Chapter Text
Harry lay on his bed, on top of his blankets. It was early evening, and no one else was in the sixth year Gryffindor boys’ dormitory, but Harry had the curtains to his four-poster closed tightly around him. He was shaking. Every time he closed his eyes, he saw Draco Malfoy lying on the bathroom tile, bloody and gasping and wet from the water spraying from a pipe they had broken in their duel. The scene kept replaying in Harry’s mind, despite his attempts to turn it off.
He shouldn’t have used that spell. Godric, why had he used that spell? He should have gone for a stunner. He should have used a body bind. He should have used expelliarmus.
His mind circled uselessly in a vain attempt to fix the events of the day, but there was no escaping the fact that Draco was in the hospital wing and that Harry had put him there.
If it hadn’t been for Myrtle’s cries for help — if it hadn’t been for Snape, who arrived quickly and who knew what to do — Harry would have been a murderer.
Harry lost track of time, lying on his back, staring up at his canopy and trying to still the panicked beating of his heart. Eventually, he heard voices as the other boys in his dorm came in and got ready for bed. Ron called out to him to ask if he was awake, but Harry stayed silent and didn’t answer.
When all the voices stilled and the room beyond Harry’s curtains drifted into deep darkness, then Harry finally got up. He didn’t think very hard about what he was going to do, but he knew he had to do something. He couldn’t just leave things as they were.
Quietly, Harry got out his invisibility cloak and the Map. He crept down to the darkened common room, checked the Map for Filch and anyone else out patrolling the corridors, and then slipped out the portrait hole.
Harry had had six years of creeping around the castle after curfew. He arrived quickly at the hospital wing without any setbacks.
The hospital wing felt even quieter than Gryffindor Tower. The white curtains hung like ghosts around each of the beds, unmoving and heavy with the silence.
“Lumos,” Harry whispered, shrugging off the cloak and stuffing it in his pocket. There was a chance that Madam Pomfrey would come out of her rooms and find him there, but Harry didn’t want to startle the already injured Draco. Harry moved forward, checking each bed until finally he found the only one that was occupied.
Draco’s grey eyes met his as Harry pulled back the curtain, his dimly lit wand held aloft. For a moment, they only stared at each other. Draco’s white blond hair was tousled and mussed from the pillow he was lying on. He looked frail and thin in his hospital nightshirt, his collarbone prominent above the nightshirt’s loose collar.
“Come to finish the job?” Draco murmured.
“Godric, no.” Harry’s throat felt thick and constricted. “Draco. I didn’t know what that spell would do. I swear, I didn’t know.”
“If you’re planning to lie about it, you’re going to have to do better than that.” Draco’s voice was strangely mild, as if all the tension from the previous months had been bled out of it.
“I’m not lying!” Harry protested. “I found some spells in a used spellbook. The other spells were all for — just pranks, really, nothing too bad. I didn’t know what that one would do. The book didn’t say!”
“That’s not a thing, Potter,” Draco said, shaking his head slightly, a faint line appearing between his fair brows.
“What’s not?” Harry said.
“You need intent to cast a spell. You can’t cast a spell if you don’t know what it does.”
“Maybe you can’t,” Harry said, nonplussed.
“What?” The line between Draco’s brows deepened. “What do you mean?”
Harry shrugged.
“I mean I didn’t know what that spell did.”
Draco stared.
“What, you mean — You really didn’t — So what are you saying, you just have a natural affinity for dark, deadly spells?”
Harry shrugged again, feeling more uncomfortable now.
“I’d just… read the spell in the book,” he repeated. “And when you attacked me, I just… thought I’d try it out. To see what happened.”
“Potter.” Draco was wincing now as if it pained him to speak. “Tell me something. Just so I understand the situation clearly. Had you ever cast that spell before?”
“No,” Harry said. “I never would have cast that on you if I had known.”
“So not only were you somehow able to cast a dark, powerful spell without knowing what it did, but also, you cast it at full, deadly strength… on your first try?”
