CHECKMATE

PART I – THE SET-UP

Chapter 4

Now I’m where I want to be and who I want to be and

doing what I always said I would and yet

I feel I haven’t won at all.

Don’t get me wrong

I’m not complaining

Times have been good

Fast, entertaining

But what’s the point

If I’m concealing

Not only love

All other feeling

Lyrics from “Where I Want To Be” from Chess by Benny Anderson, Tim Rice and Björn Ulvaeus

* * *

Ron, Hermione, and Harry barely got in the door and to their seats before Snape swept into the Potions classroom. He gave them all a severe look, then turned on Harry.

“Mr. Potter,” said Snape, in a silky sneering tone. “There seems to be a rumor going around that you’ve been seen brawling in the hall. I do hope for your sake that isn’t true.”

There was a snicker from the Slytherin side of the room. “Sprawling was what I heard,” said an anonymous loud whisper that elicited a round of muffled giggles.

Harry didn’t say anything, he had learned from long experience not to respond to Snape’s jibes. He just kept his eyes down until Snape turned away and went up to his desk. Then he glanced up to where Draco was sitting in the first seat in the row of tables on his left. Draco had his face buried very conscientiously in his Advanced Potions text. Harry couldn’t tell if he was laughing or not. Out of the corner of his eye though, he could see that Ron was turning purple, and seemed to be puffing up in a very frightening way, as Snape very pointedly ignored Malfoy’s involvement in the morning’s incident.

Snape opened the potions text on his desk, then turned around and faced the class with narrowed eyes. “Very well, Potter. Since you won’t discuss this morning’s rumor, perhaps you’d like to explain to the class what the ingredients for today’s potion are?”

There was a silence that lasted several heartbeats, broken only by stifled tittering from one of the Slytherins. “Sir?” said Harry in a very unsteady voice. What the hell was today’s potion?

“The ingredients were clearly listed in last night’s reading assignment, Potter.”

Oh God, thought Harry. He’d been too involved with Ron and Hermione’s announcement, and then too upset last night to do all his homework. Everyone in the class turned around to look at him, except Draco, who seemed to be ignoring everything, and was busily writing on a piece of parchment on his desk. Harry glanced quickly over at Ron and Hermione, who were sitting together in the row on Harry’s right, and who were looking stricken and extremely guilty respectively. Evidently they hadn’t read the assignment either, which shocked Harry even more – well, not that Ron hadn’t read it.

Very slowly, Snape began walking back toward Harry’s desk. “We’re waiting, Mr. Potter,” said Snape with a delighted sneer.

“Er, yes sir,” said Harry, stalling, his voice still shaking. “I – ”

A motion at the front of the row on Harry’s left caught his eye. Draco had turned around for the first time to look back at him. Harry gaze shot over to Draco and their eyes met. Draco seemed to be trying very hard to keep a straight face, and when Harry looked at him, he raised one eyebrow and stealthily slid a piece of parchment out from behind the drape of his sleeve. On it, in big block letters were written a list of potion ingredients. No one else could see it because everyone had their backs to Draco in order to watch Harry. Harry didn’t stop to question if Draco might be setting him up with the wrong answers. He sat straight up and read as fast as he could.

Harry barely finished reading, as Snape reached his desk. He pulled his eyes away from the list, and looked up at the professor. “I think,” he said slowly, “the ingredients were, er, one . . . lizard tongue, uh, a teaspoon of chopped . . . blackcap mushroom gills, um . . . three toenails of a . . .” Of a what? He glanced back toward Draco, but the list had vanished. “. . . three toenails of a . . . a giant shrew, a pinch of powdered salamander, and . . . and . . . five drops of strangling ivy sap – ”

Snape was looking down at Harry with increasingly undisguised irritation at each correct answer. Then Harry stopped cold. Snape seemed to be looming over him, waiting . . .

Oh shit, thought Harry, what was the rest of it? What was the last ingredient? Six something-to-do-with-butter. “And six butterfly wings?” said Harry hopefully.

Snape’s eyes lit up, and he smiled a nasty smile. “WRONG, Potter! Five points from Gryffindor, for coming to class unprepared.”

Harry gulped, and looked back at Draco.

