Why Do You Love Me?

“Harry,” Hermione asked once they were all sitting comfortably in Harry and Ron’s shared room in the Burrow. “Are you wearing a glamour because something’s wrong with your scar?”

Harry’s eyes widened and his hand automatically reached up to rub the linen covering his new wound, which, although he could feel, no one could see. “No,” He denied right away, a little too fast for Hermione’s likings. “And I’m not wearing a glamour!” Harry said after a short pause. Hermione raised an eyebrow.

“Is that so? Well then, if it is, I suppose this will just prove your point. Finite-”

“Stop! Why don’t you just believe me?” Harry raised a hand and shielded his face as Hermione cut off the charm right away.

“Harry, I would believe you, if all the facts didn’t point in one obvious direction!”

Harry backed away from her and leaned against the nearest wall for support. “What direction?” He asked wearily, not really wanting to know but knowing that he didn’t really have a choice.

“That you aren’t the same person,” Hermione said grimly.

“Of course I’m not!” Harry exclaimed, eyes gleaming. “Because I didn’t go to the party!”

“No, Harry, I didn’t mean that. You’re not the same person that you were when you left Hogwarts. I want to know why. You were acting sort of off when you were at the party, but that was nothing compared to the way you’re acting now!”

“Please, believe me, Hermione. Please?” Harry begged, and Hermione eyed him doubtfully.

“Harry, I-”

“Hello, Harry!” The door slammed open at that moment, two voices chimed the greeting cheerily and in unison, and Harry sighed under his breath in relief.

“Fred, George! How’re you?” Harry asked.

“Great, mate! And yourself?”

“Uh…good,” Harry said, averting his eyes slightly.

“You’re not pissed at us for not being able to make the party, are you?” George asked.

“Huh?” Harry asked. “Oh, uh…no, of course not.”

“See, George?” Fred asked, prodding his twin in the side. “I knew he’d understand!”

Hermione growled in frustration and pointed her wand threateningly towards the twins, who were laughing with each other jokingly. “If you don’t shut up and let me finish,” She threatened. “So help me, I’ll-”

“All right, all right!” Fred exclaimed, raising up his hands.

“We surrender!” George agreed mockingly, raising his hands up as well.

“Good,” Hermione said, turning back towards Harry. “Now, then. I really wish I could trust you, Harry, but for some reason, my gut’s telling me not to. You understand, don’t you?”

“No!” Harry exclaimed, rushing across the room to hide behind one of the twins. He was too slow.

“Finite Incantatem!” Hermione cried, hitting Harry squarely in the back. Harry let out a strangled groan as one of his back wounds ripped open and he fell to the floor, panting. Hermione looked horror stricken as she looked down at what had once been her healthy best friend.

Harry was thin, his ribs visible through the too big, tattered old shirt he wore that had seconds before looked brand new and form fitting. The shirt was riding up to Harry’s shoulders, and Ron blanched at the sight of the blood trickling down Harry’s back.

Harry stayed on his knees, head down in shame and blood-matted hair covering his eyes which were quickly tearing up. Blood was dripping from the bandage that covered Harry’s forehead, the linen having sucked up the maximum amount of blood that it could hold. “You could have trusted me,” Harry said in a whisper, his voice cracking on the last word. He remained in his position on the floor and flinched away from Hermione when she dropped to her knees, her own eyes flooding with tears.

“Oh, Harry,” She said, tears trailing down her face. “I’m so sorry.”

Harry remained silent and struggled to get away from her when she placed her hand on his shoulder. “Don’t touch me,” Harry whispered, his voice sounding dry.

Ron, having recovered slightly from the sight of blood, looked Harry up and down, eyes wide. “What happened to you, mate?” He asked, unbelieving of the sight of a wounded, broken Harry that refused to go away even after he had tried to convince himself that he was imagining things.

Harry looked up and met Hermione’s eyes, his own eyes gleaming with bitterness. “Nothing,” He said after a long bout of silence. “I’m just a little banged up, is all.”

