Refraction

"I do think, half of what we call madness is just some poor slob dealing with pain by a strategy that annoys the people around him."

-Lois McMaster Bujold

* * *

(Harry, 1997)

Sixth year

"It won't do any good now."

He says he doesn't hate me. He doesn't lie. He says he loves me. He just showed me that I'm a monster. He knows I'm a monster. But he doesn't lie. I don't understand. Can he love a monster? No one could. Could he?

"Can you stand, Harry? Do you want to go to the infirmary?"

His voice was cold, so empty of emotion, when he told his story. My story. Will's story. Like ice. Reading the news. Just the facts. Now it's warm and soft and worried. It's my voice, this one. He only uses this voice with me. Mine.

"No. I think I'm okay. I'll go to the Room of Requirement." I often sleep in the Room of Requirement. No one asks me questions, there.

Draco nods, but he still looks worried. Dear, worrying Draco. I think you were hiding behind Cold Bastard Draco the whole time he was breaking my mind. Or maybe my mind was already broken. Sometimes things have to be broken again to be fixed. I know this. It was the Dursley's philosophy concerning me, after all.

Somehow we get there, somehow I walked. Or he carried me. I don't remember. He opens the door now, and the room is lit softly, and the colors are warm, and the bed is huge and comfortable. He leads me to the bed, and waits while I undress. He tucks me in (no one has ever tucked me in), he kisses me on the forehead (does his mother do this for him?), and he turns to go. He turns to go, he turns away, and I'm convinced I'll never see him again. The strangest feeling, but I can't get rid of it. He'll die before he gets to the dungeons. Snape will stab him. Voldemort will take him. They always take what I love and he's walking away from me and my heart is racing and I'll have lost him too--

"Stay!"

He stops at the door. Turns. Smirks at me. "Stay? You mean, stay the night? I'm not you, Potter. My friends will ask questions if I don't turn up."

"Please?" My voice is a whisper. I'm so lost lately. It's a bit pathetic. Draco isn't angry when I'm weak. Draco is different.

Something about my face, I guess, because he hesitates, but he comes back to the bed, and he strips down to underwear, and he lays next to me. I wrap myself around him. He lets me.

Sometimes the warm curve where his neck meets his shoulder is the safest place in the world. Tonight it's not enough. Would I notice if he stopped breathing? (Is he afraid to stay with me because he's a Slytherin and I can't tell the difference between a beast and a Slytherin and a broken child?) If someone snuck in and stabbed him, would I feel it, or only wake up with a cold, cold body...is he breathing now? I can't be sure. Am I imagining it?

I put my lips to his neck, to feel his pulse. I touch it with my tongue, just to be sure, and yes, there it is--strong and surely a little harder and faster than usual? (Is he afraid of me? no) I hold him tighter and continue testing and tasting and no one can take him from me he's mine this heartbeat this body this face this mind--

"Harry?" This voice is a shaky whisper I've never heard before. This voice is mine. "Harry, what are you doing?"

He always tells me the truth. He loves me, he says he loves me. I can tell the truth to him. I have to.

"I'm keeping you," and I mean it gently, but it comes out more a growl. "They're not taking you from me. No one can hurt you. You're mine. But you'd, you were walking away. How would I have known? Someone could have killed you in the hallway and I wouldn't have known how could I have known?" I'm starting to cry again. I'm so weak. But I have to tell him. I once said, once told him I would tell him anything he wanted to know. "You'd be gone too," I whisper. "Like my parents. Like Cedric, like Sirius, like Molly like Will Ferox. . . ." I'm crying too much to keep talking, so I kiss him instead. I kiss him everywhere, because maybe this will keep him here, maybe I can bind him to the earth with my lips, and it's certainly not something I've tried before. I'm whispering, whispering, "Please, please, please," and the word is brushing over his skin with my kisses. His hands are moving, moving up and down my back and gripping my shoulders and pulling me close as if he's trying just as hard to keep me here.

