Complications

Harry gathered up his clothes quickly, the room becoming more dark and desolate every moment he was alone but he couldn't keep the smile from his face, they were going to have another night. He donned his cloak and hurried back to dorms, mumbled the password to the fat lady, who barely woke up being used to his wonderings. Harry climbed the stairs to his dorm room, careful not to wake his friends and quickly curled himself up into bed, falling fast asleep dreaming happy dreams.

*~~*

The next morning Draco awoke and began his normal morning routine. It wasn't until half way through his hair preening he noticed that two of the beds in his dorm room were empty. He looked around quickly too see if it was that they had just not gotten back last night. Draco began hurrying through his morning, whilst making sure to not look like he had hurried. Malfoy's were always perfectly presented, always ready early but fashionably late. To think that those two idiots would actually attempt to show him up and get to breakfast early was unthinkable, it was actually very likely, they could barley understand table manners let alone the nuances of proper etiquette.

Draco stalked in to the dinning room like nothing was the matter, even though he was seething on the inside. Behind him followed most of the rest of the Slytherin dorm, taking its lead from him on the unusual situation. He sat down with a flourish of robes and gave a quick glare to his two brutes.

"You were up early this morning? Eager to get to class?" The Slytherins laughed slightly before turning to their breakfast, as it was obvious Draco was going to punish them personally rather than causing a stink for the rest of them. Goyle laughed slightly, not really understanding the joke whereas Crabbe cocked his head to one side like a lost puppy. Draco sighed loudly, rested his elbow on the table so he could place his forehead in his hand with dignity. "Why were you up early this morning?!" Crabbe and Goyle both leant in towards Draco, attempting to tumble together a strong of words into a sentence, neither were succeeding, which wasn't helped when they cracked heads. The rest of the table turned around and laughed. Slytherin pride only went so far when these two clots began to show how truly stupid they are. "Goyle, will you please tell me quickly, before I have to slap the stupid out of you?"

"We were planning." Goyle whispered.

"Yeah, planning." Crabbe reiterated. Draco put his head in his hands again.

"What have you two done this time? If I have to clean up another failed prank to save us house points you are not going to like to consequences."

"Nah, Draco. This time it is really going to work and they will never pin it to us." Goyle looked very proud of himself.

"Yeah, it is like..." Crabbe thought for a moment trying to place the word he was after "fool-something"

"Foolproof?" Draco supplied, almost laughing.

"Yeah, that's it!" Draco's interest was slightly peaked, after all you couldn't tell when something backfired if you didn't know what was meant to happen.

"Ok, idiots what's the plan."

"We found a potion in that spell thingy that Snape gave us. It is going to turn Potty in to a ferret! We put it in his juice glass!" Goyle was sat upright, looking like he was about to be presented with a medal, and Crabbe was so excited be began applauding himself.

"Will you two please stop moving otherwise people will know exactly who to blame when this goes wrong..." Draco started to analyse what the slightly less idiot had said. "You two brewed a potion?" Crabbe nodded enthusiastically. "Oh Merlin. This is not going to go well."

"It wasn't a hard potion, Draco, all you had to do was read across and follow the instructions. It was dead simple!" Goyle was still looking proud of himself although he had toned it down slightly.

"Yeah, I even did the stirring just right!" Crabbe looked around for a pat on the back.

"I'm just surprised to two of you could read." This time they both did the lost puppy look and Draco gave up. "Well let's see how this plays out." Draco clicked his fingers and his food appeared on the table, bribing house elves was such a good way to get ahead, the best part was you got to bribe them with extra duties!

He took a covert look over to Harry's table. He hoped whatever the terrible twosome had concocted wouldn't be too harmful, he had hoped to have a repeat of last night quite soon but he wasn't sure he could enjoy himself so much if Harry were furry, as much as he liked Harry all was fair in house rivalries. There was not much he could do now anyway, the juice was already on the table but Harry was too deep in conversation with the Weasel to have taken a drink yet.

They seemed to have gotten to a natural pause in the conversation, however, and he watched as Harry slowly bought the glass to his lips. Draco watched the Gryffindor table, attempting to not be too obvious about it. He closed his eyes briefly but soon opened them again as a shrill scream rose from the Gryffindor table. Harry was on the floor, unconscious, though defiantly not furry.

Granger was the one who had screamed, she had gone to the floor to try and wake Harry. Draco gave Crabbe and Goyle a nasty look, which were interpreted as 'I thought it was supposed to turn him into something furry' not what it really was, which was 'as soon as I get out of here you are going to regret being born.' A prank was a prank but when you poisoned one of his then you had to suffer the consequences. Draco looked up just in time to see Harry being taken away on a stretcher to the Hospital Wing. Draco's first instinct was to get up and follow, to see how bad the damage was, but any act on his part would look suspect so he ate his breakfast calmly, his house taking it's cue from him, not wanting to appear guilty, and a waited his first period of the day where Slytherins had a study period whilst the Gryffindors laboured their way through Herbology, he should be able to sneak away then.

*~~*

Draco snuck in to the hospital wing quickly. First thing he saw was Harry sitting up in bed, quite happily, his hand draped over his stomach and his head back staring at the ceiling. Draco let out a sigh of relief and skulked over to him.

"Hay, babe." Draco whispered quietly into his ear, from behind. Harry jumped about three foot into the air.

"Shit! Draco don't do that to me! What are you doing here, it is dangerous, people could see!"

"I just wanted to protect my investment, I can't have the idiot twosome distroy my potions prodigy, now can I?" They both laughed, Harry's arm still not moving from his stomach. "I'm sorry, they didn't tell me they were going to do anything till this morning and it was too late to stop them. Are you ok?"

"I'm fine, a bit of a stomach ache, but other than that fine. So it was Crabbe and Goyle, thought so. Did it have the desired effect?"

"Nope, they got it wrong again, it was supposed to turn you into a ferret, not render you unconscious. They should have known better than to attempt a potion. I looed through the recipe they were trying and even I can't work out how they screwed it up!"

"Hey! You sound like you actually wanted them to succeed!" Draco started laughing.

"Well, I can't be seen protecting spotty Gryffindors all the time, now can I? There's house loyalty to consider. Plus I think you would have made cute little ferret!" Harry joined in the laughter. "So you are sure you are ok?"

"I'm fine, Draco, you should go before Pomfrey sees you, she will throw a fit!"

"When are you going to be released, up to a little private examination tonight?" Draco waggled his eyebrows to highlight the pun. Harry gave him a big smile.

"You really mean it?"

"I've got to make sure you are fully recovered, haven't I?" Harry leant up and gave him a quick kiss.

"Nothing would stop me, what time and where?"

"Midnight, astronomy tower. I know a way to keep it warm." Harry gave an even bigger smile and kissed him again, this time it lasted longer and gradually got more passionate. Tongues entangled, hands groped and harsh moans echoed off the walls. Suddenly they stopped as shuffling was heard from the other side of a curtain on Harry's left.

Draco shot Harry a quick smile, mouthed 'Until Tonight' and quickly ran out of the room, before Madam Pomfrey came in looking rather annoyed.

*~~*

A/N well what do we think so far? Going well, not so well. You can tell me what's the worst that will happen? I will stop writing, live a pitiful live of paper pushing before getting a big house full of cats and be the weird old lady that lives down the street. Of course even though I will leave my entire estate to them the cats will eat me as soon as I die. So no pressure to like it or anything!

A/N2 Sorry just to add to the above. This is the only authors note which has survived the kull. I like it because there is still the off chance that this may happen, seeing as I currently work in a very dull office. The only difference might be that my husband would be a crazy cat man by my side.