Hermione’s tears fell at a greater speed and she let out a choked sob. “I’m sorry, Harry! So unbelievably sorry!”

“So, your gut’s telling you to believe me now?” Harry asked, ignoring her apologies. “Why not sooner? Why not then?”

“Harry, you’ve got to understand-”

“No,” Harry said, finally pulling himself up and replacing the glamour. “I haven’t got to understand anything.”

Fred and George glanced between Hermione and Harry in shocked awe. “What’s going on?” George asked Fred in a whisper after a moment.

“I don’t know,” Fred whispered in return. “But I don’t think dad knows, and I don‘t think that it‘s anything good. We should probably tell him or mum. Mum, at least.” George nodded in agreement, and they sneaked off while Harry was glaring heatedly at Hermione.

“I’d like to be alone for a few moments, if you please,” Harry said, his voice cold and eyes distant.

Hermione nodded frantically and when Harry retreated to the bathroom across the hall, she slumped into Ron’s arms and sobbed while Ron glanced at her in confusion.

Harry slumped onto the toilet seat and let the tears that had been welling up fall with a sniff. He didn’t know why he had lashed out at Hermione as he had, but he felt that she deserved it. Even if she had believed him when he had told her what had happened, he knew that there wasn’t much that she could have done to begin with, but it was the fact that she hadn’t believed him that got to him so much.

Hot tears trailed down Harry’s cheeks, stinging his eyes as they were replaced with even more tears that quickly followed, forming a trail down his cheeks that burned. He sobbed quietly, his whole body quaking with the effort that it took, his lungs burning from the loss of air as he held his breath to keep his sobs silent, and the rest of his body aching painfully because of the acceleration of his heart at the lack of oxygen, which caused blood to pulse quickly through his veins and out of his wounds.

There was no pain, though. Not until he was forced to inhale. That was when the pain hit him in waves, crashing over his body and filling him with a feeling that few people could go through without being knocked unconscious. But he was the Boy-Who-Lived; he had gone through pain before. He had been raped before, and it had hurt like hell. Surely this couldn’t be as bad as being raped, could it? As the pain wracked his body, Harry’s mind went to a state similar to that of a person about to die; his life, the bad parts, particularly, flashed before him in dream-like visions as his eyes slowly slid closed.

‘This isn’t so bad,’ he thought finally, as the pain began to overtake his body, pushing everything else to the back of his mind as it forcefully took over his entire being. ‘I can get used to this. I can heal. I’ll be fine.’ As Harry continued to try and convince himself that he would be just fine, the pain slowly began to subside, until it was but a small, painful throb. The blood continued to flow, but the pain wasn’t so bad. Harry could feel a slight tingling in all of his limbs before everything went numb.

Minutes later, or maybe hours, Harry couldn’t quite be sure anymore, there was a loud banging on the bathroom door. Harry slowly opened his eyes and glared at the door as the pounding became more consistent, only adding to the painful throbbing of his head, which was aching more by the second. “What?” he cried out, his voice hoarse from crying. He hardly noticed that, though, as the door slowly swung open and the kind, worried face of one Molly Weasley was presented to him, her lips upturned in a hopeful half smile.

“Harry? Are you all right, dear? Fred and George said you’ve got a few bruises. Do you think I could have a look?” Molly asked warily. She slowly stepped into the room, and Harry eyed her.

“I’m fine, Mrs. Weasley.” He said after a while, his voice monotonous and his eyes empty of all emotion. “Really. They’re only a few bruises, I’ll live.”

“You’re sure? Hermione was awfully worried. Even Ronald seemed a little upset.”

Harry blinked blankly at Mrs. Weasley, his brow furrowed slightly and shiny because of the light sweat that covered his entire face. “You don’t look too good, dear. Do you need to lie down?”

“Uh, yeah, I think I’m a bit sick, actually. You wouldn’t mind if I just skipped dinner tonight, would you?” Harry asked.

