"Third year was relatively calm. I was only a little worried about Sirius trying to kill me. The dementors were the ones I was really worried about. They affect me more than others. When they are near me I can hear Voldemort killing my parents." Harry choked a little on the last sentence. Draco scooted closer and put a comforting arm around his shoulders. Harry sighed warmly at the contact.
"I worked with Professor Lupin and mastered the protronus charm. I found out the truth about Sirius. He was my godfather and he hadn't even been given a trial when they locked him up. Wormtail was the one who committed the crime. He was one of my parent's best friends. And he was able to just hand them over to Voldemort. I would rather die than give up one of my friends. It was such a lowly coward thing to do. I couldn't believe it. How the man was placed in Gryffindor is beyond me. Wormtail got away that night. There was no way to prove Sirius's innocence. Remus quit before he got fired. It was not a good year. But it did end with the closest thing to family that I had." Harry smiled sadly thinking of Sirius. Now he just feels empty. No family left at all. Draco gave another firm squeeze. His arms still around Harry.
"Fourth year that was a bloody disaster. It was difficult having no one believe me about the Triwizard tournament. The only one I had on my side was Hagrid and Hermione. Ron assumed I was lying. Wouldn't even listen to me. That hurt the most to be honest. I thought for sure that at least my best friends would believe me. Even if the whole world hated me I would have them." Draco clenched one of his fists tightly in anger. He had known that Harry had been telling the truth. One look at his face when his name had been called was all the proof that he needed.
"Eventually he came around. When he got his head out of his arse. The whole year I felt as if something was just brewing, waiting for the moment to strike. It felt like a bad omen. During the third task when I was transported to the graveyard, it was one of the worst things I ever had to go through. Right after Cedric and I landed Voldemort ordered Wormtail to kill Cedric. He said 'Kill the spare'. Like his life meant nothing. That's what gets to me the most. The way he just carelessly discards life. One second he was there and then bam Cedric was lifeless. It haunts me to this day. To think that he died just because he was with me. If I hadn't brought him with me he would still be alive. It's my fault. I should have tried harder. I should have been faster. I should-" He was cut off.
"Harry!" Draco scolded. The tone of his voice caused Harry to jump slightly. "You cannot blame yourself for his death. You did not force him to go with you. You did not raise the wand that killed him. You had no time to protect him. This is no one but Voldemort and Wormtails fault. I refuse to let you blame yourself." Draco finished sternly with a slight glare.
Harry was too shocked to argue. He weakly nodded along. Draco relaxed slightly. "I was forced up against a tombstone. I couldn't move. They created some potion and added my blood to it. He was brought back to life. And good Merlin was he hideous." Draco snorted in amusement at that. He had to agree.
"He summoned all of his death eaters. The only ones not to show up were Snape and Igor. I could hear your dad in the background. Sometimes even your dad's voice haunts my dreams. I can hear him taunting me with the rest of them as I was held against my will on the tombstone." Draco was racked with guilt. He knew it was not his fault that his father acted that way. But it didn't help any. He still felt guilty.
Harry turned slightly and saw the guilt on his face. "Don't even think about it Draco. You are not your dad. Don't be guilty for something he did." He told him sternly. Draco nodded weakly.
"Voldemort and I fought against one another. He sent a killing curse at me, I sent the expeliarmus spell at him. Our spells locked in flight. It created a dome if you will around us. It vibrated. It was difficult to hold on to my wand." Draco gasped. It caused Harry to look over at him.
"Priori incantatem." Draco said a little stunned. Harry smiled slightly at his knowledge. "Yes. It caused all his latest victims to manifest around us. I saw Cedric and my parents. Cedric asked me to take his body back to his dad. My parents told me they were proud of me." Harry choked back tears. Draco held him tighter.
"I released the hold on the spell and launched myself at Cedric and summoned the portkey to me. I was a wreck. My mind couldn't fully understand what was going on. The chaos of everyone around me was so confusing. Next thing I know another death eater was trying to kill me. It was odd knowing that the person you thought was your teacher was actually someone under a polyjuice potion. That took some getting used to. Everything was a blur. It was hard to get over Cedric's death. Hermione called it survivors guilt. She was probably right. Usually is." Harry snorted but it was weak. No humor.
