Harry Potter 1. Roses and Ivy

Disclaimer: I don't own any of these characters, much to my annoyance. JKR does. I own nothing but the writing.

Warning: This is M/M SLASH so if you have objections to that, don't read this.

Author's Note: THANK YOU wonderful people who reviewed my first attempt at fanfic, Winter Morning Elegy. I love you! Hope you'll enjoy this.

Title: Dragonweed

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"The mind is its own place, and in itself

Can make a Heaven of Hell, a Hell of Heaven"

John Milton, "Paradise Lost"

*********************************************

CHAPTER 1 – Roses and Ivy

---Harry ---

It's a perfectly ordinary evening after a perfectly ordinary day. I sit in the Gryffindor common room next to Hermione, pretending (even to myself) to read. She is calm and collected as she usually is these days, no longer the over-energetic little girl who gets on everyone's nerves. She turns pages, takes notes, looks up at me once in a while and smiles in a way I can only describe as reassuring. I don't know why she thinks I need to be reassured. But maybe I exude indecision or uncertainty or anxiety. Maybe she just feels it before I do. Because suddenly my skin crawls and I feel as if I'm going to pass out. The room is too stuffy, too hot, too noisy, too full of people. I can't breathe, it's like the time I rescued Ron from the lake and the effect of the gillyweed wore off before I had reached the surface. I'm afraid I'm going to be sick. I'm afraid I'm going to cry. I stand up and my chair clatters to the floor behind me. I brush aside Hermione's alarmed exclamations, run out of the room and down the stairs. Hermione means well, she always does, and I feel my conscience sting me, but tonight I just can't take her anxious questions on how I feel. The truth is I don't know how I feel. But she won't take "strange" for an answer.

As seventh year students we're allowed to use the gardens in the evenings, as long as we're back in our dorms by eleven. The gardens spread out wedge-shaped from the school to the lake, with terraces marching down the slope. They are criss-crossed with high, clipped hedges and dotted with old, tangled thickets of roses and patches of fragrant herbs. There is even a small walled-in orchard with apple trees, and peach and apricot trees trained against the brick walls, competing with ivy for space. There are plenty of places you can go for privacy. It always surprises me that so few students make use of it, even on a beautiful night like this.

I stand on the lawn for a while, taking great gulps of the clear night air. It's an unusually warm night for the season and some late roses still open their pale, scented semi-spheres. The sky is an enormous dark blue vault pinpricked with stars, and the almost full moon bathes everything in a chalky blue light. I walk slowly across the grass, knowing where I'm heading but in no hurry to get there. At the bottom of the garden there is a secluded part of the terrace with a stone balustrade running along the edge, overlooking the lake. It's a spot where you can go to be alone, to clear your head and think. Feeling lonely in the crowded common room pushes me to the edge of breakdown. Being alone is soothing. It takes the loneliness away.

But tonight I have company in my private spot. Someone is sitting on the balustrade at the edge of the terrace. I stop cautiously in the deep shadow of a big cedar tree, not sure why I stop, but I can sense that whoever is sitting there doesn't want to be disturbed. And I don't really want to be seen, either. I don't want to talk. Talking would shatter this fragile evening like glass. It's a night for held breaths.

The boy on the stone balustrade is Draco Malfoy, the very reason why I had to run outside and gulp night air. He sits with his back against a stone pillar which is covered with ivy and the rampant climbing roses. Near his head some of the white flowers glow faintly in the strange light, shimmering and floating. The moonlight glitters on the lake behind him, but he doesn't look at either the lake or the roses. He sits half turned towards the gardens, and the rippling light on the water behind him obscures his face. He has taken off his robes and his shirt. They hang neatly folded over the balustrade beside him and he is naked to the waist; the smooth planes and curves and hollows of his upper body sculpted with moonlight and shadow. As he leans his head back against the stone pillar to look up at the starry sky, the cold light catches his sharp face, and his strange, grey eyes hold nothing of their usual arrogance. They look dreamy and slightly puzzled, as if he is thinking about something that gives him pleasure but which he does not quite comprehend. 

I stand frozen in the deep shadow under the big cedar tree. If I had wanted to keep up our antagonistic relationship I would be in the perfect position to humiliate him – after all, he sits there half-naked under an arch of roses like a slightly indecent fairytale prince. I could just saunter up to him and start our conversation with "Moonbathing, Malfoy? No wonder you never get a tan," but the temptation isn't there. Instead I have trouble breathing again, and I know that if I go up to him now, the temptation will be a very different one. _A night for held breaths. _Only Malfoy can arrange himself in a tableau like this and manage not to look ridiculous in the least, just completely natural, graceful and poised. He has a cat-like instinct for decorativeness, placing himself where he is shown to his best advantage and making it all look very casual. I literally hold my breath. I don't want to break the moment. I just want to stay in the shadow and hold this perfect picture. Dark foliage, glittering water, the dreaming boy with the light playing over his pale face and silvery hair. My fingers twitch. I want to trace them over that white, perfect skin. Is he hot or cold to the touch? 

There was a time when the only physical contact with Malfoy I desired was letting my fist connect with his jaw. I would have loved to see that haughty smirk break up in confusion and pain. Now there is no trace of a smirk on his face, and I can't help myself. I give in. I eat him with my eyes; I let them slide from his lips down the delicate neckline; I rest them on the soft shadows above his collar-bones, on the almost unnoticeable rising and falling of his chest, wondering what it would be like to feel his pulse beat against the tip of my tongue as I touch it to the hollow at the base of his throat.  


My red alert system is screaming and flashing inside me but I just stand there helplessly. _There is nothing even remotely attractive about him! this wild little voice inside me shouts. That beauty is nothing but surface! Scratch it and you will find darkness and ruin. He is dangerous. Anyone who takes pleasure in other people's pain is dangerous. You had more sense when you were eleven years old and turned down his dubious offer of friendship._

I back away cautiously from under the tree. I feel vaguely ashamed, as if I have seen something I should not have seen. I'm sweating and shaken, hot and cold as if I have fever. I cross the lawn quietly and walk up through the dewy terraces back to the castle. The Fat Lady is dozing but she jerks awake to let me into the common room, gives me a motherly look and says sleepily: "You're all damp, dear; be careful you don't catch cold". I go up to the dorm and go to bed, but I can't sleep. I toss and turn behind the drawn curtains of my four-poster, thoughts whirling in my head. Just one thing stands out clearly: The picture of the half-naked boy in the garden, so beautiful he almost does not look human.

* * * * *

At breakfast I carefully place myself with my back to the Slytherin table. Most mornings I allow myself the pleasure of watching Malfoy's sleek, well-groomed head bend over the plates, but today I don't want to look at him. I usually try not to look at him too much, I don't want to be obvious, but I find it very hard to resist. And quite often, when I let my eyes wander over to the Slytherin table, I find his eyes already resting on me, or lifting to meet mine. Usually we both quickly look away, but sometimes one of us holds the other's gaze, almost like a challenge. The intoxicating mixture of pleasure, fear and desire that washes over me when we do is addictive, like a very potent drug. It's so strong I can't believe he doesn't feel it too. It lives in me like a tropical fever – dormant for long periods, but breaking out in sudden bouts that leave me confused, trembling, sweating. Today I don't want to risk it. I'm afraid my own eyes will betray me if they meet his; give away what I saw last night. I try to concentrate on my cereal and on Ron talking to me across the table about a letter from Bill that a distracted owl has just dropped into his plate of scrambled eggs.

It's simply impossible to concentrate. I feel Malfoy's presence like insects climbing up my back. When there are five hundred people in the room I see only him. He stands out as if someone has put a Luminous charm on him. It's as if the hall is all misty and blurred and he is the only clear figure in it. When I hear his voice I feel a shiver go down my spine. I recognize all these symptoms as ones of being in love. But I can't accept that. Physically attracted, yes. In love, _no_.

I catch Hermione watching me with this worried look she's reserved for me for weeks now. But she doesn't say anything, and neither do I. I don't know why I have developed such an obsession with Malfoy and it worries me, but it's nothing I want to discuss with either her or Ron. Well, my face is not exactly inscrutable. They both know me well and they're not stupid; of course they come to their own conclusions.

I go to Potions class with Ron and Hermione walking on either side of me like body guards. For some reason, Snape is in a very good mood this morning. He doesn't exactly smile but his lips curl in way that, with Snape, must be interpreted as mirth. He even makes a not-too-nasty joke about my failure to tame my unruly hair. I'm in the process of chopping up a bunch of thick dragonweed stalks, and my knife slips in surprise. A few drops of the blood-red sap splash up and hit my cheek, leaving a hot tingle on my skin. The sensation is not unpleasant. Snape, who never misses anything, says: "Well, Potter, go ahead and taste a few drops now you have the chance. Pure extract of dragonweed is a powerful pick-me-up. Could give you a better memory for your potions." He's almost cheerful. The inevitable snicker from the Slytherins moves like a wave through the dungeon and I hate myself for taking notice of it. I wipe the dragonweed sap off my cheek with a finger and lick it tentatively. It has a fruity, slightly spicy taste, and I remember Ron saying that wizard parents give their children dragonweed extract just like Muggle parents give their children extra vitamins.

