Pawns | A Draco Malfoy Love Story

Dobby's News

A few days had now passed since the note was delivered to Draco. I hadn't been to the Room of Requirement on Friday but at least Draco should now understand why I missed yet another meeting.

It was a very quiet Sunday night and I sat in the common room with Harry, Hermione and Ron. Harry and I shared the couch while Ron and Hermione sat in facing chairs working on Ron's essay.

Hermione had offered to finish writing it for him and in Ron's thankfulness he told her he loved her. She got pink in the face and I think I did too from experiencing second-hand embarrassment. She told him not to let Lavender hear him say that and he looked distraught at the sound of his girlfriend's name.

Suddenly, a loud crack filled the room and Ron spilled ink all over his essay in his fright. He let out an equally loud roar of disappointment upon looking at the damage to his work which was matched by yet a second loud crack.

My head whipped around to the noise, and I saw two little elves standing in the common room, near the fire. Kreacher and Dobby approached Harry and I.

Kreacher announced that he was there to give his regular update on Malfoy's whereabouts, as per Harry's instruction.

Hermione looked aghast and stared at Harry who deliberately avoided her gaze. I guess he hadn't asked her for her opinion on the mater- likely because house elves were such a tough topic, in addition to her disapproval of his obsession with Malfoy.

She freaked out when Dobby said that he hadn't slept in a week due to his constant monitoring of Draco.

Harry tried to shush her and told her that he never said they couldn't sleep. She huffed loudly then bit her lip, making it clear she'd be giving him an earful later.

He ignored her mannerism and asked for information on what Malfoy was up to. Kreacher wasn't much help giving an answer; he mainly began to list the obvious: he goes to class...he sleeps in the dungeons...

Harry cut him off, annoyed, and asked Dobby. But I didn't think Dobby would say anything too different from this. Having read my note, Draco shouldn't have been doing anything odd knowing that he was being followed.

But Dobby didn't say exactly what I expected.

While he said that Draco hasn't been doing anything wrong, he also said that Malfoy consistently makes visits to the seventh floor accompanied by other students.

"The Room of Requirement!" shouted Harry.

My heart felt like it stopped beating all together. Why was he still going there? Was he still expecting me to meet him? Maybe he hadn't understood my note. Maybe I overestimated his ability to decipher my coded message.

"...and those girls that I saw, that's Crabbe and Goyle," Harry said, putting his hands on his head in realization.

He explained to a confused looking Hermione that he saw Malfoy with two girls right before the Quidditch game and that he now knew that they were actually just Crabbe and Goyle using polyjuice potion. Even the small girl we startled the other day, the one who dropped her scales, was one of them.

I couldn't say for sure if this was even a plausible theory. Part of me would have liked to believe that the girls were just Draco's stupid friends in disguise because I'd be lying to say that it didn't make me feel a little insecure when Harry said he'd seen Malfoy skip the game with two other girls.

At the time, I wasn't able to dwell on it because the bigger issue was the fact that Harry had been stalking Malfoy. But somewhere in my subconscious, the idea of him sneaking around with others was troublesome for me. So, Harry's theory of the girls actually being his two ugly goons was a little bit of a relief.

But, a different half of me found this upsetting and strange; Why was he sneaking around with disguised friends? It couldn't really be mischief as he had already claimed, could it? I hadn't really thought about his excuse too deeply when he had given it to me.

I'd have to ask Draco about it when I see him again. I felt sad when I realized I wouldn't actually be able to do that until the elves were done their work with watching him. I wouldn't want to end up in one of Kreacher's reports.

But maybe, if I tried much harder to be sneaky, it might be possible to see him again so long as the elves were away. That way, Harry would never find out.

I took a breath in, waking up from my deep thoughts and focused on Harry's voice again.

"...he showed them his dark mark?" Harry continued, trying to reason why Crabbe and Goyle would be going to such odd lengths to do whatever Draco wanted of them.

Hermione voiced her skepticism about the existence of such a mark and I agreed with her.

Harry waved our words away with his hand, firmly believing in the conclusions he'd come to.

Harry thanked Kreacher and Dobby for their work and they left again with two loud cracks.

Hermione still looked a little mad at him for using the elves, but she didn't say too much at first. Instead she started to use her wand to clean up the ink that had spilled all over Ron's essay. He put his head in his hand and admired her as she worked.

Harry turned his body on the couch to face me and he looked at me with an incredibly happy expression.

"See!" he said smiling. "I knew something was up! He's going to the Room of Requirement!"

"So I heard," I said, expressionless.

He didn't pick up on my annoyance and started talking about how he'd try to get in there to see what he's been doing.

Hermione jumped in to tell him that it probably wouldn't work; He doesn't know what Malfoy's doing in there and so the room wouldn't open for him. Harry seemed to think there was a way to work around this.

Given my obvious position on the matter, I also voiced my agreement with Hermione, trying to get him to give up on Malfoy and instead focus his attentions elsewhere - like on Slughorn.

He seemed bothered by our lack of interest but also pumped by his discovery. He went off to bed a few moments later as to not ruin his good mood.

I sighed. My thoughts started racing and I could sense a headache coming on. Draco must still be going to to the Room to meet me and so the question became a matter of why. My note had specifically warned him not to.

I also really wanted to know if Harry was right about his friends transforming into the girls, and if so, what that was all about.

When I laid in bed, I could hardly sleep. I badly needed it to be morning so that I could find Draco and speak to him for myself.