I roll us over a bit savagely, so he's on top now. I don't even know what I'm doing anymore, but I want to know, to be sure that he's alive (and that he isn't afraid of me please don't be afraid not you too), so I pull him down, and he's just as hard as I am and he wants me and I gasp and I'm still whispering, still crying, still pleading. He asks if I'm sure, so I kiss him as hard as I can and when I pull away there's blood on his lips but he smiles, so maybe that's okay.

He mutters a spell. I frown and he smiles again, he trails fingers suddenly slippery down my side, and my groin is on fire, fire spreading up through my stomach, not pleasure or pain but just an intense need to keep going, but I'm still with it enough to choke out, "You would know that spell," and to hear him laugh, gasping. Somewhere his pants are off and so are mine, with legs tangled and more laughing, gasping, writhing...

A blank, a blackout to fire and touch and stabs of sensation, silver hot/cold burning. Then he's inside me, more and more and too much and it hurts and I'm still crying and he's gasping and I want more and he's moving in me and his hands are on me and I'm whispering please again but he couldn't stop if he wanted to his face flushed hair falling forward sweaty and in my mind I'm screaming, shrieking to the gods that this is life, this is too bright and hot and close to earth to take away--not sublime because my legs are cramping where they're over his shoulders and the sweat and tears are stinging in my eyes and I'm nearly sobbing with a golden heat that feels like pain

And I throw my head back, trying to arch up, screaming, screaming for him, and he's screaming too a moment later, still thrusting a little as if he's forgotten how to do anything else, and then he's slowing, slowing and finally stopping. We're coming down, down, my legs back on the bed, and he's not inside me anymore but only on top of me. We're realizing in fragments that the sheets are soaked in sweat, that I'm not going to be able to walk tomorrow, that we're really quite disgustingly sticky.

For no reason at all I'm remembering a poem Hermione once made me read, about a proud king everyone had forgotten. I'm sure, now, that the gods, the world will pay as little attention to me, to us, to my protests. Poor weak humans. Frail. Brief. I can't even remember the king's name. It seems so important, suddenly. What was his name? I can't remember and Draco's face is hidden against my chest and I can't see him and he's not talking to me.

Draco lifts his head very slowly and looks around the room, frowning a little, and now his face is all I can see. The rest of the room is black. Just his face. And he turns to me, and he smiles (it's glorious, his smile. The world holds still for it), and he says, his voice is raspy, he says, "Harry. I think I see a bath in that corner." He nods to it, and arches an eyebrow. I can see it, and I can see the candles now, the candlelight playing softly across his face. He looks wicked and debauched and beautifully, intensely alive.

"Scrub your back?" he asks, and he's still smiling.

I smile back and nod, and tell myself it's awful to be this happy right now.

Ozymandias.

The king's name was Ozymandias. I remember.

* * *

(Severus Snape, 1997)

Sixth year

I walked to Albus Dumbledore's office. I had good news. Albus would be so pleased.

The students like to believe that they can hide their little illicit activities from the professors. They forget that we were also young and stupid; they forget that we know all of their tricks because we once used them--just as we forgot, when we were students. Romances, midnight outings, cheating on exams, incomplete homework--we see it all.

Rarely do students try to hide murder from the professors. Rarely enough that almost no Hogwarts professor would have recognized the signs for what they were.

It is their great misfortune that they were trying to hide a murder from me.

Minerva would have known they were trying to hide something, but wouldn't have guessed what. She would never have believed students capable of murder, but it was obvious to anyone with eyes to see. Draco Malfoy and Luna Lovegood--but no Harry Potter? No. They've been the inseparable trio for the last month. I don't pretend to know why, but they are three, never two.

If it had, by some miracle, occurred to Minerva to blame students, she would have blamed Draco. She would have wished that Potter had stuck by Granger and Weasley; would have wished he had never been corrupted by a Slytherin. She would not, could not have known who was truly responsible for that death. I know.

He sits behind an antique desk in his comfortable, warm office, looking every inch the benevolent grandfather. Looking pleased and benign.

I hate him.

I hate him.

I hate myself.

"Headmaster," I say, and my voice is admirably calm. "Congratulations."