In the same second, Snape spun around and also looked at Draco. “Mr. Malfoy!” he called out smugly.

For a split second, Harry saw on Draco’s face that he thought they’d been caught, then Draco’s expression smoothed out.

“Sir?”

“Please tell us the correct final ingredient.”

“Six bottles of butterbeer, sir?” said Draco with a straight face. Snickers broke out all over the room. Even Harry laughed.

Snape looked for a moment like Mad Eye Moody, his eyes bulging in different directions. He glared at Draco. “Well, well,” said Snape, viciously. “I expected you to know the answer, Malfoy.” Snape turned in a circle in the room giving every student a cold stare. “HAS NO ONE IN HERE DONE LAST NIGHT’S ASSIGNMENT?” Harry could see Ron turning purple again presumably because Snape hadn’t taken points from Slytherin for Draco’s wrong answer.

Then Snape’s gaze stopped and lingered on Hermione. Harry saw a look of horror appear in her eyes. Was Snape actually going to call on her – the one time in her whole life when she hadn’t studied? A very slow smirk appeared on his face. Then he whirled around. “Mr. Longbottom!”

A frightened squeak sounded from the front of Harry’s row.

“Do you know the answer, Mr. Longbottom?”

A small quivering voice from the front of the room said, “Six buttercup petals, sir?”

“Hmm,” growled Snape. “Correct.” He walked stiffly back up to the front of the room and stared down his nose at Neville. “Go on, then. What’s the name of this potion?”

“It’s a Hex Repellent, sir. Commonly known as ‘Hex-Off’, sir.”

“Hmm,” said Snape again, stroking his chin, still staring at Neville. “I’m impressed, Longbottom. Your performance in this class has improved.” He turned and glared out over the class. “It seems you have all reached a new low,” he hissed, “when LONGBOTTOM is the only person in here who KNOWS THE ASSIGNMENT!”

Snape sat back against his desk and crossed his arms over his chest. He leveled another intensely nasty gaze at everyone in the room. “The consequence of your negligence is that now you will all have to listen to me lecture on what you should have read.” A chorus of ill-disguised moans broke out like a rash across the room. Snape cleared his throat in warning, and the moans cut themselves off abruptly.

“The Hex Repellant potion that is discussed in your text,” began Snape, “is, if properly concocted, very effective at making the user impervious to even the most powerful hexes, and has also been known to greatly reduce the impact of curses. However, it is quite short lived – usually lasting only an hour or two at most. What your text does not tell you is that there is a more powerful variation. . . .”

Harry tuned Snape out. The events of last night and this morning with Draco were entirely too unsettling, entirely too fantastic and unbelievable, for him to keep them out of his mind for more than a few minutes. He felt like he needed to go shut himself up in a dark closet somewhere and try to think. He couldn’t seem to take it all in. The one thing that had finally crashed through into clarity though, in that same unsubtle way that grand pianos have of crashing down on you when dropped from several stories up, was that . . . Draco Malfoy liked him. As in holding hands and kissing and . . . oh my God . . . liked him.

Harry felt his ears do a slow burn. He let his eyes slide over to the left and up to the front table. Draco was taking notes, his attention riveted on Snape. Harry looked back over at Snape and tuned in to the lecture again for a moment, just to see what Draco found so fascinating.

“This variation,” Snape was saying, “allows the user to concentrate the power of the potion in an object that the user can wear, thus increasing its effectiveness up to two or three weeks. The normal potion ingredients are used, with the addition of shredded boomslang skin stirred into an infusion of forget-me-nots. These last two ingredients are not available to students, so I have a few samples here on my desk for you to study. The object is to be soaked for 24-48 hours. . . .”

Harry looked back at Draco, and an entirely new idea occurred to him – that Draco was good at Potions. Somehow Harry had always thought that Draco made a point of knowing the right answers in this class just to show Harry up, and to be insufferably irritating, but maybe . . . maybe . . . it was because Draco studied, and was really interested in this potions stuff! Harry watched Draco, noticing the way he was taking careful notes, the way he was actually listening to Snape, the way his brows were furrowed a little in concentration, the way his hair looked so soft and silky and pretty – !!! Harry choked, jerked his gaze back to Snape, and tried to pretend that he was paying attention.

