The Outer Secrets

Chapter One:

Sniffing, Draco frowned, there was no mistaking that smell, it was blood. Looking around at the students around him though, it appeared that none of them could smell anything. Draco turned to Goyle

"Can you smell anything?"

His questioning gaze was met with a dull uncomprehending look

"Nuh."

Rolling his eyes Draco reflected that maybe asking Goyle wasn't such a brilliant idea, the only thing he ever registered was food. Sniffing again though his frown deepened, there was no way that Goyle could have ignored that smell though. Shrugging, he sighed, maybe it was just the late nights, after all, his dreams had been nothing short of disturbing lately. Draco assumed his regular spot at the Slytherin table, his back to the Gryffindors, as much as he enjoyed pissing them off, he didn't want to look at the ugly gits when he was eating.

"Are you okay Draco? You look kind of sick and you've been acting a bit weird lately."

Draco smiled lightly up at Pansy Parkinson who was looking over at him concerned, from the other side of the table.

"I'm all right Pans. Just a bit tired, I haven't had much sleep."

She smiled back and patted him gently on the hand "Well just make sure you get some more then, you look dreadful."

Coming from anyone else, Draco would have pretended to be completely offended and hexed their hair off, but after a few run ins with Pansy he'd learnt maybe that wasn't such a good idea when she was around. Running his fingers through his hair and sighing again, he tried to ignore the smell of blood that seemed to be with him wherever he went and tried to pay attention to the conversations around him.

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"Hey Ron?"

"Yeah?"

"Have you noticed how Malfoy's been acting weird?"

Ron raised his eyebrows at Harry. "Who cares?"

Hermione rolled her eyes "He has been ignoring us a bit hasn't he? Not as many snide remarks."

"Yeah and let's hope it stays that way."

Harry grinned in agreement "So true, it's been pretty nice not having him make rude comments all the time."

Hermione grinned "Oh I don't know, I think I've missed it."

Ron looked at her aghast before he saw the humor in her eyes and then laughed with Harry and Hermione soon joining in.

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Climbing into bed later that night Draco lay back into the mattress, rolling his shoulders and wiggling against the sheets a bit, his back had been aching the past few days, and no amount of stretching or massaging had eased the pain. As much as he hated to admit it to himself, he'd probably have to go and see Madam Pomfrey about it. And he should really speak to her about the smell, he probably had a bloody nose, yuck. He scowled at the thought of going for help, it was all very good to do that when you were faking pain but actually admitting something really was wrong to his friends was a bit much. He knew it was childish but he didn't care, it was just the way he was. Rolling onto his side so his back wasn't pressed so painfully onto the mattress he pushed his face into his pillow in an attempt to get some sleep.

Draco looked around him, he was in a small dark alleyway, a dim light shining through from the street it was coming off. The cobbled stones glinted slightly, a thin layer of water covering them from some recent rain. The shadows loomed up over the exit of a pub which opened out onto it. Looking more closely Draco could see that it was the Leaky Cauldron.

As he was about to step out of the shadows he was standing in, the door swung open and a person stumbled out. He wrinkled his nose in disgust, it was obvious that they were drunk, about to walk away, so he was a was as far from this person as possible he suddenly caught a glimpse of their face, Harry Potter. The Perfect Harry Potter, drunk! Oh this was too good!

Stepping out towards him he smirked, "My, my Potter, what are we doing in a dark alley in the middle of the night?"

Harry turned to face him and froze as he saw his face "Please! Please, don't hurt me!"

Confusion flickered briefly over his face, to soon be replaced with his cool mask of indifference. "And why shouldn't I?" Stepping closer, he noticed that the smell of blood was extremely strong around Potter, and an unexpected, irresistible urge came over him, he reached out, grabbing hold of Harry's hair.

"No! What are you doing?"

Ignoring him, Draco brought his mouth down onto his neck.........

"AAAARGH!" Draco sat bolt upright in bed, ripping the curtains open around his bed and breathing heavily.

"Wha? Draco? Are you all right?" Becoming aware that he'd woken the whole dorm up and they were all looking at him curiously Draco's mind scrabbled for a plausible excuse, for some reason he didn't want to tell them about the nightmare.

"Uh.... Sorry guys, there was a mountain moth on my face." A snickering went around the room, he'd never hear the end of this.

"I still can't believe it! Draco Malfoy! Afraid of a moth!"

"Only one type!"

A bark of laughter came from Crabbe's bed "Which makes it even funnier!"

"Shut up."

"Heh heh, just go back to bed Draco. The big bad moth won't attack you again."

