Кассандра Клэр - Draco Veritas

isn't this my area?"

Harry laughed. "Right," he said. "Sometimes I forget you haven't known me that long."

"I've known you six years."

"You know what I mean, Malfoy." Harry paused, his eyes raking Draco's clothes — he had not yet changed out of his fancy dress. "You can't wear that. We're going to have to take Muggle transport. Put on some jeans or something."

Draco looked at Harry irritably. He hadn't noticed what Harry was wearing before, but now he did: his Quidditch cords, a heavy dark wool sweater and a black jacket, and lace-up boots. He did indeed look dressed for reconnaissance. Draco found it inexplicably annoying. "I'll wear whatever I bloody well please, Potter. If I choose to wear a fruit-covered hat, I don't see where it's your business."

Harry looked at him hard. "Tell me I've gone mad," he said, "But I'm sensing that you're sort of ambivalent about all this."

Draco shrugged. It hurt. "Well, I am and I'm not."

"Very funny." Harry widened his eyes. "Don't you trust me?"

Draco sighed. "Lately I've been having this dream," he said. "Where you come to my room and tell me that you just killed someone, and you need me to help you hide the body. So I do it. But I wake up very annoyed."

"What's your point?"

"My point is not just that you keep asking me to do things without explaining exactly why I have to do them, but that the last time I took a risk and broke the rules, someone tried to kill me."

"Oh, I know," said Harry quickly, "and I completely understand."

"That's great, because I'd hate for my little untimely horrible death concern to be ambiguous."

"I won't let anything happen to you!" said Harry, looking exasperated.

"That's touching," said Draco, "in a dumb, blustery, overconfident Gryffindor sort of way."

Harry blew out an aggravated breath, which made the fringe of hair falling over his eyes fly up. "Malfoy…"

"All right," said Draco. "I'll go, and I'll even shut up about it, too. On one condition."

"And what's that?"

"Tomorrow, when we get back, you tell Hermione exactly where we went. I won't tell lies to her, not even on your behalf."

Harry's head went up quickly, his eyes searching Draco's face. For someone who so often these days looked distracted or distant, Harry's eyes could cut like knives when he wanted them to. Draco fought not to look away, and didn't. "Fine," Harry said quietly, after a short silence. "I'll tell her tomorrow."

"Okay." Draco went over to his wardrobe, and selected a long charcoal-colored overcoat of silk-lined dragonsuede. He threw it on over his clothes and turned back to Harry, who was watching him with barely controlled impatience. "Ready," he said.

Harry held out his left hand, the box containing the Portkey in it. It shone bright silver in the dim light that came through the window, and Harry's eyes shone, as if they had been minted out of some glowing green alloy.

His mouth was hard and set with determination and for the first time in a long while, Draco recollected why the thought of Harry Potter had once made him afraid.

He went towards Harry, and stood beside him. "Hold on to me," Harry said, and Draco took hold of the sleeve of Harry's jacket, and held fast. He saw Harry tip the Portkey from the box into his open right hand, and then the familiar whipping tug took him, hurling him forward into gray oblivion, Harry at his side.

References:

"May I remind you," said Draco, "that detention is a time-honored form of punishment." — Buffy

“'When life gives you lemons, make lemonade, and then throw it in the face of the person who gave you the lemons until they give you the oranges you originally asked for.'" NewsRadio

“"It isn't my fault if you choose to be all buddy-buddy with an overgrown gingery lummox who'd lose a battle of wits with a stuffed iguana." — Red Dwarf

“"I'm pretty sure that's what evil tastes like." Friends

“Captain Cardboard” — Buffy

“I'd hate for my little untimely horrible death concern to be ambiguous."

Buffy

With one hand on the hexagram and one hand on the girl I balance on this wishing well that all men call the world.

— Leonard Cohen

"What do you mean, there's no train?"

"What I said. There's no train until six in the morning." Harry shrugged, and rubbed his black-mittened hands together. His cheeks were scarlet with the cold, and he looked mildly embarrassed as he avoided Draco's gaze. "I guess we'll have to wait."

"I bloody think not," said Draco, hopping down off the bench where he'd been sitting. He glanced around in restless annoyance. "I should have known that when you said you had a plan, what you meant was that you had a half-arsed plan."

Harry said nothing. His eyes were roaming up and down the outside of the deserted train station. As it had turned out there was no train station whatsoever in Shepton Mallet proper; they'd had to walk to a nearby town which reportedly had one. And it did have a station — but it was closed, and locked as tight as the forbidden third floor corridor at Hogwarts.

Harry had gone to look around while Draco, miserable with boredom and cold, had flopped down on an empty bench and tried to read a Muggle newspaper that he'd found blowing about. Privately, he rather thought that due to Harry's years at Hogwarts, the other boy had probably forgotten more about Muggles than he remembered. "Look, Potter. If we wait until six in the morning, there's no way that we'll be back in time for classes, and I thought that was the whole point of all this."

Harry shrugged and glanced around. He looked small and cold and defenseless, which made it difficult to stay angry with him. "Well, what do you suggest then, Malfoy?"

"We could just use the Portkey to go back," Draco said. "Where does it take us? Lupin's office? Good enough for me. I might even be able to get almost an hour of sleep in."

"No!" Harry exclaimed, and then more quietly, "No. There must be another way."

"There is," said Draco, and Harry looked at him in confusion. Draco raised his left hand and snapped his fingers, and as he did so he saw Harry's expression of confusion clear, to be replaced by what looked like panic.

"No, Malfoy! Not the — " He was cut off by a loud squealing and roaring noise as the huge, hideous, triple-decker purple bus with its splashy gold lettering roared to a stop in front of them. The driver honked the horn, which sounded like a parakeet being strangled. Harry sighed in defeat.

"Not the Knight Bus," he said wearily. "What if they tell someone they saw us?"

"Oh, bloody hell, Potter, quit thinking you're the biggest news story since

… well, since you, but I'm not sure 'Harry Potter Takes The Bus' is going to move a lot of copies of the Daily Prophet."

Harry looked from Draco to the hideous purple bus, and sighed. "I hope you're right."

"I'm right. I'm always right! Now get on the bus, you're giving me a headache."

Draco was so exhausted that he barely took note of the pimply-faced young man who took his money, and was too cold to complain about the fact that he then charged him a ridiculous two galleons for a bottle of water and a chocolate bar. Draco paid, then went directly to the back of the bus, which was deserted, and flung himself down onto an empty four-poster bed. Then he sat up, and looked around him with concern.

"What is it, Malfoy?" Harry asked, taking the bed next to Draco's and lying down in it. "You look worried."

"Malfoys," said Draco tightly, "do not sleep on municipal beds. How many other people do you think have lain on these sheets? It makes my skin crawl just thinking about it."