Nearly

As the last boy to be Sorted — Blaise Zabini — makes his way over to the Slytherin table and gracefully slides into the seat next to Harry, Professor McGonagall rolls up the scroll and escorts the Sorting Hat out of the Great Hall again. Harry glances at the empty plate in front of him, his belly clenching with hunger, but apparently the feast will have to wait a while longer because Headmaster Dumbledore stands up — to hold a speech, Harry figures. 

Professor Dumbledore holds out his arms in a welcoming fashion, his long sleeves glittering in the candlelight as he shakes them out and, beaming down at the students, he says in a booming voice, ”Welcome! Welcome to a new year at Hogwarts! Before we begin our banquet, I would like to say a few words…”

Harry stifles a sigh and sits up a little straighter, ready to listen as avidly as he can while his stomach starts to eat itself… 

”And here they are”, Dumbledore continues, his eyes twinkling behind his halfmoon spectacles. ”Nitwit! Blubber! Oddment! Tweak!”

Harry huffs out an incredulous chuckle and then looks around at the other Slytherins to see if they could somehow make any sense of the Headmaster’s unorthodox speech. The other first-years glance around uncertainly just like Harry, but the older students seem less surprised by the Headmaster’s behaviour, allthough they don’t seem altogether sure either. 

”Thank you!” Dumbledore says and sits back down. 

”That’s it?” Harry whispers to Seamus Finnigan.

The other boy merely shrugs with a grin and then immediately starts tucking into the food that suddenly materialises on the plates in front of them. Harry gasps and stares down at the many dishes crammed together on the table and immediately starts filling his own plate with roast potatoes, chicken, chips and Yorkshire pudding, then finally scoops some peas and carrots onto the edge of the plate when he realises what Remus would say if he was here. 

Draco seems to hesitate for a moment, glancing between Seamus, Harry and the two large boys on either side of him, he frowns as they all tuck in eagerly before he gingerly scoops up some peas and pour onto his own plate. A couple of boiled potatoes and half a sausage joins the peas, and then the boy starts picking at it all, putting tiny bites into his mouth and chewing mechanically. Harry gives him a surprised look and is about to ask him if that’s all he’s going to eat, but before he has a chance to say anything, the blonde looks up and gives him a defiant look and Harry decides to keep his thoughts to himself. 

When Harry has finished half his plate and is starting to feel full and content, he slows down a bit and looks around the Hall more properly. Scanning the High Table, he notices Hagrid the gamekeeper squeezed into the corner where he’s drinking from a bucket-sized goblet and ironically enough he’s talking to the tiniest of all the Professors, a small man wearing a pointy hat. Next to them, Professor McGonagall and Professor Dumbledore are conversing pleasantly, and on the other side of the Headmaster’s Chair Harry can see Professor Quirrell in his weird turban, talking to a man with shoulder-length black, slightly greasy-looking hair that frames his sallow face with the most predominant feature being a rather long, hooked nose. 

Suddenly, the hooked-nosed teacher looks past Quirrell’s turban straight into Harry’s eyes, and a sharp, hot pain stabs Harry’s forehead, right along his lightening bolt scar and he gasps and claps a hand to his head. 

”What’s wrong?” Zabini asks him. 

”N-nothing”, Harry mutters, because the pain went away just as quickly as it appeared, and he quickly flattens down his fringe and grabs his goblet of pumpkin juice and gulps down a couple of swigs. 

Glancing up at the High Table again, he catches the hooked-nosed teacher looking at him still, before the man quickly looks away again. Harry frowns, wondering if he’d imagined the slight scowl on the man’s face… Yeah, I must have done, he thinks. Why would he dislike me, he doesn’t even know me…

Professor Dumbledore gets to his feet again and relays some start-of-term notices and also informs the first-year students that the Dark Forest is strictly out of bounds, as is a third floor corridor apparently. Harry frowns at that. The Forest he can understand, from what his dad has told him it’s the home to some seriously dangerous creatures, but why would the students be forbidden to enter a corridor in the school?

”And now, before we go to bed, let us sing the school song!” Dumbledore says and gives his wand a little flick, causing a golden ribbon to fly out of the tip. 

Harry glances at the other teachers and notices that all of their smiles have become rather strained, and the hooked-nosed man isn’t even smiling at all. 

”Everyone pick their favourite tune”, Dumbledore says. ”And off we go!”

All the students, and some of the teachers, all start bellowing out the words spelled out by the golden ribbon, all to different tunes. Harry looks around in amusement, mouthing the words silently and just enjoys the spectacle. Finally, the only people still singing are the Weasley twins who have chosen a rather slow funeral march, and Harry laughs as Dumbledore conducts them through the last few lines then claps the loudest of everyone. 

”He’s a bit mad, isn’t he?” Harry says under his breath, to no-one in particular. 

”You said it”, Draco mutters, surprising Harry — and evidently himself as well, because he seems to startle and then quickly shoots Harry a worried look, as though expecting Harry to mock him for dropping his aloof exterior — but Harry simply laughs, and Draco relaxes again, his lips twitching.

As everyone finish up their meals, the Prefects get up and herds the first-years out of the Great Hall, leading the way to their House Common Rooms. Harry sees Ron’s red head disappear up a staircase with the rest of the Gryffindors, before he and the other Slytherins make their way through a dimly lit corridor, then take a spiral staircase down several levels until they reach the dungeons. Harry watch the paintings they pass curiously, waving back as the inhabitants of the various portraits greet and welcomes them to Hogwarts. 

Finally the two Slytherin Prefects — Cyril Lympsham and Scarlet Cowe — both stop abruptly next to a stretch of stone wall, empty save for a couple of torches on either side of the spot Lympsham is looking at intently. Harry cranes his neck, trying to get a better look and see what the older boy is staring at, but as far as he can see, there is nothing there.

”Salazar”, the Prefect says in a loud and clear voice. 

The stones in the wall start to wriggle, just like the wall concealing the entrance to Diagon Alley, and Harry smiles to himself as they rearrange themselves to create a narrow archway. 

”Come on, this way”, Cowe says loudly and marches through the archway, Lympsham close on her heels. 

The first-years quickly follow them into the hidden passage on the other side of the wall, then continue through another archway that leads them to a large circular room decorated with green and silver tapestries and Slytherin crests. Cowe leads the girls to one side where the entrance of the Girls’ Dormitories are and Harry and the other boys follow Lympsham to the Boys’ Dormitories. It’s quite cosy, with several large, ancient four-poster beds all with green silk hangings, and from the ceiling a couple of silver lanterns hang, casting a dim glow over everything.

He walks up to the nearest window and peers out, but he can’t make anything out, it’s too dark. He turns around and watches his fellow Slytherins choose their beds and unpack their trunks, and climbs onto the four-poster bed closest to him and leans down to grab his pyjamas from the trunk at the foot of it. Through the corner of his eye he sees Draco sidle up to the bed next to his, but doesn’t look over until he’s changed into his pyjamas and slipped beneath the cover. 

The pillow smells differently from his pillow back home, but it’s comfortable enough and he is exhausted anyway, so he probably won’t have any trouble falling asleep. He looks over at Hedwig who is sitting in her cage, sleeping with her head beneath her wing still, and he wonders if he should have let her out before heading to the dungeons…

”So…” Draco murmurs suddenly, breaking Harry out of his thoughts. ”That man in Madam Malkin’s, was that your… one of your…”

”Yeah. One of my dads”, Harry says shortly. 

Draco fingers the hem of his night shirt, avoiding Harry’s eyes for a moment. Harry glances around at the others, but everyone else seem to have gone to sleep already. Draco swallows a couple of times and then finally looks up at Harry through his lashes, looking quite shy suddenly, and Harry is reminded again of what Remus told him about Draco showing him another side if only Harry got to know him better. 

”Look…” Draco says quietly. ”On the train, what I was saying about hanging around riff-raff, I wasn’t talking about —”

”Okay”, Harry says. ”But I don’t think the Weasleys are riff-raff either, though. I only just met them, but they seemed all right to me. They were really nice actually.”

