My Beautiful Dragon

Warning: Mentions of torture and extreme angst.

Thanks again to my wonderful beta Naycit Malfoy, you're the best.

Conversations and Observations

That morning in the Great Hall, as the trio tucked into their breakfast, Ron could see Harry staring forlornly at the Slytherin table. He’d been doing that a lot lately, much to the red-haired boy’s chagrin. Just sitting, staring, not eating, and looking… well, just looking lost. Ron could finally see that there was a reason for Harry’s pointed stare.
It was always directed at the Slytherin table near the sixth year students’ section, and always, always, at the empty seat between Parkinson and Zabini… Malfoy’s seat.

But no one could tell if they knew where Malfoy was or not.

‘Does anyone really care where Ferret-face is?’ Ron wondered aloud, not realising Hermione had heard him.

“Ronald! Really, have some compassion; Harry obviously misses Malfoy for some peculiar reason.” She wrinkled her nose in disgust as she continued to observe Harry.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Ron had managed to speak to Hermione before breakfast as they waited for Harry to join them after his shower. Harry would probably be mad as hell if he found out, but Ron needed to talk to someone. Hermione, however, knew more than she wanted to admit, which annoyed Ron. Her words were still ringing in his ears as he replayed their conversation in his head.

“After Harry was found unconscious, he was rushed to the hospital wing here. Madam Pomfrey said he was lucky to be alive. He was in a terrible state, Ron, and he had slipped into a coma.” Here she stopped to take a breath. Ron’s mouth was agape, wondering how she knew all this. He didn’t. No one had thought to mention it to him, Harry’s first real friend, ever. “When he came out of the coma, he wouldn’t speak to me because I was hounding him for information and wanted to know everything. He… he called me an ‘insufferable-know-it-all’ and…” She trailed off.

Ron smirked. Well that would shut her up. He was mad at her, too, for not telling him sooner.

He had no idea what happened to Harry, but it must have been bad enough for the young hero to slip into a coma for a week. He made a mental note to find out that information at some point. The first time Harry had spoken to either of his friends about what had happened, he mentioned Malfoy’s name quicker than necessary. Ron wondered if the git was dead or in Azkaban. Maybe having happy thoughts of torturing Muggles sucked out of him. Ron liked that thought better.

He didn’t know how long he’d been following Harry’s gaze, but he couldn’t look away from the intensity of his friend’s staring across the Hall.

Parkinson turned around then, followed closely by Zabini. They both knew that there were eyes focused in their direction. They glared at the Gryffindors. They knew exactly what Weasley and Potter were staring at. They missed Malfoy too— that much was obvious, but not too much, just in a sense that they were lost without his excellent leadership.

“Whatever the reason is, Ron, we have to accept it for Harry’s sake if nothing else… Ronald, are you even listening to me?”

“Huh? Oh, sorry, ‘Mione. Yeah, I agree.” Hermione shook her head. Obviously, Ron had drifted away from reality whilst she was talking. Sighing angrily, she nudged Ron on the leg, making him jump out of his intense study of Harry. Knowing that she had the redhead’s attention and making sure Harry couldn’t hear her, she spoke in a hushed tone, suggesting that maybe they should go and speak to Dumbledore. Ron nodded and quickly finished his eggs and toast.

They looked at Harry to make sure he hadn’t heard their hushed conversation, just to find him asleep with his arm under his chin, which firmly held his head up. His closed eyes were still trained on Malfoy’s ‘invisible to everyone but Harry’ form. They shared worried glances. It seemed Harry still found it difficult to sleep at night.

~*~*~*~*~*

Harry woke up painfully and slowly, and then he realized that he was not, as he had hoped, in Madam Pomfrey’s care. Even after all her badgering, which drove him crazy, he desperately wished to have her back. Anything was better than this. He tried to get up again. It was futile, as always; the chains tugged at his abused arms as Harry grimaced in pain. The pins and needles, the feeling of numbness, were back, making him ache worse.

“Awake, are we?” a shadow in the dark said, the silky malice of his voice echoing through the heavy air. Harry didn’t deem him fit for an answer. Big mistake.


