The Downfall

The Downfall
by Rave_XTM


Chapter I: The Fall


‘I’m going’, he thinks. ‘I’m going’. His legs carried him from the window in the Astronomy tower to the door. He opened it. He walked through, closed it behind him.
The sounds of thunder and explosions and screams softened. He only then realized he wasn’t listening to it.
He walked the first staircase down. He met nobody. The second staircase he met someone. Ron.

“Harry”, his voice croaked. Harry turned his head towards him. He saw Ron’s eyes were red and his cheeks wet.

“Hermione, she- with Neville- gods, Harry”, he said in a voice just above a whisper, throwing his arms around Harry’s neck, shacking uncontrollably. Harry blinked and kept staring ahead of himself.

“Gone”, Ron breathed against his neck, barely hearable through his crying. “Gone”. He shook harder.

Harry wanted to say sorry. He wanted to feel sorry. But he didn’t. He felt- nothing. Just a void in his stomach. His irritation grew by every second Ron held him crying, shacking, muttering nonsense.

“Ron”, he said, more agitation in his voice than he wanted to, and pushed him away.
Ron’s face flushed with emotion. Suddenly, he was mad.

“You don’t care? You don’t even care? Gods, Harry, Hermione is dead!”, Ron yelled, frightening only himself. He slammed his hands before his mouth, more tears leaking down his face and hands.
Harry just stared at him, walking past him, walking another staircase down.
More students were here, all staring at him. Angry.

‘Do something Harry’

‘We’re stuck here because of you’

‘People are dying’

‘Come on, golden boy’

‘It’ll be over soon’

He didn’t pay attention to any of them. Nobody knew what he was going to do. Nobody cared what he was going to do. No, they did care about what he was going to do, they didn’t care about him. Reaching the Great Hall, opening its doors, everybody inside stopped to look at him. Nobody talked of even whispered. Some people looked angry, others looked guilty. Most of them were of have been crying. Everyone was showing something.

Except Malfoy. Standing in a far corner. Alone. He too watched Harry’s every movement, but his expression said nothing. He didn’t even sneer. Then, their eyes met and their gazes locked. Harry froze. Malfoy started walking, though halfway the Great Hall, he stopped dead. His expression changed. Not much, just a subtle hint of change.

‘He knows’, Harry thought.

‘He’s going to do it’, Draco thought.

Draco nodded barely noticeable towards the stairs, not knowing exactly why.
Harry tilted his head up and just a little pointing his nose up in the air, and for some reason, unknown to even himself, he turned around and walked through the doors, who fell shut behind him, turning a corner that showed a hallway, which was leading to the dungeons. A large statue of a dragon he almost bumped up against was hiding a narrow staircase leading upstairs. Between the statue and the actual stairs was a little space, enough for two people. Harry casually leaned against the stone wall, waiting for Malfoy.

Somehow he knew that it was not just to taunt him, he could and would have done that in the Great Hall, with everyone watching and laughing with him. Or looking at him angrily and than look back at Harry with that sickening guild in there eyes.

He heard footsteps. He assumed is were Malfoy’s. The footsteps halted, Harry assumed in front of the statue, and continued a little more rushed to after the statue, meeting Harry.
His breath was more frequent than normal, his expression also wasn’t what it normally was. Though, it did not gave away a thing.

Their gazes locked again. Emerald meeting silvery grey, lion meeting serpent. All the things he could not see in Malfoy’s eyes, so frustrating. He had always find it frustrating. Though not ever as much as now. Harry cocked his head a little and folded his arms, daring Malfoy to speak up. Instead, he swallowed and turned his gaze away, just for a fraction of a second, before meeting with Harry’s again.

Harry’s eyes had lost their life. Even before Voldemort and his Death Eaters had attacked Hogwarts, who were still trying to break through its defenses. Nobody knew who much Death Eaters were out there, but it was going on for weeks. The ones who did try to go outside in some way at some point did not live long enough to tell anyone else. They were running low on food; though Dumbledore did a good job in all the defenses, Voldemort did a great job to; he placed, as Dumbledore suspected, a circle around Hogwarts and all its defenses, so nothing could go through unless the Dark Lord himself allowed it to. Even Dumbledore could not think of anything to do besides all the obvious which was tried already.
Draco did not know why Harry’s eyes lost their life. He was determent to find out before Harry would do it.

‘Don’t’, Draco thought.

“Why?”, he said instead.

Harry’s eyes widened a little.
“Why do you care?”, Harry said.
‘You are the first to ask such a question in a long time’, he thought.
Draco narrowed his eyes just a little, which made his gaze more intense.

“Even you, the noble, worthy Gryffindor, the Boy Who Lived, the One, or whatever, would not do such a thing as sacrifice himself for others. Just for others. You have some sort of personal gain in here”, Draco said, sounding colder then he had mend to.

‘I’m sick of it’, he thought. ‘Because I will live through it only once, not twice’, ‘Because I’m angry’, ‘Because I’m tired’.
Instead of giving him an answer, he just looked at Draco, trying to read his eyes, trying to put some part of his anger behind him.

