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Chapter Text

The first rule at the Dursleys’ was “Don’t ask questions.” Harry had this rule drilled into him from a young age, so by the time he received his Hogwarts letter, it was second nature for him. That’s not to say that he never asked questions. He still did sometimes — just not as many as he perhaps should have. More often, if he was curious or confused about something, he stayed quiet, made his own observations, and came to his own conclusions. Harry was a bright young lad, and this method served him well. Most of the time. But every now and then, the conclusions Harry came up with were utterly and completely… wrong. 

***

Harry stepped nervously into Madam Malkin’s robes shop. He’d never been shopping by himself before, and he wished Hagrid had at least stayed to speak to the shopkeeper for him. 

“Hogwarts, dear?” a voice called. 

Harry looked past the lines of robes on display to see a woman standing with her wand out in front of a girl who looked about his age. The girl was standing on a wide stool in front of a mirror, her arms held out away from her sides. As the woman flicked her wand, the hem of the girl’s black robe folded back so she wouldn’t trip on it. Several dozen pins came flying out of a box on a shelf, and they swarmed around the girl’s feet, securing her hem in place. 

“Have a seat, dear,” the woman (presumably Madam Malkin) said, gesturing to a nearby chair. “I’ll be with you in a moment.” 

Harry sat down. He was facing the girl, whose eyes slid languidly over his face. 

“Will you be a first year, then?” the girl asked. Her white blond hair hung sleek and straight down to her shoulders. 

“Yes,” Harry said. 

“Know what House you’ll be in?” The girl’s voice was a bit bored and extremely posh. And on top of that, Harry was quickly realizing that she was very pretty. He felt more than a little intimidated speaking to her. 

“Er, no,” he said. 

“Of course, no one really knows until they get there, do they,” the girl continued. She seemed content enough to speak without much input from Harry, for which Harry was very grateful. 

“But I know I’ll be in Slytherin,” the girl said. “Everyone in my family has been.” A measuring tape zoomed out, stretching a line down one of the girl’s arms. 

“I don’t actually know what the Houses are,” Harry ventured. The girl gave him a once-over and Harry felt his cheeks heating up. 

“Are your parents Muggles, then?” the girl said dismissively. 

“Ah, no, they were a witch and a wizard,” Harry said. “But I live with my aunt and uncle, and they’re Muggles.”

“Oh, you poor thing,” the girl said. “How dreadful for you. However do you manage?”

“It is pretty bad,” Harry admitted. It wasn’t something he usually talked about. Whenever he complained about his relatives to Muggles, they would tell him he should be grateful that his aunt and uncle had been there to take him in. They never seemed to understand. But somehow, this girl understood. She understood right away, and it made Harry feel suddenly eager to confide in her. 

“Are they very horrible to you?” the girl asked sympathetically. 

“Yes,” Harry said. “They shout at me a lot, and they make me do chores. And they never make my cousin do chores. And they don’t care if my cousin hits me.”

“The savages,” the girl said, shaking her head. “Good thing you’re starting at Hogwarts soon. You’ll be safe from them for the whole school year.”

“Yes,” Harry agreed, his heart warming at the thought. 

“That’s you done, dear,” Madam Malkin said, taking the black robes off the girl’s shoulders. She was wearing a blue dress underneath with silver embroidery down the front. The fabric looked airy and light for the summer, and the dress fit her very well. 

The girl stepped off the stool and held her hand out to Harry. 

“I’m Draco Malfoy, by the way,” she said. 

Draco? That seemed like an odd name for a girl, but Harry didn’t know much about wizarding names. They were clearly different from Muggle names. 

“I’m Harry Potter,” Harry said, taking the girl’s slender hand. 

“Are you really?”

“Up here, dear,” Madam Malkin said, ushering Harry up onto the stool. Draco watched Harry with increased interest as the tape measure zoomed around him. 

“That’s right,” Draco said, more to herself than to Harry. “I read that Harry Potter was sent to live with his Muggle relatives.”

“You read about me?” Harry said, surprised. 

“Of course,” Draco said. “It’s brilliant that we’re the same age! We’re going to start Hogwarts together! Aren’t you excited?”

“Let’s try these on for size,” Madam Malkin said, pulling black robes over Harry’s arms and fastening them down the front. 

“Yes, only…” Harry hesitated, and then made the decision to confess. “I don’t think I’ll fit in, really. I don’t know anything about magic. I found out I was a wizard last night, and —”

“What?” Draco looked flabbergasted. “You didn’t know you were a wizard?”

“My aunt and uncle hate magic,” Harry said. “They didn’t want me to know.”

Draco scowled, her face darkening. 

“Muggles,” she said scathingly. “They should never have made you live with Muggles. What a stupid idea.”

She tossed her hair, and then her face brightened with a new thought. 

“You stick with me, Potter. I’ll tell you everything you need to know. And any time you’re confused, you can let me know, and I’ll explain things to you.”

“Okay,” Harry said, feeling immensely comforted. 

“I say, who in Merlin’s name is that?” Draco said suddenly. Her attention had been caught by Hagrid, who was outside the window waving at them. 

“That’s Hagrid,” Harry said. “He’s the gamekeeper at Hogwarts. He’s taking me shopping.”

“I’ve heard about him,” Draco said. She looked like she was going to say something else, but she stopped herself, and all she said was, “I’m glad it’s not the Muggles taking you shopping.”

“They would never come here,” Harry said. 

“Good,” Draco said. “This place is for our people. They don’t belong here.”

“Do you think I belong here?” Harry couldn’t help asking. He had never felt like he belonged anywhere. 

“Of course you belong here,” Draco said firmly. “Doesn’t matter that you don’t know anything. You’ll learn. You’re a wizard, and you belong here with us.”

“Oh,” Harry said. He felt a bit overwhelmed, and he didn’t trust himself to say anything else. Draco was the best person he had ever met. 

Draco stayed for the rest of Harry’s fitting, and they left the robe shop together. 

“Alright there, Harry?” said Hagrid, who was outside waiting for him. 

“Yes,” Harry said. “Hagrid, this is Draco.”

“Ah, met another Hogwarts student, have you?” Hagrid said genially, but just then, Harry was distracted by the approach of a woman in a long, flowing grey dress. 

“All finished, Draco?” the woman said, walking up to them. She was very tall for a woman, and Harry was sure she had to be Draco’s mother. He could see where Draco had gotten her good looks. Her mother had the same fine features and the same white blond hair, although hers was longer and was pulled back in a ponytail. 

“Look, I found Harry Potter!” Draco told the woman, putting a hand on Harry’s shoulder. (A thrill went through Harry’s entire body at the contact.)

“Is that so?” the woman said, eyeing Harry with interest. Her voice was a bit deep for a woman, rich and mellow. Harry thought it suited her. 

“Malfoy,” Hagrid said. Harry was surprised to see that he looked unhappy. 

“Hagrid,” the woman said curtly. She turned back to Harry and she seemed about to say something else, but just then another blond woman came up to them. She was tall as well, though not as tall as the first woman, and her hair was a more golden blond. 

“Lucy?” the second woman said. “Are you and Draco ready to go?”

“Mother, look,” Draco said, taking hold of her wrist. “It’s Harry Potter!”

The three blondes all looked at him while Harry blinked. Wait, the second woman was Draco’s mother? Then who…?

“Mr. Potter,” the first woman said, holding out her hand. “We’re honored to make your acquaintance. My name is Lucius Malfoy, and this is my wife, Narcissa.”

Harry shook Lucy’s hand, his mind whirring. So… Draco had two mothers! He’d heard about lesbians, but he’d never met any before. The people in Little Whinging didn’t approve of them. But perhaps the wizarding world was more accepting of lesbians? Or perhaps not, judging by the look on Hagrid’s face. 

Harry tried to hide his own surprise. He schooled his face into what he hoped was a friendly, non-judgmental expression. He didn’t want to embarrass Draco. 

“It’s nice to meet you,” Harry said. 

“Can Harry come with us for the rest of our shopping? Pleeease?” Draco had her hand on Narcissa’s sleeve now. She bounced up and down, drawing out the last word in a wheedling tone. 

“We’ve set aside the whole day for Hogwarts shopping,” Lucy said to Hagrid. “We’d be happy to join you for the children’s sake, if you’re willing.” 

Lucy must be Draco’s biological mother, Harry thought. They looked so much alike. It would probably be rude to ask, though. 

“I, uh. Sorry, Malfoy, but we really have ter be going,” Hagrid said, to Harry’s disappointment. 

“What about just the wand shop?” Draco bargained. “Have you got your wand yet, Harry?”

“Draco,” Lucy said reprovingly. “Mr. Hagrid said no. You’ll see Harry soon enough at Hogwarts.”

Hagrid grimaced at that. Draco, however, swallowed her disappointment and turned to Harry. 

“September 1st, then,” she said. “I’ll see you soon.”

“Right,” Harry said, and he reluctantly left Draco behind, following Hagrid down Diagon Alley. 

“There’s somethin’ yeh ought ter know, Harry,” Hagrid said when they were out of earshot of the Malfoys. “When it comes to wizards, there’re good ‘uns and there’re bad ‘uns. And the Malfoys… well, they’re as bad as they come.”

“I thought they were nice,” Harry said quietly. He’d expected something like this, after the way Hagrid had been looking at Draco’s lesbian mothers. 

“Yeah, well, manners can be deceivin’,” Hagrid said. “I jus’ don’ want ter see yeh gettin’ mixed up with the wrong sort before yeh even start Hogwarts. The Malfoys supported You-Know-Who, yeh see.”

At this point, Harry strongly suspected that Hagrid was just making up slander to justify his dislike of the lesbian couple. 

***

Harry was sitting on the Hogwarts Express with Ron, a boy he had just met, when the door to their compartment slid open. 

“There you are, Harry, I’ve been looking all over for you!” It was Draco, her white blonde hair just as sleek and shiny as Harry remembered. There were two boys standing behind her, both of them taller and larger than she was. 

“Hi Draco,” Harry said. “This is Ron.”

“Hi Ron,” Draco said. “This is Vince and Greg.” She gestured carelessly to the hulking boys behind her. 

“Want something to eat?” Harry asked, gesturing to the piles of cakes and sweets surrounding him and Ron. 

“Harry bought out the trolley,” Ron said proudly. 

“Wicked!” Draco said. She scooped up several cauldron cakes to clear a space so she could sit next to Harry. Vince and Greg squeezed into the compartment as well, digging cheerfully into Harry’s purchases. 

Harry was a little taken aback by Draco’s choice of friends. He’d expected her friends to be more… female. Maybe Draco was a tomboy? She didn’t look like a tomboy. She was wearing another very pretty dress, this one dark green with a pleated skirt. The green contrasted nicely with her sleek blond hair that brushed against her shoulders every time she moved her head. 

Draco and her friends stayed in Harry’s compartment until they were nearly at Hogwarts. Then they had to leave to change into their school uniforms, since they had left their trunks somewhere else on the train. 

“So, you’re friends with Draco Malfoy, huh?” Ron asked when Draco and her friends had left. He sounded a bit unsure. 

“Yeah,” Harry said. “At least, Draco came looking for me, so I think so?”

“I don’t know them well, but I’ve seen the Malfoys around now and then,” Ron said. “I don’t think my dad likes them very much.”

Harry felt a bit disappointed in Ron’s dad (who he had never met), but not surprised. It seemed that wizarding attitudes towards lesbians were not that different from Muggle attitudes. 

“But he seems okay,” Ron hastened to assure Harry. “A bit stuck up, but not bad, overall.”

“Who?” Harry said. 

“What?” Ron said. 

“Sorry… what were you saying?” Harry asked, confused. 

“Oh, uh. I was just saying Draco seems alright.”

“Yeah, Draco’s cool,” Harry agreed. He kind of liked the way she walked about with her nose in the air as if she owned the place. He found her confidence very attractive. 

***

“Potter, Harry!”

Harry walked up to Professor McGonagall, trying not to listen to the buzz of excited whispers that had arisen at the announcement of his name. Turning around to face the crowd, he sat down on the stool. Behind him, Professor McGonagall dropped the Sorting Hat onto his head.  

Slytherin, Harry thought. Please say Slytherin. Draco had already been sorted, and, as she’d expected, she’d gone to Slytherin. 

That’s an awfully big crush you’ve got there, the Sorting Hat said, somehow speaking directly to Harry’s mind. 

Slytherin, Harry thought. Please be Slytherin. 

It’s really not a good idea to be in the same House as your crush from such a young age, the Sorting Hat said. You’d live in the same dorms, have all your classes together… It’s too much. A little space is healthy for a developing relationship. 

But — Harry protested. 

“GRYFFINDOR!!!” the Hat shouted out loud. 

“Bollocks!” Harry said, but no one heard him over the cheers from the Gryffindor table. 

***

Classes at Hogwarts were intimidating, but also exciting. On the whole, Harry enjoyed all his classes — except for Potions. 

“Snape hates me,” Harry groused to Draco as they left the Potions classroom together (Potions was the only class that Slytherin and Gryffindor first years had together, much to Harry’s dismay). 

“He doesn’t hate you,” Draco said. “He’s just old school, that’s all.”

“Old school,” Harry repeated. “What does that mean?”

“Most of the teachers these days are pretty soft, but they used to all be like Snape. My parents told me,” Draco explained. “Snape uses the Socratic method. That means he teaches by asking questions. And he expects us to have done the reading beforehand so we know how to answer the questions.”

“You could have warned me,” Harry complained. “I didn’t know I was supposed to read before the first day of class. That first day of Potions was awful…”

Draco laughed, and Harry couldn’t even be annoyed with her because he loved the way her face lit up when she laughed, her grey eyes sparkling and lively. 

“Sorry, but it’s really nothing to be embarrassed about,” Draco said. “It’s part of the old school thing. The teacher mocks the students who aren’t prepared. It’s practically a rite of passage.”

“Being old school just sounds like being a git,” Harry grumbled. Draco just laughed again. 

Harry was pretty sure that Draco was wrong and that Snape actually did hate him. But that wasn’t the only thing that had been bothering him about Snape. 

Their first Potions class, Harry had thought he heard Snape call Draco “Mr. Malfoy.” He immediately thought he’d misheard. Or he thought maybe Snape had misspoke. But in subsequent classes, he’d heard it again: “Excellent work, Mr. Malfoy.” “Correct again, Mr. Malfoy.”