Snape was asking, “Who can tell me a practical application of the Hex Repellant Potion?”

One of the Slytherin girls raised her hand. “If you use it before you have a wizard’s duel, the other wizard can’t hex you.”

Harry heard a familiar snort, and then heard Ron mutter, “I think that’s called cheating.”

Snape spun around, and speared Ron with a narrowed stare. “No, Mr. Weasley,” he said in an unpleasantly condescending tone, “it's called using an intelligent precaution, something you wouldn’t be expected to understand.” There was another rash of sniggering from the Slytherin section of the room.

Harry let his mind drift away again, though he kept his eyes on Snape, to at least keep up the pretense of paying attention. One thing was bothering Harry immensely. He might as well let himself think about it. Draco had kissed him last night . . . no, not just kissed him – had kissed him like that. And then had said to Harry this morning, “If you’re so straight, how come you liked it so much?” That one statement, made so certainly, was tying Harry into knots. I know I’m straight, he told himself. For God’s sake, I’ve even slept with a girl. And thought we were in love. But Harry couldn’t explain why he had never felt the way that one kiss last night had made him feel. And how the bloody hell had Malfoy known that?

Harry couldn’t help it – he let his gaze slide back over to Draco. Draco had stopped writing and was now staring into space as if deep in thought. Harry’s eyes took in the perfect profile, the abstracted half-smile, the lock of hair that fell behind Draco’s ear and curled against his neck. Harry’s attention was suddenly fixed by that spot, just below Draco’s ear, that was framed by that lock of soft blond hair. It looked somehow quite inexplicably adorable, so very compelling and . . . and kissable –

“MR. POTTER!!!”

Harry jerked upright. Snape was staring at him, his black eyes glittering.

“I asked you a question, Potter, but you haven’t heard a word, have you?”

Harry felt nauseous. Everyone in the class turned around again to look at him, including Draco. “No, sir,” he said. “Sorry,” he added in a small voice.

“Perhaps,” said Snape in his most venomous tone, “I should excuse you to go to the hospital wing. Evidently, that tumble you took in the hall this morning shook loose the last little bit of your brain that was still connected. Five points from Gryffindor, again, Potter.”

Harry kept his eyes averted from Draco’s direction, but he was very aware that the other boy was now watching him intently. His last thought about Draco suddenly came back to him in all its startling, mortifying, horribleness. Harry blushed and sank down low in his seat. He felt very nauseous. Oh God, he thought, let me throw up now, so I can be excused from this class.

The rest of the class period, however, passed without incident. Evidently Snape did not intend for them to actually concoct this potion themselves – which was a good thing, Harry thought gratefully – he could just picture everyone trying to hex each other to test the potions, and the students with failed potions going about with giant swollen body parts, or spider legs coming out of their heads, or other equally revolting results of inventive and ineffectually averted hex-making.

At one point, Snape made everyone come up to his desk to look at the restricted potion ingredients he had brought in. Harry tried to stand as far away from Draco as possible, though he noticed that Draco was extremely interested in picking up several of the samples and examining them closely. Harry also, at the same time, tried to be invisible to Snape. But apparently, Snape had had enough of him for one class period, and didn’t even glance in his direction anyway.

At last, the class was over, and before a relieved Harry could even start to worry about what he might have to say to Draco if they ran into each other on the way out, he looked up and Draco was already gone. Hermione and Ron, however, pounced on him the moment he stepped into the hall.

“Harry!” said Ron with deep exasperation written clearly on his face. “What is wrong with you? You’ve been acting completely mental all morning!”

Harry gave Ron a rather black look, then started walking to their next class. His two friends exchanged a glance, and hurried to catch up to him.

“It’s not anything to do with . . . us – with what we told you last night, is it?” asked Hermione, worried, as they walked. “We thought that seeing us together might be making you feel upset again . . . you know, about breaking up with – ”

“No!” said Harry, cutting her off. “It’s not that. Or maybe it is a little. But you guys know I’m really happy for you. I just have . . . something on my mind.”

“Well,” snorted Ron. “Whatever that something is, we know for sure it isn’t potions.”

