Title: Mere Damnable and Detestable Curiosity

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

Rating: PG-13

Word Count: 16,000

Pairing: Harry/Draco

Warnings: DH spoilers (ignores epilogue), language, some mild violence

Summary: Back at Hogwarts and studying to sit his NEWTs after the war, Harry Potter has plenty to concentrate on that is not Draco Malfoy. Yet he's trying to decipher him anyway—him and his mysterious jewelry and even more mysterious letters—and it's all a bit much to do for mere curiosity.

Author's Notes: Happy (belated) birthday, dysonrules! This fic uses two of your prompts, a braided silver circlet and a wall of mirrors. The title comes from a quote by Charles Darwin: "Physiological experiment on animals is justifiable for real investigation, but not for mere damnable and detestable curiosity."

Mere Damnable and Detestable Curiosity

Malfoy was wearing a braided silver circlet.

Harry kept an eye on him around the bowls and platters being passed up and down the Gryffindor table for breakfast. Malfoy was sitting back in his seat, toying with the circlet, which hung on his left wrist though it looked large enough to sit on his head. But perhaps that would have been too ostentatious for him.

Harry snorted to himself in the next moment. Too ostentatious for Malfoy? I can't believe I just seriously thought that.

But it was true that Malfoy had been more subdued since the end of the Battle of Hogwarts, never mind since they arrived at Hogwarts for a "regular" school year combined with the tutoring sessions that Hermione insisted were necessary if they were going to sit their NEWTS. (And they were going to sit their NEWTS; Hermione had been driven too near tears for Harry's comfort when Harry had said he didn't really think he wanted to take the exams). This was the first time he'd done something that reminded Harry of the boy he'd known before the war.

Now, though, Malfoy held up his hand and let the circlet flash in the September sunlight through the windows of the Great Hall. Pansy Parkinson, who tended to remain warily in her circle of Slytherin friends thanks to what she'd said about giving Harry to Voldemort, touched his shoulder and made some comment that was probably tender and admiring. Malfoy turned his head, winked at her, and then went back to playing with the circlet. Parkinson flicked a spoonful of porridge at him.

Harry blinked. He didn't think he remembered seeing a gesture like that at the Slytherin table before.

"What are you staring at, Harry?" Hermione's voice was gentle, but stern enough that Harry had the feeling she'd tried to get his attention more than once.

He shook his head a little and turned back to Hermione. "Malfoy has a bracelet on," he said. "Probably some gift from his parents."

Hermione turned her head and scrutinized Malfoy with narrow eyes. Already she was planning on entering the Department of Magical Law Enforcement, Harry knew—her jibe to Scrimgeour the previous year notwithstanding—and she was probably checking the circlet against the newly absorbed knowledge of illegal Dark artifacts in her mind.

"Yes," she murmured at last, in a tone of such deep abstraction that both Harry and Ron, who sat on Hermione's other side, leaned forwards automatically. "I'm sure it's only a gift."

"Well, what can we do if it's not?" Ron leaned back and reached for his fork again, but his eyes were cautious. Harry smiled at him over Hermione's shoulder, though Ron didn't seem to notice. He'd grown over the summer, and in more ways than the obvious, which involved his getting so tall so fast he regularly hit doorframes he'd been able to pass under a month before. He'd actually been gracious to some of the Ministry officials who wanted to interview him, Harry, and Hermione about their experiences on the run from Voldemort, and he'd attended the Death Eater trials with this same look on his face. It was an intent, listening look. Though Harry had tried to absorb every detail of what was happening to the people who might still want his life for defeating the Dark Lord, he thought Ron had learned more than he had.

"Nothing for right now," said Hermione decisively. "We can't let him know that we suspect anything if it really is a plot, and he'll just hide the circlet and pretend nothing is wrong if we press too hard." She scooped up the book that she'd braced on her knee beneath the table. Harry and Ron had argued her out of doing any lecturing during breakfast, but they couldn't prevent her from bringing books. "Besides, it's about time we go and study some of the Reversal Charms again."

Harry groaned on cue, letting his head slump into his hands. He was having trouble mastering Reversal Charms, which exchanged the place of two objects or people within a certain small distance. You had to be able to picture exactly what the objects or people would look like when they reversed positions, and Harry couldn't, no matter how much Hermione scolded him that this should be easy next to the Patronus Charm. He just did things impulsively in the midst of dangerous situations and they worked. That didn't translate to instant mastery of every piece of magic ever.

