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“I know you can walk, you don’t have to play it up anymore,” Harry said, straining as Malfoid shifted her weight on his back.
“But this fits your station far better, doesn’t it?” she sneered, rearing up as though she were astride some noble steed rather than clinging to the most pathetic piggyback ride known to man.
Harry rolled his eyes. He’d been doing that a lot lately.
That and taking Malfoid to the damn infirmary every week.
At first it was mere happenstance.
Hagrid was not the soundest professor when it came to lectures, trading the reliable quill and ink for a more interactive method of education.
That meant frequent outings to the outskirts of the castle grounds.
That meant mingling beasts.
That meant having to listen to Malfoid’s screeching as she nearly succumbed to cardiac arrest every time one so much as grazed her.
At first, it was hilarious, downright the highlight of the day, hell highlight of the week. Ron and Hermione certainly didn’t mind, nor were they, or anyone in their class besides Crabbe and Goyle, particularly eager to jump in and help as she pathetically curled into a ball and cried wolf.
Because that was all it was.
As if Hagrid would ever let them anywhere near any real danger (if you didn’t count the unauthorized kind).
But she’d made it a habit to gnash her teeth and sway her wand to cast the most potent spell she knew.
“My father will be hearing about this!”
Even now as he trudged with her on his back he could feel that searing smugness grace her face. He could hear those words clear as the noon they were walking in.
Well, HE was walking in.
She’d made a point of having him, of all people, carry her to the infirmary. Not Hagrid, the great giant of a man that he was. Not Floo powder. Not even a broom.
All she had to do was point a finger, utter those pretty words, and suddenly she was kicking him from above, riding him like some whipped dog.
And somehow, that was supposed to be his privilege.
“Seriously, Potter, can you go any faster? It’s blazing at this hour! Ugh, and I’ll be late for class too, no doubt!”
She shifted again, kicking at his sides.
“I’ll drop you.”
Malfoid laughed at that. It was a sharp little sound, almost a hiss. For some reason, though, Harry didn’t seem to mind it.
It’s the heat that’s getting to me…
“If you drop me, you can kiss Buckbeak goodbye, then.” Malfoid’s voice turned sweet with mock concern. “He did injure a student, after all. Such actions cannot be tolerated!”
It was Harry’s turn to laugh. She’d used that canned line a dozen times by now, yet not once had he heard anything come of it. No Ministry officials. No executioner.
Not even so much as a stern letter from her precious father.
“Yeah,” Harry said between breaths. “I’m sure it was absolutely dreadful. I mean he must have torn your leg off the way you cried. How did it go again?”
Malfoid kicked.
“Enough!”
“Ahh! It’s killed me! Ahhh, it’s killed me! My leg!”
Harry wailed the words with exaggerated agony, scarcely minding the barrage of feeble kicks and half-hearted thumps raining against his sides.
“Can you blame me? That oversized chicken could very well have—”
“He’s not a chicken, he’s a Hippogriff!” Harry remarked matter-of-factly.
He could feel her eyes roll.
“Does it matter?”
“Of course it does! If you’d just bowed down and done as you were told—”
“I did!”
Harry glanced sideways, his mouth twitching.
“No, you didn’t!”
“Did too!”
“Did not!”
“Did too!”
“Did not!”
Harry shook his head, grinning despite himself, and tightened his grip beneath Malfoid’s knees when she kicked again.
She quite liked beating on him it seemed.
But for some reason, for some ungodly machination beyond the reach of his reasonable mind, he didn’t mind it.
In fact, the reason he was slogging along the castle outskirts with the brat in tow, sweat beading on his brow and his legs beginning to ache, was precisely because he didn’t mind it.
Which, Harry surmised, was a rather worrying thing indeed.
When they reached one of the courtyard gates, Malfoid apparently found it wise to dismount from her steed.
Was it to spare him?
No, of course not.
She simply found it far more entertaining to mock him from the side than from above.
“Do keep up, Potter.”
Harry sighed and quickened his pace to fall into step beside her.
“And I suppose your leg has miraculously recovered?”
Malfoid smirked, stretching her stride just a little farther.
“Oh, I am in great pain, I’ll have you know.”
Harry rolled his eyes again.
“Of course you are.”
Malfoid’s smirk only widened.