“Shut up, Ron,” said Hermione, punching him in the arm. “You are not helping here.” She turned back to Harry. “Harry, you know you can talk to us – or me, anyway,” she said, glaring at a suddenly contrite and stricken Ron, “if you need to.”

“I know, Hermione. Thanks. But right now, I just need to sort through things on my own a bit.”

Thankfully for Harry, their next class was History of Magical Mysteries, which was taught by Professor Binns. And since almost everyone except Hermione slept through this class, while Binns droned on interminably about antiquated wizards and spells, the magical mysteries were just as mysterious after the lecture as before. But Binns never called on anyone, and it would finally give Harry a chance to think. Advanced Potions, which for seventh years, met every day, was the only class he had this term with Draco, so now that that was over, Harry wouldn’t have to see him again until tomorrow. And that was certainly a relief, wasn’t it? Well? That was the very thing Harry wanted to think about. What did he want to do about Malfoy?

Harry slid down in his seat, and crossed his arms over his chest. He let his head fall forward, his eyes fixed staring and unfocused on his desktop. Harry tried to recall exactly the words Draco had said to him last night:

“Would you believe me if I said that most of what you think you know about me was just an act I put on, to hide what I really felt?”

“If it was acting, you were very good at it – it seemed quite real.”

“I am good at it. But that doesn’t make it real.”

His heart told him now what his shocked emotions last night had kept him from seeing – that the Draco he had met last night – seen in life for the very first time – was real. He had always hated Draco Malfoy – or hated the Draco Malfoy that the other boy had pretended to be. Maybe what he had really hated was the feeling of falseness he had always sensed in Draco, that sneering, arrogant, insufferable attitude that had constantly frustrated him because he also felt that there was something underneath it all that he wanted to know, but was never allowed to see. He certainly hadn’t hated the boy who had talked to him last night, who had laughed with him, and had touched him with such surprising tenderness. In fact, there had been a quiet gentleness about that boy that had caught Harry completely off-guard, and had captured Harry’s interest in a way that no one else ever had. Harry remembered how hurt he had felt afterward when he thought it hadn’t been real. But oh, said his heart, and Harry felt a fluttery feeling stirring inside him, last night had been real.

Then his thoughts shifted back to the last time he had had these kinds of feelings, and a lump rose up in his throat. It still hurt every time he thought of her. Harry had believed that she loved him, that they were starting a future together. They had made love on the last night of the school year last year, before summer break separated them, and for Harry that had been the expression of what he believed was to be a life-long commitment. In the morning, she had told him, sadly and gently, but with irrevocable finality, that it was over.

Harry had been completely, totally, devastated and horribly shocked. Somehow, he had ended up in Dumbledore’s office sobbing out the story on that great man’s shoulder, begging to be allowed to stay at Hogwarts over the summer. He couldn’t bear the thought of having to face the terrible Dursleys, hell he couldn’t even face his friends. Everyone had left on the train and he had stayed behind. And he had never told anyone else about what had happened. He let Ron and Hermione believe that the relationship had broken up over the summer. They knew only that Harry had been very upset, because he refused to talk about it.

Over the summer he had worked, doing whatever odd jobs were found for him. Often he had helped Hagrid, sometimes even Filch, though that had not improved his relationship with the crotchety caretaker. And he had spent a lot of time thinking. Finally, he had come to a kind of tenuous acceptance of the break-up, and even was able to acknowledge that though the sexual experience had been extremely significant for him, he had also felt that something important had been missing, it hadn’t touched him as deeply as he had expected it to. Now he knew that what had been missing was that she had always known they couldn’t be together, had always kept herself somewhat reserved. She had not let herself be truly involved, or in love with him.

So what had made that very brief kiss with Draco feel so intense, so perfect? How had that moved him so deeply? Draco had said, “I’m actually quite sure there is someone here that would love to kiss you like that.” And what had Draco meant when he said he had been hiding what he really felt? And why am I not more shocked at this!? That in itself was rather startling.