"Yeah, yeah, yeah, good night." Draco crawled back into his bed and waited for the chuckling to die down. His mouth hurt so much! Lifting a hand to touch it he could feel something warm and a little bit sticky on his lips. It was bleeding! He must've bitten it when he was asleep, at least that explained why he could smell blood so well in his dream. Getting carefully out of bed so as not to wake the others again, he quietly crept out of the dorm to the bathroom and looked at himself in the mirror.

He opened his mouth in horror. Not only was there blood on his lips, it was all over his face. Turning on the tap, he cupped his hands under the flow of water and then scrubbed the blood of his face. Looking back up again, he notice that his bottom lip was slightly swollen and his face had gone deathly white making his lips and eyes stand out in stark comparison. What was wrong with him? He'd gradually been getting paler and paler, but this! This was just ridiculous! Moaning quietly to himself he leaned back onto the wall behind him and slid down it so he was sitting on the floor, praying that whatever was wrong he'd get better soon.

Blaise woke up relatively early the next morning and lay in bed vaguely wondering why he felt so amused. Then he remembered, Draco had woken up last night because of some dumb moth! Giggling to himself he got out of bed, pulling his curtains open with every intention to go and wake Draco up. Looking over to his bed though he was surprised to see the curtains already open and Draco missing. Now if there was one thing he knew about Draco, was that he was most definitely not a morning person, so this was just plain weird. Padding out of the dorm he went to investigate the bathroom and grinned to himself, Draco must've really needed to go to get up this early! Opening the door though, he was extremely surprised by what he saw. Draco sat up against the tiled wall, fast asleep and extremely pale.

"Draco!"

The pale blond jerked up in shock and looked around him wildly "Huh? What?"

Running over and crouching next to him Blaise frowned in concern "Are you all right? You look terrible!"

Draco seemed to have woken up a bit more and looked quizzically at Blaise "How'd I get here?"

"How should I know?" Blaise was getting really worried by Draco's evident confusion and put his hand up against his forehead, it was extremely cold, despite the fine layer of sweat. "Man! You must be really sick! You should go to the hospital wing."

Draco shook his head in defiance "No. Not Pomfrey." Placing a hand on Blaise's shoulder to help him, Draco shakily stood up "Just, need some water.... s'all I need... water." Draco suddenly slumped forward, Blaise just managing to catch him and lie him gently on the ground "VINCE!"

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"HARRY!!!!"

"Ugh..." Harry groaned and rolled over onto his stomach "Go away Ron."

Ron grinned and pulled Harry's hair "Get up!" Rolling over, Harry glared up, just a bit to the left of Ron.

"You know, glaring at my left ear really isn't that effective Harry." Ron then proceeded to unceremoniously plonk Harry's glasses on his nose. "Don't forget we've got detention for half an hour this morning."

Harry groaned again, he'd forgotten all about it, "All right, all right I'm getting up." Dragging his legs out of unconsciousness, he promptly fell out of bed.

Ron grinned again "You might want to hurry, we've only got 15 minutes to get there."

"WHAT?!"

Ten minutes later it was a very ruffled Harry and pleased looking Ron who walked down the corridor to the Dungeons.

"I hate Snape."

"Don't we all?"

Heavy foot steps suddenly reached their ears and they rounded the corner to see Vincent Crabbe running towards them, with Blaise Zabini and Gregory Goyle close behind. As they neared them they could tell that Crabbe was carrying a very limp person, jumping out of their way, Harry and Ron watched them turn up a set of stairs and out of sight. A few moments of stunned silence passed, when Ron ventured to speak.

"Was he carrying Malfoy?"

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Draco woke up later to find himself staring up at a white ceiling. Looking around he could see he was in the hospital wing. What on earth? How did he get here? He couldn't remember a thing. A bustling at the door made him look up, Madam Pomfrey smiled back at him "Ah! You're awake! Splendid!"

"What... what happened?"

"Well you fainted dear."

Draco just looked at her "I most certainly did not."

The stocky woman just smiled and took a foul smelling potion over to him "Call it what you will, but I call it fainting, and in the bathroom no less."

Draco covered his face with his hands, it had all come back, he'd actually fainted! How humiliating! Warm hands covered his and gently prised them from his face, "Now, now, there's no need to be like that, drink this up and in a few hours you be much better."

It was a mark of how embarrassed he actually was that Draco actually took the concoction and drank it without complaint, only grimacing slightly at the taste.

"What's the time?"

"Two o'clock dear."

"Two o'clock?!"

"That's what I said."

Draco nearly leapt out of bed "I'm missing potions!" Any excuse to get out of the hospital wing!

