Having returned to the quiet room was no better than standing in the records of the past. It took him some moments to compose himself so he was at all able to retrieve the memories from the bowl and put them back into the phial. Once stoppered again, he studied the peaceful wafting, slightly glowing matter. There was only one way to find out. With a deep sigh, Harry turned and slouched over to the desk. The portrait’s head still rested on its right hand, breathing absolutely calm.
“I wondered – ”, Harry whispered, “Whether portraits have all the knowledge of the person at the moment they were created.”
“Certainly, we do.”, said Dumbledore softly, but didn’t change his position.
“And – do you have a – a proper memory?”
“If you refer to remembering like a living being, yes, we have a proper memory.”
“Alright.”, Harry hesitated, his gaze directed towards the still Sorting Hat on his shelf. “Has he ever said – has he told you that he just joined Voldemort – with the intention – to bring him down?”
“We might have a memory and be able to perform magic to some extent, Harry,”, Dumbledore sighed, his blue eyes free for him to see now, “But it does not mean, we are fully capable of what our model had been. Even if I wanted, I could not use Legilimency against you. You will have to tell me whom you are talking about.”
“Professor Snape.”, he said curtly and found Dumbledore’s kind smile frozen to unease. “So he hasn’t?”
“What makes you believe he did so?”, Dumbledore blinked over his half-moon spectacles and slightly raised from his arm.
“Well,”, Harry lifted the flask for him, “That’s what he told my mother.”
“Ah well, he may have told Lily, but having knowledge of his feelings for her, I must admit, he might just have said that to prevent her from suicide.”, Harry didn’t miss the scarce panicking undertone.
“Not really. He was actually very keen on the truth in that conversation and I don’t think that was played. He knew it was senseless to lie to her because she had a talent for looking beyond his mask. She confirmed that.”
“And what exactly did he state about joining Voldemort?”
“He said that he hadn’t joined him `for pleasure´ but because he `wanted him away´.”, for Harry, there was definitely some peculiar sensation to the discomfort in Dumbledore’s expression.
“When did he state that?”
“Oh I don’t know,”, he said casually, “They’d seen each other for the first time after he’d been gone missing for more than a year. She’d married a week earlier. Maybe you know a date and can tell me when it was,”, Dumbledore wiped his right hand over his mouth, avoiding Harry’s eyes.
“Are you sure about that?”, he muttered through his all intact fingers.
“If you could climb down, I’d probably show you.”, Harry waved with the crystal vessel again when Dumbledore took off his glasses with the other hand and rubbed his eyes.
“Are you absolutely sure, Harry?”, there was no possibility the old man could hide the horror that stood in his face now and something dawned on Harry. “That he said the truth?”, Dumbledore partly ran his fingers through his hairline, leaving the silvery white strands in a mess while he gazed at some bookshelves.
“Positive. He meant that.”, Harry said, becoming a bit upset. “Is there anything you’d like to say?”
“I – ”, Dumbledore just aspirated, tears damming up in his formerly clear blue eyes. “I – god – oh – god – ”
“I have spent a year with this man as well, Albus.”, Phineas noted. “Telling from what I have gotten to see, you cannot ignore that we both know Potter’s got the right to hear what has been troubling you for so many years. He has the right to get to know what happened in that courtroom.”
“No – ”, Dumbledore shook his head, but Harry already knew where this was going.
“What is he talking about?”, he said angrily. “Does this have to do with the scars on Professor Snape’s back?”, some hair slid over his face when he started crying into his hand, but Harry couldn’t feel less sympathy. “Have they tortured some regret out of him?”, crying bitterly, Dumbledore refused to answer. “Have you watched it?”, Harry continued, the words obviously being worse to what had been included of a soul into the painting than the edges of that mirror shard in Harry’s pouch. “Have you ordered it?”, he could hear Dumbledore muttering something about stopping, but Harry had not the slightest urge to ease him. “What did you tell them? To show no mercy? Did you give him the same face you gave him on that hill when he begged you for bringing my mother into hiding? Did you drag him into the Ministry and have him tortured? Or did you even do it yourself?”, Dumbledore shook his head, crying noisily. “Right, but you ordered it, didn’t you? You don’t need to say. I know.”, Harry hissed. “It’s been all for the greater good, hasn’t it?”
