True Faith

~*~*~*~

True Faith 05

~*~*~*~

"And I believe in Love

And I know that you do too

And I believe in some kind of path

That we can walk down, me and you

So keep your candles burning

And make her journey bright and pure

That she will keep returning

Always and evermore

Into my arms, O Lord."

Nick Cave and The Bad Seeds, "Into my Arms"

~*~*~*~

It was immediately after the exchange at the Gryffindor Table that Draco chose to kidnap Harry, and evacuate to a safer venue. Pansy was glaring at him in a way that promised a slow, agonizing death through the most excruciating torture she could devise. He would have to strengthen the wards around his bed this evening, and start sleeping with his wand under his pillow.

He wasn't sure what had possessed him to abandon his own safety, and cross the gulf of space to the Gryffindor Table. He'd seen the atmosphere at the other end of the Hall change the instant Harry had sat down; Harry's posture had subtly shifted to that of a man staring valiantly towards the block where he was about to be beheaded.

He'd feared for a moment that Harry would deny everything, but it became obvious that nothing of the kind was happening; he could see that from Weasley's ramrod-straight spine. Granger, who was sitting across from them, looked alternately horrified and morbidly curious. When it became obvious that neither Harry nor Weasley were backing down from the confrontation, Draco found that he was traversing the distance between himself and Harry without a single thought as to how this would affect him later.

He'd found himself standing behind Harry so quickly it was like he'd Apparated there, his hand coming to rest on Harry's shoulder. He couldn't believe the things he was blurting out in both his and Harry's defense. He didn't particularly care what they thought of him, but he knew that Harry cared very much. It was only for Harry's sake that he had done what he had.

A sudden rush of warmth suffused his entire body. He'd never done anything for anyone's sake, other then his own, until just a few moments ago. This feeling... it was new, and completely unexpected. He felt GOOD- proud of himself. Harry had looked up at him in those few moments, first in shock, and then with great relief mixed with a vague joy. He had no words to describe this new feeling- it tingled on the backs of his forearms, and all the way from the nape of his neck to the base of his spine. It felt like a strange mixture of excitement and nervousness that had distilled together to create an entirely new emotion.

In the space of only a few months, his entire world had undergone an alarming change. Although the more he though about it, and of late it was ALL he thought about, he could see nearly all the way back to where the path started. He supposed he began to question things when Harry refused to shake his hand. The path to where he was now spiraled outward from that point like Dorothy on the Yellow-Brick Road.

Where he was now: they were in an unused classroom somewhere, Harry and himself both panting to catch their breath from the long sprint up many flights of stairs. Harry had draped himself over the surface of a desk, his chest heaving, arms dangling off the sides. If possible, the other boy's hair was in even more wild disarray then usual, and his cheeks were suffused with the color of a healthy flush. His eyes seemed even more impossibly green then usual. Magnified from behind his spectacles, they shone with near feverish vitality and joy, alive and so very real in this incredibly sharp moment. He hadn't seen this kind of lucidity staring back at him from the depths of Harry's eyes since... well, since Gryffindor had won the Quidditch Cup in their Third Year.

'Holy Morgan, mother of Mordred... Did -I- do that?'

His last thought hit him so hard it was almost like a physical blow, and his throat closed in sudden emotion. He nearly forgot to breathe and only remembered that he had lungs when he began to feel light-headed. His whole body tingled, and he could only return Harry's wide grin, feeding off the other boy's intensity. Harry seemed like he was truly THERE for the first time in years, and the thought that he might have been the one to return him... it took his breath away. Never in his entire life had he been looked at in such a way, had he felt so important, or valuable, or needed, or... The feeling grew and churned with such strength in his chest that he was amazed his lungs had room to breathe at all. He had no idea what it was, but it was wonderful. He'd never known that giving and receiving could be the same thing.

~*~*~*~

Pansy Parkinson did the first thing that came to mind when she saw Draco bolt out of the Great Hall, with the Boy Wonder in tow: she headed straight to the office of Professor Snape. He'd be able to sort this out, if anyone could. It HAD to be sorted. There had to be something wrong: a curse, a love potion, something. There had to be something to explain this behavior.

