Harry laughed at his friend's expressions, and then explained that he figured out what the problem with his and Ginny's relationship. Ron was insistant that he had to have a crush on someone or else how did he figure it out, and Hermione figured out it was Malfoy who helped Harry figure out his sexuality all on her own whilst Ron ranted. At which point, Ron became convinced that Malfoy had poisoned Harry with a love potion.

'He doesn't even know it's me.' Harry regretted it as soon as he said it, but promised to explain everything in a more private place later.

'So', Ron said later that evening, after Hermione made Ron listen to what Harry had to say before accusing him of anything. 'You've been sneaking around with Malfoy, but he thinks your Pansy using polyjuice to be yourself? And he hasn't figured out you aren't her?'

'Not yet', Hermione pointed out, 'But he will, Harry, you have to know he will. You can't keep—'

'I know, I know. I just don't know how to tell him.' Harry sighed and leant back against the couch, where Hermione sat in between Ron and himself incase Ron was unable to control his temper. He had yet to put together that Harry might have been with Malfoy prior to breaking up with his sister, so Harry was safe for the moment. Judging by the glares he got from Hermione she had put the two together and he'd be hearing about it later. 'I mean look at what happened when Ron laughed at his name—this is so much worse.'

Niether of them seemed to have an answer for that, so Hermione peppered him with questions about the next time they'd see each other. When? Tonight. What time? Around ten. What where they going to do? Probably not a lot of talking, though he left that unsaid and gave her a look that he excepted was enough to communicate the idea.

For the first time in his life, Harry made an effort to look good, and he was completely lost. As he went through his clothes he realised he was one of the riches kids at Hogwarts, but he still dressed like the poorest. He never wanted to make Ron feel inferior, so he never bothered to buy himself new clothes, continued to wear what his family gave him, and never learned any spells to help them fit him any better. The only clothes he owned which fit him were his school clothes—which were what he always wore to meet Malfoy—and the sweater Mrs Weasley made him for Christmas. It was green and sans a letter, but everyone knew where he got it. Should he risk it? If Malfoy noticed then it would open them up to the conversation he needed to have with him.

His hair was another problem. A rather big one. Harry never could get it to do what he wanted, except the one time he unconsciously made it grow back. If he could make it grow back, why could he never get it to lay down. He brushed it until all the knots were out and it did look tamer, though still stuck up in odd places. He refused to use gel which he thought was gross and smelled funny, and he was glad that Draco gave up on it after second year. Though Draco's hair was tidy and in the right place at all times, he no longer turned it into a helmet. Harry figured he must have found a magic solution and wondered what it was.

He beat Draco to the room and waited for him on the bed, after he decided he tortured his hair enough and he would risk wearing the jumper.

Draco always made an effort to look his best, so even though Harry studied him to see if there was a difference in him he couldn't pick anything out. He wore a mixture of dark gray and black which made him look paler than he was, yet made his eyes seem more present. Grey eyes could seem colourless at times, but grey clothes, at least on Draco, brought them out. Harry wondered if wearing green did the same with his eyes.

Since Harry had something he had to say, he had no desire to talk and kept quiet as Draco joined him. Draco smiled at the green sweater, but choose not to say anything and soon they were kissing like the few times before. This could be their last night together, before Draco either hated him forever or they stayed away from each other because them being together is too dangerous. It was the one thing he thought Hermione would harp on the most, but she never brought it up. It was dangerous; he knew it was dangerous, but she focused on his deceit; on how Draco would feel.

It didn't need to be said, he was aware of the dangerous situations he always got himself into. Maybe, that was why his friends left it out of their conversations. He can't escape danger and on the scale of things messing around with Draco isn't as risking for him as it is for Draco. Chills ran to his toes as Draco kissed his neck. If this was their last night, then Harry wanted to remember every moment of it. Draco's warm breath on his face and neck, his slim fingers grabbing, pulling at the fabric of Harry's Christmas jumper, the taste of mint—not peppermint, but mint—tingling in Harry's mouth in the places where Draco's tongue meet his, and the smell of cinnamon, cloves, leather, and grass that surround Draco at all times.

He was glad he wore his jumper, because he could wear it later and remember this; he'd never be able to concentrate in class if he wore his uniform, as it would be a constant reminder. Draco climbed on top of him, straddling him, and tried to pull the green jumper off. Harry allowed it, then retaliated by pulling at Draco's shirt. He almost finished unbuttoning it when Draco pulled his hand away. Not that easy to detour, Harry resumed his struggle with the last button.

'Don't', Draco said in between kissing Harry's jaw line then mouth.

He continued despite the command.'Why? I want to see you.' It came out a mix between a whine and low moan.

'Because I—just because.' He pulled Harry's hands away and this time kept a hold of them.

'What?' Harry didn't respond to the next few times Draco tried to kiss him. 'What's wrong?'