"After the dementor attack and the trial during the summer, I was for once wishing to go nowhere near Hogwarts. The prophet was making me out as some lunatic that needed to be locked up. I couldn't believe that after everything I went through that the ministry was turning their backs on me. I had known all along that one day I would have to fight Voldemort but to have him come back to life literally in front of me was another thing. I felt inadequate. I felt like I couldn't do it. I was so unsure on what to do. Everyone expected me to know what to do. They expected greatness from me. It was so much pressure. I was almost crushing me. Then Umbridge." Harry growled out her name.
Draco nodded. The woman had been a nightmare. "Gods she was such a bitch. I couldn't stand her. She went out of her way to make me out as some liar. Then the detentions. I still have the scars." Draco made a noise of outrage. Harry looked at him curiously. Did he not know? Perhaps none of the slytherins had the pleasure of her detentions. Harry lifted his hand and did a lumos spell to light the area around him. He pointed out to the faint lines on the back of his hand. If you squint just right you can make out the words. I must not tell lies.
Draco was furious. "How dare she do that. That is sickening. To do that to someone. You were telling the truth! She should have been locked up after that. Blood quills are illegal!" Draco said darkly. Harry smiled at the outrage in his voice. It was nice.
"That year I found myself being angry all the time. So angry. It wasn't until the dreams started that I realized that a lot of it was stemming from Voldemort. Due to my curse mark we had a connection. When he was feeling a particularly strong emotion I could pick up on it. Sometimes my dreams would show me what he was doing. I could see him torturing and killing people. It was enough to drive anyone mad. This was just another thing to worry about. My life wasn't complicated enough as it was. Fate just had to throw in sharing the mind of a sadistic evil bastard too." Harry clenched one of his fists in anger. Draco frowned. He couldn't imagine having a link with Voldemort. Being in the same room with him was bad enough but to have a link straight into his head? He shuddered at the thought.
"Snape was supposed to give me lessons on Occlumency but those made everything worse. He used that time to berate me and complain about my dad. The dreams got worse and worse. I was slowly losing it. The only thing keeping me going was the fact that I had to be the one to kill him. I couldn't let everyone down. I didn't want to kill him. But I knew it was expected of me. I did have the DA to keep things interesting for a while. But after we were found out it was too dangerous to keep going. Especially with Dumbledore gone. Snape broke off his lessons when I saw some of his memories. Hypocritical if you ask me. He was assaulting my mind once a week. Getting every one of my bloody worst memories out of me. But once I saw one of his he lost it. It was a bad memory. I saw firsthand how bad my father bullied him. It was not a good sight to see. It went downhill after that. Then came the vision of Sirius being held in the Ministry. I tried to see if it was true. The house elf at Sirius's home told me he was at the Ministry. I saw no reason to think he was lying. I rushed over there with Ron, Hermione, Neville, Ginny and Luna. A rag tag group if you ask me. We fared well. Until we realized it was a bloody trap. I was so stupid. Hermione had tried to tell me that it was a trap. I should have listened to her. I should have tried something else. Your father tried to get the prophecy out of my hands. I smashed it so that he couldn't do anything with it. When the order came, I thought we were going to be alright. I thought we were going to make it out of there. Until Sirius died." Harry tried to keep it in but talking about him, reliving it all was too much. The tears started coming. He turned towards Draco and clutched his hands in the other boy's robes. Draco wrapped his arms around Harry and let him cry into his chest.
Draco was unsure on how to make him feel better. He did not know what it felt like to lose someone like that. He just rubbed soothing circles into Harry's back and whispering words of comfort to him. He hoped that helped, he was always pants at the whole feelings thing. Pansy always said she would rather cry to a brick wall then to him. With a father like his, was it really a surprise? Harry slowly stopped crying until it was just small hiccups remaining. He closed his eyes and let Draco's hands and words comfort him. He had never been held like this before. Not even hugs from Molly which always made him feel loved felt like this. This was something else. Something better, something stronger.
