The next day dawned brilliantly sunny, the kind that was almost like a guilty pleasure. So perfect that it can't possibly exist without the threat of a wicked springtime thunderstorm sometime in the near future, when the heat cracks. Harry woke up sticky with sweat, his pajamas tangled around him, stuck to him.
He deliberately turned the shower as cold as it would go, driving the sweat from his skin. Then, clean and shivering, he combed his hair and dressed, not glancing in the mirror at all. He knew his eyes would still be flat and dull, his face almost waxy, like the muscles that commanded his smiles and his frowns had just given up, stopped responding to his commands. Or maybe he'd just stopped trying to command them.
Ron was up, Hermione had promised to help him finish up his Defense Against The Dark Arts assignment. Glancing at Harry as Hermione read over his latest offering for a concluding paragraph, Ron said, "You tossed and turned all night, Harry. Bad dreams?"
Harry frowned. "I don't think I dream anymore."
"You've always dreamed. And they usually come true. What changed?" Hermione asked.
"I did," Harry replied. He didn't elaborate when she questioned him and she gave up far too easily. Homework was a distraction of course. With Hermione, it was always a priority.
They went to breakfast together and Harry made a vague attempt to involve himself in the conversations around him, but he didn't much care for them, or anything really. That is, until a group of Slytherins caused a disturbance by arriving late, Draco leading them. Even then, his interest was brief, his eyes flicking up towards the door and then away a second later. But if anyone had cared enough to look and cared enough to actually see, they may have seen that for half a second at least, Harry's eyes...well, they glowed. Just a little bit.
Harry's first class that day was Divination, and as he and Ron made their way there, Harry was lost. Not physically lost, not even lost in thought, just lost inside himself, in the strange numb darkness that had fallen over him sometime in his sleep a few nights before. If he had the strength, he would have wondered about this darkness. If he had the courage, even. But he didn't. One thing few people ever understood about Harry was that he never chose to be a hero, he was chosen for the role. Courage held by those with no other choice than to be brave is not a characteristic they can claim as their own but one they borrow when the situation demands it.
Almost inaudible above Ron's chatter, Harry became distantly aware of a set of running footsteps coming quickly down a corridor that would intersect perpendicularly with the one he was walking down. He wasn't deeply concerned and did nothing to alter his trajectory, so Draco, who was the one speeding down the hall, could not even give the excuse that it was not him, but the sound of his approach, that saved Harry's life that morning. It was not the sound that turned Harry from his path, because Harry didn't care enough about it to react, other than to raise his eyes and narrow them slightly.
Draco barreled around the corner just as something to the right creaked painfully-the sound of metal fatigue finally overcoming its molecular bonds. The nails that held the suit of armor against the wall where Harry was standing, gave way with a terrible screech.
The armor was huge, and at least six times as heavy as Harry himself, and would doubtlessly have hurt him very much, if not crushed him. He felt nothing more than a brush of cold air as it fell, however, easily over shadowed by the sudden shock to his system when Draco Malfoy slammed into him and knock him down, out of the path of falling armor.
Inertia sent Draco tumbling to the ground after Harry and flipping over him, rolling a few feet away. For a few long minutes, Harry didn't understand what had happened, and then Ron's excited shouting registered.
"God, Harry! That armor nearly fell on you! If Malfoy hadn't run into you -" Sudden suspicion crowded Ron's voice. "Just what were you doing, running through these halls, Malfoy?" he asked, inspecting the armor, trying to find out why it had fallen.
No reason, really, besides old nails and old metal that had for some reason chosen that moment to let go.
But Malfoy, who, Harry decided, after sitting up and looking at him, looked rather winded and startled himself, offered no snappy defense. Instead, he merely scowled and snarled, "I was late for class, Weasley."
Ron decided to let go of his suspicions that the whole thing had been a set up. After all, how likely was it, really, that Malfoy had caused the armor to fall and then felt guilty and saved Harry's life? Had Harry been hurt, then Ron would have had reason to pound Draco into a bloody pulp. As it was, he merely cried, "Cripes, Harry! He saved your life!"
Before Harry managed to get to his feet, Draco had walked away, limping a little, and swearing savagely at once again having accidentally saved Harry Potter from certain death.
It was not to end there, however. Harry had chalked the armor incident up to another one of the strange coincidental near death experiences by lunchtime and had done his best to forget it. There had been no others as of yet, sparing a strange incident in Care of Magical Creatures in which Millicent Bulstrode had handed him what appeared to be a badly-rhymed love sonnet. He had read it and screwed his face up in a rather puzzled sort of expression, put it in his pocket and had forgotten it.
Ron was eagerly filling Hermione in on the armor incident while Harry picked at his food. Not feeling particularly hungry, he made his excuses and rose to leave the table.
"Oh, Harry!" Hermione cried, almost coyly. "You can't leave that." She was pointing to a cupcake gaudily frosted in Gryffindor colors with 'Harry' shakily written in green sprinkles. "It's a gift."
He picked it up doubtfully. "Uhh, thanks."
"Don't thank me, it's not from me," she said quickly. "It's from... a girl we both know." Ron choked a little and Hermione glared. "Not Ginny. Someone else."
"Oh," Harry said, distractedly, trying to pretend he cared. "Thanks. Really. Umm."
He turned to go, nodding at them, still holding the ugly cupcake. Just as he was slipping through the doors, however, Draco and some other Slytherin fifth years were coming in, and Draco smirked cruelly.
"Pretty cupcake, Potter," he sneered.
Harry glanced from the cupcake to Draco's pale face and back again. "Prettier than you," he lied.
