Chapter Text
As the door disappeared, Harry looked around wildly, as though hoping to see another door or escape route. Unfortunately, there were none to be seen. All the room contained were two armchairs and a small side table positioned between them. Malfoy was already sitting in one of the chairs, looking put out. Harry prowled around the room, inspecting the walls and casting unlocking spells, until he realized he was back where he started. Finally, he stormed over to the center of the room and sat down in a huff in the remaining chair.
“It’s the room of fucking requirement, and we require a door. Why won’t one show up?!”
As if in response, a note fluttered down from the ceiling, landing just so on the side table. Malfoy quickly snapped it up, reading aloud, “‘Welcome to the Room of Requirement’s matchmaking service! You may notice the door has taken a leave of absence. Never fear, it will reappear once you’ve achieved your goal of intimacy with your partner.’ What in the name of Merlin’s saggy tits?”
Harry groaned loudly, covering his face with his hands. “Romilda Vane.”
“What?”
“Romilda fucking Vane. She’s been following me around ever since she found out I broke up with Ginny over the summer. She chased me in here. She must not have known there was already someone in the room.” Harry glared over at Malfoy through his hands. “What are you doing in here anyway? I’d have thought you’d avoid the place like the plague after….”
“After my friend died here, you mean?” Malfoy asked icily. Harry looked away awkwardly, not knowing what to say.
There was an uncomfortable silence, until with a small tink, a tiny glass vial appeared on the side table. Simultaneously, more words began to unfurl on the parchment Malfoy still held in his lap. “‘To promote open communication, each partner must drink three drops of veritaserum before answering the questions.’ What questions?”
“Oh no. I’m not drinking anything Vane’s been near since she tried to slip me a love potion in sixth year.”
“Do you see any other way out?” Malfoy sneered. He carefully unstoppered the bottle and lifted it to his nose to sniff delicately. “Odorless. Clear. This is either veritaserum or water.”
Harry relented. “Fine. But we’re only answering whatever dumb questions Vane’s set for us. You ask me anything invasive and I’ll do the same for you. And you’re drinking first.”
Malfoy rolled his eyes. “Whatever gets me out of here and away from you.” He tipped his head back, opening his mouth and slowly dripping one, two, three drops of the liquid onto his tongue. Harry followed, and placed the vial on the side table.
More words appeared on the parchment. “‘Congratulations! You are ready to begin your first set of questions. Each of you must answer each question fully before the next question will be shown.’” He looked up at Harry. “‘Given the choice of anyone in the world, whom would you want as a dinner guest?’”
Harry looked perplexed. “Hermione and Ron.”
“What? Anyone in the world and you choose the two you have dinner with every day?” Malfoy asked, baffled.
“Well...yeah. I don’t want to have dinner with anyone famous or important, I’d just be uncomfortable the whole dinner. I want to have dinner with my friends. Why, who’d you choose?” Harry asked.
“Damocles Belby, the Potions Master and inventor of Wolfsbane,” Malfoy answered immediately. “I’d ask him to take me on as an apprentice. Potions was always my best subject.”
More words appeared on the parchment. “‘Would you like to be famous? In which way?’”
Harry groaned. “I’d give almost anything to not be famous.”
Malfoy looked surprised. “I always thought the humble thing was an act. But here you are on veritaserum, and you really don’t want it.”
Harry shrugged uncomfortably. “It gets me creepy stalkers who chase me into weird love traps like this. No one could want that. What about you?”
Malfoy glowered. “I’m already famous. Or infamous.” He appeared to try to stop there, but the veritaserum wouldn’t let him. “I really would give anything not to be famous for being a Death Eater. I’d like to be famous one day for my accomplishments. Good ones, that is. Not letting Death Eaters into Hogwarts.”
Harry looked at Malfoy, and nodded. Soon, another question appeared. “‘Before making a firecall, do you ever rehearse what you are going to say? Why?’”
Harry blinked. “No, I just throw the floo powder in and talk. Who rehearses?”
The corners of Malfoy’s mouth turned down. “I do. Have to make a good impression.” He waited for more words to appear. “‘What would constitute a “perfect” day for you?’”
Harry sat, thinking for a minute. “Christmas Day at the Burrow -- that’s Ron’s family’s house. Surrounded by all the Weasleys, only it’s not awkward between me and Ginny anymore. Hermione’s there too. Everyone loves the gifts I got them, and Mrs. Weasley has knitted me another sweater. We all go out to play a game of quidditch in the snow, and I catch the snitch.”
“How quaint,” Malfoy answered. “In my perfect day, the Wizengamot reviews the sentencing for my family and gets both my parents out of Azkaban.” Malfoy winces. “My father still has to leave the country though, and my mother and I stay. Fuck, I shouldn’t want that. But I do. I want my father out of Azkaban but far away from me. Damn, I need a drink.” The Room must be listening, because a firewhisky appears on the side table. Malfoy takes a sip and continues. “My probation ends, and I can use my wand out of classes again. I get a letter saying I’ve been accepted into an apprenticeship for a potions mastery. I find a spell to get this damn thing off my skin” -- Malfoy points to a spot hidden by his robes where Harry knows the Dark Mark is -- “and I find a cute boy who’ll snog me senseless.”
