Honi Soit Qui Malfoy Y Pense

Epilogue

Harry woke up to the cold. Like a bubble floating inexorably to the surface, his mind drifted into awareness and he could do nothing about it. He tried to fall asleep again, tried to grasp the warmth and sweetness of his dreams and hold them fast, but to no avail, the chill of dawn seeped into his mind and pried it open.

The first thing he noticed was the warm body next to him. Without thinking about it, Harry edged closer, intending to steal some of the warmth the other person seemed so richly endowed with. But the touch of the other’s skin on his own made him jerk back as if he’d been burned. Harry’s eyes flew open.

The world was awash in blurs and smudges around him, but since this was the usual sight that greeted him every morning until he put his glasses on, it was not what started the panic rising inside him. What squeezed his chest until he felt he could never breathe again was the realization of where he was, and with whom. And why.

A tiny tingling still flickered over the part of his body that had touched the other’s skin, as if to mock him. Every detail of last night’s occurrences stood out in his memory with aching clarity: The ball, Narcissa Malfoy, the drink she had given him… and Draco.

Draco. Harry looked to his right and saw the pale figure lying next to him, blurred into a mere blotch by his eyes. He shivered slightly. A weak pull seemed to reach out for him from the white skin, the temptation to touch not as burning as it had been the night before, but still present even now. Involuntarily, Harry backed off. Right now, he wanted nothing more than to get away before Draco woke up and saw him.

Only then did Harry remember the mask. It was still there on his face, smooth and solid beneath his shaking fingers. Maybe that meant all would be well, and he’d get home untroubled. He hadn’t taken the mask off all night, had he? Malfoy didn’t know it was him. He couldn’t know. Harry clung to this vague hope like a drowning man to a piece of driftwood.

As he rose to his feet carefully, Harry's heart hammered in his chest so wildly that he felt sure the sound alone would rouse Draco from his dreams. Nervously, he listened to the sleeper’s breathing, waiting for that inevitable hitch foretelling Draco’s waking. But it never came.

Harry quickly gathered his clothes and dressed as fast as he could with trembling hands, all the while not daring to take off his mask. It felt uncomfortable on his face now, itching and confining. He couldn’t wait to leave the Malfoy estate and finally take it off.

Turning to leave, Harry cast a last glance at the pale smudge that was Draco and froze on the spot as he saw the slim figure now sitting upright, watching him. Neither of them said a word. The silence between them stretched and bulged until Harry thought it would suffocate him. A queasiness grew in his stomach with every passing second.

*He can’t know it’s me, he can’t know it, he can’t know it’s me – *

He stared at the blond helplessly. The idea of just running away never occurred to him.

Then Draco spoke up at last. “What’s the matter?”

Not, “What’s the matter, Potter?”

Inside Harry the tiniest bit of hope began to rise. Whatever had happened between them the night before, Draco would have said his name now, if he knew it. Wouldn’t he? Harry couldn’t see Draco’s face properly from this far away, so he tried to gauge the blonde’s frame of mind from his voice. Draco still sounded a bit sleepy, but his tone also conveyed puzzlement and annoyance. Yet there still had to be a way to get out of the situation, somehow.

“I – it’s late. I have to go now.”

The strength of his voice surprised even Harry himself. This was how people who had just spent the night doing... something (or other) said goodbye to the people they woke up next to, he felt sure. Whether or not Draco felt the same, Harry could not see, and he did not wish to wait and find out. He turned away and started to walk before Draco could whip out his wand and stun him, or call for his father and his Death Eater friends. Or, heaven forbid, try to talk to him about the previous night.

He did not get further than a couple of steps before Draco caught up with him and yanked him around by his shoulder. “What the hell is wrong with you, Potter? You can't just leave like that!”

Harry felt his knees give for a moment. It took him some time to work his voice around the dry hoarseness of his throat. “You knew?”

“You didn’t honestly think a mask would hide you?” Draco asked with a dry chuckle that felt like a slap in the face. “There was still your voice, your hair, your bloody self-righteousness…” He eyed the flabbergasted Harry with mild pity. “I knew all along.”

With fingers that felt numb after the last night’s abundance of sensations, Harry took off his mask and let it fall to the ground. Draco was watching him with an inscrutable expression. He seemed oblivious to the fact that he was still stark naked, and Harry couldn't care less at this moment. “You knew all along,” he echoed, trying to comprehend. “Then, why?”

Draco shrugged and averted his eyes for a moment. When he looked back at Harry, his customary smirk had returned to his features. “You were asking so nicely.”

Anger flared up in Harry. Whatever had he been thinking? No matter what had happened between them the previous night, no matter how close, hot, magnificent it had felt, this was still Malfoy, just the contemptuous prat he'd always been. “That wasn't me,” he said tensely, balling his fists when Draco snickered.

“Of course you would say something like that. I mean, how could you live with the knowledge of not being able to resist my charms? They should rename you The Boy Who Randomly Humps Other People's Legs On Masked Balls!”

More than anything, Harry wanted to hurt Draco now, to wipe that stupid smirk off Malfoy's face for good. And he had an idea just where to strike. “Your mother put something into my drink.”

That had the desired effect. Draco stopped laughing at once. “I don't give a damn if you want to delude yourself about what happened last night, Potter,” he hissed, “but you'd better keep my mother out of this!”

Harry crossed his arms in front of his chest, rather satisfied with Malfoy's reaction. “She gave me a syren's tear,” he said calmly. Harry wasn't all too sure what exactly a syren's tear was, but Draco seemed to know well enough.

“She didn't!” Draco's face turned as white as a sheet, contorted with anger and hurt.

“She gave me one, and took one herself as well, right before you walked in on us,” Harry insisted. “You didn't honestly think I'd have done all that stuff of my own free will?” he added as an afterthought, deliberately mimicking the blond's words from earlier.

Just at this moment and without warning, Draco's mere nearness once more triggered a soft yearning inside him, a longing to touch and be touched; and that, in turn, spurred his anger. What right did the Malfoys have to violate people's preferences like that? There was no chance he'd ever have looked twice at Draco in that way! Was there?

Harry squared his shoulders, nipping that thought in the bud. “I'm going now.” Without looking back, he turned around and started walking again. Draco made no move to hold him back this time.