I'm suddenly acutely aware of someone looking at me. I raise my eyes cautiously, thinking that Snape is still hovering over me like a malevolent bat, waiting for some curious reaction to the dragonweed. Instead I meet Draco Malfoy's strange, silvery eyes across the room and I almost jump. They're not dreamy like last night. There is a disturbed light in them; they are intense and very steady. He holds my gaze almost fiercely and I half expect a crackling ray of blue light to appear between us. He's telling me something, but I can't read it.

The next moment I realise that even if my mind can't read his message, there is no doubt that my body can. The heat of it hits the pit of my stomach and melts down to my crotch. _Oh, no. Not now._ I avert my eyes, desperate to break the connection.

I'm not sure when my obsession with Malfoy started, but I know I have spent an inordinate amount of time during the past six months or so thinking about him. Not always consciously or in any structured manner, but somehow the image of him is always there at the back of my mind, nagging and persistent like a song you have in your head when you wake up in the morning.

His general behaviour has changed very much over the last year. Not that there's anything strange about that, really. People mature. Hell, even Malfoy has to mature. He used to be obnoxious but he has never been loud. These days he is very withdrawn and quiet, but he looks as if he misses very little. He still has the same smooth, arrogant stride, but there is no more taunting. Come to think of it, I haven't heard him talk about Mudbloods for ages. He even leaves Hermione alone. He rather seems to avoid me, apart from the times when our eyes meet. If it hadn't been so unbelievable I would say that Malfoy at times, when he doesn't know he's being watched, looks troubled, vulnerable even. But why should I be so interested in what goes on in his mind?

Perhaps it's not that surprising. He has never allowed me to forget his existence since that first time we met, in Diagon Alley when we were just kids. I've always watched him closely, if only just to see where the next attack will come from. Malfoy always evokes strong feelings, not only in me. Perhaps the really strange thing is I haven't been intrigued by him before. Or noticed his looks. It's not just his character that has matured. His face is less pointed; it's a strong face with clean, sharp features and those strikingly beautiful eyes. His body has lost its boyishness. He is tall and lithe and athletic, well-muscled but not overly so. He has a runner's body. Or a flyer's.

__

Not the right thing to think about right now.

I'm aware of Ron watching me intently with a strange expression on his face, and I gather myself together as best I can.

"You OK, Harry?"

"Yeah, I'm fine. Why does everybody keep asking me that? I was just a bit distracted by this dragonweed thing. It doesn't taste bad, actually. Did you say it's like vitamins?"

* * * ~ * * *


	2. Dragonweed

Disclaimer: I don't own any of these characters, much to my annoyance. JKR does. I own nothing but the writing.

Author's Note: This is M/M SLASH so if you have objections to that, don't read this.

Title: Dragonweed

__

"The mind is its own place, and in itself

Can make a Heaven of Hell, a Hell of Heaven"

John Milton, "Paradise Lost"

*********************************************

CHAPTER 2 - Dragonweed

---Draco---

I saw him in the garden last night. I saw the dark figure stop dead in its tracks under the cedar tree. The moonlight was reflected in his glasses, and even if I couldn't see him clearly I knew who it was. I don't know what it is about him these days, but something makes the hairs stand up at the back of my neck when he comes close. It's vaguely unpleasant, like static electricity. I have always been able to feel his presence but this is getting ridiculous. 

It was about a year ago that I first had to admit to myself that my antipathy for him was slowly changing into something else, first into some sort of reluctant admiration and then, gradually, into attraction. And the attraction keeps growing stronger. I've never really tried to do anything about it, unless you count some emergency solo performances late at night. I've never approached him in any way. I've also finally had to admit that the the attraction is physical _and_ emotional, although it took me a long time to get there. The physical attraction was easier to admit to; it was more direct and easier to explain. He's not a scrawny kid any more, but tall and lean and rather well-built, although by no means heavy. He has the perfect build for a Seeker. He's the most beautiful flyer I've ever seen, his movements very precise but still with a flowing grace and complete ease. I'm not a bad Seeker or flyer, but I don't compare to him. No one does. To be honest we have lost more than one match to the Gryffindors not because Harry is such a superior Seeker but because I hold back just to watch him. The look in his eyes when he has located the Snitch is so intense it shatters my concentration. My focus shifts from the Snitch to him, and then the game is lost. If anyone has noticed this they haven't said a word to me about it. 

My interest in Harry is really nothing new, only the focus has shifted, just like it does when we play Quidditch. I've always watched him very closely, pondered him, analysed him, watched his moves, his reactions, his relationships. He has always seemed completely unaware of this. He also seems completely unaware of his own attractiveness. And that only adds to the attraction. It's – refreshing. After all, he has faced the Dark Lord on several occasions. He's been very close to death in more ways than one. But those experiences don't seem to have hardened him, just deepened this – well, whatever it is. Humility, perhaps. His essential innocence and – and _goodness_ seems to be unaffected by the dark memories he must have. This is a strength in him that I have scorned and ridiculed but also, to be truthful, been more than a little afraid of. It's so ironic that I now regard this as the most desirable characteristic of all. I feel that if he would just touch me I would be healed; he would somehow be able to silence the voices rising from the dark depths inside me. 

The other Slytherins are used to my nightmares by now. None of them even asks me if I'm OK when I wake up screaming. They just clamp their pillows over their ears and go back to sleep. I'm left to wonder what foul sources these nightmares well up from. I have no idea why I feel that _Harry Potter_, of all people, could help me. The thought of asking him, of telling him, makes me sick to the stomach.

I am well aware that I have changed. I've begun to see people in a different light; I've begun to be interested in them for their own sake, not just for any use they could be to me. I've realised I might not be the only one with dark depths, not the only one to see unspeakable things rise from these depths when I'm off guard. I don't find much pleasure in my old favourite game any more; finding people's weak spots and using them to my own advantage. Not that I'm not still good at it – I'm a fucking expert. But I seem to have lost the taste for exploiting my talent in this area. I don't do it unless I'm given no choice.

Lately I've seen a new element in Harry's attitude towards me. There is a tentativeness, a questioning look in his eyes. I have to seize the opportunity when it's there to be enjoyed. It certainly wasn't chance that placed me on that balustrade last night. I know that Harry sometimes goes to this part of the gardens; several times I have been the one standing in the shadows watching. Last night the roles were reversed. For evenings on end I've been sitting on the balustrade, waiting for Harry to come or just waiting for something to happen, although I wasn't quite sure what. Something did happen last night, but I'm not sure what that was, either.

At breakfast I notice that he turns his back to the Slytherin table. Usually he faces it, and occasionally our eyes meet. But not today. It may just be coincidence, but I feel oddly rejected. Rejection is not something I take well, or lightly. When I walk slowly down to the dungeons for Potions I feel a strange mixture of anger and nausea. But I do what I do best, I feign indifference.

I enjoy Potions, not only because Snape is an excellent teacher and it's easily my best subject, but also because I know that for the next hour my eyes will have access to Harry whenever they want to. It's a secret pleasure of mine, watching him concentrate on his work, a small wrinkle appearing between his eyebrows; watching his hand come up and push the black hair out of his eyes and reveal the lightning-bolt scar; watching the confusion in his eyes as they meet mine. Sometimes I wonder what it would feel like to kiss the scar. For some reason I imagine it to be hot to the touch. Sometimes I have to turn my face away. 

Snape makes a joke and Harry's knife slips. (Really, the idea of Snape making a joke is enough to make anyone slip.) The blood-coloured sap from the dragonweed splashes up on his cheek, and I almost have to leave the room. It's beautiful. It's perfect. The black, pillow-messy hair, the green eyes shining with confusion and hurt pride, the drops of dark red liquid on the pale skin. I stare at him, enthralled, vaguely thinking what a good thing it is I am wearing robes to hide the disastrous effect he has on my body. If there were no other people in the room, I would go straight up to him, hold him by the shoulders, our faces level, our eyes locked – mine forcing down the confusion in his, forcing them to respond to the demand in mine – and slowly put my tongue to his skin, lick the red drops off, the tang of the dragonweed mingling with the taste of _him_. Now I have to content myself with watching him wipe the drops off with a finger and put his finger in his mouth – and really, that's not such a bad substitute. I just wish it was my finger – or some other part of me – there in his mouth. My eyes don't leave him for a second.

And then he looks up. He catches me staring, but I don't back down. I hold his gaze almost aggressively. He stares back at me, and there's a flicker in his eyes – uncertainty, puzzlement… He doesn't know what I want. Or does he? Suddenly his lashes come sweeping down like a bashful girl's, and I watch as deep colour comes into his face, spreading slowly like spilt wine on white linen. I think he really does know what I want. He just doesn't know what to do about it. 