”They’re Gryffindors, though—”

”So were my dads”, Harry cuts in. 

Draco frowns, but doesn’t say anything. After a moment’s awkward silence, he climbs into his own bed and burrows down. Peering through the gloom, Harry thinks he can see the boy pouting and suppresses a smile. 

”Hey…” he whispers after a while. ”Draco… I might not hate Gryffindor, but we’re still going to slaughter them at Quidditch, right?”

Draco’s pout twitches a little, ”First-years aren’t allowed to try out for the team, though…”

”I know. But that doesn’t mean we can’t do a bit of practising, you know, so we’re ready to try out next year.”

Draco’s eyes seem to glitter in the gloom, ”Practise?”

”Yeah”, Harry whispers and smiles wickedly. ”Promise you can keep a secret?”

Draco nods eagerly and props his head up on his hand as Harry sits up and leans down to dig his shrunken Nimbus 2000 out of his trunk. He taps it with his wand and whispers, ”Finite”

Draco gasps and immediately sits up on his bed as the broomstick regains it’s normal size and Harry holds it up so that the other boy can read the golden letters. 

”You got a Nimbus 2000? I got a Nimbus 2000, as well —!” Draco whispers excitedly. 

”You do? Where is it?”

”Father made me leave it at home”, Draco mutters. ”I told him there was no reason to buy it, if I couldn’t even use it until next year, that we might as well wait until the next model comes out… But then I won’t have a broom to fly during Christmas hols, so we decided to get it after all.”

”Well, you can borrow mine if you want. If we find a way to fly in secret.”

”Really?”

”Yeah, sure!”

They beam at each other for a moment, then Harry hides the broom behind the trunk and gets back under the covers. Draco follows suit and then they lie silently for a long while, just staring at each other in the darkness. 

”Harry…” Draco whispers finally. ”Are you asleep yet?”

”No, not yet”, Harry whispers. 

”I just wanted to say… I like you.”

Harry feels the fluttery things in his belly fly up again and smiles, ”I like you too, Draco. I really want us to be friends.”

”Best friends?”

”Yeah. Best friends.”

”I’d like that too.”

The next morning Harry wakes up the soothing sound of water lapping against the windows and smiles as he stretches. He blinks his eyes open and peers sleepily over at Draco’s bed, only to discover that it’s been made and the blonde is nowhere to be seen. Harry pushes himself up to sitting and looks around the dorm. Vincent, Greg, Blaise and Seamus are all still in bed, so he hasn’t overslept. He wonders if Draco has already gone down to the Great Hall for breakfast, and considering the boy barely ate any dinner the night before it would make sense for him to be starving this morning, but Harry still doesn’t understand why he would go to breakfast alone and not wait for him… 

Just then, the door to the dormitory opens and Draco comes in. His blonde hair is wet and slicked back from his face and he’s carrying a damp towel and some toiletries. 

”Oh”, Harry says. ”I was wondering where you’d got to.”

”Shower”, Draco says simply and puts his things away before hanging the towel up to dry next to his bed. 

”How’d you know where to go?”

”I asked Professor Snape.”

”Who?”

”Professor Snape, the Potions teacher. He’s our Head of House”, Draco says and perches on the side of his made bed. 

”But… How did you know that?”

”He’s acquainted with my father”, Draco says and shrugs. ”Come on, let’s go to breakfast.”

”Yeah, just give me one minute… I need to write a letter to my dads”, Harry says. 

”Now?” Draco more or less whines, and Harry throws his pillow at his head, ”Yes, now. It won’t take long…”

He gets some parchment and a quill and scribbles down a quick message: ”Dad and daddy, I’m loving Hogwarts so far! I hope you won’t be too terrified, but the Sorting Hat put me in Slytherin, it’s okay though… I’m really liking the dorms, and I’ve made two good friends already! Draco Malfoy who is in Slytherin with me, and Ron Weasley who was sorted into Gryffindor. I miss you both! And I love you!”

Whispers follow Harry from the moment he leaves the Slytherin Common Room the next day. People queing outside classrooms crane their necks and stand on tip-toe to get a better look at him, and some even double back to pass him for a second time in the corridors. Harry really wishes they’d all just ignore him. It’s hard enough to navigate the corridors, without the constant distractions of the other students trying to get a better look at him. 

Apparently there are a hundred and forty-two staircases at Hogwarts, wide and sweeping ones, narrow and rickety ones, some that like to change things up randomly and move their positions and some with vanishing steps that you have to remember to look out for. Then there are doors that won’t open unless you ask them nicely, and some that won’t even show themselves unless you tickle them in exactly the right place, and then there are doors that aren’t actually doors at all, just walls pretending. And the staircases aren’t the only thing changing either, the inhabitants of the portraits tend to leave their own frames to visit each other, and Harry is sure the coats of armour can walk as well. 

He is just about to double back, having made a wrong turn between the Great Hall and the dungeons, when Draco comes running up to him, leaving Greg and Vincent behind. 

”It’s this way”, the blonde says and leads the way. 

The first Transfiguration lesson starts off rather promising with Professor McGonagall telling them strictly that Transfiguration is one of the most complex and dangerous magic they’ll learn during their time at Hogwarts and anyone who messes around in her class will leave and not come back, then proceeds to turn her desk into a live pig, impressing them all and making them excited about getting started, but as it turns out they won’t be turning furniture into animals anytime soon. Instead they’re all given a matchstick each and intructed to turn them into needles. 

At the end of the lesson however, Hermione Granger is the only student to have altered her match in the slightest, and Professor McGonagall holds it up for everyone to see, favouring Ms Granger with a rare smile. The match had been made silvery and rather pointy, Harry can see and feels a stab of envy, but also a grudging respect for the muggle-born girl. Draco looks thunderous and mutters about mudbloods and cheating. 

Harry gives him a cross look, ”You shouldn’t use that word…”

Draco glares back, but doesn’t say anything else. 

At the end of their first day of classes, they have a subject that they’ve all been looking forward to — Defence Against The Dark Arts — but it turns out to be the biggest disappointment yet. The lesson and Professor Quirrell himself are both a bit of a joke, Harry decides as he and Draco make their way out of the classroom again. The Professor had told them that the turban he favours had been a gift from an African prince to say thanks for getting rid of a zombie, but when Seamus asked him how he’d fought off the zombie in question, Professor Quirrell had immediately blushed a faint pink and started stammering about the weather. 

*

Harry slides into the seat next to Draco at the Slytherin table in the Great Hall just as a hundred odd owls swoop down to deliver the mail and Harry eagerly scans the Hall for a sign of Hedwig’s snowy white feathers. The Malfoy’s eagle owl Bertram swoops down, its tail feathers brushing the top of Harry’s head and the medium-sized package dangling from its’ beak knocking over his goblet of pumpkin juice. 

”Oh, sorry”, Draco says. ”Bertram, be careful!”

”It’s all right”, Harry mutters, wiping pumpkin juice off his hand as he continues searching for Hedwig with his gaze. 

Finally she flutters into view and lands gracefully next to Harry’s plate on the table. She nips his fingers affectionately as he unties the note from her leg. He offers her a piece of bacon before she takes off again and unrolls the parchement, immediately recognising his daddy’s swirly handwriting. 

”Want one?” Draco asks, holding out the package of sweets sent by his mother. 

”Thanks”, Harry mumbles and grabs one without tearing his eyes away from the letter. 

”Good news?”

”No news, just my dads checking in. They say to say hi as well”, he says and finally looks up.

”To me?” Draco says and blinks in surprise. 

”Yeah, of course.”

”Whoa, you guys”, Blaise says and smooths out his copy of the Daily Prophet. ”Someone’s broken in at Gringotts!”

”What?” the others say in unison and crowd together around the boy to get a better look at the headline.

”But that’s impossible” Harry says. ”My dads say that Gringotts is the safest place on earth besides Hogwarts, it’s literally impossible to break into!”

