Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality

Footsteps approached.

"Here ya go," said Vincent's voice. "Now da boss ain't in a good mood today, so ya'd better watch your step."

Draco was going to skin that idiot alive and send back the flayed body with a request for a more intelligent servant, like a dead gerbil.

One set of footsteps went off, and the other set of footsteps came closer.

The churning in Draco's stomach got worse.

Harry Potter came into sight. His face was carefully neutral, but his blue-trimmed robes looked oddly askew, as if they hadn't been put on quite right -

"Your hand," Draco said without thinking about it at all.

Harry raised his left arm, as though to look at it himself.

The hand dangled limply from it, like something dead.

"Madam Pomfrey said it's not permanent," Harry said quietly. "She said it should mostly recover by the time classes start tomorrow."

For a single instant the news came as a relief.

And then Draco realized.

"You went to Madam Pomfrey," whispered Draco.

"Of course I did," said Harry Potter, as though stating the obvious. "My hand wasn't working."

It was slowly dawning on Draco what an absolute fool he'd been, far worse than the older Slytherins he'd chewed out.

He'd just taken for granted that no one would go to the authorities when a Malfoy did something to them. That no one would want Lucius Malfoy's eye on them, ever.

But Harry Potter wasn't a frightened little Hufflepuff trying to stay out of the game. He was already playing it, and Father's eye was already on him.

"What else did Madam Pomfrey say?" said Draco, his heart in his throat.

"Professor Flitwick said that the spell cast on my hand had been a Dark torture hex and extremely serious business, and that refusing to say who did it was absolutely unacceptable."

There was a long pause.

"And then?" Draco said in a shaking voice.

Harry Potter smiled slightly. "I apologized deeply, which made Professor Flitwick look very stern, and then I told Professor Flitwick that the whole thing was, indeed, extremely serious, secret, delicate business, and that I'd already informed the Headmaster about the project."

Draco gasped. "No! Flitwick isn't going to just accept that! He'll check with Dumbledore!"

"Indeed," said Harry Potter. "I was promptly hauled off to the Headmaster's office."

Draco was trembling now. If Dumbledore brought Harry Potter before the Wizengamot, willingly or otherwise, and had the Boy-Who-Lived testify under Veritaserum that Draco had tortured him... too many people loved Harry Potter, Father could lose that vote...

Father might be able to convince Dumbledore not to do that, but it would cost. Cost terribly. The game had rules now, you couldn't just threaten someone at random any more. But Draco had walked into Dumbledore's hands of his own free will. And Draco was a very valuable hostage.

Though since Draco couldn't be a Death Eater now, he wasn't as valuable as Father thought.

The thought tore at his heart like a Cutting Charm.

"Then what?" whispered Draco.

"Dumbledore deduced immediately that it was you. He knew we'd been associating."

The worst possible scenario. If Dumbledore hadn't guessed who did it, he might not have risked using Legilimency just to find out... but if Dumbledore knew...

"And?" Draco forced out the word.

"We had a little chat."

"And?"

Harry Potter grinned. "And I explained that it would be in his best interest not to do anything."

Draco's mind ran into a brick wall and splattered. He just stared at Harry Potter with his mouth hanging slack like a fool.

It took that long for Draco to remember.

Harry knew Dumbledore's mysterious secret, the one Snape used as his hold.

Draco could just see it now. Dumbledore looking all stern, concealing his eagerness as he explained to Harry what a terribly serious matter this was.

And Harry politely telling Dumbledore to keep his mouth shut if he knew what was good for him.

Father had warned Draco against people like this, people who could ruin you and still be so likable that it was