He blinks at me, as if he doesn't know what I'm talking about. As if he doesn't know everything that happens in this castle.

"Oh? What's the good news, then, Severus?"

He phrases it this way deliberately, so that it will hurt me more to tell him. I'm convinced. He already knows. He always knows.

"Mission accomplished," I announce. "Well done, indeed, awards all around. You wanted Harry Potter insane enough to kill? Break out the bubbly, because he is. It's done. Done, and well done. With accomplices burying his bodies for him, as well, so no worries on that score."

"Harry's killed someone," he says blankly. As if he doesn't know. As if he wasn't watching the whole thing.

"That's right," I reply. "A Slytherin. Apparently the Slytherin had cast Crucio--it was the last spell on his wand. Of course, I don't know who the unfortunate recipient was..."

"His name?"

"Why do you pretend to care?" My voice sounds weirdly polite. I'm proud of myself.

"Severus, please." He sounds tired and put-upon. He always has been the better actor.

"Will Ferox."

"Related to the Lestranges?"

Ah. I see where he's going with this now. "Yes. The Lestranges. Cousins. The Malfoys as well. The Blacks. The Princes, if you really want to press the issue."

"Don't be difficult, Severus." Difficult? Oh, no, Headmaster, I'm a pushover. As you well know. "Did Harry know?"

"That all purebloods are somehow related to other purebloods?"

"Severus! Did Harry know that the Lestranges were related to Will Ferox?"

"I doubt it. He's remarkably uninterested in family connections, I've noticed."

"What if he did know, Severus?" Ah, here it comes. "What if his hatred for Voldemort is too impersonal? What if he's only able to kill those who he has seen commit a great wrong--"

"Headmaster, he's just killed a boy he'd never met, as far as I know. I don't know how much more impersonal it can get. The boy was related to the Lestranges--if that was the reason, the Dark Lord created the Lestranges, and I'm certain Potter can work up the appropriate insane hatred."

"Severus, we must be sure--"

"Sacrifice one more innocent, and this whole story goes to the Daily Prophet and Remus Lupin. And don't think you can keep me quiet by killing me--I've already sent messages openable only on my death."

"To whom?"

Façade slipping, dear Albus? "I don't think I'd like to say, you murderous old lunatic."

"Remus."

"No one so obvious; give me some credit."

"Of course. My good spy." Backpedaling. Speaking with Albus is like fencing with the sea.

"No more sacrifices, Headmaster. The boy is seriously unbalanced. That's what you wanted, isn't it? I don't doubt he'll kill me, too, before the end. Surely that was part of your plan all along."

I storm out of the office and slam the door behind me. I have to leave, you see. I have to leave, because I don't want to hear him agree with me--and then apologize.

I deal with enough hypocrisy during my night job.

* * *

(Luna's journal, 1997)

Sixth year

Once upon a time...

Once upon a time, Harry killed a boy he didn't know. Once upon a time, Severus Snape found us, and Draco suspected that he suspected something. Once upon a time, Draco cast his and Harry's new and innovative tracking/listening spell on Severus Snape's cloak, just in case he might have something interesting to say.

Once upon a time, we learned a great deal about Albus Dumbledore that even Draco's darkest suspicions hadn't suspected.

Once upon a time...

The Boy Who Lived is a tool, but we didn't realize how much he was being used as one. Albus Dumbledore is a monster, but he knows that he is. Severus Snape is a good man, but a good man in agonizing pain. Nothing is as it seemed to be. Nothing is as it should have been.

Now we have to tell Harry, Draco and I. We can't tell him tonight. We won't tell him tomorrow, because we're weak--but we'll call it sympathy. We'll tell him the last day before holidays, because we won't have to deal with the consequences--but we'll tell ourselves that we're not telling him so that he'll have time away from Dumbledore; time to work it out without confronting a desperately powerful wizard in a towering rage.

Weakness, cowardice, lies. I think I remember that that's how we got here. It's an easier idea to cope with, overall--easier than the idea that we came to this by virtue. By twisted strength, misapplied. It's better to blame our flaws, because if this is what our strengths bring us, we're doomed. If we haven't been doomed from the start.