There was a chair near Draco’s bed. Harry sat down in it with a huff.
“This isn’t what I came here to say,” Harry said.
“If this whole situation didn’t suck so much, it would be funny,” Draco said. “The Death Eater’s son can’t perform dark magic when his life depends on it, but Dumbledore’s golden boy can do it without even knowing what he’s trying for.”
“Don’t call me that,” Harry said.
“Maybe we should switch places,” Draco said, and he laughed, a short and mirthless sound.
Harry could have pressed for more information then. He already knew that Draco had some mission from Voldemort, that Voldemort had said he would kill Draco and his parents if Draco failed. Harry had heard Draco say all of that to Myrtle in the bathroom before they had dueled.
But Harry was still feeling raw and vulnerable from seeing Draco nearly die, from having nearly killed Draco. And all of that had happened because Harry had been trying to get more information from Draco. So Harry didn’t say anything. He merely sat there, watching Draco’s face: his narrow, pointed features, his thin lips and his pale eyes, half hooded now, returning Harry’s gaze without any embarrassment.
“It’s like you’re keeping vigil,” Draco said after a while, “only I haven’t died yet.”
“You’re not going to die,” Harry said, more forcefully than he had meant to.
“Well,” Draco said. “If Saint Potter says it, then it must be so.”
“Don’t call me that,” Harry said again, automatically and without heat.
“Would you cry for me if I died?” Draco said, settling back against his pillow.
“You’re not going to die.”
“I know you’re not here because you care about me,” Draco said mildly. “You’re here for yourself, not for me.”
Harry didn’t cry often. It wasn’t a safe thing to do at the Dursleys, so Harry had long ago learned to shove his emotions down deep, to keep the tears from surfacing. But when Sirius had died, Harry had cried. He had raged, and he had grieved, and he had cried. And when he thought of how he had felt when Draco lay on the bathroom floor, bleeding and dying, it didn’t feel that different from when Sirius had died.
“I would cry for you if you died,” Harry said, a solemn pronouncement in the quiet of the curtained room.
“Oh,” Draco said, and his grey eyes widened for a moment. He sounded both surprised and pleased.
There was something deeply wrong with Draco. But then, Harry had known that all year.
They sat in silence again. After a while, Draco fell asleep, and Harry felt forgiven, because Draco trusted him enough to sleep with him there.
***
The Aurors spoke to Harry after Dumbledore fell from the tower. Harry blamed everything on Snape, and he didn’t even mention Draco. He didn’t give any thought to this decision. He was preoccupied, for one thing, reeling over the loss of his mentor, raging over Snape’s betrayal. But also, he didn’t feel like he was doing anything wrong. Draco had been forced. He hadn’t wanted to do any of the bad things he’d done that year. He’d only done them because Voldemort had threatened to kill him and his family.
Most importantly, Harry had seen Draco disarm the sick and weakened Dumbledore. Draco had had plenty of time to kill him, but he hadn’t done it. Even at the risk to his own life and to those of his parents, he had chosen not to kill. Harry had seen how much Draco had suffered up to that moment, and he respected him for that choice. Now he was honoring Draco’s decision by covering for him in the aftermath. It seemed to Harry like the right thing to do.
“The deputy headmistress says there’s a student missing,” said the Auror who was taking Harry’s eyewitness account. “Draco Malfoy. Do you know if he was involved in any of this?”
“Who?” Harry said.
***
Harry once heard someone say that war was long periods of boredom punctuated by moments of sheer terror. That about described the following year for him after Dumbledore’s death. Harry, Ron, and Hermione ran from Death Eaters, hunted down a locket, and chased some dead ends… but mostly they sat around in their tent in the woods and tried to figure out what to do next. Harry spent many evenings lying on his cot with the Marauders’ Map out.