”Obviously noy”, Seamus says and nods towards the paper. ”What was stolen?”

”Well, that’s the weird part”, Blaise says. ”Nothing was taking. Apparently the vault that was broken into had been emptied earlier that same day!”

”That’s a weird coincidence”, Seamus mutters.

Harry says nothing, but it doesn’t sound like a coincidence at all to him. 

At the end of the first week, the Slytherins first Potions lesson was scheduled: double Potions with the Gryffindors, and Harry has mixed feelings as he makes his way to the dungeons with Draco next to him. On the one hand, he’s looking forward to seeing Ron again, because so far this week, they’ve only been able to wave at each other from across the Great Hall. On the other hand, he is a little apprehensive about interacting with the hooked-nosed teacher for the first time. Draco tells him that Severus Snape is a fair teacher and a brilliant Potions Master, but Harry remembers that moment during the Welcome Feast when he’d accidentally locked eyes with the man and got the strong sense that the man really disliked him. Not to mention the pain that had seared through his scar during the eye contact. 

At the start of the lesson, Snape had taken the registry and when he reached Harry’s name he paused, then murmured silkily, ”Ah, yes… Harry Potter, out new celebrity…” 

His dark eyes flickered up to meet Harry’s and, once again, Harry got the strange sense that the man really disliked him. But the moment was over just as quickly as it had started and Professor Snape continued down the list. He then continued to tell them about the subtle science and exact art of potion-making, and although his voice was barely above a whisper, every word was heard clearly since he, like Professor McGonagall, seemed to possess the gift of keeping a class silent and focused without any effort at all. 

”As there is little foolish wand-waving in this class, many of you will hardly believe this is magic and I don’t expect you will really understand the beauty of the softly simmering cauldron with its shimmering fumes, the delicate power of ensnaring the senses… I can teach you how to bottle fame, brew glory, even stopper death — if you aren’t as big a bunch of dunderheads as I usually have to teach…”

Professor Snape’s dark eyes linger on Harry as he trails off, and Harry tenses up, steeling himself for — something — he isn’t sure, but Professor Snape merely frowns at him, then turns away with a dramatic swirl of robes and barks at the class to get their cauldrons out. 

During the lesson, in which they’re instructed to brew a simple potion to cure boils, Professor Snape divides them all into pairs and then stalks around the classroom, critising almost everyone except Draco, whom he seems to like. Harry, although partnered with Draco, doesn’t get off as easily, but it’s still nowhere near as bad as the Gryffindors, with the exception of Hermione Granger but only because Professor Snape can’t find a single thing to criticise, and judging by the scowl on his face it really annoys him that her potion is next to perfect. 

A sudden hissing sound distracts him and everyone else though, and they all turn to see Neville Longbottom’s cauldron melting into a twisted blob and his potion seeping across the stone floor, burning holes in people’s shoes. A huge cloud of acid green smoke swells and fills the classroom and everyone on the Gryffindor side of the classroom scramble to stand on their stools, except for Neville who has already been drenched by the potion and is trembling in pain as red boils erupt all over his body. 

”Idiot boy!” Professor Snape snarls and towers over him menacingly after having cleared the potion with a careless flick of his wand. ”I suppose you added the porcupine quills before taking the cauldron off the fire?”

Neville, trembling more than ever but now from fear rather than pain, merely whimpers in response and boils continue popping up across his face. 

”Take him up to the hospital wing!” Snape says to Hermione, then rounds on Harry who is sitting across the aisle in the middle of the classroom. ”Potter — why didn’t you warn Longbottom not to put the porcupine quills in? Thought it might make you look better in comparison if he got it wrong, did you?”

”N-no, Sir!” Harry says. 

Snape takes a point from Slytherin anyway, but almost immediately gives it back after having praised Draco for his and Harry’s potion, the only one besides Hermione’s and Ron’s that is actually successful apparently. Not that Snape seems to think Harry has had anything to do with that success. On the contrary, he seems to think Draco is a potion-making genius and Harry a potential distraction. 

”Don’t worry about it”, Draco tells him as they make their way from the Potions classroom at the end of class. ”Professor Snape can be a little prickly sometimes, but he’s brilliant, you’ll see…”

”Easy for you to say”, Harry mutters. ”He clearly loves you!”

”Don’t be silly”, Draco says with a dismissive hand gesture, but Harry can tell his lips are twitching proudly. 

Two weeks into term, the first-years have their first flying lesson with Madam Hooch. Slytherin and Gryffindor are scheduled to have their flying lesson together, and Harry is really excited. Despite what he’d told Draco on the first night about secret flying practises, the two have yet to find a time and a place to take turns on his Nimbus 2000, so this lesson will be the first time Harry gets to fly since leaving home. 

It’s a clear day, perfect weather conditions to fly, and Harry feels a spring in his steps as he, Draco and Seamus hurry down the front steps of the castle and towards the smooth lawn on the opposite side of the grounds to the Forbidden Forest. The other Slytherins are already waiting for them, but the Gryffindors and Madam Hooch have yet to arrive. Harry and Draco make their way over to two of the brooms laid out on the ground. Draco mutters about sub-standard school brooms and Harry silently agrees, wishing he could have brought his own, but not daring to risk having it confiscated. First-years aren’t allowed to bring their own brooms to Hogwarts after all. 

When the Gryffindors and Madam Hooch finally arrives, they’re all instructed to step up to their broomstick, hold out their right hand and command the broom to rise into the air with a simple ”Up!”

”UP!” they all shout. 

Harry’s and Draco’s broomsticks shoot off the ground and into their waiting hands immediately, but they’re two of the few brooms that do. Hermione Granger’s merely rolls around indecisively on the ground, and Neville Longbottom’s doesn’t move at all. Draco sniggers as the boy’s plump face grows redder and redder with concentration and embarassment. 

When they all had their broomsticks in their hands (Neville had finally bent down to grab his, when Madam Hooch’s back was turned.) The windswept witch blows her whistle and intructs them to mount their respective brooms without sliding off the end, then walks up and down the rows to correct their grips. 

Harry gets a nod of approval and grins, then looking around he accidentally locks eyes with Ron who seem to startle and quickly looks away, the tips of his ears turning red.

”All right, Ron?” Harry says. 

The red-head wips his head around and stares at Harry in surprise. Harry can tell when he glances uncertainly at Draco over his shoulder, but keeps grinning. 

”How’s your first weeks been?”

”Er… Alright, yeah…” Ron mumbles. ”Charms was okay. Hard though.”

Harry nods in agreement, ”Yeah, what about Transfiguration though?”

”Oh, the worst! But McGonagall is all right, though — unlike Snape…”

”Yeah — and what about Quirrell?”

Ron chuckles in agreement, ”Fred and George reckons that story about the zombie in Africa is all bogus, and the real reason he wears that stupid turban is to ward off vampires wherever he goes — haven’t you noticed, it smells kind of funny? Fred and Geroge reckons it’s stuffed full of garlic!”

Harry laughs. 

”Good”, Madam Hooch says and Harry turns back to the front, his smile still lingering. ”Now, when I blow my whistle, you will kick off the ground hard, then keep your brooms steady, rise a few feet then come straight back down by leaning forward slightly, understand?”

Finally, we get to fly, Harry thinks and glances over at Draco to share his excitement, but to his utter shock, the blonde is avoiding his eyes and glaring thunderously at the ground in front of him. 

”Draco?” Harry whispers. ”What —?”

”Okay then”, Madam Hooch says. ”On my whistle — one — two —”

But before Madam Hooch has reached three, Neville, being nervous and jumpy and probably terrified of being the only person left on the ground, pushes off hard and soars aimlessly into the air. 

”Come back, boy!” Madam Hooch barks immediately, but Neville continues to shoot into the air like a cork out of a bottle and with just as much control of where he’s going, until finally — twenty feet into the air — the boy glances down and realises how far up he’s got, gives a horrified gasp and promptly slides sideways off his broom. 

He lands with a thud on the lawn and whimpers quietly as Madam Hooch runs over to examine him. 