Harry’s jaw drops. “A cute boy?”
“Why, you have a problem with that, Potter?”
“N-no, I just...I thought -- you and Pansy --”
Malfoy snorted. “Our parents would love that. No, Pansy’s my best friend. She’s not exactly my type. Not all of us are straight as an arrow like you are, Potter.”
Harry, who had just taken a sip of his own firewhisky, choked and coughed. “Um… I don’t know if I am, actually,” he said and then immediately regretted it. He hadn’t even told Ron and Hermione yet, and here he was spilling this secret to Malfoy?
Malfoy looked shocked. “What? You can’t be gay, Potter. What about that girl Weasley? And you were mooning over that Cho girl all of fourth and fifth year.”
“Didn’t know you watched me so closely.” Malfoy started to turn a distinct shade of pink. “No, I’m not gay. I don’t know what I am. I definitely like girls. I just...might also like boys.” Now it was Harry’s turn to go pink. “Don’t tell anyone, please. I haven’t told anyone else.”
“Not even Granger and the Weasel?”
“Don’t call him that. Yeah, the veritaserum --” He knew it wasn’t the veritaserum. He hadn’t been asked a question, after all. He’d just...wanted to tell.
“I won’t tell anyone, Potter. I’m sure the veritaserum will make me say something I don’t want getting out soon too. Let’s just agree, what’s said in this room stays in this room.”
“Agreed.” Changing the subject, Harry asked, “What’s the next question?”
“‘When did you last sing to yourself? To someone else?’”
“I sang to myself in the shower this morning,” Harry admitted, thankful for the lighter question. “To anyone else...maybe Hoggy Warty Hogwarts, at the Welcoming Feast?”
“I don’t think I’ve sung since before the war. ‘Weasley is our King,’ maybe. Both to myself and to the other Slytherins. Let’s just move on. ‘If you were able to live to the age of 90 and retain either the mind or body of a 30-year-old for the last 60 years of your life, which would you want?’ I would want the body, obviously. Not just for vanity’s sake, getting old looks painful. Plus, my mind might be perfectly fine. Look at Dumbledore. Sharp as a tack all through to the end.” He had the grace to look a little embarrassed at bringing up Dumbledore, likely remembering his attempts to kill the Headmaster.
Harry shuddered. “The mind, definitely. I’ve had my mind altered with, and if I ever experience anything like that ever again, it’ll be too soon.”
Malfoy looked down at the parchment again. “‘Do you have a secret hunch about how you will die?’” His face turned stony. “I worry, sometimes. That someone will take vengeance for what happened in the war.”
“Do you really think that will happen?” Harry asked, shocked.
“Of course I do, Potter. I’m on veritaserum, if I say I worry about it, it’s because I do. Plus, it’s not like people haven’t already tried to hurt me. I’ve gotten hexed in the corridors a few times this year already. And I can’t fight back, not without breaking the terms of my probation.”
Harry became angry. “That’s not fair! No matter what you’ve done, you should be able to defend yourself!”
Malfoy just shrugged. “What about you? How do you think you’ll die?”
“I already died.” Malfoy just looked confused. “In the Forest, Voldemort killed me. I died. I had the choice to stay dead or come back. I chose to come back.”
Malfoy cleared his throat. “Thank Merlin you did.” He fumbled for the parchment again. “‘Name three things you and your partner appear to have in common.’ Oh dear. This will be difficult. Well, we’re both top notch at quidditch, I’ll give you that. Um, we’re both rich. We’re both at least a little gay.”
Harry blushed at that last one. “We’re both competitive. Er, we’re both trapped together in the Room of Requirement. We were both forced into roles in the war we didn’t want.”
Malfoy just looked at Harry until Harry got uncomfortably hot and picked up the parchment himself. “‘For what in your life do you feel most grateful?’ Er, I’m alive. Ron and Hermione are alive. A year ago, I wasn’t sure any of us would last.”
“I’m not in Azkaban. My mother only got two years in Azkaban, when it could be way worse. I never got to properly thank you for that, by the way. Without your testimony, Mother and I would both be in Azkaban for life.”
“I just told the court what happened. You saved my life by not identifying me in the Manor. And your mother saved my life in the forest by lying to Voldemort.”
“Still. You didn’t have to do that. Thank you.”
They both took a sip of firewhisky and Malfoy read out the next question. “‘If you could change anything about the way you were raised, what would it be?’” He laughed. “I would have liked to not be strong-armed into joining a murderous cult.” He thought a bit. “And beyond that, I wish I hadn’t been taught bigotry. I regret a lot of things I’ve said and done because of it. To muggleborns, and also to other folks, like what I’ve said about Weasley’s money and family. And to you, stomping on your face, saying stuff about your parents...I wish cruelty hadn’t been modeled to me as the way to get ahead.”