Harry pulled away when he felt like he could cry no more. A slight flush of embarrassment flooded his cheeks. "Sorry Draco. I didn't mean to cry all over you." Harry rubbed the back of his head and gave a sheepish smile. Draco smiled warmly at him. "Harry, you don't need to apologize for that." He said softly, finding his embarrassment endearing.
"Right well I still meant it either way. Shall I continue?" Harry asked. Draco smiled slightly at his stubbornness and nodded. "Okay after Sirius died it hit me pretty hard. He was the only parent figure I have ever known. He treated me like family. He meant the world to me. We used to plan what we would do after he had been found innocent one day. It was nice. When we spoke of the future we never spoke of Voldemort. He was the only one who had ever done that before. When my future was mentioned around anyone else it always revolved around Voldemort. It was so frustrating. But Sirius only ever saw me as Harry. There were many times he saw me as his best friend's son. He said I was so much like him. I wish sometimes that he had seen more of me than my dad. But I would take that over being seen as The Harry Potter any day." Harry sent Draco a smile. He was unsure of what the smile meant, but he smiled back at him.
"You know you were also someone who never saw me as the boy-who-lived. The name calling and the attacks were no walk in the park. But you were someone that knew who exactly who I was and didn't give a damn. You never once bought into that nonsense. You didn't exactly treat me nice but it was a welcoming change. It was nice to know that I had at least someone who would always keep me on my toes and remind me that not everyone sees me as the golden boy. You didn't dislike me because I was the-boy-who-lived, you disliked me because I was Harry. Not Harry Potter. You had a problem with me. It was different." Draco furrowed his eyebrows. Harry was confusing him.
"Now I find out that you wanted to be my friend all along. Only not because I was the golden boy. You wanted to get to know me for who I am. You have no idea what that knowledge means to me Draco. That is all I have ever wanted. Ron and Hermione are my best friends. They always have been. But even they never bothered with wanting to know everything about me." Draco scowled at that. How could they be his friends and not want to know?
"They have always known exactly who I am. Sometimes it frustrated me that they knew about Voldemort. Over the years, we spent so much time talking about the end and what was to happen. We didn't have a whole lot of time for just normal friendship. They were always there for me. Which is more than I could ever ask. But I just wanted someone to treat me like a normal teenage boy. Just once. Even though I never was one. It was all I wanted. They saw me as Harry most of the time. But they couldn't forget that I was the-boy-who-lived. It was always in the back of their minds. Always." Harry sighed sadly. Draco felt anger towards them. He could see the sadness in Harry and he did not like it.
"Anyways. Sixth year was interesting. I knew something was up with you from the beginning. I may have developed... an obsession if you will." Draco raised in eyebrow in amusement.
Harry coughed a little embarrassed. "Maybe it was our rivalry or just that you were acting odd that year. I don't know. I had to know what you were doing. So I started following you around. Ron and Hermione thought I was mental. It took way too long for me to figure out that you were in the Room of Requirement. Not one of my proudest moments. Hermione is definitely the brains of our group." Draco snorted. He was thoroughly enjoying this. Harry stalked him sixth year? It was entertaining. He felt a little flattered.
"I knew from the way you held yourself and the way you avoided contact with your arm that you had the dark mark. I figured that out pretty easily. No one wanted to believe me. You would think that after all I have been through they would have given me the benefit of the doubt. The longer the year went on the more I saw how sick you looked. Whatever you were up to in there was affecting you. I was worried about you." Draco's heart started beating fast. He was worried? They were enemies and he had been worried?
"I tried getting into the room but had absolutely no luck. The way you handled the room was quite impressive." Harry praised. Draco smiled smugly. "I suspected you were the ones behind the attacks. To me it was obvious. Again no one wanted to believe me. Little bitter at that." Harry said with a scowl. Draco grinned at him. A sudden thought occurred to Harry, he looked up at Draco with scared and pained eyes. Draco's eyes widened in surprise.
"What's wrong Harry?" He asked a little panicked. One minute Harry was grinning then the next it looked like his cat died. "I'm sorry!" Harry choked out blinking back tears. Draco tilted his head in confusion. "What are you on about?" He asked shrewdly.