There was suddenly so much Harry wanted to know – so many questions he wanted to ask. He wanted to feel again the way he had felt talking with Draco, listening to him, confiding in him, that very unexpected moment when Draco had seemed to understand his fear of being alone so well. He had never experienced any kind of sexual interest in another boy, but when he thought about how he had felt with Draco’s body and lips pressed against his, he felt an ache of longing, and that strange fluttery excitement stirring deep inside him. He was rather uncomfortable with those feelings, or with following that line of thought any further, and Draco’s suggestion of what would happen if he won the chess game, was something Harry didn’t want to think about at all. But first things first. What did he want to do about Malfoy? He wanted to see him again. Alone. Without fifty other students watching. And he wanted to ask him about a million questions. And that was that. He would take the rest one step at a time.

Harry felt a sharp poke in his shoulder. “Psst.” He turned his head, startled from his thoughts, and looked at Ron.

“Harry,” whispered Ron. “You okay?”

“Yeah,” whispered Harry back. “Much better.”

* * *

By the time Harry, Ron, and Hermione got to the Great Hall for lunch, Harry was feeling quite good. His world had abruptly tilted in an entirely unexpected direction, but Harry thought he had regained his balance within it. And with that, his confidence. In fact, he was sort of excited. When they walked into the Great Hall, Harry immediately looked for Draco. The blond was sitting in his usual place, seemingly involved in a heated discussion with the two Slytherin sixth-year girls who had giggled at him in the hall that morning. Draco was shaking his head, and looked both amused and murderous.

Harry dished up his lunch, with a bit more attention than he had his breakfast, and was just starting to eat, when a small rolled parchment appeared next to his plate. He was startled – was it meant for him? He picked it up and read the tag. “Harry Potter.” Hmmm. Harry untied the ribbon and unrolled the note. It read:

Mr. Potter,

I would like to see you in my office immediately following your afternoon classes. A report of a disturbing incident has come to my attention that I feel I must discuss with you and Mr. Malfoy. Please be prompt.

A. Dumbledore

Harry gulped. He had completely forgotten McGonagall’s lecture this morning. He quickly glanced over to the Slytherin table. Draco was reading an identical note and had turned extremely pale. Draco also looked up, directly at Harry and their eyes met for a second. But even in that mere second of contact, Harry picked up a distinct feeling of alarm in the other boy’s gaze. Then Draco looked down, pushed away from the table and walked out of the Great Hall. Harry had to fight the urge to chase after him again.

“Hey, what’s that, Harry?”

Ron was leaning over his arm trying to see the note. Harry shoved it at him.

“Looks like a love note,” piped up Seamus, grinning.

Ron quickly scanned the message, then whistled. “Oh, Harry. This is bad.” He handed the note over to Hermione. Hermione read it silently and passed it to Seamus.

“I’m sorry, Harry,” said Ron miserably. “If I hadn’t said that bit about punching and fighting to McGonagall – ”

“Never mind me, Ron,” said Harry in a hard voice. I don’t think I’ll get in much trouble. But what about Malfoy? He’s a prefect. What if Dumbledore expels him? It would be my fault!”

Ron looked at Harry for a minute as if he had grown two heads – with antennae. “You’re worried about Malfoy!?”

“YES!” said Harry. “I am. Because he’s stayed out of trouble all this year – until I provoked him this morning.”

“Harry’s right, Ron,” said Hermione. “I’ve talked to him a good bit lately, since I’m Head Girl and he’s a prefect – he’s really been trying to change.”

Ron dropped his face into his hands in disgusted disbelief, and muttered something that sounded like, “when trolls do ballet.”

Harry ignored him. He looked at Seamus. “I’ll be late for Quidditch practice this afternoon. Will you take over for me and get everyone started?” Seamus had joined the Gryffindor Quidditch team in sixth-year as a Beater, to replace one of the Weasley twins, and had turned out to be very good at it.

“Aye, aye, Capt’n,” said Seamus. “I’ll just say you were unavoidably detained in the company of a gorgeous blond.” Seamus grinned at Harry’s startled expression, then shrugged. “It’s only God’s simple truth, isn’t it? Draco Malfoy is the best looking thing in this school.”

Harry felt his face flush. He heard a rude gagging noise coming from somewhere behind Ron’s hands. “Just tell them I had a meeting with a teacher, Seamus, thank you.”

“You’re no fun, Harry.”

Oh, if you only knew.