Dear God, what will Harry say?

* * *

(Draco, 1997)

Sixth year

Almost I'm beginning to trust Luna Lovegood.

My plan to keep her close didn't take the possibility of murder into account. Yes, I am a shame and a disgrace to my house. It isn't news. She could have destroyed us with this, but she's remained as silent as she ever was. She's covered up a murder. It will never be safe for her to turn on us now, and I have enough faith in her reasoning to believe she knows it. She's tied to us more firmly than I could ever have made her.

She stood beside me as I told Harry about Dumbledore. I told him on the Hogwarts Express, so that there was no possibility of his charging into the school and wreaking bloody vengeance.

He didn't look much inclined to wreak bloody vengeance. He looked inclined to sit quietly and be borderline catatonic, as he has been since...that night.

That night. I don't know what to do with that night, not even in my own mind. He's come to my bed nearly every night since, and I don't know what to make of it, and he certainly hasn't told me. He doesn't speak much. I'm lost somewhere in a confused haze of tentative happiness and smothered fear.

Lovegood looked as concerned as I felt about Harry's lack of reaction. It was almost a relief having her there--having someone understand, having someone to worry with. It isn't right that I feel the need of an ally against my lover. None of it's right.

I remember how dramatically Harry reacted to Dumbledore's first betrayal--to the prophecy. I never thought I would wish to see that reaction again. But then...how many times can he be surprised by this man's faithlessness? This is a step beyond, yes--but was Harry expecting it? He might have been. It's hard to say with Harry, anymore. Maybe it was always hard to say. Maybe no one has ever really known what he was thinking.

* * *

(Padma Patil, 1997)

Sixth year

Well, I've been watching the mad love triangle for ages, by now. Ages. I knew something funny was going on. No way, no way two boys that beautiful could find old Loony Lovegood attractive, no way. And I was spot on! At least, I think I was. It's all so absurdly confusing!

Luna was sitting at the Ravenclaw table for breakfast, because she was down first. They sit at Gryffindor when Harry's first, and Slytherin when Draco's first. How cute. Hmph.

So, Luna was sitting, and Draco came in, and I've never seen him look so tired! He positively crashed at our table! I heard Luna ask why his hands were wrinkled (ridiculous girl--wasn't worried about how tired he was! His hands--honestly!). He said he'd fallen asleep in a bathtub. And she just nodded! Who, I ask you, who falls asleep in bathtubs? It just doesn't seem normal. Surely you could drown. She asked how Harry was, and Draco shrugged. They both looked very worried...and guilty? I just don't ... is it a threesome? I don't understand.

And then, this is the thing, then Harry Potter came down. He was walking very oddly, I thought, and he looked utterly exhausted as well. He sat down like he was glass, which seemed strange. When he reached for something on the table, Luna grabbed his hand and checked it (the cheek of that girl!), and she smiled. It was quite a nasty smile, I thought. She asked him if he had fallen asleep in a bath.

And he said yes!!!

Luna looked, well, she looked amused, to be honest. A little sad, but she'd looked sad since she sat down. Now she looked less sad. Has she been covering for them? Is she involved? Did they dump her? Why are they still hanging around with her? (Why were they ever hanging around with her? She's so odd.)

Anyway, she still had that nasty little smile, and she turned and looked at Draco. His head was down on the table by then, but he must have sensed her or something, because he said, "Shut up." Quite rightly, I should think! And then, I suppose she thought she was being clever, she told Draco, "I don't think the table is able to talk, love." She said love! Draco said, "I hate you." She said, "You're being very hard on that table." Draco growled at her, and she turned the nasty smile on Harry. He was bright red.

In any case, I don't at all know what to make of it. Harry and Draco! It hardly seems right, does it, after that boy died yesterday? I guess boys just don't think of that sort of thing much. Anyway, Parvati will be so scandalized! Oh, I must tell her right away!

* * *

(Harry and Draco, 1997)

Summer

5 July 1997

Potter, are you all right?

Draco

. . .