“Oh, of course not! I’ll just make you something a bit later and you can rest now. Come on,” Mrs. Weasley extended her hand for Harry to take and looked at him expectantly as Harry eyed her hand. When Harry hadn’t taken it after a few moments, Mrs. Weasley settled for feeling his forehead. “My, dear! You’re burning up. Come, now, let’s get you all settled.” She walked from the room still chattering and Harry followed reluctantly.

…
…
…

“Dad, I don’t want to go there again!” Draco complained as he raked a hand through his hair and followed his father into his study. “Bloody Potter almost mauled me last time I was there.”

“Draco, you’re a wanted man. You’ve ‘killed’ the greatest wizard of the century, you’re a supposed death eater, and you have no where else to retreat to. The Dark Lord can protect you, but when push comes to shove, he always thinks of himself first. I don’t want you to get hurt.” Lucius looked sternly down at his son as he paced in his study.

“And you think I’d be safe at Number Twelve?” Draco asked mockingly.

“Of course you would!” Narcissa Malfoy exclaimed as she followed Draco into Lucius’ study. “Lucius, tell him he would be safe.” Narcissa demanded her hands cocked on her hips as she glared Lucius down.

Lucius sighed. “It will be safest there, Draco,” He said after a few moments pause. “The Dark Lord would be most pleased to find out that you were already spying for him as well, and may wish to give you the Dark Mark earlier than expected.”

“I can’t have the Dark Mark!” Draco said, paling. “I’m on the light side.”

“I know, Draco. But what must be done must be done. Severus has the Dark Mark, I have the Dark Mark. Even your mother has the Dark Mark.”

“He won’t be getting the Dark Mark, Lucius!” Narcissa said as she stalked further into the room and slung her arm around Draco’s shoulders protectively. “We aren’t spying for the Dark Lord; we have excuses for our marks. And Dumbledore is most accepting of Severus and his Dark Mark. As you’ve said, what must be done must be done. But we cannot sacrifice our son in the mean time!”

Lucius rubbed his eyes tiredly. “I know, Narcissa, and for now, The-Boy-Who-Lived is our only hope of survival.” He turned to Draco then and placed a heavy hand on his shoulder. “Draco, you are to stay at Number Twelve for the remainder of the summer. And you will not return to Hogwarts this year, I’m afraid.”

Draco sighed and nodded. After all, what had to be done had to be done.

…
…
…

After snoozing for a few hours, Harry felt awake enough to face the world. What a mistake that had been. As soon as he had left Ron’s room, he was faced with the whole of the Weasley family wanting to know exactly what had happened to him over the summer. But the best part of it was that Hermione was no where to be found, so Harry didn’t have to deal with her.

After a very festive dinner (Harry hadn’t missed dinner after all, that evening) with the whole of the Weasley family (including Fleur, whom was still engaged to Bill, and whom still annoyed the heck out of everybody), they had all settled into the family room to share their stories of the summer, when Arthur giddily suggested that they go to Number Twelve Grimmauld Place right that very instant. Of course, he was a little hopped up on Firewhiskey, but everyone else seemed to think that it was a divine idea (because most of them were hopped up on it, too), so they grabbed all of their already packed luggage, piled into the car that Arthur had borrowed from the Ministry to pick up Harry, and took off.

Of course, when they arrived at Number Twelve, no one was expecting them, so the current residents were a little slow at answering the door. When the door was finally yanked open, it was by a very annoyed looking Tonks, who now had bright, dark green hair (much similar to Harry’s eyes) that flowed over her shoulders and puddled elegantly onto the floor. She was clad in only a very flimsy, light green nightgown, and looked to be half-asleep. The half-asleep look disappeared moments after she found out who was on the other side of the door.

“Remus, you’ll never guess who’s out here!” She called as she ushered the Weasleys, Hermione and Harry into the warmly lit foyer.

“Did they come early? Have they arrived?” Remus had a very excited look in his eyes that quickly died away when he caught sight of the Weasleys. “Guess not. But um…I’m glad to see them, too.”

Tonks shot him a knowing look and Remus blushed slightly. “Hey, I have fantasies, you know!” he said as an excuse. Tonks giggled and led the Weasleys into the kitchen.