”Tut, tut… Broken wrist…” she mutters, then gently helps Neville to his feet. ”Come on, boy — it’s all right — let’s get you to the hospital wind…”

She turns to the rest of the class and her yellow eyes narrow, ”None of you is to move until I get back! You leave your brooms where they are or you’ll be out of Hogwarts before you can say ’Quidditch’, understand!”

She then puts her arm around Neville who hobbles along next to her, his tear-streaked face pale and drawn as he clutches his broken wrist close to his chest. 

As soon as they’re out of earshot, Draco lets out a cold laugh, ”Did you see his face, the great lump?” he says to the other Slytherins and Harry frowns. 

”Shut up, Malfoy!” Parvati Patil snaps and Pansy Parkinson lets out a high-pitched giggle, ”Ooh, look who’s sticking up for her boyfriend — never thought you’d like fat little cry-babies, Parvati!”

”Look!” Draco says suddenly, darting forward and snatching something small and shining from the grass. ”It’s that stupid Rememberall Longbottom’s gran sent him! Too bad the lump didn’t check it before he fell, or he might have remembered to land on his fat arse —!”

Harry stifles a sigh and steps up to Draco, holding out his hand for the Rememberall, ”That’s enough, Draco…”

The blonde finally turns to meet Harry’s eyes, and Harry feels a shiver run through him as the cold, steel grey eyes bore into him. 

”No”, the blonde murmurs coolly. ”I think I’ll leave it somewhere for Fatbottom to find… How about… up a tree?”

Draco tosses the Rememberall tauntingly into the air and catches it again, but before Harry can grab it from him, the blonde has kicked off the ground and is soaring towards the top branches of the nearest tree. Harry hesitates for a split-second, then kicks off the ground as well. He leans forward on the broom and speeds after the other Slytherin, pulling up to a stop only feet away from the other boy. 

Draco’s eyes flash with worry and his grip on the broom slips slightly as he holds the Rememberall up with his free hand. 

”Why are you doing this, Draco?” Harry shouts over the breeze. 

”What do you care?” Draco shouts back and when Harry doesn’t answer immediately, his frown turns into a pout. 

Harry’s stifles a sigh and slowly drifts a little closer to him. He can tell the other boy is tensing, getting ready to bolt, but he keeps drifting closer and closer to him until their broomsticks are nearly knocking into each other. 

”Whatever I’ve done to make you angry with me, there’s no reason to take it out on Longbottom”, Harry says. ”Come on, Draco… Don’t you think he has it hard enough without us making it worse?”

Draco blinks in surprise at the word us, and Harry gives him a tentative smile. 

”What do you mean us?I took this stupid thing, not you”, he mumbles. 

”Yeah, but we’re best friends, aren’t we? So we stick by each other, right?”

The steel grey of Draco’s eyes brighten to a silver hue and his lips twitch, then he nods and they both dip their brooms to fly back to the ground. Dismounting his broom, Draco fingers the delicate glass sphere with the tiny cloud of smoke inside uncertainly, then holds it out for Harry to take. 

”Give it to Ron, he’ll make sure Neville gets it”, Harry suggests. 

Draco frowns a at that and glares over at Ron, but doesn’t say anything, just thursts the glass ball into the redhead’s hand and then promptly looks away. 

Later that night Draco is still sulking slightly and Harry decides to let him use his Nimbus 2000 to get him in a better mood, suggesting they sneak out of the dormitory as soon as the other boys have fallen asleep. 

”Any idea where we can go, though?” he asks Draco.

”Well, I don’t think we should risk going outside or we’re bound to get caught by Filch or Mrs Norris… We’re better off finding some place inside the school.”

”Somewhere big enough to fly…”

”What about the trophy room — that’s always unlocked.”

They wait until the other boys in the first-year dormitory are all snoring and snuffling in their beds, before they pull on their dressing-gowns over their pyjamas and step into their boots. Harry grabs his broom and they sneak silently out of the dorms and across the Common Room. Draco tip-toes up to the door and listens intently to any sounds on the other side and when nothing is heard he gestures for Harry to follow him out into the narrow corridor. 

They keep to the shadows and jog as quietly as they can, pausing at every corner to listen for any sign of Filch or Peeves the Poltergeist before they continue further up in the castle. Finally they reach the trophy room, which is indeed unlocked as Draco had said and definitely big enough to fly several feet above the floor. Harry lets Draco go first and sits down crossed-legged in the middle of the room and watches him as he zips between the walls and rounding the dusty old chandelier, his dressing-gown flapping around him. 

”Okay, my turn!” Harry calls out after a while. 

Draco zooms down and lands smoothly next to him, his eyes glittering and his hair looking almost wind-swept, and Harry’s heart leaps at the sight for some weird reason. Draco hands him the Nimbus 2000 and Harry mounts it, but before he’s had a chance to kick off the ground, a noise in the next room makes them both jump. 

”Sniff around, my sweet…” the unmistakable voice of Filch the caretaker can be heard from the other side of the wall and the boys look at each other in horror.

They scurry silently towards the door, away from Filch’s voice an no sooner have they snuck through it than they can hear the creaking of the door on the other side of the trophy room and Filch’s wheezing breath as he enters. 

”They’re in here somewhere… Probably hiding, my sweet…”

”This way”, Harry mouths to Draco and leads the way down a long gallery full of suits of armour. 

They can hear Filch getting nearer and nearer. Frightened, they finally break into a run and pelt through the doorway at the end of the gallery and down one corridor then another, before ripping a tapestry aside and hurtling along a hidden passageway behind it until they burst out into the Charms corridor. 

”I think we lost him”, Harry pants. 

”Yeah”, Draco says breathlessly. 

Suddenly a doorknob rattles and something comes shooting out of a nearby classroom, making them both jump. The silvery thing lets out a delighted squeal and zooms around them: it’s Peeves the Poltergeist. 

”Shut up, Peeves, please”, Harry begs, but the Poltergeist simply cackles. 

”Wandering around at midnight, ickle firsties? Tut, tut, tut — naughty, naughty, you’ll get caughty!”

”Not if you don’t give us away, Peeves, please!”

”STUDENTS OUT OF BED!” Peeves bellows happily. ”STUDENTS OUT OF BED DOWN THE CHARMS CORRIDOR!”

Ducking under Peeves. Harry and Draco run for their lives, right to the end of the corridor where they slam into a door — but it’s locked. 

”This is it, we’re done for!” Harry groans as he rattles the doorhandle desperately but to no effect. 

They can hear hobbling footsteps approaching and the unmistakable wheezing sound of Filch heavy breathing. 

”Alohomora!” Draco exclaims, tapping his wand against the lock on the door and immediately it clicks, and the door swings open. 

Harry and Draco tumble inside and Harry quickly slams the door shut again. 

”Which way did they go, Peeves?” Filch bellows excitedly in the other end of the corridor. ”Quick, tell me!”

”Say ’please’”, the Poltergeist says. 

”Don’t mess me about, Peeves! Where did they go?”

”Shan’t say nothing if you don’t say ’please’…”

”All right, please!”

”NOTHING! Ha haaa, ha ha haa haaa! Told you I wouldn’t say nothing if you didn’t say please! Ha ha ha haaa!”

Filch swears loudly and Harry and Draco hold their breaths, listening closely as his footsteps disappear and Peeves whooshes away. 

Harry can feel his heart hammering wildly in his chest and hears his blood pounding in his ears, the steady soundtrack disrupted only by Draco’s heavy breathing… very heavy breathing… Harry frowns and glances at the other boy, but something isn’t right — Draco seems to still be holding his breath and yet Harry can clearly hear —

Draco’s eyes widen in horror and his face drains of what little colour it had to begin with. 

Slowly, both boys turn away from the door and look into the room. Except it isn’t a room at all — it’s another corridor — Harry’s heart lurches into his throat and he stares horror-struck at the monstrous dog towering over them… It’s the largest dog Harry has ever seen, it’s paws the size of seals and the heads — the three heads — brushing the ceiling… three sets of blood-shot eyes staring, three quivering noses, three drooling mouths with bared, sharp teeth…

Draco whimpers and steps closer to Harry, clutching his arm.