6 July 1997

Not really.

H.

. . .

6 July 1997

I'll be there tomorrow afternoon.

Draco

. . .

6 July 1997

Draco, no--you don't have to. I mean, the muggles won't react well and I'm fine and you'll just get into trouble with your mother--it's not worth it.

Anyway, how would you even get here? You don't have to bother. Really. I'm fine.

Harry

. . .

6 July 1997

Harry Potter

Number Four Privet Drive

Little Whinging

Surrey

Dear Harry,

I shall be arriving by broom at your Aunt and Uncle's residence at 2pm, the 7^th of July, 1997.

My mother might grieve over my absence, it's true, save that she has not yet noted my presence.

I have every confidence that your non-magical relatives, with a little encouragement, will react appropriately to my arrival. Your concern is laudable, but not necessary.

There is no need to contact me again before tomorrow, as I assure you everything is quite arranged.

Sincerely,

Draco Malfoy

Malfoy Manor

Wiltshire

* * *

(Dudley Dursley, 1997)

I don't want him here.

He ruins everything. He always ruins everything.

My dad's always saying, "Gee, we hate that Potter boy," but the minute he walks into a room, Dad pays more attention to him than anyone. It's not fair.

And Mum--Mum said we have to keep him. After he attacked me! Felt horrible...it was every time my dad had talked about Harry all dinner, and every time I couldn't have something I wanted because of Harry, and that one time the professor told me I was the most worthless excuse for a child he'd ever seen...

He even ruins my sleep. I mean, you can hear him crying and screaming and all that from my room! On and on about Cedric, then about Sirius, then just moaning and screaming all the bloody time...

Now he's got that little freak of a friend of his up there. Won't even talk about the noises they make. Always knew, I always knew...eww! I bet he's been screaming about his boyfriends the whole time! Eww! I was right! Omigod, what if he's been, like, having wet dreams, or, or wanking, and I was just there, not knowing and he was getting the bed all...eww!

And then, anyway, that's just gross, but I have to put up with them during the day, too! His little, little boyfriend is just...well, a freak, obviously, but...he acts like he's better than us. All the time. He sneers at Mum, and Mum just lets him. Like she's afraid of him, or something. I don't get it. I'm not afraid of him. He's just a jumped up little freak, no matter what he thinks he is. No, I'm just not going near him because he's disgusting. I mean, it has nothing to do with what he said.

I mean, he walks in the door, right? And Harry comes running down the stairs like he's crazy, and then they were all over each other--eww--and then--finally--the boyfriend looks at me. He said something like, "How could anyone be indifferent to that?" and Harry said, "I've reached some white-out overload point, I think," and then the boyfriend whispered something about belladonna and something tooth being good fun and Harry laughed--it's probably some kinky sex thing they do...God, I'm gonna be sick.

But the boyfriend, I think he's checking me out. He's always staring at me. I'll show him. I'm not afraid of him. Thinking he can come over here, all acting like he's better than we are and like Harry's better than we are, thinking everyone will do what he wants cuz he thinks he's gorgeous, and like nobody will mind that he's having, having sex with my freakish cousin every night...I'll show him. Get Piers and the guys together. We'll show him all right.

It's not just him now, either. Harry was all quiet till he showed up, then all of a sudden he gets snottier than he was summer before last--and that summer he tried to kill me. Calls us 'muggles' all the time, now. I think Mum knows what it means. I don't think she likes it much. Teach Potter. Bring that boy here, call us names, not even normal enough to see girls...

I'll teach them. I'll teach them both. They can't just ignore me.

* * *

(Harry and Draco, 1997)

10 August 1997

Draco,

Did you make it back okay? You can't tell me your mother didn't notice you were gone for a month. She had to have.

Dudley's still hiding from me. Draco, what did you do to him?

Draco? Thank you for staying with me. Being strictly ridiculous...I miss having you here.

Harry

. . .

12 August 1997

Potter,

Do stop gushing. It's unsettling. I realize I'm a fairly amazing human being, but hearing it all the time...well, it's a bit embarrassing, isn't it?

