The If Sieve

Draco didn't go to any of his classes the next day. He curled in his bed, avoiding looking at any of his dorm-mates, and said that he was sick.

The others must have made some excuse to the teachers, he supposed, since nobody came looking for him.

Crabbe and Goyle's twin horrified stares when they came back to change and he said he wasn't going to dinner either eventually changed his mind.

He regretted it as soon as he got there.

"Why didn't anybody tell me Potter was out of the hospital wing?" he hissed.

"Er ..." Crabbe said.

Goyle leaned over to Crabbe. "Did I miss something?" he whispered, worried.

Draco sank lower into his seat.

Potter didn't seem to have suffered for his stint in the hospital wing. He was chattering animatedly to Granger and Weasley, his elbows sprawled all over the table and into Longbottom's table space (who was cramping his elbows awkwardly as he tried to find room to eat). His cheeks were flushed with excitement; or maybe with warmth and food. His robes were rumpled and twisted. It probably never occurred to him to neaten up before dinner.

He looked up for a moment and caught sight of Draco. For a suspended moment his face was open and confused. Then the expression morphed into a glare and he looked pointedly away.

Draco squeezed his eyes shut, sinking even lower. His chin was barely above the table, now. Crabbe and Goyle looked down in astonishment.

The thing was that it hadn't actually happened. Potter didn't actually make pleased noises against his mouth in a dungeon corridor and then stand there, cold betrayal in his eyes, and tell him to go to hell.

Even if it had happened, it would have been two years ago.

"Malfoy?" Goyle gave a cautious glance around the hall and then back down. "Are you going to be sick again?"

"No." He eased himself up a bit. "Just ... Goyle, you go sit on the other side of the table. Right there. Just ... no, a little to the left. My left. No, that's still ... oh, alright, to the right, then."

The fourth year boys Goyle had just dislodged made faintly protesting grumbles, which stopped when Goyle looked at them. They scooted along .

Okay. Now Draco couldn't actually see Potter. This was better.

He cast a sound scrambling charm around the three of them -- something as obvious as a silencing charm was asking for trouble -- and straightened a little further.

"I want to ask you both something."

Crabbe looked expectant. Goyle was occupied in eyeing the glass of pumpkin juice he'd left over their side of the table. Crabbe passed it to him.

"I ..." This was actually more difficult than he'd expected. For the second time, Draco didn't know how to word something to Crabbe and Goyle.

"You remember fourth year, when the Durmstrang students were sitting at our table?" he asked finally.

They both nodded.

"Do you remember how I ... kind of followed Victor Krum around for a while?"

They nodded again.

"Right. Good. Uh ... how about in fifth year? Do you remember how I used to laugh at all Adrian Pucey's jokes, even when they weren't funny?"

More nods.

"Um. OK. And do you remember that time Greengrass threw her arms around me after we'd beaten Ravenclaw and tried to snog me and I hexed her hair into snakes?"

They were confident in their responses now. They probably expect me to play this game all through dinner.

He took a breath.

"Did you ever think ... that I might be ...?"

He paused and they looked back at him with big, honest puzzlement. He tried again.

"I mean, that I might like ...?"

They carried on watching him.

"... never mind."

He noticed as they left the hall at the end of dinner that Potter was watching him again.

*

The Potterettes had gone back to planning now that the first excitement of whatever their triumph had been was over. Their heads were buried together every meal, their expressions increasingly serious and frustrated.

The frustrated expression on Potter's face deepened whenever he looked at Draco. Which was still quite a lot. And always seemed to end in a glower.

The Crush on Potter, which Draco was beginning to realise might have been there for a while -- for all it felt as though it had knocked him down as he watched himself with Potter in the If -- was making his life miserable. It kept surprising him with new, nasty little developments. At first it was a feeling as though someone was jumping up and down on his stomach whenever he saw messy hair and glasses. That was horrible -- although he didn't throw up again after the first time. It began to fade after a couple of days, though, as the memory Go to hell, Malfoy lost strength against the backdrop of school and his own solid reality.

The next worst was the layer under the kicked-in stomach one. It was the old feeling, really -- looking at Potter and wanting -- something. Aching. Even after the If it wasn't a defined want, but it was sharper, stronger.