Harry hadn’t said anything about it at first because he didn’t want to embarrass Draco over Snape getting her gender wrong. But no one else seemed to notice, and Draco herself didn’t seem bothered by it. Harry was beginning to doubt himself, and he finally decided to ask about it. 

“Draco, why does Snape keep calling you Mr. Malfoy?

Draco looked confused. 

“What else would he call me? Don’t Muggles use titles too?”

“Well, yes, but… not quite in the same way. So… Snape is calling you the right thing, by wizarding standards?”

Harry had wondered if wizards addressed everyone as “mister” regardless of gender. But the professors clearly addressed other girls as “miss.” His next guess was that Draco was addressed as “mister” because of her family’s status in the wizarding world. He knew the Malfoys were very rich, so maybe that had something to do with it?

“Yes, Snape is calling me the right thing,” Draco said, bemused. 

“But why are you called that?” Harry asked. 

“I don’t know… That’s just how we do it here,” Draco said. 

Draco did try to explain things when Harry asked. She was good at explaining things like Quidditch and Every Flavour Beans. But she didn’t know very much about Muggles, and so she lacked a frame of reference sometimes to understand what exactly it was that Harry was asking. 

The wizarding world was just complicated, Harry thought. He might never understand all the intricacies of it, since he’d been raised Muggle. 

***

Aside from some good-natured teasing, Draco was fairly nice to Harry. Also, every time Harry saw Draco, he found himself getting dazzled by her good looks. With those two facts combined, it took Harry perhaps longer than it should have to realize that Draco had a mean girl streak. She made clever remarks at the expense of the less popular students, and she did unflattering impressions of their professors. 

She was unfortunately very charming and funny when she did these things. However, Harry determined that he could not continue to turn a blind eye to such behavior. So when Neville fell off his broom at their first flying lesson and had to go to the hospital wing, and Draco laughed about it and stole his Remembrall, Harry seized the opportunity to make a stand. 

“Give it back, Draco,” Harry said sternly, holding his hand out for the Remembrall. 

“Come and get it yourself,” Draco said, and she jumped onto her broom and sprang into the air. She looked back at Harry as she flew, and she threw him a flirty, mischievous smile. 

It was all over for Harry at that point. He would follow Draco anywhere if she looked at him like that. So he grabbed a broom and kicked off into the air after her. 

Draco was torn between pride and jealousy when Harry got a position on the Gryffindor Quidditch team after that incident. She argued to Professor Snape that she should get to be on the Slytherin team since Harry only got on the Gryffindor team because of her. She reported to Harry afterwards, in a peeved off tone, that Snape had told her she had to wait until second year to try out, as Slytherin already had a full team. 

***

Harry’s first year at Hogwarts was exciting and magical, and full of trolls, dragons, and three-headed dogs. The typical experience for an eleven-year-old in the wizarding world, Harry could only assume. 

Near the end of the school year, Draco accosted Harry and Ron on their way to lunch. 

“Ron, we have to save Harry from the Muggles this summer,” Draco said. 

“Uh, ok?” Ron said. 

“I’ve asked my parents if Harry could stay the whole summer with us, but I don’t think they get it. They keep telling me that Harry’s Muggles won’t want him gone for the whole summer, and that he can come stay with us for part of the summer. So here’s where you come in, Ron,” Draco said. 

“Ok,” Ron said again. He was mostly a very agreeable person, and Harry liked that about him. 

“If Harry stays part of the summer with me, and part of the summer with you, then he can spend as little time as possible with the wretched Muggles,” Draco explained. 

“Sounds good,” Ron said. “I’ll ask my mum.”

“Will your family require financial assistance to feed and house Harry over the summer? I can offer you a portion of my allowance. I’m sure it will be more than adequate,” Draco said. 

“Oi, bugger off, mate,” Ron said, making a face. 

Chapter Text

The Malfoys arrived abruptly in the back garden at Privet Drive a week into summer holidays. Harry was alerted to their arrival by Aunt Petunia's scream. He could tell his aunt was outraged at having lesbian witches walk into her house as if they owned the place, but luckily she was too intimidated to be overtly rude to them. 

Narcissa sat stiffly in the Dursley’s living room, looking as if she were smelling a very unpleasant scent, while Lucy and Draco helped Harry gather his things. 

Everyone always thought the Dursleys were such nice, respectable people. Harry liked how the Malfoys could see right through them. 

Draco’s house, it turned out, was more like a mansion. They had an indoor swimming pool with winding rivers and frothing waterfalls. Draco wore a one-piece swimsuit with buttons down the front. It covered her shoulders and went down to her knees. She called it a bathing costume and she gave Harry a similar one, so he assumed wizarding swimsuits were gender neutral. Their Hogwarts uniform robes were also gender neutral, so Harry wasn’t really surprised about the swimsuits. 

The Malfoys also had a Quidditch pitch and a four-story treehouse in the back garden, and a funny little house elf called Dobby who squeaked and fell over when he met Harry for the first time. Harry had a large guest room all to himself and pudding every night after dinner. 

Mid-way through the summer, Harry packed up his trunk and his owl, and the Malfoys apparated him over to Ron’s house. Ron’s dad was there, and he and Lucy stood on the front step trading passive aggressive insults with such venom that Harry had to revise his earlier assumption. He no longer thought that Mr. Weasley disliked the Malfoys because they were lesbians. Rather, he now strongly suspected that Mr. Weasley and Lucy had been romantically involved in the past, and that they had had a spectacularly messy break-up. Possibly involving cheating (Harry wasn’t sure what else could inspire such open hostility). 

Or on the other hand, maybe Mr. Weasley hated lesbians because he blamed them for stealing his ex-girlfriend from him. Either way, Harry definitely wasn’t going to ask. He didn’t want to embarrass anyone. 

Staying with the Weasleys was different from staying with the Malfoys, but it was also good. Their patchwork house was filled with people, all warmth and bickering and laughter, and in constant motion. Their Quidditch pitch was not up to standard regulations like the Malfoys’ was, but they had a pitch all the same, and there were enough of them that they could play three against three (or even four against four, on the rare occasion that they could convince Mr. and Mrs. Weasley to join in). 

It was the best summer of Harry’s life. The days flew by, and before he knew it, he was back at Hogwarts for his second year. He moved his things back into his Gryffindor dorm. He returned to the routine of attending classes and doing his homework. And, of course, he trained with the Gryffindor Quidditch team. 

It was the second week of classes when Harry and the rest of his team got up for an early morning training session only to find the Slytherin team already out on the pitch. 

“I booked the pitch, Flint!” Oliver hollered, instantly raring for a fight. 

“Ah, but I’ve got a note from Professor Snape,” Flint said smugly, waving a small slip of parchment in Oliver’s face. “Special permission to train our new seeker.”

“New seeker?” Oliver said, distracted from his fury. “Who?”

The Slytherin team parted to reveal Draco clutching a brand new broomstick and looking so ecstatic, Harry didn’t know how she had contained herself long enough to hold back for her dramatic entrance. Her blond hair was pulled back into a short ponytail that stuck straight out from the back of her head. 

“Draco!” Harry said. “You got the spot! Congratulations!”

“You’re going down this year, Potter,” Draco said, flicking a loose wisp of hair out of her face. 

Draco was dwarfed by her teammates, all of whom were burly upper year boys. Her size wouldn’t be a disadvantage for her position, though. She and Harry both had ideal seeker builds: small and light, good for fast flying and quick maneuvering. They were also both the youngest by far on their teams, with everyone else being a fourth year or older. Harry’s team, however, had three girls as chasers, while Draco didn’t have a single female teammate. 

“I think it’s really cool that they let girls and boys be on the same team together,” Harry said. 

“Yeah,” Draco said, but she sounded uninterested. Maybe she didn’t want Harry making a big deal about her being the only girl on her team. 

In the end, Oliver made them run laps and drills on the sidelines of the pitch while the Slytherins practiced. Harry thought Draco was flying very well. He couldn’t wait to go up against her in a match.

***

Harry, Ron, and Hermione sat with several Hufflepuffs at a table in one of the greenhouses. 

“I was down for Eton,” Justin Finch-Fletchley was saying. “My mother was pretty disappointed when I got my Hogwarts letter.”

“Oh,” Harry said. “Are you a Mudblood, then?”

The table fell silent. Several people sitting within earshot at other tables turned to stare at Harry. 

“What’s a Mudblood?” Justin asked. 

“Finch-Fletchley! Language!” said Professor Sprout, who had just come up to check on their work. 

“Professor, Potter called Justin the M-word!” said Ernie MacMillan, sounding shocked. 

“Potter.” Professor Sprout sent him a disappointed look. “Five points from Gryffindor. I don’t tolerate such language in my classroom.”

“Sorry, miss,” Harry said, sinking into his chair and trying to disappear. 

They had lunch after Herbology. Harry made a beeline for the Slytherin table. 

“Greg, could you please move over? I really need to talk to Draco,” Harry said. He still had no idea why Draco, a pretty, popular girl, was best friends with two, in Harry’s opinion, stupid goons. 

Greg grunted and slowly scooted over to give Harry a minimal amount of space on the bench between him and Draco. Harry squeezed in facing Draco with his back to the table. 

“The ‘M’ word is a bad word,” Harry said accusingly and without preamble. 

“Hm?” said Draco, who was busy making herself an egg and cress sandwich. 

“I said it didn’t sound very nice, and you said that was just what people with Muggle parents were called!” Harry said indignantly. 

“Did I say that?” Draco began fastidiously placing cress leaves onto her open sandwich. 

“You did,” Harry said. “And I was sitting with some Hufflepuffs in Herbology this morning, and Justin said he’d been down for Eton and his mum didn’t want him to come to Hogwarts, and I said… I said…”

Draco looked up. Harry finally had her attention. 

“You called Finch-Fletchley a Mudblood?” she guessed. 

“More or less,” Harry said, wincing. 

Draco threw back her head and laughed. She was radiant when she laughed, full of genuine happiness. It was disturbing that this was what brought her such joy. 

“It’s not funny!” Harry said. “Why didn’t you tell me it was a bad word? People were really offended!”

Draco only shook her head and chuckled some more. 

“It was just a prank, Harry,” she said. “Can’t you take a joke?”

“It wasn’t a good joke,” Harry said. “No one was laughing.”

“I’m laughing now,” Draco said, flashing her sharp, bright smile at him. Harry scowled. 

“I can’t talk to you if you’re going to be like this,” Harry said. He stood up abruptly and stalked off to the Gryffindor table in a huff. 

***

Draco was a terribly confusing person. One moment she was kind, and the next moment she was cruel. Sometimes Harry thought he should drop her, but then he would remember the times she had been incredibly thoughtful and sweet, like when she arranged for him to spend the majority of the summer away from the Dursleys. 

When it came down to it, Harry didn’t want to drop her. It wasn’t that he found her mean girl streak attractive. He really did not. He much preferred her when she was being nice. But even when she was being mean, he couldn’t bring himself to cut her off entirely. 

He thought Slytherin House was largely to blame for Draco’s recent behavior. He’d become aware that year that Slytherin was almost all pure-blood. While Muggleborn students could be found in all the other Houses, there wasn’t a single one of them in Slytherin. 

Slytherin was too insular. Harry thought it would do Draco some good to spend time with people who were different from her. 

“Hermione doesn’t have any girl friends,” Harry told Draco. He’d found her studying by herself in the library. “Ron and I are her friends, of course. But it’s not the same, I don’t think.”

“Hmm,” Draco said, marking something in her spellbook. She sounded supremely bored. 

“And I was thinking,” Harry pressed on bravely, “maybe you could be her friend.”

“What! Why me?” Draco looked up from her homework, her grey eyes widening comically. 

“Well, you don’t have any girl friends either. You have that in common,” Harry pointed out. 

Draco’s mouth worked wordlessly as she grappled with Harry’s logic. 

“Pansy is my friend,” she finally said. 

Harry scoffed. 

“She isn’t.”

“What — yes, she is!” Draco said indignantly. 

“She’s not a very good friend,” Harry said. Pansy was probably the one filling Draco’s head with pure-blood superiority nonsense. And he didn’t think she really cared about Draco. Not the way Harry did, anyway. 

“Sod off, Potter,” Draco said. 

Whatever. Harry hadn’t come here to argue about Pansy. 

“We’re meeting here in the library after class tomorrow to do our homework,” Harry said. “You should come. You can hang out with all of us.”

“Who is ‘all of us’?” Draco asked suspiciously. She was, in general, friendly to Harry, and rude to Ron in a genial sort of way. But she ignored Hermione altogether, and she didn’t hang out with Harry if he was with all his Gryffindor friends. 

“It’ll just be me, Ron, and Hermione tomorrow,” Harry said. “That’s all.”

“I work better on my own,” Draco said, her eyes narrowing as if she thought Harry was trying to con her into something. 

“You don’t have to study with us every day,” Harry said. “Just… you know. Now and then.”

“I’ll think about it,” Draco said, burying her pointy little nose back in her spellbook. 

***

Draco did join their homework group the next day. She sat there stiffly at first, speaking only in monosyllables. Harry caught her looking at Hermione with a strange expression on her face, and he began to second-guess himself. 

What was he thinking, trying to make Draco and Hermione be friends? There couldn’t be two girls who were less alike. Draco, the pretty, popular girl, with her stylish wardrobe and her perfect, straight blond hair — and Hermione, the bookish know-it-all, the swot, with her buck teeth and her cloud of frizzy hair…

But then Hermione opened one of her books, and a signed photo of Gilderoy Lockhart fell out of it. Harry recognized it as one that Lockhart had passed out in their class recently. The photo showed the DADA professor astride a winged horse, a bow and arrow in his hands and a blinding smile on his face that seemed to show all his teeth at once. 

“Oh, I don’t have this one,” Draco said, picking it up to look at it, an entirely inappropriate (Harry thought) note of longing in her voice. 

“You can have it if you want,” Hermione said after a moment’s hesitation. “I took Harry and Ron’s copies of that one, so I have extras.”

“Are you sure?” Draco asked, but she was already tucking the picture into one of her spellbooks. 

“Yes, it’s fine,” Hermione said. 

“You’ve probably seen his latest spotlight in Witch Weekly already,” Draco said, producing a magazine from her bookbag. 

“I haven’t, actually. I’m not subscribed to Witch Weekly,” Hermione said. She seemed to be leaning involuntarily towards Draco. 