Draco's odd behavior had become far more pronounced at the end of Sixth Year, though he'd started acting oddly in very subtle ways as far back as Third Year. She'd known Draco all their lives; they'd been betrothed since her first birthday.

It had been a terrible shock to her when her father had told her of the letter from Lucius, stating that the Malfoys would be unable to fulfill their obligation, and that the situation was quite beyond his control. There was no elaboration as to why; for Lucius to admit that anything at all was beyond his control spoke of much deeper problem. In their society having different preferences, as Draco so obviously did, was not allowed to interfere with familial responsibility. Something had happened to deem him unsuitable for marriage. This was even stranger because Draco was an only child; normally in these circumstances the responsibility would be handed to next oldest son.

But there was no other son, or even a daughter for that matter. Did Lucius prefer to end a family line that went back uncounted generations rather then allow Draco to continue it? What could he have possibly done that was that bad? Even having a thing for Harry Potter wasn't that bad. The worst thing of all was that she cared- Her mother had advised her years ago that love had nothing to do with a successful marriage, and that it was often its downfall instead. She had been terribly hurt by the letter from Lucius, and it had nothing to do with the dishonor he had shown her family. It would be no problem at all for her parents to find her another potential husband of suitably pure blood. Had nothing gone wrong, they would have been married immediately after finishing school.

The honor of becoming a Malfoy was denied her. She had wanted very much to be Draco's wife; she had, quite against her will, come to love him over time. He was the sort to suffer in silence, all the while putting on a sardonic, self-assured mask. Because she knew him so well, his pain from behind that mask had been nearly palpable to her, although his suicide attempt had taken her completely by surprise.

When Professor Snape had spoken to the gathered house about the near-tragedy, she'd been totally baffled, along with everyone else. However, as she'd thought about it later that night behind the comparative safety and silence of her emerald green velvet bed-hangings, she remembered the letter from Lucius; first their engagement was canceled, and now they were being told that Draco had slit his wrists nearly to the bone?

She obviously didn't know Draco as well as she had thought.

The door to Professor Snape's office was as imposing as an inanimate object could possibly be. It was not ornate or beautiful as one might expect, but was of thick, stout oak planks banded together in solid iron. The door itself had to weigh as much as she did, and probably dated back to the time of the illustrious Salazar Slytherin himself. It had been stained nearly black from the smoke of fireplaces and torches, potion fumes, and the accumulated dirt on the hands of thousands of students over the many hundreds of years. There were several deep scars on the door as well; you could tell their age by the color of the stain in the wood- the darker the stain, the older the scar. The oldest one looked to have been made by a battle-axe, and was stained to nearly the same dark shade as the door itself. The newest ones were pale, and stood out painfully- they couldn't be more then a few years old. They looked distinctly as if someone had used the door to practice their aim with throwing knives. Pansy supposed that there were a great many people who would enjoy using the Potions Master for target practice, but would settle for his office door if he were not available.

Pansy lifted her arm and rapped smartly on the forbidding door. Almost immediately, she heard it unlatch and swing open quickly and silently, as though it weighed nothing at all. "Enter!" The dark, velvety voice of her Head of House bellowed, echoing eerily off the thick stone walls. She had always been just a little afraid of Professor Snape, and with good reason: anyone who had the know-how to create poison that had neither taste nor smell and left no signs in your blood or urine should be feared. She closed her eyes for a moment, cleared her mind and took a deep breath, steeling herself for the ordeal to come.

Professor Snape had and probably would always be an enigma; students and staff alike were never able to find any sort of neutral ground to approach him on. He wasn't an attractive man; or not at first, or even fifth glance at least. He probably cleaned up nice, were he to try- he had some attractive features, the most obvious being his fabulously dark and sultry voice, but the man simply did not have eyes for anything but his potions. Pansy thought he was a prime example of the phrase "There is a fine line between genius and insanity."

