Yes, I updated. No, don't get used to it.
Leave some love.
-Nicole
Harry lay curled on his bed, one hand fisted in the deep green sheets, the other tangled in his hair, drifting into and out of sleep. His glasses lay on the bedside table, flung carelessly there the night before. The bed Draco had pointed him to in the adjoining room was all green, of course. Harry hadn't even bothered protesting the color this time, rather used to its abundance by now. Draco still took a malicious glee in dressing him every day so the little green room was rather austere with just a bed and nightstand, sadly enough no magical wardrobe with perhaps a little crimson and gold, which wasn't much incentive to spend much time in the room.
He rolled over sleepily, wiping a trail of saliva from where it had collected in the corner of his mouth and rubbed at his eyes, trying to figure out what that sound was. The one that had woken him from a particularly pleasant dream. Damn that sound.
It wasn't a particularly urgent matter – there wasn't much to worry about except for an overzealous vampire – but it was something to do and he'd been much lacking in that respect for the past week. Draco had found something more interesting than tormenting Harry and Harry had yet to find something more interesting than being tormented by Draco. Which, he reflected sleepily, was kind of pathetic. He was almost willing to take up Latin. He snorted, the indignant sound muffled by the duvet. Not likely.
"Attractive, Potter."
He was up in a flash, hand groping blindly at his side for his wire-rimmed glasses. Finally his fingers touched the cool metal and glass and he jammed them onto his face, almost knocking them off his nose again with the rough treatment. "Whosat?" The bed tilted slightly to one side as Blaise sat gingerly down on edge. "Oh, you. What do you want? And why are you here so early?"
"You have a strange definition of early."
"Yeah, well, I don't have much need for the time at the moment. It's all relative to when his highness wants me up and about, anyway."
"All right, up, Princess."
Harry spluttered slightly. "P-princess?"
"If he's his Highness," Blaise took extra care to enunciate the capital, "then you must be his faithful consort." He offered his arm in a sweeping gesture. "Lady Potter?"
Harry rolled his eyes and tumbled out the other side of his bed. "Bugger off so I can get dressed. What green monstrosity do you suppose his Highness picked out for today's humiliation?"
"I don't see what you've got against green. It's a lovely color. Nothing like that hideous maroon you used to wear all the time in school. Besides, I made Draco let me choose."
"You're nuts. It's crimson, anyhow. But the sentiment stands. Is it green?"
"Don't say crimson. It makes you sound pretentious. And yes, it's very green."
"And why exactly are you in my bedroom?"
"Because I came to visit you!"
"Not likely. Right, hand over the clothes. I'm not going to stand around in my pyjamas all day just so you can gawk at me. Eyes. Up." He waited a moment and waved his hand in front of his face. "Up here! Hello? Good God, Blaise, you shared a dorm with the other Slytherin boys, didn't you? I'm sure there's nothing down there you've never seen before." He gave up and grabbed the pile of green fabric from the bottom of his bed where it had been cleverly camouflaged against the sheets. He muttered to himself about stupid, perverted Slytherins as he stripped and changed.
"So what exactly do you want?" He had dressed in what was, as promised, a very green outfit and was currently seated cross-legged in the exact center of his bed. It was strategic. He had plenty of room to roll out of the way in case Blaise should make a move in his direction.
"Company!"
"Of course. How could I ever have missed that? No, seriously. What do you want? What painfully humiliating act do you have in store?"
"Actually, I just wanted to talk to you. About…this." Blaise gestured emphatically around the room from where he sat on the mounded bedcovers. "About Draco."
"I'm pretty sure I've got him figured out already. Crazy psychotic vampire and all. Hates me, drinks my blood every now and again. Ergh. Even saying it gives me the willies."
"You say that, but you're still here. I notice these things. I'm perceptive."
"Yeah, well, I'm a martyr. What was it that you came by to say? Say it and leave so I can get back to… nothing, really."
"Oh, never mind. Come on, Potter. Let's go shopping or something."
Harry grimaced, his nose curling up at the thought of prancing around shopping with Blaise. Maybe, though…
"No, you can't buy anything in those awful colors."
Half an hour later found Harry trailing Blaise like a besotted puppy, as they wandered through the aisles, his arms full with bundles of clothing. None of which were crimson. "Why are we here?"
"Because I was bored."
"Right."
A few minutes later, after Blaise had tossed a few extra pieces on top of the mounds of fabric already threatening to spill out of Harry's hands, they finally meandered over to the counter. The smiling saleswoman – Harry suspected from the breadth of her grin that she was paid on commission – rang them up and Harry once again trotted after Blaise, now lugging shopping bags. Much more manageable shopping bags, he noted with great relief.
"What did you do to piss him off so much, anyway?" Blaise was licking cherry ice cream off his spoon in what Harry supposed was a seductive manner. Supposed with a great deal of skepticism. At least the waiter seemed interested, so Blaise's efforts weren't for naught.
"I didn't. He's just sadistic." Harry peered curiously at his own chocolate confection. Yes, those were definitely green swirls, and they were definitely still swirling. This was getting ridiculous. "I'm never going to get used to magical food."
"If you don't want to eat it, I will, and he's actually rather nice. Well, that's a lie, but he's not sadistic."
Harry plunged his spoon protectively into his ice cream and took a huge bite, green swirls be damned. "He sure seems pretty fucking sadistic to me."