I did nothing to your revolting cousin that he did not richly deserve. Get him to tell you, if you're so concerned. It was nothing permanent.

Mother is gone, presumably on holiday. My guess is that she sent a note to Hogwarts telling me as much. The world you and I see, Harry, is not the world my mother sees. I don't know what she sees. I don't want to know.

Being strictly ridiculous, I miss being with you. Sadly, you're leaving for Weaseland... tomorrow? And I have no wish to be hexed by, ah, feral humans. I do expect post this time around, Potter.

Draco

. . .

15 August 1997

Draco,

I'm lurking the halls of the Most Noble House of Black.

Tried to ingratiate myself by combining nightshade and powdered unicorn horn, 3:1, at the base of Mrs Black's portrait. Frightened everyone (except, of course, Fred and George, who were very proud) and blew out part of the wall. You were right, though. Very pretty colours.

Now, strangely, I find that I miss Mrs Black. More disturbing, Kreacher seems to have taken her destruction rather better than I was hoping. In fact, he seems to have adopted me as his true master, despite his months of extreme resentment, despite my dirty blood, and despite (or perhaps because of) my tendency to hex him whenever I see him.

Yeah, you laugh, but you want the explanation he gave me for following me around? He can smell you on me. You and your mother, dear Draco, have, in Kreacher's eyes, the clearest claim to him, as the nearest Black purebloods...and I am apparently your little mudblood possession. Thus and thus. Sirius might have willed him to me, but you made him mine. So thanks for that.

If one more person asks how I'm doing, I'm going to scream and hex. It's still weird being here without Sirius. It's pretty awful, actually. Not so bad as last summer, though.

I miss you. I miss waking you up. I miss you smiling and mumbling, "Love you," before you even open your eyes. I'm sick of waking myself up by reaching for you and not finding you where you should be.

You shouldn't be in a lonely house by yourself. You should be with me.

Harry

. . .

17 August 1997

Harry,

Not a lonely house. A lonely mansion. Let the lower classes be stuck in lonely houses--Malfoys do everything with style.

You are not permitted to be depressed. You'll have me in your bed stealing all your blankets again in two weeks. Fifteen days, actually. But who's counting? Practically no time, is what I'm saying. Buck up.

I just wrote "buck up" in a letter. On paper. Kill me now. This is all your fault, Potter.

Oh, you have a loyal little minion. Who killed your godfather. That's so...dysfunctional. And, incidentally, typical of your life. Why hasn't anyone killed that house elf yet? Why haven't you?

Well. Order him around a lot for me. Have him iron his hands and so on. You are my little mudblood possession, after all. It's your duty to obey me. Clearly.

My little Potter all grown up and destroying animate property! Ah! I'm so proud! And you remembered the proportions. I am...dazzled. Truly. I hope the crazed Weasleys praised you lavishly.

Hey, Potter. They ask you how you are because, for some unknown reason, they're fond of you. I feel that we've been over this before. They don't know what else to do for you. Don't snap at them.

I miss you waking me up, too. And Malfoys don't mumble.

Draco

. . .

21 August 1997

Draco!

They want me to teach Defence Against the Dark Arts this year! What am I going to do? Have they gone mad?

Harry

. . .

21 August 1997

Harry,

I would advise you to...well...teach Defence Against the Dark Arts. Call me insane.

Draco

. . .

21 August 1997

Dearest Draco,

You are insane.

What I was looking for here, dove, was a way to get out of this gracefully. You're the Slytherin. Give me a cunning plan. You can see that I don't have time for this--I don't even have time for Quidditch!

And there is Dumbledore.

Harry

. . .

21 August 1997

Dearest, Darling Harry,

You don't have time for Quidditch? Potter, what were those long, sleepless nights I vividly remember spending with you? No, not those, you dirty bastard--the Quidditch ones. Do you remember the Quidditch? Or was that some hallucination of mine, induced by sleep deprivation?

Speaking of which, no more of that. Professor or no, you will not be keeping me up all hours--I need my beauty sleep, and, wow, do you ever need yours. Normal Quidditch with normal people at normal hours, Potter. No excuses. I can't keep up with this two-practices-a-day thing I had going last year. Besides, I want my last game with you. I think I've earned it.