“Still being an insolent, un-dying brat,” the Death Eater hissed, annoyed. “That’s okay; you’re no fun to play with when you’re dead.” Harry wasn’t sure where this voice was coming from; he tried moving his head from side to side, to no avail. He’d been awake… what? Five minutes? And he’d already made this one mad. He wondered what this shadowed Death Eater would do to him first. He didn’t realize the Death Eater was talking again until it was too late.

“Don’t you listen to your superiors, boy? Crucio!”

Pain stacked on old pain and made everything hazy. Harry wanted nothing but to die, or at least pass out. Of course, as soon as Harry thought that his wish might be granted, the man lowered his wand. Harry, body convulsing longer than the last time that spell had been cast on him, tried to breathe slowly. His throat was raw; he must’ve been screaming. He hadn’t screamed in a while. As he exhaled, a cough escaped painfully; it was bloody.

The figure, except for his face, came out of the shadows. His black robes were billowing around his frame, as if an icy cold wind was stalking through the dungeons. Harry concluded, by the raspy Voldemort-like sounds, that his Death Eater for the day was laughing. The boy’s still trembling body shivered.

“What a sweet scream you’ve got, Mr. Boy Who Lived,” he said, still laughing. He would’ve laughed himself at the irony of it all, but he tried to reason with himself; he was in too much pain. He knew the real reason for which he couldn’t allow himself to laugh was to maintain his sanity, which he feared he was losing more and more as the days went by. He didn’t want the Death Eaters to get to him. He wasn’t insane, he WASN’T! A laugh bubbled up in his bloody throat. He agonizingly clamped it down.

Harry’s train of thought died when the Death Eater stopped laughing abruptly. He looked toward the darkened shadows and caught the Death Eater shaking, in fear this time. Harry then heard the footsteps. Another one? It was unexpected for both of them. The footsteps, dangerously multiplied by the ricocheting effect of the dungeon’s nakedness, sounded like muffled heartbeats. The other Death Eater appeared in the doorway, imposing and intimidating.

“What… was… that... NOISE?”

“What noise?” Harry watched in morbid fascination as his Death Eater became meek.

“That screaming, you imbecile, was unneeded,” he drawled, as if bored. This was all normal; causing pain was as usual as eating and sleeping was for them.

“If you plan on subjecting our Guest of Honor to any further torture …” Here his voice turned velvety soft; an image of blood pouring from a fountain assaulted Harry with shudders. “Then, please do. It is your day, after all… But SILENCE HIM, damn it. His screeching is disturbing the peace and quiet.”

The figure- somehow he still remained mostly in shadows- glided down to Harry’s caged door, unlocked it, got inside, and sunk down near the dull emerald of the tortured boy’s eyes.

“I’m sure you don’t want to hear your screams either, Golden Boy.”

Like Harry heard his screams, anyway…

“You especially don’t want to hear them when I do to you what I plan to do…” Dark wistfulness coloured his voice. “After I’m done, you’ll still be screaming. I’ll give you some mercy and keep the charm on,” he drawled coldly. His smile was vindictive, like everything else about him, Harry noticed reflectively. The Death Eater, face still in the shadow of his hood, bent down further and brought his hand up to Harry’s left cheek, caressing it slowly, almost lovingly. It was so wrong, the gentle touch from such a violent creature, that Harry wanted to throw up and cry.

He wanted the pain of Crucio back.

Harry looked at the finger on his cheek in barely veiled disgust; that’s when he caught a glint of silver on the fingertip, a thimble like object. Confusion marred Harry’s face until that finger pressed harder on his cheek, eliciting a raspy wheeze from Harry and a chuckle from the assailant. The blood ran down Harry’s eerily tingling face. He hardly felt it compared to the pain of his thudding heart as the Death Eater, still chuckling forebodingly, bent over and licked it off. Harry was shaking raggedly now as the hooded new leader of the Death Eaters leaned next to his ear and whispered, hot breath mingling with Harry’s cold sweat and cooling blood.

“Oh, I think we are going to have so much fun, Harry…” The drawl was breathy, and his hand was again placed on Harry’s cheek.

~*~*~*~*~*

Harry was shivering, and Ron and Hermione truly wanted to wake him up.

“What’s wrong with him now?” Seamus asked tonelessly. Hermione looked at Seamus and noticed he had become a little thinner… Maybe it was because he’d lost his mother in the war … She looked at Dean, then, but he was too busy worriedly looking at his best friend to acknowledge her.