”I think we’re in that third floor corridor”, Harry gasps. 

”W-w-what—?” Draco hisses. 

The three-headed dog starts growling ominously and Draco clutches Harry’s arm so tightly he’s sure he’ll have bruises come morning. 

If I even live that long, he thinks numbly as the dog ducks its three heads and bares its yellowish fangs further. 

He gropes blindly for the doorknob behind his back and finally manages to turn it and he and Draco fall backwards and scramble away from the snapping jaws of the dog as it dives after them, Harry kicking the door shut just in time. 

He grabs Draco by the arms and pulls him up with him, then grabbing his Nimbus 2000 from where it had clattered to the floor in one hand and interlacing the fingers of his other hand with Draco’s he starts running and doesn’t stop until they’ve reached the hidden door of the Slytherin Common Room. 

They both stop to catch their breaths. Draco leans forward and clutches his side. 

”That — was close —!” Harry pants. ”And what the Hell — was Dumbledore thinking — letting that — that — monster into the school —?”

Draco just shakes his head, still too out of breath to speak. 

Suddenly they hear a soft creaking and look up at each other in horror.  The unmistakable sound of footsteps can be heard getting nearer and nearer, but it’s not the uneven hobbling of Filch, rather the swift footfalls of —

”What is the meaning of this?” Professor Snape’s silky voice rings out in the quiet and in the next moment his pale face swims out of the darkness in front of them like some ominous moon. ”Draco. Po- Harry… What are you doing out of bed? Have you any idea what time it is?”

”S-sorry, Sir”, Draco gasps. 

Professor Snape’s gaze flickers between the two of them and the Nimbus 2000 clutched in Harry’s hand and a small frown creeps onto his face. 

”Sorry, Sir”, Harry repeats quickly. ”We were just…”

”Yes?” Snape hisses expectantly, his dark eyes boring into Harry like he can see right through his skull and into his mind.

Harry shivers and quickly looks down, ”Flying, Sir…”

”Flying”, Snape repeats. ”I see… So that’s two school rules you’ve broken now. I think that warrants a detention. Congratulations Po- Harry… Draco… You two are the first Slytherins to serve detention this year, you must feel very proud of yourselves.”

Harry and Draco glance sideways at each other, but don’t respond. Harry notices that Draco looks paler than usual. 

”Well?” Snape demands and Harry quickly whips his head around and meets his eyes again. 

”No, Sir”, he says.

”Good”, Snape mutters. ”Because I do not want this to become common practise. Rule-breaking might be something that is celebrated in Gryffindor, but in Slytherin we value other traits. Is that understood?”

”Yes, Sir”, Harry mutters, feeling a stab of annoyance that Snape would assume the whole thing had been Harry’s idea and that his Gryffindor tendencies have lead Draco astray, but he says nothing. 

”Good”, Snape says again. ”You can report to Filch at ten o'clock on Sunday morning. Now off to bed, both of you.”

Harry and Draco make their way across the Slytherin Common Room and inside the boys’ dormitory in silence. Not until they’ve both crawled into their respective beds does Harry speak up and tell Draco he’s sorry for getting him into trouble. 

”Don’t be stupid”, Draco mutters. ”It was just as much my fault.”

”It was my idea, though…”

”Yeah, but I wanted to go just as much as you… What do you think they’ll do to us in detention?”

”Do to us?” Harry says in confusion. ”What do you mean? They’ll probably have us do lines or scrub some toilets or something…”

Draco says nothing but looks a little more like himself and less like he’s about to faint, and Harry can’t help but wonder what stories his dad have told him about Hogwarts… 

The next morning, Harry wakes up feeling slightly better about the previous night. Yes, they had been caught by Professor Snape and landed themselves in detention. But considering they were almost eaten alive by a giant, three-headed dog and narrowly escaped unscathed, Harry isn’t all that fussed about it. 

”Really though”, he tells Draco during breakfast. ”How can they keep such a dangerous animal in a school? What was Dumbledore thinking?”

”Well, it’s clearly guarding something, isn’t it”, Draco says and shrugs. 

Harry blinks in confusion, ”What makes you so sure of that?”

”Well, it was standing on a trapdoor. Didn’t you see it?”

Harry shakes his head. He hadn’t been looking at the monster’s feet, after all. 

Despite their pending detention drawing nearer, Harry and Draco wake up on the mornig of Hallowe’en feeling more excited than ever. The smell of baking pumpkins permeate the corridors as they make their way from the dungeons to the Great Hall for breakfast.

And when they get to their Charms lesson, Professor Flitwick announces that he thinks they’re ready to try their hands at making objects fly, something they’ve all been looking forward to ever since their first Charms lesson when Flitwick made his own hat zoom around the classroom. 

They are all divided into pairs to practise and Harry gets paired up with Draco as usual. 

”Now, don’t forget that nice wrist movement we’ve been practising!” squeaks Professor Flitwick as he perches on top of a huge pile of books behind his desk. ”Swish and flick, remember? Swish and flick! Also, saying the magic words properly and clearly is very important — remember what happened to Baruffio when he mixed up his ’s’ and ’f’ and found  himself on the floor with a buffalo on his chest…”

It turns out it’s a lot harder to make a feather soar into the air than it looks. No matter how much Harry swishes and flicks, his practise feather merely spins around feebly on the desk in front of him. He gives an angry huff and the feather leaps into the air. For a split-second he feels a jolt of triumph, but then he realises that the feather’s sudden movement had nothing to do with magic, but was the result of his own breath… Draco giggles next to him and Harry gives him a half-hearted glare. 

Suddenly there’s a minor explosion on the other side of Harry, who whips his head around just in time to see Seamus’s feather burst into flames and Harry quickly smothers it with his own hat.

Flitwick frowns at them and at the end of the lesson tells them all to practise the spell as homework between now and their next lesson after the weekend. 

”We’ve got so much homework already”, Harry moans as they make their way from the Charms corridor. ”Plus we’ve got detention tomorrow…”

The moment they enter the Great Hall for the Hallowe’en feast however, all thoughts of detentions and homework are immediately put out of their minds. The entire Hall has been decked out with lavish Hallowe’en decorations and a thousand live bats are fluttering between the walls and the enchanted ceiling, making the candles inside the pumpkins flicker eerily. And just as it had done at the Welcoming Feast, food suddenly appears on the table from out of nowhere and they all begin to tuck in excitedly. 

”Draco, did you hear about that mudblood Granger?” Pansy Parkinson says eagerly. 

Draco glances at Harry quickly, but doesn’t say anything. Harry pretends not to have heard and helps himself to some pumpkin juice. He can’t stand Pansy, but it’s really up to Draco whom he talks to. 

”Apparently she was being a know-it-all in Charms, as usual, and Weasley said something really mean about her and now she’s in the girls’ bathroom crying!” Pansy grins maliciously. ”That’ll teach her, won’t it… To think, not even the Gryffindors want her…”

Draco gives a noncommittal shrug and turns his body slightly more towards Harry, opening his mouth to speak… But before he’s got a chance to say anything,  the large oak doors leading to the Entrance Hall glide open with a groan and Professor Quirrell comes pelting inside the Hall, his turban slightly askew and a look of pure terror on his pale face. Every eye in the Hall follow him as he crashes into the High Table in front of Dumbledore and gasps, ”Troll — in the dungeons — thought you ought to know!”

His eyes roll back into his head and he crumples to the floor in a dead faint. 

For a second, the entire Great Hall is dead quiet save for the fluttering of bat wings. But as the shock lifts, there is an uproar of movement and terrified cries as students jump up from their seats and start fleeing the Hall. 

Dumbledore lets out several exploding firecrackers from his wand to get everyone’s attention, then promptly intructs the Prefects of Gryffindor, Hufflepuff and Ravenclaw to lead their charges to their dormitories and the Slytherins to stay in the Great Hall while the teachers follow him to the dungeons. 