“H-Harry – please – ”, by that moment, half of the portraits had left their frames in the office; Phineas Nigellus raised to go as well.
“You watched them torture the living daylight out of him, didn’t you? Didn’t you? Just like you let Voldemort kill my mother even though he pleaded on his knees for saving her, in hope she would crush Voldemort by trying to save me? Well, guess, it worked! But you knew that from the beginning, didn’t you? Isn’t it so?”, the door behind him opened, though he ignored it. “But guess again, it doesn’t bring back my parents! They’re dead! Dead because you preferred to cross your fingers!”, Harry spat.
“What by – ”, a woman’s voice moaned, though Harry still didn’t care.
“LOOK ME IN THE EYES AND TELL ME WHAT YOU DID! TELL ME HOW YOU SAT IN THAT COURTROOM, WITH YOUR FINGERS CROSSED, AND WATCHED THEM TORTURE HIM UNTIL HE BROKE, IN YOUR OPINION!”, Dumbledore still shook his head into his hand like a child. “BECAUSE HE DIDN’T BREAK! HE KEPT RESISTENT UNTIL, THE, END! He’s fooled everyone, including you, old man.”
Harry panted heavy, purposely calming, but not able to get rid of his fury, which still reflected in his tone and he felt some pressure by his temple, but decided to not bother it. The indirect confession was too much for him.
“He’s been fooling everyone, doing his own thing all the time. Well, everyone but my mother, but that’s not the point. You’d been hoodwinked by him just like everybody else and you didn’t even realise by the time you begged him to kill you. You asked him for quite a big favour there, compared to what you refused to do for him. Took everything for granted. All, the, time. Let me tell you something, Dumbledore. He hasn’t even watched me on your behalf, no. Want to know why he really did it? Why the first person I actually liked in my life was a `postman´? Because he cared for me!”
“Harry – ”
“Not only for my mother, but for me as well. Want to know why?”, Dumbledore kept crying and shaking his head. “No? But I tell you. Because he knew that Lily Evans wouldn’t have married James Potter if he hadn’t disappeared for a year. Because he knew that she’d loved him probably as much as he’d loved her. But of course you didn’t see it. No one saw it, apart from them. They’ve been too good at keeping secrets. Even under your nose, you oh so wise man. Even under your nose. And you sacrificed them for your own profit. Yeah, maybe it helped the world, eventually, but it just doesn’t work out like that. Your brother told me an hour ago that you never were much into chess, and I think he’s right. You meant to play chess but didn’t know the rules. You forgot one of your pieces and that piece knew much better how to play. You forgot the queen. Let the pawns play, sent them into battle and sacrificed them so the queen could check the king for the bishop to get him down. But you forgot that the queen has all rights. You were too fixated on the whole that you forgot the most basic rule of considering every single step in chess.”
“Harry – I – ”
“I am not done yet!”, he said lividly. “Severus Snape was the queen on your board and he slew all the other pawns and knights and castles and bishops without your notice. And when you woke up, only seconds ago, the game was over and won. But not by you, no. Because you don’t know how to play chess. He knew from the beginning that it might cost his life, but rather like seeing that, you encouraged him to give everything for the cause, even his life, I guess, because you still meant to make him pay for having accidentally betrayed the one he loved – while you knew nothing about that love. There’s some simple principle Ginevra just recently threw at Hermione: she said `It’s not your relationship. So keep your bloody nose out. You know nothing about our problems. It’s not on you to solve them. Better waste your energy with your own.´.”