Draco was back at Hogwarts. Harry watched his dot moving slowly around the castle, from classroom to dinner, from dinner to dormitory. He seemed to spend most of his free time holed up in his dorm room, alone.
***
Harry nearly died at Malfoy Manor. If he had been a few seconds slower, Voldemort would have arrived and Harry would have died. That was why Harry hadn’t had time to think, to figure out the best solution. It didn’t stop him, though, from running through the events over and over in his mind afterwards, trying to find where he could have acted differently.
Because Dobby had died, and as Harry sat in the grassy weeds outside Shell Cottage, clutching Dobby’s tiny body in his arms, he saw in his mind the moment when Voldemort arrived at the manor.
Harry had left Draco behind to face Voldemort’s wrath.
Dobby had dropped the chandelier on Bellatrix, and in the ensuing chaos, Draco had looked at Harry and had held up his hand, which was holding three wands.
It was a small gesture. Anyone else might have missed it entirely. If they had noticed anything, they might have thought Draco was warning Harry off. But Harry had spent six years staring at Draco, and he knew the gesture for what it was: an offer of escape.
Harry grabbed the wands from Draco’s hand, and Draco let them go without complaint. Harry stunned Greyback, who was about to attack him, threw a wand to Ron, grabbed Dobby and Griphook, and apparated away.
He should have grabbed Draco too.
There hadn’t been any time, and he didn’t even know if Draco would have wanted to come.
He should have grabbed Draco.
Snape had spent months trying to teach Harry to close his mind against Voldemort. Harry had never been able to do it, had given up trying. But now, drowning under his grief and guilt, Harry took hold of his mental link to Voldemort.
And shut it closed against Draco’s screams.
***
Harry didn’t see Draco again until he was standing in the Room of Requirement, back at Hogwarts once more. Crabbe and Goyle were there brandishing their wands, and Draco was trying fruitlessly to hold them back, to keep them from hurting Harry.
“Don’t kill him! DON’T KILL HIM!” Malfoy was shouting as Crabbe and Goyle shot curses at Harry.
But all Harry felt (as he ducked spells and hurled his own right back) was an overwhelming rush of relief. Draco was alive. Voldemort hadn’t killed him.
Technically, he had already known this. He still checked the Map often. But it was still a relief to have absolute confirmation of the fact.
Then Crabbe — stupid, stupid Crabbe — cast the Fiendfyre Curse.
Harry found a broomstick, pulled Draco from the inferno, and flew towards the exit with Draco riding behind him. The heat of the roiling flames rose all around them, but Harry steered his broom automatically and hardly noticed the danger, because all his thoughts were zeroed in on Draco Malfoy pressed against his back, his arms wrapped painfully tight around Harry’s waist.
When they got to safety, slamming the door shut behind them, Harry was a little surprised to find that Ron and Hermione had managed to rescue Goyle. He never would have guessed that his friends would risk dying by Fiendfyre to save Goyle, of all people. It was decent of them, of course, and they were decent people.
At that point, the Death Eaters breached Hogwarts’ defenses, and the battle began in earnest. Draco was safe, so Harry left him to go join the fray. The fighting was intense, and then Harry had another vision from Voldemort. He knew where the snake was now, the last Horcrux. They needed to get to it.
But before Harry could leave Hogwarts, he came across Draco again. And yet again, Draco was in trouble. He was fending off a Death Eater while trying to convince the man that he was on his side.
Harry stunned the Death Eater. Draco turned around to see who had helped him, and Harry was stopped in his tracks, because Draco was smiling, and Harry was caught off-guard by the brilliance of it.
And then Ron ruined the moment by punching Draco in the mouth.
“And that’s the second time we’ve saved your life tonight, you two-faced —” Ron shouted.
“Ron!” Harry seized Draco’s arm to keep him from toppling over with the force of Ron’s blow. Harry thought it was clear that Draco had only been attacked because he was in fact, not loyal to Voldemort, but there was no time to argue with Ron about this.
