Chapter Text
Chapter 19
The four Slytherins somehow manage to make it back to their dormitory after their harrowing brush with death in the Forbidden Forest without further incident. Once the door to their room is securely shut behind them and Harry’s invisibility cloak has been discarded on the floor, Harry, Draco, Blaise, and Theo visibly deflate, each exhaling a sigh of relief. They’re exhausted, both emotionally and physically, and they silently agree to leave any further discussion and planning for tomorrow so they can tackle the situation with fresh and rested minds.
Wordlessly, the four boys trudge, almost zombie-like, to their respective four-poster beds and collapse into the warmth and comfort of their duvets. The room is completely silent for a few moments before a light shuffling is heard coming from one of the mattresses. Suddenly, Blaise’s voice calls out, startling his three companions from the brink of unconsciousness.
“Guys?” Blaise pauses, waiting until his friends respond with faint grunts of acknowledgment before continuing. “Next time someone tells us to ‘follow the spiders,’ I vote we just kill them and be done with it. All in favour?”
A chorus of ‘aye’s fills the room as each boy answers without hesitation.
“Motion passes by unanimous vote. Meeting adjourned.” Harry says, his voice rough and slightly slurred from exhaustion. A round of lighthearted chuckles and mumbled agreements follow Harry’s declaration as the four friends finally settle down for the night.
Harry wakes up the next morning feeling surprisingly well rested. For the first time in months, the thought of facing the bustling castle and the cheerfully blazing sunlight doesn’t make him feel moderately homicidal, and that fact alone is enough to make Harry grin as he opens his eyes and hops out of bed.
He instantly notices that his friends are still sleeping soundly, which is understandable, considering the night they’d had, but still quite unnerving, seeing as Harry is almost never the first one out of bed in the mornings. Furrowing his brows in confusion, Harry grabs his wand and quietly casts tempus , squinting his eyes at the blurry, floating blob of light in an attempt to bring it into focus. After an embarrassingly long time, he’s able to vaguely make out that it’s 9:37 in the morning. Harry cancels the spell and sets his wand down on the bedside table, groaning softly to himself as his fingers brush the metal frames of his glasses, reminding him that the minute-long struggle to make his eyes cooperate was completely unnecessary.
“That’s it. I’m getting my bloody eyes fixed.” Harry grumbles under his breath as he grabs the current bane of his existence and situates the wire-frame glasses on his face with a huff of annoyance.
Harry grabs his wand once more and whispers, “ Lumos ,” before shuffling over to his trunk, pulling out a clean set of clothes and everything he needs to take a shower. None of the boys had been anywhere near coherent enough to do anything by the time they’d returned to their dormitory the previous night, resulting in them falling asleep in their dirt-covered clothes.
Taking advantage of being the only person awake, Harry gathers the pile of clothing and various other items in his arms and makes his way over to the bathroom to get ready for the day.
When Harry exits the bathroom, he sees his friends sluggishly milling about the dorm, all three of them seemingly in a trance as they prepare for the day.
“Good morning, lovely friends of mine!” Harry chirps, making Draco, Blaise, and Theo groan in annoyance before whipping their heads around to stare at the dark haired boy in shock.
“What’s wrong with you?” Draco asks, eyes squinted in distrust.
“What? Can’t I be in a good mood?” Harry throws back hastily, turning up his nose at Draco in a rather decent impression of his best friend. Blaise and Theo suddenly burst into laughter and Harry snaps his head around to glare at them.
“You can,” Blaise pauses to straighten up from his laughing fit and clear his throat before grinning cheekily and continuing. “But from our experience, mate, not in the mornings.”
“I strongly disagree.” Draco sputters indignantly at Harry’s response, while Blaise and Theo quickly begin to spiral into hysterics once more.
Once Draco calms down, he takes a deep breath and responds. “Oh, let’s see. You’ve tackled me, thrown me across the room, and let’s not forget the time you almost clawed my eyes out.” Draco lists off, all the while fixing Harry with a deadpan expression that makes mildly Harry fear for his life.
“That was an accident and you know it.” Alright, so before you say anything, it’s been proven time and again that Harry James Potter has no sense of when to keep his mouth shut. So, his response and utter lack of self preservation shouldn’t be all that surprising. However, unfortunately for Harry, Draco is exhausted and already at his wits end, despite only being awake for thirty minutes.
There’s a moment of charged silence, during which Harry watches the seething blond in front of him with a petulant expression.
Draco’s eye twitches worryingly.
Harry grins…
“I’m going to kill you, Potter!” Draco suddenly pounces at Harry, growling with his arms outstretched as Harry dodges to the right and hops on top of his four poster bed.
“Now, now, Malfoy. That’s no way to treat your favourite person, is it?” Harry taunts, watching gleefully as Draco’s expression twists up and his face flushes.
“That’s it! Come here!” Draco leaps onto the bed and Harry only barely manages to clear the other side of the mattress before he’s racing towards the door, laughing all the while.
Blaise and Theo watch on with bored expressions, obviously used to this by now. Suddenly they hear shouting coming from halfway up the stairwell, the words of their two friends echoing off the damp stone.
“You’ll never catch me alive!”
“That’s the point, you lunatic! Now get back here!”
Blaise snorts in amusement while Theo chuckles softly to himself. After a moment, once the yelling has stopped and the cacophonous sound of two twelve year olds running haphazardly through the halls has died down, Theo looks over at Blaise.
“Well, at least life’s never boring.”