Even when we were just kids I enjoyed seeing him blush. I used to taunt him purely to see his colour deepen in anger. I still enjoy making him blush; I feel something close to elation when I can provoke this reaction in him. I dream of seeing his face flushed with pleasure under me.

At other times I still loath him. _Potter._ His last name is a name you can hold on the tip of your tongue like something bitter and spit out in contempt (a fact that Snape knows well and makes frequent use of). The odd thing is that the things in him that make me loath him are the same ones that make me want him.

Sometimes I have a strong wish to hurt him, to slam him up against the wall, expose bare skin and bite it, break it, draw blood. But I'm never sure whether it's a genuine desire to hurt or just a feeling born out of frustration. 

__

But last night, in the garden – what were you thinking when you stood there under the cedar tree watching me?

It was deliciously erotic, sitting there in the moonlight half-naked, exposed, stared at. I could almost feel his eyes greedily licking at my bare skin, making it burn and tingle in the cool night air. I looked oh so innocently up at the sky, an incredible starry sky, not giving anything away, carefully not looking in his direction, like an actor who avoids meeting the eye of the camera. 

__

I've stopped saying no to you. Here, in the bleak reality of classrooms and potions and scuffling and shoving, I'm not sure what I'm saying instead. But at night, when I wake up into the dusty silence of the dorm from a deep, dark sleep, gasping as if I have just reached the surface and my lungs are about to burst, I know that if you were there at that moment I would say yes. And yes. And yes.

* * * ~ * * *


	3. Water Lilies

Disclaimer: I don't own any of these characters, much to my annoyance. JKR does. I own nothing but the writing.

Warning: This is M/M SLASH so if you have objections to that, don't read this.

Title: Dragonweed

__

"The mind is its own place, and in itself

Can make a Heaven of Hell, a Hell of Heaven"

John Milton, "Paradise Lost"

*********************************************

CHAPTER 3 – Water Lilies

--- Draco ---

__

My arms are flailing feebly, splashing up the black water, but it's too strong, it's dragging me down. Something underneath the surface is calling me with cold, frightening strength. I'm trying to fight it but I'm too weak. I turn my head and see something floating and bobbing on the surface next to me. Water lilies, ghostly-looking white water lilies. When they come closer I see that each of them holds a drop of pearly substance, and I know that it's a human soul. Each of the water lilies holds the soul of a dead human being, and I know I'm the one who has killed them. The water turns thick and red and I know that I am the cause of this bloodshed. There is blood on my hands. My clothes are soaked in it. It's dripping from my hair. I'm swimming in a lake of human blood. I know I must be punished. I know I'm going to have to pay with my own life. I'm too weak to hold my face above the surface any longer, and when I feel the blood seep into my mouth I scream.

I wake up, still screaming. 

It's the third time this week I have had this dream. I lie still and stare into the dark, trying to control my breathing. Blaise Zabini moans and mutters something as he turns in his bed next to mine. My hair is damp with sweat and my heart is pounding.

I've never been afraid of solitude. Why should I be afraid of dying? Death is only the ultimate, deep solitude. There is a certain beauty in that thought.

--- Harry ---

I can't sleep. I've never suffered from insomnia before, which is a little strange, when you think about it. Some of the things I have lived through are so dark I have to move my mind away from them to keep my sanity. They lie there hidden in their caves like hideous sea monsters, and I skim the surface above them, careful not to disturb it, gingerly skating on the surface tension like a water insect. But these things have never prevented me from sleeping.

Being in love does.

This is almost like another tri-wizard tournament task. In its own way, it's more difficult than fighting Voldemort. With him, the sides are clearly defined. There is no doubt about the loyalties. But in this battle I'm helpless, for how do you fight love? A good deal of our time here at Hogwarts has been dedicated to Defense Against the Dark Arts. But when it comes to love, we are all left without defenses.


	4. Chocolate

Disclaimer: I don't own any of these characters, much to my annoyance. JKR does. I own nothing but the writing.

Warning: This is M/M SLASH so if you have objections to that, don't read this.

Title: Dragonweed

__

"The mind is its own place, and in itself

Can make a Heaven of Hell, a Hell of Heaven"

John Milton, "Paradise Lost"

*********************************************

CHAPTER 4 – Chocolate

--- Draco ---

This evening will be significant in more ways than one, but as I walk through the great hall I don't know that yet. It's late and the hall is dark and empty. A faint smell of food lingers in the air. I skipped dinner tonight and I'm not sure whether this hollow feeling in my stomach is hunger or nausea. I stop to look up at the enchanted ceiling, where the wind is chasing thin wisps of cloud over the brilliant autumn stars. I'm on my way out into the gardens for a bit of air before I go to bed. I've had so many nightmares lately I'm almost afraid to go to sleep.

My eye catches a slight movement, almost imperceptible, in the shadows by the wall. I turn sharply and try to pierce the darkness. I listen intently. I stand there for a long time but there is no more movement. Perhaps it was a figment of my imagination. I feel a cold fear starting to close in on me, suffocating and strong. It rises and tightens and I imagine I can hear it, like an unearthly music building up to a crescendo around me. My vision grows dim and my heart is pounding in my ears, almost louder than the terrifying music. A pain seizes me, white-hot and flashing through my head, strong enough to make me retch, but my stomach is empty and nothing comes up. I gasp and cough and feel cold sweat break out all over my body. Another flash of pain hits me. An enormous, sweeping blackness rises up, and there is nothing I can do but let it swallow me.

* * *

When I open my eyes I feel cold flagstones under me, but my head is softly pillowed. The room revolves slowly, sickeningly around me. The walls waver and recede, the stars in the ceiling come and go in a ghostly fashion. I close my eyes again and wait for the room to steady itself. I don't know how long I lie there, but gradually my head stops spinning and I feel confident enough to open my eyes again. I look up and in the faint moonlight I see a pair of green eyes looking down into mine. They are very wide and very concerned. I find I'm lying with my head in Harry's lap. One of his hands is resting lightly on my chest, the other gently pushing my hair from my forehead.

"What happened?" My voice is just a whisper.

"I don't know. I came down to the hall and found you lying here."

I feel strange but the room is still now, still and quiet except for our breathing. Strangely, the incident is almost gone from my mind. The terrifying blackness that made me faint has been chased into the corners by Harry's presence. His hand on my brow is warm and gentle. I'm amazed by the soft warmth of having him so close, the unexpected feeling of security.

"Malfoy… are you all right?"

His voice is so full of concern. I turn my head just to feel the warmth of his thigh under my cheek. I close my eyes again and say weakly: "I'm not sure." His hand is still on my chest, palm flat and fingers spread lightly, as if he's trying to feel my heartbeat. 

"You need some chocolate," he says, very practical. "Can you sit up, do you think?"

I have no excuse to stay with my head in his lap, so I sit up gingerly, shaking my head like a dog. But it's quiet now. No more music. Only my pulse. I can't bear to lose the close warmth of him, and I inch up to him to feel his thigh along mine, his shoulder against mine. He has unwrapped a bar of chocolate and breaks off a piece, turns to me and pushes it into my mouth. For a fraction of a second, my body goes rigid with surprise. Why would he do that instead of just handing me the chocolate? It's such an intimate gesture, from a mother to her child. Or from one lover to another. His fingers brush my lip as he withdraws, and the touch goes through my body like a current.

Our eyes lock. I hear the hitch in his breath and the air vibrates between us. After a second that feels like an eternity, his eyes drop to my lips. I turn the piece of chocolate around slowly in my mouth, caress it with my tongue, my eyes still on his face. I see him almost wince, as if with pain, and a slow flush creeps up over his cheeks. I don't let him go. His eyes come up to mine again, and he lifts his hand and touches the corner of my mouth, a small, shy caress. He is so close. His hand lingers.

"You – you had some chocolate there," he says in a half-whisper. 

He actually finds it necessary to give me an excuse for his touching me, although the real reason is written all over him. In spite of everything, I almost laugh. But I'm also trembling. It has to happen now. He wants it as badly as I do. I don't care if it's the stupidest thing I've ever done. I know even as I do it that some way or the other, I will be made to pay for this. But I lean forward and kiss him very softly on the lips, my mouth still full of chocolate. He starts, but as the initial surprise dies down he responds, equally softly. I feel his hand brush my cheek and then nestle against it, and I reach out to pull him closer. Our mouths open, our tongues meet. I am surrounded by gentleness. I have never been kissed like this before; the sweetness of it makes me light-headed. The liquid heat in my stomach spreads to my crotch, and my hands begin a journey all on their own. I can't think, I can't control them. They are exploring his hair, his flushed face, his neck, his back, groping to get under his robes. I hear him make a small sound, almost like a whimper, and I pull back. We both scramble to our feet and stand there staring each other, dazedly licking chocolate from our lips.