“This one’s very good,” Draco said, sliding the magazine towards her on the table. “Professor Lockhart explains his hair care routine, and there are several photos of him with different hairstyles.”

“That, um… That sounds very interesting,” Hermione said, taking the magazine. 

“That’s my only copy, but, um,” Draco hesitated for a moment. “You could borrow it, I suppose. If you want.”

“Really? You don’t mind?” Hermione looked at Draco in surprise. 

“Of course not. Go ahead,” Draco said, brushing off her earlier hesitation. 

“I’ll take good care of it,” Hermione said, and she began paging through the magazine reverently. 

Ron groaned and dropped his head on the table. 

“Did you have to invite Malfoy?” he said to Harry. 

“Lockhart is one of the leading magical figures of our day,” Draco said, a bit defensive. 

“It’s really impressive what he’s managed to accomplish at such a young age,” Hermione agreed. 

“And his books are so exciting,” Draco said. “Have you read them all?”

“Of course!” Hermione said. “Which one is your favorite?”

Harry didn’t like Gilderoy Lockhart. He was tied with Snape for worst professor, in Harry’s opinion. All the same, Harry had to admit that this was exactly the sort of thing he’d thought Hermione needed: a girl friend to talk to and to gossip about celebrity crushes with. 

***

Meanwhile, back at Malfoy Manor:

Lucius cared greatly about appearances. His hair care routine was lengthy and involved both potions and charms. He had detangling charms and anti-static charms and charms for keeping every hair in place even on a windy day. He had potions for really keeping every hair in place (he would have been balding by now without them) and potions for keeping the “blond” in his white blond hair. 

His skin care routine was nearly as involved. No razor had ever touched his face — he’d used magic to meticulously vanish his facial hair ever since he was a teenager, and consequently, his face was as smooth as Narcissa’s. 

But lately, it wasn’t his physical appearance that preoccupied him — rather, he was concerned with appearances of a much more serious nature. 

Lucius had a problem. The ministry was getting distressingly brazen, going so far as to conduct raids of wizarding homes, looking for forbidden dark artifacts. Lucius had one artifact in particular that had worried at the back of his mind for over a decade. He couldn’t handle it any longer. The risk he was running by keeping it in his possession was simply too great. It was time he got rid of the Dark Lord’s diary. 

Unfortunately, that was easier said than done. Fire and water each proved ineffective at damaging the thin little book. Borgin & Burkes wouldn’t buy the thing. Lucius thought about just dropping it in the Weasley’s house while he was there (that would be a laugh — imagine when they found it), but little Harry was staying with them, so he didn’t feel right about that. In the end, he dug a magically deep hole and buried it beneath some bushes far out in the manor’s extensive grounds. Out of sight, out of mind. That was the best Lucius could hope for. With any luck, the dark little book would get mildew and rot. 

***

Back to Harry:

The next summer, Harry had to go back to the Dursleys again, but it wasn’t long before the Malfoys showed up to whisk him away to their manor. Harry settled in to enjoy a good month in luxury. However, his visit was cut short when Mr. and Mrs. Weasley arrived at Malfoy Manor to pick him up early. 

“We’ve got a letter from the minister,” Molly Weasley said, passing a rolled up piece of parchment over to Narcissa. “Harry’s to stay with us for the rest of the summer.”

The last time Harry had seen the Weasleys and the Malfoys together, Lucy and Arthur had traded insults, but Narcissa had been nearly silent. Now it was Narcissa who spoke up, sharp and offended. She hadn’t seen her cousin in years, she said, and she wanted nothing to do with that ne’er-do-well who broke her aunt’s heart and led her to an early grave. 

Harry didn’t know what that had to do with anything, but the Weasleys bustled him along to collect his things, and then it was off to the Burrow. 

***

Harry received several mournful missives from Draco later that summer after news of the Gilderoy Lockhart scandal broke in the Daily Prophet. Apparently he’d been pretty good with his memory modifications, but it was hard to obliviate entire communities who knew who their real local heroes were. Draco seemed mostly upset over the fact that Lockhart would not be returning to Hogwarts the following year. 

***

In Harry’s third year at Hogwarts, he had a falling out with Hagrid after Hagrid’s hippogriff nearly tore Draco’s arm off. Harry had a temporary falling out with Ron as well after Ron suggested it was Draco’s fault she’d been attacked, since she hadn’t listened to instructions and also she’d been rude. Harry, appalled by Ron’s victim-blaming, didn’t speak to him for the rest of the day. 

Hermione decided to make it her mission to Help Hagrid and Save the Hippogriff from Lucy, who was a protective mother and wanted the hippogriff put down. Harry thought Lucy had a point. He didn’t necessarily want the hippogriff to die, but Draco had been in a lot of pain and there had been a lot of blood. He felt Hermione was being disloyal and insensitive to Draco’s suffering. 

However, by the end of the school year, Harry had forgiven Hagrid enough to begrudgingly help Hermione deliver the hippogriff to Sirius, his convict godfather, so that Sirius and the hippogriff could escape justice together. 

Harry would have preferred to give Sirius a hippogriff who did not have a history of savaging little girls, but Hermione was insistent. 

Chapter Text

In Harry’s fourth year, the Triwizard Tournament came to Hogwarts, and Harry was chosen as one of two Hogwarts champions. Competing in the tournament brought new and challenging experiences for Harry, such as going head to head with a dragon and having to ask someone on a date. 

“The champions open the dance at the Yule Ball,” Professor McGonagall told him, as stern about this as she was about anything in class, “so be sure you have a partner.”

Harry gulped. 

He didn’t have to wonder who he would ask. Obviously, he wanted to ask Draco. But the idea of asking Draco on a date was intimidating, to say the least. For one thing, he felt that if he asked her, he would be confessing his feelings for her. And what if she didn’t feel the same way about him? What if she turned him down? Then things would be awkward between them afterwards. She would probably stop coming to their study group. And also Harry would be broken-hearted and miserable. 

Harry put off asking Draco at first. But then he overheard Hermione, cheeks pink, eyes bright, confiding to Draco that she’d been asked to the ball by Viktor Krum. 

Harry’s first thought was to feel gratified over Hermione and Draco’s friendship, which he’d facilitated. Hermione hadn’t told him and Ron about her date. This was clearly the sort of thing she needed a girl friend for, and Harry was glad she’d found that friend in Draco. 

But then Harry had another thought which made his stomach drop. Hermione had already been asked to the ball. If Krum could ask Hermione, then someone else could ask Draco. Maybe they already had. Maybe Harry was too late. Draco was so pretty and popular, surely there were lots of boys who wanted to go out with her. Why hadn’t Harry thought about this earlier?

In a panic, Harry rushed up to Draco where she and Hermione were standing between the stacks of books in the library. 

“Draco!” Harry said. “Can I talk to you?”

“Yeah, what is it?” Draco asked, flicking her blond hair out of her eyes. 

“I mean…” Harry glanced nervously towards Hermione. “Can I talk to you in private?”

“Um, okay?” Draco also turned towards Hermione. She pointed at her imperiously. “Tell me more about your hot date later. I want all the details.”

Hermione had been looking a bit miffed at Harry, but Draco’s words seemed to mollify her. 

“I’ll go look for a study table,” Hermione said, and she left them. 

“Um, could we go over here?” Harry said, gesturing to the back of the library where he hoped they would be less likely to be overheard. 

“Okay?” Draco said. She looked confused, but she followed Harry out of the stacks and down the aisle. 

Harry was breaking out into a sweat. He and Draco didn’t say anything as they walked. He’d never felt so awkward around her. 

After what felt like an eternity, they reached the back of the library. Harry stopped next to a window overlooking the school courtyard, and he turned to look at Draco. She was looking at him curiously with her pretty grey eyes, and Harry nearly lost his nerve. 

If you don’t ask her, someone else will, Harry reminded himself bracingly. He imagined her dancing at the ball with… with Cedric Diggory (he was certainly good-looking enough for a girl like Draco, Harry thought, suddenly despairing). What would that be like, seeing them together because Harry had been too cowardly to act first? Harry didn’t think he could stand it. He wouldn’t stand for it! He had to hurry and ask Draco before Cedric did!

“Would you go to the ball with me?” Harry blurted out. 

Draco actually looked around to see if Harry might be talking to someone else. It was very cute. 

“You want to go to the ball… with me?” she said slowly, turning back to Harry with wide grey eyes. 

“Yeah?” Harry said. 

“Really?”

“Yes?” Harry wished Draco would hurry up and answer and stop keeping him in suspense.

“Are you gay?” Draco asked. 

Harry blinked. Why would Draco ask that? Had Harry done something to make Draco think he was gay? Oh dear. Did Draco not want to go to the ball with him because she thought he was gay?

“No?” Harry said in answer to Draco’s question. “I like you.”

“Oh,” Draco said, and her cheeks went pink. Then Harry realized that he had just confessed his crush, and he felt his face heating up too, and then they just stood there for a while looking at each other and blushing furiously. 

“So, er. Do you want to go to the ball with me then?” Harry finally said. 

“I do want to, it’s just that…” Draco chewed anxiously on her lip. “I’m not exactly out. Are… are you?”

Not out. Was this a wizarding culture thing? They did seem a bit old-fashioned in a lot of ways. 

Aunt Petunia liked to watch Jane Austen movies. Harry remembered a scene in one movie where an older woman asked Elizabeth Bennet if her younger sisters were out. Being out meant that the girls could go to dances and were available to be courted by young men. The older woman was quite shocked to learn that the younger sisters were out before the elder ones were married. 

If wizarding culture was like Jane Austen culture, then perhaps Draco was just saying she’d never been on a date before? Harry had never been on a date before either. 

“I’m not out yet either,” Harry said. 

“And… are you sure you want to be?” Draco asked, her forehead creased with worry. 

“Yeah, I’m sure.” Harry didn’t know why Draco was so concerned about this, but maybe a first date was a really big deal in wizarding culture. 

“And… you want to go with me?” Draco still sounded uncertain. It was endearing to see her so unsure, when she was usually so confident about everything she did. 

“I’d really like to go with you,” Harry assured her. “If you want to, that is.”

Draco took a deep breath and let it out. 

“Ok. Yeah, I’ll go with you,” she said. Her voice had gone a bit breathy. 

“Brill,” Harry said, his face breaking out into a relieved smile. 

***

Harry found Hermione sitting at a library table with Ron, their homework spread out in front of them. Draco had gone — she’d said she needed to go find Pansy. 

“Guess what,” Harry said, plopping himself down into the chair next to Ron. “I have a date to the ball.”

“Oh?” Hermione looked up, interested. “Who did you ask?”

“Draco,” Harry said. 

There was a silence. Harry saw Ron and Hermione glance at each other. 

“What?” Harry said, annoyed. 

“You asked Draco?” Hermione repeated. Her voice sounded careful. “To the ball?”

“Yes?” Harry said. 

“Like, as a friend?” Ron asked. He was frowning. 

“No,” Harry said. “As a date.”

“And Draco said yes?” Hermione asked, still careful. 

“To a date?” Ron added, as if this detail were necessary. 

“Yes!” Harry said, impatient. “I guess it’s a big deal, coming out and all, but we talked about it, and we’re going to do it.” He felt pleased with himself for casually throwing in that wizarding culture thing that Draco had mentioned, about coming out. He supposed that was why Ron and Hermione were so surprised. They didn’t think that a pretty girl like Draco would agree to give her important first date to someone like Harry. It was a bit hurtful that his friends didn’t think he was good enough for Draco, but he couldn’t really complain, because he agreed with them. He knew Draco was way out of his league. 

“Are you sure about this?” Hermione asked. 

“Yes!” Harry nearly shouted. 

“Shhh!” hissed Madam Pince from her desk. 

Harry thought that was the end of it. But that evening after dinner, when Harry was curled up on an armchair in the Gryffindor common room, Hermione and Ron came up together and sat near him, both wearing serious expressions. 

“Harry, we’ve talked it over,” Hermione said, “and we want you to know we think you’re very brave for taking Draco to the ball.”

“Um, thanks?” Harry said, nonplussed. It was true that Draco was a little intimidating. But Harry had known her for years. Surely his friends weren’t that impressed that Harry had asked her out? This was kind of condescending of them. 

“We also want you to know that we’re gonna have your back,” Ron said, clapping Harry’s shoulder bracingly, “both at the ball and after. We’re here for you, mate.”

“You just focus on going to the ball and having a good time with Draco,” Hermione said. “If anyone has a problem with that, they’ll have us to deal with.”

“Okay?” Harry said, feeling like he had missed something. Did they think all of Draco’s rejected suitors were going to come after him? Wait. Were all of Draco’s rejected suitors going to come after him? Was that something he needed to be concerned about? 

“Now we just have to find a date for Ron,” Hermione said. 

“I have a date,” Ron said. 

“Oh? I thought you didn’t,” Hermione said. 

“After I heard you and Harry already had dates, I thought I’d best get on it,” Ron said. “I asked Lavender, and she said yes.”

“Lavender?” Hermione said. She looked somewhat taken aback. 

“Well, yeah,” Ron shrugged. “She laughs at my jokes. She’s a cool girl. I think we’ll have fun.”

“Right. It’ll be lots of fun,” Hermione said. She looked uncertainly from Harry to Ron. 

Harry didn’t say anything. Dating was turning out to be even more complicated than he had thought it would be.

***

Harry woke Saturday morning to the sound of knocking. He listened to it for a while, rubbing the sleep from his eyes and stretching in bed. 

By the time he finally sat up, the knocking had stopped. Harry pushed back the curtains around his bed. And started. 

Draco was standing in his dorm room, looking about with a purposeful air. 

“Draco!” Harry said. “You’re not supposed to be in here! Who let you in?”

“Ginny did,” Draco said. “She thinks I’m pretty.”

“Well, you are,” Harry said. 

Ron groaned from behind his own bed curtains. 

“Can you not?” he said. “I only just woke up.”

“What are you doing here?” Harry asked Draco, who had opened Harry’s dresser and was peering inside. 

“I need to see your dress robes,” Draco said. “I need to know what you’re wearing before I pick out my robes.”

“Haven’t you bought your dress robes yet?” Harry asked. 

“No, I didn’t want to risk clashing with my date,” Draco said. “Is this what you're wearing?” She had found the emerald green dress robes that Mrs. Weasley had picked out for Harry. They weren’t hard to find; they were the only wizarding robes in Harry’s dresser that weren’t school uniforms. 