“Harry – ”
“And just because it’s called `war´, it doesn’t mean that sacrificing people is justified by the cause, you know. It’s different if they do it themselves; what he did to some extent; but it’s murder if you force others into combat for the chance of victory. You’ve killed at least one family by that. You’ve killed my family. Additionally by confiscating their rightful possession which might have saved their lives for a long time – out of mere greed. Because, even after a century, you couldn’t resist the powers you hoped to gain from the Hallows, which; if you haven’t noticed yet; bring neither power, nor salvation if you are seeking to find it in them. Not for the seeker, and most especially, not for anyone around. They are as much a gift as they are a curse, but they are the curse of my family, not yours. But of course that doesn’t matter to you. You never really cared about your own family even; ignored how you dragged them into misery and death by your hunger. You never really cared about your sister or how you hurt your brother by ignoring her existence. And I can gladly say that even though I’ve seen and heard you crying for her under that potion. Because that’s nothing! You think you feel ashamed? You aren’t ashamed enough.”
“What are you talking about there, Harry?”, moaned the woman again and Harry finally turned to her.
“I am talking about this place being the Headmaster office.”, Harry said grim. “It’s missing a portrait, as far as I can see. This school has had a Headmaster, braver than probably anyone else I’ve ever met. I wouldn’t say wiser, but at least more cunning than any. Severus Snape deserves a place in here, Minerva, and if it’s just for climbing the Great Hall’s wall and roof. And he,”, he pointed up at the still weeping Dumbledore, “Will have to bear it. That’s his achievement in his war. If he hadn’t had that while he was still alive, I demand that he looks at the result of his greed, every day of his painted existence.”
With that, he stomped past Minerva and slammed the door shut so he wouldn’t hear that pathetic crying anymore. Outraged, he downright flounced past the stone statue.
“Successful?”, the Gargoyle screeched after him.
“Quite, yes.”, Harry grunted, not turning back. “Have a nice day.”
“Oho – and how successful! No one ever wished me that! A nice day to you as well, Mr Potter!”
Passing walls and windows he didn’t see, Harry walked back into the Grand Tower where the portraits all the way down had started flustered conversations. The former Headmasters and Headmistresses were apparently spreading the news. Harry ignored the fingers of oil pointing after him, way too angry with Dumbledore; and even himself for having held his hand in the Limbo.
Like so many times, a voice echoed along with the sound of his shoes stomping. Albus Dumbledore is currently unavailable for dwelling in his so beloved world of vested interest, due to wallowing in an amusingly worse sort of self-pity..and he himself had done the same, completely ignoring that proof of one of the old man’s habits provided to him. He had ignored. Out of – the dead that had not been meant to wander among the living, should be laid to rest..but Dumbledore was there, wasn’t he? He remained as a portrait..being aware of their acts is one thing and learning from it as well, but developing hate another. It will be projected on –
“Harry?”, at first he had thought, he had left his portrait as well and already meant to yell at him to leave him alone, but then he saw it was his brother. “What happened up there?”
“How come you think, something happened?”, Harry tried to look indifferent, which was hard with all those memories pounding against his skull from inside – fools who wear their hearts proudly on their sleeves, who cannot control their emotions, who wallow in sad memories and allow themselves to be provoked so easily –
“You’re a terrible liar, you know that?”
“Yeah. Been told.”, he sighed.
“Where’re you going?”
“Dunno. Reading Rita Skeeter, perhaps,”, Aberforth had a little laugh on that. “I’ve got a feeling that it might be surprisingly satisfying now.”
“What did my brother do, ey? We’ve heard your cheerful voice coming from the open window.”
“Er – it was open? Oh. Didn’t notice. That’s why she came.”
“Yes, that’s why. So? What’s he done?”
“Well, having been exactly the arsehole Skeeter described him as. And it seems, he finally got it. But in my opinion, he hasn’t understood it nearly as much as he should.”
“What’d you intend for him?”
“Suggested another roommate. Listen, she’d quite likely be fainting there and if I look at that oil mayhem in here, there’s no one left to get help.”