Harry let out a shudder and closed his eyes tightly. A lone tear escaped his eyes. Draco hesitantly reached out and gently wiped the tear away. Harry's eyes snapped open at his touch. He could see the concern in Draco's grey eyes which only increased his guilt. "I am sorry I hurt you." Harry said reaching out and touching Draco's chest.
Draco tilted his head to the side still confused. It took a few minutes before he finally realized. His eyes widened. "Oh! Harry I am okay. You were only defending yourself. I attacked you first in the bathroom." He told him gently. Harry shook his head firmly. "No. Don't make excuses for me. I didn't mean to hurt you. I had never even performed the spell before. I should have known better. I never ever ever would have done that to you if I had known. I wanted to apologize to you before but I was worried how that would go. Now I find out everything you have been through and I feel like shite. I am so sorry Draco. So sorry." Harry choked back sobs. He didn't want to cry anymore. He didn't want to be weak in front of Draco.
Draco felt relieved to know that Harry had not actually meant to harm him. But it hurt to see how gutted Harry was over this. He pulled him back into his arms and hugged him tightly. At Draco's comforting touch Harry lost it. He couldn't hold the tears back. "Shh Harry. It's okay. I understand. I forgive you." He whispered in Harry's ear.
Harry leaned away in shock, his eyes wide and tears streaming down his face. Draco wiped his tears away and put his forehead against Harry's. He closed his eyes and whispered, "I forgive you Harry. Don't let it get you down. Please." Harry closed his eyes and nodded. Draco leaned away and gave him a small smile.
"I can't forgive myself. But I am grateful that you forgive me." Harry said quietly. Draco could see the pain still in his eyes. He shook his head. "Then my forgiveness will just have to be enough for the both of us." He replied with a smirk. Harry's mouth twitched in response. He didn't want to smile but his lips had a mind of their own. Draco saw this and his smirk grew bigger. Harry shook his head in amusement. Harry cleared his throat signaling he was ready to continue.
"Besides spending an un-godly amount of time following you around I also spent a considerable amount of time with Dumbledore." Surprise flickered across Draco's face.
"He showed me a bunch of memories. They all revolved around Voldemort. Some memories were straight from Dumbledore himself. Some were from other people. Some were about his family. Some about what he did prior to school, during and even after Hogwarts. It was interesting. You know Ron thought I was mental but after seeing his childhood I actually felt bad for him. Voldemort I mean." Draco smiled warmly at him.
"I don't think that makes you mental. It is surprising after everything he put you through that you could show him compassion like that. But that is what makes you... well you. I actually admire that. If you can show someone like that compassion, then you are a far greater man than I thought." Draco's smile turned into a full blown grin. Harry blushed rather hard at his words. Draco chuckled at the blush. He found he rather liked this reaction from Harry far more than he ever liked the spark of anger he would see during their fights.
"I also learned about Horcruxes that year like I mentioned earlier. What I left out before was that the locket we found in the cave was a fake." Draco had to hold back a gasp. His surprise must have shown on his face though. "Yes, I was pissed when I found out. A former deatheater had found out what was going on and he swapped out the real one with a fake. He sacrificed himself that day to get the locket out." Draco was curious. He hadn't heard of a death eater switching sides.
Harry saw the slight confusion on his face. "It was Sirius's brother. Regulus Black. Everyone thought he died trying to back out of being a death eater. But no. So that night on the tower when Dumbledore died I was wracked with guilt." Draco narrowed his eyes sharply at him. "If I had been the one to drink the liquid then perhaps he would have been able to stand up to you and Snape more firmly. I know he wouldn't have had many more days since it was limited. But if I had just done something else maybe he could have had more time." Draco held a hand up stopping him.
"Harry." Draco said with anger in his voice. Harry was surprised at the tone. He looked up with confused eyes at Draco. "I have every reason to be legitimately guilty that night. You told me that you would not let me feel guilty because he was going to die. I flat out refuse to let you blame yourself. No way. No how. His days were numbered. None of what happened was your fault. Please don't do this. Don't take the blame for something you didn't do. By all means take credit when it is due. If you legit did something wrong, then own up to it. But you blaming yourself right now is taking away from the sacrifice he made. If he was here we both know he wouldn't let you take the blame. He would tell you he made the choice to take the liquid. He made the choice to have Severus kill him. He was the one making the choices not you. Never you. Got that?" Draco asked pleading Harry to understand.
