sense and all he knew was that he loved Harry, in hell or beyond.

And the dragons could not have him.

It was simple, much simpler than it should have been. He dropped his hand from Harry's cheek and to his wand instead, whispering the spell and the Light Patronus flooded through him and if the dark one felt like shadow, this one felt like ice cream and the lightest feathers, and it whispered through him and silver lights burst from his finger tips. They swirled madly and took the form of a griffin, with huge wings, that lifted effortlessly off the ground and blasted through the dragons, and they fell apart with shrieks and screams and bits of fire that rained all around. The griffin returned to earth then and the basilisk attacked it, silver mixing with the deepest black, and it did not matter, they could not destroy each other, they were a part of each other, opposite ends of each other, and they knew it.

The world stopped burning, and the darkness faded away. There were still shattered pieces of Harry all around, and the basilisk and griffin gradually crumbled to dust. A soft breeze whispered through the dust and ash and then there was nothing. The world was not gray any longer, but where hell had stood mere moments before, now was a wild and vibrant heaven.

It was suddenly very, very quiet, and Harry lowered his head, looking confused. He stared at Draco for a long, endless moment, and then his eyes cleared, the darkness and shadows and reflections of dragons fading away, until they were the same bright green that Draco had lost himself in that very first day in the robe shop. "Draco?" he breathed, voice cracking as fear gave way to a fragile sort of hope.

"Hello, Harry," Draco said, so gently. "I've come to take you home."

***

Somewhere Else, in Draco's white, white flat, Harry and Draco lay tangled together, and slowly, in another endless moment, their last breaths whispered from their lips and mingled and were gone.

We carried the weight
and died for the cause
is misery made beautiful
right before our eyes?
will mercy be revealed
or blind us where we stand?
will we burn in heaven
like we do down here?

~The End~


Author notes: The lyrics at the beginning of this chapter are from the song "Hallelujah", which I listened to as sung by Rufus Wainwright when I wrote it, but has been done by a million different artists before him. The lyrics at the end come from the song "Witness" by Sarah McLachlan.

Thank you for reading this story, feedback is much appreciated. Dedicated in its entirety to Umbralin, for the fantastic and fast betaing jobs, Aarynn and Tracy, for being part of the reason why I did not lose my mind before I finished it, primroseburrows for her thoughtful and inspiring comments, and Ani and Caroline for hours of listening to me whine about it. Also to all the reviewers (especially those who said nice things-- hehe, kidding), and Lady Morsmordre for getting me into slash in the first place (I know, I'm rambling, but this is going to be my last one, so...) and being patient enough to beta me when no one else would. Oh, dear, I'm getting nostalgic, so I'd best stop.

I'm sorry to anyone who doesn't like the ending, I hadn't planned to end this one this way, I swear, but then I realized it couldn't end any other way. I shall understand if you hate me for it, though.

Thank you for reading.