“Yes, that’s it,” Harry said, crawling over on his bed to sit near Draco. 

“Hmm. It’s alright, I suppose,” Draco said, casually dismissing the nicest piece of clothing Harry had ever owned. “I don’t suppose I can persuade you to get one of these?”

Draco produced a magazine which she opened to a dog-eared page and dropped on the bed next to Harry. 

The magazine showed several photos of wizards who turned and swayed and strutted about, showing off their robes. From what Harry could tell, the robes in the magazine looked more or less the same as the emerald robes in his dresser. He guessed they were a lot more expensive, though. 

“I’m good, thanks,” Harry said. “I like my robes. Mrs. Weasley says they match my eyes.” Harry shut his mouth. Why had he said that? That was the sort of thing that sounded nice if someone else said it. If you said it about yourself, you just sounded like a prat. 

Draco took Harry’s dress robes out of his dresser and held them up to Harry’s front. She took her time looking him up and down, her eyes lingering on him, and Harry felt his cheeks heating up as he watched her in return. 

“It’ll do,” Draco finally said, turning away from Harry to put the dress robes back in the dresser. “I’ll owl order my robes today. I think —”

Draco paused, her attention caught on Ron’s partially open dresser. 

“What is this?” Draco said, horror-struck. She opened the dresser wider to reveal the maroon dress robes that Ron had stuck haphazardly on the door. “Ron, please tell me you’re not actually thinking of wearing these.”

Ron pushed aside his bed curtains with a grunt. 

“Paws off my stuff, Malfoy,” he said. 

“Answer the question, Ron,” Draco said, her voice tense. “Is this what you’re planning to wear to the Yule Ball?”

“What of it?” Ron said belligerently. 

“Ron. I can’t let you do this,” Draco said. 

“Stop saying my name,” Ron said. 

“I’m getting you new robes,” Draco said. 

“Sod off, Malfoy, I don’t need your charity,” Ron said, annoyed. 

“Harry can pay for them if it makes you feel better,” Draco said, “but I can’t let you wear that. Friends don’t let friends wear hideous, moth-eaten fashion disasters to the Triwizard Tournament’s Yule Ball.”

“Since when are we friends?” Ron asked, but without much heat. Draco was wearing him down, Harry could tell. He knew how much Ron hated his dress robes, and Draco was giving him a way out. 

“Hermione and I are friends, anyway, and somehow you’re part of the package deal,” Draco said. Ron made a half-hearted rude gesture at her. 

“Now stand up,” Draco said. She pulled a tape measure from her pocket (Harry guessed she had been hoping to use it on him). Ron made a show of reluctance, but he stood up in his orange Chudley Cannon pajamas and Draco got to work, busily taking his measurements and jotting them down in the margins of her magazine. 

“You know how to take measurements?” Ron asked doubtfully. 

“Well,” Draco said, her arms awkwardly around his waist with the tape measure, “I’ve never done it before, but I’ve had people do it to me plenty of times. Arms out, now, don’t slouch.”

Ron grumbled, but he went along with Draco’s instructions. Draco measured some more, wrote down the numbers in her neat, meticulous script, and finally snapped her magazine closed. 

“That’s you done, dear,” she said, in an approximation of Madam Malkin. 

“Thank Merlin that’s over,” Ron said. Harry agreed with the sentiment. He wasn’t sure how much more he could take of watching Draco stand so close to Ron, putting her hands all over him. He was beginning to regret not getting new robes himself. 

“I’m going to go place the orders now,” Draco said, waggling her fingers at them in farewell as she made for the door. 

“Draco,” Ron said. 

Draco paused in the doorway and looked back at him. Ron cleared his throat. 

“Nothing too posh, yeah?” Ron said. 

“Don’t worry, Ron,” Draco said. “I know you don’t want to dress like me — I’m not stupid. I’ll get you something suitably boring that you’ll be comfortable in.”

“Right,” Ron said. The tips of his ears were turning pink. 

Draco sailed away, letting the door thump closed behind her. 

“Well, now I’m up…” Ron mumbled to himself, and he went off to the bathrooms. 

“Was that Malfoy in our dormitory?” Seamus asked, pushing open his bed curtains. “What was he doing here?”

“What?” Harry said. 

“What did he want?” Seamus said. 

Harry’s insides felt strange. A cold fury rose like a rushing wind behind his eyes. 

“Is that supposed to be funny?” Harry said. “Is that your idea of a joke?”

“Huh?” Seamus said. He had the gall to look confused. 

“It’s not okay to say shit like that,” Harry said. “Just because she’s a bit a tomboy, and just because she’s kind of rude sometimes.”

“Who are we talking about?” Seamus said, tilting his head and squinting across the room at Harry. 

“Ugh,” Harry said. He stomped off to the bathrooms after Ron. 

***

A couple weeks later, Draco was back in Gryffindor Tower. This time, she sat on one of the couches in the common room with a large potion bottle. Hermione sat in front of her on the floor, and Draco was massaging the contents of the bottle into Hermione’s hair. They were doing a trial run for the night of the Yule Ball. 

“Your hair is so thick! I hate you,” Draco moaned. 

“It’s not that great, having thick, curly hair,” Hermione said. “It’s such a hassle to take care of.”

Draco paused to pour more potion into her palm. Then her fingers dove back into Hermione’s hair. Hermione sighed a little and closed her eyes. 

Harry, watching them from a nearby arm chair, fidgeted impatiently in his seat. He didn’t know why him asking Draco to the ball had resulted in Draco touching his friends so much. And Hermione’s hair was taking a lot longer than he had thought it would. 

“Okay, let’s try a sort of up-do, like this,” Draco said, and she spent the next half hour using her wand to twist strands of Hermione’s hair, which she then stuck in place with sticking charms. 

“I don’t know, I think you should use hair pins,” Hermione said, watching Draco in the large mirror that Draco had dragged up all the way from the dungeons and set on the coffee table in front of the couch. 

“Do you doubt my charm work, Miss Granger?” Draco said, busily twirling her wand over Hermione’s head. 

“It’s nothing against your charm work,” Hermione said. “It’s just… what if it wears off before the ball ends?”

“That sounds exactly like an affront against my charm work,” Draco said, lifting a new section of Hermione’s hair. “Don’t doubt me. I learned from the best. My mother knows how to set hair charms that will last through even the longest and dullest ministry functions.”

“Shouldn’t I try the charms now?” Hermione said, lifting her wand. “Since I’ll have to do all this on my own the night of.”

“What?” Draco paused her work to frown at Hermione in the mirror. “You’re not doing this on your own. I’m going to do your hair for the ball.”

“You are?” Hermione sounded surprised. “I thought you were just going to show me what to do.”

“Do you really think you can handle this by yourself?” Draco said, fingers busy once more in Hermione’s hair. “Of course not. This could be a once-in-lifetime event, and you’re going to be opening the ball on the arm of one of the champions. You need me, Hermione. You have to look your best.”

“Well… if you don’t mind,” Hermione said. 

“But I also promised Pansy I would do her hair, so you’ll have to come down to Slytherin to get ready.”

“Slytherin?” Hermione said. She sounded taken aback. She and Draco had grown closer in the last two years since they first bonded over their mutual crush on their DADA professor. However, Draco had, up to that point, kept her Gryffindor friends separate from her Slytherin friends. 

Harry preferred it that way. On the one hand, he thought it was cute that Draco had started befriending the Slytherin girls after gaining Hermione’s friendship in second year. Before Hermione, all of Draco’s friends had been boys. But on the other hand, he didn’t care much for her Slytherin girl friends. He thought they were a bad influence on her. 

And now, Draco was essentially inviting Hermione into her mean girl clique. 

“Mm-hm,” Draco said, as if she hadn’t said anything out of the ordinary. 

“I’m pretty sure Pansy hates me,” Hermione said. 

“If she wants her hair done, she’ll keep a civil tongue in her mouth,” Draco said. “Anyway, it won’t be just her. We’ll have a getting ready party. Daphne and Tracy will be there.”

“Is that… a good thing?” Hermione said cautiously. “I don’t really know them.”

“Tracy is a half-blood,” Draco said. “Daphne’s very protective of her.”

“Oh!” Hermione said. “I didn’t know.”

“Daphne and Tracy will do each other’s hair,” Draco said. “And I’ll do yours and Pansy’s. And Pansy will do Millicent’s. Millie doesn’t get to do anyone’s hair. We don’t trust her with things like that.”

“And who’s doing your hair?” Hermione asked with a grin. 

“Oh, I’m not doing much with mine,” Draco said. “I’m certainly not going to let Pansy curl it. I don't want to look like a poodle.”

“I could help, if you like,” Hermione said. 

“You?” Draco laughed merrily, and for so long that it got a bit awkward waiting for her to stop. Hermione frowned at her in the mirror. 

“I meant you could show me what to do,” Hermione said crossly. 

“No, darling, you’re in the same category as Millie,” Draco said, shaking her head and chuckling. 

They were quiet for a while. Harry watched them surreptitiously while he pretended to read his Quidditch magazine. 

“There,” Draco finally said, holding a second mirror up behind Hermione’s head. “What do you think?”

“Goodness,” Hermione said, angling her head back and forth to inspect Draco’s handiwork between the two mirrors. “I didn’t know my hair could look like that.”

“Do you like it?” Draco asked. 

“It’s beautiful,” Hermione said. “You certainly know what you’re about.” She put one hand to her hair, touching it with tentative fingertips. 

“If you come down to Slytherin, you’ll be with me, you know,” Draco said abruptly. “No one’s going to mess with you. Or they’ll have me to deal with, if they try.”

“Oh! Well. Alright.” Hermione seemed to consider; then she spoke again, hesitantly. “We already told Harry, but the same goes for us. At the ball, I mean. So don’t worry about what anyone says. Ron and I will have your backs.”

Draco nodded. 

“Thank you,” she said. 

She seemed uncharacteristically subdued, Harry thought, still watching from his armchair. She also didn’t seem confused about why Hermione was saying these things. Did she know something that Harry didn’t?

Don’t worry about what anyone says. That’s what Hermione had said just now. Harry’s stomach dropped as he suddenly remembered Seamus’ stupid jibe. He’d called Draco a boy. 

Was Draco getting bullied for her less feminine traits? She’d always been a bit of a tomboy, running around with Greg and Vince and playing Quidditch. Although lots of girls played Quidditch; there wasn’t anything very unusual about that. 

Her voice was a bit low for a girl. But she took after her mother, Lucy, who had a rich, mellow voice that Harry found quite pleasant. 

She had a very flat chest. She was also very skinny, though, so that wasn’t terribly surprising. They were only fourteen, and she might develop more as they got older, but Harry didn’t care either way. He thought she was perfect just the way she was. Were people making fun of Draco over this? The thought made Harry want to kick someone in the teeth. 

He wasn’t going to say anything to Draco about it, though. He didn’t want to embarrass her. If she wanted to talk about it, then she would bring it up herself. 

Chapter Text

The night of the Yule Ball, Harry stood waiting in the corridor with the painting of the little girl poking about a cockatrice’s den. There was a tall window next to the painting, and Harry could sort of see his reflection in it. Looking into the window, he smoothed down his dark green robes. They were fancier than anything he’d ever worn before, and he felt strange wearing them. They were a bit stiff around the shoulders, and not as comfortable as his school uniforms. 

Footsteps sounded on the stone floor behind him. Harry turned — and then just stood there for a moment and looked. 

Draco was wearing a silvery dress with long sleeves, a perfectly tailored waistline, and a full, flowing skirt. She’d let her white blond hair grow out longer since Harry first met her. She had it partly pinned back (or stuck back with sticking charms of some sort, Harry guessed), and the rest of it hung loose over her shoulders and down her back. As she got closer, Harry realized she had real snowflakes in her hair, tiny and exquisitely patterned, and presumably charmed not to melt. She looked like a princess from the fairy realm. She was the most beautiful person Harry had ever seen. 

He cleared his throat abruptly when he realized he had been staring too long. 

“I, er. I like your dress,” he said. 

Draco rolled her eyes. It broke the fairy spell a bit, but not by much. 

“Dress robes, Potter,” she said. “They’re called dress robes.”

“Right,” Harry said. “Er. Shall we?” He offered Draco his arm. She graced him with a pleased little smile and tucked her fingers into the crook of his elbow, so Harry must have done something right. 

They found the other champions and their dates in an antechamber outside the Great Hall. Hermione was there with Viktor Krum. Fleur was with Roger Davies, the Ravenclaw Quidditch captain. And Cedric, the Hufflepuff seeker, was with Cho, the Ravenclaw seeker. With Harry and Draco there, all the Hogwarts seekers were in the room. 

Cho’s eyes widened as she took in their presence. Her gaze bounced back and forth between Harry and Draco. Cedric, for his part, looked politely bewildered. 

“Hello Harry, Draco,” Hermione said, her cheeriness sounding forced. She’d apparently survived her foray down into the Slytherin dungeons, and she’d come out looking all the better for it. 

Before Harry could say anything to her, the door opened behind them, and a harried-looking Professor McGonagall swept inside. She gave them all a quick once-over, her lips moving silently as she tallied them up. 

“Potter, where is your date?” Professor McGonagall said impatiently. “It’s time for the champions to open the ball. Mr. Malfoy, what are you doing here? You’re supposed to be in the Great Hall with the other students.”

“Draco is my date,” Harry said, putting a protective hand on Draco’s back and feeling a bit offended that Professor McGonagall had assumed she wasn’t. 

Professor McGonagall looked at Harry, then took in the sight of Draco standing at his side. 

“Draco is your date?” she repeated. Her lips had gone tight. 

“Yes,” Harry said firmly. He didn’t understand why this was such a shock. Sure, Draco was better-looking than him, and wealthier, and more fashionable. But wasn’t it kind of rude to point it out? Draco had said yes to him; that should be good enough for everyone else. 

“May I speak to you for a moment, Mr. Potter?” Professor McGonagall said. “Come over here.”

Harry reluctantly followed Professor McGonagall over to one corner of the room, where she cast what Harry thought was a privacy charm. He glanced back at Draco. She was holding herself, her fingers gripping her thin arms as if she were cold. She looked vulnerable and alone. Harry sort of hated McGonagall for making Draco look like that. But then Hermione went and stood next to her (followed by a disgruntled Krum), and some of the tension left her shoulders. 