'Nothing—' Draco hissed, but it sounded more like a hiss of pain instead of his usual angry one, when Harry noticed he had grabbed Draco's left arm.

'Is it because you're marked?' Harry'd forgotten. That was the whole point of him following Draco around in the first place was that he was sure he had been marked over the summer. As soon as he forgot about it, his chance to find out opened up. Except then, he didn't want to know. 'Draco, I know you have the mark.'

Draco starred at him with wide eyes whilst he faltered for something to say. When Harry let go of his arm and pulled at his shirt again, Draco pulled the shirt tight around himself.

'Fine', Harry said in frustration. 'How about if I promise to let you keep your arms covered?'

He shook his head with a confused look on his face.

'Come on, please?' Harry tried to look cute, though he had no idea how to do that and it made Draco snort, but he shook his head no again. 'Why not?'

'I don't want you to see me.'

'I gathered that, why?'

'I'm too skinny; no matter what I do I can't—I play Quidditch all the time and eat as healthy as possible—Crabbe and Goyle says it's because I refuse to eat meat, but that's stupid because even when I did try eating meat I just got sick, and when I just took protein potions nothing changed either—'

'Draco! I don't care.' Harry quickly added, 'I will find you attractive no matter what. I wasn't expecting you to be muscular', because Draco looked upset at his outburst. 'I'm already attracted to you. You don't have to be anything, but what you already are, okay?'

Draco seemed hesitant, but he didn't stop Harry from taking his shirt off. Still Harry took it slow afraid that if he moved too fast Draco would protest again. The mark was there, but Harry kept his eyes on Draco face and his hands roam his stomach and chest. He knew it was there, but it still hurt to see it. Kissing Draco again didn't make the emptiness disappear, but made it sharper. It happened too soon; he wanted to savour the evening before they talked about darker things and he spoiled it by pushing too fast. He pushed his negative feelings aside and concentrated on Draco's mouth. After his stomach began to feel normal again, Harry worked on getting the rest of their clothes off.

He thought there might be some hesitation on Draco's part—after all he wasn't the one who read a gay sex manual all week—but he didn't question Harry when he started casting protection and lubrication spells on them both nor protest when used the stretching spell on Draco instead of himself. He did gasp and Harry was sure to have marks left from his finger nails, but Harry hoped that was from the shock of it happening and not because Harry fucked up the spell and hurt him. He figured he had to be doing something right after made it through the initial awkward stages of getting comfortable with each other, because soon Draco's whining transformed in to slight moaning which became Harry's name. Not Potter, but Harry.

At first, he ignored it—rather he savour it, loved it, floated in it, but soon the realisation that he wasn't supposed to know who he was crashed him back into reality and he decided he'd pretend Pansy hadn't heard it—but after the third time Harry kissed him to shut him up worried about the moment Draco realised what he was saying.

It killed the momentum they had going and Harry tried to get it back before Draco noticed, but it was useless. Draco sense something was wrong and studied Harry's face in concern, then he sighed and rolled his eyes.

'Stop it. I know it's you, Harry. Where would Pansy have gotten your glasses?' He put his hands on either side of Harry's face forced him to focus on his face. 'Can we please quit thinking about other shite and focus on this for once?' Harry agreed without saying anything and he didn't think about how Draco already knew it was him, how long he had known, or what that might mean, but on the present moment no matter what the consequences. It was too late to worry about them anyway.

Hermione said, 'I knew he'd figure it out', as soon as he told them. It turned out to be a few things, though he's acting skills wheren't among them. His glasses were what first tipped Draco off, then he noticed the Gryffindor school uniform, which were both problematic because Pansy had no way of getting them even if she had known she'd need them. Pansy knew how to tie a tie without his help, and even if she attempted to go that far in character, she would refuse to have a sloppy tie on principal.

'Well?' Hermione asked.

Harry gave her a confused looked. 'Well what?'

'Has he renounced the Dark Lord', Ron asked, 'Have you decided to die for his cause, have you both woken up and realised that it is insane for you two to be doing what-ever-it-is you are doing, or should we start planning both of your funerals?' Maybe he had left them alone together a bit too much.

Harry laughed, but stopped at the glares his friends gave him. 'It will be alright.' Neither of them agreed with this and it was rare for them to agree on anything. He looked over to see if Draco looked the way Harry felt, and hoped to catch his eye but Draco never looked his way. Soon every spot he looked at on Draco reminded him of the night before, even his hands and elbows made Harry want to blush and he decided that maybe it was a good idea not to look at him after all. If only he could make himself stop.

'He's doing it again', Blaise said to Draco who was busy staring at his breakfast, but not eating any of it.

'Who?'

'Potter, he keeps staring at you.'