"Draco, I – " He sounds confused, almost remorseful. "I don't know why I… I'm sorry."

"I'm not," I say. I feel weak and drained from fainting and I'm tired of games. Now that the barrier has been broken down and there is a way forward, I want to stop circling. "And I know perfectly well why. So do you."

He looks taken aback, scared. He Who has Fought Evil – afraid of a kiss. I'm annoyed at his timidity, and at the same time I still have this mad wish to laugh.

"Look, do you want to play games?" I ask him. My voice is soft and almost threatening. "I think we've done that long enough. What's the point? Are you trying to be polite, Potter, or are you just plain scared? You know what you want from me, and I know it, too. You think I haven't seen it? You're so transparent, Potter. I saw you in the garden that night." 

He's getting angry now. He doesn't like this; I'm too blunt. He really does want to play games. He thinks it's required of him, for politeness or for decency, or perhaps he's only trying to protect himself. He knows as well as I do that what we are doing now is disastrous.

"What if you did?" he growls. And we're back on old, old, familiar ground.

"You enjoyed it, didn't you, being the voyeur? You just wished I had taken the rest of my clothes off, too."

I'm crude because I want him to shut up. There are better uses for his mouth right now. We are here, alone, in the hall. We shouldn't waste this opportunity. We can't afford to let it go. He laughs unexpectedly, as if he's thinking along the same lines. His eyes flash into mine, challenging now, frank, appraising. He takes a step forward, close enough for me to feel his breath on my skin.

"Have some more chocolate, Malfoy," he says silkily. "Being speechless became you."

He thinks there are better uses for my mouth, too. He has surprised me and I love it. I can't keep my eyes away from the slender curve of his neck. I lift my hand and undo the clasp of his robes, push them off his shoulders. I lean forward the few inches that separate us and kiss his neck just where it meets his shoulder. I hear his sharp intake of breath and feel the responding heat in my body. His skin is hot and smooth and wonderfully alive under my lips. I let my mouth travel slowly up his neck to the tender spot just below his ear. I touch his earlobe with my tongue and his cheek is burning on mine. He doesn't move, doesn't breathe. I want to tell him to exhale. I brush my mouth along his jaw and very gently catch his lower lip between my teeth, touch it with the tip of my tongue, tease it, caress it. My hands slide over his shoulders and down his chest, very lightly. Oh, this gentleness. It is such a beautiful novelty. I have always known I had the capacity for it, but I have never been given the option.

I feel his hands come up into my hair, not lightly or gently at all, tangling in it, sliding down the back of my neck and gripping my shoulders, leaving a trace of small flames on my skin. My robes come off and I'm being pulled close to him in a stumbling movement. I steady myself against him as his tongue roughly explores my mouth. He makes it clear that he wants no more teasing. I respond by placing a hand at the small of his back and pressing him up against me, feeling the hardness, grinding against him. He gasps in surprise. I let go of his mouth and laugh.

"What? Isn't this what you wanted?"

"I – what – are you… I mean, is it…"

He's so furious with me for breaking the moment that he's stuttering incoherently. His confusion makes the air taste sweet. At this moment, his anger is almost as strong as his excitement. 

"Eloquence, Potter. Your strong point."

He looks as if he could hit me, but I stop laughing and put my hands on his chest. Something changes between us, I don't know what it is. The surge of emotion between us is rearranging itself, revealing new patterns.

"Draco…"

My name on his lips sends a shiver down my spine.

"Yes."

But he shakes his head, he doesn't know what to say.

I feel a rush of tenderness at his awkwardness. This is one of the reasons for my attraction to him – it's not the things he knows, but the things he doesn't know. It's a heady mixture; his indisputable power mingled with this disarming insecurity. I pull him to me again. He is the one closing the distances between us this time. He presses himself up against me very gently, very insistently, and my heart is skipping beats in an alarming fashion. His mouth is on mine again, his tongue insistent. I explore his mouth with eagerness, the silky wetness, the hard teeth. My hands are fumbling with his clothes, wanting to feel naked skin. As my palms meet the hot, tender skin of his bared midriff, we hear voices approaching the hall.

We fly apart, flushed and guilty, snatching up our robes from the floor. We both immediately sense the urgency of the voices drawing close. Lights come blazing on; the hall is drenched in light and we gape at the hurried entrance of Dumbledore, McGonagall, Snape and Sprout. Dumbledore has a look on his face that makes a chill run through me. His features seem to have arranged themselves into a mask, purposeful and iron-hard.

"Heads of House, please summon your students. Will one of you kindly alert the Ravenclaw students."

Even his voice has a sharpness I have never heard before. I feel Harry moving uneasily just outside my field of vision. Dumbledore sees us standing there and nods at us. His eyes are piercingly blue. For the first time, I understand why he is said to be the only wizard that the Dark Lord fears. Except – except the very young, trembling, newly kissed wizard whose elbow is just touching mine.

"Mr Malfoy; Mr Potter. We are calling all students and all staff to an urgent meeting. We have just received word that the Dark Lord is mobilizing his forces."

I feel Harry straighten up beside me, standing to attention.

"Gentlemen. Very shortly we will be at war."


	5. Dark Year

Disclaimer: I don't own any of these characters, much to my annoyance. JKR does. I own nothing but the writing.

Author's Note: THANK YOU, all reviewers!! 

Warning: This is M/M SLASH so if you have objections to that, don't read this.

Title: Dragonweed

__

"The mind is its own place, and in itself

Can make a Heaven of Hell, a Hell of Heaven"

John Milton, "Paradise Lost"

*********************************************

CHAPTER 5 – Dark Year

"unlove's the heavenless hell and homeless home"

e.e. cummings

--- Harry ---

That evening in the Hall is followed by frantic activity; organisation and preparation. The younger students are sent home immediately. Classes are cancelled and the older students have to make the hardest choices of their lives – those who have not made their choices much earlier. Most of the Slytherin students simply disappear within the next day or two. No one is in any doubt that they have left to join the Dark Side.

Other students leave on missions for the other side. Ron and Ginny leave to join their father, but Hermione is among those who stay, and I am very glad to have her company. It is during this intense period after the meeting in the Hall that I realise the full extent of her strength and determination, her sharp, calm logic, her analytical brilliance in strategic matters. We sit through long conferences with Dumbledore, McGonagall, Sirius, Lupin and others, and I am very impressed by her. I feel that if I am part of the sword-arm of this closely united force, Hermione is definitely a vital part of its brain. She has always pointed out to me and Ron that knowledge is power. I haven't understood until now how true that is.

Draco Malfoy is still at Hogwarts, but I do not see a lot of him. I wonder why he is staying. We have not spoken since that fateful evening in the Hall. My eyes are constantly searching halls and corridors to catch a glimpse of the tall, elegant figure. The elegance is still there, but he seems very troubled and very busy. His steps are hurried and his grey eyes are darker than I have ever seen them, and they rarely meet mine. He seems very anxious to keep a distance between us. I am hurt by his coldness and I never try to approach him. Once or twice I think about sending him an owl, but something holds me back. I see him frequently conferring with Snape. One evening I meet him coming out of Dumbledore's office. I open my mouth to speak, but he brushes past me without a word or even a nod. The soft, ghostly touch of his fine robes against my hand is enough to leave me shaking.

At night my dreams of kisses, of soft lips and hot hands and silky blond hair, mingle with dreams of darkness and blood and the pervasive green light. I wake up feeling hollow; a deep, dark cave inside me. There is nothing to fill it except fear and steely determination.

We grow up very fast. For a lot of us, it happens in a matter of days.

War does not break out at once, as everyone had expected. There is fear and movement, sabotage and random attacks, but not war outright, not yet.

My schedule is very busy with meetings, hard physical training and Advanced Defense Against the Dark Arts classes. Mad-Eye Moody is back, more fiercely dedicated than ever. I don't have much time to brood. I'm grateful.

About two months after the meeting (and our kisses) in the Hall, Draco Malfoy leaves. He has no words of goodbye for me, either spoken or scribbled down on a piece of parchment, no handshake, not even a look. One morning he is simply not there.

That night I lie sleepless in my four-poster, knowing that Malfoy's leaving means that I will very probably have to live my nightmare, the thing I dread most of all, more, even, than facing Voldemort again.

When the war breaks out, Malfoy will be my enemy and I will have to fight him.

--- Draco ---

One of the hardest things I have ever done was leaving Hogwarts without talking to you, Harry. I wanted to tell you where I was going, what the plan was, my intentions. I wanted to tell you I keep the memory of our kisses like a heavy, smooth crystal inside me, occasionally stopping to marvel at its beauty. I couldn't. I don't mean there was anything to stop me or that I was not allowed to, I just mean that I couldn't. 

I had to leave secretly, knowing it would hurt you but unable to do anything else. It hurt me, too, but I have had lifelong practice at ignoring hurt, or at least hiding it.