“Mr. Potter,” Professor McGonagall said, and Harry turned his attention back to her. “Have you thought this through? Are you absolutely sure you want to do this?”

“Yes?” Harry said. Why was he the only one getting his dating choices questioned?

“It’s not too late to change your mind,” Professor McGonagall said. “I could even find a girl for you to dance with, just to open the ball, when everyone’s attention will be on you, and then after that you can go back to Mr. Malfoy.”

“What?” Harry said. 

“I’m sure there are lots of girls who would be more than happy to open the ball with you. Miss Weasley, perhaps? Your best friend’s sister. She would be discreet, I think.”

Harry was beginning to feel like he was missing something. Why was it so unacceptable for him to open the ball with Draco? He needed to ask. 

“What’s wrong with me going with Draco?” he asked. It came out more than a little defensive. 

“There’s nothing wrong, per se.” Professor McGonagall looked pained. “But you must know… Potter. You know Professor Dumbledore has forbidden reporters from coming onto Hogwarts grounds. But there are hundreds of people out there.” She pointed towards the Great Hall. “Someone will leak this to the press. You know they will. And it’ll be all over the front page tomorrow morning. Are you really ready for that?”

This explanation didn’t make any sense. If the Daily Prophet cared who he was dating, they would care about any girl, right? Not just Draco. 

“But Professor, I have to dance with someone, right? You told me I had to have a date.”

“I did say that, yes,” Professor McGonagall said, looking regretful. 

“And whoever I dance with will end up in the papers, right?” Harry said. 

“Potter,” Professor McGonagall said seriously. “It’s different with Mr. Malfoy. Don’t try to fool yourself that it won’t be.”

Why would it be different? Oh. Suddenly it clicked. This was about Draco having two mothers. The Daily Prophet would make a big deal about that. Boy-Who-Lived in Love with Lesbians’ Daughter, the headline would say. This would put Draco’s family under scrutiny, under the spotlight. And the spotlight, in such a case, was unlikely to be kind. 

“Draco.” Harry stepped away from Professor McGonagall, feeling her privacy bubble pop as he passed through it. “I guess I should have asked you earlier. But it’s likely you’ll get attention from the papers for this. You… and your family. Are you okay with that?”

“I know, Potter, it’s fine…” Draco bit her lip. “…unless you’ve changed your mind, which, I suppose…”

“No, I don’t care, I want to go with you,” Harry rushed to reassure her. 

Professor McGonagall sighed a little, resigned. 

“Very well. We’ve kept everyone waiting long enough. Come along now…”

***

The champions and their partners made their entrance into the Great Hall down a large, wide staircase that hadn’t been there at lunchtime. Harry thought it was probably his imagination, but he felt like every eye in the room was specifically on him and Draco. 

They moved from the stairs down to the open ballroom. The crowd was spread out, lining the edges of the ballroom, and there in the front, Harry saw Ron standing with Lavender. He was wearing his new robes — dark blue and handsome, but not too showy — and he was looking at Hermione with a complicated expression on his face. But then he saw Harry looking his way, and he grinned and gave him a thumb’s up. 

The music started, and Harry turned to Draco. 

“Follow my lead,” Draco murmured, taking Harry’s hand in hers and placing her other hand on Harry’s waist. “Don’t look at anyone else. Just focus on me.”

“Right,” Harry muttered. Draco had made Harry practice with her in the days leading up to the ball. There hadn’t been enough time for Harry to actually get good at dancing, but Draco led confidently, and Harry could follow her well enough for a simple waltz. 

He put his free hand on her shoulder. Draco murmured a “1-2-3, 1-2-3” in his ear, and then they were dancing. Harry followed Draco, trying to move in a way that would keep his back pressed to her hand behind him, the way she had taught him to. 

Draco was taller than him. Not by a lot, but it was more obvious when they were standing so close. Harry hoped he might have a growth spurt in the coming years and pass Draco up. But on the other hand, Draco’s mother Lucy was quite tall, and Draco took after her in a lot of ways. Harry hoped Draco wasn’t set on having a boyfriend who was taller than she was. 

Harry looked over Draco’s shoulder and accidentally made eye contact with a girl in the crowd. It was Parvati, and she was staring at him, wide-eyed. Harry failed to move as he should have, and Draco bumped into him. 

“Eyes on me,” she said. 

“Right,” Harry said, focusing his gaze on her pointy little nose. 

Finally, the song ended and the audience applauded. The band began another song and, to Harry’s great relief, other couples began to stray onto the dance floor along with the champions. Ron and Hermione were nearby within seconds, hovering about him while dancing with their dates. Harry and Draco danced a bit more, and Harry started to relax now that less people were staring at him (he kept catching people nearby looking — Ron and Hermione couldn’t block them all, though they were trying — but he tried to ignore them). 

A few songs in, Pansy swept up to them with Blaise. 

“I’m cutting in, Potter,” she announced. 

So, Harry, Ron, and Hermione (and Lavender and Krum) took a break to get punch, sit on the sidelines, and watch Draco and Pansy dance. (Harry looked around to see if Blaise was going to join them, but Blaise was already off flirting with a girl from Beauxbatons.)

Draco and Pansy clearly knew what they were about. Their movements were both stately and dramatic, with complicated footwork that always aligned just right. At one point, Harry saw Draco take out her wand and cast what must have been a featherlight charm on Pansy. It was followed by a series of breathtaking lifts, Draco supporting Pansy easily with her thin arms, and Pansy lifting her own arms gracefully like a bird in flight. 

Harry was a little jealous. He wished he could dance like that with Draco. But it was also thrilling just to watch Draco dance like that, and Harry thought it was cool that wizarding dances allowed for two girls to dance together. 

“Don’t you know any wizarding dances, Harry?” asked Ginny, who had seen them standing around and had come to join them with her date, Neville. 

“Just the waltz that Draco taught me,” Harry said. “I’m not really any good at dancing.”

“You should learn another one! We’ll show you how,” Ginny said, and she and Neville proceeded to try to teach Harry. They would demonstrate a few steps, and then they would have Harry take Neville’s place and try out the steps with Ginny. It was fun, but it was harder than dancing with Draco. Ginny seemed to think that Harry was the one who should be leading, even though she was the one who actually knew the dance and Harry didn’t know what he was doing at all. 

Ron and Lavender started dancing again (to show Harry how it was done), and Krum told Hermione he would teach her the dance as well. 

After a while, Harry glanced over at Draco and saw her looking back at him. She happened to have Pansy off the ground again at that moment, and she tossed her a bit harder than she should have. Pansy went sailing elegantly and lazily through the air (slower than she would have otherwise, thanks to Draco’s charm), until she bowled right into poor Professor Flitwick, knocking him over. 

Harry chuckled and turned back to Ginny, but the moment the song ended, Draco was back at his side. 

“I think I’ll have my date back now, Weasley,” she said to Ginny, rather snootily. 

“Don’t leave him unattended if you don’t want anyone to scoop him up,” Ginny replied. 

Draco sneered and looked down her nose at Ginny. 

“Alright, let’s not start anything,” Harry said hastily. 

He danced the new dance he’d been learning with Draco next. She seemed determined to show up Ginny and Neville. Unlike Ginny, she led and had Harry follow, which was fine with Harry. 

Dinner was announced, and Harry and Draco went to sit at the champions’ table. Draco chose something fancy and French off the menu, and she insisted Harry do the same when she realized he’d never had it before. Hermione sat on Harry’s other side, and Krum spoke stolidly to her while casting baleful glances at Harry. 

After dinner, Harry and Draco got sucked into a large group on the dance floor led by Seamus Finnegan (in all the chaos, Harry couldn’t tell who his date was supposed to be). The group, which included a fair amount of half-bloods and Muggle-borns, all bobbed up and down, jumping to the beat. Harry happily jumped with them — this was something he could do. Draco looked mystified, but she gamely jumped at Harry’s side. 

When the song changed, Seamus made everyone in their group spread out in a big circle. Then he went into the middle of the circle where he proceeded to make a series of contorted poses. Then he got down on the ground, spun himself around, and ended by doing a strange sort of handstand with his knees bent. 

Seamus’ crowd went wild. Harry whooped, and Draco looked bewildered, but she clapped politely. Next Justin Finch-Fletchley took a turn showing off his moves in the middle of the circle, and then Lavender (Harry heard Ron hollering his encouragement). And then Harry had to blink several times to make sure he wasn’t seeing things, because suddenly Blaise Zabini was in the center of the circle dancing in the same energetic style that Seamus had used. Blaise, who never spoke much and who was always on the side-lines being aloof and mysterious. 

He struck a one-handed handstand pose, his legs splayed crazily in the air. Then a minute later, he did a flip. Pansy screamed ecstatically while everyone else cheered. How typical, Harry thought while he clapped. Of course Blaise had to be good at breakdancing on top of being cool, good looking, and rich. 

Things quieted down near the end of the ball. The band started playing some slow songs and people started pairing off again. Draco put an arm around Harry’s waist and they swayed together in the simple Muggle style, holding hands. It was a lot less stressful than the earlier dances, and Harry found himself relaxing. He liked Draco so very much, and it didn’t matter that they weren’t saying anything — the music was too loud for a conversation — he felt completely comfortable and at the same time utterly exhilarated just being there with her, standing close and touching, breathing in her scent. The Yule Ball was wonderful, Draco was wonderful. Everything was good and right in the world. 

Finally, the music ended, and the band said their farewells to much applause. Then the students began their reluctant exit from the Great Hall, spilling out into the corridors beyond. 

Cedric stopped Harry as he and Draco were heading towards the dungeons. 

“Harry! Can I have a word? Alone?” 

Draco, looking a bit put out, waited while Cedric took Harry aside and whispered a much needed but cryptic hint about the second task for the Triwizard Tournament. Then Cedric grinned. 

“Got to get back to Cho now,” he said. “Want to say goodnight.”

Cedric strode off with a spring in his step, but Harry stayed frozen in place, because he knew what Cedric was talking about. Cedric meant he was going to go kiss Cho goodnight. 

Harry hadn’t thought about this. Was Draco expecting him to kiss her? He turned around to look at her, standing further down the corridor. She raised her nearly invisible white blond eyebrows and gave him an expectant look. Harry’s throat suddenly felt very dry. 

They walked in silence down to the dungeons where the Slytherins had their common room. Harry’s mind was whirring with too much anxiety to attempt conversation. It really didn’t help that Draco, who was normally very chatty, was also silent. Was she feeling nervous because she was also thinking about kissing? Or maybe she didn’t want him to kiss her, and she was worried he would try? And anyway, did Harry actually want to kiss Draco?

Yes. He absolutely did. Draco was beautiful, with her blond princess hair and her lively grey eyes and her alabaster skin. Harry had had a crush on her for years. 

Their steps slowed as they reached the entrance to the Slytherin common room, and Harry realized he had made a serious miscalculation. The entrance, usually guarded by a password, was being held open by two Slytherin prefects who were leaning against it and making casual conversation with the steady stream of Slytherin students who were passing through — some of them rowdy, many of them talking too loudly, and all of them excitable and happy. Right outside the entrance, an older Slytherin girl was shamelessly snogging her Hufflepuff boyfriend. She had her arms wrapped around his neck, and Harry had to remind himself not to stare. 

If Harry had wanted a private moment to kiss Draco, he should have stopped somewhere before they got to the common room entrance. 

Draco had stopped walking and had turned to face him. 

“Er,” Harry. “Um…”

“Potter!” 

Harry got a mild shock as Blaise Zabini threw an arm around his shoulders. 

“Taking good care of our Draco, are you?” 

Harry turned his head and found himself looking right at Blaise, his face far too close for comfort. Blaise waggled his eyebrows in a suggestive manner, his handsome dark eyes dancing with mischief. 

“Er,” was all Harry could think of to say. 

“Wasn’t that a lovely ball, Harry?” said Pansy, who had come up on his other side while he was distracted by Blaise. She put a hand on Blaise’s arm that was still around Harry’s shoulders, and she leaned in, looking up at Harry through thick, black eyelashes that trembled in a brief flutter. 

“Did you have a good time?” Pansy asked, her voice sultry. 

Harry looked up at Blaise, who was grinning at him, and then back down at Pansy, who seemed to be plumping out her bright red lips at him. He was caught between two flirty Slytherins and his brain was short-circuiting. 

“Yes,” Harry said, in answer to Pansy’s questions. 

“Alright, that’s enough of that,” Draco said, taking his arm and pulling him away from her friends. “Off with you now. Leave the poor boy alone.”

Blaise and Pansy went laughing through the open door. Harry and Draco were left alone — with the Slytherin prefects and the other Slytherins trickling in down the corridor. 

“Er, thanks for coming with me,” Harry said. 

“You’re welcome,” Draco said. 

“Er. See you tomorrow, then?” Harry said. 

“Yes,” Draco said. “Goodnight.”

“Goodnight,” Harry echoed. 

Draco hesitated as if waiting for something, but Harry also hesitated, unsure, and before he could say anything else, Draco had turned around and disappeared into her common room. 

It was for the best, Harry thought, as he made the climb up the stairs to Gryffindor Tower. He’d already told Draco he liked her, after all, and she hadn’t really said anything in response. She hadn’t said that she liked him back. Probably, she’d only gone to the ball with him as a friend. He was lucky she still wanted to be friends. He could have scared her off, making unwanted confessions like that. 

Harry sighed morosely and gave the password to the Gryffindor common room. 

***

A/N:

Why does Blaise know about breaking? I imagine it’s been complicated for him, trying to figure out his place in the world. He’s biracial: his mother is Italian and his father was black. His mother is wealthy, but she’s often busy with her latest husband (she’s remarried multiple times). His father died when he was still young, so he isn’t there to help Blaise navigate life in Europe as a young black man. 

At some point, Blaise discovered a community. The kids he met were like him in some ways, and they were not like him in others. They were not wizards. None of them came from money. His mother would not have approved, if she’d been paying enough attention to notice.

But many of these kids looked like him. If you have never lived in a place where no one looks like you, it is difficult to explain what this meant to Blaise, a boy who didn’t even look like his own mother. With breaking, Blaise found his people, and when he danced with them, for the first time, he felt like he’d come home. 

What about Seamus? Seamus’ father is a Muggle, so Seamus is comfortable in the Muggle world. Seamus had thought for years that Blaise looked oddly familiar, but until the night of the Yule Ball, he’d been certain that the stuck-up, standoffish Slytherin couldn’t possibly be the same person as the b-boy that Seamus had once competed against in a breaking battle. 