Even though some people thought it did, he mused sourly. Younger students who hadn't been part of Dumbledore's Army had cornered him on the first day of school and demanded that he teach them the "secrets" of dangerous and important upper-year spells that their professors wouldn't let them learn yet. Harry had tried to explain that he didn't know all those spells himself, some of them weren't safe to learn outside controlled environments, and he didn't know why these students would need to learn the spells before they reached the upper years. By the time he'd finished talking, he'd been faced with many pulled-in mouths and disappointed eyes.

"But you're Harry Potter," a third-year girl from Ravenclaw had told him. "You break the rules all the time, and you're not safe. You could teach us some important things! You just don't want to."

She'd frowned at him, and Harry had checked a sigh and a grin at the same time. This was different from the silence and staring that accompanied him on some of his visits to Diagon Alley, at least, actions that greatly embarrassed him. So he'd taught them the Patronus Charm and some of the more difficult upper-year spells that wouldn't actually harm anyone, and they'd gone away happy.

"You need to know how to do Reversal Charms, Harry," Hermione was saying now. "It'll be on the Charms practical."

"She's been in contact with the Wizarding Examination Authority," Ron whispered loudly over her head to Harry. "I think she has a crush on the ones who mark the hardest."

"It's only that I actually study the exams they've given in the past," Hermione began, her voice mounting dangerously.

Ron gave her a skeptical look, which made Hermione get louder. Harry leaned on the table and smiled as he watched them. They were so obviously content in each other's company, even when bickering, that he felt soothed rather than shut out when they began a row.

He looked down the table at Ginny for a minute, then away. She'd still sensed him looking, though, and glanced up with a brief smile before paying attention to her food once more.

They'd tried, that summer, but it didn't work out. Ginny couldn't really understand the adventures Harry, Ron, and Hermione had been on, any more than Harry could understand exactly what the students in the school under the Death Eaters' dominion had suffered. They'd tried to explain to each other, but Harry couldn't find the right words—he'd never been good at that—and Ginny often ended up chewing her hair and gazing pensively out the window. Harry wasn't sure if she felt shut out and excluded by his friendships, or just caught up in her own memories.

Eventually, he would find someone he fit with like Ron and Hermione fit together. He held on to that as an item of faith. After all, it was much less impossible than defeating Voldemort, and he'd already done that.

When he stood up to leave the Great Hall and proceed to morning Potions, he briefly caught sight of Malfoy again. He was standing with his arms folded, shaking his head whilst Gregory Goyle spoke to him. The shakes of his head grew more and more rapid, and, Harry thought, observing them both with his eyes squinted against the sunlight and the distance, more desperate. Goyle at least threw his hands up and stormed away through the doors of the Great Hall. Parkinson touched Malfoy's shoulder once, then followed Goyle.

Malfoy sneered at their backs, toying restlessly with the silver circlet once more. It caught the sun and flashed spots into Harry's eyes. He blinked.

When he looked back, Malfoy had noticed his gaze. He was, of course, sneering.

Harry rolled his eyes, suddenly feeling impatient. You'd be much more interesting if you knew other expressions, he thought, and turned away.

Of course, there had been another expression when he'd gone to Malfoy Manor to return Malfoy's wand to him. He'd stared at Harry with lost, hopeless eyes, as if he were drowning. He'd looked that way until Harry placed the wand in his hand. If his hair had been wet, Harry would have thought he was drowning.

Then he had stirred and looked down at the hawthorn wand. He made a single pass with it, and golden and green sparks sprang out of the end. A fragile smile came over his face, and Harry thought he might speak.

Instead, he'd just shut the door of Manor in Harry's face.

Harry shrugged impatiently now and slung his satchel's strap over his shoulder as Hermione called for him. Why should it matter to him what Malfoy did or looked like? This wasn't their sixth year over again. There were no more Death Eaters Malfoy could let into the school. Though he could act the snobbish prat all he liked, it didn't concern Harry any longer.

Malfoy sure was receiving a lot of post.

Harry tried not to make it obvious that he was watching Malfoy at lunch, when most of his letters generally arrived—and that was strange, too, since students were more likely to receive owls in the morning. Malfoy, however, only received the odd stray package at breakfast, and very far from every day. At every single lunch, though, even on the weekends, he would sit down at his table and expectantly look up.

And at least two owls, possibly three, would come winging in with envelopes for him. Malfoy would feed each bird, thank it graciously, and send it on its way. Then he would open the letters and read them, smiling quietly to himself, which was how Harry learned that Malfoy had yet another expression.