That was more than a year ago, but you are so clear in my memory. You are what keeps me going, Harry. You are what keeps me human. When I stand in the background watching my father do unspeakable things to other human beings, a fanatic light shining in his eyes, or during the night-long Death Eater meetings where we discuss our strategies, or on our endless, uncomfortable journeys from country to country in the dark, I think of you. You keep me upright. You made me see what really matters in life, and it was not what my father has always preached.

Subservience, lies, deceit. Rituals. Blood. Darkness. How can I even begin to tell you about the horrors I see? Some of them I have to partake in. Some of them I can watch from a distance. That does not diminish my guilt. I am doing this for a purpose, but sometimes at night the agony overwhelms me, and I find myself kneeling pathetically on the hard flagstones, wishing there was a higher power I could pray to, someone to ask for forgiveness.

Our years at school stand out in my memory. They truly shine. They were so innocent. _We_ were so innocent. Cruel, perhaps, in the way that children are cruel, but their cruelty is largely involuntary, it is mostly ignorance. We did not really know evil back in those days, Harry. Well, now that I think of it, I suppose you did. You had met it. But you were the only one among us.

I wish I could tell you what is going on here. I don't know if you will ever know, or if we will ever meet again. We might not come out of this alive. But I do know that we are fighting for all the right things, and what we feel for each other is one of those things.

Without hope, the soul dies. My hope, the one that I cling to in my most desperate hours, is that one day, somewhere far away from all this, where the air is sweet and pure and the streams are clear, we will meet and I will be able to find words to express my feelings for you. Sometimes I think that those feelings are the only sane and true part of me.

I will have to wait a long time for that. But I know how to be patient. I have had so much practice.


	6. Battle

Disclaimer: I don't own any of these characters, much to my annoyance. JKR does. I own nothing but the writing.

Author's Note: THANK YOU, all reviewers!! And if you thought the last cliffhanger was cruel – well…

Warning: This is M/M SLASH so if you have objections to that, don't read this.

Title: Dragonweed

__

"The mind is its own place, and in itself

Can make a Heaven of Hell, a Hell of Heaven"

John Milton, "Paradise Lost"

*********************************************

CHAPTER 6 – Battle

--- Harry ---

Darkness… mud… clashing flashes of white and green. Death Eaters closing in.Voldemort's flaring, excited red eyes. An explosion of violent pain in my head. At long last, we have reached the battle. Wands flashing and sparkling around me. Dumbledore at my side. Snape, black eyes burning. Sirius with a look on his face that I will never forget. 

My vision is blurred with pain, my mind in shadow. My perception is weakening. I have no grasp of what is happening around me, or even to me. I hear the groans and screams and thuds of fighting. I repeatedly hear Avada Kedavra, or perhaps it is just an echo inside my head. The pain is excruciating, blazing white. I stagger and retch, trying to stay upright. At the edge of my blurred field of vision I see Bill Weasley fall heavily to the ground.

Flashes of green and red. I point my wand and my voice has a commanding note I have never known before. Lights are blinding. Darkness soars. This will never stop.

I slip in the mud and fall down on my knees. My wand rolls away from my hand and I feel mud squelch between my fingers. Mere inches from my hands, I see a pair of heavy black boots and the hem of black robes. Dizzy and defeated, I follow the folds of the robes upwards with my eyes. I find myself looking up at Draco Malfoy. 

I have never known him to look so forbidding, so intimidating. He is towering over me, firm and still in the billowing battle, exuding a terrifying power I have never known him to possess. In my vision, hazy with pain, his hair seems to shimmer, a spiky halo of bluish white around his head. He is a pillar of blackness and metallic light, standing sternly over me like an avenging angel. I close my eyes, having no strength left in me to fight, and I know I have met my Angel of Death. I should have known that long ago. My last thought is that even if I had been fit, I don't know whether I could have fought him. His beauty shines through the mud and the grime and the blood. Even in this dark moment he is magnificent. Even in this dark moment I love him.

He lifts his hand and pain explodes white and hot in my head. Then there is only darkness.


	7. Mud and Butterflies

Disclaimer: I don't own any of these characters, much to my annoyance. JKR does. I own nothing but the writing.

Author's Note: THANK YOU, new reviewers and wonderful, faithful reviewers…!

Warning: This is M/M SLASH so if you have objections to that, don't read this.

Title: Dragonweed

__

"The mind is its own place, and in itself

Can make a Heaven of Hell, a Hell of Heaven"

John Milton, "Paradise Lost"

*********************************************

CHAPTER 7 – Mud and Butterflies

--- Harry ---

I wake up to a bright day and a white ceiling. The equally white dividers and something about the atmosphere and the way the light falls in through high windows tells me I'm in the hospital wing at Hogwarts. My eyes go around the room while I try to understand how I came to be here. I lie still for a long time, trying to reconcile the brightness of the room with the dull emptiness inside me.

Shreds of memories drift past, ragged flashes of mud and fear and pain.

I touch my scar. It does not hurt. Perhaps I am imagining it, but I can hardly feel the familiar lightning-bolt ridge under my fingers. It seems to have sunk into the skin.

The door opens and Madam Pomfrey enters. She starts when she meets my eyes, and comes up to me with a look of deep concern.

"Oh, you are awake," she says. "How do you feel?"

How _do_ I feel? I hardly know who I am. Confusion and bewilderment are very weak, very inadequate words. I don't know if I will ever find words to describe the abyss inside me. She seems to understand this, without me saying anything.

"Here," she says and places a beaker of something vividly red on my bedside table. "Drink this."

I drink it obediently, and the taste of it calls up a faint memory. It is hazy and without detail, but I know it's a pleasant memory. I can't hold on to it. It flutters at the edge of my mind and dances away like a butterfly.

A few minutes later I am asleep again.

* * *

When I wake up this time the light is softer, the reddish golden light of a winter afternoon. I feel a hand on my shoulder and turn to see Dumbledore's eyes look into mine, warmth spreading through my numb body. He looks very tired but also tremendously relieved and – and yes, he looks happy.

"Harry," he says warmly. "Just rest. Just rest."

"Voldemort," I say.

"Voldemort is gone, Harry," he says softly. "I will tell you all the details when you are feeling better."

"Gone?" The word leaves a vacuum in my head. For a moment, everything stands still. I will not even try to comprehend. I start on another, more immediate thread. "And – and Sirius?"

"He's here in the hospital wing."

Cold fear spears me.

"Is he – will he be all right?"

"Yes, eventually. It will take some time, but – yes."

Scraps of vivid memories flash past. I'm halfway out of bed in alarm.

"Ron – Hermione! Bill, Charlie… They were all out there with us, weren't they?"

"Yes, Harry, they were." Dumbledore's hand on my shoulder gently pushes me back onto the pillows. He is silent for a while. I can see that he is sorry for me, so sorry, and doesn't know how to tell me what he has to tell me. "Ron is well; he's at The Burrow." He pauses again. "But I'm afraid that, as always, the good news is accompanied by bad. Are you strong enough to hear the worst of it?"

I am so tired. I just want to sleep.

"Yes," I say.

* * *

I must have cried for hours after Dumbledore left. It's too much to grasp, too overwhelming. Hagrid, Bill, Charlie, Lupin... So many more whose names I have never known. So many gone. Hermione is here in the hospital wing, being treated for a dark burn that covers most of her left side and very nearly cost her her life. But I have no strength to go and see her.

With the aid of Madam Pomfrey's blessed potions I sleep for several days. I lose track of time. I just lie here and watch day change to night, night to day. Madam Pomfrey brings me nourishing food, little treats, kind words. Dumbledore visits me regularly. I know he senses the overwhelming guilt I feel, but we don't talk about it. I have only asked him to send an owl to the Weasleys to tell them how very, very sorry I am. Sometimes the feeling of guilt is so strong that I get physically sick, grabbing the bowl from my bedside table and retching up Madam Pomfrey's excellent dinner into it.

I lie and watch the light wander around the room, white and cold on the wall opposite me in the morning, bright and sharp across my bed at noon, slanting and softly golden in the afternoon when it almost touches my face. 

Days go by.

* * *

Today I got out of bed. I went to see Sirius. He is much better now, but neither of us had the strength to talk about what has happened. I don't know exactly what it is he is being treated for and I did not ask. We sat like strangers, making conversation about harmless things. The subjects were so limited that I soon got up to leave. He got up, too, and gave me one single look. I knew that he could see my pain, and I saw his, raw and screaming. He did not say anything at all, just took a step forward and embraced me. I put my head on his shoulder and we stood there wordlessly. All I heard was his steady heartbeat and my own ragged breathing. I thought I was crying but there were no tears. Then I pulled out of his embrace and left him without another word.

I lie on my bed staring up at the ceiling. I should go and see Hermione but one strained bedside conversation is enough for one day. Madam Pomfrey tells me Hermione is holding her own. I will go and see her tomorrow.

Dumbledore comes in and sits down in the chair beside my bed. He looks very purposeful today.

