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“Avoiding your lover boy?” Pansy asks as she takes a seat beside him in the courtyard.
Draco isn’t surprised by her appearance, he’d heard her coming, but he still tenses slightly at the question even as his words don’t match the reaction. “I’m rather certain I don’t have a lover, despite what you constantly try to claim.”
With all her usual judgement she raises a brow at him, “of course you don’t Draco, because you’ve become horribly self deprecating this year, despite somehow managing to get your paramour’s attention, well beyond his standard obsession.”
“Pansy, I love you, really, but can we not do this?” Draco requests with a heavy sigh.
“You got into an argument with Harry, didn’t you?” She’s asks plainly instead.
“We had a disagreement,” he offers.
“Are you going to tell me what about or am I meant to guess?” Pansy asks, leaning back against her hands on the wall's edge.
Draco rests against his knees, drawn up on the wall, legs to his chest. “It requires context…”
Pansy is quiet for a long few moments, “would it be better if Blaise was included in this conversation?” She says it like she knows whatever he has to tell them is something he’d rather not have to repeat. “I’ll be right back, hopefully he hasn’t jinxed Harry just yet.”
“Pansy!” Draco shouts as she runs down the hall, but only gets a laugh in response before she disappears around the corner.
The courtyard is quiet – expected seeing as most of the school is in the Great Hall for dinner, or already retired to their common rooms. Draco doesn’t settle in the quiet though, his mind much too loud for that. He knows this could blow up in his face, that telling Pansy and Blaise of his furry little secret could very well end their friendship. He’s reasonably certain they won’t tell anyone, that even if they shun him they won’t out him. Maybe he’s being too hopeful with that, but they’re his friends, whatever oddness or familial situations have caused a separation, that hasn’t ever truly changed. He has to trust them.
It isn’t long before he can hear the distinct sound of Pansy’s low heels against the stone castle halls, Blaise’s hushed tone, just far enough he can’t entirely make out what he’s saying. Soon they round the corner, whatever conversation they had on the way here over. Blaise’s dark eyes flick around the courtyard, the quiet halls surrounding it, as if checking for anyone listening in.
“Happy to inform you that your lov– sorry” Pansy gives a teasing smirk, “that Harry was left in perfectly fine condition, those lovely curls of his just as artfully mussed as they have been since Hermione managed to get him to care for them properly, nothing out of place, promise.”
Draco chooses not to dignify her comment with a response, may that be because he’s not certain he could manage any of their usual banter with the increasingly horrible scenarios of how this confession ends playing in his head – well no one needs to know that. He turns to face them properly, pushing his hair back a bit to meet their gaze. His expression must not hide his apprehension as well as he’d like, or they just know him much too well because he sees Pansy’s sharp but teasing expression soften, while Blaise purposely relaxes his stance as he nears more properly.
“I assume this is going to explain whatever’s been going on with you this year?” Pansy asks, her tone void of any bite, blunt but out of respect, they don’t actually have to play games with each other. Blaise doesn’t say anything, which isn’t entirely surprising, just a slight nod in agreement with his girlfriend.
“It goes without saying, but what I’m about to tell you is not to be repeated. Whatever your opinions I–” He takes a breath, his fingertips hovering at the edge of his left sleeve, “expect that I can count on you to keep this discrete.” He rolls his sleeve, but his eyes don’t leave either of them. Pansy tenses the moment he begins, but as skin marked with deep scars instead of black shows he finds confusion then, relief. Blaise is different though, his expression stays neutral throughout, his eyes barely stay on his arm a moment before he looks at Pansy, searching? He’s checking her reaction. He quickly pushes his sleeve down again, though Pansy’s eyes don’t leave his now covered arm. “Well clearly one of you had an idea,” he says looking at Blaise. The comment finally gets Pansy to stop staring, brown eyes shifting to the wizard next to her rather than at Draco’s sleeve, the confusion of before returning. This finally gets Blaise to tense – Draco’s not entirely sure if it was his words or her gaze that caused the reaction.
“I’ve had some suspicions, we do share a room, did.”
Blaise does something that surprises him more than him knowing ever could, he sits next to him despite the likely confirmation of his suspicion.
“Is anyone going to explain or am I meant to guess?” Pansy questions, unable to help her natural bite with the question.
Draco almost wishes Blaise would have just told her before, but of course he’s a good friend, “it is your secret,” annoying though seeing as he would rather anything else than actually say this out loud.
“At Voldemort’s order, Greyback took quite a bit of pleasure in forcing his horrid curse upon me,” he explains, the words like acid on his tongue.