The birds looked like school owls, but Harry had never been any great shakes at telling owls apart except for Hedwig (who he still missed, and who he wouldn't buy another owl because of). And even if they were, so what? It wasn't impossible that there were girls in school who admired Malfoy, but didn't want to approach him because of the stigma attached to his name or because he was in Slytherin. Perhaps they even thought him some sort of doomed, tragic hero. The Malfoy family had come out of the debacle of serving Voldemort well enough; they'd retained their possessions, and Lucius had spent no more than a month in Azkaban. Part of that, Harry knew, came from his own testimony, but Lucius and Narcissa had seized on his words and spun them further. They'd milked the story of how Draco refused to commit to Harry's identity when Death Eaters brought Harry to the Manor and how Narcissa saved Harry's life in the Forest, making it sound as if they had been secretly on the side of the Boy-Who-Lived from the moment Draco refused to kill Dumbledore.

The letters were long enough that Malfoy lingered over them as he ate his lunch; he could often finish a whole sandwich whilst reading one. And then he would fold them carefully and tuck them in a book, or a satchel. Harry suspected he had a whole collection of them back in the bedroom set aside for those Slytherins who hadn't sat their NEWTS, either, and felt brave enough to return (which in practice was everyone in that year except Tracy Davis and, of course, Vincent Crabbe). Probably slept with them under his pillow.

That didn't make it clear who they were from, though.

Harry scowled and munched ferociously on a collection of kippers that he'd added to his plate at Hermione's urging. They were actually quite good, but that wasn't the sort of thing one told her.

"What's the matter, Harry?" Ron was sitting next to him today, and he had probably noticed Harry's fixed stare at the other table. He did that often now. He'd known long before Harry meant to tell him that he'd broken up with Ginny, and he'd done it simply by noticing that they didn't spend much time together anymore. Now he stirred his fork through the food on his plate and watched Harry expectantly.

Harry blinked and looked at him. "Just wondering about where Malfoy gets all those letters."

Ron snorted and rolled his eyes. "Home, where else? I'm sure Mrs. Malfoy doesn't think her precious little darling can go an hour without being threatened by some big nasty Gryffindor." He turned back to his lunch.

"I just think it's odd that they come every day." Harry looked back at the Slytherin table. Malfoy was reading one now, and a faint blush had come into his cheeks. He toyed with the silver circlet on his wrist again, as he'd acquired a habit of doing, making it rotate until it climbed his arm and lodged around the elbow. Harry concealed his snort.

"What?" Ron demanded, leaning past Harry to snatch a tray of biscuits.

"Just wondered if Malfoy's got a girlfriend," said Harry, and nodded towards Malfoy.

Ron didn't look up, but shuddered. "That isn't the sort of thing I want to wonder about, mate."

"You've got Hermione," Harry said. "And I know you've got ears, because you always put your head under the pillow when Seamus starts saying the two of you—"

"As I said," Ron said, loudly enough to make Hermione glance up from her book, "there are things that are some people's private business, and decent people don't speculate about them."

Hermione smiled at him in surprise. "That's quite a mature sentiment, Ron. I'm proud of you."

Ron flushed, and then blinked at her, as if he didn't quite dare to smile. Harry wished he wasn't sitting between them today. Sometimes they forgot little things like distance and bodies in the way when they were trying to snog.

He looked across at Malfoy again. He seemed to be reverting more and more to his old self as October advanced. He showed off the circlet, volunteered answers in a smarmy voice in every class Harry shared with him, and had said "my father" twice in Harry's hearing in the last week. The war hadn't really changed him, Harry thought, and the Malfoy he thought he'd glimpsed when he handed the hawthorn wand back didn't really exist.

Once again, Malfoy looked up suddenly and caught his eye. Harry frowned at him, and Malfoy sneered back.

Of course.

But, just because he was curious about the letters and knew Malfoy would never tell him the truth if he was hostile, Harry decided that frowning wasn't all he knew how to do. He cocked his head at the letter Malfoy held and raised an eyebrow. When Malfoy's face became blank, Harry tried to show as cheerful a grin as he could.

"Ew," Ron said from beside him, through a thick mouthful of food, "that looks bloody awful. You're practically leering at him, Harry."

It seemed Malfoy thought so, too. He stood, nose pointed so straight into the air that Harry thought he would surely trip over his feet on the way out the door of the Great Hall. He didn't, of course, because life was not fair. He swung his arm all the way, though, and waved the letter about before he tucked it away into a pocket, to make sure as many people noticed it as possible.

"Not worth your time," Ron said positively, and a chunk of food fell out of his mouth and landed on Harry's elbow. He snatched his arm away, whilst Ron made sheepish apologies and Hermione scolded him, sounding happy. She liked nothing better than scolding, Harry thought, casting Scourgify on his sleeve and still staring after Malfoy.