“Alright.”, Aberforth smirked. “See you somewhen, then.”
“Yeah. See you. Second – ”, Harry turned back just when both were about to walk on, “How’s the wing doing?”
“Fantastic!”, Aberforth laughed from the corridor. “Three floors done! See you!”, with a little wave, he disappeared around a corner.
Back in thoughts, Harry stood there for some minutes, apparently blank as he couldn’t remember having continued thinking about anything, before he managed to get moving again. Automatically, his legs brought him on, to a certain portrait he just noticed when it wouldn’t let him through.
“Potter?”, she asked.
“Oh. Sorry – force of habit.”, he murmured and already spun for going downstairs when she called after him.
“If you wish, you may enter.”
A little dumbfounded, he stared at the Fat Lady when her canvas swung aside and revealed the hole. His mumbled thanks waived as he climbed through, he noticed for the first time that the Gryffindor common room had a smell. It had – it’s very own smell. Suddenly he felt like he had returned to something like a home. He was back home, after an exhausting journey that had taken him a year. So many hours which he had spent in that room and he had never noticed it was his home. Tears filling his eyes, they travelled through the cosy red room and he scratched his neck unobtrusively. Deeply in thoughts once more, he waddled over to the sofa in front of the big fireplace – and jumped.
“What the heck – ”, he gasped.
“Harry!”, Hermione moaned, as startled as him.
“Now that’s a surprise,”, Draco chuckled.
“Er – what’re you two doing here?”
“Sitting.”, the girl meant curtly in her charming manner that told him to face up to it. “But what are you doing here?”
“I – er – ”, he sank into the armchair to their left, “I? I – erm – felt the need to yell at Dumbledore.”, Harry gazed at the carpet under his feet.
“So that was you?”, Hermione, snickered. “I wasn’t really sure, you know,”
“Don’t tell me – ”, he nearly cracked his neck at the attempt to look at the window that was in fact open and huffed. “Sure. It’s a bright day. There’s nothing like opening a window.”
“What did he do this time?”
“He – he killed my parents.”, Hermione’s grin was gone instantly.
“Harry?”, she moaned again. “Would you tell us – ”
“It’d be easier if I showed you that first,”, he held up the flask he still kept wrapped tightly in his sweaty left hand, “But I’ll try without. Er – Hermione?”, she had reached into her beaded bag and pulled the bowl she had stored just minutes ago. “Don’t tell me that’s – ”
“A Pensieve, yes.”, she contorted her lips.
“Where have you got that from?”, Harry sat up, having gained interest.
“From Remus.”
“What?”
“Actually, Dumbledore left it for him in a Mokeskin Pouch so the Ministry couldn’t discover it. But he had clearly meant it for me as well. Don’t ask.”, she said quickly on his look. “Though basically, yes, I’ve got my own Pensieve.”
“Since when?”
“He woke me early before Bill’s and Fleur’s wedding to give it to me.”
“So you – had it in there? All the time?”
“Yes.”, she confessed. “Please don’t be angry with me,”
“I’m not.”, he shrugged her off.
“You know, there’s been no need for it and when – you know, I – I just didn’t – think about it – ”
“It’s okay,”, Harry said calm, with a languid frown and she countered with some air sought in and an expression he interpreted quite wrongly. “Really.”, the same was true for Draco’s slight coughing.
“Shut up.”, Hermione murmured subdued.
“I didn’t say anything,”, he eyed her.
“Oh sure,”
“Er – ”, Harry started.
“Nothing. Um, Harry, do you want me to see it or not?”
“Oh – yes, sorry. Almost forgot.”, he handed the flask over to her when she levitated the Pensieve and opened its lid.
“I’ll be leaving then,”, Draco suggested, but Harry stopped him.
“No. I think you know that already anyway.”
“What’s it about, if you think that?”, Draco chuckled.
“I suppose, you don’t fit in there together?”
“No.”, answered Hermione.