The first two levels meant that it was a few days before he really noticed the third, horrifying dimension of the crush; which was maybe surprising, given the If scene that had sparked it. That was the first time he caught himself intently watching Potter's mouth as he talked.

Potter bit at his lip as he listened to something, the colour changing from red to white, then released it to laugh. It wasn't a laugh somebody who'd done what he had ought to have, Draco thought distantly. It was that delighted, unselfconscious laugh that small boys have. It made his whole face look unguarded and happy.

The messy fringe was falling over his eyes again and he blinked it away, still grinning, and rubbed a hand over the side of his neck. His hair was getting a bit long; tangled strands brushed against his collar and his neck with a whisper-soft rhythm that must have tickled. Rubbing at the skin had reddened it a little; a light flush over skin the summer tan was fading from.

Draco wet his lips, dry-mouthed. Then he realised what he was doing.

He looked up, dreading, to find Potter ignoring Weasley and Finnigan now to watch him with that same suspended openness he'd seen for a moment at dinner. Then it was the glower again, a determined anger; more than Potter had ever been able to keep up before this year.

Draco raised his eyebrows and gave him a half-hearted sneer before he turned away.

He didn't spend the next few minutes staring at nothing, lost in imagining Potter's mouth, his neck. He just happened to find this section of his textbook particularly fascinating.

*

Once he'd noticed the first time, he realised that it was something he did all the time. He must have been doing it for ages.

He might die of the embarrassment.

He caught himself sneaking looks at Potter's arse under his robe on Monday when he and Crabbe and Goyle found themselves behind Potter and his friends on the way to the greenhouses for Herbology. He stared raptly at Potter's fingers as he played with the Golden Snitch when he walked by the Gryffindor team practicing on Wednesday; until Ginevra Weasley glared at him and told him to buzz off and stop spying on their strategy. (Draco didn't personally think that Potter releasing and then catching the Snitch over and over again while Weasley and Thomas argued about why the Quaffle had flown wide was much of a strategy, but he didn't bother saying so.)

He couldn't step into the shower anymore without imagining Potter there, which he blamed on association: you had one little fantasy about a place and the next thing you knew you remembered it every time you went in.

But it was realising that he was focusing intently on the little bit of skin between the black hem of Potter's robe and the top of his rumpled sock as he stretched his feet out in Potions that made him understand how bad it had become.

The worst of it was that Potter always seemed to catch him. He looked up from Potter's ankle to find the other boy watching him back, frowning.

He told Crabbe and Goyle that evening that he was using the sieve again.

*

They were a little hesitant about the If he'd chosen.

"Would Potter really do that?" Goyle asked, his forehead creasing.

Draco lifted his chin. The truth was that he was sick of seeing things that were his fault. He wanted to look at something that had been Potter's fault, indefensibly.

"Maybe," he said shortly.

He wrote: If Harry Potter chose to apologise to Draco Malfoy after he almost killed him in a bathroom in their sixth year at Hogwarts.

He touched his wand to the silvery surface and the world tilted.

If

He had to blink a few times to adjust his eyes. Wherever he was, it was almost dark. There were a couple of witch lights bobbing on low glow along one wall but they didn't do much more than give shape to the dimness. He thought there was a large window in the wall opposite, too, but the overcast sky outside was only a little lighter than the room.

He spotted the row of beds along the wall under the window. The Hospital Wing. That made sense.

He moved closer. He'd been the only one in the Hospital Wing this night, he remembered. Not in the first bed, but ... yes, there.

He was seeing a lot more clearly now; well enough to see details of the sleeping form in the bed. It was -- just a little bit unsettling, seeing himself like this. You could never make a Pensieve show yourself sleeping; nobody ever remembered what that looked like.

This was only a year ago -- less, in fact. He didn't look young, particularly. He looked ... scared.

Draco glared at himself. He was lying there, curled partly to one side, his sleeping face scrunched up in pain and fear. He looked scared.

He didn't remember nightmares from that night, but then the whole experience was a grey sort of nightmare in his memory. Most of the year was like that, actually; after the first thrill of confidence when he'd been sure he could do the task, sure it was the right thing to do.

The door of the hospital wing creaked open. There was a swish as somebody slipped inside but nothing visible. Then a whisper of fabric and something fell away, revealing Potter's form in a rush. The invisibility cloak.