Though he had promised himself he was done chasing Dark wizards after the war, at least until he actually passed his NEWTS and became an Auror, Harry couldn't help feeling there was something wrong and worth investigating about Malfoy's behavior. What kind of normal person hid his girlfriend like a shameful secret, anyway? When he'd been dating Ginny in his sixth year, Harry hadn't care who knew.

It was probably nothing; Harry was far more willing to think that than he had been when Malfoy was secretly casting the Imperius Curse and poisoning Slughorn's mead. But it couldn't hurt to watch out, just in case. Harry's curiosity had saved his life and the lives of others before.

Malfoy was standing alone between the gates of Hogwarts, staring towards the Forbidden Forest.

Harry halted in the entrance of the school, gaping at him and feeling a strong current of irritation, as though someone had run a Tarantellegra through his guts. He'd come out here to be alone, away from the riotous celebrations—it was Halloween, and somehow everyone had decided that meant Harry Potter Day for the first time since he overthrew Voldemort as a baby—and the attempts to corner and kiss him, and the requests to touch him, and the honest-to-God swooning that had happened with that third-year-girl in Ravenclaw who'd been one of his students for the extra spells.

Harry wouldn't be so stupid as to say it was hard being a hero, but there were parts of it that he hadn't anticipated in the way he'd anticipated the battles and the running from enemies and even the sacrificial death.

So now Malfoy was standing here, fingers closed around one of the gates as though it alone supported him from sagging to the ground. Harry hesitated, then walked closer. His footsteps crunched on the leaves that not all the charms in the world could keep from blowing over the walls, but Malfoy never turned. When Harry stood behind him, he could hear the sharp, hoarse breaths that filled the air with bright plumes of white smoke. Malfoy was too caught up in his own torment to pay attention to anything outside it, maybe.

"Are you all right?" Harry found himself asking, and then wondered why. Curiosity, again, probably. He'd tried to learn about Malfoy's mysterious girlfriend in the two weeks since he'd first really noticed the letters Malfoy received at lunch, but had no luck. There were no girls hanging about Malfoy or casting him covert glances that Harry noticed, and even listening to Parvati's and Lavender's gossip for a few hours had yielded no information. This was a question he might at least learn the answer to.

Malfoy whirled around with a slight scream that Harry had to struggle to suppress a smile at; if anyone ever asked him if he'd heard Malfoy scream like a girl, he could honestly answer yes. Then he leaned on the wall and stared at Harry as if Harry had died years ago and Malfoy was meeting his ghost for the first time.

And that was bollocks, really, and Harry didn't know why the comparison had occurred to him, because Malfoy was the one pale enough to be a ghost. Moonlight had leached all the color from his face, except for the faint shadows of his nose and cheekbones, which looked like bruises. His right hand, still clenched on the gate's bars, clutched so hard he actually seemed to be going into rigor mortis. Harry found himself shuffling backwards to put a little distance between them.

The movement seemed to reassure Malfoy. Perhaps everything was all right in his small world as long as he could unnerve Harry Potter. He stood up straighter and once again gave that inevitable sneer. Harry rolled his eyes. Yes, this was the real, living Malfoy, all right.

"You don't understand anything, Potter," Malfoy said. "You couldn't understand the losses I've suffered that might make me want to be alone on a night like this."

Harry bared his teeth. His wand was stowed safely in the pocket of his robe, and he didn't really want to draw it, but there was no way he'd let Malfoy get away with saying that kind of shite. "Think again. Whose parents died tonight, exactly?"

"Not tonight," said Malfoy, and flipped his cloak behind him, leaning more fully on the wall. His right hand finally let go its grasp on the gate. Harry found himself glad of that. Then Malfoy began toying with the silver circlet again, and Harry thought irritably that it was a wonder the bracelet hadn't been tarnished yet, as much time as he spent fingering it. "Seventeen years ago. Really, even your flair for tormented tragedy ought to have worn out the fuel of that one by now."

"Don't say that." Harry took a step closer. Malfoy didn't retreat. He smiled, and crouched lower. Harry thought he could see muscles bunching and flexing in his legs. He almost laughed. Was Malfoy going to attack him now, months after the war, and close to a school full of people who championed Harry?

"I'll say whatever I want." Malfoy's breath was rushed now; Harry couldn't tell if he was scared, excited, or some mixture of both. "Whatever I want. No one can stop me. You'll never have what I have."