”Why do we have to stay here?” Pansy demands shrilly, wringing her hands worriedly as the Great Hall steadily empties. 

”Because our dorms are in the dungeons!” Harry says and rolls his eyes. ”Where the troll is…”

”Oh, right, but… but… what if it doesn’t stay in the dungeons? What if it comes here and all the teachers are gone?”

Harry frowns. Pansy has a point. What’s to say the troll stayed in the dungeons while Quirrell made his way to the Great Hall to warn everyone… Just then, the man scrambles to his feet and, readjusting his turban with shaky hands, he hurries out of the Great Hall again. 

”Oh great, now we’re really on our own!” Pansy says. 

”Like Quirrell would have been much help if the troll shows up!” Seamus says. 

”Hey, Pansy”, Harry says. ”What bathroom did you say Hermione Granger was in?”

”What?” the girls says. ”Who cares?”

”But she doesn’t know about the troll”, Harry says and turns to Draco. ”We need to warn her!”

”What? Are you mad?” Draco says incredulously, his already pale face draining of blood at the mere suggestion and making him look as pasty as the Bloody Baron. 

”The Gryffindor Prefects probably don’t know she’s there”, Harry argues. 

”We don’t know she’s there!”

”What are you talking about? We do know, Pansy told us!”

”Yeah b-but — that’s not — that’s gossip — don’t know for sure —!”

Harry shakes his head dismissively and jumps to his feet, ”I’m going. Are you coming with me or not?”

”What?” Cowe pipes up at the other end of the table. ”What’s going on? Potter?”

Draco looks horror-struck and just opens and closes his mouth silently a couple of times. Harry frowns, ”Suit yourself…”

He jogs up the aisle between the Slytherin and the Hufflepuff table, ignoring Cowe’s demands that he stay put, and it’s not until he’s reaches the doors to the Entrance Hall tgat he hears running footsteps behind him. For a second he thinks Cowe or Lympsham have decided to chase him and force him to stay in the Great Hall, as instructed by Dumbledore, but then he hears Draco’s high-pitched voice, ”W-wait —!” 

Harry glances over his shoulder and sees the blonde hurry after him, but he doesn’t say anything. Just waits for him to catch up, then sprints across the Entrance Hall and up the large marble staircase. They slip into a deserted corridor on the third level and start making their way to the nearest girls’ toilet when they suddenly hear quick footsteps behind them. 

Draco grabs Harry’s hand and pulls him behind a large stone griffin. Peering around it, Harry is shocked to see Snape walking quickly down the corridor and disappearing round a corner. 

”What’s he doing?” he whispers to Draco. ”Why isn’t he in the dungeons with the other teachers?”

He gives Draco’s hand a gentle squeeze, then pulls him along from behind the griffin and follow Snape’s fading footsteps. They creep quietly along the next corridor and Harry peers out from behind the corner. 

”He’s heading for the third floor corridor, with the three-headed dog”, he whispers. 

”H-Harry… Do you s-smell something?” Draco whispers back. 

”What?” Harry says in confusion. 

But then it hits him… The foulest stench he’s ever come across, like a mixture of old socks and public toilet, washes over him and he almost gags. 

”What is that?” he says, slapping his free hand over his nose and mouth. 

Before Draco has had a chance to reply, they can hear a low grunting noise and the shuffling footfalls of gigantic feet. Draco starts trembling all over and he stares in mute horror at something over Harry’s shoulder. Harry feels his stomach plummet and slowly turns around. 

There it is: a twelve-feet tall mountain troll, its’ granite grey body lumpy and stinking, dragging a huge wooden club along the floor and shuffling closer and closer to them.

Harry immediately shrinks back into the shadows and pulls Draco with him, hugging him close… They hold their breaths… Harry can feel Draco’s heartbeat against his own… 

The troll stops next to an open door and peers inside. Its’ long ears waggle as if it’s listening for something and then it makes it mind up and shuffles inside. 

”The key is in the lock”, Harry breathes. ”We could lock it in…”

Draco says nothing, just keeps clutching Harry’s arms and staring in shock at the door where the troll had been. Harry gingerly moves out of the blonde’s grasp and edges towards the open door, his heart hammering wildly somewhere in the near vicinity of his throat… Please don’t let the troll come back out, please don’t let the troll come back out, he thinks desperately as he finally reaches the door. 

Then with one swift movement he grabs the key and turns it at the same time as shouldering the door shut and the lock clicks into place. 

”Oh Merlin…” Draco gasps and slumps against the wall in relief. 

Harry grins at him. 

They start making their way back, but as they reach the end of the corridor they hear something that makes their blood run cold… a high-pitched, terrified scream… and it seems to be coming from the chamber Harry has just locked, except… Oh Merlin, it’s not a chamber, Harry thinks in panic as he wheels around and stares in horror at the locked door, the door he has just locked, with the troll inside… 

”It’s the girls’ toilet!”

Draco’s eyelids flutter dangerously, as if he’s about to faint. But Harry grabs him by the arms and shakes him, ”Granger is in there with the troll, we have to save her!”

He then grabs Draco by the hand and sprints back to the door. He fumbles with the key in his panic to get the door unlocked, then wrenches it open and tumble inside. 

Hermione Granger is backed into the far wall of the bathroom, her entire body shaking like a leaf as she stares up at the gigantic mountain troll slowly advancing on her while knocking sinks off the walls with his club. 

Harry stares around wildly, trying to come up with a way of distracting the troll. His gaze lands on a tap that’s been wrenched from a broken sink and grabs it, then with a loud yell he hurls it at the troll. It hits the back of the head with a sickening crack and then falls to the floor again with a clang. 

”What are you doing?” Draco whispers in panic as the troll stops mere feet away from Granger and instead starts turning around towards them. 

”Improvising”, Harry says as the troll’s mean little eyes find him and it starts making for him instead, its huge club raised over his head. ”Granger, move it, come on, run!”

But the girl remains pressed flat against the wall, clearly too terrified to move. Harry dives under the troll’s arm and skids across the floor, grabbing a metal pipe and hurling it at the troll. It hits its’ shoulder, but the troll barely seems to have noticed, now glaring intently at the petrified Draco instead. 

”Hey!” Harry yells. ”Hey, ugly! Over here!”

The troll pauses in confusion, turning around with an annoyed roar. Harry runs around it again and hoists himself up on the troll’s back, locking his arms around its’ thick neck and clinging on for dear life. 

”Do something!” Harry yells, but both Draco and Granger seem frozen on the spot. 

The troll tries to swat Harry away, but Harry manages to hold on. He draws his wand, but before he’s hand a chance to try a spell, the troll starts thrashing around wildly and the wand lodges itself in one if its’ huge nostrils. The troll roars in anger, or pain, Harry isn’t sure. 

Finally, the troll gets a hold of one of Harry’s legs and pulls him off and holds him out. Harry dangles upside-down in midair, his arms flailing hopelessly as the troll pulls the club back, about to strike. This is it, Harry thinks. It’ll club me to death…

”W- Wi- Wingardium Leviosa!” Draco shouts desperately then and as the troll swings, the club slips out of his grip and remains floating in midair, held up by Draco’s levitation spell. 

The club continues to rise higher and higher in the air. The troll stares up at it in confusion. Suddenly, the club drops and before the troll knows what’s happened, the club hits it hard in the head and he collapses unconscious on the floor, Harry tumbling to the floor next to it. He pulls his wand out of the troll’s nose and wipes the lumpy, grey snot off on its trousers before sticking it in his own pocket. 

He turns back to Draco who is staring in shock at the troll, his wand still raised. But before Harry can thank him or say anything at all, there’s a sudden slamming noise outside the bathroom and several loud footsteps approaching. 

A moment later, Professor McGonagall bursts into the room, closely followed by Snape and finally Quirrell, who takes one look at the troll and immediately sinks down on top of a toilet clutching his heart with a whimper. 

