Obscurity of Love

Chapter Two

~Confusion~

Harry woke the next morning refreshed and content, and he found himseeluctant to move from the cocooned warmth of his bed. As he snuggled even more under the covers, Harry wondered why he'd had such a restful night. As usual, he'd had a nightmare, and then gone for a walk, then there was that ...

Oh.

"Oh no." Harry whistled under his breath. That had all really happened last night. Some unknown boy had accosted him while under the Disillusionment Charm. Accosted him and kissed him senseless.

He groaned loudly, resisting the urge to smother himself with his pillow as he rolled over onto his stomach. How could he have let that happen? He had killed Voldemort; surely, some invisible or camouflaged boy would have been next to nothing to overcome.

He shook his head; he didn't want to think about it anymore. The covers were thrown back as his legs decisively swung out of bed and onto the cold floor, belatedly noticing the lack of noise coming from the other boys. Usually, their dorm was always a scurry of activity; both when sleeping - where Ron's snores would fill the room - and when getting ready for the day. Now however, there was hardly a noise to be heard.

After hastily grabbing his glasses from his bedside table and placing them on his face, he looked around curiously and saw that everyone else's beds were conspicuously empty. Startled, he looked at the clock and saw ...

"8am!" he exclaimed. Breakfast was half over and classes started in one hour, first of which would have to be Pons of course.

Having been accepted into sixth year potions because of a very stubborn Head of House, Harry had even more amazingly been accepted into the NEWT class the following year, after extensive tutoring from Hermione and even, albeit grudgingly, Professor Snape.

The latter name stopped becoming a moot point for Harry by the end of sixth year, as the two had somehow managed to maintain a civil, yet understandably distant relationship. Admittedly, it was a forced one at first; they'd had to resume Harry's remedial potions lessons during the length of Harry's sixth year, and start other extra curricular lessons that would prove necessary for the war.

But afterwards, with neither ever bringing up issues about Harr parents, or Snape's experiences at school, their truce had grown less forced and more relaxed.

That is, if one was to exclude the brief apology Harry had issued the Potions Master one remedial potions lesson when Harry had witnessed another painful moment from the professor's memory. However, a simple frustrated 'legilimens' from Snape had proven his apology to be sincere and solemn, and Professor Snape had relented slightly enough to make their lessons bearable from that point on.

Then during the final battle, the two had fought side by side along with the rest of the Order. At one stage, when Harry had faltered slightly at facing Voldemort, Snape had sent a stunning spell to the Dark Lord, giving sufficient enough time for Harry to pull himself together. After that, all was history. Voldemort was killed, his many death eaters following after him and the remaining captured for Azkaban.

So he wasn't fazed in the slightest when he entered the class earlier than usual to find that the class was practically empty. He gave a faint nod to a surprised Professor Snape as he took a seat and pulled out his books. He looked down at them, but regardless of his newfound energy, he couldn't be bothered to open them yet. He'd never have that same aspiration to memorise every one of his textbooks that Hermione seemed to have. He stopped himself chuckling fondly at that thought. Over the years, Hermione had certainly lightened up, but still, every now and again, he'd be reminded of that bushy-haired little girl chastising him and Ron for breaking the rules on the train that first year.

As he began to tap his fingers thoughtfully onto his textbook, a prickling sensation started up at the back of his neck and spread down his spine as though someone was watching him. Stopping his tapping to rub away the feeling at his neck, he looked up, and feeling slightly unnerved, he flicked his gaze around the classroom, noticing too late that he'd overlooked exactly who that other student already seated in the dungeon with him was.

Draco Malfoy.

Who was currently staring at him with an intent, but unreadable expression on his face. Confused green eyes met aloof grey, then Malfoy looked away with a slight curl on his lips. Harry frowned slightly, not moving his own away.

Draco Malfoy meant confusion galore to Harry. Going against what everybody - especially Harry - had originally thought, the Slytherin boy had not involved himself in the final battle, ignoring both his family and legacy. He'd chosen instead to remain neutral, not fighting for any side in the war.

Dumbledore hadn't minded; he'd allowed him to remain in the Slytherin dungeons, well out of the way of everything. Harry knew all too well that the sly Headmaster did that because anything was better than more of his Hogwarts students moving to the Dark side.

But although it was said that Malfoy had remained neutral at all times, Harry had heard Dumbledore and Snape talking once about another, lesser known spy who had managed to gain enough information to be aware of the final battle. Before then, Harry had always gathered Snape to have been the one to know about the final battle, but after hearing the conversation, his thoughts began to stray to Malfoy.

