To seek a foe
Chapter Three
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"Get out!"
"Harry!"
"What are you even doing here ferret?"
"Harry James Potter!"
"Mate."
"We'll, er, just give you some space. Everyone." Healer Johnsen gestured to the slack-jawed group then turned to the frozen blond. "Healer Malfoy, see me when you're done?"
But Malfoy just stood there, unmoving. Seemingly unblinking. Shocked still.
"Draco" Hermione hissed.
Malfoy came alive suddenly. "Yes, Sir. When I'm... done here. I'll come find you."
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Once the healers had cleared out.
Harry got a better look at his school archnemesis -ex archnemesis, Harry supposed - and hated to admit that the git looked hot.
The ex-sytherin looked as posh as ever, even in his healing garb.
His scrubs fell quite nicely and exposed his collarbones and neck in a truly deliciou-Stop it!, he mentally scolded. Trying to furiously quell his blush. This was Malfoy for fuck's sake.
The blond was taller than Harry, always had been, and he was lean in a way Harry could never achieve without looking sickly thin.
Uncomfortable under Harry's scrutinising stare, Malfoy folded his arms over his chest, which drew Harry's attention to the beautiful muscles taut with what Harry could only assume was unbridled rage.
Hermione was weirdly ushering in the unfairly gorgeous and unwelcome guest though.
What the hell?
Ron was shuffling awkwardly on his feet, now somewhere behind Harry's left.
The silence was thick in the room. Tension bleeding into Harry, but he hadn't taken his gaze off the willowly slytherin as he made it across the room.
"You're- you're awake?" Malfoy coughed out. His silver eyes locked onto emerald ones, swimming with so much unspoken emotion.
Hate, Harry could only guess.
While Harry felt the question was rhetorical, he just couldn't resist.
"Obviously" Harry gave his best Malfoy-inspired drawl.
"Erm...Draco, can I talk to you privately?" Hermione touched Malfoy's wrist, still folded over his frame.
Like, she just fucking reached out and touched him. Voluntarily.
What the fuck is going on?
Malfoy was startled out of his thoughts by the touch. Turning to the others for the first time since entering the room, almost as if just noticing that there were people besides Harry.
"Arrogant bastard" Harry muttered loudly.
Then three things were said at once:
/"Harry" gasped Hermione/
/"Mate" Ron reprimanded/
/and a truly baffled, "what?" from his childhood rival. /
Harry couldn't figure what was happening.
Why hadn't Malfoy left? - or hexed him? And when had he gone into healing?
Who let him?
And why for the love of Godric were his friends acting this way?
"Get out Malfoy!" He barked again, deflecting the attention back to where Harry felt it truly belonged.
Hermione dropped her voice, "Harry, this is Draco, remember?"
Harry was briefly baffled that Hermione called her childhood tormentor by his first name.
"I know who it is!" He spluttered indignantly, raising his good arm.
"Oh-kay" was the only broken up reply he got. Ron and Hermione exchanged a look.
Harry was about ready to tell the blond to leave again when Hermione's face changed with barely concealed effort.
"And Draco, Harry was just telling us about starting aurortraining." Hermione stressed obviously hinting at something Harry was missing.
Malfoy's eyes widened.
"S-s-starting?" Malfoy's voice cracked out, barely audible.
Then his features changed, shifting and contorting with little effort. And Harry, after years with Malfoy, could almost see the familar mask locking into place, piece by piece.
"And pray tell what is so interesting about that?" Malfoy drawled, looking more like the git Harry knew from school.
Hermione looked stunned at this sudden change of appearance but Harry relaxed a fraction.
That's more like it, he thought, I can handle Malfoy like this. Not the attractive healer who was baffled by Harry's determined glare.
Once she recovered from the familar look of distain and boredom, Hermione continued in that horribly obvious, slow tone.
"Well, you see. Harry here thinks that his application may be affected by his....um, accident."
"Hermione!" Harry had enough, why was she sharing this, with Malfoy of all people!
"What you telling him for?!" Harry huffed, facing Hermione properly and couldn't help but be thrown again by how different she looked with her hair cut short. Older, more mature.
"Well." A beat. "As a trained healer, Dra-Malfoy could potentially shed light on recovery times, and absence sabaticals." Hermione said, carefully watching them switching looks between Harry and the healer/nemesis.
"Yes!" Ron bellowed, making Harry jump out of his skin. "Because he's a healer!" As if this was a revelation of some kind.
"...Right" Malfoy paused, cleared his throat loudly. "Right" he repeated louder this time.
Then he sqaured his shoulders, shifting into what Harry could assume was his "Oh I'm so self-important" healer mode.
Dick, Harry thought, watching as Malfoy moved over to monitored vitals, and flipped through some medical nonsence with his wand.
Ron tried to read the red words over his shoulder, but seemed baffled by whatever the charts showed.
Silence.
Harry was glaring at Hermione, furious that she hadn't kicked Malfoy out already. He thought she'd have started screaming for a different healer or something the second Malfoy entered.
But Hermione was pointedly not looking at him. She must've felt his stare, Harry was trying to catch her attention and wordlessly ask: What the hell is going on here?!
Ron, never one to enjoy silence, spoke up:
"So yeah, Harry seems to think that Robards is looking for a reason to sanction him or something" He opened the discussion to the room but was looking searchingly at Malfoy, as if trying to communicate something.
Harry really couldn't cope with all this strangeness.