They walked side by side for a while, occasionally catching odd looks from students on the scattered grounds gawking at the equivalent of oil and water trying to mix.
He could already picture himself batting away the rumors before they’d even had a chance to take root properly.
No, we’re not friends.
No, we weren’t holding hands.
No, I did not carry her across the grounds on my back.
That last one, Harry decided, needed particular emphasis.
Because he had.
He absolutely had.
After a stretch of silence, broken only by the scrape of their shoes against the courtyard’s stone tiles, Malfoid abruptly stepped back.
Her eyes widened.
Harry stopped mid-step, watching her carefully.
“What?”
She pointed a finger past him.
“Dementor! Dementor!”
For a moment, Harry’s blood ran cold.
All at once, his arm twitched, almost of its own accord, begging him to seize his wand and cast Expelliarmus.
Before he could, however, sense finally struck him square in the head.
Malfoid began laughing.
“Oh, my Potter! I never knew you could change colors without a spell!”
She was doubled over in tears and clutching her stomach as Harrys cheeks burned bright with fresh embarrassment.
Why did I ever think that laugh was pleasant?
However, before he could retort, an odd shadow slithered near a stone, mingling with the brush beside one of the castle entrances.
Harry furrowed his brow.
Is that what I think it is?
“Malfoid…”
She was still laughing, hardly aware of the dark little figure racing toward her feet.
“Malfoid!”
“Oh, lighten up, Potter! If there really were a Dementor, I wouldn’t mock you—”
“Snake!”
Draco’s laughter died instantly.
Her eyes dropped.
A snake, no larger than Harry’s forearm, slithered lazily across the stone.
Malfoid shrieked louder than Buckbeak could ever have made her.
“POTTER!”
Before Harry could so much as blink, she launched herself at him.
He staggered backward, arms shooting out on instinct as Malfoid practically climbed into his chest, legs curling away from the offending creature.
“GET IT AWAY!”
Harry stared down at her. A quivering mess with her face buried deep in his robes.
Then he stared at the tiny garden snake.
Then back at her.
“You’re joking.”
“POTTER!”
He was at a loss for words.
Perhaps he was dreaming, because the irony was so delicious it couldn’t possibly be real.
“Are you scared of snakes?” Harry grinned. “A Slytherin? Scared of snakes?”
She tore herself away from him for a moment and peered up, her face still pale.
“N-No! Of course not! It’s just, uh, well…” Her eyes darted toward the tiny creature. “It could be—uh—venomous! Yes! Venomous!”
“Uh huh.”
Oh, this was fun.
“So you wouldn’t mind if I…”
Harry leaned down, bringing Malfoid mere inches away from the snake’s beady eyes.
“POTTER!”
“It’s just a little garden snake. He can’t do anything. Besides, you’re not scared of this little thing, are you? You’re a pure-blooded witch, after all!”
Some false bravado found her again as she did her best to sheath the utter desperation on her face.
“O-Of course I’m not scared! Me? A witch? A Malfoid? Scared of such a tiny little thing? Please!”
She squeaked as the snake’s tongue flicked at the air, its beady head inching closer to her face.
“B-But as a matter of precaution, we shouldn’t-”
He leaned further down.
“OK OK, YOU WIN! I’M SCARED! JUST STOP!”
Harry lifted her up again, smirking as she clung even tighter.
She was still trembling in his arms, and as Harry looked down at the tangle of blonde hair and shaking limbs, he realized just how light she was.
And how genuinely terrified she was.
He should have been taking far more joy in this.
I mean, he was entertained, and it wasn’t as if she were innocent. Malfoid, of all the people he knew, needed her ego checked the most.
But right about now, it felt as though he were kicking a puppy.
Damnit, Malfoid.
How was it that she could spit such vile venom at him, use him as a pack pony, scare him half to death with false alarms, and somehow still emerge the winner?
His arms tightened around her almost imperceptibly as she squirmed, and the corner of his mouth betrayed him with a small, helpless smile.
“I’ll shoo the snake away, but first you have to apologize to me.”
Malfoid mewled something that sounded suspiciously like a complaint.
“Then you’ll tell Hagrid you’re sorry.”
That got her to lift her head.
“That oaf? I am NOT going to—”
“Then you’ll make up with Buckbeak, and bow before him like you were supposed to.”