Harry looked hard at Malfoy. He knew Malfoy had apologized to Ron and Hermione over the last few months, but he hadn’t known what to make of it. Was Malfoy just trying to clear his name? But here he was, under veritaserum, apologizing.
“What about you?” Malfoy asked. “Obviously you’d wish your parents had been alive, but barring that, what would you have changed?”
Harry gave a tight lipped smile that didn’t reach his eyes. “I wouldn’t have slept in a cupboard, for one.”
“You what?” Malfoy asked, dumbfounded. “I knew you didn’t like your aunt and uncle, but I didn’t know...they abused you?”
Harry wanted to change the subject, but he’d been asked a question and the veritaserum wasn’t going to let him get away with not answering. “Not physically, at least not my aunt and uncle -- my cousin was another story. I suspect they were too scared of me, of the magic I could do, to do that. But in every other way...when they finally gave me a room, they put bars on the windows and fed me through a cat flap.”
“Merlin…”
“Let’s just move on. Here,” and Harry picked up the parchment, “‘Take four minutes and tell your partner your life story in as much detail as possible.’”
“Well, you know most of it. I was born into privilege. Got everything I ever wanted as a kid. Looking back, probably not the best for character development, but I was happy. Then I came to Hogwarts, and I wasn’t getting all I wanted anymore. You were on the quidditch team before me, Granger was getting better marks than me. A hippogriff attacked me and I overreacted. I realized I was gay, and Merlin help me if my parents found out about that. Then the Dark Lord rose again, and moved into my house, and my father was sentenced to Azkaban. I was pushed to take the Dark Mark. I was told I had to get Death Eaters into Hogwarts and kill Dumbledore or myself and my parents would all be killed. I got caught crying about it by you and you sliced me open. I let Death Eaters into Hogwarts, but couldn’t bring myself to kill Dumbledore. He died anyway. Then I tried to do as little as possible for the wrong side of the war, as little as I could get away with without getting killed. I failed to identify you when you were captured, you stole my wand. One of my best friends tried to kill you using Fiendfyre and ended up killing himself instead, and you saved me from the fire. Then after the war, I went on trial, got probation, and here I am back at Hogwarts.”
“Whew, that’s a lot for four minutes. Well, my parents were killed when I was one, and I survived a killing curse that rebounded on Voldemort. I was sent to live with my Aunt and Uncle, who abused me, and my cousin, who beat me up. They lied that my parents died in a car crash and never told me that I was a wizard. When I was turning eleven, I got a series of owls that scared the hell out of my Aunt and Uncle, who hid them from me until Hagrid came down and told me I was a wizard. He also told me I was famous, and what for. My first year at Hogwarts, I hid a dragon, fought a mountain troll, and made it through a series of increasingly ridiculous trials until I came face to face with Voldemort and hid the Philosopher’s Stone from him. My second year I killed a basilisk and faced a young version of Voldemort from a diary (thanks to your dad for that one). My third year I was told the man who betrayed my parents to Voldemort had escaped from Azkaban to hunt me down, but it turns out the real man who betrayed my parents was my best friend’s rat. My fourth year I had my name put in the goblet of fire for the Triwizard Tournament because for some reason this was thought of as the best way for me to touch a portkey that transported me to Voldemort to help him resurrect. I got Cedric Diggory killed by taking him with me on the portkey. Fifth year no one believed me that Voldemort was back, I got horrible dreams about Voldemort and one told me to go to the department of mysteries, where I got my godfather killed in the ensuing battle. Sixth year you break my nose, I find a potions book that helps me become excellent at potions and gives me a spell I use without thinking that slices you open. I find out how to kill Voldemort and start on that journey. Seventh year I’m on the run, continuing the journey to kill Voldemort, until I finally face him, he kills me, then I come back to life and disarm him so his curse rebounds on him, killing him. Er, then eighth year I get stuck in a love trap with you.”
Malfoy laughed. “And I thought my life was eventful.”
“‘If you could wake up tomorrow having gained any one quality or ability, what would it be?’”
“I’d want the ability to heal any ailment,” answered Malfoy. “I’ve done so much damage in my life, I want to do the opposite of that. I’ve thought about becoming a healer, but I don’t think anyone wants to be treated by an ex-Death Eater. That’s why I want to become a potions master. So I can invent potions that help people.”
“I would like the ability to just lead a normal life. Not one where everyone’s watching me and counting on me.”
At this, the paper changed again, but didn’t have a question this time. Rather, it had instructions: “‘Your veritaserum should be starting to wear off by now. To receive the next set of questions, you must take three more drops.’” Harry and Malfoy both poured three drops each into what was left of their firewhisky and downed the glass.