Potter balled up the cloak and stuffed it into his pocket. He looked across at the still form on the bed for a moment, rocking between the balls and heels of his feet. Then he squared his shoulders.

"Going to do this," he whispered to himself.

Not really convincing, Potter, Draco thought after another minute had passed and Potter still hadn't moved.

Potter prowled forwards a few steps and peered cautiously down at the bed. He bit his lip, frowning a little. Draco wondered if he was seeing the same things Draco had seen when he looked down.

I don't bite, you know. And that wasn't a good thought to have, because Potter was frowning in indecision and making an indent in his lower lip and, actually, Draco would rather like to bite him.

Potter frowned and half extended his hand, as though he was going to touch Draco's forehead. He changed his mind and jabbed at Draco's shoulder under the coverlet.

There was a moment where the sleeping form went entirely still and Draco knew that he was awake and trying to work out what was happening without letting on. By the second half of sixth year almost every awakening had been like this: that moment of terror when he knew it was almost impossible but he still wondered whether Voldemort had sent somebody for him: his Aunt Bella, or Macnair; or Greyback.

His eyelids cracked open, revealing a sliver of silver grey that caught the dim light. Potter rocked on his heels.

"Potter," the Draco in the bed said finally. His voice was scratchy and a bit uneven. "Come to finish me off? I wouldn't think you'd have the nerve to wake me up first."

Potter bit off the first answer he wanted to make. He took a breath. "Uh, no," he said.

Both Dracos waited but apparently that was all he had.

"Well, go away then," Sieve Draco said finally. "I hope you know that I'm going to do my best to have you expelled for this."

He hadn't, actually -- he'd been more concerned with the cabinet and Dumbledore and his imminent death at the age of sixteen, along with that of his mother.

Potter gritted his teeth. "I came to apologise," he said. "Actually."

Draco pulled himself up to sit against the headboard, wincing a little. The blanket fell away to show the white gauze plastered over his chest and stomach. "For attempting to murder me?" he demanded, his voice cracking again on murder.

"No! I didn't try to -- I didn't know that was going to happen, alright?"

Draco did actually know that -- had known it even then. The sheer panic in Potter's voice as he knelt next to Draco in the bathroom -- next to Draco who was sprawled in his own blood -- couldn't have been faked.

Regardless, his younger self sneered at Potter from the bed. It was a shaky sneer but apparently Potter couldn't tell the difference. He flushed.

"I didn't," he said more quietly. "Really. I wouldn't have -- Malfoy, how could you think I would try to kill someone?"

Draco looked away. "Just ... fuck off, Potter, okay?" he said finally.

Potter looked at him for a moment. He turned and fiddled with the window curtain, which was drawn most of the way back.

"Malfoy? Why did you try to cast Cruciatus at me?"

Watcher Draco jumped a little. He'd forgotten he'd done that. Apparently Sieve Draco had rather forgotten that part of the encounter, too, because he looked startled.

"You were annoying," he said after a pause.

Potter ignored that to look at Draco directly. His expression was an odd mix of earnest and distrustful. "At first I thought it didn't matter -- the Sectumsempra; since it didn't kill you it didn't matter because you'd tried to cast Cruciatus. That's supposed to be unforgivable, no matter what. Only ... well, I've cast it, after all."

"You've what?" Draco pulled himself up straighter in the bed.

"There were reasons for it," Potter said coldly. Both Dracos gaped at him.

"But." Potter looked as though he had a certain amount of trouble saying this. "But you probably had reasons too. I talked to Hermione and she said -- she pointed out that you couldn't have planned it. Because you had to know you'd be expelled, or arrested, or both probably. And ... well, really, Malfoy." He frowned at Draco. "It was kind of an overreaction, you know. I don't think you can have known what Cruciatus is like."

"And you do?" Draco demanded.

Potter shrugged. "I've been on both ends of it, so yeah. And it's a pretty big deal to cast just because you didn't like me seeing you crying."

Sieve Draco took a breath, his face tightening. His eyes hardened too.

"There is no just because, you stupid little prat. Do you know -- do you have any idea what --? You have no idea, Potter. You have no idea at all what I'm dealing with." Watching, Draco could hear the unsaid words: What I'm trying to do.