Looking down at her patient a little startled the witch tried to push him back into bed, "You can't go to class. You're not fully recovered."

"But I feel fine!" Draco was a little surprised, because that was actually the truth.

"You most certainly don't look it."

Draco jumped up and down "There! If I was sick do you really think I'd be able to do that?"

Madam Pomfrey frowned "I suppose not...." She trailed off and looked at the boy's hopeful face. She supposed she shouldn't complain about a student actually wanting to go to class. ".... Oh all right, but you have to be very careful and don't strain yourself, if anything else happens you are to come straight back!" Draco grinned at her and nodded, pulling on a dressing gown he dashed out the door to the Slytherin rooms.

Madam Pomfrey peered out after he had left and shook her head slightly, it was just unnatural for a student to want to go to class.

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Snape was in a particularly foul mood that day.

"Bet it's because of Malfoy."

Harry had to agree with Ron, ever since they'd told the Professor about what they saw that morning in detention he'd been extremely grouchy. Like Oscar the Grouch thought Harry, then had to suppress a grin at the thought of Professor Snape living in a garbage bin with a worm called Smiley. A small gasp from Hermione brought him out of his day dream and he looked up to see that Draco Malfoy had jut walked into class, looking extremely pale and well.... Sick.

"Mr. Malfoy!" Snape's surprised voice echoed around the dungeons making everyone look up in shock, by now everyone knew that Draco Malfoy had been carried up to Madam Pomfrey early that morning completely unconscious.

"Sorry I'm late sir, I've been up in the hospital wing."

"So I've been told. Are you sure you're feeling completely up to class?"

Draco nodded "Oh yes, I feel fine."

Snape frowned doubtfully, "Very well, take a seat Mr. Malfoy. I hope you get better soon."

Harry and Ron watched in shock as Malfoy took a seat next to Blaise, who leaned in to speak to him.

"He looks like a corpse!"

Hermione shot a glare at Ron "Ron! That's not very nice!"

"What? He does!"

Harry secretly agreed with Ron on that one, he looked, if possible, even worse than he had in Crabbe's arms.

"I can't believe he's better already!"

"Me neither! I thought he was a corpse when we saw him this morning!"

"Ron!"

"Well I did!"

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Draco sighed and flipped his fringe out of his eyes, he wished everyone would stop asking him if he was feeling okay. It was bad enough that Vince, Greg and Blaise wouldn't leave his side as if he was about to collapse the second they blinked.

"Really! I'm fine!"

Blaise just looked at him "Yeah, sure, whatever." Taking his arm he guided him into the Great Hall for dinner. Rolling his eyes Draco gave up on trying to convince Blaise that he didn't need any help. When they got to the centre of the hall however, Draco stopped and sniffed, the smell of blood was back and it was so strong. The pain in his back suddenly became unbearable and he dropped to his knees.

"DRACO!" Draco ignored the shout and the gasps around him. His shoulders felt as if they were tearing up and with an agonised groan he fell forward, clenching his fists against the pain. His mouth was throbbing in pain again, he'd probably bitten his lip once more. His whole body felt as if it were on fire, and he could feel his nails cutting into his skin, then with a ripping noise the pain instantly stopped, leaving him lying on the floor gasping for breath. His eyes were clenched shut, but even without his sight he couldn't ignore the deadly silence. What had just happened to him? Gingerly opening his eyes, he pushed himself up onto his knees and looked down at his hands. His mouth opened in shock. His fingers had lengthened so they were long and slender, long claw like nails coming from them, not only that, his skin was not just pale, it was white. He spoke, his voice barely more than a whisper

"Blaise?"

He felt a person drop down beside him.

"What has happened to me?"

He swung his head to look at his friend and noticed something white hanging around his face, reaching up to brush it out of the way he realised it was his hair.

"Oh Gods..." Draco abruptly stood up, swaying as he did, feeling a little off balance, he could see his robe and shirt lying torn on the floor. The Slytherins that had gathered around him all gasped and backed away. There was something definitely wrong with his back, reaching around behind him he encountered something soft and leathery feeling. The silence was broken by the commanding voice of Professor McGonagall.

"What's going on here? Everyone out of the way!" She pushed her way to the centre of the Students and what she saw almost made her scream out loud. She couldn't tell who it was at first, bare chested, tall with white skin and hair hanging straight to swing lightly just above their collar bone and from their back, a pair of large black velvety wings. Startling blue eyes looked desperately at her searching for answers and as their lips parted to speak she knew. "Mr. Malfoy, I think you had best come with me."