“I know,” she said as she disappeared into the kitchen with Molly in hot pursuit.

“Oh, this house is filthy,” Molly reprimanded drunkenly as she swiped the mantle of the fireplace with her finger and held it up to inspect the dust that had gathered there.

Ron stumbled into the kitchen quickly after his mother and yanked open the fridge unceremoniously. “Any grub in here?” He slurred out as he stuck his head into the fridge. A loud rattling sound followed, and Ron quickly fell onto his bum, holding a wriggling jar of something that looked like mouldy pickles in his hands.

Harry seated himself at the table and watched as Ron struggled to get back on his feet and stumbled around the kitchen, shrieking at the top of his lungs. “Get ‘em off, Hermione! Get ‘em off!”

Hermione shook her head scoldingly at Ron and took the jar from him. As soon as it was replaced in the fridge, she spelled the door locked and conjured some food for Ron, who was content to scarf it all down in moments, before belching loudly and giggling.

“What’s all this racket about?” A cold voice asked, and Harry looked to the doorway to find a very unhappy-looking Severus Snape looming there, glaring at Ron, who was still cackling heartily about his quite long and rather loud burp.

Hermione shook her head and sighed. Harry refused to meet her eyes when she tried to look at him, and she sighed again before turning to Snape. “They’re all rather drunk, sir. Actually, the only people who aren’t drunk are Harry, Ginny and me.”

Ginny nodded in agreement and eyed her brother, laughing at his drunken antics (but mostly laughing because he looked like a fool, sitting there cackling away at himself the way that he was. It made him seem rather loony).

Snape eyed Arthur, who was doing a little Irish jig for some reason or another, distastefully. “Drunk?” he asked in disbelief, and Hermione nodded. “How noble of them.” Snape said after a few moments of silence, then he cast a short spell under his breath.

All of the Weasleys stopped what they were doing and looked around dazedly. “How’d we get here?” Mrs. Weasley asked after an awkward lull in sound.

“I don’t know,” Arthur replied, looking around confusedly.

Snape smirked smugly and left the room. A loud ‘ugh!’ could be heard from him as he ran into Bill and Fleur in the hall, half naked and snogging the daylights out of each other. They pulled apart for a few moments, looked distastefully at Snape, then continued as though nothing had happened. Snape scrunched up his face disgustedly and stormed up to his room, slamming the door loudly behind him.

…
…
…

Harry lay slumped in his bed with a snoring Ron laying across from him a long while later. The painting above him snickered slightly and Harry sighed and rolled over. “What do you want, Phineas?” he asked as the portrait continued to make small noises. “It’s four o’clock in the morning; I’d like to get some sleep.”

“Got a big day ahead of you, eh?” The voice of Phineas asked, and Harry sighed.

“No,” he said. “Now go away.”

“Can’t, I’m afraid. Been asked to keep an eye on you after what I saw earlier today at the Weasleys’.”

“By who?” Harry blinked and his brow furrowed, trying to think of who would have asked

“Minerva McGonagall, of course.” He said, his voice holding an air of superiority.

Harry sat up. Of course Minerva would be the one to ask this of Phineas. She was the current Headmistress, now that Dumbledore had been ‘killed’. “What exactly did you see today?” Harry asked suspiciously, glaring at the portrait blearily.

“Oh, not much,” Phineas assured. “Just that you looked a bit worn for wear. The Dursleys give you a hard time over the summer?”

Harry shook his head and clamped his mouth shut.

“Not talking, eh? Well, I see no reason that that should stop me from doing my tasks. Be a sport and wake up that Weasley over there, would you? Oh, what’s his name; Raymond, isn’t it?”

“Ronald,” Harry gritted out, and threw a shoe at Ron, who twitched slightly and snorted before rolling over.

“Ah, yes, Ronald.” Phineas agreed and waited for a response from the red head. “Why hasn’t he awakened yet? I wish to ask him questions.”

“It’s four in the morning!” Harry protested, shooting Phineas a withering glare. “He isn’t going to wake up on demand. Besides, he’s a heavy sleeper. Bother us in the morning.”