Pansy made her way as calmly as possible to the far side of the office and stood nervously in front of the massive well-polished and lavishly carved cherry-wood desk. There were no loose papers in this office- one wall was lined exclusively with filing cabinets, and everything was labeled meticulously, separated by subject; Research and Class. Research was broken down by "Successful" and "Unsuccessful" and then further by the experiment's goal. Class was broken down by the year, then by student in alphabetical order, then First through Seventh Year. After being forced to file homework during a detention, she'd realized that Snape must have every homework assignment turned in from the beginning of his teaching career. She'd made certain to never to get another detention from him.

The man was an insufferable pack rat, but at least he was an obsessively organized pack rat. Currently, he was a pack rat that was eyeing her with increasing disdain from down the length of what was obviously a nose that had been broken at least twice. Somehow that nose, though slightly crooked, maintained a prideful elegance that allowed you to ignore the fact that it WAS crooked. Pansy sincerely hoped that the Professor's eyes were not portals to his soul; if they were, the Professor's soul existed in alternate states of Hell-wrought conflagration, or cold bleakness so frigid it made the Antarctic look like a nice place to pass the Christmas Holidays.

Presently it was the cold bleakness that was glaring at her from down that strangely elegant nose. Struggling not to fidget under the perusal of the depthless black eyes, she began to plead her case. "I think there is something wrong with Draco." She began.

A remarkably well-shaped black eyebrow arched sardonically. "Ah. I had thought that would be obvious even to you, Miss Parkinson. I assure you, I am aware of the problem." The deceptively delicate and pale spidery fingers of one hand waved a little flourish in the air to emphasize that point before joining its twin to form a steeple together in front of his face in what was very obviously designed to look like attentiveness to those not paying attention.

She, however, was paying attention. He was getting ready to toss her out on her ear; she heard it in the tone of his voice. "I don't mean the suicide attempt, Professor. I think he might have been hexed, or..."

"Or?" His considerable patience was rarely wasted on mere humans, and Pansy could tell she'd nearly used up her quota. Professor Snape had a way of making you feel incredibly stupid, and then DARING you to prove him wrong.

"Or, perhaps someone slipped him something in a drink." Pansy finished, making sure her voice didn't tremble and reveal that she was less then certain with her conclusion.

"With what evidence do you come to me with this theory, may I ask?" The nearly sickening politeness with which he enunciated every word translated to 'I demand to know why you are wasting my time,' in Snape-speak.

"I just saw him kissing Harry Potter in the middle of the Great Hall." There. Even Snape looked mildly surprised at that. He pressed one long elegant hand to his forehead briefly, and his mouth tightened. If it hadn't been for one corner of his mouth stubbornly twitching upwards... Pansy was now certain that someone had slipped something into the dungeon's well water. Professor Snape simply did not chuckle, or ever had to struggle to suppress such. That or someone had Polyjuiced into him. Evil weirdness. She swore she saw him bite down on the inside of his cheek, because he sobered instantly.

"I assure you that there is nothing wrong with Draco, outside of his bad taste in company." Pansy felt pure hopelessness crash down on her as the Professor picked up with deliberate slowness the large volume he'd been perusing when she'd knocked on his door.

Well then. That had gone badly.

~*~*~*~

The Slytherin Common Room seemed darker then usual when Pansy arrived back. It was forbidding even in broad daylight; not that any daylight could make its way down into the depths of the dungeon that the Common Room and all the dorms occupied.

Blaise was sprawled out gracefully on one of the leather couches that were strewn about the room, waiting for her to return. Sitting up a little straighter, Blaise pulled her skirt down to her knees from where it had ridden up.

"What did the Professor have to say?" Blaise enquired, draping one arm elegantly over the arm of the couch. Anyone else could have been accused of posing; for Blaise it was just natural.

Snorting ungracefully, Pansy replied, "Basically, he told me to shut my gob and clear off before he hexed me." She turned away from Blaise's observant gaze; though Pansy doubted that Blaise missed the gleam of unshed tears that had refused to be stifled. She heard the creak of the leather as Blaise rose from the couch and the dull clicks the heels of her shoes made against the cold stone of the dungeon floor. Warm arms circled her from behind, one above her breasts, one around her waist. She could just barely repress the sob that was struggling to break free from her chest.

"He doesn't deserve you." The warmth of Blaise's quiet words against her cold ear finally pulled the brewing sob from the depths of Pansy's chest.