Anyway, are you really trying to tell me you don't have time to teach Defence...because you need to be practicing Defence? Do you see the logical flaw here, Gryffindor? You never felt the DA was too time-consuming.

Don't tip your hand to the Professorhead. Now is definitely not the time, whatever you may decide to do about him later. I think we've discovered that tipping your hand to him is...potentially fatal. Act as normal, Harry Potter. Act as though absolutely nothing has changed. He can't be a consideration--not yet.

Tell you what, you teach Defence, and I'll tell you what I did to your revolting cousin. Deal?

Draco

. . .

26 August 1997

Draco,

I did it. If the Slytherins (etc.) kill me, it's all your fault.

Ron found your last and read the beginning of it. Thought he was going to have a stroke. He says it was an accident...but how do you read other people's letters accidentally? He turned purple. It was funny. He hyperventilates whenever anyone mentions Quidditch, too--but he hasn't told anyone, not even Hermione. It's great. I think he'll spontaneously combust soon.

Had a nightmare and you weren't there. Six days, Draco. Six more days.

Right. Tell me what you did to Dudley now.

Harry

. . .

28 August 1997

Sex kitten,

Do you think Ronnie dearest would like to be in on our little games? Now you're a professor, we could play stern professor/naughty students. What fun! We could use the Potions classroom again!

(Please tell me Weasley read that, Harry, please).

As to your...cousin...I fed him some Veritaserum in front of his friends and asked him a lot of personal questions, to which he gave some very interesting answers. Then I cast Incendio at a bush, just by way of demonstrating what would happen to him should he touch you. It's lovely being of age. I think he missed the meaningful symbolism, though. I don't mind. Have his friends been treating him oddly lately, by chance?

Love, the squishy kind,

Draco

. . .

29 August 1997

Yes, Ron read it.

Yes, he has been taken to St Mungo's.

Draco, that was unkind. Ron is broken. The twitching can't be a good sign. I think Hermione's really worried about him.

I'm not laughing. I'm not.

"Our little games," Draco? Is what we have not enough for you? You want to involve Severus Snape, however indirectly, in our love life? I just don't know if I can go on...

WHAT personal questions, you hideous tease? And where did you get Veritaserum?

Harry

. . .

30 August 1997

Prat,

You know it was all for Weasley's benefit, so there's no need to be nasty.

I'm a tease? That's hysterical, Potter, coming from you.

I made the Veritaserum, Potter. Because I'm talented. Unlike you.

As to your cousin...well, he didn't half fancy us. In a twisted, unsettling sort of way. You and your dysfunctional relationships--it's beginning to be a worry. Also, it makes me wonder how I fit in. Do I have severe psychological problems that I'm not aware of? Gods know you never like normal people. Own up, Potter: what's wrong with me?

Take care how you answer that.

Anyhow, praise me, for I selflessly protected your, um, virtue, and vowed to hex off any bits that might come into contact with you. Well? Are not you pleased?

Two days.

Draco

. . .

31 August 1997

My hero,

Yes, Dudley's friends were being a bit odd around him before I left...save for one ugly fellow I hardly know, who was becoming strangely attentive. He'll have to be really persistent...but then, he does seem to be really persistent. On the plus side, I won't have to worry about the children. Uncle Vernon's going to go spare when he finds out. I promise he'll find a way to lay all the blame on me--and it won't matter, because I'm gone, gone, never-to-return! HA! I wonder if they've figured out yet that I'm not coming back. I wonder if they care at all. Well, apart from Dudley. Eurgh.

What's wrong with you? Let me count the ways...but, Draco, normal people are boring. If it makes you feel better, you're a completely different sort of odd from Dudley's odd--and I don't like Dudley, I just have the great misfortune to be related to him. Anyway, a normal person would never put up with me, so whatever it is that keeps you around--that's what's wrong with you.

Tomorrow, Draco Malfoy. Tomorrow.

Harry