"What's that?" Harry pointedly glanced at Malfoy's left forearm, though he knew well enough by now it didn't bear the Dark Mark. Malfoy had never done well enough in Voldemort's eyes to be "honored" with the brand. "Pathetic parents, a tradition of broken pride, and a wand that my best rival stole?"

"Attention," said Malfoy, though a brittleness in his voice told Harry at least some of his words had landed heavy blows. "Haven't you noticed the packages my mother sends me? The letters I get? The gifts I receive?" He held up his arm so the silver circlet flashed again. Harry thought that he must have cast an enchantment on it to attract the light; the moon wasn't nearly bright enough for all the dazzling the damned thing was doing. "You'll never have that."

Harry snorted hugely.

"Personalized attention," Malfoy amended quickly. "Yes, those people in there want to be close to you, but that's just because they think you're a hero. How many of them really know you? How many of them would want to give you gifts just because they like you as a person? That's what I have."

"I've got nine," said Harry, unruffled. Malfoy's words had touched a nerve, but Harry was damned if he'd show that they had. "And it would have been eleven, if your aunt hadn't killed my godfather and your friends hadn't killed Fred." It was easier to speak of those deaths than he'd thought it would be. The vanishing of Voldemort from the world had made a lot of things easier. Harry could mourn if he wished, secure, now, in the knowledge that doing so wouldn't take time away from a more important task.

"So like you to blame me for things that aren't my fault," Malfoy whispered, and turned away. His shoulders slumped, and he suddenly seemed to have lost his taste for the fight, which Harry didn't understand. He blinked, but that didn't change the way Malfoy leaned on the wall as if it were the only thing holding him up. "You and everyone else."

Harry hesitated for long moments. He wanted to back away, or say something deliberately insulting. Those were the ways he could best handle a situation like this. Instead, he bit his tongue and then said stiffly, "I wasn't blaming you, Malfoy."

"No. Just my aunt, who I didn't choose to be related to. Just my friends, who I didn't choose to fight beside." Malfoy's last words were so soft Harry had to move a few steps closer to hear them, and then so bitter he wanted to recoil.

"I just—" When did Malfoy become almost reasonable? Since when did Harry have the urge to soothe him? He shook his head and moved backwards again. Being this close to Malfoy and wanting to sling an arm around his shoulders or speak reassuring words was just weird.

"Who are you getting those letters from?" he asked.

It was the wrong thing to say, and he knew it almost instantly from the way Malfoy swung around to face him, his face flushed and his mouth twisted in a sneer once more. But it got rid of the half-guilt he'd felt for insulting Malfoy at all. Insulting each other was what they did, and Harry didn't want things to change, because he didn't know what would replace them.

"Someone who actually loves me for myself," Malfoy said haughtily. "Someone I can rely on to keep doing so, no matter what anyone else thinks. I notice that you and the smallest Weasley don't seem to have managed that."

Harry rolled his eyes. He had done his best, he thought. He'd offered Malfoy a chance to confess his troubles if he really wanted to, and he'd asked the question he spent a few weeks wondering about. He hadn't even used violence or really lost his temper. He didn't have to remain here and listen to Malfoy insult Ginny. "Keep telling yourself that," he said, and turned to walk back to the school.

"So you are dating her?"

Harry grinned over his shoulder at Malfoy, enjoying the sensation that he had a piece of information his rival wanted, for probably the first time since September. "I'll let you listen and look and find that out for yourself."

"Potter!"

Harry jogged back to the school. The concept of company suddenly seemed much more interesting than it had when he retreated. He could ask his friends to form a wall around him. Or he could just stand in the corner with Ron and Hermione and watch them coo at each other. Eventually, he knew his jealousy over what they had and he didn't would drive him away again, but they were cute for a few minutes at a time.

Malfoy didn't pursue him, which told Harry he couldn't have been that interested in Harry's answer to his question.

He had to admit to a brush of disappointment along the edge of his thoughts.

The owl actually flew into the middle of the Potions classroom this time to deliver Malfoy's gift. Harry couldn't turn around to stare—since he had given up Snape's book, he had to pay strict attention to all his potions simply to ensure he got passable marks in Slughorn's class—but he could feel the hair on the back of his neck stand up. Whoever was courting Malfoy must be serious about him, to risk offending a professor by sending an owl that didn't come during a meal.

Courting? He snorted to himself a moment later. What an active imagination I have. There's no evidence yet that those letters and that circlet aren't gifts from Malfoy's parents. Maybe they just want him to feel loved in this big hostile world.