"I've loved him for years. And suddenly, he's a completely different person..." Pansy trailed off, and turned in Blaise's arms. She tucked her face into Blaise's neck, and sniffed before continuing. "I wonder if the letter from Lucius and Draco's suicide attempt were connected?" she mused quietly.

Blaise gave her a squeeze before pulling away and took her hand, leading her back towards the couch. Seating herself at the far end, she pulled Pansy down so that she was lying on her back, her head resting comfortably on Blaise's lap.

Pansy closed her eyes, and tried to allow Blaise's delicate fingers gently stroking just above her ear to relax her. She tired to force all her thoughts away, so she wouldn't have to look at them. If anything this made the hard, cold knot in her chest tighten. She couldn't stop the prickle of welling tears from forming painfully behind her eyes. They leaked out steadily, as blood flowing from a cleanly sliced vein.

Was the revolting, frigid coldness what Draco had felt when he'd decided he wanted to die? If it was, she could understand. This coldness, the... tattered gap... It wasn't quite pain, it was just... empty. It was like waking up in a bathtub full of ice, with some of your organs missing.

What she didn't understand was WHY. It was the why of the whole situation that was making this as bad as it could possibly be. This told her that Draco cared nothing for her at all, in fact, hardly acknowledged her existence. Every time something had gone horribly wrong she had tried to be there for him, tried to understand why he acted as he did. Was it something that she'd done or said? Had she hurt or offended him in some way without her knowing she had done so?

Initially, she'd hated the arrangement. She'd known Draco all her life, though she had always avoided him when they were children. In fact, most people had avoided him. He'd always been a cruel child, the sort that would steal or break other people's toys given even the slightest chance.

After the announcement, she'd been forced to spend a lot of time with him. Slowly, over many years, she had realized that all Draco's posturing and hateful attitudes were because he was missing something else. When she freely shared her things he didn't break them, or feel the need to steal them. When you gave things to Draco freely, he treated them with reverence, and gave them back in one piece.

He seemed to act in extremes to everything, though when you realized the pattern his brain worked in, they were easy to predict and control. When they'd started school and they were sorted into the same house, he was even truly nice to her. She'd always gone along with his various plots to torture and humiliate the Gryffindors, even when she knew from the outset that they were doomed to failure.

She really had thought that she had made progress with him- he wasn't an easy person to love. When he'd needed someone to talk to, he had always come to her. Vince and Greg, loyal though they were, were both dumber than a box of rocks, and twice as dense.

She had been thrilled when he'd asked her to the Yule Ball Fourth Year. They'd had fun; she thought- or at least she'd had fun. As she thought about it now, Draco had seemed rather blank the entire time. He changed, somehow, that year. She couldn't point to any one specific thing and say it was different.

Except his way of addressing his parents- he'd started calling them by their first names. She'd thought that was strange, but not overly so- at first she had thought it was a respectful thing. Slowly she had come to realize that every time she heard Draco speak of them, his face adopted the expression of one who had just eaten something disgusting.

Draco was one big stack of mysteries; you'd pick one up to examine it, turn it over in your hand to look at the details, and realize that there was another one underneath the first. He made you feel like you were running around in circles. Twisted in knots. Cold... so cold. The tears continued to trail slowly and gently down her cheeks, soaking into the coarse fabric of Blaise's uniform skirt.

~*~*~*~

Blaise was afraid. She'd never seen anyone like this. Pansy had curled up with her head in her lap, her hips twisted so that her legs fell to the side while she was still face-up. Her hand rested next to her face, her fingers curled in such a way as to resemble the legs of a dead spider. She neither moved nor spoke, though silvery tears trailed steadily over the flesh of Pansy's pale cheeks, rolling down to moisten Blaise's skirt.

She did not shake with sobs, as Blaise would have expected her to. The most frightening part was that her eyelids had not so much as fluttered in the time they had been here. Blank and slack: it like Pansy was willing herself to shut off, to tune out.

