44

Harry grinned as he peered around the bookcase at his prey. It had taken him the rest of the day and well into the evening to corner the boy, but finally he had found Draco by himself in the back of the library. He was sat at a table, engrossed in an enormous book which he was reading by the light of his wand. Harry whispered the words to wipe the marauder's map clean; it had done its job and now he just had to make sure that Draco didn't run away before Harry had his answers.

"Draco," he called, his voice mostly cheerful but with a hint of warning. The blonde looked up and, on seeing who it was, scowled.

"What do you want, Potter?" he drawled, "I'm rather busy here." Harry frowned, taking a seat at the table opposite his boyfriend. Or, at least, he assumed that Draco was still his boyfriend. Wasn't that the kind of thing that couples were supposed to tell each other? Whether or not they are still a couple?

"Okay, what the fuck is going on?" Harry snapped. He really could be almost brutally Gryffindor-ish sometimes. "One second you're fine, we spent all of fucking Christmas together and you were fucking fine. A whole bloody month of school, and you're still fine. And then, over-fucking-night, you're suddenly Malfoy again, the arrogant git you always pretended to be. So what the fuck happened?"

"What happened? I got some sense knocked into me, that's what happened," Draco spat across the table, standing up and slamming his book shut, "I don't know what ever possessed me to entertain this relationship with you, but clearly I went temporarily insane. You are not, and never will be fit for a Malfoy. And the next time you bring this up, I'll kill you." With that he stormed out of the library, leaving a stunned and confused Harry in the dark behind him, watching as the glow of Draco's wand was carried farther and farther away.

When Ron found Harry in the common room the next morning, he was slumped over the couch by the fire, an almost empty bottle of firewhiskey in his hand and a snoring Dobby by his feet. Harry himself was wide awake, staring into the fire with an uncharacteristically serious expression on his face.

"Uh, Harry?" Ron asked, forgetting for the moment that he wasn't supposed to be talking to his best friend. Harry looked up, his eyes clearly unfocused, and Ron wondered silently how much of that bottle Harry had drunk. Probably most of it, as Dobby only tended to need a few shots to be completely out of it.

"If you want to have a go at me for dating a Slytherin, you may as well save your breath. Because I'm not anymore. I'm sure that makes you very fucking happy," Harry's voice was almost entirely monotone, all of his usual excitement for life drained out of it. Ron's forehead creased in concern, but Harry ignored it, turning back to the fire.

"Shit... that's um... shit," Ron said, ever eloquent. Hermione, coming down the stairs from the girl's dormitories paused, just out of sight, wondering what her two best friends were talking about.

"Pretty much," Harry answered.

"I can get the twins to prank him if you want?" Ron asked, tentatively and Harry smiled, though it was a far cry from his usual ear-to-ear grin.

"Nah, it's alright, mate. I mean what the fuck was I thinking anyway? I mean, sure me and him have all this sexual tension and stuff, but an actual relationship? Sirius was right; relationships are for pussies."

"Isn't he going out with some muggle bird though?"

"Huh. Never thought of that." Harry scratched his head thoughtfully. It was completely different though, he thought, because Ruby was lovely, and Draco was not.

"Come on, let's go get some breakfast. We have potions first thing," Ron suggested, holding out a hand to pull Harry to his feet. Harry paused slightly, but took the offered hand and stood, allowing the empty bottle to fall out of his hand to the floor.

"What should we do about Dobby?" Ron asked.

"Oh, he'll be fine," Harry said, "Just needs to sleep it off and he'll get back to Grimmauld Place probably." Ron nodded and they left the common room together, joking and laughing as though the break in their friendship had never happened. Hermione, still stood on the stairs, had tears in her eyes.

"Boys," she muttered angrily, dashing them away with the back of her hand.

The next few weeks passed in much the same way. Harry would spend his days attending classes and chatting with Hermione, Ron and Neville, occasionally taking time to see his other friends. He would then spend his evenings getting riotously drunk in the common room, the owlery, the astronomy tower, or even, one memorable time, in the library. His friends were all worried about him, but none knew what to say; nothing could be said to make him feel better, especially as all any of them actually knew about the situation was that Draco had split up with Harry.

And the one boy who could possibly have known the right thing to say was currently busy trying to persuade his best friend to talk to him again. Poor Blaise, who usually knew everything that was going on around him, uncannily observant as he was, had no idea what had happened to cause such a severe change in Draco. It was almost as if somebody had come along and scooped the parts of his brain that made him Draco out of his head, leaving only those parts that made him a Malfoy. Worried though Harry's friends were about him, that was just a tip on the iceberg of the concern that Blaise felt about Draco's current state. And so it was that he found himself taking a seat opposite Hermione Granger when she was working in the library. It was six in the morning, but that didn't seem to deter the Gryffindor girl, as she was surrounded by books and parchment, her bush of hair tied back haphazardly.

"Blaise," she greeted distractedly, "What are you doing here this early?"

"I needed to talk to you," he answered, glancing around at her work, "What is all this?"

"Oh, just working on a project. It's called SPEW." She smiled wryly, as though expecting him to laugh at her.

"The house-elf protection thing?" he asked instead, keeping his face blank. All pure-bloods had a natural reaction to laugh any time they heard anything about the society. Denying a house-elf work was like denying Hermione books, or denying Harry alcohol. It was kind on some level, he supposed, but on the whole it was just cruel.

"Yes, did you want to become a member?" Hermione's eyes lit up and she began rifling through her work, "I'm sure I have the tin here somewhere..."

"Maybe later, Hermione," Blaise cut in smoothly, "I needed to talk to you about Draco."

"Oh." A frown creased her forehead and she immediately stopped looking through her papers, choosing instead to look intently across the table at Blaise, her chin resting in her hands. "What about him?"

"He's not himself," Blaise began, hurrying to continue when Hermione showed signs of disagreement, "No, I know what you're thinking: 'he's always been like this, he just had a momentary lapse with Harry.' But that isn't true! The Draco that he was when he was with Harry was the proper Draco, the one I've known all my life. He's always been an arse in public, but he's himself with me. And now he's not, now he's that arrogant pureblood everyone thought he was all the time. He's basically my brother, Hermione, I know when something's wrong with him. And something is most definitely wrong with him now. I can't ignore it any longer. I need your help." He watched the cogs turn in Hermione's mind, knew that she was considering his words from every angle and knew that she would agree to help him. It was just the sort of girl Hermione was; she was curious, kind, and always willing to help others with very few questions asked. It was why he'd come to her, and not to Neville or one of Harry's other friends.

"Alright," she agreed and Blaise mentally breathed a sigh of relief, "What do you need me to do?"

"Right, I thought we'd start by researching spells and potions that can be used to control somebody."

"Well, there's the imperius of course, but surely whoever was casting it on him would have to see him regularly to renew the spell, otherwise there's a chance he could fight against it. We need to figure out exactly how long he's been acting like this, and then go from there, I think. That way we can rule out anything that only works for a short amount of time. Just let me get this lot cleared away and we can make a start." Blaise smirked to himself slightly, pleased with the way the conversation had gone. If anybody could figure out what was wrong with Draco, it was Hermione.