"Now, Harry," he says, "I think you are strong enough for this."

I close my eyes. I don't want to hear it. Every time Dumbledore comes here he feeds me a piece of unwanted information, like bitter bread I have to choke down against my will. 

"There is someone who wants to see you, Harry."

__

No. I've spent so much time trying to hold off this moment. My whole being is screaming out in protest. I want to hide under the bedclothes like a child, beat at the pillow with my fists. The white fire in me that I have managed to quench for days is there again, as searing and painful as ever.

"He has been here every day, but Madam Pomfrey didn't think you were strong enough to see him."

Madam Pomfrey is quite right. I doubt if I will ever be strong enough to see him again.

"Well, Harry, _will_ you see him?"

I shake my head on the pillows, unable to even say no. I want to say, tell him I will never see him. He ought to understand why.

"As you wish." Dumbledore gets up from the chair, hesitates. "I just want you to know that you owe Mr Malfoy a great deal. He did save your life, after all."

And then he leaves the room, noiselessly, leaving me to deal with the waves of hot pain rolling in over my fragile shores.

* * *

I realise now that I have spent most of my time here in my sickbed trying to numb my mind, stop my thoughts, bar all the gates to my consciousness. And I feel ashamed to admit that the main reason for this is not my feelings of guilt or even the sorrow for all the people who have died, deep and genuine as that is. The main reason, the driving force, is Draco Malfoy. Of course. As always. He has been the centre of my pitiful emotional life for so long – why should there be an end to that because of trifling little things like his joining the Death Eaters and attempting to kill me on the battlefield? I have been concentrating so hard not to think about him that he has been in my mind constantly.

Dumbledore's words are ringing in my ears. _You owe Mr Malfoy a great deal. He saved your life, after all._

I can't make it fit. I don't want to make it fit. I can't accept that I should have been so wrong. And God knows I don't need to feel any more guilt. Or gratitude.

* * *

I wake up to a grey dusk. I lie still and let the greyness soothe me. I have dreamed again of the green flashing light, violet stars sparkling from wands, the shouting and the screaming and the pain, the tall column of a man in front of me, all black and silver and terrifying beauty. Tears are gushing out from under my eyelids. My pillow is wet and I must have cried in my sleep.

A soft rustle next to me makes me jump and sit up straight in one movement. The shock is so great that black spots dance before my eyes.

Draco Malfoy simply says:

"Harry."


	8. Confrontations and Confessions

Disclaimer: I don't own any of these characters, much to my annoyance. JKR does. I own nothing but the writing.

Author's Note: Love to all reviewers. Cat Samwise, SoulSister and dramaqueen, thank you – faithful reviewers keep me going.

Warning: This is M/M SLASH so if you have objections to that, don't read this.

Title: Dragonweed

__

"The mind is its own place, and in itself

Can make a Heaven of Hell, a Hell of Heaven"

John Milton, "Paradise Lost"

*********************************************

CHAPTER 8 – Confrontations and Confessions

"out of the lie of no

rises a truth of yes"

e.e. cummings

--- Draco ---

War is over, I am alive, Harry is alive, and I should be happy, but I only feel deathly tired.

The first week I have my own private room in the hospital wing at Hogwarts, then I am moved to the general ward. My condition is considered severe at first and I need expert treatment, but most of all I need rest and plenty of light. A specialist in Dark Injuries has been called in from Bulgaria. Not just for me; Madam Pomfrey tells me there are several patients here with different types of Dark Injuries – Harry, Sirius Black, a number of others I don't know. Dark Injuries are difficult to treat; some of them affect only the body but most of them go deeper and cast shadows on the mind, too. Others again affect only the mind, and this is the most severe type. My injury belongs to this category, and so, apparently, does Harry's. Madam Pomfrey has already dealt efficiently with my Dark Mark, an injury, if you can call it that, which affects both body and mind. Physically, it is limited, a small deep burn, but it is worse than most because of the powerful magic and symbolism connected with it. Now there is only a faint, sickly-looking shadow left of it on my arm, but I still feel the imprint on my mind.

I hear that Granger is here, too, receiving treatment for a dark burn. I know what it's like to feel it eat its way into your flesh and your mind. And Granger's burn covers almost half her body. The mere thought of how painful it must be makes me feel sick. 

As soon as I can get out of bed, I go to see her.

"Ten minutes," Madam Pomfrey whispers before she leaves us.

Granger looks so small in the crisp, white hospital bed. When she opens her eyes and sees me, she smiles and holds out her uninjured hand to me. I take it and sit down on the edge of the bed, careful not to bump against her.

"Hello, Muggle-girl."

"Draco," she says. "Oh, I'm so glad to see you. _Thank you_."

"For what?"

"For coming to see me. For _surviving_. But, most of all, for what you have done. For Harry and for all of us." She is choking. "I know the risks you took. The danger you placed yourself in."

I'm embarrassed by the fervour in her voice and try to just brush it off.

"Well, it's not all that easy to kill off a Malfoy."

"That's what you said to me before you left." 

Her hand squeezes mine. She looks very tired, and I ask her if she wants me to leave.

"No. I thought I heard Madam Pomfrey say ten minutes? Please stay those ten minutes."

"Is it bad? The pain, I mean?"

"It would be if Madam Pomfrey didn't supply me with the right potions."

"I'm so sorry."

"No, Draco, don't be. Not for me. I'm alive, after all. So are you. And Harry. You have been very, very brave – you more than anyone."

I'm not used to receiving thanks or being praised; I don't know how to deal with it. It makes me feel warm and infinitely sad at the same time. I have been a coward all my life except this past year.

"You had part in it, too, you know." I say this in a low voice, not looking at her, because I'm not used to saying things like this either. My life hasn't exactly been lined with niceties. Formal niceties, perhaps, but hardly heartfelt.

"God, I was scared!" she says. "When I think back, I know I've been scared for a whole year. I just didn't realize it until it was over."

"I know, Granger. I think we all felt that way. Well, maybe not all. Out there, on the battlefield… there were two people who didn't seem scared. Dumbledore and… and Harry." I have problems saying his name. "And Harry was their prime target." I have to swallow hard. "He thinks I tried to kill him, did you know that?"

"Oh, Draco, he won't go on thinking that. Dumbledore will tell him what really happened." She looks at me and I know she can see my hurt. She says with a strange note of compassion in her voice: "You… really do love him, don't you?"

To her dismay, and my own, I bury my face in her bedclothes and begin to cry. She moves her hand up to my hair, stroking, soothing. Floodgates open inside me. I hold on to the feeling of her hand in my hair, or I would drown.

Granger and I did a good deal of talking during those months before I left Hogwarts to go back to my father and the Death Eaters. Her clever strategies and analyses impressed me deeply, and, forced to spend time together, we found we actually liked each other. I think we were both equally surprised. I found myself confiding in her, and the last week before I left I even talked to her about Harry. By then I knew I could trust her not to say anything to him. She was calm and sensible as always, but I sensed her emotion seething under the surface. She loves Harry very much. It was hard work to convince her that I do, too. At first I was afraid we would be rivals, but I soon understood that Harry is her friend. No romantic involvement.

Harry, naturally, did not know about any of this. By keeping the number of people involved in my mission down to a minimum, we could minimize the risk for me. The simple principle of fewer mouths, less talk. Harry and everyone else would believe that I had gone to join the Dark Side. It meant that I had to risk losing his love, but I had to take that risk, along with all the others. There are times in your life when you really have no choice. There is only one path you can take, if you want to be able to live with yourself. As if life has chosen for you. And that, I thought, was something that Harry should understand better than anyone.

I am still crying when Madam Pomfrey comes in to say that my ten minutes are up. I don't even have the strength to feel stupid when I lift my wet face from the bedclothes. Madam Pomfrey takes my arm gently and leads me back to my room, leaving a potion for me to take. I go on crying for hours, not even sure why. When I finally stop I feel purged, and for the first time I sleep a sweet, healing sleep without bad dreams.

* * *

After two weeks I am moved from the hospital wing to a spacious private room – in the Gryffindor tower. The beautiful irony of it makes me laugh. 

I feel decidedly better now, and every day I take long walks through the grounds. The bright winter sunlight caresses my eyes, dispersing the darkness of the long months behind me. I take deep breaths, as if the art of breathing is new to me. At times, I can almost pretend I am well.

But nights have always been bad for me. In the dark, with no colours or movements around you to distract your eyes and your mind, the inner pictures overcome you. And the pictures in my mind could furbish a chamber of horrors.

It's not only the things I have seen but also the things I have done. Betraying my family. My parents are dead and I am the cause of their deaths, indirectly if not directly. They never knew that, but I know. They both chose to die rather than go to Azkaban, and I am thankful (a hopelessly inappropriate word). I am told I did what was right. I _know_ I did what was right. But that does not change anything in effect. They were my parents. The grief and the guilt is mine.