Draco shrugged, but gave no indication that he cared one way or another. It used to be the other way around. Draco constantly staring at, following around, or talking about Potter at all times. Not that Blaise missed those days, but something had to be going on if Draco was not interested in the fact that The-Boy-The-Dark-Lord-Was-Most-Interested-In had a sudden interest in him. If it Potter's attention was on Blaise he'd do his upmost to lure Potter into a dark corner and figure out the purpose, and Blaise didn't have six years of obsessing over The-Boy-Who-Lived behind him.

'Crabbe and Golye wanted to have a chess competition in the common room tonight, you in?'

'Thanks', Draco said,'But I've got studying to do. Not tonight.'

Blaise'd have to see what it was Draco was studying.

It was the situation with Ginny all over again, except this was worse because he wanted it to work and he was afraid it wouldn't. They had sex first, because he thought it might relax Draco, force him to see what he'd be missing without Harry, and Harry didn't want to lose the the opportunity, since he was sure he would once he brought this conversation up.

'Do you still plan on fulfilling your mission for Voldemort?'

Draco tensed and pulled away from him. 'I don't want to talk about this with you.' He got off the bed and began to dress, picking his clothes off the floor and charming the wrinkles out before he put them on.

'I'm not giving you another option.' Harry made no move to get out of the bed. 'Stop, get back in bed—I wanted this to be a conversation; not a fight.'

'How could this be anything other than a fight? I'm not going to say what you want me to. It's not that simple!'

Harry lost all patience. If he wanted to fight, then Harry would fight. 'He wants me dead! You do realise that right? He got up, but didn't bother to dress. 'You can't have both; I can't be with you knowing that you are part of group who are planning my murder! Do you not care that they'd kill you without a thought, if they found about this; they'd assume you were a spy, which I'm not allowing you to do either—not that thought ever crossed your mind—'

'How would you know?' Draco shoved Harry against bed. 'You know nothing about me! You think I've never thought about going to Dumbledore? I knew your side would never listen to me; it would have been suicide. You think I wanted to spend my sixth year figuring out the impossible, instead of studying for my future like everyone else was this year?' He took a couple steps away from Harry and began to button his shirt. 'I didn't permanently disfigure my arm because I wanted to. I did this, I'm doing this, because my father failed, and he was going to kill my mother as punishment for it. I offered my services instead to spare her life.'

Draco started to cry, and this time Harry did what he should have done the last time, and Harry pulled him into his arms and let Draco cry it out, while he whispered it was going to be okay. Dumbledore would listen to him, and even if they wouldn't have before Harry would make them. Harry had the money, the house, and the power to keep Draco save, and yes of course his mother too.

Once Draco calmed down he continued, 'I never thought he'd give me a task that was impossible. My father's tasks never seemed impossible. Get the prophecy. How hard is that? Figure out what number it was—through connections, or make yourself invisible, Merlin even I can do that—pick the bloody thing up and take it to The Dark Lord. It is about him, so he will be able to hear it once he touches it. There was no reason to lure you to the ministry, except he couldn't figure out which prophecy it was so he needed you to find it for him. Stupid. I thought anything he'd give I'd have figured out within a week, but he picked something no one had ever been able to do.'

'Draco.'

'Except, I did it. I figured it out weeks ago. I just haven't told him yet.' Draco kept talking and Harry wanted to ask questions, but he stayed quiet accepting everything Draco offered him. 'I was almost ready. Right after you hexed me nearly killing me without getting in trouble for it—' Harry got detention for the rest of the year with Snape, but he always had detention with Snape. A part of him knew that anyone else would have been expelled and spend some time in Azkaban, but he couldn't claim about it. Draco continued,'I didn't care what happened to you or anyone else at that point, but I couldn't move for days and by the time I was up again—probably also, because of all the potions I was taking—the anger was gone and I was in the same place I was when you found me crying on the bathroom floor.

'I didn't want to do it. People were going to get hurt and I felt guilty every time I saw someone that I didn't mean to hurt. He gave me a loophole. He said or. Kill Dumbledore and then in a joking way obviously ment to tease me, or find a way to get us into Hogwarts so that we can do it for you.

'Not I, but we. He is afraid of Dumbledore and he sent me to do it, but obviously I can't. He'd be dead now, except I can't seem to escape my bad luck, then again I'm lucky no one else died instead. I did find a way into Hogwarts. I found a room that no one can get you. You found it, actually. All year I tried to get into that room thinking, I have something to hide, or I need a room to hide something, or I need a secret place, but it never let me into your secret meetings.

'Once, when you weren't there it did let me into the room and that's where I found the way in—'

Harry couldn't keep silent any longer. 'The Room of Hidden Things, of course.' He pushed Draco away from him enough so that he could look at his face. 'You really are brillant. I've been following you all year, I know how the room works, and I've even been in The Room of Hidden Things your first day in the hospital, yet I never put it together that you were hiding something and therefore using that room.'

'What were you hiding?'

'The book where I found that spell, which nearly killed you.'

Draco kissed him.