Malfoid stared at him in utter disbelief but said nothing, knowing full well that her hands were tied. Metaphorically, of course. In reality, she was still clinging desperately to him.
Harrys lips went sly.
“Your choice, Malfoid.”
Slowly, painfully, she nodded, mumbling a barely audible “ok” before donning a half-hearted glare, as though the very act of agreeing had wounded her pride.
“I’m sorry…”
A tinge of pink dusted her cheeks then, a sharp contrast to the daggers in her eyes.
Cute.
Oh the heat IS really getting to me…
The snake was easy enough to shoo away, even without using Parseltongue.
When it slithered into the brush they maintained their trek to the infirmary, side by side…
…
For about a minute.
As they continued Malfoid , stepped over a black shoelace and screeched again, promptly jumping into Harry’s arms as if he were her personal litter.
She seemed strangely comfortable clinging to him, her arms wrapped around his neck as though she had every right to be there. Harry, much to his bewilderment, found that he didn’t particularly want her to let go.
If anything, he was becoming far too aware of the warmth of her pressed against him, the way her fingers curled into his robes, and how naturally she appeared to fit in his arms.
Neither of them seemed in any hurry to break apart.
She forced him to bridal-carry her the rest of the way.
He could’ve teased her about it. Perhaps even make a proper show of it. They were in the inner corridors now.
One quick detour, and they’d be standing in front of dozens of curious eyes.
Harry carrying Malfoid. Oh, she wouldn’t hear the end of that.
The thought was almost too tempting.
But he relented, still hung up on one hilarious detail.
“So… snakes. How come?” Harry asked after a minute of quiet walking.
“If you’re going to mock me about it, why should I even bother entertaining you?”
“I won’t mock you. At least, not too much.”
“That was mocking me.”
Harry grinned.
“It’s just, you’re a Slytherin. Seems a little…”
“Convenient?”
“Yes, actually.”
Malfoid gave him a withering look and muttered, “It’s their eyes.”
Harry strained to hear.
“Their eyes?”
Malfoid nodded defiantly.
“That’s what I said, isn’t it?” she snapped. “It’s their stupid black eyes! They don’t look natural. I can’t tell what they’re thinking! And those fangs…”
She grimaced as though a thirty-foot snake were slithering past them.
“Still, you are a Slytherin after all. The fangs are on your crest.”
“Oh, and I’m sure you’d love to have a griffin suddenly appear right in front of you? Beak and all?”
“I would.”
She scoffed, giving him a mocking look.
“It’s not as if we chose our houses based on their mascots,” she said, clearly annoyed. “Well, maybe you and your idiot friends did.”
Harry shrugged, taking the comment on the chin.
At least she hadn’t used the word half-blood.
“I suppose the Sorting Hat thought you’d appreciate the irony.”
That earned him a playful slap and a real laugh this time. Not the sneering sharp kind she used when insulting him.
A real one, all bright and unguarded.
Harry faltered.
He found himself staring down at her smile, at the way it softened her face, and felt a traitorous heat creep up his neck.
He darted his head to the side.
Damnit Malfoid.
Malfoid was still laughing, hardly noticing the pink that lingered on her cheeks.
When they finally reached the infirmary, they stayed pressed together for a moment, neither quite willing to be the first to pull away. Malfoid wouldn’t look at him, while Harry seemed reluctant to let her warmth slip from his arms.
From the hall they began to hear echoes of commotion as students departed their evening classes.
Malfoid took it as a sign and untangled herself, lingering in the doorway of the infirmary for a while.
“Your services today were much appreciated, Potter. I might have more use for you yet.”
She held her head high, as if she hadn’t spent the last half hour being hoisted around like some child.
Harry crossed his arms, not quite finished with her yet.
“You will apologize to Hagrid, though. And Buckbeak.”
She shot him a look of defiance, though the faint color creeping up her neck betrayed her.
“Stupid Potter!”
Before he could say another word, she whipped around and hurried into the infirmary, vanishing through the doors.
Harry just stood there for a moment, even as throngs of students hurried past him, the corridor slowly filling with life.
Thump thump.
What was that? Was there a troll on the loose again?
Thump thump.
He clutched his chest.
Oh, it’s my heart.
Damnit Malfoid.