I still have not been allowed to see Harry. I go up to the hospital wing every day, but Madam Pomfrey keeps saying he is not strong enough. I think I see disapproval in her eyes when she talks to me, but I might be imagining that. I need to talk to Harry. I need to see him. The picture of him kneeling in the mud, exhausted, on the verge of unconsciousness, looking up at me with fear and resignation in his eyes, has etched itself into my memory. I want to rub it out. I must see him.

I talk to Dumbledore. He is a very dangerous man. After talking to him for five minutes you find yourself telling him your most private thoughts, confessing your deepest fears – you feel there is no point in denying them since he has already seen them and is just waiting to see if you will be honest with him. He promises me he will talk to Harry.

When he returns with the information that Harry refuses to see me, I almost black out. It was bad enough when Madam Pomfrey stopped me, but to know that Harry himself does not want me is excruciating. I stagger and Dumbledore has to guide me to a chair. He is very earnest.

"Draco, you must understand that Harry does not know anything about what you have done for us. I haven't talked to him about it – I think that is for you to tell him. He feels betrayed by you and he is defending himself against anything that will make him think about you. You shouldn't let it deter you. You should see it for what it is – proof of how deeply he feels about you." He pauses and gives me a searching look. "You have shown remarkable strength, Draco. Please be strong a little while longer. Today I planted a seed in his mind and I know there is good soil for it. Just give it some time to grow."

* * *

And in another couple of days, Dumbledore tells me I can go up to the hospital wing.

"Harry has not given me his permission to let you in, but I know he is ready."

* * *

He is asleep when I come into the room, and I sit down in the chair by the bed, waiting for the wave of emotion to pass. I have waited so long for this moment, but now I'm here I don't know what to do. Part of me wants to run away. He looks so vulnerable, so fragile. I would like to touch him but I don't want to disturb his sleep. My heart beats in loud slamming strokes and I realize I am afraid. Afraid of his reaction to my presence. Afraid he will order me out of the room. Afraid he will never want to see me again.

I am compelled to touch him. I reach out and push the black hair from his face, very gently. He doesn't stir. I bend over him and kiss his scar, light as a feather. I remember I always imagined it to be hot to the touch, but it isn't. It just has the same soft warmth as the skin around it. It seems less prominent than it used to be, but perhaps it's only a trick of light.

I have been sitting there a long time, so long that the afternoon light has turned into dusk, when I see tears oozing silently from under his lashes. I catch my breath. It is almost unbearable. The pain that takes hold of me is raw and bleeding, as if my skin has been peeled off. I grip the arms of the chair so hard the chair creaks.

It must have woken him up. He opens his eyes, looks up at the ceiling, unfocused, tears still flowing. When his eye catches me he gasps and sits bolt upright. I know I have an unfair advantage but I can't wait.

"Harry."

He stares at me in shock, as if I were the Dark Lord himself. The air between us is so dense with emotion and unsaid words you could catch it in your fist and squeeze it into a ball.

"What do you want?" His voice is a hoarse whisper.

"I want to talk to you. I wanted to see how you are."

"I'm fine."

This is such a trivial, blatant lie that, in spite of everything, I have to laugh. It's a ghost of a laugh and it hangs in the space between us, fluttering like a trapped bird.

"You don't look it."

Oh, his eyes through the dusk. They are everything I have remembered them to be; they reveal his emotions so clearly it makes me tremble.

"Why?" he asks.

I'm not sure what the why refers to. Why am I here? Why did I go away? Why do I love him? If he will only let me, I will try to answer all of these questions.

--- Harry ---

"Why?" I ask.

He just looks at me.

"Why did you leave?" I sound accusing and scared, like a child who thought his parents would never come back, confronting them when they do. And I realize that this is exactly how I feel. My parents left me when I was so young I can't even remember them. All my life I have been terrified that the people I love will leave me. I have hardly dared love anyone for fear they would leave. I loved Draco – and he left. "Why did you go to _them_?"

He leans back in the chair.

"It was only my body," he says.

I feel a hot surge of anger. Of all the off-hand, arrogant replies…! Draco Malfoy acts true to form. No one else in this world can make me so furious. I clench my fists and the tension in the room could blast a hole through the entire castle.

"What the _fuck_ is that supposed to mean," I say through gritted teeth, so angry I could cry again.

"I went because Dumbledore asked me to," he says softly. "I didn't _join_ them, Harry. I went there to destroy them." He looks up at me now but I find I can't meet his eyes. "I went there as a spy for _your_ side. An infiltrator."

My mind is throbbing. I can't believe what I'm hearing. Again, I can't accept that I should have been so wrong, but he must be telling the truth. I don't trust him, but I trust Dumbledore, and Dumbledore would never have let Draco into the room if this had not been the truth.

"Go and talk to Granger," he is saying. "She knows everything about it. She was one of the people who planned the whole thing."

I have never really believed that your jaw can drop, but mine drops now.

"_Hermione?_"

"I believe that's her name, yes."

He is making me so angry I could hit him. 

Or I could take him in my arms and kiss him.

That thought makes me shake so badly I have to steady myself against the bedside table. My mind clears slowly. If it's true that he has been an infiltrator all this time, he must have taken enormous risks. Why would he do that? Well, he wouldn't, unless… unless he really believes in the same things I do. Unless he really values the same things I do.

"Why? Why did you agree to do it?" My lips are cold and I can hardly force the words over them. "It meant you had to… betray your family. You had to leave behind all you believed in. _Why_?"

I'm repeating myself but I can't help it.

"I didn't have to leave anything I believed in, Harry," he says, and finally I manage to lift my eyes to his. Oh, those lovely, cloudy-grey eyes. He will never know I have dreamed of them every night since he left to go back to his father, dreamed of their beauty and their ever-changing expression. This has lived in me ever since he left: His eyes, and those kisses in the Hall the night our lives were turned upside down. "On the contrary. I went to fight for the things I _did_ believe in. But betraying my family – yes, that was hard. The fact that they betrayed me all my life did not make it any easier. I was naïve enough to think it would."

I know that behind these words lies an entire world of pain and fear and doubt that I know nothing about. I can't even guess at the things he has had to suffer. Compared to his courage, my own is nothing but a child's ridiculous bravado. My path has been straight and clear and I have had support all the way, where he has had to find his own way through the dark forests of lies and treason.

How can I even begin to say I'm sorry?

His eyes are still resting on me, almost dreamy now, like that night in the garden, so long ago. In another life. He stands up and takes his cloak from the back of the chair. I don't want him to leave, not now, not ever. But I say nothing. I don't even make a gesture. He looks at the beaker on my bedside table, and smiles a little.

"I see Madam Pomfrey is feeding you dragonweed."

He goes to the door, opens it, and stops. Without turning around, he says:

"Harry, I want you to know… that most of all, I did it because I love you."

The door closes behind him and I am left listening to my own sudden, startled sobs, dry and uneven as if I have never cried before.

--- Draco ---

I walk down the corridor very fast, not really seeing where I am going. So that was it, at last. I have finally told him that I love him. I did it without looking at him, without his saying it back, without string quartets and roses. I have no idea what his reaction was. I don't think I want to know. It was the dragonweed potion that made me do it. When I saw it on his bedside table I suddenly remembered that Potions class a hundred years ago, when I was so aroused at the sight of the blood-red drops on his cheek. Somehow I feel that's where it all started. I know it's not true, but at least it must hold some sort of poetic truth.

Back in my room I toy with the idea of hastily packing my things and leaving. I could just leave and try to go on with my life as if none of this had ever happened; I could go to Muggle London and create a new identity for myself, an entirely new life.

Realizing I will never be able to put my memories behind me except with the help of an extremely powerful Memory charm, I decide that the best remedy right now, if only temporary, is to go to Hogsmeade and get myself thoroughly drunk.

* * *

Some hours later I sit at The Three Broomsticks, swaying in my seat; Madam Rosmerta's potent Muggle whisky having done its job only too well. My elbow keeps slipping off the table, and whenever I try to stand up the room spins in an alarming fashion. The whisky has not taken my misery away, only diluted it and mixed it with a ridiculous wish to laugh. A clear and persistent little voice at the back of my mind keeps asking me how the hell I think I'm going to get home. 

"I'm a wizard, for fuck's sake," I tell the voice loudly.

"Are you really, Malfoy," someone says into my ear. "Who are you trying to convince?"

When I'm sure this is an external voice I turn my head gingerly, and my elbow slips off the table again, almost making me fall off my chair. Someone is standing there, looking down at me patiently. The flaming red hair, the incredible amount of freckles… A Weasley. Which Weasley I can't tell. After a minute's deeply concentrated discussion with myself I come to the conclusion that it's one of the twins. I wouldn't know which one even if I were sober.

"You look as if you're ready to go home," he says, and he's not mocking or hostile at all. "Come on, Malfoy. I'm going to Hogwarts anyway. Thought you might want company."