“Well, then look at it and decide whether it’s suitable for him as well, I don’t care. I’ll be in the bathroom meanwhile. I need a shower, somehow.”
“Wait, Harry.”, Hermione reached deep into her bag and pulled a big, light blue towel and a bottle of shower gel.
“Damn. I don’t really believe you that you didn’t think of your Pensieve.”, he laughed when taking the things from her. “Ow.”, she had thrown a red cushion at him. “Sorry,”
“Get drowning yourself, honestly.”
The anger from before hadn’t yet worn off completely when he placed his glasses on top of a pile of his clothes, on an old white wooden stool, the paint having pealed off around the edges. Even more, the feeling had come back, now that he was alone in the bathroom. Surrounded by windows, the tiled round bathtub looked slightly tempting from where he stood in half shadow. He had never used it. Six years at Hogwarts and he hadn’t made benefit of it. Not even though he had never been allowed to use the Dursleys’ bathtub. But maybe it was just because of that. He was used to not being allowed. So, ignoring his considerations on the blurred pool some yards away from him, he stepped into a cabin with the bottle of gel in hand and already wanted to shut the curtain when he nearly tripped over upon the startling and spinning a voice had made him.
“Can I – er – sorry. Didn’t mean to – er – what I – er – can I have the shower gel when you’re done with it?”, seeing him slightly blurred as well, Harry listened to Draco’s stammering.
“It’s not mine.”, was all he could get out.
“She gave me – a towel too – when I – asked.”, he could see him shortly lift something big and light blue.
“Okay,”, Harry meant. “What’s the matter?”
“Hmm?”
“You’re stammering.”
“Oh – ”, Draco escaped a clearly embarrassed chuckle. “I just – you know – it doesn’t happen all too often that I see someone naked. Someone other than myself, I mean.”
“Nor do I, but what’s so – ”
“Actually the only ones I’ve ever seen were my parents on occasions, Hannah, you now and – ”, he sighed heavily.
“Not many more than I had,”, Harry threw in quickly. “I never went in here while it was bustling. Just didn’t want to duck away from flying soap, you know? Ron’s been telling me loads of stories about the fun games in here I never really asked for.”
“Imagined him the sort of.”, Draco chuckled again.
“What’s that mean?”
“Oh, nothing.”, he just shrugged, dismissing it when Harry walked over to the stool. “Whataya you doing?”
“You’re starting to hurt my eyes.”, Harry picked up his glasses and put them on, just to see Draco’s normally pale face carry a massive amount of pink and he mentally kicked away the sick image of Umbridge’s favoured clothes that flashed up behind his eyes. “You can have it already.”, he went for his towel and held the bottle towards Draco. “I think, I’ll take a bath. The last I had was in a lake when I jumped off a Dragon.”
His hands quivering a bit, Draco received the bottle and watched him walk over to the bathtub and turn on three taps, filling it with warm water, a low crown of foam growing on the surface. While Harry stepped in, he finally got himself a stool as well and started undressing. Harry had already closed his eyes behind the glasses and leant back, relaxing, when Draco was finally done with folding his clothes. He lifted the bottle from the floor where he had placed it in the meantime and slouched over to the cabin Harry had stood in, but stopped halfway to it, his eyes on the messed, layered black hair that partly shimmered in the summer light, reflecting the blue sky faintly. Much to his discomfort, that silence drew Harry’s attention, making him look up.
“Yes?”
“Erm – ”, Draco curled his lips and stared into space, the towel and bottle limply in hands.
“Are you okay?”, that made him startle from his thoughts at last.
“Er – yes – I just – it’s been some exhausting weeks, you know,”
“Whom you tell. It’s been years, not weeks.”
“Probably.”, unable to revolt against his legs, they brought him over to the bathtub.
“What’re you – ”
“No idea.”, Draco sighed the truth. “I guess, something in me thought that this one is big enough for two.”, he put down bottle and towel on the broad tiled edge and climbed inside, sinking further and further into the soothing liquid and their feet briefly touched. “Oh. Sorry. Not so big, then.”