“I dunno,” he replied distantly, while still looking at Seamus. “Wake him up, though.”

Hermione, wanting to wake him up as softly as possible, leaned across the table, down by Harry’s ear, and quietly whispered his name while putting a reassuring hand on his left cheek.

At least, she thought, it was reassuring, but at that time, Harry was stuck with a breathy, lust-filled whisper of his name and a painful caress from an unknown Death Eater, face immersed in shadows.

Harry jerked out of his sleep, a frightened screech emanating from his lips around the Great Hall.

Everyone froze. Most people in the Great Hall looked at Harry— or his previously occupied place, as he was now sprawled on the floor and gawking shockingly at the ceiling which reflected the muggy day outside. Hermione looked around, shaken, but glared at all the students anyway. She felt sorry afterward, though, when they turned around; Most of them had concerned, pitying looks on their faces. The only ones she felt justified for glaring at were the Slytherins— most of them— and some of the Ravenclaws. Even— she was dismayed to note— people from her own House.

Ron left the glaring to Hermione; he was pretty rubbish at that trait for the most part. He could see himself turning red from embarrassment or anger before he could successfully glare at anyone. Hermione was better at that than he was, and Harry was even better than her, but Malfoy had the best glare of all. Not that he would ever tell him that. But who cared about Malfoy right now, other than Harry, who, right after he regained some of his composure and realized he was sprawled on the floor with Ron’s hand held above his head (ready to help him up if needed) would swirl to look at the now usually-empty chair? After getting the reassurance he needed from the invisible Malfoy, or that’s how Ron interpreted the action, he visibly relaxed.

Harry looked back at Ron and his hovering arm. If Ron could read thoughts, at that moment he was sure to hear Harry’s repeating mantra that ‘Ron wouldn’t hurt him, because he was a friend.’ After a couple of minutes of staring at Ron’s hand, which was just starting to show faint tremors from being held up for such a long time, Harry grasped it and hoisted himself up from the floor as Ron pulled. To some, Harry might’ve seemed weak, but the pale black-haired boy didn’t think so, and neither did Ron.

Harry clumsily fell into Ron’s waiting arms and had just enough time to hear Ron asking if he was all right before he scrambled out of the arms and nodded his affirmative. He wasn’t ready for that battle yet. Harry started to walk out of the Great Hall with Ron and Hermione following. Ron’s nose was held high, proudly. This – looking proud- he could do.

~*~*~*~*~*

Albus Dumbledore watched Harry and his two best friends walk out of the Great Hall; worry was surreptitiously hidden between falsely twinkling eyes and half-moon spectacles. It was a dark cloud that only he could see. Maybe Harry’s friends ought to know what was going on. Maybe it would help him recover if people knew, especially beloved people like Ron and Hermione. He could tell that Hermione wanted to talk to him, if the impersonation of his spectacles -four times- was anything to go by. He would wait until the end of the week, if Harry’s friends didn’t seek him out, or if Harry didn’t get better, or both. Then he would request a meeting. Should the three students be together, or should he have two separate meetings? He would have to speak with Harry anyhow, to ask how he was really doing. As he went back to his breakfast, he also worried about Harry’s obsessive staring at Mr. Malfoy’s empty seat.

~*~*~*~

Hermione, for the first time in a long while, was very happy that they had Care of Magical Creatures first thing in the morning… or at all, actually. If anything, Harry had a great affinity for animals; well, he never managed to get hurt there, for the most part. Maybe Hagrid would review Hippogriffs, or show some kind of snake. In any case, Harry was good in this class and he loved Hagrid. It was a good thing they didn’t have Potions, though Snape was being rather easy on Harry, weirdly enough. She was interrupted from her musings by Hagrid’s booming voice.

“G’ther ‘roun’, class. I got you somethin’ very special.”

He had an eye patch over one eye now. Giants were very good at taking a lot of spells, but that just meant that the eyes, a weak spot for everyone, were extra targeted for giants and half giants. If they were not protected sufficiently, they would get hurt there as soon as the enemy realized it. The Order counted on this fact during the war, both offensively and defensively. But on the day that Hagrid had lost his left eye, he was hurried into a surprise attack and was too busy trying to save one of his very dangerous hybrids. Ironically enough, when Hagrid got hurt, it was his new creature that went crazy and killed the responsible Death Eater. Hagrid called him Larry from then on. He would’ve called him Harry, but he said that would’ve been too confusing.

