Title: Heart in Azkaban

Disclaimer: J. K. Rowling and associates own these characters. I am writing this story for fun and not profit.

Pairing: Harry/Draco (mostly pre-slash)

Rating: PG-13

Warnings: Heavy angst, imprisonment

Wordcount: This part 1080

Summary: Harry can't do much for Draco, who's imprisoned in Azkaban despite all the testimony Harry could offer for him. But what he can do, he will.

Author's Notes: Another of my July Celebration fics, for the following anonymous prompt:

I'd love to see a story with Draco being prisoner of Azkaban after his trial as a Death Eater, and Harry coming to work in Azkaban (since he can't prevent Draco to be incarcerated despite his celebrity and his position as Savior) to prevent Draco to be too depressed because of the Dementors, and be his friend, as he tries to free him legally. Of course, love ensues between Harry, the hero of poor soul, and Draco who's looking for a personal hero. This may not quite qualify as getting all the way to a romance, but I hope it satisfies. Due to issues with my Internet access, it will be posted in four installments, and is therefore the last of my fics for July; I hope to post the other ones I have half-written later.

Heart in Azkaban

Harry took a deep breath as he walked through the tunnels towards the cell that was his daily destination. Even when he was perfectly capable of casting a Patronus that would hold back Dementors, and both they knew it and he knew it, he shivered every time he was on the island.

They can't hurt me. I'm here for someone else.

The words repeated in his head like a chant, and Harry finally found himself standing outside a thick door that was banded with a mixture of iron and silver that supposedly disrupted magic. It was a new addition after the war; the Ministry officials claimed it would prevent anyone from turning into an animal the way Sirius had in his cell.

Of course, they referred to Peter Pettigrew when they said that. But Harry didn't care. He knew the truth.

When he was this close to the door Malfoy lay a prisoner behind, then he felt himself relaxing and straightening his shoulders. He suffered from being close to Dementors, but he could go home at the end of the day and abandon his job as general janitor and guard and comfort-creator. Malfoy was here all the time.

Harry had thought—well, he'd thought he'd be able to stop it. With Narcissa pardoned for saving him and Malfoy being a kid at the time and with barely anyone testifying against him because he hadn't actually hurt students at the school in his seventh year, Harry hadn't taken defending him seriously.

And now Malfoy was paying the price.

The charms on the door examined Harry, raking over him in a process that felt like a barbed net, to make sure he was supposed to be there. Harry gritted his teeth and held still. He was the one who hadn't fought or argued hard enough. He could bear the price.

Finally, with a faint noise like a disappointed snicker, the charms pulled back, and the door swung open. Harry stepped into the cell.

It was bare and cold, as all the others were, except for those prisoners who had wealthy families that could bribe the guards. In Malfoy's case, Harry was the one who brought extra food and blankets. He'd also brought a picture from the Manor, of a soaring dragon, that Narcissa had said was her son's favorite, and today he had a hood of soft grey wool that Malfoy could clip to the cloak Harry had already given him. None of the other guards would object; since a lot of them made extra money from bribes, they didn't try to take away prisoners' gifts, or they could find themselves facing anger from their fellow guards.

Harry hated a lot about Azkaban, but it was also teaching him a lot—about miscarriages of justice, if nothing else.

"Malfoy?"

"I can't stand it."

In a moment, Harry was across the cell and over crouching by Malfoy's side. Most of the time, he would have hesitated, if only because Malfoy was protective of what little privacy and personal space he had. But when he spoke in that soft and whimpering a voice, then Harry lost his fear of what Malfoy would think of him if he tried to intrude.

"It's all right," Harry said, and focused as hard as he could on the moment when he and Ron and Hermione had last had dinner together, laughing about the Horcrux hunt finally being over and done. "Expecto Patronum!"

The stag manifested and pranced up and down by Malfoy's low blanket-bed. Harry waited expectantly. Most of the time, Malfoy started breathing more easily within a few minutes of the Patronus appearing.

But this time, he kept on huddling. Harry tugged his blanket up over his ears, but that didn't appear to help. "Malfoy?" he whispered again.

"I can't stand to hear you call me by that name." Malfoy rolled over and stared up at him with blurring eyes. "You always sound so hateful when you say it!"

Harry flinched. He hadn't known that. "You want me to call you—Draco?" Another thing he hadn't done because he had thought Malfoy would want to hold onto the privacy and formality between them.

Malfoy caught Harry's fingers. His own hand was freezing, colder than the stone beneath them. "Please," he said. "Please. Please. For my sanity."

Harry nodded slowly, and hooked the hood onto the cloak without moving away from Malfoy. "Yes. All right. Draco. Whatever you want."

Draco gave a breath as soft as the cloak's wool and sank into sleep, just like that, as if he'd been awake all night and had finally succumbed to sheer exhaustion. Harry bowed his head and clutched his hand back.

The thought of how terribly Malfoy must be hurt, how horrible it must be for him to have no one but an enemy to depend on, kept Harry there and still for the rest of his allotted time, until he absolutely had to leave to go on his rounds. The Ministry didn't dare turn him down when he requested a job at Azkaban, but Harry knew they were always watching him narrowly. Make too much of a fuss or neglect his duties, and they would remove him in a second "for the good of his health."

Harry did pause to look back once. His Patronus glowed beside Draco's bed, on guard. Harry nodded to it and slipped out the door.