* * *

Harry arrived at the gargoyle that marked the entrance to Dumbledore’s office, and found Draco already there, slumped with his back against the wall, his arms crossed tightly over his chest, his eyes studiously locked on the toes of his boots. What Harry could see of Draco’s face, beneath the fringe of silver blond hair that had fallen forward to cover his eyes, was very pale. Suddenly Harry realized that while he had known since this morning that McGonagall was going to report them, and that this would be the probable result, Draco had had no warning, no idea of it until he got Dumbledore’s summons at lunch. He looks really worried – scared even, thought Harry.

Harry paused for a heartbeat, then deliberately went to stand right next to Draco, close enough that their shoulders were almost touching. He leaned back against the wall, and folded his arms across his chest too, but his face was turned toward Draco so that he could watch the other boy.

Draco didn’t move, or acknowledge Harry’s arrival.

Harry wasn’t sure what to say, how to respond to a scared and silent Malfoy. All the Draco-Malfoy-responses that he had relied on for so long that they were nearly automatic, were beyond inappropriate, vastly wrong. What on earth did you say to someone who had been your enemy and then let you know that their feelings had changed? And if Harry was having this kind of trouble knowing what to say, when he knew that Draco liked him now, he suddenly appreciated with some amazement how much courage it must have taken for Draco to come up to him last night, sit down and talk to him. Draco had risked the very rejection that had hurt him in the first place, and had allowed Harry to see his real self. In fact, Harry realized, he’s being quite honest with me right now. Letting me see he’s scared, not trying to hide it. The significance of that was rather profound. With that realization came a budding sense of sympathy and a need to give comfort that Harry could relate to and act on. “Hey, Malfoy,” he said softly. After a long moment of silence, he added, “That was really great – what you did for me in Potions class. It would have been better if I could have remembered that last bit, though.”

Draco shifted his shoulders a little, a hint of his classic shrug, and continued staring at the toes of his boots.

There was another extremely long silence. Harry wanted very much to raise Draco's spirits a little, see him smile again. “Those are nice boots, Malfoy,” he said at last, a hint of friendly teasing in his voice. “Very striking. In fact, I noticed them this morning – they made quite an impression on me.”

Draco glanced briefly over at Harry through his hair. A slight smile appeared for a fleeting moment, then faded. “McGonagall’s up there now,” he said finally in a very low voice. “Somebody told her we were fighting.”

“It was the fifty somebodies that were watching us this morning,” said Harry in an equally low voice. He figured it would be best not to mention Ron. “McGonagall turned up just after you walked off. I told her we weren’t fighting, but I guess she thought I was trying to keep from getting in trouble. Gave me one bloody hell of a lecture.”

“I just got it too, before she went up.” There was a pause, then Draco said, “Did you really tell her we weren’t fighting?”

“Yes,” said Harry. “But I didn’t know what else to say – about what we were doing. I’m sure it sounded pretty lame.”

Draco leaned his head back against the wall, his eyes closed. He sighed. “I am so screwed, Harry.”

“Oh, hey,” said Harry, trying his best to sound reassuring. “I don’t think so. Dumbledore has always been fair. It’s not like we were magic dueling, or anyone got hurt.”

Draco turned to face Harry and looked at him for the first time. “But there’s something you don’t know.”

Harry turned his shoulder to the wall so that he and Draco were face to face. Their eyes met, gray melting into green melting into gray, and Harry suddenly couldn’t think about Dumbledore, or about being in trouble, or about anything except what was happening right then between him and Draco. Even the air seemed to tremble between them. He took a deep breath, and gathered all his courage and daring. “There’s something I want to know,” he said softly. “You’ve always hated me. I don’t understand this sudden change, why you . . . like me now – I’d like to know that.”

Draco stood very still for a moment, looking into Harry’s eyes. “You really don’t know do you?” Then he lifted one hand, brushed away Harry’s unruly fringe, and gently traced a zigzag line down Harry’s forehead. A small smile played around the corners of his mouth, and one delicate eyebrow twitched upward. “It’s the scar, Harry. What can I say, I just seem to find it irresistible.”

