A/N- Thanks so much to everyone who has reviewed! Reviews literally make my day. I walk around with a constant smile on my face thanks to all of you!

This is probably about the halfway point through the story, and I’d like to thank everyone who has stuck with it this far! Things should be a lot more fun from now on, so I hope you all continue to enjoy it!

And a few quick review responses...

JaceDamian23: They’re sixth years. And I completely forgot about the complications with illegal spells and the ministry, but I can’t remember if the books specify if the ministry keeps tabs on spells done at Hogwarts. Thanks for pointing that out, though.

LadyLove92: Oh, wow, thank you so much! I’m happy you caught the meaning of the title, too!

laffertyluver23: Yes, Draco is pretty good at restraining himself right now. But you’re right – there just might be a death coming up soon!

Alug-Andaaz-Hai: I just had to have some marriage fluff in the midst of all of the darkness! I’m happy you liked it!

Chapter X

December 1st 1996

McGonagall came by today... making a list of all of those who are going to stay at Hogwarts for the holidays. My name is on that list; Ron’s is not.

I was going to stay. Just for him. I don’t know what to do now. I tried to talk to him about it, but somehow, I lost my temper and we ended up in a bit of a row – I don’t even know if he’ll talk to me now. But nothing changed. He’s going home – I’m going to have to deal with life without him for two weeks. No other Slytherin is staying. I don’t know what I’m going to do. Just the thought of it terrifies me.

January 1997

Saturday

“This way; I left him in Madame Puddifoot’s,” Hermione called over her shoulder to Dean and Seamus. She had found them just down the road from the tea shop, and figured if anyone could assist her in helping Ron back to Hogwarts, they could. She had briefly explained the situation in a frantic, worried manner; and all the other two boys understood of it were the words ‘Ron’, ‘table’, and ‘blood’ - enough to let them know to follow her without question. It wasn’t often that Hermione lost her composure.

They quickly entered the little tea shop, only to find it empty save for Madame Puddifoot straightening up some tables and chairs that had been knocked over.

“He was just here!” Hermione exclaimed, looking around in confusion. She trotted over the table they had sat down at. “He was right here!”

“What happened here?” Dean asked Madame Puddifoot, who had been looking at them curiously.

“Well,” she said softly, her voice as light and sickeningly sweet as the rest of the shop, “I was in the back preparing some nice Treacle Tart when I heard all this crashing and banging and yelling – but by the time I got out here, there was no one around. I expect it was a fight of some sort – they just left this huge mess behind.” She flicked her wand, and the rest of the tables righted themselves.

“Oh, I bet it was Malfoy!” Hermione growled, crossing her arms angrily. “He decided to start picking on us just before we came in here.”

“I’m surprised you got Ron to come in here at all,” Seamus mused, looking around at the tacky decorations. Dean nudged him with his elbow.

“Malfoy?” Dean asked, continuing the conversation with Hermione. “Ron mentioned him the other night... when came back to the dorm in that awful state.”

“What do you mean?” Hermione asked warily.

“No one told you? Thursday night – or early Friday morning, really – he came into the dorm room fully dressed, hair wet, and horribly sick. We tried to get him to go to the hospital wing, but he just wouldn’t listen.”

“He was overreacting quite a bit to us touching him, too,” Seamus added helpfully.

“Quiet,” Dean said, nudging him again, “but yes, he was getting overly upset every time anyone touched him. Then he started yelling about Malfoy. But when Harry checked his map, it showed that Malfoy was in bed. So somehow Ron had managed to convince himself that Malfoy had done something to him.”

“Or Malfoy really did do something, and he just made it back to his dorm really fast,” Seamus cut in.

“Right, or that,” Dean agreed, nodding. “We reckon they set up a time to duel, and Ron was Confunded or – Hermione, are you alright?”

Hermione’s gaze had darkened and she was visibly trembling. “Why didn’t anyone tell me about this?” She asked tightly.

“I guess we thought Harry would tell you,” Seamus said.

“Well he didn’t!”

“We’re sorry,” Dean said sincerely, “but at least you know now, right?”

“That’s not good enough!” Hermione snapped. “Don’t you realise how important this is!? Whatever’s going on between Malfoy and Ron – we have to put an end to it before someone gets hurt!”

“We don’t even know if Malfoy has anything to do with it,” Dean said reasonably. “He’s always been a git. Ron was obviously confused that night; we have no way of knowing what happened.”

Hermione sighed and raked a hand through her hair. “You’re right.” She knew right then that she wouldn’t be able to rely on anyone else to help her with Ron. It was plain to her that Malfoy was behind it in some way, and it was up to her to find out how.