Pansy doesn’t react for a moment, processing his words. He watches the moment the information sets in, how her eyes widen. Blaise has himself between them before any words can be said, or any curses can fly. “Blaise,” she says with a shake to her usual bite, he’s blocking Draco’s view well enough with his back that he can’t see the dark haired girl’s expression. He’s seen enough though, the immediate rush of fear at such a reveal.
“Don’t do something you can take back Pansy,” Blaise warns with a tone that’s pleading more than anything else, though his shoulders are squared, shielding Draco from her. Several moments pass with their standoff before Blaise speaks again, “walk away, please.”
“Blaise, you can’t be siding with a–” Pansy doesn’t finish her sentence, not that she needs to. Creature. Monster. Werewolf. It doesn’t really matter which it was meant to be. Draco can’t see whatever silent conversation goes on between them in the few moments that pass, but he knows that it happened. Eventually Pansy steps back, “I can’t,” she says, walking away before either of them can say anything.
Blaise doesn’t move from where he’s standing for a while, long enough for Draco to manage getting something out, “you should go after her. I’m fine.”
“She won’t tell anyone,” Blaise says in lieu of a proper response.
“Probably not,” Draco agrees.
Finally Blaise turns to him, and Draco watches as he slips his wand back into the pocket of his robe. He hadn’t realised Blaise had pulled his wand, that he’d actually pulled his wand on Pansy.
“I’m sorry,” he sighs, “Blaise I don’t wan–”
“You don’t have anything to apologise for. I’ll talk to her later.” Draco just nods, deciding not to argue with him. “Does anyone else know? Well besides… you know.”
“Luna, Hermione, Harry, and Weasley – the one in our year,” he explains, clarifying a moment later, “that’s in order. I’m not sure if Theo’s been told; doesn’t seem like it.”
“Who told Weasley?”
“I did, it was easier.”
“For you or them?” Blaise challenges slightly. Draco doesn’t answer beyond a non-committal hum. “I’ll assume those first two sorted it out themselves?”
He nods in confirmation. “How long?”
“A bit before winter holiday, at first I thought… but that didn’t seem right, the rumors it won’t take.”
“Never got the chance to find out, not that I would want to – still would have of course, wouldn’t have been a choice,” he leans against the inside of the alcove, the cold stone grounding him a bit. “Despite–” he gestures to himself, “this is probably better.”
Blaise nods, maybe in agreement, maybe just acknowledgement, Draco isn’t in the head space to figure it out. “So, what’s going on with you and Harry? I heard something about you having a falling out?” He doesn’t say it, but he knows Pansy told him.
“He wants to help me,” Draco sighs.
“That’s vague…”
“Hardly, as far as he’s concerned I should air every bit of dirty laundry to Dumbledore and hope he takes pity on me, as if that man isn’t–” Draco just puffs out a breath, not like Blaise disagrees with his distaste for Dumbledore. “Threw it in my face that I had gone to him earlier in the year– don’t look at me like that– as if it mattered. He’s under the impression that I signed on, did you think you would not be required to earn it?” He bites out what Dumbedore had told him at the beginning of the year. “It was foolish to seek his help, I’ve seen what he does with his pawns.”
“So now you’re avoiding Harry instead of talking about it,” Blaise states.
“If he wants to talk he can come find me, he has managed to follow me around for years just fine.”
Blaise chuckles, “you know you two are impossible right? If it makes you feel better he was moping at the Gryffindor table, and no one’s risking sitting in your spot.”
“I don’t have a spot, Blaise.”
“Sure you don’t, and if you go into the Great Hall right now there certainly won’t be a seat open for you right next to one Harry Potter,” he says with a raised brow.
“He’s been avoiding me all week, he doesn’t want me there and without him I won’t be welcome.”
“Fine, then continue your moping here if that’s what you’d prefer. I for one have a paper to finish so I’ll leave you to it. Please, do try not to ruin this for yourself though.”
A few minutes after Blaise’s departure he finds himself at the open doors of the Great Hall, his gaze focused entirely on the Gryffindor table, on more specifically the empty spot next to Harry, well mostly empty, Draco recognises the wand even from here.
He should go over, let whatever disagreement they have settle, figure it out later, or maybe just forget it. If he was a braver man he would, he’d take his saved place, and fall into the banter that has grown to include him at the table of lions. He’s not like them though, so he stays at the entrance of the Great Hall, watching for a long while as people filter in and out. He’s not sure how long he’s stood there before he notices the eyes on him as well, though not the green he expects, when he scans the room to find who it is he locks eyes with a familiar brown, Pansy flinches from his notice. Her reaction is enough to get him to turn on his heels. He’s not like them, any of them. Not anymore.
And if come morning he has fresh cuts where that cursed bite is concealed by layers upon layers of scars, well that’s no one’s business but his own.