Cocking his head, Draco pretended to look hurt. "Really? Even with the squiggly letters and clashing colours? Wow, Potter, if being a sodding hero brings perks like that, where do I sign up?"
"If being a sodding hero were that easy, Malfoy, I doubt you'd still be a stupid, sneering bully. After all, everyone knows you just do it because you're jealous."
"Of you and your cupcake? Hardly." But Draco looked as if his pride had been ruffled, just a little at least.
Shrugging, Harry frowned. "I don't much care. Have it if you like."
He held it out and Draco reacted without thought, taking it. Their fingertips brushed and their eyes met and Harry's sparkled, for just a second, with some indefinable sort of life that had been missing moments before.
"Draco! Draco, no! Don't take it, it's a Love Cake!"
They both turned at the same time to see Millicent Bulstrode standing near the Slytherin table, looking panicked. At the same time, both Draco and Harry's eyes slammed together again, furious silver and flat green as understanding hit them both.
A Love Cake baked by the most ineffective witch of Slytherin could hardly have come out the way it was intended, and even so, death was in some ways preferable to falling in love with her. Again, by accident, Draco had saved Harry's life.
He cursed, savagely, threw the cupcake at Goyle, and stalked out of the room.
After Hermione finished begging forgiveness and explaining that Millicent had only said it was a cupcake and had neglected to mention the whole love spell thing, Harry left the Hall as well, oddly resigned to this new game fate seemed to be playing with him.
He kept waiting to nearly die only to be rescued by Draco. All day, in every class, Harry kept watch for the next accident awaiting him. It was something to pass the time, after all, though he supposed paying attention in class would have been better, given that it was almost exam time and all.
By the end of classes, he'd nearly stopped caring. After all, in his advanced state of apathy towards everything and anything, Draco Malfoy hardly rated more than a few hours worth of consideration.
Late that afternoon, as Harry walked about the grounds enjoying the hot day, he watched the Weapons Club practice on the Quidditch Pitch. The club had been formed to train any student in fifth year or higher in the art of weapons and physical fighting, more because that year's new Defense Against The Dark Arts professor was a professionally trained Master of Weapons than anything. Ron had joined, as had most of the boys in Harry's year and a few of the girls, but Harry hadn't been interested. He'd grown up in a Muggle world of movies full of weapons like crossbows, daggers, and bows. He was here to learn magic, not how to shoot a bow. But still, he liked to watch sometimes, and now, as he did so, he was even more pleased with his idea not to join the club. The day was hot enough without having to move overly much, and shooting bows and arrows looked like far too much moving.
He was lying on his back in the grass, his eyes closed, the heat crawling over his skin like warm fingertips, when the crunching of grass under someone's feet disturbed him and he opened his eyes. A second later, he'd sat up, eyes widening.
"Malfoy."
A few feet away, Draco paused, surprised. That was quickly covered up with a sneer and Draco drawled, "Lying here waiting to ambush innocent students, Potter?"
"If there's one thing I know about you, Malfoy, it's that you've never been innocent."
"Then you don't know very much, do you?" Draco turned to go.
"Wait."
He paused and glanced over his shoulder, the glare of sun off his hair hurting Harry's eyes as Harry tried frantically to remember why he'd made him wait at all. "Well, Potter? If you've got something to say, say it already. It's bloody hot out here, I want to go in."
Harry couldn't think of a thing to say. He didn't have to, honestly, because at that moment, one of the fifth year Hufflepuffs on the pitch slipped as they released an arrow, the bow turning sharply upwards, arrow arcing high. Neither saw it as it sped towards them, until a second before it embedded itself in Draco's arm. Had it been a fraction lower or Draco's arm not been there, it would have hit Harry right between the eyes.
What happened next was too fast even for Harry to register, and the next thing he knew, Draco was on his back, blood pouring from the wound, an arrow still jutting from his upper arm. The whole weapons club was running towards them but they seemed to be coming in slow motion, and Harry was kneeling beside Draco, his shadow blocking out the sun.
For the first time since Harry and Draco had been in the forest together as first years, terror had made Draco's eyes nearly more black than silver. "How... how bad is it?" he whispered, staring up at Harry.
Harry stared at the arrow. "Not so bad."
"Am I dying?"
"I don't think so."
"Good. Because if I died for you, Potter, I'd haunt you forever."
Harry smiled faintly. "I'm sure you would. Do you want me to pull it out?"
"The arrow?"
"Yes."
"Depends. How many more times is my life gonna be risked for yours today? Because at the rate this is going, this might be the least painful way to die."
Harry's smile grew stronger, even as he bit his lip to restrain it. "You're done for the day, I think. Only three, Malfoy."
Closing his eyes, Draco nodded. "Do it then, before I start to cry. It hurts like a bitch. And don't let that fucking Weapons Club see me like this, Potter, or I'll kill you myself."
The Weapons Club still had a ways to go, and Harry nodded. "They're still far away," he said reassuringly, wrapping his hands around the arrow. "Are you ready? I'm going to count to three."
"I'm ready," Draco lied.
"One..." Harry jerked the arrow out and Draco yelped, his eyes flying wide as he started to sit up, his good arm reaching up to wrap around Harry's throat. "Hold still," Harry scolded. "I'll close the wound and clean up the blood, we can tell them the arrow missed."
The idea of saving face before the Weapon's Club was apparently more appealing than killing Harry because Draco fell obediently back into the grass, letting Harry fix his arm and clean it up. When it was done, he got to his feet.
"If you ever touch me again, I'll kill you."
Harry watched Draco walk away, and then turned to face the club. "It missed," he said, handing the arrow to the distraught Hufflepuff archer. "He's fine."
It was Ron who noticed the blood on the arrow and on Harry's hand, but he didn't comment.