“No.”, Harry chuckled with a frown, but then gazed out of the windows so he wouldn’t have to look at Draco’s scarred chest, the product of his spontaneous defence little more than a year ago. “What’ve you been doing out there? You and Hermione?”
“Talking.”, it was of course only half of the truth, but it was the truth.
“I guess, it was her idea?”
“Yes.”, Harry nodded stiffly on it, his thoughts drifting off with his eyes over the landscape.
“You know, he wrote my mother a song.”
“I didn’t know.”, the other pricked up his ears. “But yes, now that you say it, he’d have been likely to have done such. If he’d done something, he’d done it thoroughly.”
“I don’t think, she ever got to hear it.”
“I think she had. How did you find out anyway?”
“Hermione’s just watching it.”
“Oh.”
“Do you know when he crashed Flitwick’s choir?”
“Which time? He’s done that more than once, you know.”
“Yeah. I do know. I’ve been there. I’ve seen you. April last year.”
“You’ve – you’ve been there?”
“Under my cloak, yes.”
“Oh god.”, Draco laughed dull. “Yeah. But that’s been rather pleasant, I think. The last time’s been a total disaster, as far as I heard. I’ve never seen Flitwick in such an awful state as on the morning after.”
“He tortured him.”, Harry said earnest. “Verbally and physically.”
“Really?”, Draco’s weary grin faded eventually. “Well, it was – the evening before Hermione’s birthday. He’s not been a bad person, you know. I mean, yes, he might have tortured him – ”
“He has.”, Harry corrected.
“Well, then he has. Sure. That wouldn’t make Flitwick the first one to have experienced it. And he’s killed the one or other as well. But he’s always been on the good side. Some toes in a pot of unscrupulousness, of course, but he’s never been a bad man. As I said, he knew to do things thoroughly.”
“Yes.”, agreed Harry and finally looked at him. “I know. At least by now. Even though Dumbledore didn’t.”
“Tz. Dumbledore. What did he know anyway.”, now it was Draco who stared outside.
“Quite a lot, but as many secrets he kept, as many he missed. Remember the scars on his back?”
“Yes.”
“Did he tell you where they came from?”
“His trial.”, Draco nodded.
“Then I don’t need to explain.”
“Not at all.”
“Dumbledore ordered them to torture him.”, there was a short pause, but Draco nevertheless answered.
“I know. But I didn’t before he did him that final favour. I was too fixated on my – task – anyway as to wonder.”
“You owe me a favour, you know?”
“That is?”
“Well, dunno but – I’ve saved your life twice. It’s two to one for me.”
“Hell,”, Draco groaned, “Why d’you lot always have to count.”
“`We lot´?”
“Oh come on, it’s a saying, isn’t it? If – forget it.”
“So?”
“So what? Are you dying right now?”
“Yes. Dying for some information.”
“About?”
“Guess.”
“No.”
“So you know what I’m talking about?”
“I’m not gonna pass on things he told me in private.”
“Not you as well.”, Harry grunted. “First Dumbledore – well, partly, then Hermione, Ginevra, now you – why am I not allowed to know more than he told me personally? Or – through extracted memories?”
“This time you’re counting right. He’d had his reasons. If you’re not allowed to know more, you’re not allowed. Live with it.”
“I won’t!”
“You’ll have to,”, Draco remained cold.
“He’s given his life for me, if that escaped your notice. Don’t you think, I have the right to know – ”
“No.”, he said serious. “The less we know about a person’s faults, the less will shock us. No matter what Mum knows about Dad, I don’t want to hear any of his little secrets. He might become a better person to me through that, but I don’t want to risk seeing him as something even worse just for the sake of it. The dead can’t defend themselves.”