Snape’s eyes dart between Draco, Harry, Granger and the troll, but he says nothing, just walks over to the troll and bends over it. Meanwhile, McGonagall looks between Draco and Harry, her lips pressed thin with barely suppressed rage and her eyes flashing dangerously behind her spectacles. 

”Explain yourselves!” she demands. ”Immediately!”

Harry glances over at Snape who gives him a percing look and Harry quickly looks down again. 

”P-please, Professor”, Hermione Granger pipes up, surprising everyone. ”It’s my fault…”

”Miss Granger?”

The girl pushes away from the wall and takes an unsteady step forward, wringing her hands anxiously as she gazes at the unconscious troll. 

”I went looking for the troll because I — I thought I could deal with it on my own — you know, because I’ve read all about them.”

Draco’s wand clatters to the floor, but no-one pays any attention to it. 

”If Potter and Malfoy hadn’t found me, I’d be dead now. It was about to finish me off when they got here.”

”Miss Granger!” McGonagall gasps in disbelief. ”You foolish girl, how on earth could you possibly think you could take on a full-grown mountain troll on your own?”

Hermione hangs her head in shame, and Harry glances over at Draco quickly. The blonde looks just as gobsmacked as Harry feels. Hermione Granger out-right lying to a teacher… Hell must have frozen over… 

”Well, five points will be taken from Gryffindor”, McGonagall says sourly. ”I am very disappointed in you, Miss Granger… If you’re not hurt at all, you’d better get back to Gryffindor Tower. Now.”

As Hermione leaves, McGonagall rounds on Harry and Draco who are now cowering together in the doorway. Through the corner of his eye, Harry can see Snape pulling himself to his full height, as if getting ready to step in, but he doesn’t. 

”Well, I must say”, McGonagall says. ”Not a lot of first-year students can take on mountain troll and live to tell the tale! Ten points each — will be rewarded to you… For sheer, dumb luck!” she adds furiously as Harry and Draco exchange a delighted look. 

”Now off to bed both of you!”

”Wait”, Snape says swiftly, and they both turn back to the room again. ”I will accompany you.”

Snape marches up to them, his big black robes billowing behind him and he pushes them both ahead of him out the door.

Once they’re outside in the corridor and away from the foul smell of troll, Harry suddenly notices something odd about the way Snape is walking — He’s limping — But even so, Harry and Draco almost have to jog to keep up with him and the man doesn’t slow down or look directly at them until they’re standing outside the Slytherin Common Room.

”I don’t know what happened tonight”, he murmurs. ”But do not think this is the end of it. The Headmaster will be informed of this and… I will have to… contact your parents…”

Harry frowns in confusion. He doesn’t care if the school contacts his dads, he was going to write to them and tell them all about it anyway so it doesn’t upset him at all… What’s weird though is that Professor Snape himself seems more upset at the idea of contacting their parents than they do.

Well, Harry thinks, glancing sideways at Draco, than I do anyways…

”Now get to bed, both of you”, Snape says. ”You’ll report to Filch for detention at ten o’clock tomorrow evening, is that understood?”

”In the evening?” Harry says. ”But the other day you said ten in the morning —”

”I know I did”, Snape says silkily. ”But I think tonight’s little escapade deserves something a little more taxing than scrubbing cauldrons…”

”What do you think Filch will have us do tomorrow?” Draco whispers as they make their way to the dorms.

”Dunno”, Harry mumbles, still thinking about Snape’s limp and the fact that when Draco and he saw him walking towards the third floor corridor he hadn’t been limping at all…

The next evening, Harry and Draco, having had to finish all their remaining homework before dinner since they were due to have detention at ten o’clock, run down to the Great Hall at a quarter to ten to quickly shovel some food down before running to Filch’s office to report for detention. But the caretaker isn’t there, and neither is his cat Mrs Norris. Draco grumbles about having had to eat too quickly and get a stomach ache for nothing. 

”I’ll go see if he’s in the staff room”, Harry says. ”You stay here in case he shows up.”

He doubles back and runs to the staff room in the other end of the same level. He knocks on the door, but there’s no answer. He hesitates for a moment, then with his heart hammering he decides to push the door open and peer inside. 

His heart skips a beat at the sight that meet him on the other side of the door. Snape is standing in the middle of the room with his robes pulled up over his knees, exposing his naked legs, one of which is bloody and mangled. Next to him, Filch is hovering uncertainly, looking slightly green in the face as he hands the professor fresh bandages. 

”Blasted thing”, Snape mutters darkly as he presses another bit of bandage to his wounded leg. ”How are you supposed to keep your eye on all three heads at once?”

Harry quickly ducks his head out again and tries to slide the door shut as quietly as possible, but before he’s managed to, Snape looks up and bellows, ”POTTER!”

Harry’s heart does a double tap inside his chest and he swears silently, before pushing the door open again. Snape quickly drops his robes to hide his legs again. His face is twisted with fury. Harry swallows thickly. 

”S-sorry”, Harry mumbles. ”I was looking for Filch…”

The caretaker immediately scowls suspisciously, but Snape glances at the clock quickly and seems to stifle a curse. 

”It’s past ten”, he growls at Filch. 

He then turns back to Harry swiftly, pointing a trembling finger at him threateningly. ”Potter! This is the third time you have disregarded a school rule — I will not suffer this kind of disobediant behaviour from one of my students, especially from you, do you understand?”

Stricken, Harry flinches back, especially me, why especially me, what have I ever done to him?

Snape lowers his hand again and pulls himself up to his full height with a deep breath, then gives Harry a nod as if they’ve come to some sort of arrangement. Harry glowers back, but says nothing. He lets Filch grab him by the scruff of his neck and propel him out of the doorway, but fumes silently as they make their way back to the caretaker’s office to collect Draco. 

It turns out they’re not to serve detention with Filch after all, but the caretaker is merely escorting them to Hagrid. Harry’s spirits lift considerably when he hears this. From what he remembers, Hagrid is really cool and he would love to spend the evening with him, rather than scrub Snape’s cauldrons, so if Snape thinks he’s just made detention worse for them, he’s quite mistaken…

”All right, you two, follow me”, Filch says with a leering grin after he’s grabbed a lantern from his office. ”I bet you’ll think twice about breaking another school rule again, won’t you, eh?”

He leads the way outside and across the Hogwarts grounds, muttering about the more effective punishments back in the day. The moon is bright, but wisps of clouds drifting in front of it keeps throwing them into shadow and Harry trips several times as they make their way towards the edge of the Forbidden Forest where Hagrid is waiting for them. 

Draco stops dead in his tracks, ”Hang on! Are we — we can’t go into the Forest — at night — there’s all sorts of things in there! Werewolves a-a-and — and —”

”That’s your lookout, isn’t it?” Filch says, his voice cracking with glee. ”Should’ve thought of them werewolves before you got in trouble, shouldn’t you!”

Hagrid walks up to them, his large bloodhound Fang trailing behind him. 

”About time ye turned up!” Hagrid says. ”I’ve been waitin’ fer an hour already!”

”I’ll be back at dawn”, Filch says, then turns back to the boys with a malicious leer. ”for what’s left of them…”

Hagrid snorts, and readjusts the quiver of arrows on his shoulder. Harry notices the crossbow in his hand for the first time, and he wonders if there’s any truth to what Draco said about dangerous things like werewolves in the Forest… 

”All right, ye two… come with me…” Hagrid says and starts lumbering back towards the edge of the Forest. ”Now, listen carefully, ’cause it’s dangerous what we’re gonna do tonight an’ I don’ want no one takin’ unnecessary risks, all right?”

He pauses at the very edge of the forest and holds up his lamp, and Harry can see a narrow footpath that disappears into the darkness of the forest. 

”Look there”, Hagrid says. ”See that stuff shinin’ on the ground? Tha’ silvery stuff? Tha’s unicorn blood, which means there’s a unicorn in there tha’s badly hurt. This is the second time in a week. I found one dead last Wednesday. So, what we’re gonna do is try an’ find the poor thing… We might have ter put it out of its misery an’ all…”

”And what if whatever hurt it finds us first?” Draco demands, but there’s a quiver of fear in his voice. 