I'm too drunk to mind him putting his arm around my waist and almost lifting me up from my seat. He hoists me out into the street. I lean heavily on him, thinking how absurd it is that I should have to rely on a Weasley to keep my dignity. The last thing I remember from this evening is my own high, hysterical, drunken laugh echoing through the quiet streets of Hogsmeade.


	9. Snowflakes

Disclaimer: I don't own any of these characters, much to my annoyance. JKR does. I own nothing but the writing.

Author's Note: 

SoulSister: Less angsty from here. I promise. : )

And dramaqueen, if I've made even one person see the beauty of H/D, I'm happy!!

Warning: This is M/M SLASH so if you have objections to that, don't read this.

Title: Dragonweed

__

"The mind is its own place, and in itself

Can make a Heaven of Hell, a Hell of Heaven"

John Milton, "Paradise Lost"

*********************************************

CHAPTER 9 – Snowflakes

"love is the voice under all silences,  
the hope which has no opposite in fear;  
the strength so strong mere force is feebleness:  
the truth more first than sun more last than star  


– do lovers love? why then to heaven with hell"

e.e.cummings

--- Draco ---

The next morning is best left in the deepest dungeons of memory. After a few hours of agony I decide to swallow my pride and drag myself over to the hospital wing to get Madam Pomfrey to give me a potion or a charm to cure my hangover. She does so, looking very disapproving, but she does not say anything except order me to sit down until the charm has taken effect properly. How do Muggles cope with hangovers? I have to ask Granger.

When I feel almost normal again, I thank Madam Pomfrey and ask her if I can go and see Harry.

"He is out in the garden," she says.

* * *

I know where I will find him, of course. Poor old Harry, so sentimental, so easy to figure out. I smile to myself as I walk along the snowy paths. When I come to the terraces, a lonely trail of dark footprints tells me that I am right. I follow it slowly past the leafless, snow-covered lacework of the rose bushes.

The bright sun of the morning has surrendered to heavy, grey clouds, and the faint tang in the air tells me there is going to be more snow.

He is standing by the balustrade, looking out over the lake. It is not frozen over yet, and the surface is the colour of lead. He shows no sign of having heard me.

He looks so vulnerable, a thin, lonely figure, dark against the greys and whites. My heart seems to swell to three times its size, obstructing my breathing. I want to take him in my arms and coo to him, murmur silly little words, sing him nonsense, protect him from the world that has hurt him. But I know I am part of that world.

I walk slowly up to him.

"Hello, Malfoy," he says without turning around.

I wish he would stop using my last name. I know he does it to create distance between us, but I don't understand why he still feels the need to do that. I don't reply. I lean against the balustrade beside him, as close to him as I dare, and we both stand there looking out over the cold grey waves. The landscape has an emptiness that seems to reflect the dead silence between us. I turn to look at him. The first snowflakes come whirling and settle like miniature stars on his black woollen cloak.

I take hold of his shoulder and turn him around to face me. He is strangely pliable. I see now that tears are running down his face, but he doesn't make a sound. It makes me feel worse than if he had been howling. I pull him to me and hold him close, and he doesn't pull away. He just puts his head heavily on my shoulder as if he is very, very tired, his face turned away from me. I rest my cheek against his head and I think that this is where I want everything to slow down and stop, I will hold him and we will stay in this moment indefinitely. He whispers something but the wind takes his words. I feel a tremor go through his body and his arms come around me slowly, almost shyly. He keeps mumbling into my shoulder.

"What, Harry?"

"I'm sorry, Draco. I'm so sorry."

I pull him even closer and he responds; we hold each other as if we are drowning. He says "I'm sorry" again and again, as if he can't stop once he has started. When I feel the wind chill my face I realize that I am crying, too. A trapdoor opens inside me and I fall down into myself, so fast my head starts spinning. I am so frightened and so absolutely sure that this fear is good. I never knew love could mean that you allow yourself to be torn apart for the exultation of being put back together again. He lifts his head from my shoulder and looks into my smarting eyes. I have never been looked at with such tenderness. I have never seen a smile so soft. I am still falling, falling, falling into the depths of myself. 

His kiss is heartbreakingly gentle. I close my eyes and hope the salty taste will never leave my tongue.


	10. Epilogue

Disclaimer: I don't own any of these characters, much to my annoyance. JKR does. I own nothing but the writing.

Warning: This is M/M SLASH so if you have objections to that, don't read this.

Title: Dragonweed

__

"The mind is its own place, and in itself

Can make a Heaven of Hell, a Hell of Heaven"

John Milton, "Paradise Lost"

*********************************************

EPILOGUE

"lovers alone wear sunlight."

e.e. cummings

--- Harry ---

The sun is hot on our faces and the crushed grass under us smells of green freshness and rich promises. A small, warm gust of wind breathes through the big cedar tree. It's one of those days in late April that trick you into believing it's summer until dusk falls and you are shivering in the soft blue light, feeling stupid for having been fooled again. We are not lying close enough for our bodies to touch, but I feel Draco's presence like a soft vibration, a humming note. I have never been this happy.

I turn my head to look at him. His eyes are closed and he lies with his hands clasped behind his head, the heat from the sun giving his pale skin a faint pink flush. There is a small smile playing at the corners of his mouth. I love him so terribly it hurts to look at him. Oh, Draco. You are…

"…so beautiful."

I hadn't meant to say it out loud. He opens his eyes, squinting against the sun. I touch his face.

"Do you know how beautiful you are?"

The pink flush deepens. He is still not used to me saying things like this to him. I must kiss him. I raise myself on my elbow and my mouth finds his. There is the immediate hot reaction of my body, the liquid feeling, the irresistible urge to touch skin. His hand cups the back of my neck. I open one of his shirt buttons, and another, enough to slide my hand in and trace my fingertips over the silky skin of his stomach.

"Mmmh," he protests half-heartedly against my mouth. "Not here."

"You want me to. You know you do."

"Mmm," he mumbles again, in agreement this time. "Yes. But not here."

He is an exciting lover. He can be amazingly tender and gentle, pulling me into the curve of his body, enchanting me with soft caresses, never saying the small words of love but kissing them into my skin, writing them on my body with his fingers. At other times he is dominating and slightly threatening, a streak of darkness in his eyes signalling danger and making me shiver with a desire that mingles with fear. My own willingness to play the games he initiates surprises me. Our skin shows bites and bruises for days afterwards, and we exchange hasty looks in public, pleased and excited at having branded each other with these secret ownership marks, hidden under our clothing. But mostly our love-making is deeply tender, gravely playful, intent on giving pleasure. Sometimes I lead, sometimes he does. I love his creamy skin, I love the arc of his white throat when he throws his head back. I adore his soft moans when I touch the places that make him give himself up to me helplessly, floating down the dark stream of desire. I love the sweet and salty taste of his arousal; I have learned when and where the touch of my tongue will send him over the edge. He is equally skilled at reading my body. He knows exactly when to whisper "come" and I'll come.

He pushes me away gently and buttons his shirt.

"Naughty."

I laugh.

"Remember when you sat on the balustrade over there with your shirt off, parading yourself to me in the moonlight?"

"I remember. You were lurking under the cedar tree, pretending to be invisible. I wish you had come up to me and…"

"Shhhh. Don't say it. I wish I had, too. I wish we had stopped playing games earlier. We could have had a great time if we hadn't been so uptight about being in love. It was really stupid of us, not making use of the time."

"Yes... But we were just kids. And we couldn't know what was going to happen – the war..."

"Well, we did know that there was going to be a war sooner or later. We should have had the sense to… oh, well, I guess we _were_ just kids. Draco, do you realize it's only eighteen months ago?"

It's an absurd thought.

"It feels like a lifetime. I feel like a different person."

With my free hand, the one that's not playing with his earlobe, I pick one of the brightly yellow dandelions and push it up under his nose, rubbing his nose with it. He sits up with a yelp, pushing me away.

"What the hell are you doing?"

I lie in the grass laughing helplessly. I knew he would hate that. So childish, so undignified. He looks adorable with his nose all yellow from the pollen. He rubs it and glares at me.

"_You_ haven't grown up, obviously. We should go inside."

"I don't want to grow up. I don't want to go inside. I want to stay out here in the sunshine and bounce around like a puppy. Stupid but happy. For the rest of my life."

He looks down at me with a funny expression on his face, tenderness mixed with amusement and indulgence.

"I don't know why I put up with you, Potter," he says. "Now that Voldemort is gone, I suppose nothing is really that special about you any longer."

"Or about you, _Malfoy_," I say. "The Death Eaters are a pretty pathetic bunch these days. No leader to suck up to. Just dragging their miserable black robes around in the shade trying to pretend the sun isn't shining."

He laughs out loud, surprised, and I think how much I love hearing him laugh. I sit up, brushing grass from my clothes, and meet his smiling grey eyes. He is beautiful in love. I lean forward to kiss him again.

Lovers alone wear sunlight.


End file.

Harry Potter, Angst, Romance