Blaise continued to stroke the hair at Pansy's temple gently, loathing Draco with all her soul for doing this to Pansy. They had known each other even longer then Pansy had known Draco; they had been best friends as far back she could humanly remember. Draco had always been a wretched little brat, expecting everyone to defer to and make exceptions for him. Although they had been engaged practically since Pansy had been born, Blaise remembered when she'd found out about it.

She'd been invited over to the townhouse that the Parkinson's' kept in the section of London that had been fashionable in the Wizarding Community at the time. Blaise's mother had been invited too, although she didn't come when she had found out that Lucius and Narcissa Malfoy and their son Draco would also be there. It had been Pansy's ninth birthday, and there had been a small dinner party for the occasion. Why they had chosen the ninth birthday to make the announcement was beyond her- it had something to do with it being the square root of three, and therefore an auspicious number. It was that night that Pansy's father, glowing with pride, had stood up at the head of the table, and lightly tapped his wine glass with his fork. The adults had all been quite pleased with the announcement, though none of the children present were all that impressed, or amused in the slightest.

That night, Pansy had crept into bed with her, and pulled her into a tight embrace. Her face damp and swollen from crying, she had said, "I don't want to marry Draco. He's mean. I want to marry you instead!" This was a memory Blaise held very dear. As the years had past, she had held onto that memory. As Pansy adapted to the idea of becoming a Malfoy after they finished school, Blaise had kept it close to her heart, bringing it forth when the pain of seeing Pansy pine after Draco became too much. And now this.

That Draco didn't like women did not come as any kind of shock to Blaise. He had always treated women dreadfully, even his own mother. Women threw themselves at him, and he had continually brushed them off, always going to the social functions persons of their status were expected to attend without a date. Then at the beginning of this year, Pansy received that letter from Lucius Malfoy. Draco had been ignoring absolutely everyone, and then attempted to off himself, only to miraculously survive and take up with the likes of Harry Potter. One would almost think he was ashamed of his heritage! No matter what had happened to him, she couldn't forgive anyone, even the Dark Lord himself, for hurting Pansy like this.

The grief-stricken girl in her lap still had not moved, and instead of improving, seemed to be slipping into light catatonia. "Pansy?" Blaise stilled her hand in its soothing gestures, but all she received was silence. Blaise firmly gripped Pansy's shoulder and gave her a gentle shake: nothing.

"Pansy!" There was no response. "That selfish bastard. He doesn't deserve you...I won't let him get away with this." Blaise felt tears come to her own eyes looking at the unresponsive girl in her lap. "Why couldn't you love someone who would love you in return?"

Blaise let her fingers trail gently from the widow's peak at Pansy's hairline, tracing over an elegantly arched eyebrow, across a sculpted cheekbone, and down to the delicate jaw-line. A patient hand cupped the other girl's chin in her palm, and leaned over hesitantly to touch her lips to those of her best friend whom she had loved for as long as she could remember.

Pansy's lips were cold, but quickly heated. The skin was just as smooth as she'd always imagined it would be. Very suddenly, the lips of the other girl parted, causing Blaise to freeze where she was.

This was it. She'd though Pansy was too far gone to know what was going on; she'd taken advantage of her friend.

Blaise had never told ANYONE how she felt for Pansy. In their circles, it was one thing for the men to take lovers of their own sex, but it was unheard of for women. Even still, it was unacceptable for such a reason to prevent them marrying, as Blaise suspected it had Draco.

She maintained pressure but did not deepen the kiss; the shock of Pansy's lips moving against hers had made it impossible for her brain to function normally. Against all odds, here it was; what she had meant as a chaste, friendly kiss was quickly turning into something else entirely and it wasn't she that was doing it. The hand that had been resting so morbidly next to Pansy's face had come up to twine in Blaise's hair, fingers threading through the thick strands, while her fingertips gently massaged into the nape of her neck. The tip of her tongue was gliding gently along the fold created by Blaise's sealed lips, questing for entrance.

Blaise pressed her eyes closed fiercely, and colors bloomed like spring flowers behind the thin veil of her eyelids. Did Pansy have any idea of what she was doing to her? Hesitantly, she allowed her lips to part, and the kiss to deepen. Blaise straightened up a few short moments later, and found Pansy's eyes intently on hers.