On the bed, Draco was white and -- it was hard to tell in the pale light but Watcher Draco thought that he was shaking. "I don't know what you came here for. If you want -- what? For me to forgive you for eviscerating me? Then you're insane. Just get out."

Potter was breathing through his nose by the end of this. "You're right, Malfoy," he said. "I don't know what you're up to. But I'm going to find out. I promise."

Draco sneered at him and turned to stare out of the darkened window, as though whatever he couldn't see was infinitely more interesting than the angry boy by his bed. Potter turned and walked quickly out, the invisibility cloak still tucked into his pocket. The door to the hospital wing swung closed behind him with a clack.

*

Draco came back to the library. Crabbe and Goyle looked at him hopefully; then backed away at his scowl.

This isn't working.

*

Slughorn sent them into the Forbidden Forest on Friday afternoon. "If you're to be true Potions students -- and I think some of you have the potential, my but I do --" and he winked at Potter, despite the fact that Potter had been abysmal in Potions all year "-- then you'll need to recognise your ingredients outside of their jars."

They were looking for the ingredients for a calming draught. Draco doubted that all sixteen ingredients could be found in the forest but he supposed it gave Slughorn an excuse to lounge in his laboratory and catch up with his reading.

"This says powdered bluetop toadstools," Goyle said, looking up from their list. "Malfoy, I don't see any powders."

"We have to find them unpowdered, you idiot," Draco said. "Come on, they grow in dung. They'll be near the Thestrals. I think I remember the way."

"But we can't see Thestrals," Goyle said, catching up with him.

Draco rolled his eyes. "I can."

They got a bit lost but they found their way there eventually -- more thanks to Crabbe's memory than to Draco's.

The first thing Draco saw as they entered the clearing was the leathery, reptilian Thestral chewing on a mangled piece of meat under the trees on the far side.

The second thing was Granger, balancing gingerly on her knees as she investigated a partly dried pile of dung with a stick. Weasley and Potter were hanging back a little, trying to look helpful without actually touching the dung. It smelled a lot more unpleasant than horse dung; because of the Thestrals' diet, Draco supposed.

Potter looked away, wrinkling his nose, and caught sight of Draco and the others. His face immediately set into a determined expression.

"Malfoy!" He swung away from Granger, who looked up with an expression of annoyance at being interrupted. "I want to talk to you."

Draco's mind raced. Oh please god not about the staring.

He raised his eyebrows. "Do you."

Potter came to a stop a couple of feet in front of him. He was frowning fiercely.

"I want to know what you thought you were doing that evening when you threw yourself under the Whomping Willow."

Crabbe and Goyle stared at Draco. He'd somehow never quite got around to telling them about the Whomping Willow incident.

He narrowed his eyes at Potter. "I would have thought that was obvious. Unless you were enjoying yourselves under there? I couldn't say what Gryffindors do for fun."

Potter looked angry. "I know you didn't do it to help us, Malfoy. You have some plan and you did it for a reason of your own that we don't understand."

Draco glared. He'd had enough.

"That would be because you're completely thick, Potter. God, what kind of plan do you think I had? Do you think the Dark Lord wants you rescued from trees like a fucking kitten?" Potter tried to say something but Draco didn't let him. "Just wake up, would you? My father is in prison. My mother lived in fear of her life all last year, because it was forfeit if I failed. I go to McGonagall every fucking week and ask for a way to help. But you tell the whole school that I'm plotting to kill everybody. You're completely insane!"

Potter's face was red. "Gee, I wonder why I don't trust you, Malfoy?" he sneered. "Couldn't have been because you murdered someone last year, could it?"

"Harry ..." Granger said but Potter ignored her. Draco blinked, though; he'd forgotten there was even anybody else there. Crabbe and Goyle were watching him warily, ready to join in if somebody threw a punch.

He said, very quietly, "I didn't murder anybody."

Potter opened his mouth again and he continued, louder, "I didn't. I tried to and yeah, I know that was fucked up and I can't change it but there didn't seem to be much of a choice last year. Nobody's ever told you to kill somebody or watch your mother die, have they, Potter?"

"I did watch my mother die," Potter said, low and dangerous. "I watched my godfather die, too."

Draco demanded, "And if somebody had given you a choice?"

Potter looked at him for a long moment. Then he looked away.