He was, after all, the undisputed leader of Slytherin house and everyone always followed his lead. Once he had made his decision to stay out of the war, the rest of the House had stuck by him. In Slytherin you'll make your true friends. He remembered the Sorting Hat saying that to him in first year, and from that moment on, he'd actually believed it to be true.

What he couldn't understand though, was why Malfoy would even have warned Dumbledore about Voldemort's final attack. If he was completely neutral to the situation, wouldn't he have just allowed both sides to fight it out? That, at least, would mean whoever won, Malfoy could easily realign himself to them with a minimal amount of trouble.

But that couldn't be the case. Leaking information about the time and place of the final battmeant that the favour had been tipped to the Light side. If Harry hadn't known where and when Voldemort was planning to kill him, he wouldn't have been sufficiently prepared to perform his own plan to bring the Dark Lord down.

At the sound of more people entering the classroom, he dropped his gaze to the table, realising that as he'd drifted into his thoughts, he'd continued to stare at the other boy, who thankfully hadn't looked back.

"There you are Harry." A voice exclaimed behind him. He didn't need to look up to know it was Hermione, one of his closest friends and the only other member of their trio going on with Potions. Ron had discontinued Potions back in sixth year, his marks making the choice for him to continue History of Magic instead of this torture lesson.

"Sorry," he replied, only turning to look as the girl slipped into the chair beside him. "I slept in this morning so I just skipped breakfast altogether and came here."

Hermione smiled brightly. "Ron told me you were still sleeping when he and the others got up." she said, "and I'm just glad you finally got a good night's sleep. You look so much better, so whatever you did differently must be working."

Harry smiled weakly. "Thanks." He didn't want to remind himself what had assured that dreamless and unusually long sleep. It was strange to think that that unpleasant situation had been the one thing that had succeeded, other than the Dreamless Sleep Potion.

"Now," Snape's voice barked loudly and he turned his attention back to the black robed Professor standing by the blackboard. "Seeing as you've all finally decided to wander in, turn to page 394 of your textbooks."

Harry did and looked down at the page. It was a rather complicated potion; according to the ingredients needed, it would take close to two months to brew, even longer than the Polyjuice potion had taken.

"As you can see," Snape's silky voice continued on, "this potion will be the most complicated one yet. Therefore, I will be pairing you up to equally share the workload over the next one and three quarter moon cycles."

Harry automatily shifted closer to Hermione, noticing the envious stares at him being able to snag the cleverest witch for the potion. He grinned despite himself; it was good to have her as his best friend sometimes, it really was.

"Not so fast." Snape said, looking directly at Harry with a malevolent expression on his face. It didn't surprise Harry too much. Though they no longer hated one another as much, Snape still took great pleasure in putting him in every uncomfortable situation possible, and this time would undoubtedly be no different from any other. "I will be the one to designate your pairs. I believe that some have been privy to more advantages than others."

Harry snorted as he stole a look at Hermione. She may be an advantage, but it wasn't as though Harry didn't do his fair share of work. Hermione would always make sure of that.

"All right." drawled Snape, not waiting for an answer as he looked down at the parchment he now held in his hands. A foreboding feeling settled in the pit of Harry's stomach. If Snape had already written them down, then these pairings would be disastrous. "Let's see here. Miss Granger with Miss Abbot ... Mr Smith with Mr Nott ... Mr Thomas and Mr Finch-Fletchley ... Miss Parkinson and Miss Brocklehurst ..."

Harry really didn't like where this list was going. He hadn't heard his name or Malfoy's yet.

"Mr Potter and-" there was a drawn out pause, before a satisfied, "Mr Malfoy."

Hiding his face in the palm of his hands, Harry should have known Snape would be wanting to place him with the one person who drove him insane. Glumly, he waited for Snape to finish calling out the rest of the pairs before he trudged over to Malfoy's table.

"Hail oh saviour of our world," Malfoy greeted in a monotone, not bothering to make space for Harry. "How may I serve you?"

Harry scowled. He hated it when people called him that. The newspapers had been doing it for months and were slowly replacing the other ridiculous title they had been calling him for the past sixteen years. "Shove off, Malfoy. I just want this potion done." He irritably pushed Malfoy's book bag over so he could place his own stuff on the table.

Malfoy's voice was heard again. "Would you like me to speed up time so you can get it done now then, oh saviour?"

