'Then we can take it up with the Ministry when this is all over,' said Draco, who had come back over to their aside of the room and was gazing at Harry in irritation. 'Would you stop with the self-pity, Potter? You're not going to go all mad and evil, you've got a bit of me in you, not a bit of Voldemort.'
'Same difference,' said Harry, staring at the floor.
'Right,' said Draco. 'Tell me: when did the Boy Who Lived become The Boy Who Sulked?'
'Oh, very funny,' said Harry. 'Too bad none of the Slytherins are here to appreciate you, Malfoy.'
' I didn?t choose to have Wonder Twin powers with you, either, but I?m not lying about whinging on and on,' said Draco shortly.
'No,' said Harry, with heavy sarcasm, 'your method of solving the problem by snogging Hermione every chance you get is working wonders. You deal with crises in your way, Malfoy, I?ll deal with them in mine.'
'My way is more fun,' Draco pointed out.
'Your way,' said Harry, 'is going to get your head kicked in.'
'Now thats me talking, that is,' said Draco, sounding pleased. 'I recognize the bad temper.'
Harry didn?t look like he even had the energy to tell Draco, who was smiling to himself, to shut up. He glared at him, stood up, grabbed the map, and said, 'If we?re going to go, we should go now.'
They went, Draco grabbing up the invisibility cloak and Hermione taking her wand, which had fallen inside the wardrobe during all the confusion. As they walked toward the door, Harry passed Draco and hissed under his breath, so Hermione wouldn?t hear him, 'She only likes you because you look like me.'
Draco stopped smiling.
The first part of the plan went remarkably well. Draco, in his invisibility cloak, went into the drawing room, checked that no one was around, and opened up the trap door for Harry and Hermione. They scrambled down the stairs and Draco followed after them.
Using a combination of Draco's memories of the underground passages and Harry's incomplete map, they made their way slowly downward through the tunnels. Hermione was amazed at how huge they were. The passed underground rooms the size of tennis courts, some with sparkling jewelry-like stalactites hanging down from the ceiling.
'There are more rooms under your house than in your house, Draco,' she said.
'I know,' said Draco's disembodied voice off to her left, 'The Manor is only about six hundred years old, but these passages have been here for a millennium at least. My mother says she reckons it once was some sort of underground city.'
'Did you know your mother went to school with my parents?' said Harry, who still wasn't looking very friendly, but seemed resigned to the situation.
'I knew she went to Hogwarts, yeah.'
'She used to be friends with Sirius,' said Harry.
Draco's voice was flat. He didn't sound like he wanted to talk about his mother.
'She's never mentioned him.'
Hermione trailed along after them. She was brooding on what had transpired between her and Draco in the wardrobe. She wondered if Draco was thinking about it as well. It was a bit hard to tell, due to his current invisible state.
It wasn't the first time she had ever kissed anyone. She had kissed Ron a couple times during fifth year, but nothing had ever come of it, every time their lips had met Ron had panicked and run away, then ignored her for several days thereafter.
This had swiftly begun to grate on Hermione's nerves and she had announced that they would just be friends from then on, which was a huge relief to both of them.
Then there had been Viktor. Hermione grinned to herself. Poor Viktor. She had never really liked him all that much, although she had allowed him to kiss her on several unmemorable occasions. She had mostly paid attention to him in hopes that it would make Harry jealous, which it hadn't. Harry, as usual, seemed to be able to see right through her and could tell without trying that she wasn't really interested in Viktor at all.
She remembered how happy she had been right before the second task of the Triwizard Tournament, when they had told her she was going to be a hostage for one of the champions — the 'thing the champion would most miss.' She'd assumed it would be Harry whose hostage she would be. The memory of how disappointed she'd been when it had turned out to be Viktor wiped the grin off her face.
'We're here,' said Draco, somewhere off to her right. 'Hold on.'
They were at the dungeon entrance, now tightly barred and locked with the snake-shaped lock. There was some rustling as Draco went up and presumably did whatever it was he had to do to get the lock open. It fell to the side, and the gate squeaked open.
Harry took her hand as they went through the gate and she gripped it tightly. It was creepy down here, and the dungeon itself was very dark. Harry pulled her forward, and behind her, faintly, she could hear Draco following them.
Harry dropped to his knees before a row of bars, and Hermione dropped down next to him. 'Sirius,' said Harry in a whisper. 'Sirius, are you awake?'
There was no answer. 'Sirius,' repeated Harry, more urgently now.
A tiny light blossomed like a firefly in the pitch darkness of the cell. As it bloomed outward, Hermione realized it was the light from a wand. It expanded to illuminate the cell, showing the bare, straw-covered floor, the dank walls, and Lucius Malfoy and Wormtail, sitting together on the stone bench on which Sirius had been lying an hour before. Lucius, holding the glowing wand in his right hand, was staring at Harry with an expression of dawning rage.
'Draco,' he said through his teeth. 'What are you doing here?'