Draco realised that he was breathing harshly, as though he'd been running.

"I don't care what you think," he said finally, looking at the Thestral over the other side of the clearing rather than at Potter or his friends. "This is my war too, now. If you don't want me in it, you can go to hell."

Crabbe and Goyle fell into place at his side as he turned and left.

"Draco?" Goyle asked eventually. "We didn't get the toadstools."

Draco snorted; the sound was far too hysterical. "Are you offering to go back?" he asked. Goyle fell silent.

*

He stewed all evening. Obviously he'd known what Potter thought of him, but hearing him say it, so fucking self-righteous and sure of himself, stung him into fury. The other occupants of the Slytherin common room watched him warily and found reasons to go to bed early despite it being Friday night.

Of course Potter had to be right about all things. If he disliked someone, they must be evil. If he liked someone, they had to be good, even if they brought vicious monsters into the school and gave the third years to them.

Crabbe and Goyle and Pansy eventually left him in the common room, still glaring at the fire.

Sometime just after dawn he put the sieve in his bag and traipsed off to the library by himself. Madam Pince raised her eyebrows at him and yawned over her cup of coffee.

He set the sieve down with a thunk on the desk in his favourite corner and scribbled out the If, the one he'd thought of last night.

If Draco Malfoy chose not to get a Hippogriff put down after it attacked him in third year.

It was probably a long shot but he was running out of ideas. And he had meant to make Potter as well as the half-giant angry over the Hippogriff thing, because he knew Potter was chummy with Hagrid.

He hesitated, staring at the parchment sinking soundlessly into the liquid of the sieve.

There had to be a safe point. That was the theory Draco had been working with. He knew he and Potter could be friends, he'd seen that in the Madam Malkin's If. There were a thousand ways it could fall apart, but ... there had to be a point where they understood each other; where every little thing wouldn't break them into pieces any more. Didn't there?

He bit his lip, blinking away his tiredness, and wished he could make that sound more convincing. Then he reached his wand through the silver rings and touched it to the surface of the sieve.

If

Bright sunshine made him squint up his eyes as the scene steadied around him. Green lawns swept below him to the giant squid's lake glinting blue and gold. Students were scattered in clumps on the grass, books spread out in lazy and mostly ignored piles around them.

Sieve Draco sat on the grass, leaning against the shady trunk of a tree just a few feet away. Pansy was using his shoulder as a backrest as she sat sideways against him. Crabbe was sprawled out beyond the patch of shade, a frown of concentration directed at what looked like Charms homework, and Goyle was reading a Martin Miggs comic next to him.

They didn't look any younger than Draco was now. It could have been the beginning of this term.

"What on earth ...?" he murmured, looking around. How could the results of a choice made in third year really be best seen in seventh year?

"Draco," Pansy said, staring droopy-eyed down at the heavy book on her knees. "Remind me why I took NEWT level Transfiguration?"

"Because your mother would have disowned you otherwise," Sieve Draco said, not looking up.

Pansy sighed and flopped her head backwards against his shoulder.

"It's ridiculous, though," she said. "Give me one real world example where I would need to transfigure a kitchen chair into a mirror-winged beetle hybrid. It's just not practical."

Sieve Draco twisted to give her a lazy smile. "When you do hit a kitchen chair/mirror-winged beetle emergency, isn't it nice to know you'll be ready?"

She sneered at him.

"Goyle's not studying," she decided. "And NEWTs are ages away. I've had enough."

"I am studying!" Goyle cried, lifting his head. "For Muggle Studies!"

Crabbe snorted.

"They put a comic book on the syllabus?" Draco demanded.

Goyle hesitated. "They should have."

Watcher Draco didn't hear what was said next, because he was staring transfixed at the tall figure walking slowly over the grass towards them. He looked drained and pale, and he held one arm protectively against his chest, but he was ... alive.

Albus Dumbledore nodded twinkle-eyed at the group of Slytherins as he passed them on the lawn.

Watcher Draco gaped at him.

Dumbledore was alive. In this If, Snape hadn't killed him for Draco last year. Which meant Snape probably hadn't made that Unbreakable Vow to Draco's mother. Which meant Draco mustn't have promised the Dark Lord he'd kill Dumbledore.

Which could mean anything.

"Malfoy."