Harry had a problem. He had some very important things he needed to do, but he wasn’t going to be able to focus on them if he was constantly worrying about Draco’s safety. He wished he could put Draco in a little box, and put that box somewhere safe until the battle was over.
And that’s when Harry knew what he was going to do.
“Draco, come with me,” Harry said decisively, pulling on Draco’s arm. He strode off down the corridor. Draco meekly allowed himself to be dragged along, his hand over his mouth where Ron had hit him.
“Harry, you’re going the wrong way!” Hermione protested as she and Ron jogged behind them.
“I have to do something first,” Harry said. “Hermione, fix Draco’s mouth. He’s bleeding.”
“Harry, just leave him,” Ron groaned, but Hermione shot a healing spell at Draco without missing a step.
Draco continued to follow Harry without complaint until Harry pushed a door open and Draco realized where Harry had brought him.
“A girls’ bathroom?” Draco said faintly, staring at the row of toilets.
“Good idea, Harry,” Ron said, as he pushed into the bathroom behind Draco. He had cheered up considerably when he had realized where they were taking Draco.
Harry didn’t waste any time. He went straight for the sink with the tiny snake etched on it.
“Open,” he hissed. And the sink opened.
“What is that?” Draco said weakly, staring at the black gaping hole that yawned into the space where the sink had been.
“It’s the Chamber of Secrets,” Harry said. “You’ll be safe down there.”
“The Chamber…” Draco gaped at him. “You mean you really were the heir of Slytherin?”
“What? No!” Harry said.
“You attacked Granger?” Draco sounded shocked.
“It wasn’t me!” Harry protested. “It was… well, it was basically Voldemort. I don’t have time to explain. Just go down the slide and you’ll be fine. No one will be able to find you down there.”
“Wait… you want me to go down there?” Draco seemed to be having difficulty keeping up.
“Don’t worry, Malfoy,” Ron said nastily. “The monster won’t be interested in you. You’re way too scrawny.”
“Slytherin’s monster?!” Draco paled and tried to back away, but Harry grabbed him and pushed him towards the opening.
“Don’t listen to Ron; he’s just trying to give you a hard time. The monster’s dead. I killed it.”
“You —”
“Come on, Draco, I don’t have time!”
Draco did take a little more convincing, but eventually he sat down shakily at the top of the open pipe, and Harry gave him a push before he could protest further. Then he sealed up the entrance behind him.
It was a huge weight off of Harry’s mind knowing that Draco was safe. He ran off to look for Voldemort’s snake with Ron and Hermione at his heels.
***
Harry was there when Snape died. Snape left Harry some of his memories, and Harry took them up to Dumbledore’s office to watch them in his pensieve.
What he saw left him numb with shock. He stumbled out of the office in a daze. He had to die. That was what everything was leading to. It was the only way to permanently defeat Voldemort.
Harry walked through the corridors. He couldn’t bear to see his friends before he went. He would just have to go. He would leave without telling anyone. He would turn himself over to Voldemort, and he would die. He was going to die. He was —
“Oh, for Merlin’s sake,” Harry said, remembering suddenly. He turned around and ran back the way he had come. He kept running until he was back inside the girls’ bathroom.
“Open,” Harry hissed.
He couldn’t just go and die while Draco was still in the Chamber. Draco would be stuck there forever. He certainly couldn’t count on Ron to get him out.
“Oh, it’s you,” Draco said, relieved, when Harry landed with a thump on the dusty floor of the Chamber.
“Change of plans,” Harry said. “I need to put you some place else. We have to…”
Harry trailed off as he turned around and looked at the steep pipe he had just slid down. Ron and Hermione had come down here earlier to get the basilisk fangs. How had they gotten back up?
“There’s a spiral staircase right there,” Draco said, pointing.
“Oh,” Harry said. Had that been there before? Oh well. No time to question it. Harry led the way up the stairs. Draco followed close behind. He seemed more than happy to be leaving the Chamber behind. They were a long way under the school, however, and there were a lot of stairs…
Harry saw a long, curling snake carved into the wall along the stairs.