Draco slammed the door to their third floor classroom behind him, stumbling out into the corridor. He was feeling so many things at once; part of him wanted to scream, part wanted to laugh, and part wanted to just throw himself onto the floor and cry until he ran out of tears.

With one hand braced on the wall, he slowly made his way down the corridor. He didn’t know where he was going or why, but he didn’t care. He hardly even realised he had gone anywhere until he pushed open the door to the Charms classroom.

It was empty, of course, since it was a Saturday and majority of the students were still in Hogsmeade. The torch light was flickering wildly above, looking as if it were about to go out at any moment. Draco walked over to the window that overlooked the front of the castle, staring down at the ground. There were two students returning from Hogsmeade. They walked so close together that their arms were in constant contact, and their hands were clasped tightly as they looked through a bag from Honeydukes.

Draco felt a heavy wave of jealousy and anger, and before he even realised what he was doing, he slammed his fist into the window; shattering it. The couple below jumped and looked up in surprise. They saw nothing; Draco had already left the window.

He spun around and slammed his fists down onto Professor Flitwick’s desk, letting out a frustrated scream. It just wasn’t fair. And now, their lack of public contact was causing Ron to lose interest in him. He couldn’t let that happen; he couldn’t let Ron leave him.

“I’ll kill her,” he growled, “I swear, I’ll kill her.”

He had to show Ron how much he loved him; he couldn’t allow that stupid mudblood to take his place. If Ron wanted public affection, that’s what he would get.

“Weasley,” Draco said lightly, almost singing. “You’re mine, Weasley.”

He spun around, laughing, watching the room whirl around him as he continued spinning. He stopped abruptly, taking an unsteady step forward, and then fell dizzily to the floor. That brought him to hysterics again, and he stared up at the ceiling, watching as it seemed to spin even though he was staying still.

“I love you,” he whispered. Blood started seeping through the cracks on the ceiling, dripping down and splashing onto the floor around him.

“Weasley is my King,” he sang softly, staring up at the blood pouring from the ceiling. “He... he never lets the mudblood in, That’s why Draco Malfoy sings, Weasley is my King.” He laughed lightly at the ridiculousness of his altered lyrics, slowly closing his eyes. He continued to hum the ‘Weasley is Our King’ song, every once in awhile muttering a new verse that he made up.

When his eyes finally opened again, he had a twisted smile on his face. Blood now coated the walls in the room, oozing down and pooling on the floor. And suddenly, Ron was there, kneeling next to him, stroking his hair with fervent adoration.

“I love you, Draco,” he whispered, his voice light and beautiful as if from a far off dream. “You’re my world. I don’t know what I would do without you... I’ve never known anyone who needs me like you do.”

Draco closed his eyes once again, surrendering to Ron’s caresses. Ron’s loving words continued to wash over him in soothing waves, nearly lulling him to sleep. Every few minutes, a disjointed verse from the newest version of ‘Weasley is Our King’ would escape unnoticed from Draco’s lips, but he otherwise remained silent.

“I’ll never leave you,” Ron continued, carefully tangling his fingers in Draco’s hair, “no matter what happens, you’re the only one I could ever love. I’d kill for you, you know that right? You’re mine.”

Draco’s eyes flickered open, and he gazed up at Ron once again. Ron’s face was slowly morphing; his soft features becoming sharp and pointy, his sparkling, happy eyes turning vicious and grey. A smooth smile still remained on his lips, but it now looked more menacing than loving.

“If I ever see you look at anyone else, I’ll kill you,” Ron went on, tightening his hold on Draco’s hair and giving it a sharp tug.

Draco growled, pushing himself up onto his elbows. “Ron, stop it.” He meant for it to come out firmly, but his voice was shaking.

“You’re just my little porcelain doll, aren’t you? You’re mine to break whenever I choose.”

“Stop,” Draco snapped again, pushing himself away from Ron. Ron must have let go of his hair when he wasn’t paying attention, as he easily escaped. He pushed himself up against the bloodied wall, gasping with fear and shock when he felt the blood seeping through his clothes and pouring over his body.

Ron slowly made his way over to Draco, walking on his knees. His hair was slowly becoming lighter, switching to strawberry blond to finally, a blond so light that it was almost white. By the time the transformation was complete, one Draco was kneeling in front of the other, and they stared at each other in silence.

The Draco who was leaning up against the wall was shuddering with fear, his eyes darting around the room, searching for an escape. “I’m not going to hurt him,” he said defensively.

“Of course you’re not,” the other Draco crooned, stroking his face with a chilling affection. “That’s why you almost killed him today, isn’t it?”