Draco whipped his head around. He'd been so occupied staring after the Headmaster that he hadn't seen Potter and his friends tramping past the tree Draco and the others were sprawled under. Potter looked down at Draco with dislike.

"Potter," Draco said, getting to his feet. Crabbe and Goyle rose too, in a scramble that left their books on the grass. Watcher Draco saw Weasley glance down at the comic book with a gleam of interest in his eyes.

Pansy very deliberately crossed her legs, adjusted her book, and leaned back against the tree.

"Did you stop here simply to take up space, or did you forget which foot goes next?"

Potter glared at him.

"No, Malfoy. I just wondered if you'd heard from your father recently. You know -- your father in Azkaban."

Watcher Draco was stung by the viciousness of the question. Potter wasn't usually this randomly cruel -- not without some goading.

Crabbe and Goyle cracked their knuckles and moved their feet apart a little so that they looked more hulking. Sieve Draco sneered.

"Actually, I did. He had a very special message for you, Potter. He said to tell you that he'd like you to die in horrible pain, begging like a house elf."

Granger's face tightened. "I'll bet he did."

Draco's eyes swept over her. "How's the house elf liberation going anyway, Granger? I see you've already started dressing like one." He smirked. "Of course, Potter always did. I'll bet you and Dobby share wardrobes, don't you, Potter?"

Potter gave him a hard look.

"What do you care what I wear, Malfoy?"

"Oh, please." Sieve Draco rolled his eyes. "I don't care if you want to wear Rowena's shiny silver tiara, Potter. Just follow my father's advice and go and die somewhere, would you?" He grinned. "The Forbidden Forest is close. Find somewhere nice and dark. Maybe in that nest of acromantulas."

Potter opened his mouth, flushing. Granger grabbed his arm.

"He's not worth it, Harry."

Sieve Draco flopped back onto the grass as they walked away. He looked pleased that he'd got the last good insult in.

Pansy raised her eyebrows. "Rowena's shiny tiara, Draco? That was the best you could do?" The scene began to darken around her voice. "Sometimes I think you two don't think about these little conflicts at all."

*

Draco wobbled, grabbed the desk in the library. He dropped sideways into a chair.

The light was a lot stronger, now. It almost looked like a legitimate time to be up and about.

He gazed around, feeling aimless.

That's it. He blinked a few times, slowly. His eyes felt dry and uncomfortable.

He'd been wrong. He'd been sure, but he'd been wrong. He'd seen seven Ifs. Seven possibilities and every time, he and Potter finished as enemies. There was no way to change it.

Part of him rebelled against that, clamoured ideas for new Ifs. It was useless, though; he'd known that for a bit, if he was honest.

Well. He focused on the long window. Outside, the Hogwarts grounds were beginning to wake up, chill and fresh in the early morning.

It wasn't as though he wasn't used to being enemies with Potter. It was as easy as breathing. He could do it on his head.

The whomping willow was swatting idly at something down near the forest. He looked away.

"Malfoy?"

He was slow to locate the voice. Potter. Oh, of course. Obviously there would be Potter.

The other boy pushed his glasses up his nose and stepped closer, out of the shadow of the tall shelves surrounding the desk.

Draco sneered tiredly. "Did you forget something you wanted to say? Have you been lying awake thinking up the perfect comeback?"

Potter flushed. "No. That wasn't it."

He looked tired; almost as tired as Draco, as though he had been lying awake. He had a nervous energy about him, though. He rocked back and forth on his heels as he looked at Draco.

"Um," he said. "I think ... I may have been wrong. A bit. In the forest yesterday."

It took a moment for Draco's sleep-deprived brain to process that.

"What?"

Potter looked away. He was wearing soft sleeping pants and a shirt worn so thin and pale it was almost colourless. It was too big, like all his clothes other than his uniform robes, and it slipped off one of his shoulders. He fiddled with the hem.

"It -- you could have been killed that evening, with the willow."

That had occurred to Draco at the time, actually.

"And you're always hanging around McGonagall's office." The words sounded as though they'd been dragged out of him. "So maybe ... I guess you were telling the truth."

Draco blinked at him.

No. Some part of him was backing away. I know how this goes. I can't do it. I can't stand nearly getting there and then watching it all fall apart; not for real.

He shook the thought off.