Unfortunately, remembering the newspaper articles over the last few weeks, the joke fell flatter than he would have liked. The Daily Prophet claimed to have discovered a store of evidence that would link Lucius Malfoy to crimes worse than anything he'd yet been tried for. Of course, being the Prophet, they hadn't confirmed or denied anything yet, but a solid fortnight of screaming headlines, photographs of Lucius presented in the most sinister manner possible, and rehashing of the history of the war would take its toll on anyone's sanity.

His potion fizzed warningly, and Harry fixed his attention strictly on it. He had lost count of how many times he'd stirred it, but after a short hesitation, he decided that six was the last number he could remember, so he stirred it once more and then dropped in the sea eagle feather. The potion fizzed at him again and turned a bright, clear blue. Harry relaxed and finally felt comfortable enough to look sideways at Malfoy.

A ring clung to the largest finger on his right hand. Harry stared. He had to admit, this ring didn't look like anything a parent would buy for a son. The emerald on the ring was cut in the shape of a heart. From the flush on Malfoy's cheeks, he found that somewhat embarrassing, but not enough to keep him from showing the ring to the few admiring Ravenclaws who sat beside him. Like the woven circlet, the ring was silver, and had a tendency to flash more than the light in the dungeons could account for.

Malfoy caught Harry's eye for a moment. He looked away at once, but there was triumph in his face. Harry frowned, intrigued. Does he like someone to notice and ask questions? I wonder, if I'd asked that question about the letters in the right way, if he would have told me who they were from.

"Don't stare, Harry," Hermione said primly beside him. "It's rude." She liked him to focus on his potions, too, so that she could be sure he wasn't cheating with a second miracle Potions book.

"I can't believe Slughorn isn't saying something," Harry muttered, and checked the state of his potion once more before he began to add the powdered obsidian. The potion was supposed to turn black when he did, but it became a muddy purple instead. Harry looked down at the instructions for the brewing and cursed. He should have stirred the potion counterclockwise as he added the obsidian, not after.

"He might actually feel sorry for him," Hermione said. "Keep your eyes and your mind on your work."

So Harry tried, but they kept going back to Malfoy, anyway, when Hermione seemed unlikely to notice. His ring tapped softly against the edge of the cauldron as he stirred, and it seemed to unbalance his hand, but he didn't remove it. Whoever had sent it must mean a lot to him.

It couldn't be so harmful, surely, to try and find out who that person was. Harry didn't really think it was some evil pure-blood witch trying to cause trouble, though that had been the first suspicion to spring to mind. No matter what the Daily Prophet said, he didn't think Malfoy was in a position to cause trouble anymore.

But he'd like to know. Curiosity was permissible.

It was only after he had draped his Invisibility Cloak over himself and slipped out of Gryffindor Tower that Harry realized he really had no idea where to go to find Malfoy—especially without the Marauders' Map, which Hermione had insisted they leave in the Burrow this year so it "couldn't cause trouble."

He paused indecisively and stared up and down the nearest corridors. It wasn't curfew yet, so Malfoy could be in the library, studying, or flying on the pitch, or leaning moodily against the gates of the school again. But he was just as likely to be holding court in the Slytherin common room, and Harry wasn't sure he could slip into that room undetected. Rumors had circulated among the other three Houses that Slughorn had given his students permission to use powerful wards around the entrance to Slytherin in order to lessen attacks that they might suffer from the resentful and the grieving. The rumors said the wards were linked to Slytherin ties and robes, but Harry couldn't be certain of that.

You can't be certain they exist, either. And really, when have you ever hesitated this long over something you know you're not supposed to be doing?

Harry shook his head briskly and set off in the direction of the Slytherin common room. If he waited in the corridor until he saw the wall open, there was at least the chance that he could look through and catch a glimpse of the interior—enough to tell him whether Malfoy was there or not.

He nearly fell down the stairs in surprise when he reached the ground floor and saw Malfoy stepping out of a side corridor near the Great Hall. He froze at once, and hoped that his footsteps, which he'd muffled with a few spells he wasn't an expert in, hadn't echoed.

Malfoy ran a hand through his hair, smoothing it back into place; it looked rather ruffled. Then he glanced around twice as if to make sure no one was watching him, and cast a swift Disillusionment Charm. Harry squinted, and made out one of the school doors opening a moment later. He slipped quietly after.

Outside the school, Harry had to follow a line of blurred footprints in the grass and his own best reckoning. Luckily, a heavy dew had fallen and the Disillusionment Charm didn't prevent anyone's robes from disturbing it. Harry felt a lazy excitement burn through his blood, glowing brighter and brighter, the further he had to track Malfoy. He hadn't had enough of this excitement in a while, and even the war hadn't made him lose his taste for investigations, only his taste for the threat of torture and death.