“Up,” he said in Parseltongue, just to see what would happen. He heard Draco yelp behind him as the stone stairs began to move, carrying them upwards like an escalator.
The stairs somehow managed to open up in the same spot as the pipe that Harry had slid down earlier. Harry hissed at it to close it, and then he grabbed Draco and took off at a run. He didn’t stop until he was back at the entrance to Dumbledore’s office. He gave the password to the gargoyle and then led Draco up the stairs, which moved just like the ones in the Chamber.
“Just stay here and don’t go anywhere until you’re sure it’s safe,” Harry said, ushering Draco into the circular office lined with the portraits of past headmasters.
“Aren’t you going to come back?” Draco said, and his voice sounded lost and plaintive, like a child.
“I —” Harry said, and then paused. He had told himself that he couldn’t tell any of his friends. But Draco wasn’t his friend, and Harry badly wanted someone to share his burden.
“I might not be able to come back,” Harry finally said.
Draco wrapped his arms around himself as if he were cold, his shoulders hunching up. He looked miserable.
“You don’t have to go back out there,” he said. “You could stay here.”
Harry shook his head.
“I know how to stop Voldemort. And I’m the only one who can do it. It has to be me. It’s just… I don’t know if I’ll survive.” He wasn’t going to survive. It had always been the plan for him to die.
“You can’t die,” Draco said. “You won’t.”
“Well,” Harry said, giving a small, forced smile, “if Draco Malfoy says it, then it must be so.”
“You always pull through in the end.” Draco was looking at him, his grey eyes intense, desperate, even. “You always pull off some miraculous escape.”
“Draco,” Harry said. “Would you cry for me if I died?”
Draco made a strange, strangled noise, and then he grabbed a fistful of the front of Harry’s shirt and hauled him in close. Harry had a brief, dizzying moment of seeing Draco’s face inches away, right in front of his. And then Draco crashed their faces together.
It wasn’t a soft kiss. There were teeth, and it didn’t feel that different from fighting. The blood rushed in Harry’s ears, and he couldn’t think. He shouldn’t think about this. He was going to die soon; there was no point in thinking. He was just going to have this, in this moment, before he died. He wrapped his arms around Draco’s waist and kissed back, matching Draco’s desperate ferocity with his own feverish touches.
Eventually, Draco broke off with a sob and turned away from Harry. His hand went to his mouth, and Harry realized he was crying. Harry hadn’t even died yet, and Draco was already crying.
He understood now how Draco had felt in sixth year, when Harry had said he would cry for him. It was a comfort, in an empty, hollow sort of way, to know that Draco would mourn him when he was gone. Harry was only sorry that he wouldn’t be around to one day return the favor.
He was desperately glad that Draco was not a Gryffindor, and that he could trust him to stay put wherever Harry said was safe.
***
Harry went to find Voldemort. He died, but he also came back. And when he came back, he got rid of Voldemort for good.
In the aftermath of the battle, Harry saw Lucius and Narcissa running about, looking desperately among the survivors for their son. Harry made his way towards them, and when Narcissa saw him coming, she rushed to meet him.
“Have you seen Draco?” she asked, her face tight with anxiety.
“I put him in Dumbledore’s office,” Harry said.
From the way Narcissa’s pale face went ashen, Harry realized she thought he meant that he had put Draco’s dead body in Dumbledore’s office.
“He’s alive, and he’s fine,” Harry said quickly. “At least he was the last time I saw him. I put him there to keep him safe. He kept getting into trouble.” It sounded ridiculous when he said it out loud. Everyone in the whole castle had been in trouble. But Draco had been the only one Harry had put away for safekeeping.
Narcissa wasn’t questioning Harry’s dubious decision-making, though. She was already relaying the news to Lucius, and then both of them were off, making their way to Dumbledore’s office in a flat out run.