“I had no idea you were such a wise old man, quoting people at your own sweet will,”
It took them some moments, but they couldn’t resist laughing in the end. Yet it was a quiet and weary laugh they shared. When their chuckling faded into sad smiles that vanished slowly, they just eyed one another for some moments. Then, it was only each of them alone in their thoughts again, trying to avoid the other’s eyes which they found best to be done by either studying the hills in the distance or the bit by bit collapsing foam. Harry unconsciously scratched his neck. That drew Draco’s attention, and thus, Harry’s.
Some more time they just looked at each other, probably waiting for their opposite to say something. They waited so long they already got embarrassed by it. Draco escaped one of those very faint, unintentional chuckles and with a deep sigh, Harry turned his face at the tiles to his right, though not really realising they were there at all. He was too fascinated by the clean grey grouts. The mush that held everything together. Totally straight, neat – flawless to the eye. He was so riveted by them that he didn’t notice Draco having changed his position until he was already very close. Too puzzled, he could only watch him turn and lie down against him, comforting his head at Harry’s left shoulder.
“I hope, you don’t mind,”, he whispered.
“Normally, when wanting to be polite, people ask before they do something another might not like.”
“Sorry. I – ”, he already attempted to raise again, but, not really knowing why, Harry pressed him down by his shoulders.
“It’s – I’m okay with it.”, Harry considered.
“Really?”
“No idea why, but yes.”
“Thanks.”, Draco said when closing his eyes, which Harry couldn’t see.
“As long as you keep your hands to yourself,”
“Sure.”, it was no snap, no harsh word at all, only agreement.
A little dazzled, Harry began to realise what it might be. He had never been in any situation alike, let alone the fact that they were naked or in a bathtub, but he had never comforted anyone like that; not even Ginevra; nor had he ever been comforted in such a way. It felt strange, but somehow good, when he tried to ignore that it was Draco Malfoy who cuddled up to him. Not one of his best friends, not his girlfriend, but a person he had hated from the very first encounter at Madam Malkin’s. That was it, he thought, when his hand glided over to the other’s shoulders, trying to tell himself he only did it for relaxing his arms a little more. Draco was so thin, he actually had no problem at doing so.
So that’s what war does to other people, he heard his own voice in his head. It changed them completely. There was Albus Dumbledore, whom he had always trusted. Within a year he had gone through hating and admiring and hating the dead man so many times, it was a miracle he hadn’t rushed at that portrait and scratched it with the mirror shard, if he thought about it now. And there was Severus Snape, absolutely not the person he had pretended to be either. But he had given him hints – and he, Harry, had done his best to swallow them down and away, because the probable truth might have been incompatible with his opinion of him, an opinion he had built himself in times of utter naivety, when he had been much younger and unaware of how things went in the world. And last, for his current circle of thoughts, there was Draco Malfoy. A little puke who had probably seen worse than Harry could imagine.
Spoilt by his father and pressed into a society that wasn’t good for any child. Fallen into the hands of Voldemort by his father’s obsessions. Sentenced to death if he couldn’t restore his family’s reputation, in a senseless game of a sick man’s spare time fun. Having survived a war, always cornered by the claws of death and shame. And when it all had finally been over, his father had been too ruined by his own failure as to look at himself any longer. So he had thrown Draco in the next pit by leaving him to care for his devastated mother.
Fearing he would see the tears in his eyes reflecting in his glasses, Harry took them off and placed them on the tiles to his left. He had had no idea that the guy in his arms; he had laid his other arm around Draco’s stomach as well now; was such a courageous, tough man. Left alone in a cold world, but now starting to give everything he could to make it a better place. Turning the house he had grown up in into an orphanage, willing to teach before his graduation just to pass on his experience for the benefit of the younger ones, and ready to do his final exams along with it. Trying to reconcile with everyone he had treated badly because he hadn’t meant to bare his weaknesses..
Curling his lips and unable to hold back the tears, Harry closed his eyes, wrapped his arms tighter around Draco, and nestled his head to the other’s, biting down the chuckles his silent crying would cause. But it wasn’t necessary. That he knew by the moment Draco started crying quietly too and placed his hands onto Harry’s arms.
~~#~~