"Pansy, I..."

"Make me forget him. Please."

Damn you, Draco Malfoy.

~*~*~*~

It had taken a goodly amount of time for them to catch their breath. Partially, this was due to the fact that they were both talking constantly, and laughing somewhat manically over the others' escapades. Draco realized over the course of their conversation that he was in much the same position as Harry- he really knew next to nothing about him, when it came right down to it. Harry too had a face which he presented to the general public, and yet another to his friends. At the same time as noticing this parallel between their personalities, Draco couldn't help but wonder if what he was seeing now was just another face, or if this was really and truly HARRY. He knew what he'd seen last night was; or more accurately, he sensed powerfully that was who Harry truly wished he could be.

They had been talking for what seemed like hours, relating stories and experiences that dated back as far as each of them could possibly remember. In many ways Harry was far more worldly then Draco, and yet very proletarian in some of his likes and dislikes. He looked for a moment like he would lose his lunch when Draco had said he liked caviar ("Fish eggs? People eat that rubbish?") And sushi ("RAW? Bleck!").

Harry, he could tell, had been surprised when he'd learned that Draco read Muggle literature like it was going out of style, and that his favorite writer was Oscar Wilde.

"We can forgive a man for making a useful thing so long as he does not admire it. The only excuse for a useless thing is that one admires it intensely. All Art is Useless.(1)"

When Draco had quoted this excerpt, Harry had looked confounded, and demanded that he explain it to him.

"It's like this", he'd said to Harry, "Useful things are created out of necessity. These things are used in everyday life, and therefore become a fixture. Why should you admire the functionality of your wand? They simply ARE. All wands do the same thing, essentially. In that respect they differ not at all. It is another thing entirely to admire the beauty of the carving of each wand individually. Elaborate handles do not enhance a wand's performance; they are merely for the pleasure of the eye of the user."

He'd seen understanding flicker across Harry's eyes. "I'd never thought of it that way.

Draco had smiled, in a secretive sort of way, at that. "I rather think very few people do. That is one of the major reasons why Muggles irritate me- they create a great many useful things, and admire them shamelessly. I think that is pure egotism! It is different if you can manage to make each useful thing a work or art in its own right. Paintings, music and literature are all positively useless, but they stir the soul nonetheless for it, don't you think?

"I don't think so at all!" Harry's brows had furrowed, and he was gesticulating rather wildly with his hands, as he sought to vocalize the half-formed idea. "Music, especially. Modern music carries so much meaning- it often speaks with far more truth than the news. News is altered to attract readers, whereas music is solely one persons' honest opinion of events, thoughts, and feelings. Poetry is the same way. That is merely one person's views, unclouded. You can tell so much about an individual by their poetry.

"For example, Poe (2)- He had to have been a squib! It was obvious that he was horribly bitter about it. Lewis Carrol (3) was positively mad. Anyone who's read "The Jabberwocky" can tell that. Yeats (4) fancied himself a prophet, you know."

Draco had stared at Harry in quiet disbelief, all the while thinking that this was absolutely wonderful. He could tell from Harry's posture that he was having similar thoughts on the matter; their own social positions were such that people tended to agree with them no matter what they may have thought privately. It was wonderful to have someone who actually had the brains to challenge them and was willing to do so. He supposed that he shouldn't be overly surprised. Harry had always challenged him; why should now be any different?

They fell into a strange sort of comfortable silence. Draco found himself chewing idly on the nail of his index finger, gazing around the strange classroom, his mind blank. Very slowly, the details of the classroom materialized in his conscious.

"Harry, is this the Muggle Studies classroom?"

"No, why?"

"The bookshelves in here are lined with books by all the authors we've been talking about."

After glancing quickly around the room, the life that had been sparkling in Harry's eyes died a quiet death. "I can't believe I didn't realize it. This is the Room of Requirement. I haven't been in here since Fifth Year. This is where I taught the DA meetings."

