Chapter Text
Draco was still awake, listening to the slow, steady breathing of his new roommates as they slept peacefully. He studied the drapes that hung around him, taking in the view from what would be his bed for the next year. With a pang, he remembered his bedroom in the Manor, with its light blue walls and dignified antique furniture that had been passed down from both the Malfoy and Black families for generations.
He shook himself. There was no need for sentimentality. He wasn’t a Hufflepuff—the Sorting ceremony had confirmed that just hours ago.
Gods, the opening feast. He scowled, stomach twisting as he recalled the evening that should have been only celebratory but was turned into humiliation by that Potter boy. How dare he reject him?
“Not all that glitters is gold, son,” his Father always said. “You must choose your allies wisely.”
Draco’d always had friends; his family’s status had seen to that. He had no shortage of children to play with under the watchful care of house elves, while their parents hobnobbed and gossiped over canapés and tea.
But Potter was the first friend Draco’d tried to make on his own, without the convenience of a pre-established, generations-long social alliance, and the rejection had stung more than he cared to admit.
Draco tossed and turned with a frown, eventually pulling the drapes closed around his bed to shield himself from the world for a few hours more.
“Draco!” Pansy hissed.
Draco was pulled out of his reverie. “What?” he snapped, keeping his voice low.
Pansy gave him a knowing look. “You were staring at him again.”
He resented his cheeks for blushing. “I certainly was not.”
“Sure, you weren’t,” she said, rolling her eyes.
Draco huffed and glanced down at the page open in his notebook, which he realized with a jolt of anxiety was completely blank of notes. He looked up to see if he could quickly get down anything Flitwick had written on the board, but the professor had just cast the cleaning charm, the words fading away into oblivion.
“Remember, class, your homework for tomorrow is seven inches on the history of the Summoning Charm. You are dismissed.”
The students stood, gathering their materials into their bags. At the desk in front of Draco, the Weasel was rambling about some nonsense that caused Potter to laugh, revealing one of his dimples. It made Draco’s stomach flip in ways he had learned to actively ignore over the past three years.
Suddenly tired of the company of his peers, Draco mumbled a quick “See you later, Pans,” before pushing his way out of the classroom ahead of the other students. Pansy might have called after him, but he wasn’t sure, and either way, he didn't bother to check.
Draco strode outside, walking briskly past students milling about in the courtyard now that classes were finished for the day. He kept moving until the others were out of sight, stopping when he finally reached the Black Lake.
Draco took a deep breath. The lake had always calmed him when he needed a moment of peace. Something about the smell of the water and the sound of the waves softly hitting the shore put his mind at ease. He sat on a bench, not caring if he got dirt on his robes.
He closed his eyes, enjoying the warmth of the sun on his skin. He’d have to get the notes he missed from Pansy, who undoubtedly had questions about his brusque dismissal after class. But he’d had to get away from her. She’d become far too nosy, far too comfortable minding Draco’s business.
“Keep your enemies under close watch,” Father always said. That’s why Draco was staring at Potter all the time. It was merely surveillance. Gathering intelligence. But he couldn’t tell Pansy, of course; she wouldn’t understand.
He had discovered some very important information, too. He knew how Potter’s cheeks flushed a bit when he laughed. He knew how Potter grinned and stood a little straighter after he mastered a spell in Defense. He knew how to tell if Potter was anxious by how much he ran his fingers through his truly disastrous hair. He’d all but memorized how much brighter Potter’s green eyes were when he was confident—and even more so when he was angry. Sometimes, Draco liked teasing Potter just so he could see those glinting eyes trained on him; so that he could have an excuse to look at them, to sink into them.
“But Harry, they haven’t got a chance! Look, the Cannons--”
The Weasel stopped talking as he and Potter approached Draco’s bench. Draco turned to scowl at them.
“Can I help you?” Draco drawled, “Or do you mind taking your boisterous conversation elsewhere? I was here first.”
Weasley glared at him. “Shut up, Malfoy. We didn’t see you, or we wouldn’t have come any closer in case being a prat is contagious.”
Draco smirked. “Unlike you, I wasn’t raised in a barn, so I don’t carry diseases. But we snakes do bite, so mind your place, Weaselbee.”
Weasley started toward Draco, his fists clenched, but Potter grabbed his arm.
“Ron, he’s not worth it. C’mon.” Potter said, glaring at Draco with his bright eyes flashing.
Weasley gave Draco one last glare before he let Potter steer him away from Draco, who widened his smirk in satisfaction before letting the mask fall away once he was alone again. He sighed, tilting his head back as he let his breathing match the rhythm of the waves.
“P-Potter,” Draco gasped, now trapped between the bathroom wall and the other boy crowding him, his face inches away. “W-what—?”
Potter shook his head, smiling softly. “You heard me, Malfoy.”
“I-I’m not sure I did, actually. Might you repeat it?” Draco felt like flying.
Potter chuckled. “Why don’t I show you instead?”