Chapter Text

Harry was sitting at breakfast in the Great Hall a few days later when he saw Hermione unrolling her latest copy of the Daily Prophet. Her eyes flicked over the front page, and then stopped. She was caught motionless for a moment, her half-eaten toast forgotten. Then she slowly looked up at Harry. 

“What is it?” Harry said. 

“It’s nothing,” Hermione said. 

“You’re making a face,” Harry said. “Let me see.”

“It’s so stupid, Harry, I really think you might be better off ignoring it,” Hermione said, but Harry had already taken the paper from her. 

“Harry Potter’s Shocking Date to the Yule Ball”, the headline read. Beneath the headline was a large, blown-up photo. It was taken at a distance and it was grainy from the low lighting, but Harry could clearly recognize himself with Draco, waltzing in a loop, the other champions and their partners dancing behind them. 

Professor McGonagall had been right. Someone had snuck a picture of them and sold it to the Prophet. 

Had Draco seen it yet? Harry looked over at the Slytherin table. Draco, who was also subscribed to the Daily Prophet, had the newspaper out on the table in front of her. She was already reading whatever snide, hateful things the paper was saying about her lovely little family. Harry was sure it was something bad because Hermione hadn’t wanted him to see it. 

He stood up, leaving his breakfast behind, and strode over to the Slytherin table. 

“Don’t read that,” he said firmly, picking Draco’s newspaper up from off the table. 

“That’s mine!” Draco cried, snatching her paper out of Harry’s hands. 

“The stuff they’re saying is stupid,” Harry protested. “You shouldn’t have to read that.”

“I suppose it’s nothing new to you, Mr. Hogwarts Champion,” Draco scowled. “You’re in the papers all the time.”

“Hardly…” Harry began. 

“But I’ve never been in the papers before, so shove off!” Draco finished, and she opened the newspaper and buried her face in it, her thin shoulders hunched. 

“Oh,” Harry said stupidly. 

He’d underestimated Draco’s vanity. Apparently any press was good press, as far as she was concerned. 

Not that Harry thought Draco’s vanity was unwarranted. Any girl who looked like Draco did was allowed to be a little vain, in Harry’s opinion. He was, overall, relieved to find that Draco was not bothered by the article. Harry himself never read it (he knew it would only make him angry to see whatever nasty things the paper had said about Draco having two mothers). But he did ask Hermione to cut out the picture of him and Draco dancing. He put it up on the inside of his dresser door, because it was the only photo he had of them together. 

***

Harry stood with his back to the lake, his eyes searching through the faces in the crowd. The second task was about to start and Draco wasn’t here. That was concerning. At the first task, Draco had been right there in the front row. Harry had put her there himself, on one of the benches reserved for the champions’ friends. She’d been at his side all morning, trying to calm his nerves and hide her own. So where was she now? Was she mad at him? Harry tried to go over their interactions from the day before, but he couldn’t think of anything he’d done to upset her. Even if she was mad at him, he didn’t think she would be mad enough to miss the second task. 

“You have one hour to retrieve what has been taken from you!” Dumbledore announced. “You may begin!”

Harry cast a warming charm on himself. It wouldn’t last the full hour, and it wouldn’t completely keep out the chill, but it would take the edge off it, at least. Swimming in the ice cold lake in the middle of February… Whose bright idea was this, anyhow? 

He reluctantly shrugged off his school robe and dropped it on the chair he’d been given while waiting for the task to start. Underneath his robe, he was wearing one of the old fashioned bathing suits the Malfoys had given him the previous summer — a one-piece with a tight, sleeveless top attached to swim trunks that went down to his knees. 

The other champions were already wading out into the black water of the lake, so Harry grit his teeth and followed them. He put one bare foot in the water and shuddered involuntarily. He couldn’t imagine how bad this would be without the warming charm. 

From his swim trunks’ pocket, he pulled out his wad of gillyweed, popped it in his mouth, and started chewing frantically, trying not to think about the rubbery texture. It was Neville who had told him about the gillyweed. It had been in a book that Professor Moody had given him back at the beginning of the school year. That was a lucky coincidence. Then Harry had asked Draco if she’d ever heard of gillyweed, and she immediately wrote to her parents, who ordered a package of the stuff (far more than Harry actually needed, since the time it lasted wasn’t affected by how much you ate at one time), and had it sent directly to Harry. 

Where was Draco? Harry resisted the urge to look back at the crowd, and instead dropped into the lake, his new gills forcing him into the water that no longer felt so uncomfortably cold. 

Harry began to swim, trying to focus on the task at hand. He took out his wand to zap at some grindylows that grabbed at his ankles. What was he supposed to find down here? Something important to him, something he’d miss. He hoped he would recognize it when he saw it. He hadn’t been listening very closely to the instructions; he’d been distracted looking for Draco. 

He found the merpeople village at the bottom of the lake. His eyes were drawn to a large statue at the center of the village. There was something there on the statue. People. People tied up?

Harry swam closer to get a better look. As he neared the statue, he came up short, pausing in surprise. If he’d been breathing air, his breath would have caught in his throat. As it was, he felt as though his heart stopped for a moment, because there, tied to the statue, was Draco Malfoy. 

Her pale blond hair, hair that usually lay so smooth and sleek down her back, now billowed in a cloud around her head, undulating gently with the current. She looked like a mermaid, more so than the actual merpeople who were currently observing Harry’s progress from a distance. In the shadowy depths of the water, her pale skin took on a bluish tinge. 

She looked like a dead mermaid. 

Harry kicked hard to reach her side. He used his wand to sever the ropes holding her to the statue, and he put an arm around her waist to keep her from drifting off in the water. Then he looked around to see the other hostages tied to the statue. 

Cedric arrived at that moment, a bubble around his head. He cut Cho free with swift, strong movements, and then he swam off with her without a backwards glance. 

A shark-headed Krum came next. Harry had to help him cut Hermione free. (Oh look, Hermione was down here too! Now that he saw her, Harry remembered vaguely that Ron had been saying something that morning about not being able to find her.)

Krum swam off with Hermione, and then it was just Harry, Draco, and the last hostage: a much younger girl with blond hair. 

Harry adjusted Draco in his arms. It was a bit awkward, because he really liked holding her, but he didn’t know if she wanted him to hold her, but he had to hold her to get her back to the surface…

She was so still. It wasn’t like a regular sleep. Harry leaned forward and touched his cheek to hers. He tried to convince himself that he could feel her body heat. She couldn’t be dead. That didn’t bear thinking about. He just had to get her to the surface, and she would be fine. 

She would be fine. 

Where was Fleur? What was taking her so long?

Harry was getting anxious to leave. But the last hostage, the little girl, was so small. She was probably only seven or eight years old. And she kind of looked like a younger Draco, with her light blond hair and her pale, bluish skin. She could have been Draco’s sister. Or maybe her future daughter, or… or something. 

Harry couldn’t leave her behind. But he couldn’t wait any longer. He was starting to feel panicky, holding Draco’s cold, still form. He had to get her to dry land. 

He cut the child free from the statue, shooting sparks out from his wand to scare off the merpeople who tried to stop him. Then he tucked a blonde girl under each arm and made for the surface, kicking as hard as he could. 

It got hard to breathe near the end, but Harry couldn’t allow himself to think too hard about that. He just kicked and kicked, and finally his head broke the surface. He gasped for air, pulling the two girls up on either side of him. He heard Draco gasping next to him and felt the grip of small fingers as the little girl clutched his arm. 

Harry, his head out of the water, began swimming awkwardly towards the crowd gathered on the shore, his arms still around the two girls. 

“Aidez-moi,” the little girl said in a tiny, frightened voice. 

“C’est bon. Viens ici,” Draco said, and she reached in front of Harry and pulled the girl towards her, positioning her between Harry and herself. 

“Accroche-toi,” Draco said, and the girl grabbed on to each of them on either side of her, and Harry and Draco began swimming. 

“Just wait until my parents hear about this,” Draco said to Harry, who could only nod because he was using all his breath to keep moving forward.

They still had a ways to go, since Harry had swum straight up from the merpeople’s village so he could get to the surface as soon as possible. However, it was much easier going now, with Draco’s help. Draco was a stronger swimmer than Harry. It was a little embarrassing for Harry, but on the other hand, he was just glad he knew how to swim at this point. Draco had taught him the summer after first year when Harry had gone to stay at her mansion, and Harry had been able to practice at Malfoy Manor every summer since then. He didn’t know where he would be with this task if it hadn’t been for Draco. The Dursleys were certainly never going to pay for him to have swimming lessons with Dudley. 

Harry’s foot touched soft, wet earth, and he realized the water was shallow enough for him to stand. As he and Draco waded towards the shore, towing the little girl between them, Fleur came splashing towards them. 

“Gabrielle! You saved her!” she cried. She scooped her little sister out of the water and deposited her in front of a middle-aged woman with silver blond hair who must have been their mother. The woman was waiting with a heavy blanket which she instantly wrapped around her younger daughter. Fleur, in the meantime, turned back to Harry. 

“I got stuck, I couldn’t — the grindylows…” Her blue eyes were reddened and her face was streaked with tears. “You saved her, Harry. Thank you.”

She darted forward, placed both hands on either one of Harry’s shoulders, and kissed his cheek. Then she ran back to shore to join her mother in fussing over her little sister. 

Draco scowled at Fleur’s retreating back. She put a hand on Harry’s upper arm and steered him out of the water and onto the shore, but away from where Fleur had gone. Harry, glancing at Draco’s expression, began to feel lightheaded. 

Was it possible? Could Draco be jealous?

Madam Pomfrey was waiting for them. She hit them with a drying charm and then sat them each down with a heavy blanket over their shoulders and a large, steaming mug of Pepper-up Potion. The champions’ scores were announced and Harry was happy with his score, but he was having trouble listening to everything Dumbledore was saying. His mind was too busy whirring, thinking about Draco who was sitting at his side. 

Once the second task was officially over, Madame Pomfrey bustled them inside a long, white tent. Harry thought it was probably an outdoor medic’s tent, because it reminded him of the hospital wing. The inside was divided by white curtains that created small rooms with chairs and some amount of privacy. It must have been magically heated, because the rooms were warm and toasty. 

“I see you’ve yet to touch your Pepper-up Potions,” Madame Pomfrey said with a note of disapproval in her voice. 

“I should say not,” Draco said. “Do you think we want to have steam coming out of our ears for the next two hours?”

“It’s up to you,” Madame Pomfrey sniffed, as though she thought it really shouldn’t be, “but you're not making the walk up to the castle until I’ve judged you properly warmed up. Honestly, I don’t know who dreams up these tasks! Swimming in the lake in the dead of winter…”

Madame Pomfrey stalked off muttering to herself. 

Harry turned to look at Draco as they both took a seat, feeling suddenly nervous to be left alone with her. She looked different, huddled under the scratchy woollen hospital blanket. Her usually sleek blond hair was mussed and a bit frazzled from first the water and then the drying charm. She could be intimidating sometimes with how smart she looked, with her stylish clothes and her perfect hair. She even managed to make her school uniform look more fashionable than everyone else’s. Sometimes, when she strutted around the school with her nose in the air, Harry thought she looked untouchable. 

She didn’t look like that now. Now, she looked like someone who could be touched. Maybe even, with the way she was returning his gaze with her serious grey eyes, someone who wanted to be touched. 

Harry reached out tentatively and gently brushed a strand of her hair back. 

“It was, er, sticking out a bit,” he said by way of explanation. 

“Ugh, my hair must look a fright,” Draco said, rolling her eyes. 

“No, it’s lovely,” Harry said. 

Draco smiled and her eyes turned mischievous. 

“Soooo, I’m the thing you would ‘sorely miss,’ am I?” she said, quoting the rhyme from the clue Harry had been given about the second task. 

Harry shrugged, feigning nonchalance even as his heart began thumping away in his chest. 

“Who would it be for you?” Harry said. “If you had to rescue someone from the lake?”

Draco tapped her lip with one finger, making a show of thinking. 

“I’m very fond of Ulysses,” she said, referring to her large eagle owl. “But maybe they would just take my broomstick instead? That would certainly motivate me to dive into the lake. Or — I know! — Gilderoy Lockhart!”

“Draco,” Harry half groaned, half laughed. 

“Yes?” Draco said, giving him an innocent, mildly curious look. 

“I’m trying to ask you something,” Harry said. 

“Are you?” Draco said. “Go on, then.”

Harry took a breath. He was feeling bold after his success in the second task. And Fleur had kissed him, and Draco, he was almost certain, had been jealous. 

“Look, you know I like you. I already told you I do,” Harry said. “I just… I just want to know if you like me too. And if you don’t, I promise I’ll never talk about it again. I just want to know. So, er, do you? Like me?” Harry waited. His heart felt like it had made its way up into his throat. 

“You’re so frightfully earnest,” Draco said. “Are you really going to make me say it?”

“Draco…” Harry said. 

“Blasted Gryffindors,” Draco said, and she leaned forward, grasped Harry’s blanket on either side of his head, and pulled him towards her. Her lips landed on his mouth. Harry’s mind went completely blank with the shock of it. It was as if the entire world fell away and all that was left was the point in space where Draco’s mouth met his own. 

Draco, was all he could think. Draco, Draco, Draco. She was kissing him. Draco was kissing him!

She pulled away all too soon. Her blanket was falling off her thin shoulders since she had her arms up, holding on to Harry’s blanket. Harry pulled his chair in closer to hers and put his arm around her back to keep her blanket on. She was watching him intently, her cheeks pink, and Harry leaned in and kissed her again. He could feel her trembling slightly beneath his arm, and Harry was shaking a bit too, both from nerves and from the still fresh memory of holding Draco at the bottom of the lake, fearing that she was dead. 

He pulled her in closer, offering her his warmth, reassuring himself that she was okay. He put his free hand up and touched her hair, the strands so delicate and fine, like corn silk. She leaned into his touch, slowly letting go of his blanket and wrapping both her arms around him. 

She was lovely. She was so lovely and Harry was pretty sure he was in love. 

“Be my girlfriend?” Harry murmured. 

“Get stuffed,” Draco said. She shoved him and Harry flailed to keep from falling off his chair. 