Harry closed his eyes. "I get what you are saying. I do. It's just so hard living with the guilt. I have lived with it for so long that I am not sure how to stop it. You are right though. Dumbledore would not be happy to blame myself for something that he chose to do. I get it." Harry said as he opened his eyes and gave Draco a small shaky smile. Draco reached out and gave Harry's hand a gentle squeeze. Harry smiled at the feeling of Draco's hand. It was calming. Soothing even.
"Okay. I can continue. After Dumbledore's funeral, I decided I would embark out and find the rest of the Horcruxes. Ron and Hermione went with me. For them to come with me meant the world to me. I needed them. I could not have done it without them. It was a difficult journey for sure. We had no idea where to even start. We spent some time inside Grimwald place. It was left to me by Sirius. We discovered while we were there about what happened to Regulus. The house elf knew. Regulus had given the locket to him to destroy as a last dying wish. Kreacher had no idea how to do that though. It turned out that my house had been raided by an order member." Draco's face was outraged. How could a member of the order of the phoenix be so backhanded? Rob from Harry?
"When we tracked him down he told us that he sold the locket to a member of the ministry." Draco raised his brows in surprise. "He sold it to Umbridge." Draco choked on air. Harry smirked at his reaction. "Oh yes. The fucking irony in that. So we hatched a plan. We all used polyjuice potion and became members of the ministry. We were able to get out of there. Barely. But it worked." Draco held up a hand.
"Hold it. Let me get this straight. You are telling me that you three went to the one place that was desperately looking for you. You used polyjuice potion to transform yourself and stormed the ministry and stole the locket straight off of Umbridge?" He asked incredulously. Harry smirked. "Well I wouldn't say stormed. But yes." said Harry. Draco shook his head. "That was bloody gutsy. So many things could have gone wrong with that plan. Merlin I am surprised you all made it out of there in one piece." Draco said shaking his head again. He was amazed.
Harry winced. "Well Ron ended up getting splinched. But other than that, yeah we made it out alright." Harry said smiling at the amazement in Draco's eyes. "We quickly discovered that we had absolutely no idea how to destroy the locket. Nothing worked on it. No spell. No potion. Nothing. It was so frustrating. We had no idea where to even to begin to look for any of the others. The house had been compromised so we spent the rest of the time in tents, changing places quite often." Draco grimaced at the idea of spending so much time camping. How primitive. Harry caught that and rolled his eyes in amusement.
"We couldn't put the locket down in case something happened. So we took turns wearing it. The locket was pure evil. The aura it radiated was not good. The longer we wore the locket the worse it became. We were all moody and very likely to snap. One night we were talking about the sword of Gryffindor. The sword only takes in what can make it stronger. That's when we realized that the sword took in the basilisk venom during my second year. The sword could destroy the locket. Hermione and I were so excited to finally have figured out something. Only the problem was Ron." Draco looked at him sharply.
"The locket affected him more than the rest of us. An argument broke out and he left us." Draco furrowed his brows. The golden trio had split? "Hermione was crushed. Those two have spent many years in an off and on again romance. Neither one wanting to admit their feelings. I was crushed myself. He was my best friend. We spent seven years having each other's back for him to just up and leave. We were trying to stop the most evil wizard of all time and I needed his support and he just bloody left." Harry growled at the hurt that remained. Draco gave his hand another squeeze.
Harry took a moment to explore his residual anger over Ron's betrayal. At the time he was just so wrapped in destroying Voldemort that he didn't bother thinking things over. He needed Ron at the time and pushed his feelings to the side. Sure the locket effected his thinking but Hermione didn't have a problem with it like he had. Harry was a Horcrux for fucks sake and he was still fine. Leaving was piss poor cowardly thing to do. It was the middle of war and they were on the edge of the final lap and he chose to get a bee in his bonnet and disappear? He shook his head to clear his thoughts. Now was not the time to think about it. He would examine his feelings and come back at a later date.