With that, Harry slumped back into the bed and yanked the covers over his head. Phineas just snickered. “But it is morning.”

Harry sighed. “You know what I meant.” he said grouchily, rolling over and securing the covers over himself.

Phineas watched over Harry for the rest of the night, but when he began to stir a bit later that morning, Phineas was nowhere to be found.

…
…
…

The next morning as Harry sat at the breakfast table, he didn’t have much of an appetite. His wounds were healing slowly, and sometime in the middle of the night, his glamour had faltered, which worried him a great deal. He had woken up with the covers thrown off and tangled about his feet, his face stuffed into the pillow, making it very difficult to breathe, and his bladder full to bursting.

Ron had already been gone by the time Harry got back from the bathroom, and Harry really hadn’t wanted to go down to breakfast, but he hadn’t really had much of a choice in the matter. Tonks had burst into the room seconds after he had refreshed his glamour and demanded that he go down and see just how much her cooking skills had improved. When he was finally dressed and fully functional, Tonks and dragged him down behind her and piled heaping amounts of food onto a plate she had hastily set in front of him. “You look like you need some fattening up,” she had said, pinching one of his bone-thin ribs (which, to her, were normal feeling ribs which had just the right amount of fat and muscle to make Harry healthy).

Harry had winced slightly, but covered it up with a fake smile. “Yeah,” he’d agreed. “I’m starving, hope you made enough for seconds.” Tonks had beamed at him and walked off, hitting Remus in the back of the head for making faux gagging motions at Harry after he had taken a bite of food.

Harry regretted having told Tonks that he was hungry now, though. His stomach was rumbling in protest at the small amount of food that he had shoved down his throat, and he had been forced to charm more than half of his food invisible in order for anyone to believe that he had eaten at all.

None of the Weasleys had any affects of the alcohol they had consumed the night before; all, that was, except for Ron, who was a first-time drinker and had the largest hangover in ‘the history of the world,’ as far as he was concerned. Snape had told him that it was impossible to feel the affects of alcohol after the hex that he had used, but Ron insisted that he had a hangover, and after thinking about it for a while, began to freak out about Snape placing a hex on him in the first place.

Hermione kept a watchful eye on Harry for the entirety of breakfast. Everyone was surprised when the doorbell rang quite forcefully towards the end of their morning meal, and just to get away from Hermione’s prying eyes, Harry volunteered to answer it. He stalked from the kitchen slowly, taking his time to think over the things that he had put off the previous night, and before he knew it, he was staring at the door.

Draco stared at the door impatiently, and rang the doorbell once again. Why the bloody hell was no one answering? It was nearly eleven o’clock on a nice, warm day, and Draco knew that at least someone had to be awake to hear the doorbell ringing. He sighed in relief when the door was finally pulled open. “Finally,” he grumbled to the person who answered, not even bothering to look up at the man as he reached down and grabbed a suitcase to shove in the person’s arms before levitating his trunk.

He stopped mid-stride when he finally took the time to see who had answered the door.

Harry Potter looked like shite. His hair was rumpled from sleep, his eyes were empty and had no spirit in them, his cheeks looked a little sunken in, there were bags under his eyes, his skin looked sallow, and was that blood dripping from his lip?

Harry could feel a slight tingling and cursed at himself under his breath. His glamour was beginning to wear off.

“What was that?” Draco asked. Harry was thankful that he was finally done staring.

“Nothing,” He said. “It wasn’t anything important, I was just sort of talking to myself, that’s all.”

“Oh, right. Well…are you going to…move aside?” Draco asked after a while, and Harry flushed slightly.

“Sorry,” he said, stepping to the side.

“Who is it, Harry?” Ginny called from the kitchen and Harry cringed. Draco looked at him questioningly.

“Major headache,” Harry explained, and Draco nodded in understanding. “It’s Malfoy,” He called back, and almost the entire household stormed into the foyer in seconds.

“Did I hear you right?” someone asked. “Malfoy?”