"Ron" He groaned, momentarily disregarding Malfoy's presence, "We've been over this, he can't sanction trainees, but he can cut me from the programe quicker than you can say quiditch."
This made Malfoy scoff.
"What was that ferret-face?" Harry was itching for a fight now, anything to end the tension.
Malfoy seemed taken aback at this.
Which, yeah, was fair because his face had softened a bit, his jaw line sharp, and his nose less pronounced. Even as his brow furrowed with thought, Harry felt it unfair that it didn't mar his sexy appearance.
Harry blinked in shock. What the fuck. Malfoy is not sexy.
He's...he's evil. Well, not Voldemort evil, nor was he take-over-the-world evil but he's....he's...
Cruel, Harry settled on.
Yes, Cruel. Malfoy could only feel good if he put others down first.
He made Hermione and Ron feel like shit over uncontrolable nonsense such as blood status and appearance. For years Malfoy did this, with bigotry slurs, and poorly constructed insults.
Harry couldn't find him attractive.
"Nothing, Pot- Potter, I'm just looking at your record over the week you've been here." Malfoy wasn't even looking at him now. It grated Harry that Malfoy was in the room, asserting some dominance or shit. 'Oh, look at me, I'm so important and clever'.
Git.
Harry didn't know what came over him when he loudly asked:
"Speaking of, Ron, where are we? what kind of self-respecting hospital hires death eater scum nowadays?"
He was expecting Ron to laugh or something but Ron looked grief stricken.
He choked. "That's - that's not okay mate" His voice strained, eyes bulging out.
Surprisingly, Malfoy rotated his head towards his best mate and muttered, "It's fine." Ron seemed to take a breath at that, reading something in the ferret's face that Harry couldn't see.
Then Malfoy turned to face Harry looking almost bored, "If you must know Potter, you're at St.Mungos."
His voice turned haughty. "You've heard of it I assume. High profile, London stationed, World renown hospital for charm damage, magical casualties, medical anomalies, etcetera. I won't bore you with the details but you'll find that-"
He audibly paused.
"Harry Potter isn't the only famous wizard treated here." Finally finished, Malfoy sneered down on him.
Hermione was impressed (and a little sick) of how easily he'd slipped into his former skin.
She shared another look with Ron, but Harry missed it.
He was too focused on what Malfoy said.
St. Mungos.
Harry was startled.
He supposed if he'd been unconscious for a week, as he'd been told, he could imagine Hermione wouldn't rest until she found him the top specialist available.
Hermione was feircely loyal, and truthfully a little scary when it came to her friends' safety. Harry would know.
So, he guessed, St. Mungos made sense, but Malfoy here, in his room and in control of Harry's health? He wavered.
He turned his eyes to Hermione, pleading for some more information.
-How could she trust Malfoy after everything?
-Was she willing to risk his life over burying old grudges?
-And most important, was he safe here?
She seemed to read him like a book, a beloved book she'd cherish but a book non-the-less, she nodded to him.
He turned next to Ron, who looked back at him helplessly, like he'd get him out of the hospital if he only could, then he shrugged with a half smile as if to say:
Sooner you calm down, sooner we can leave.
Suddenly, Harry felt as if all the fight left him, and he was only left with questions. He started with the most burning.
"What- what happened?"
The three ex-hogwarts students looked at each other, universally agreeing something. Then Malfoy stepped towards the bed, his face passive but his eyes swimming with emotions.
"Harry, you were out in the field-"
"I haven't-"
"You have, mate." Ron interupted.
"But I-"
"You were out in the field" Malfoy started again, "and" he paused like this was difficult somehow. "you were clearly hit by the dark wizard you were chasing with some sort of curse"
"A dark wizard?"
Ron answered this one. "It's true mate, I heard the call come through myself!"
"Say I believe you- which I'm not sure I do. I mean I haven't even finished training yet- But if I did, what kind of curse are we talking here?"
"Harry, you finished training 8 years ago" Harry heard a ringing in his ears, he wasn't certain who'd said that.
"No, I -"
But the look on Ron's face told it all.
"Which leads me to believe you've encountered a... a memory charm of sorts." Malfoy's composure was slipping a little, his hand started fiddling with his wand and his eyes darted around the room, never once landing on Harry.
"Like," Harry swallowed, tasting metal. "Like, Obliviate?" He asked Hermione. Knowing how painful it is to be forgotten already, after her parents, this must suck for her.
He didn't want her to hurt. It made Harry's chest ache. But worse because this time Harry was the cause.
He looked to her.
She wouldn't lie about such things.
Hermione would never joke about such a loss.
She seemed thrown off by his intense gaze, she fumbled slightly looking to Ron for support before saying in a soft tone.
"Yes Harry. Probably. Like that."
More ringing in his ears, a pounding in his head, his chest aching.
"Okay...so, I've... I've lost..." But he kept trailing off, his voice becoming so unsteady. His eyes swam with unshed tears, he looked around helplessly at his blurred best friends, asking for...
Something?
Anything?
Some support?
His breath was so irratic. He didn't trust his voice anymore. There were spots dancing where his best friends should be.
His chest was so heavy, his throat too tight.
His wet eyes finally landed on Malfoy who looked so distraught under his careful mask of indifference, which Harry could see right through.
His vision started to clear a little, focusing on Malfoy's steady grey eyes.
"It sounds likely that you have lost almost a decade's worth of memories."
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