Кассандра Клэр - Draco Veritas

There was something about the hard viciousness in his tone that made the vampire smile at the same time that it made Draco tense up against Harry so that the arm around Harry felt suddenly like tensile steel. "I will tell him," the vampire said, and drew its cloak around itself, and vanished, followed in quick succession by the rest of its followers.

For a moment, neither of the boys moved. Harry stared down the empty street, seeing the shadows, the clear pools of light that spilled from the lamps overhead, the shut and curtained windows. He could hear the clear steady hammer of his pulsebeat inside his own head.

"Well done," Draco said finally, stepping back and releasing Harry. Harry turned to face him; Draco was holding the Gryffindor sword, by the hilt now. There were smears of blood on the blade. They looked black in the moonlight. "Especially that last speech. You sounded as if you meant it."

"I did mean it," Harry said. "Are your hands hurt?"

"Only a little. Shallow cuts bleed. I'll be fine."

"Where's Hermione? Is she with you?"

"She's upstairs in the apartment," Draco said.

"So it was Viktor told you where I was," Harry said.

"Fleur, actually."

They were both speaking in normal voices, as if discussing the weather.

Harry fought the urge to stare at Draco. His face was pale and set and unreadable and shards of lamplight caught in his hair and made it look as if glass had shattered down on him. "I told her not to tell you," Harry said.

"And Viktor told you not to go out after dark," Draco said.

Harry flushed. "I forgot something important in a bar," he muttered.

"What, your brain and your sense of responsibility? Oh, wait. That's two things."

"Glad to see you can count, Malfoy."

"Yes," Draco said. "Although not, apparently, on you."

"Don't," Harry said, unable to stand it for another moment, "don't let's fight, I'm not angry at you."

"That's very gracious of you." Draco's voice was carefully neutral. He lifted his face so that the shadows fell across his eyes and it looked almost as if he were wearing a mask. "I'd hate to think my saving your life had caused you any distress or inconvenience."

"Is that why you came after me," Harry said, "to save my life?"

"Why else would I have come after you?" Draco said, sounding perfectly calm, perfectly reasonable.

"Maybe you missed me," Harry said. "I thought you might have, a little."

"Ah." The shadows deepened around Draco's mouth. Harry tried in vain to reach out and feel what Draco was feeling, thinking; it was like having his face pressed to a glass so darkly tinted that it obscured everything happening on the other side. "Well, I didn't."

Harry blinked at him. "You don't need to be all proud around me — "

"No," Draco said. "I think you've made it quite clear that you have no use for me, or for my pride."

You had no use for me in life, why would you have a use for me after you were dead?

"I'm not dead yet," Harry muttered under his breath, and saw Draco start and look at him oddly, and he gritted his teeth. "I missed you," he said.

"Whatever you might think, I did miss you."

Draco looked down at him, and the lamplight spilled clear and unbroken over his face and hair. His expression as he looked at Harry was tranquil, almost serene.

"So?" Harry licked his dry lips. "Say something. What are you thinking?"

"I'm thinking," Draco said equably, "that right now, it's taking a great deal of effort for me not to hit you in the head with something."

"Oh." Harry blinked. "How much effort, exactly?"

"Too much," Draco said, and in one swift movement he swung his arm up, hard; the hilt of the sword crashed into Harry's temple with the force of a battering ram. Harry dropped like a rock, out cold.

When Draco opened the door to the apartment he found Hermione standing in the middle of the foyer with the loaded crossbow balanced against her shoulder. It was pointed directly at him. "Move and I'll put this bolt right through your heart," she said in a steady voice. "I mean it, Malfoy. Stay where you are."

He froze, one hand on the doorframe. There was blood all over the front of his shirt, and blood on his hands. Not his own blood. It was red. "I only left ten minutes ago," he remarked, his eyes on the weapon in her hands.

"Do your feelings about people usually change this radically over such short periods of time?"

The crossbow was heavy and was beginning to hurt her shoulder, but she didn't move. "Where's Harry?"

"Downstairs," Draco said. "In the foyer — I wanted your help to get him up the stairs." He raised an eyebrow at her. "Or I did. Admittedly this was before I realized you'd decided a sucking chest wound was exactly what was needed to improve my rotten day."

Hermione relaxed her grip slightly. "You hit him," she said. "I was watching from the window with the crossbow — I was ready to shoot any of those vampires if they got near you."

"I had to knock him out. He wouldn't have come with me otherwise." His voice was quite calm, and the incredulous, almost amused look in his eyes made her feel ever so faintly silly. "I don't see how this translates into you pinning me to the wall with a fourteen-inch crossbow bolt."

"Vampires can hypnotize people with their eyes," she said crossly. "Don't you pay attention in class? I thought they might have hypnotized you into hurting Harry — "

"Well, they didn't. Now are you going to come with me or not? Your boyfriend's unconscious and bleeding all over the foyer. If we leave him too long he might go septic, or wake up and run away, or both."

Hermione lowered the crossbow. "I can't believe you were willing to hit him," she said.

"I can't believe you were willing to shoot me," Draco replied.

She flushed. "I wouldn't have done it."

"Even if I really had been hypnotized?" There was a brittle tone to his voice.

She shook her head. "I couldn't."

"Well," he said, taking his hand from the doorframe and preparing to go downstairs, "I guess that's the difference between us, then, isn't it?"

Waking up was like having two very long, very thin needles jammed into his temples, just behind his eyes. Harry moaned, his eyelids fluttering wide and then squeezing shut again in protest as agonizing light sliced into his eyeballs. He tried to cover his eyes with his hands, but something seemed to be preventing him.

"Welcome back to the land of the living," said a familiar voice. Draco.

"Does the light bother you?"

"Yes," Harry said, and winced again. Speaking also hurt. His head seemed to have started a rebellion and was trying to secede from his neck. As for the rest of his body, it didn't seem to be cooperating with him either.

Neither his arms nor his legs were working properly.

"Sucks to be you, then," Draco said — rather unfeelingly, Harry thought, surprised. Very slowly, he pried his eyes open.

He was lying on his back on the bed in Viktor's apartment. Draco sat on the side of the bed, idly playing with the black seal ring on his left hand.

Harry realized why neither his arms nor his legs seemed to be working. It was because his hands were tied to the ornate headboard, while ropes secured his ankles.

"Malfoy!" Harry yelped. Forgetting the pain in his head, he jerked violently against his restraints, with little result. "What the hell are you doing? Did you tie me up?"

"You wound me, Potter," Draco said, with a beatific smile. "As if I would do such a thing."

"Then — "

"I got the house-elves to do it," Draco said, giving the ring on his finger a final spin and turning to look at Harry. "They're wicked good with knots."

"Why?" was all Harry managed.

"I'm tired of chasing you round Europe," Draco said. "Barrelling from country to country, never a change of trousers. You're a flight risk, Potter.