The footsteps halted near the Quidditch pitch, and then Malfoy became visible again. He was briskly unlocking the door of the Quidditch shed. Harry frowned. Had he come to steal some equipment? It seemed a bit odd for a nefarious plan, but then, so had disguising Crabbe and Goyle as girls and stationing them outside the Room of Requirement.

Malfoy emerged a moment later with a school broom and took off. Harry sat down near the shed to watch him, now and then peeking into the shed to make sure Malfoy hadn't carved a hole in the wall or similar. But everything looked normal and everyday in there.

The same couldn't be said for the way Malfoy was riding the broom.

He seemed perfectly content to make big, looping circles over the pitch, now widening them to encompass the lake, now shrinking them down so he stayed above the grass. Now and then he sat sideways on the broom or went into a brief, daring dive, but he didn't seem interested in tricks most of the time—and actually, Harry remembered, Malfoy hadn't attended the Slytherin Quidditch practices this term at all. He was too busy trying to stay out of sight and gain attention for his letters and gifts at the same time.

Why's he out here, then? I'd think he'd at least have brought a Snitch with him if he wanted to do something entirely innocent.

The longer Harry watched, and the longer Malfoy circled in the moonlight and the chill November dusk without doing something horrid, the better the simplest conclusion seemed to be.

Maybe he just wanted to fly. To be alone. I'd do the same thing if I didn't get the chance to get away from Gryffindor and just think sometimes.

Harry shifted uneasily. He didn't like thinking about similarities between Malfoy and himself. After all, that last fight they'd had concentrated so much on emphasizing the differences, and those differences could stay there and comfortably separate them for all Harry cared.

Something cold struck his foot, and he started, thinking Malfoy had somehow spotted them and cast a Freezing Charm. But he realized what it was a moment later; a snowflake had fallen from the sky and melted on the bare skin where his sock and the Cloak both pulled back.

Harry looked up, thinking Malfoy must mean to come down now. But he began whirling his broom instead. Harry squinted, and finally decided Malfoy was chasing snowflakes as if they were Snitches. He was certainty sticking his palm out to catch them, and maybe his tongue, too.

And then Harry heard him laugh.

He didn't think he'd ever heard that sound before when Malfoy wasn't gloating over someone's imminent death. Malfoy put his hand out further, leaning so far over the side of his broom that Harry's breath caught in fear. But Malfoy straightened again and then came back down to the Quidditch pitch, trotting towards the shed whilst he shook his hair free of snowflakes. His face was flushed and his smile absent-minded.

Of course he doesn't smile or laugh like that when he's in public. Too much depends on the expression he wears, and someone would be sure to accuse him of taking the suffering of other people or his father's arrest too lightly.

Harry scowled hard. He didn't like these insights; he wished there was some way to get rid of them.

But so long as he followed Malfoy and tried to figure out the source of the letters and gifts, it seemed likely they'd keep coming.

Harry faithfully followed Malfoy into the shed and back to the school, but Malfoy only put the broom away and then walked directly to the Slytherin common room, humming, not even bothering to glance at his circlet or his ring. Harry halted well up the Slytherin corridor when he saw the warning glitter of wards and watched in frustration as Malfoy ducked through the wall and vanished.

Well, maybe he'd just have to watch more often, then.

Harry spent a long moment staring at the box in his hands, which he'd wrapped in silver and green paper without allowing himself to think about what that meant. He turned it over twice and listened to the sharp rattle coming from inside it. Then he stowed the box underneath his bed and lay down on the bed itself, casually stretching and closing his eyes as Ron came into the room.

"You aren't still tired, mate?" Ron asked in surprise, as he bent over to retrieve his Transfiguration book. He had a "study session" with Hermione in the library, Harry knew. He often did these days. "You went to bed early last night."

Harry gave him a faint smile. He didn't want to tell Ron that he'd gone to bed early to hide his nervousness, which he thought he'd give away if he stayed much longer in the common room. "Yeah, well, you can never have too much sleep," he said, and rolled his head back on the pillow again. "Especially since I don't have nightmares of Voldemort to wake me up now."

Ron unexpectedly stepped up to the side of the bed and touched his shoulder. Harry looked at him curiously.

"I never really said I'm glad that You-Know-Who is gone," Ron said, and he flushed, though thankfully not as bright a red as he tended to blush when Hermione kissed him. "I mean, I'm just really glad that you don't have nightmares any more, and that you don't go about looking as though you'll kill someone else in a minute if you don't kill him—I'm glad." He shrugged and backed awkwardly away from the bed.