‘T’day we’re g’in te look at Runespoors. Anyone know wha’ they are’?”

‘Here we go again,’ thought Hermione wryly as she prepared to raise her hand.

“Yes, ‘Arry?” Hermione whipped her head around— actually the whole class’s heads were now pointed at Harry. The second time in one morning. Harry didn’t notice, though, since he was looking at the ground with a vacant look on his face.

“They’re snakes with three heads: a planner, a dreamer, and a critic.” He stopped, now close to tears. Ron and Hermione stared each other, flabbergasted. This had been the first time he’d spoken in class since he had returned, and it was a full sentence, practically. Hermione made a mental note to check how Harry would know about Runespoors with Professor Dumbledore as well.

The class was a good twenty minutes of explanation, which Hermione didn’t really bother listening to, as she knew it all already; instead, she thought about what Runespoors meant to Harry. When Hagrid went to fetch one, though, she started to pay attention. She’d never seen one and thought they might be fascinating to look at. When Hagrid was rifling around in a wooden box, she looked at Harry; he seemed to have become even more closed off, and he looked even sadder, if that was possible, and angry. At least anger was some kind of other strong emotion.

When Hagrid came out with what he called a baby Runespoor and asked if anyone would like to pet it, Harry looked wounded; the angry emotion was almost gone. He got up and made his way over to go look at it. His eyes widened, his mouth dropped open, as if in a silent scream, and he ran away.

Ron started to get up from his position on the ground to go after Harry, but Hermione stopped him with a shake of her head and very slightly made the letter D on the ground. Ron got the hint and complied with her wishes, though he didn’t look very happy about it. They both looked back at Hagrid and immediately felt bad. He looked like Larry had just died.

~*~*~*~

Harry ran all the way back to the castle before he stopped. It was too much; he didn’t want any of it, and for the first time, he wondered if he had ever felt Hogwarts was a prison before. It was now, though. Everything was a prison. Everywhere he went he got caught in a cage of memories. A cage of nightmares, a cage of good memories gone bad because of the war… He felt like dying, standing there.

He was already dead inside, it seemed.

He stood there in the Entrance Hall and felt very small, and then very insignificant. What had he done that warranted recognition? Got captured and tortured and … and have those things done to him? He hadn’t even killed Voldemort. And for all he knew, the person who did, the person who saved his life, was dead. He stood there and felt completely, utterly, alone. Tears rolled down his red-from-running cheeks, bumping across the slight scar on his left one. He sank to his knees on the floor and felt his head drop to his chest heavily.

When would it all end?

~*~*~*~

Albus Dumbledore never said he was all-knowing of the current happenings at Hogwarts, but he was well aware of the rumors… that he was. So it was with some wry amusement in his gravely saddened face that he rushed from his office to the Entrance Hall, looking for a lost, little boy. He’d been checking up on Harry in Hagrid’s class and saw what had happened. Well, enough to know that Harry was upset. Though he saw what Miss Granger communicated to Mr. Weasley and watched him heed her warning, he wasn’t about to do likewise. He wondered what had made Harry rush out of one of his favourite teachers’ class like that.

He was running down the last set of stairs when he saw Harry, standing there, looking bewildered. His gaunt face was red, slicked with heavy tears. His mouth was slightly open, breathing silently. But he was otherwise very statuesque. When Albus stepped down from the final step, he watched what he would later dub in his head as ‘the beginning of the end.’ Harry, in slow motion, fell to his knees in the middle of the Hall. His knees, colliding with the cold floor, echoed blankly down the place. The sound reached Albus’ ears. He had remained very still, just observing. His heart was shattering.

He never thought it would get like that.

He thought that everything would be better when he could tell HIM to come.

And he was coming soon— as soon as Albus could give him his sign, in fact.

Too late, it seemed.

Too late.

He jumped out of his reverie when a keening noise, very low, coming from Harry’s direction reached his ears. Albus looked over and saw that Harry’s face was turning red. The red of a panic attack, the red tinted with blue- a lack of oxygen. Harry was clawing at his throat. He rushed over to the boy, scooped him in his arms, and held him close; even with the flinch, he held him. He rocked him like a baby, suddenly realizing that Harry might never have been held like this.