Harry sighed and covered his eyes tiredly. Mumbling the words to his glamour softly under his breath and pushing some of his magic out through his fingers, the glamour replaced itself and became stronger in seconds. “Yes,” Harry said finally. “Malfoy.”

The adults gathered around him in moments, greeting him, pinching his cheeks and prodding his body, commenting on how much he had grown since they had seen him last, and other such things adults such as they normally did. Draco withstood the prods to his ribs and the pinches to his cheeks, the tugs on his hair and the such, all the while keeping a close eye in Potter, whom he was sure was going to pounce him any second now.

Upon closer observation, he confirmed that it was, indeed, blood that was dripping from Potter’s lip. But even before his eyes, the blood was fading and Potter’s lip looked good as new. Draco’s eyes trailed up to Potter’s hands, which were prodding into Potter’s eyes at the moment, and he felt the slight tingling sensation that one felt whenever wandless wizardry was performed. ‘Is Potter wearing a glamour?’ Draco wondered to himself. He made a mental note to check up on that later, then turned to the group of adults and greeted them in return.

Draco wasn’t the only one keeping an eye on Harry. Ron and Hermione stood off to one side of the group of adults, with Ginny, Fred, George and Neville standing there with them. Neville and Ginny were directing glares toward Draco (they never had quite gotten used to him the previous year, though he spent most free time with them in the Room of Requirement, learning the newest and strongest techniques of Defense), while Hermione’s eyes didn’t miss a single movement of Harry’s body. She also caught site of the blood.

‘Harry’s magical barriers are weakening,’ she thought in worry. ‘This can’t be good.’

Ron glanced at Hermione out of the corner of his eye and wondered exactly what she knew.

…
…
…

After all of the initial greetings of Malfoy were over with, everyone gathered in the kitchen again to finish their brunch where it had left off. Neville sat by Ginny, who sat by Ron. Ron sat across from Hermione, who had attempted to sit by Harry but had not succeeded because Harry had sat at the edge of the table, and Draco had taken the spot right next to him. So now Hermione was sitting by Draco, glowering and poking at her scrambled eggs.

“You gonna ea’ those?” Ron asked, his mouth already stuffed to the brink with food as he attempted to shovel more in.

Hermione shook her head absentmindedly and looked towards Harry. “Hey, Harry, could you pass the salt?” She asked, desperate to have any contact from Harry whatsoever.

Harry grunted, picked up the salt, and handed it to a bewildered looking Malfoy. Draco blinked, then handed the salt shaker to Hermione, before gluing his eyes to Harry once again in observation.

Harry was pretending to sip on his pumpkin juice and had almost succeeded in vanishing all of his food with his wand from under the table, when he caught Draco’s eyes staring intently at him. “What?” Harry snapped, pocketing his wand and deciding to leave the remainder of his food on the plate. He slammed his goblet of pumpkin juice down on the table a little more forcefully than necessary before turning his glare to Malfoy.

Malfoy just shook his head and looked down at his own meal. Tonks looked down at Harry from her end of the table and smiled proudly. “You’re finished already, Harry?” She asked, her eyes sparkling. “Care for another helping?”

Harry shook his head frantically. “Can’t,” he said after a while. He lowered his hands to cup his stomach and rubbed softly, careful not to touch his bruises. “I’m stuffed.”

Tonks nodded and turned back to her conversation with Snape and Remus. When everyone was finished, Harry stayed at the table and rested his head on it. Everyone else left the room to help Molly get the place back to her standards of clean, and Harry was left alone with Draco, who was still finishing his meal because he had arrived late.

Harry could feel breath on the back of his neck and he lifted his head to glare angrily at Draco. Draco’s eyes filled with an emotion that Harry couldn‘t quite place, and Harry wondered exactly what it was. “What?” He asked after a while.

Draco licked his lips, stood, and said, “Your glamour’s fading,” before he left the room to meet up with everyone else.

Harry blinked, then glared at the empty doorway that Draco had just gone out of. “Hey, Malfoy!” Harry called. He got no response. “I’m not wearing a glamour!”