"And you did really help us," Potter continued quickly. "If we'd tried to break free we probably would have been in the hospital wing for a month. And then we couldn't have gone out and got the Hufflepuff Cu -- er, I mean we couldn't have ..."

Draco was a little bit interested despite himself. "I thought I saw Granger carrying a goblet or something that day," he said. "Is that what it was? The Hufflepuff Cup?"

"No," Potter said. "Did I say that? I meant to say something different."

Draco frowned. "Why on earth are you collecting Founder memoribilia, though? Are you trying to spur the Dark Lord into a jealous rage? I remember Father saying that he had an enthusiasm for that sort of thing."

Potter looked torn. "That's not what we're doing," he said. "Honestly. Although if it was, it would be for something like that. To make Voldemort jealous."

Draco raised his eyebrows. "Uh huh." He leaned back in his chair, tilting his head so that he could see Potter properly. "What's next, then? A desperate adventure to capture Salazar's candle holder? Mad hijinks to retrieve Godric's snuggly blanket? A daring jewel heist to sieze Rowena's ... tiara ...?" He paused. "Er. Rowena's tiara?"

Potter fixed him with a narrow look. "Do you know something about the Ravenclaw crown, Malfoy?"

Draco didn't answer. He was trying to remember what his Sieve self had said in that last If; what Sieve Potter had said. He asked if I'd heard from Father and I said that I had. He frowned, working it out. I said Father had a message for him.

And, alright, the message was 'Drop dead,' but still ...

"Malfoy?" Potter peered at him through his glasses, confused now.

Draco waved an arm. "Shush, I'm thinking. Don't try to join in."

Potter made a choked noise. Draco shot him an absent glance and found him biting his lip against what looked like a smile. He ignored it.

Sieve Draco said that Father had a message for Potter; then he mentioned the tiara. Then he told Potter to go off and die in ... He stopped. My god. I gave him a location. The acromantula nest in the Forbidden Forest. A message from Lucius, the Ravenclaw Crown and a location. I am ... completely blind.

He looked up at Potter, slowly. He could feel a wide smile beginning to overtake his face.

"Yes," he said. "I think I do know something about your crown."

"Are you going to tell me what's going on?" For some reason Potter looked as though he didn't mind very much.

Actually he looked as though he was still recovering from the smile. He was blinking and smiling a bit. His hair was messy and in his eyes. It always was; Draco didn't know why he'd noticed it now.

"Later," Draco said. "I think it's breakfast. Don't you think it must be breakfast? I'm starving. I'll tell you all about it afterwards." He stopped, giddy, and grinned. "Well, no, not actually, but I'll tell you the part about Ravenclaw's tiara. And the code. The code was brilliant. That part was probably my idea."

"What?"

"After breakfast," Draco promised. Potter raised his eyesbrows, his gaze lingering on the heavy sieve now pushing the lining of Draco's bag out of shape, but he didn't say a word.

Draco ducked out of the corner the desk was hidden away in, Potter following, and they headed through the large main aisles of the library. It was the first time they'd actually walked together, outside the Ifs. Potter seemed to realise that, too; he looked awkward, unsure of how to hold his arms.

"You know, I had a great uncle on the Black side who collected early Ministry memorabilia. He had this sash of office from the seventeenth century that was designed to strangle any incumbent of impure blood. When I was a kid he used to artfully slip it round my neck every time we went to visit because of this mad theory that there was Veela blood in the Malfoy line."

Potter glanced across at him. "You have the wierdest family, Malfoy."

Draco shrugged. "You should try walking down our family portrait hall. It's total bedlam. My great-great grandparents on the Malfoy-Rosier branch have made a game out of slipping each other shots of poison. It can't kill them because they're portraits but they always go a bit green and faint-looking, and if my great-grandmother's the poisoner she cackles and does this little dance. It's all really disturbing if you're six and seeing it for the first time."

They pushed open the doors to the library and slipped outside. Draco's shoulder brushed Potter's as they settled into step again. Potter darted a look at him and then away, smiling to himself a bit, his cheeks flushed.

Draco felt warmth like sunlight taking over his body as they started down the staircase towards the Great Hall.

All of the other Ifs had ended in himself and Potter hating each other. And maybe one out of seven wasn't the best odds in the world.

But it was enough.

Fin