“I’m serious!” Harry protested, feeling slightly panicked. Did Draco think he didn’t mean it? Or did she not like the word “girlfriend”? Maybe it was a feminist thing. Harry didn’t know much about feminists, having grown up with the Dursleys. But Draco had been raised by lesbians, so she probably knew quite a bit about feminism. Because lesbians were feminists, right? Actually, Harry didn’t know any more about lesbians than he did about feminists. 

“Draco,” Harry said, trying again with a touch of desperation in his voice. “I really want to date you. Don’t you — don’t you want to?”

Draco considered him through narrowed eyes. Harry swallowed and tried to look sincere. 

“I’m sorry for calling you that,” Harry said, hazarding a guess as to where he had gone wrong. “I won’t do it again.”

Draco rolled her eyes and dropped her shoulders with an adorable little huff. 

“Alright, Potter, keep your hair on,” she said. “Yes, fine.”

“You’ll date me?” Harry said, perking up. 

“Yes. Now come kiss me,” Draco said imperiously, placing a hand on Harry’s shoulder. 

Harry was more than happy to comply. 

Madam Pomfrey came in to check on them a short time later. She cast several charms on them before dropping her wand. 

“I see you still haven’t taken your potions, but you’ve both warmed up considerably,” she said. “You can run up to the castle now. Lunch will be starting soon, so go get something to eat first, and then you can get cleaned up. Take a long, hot shower and then go sit in front of the fire for a while, hmm?”

“Yes, miss,” Harry and Draco chorused. They left the tent and, hand and hand, made their way across the grounds and back to the entrance of the castle. 

Chapter Text

Both Ron’s parents and Draco’s came to Hogwarts the morning of the third task to support Harry. They and Harry’s friends gathered around him to wish him well right before he went into the maze.

“Good luck, Harry dear,” Molly said, giving him a hug. “We’ll be cheering for you.”

“You’ve worked very hard,” Narcissa said, and she hugged him too. “Just do your best.”

Arthur and Lucy were too busy glaring at each other to say much to Harry. Between the Weasleys and the Malfoys, Harry was starting to feel like the child of divorce. 

Hermione also gave Harry a hug, and Ron clapped him on the back. And then Harry turned to Draco. 

“It will be alright,” Draco said, her mouth tight. Harry wasn’t sure if she was talking to herself or to him. “We’ve been practicing with you for weeks, you have a lot of spells under your belt… You’re going to be fine.”

“Yeah,” said Harry, who had hardly eaten any breakfast that morning because he’d felt like he was going to be sick. “It’ll be fine.”

Draco nodded. 

“Champions! Take your places!” Ludo Bagman shouted. 

“Right,” Draco said, taking a breath. “We’d best get to our seats.”

Harry nodded, but Draco stood there hesitating for a moment. Then, abruptly, she threw herself at Harry, wrapping her arms tightly around him. 

“Good luck,” she whispered, and just as abruptly, she let go of him, turned around, and ran off towards the stands. The rest of the group followed after her, waving and shouting their final goodbyes to Harry. 

Alone with the other champions and Ludo Bagman, Harry turned his attention to the maze. He bounced on his toes and rolled his shoulders, trying to rid himself of the jitters. The dark green hedge of the maze loomed high over his head, hiding whatever threats lay inside. 

Ludo Bagman cast a sonorus on his voice and began his announcements to the crowd, who cheered and roared in response. Harry closed his eyes for a moment and tried to take deep breaths to steady himself, and suddenly it was time. Bagman held up his wand, which made a noise like a starting pistol, and then Harry was off, running through the maze. 

Harry’s heart pounded away in his ears at first, and he could hardly think as he ran. But, as he began encountering and overcoming obstacles, he started to calm down. It wasn’t that bad, really. A boggart, a mist that turned the world upside-down, a sphinx… He was able to get past every obstacle he encountered, and there really weren’t that many of them. 

He and Cedric went up against an acromantula at the end. Harry hurt his leg, and noble Cedric refused to run ahead of him to claim the Triwizard Cup. 

“You should have it,” Cedric said after casting a longing look at the Cup. “The spider would have gotten me if you hadn’t stepped in.”

“Let’s take it together,” Harry said. 

“Yeah?” said Cedric, his eyes lighting up eagerly. 

“Yeah.” Harry nodded firmly. He walked over to the cup, limping a bit on his injured leg. Cedric followed him and they stood facing each other, the Cup between them. 

“On three,” Harry said, lifting his hand. “One, two, three!”

Harry grabbed one handle of the large, golden cup, and as he did so, he looked up at Cedric. 

But Cedric hadn’t moved. He hadn’t reached for the Cup. He was just standing there, smiling pleasantly at Harry. Harry felt his stomach drop with a deep sense of foreboding, but it was too late. He’d already touched the Cup, and he couldn’t pull his hand away. The scene around him — Cedric, the maze, everything except for the Cup — was blurring and fading, and the Cup was pulling Harry, pulling and pulling him away from Hogwarts, away from his friends and from Draco, away and away and away…

Harry landed with a thud and immediately fell over. He got up quickly, pulling out his wand. He seemed to be on the outskirts of a small country graveyard. The sky was overcast and grey, the graveyard shrouded in mist. And someone — something — was approaching. 

The Cup was a portkey, Harry thought. He grabbed at it again, hoping it would take him back to Hogwarts, but nothing happened. 

“Incarcerous!” a voice cried. 

“Protego!” Harry shouted a split-second later, and the offending spell bounced off his shield. He could see who had cast it now; the figure was moving closer. It was Peter Pettigrew, the man who had betrayed his parents to their deaths. But Harry didn’t have time to brood over this, because Pettigrew was casting again. He sent spell after spell against Harry, battering furiously against his shield. 

“Protego!” Harry gasped, struggling to keep his shield from dropping under the assault. “Protego!”

Suddenly, Pettigrew switched course. He shot a spell off over to Harry’s left, and Harry’s head swung wildly to follow it and see what Pettigrew had done. 

A large tree branch that had been lying on the ground came hurtling towards him, gathering speed as it flew. Harry dived out of the way, feeling the tips of the branch scrape against his legs as it whirred past him. 

Unfortunately, it had already done its job. Harry had dropped his shield when he dodged, and before he could recover himself, Pettigrew had cast another incarcerous. Ropes snaked out from thin air, wrapping tightly around Harry legs and binding his arms to his sides even as he tried to struggle free. 

“Well, Harry, we meet again,” Pettigrew said, panting slightly from his exertion. Harry, lying on the ground where he had fallen, looked up at the balding, rat-like man who had once been his father’s friend. 

“Let me go!” Harry shouted, trying unsuccessfully to pull his hands free. 

“Not now, Harry, we have things to do,” Pettigrew said. He levitated Harry further into the graveyard where a giant cauldron stood smoking. He used his wand to tie Harry to a tall marble tombstone, and then the terrible dark ritual began. 

First Pettigrew lifted a small bundle, a horrible mockery of an infant, and lowered it into the cauldron. Then he began reciting. 

“Bone of the father, unknowingly given, you will renew your son.”

Pettigrew used his wand to open the grave in front of Harry. A thin trail of dust rose from it and disappeared into the cauldron. 

“Blood of the enemy, forcibly taken, you will resurrect your foe.”

With these words, Pettigrew advanced on Harry, drawing a thin, sharp blade out of his belt. Harry, who had already been trying to escape, now thrashed desperately, trying to get away, but it was no use. There was nowhere he could go. His bonds held him fast.  

Pettigrew brought the blade down. Harry closed his eyes. 

He opened them when he felt a sharp pain in his arm. He looked to see Pettigrew collecting his blood in a vial. 

Harry’s heart was still beating frantically, and he struggled to breathe like normal as Pettigrew turned away and poured his blood into the giant cauldron. Harry had really thought that Pettigrew was going to use that knife to kill him. 

“Flesh of the servant, willingly given, you will revive your master.”

Pettigrew cut off his own hand over the cauldron, and Harry thought he was going to be sick. But what happened next was far worse. 

A tall, bone-white figure rose from the cauldron. Lord Voldemort was back. 

Pettigrew handed him first a black robe, which he put on, and then a long, white wand. Voldemort took the wand and pressed the tip to the Dark Mark on Pettigrew’s arm. 

“Come to me, my Death Eaters,” Voldemort murmured. “How many will answer the call?”

Pettigrew was moaning over his bloody stump. Voldemort fashioned a magical, metallic-looking replacement for his missing hand. Then he turned his attention to Harry. 

Harry had been still, frozen in shock and terror, but when Voldemort turned his red, snake-like eyes on him, Harry began to struggle with his bonds once more. However, Voldemort made no move to harm him yet. He only started pacing while he waited for his Death Eaters, chatting pleasantly about his father and his grandparents who were buried in the graveyard, and who he had killed. Harry was too frightened to pay very much attention to what he was saying. 

Then the Death Eaters began arriving, apparating into the graveyard one by one. They were all wearing black robes and white masks, and they approached Voldemort cautiously. Finally, one of them fell to his knees at Voldemort’s feet, and the others quickly followed suit. Voldemort motioned lazily for them to stand, and they formed a loose circle. Then Voldemort began speaking, going up to each of them in turn. 

Harry had stopped listening completely. He was trying to figure out what on earth he could do to get out of this situation alive. He was coming up with nothing but a blank when Voldemort spoke a name that he knew. 

“Lucius, my slippery friend.”

Harry’s head snapped up. Lucy? Draco’s mother? The Death Eater Voldemort was speaking to had a mask and a hood on like all the others, so Harry couldn’t see her face or her white blond hair. But she was tall and slender like Lucy was. 

“My lord,” the Death Eater murmured, and Harry recognized her voice, low and rich. It was Lucy. 

Harry had heard the rumours. Ron had mentioned them. But he’d kind of thought it was something that Mr. Weasley, in his bitterness over the breakup, had made up. Apparently that was not the case. Draco’s mother was here. She’d answered Voldemort’s call along with the other Death Eaters. 

“…Harry Potter.” 

Harry’s thoughts were interrupted when Voldemort said his name. He’d missed whatever had come before that, but the Death Eaters were chuckling softly. 

“Some of you had thought that this mere child had defeated me,” Voldemort continued, his voice high and dangerous. “Let us put such thoughts to rest. Potter!”

Voldemort waved his wand and the ropes Harry had spent so long struggling against fell limply to the ground. 

“Peter, give Potter his wand,” Voldemort said. “I am nothing if not fair. We shall have a duel, Potter. You and me. My Death Eaters will not intervene.”

Peter scurried forward with Harry’s wand. Harry took it and gripped it tightly in his fist. The Death Eaters moved to the side as Harry stepped forward slowly to stand in front of Voldemort. 

“Bow, Potter, bow to death,” Voldemort said softly. He twitched his wand and forced Harry to bow to him while the Death Eaters laughed. 

“Now the duel begins,” Voldemort said. 

Harry held his wand up defensively. He couldn’t shield against the killing curse. He knew that. No magic could block that curse. But something physical could block it. His best chance would be to dive behind the nearest monument. And after that, well… He would just have to run. Run and dodge. That was the best plan he had. At least he wasn’t tied up anymore…

“On three!” Voldemort said. He sounded like he was enjoying himself. 

Harry tensed, readying himself to spring out of the way. 

“One! Two!” Voldemort took a breath and raised his long, white wand. 

There was a flash of green light. Harry’s heart stopped. Voldemort had cheated. He had sent his spell early — he hadn’t said “three.” Harry must be dying. It was all over. 

As Harry stood there, waiting for death to overtake him, Voldemort crumpled to the ground. There was another flash of green, and another, and another. 

It took Harry’s panicked brain a while to understand what he was seeing. A tall Death Eater was standing, wand raised, directly behind Voldemort’s fallen form. The Death Eater was sending curse after wordless curse at Voldemort’s limp body, lighting up the graveyard with green light. 

Finally, the Death Eater’s wand came down, and the Death Eater, breathing hard from the flurry of killing spells, took her mask off and cast it to the side. 

It was Lucy. 

There was complete silence as everyone gaped at her. 

“Is he… is he dead?” one of the Death Eaters asked, aghast. 

“Lucius… what have you done?” asked a horrified Pettigrew. “You’ve betrayed your Dark Mark!”

“Dark Mark,” Lucy said contemptuously, but Harry could hear her voice tremble. “I’ve had quite enough of the Dark Mark, thank you very much. I got it when I was an idiot teenager — thought it would be a lark. By the time I learned better, it was too late. I couldn’t get out. I was stuck. Stuck with him.” 

She gestured at the fallen Dark Lord. The Dark Lord that Harry was only now beginning to realize… was dead. 

Pettigrew began to moan. Lucy ignored him and continued talking. 

“Then thirteen years ago, Harry saved us,” Lucy said. “I had a chance to start over. For thirteen years, I’ve known what it’s like to be free of the Dark Lord. I have my freedom, I have a family. I am not going back into servitude for some Dark Lord who thinks it’s impressive to duel to the death with a little girl!”

Um. What?

“Anyway, that’s my son’s little girlfriend,” Lucy added in an afterthought. 

Who was Lucy talking about? Harry was having trouble keeping up. Did Draco have an older brother?

“I thought Harry Potter was a boy,” said a large, squarely built Death Eater who Harry thought was probably McNair, the ministry executioner. “Isn’t Harry a boy’s name?”

“There’s no call for that,” Lucy said sharply. “Just because she’s a tomboy and wears her hair short. Some girls feel more comfortable wearing boys’ bathing outfits; there’s nothing wrong with that. Harry’s short for Harriet. Or something. I think it suits her.”

Pettigrew disapparated with a loud, distressed pop. The other Death Eaters looked at one another, and then they started disappearing too, as quickly as they had come, until Harry and Lucy were the only ones left in the graveyard. 

“Is that the Triwizard Cup over there?” Lucy said to Harry. “You’ll want to bring that back with you.”

“It’s a portkey. It brought me here,” Harry said numbly. 

“Let’s have a look,” Lucy said, and she marched over to the Cup with her wand raised. She prodded at it and cast several spells that Harry didn’t recognize. When she was done, she looked up at him. 

“Whatever was done to it, it seems to be quite used up,” Lucy said. “It’s not a portkey anymore. It’s safe to touch.”

To demonstrate, Lucy picked it up and held it out to Harry. Harry limped over to take it, and Lucy frowned. 

“Are you injured?”

“Hurt my leg in the maze,” Harry grimaced. 