The abrupt change in Harry's demeanor was horrifying. His face had become slack, his brilliant green eyes now taking on the cast of an old bottle that had not been dusted in at least ten years. Broad shoulders drooped with unfathomable weight, and he curled in on himself. Harry's thin arms twisted together bonelessly, palms clasped, the knuckles of his long knobby fingers white, resting his jaw on his twined digits. He'd just watched Harry age twenty years in thirty seconds. A freezing cavity opened in Draco's chest, the previous warmth sucked away like it had never been there. One simple question or wrongly-spoken statement could do so much damage.

He reached forward and with careful fingers gently tilted Harry's chin up; he didn't miss the flinch as Harry struggled to meet his eyes. "You changed at the end of Fifth Year. Tell me what happened."

Raw pain like that of a rusty knife wound flickered over Harry's eyes. "Sirius died." Harry tore his face away from Draco's fingers. The muscles along his jaw line clenched, his throat working convulsively. "It was my fault. " He finished finally, his voice breaking, hardly above a whisper.

Ouch. This was going to be difficult. Draco knew from recent experience that talking did not necessarily make you feel better. Oftentimes, if forced the event or thought to solidify and make itself more real, and that made it that much more painful. Sometimes things are easier to deal with when nobody knows; that way you can pretend it was all a horrible dream. He couldn't think of anything to say, so he just waited patiently.

"My scar hurts when Voldemort is feeling very strongly about something." Harry spoke very slowly, deliberately. The words seemed to force themselves from the depths of his chest, like he was ridding his stomach of unneeded bile. "Fifth Year it got worse, and I started to have visions. Voldemort realized the connection and lured me to the Ministry with a vision of Sirius being tortured.

"I'd told Dumbledore about the visions. He had Snape teach me to block them. Except, I didn't practice; I didn't try. Then I messed up, and Snape wouldn't teach me anymore."

"So that Remedial Potions line was just that."

"Right, a line. I was convinced that Sirius was dying every second I wasted. I tired to contact him, and his house-elf lied to me and told me he wasn't there. I panicked and rushed off to the Ministry with Ron, Hermione, Neville, Ginny and Luna.

"He wasn't at the Ministry either. The Death Eaters were waiting for us. We were very lucky that the others came when they did. Otherwise all of us would be dead. Except me, since I seem to be able to live through anything out of pure, dumb luck. Sirius died when he fell through this weird portal thing in the Department of Mysteries as he was fighting Bellatrix LeStrange. If only I had done things differently, practiced what Snape was trying to teaching me..." Harry's voice trailed off into silence.

"I think I'm missing something. What was Sirius Black to you?" Draco knew that Black hadn't been the one to kill all those Muggles- the fact that Peter Pettigrew was alive made that obvious. Also, logically, that meant that Black couldn't have been the one to betray Harry's parents.

"My Godfather." A single silvery tear trailed through the perpetual five o'clock shadow on Harry's jaw. Broken. That's what Harry had been through the last year; broken nearly beyond repair. It was like he was being held together by cheap glue, and right now that glue was dissolving quickly under too much strain.

Harry straightened abruptly, and dragged his fingers harshly through his hair, before pushing his spectacles up against his eyebrows and scrubbing at his eyes with his knuckles. "I shouldn't be telling you this. You've got your own problems."

"You had seemed to forget about yours when you were busy keeping anymore of my blood from off the floor. Maybe I'm forgetting about my problems right now." Draco couldn't help but remember how happy they'd been only a few minutes ago; happy because he'd done something to make Harry happy, and that had created a kind of ricochet effect. It had bounced between them, gathering strength and now the bleakness was doing the same thing.

Harry eyeballed him skeptically, his face darkening. "This wasn't a good idea. People who care about me always die. I'd better clear off." The desk creaked as Harry stood up, stretching his denim-clad legs, before turning for the door.

Now it was Draco's turn to wrap himself in his own arms. "No one ever cared for me at all." Harry's fingers froze on the doorknob in the act of twisting it open. Slowly he turned and sagged against the door, sliding down to sit on the cold stone floor.

Elbows resting on his knees, Harry pushed his spectacles up again and dug at his eyes with his palms. "What do you want from me? Do you want my guilt and inadequacy, my fear and my bitterness? Do you really want to know those things intimately?"