Harry gave a short laugh, and colored slightly at the electricity he felt in that touch, and at the reminder of his terrible lie that morning. But he shook his head, never letting his eyes leave Draco’s. “I’m not buying that, Malfoy.”

Draco met Harry’s gaze steadily. He took a deep breath. “I’ve always liked you,” he said quietly. “From the first time I saw you, when you came into Madam Malkin’s, even before I found out who you were.” He paused. “But, Harry – ” he said, even softer, “you didn’t like me.”

“Oh,” said Harry. That was true. And Harry’s world tilted just a little bit more so that he truly saw how his dislike and rejection had hurt Draco. “Terribly, horribly, and down to the bone,” Draco had said last night. And though Harry had apologized last night, the full impact of it hadn’t hit him until now. Still, he thought, even if I had known, it wouldn’t have changed anything – I couldn’t have liked him the way he was then. But Harry, being Harry, didn’t like knowing he had hurt anyone – and it was sad that they had wasted so much time at each other’s throats.

Draco, looking into Harry’s eyes, was able to read a lot of Harry’s internal dialog. He saw the understanding and the apology surface in Harry’s green gaze, and was quite touched. “Never mind,” he said. “I know what an awful brat I was. I don’t blame you for not liking me – not now.” Then he smiled for the first time since they had started talking, as something about Harry’s relieved expression reminded him of that morning in class. He raised one eyebrow, and the smile turned into an impishly cute version of his old smirk, his gray eyes lit with a teasing warmth. “You really were a spectacle in Potions class today, you know,” he said.

Harry knew that he should say something, make some kind of witty retort, but Draco’s smile and the look in his eyes was doing something very mysterious to the stability of his knees. He smiled back, feeling foolish and not being able to help it. He suddenly felt quite tongue-tied.

Draco stepped slightly closer to Harry. “In fact, you’re being a bit of a spectacle, now,” he said tenderly. He laid his hand on the wall very close to Harry’s shoulder.

Harry felt his face flush.

Draco laughed softly. “I love the way I can make you blush, Harry. It’s so much more fun than making you angry. I’m sorry I didn’t discover it sooner.”

Harry looked down, breaking the eye contact, his feelings running into a confused muddle of embarrassment and thrill at Draco’s closeness. He was desperately trying to think of something to say to shift the conversation back onto safer ground. Draco’s earlier mention of Potions class made Harry remember the thought he’d had during class about Draco’s success in potions. “I’ve never done very well in Potions class. But you’re really good at it,” he said, and then he added, “I just can’t seem to get it, sometimes.”

“I’m really interested in it,” replied Draco with some enthusiasm. “And Snape is one of the best Potions masters there is – he knows the most amazing stuff.” Draco laughed as Harry looked up at that with a very pained and skeptical expression. “I know. Sometimes he can be a real ass- ”

Draco was cut off in mid-epithet as the gargoyle behind him suddenly jumped up out of the way, and the wall behind it split open. Professor McGonagall stepped out, and fixed the two boys with a stern eye. If she was surprised to see them standing so close together, she didn’t show it. “Go straight up,” she said in a clipped tone, as she waved them toward the door. “Professor Dumbledore is waiting for you.”

All the color and animation drained from Draco’s face, and he turned very pale again, but he turned around and went resolutely through the door first. Harry followed him closely, and the wall sealed itself shut behind them with a hollow thud. Draco stopped short at the bottom of the spiral staircase, so that Harry nearly walked right into him.

“Have you ever been up there before?” asked Harry.

“Once,” said Draco. “You?”

Harry sighed. “Lots of times.”

Draco turned slightly and looked at Harry, then tossed his hair back and grinned. “Cool office, isn’t it?”

“Awesome,” said Harry. But Harry wasn’t sure if he meant Dumbledore’s office or Draco, because somehow, even though Harry knew Draco was scared, between one second and the next, the other boy had regained his seemingly unshakable poise and confidence. How does he do that? marveled Harry.

Draco turned away and stepped onto the moving stairs. Harry waited a moment, then stepped on also. And it wasn’t until he was almost to the top, that Harry remembered what Draco had said down below in the corridor. What is the something I don’t know? he wondered. But it was too late to ask, because Draco was already lifting the brass griffin knocker on Dumbledore’s door.

End Chapter 4

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