Harry didn't reply; he merely stormed off to the ingredients table with his book, ignoring Malfoy's soft laughter. If Malfoy wasn't going to act serious about this potion, then at least one of them would.

Whatever confusion he felt towards Malfoy was always flushed out of his system whenever he conversed with the annoying Slytherin. What he noticed from afar was quite different when close up.

Harry should know, he'd watched him for almost seven years.

He gave a self-suffering sigh as he began to collect the ingredients. It would have been nice if Malfoy had given up his stupid superiority act to help him gather the ingredients. Instead, he - Harry snuck a look over at Malfoy, and scowled as he finished that sentence. Instead, the stupid git was busy sitting down and flicking away burnt ingredients off his desk with a bored look on his face.

With the same scowl still present on Harry's face, he stormed back over to the table with the whole collection of ingredients and dumped them onto their own table. He almost dropped a few along the way, his arms being ladled practically to the hilt, but he managed, with no help from Malfoy of course.

"Heard you lived like a house elf back at your muggle relatives house, but to see you now, I can actually believe it.&rd; Malfoy commented casually, flicking a charcoaled ingredient over at Harry.

Harry stopped organising the ingredients long enough to give Malfoy a contemplative look. "How do you mean?"

Malfoy waved his wand in front of Harry's face. "Ever heard of magic, Potter?" he leered. "You could have just levitated everything over, instead of using the muggle means and getting your hands dirtied."

Harry was not impressed. "Quit it, Malfoy." he exclaimed, flushing slightly in embarrassment. He didn't want to admit that Malfoy had had a point. He knew Malfoy only said it to rile him up. "I'm not going to rise to any of your bait, because I, unlike you have grown up." He deliberateused the same kind of words Malfoy had used against him in fifth year, and he noticed with satisfaction that Malfoy remembered it too.

Malfoy's eyebrow rose considerably, but he didn't answer. Instead he reached for the bat's wings. It was Harry's time to raise his eyebrows and in the silence that grew, Harry's attention was directed towards extracting juice from two dead leeches. His face scrunched up in intense concentration and all thought of Malfoy was momentarily forgotten.

After half an hour had passed without the two sniping at each other more than that first time, Harry relaxed slightly. He had to admit that Malfoy had changed since the war. For one thing, he'd noticed how Malfoy no longer referred to Hermione as the Mudblood, or bragged about the purity of his own blood. He seemed to have finally grown past the discrimination against the type of blood in one's body, which was no small feat. Harry wondered what it had taken to make that change. He doubted it was the war as the other Slytherins still sometimes insulted Hermione and the other muggleborns at Hogwarts.

Another thing that had changed about the pale Slytherin was the amount of dirty tricks pulled on Harry and the other two of their trio. Since the war, there had been only a minimal amount, and none were severe enough to get Harry and his friends expelled. Just a loss of points and perhaps an odd detention here and there.

It was as if Malfoy had finally grown up, but Harry knew that could easily be subject to change, such as Malfoy's previous comments on his 'saviour' status, his current favourite term to greet Harry.

He frowned, deep in thought, and didn't notice he had kept on chopping his already well chopped daisy roots until a pale arm gripped at his.

At the familiar contact, Harry had a flash of recognition from the night before and his head snapped up to look at Malfoy, alarmed. However, nothing gave in the other boy's expression as he stared evenly back, and the moment quickly passed.

"We do want some roots left for the potion, not your fingers." Malfoy informed him, lowering his eyes down to the table.

Brow still furrowed, Harry followed his gaze back down and saw how close his knife was to his index finger. Another few chops and like Malfoy had said, there would have been little pieces of Harry in that potion.

Harry was uncertain what to do, and he cleared his throat a bit hesitantly. "Uh - thanks." he said, his eyes fixedly watching as Malfoy uncurled his fingers from their position on Harry's arm. "I appreciate it."

Malfoy gave a little shrug, but Harry noticed his features softened slightly before they turned back to the potion. "Don't." he drawled. "I only did it because I distaste the sight of human blood."

An incredulous snort of laughter escaped from Harry's nose before he could stop it. "That's a good one." At Malfoy's inquisitive look, he added with a snigger, "you can disembowel toads, work with armadillo bile and dissect newt's eyes, but you can't stand the sight of human blood."

He sniggered again and snuck another look at Malfoy to see his reaction. No doubt something sharp and hurtful would be sprouting out of the other boy's mouth any minute now, and Harry was almost looking forward to the inevitable banter. He hadn't had a chance to let loose like that for a while.