Potter lifted a warm hand reached up to cup Draco’s cheek, leaned in and—
Draco woke with a start, his heart pounding. Sweat had gathered on his forehead and chest. He blinked, eyes adjusting to the darkness as he realized that he was not in his dorm. He sat up quickly in alarm, only to feel a searing pain in his abdomen that had him lying back down, biting his lip to keep from hissing loudly.
Finally, the hospital wing came into focus, and Draco remembered.
Even when he was using unknown spells to slice Draco’s chest open, Potter’s eyes managed to look compelling. If Draco was going to die, he thought, there were worse sights to be his last.
At first, receiving the Dark Lord’s task had been an honor. Mother and Aunt Bella were constantly reminding him of his role in restoring the Malfoy name, now that Father was disgraced, and Draco had swelled with pride.
That was, until the Dark Mark was seared into his arm, and all he could think during the blinding pain was, “This will be the end of me,” before the world had faded to black.
As he lay there, willing the pain in his abdomen and chest to subside, Draco remembered his Mother comforting him when he was crying once as a boy.
“There is no problem we cannot solve, Draco,” Mother had said. “Your Father and I will make it all right.”
Draco glanced down at the Dark Mark on his arm and wondered why he still dreamed of what he knew he didn’t deserve.
“Draco Malfoy, you are hereby sentenced to three months house arrest, followed by one year of probation,” Minister Shacklebolt banged the gavel, the sound reverberating in the large room before chatter rose from the avid audience.
Draco sat, frozen, as shock rolled throughout his body, tingling his fingers and making his head feel fuzzy.
His mother touched his arm tenderly, causing him to look into her soft gray eyes. A tear was rolling down her cheek as she smiled at him.
“We can go home now, darling. It’s over,” she said, her voice shaking slightly.
Relief washed over him, and tears sprung behind his eyes for the first time since he’d sobbed in his mother’s arms when the war finally ended. Now, he blinked to focus on scanning the room until he landed on Potter.
Potter, who’d saved Draco’s life more times than he merited, more times than was necessary. Draco rose on shaking legs and willed himself to walk over to Potter, weaving through the crowd to approach him. Potter regarded him with a tight-lipped smile.
Draco bowed his head slightly. “Thank you, Potter.”
Potter nodded. “Sure, Malfoy.”
Draco nodded before turning away, stopping when Potter reached out and grabbed his arm.
“Wait, Malfoy. I have something for you.”
Draco looked at him in confusion as Potter reached into his pocket and handed him his wand, making Draco’s eyes go wide.
“Thanks for letting me borrow it,” Potter said, his voice quiet.
Draco nodded again, not trusting himself to speak. He took the wand from Potter’s hand, closing his eyes and welcoming the familiar spark of magic as it traveled through his fingers and throughout his body.
Potter cleared his throat. “Well, er, I’ll see you around, Malfoy,” he said, nodding one final time before turning to leave.
“Goodbye Potter,” Draco said to the other boy’s retreating back.
Draco pushed away his plate of food with a sigh, his stomach too knotted with anxiety to eat.
He looked around at the friends who’d dared to come back to Hogwarts. Pansy sat next to him, lazily shifting the food around on her plate with a fork; she’d returned to school under pressure from her parents, with the spark of confidence gone from her eyes. Blaise sat across from Draco, quietly eating his broccoli and looking around the Great Hall, which was lit up and decorated lavishly to celebrate the opening feast as if the place hadn’t been close to ruin just months previously.
Draco was grateful for the chatter that filled the room with some sense of normalcy, but his chest clenched when he noticed the conspicuous silence at his own table. The first years were clearly terrified, huddled together at the end of the table, while the older students ate dutifully, their expressions blank, emotionless. He swallowed the guilt that rose in his throat like bile.
He let his eyes wander over to the Gryffindor table, eyebrows raising when he saw Potter’s forced smile as he politely engaged with interrupting fans. Granger and Weasley were regarding him sympathetically, as Potter shrugged at his friends in silent apology.
He had always thought that Potter basked in the attention, that he flaunted his fame and enjoyed the fawning from, well, almost the entire Wizarding World, really. But now, as Draco looked closer, he could see the irritation in the way Potter kept his lips pressed together, the small smile plastered on his face not reaching his eyes. He could, even from the Slytherin table, notice Potter’s exhaustion with it all.
Lying in bed that evening, Draco realized that he’d always bought into the legend of Harry Potter. He’d seen exactly what the world did: a boy hero who vanquished evil and lived to tell the tale, over and over again. As jealous as he’d been of Potter, and as much as he’d wanted to push Potter off his pedestal, it never occurred to him that Potter hadn’t put himself there.
Father taught him that no one achieves great power without selfishness; he’d learned that the only way to reach new heights was to put one’s interests first and foremost, and that success was found only by those who were willing to let others fear them.
When Draco sarcastically called Potter the “Chosen One” with his patented sneer, he’d always thought that it was unfair that Potter got both love and fame. Never had he considered that Potter didn’t love it in return. He never thought that someone wouldn’t want to be chosen.
Draco turned onto his side and looked past his curtains out at the window near his bed. He wondered if he would ever be able to choose for himself, or if his life was just one more thing he inherited. The stars winked at him in the night sky, iridescent and golden.