”There’s nothin’ in tha’ forest that’ll hurt ye as long as ye keep on the path, and you’ve got me or Fang with ye… Now, I reckon we should split up —”

”Then we want Fang!” Draco says quickly, eyeing the dog’s sharp fangs hopefully. 

”All right, Malfoy, ye go with Fang and Harry will go with me —”

”What”, Draco yelps. ”No, I don’t want to be on my own! I want to go with Harry!”

”Oh, fine”, Hagrid mutters. ”Ye two go with Fang then, and if ye see anythin’ just send some green sparks up, right?”

But how they’re supposed to see anything in the pitch darkness of the Forest is beyond Harry. He keeps tripping over roots and rocks, constantly grabbing Draco’s sleeve to keep himself from falling flat on his face. The blonde barely seems to notice however, he keeps clutching Fang’s lead close to his chest and whipping his head around at the slightest rustle of leaves or crackle of twigs in the darkness surrounding them. 

Whenever the moonlight manages to break through the overhead branches of the tightly growing trees, Harry can spot droplets of unicorn blood glinting from the ground, but there is no sign of an actual unicorn — or any other creature for that matter, but Harry has the distinct feeling they are being watched… 

Suddenly, they can hear the faint rustling of something slithering over the ground, like a cloak trailing over dead leaves. Harry’s heart hammers hard in his chest and he holds his breath, straining his ears… but whatever it was, moves away from them and soon the sound fades into the night again… 

They continue deeper and deeper into the forest until the path is almost impossible to make out because the trees get so thick and close together. They can see some unicorn blood splattered on the roots of an oak, as if the poor creature has been thrashing around in pain. 

Finally they reach a small clearing and Harry can see something bright white gleaming on the ground. He holds out his arm to stop Draco and the blonde immediately cowers behind him, whispering in fright, ”What? What is it?”

”I think it’s the unicorn”, Harry whispers back. 

He cautiously creeps closer to the white thing and when he’s twenty or so feet away from it there’s no mistaking that it is the unicorn and, Harry realises with a sickening jolt, it’s already dead… Harry feels a clenching sensation in his chest. He’s never seen anything so beautiful and so sad at the same time. 

Suddenly, he hears the same rustling sound as before, only a lot closer. He tears his eyes away from the dead body of the unicorn and scans the surrounding area quickly. Then he sees it: the bushes just behind the unicorn are quivering… something is moving closer…

Harry takes a stumbling step back as a hooded figure suddenly crawls out from the bushes and descends like a shadow over the unicorn. Hary stares tranfixed as the figure bows its head over the large wound in the animal’s side where silvery blood is still pumping forth and — Harry gasps in horror — the hooded figure begins to drink the blood from the wound…

”AAAAAAAAAAHHHH!” Draco lets out a terrified scream behind him and is quickly joined by Fang who howls, before the both of them scramble away from the clearing. 

The hooded figure snaps its head up and stares right at Harry, who can only stare in horror, rooted to the spot, as the figure slowly stands up, silvery blood from the unicorn dribbling down its’ front as he prowls around the dead animal and starts advancing on Harry… 

A sudden pain sears across Harry’s head and he doubles over, clapping a hand to his forehead as tears well up in his eyes. It feels as though his scar is on fire. He stumbles backwards blindly and trips over a root and sprawls helplessly on the ground. 

The figure reaches him and looms over him in the dark. Harry tries blinking the tears away so he can see the figure’s face, because he is now fairly sure that this is not some dark creature at all, but a human. But it’s too dark, and the hood that is pulled down the man’s face casts such deep shadows into his face, that the only thing Harry can make out is the silvery blood running down his chin. 

Suddenly there’s the sound of hooves behind Harry and before he knows what’s happened, something has jumped over him and charged the hooded man who immediately scrambles back and bolts. 

As the pain steadily eases, Harry manages to get back on his feet and wipes the tears from his face before he tilts his head back and stares up at the centaur that just saved his life; he has white-blond hair and a palomino body, and his eyes are a light blue colour that seems to glow in the darkness. 

”T-Thank you”, Harry gasps sincerely. 

”Are you all right?” the centaur says in a solemn voice that doesn’t really fit with his young face. 

”Yes, I thinks so”, Harry says. 

”You are the Potter boy”, the centaur says after a moment’s awkward silence, his sapphire eyes darting to the scar on Harry’s forehead. ”You had better get back to Hagrid. The forest is not safe at this time, especially for you… Can you ride? It will be quicker that way… May name is Firenze, by the way.” 

The centaur lowers himself on his front legs so that Harry can clamber on top of him, then starts galloping through the forest so quickly that Harry has to hug him tightly so as not to fall off. 

”Harry Potter”, Firenze says suddenly, slowing down his pace to a trot. ”Do you know what unicorn blood is used for?”

”No”, Harry says. ”We’ve only ever used the horn and tail-hair in Potions…”

”That is because it is a monstrous crime to slay a unicorn. Only one who has nothing to lose and everything to gain would commit it. You see the blood of a unicorn will keep you alive even if you are an inch away from death, but at a terrible price… You have slain something so pure and innocent to save yourself that you will from then on have a half life, a cursed life…”

”But who would be that desperate?” Harry says incredulously. ”To be cursed forever, I mean, it’d be better to die, wouldn’t it?”

”It would”, Firenze agrees. ”Unless you only needed to stay alive long enough to drink something else, something that would restore all your strength and power, something that will mean you can never die… Harry Potter, do you know what is hidden at Hogwarts at this very moment —?”

But Harry doesn’t have a chance to reply, because at that moment Hagrid comes lumbering into their path, with Draco pulling on the sleeves of his moleskin coat desperately trying to make him hurry up. 

”Harry!” Draco exclaims in relief and lets go of Hagrid’s sleeves again. 

”This is where I leave you, Harry Potter”, Firenze says solemnly and lowers himself so that Harry can slide off him. 

Draco immediately comes crashing into him, throwing his arms around him in a tight hug and Harry staggers back slightly but quickly return the embrace. 

”Hullo Firenze”, Hagrid greets the centaur. ”Thanks a bunch for helping young ’Arry ’ere…”

Firenze bows politely at Hagrid then turns around and gallops into the darkness of the forest again. 

”’Arry, you all righ’?” Hagrid asks in concern. 

”Yeah I’m fine”, Harry mutters. ”The unicorn’s dead though…”

”Yeah, Draco told me…” Hagrid says in a dark voice. ”If I get my hands on whoever did it… But, let’s yous two outta ’ere firs’ eh?”

Draco nods eagerly and hurries ahead of them on the path. 

”Hagrid”, Harry says. ”Do you know what’s hidden at the school, in that third floor corridor?”

”Wha’s tha’?” Hagrid says, a little too casually, and Harry suspects he’d heard him perfectly the first time. 

”The third floor corridor, you know, guarded by that three-headed dog”, he insists. 

”How d’you know about Fluffy?” Hagrid says in surprise. 

”Fluffy? Fluffy?” Draco says shrilly, wheeling around so quickly he almost trips over. 

”Aye, Fluffy, tha’s ’is name, innit… Gotta ’ave a name don’t ’e…” 

Harry and Draco exchange an incredulous look. 

”So he’s yours then, the dog?” Harry says. ”So you do know what it’s guarding?”

”Never ye mind that!” Hagrid growls, herding them in front of him on the path. ”Ye both forget abou’ Fluffy, ye hear? Forget abou’ Fluffy and wha’ he’s guardin’, tha’ strictly between Professor Dumbledore and Nicholas Flamel, tha’ is…”

”Aha! So there’s someone called Nicholas Flamel involved?” Harry exclaims triumphantly. 

Hagrid looks furious with himself and refuses to speak another word until they get out of the forest, when he says good night to them and quickly disappears into his hut with Fang.