So it was quite unanticipated when nothing was said and the pale Slytherin stood quite still; shoulders rigid and head bowed down to look at the potion. Then incredibly, Harry saw Malfoy visibly relax and the harsh edge from his face disappear as he looked up to meet Harry's eyes.

"Does sound a bit stupid, doesn't it?" Malfoy admitted uncharacteristically, and Harry was surprised at the almost unbidden smile that suddenly crept up on Malfoy's face. When he was like that, the Slytherin boy looked ... almost human.

His surprise must have shown because it disappeared almost immediately to be covered by his trademark smirk. "Well I don't go around looking to get hurt or bloodied so I'm not used to it like you, being the droll Gryffindork you are."

Harry bit his lip to hide his smile. There was the expected jibe, though there was that extra bite missing. Harry found the comment almost pleasant when compared to previous comments thrown between the two and he wondered too, why their style of conversation had so suddenly changed. Only just before had they been snapping at each other like the enemies they were supposed to be. Granted, they'd had hardly any time to converse the way they were now, but still ...

"Of course," he found himself agreeing with a smirk of his own. "Because you cry like a girl when you do ... get bloodied, that is. I can completely understand."

The amusement in his tone must have been obvious because Malfoy didn't shoot back a tetchy reply involving Harry's parents or his friends. "You try getting gored by a Hippogriff," he grumbled instead.

"M'fraid after being stabbed by a basilisk, rampaging hippogriff's just don't do it for me," replied Harry, casually throwing in the next ingredient.

A startled choke came from Malfoy's direction but anything he was about to say was interrupted as the bell rang. Their attention diverted by the end of the lesson, Harry hurriedly dumped the last set of ingredients for the first stage of the potion as Draco stirred it twice in a counter-clockwise direction.

Just in time. As soon as the spoon in Draco's hand was lifted out of the cauldron, Snape commanded them to clear up and place their cauldrons in the storeroom.

The two did so, already falling back into the same silence that had been present during most of the lesson. Though this time it was more companionable than the last.

It was only until Harry rejoined Hermione, and then later Ron that Harry realised he and Malfoy had had a civil conversation. No - more than civil, they had been joking with each other. It was almost friendly.

And Harry found that he didn't mind one bit. Grinning, he turned back his attention to his now arguing friends.

A few days after his memorable Potions lesson, and with no more sights of his mysterious invisible shadow, Harry looked at his watch. He was due to meet Hermione and Ron in the library, but that wasn't for another hour, and he had no idea where she and Ron had run off to. Probably his and Hermione's shared Head Boy and Girl common room, he thought, venturing a guess.

There was no point in seeking themt if they were there; they needed some time alone, or rather, he knew they would prefer some time alone without him tagging along as a third party. They wouldn't be so brash to say that directly to him, but he could tell they'd rather be off together, than play a game of exploding snap or chess with him.

He sighed, feeling like he was in the same position he was in all those nights before. Being left alone. He knew everyone else was once again off with their significant others. He'd seen Ginny drag Neville out of the common room a few minutes before, and Dean and Seamus were up to something in the boy's dorm room, apparently staking claim on it until dinner.

And really, after seven years at Hogwarts there was nowhere else to go. Ravenclaw had the Quidditch pitch that afternoon for their practice, and apart from Quidditch practices, any sort of nice leisurely flies were out anyway. Dobby would be too busy preparing for dinner so the kitchens weren't going to be a particularly nice place to relax. Harry thought hard. Where else? Oh ... the Astronomy tower, but that had an Astronomy class in there at the moment, and he'd already visited Hagrid earlier tt day, so he didn't think Hagrid would fancy another visit. Not when he could be spending that free time flooing over to Madame Maxime's place at Hogsmeade.

The only option left was the room of requirement; somewhere Harry hadn't been for a while. It was and had been a sore point to go there for Harry; many of the students he had taught in that room for DA had been hurt or killed during the war.

As his feet carried him to the room, Harry thought back to the ones he had seen happen before his eyes. Images flashed before his eyes; Parvati Patil being killed by a stray Severing charm, Lisa Turpin, and Dennis Creevey by the Killing Curse. Ernie MacMillan had lost a leg, Dean an eye. Justin Finch-Fletchley had been tortured to the point he had almost lost his mind. Though he fortunately hadn't, his nerves still had yet to recover. Those were the most painful and along with that image of Voldemort, they were what kept him awake most nights.