“Calm down, child, just breathe. It’s all right, Harry, just breathe.”


~*~*~*~

He couldn’t breathe… Was he suddenly deprived of breathing too?

He was dying; he was dying because he couldn’t breathe, and he had to get out of the cage that held him away from the air. Harry started to claw at his throat, and just as red welts started to rise on his neck, he felt strong arms catching him… warm arms. He flinched anyway, but when he looked up to the face of the Headmaster, he instantly felt relieved. The Headmaster wouldn’t hurt him, just as Ron wouldn’t. Harry heard the calming words, lovingly said, and he broke down completely. Harry knew the Headmaster was aware of what had happened; he knew almost everything that happened, anyway. Albus Dumbledore was in the hospital wing when Harry woke up from his week-long coma. They didn’t call him a ‘wise, old man’ for nothing.

This was okay. He felt safe.

~*~*~*~*~

Albus thought he’d misheard Harry talking at first, but as the babbling became louder, more insistent and questioning, he stopped his words of comfort to listen. What he heard made his heart come back together from its previous shattering.

“And, sir, what happened to Draco Malfoy? D’you know? Because I didn’t thank him… Never… never thanked him.”

And that was all Albus needed to hear.

Not too late, then.

Not too late.

But time was running short; he had to be contacted as soon as possible.

~*~*~*~*~

By the time Harry stopped crying, the Headmaster had half dragged him to his office, where he situated him on a comfortable sofa-bed he had conjured just for the occasion. After offering the mandatory tea, which Harry took to ease his raw throat, the Headmaster began to talk.

“Harry, my boy, I know I probably shouldn’t be asking you this, but how are you?”

“Fine, sir,” Harry ensured in a feeble tone. “As fine as I ought to be, considering…” he added when the Headmaster tilted his head questioningly- the twinkle, which Harry just realized had been gone until then, came back a little.

You never know what you have until you lose it.

You never know what you lost until you get it back.

“I know that things are— might not ever be— normal again, Harry,” the wizened man sighed, “but maybe if we let more people in on the hardships you went through, your life will get back to normal— or as close to it as possible— faster. You could, at least, be happy. I was thinking Mr. Weasley and Miss Granger… Maybe Miss Weasley could be informed as well.”

Harry looked stricken and stuttered through his answer. “I …sir, I… um, I really…sir, I really think... m-maybe we ought to just leave them be. I don’t want to worry them. More than they already are, I mean.”

Albus wondered if he’d dropped the Dungbomb too early, so to speak. He should’ve eased into it better, he belatedly realized.

“Harry,” the Headmaster said in his overly patient voice, which Harry hated. He wasn’t a kid. Far from it, he was the most non-child teenager he knew. He snapped back into attention; for once, his anguish was gone, completely buried away by his anger, at least temporarily.

“You have been through a terrible, terrible ordeal. You need friends around you. Open up to them, Harry, “Dumbledore ploughed on. “Only Madam Pomfrey and I know the full story, and talking about it may help”.


“No, Headmaster, I really don’t think we should. I don’t want to be a burden!”

“No, Harry, you wouldn’t be. Your friends are very worried; I would think they wanted to help.”

‘Hound for answers, more like.’ Harry thought darkly about Hermione’s insistent nature.

“No, I don’t want you to tell them. This is my problem, and it has nothing to do with Voldemort and everything to do with me. I deserve to keep at least this a secret.”

“My boy, this has everything to do with Voldemort. He is, inherently, the reason it happened. And someone should know, so that justice could be served.”

Justice could be served…wait, what? How were Hermione and Ron going to serve justice if Harry told them? Harry, at that moment, thought he’d misheard what Dumbledore had said.

“Sir?”

“Eventually, Harry, this is going to have to come out so that the Death Eaters can be punished for the crimes they have committed.” He sounded endearingly calm and sad; his voice was the one that had a great effect to calm others. “This, of course, will not come out until you are fully better,” he said in the same tone.

Yes, that voice worked with everyone but Harry. The last time the Headmaster’s office was decimated with Harry’s tantrum was proof enough of that. So Harry hadn’t heard wrong, then.

