The Scent Of Malice | drarry

thirty eight | not my problem

Harry left Malfoy to sleep in the next morning and made his way down to breakfast alone.

Ron and Hermione moved up to allow him to sit between them, and the trio ate in comfortable silence with Seamus, Parma, Pavarti, Dean, Ginny and Lavender, while Harry wondered if he should confide in any of them about the night before.

Minutes passed and plates cleared, however, and by the time the Hall was all but emptied, a collective gasp arose from the green side of the room, and Harry's head snapped to follow the source of the surprise.

It was Draco standing in the doorway of the Great Hall; tall, immaculately dressed and visibly scrubbed clean again, all traces of soot soaked out of his hair like nothing had happened. He was whistling nonchalantly as he wandered over to the Slytherin table, and slumped down casually between Theo and Millicent Bullstrode.

"What the fuck is he doing?!" Harry hissed, more to himself than anyone else, but it was apparently loud enough for Ron and Hermione to hear, and they regarded him with interest.

"What's he doing wrong this time?" Hermione asked. "He looks normal."

Harry sighed. "He's good at that."

"Everyone's staring at him," Ron noted. "Is he alright?"

Harry paused. "He's a fucking mess," he said quietly after checking to make sure that the few remaining others around them weren't listening. "I had to save him after he all but drowned in the Lake in the middle of the night last night. Gave him the kiss of life and everything. And I hate that now he's just strolling about like it didn't even happen."

"The bastard's always thought he's some sort of God," Ron muttered. "Thinks he's bloody invincible."

Harry didn't bother to challenge him; it was true, more or less. He'd seen the cracks in Draco's mortality, but somehow the boy still managed to seem pretty much indestructible to everyone else. How did he bloody do it?

He was slightly concerned, however, about the fact that Malfoy hadn't been to hospital the night before. What if permanent damage had been done? It would be all Harry's fault for not taking him to Pomfrey.  He hoped Malfoy would lie to his friends and just pretend he got discharged early, rather than admit the truth - that he'd slept in Harry's arms crying all night.

From a distance at least none of the serpents seemed angry as they swarmed around the blonde, and that was a relief to Harry. He needed the Slytherins on side at a time like this, and he knew they'd turn against him if they knew he'd just taken Malfoy to bed.

Harry watched as the blonde helped himself to fruit and toast, but didn't touch any of the juice or coffee on offer, instead swigging occasionally from an embossed metal water bottle with identical thirst each time. Something about the sight didn't sit right with Harry, and then he suddenly realised why, and it enraged him.

He slammed his hair back, making several of his friends jump, and stormed over to the Slytherin table.

"What's in that bottle?" he demanded, snatching the flask from Malfoy's grasp. He was now the source of entertainment for all the students still in the Hall, dozens of eyes from all tables fixed intently on the scene. It wasn't exactly new, this sort of attention, but it would still normally have made Harry's skin crawl. Now, however, he was too blinded by rage to care about something so trivial as a few stares.

"What's in that fucking bottle, Malfoy?" He repeated, punctuating his question with a loud crash of the object against the table and making the cutlery rattle.

He leant in and Malfoy held his breath, but Harry could tell by now exactly what he'd been drinking. It was coming out of his skin, the smell of the wine he liked to crush his ecstasy into.

The bell for the start of lessons muffled Draco's response for most people, and reluctantly the other students began to leave the Hall with disappointment that they'd miss the rest of the show. Harry, however, heard his words loud and clear.

"Just let me have a little more," Malfoy hissed, reaching for the bottle. He was shaking so hard and looked so fragile and pale. "Just a bit and I'll stop."

"You always say that and you never do!" Harry snapped, feeling awful at the shock on the other boy's face but too angry to stop. "What am I meant to do, Draco? Answer me. What would you do if it was me? Would you let me throw my life away and die young like this?!"

He didn't like the silence that followed.
"Cool, so you would do that," Harry realised. "You'd watch me poison myself. OK."

"I would if you wanted to be poisoned like I want it," Malfoy whispered. his eyes were grey hollows in his face. "If you wanted to escape your head the way I do."

As he spoke Harry could see the telltale red stain on Draco's tongue from the sweets he liked, the ones he used for his oral fixation and grinding when high, and the sight irritated him greatly. Once he'd thought it was pretty, now it was a sign of Malfoy's carelessness and self-destruction, a symbol of everything Harry hated.

"I can't believe how reckless you're being."

"Yes," Malfoy replied with a cruel and distant smile, "I'm a very irresponsible and badly behaved little rich boy. But what's the point in an inheritance if I can't spend it on drugs? That's what I say."

Harry shook his head, lost for words. "I'm going to find Blaise," he said quietly. "I need to talk to him. And I'm not doing this with you again."

And with that, he turned and left Draco sat completely alone in the Hall, his head pressed into his hands.

***

Harry's life felt completely ruined.

Ron and Hermione did their best to coax him out of his low mood, but the truth was that nothing really worked to distract Harry from the emotions surging inside him. It was a cocktail of anger, remorse, loneliness and anguish which could only be cured by Malfoy's presence, but there was nothing he could do to have that again.

March bled into April and the Lake stopped icing over at night, not that Harry knew about that. He'd been firm when he told Blaise he wasn't to be called again in the night for Draco, and the Slytherins had more or less left him alone since that discussion.

"I really mean it, Zabini," he insisted the morning after he last fought with Draco. The words were barbed in his throat. "Don't try and involve me again. I've had enough of him and his awful pain."

"If you're sure, Potter," Blaise had shrugged. "We'll do our best to keep him away from you."

And so they did, though there had been one occasion where Draco himself had come up to the dorms to knock for Harry, weeping at 3 in the morning.

His hands shaking, Harry had cast a Silencing Charm at the door, then turned over and went to sleep. "He's not my problem any more," he insisted to himself. "I don't owe him anything. I did the best that I could to save him from himself. He's not my problem any more."

But it was the hardest thing he'd ever done.

He'd taken to studying with Hermione every free period he had and throwing himself into Quidditch practice too, much to Wood's delight. And all the work was paying off - Gryffindor won match after effortless match (especially with Draco newly kicked off the Slytherin team, the reason for which was the source of a lot of school rumours) and Harry's grades just kept getting better.

But for every 'A' he got on an essay, every successful Quidditch game, Harry felt a pang of resentment, as these were signs that Malfoy wasn't present in his life any more. It just kept getting better without him. And he hated it.

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~ paradisedraco