The players were all looking towards the farther end of the pitch, where Harry was standing. He seemed to be pointing from the hoops and back: illustrating some point of game mechanics. Everyone seemed to be paying attention except Ron, who was amusing himself by tying Ginny's long braids together in a knot.
'What shall we do about Draco? Should we look into protective charms, or send him home, or — '
'No,' said Dumbledore. 'We will do nothing.'
Charlie lowered the Omnioculars in surprise. 'Nothing? Isn't that a bit dangerous?'
'I cannot help but feel,' said Dumbledore slowly, 'that any and all efforts made to protect either Draco or Harry in this instance — beyond how they are already protected, by being here at Hogwarts — will in the end, be both gratuitous and counterproductive. Neither boy willingly takes to being protected. You saw how Harry reacted to the suggestion that you were trying to protect him from knowledge he might not like, even though, in that case, you were not. Should we try to constrain them, they will rebel against the constraints, and we may lose them entirely.'
Charlie was silent a moment. Then he raised the Omnioculars to his eyes and glanced out the window again, in time to see Harry take off on his broomstick, and soar up into the air above the heads of his teammates.
Charlie wasn't sure if Harry was illustrating another point of game strategy, or if he'd simply decided he couldn't bear to be on the ground any more. Charlie always loved watching Harry fly, because Harry reminded him of himself at that age — the same overwhelming joy in flight, the same bearing that said that in leaving the ground, he had left his cares and troubles behind. He flew like an arrow, straight and true and unswerving, his black hair whipping across his face. He would never be as handsome as Draco was, but when he flew, he was beautiful.
'But if they were to ask us for help, we should help them?' Charlie said, still trying to make sense of what Dumbledore had just said. He understood it…but in some ways, did not want to. 'I mean
'Of course. If Draco were to ask me for Protective charms, I would give them to him.'
'But they won't ask for help. Harry, especially, never will.'
'Of course not,' Dumbledore said. 'Think of the first eleven years of his life. He grew up knowing that were he to cry out in a nightmare, no one would come to comfort him. That if he were in pain, he could expect no aid or sympathy. That if he were lost, no one would trouble to find him.
That if he died, he would not be mourned. Such an upbringing hardly breeds a child who readily seeks assistance in times of trouble.'
'Headmaster, with all due respect…'
'Yes?'
'You chose that childhood for him.'
'Yes,' said Dumbledore. 'Yes, I did.'
It was two days before they let Draco out of the infirmary, and even then Madam Pomfrey stood and wrung her hands as he walked out, looking as if she were quite sure that he would be returned later in several pieces.
She also asked him if he wanted anyone to escort him back to his room, but he told her he preferred to go alone. As he walked through the hallways on his way back to the Slytherin dungeons, he noted that the new Yule Ball decorations had gone up that day, and realized with a faint pang that of course the Pub Crawl was that night. And of course, he could not go to it.
He had been somewhat concerned that the Slytherins would be cool to him on his return, but they had not been. Rumors based on the story he had told Blaise in confidence (which meant of course that the whole school now knew it) said that Draco had been injured as a result of preparing for a duel with Harry, and that Harry had fled the Great Hall out of guilty familial concern and fear of Narcissa. Variations on the rumor were flying thick and fast, and while Draco resented the implication that he couldn't cast a curse properly without it rebounding and nearly taking his arm off, it was worth it for a modicum of peace of mind.
That night before the Pub Crawl, Draco stood alone in his room, regarding himself thoughtfully in the mirror over his dresser. It showed him his own reflection, bare from the waist up. He was pale (unsurprising, as it was winter) and against his shoulder the scar where the arrow had gone in was healed, and looked like a small silvery star against the skin. For someone so young, it occurred to him, he had certainly done a great deal of damage to the unmarked flesh he had been born with. There was a white line under his right eye where Harry had accidentally cut him with the jagged fragments of an ink bottle. There was also the silver lightning scar on the palm of his hand, and if he leaned close to the mirror he could see the thin white line on his bottom lip where he had bitten through the skin when the Dark Lord had tortured him. He liked his scars. They were like the faint tracery of a map that marked the greatest events of his life.
He was of course especially attached to the scar on his hand, the only one he had acquired voluntarily.
He reached for his clothes and dressed slowly, even though it was cold in the dungeon. He might be spending the evening alone, but that was no reason not to look as good as possible. He chose black trousers, cut from expensive and heavy material, and a dark green sweater. His dress robes were black, shot through with a fine weave of silver and edged with a pattern of constellations picked out in splinters of glass. The heavy silver clasp at the throat that held on his cloak was also carved in the shape of a constellation: Draco, the dragon. As he closed the clasp, his shoulder ached with a brief and fiery twinge.
When he left his room, the corridors were already full of people — girls rushing to and from the bathrooms with their hair half-done, boys in fancy dress robes giving themselves a last glance before the mirrors.
Draco edged past them and out into the common room, where a huge fire was burning in the grate. Standing by the fire was Malcolm Baddock, in navy blue dress robes over a dark suit, and beside him was Blaise. She stood perfectly positioned so that the firelight made her long hair glow, turning it to fiery tinsel, and the faint outline of her body showed through her pale gray dress robes. She smiled when she saw him. 'Draco,' she said, and held out her hand.
He went towards her. Some part of him was glad that she wasn't angry, although how could she have been — everyone knew that Dumbledore had forbidden him to leave the grounds before Christmas, and she could hardly expect him to disobey that edict. So he'd never even had to tell her that he'd already agreed not to go to the Pub Crawl, which was a nice freebie (if one could consider the consequences of nearly bleeding to death a freebie.) He hated fighting with Blaise, probably because she had a slicingly perceptive wit when she put her mind to it, and often told him things about himself he would have preferred not to hear. 'Look at you,' she said. 'You're gorgeous.'