“Headmaster, I’m sorry, but I don’t want this out, to anyone, even those close to me— especially those close to me,” Harry said, his voice cold and challenging.

“Harry, you mentioned Draco Malfoy.” He switched the subject rather quickly for Harry’s tired mind.

Harry blinked a couple of times as his mouth dropped open.

“I …um, what do you mean, sir?” Harry floundered. When had he mentioned Malfoy? Why the sudden change of topic? He was so tired…

He wondered where Malfoy was… Was he all right? Was he dead because of Harry?

Harry slumped visibly; he wanted to talk to Draco, and he wanted to see how he was doing. And most importantly… what, and why, he wasn’t at Hogwarts… He just wanted to… thank him.

Most of all… he wanted to thank him.

Harry felt closer to Malfoy than he had to anyone else, but he still didn’t like him; he just understood him. Well, no, he didn’t, but he wanted to know why he did it.

And, of course, he wanted to thank him - at least.

And also, to say sorry… Surely he’d suffered because of Harry. ‘What else was he good for,’ the black-haired boy thought in anguish. Harry heard a sigh and looked up; Professor Dumbledore had his spectacles off and was rubbing his eyes tiredly. Harry felt a pang of…pity? Guilt? Sadness? Dumbledore couldn’t make this okay and he knew it, and because of this, he looked defeated. Harry had put that look on his face. He felt bitterness, then guilt right after for feeling that way, because Professor Dumbledore hadn’t always fixed everything – Sirius was a painful reminder of it. He pushed those feelings down to his empty stomach.

Dumbledore sighed louder. “Alright, Harry, you may go. I will think on what you have told me about not telling your friends.” Here Harry shot him a glare. “And I’ll try to see what’s best for you,” he continued, undeterred.

There was no getting around it; Harry could see the steel behind the Headmaster’s slight twinkle that brooked no argument. He sighed himself, desolately and left. It was lunchtime, but he didn’t feel like eating. The Forbidden Forest sounded good and silent, with its impending chaos lurking, a match to Harry’s turbulent personality. He heard the door of the Headmaster’s office click silently behind him as he descended the staircase.

~*~*~*~*~

Albus’ head was in his hands- his heart was in his throat, which wasn’t a good thing at his old age, was it? He felt lost; he didn’t know if he was helping, but the thought of Harry as he stormed out of the room angrily…

Was anger better than despair? How long until the despair came back, holding him all the tighter?

Albus sat there for a while, playing out the form of the Child of Despair falling to the ground over and over again. He wondered about what kind of help would come soon, if it ever came. Thoughts and choices played out, and the wise old wizard wondered if he should tell Harry’s friends and let them heal him. Should he let Harry have his way until he was so deep in despair he would perish? Or would he seek help on his own?

Albus sat there, with his head in his hands, all through lunch, until a hesitant knock came at his door. Harry’s two best friends had come sooner than he would’ve liked. ‘Let it never be said that Albus Dumbledore was all-knowing,’ the old wizard thought, as he quickly penned and sent his signal to the waiting dragon that occupied the forest, while beckoning the two inside.

~*~*~*~*~

Harry, still feeling enraged rather than forlorn for once, raced through the halls and out of the building. As it was lunchtime, the halls were relatively empty. By the time he got here, all the anger was flowing away from him through his labored puffs of breath that turned whiter the closer he got to the forest. When he stopped, the enraged gleam that had implanted itself in Harry’s eyes vanished, leaving the green dark with sadness, guilt, and self-loathing once more. He sank down to the ground against a rock that was surrounded by a bush as green as the darkness in Harry’s eyes. Harry, feeling connected because of this, reached out for the bush. He whipped his hand back and stared at his finger, shining with his blood. The bush was sharp, a green blade. The wearied boy got a weird look in his eyes, a different kind of gleam that lit Harry’s eyes minutely as he reached for the bush again. ‘Was this the answer?’ he wondered. Could this be the only way to escape from the memories? He thought about it for a bit and realized it could help if he was numb.

Unbeknownst to Harry, gray eyes, darkened with leaden shadows like the stone Harry was leaning on for support, flashed with despair. Hands clutched at the missive they had just received for him to read.

It was time.

TBC