“Here, I’ll see what I can do.” Lucy pointed her wand at Harry’s leg. “Episkey. Any better?”

“A bit,” Harry said, testing his leg out gingerly. 

“You’ll have to see Madame Pomfrey as soon as you get back, but hopefully that will be enough to let you walk back to the maze? Because I’m afraid I’m going to have to apparate you to the front gates. I can’t apparate you into the grounds of Hogwarts itself.”

“Right, Hogwarts: A History, I know,” Harry said automatically. 

“Hmm?” Lucy said. “You know I was in the stands with Cissy and Draco when my Mark started to burn. That was a nasty surprise, I can tell you. And of course I couldn’t apparate from there, being on Hogwarts grounds and all, so I had to discreetly make my way down from the stands, and then once I was out of sight from the crowd, I ran as fast as I could to the front gates. Once I got through them, then I had to apparate to the manor to collect my robe and mask, and only then could I finally follow the call to this delightful rendezvous. Shall we, Harry?”

Lucy ended her narrative, spoken quickly and somewhat hysterically, by holding her arm out for Harry. Harry, the Triwizard Cup in one hand, took Lucy’s arm with the other. Neither of them spared a backward glance for the crumpled figure left lying on the ground behind them. The world went dark and Harry felt himself being squeezed very tightly, and then it was over, and Harry was standing next to Lucy at the front gates of Hogwarts. 

“Now, run along with your trophy,” Lucy said, opening one half of the tall, arching gates. “Everyone will be wondering where you’ve got to. I will be right behind you… let’s say five minutes behind you.”

“Are you — do you not want people to know what happened?” Harry said, uncertain. “You killed Voldemort. Don’t you want people to know?”

“About that,” Lucy said, looking uncomfortable. “The ministry doesn’t exactly know that I… have a Dark Mark. After the war, it was a lot easier to claim the Imperius defense if one didn’t have a Mark, so Cissy and I… Well, it was Cissy mostly. She made sure no one saw it. You can’t get rid of it — we certainly tried — but Cissy managed to hide it. 

“So now, if the ministry were to find out that Voldemort called all his Death Eaters to him and that I was among them… that could make things awkward for me.”

“So… we’re not going to say anything about what you did?” Harry said, unconvinced. 

“I would prefer if you, ah, left me out of the story, Harry,” Lucy said. “If it’s not too much of a bother.”

“Can I ask you something?” Harry said. “I need to know the truth.”

Lucy winced, but then she nodded slowly, looking resigned. 

“Very well, what is it?”

“Is Draco a girl?” Harry asked. 

Lucy blinked. 

“Is… is that a joke?” she asked. 

“No?” Harry said. 

“I must confess, I don’t understand the humour of young people these days,” Lucy said. “I can’t understand half the things that come out of Draco’s mouth lately. But Harry, you’re injured and everyone will be worried about you by this point. Off with you, missy! What are you waiting for? Are you trying to make Draco anxious?”

“Oh, right!” Harry said. He couldn’t leave Draco to worry. He turned and hurried through the open gate and down the path towards Hogwarts. 

***

Harry was swarmed by people almost as soon as he got within sight of the maze. Everyone was cheering and shouting and clapping him on the back. But then Professor Moody put a firm hand on his shoulder and started steering him towards the castle and away from the crowd. 

“Professor Moody!” Molly Weasley called, hurrying after him along with Arthur Weasley, Ron, Hermione, Draco, and Narcissa Malfoy. “Are you taking Harry to the hospital tent? I think he’s hurt — there’s blood on his arm.”

“I must speak to Harry for a moment. But don’t worry yourselves; I’ll see to it that he gets to the hospital tent afterwards.” Moody gave them what he probably hoped was a reassuring smile, but with his scarred, lopsided face, it only made him look more menacing. 

“Surely you can speak to Harry in the hospital tent after Madame Pomfrey has seen to him?” Narcissa said mildly. “He appears to be limping.”

“You can lean on me if you want,” Draco said to Harry, offering him her — his? — arm. Harry took it. 

Moody looked like he was about to protest, but just then, Harry saw Dumbledore come up rather suddenly behind him. There was a flash of red light. Moody froze in place, and then toppled to the ground. 

There were several professors running up behind Dumbledore. There was Professor Snape, Professor McGonagall, and then Professor… Moody?

Harry looked back and forth between the Moody lying unconscious on the ground and the Moody who was now standing, panting for breath, behind Dumbledore. 

“Blimey!” Ron said. “Were we talking to a fake Moody? And this is the real one?”

“The one on the ground is indeed a fake,” said Dumbledore. “However, this is not the real one. This is Professor Trelawney.” He gestured to the Moody behind him, who had one rather disturbingly empty eye socket. 

“My tea leaves told me I would experience a great change,” the second Moody said. “I confess I thought it was metaphorical.”

“We were all concerned when it came to our attention that you were no longer in the maze, Harry,” Dumbledore said. “When you returned, I happened to notice that Professor Moody was quite eager to get to you. So eager, in fact, that he didn’t notice he’d left his flask behind — the flask that he was never without for the entire school year. Professor Trelawney was seated next to Professor Moody, and she saw the flask too.”

“I was thirsty,” Professor Moody/Trelawney said. 

“It all happened in less than a minute,” Dumbledore said. “Our dear Professor Trelawney snuck a quick sip to quench her thirst, and immediately she changed into the person you now see in front of you.”

“I had a feeling I should wear some of my looser robes today,” Professor Trelawney said. 

“I realized that the Moody attempting to drag Harry away from his friends had been drinking from a flask containing Polyjuice Potion,” Dumbledore continued. “Since the potion he was drinking changes the drinker into Professor Moody, then this must not be the real Professor Moody. He must be an imposter. Professor Snape, will you help me tie this man up and bring him inside? We will have to wait for the Polyjuice Potion to wear off.”

The professors trussed up the fake Moody, and Mrs. Weasley bussled Harry off to the hospital tent where Madam Pomfrey was waiting for him. Harry leaned on Draco as he walked, more for comfort than anything, and Ron and Hermione followed close behind. 

***

Harry was later disqualified from the Triwizard Tournament after it was discovered that Barty Crouch Jr. (fake Moody) had imperioused all the other champions in the maze and had ordered them not to touch the Triwizard Cup. Cedric was named the winner of the tournament since he’d been in second place after Harry, and the prize money was awarded to him. 

“It’s not Harry’s fault fake Moody cheated for him!” Draco wailed, but Harry didn’t mind. He was just glad he’d made it through the tournament without embarrassing himself or dying. 

***

With everything going on in the aftermath of the tournament, it was several days before Harry found a private moment to speak to Draco. The weather was pleasant and mild, and Harry managed to get Draco to walk out to the lake, just the two of them. Draco had a tin of sardines with her. She — he? — used his/her wand to get it open, sparks flying. Then they levitated a single sardine up into the air and sent it flying in lazy loops over the surface of the lake until a long, dark tentacle reached up and snatched it into the water. 

“My parents want to take me to France this summer,” Draco said, levitating a second sardine into the air. “Do you think your Muggles would let you come along? Or maybe we should just take you and not tell them.”

“Draco, Lucy said some things on the day of the third task,” Harry said, trying to figure out how to word this. “And it just made me wonder… I, er… Well.”

The second sardine went spinning over the lake. Harry swallowed. 

“Did you know that I’m a boy?”

Draco’s eyebrows shot up. 

“Yes?”

“Oh. Good,” Harry said. “It’s just that, ah, I think Lucy thinks I’m a girl.”

Draco blinked. 

“You’re not serious?”

“Pretty sure,” Harry said. 

Draco made a face. 

“Harry. I’m so sorry. I don’t know how — Merlin.” Draco put a hand up to brush back Harry’s hair in an affectionate gesture. 

“And, er,” Harry said. “What about you? Um... Are you a boy?”

Draco froze, fingers still in Harry’s hair. Harry waited. Draco’s hand dropped. 

“What?” Draco said. 

“Um,” Harry said. 

“You’re — you’re not serious?” Draco’s expression flickered. 

“I am, actually.” Harry wet his lips. “Sorry…”

“You didn’t… you thought I was a girl?”

“So, just to clarify, you’re not a girl?” Harry said. “You’re a boy?”

“You thought I was a girl… all this time?” Draco said incredulously. “For… for four years?”

“In my defense, you have long hair and you wear dresses,” Harry said. 

“I wear robes!” Draco burst out. Her — his arms stiffened at his sides and his hands clenched into fists. 

“They look prettier than boys’ robes, though,” Harry said. 

“Just because I’m more fashionable than everyone else…!” Draco said. “And I wear my hair in the style of traditional wizards. Not witches. Wizards!”

“They look kind of similar,” Harry said. 

Draco sputtered. He took a few quick steps away from Harry, then whirled back to face him. 

“But you let me lead at the ball!” Draco said. “You danced the girl’s part!”

“Well, yeah,” Harry shrugged. “I don’t know how to dance. It made sense to let you lead.”

Draco shook his head in disbelief. 

“We came out together. We talked about it. The Daily Prophet talked about it.”

“I try not to read what the Prophet writes about me,” Harry said. “It’s always something stupid.”

“Potter…” Draco turned away, still shaking his head in bewilderment. He started to pace again, but then he turned back abruptly to Harry, looking suddenly horrified. 

“I asked you if you were gay,” he said, “and you said no. I thought you were being dumb, I thought you were just messing with me. But you meant it. You’re not gay. You actually thought I was a girl.”

“Well. Yeah,” Harry said. 

“And… every time you’ve… every time you’ve kissed me —” Draco’s mouth twisted unpleasantly — “you thought you were kissing a girl.”

Harry shrugged. 

Draco turned away from him very quickly. He went over to a nearby boulder and sat down, pressing one fist to his mouth. Harry followed him, moving more carefully, and sat down next to him on the rock. Draco dropped his hand and angled his body away from Harry. 

“Just go away, Potter. Go away and leave me alone,” Draco said, not looking at him. 

“Draco…” Harry said. 

“I know what you’re going to say!” Draco said, sounding slightly hysterical. “You brought me here to dump me because I’m not a girl! I get it! I think you’re very stupid for not realizing earlier, but I get it! I knew this was all too good to be true. I knew you weren’t — that you wouldn’t — Just go already! You don’t have to sit here, you can leave — I think the Weasleys will let you stay with them the whole summer if you ask. Or don’t ask — just go home with Ron tomorrow. They’re not going to send you away once you’re there. Only — please go now. Just —” 

Draco gave a little gasp and put his fist back to his mouth. 

Half an hour earlier, Harry really hadn’t known what he was going to do if it turned out that Draco actually was a boy. He’d always known that he liked girls, so he’d thought that was the end of the matter. He’d never stopped to wonder if he might like boys as well. He was fairly certain that if he’d known Draco was a boy from the start, he would not have thought to have a crush on him. 

But now, sitting here with Draco, the issue didn’t seem so complicated. Draco was upset, so terribly upset, and yet he was still worrying about Harry, wanting to make sure Harry had some place safe to go to for the summer. And looking at Draco, Harry wanted nothing more than to take him in his arms and comfort him.

Harry put a tentative arm around Draco. Draco gave a suppressed little sob. 

“Don’t,” he said, his voice muffled. 

“Hey,” Harry said gently. “Do you remember what I said when you asked if I was gay?”

“You said no,” Draco said, and sniffled, his shoulders hunching.  

“After that. Do you remember what I said?” Harry watched Draco, who still wasn’t looking at him. “I said I liked you. And that hasn’t changed.”

Draco didn’t say anything. 

“I still like you, Draco,” Harry said. 

“Don’t say that if you’re not sure. I couldn’t bear it if — if —” Draco’s voice caught, and it took a moment before he could speak again. “If you changed your mind again in a few days…”

“I’m sure,” Harry said, feeling a calm sort of confidence. He put his free hand up to Draco’s face, and Draco finally looked at him. There was a tear running down his cheek, and Harry brushed it away with his thumb. 

“Draco. Will you be my boyfriend?” Harry said, gentle and serious. Draco made a noise that was half laugh, half sob. 

“You’re sure that’s what you want?” he said. 

Harry looked into Draco’s grey eyes, the eyes he knew so well. His face was so familiar, every line from his arching blond eyebrows to his pointy little nose to the proud lift of his sharp chin. Harry loved every bit of him. 

“I’m positive,” he said out loud. “Please date me, Draco. Please?”

Draco moved closer, slowly sliding both arms around Harry. He seemed to be watching to see if Harry would shy away from him. Harry didn’t have to fake his enthusiasm as he wrapped both his arms around Draco in return. 

“Well,” Draco said, his voice a bit rough. “If it means that much to you.”

Harry beamed at him. There was no reason to hold back any longer. Harry pulled him in closer and kissed him on the mouth. 

It was a new experience, knowing that he was kissing a boy. It felt similar to before, only more fragile, more tender. Harry tried to pour everything he felt into the kiss, all the love and assurance and comfort that he couldn’t express with words. Draco, soft and yielding, kissed him back. 

Draco. Harry’s boyfriend. 

“It does mean that much,” Harry said, kissing him again. “It really does. Can I still come to France with you? I wouldn’t mind hearing you speak French again.”

Draco laughed, and then made a face. 

“Ugh, apparently I still have to come out to my dad. I really thought he already knew.”

“It’s weird Lucy just assumed you were straight,” Harry said, “but I expect your parents will be fine with us, what with being lesbians and all.”

Draco got a very funny expression on his face. 

“Lesbians?” he repeated. 

“Wait,” Harry said. “Did you say ‘dad’?”

THE END

Author's Note:

Lucius did read the Daily Prophet article. He saw the photo, which showed Harry dancing the girl’s part and Draco the boy’s. And yes, he concluded that Harry was a girl because it did not occur to him that his son might date a boy. But also, he felt terribly embarrassed for having assumed that Harry was a boy all these years. Had Narcissa bought Harry those boy’s swimming costumes because Harry had asked for them, or had Narcissa merely assumed? He hoped they hadn’t made Harry feel very uncomfortable with all their assumptions. For Salazar’s sake, why hadn’t Draco said anything??

Lucius covered up his embarrassment by storming down to the Daily Prophet’s offices and reading them the riot act for calling his son’s girlfriend a boy. Everyone was very confused, but then they had just outed Lucius’ son to all of magical Britain, so they’d been expecting something like this to happen. They didn’t like to argue with Lucius Malfoy, so no one tried to correct him.