"I want someone to know ME; someone to understand me. Don't you want the same thing?"

Harry pulled his hands from his face quickly and peered at him suspiciously. "I don't know. No one has ever tried to really understand me before."

"I asked you yesterday if you wanted to know me, and you said yes. Is it that much of a problem for me to return the favor? You said that people you care for always die; I would already be dead if you hadn't come along, remember? "

"Is this because I saved you? You don't owe me anything."

Draco cocked a sardonic eyebrow at that. "No, you moron. It's because we're alike in a lot of ways. Neither of us had a family that cares about us. We don't have any friends who really understand us; we have worshippers. Both of us were expected to do things we wanted no part of. The fact that you happened to save me from making a ridiculously permanent mistake just made me realize what we already had in common."

The beginnings of a sheepish smile graced Harry's face. "I don't have much to lose at this point, besides my own life, do I?

Draco couldn't help but roll his eyes. "Note to self: If all else fails, be sarcastic." He heaved himself ungracefully away from the desk, and moved to where Harry had fallen to the floor. "A hand up?"

Harry took the hand, and allowed Draco to haul him to his feet. Immediately, Harry wrapped his arms around Draco's waist and buried his face in the side of his neck.

"Thank you." Harry's muttered against his neck, lips ghosting over the pale flesh.

A tiny shiver danced the length of Draco's spine at the soft lips speaking against his throat. He took what he hoped was a discreetly deep breath, before draping his own arms around Harry in turn. "What are you thanking me for?" His breath gusted warmly over Harry's ear, lightly stirring the too-long hair around his ears and nape.

"For actually, really, trying to understand. Everyone: Ron, Hermione and even Neville start to look afraid when I tell them what I'm really thinking.

"Sometimes, they don't seem real to me, you know? They're all soft lines, and smudged angles. Not Neville so much. Of all of my friends, I think he's the only one who even comes close to having suffered as much as I have. I wish I was brave as he is."

Draco tightened his arms at the pain he heard in Harry's voice. "Longbottom? He's terrified of everything."

Harry pulled away to meet his eyes, but did not unclasp his arms. "Being brave doesn't mean not being afraid. It means being able to face what you're afraid of; to be able to face the things that have caused you pain. If you think of it that way, I've never met anyone braver then Neville. After all, after seven years he still faces Snape everyday, whether it's in class of in hallways. He was the willing to help me rescue Sirius too, even though there was a chance he would run in Voldemort there. I've met very few people as brave or as real as Neville."

"Real?" He'd taken to stroking the back of Harry's neck lightly with just the tips of his fingers. It seemed to calm the other boy, as all these pain-ridden thoughts poured from his lips.

"Yeah. People like you and Neville; you're sharp, focused... real. It's hard to explain. People who've had hard lives are deeper, more... I don't know. I don't think of all the people around me who are afraid of this war and are unwilling to do anything about it themselves, as real. They've never known enough pain to be really afraid. I'm not explaining myself well at all." Harry's face contorted as he struggled to think of the words he needed to express his views.

Each of Harry's words was striking strange chords inside his chest. The notes it wrought were painful, as though the chords were struggling to produce deep, sorrowful notes that were on the very edge of their capability.

"You mean people who haven't experienced a similar amount of pain to what you've suffered don't seem real to you, relatively speaking."

Surprise dawned on Harry's face. "Yes, that's it, exactly." Draco felt his lips twist into a lopsided smile.

"You know, right now I almost feel braver then Neville."

Draco's eyebrows drew together in confusion as he regarded Harry's strangely blank expression. "What's that supposed to mean?"

Harry smiled a tiny smile, though it quivered and nearly faltered. "This." He gestured to himself and Draco. "This terrifies me."

~*~*~*~

Notes:

~*~*~*~

(1) This is quoted from the last line of the preface to "A Picture of Dorian Gray" by Oscar Wilde

(2) Edgar Allen Poe; written with "The Raven" and "Spirit's Invocation" in mind.

(3) Lewis Carrol; "Through the Looking Glass", AKA "Alice in Wonderland"

(4) W. B. Yeats; written with "Second Coming", and "Sailing to Byzantinium" in mind.