"That," Blaise repied very calmly, reaching out with his spoon and snagging some of Harry's dessert, "is doubtless because you pissed him off. I think that I might know why, actually. I just want to know if you do."
"I'm a bespectacled, green-eyed, Gryffindor git." He shrugged. "Isn't that enough?"
"Not for what he's putting you through. Now, any idea?"
"Nope." Harry batted Blaise's spoon away as he leaned in for another bite. "Care to tell me?"
"It's not a very good theory."
"So?"
"It's more of a time frame, actually."
"Zabini, stop beating around the fucking bush and just tell me. That prick's been tormenting me since the first, well, second time we met. If there's something I can do to make the time I spend until someone up and stakes him a little more pleasant I would appreciate knowing about it. Also, back off the ice cream. It's mine."
"Stakes him? How long have you been a wizard now, anyway? You need to learn something about vampires that doesn't come from muggle movies. And, like I said, it's not a very good theory. It's just that he never really hated you, just sort of despised you, until sometime during our seventh year. Well, mine. You weren't around for it, were you?"
"Nope. I was off gallivanting around, finding Horcruxes."
"Ooh… an adventure. You'll have to tell me about it at some point. I do so love stories."
"I don't think I'm qualified to tell most of that story. Hermione did most of the brain work and I just…gallivanted. Blasted a few trinkets."
"Anyway, I don't know exactly what happened. I just know that it was around the time that Pansy defected and Nott disappeared and Draco just sort of lost it a little and started hating you more than ever. He and Nott, well, they were close and after that, like I said, Draco had a rough time of it. I still don't know what happened to him, actually, but we thought maybe it was something to do with your side. Are you all right? You're looking a little pale. Paler than usual."
"I'm… I'm fine."
"Well, eat your ice cream."
"No thanks. You can have the rest of it, if you'd like."
Blaise dropped Harry back off at the manor several hours later. The Leaky Cauldron had been thrilled to see Harry Potter once again gracing its presence and had kept refilling his glass, no matter how much he begged them to stop. And, as Blaise had reminded him time after time, full glasses are terrible manners in the wizarding world. He suspected that wasn't quite true.
They stumbled inside and the vaulted ceiling and pristine white marble didn't seem quite as imposing this time. Harry slipped slightly and wound up clinging to Blaise for dear life. Blaise was, in Harry's opinion, far too happy about this. He disentangled himself, concentrating very, very hard on staying upright.
"Dance?"
"What?"
"Dance."
"What?"
"Dance!" Harry found himself grabbed and spinning in circles, held by an overenthusiastic Slytherin who was somehow managing to remain elegant despite the copious amount of alcohol floating around his bloodstream. Harry couldn't say the same for himself.
"Lemme go!" He noted, in some dark and mostly sober corner of his mind, that he was most definitely the woman in this partnership. The sin was compounded when Blaise dipped him backwards. And dropped him.
Muted clapping came from above them and he looked straight up from his position supine on the floor to see Draco leaning over the balcony railing. " I believe congratulations are in order, Blaise. First you manage to steal him and now you seem dead set on breaking him."
"Steal?" Harry pushed himself up, managing only to sit. Standing was beyond him at this point.
"Yes, steal, Potter. Didn't I tell you that you weren't to leave?"
"But, Z'bini…"
"Yes, Potter. I understand. You were kidnapped. What tragic fate befell you at the hands of this hooligan I can only begin to guess."
Harry frowned. "Made me carry 'is bags. An' 'e got me drunk... 'cept I'm not drunk. Not."
"Potter, the one true sign that one has imbibed too much is that he refuses to admit it. Zabini, you useless prat, help me get him upstairs. There we go...yes, Potter, stairs. Oh for the love of..." Draco apparated the three of them straight into Harry's bedroom and dropped him on the bed with a look of disgust. "Zabini. You have five minutes to conclude any business you may have left on this earth before I murder you. I'm going to go find a sword." With that, Draco stalked angrily out of the room, muttering under his breath.
Blaise sat down heavily on the foot of Harry's bed. "That went well," he announced cheerfully. Blaise, Harry noticed sadly, was much less drunk than he. That was a shame. Who wanted to die sober? Or even just a little drunk? What was he talking about? Alcohol, probably. Oooh... that was the room spinning.
"Harry, you're talking to yourself."
"I am?"
"You are. You're going to be all right, great. Seeing as I don't really want to be eviz-eviscer-evizy... chopped up by Draco, good-night. Don't let the bed bugs bite. Only the vampy." Blaise skittered out of the room, pausing at the door to blow a kiss at Harry, who blushed wildly for about a minute until Draco returned, surprisingly sword-free.
"He's gone? Good." Draco surveyed Harry with a skeptical eye. "You're absolutely useless. I'll bet you had all of one drink, too. Poncy lightweight."
"Not!"
"Sure." He turned to leave, stopped a moment later by Harry's tentative whisper.
"Malfoy?" He turned to look and saw Harry sprawled sideways on his stomach across the bed, shirt twisted up under his armpit and glasses hanging sideways on this face. "I'm sorry."
"What for?"
Harry looked at him sadly through wide, drunk eyes. "I didn't want to, to hurt him. It was my fault, though. I shouldn't have. I'm sorry. About Nott. But they didn't know where I was. I had to..."
"Good-night, Potter."