Harry smiled. Ron wasn't eloquent. He was a good friend, and that was better. "Thanks."

Ron nodded and trotted down the stairs. Harry rolled over again, this time to watch the snow pattering softly down outside the window. It was the last night before the start of Christmas holidays, and those who went home would be leaving on the train tomorrow.

He'd spent as much time debating when he should send the gift—if he did—as he had debating whether he should buy it at all. But he'd finally decided that he should send it in the morning, to get as honest a reaction from Malfoy as possible. He'd never received a gift at dinner, and if he did he might put on a false front because he'd get more attention from the other students in the Great Hall.

It was just a game, really. Harry had bought a gift that he thought Malfoy's girlfriend might have sent him. And if Malfoy accepted it as such and then got into a kerfuffle with his girlfriend about it, Harry ought to hear rumors. That would be a useful clue to the identity of the girl, whoever she was; Harry's investigations throughout December had revealed no girl with a fondness for sending jewelry to boys or constantly ink-stained fingers from all the letters she must be writing.

He was just curious, and the gift itself couldn't do any harm.

Harry didn't often distinguish the school owls from each other, but he had made a point of remembering the one he'd assigned to deliver Malfoy's gift, a large tawny with a splash of white across its back. The moment it winged in through a far window and swooped towards the Slytherin table, Harry tensed, and it was only with a struggle that he kept eating the green "Christmas toast" the house-elves had created instead of looking over.

Then the owl made a loud landing in the middle of the Slytherin table, and Harry had an excuse for looking over. The package itself was fairly large and heavy, and he hadn't tied it on well. The owl hooted and flipped its wings out, clearly feeling itself ill-used, then turned so Malfoy could remove the gift.

Malfoy didn't move. His face had gone utterly pale, and the hand he reached out towards the owl had halted halfway. He was still holding his fork with the other, but Harry could make out the wild trembling of the tines from here.

Harry frowned, baffled. Did Malfoy and his girlfriend have a schedule for when they sent each other gifts? That seemed absurd, but it was also the only reason he could think of for why a Christmas present would so unnerve Malfoy. The silver and green paper was a touch she might have used even if she wasn't in Slytherin; Malfoy was.

Or maybe he thinks it has Dark hexes on it, Harry decided. He does still have enemies to worry about, I suppose. The Prophet had finally dropped their stories about Lucius Malfoy as it turned out that most of the "evidence" they'd collected came from a clever hoaxer, but some of the wizarding world would believe any dark rumor above a simple truth. Besides, Lucius was under house arrest now, so the Aurors had discovered something important.

Parkinson, unafraid, had waved her wand briskly over the gift and checked that it was clear of hexes. "It's a lovely box, Draco," she said, voice clear enough that Harry could hear it, since most of the Great Hall seemed to have fallen silent to watch Malfoy's unusual reaction.

Malfoy reached out with extreme reluctance and poked the box with his fork.

"Honestly, if you won't open it, I will," said Parkinson, and reached past Malfoy to make good on her word.

"No, no, it's mine," said Malfoy rapidly, and now his face was turning pink instead of white. Maybe he'd been startled, but he must believe the gift was from his girlfriend now, Harry thought in satisfaction, as he began to tear at the paper. His hands were still shaking, but Harry thought it was from eagerness. After all, who wouldn't relish an unexpected gift?

The box came open easily enough when the paper was ripped; Harry had chosen a delicate one, also of the kind a girl might favor. Malfoy pushed sheets of spelled cloth, designed to hold the object safe from harm, out of the way and reached in.

Harry had chosen a mirror; he couldn't quite make himself go for jewelry after all, though he had lingered by the displays of rings and necklaces in Hogsmeade for quite a while. The mirror's frame was silver, though, coils of the metal woven about one another in the same way as the circlet on Malfoy's wrist. Carved letters running all the way around the edge said, To one who is fair of face.

Malfoy saw the mirror. He hadn't lifted it out of the box yet, but Harry was certain he could recognize it.

His face went dead white again, and he swayed as if he were going to faint. Parkinson lifted the mirror out of the box, and several of the other Slytherin girls leaned forwards and made admiring noises.

"It's very pretty, Draco," Parkinson said. "Are you sure—"

Malfoy lashed out, hitting the mirror's face with an open palm and sending it flying from Parkinson's hands. It landed on the floor and shattered, glinting shards spinning in every direction, and the people who hadn't been paying attention when Malfoy received his gift were doing so now.

Harry stared in consternation as Malfoy got to his feet and sped out of the Great Hall. That had been a reaction, all right, but not the one he expected.

Or wanted.