Draco’s eyes were different. His expression was different, his body language was different. But then again, everyone was different. Weeks with almost no food, people dying, anger and frustration heating up was enough to change a person. Though, Malfoy seemed to change in another way. Instead of letting every wall and defense fall like any other, his walls seemed to build.

“Because you have changed”, Harry answered his own question.

Malfoy blinked.
“What?”

“Because you have changed. You care because you have changed”.

Taken aback by Harry’s response, Draco once again shifted his gaze away form Harry’s, only this time to stay away, to stay at a grey stair, trying to ignore the intensity of Harry’s gaze.
Harry saw Draco nod his head slightly as if he wanted to say something, or disagreed with something he thought. Harry was dying to find out what was going on in Draco’s head. Suddenly Draco looked directly at Harry.

“Don’t”, was all he said.

“Don’t?” Harry repeated mockingly, raising an eyebrow.

“You- you don’t know what you’re getting yourself into, Harry”. Again his gaze shifted away.

‘Harry? Harry?’
“I suppose you do then?”

“I- no, of course I don’t, I- what if they want more- more than you think they want?”, Draco said, slightly raising his voice, his expression hardening. “You don’t know what you’re up against”.

“Then why don’t you tell me what they want from me?”

“Because I don’t know. I could guess, but so could you, damnit Potter, I’m serious, I’m not playing around for gods sake! Lose that fucking stubborn attitude of yours! You’re so bloody ignorant!” Draco raged, looking furious.

Then, Harry understood.

“You- you know”, he said slow, realizing what that mend, not even paying attention to what Draco said, he only listened what he really said without knowing or wanting it himself.

“I- What the hell am I suppose to know, Potter?”

“What will happen to me if I give myself to Voldemort. What he will do to me. You have been there, haven’t you?”

There it was. Right there in his eyes. It was obvious to Harry that he had never really spoken about it, otherwise he was able to hide it.
Draco sighed and rolled his eyes, acting annoyed.

“Where the hell did you come up with that crap?” Draco said, though he didn’t sound as convinced as he did a few moments ago.

“Its right there”, Harry said with a soft tone, stepping a little closer. Draco’s eyes widened a little in shock.

“Right there in your eyes”. Without realizing, his hand moved forward to slightly touch Draco’s left underarm.

The place where Death Eaters have their Dark Mark.

Draco found himself no other choice but to look Harry in the eyes, once again their gazes locked. Harry saw the other boy open his mouth as if to say something, bit didn’t. Draco’s breath felt hot against Harry’s skin, the warmest thing he had felt in weeks. He could reed in Draco’s eyes that he was standing to close, though he did not step away. Draco could not step back, his back was already against the wall. If he could, he probably would not anyways, say something about Slytherin pride of Malfoys honor or whatever.

Harry’s eyes lingered down a little to Draco’s lips, then yaw line. ‘He is thinner than usual, he’s even paler’.

“Har- Potter”, Draco heard himself say in a voice just above a whisper. He felt the warmth radiating of the other boys body, only to discover how cold he had been. He felt himself shiver uncontrollably, wondering what the hell was wrong with him.

“I’m sorry”, Harry whispered, his eyes meeting Draco’s again.

Draco thought his heart stopped at the sight of emotion in Harry’s eyes, real emotions. For the first time in weeks, maybe months.
‘Potter knew. How the fuck could Potter know?’
He felt out of character tense. It was slightly disturbing to him that it was Harry who unleashed it.

“Why? What happened?” Potter asked, though his eyes said more than just that.
Draco clenched his yaw, irritated. Potters hot breath made him shiver. That made him tense up more. His eyes shifted from Potters eyes to his messy black hair, trying not to look at the rest of Potters face, trying to ignore the urge to seek more warmth from him.

“Why would I tell you?” Draco said, trying to sound as cool as usual, though he knew he failed miserably.

“Because you want to. Because you know that may be the only way to stop me. Because you want to stop me.”

“No Potter, I don’t”, Draco spat. “You have your pathetic little friends to do that. I don’t-“ he left the rest of the sentence unspoken. Harry did not know what Draco was going to say, but he probably knew that it was a lie, whatever he was going to say. Draco wanted to step back, avoid being so close to someone he always hated, but he felt the cold brick wall against his back. He did not want to feel this way at all. Not with anybody. Specially not with Potter.

“Draco”, Harry said in a whisper above a whisper. “I...”

Then, Harry decided that it did not really matter who was going to say what. Whatever he said made Draco more uncomfortable, whatever Draco said were plain lies.

Harry moved his hand up, as if to touch Draco’s cheek, but did not. He moved his hand closer and closer, but still did not touch Draco. Then, Draco moved his head a little to close the distance between his cheek and Harry’s hand. He closed his eyes a fraction of a second to savor the heat, then opened his eyes and moved his head forward, touching Harry’s lips with his, wondering if he was making the biggest mistake in his life.