“I – I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Draco whimpered, pushing back against the wall as far as he could, willing himself to be swallowed up in the blood.

In an instant, the other Draco’s hands were at his throat, squeezing tightly. “Seem familiar?” He demanded, his voice almost at a yell.

Draco coughed and writhed, knowing there was no way out. He was already pushed painfully up against the wall, and there was no breaking out of the other Draco’s tight hold on his throat. The other Draco pulled him forward by the throat slamming Draco’s head into the wall, and yes, suddenly it all did seem very familiar.

“You love seeing him this way; don’t you, you sick fuck?” The other Draco snarled.

Draco shook his head, his mouth gaping, trying to deny it. His world was dimming, and he couldn’t bring himself to believe that he had Ron in a similar position not ten minutes ago.

“He looks so beautiful when he writhes, doesn’t he? Can’t you see he loves it? He doesn’t push you away. He loves you more and more every time I hurt him.”

“I don’t-” Draco managed, his voice barely loud enough to hear.

“This is how you left him!” The other Draco growled, finally releasing him. Draco fell to the side, crying softly, fighting the blackness that threatened to consume him.

“I don’t want to hurt him. It was an accident,” he whimpered, “I love him; I love him so much.”

“And that’s how I’ll leave you,” The other Draco finished coldly, as if Draco had never spoken. He stood up and made his way across the room, pausing when he reached the door. “Don’t worry; I’ll take care of Weasley.” He turned around to look at Draco one last time, but the room was empty.

He had been alone all along.

He stared at the empty room for a long moment, making sure everything was back to normal; no blood, no Draco huddled against the wall; just the empty Charms classroom. As his eyes scanned the room, he was vaguely aware of the room getting darker. He glanced up at the torch, just in time to see it flicker and die.

Harry was quickly becoming bored of lounging around in the common room. Somehow, when he had originally planned this with Hermione, a day all to his self seemed like a lot of fun. But now he was just out of his mind with boredom.

In actuality, he and Pansy had finished their essay in class so they wouldn’t have to spend any extra time together. But when he and Hermione had scripted out their excuse for him to stay, they decided that the only logical reason would be the Potions essay. He had actually been a little concerned that Ron would know him well enough to see through a homework excuse, but Hermione was so intent on going on a date with him that she gave Harry no choice. In fact, from the very beginning, she was the one behind all of Harry’s attempts to push Ron in her direction. Harry actually had no idea that she was even remotely interested in Ron until she started telling him to have Ron ask her to Hogsmeade. He couldn’t help but feel a little jealous. But if Hermione would be happy with Ron, there was really nothing he could do but try to help her.

After scanning through his Quidditch book for the fifth time, Harry had just about had enough. If he didn’t get out of the common room that very instant, he was going to lose his mind. He threw the book down onto the table - where it skidded to a stop perilously on the edge - and he stood up, stretching languidly.

After leaving the common room, he hesitated for a moment, unsure of where he should go. Without Ron or Hermione around, there was nothing really of interest for him to do. He could go to the library... but the only reason he ever went there was because he knew he would almost always find Hermione. When she wasn’t there, he usually just goofed off with Ron – they would go wherever they wanted, do whatever they wanted.

Harry started walking aimlessly down the corridor, continuing to think about Ron. Ron had been so different lately; so withdrawn. He wasn’t exactly fun anymore. He was always zoning out, skipping meals, and hardly responding when spoken to. But he was still sick, wasn’t he? Harry frowned. He wished there was some way that they could have convinced Ron to go see Madame Pomfrey. He did seem to be feeling better, but something just wasn’t right.

After an eternity of roaming around, Harry somehow ended up on the third floor. There wasn’t exactly much for him to do there unless he wanted to visit the Trophy Room for the millionth time.

He walked slowly down the corridor, pausing for a moment when he saw the statue of the humpbacked witch that would take him to Hogsmeade. He could sneak around in his invisibility cloak and see how Ron and Hermione were doing, but that would mean having to go all the way back up to the dorm to get his cloak, and he just didn’t feel like doing that. He continued on, turning down the Charms corridor.

That’s when a brilliant idea hit him. He could sit around in the Charms classroom for awhile, looking out the window that overlooked the front of the school, waiting for Ron and Hermione to return. Maybe he could even get Dobby to bring up some sandwiches. It would be relaxing, and a nice change of pace from sitting in the common room all day.

He quickly reached the Charms classroom, and just as he reached out to open the door, it opened seemingly on its own accord. Harry jumped back in surprise, startled to see Malfoy come storming out of the room. He bumped into Harry as if he didn’t see him, then froze.

Malfoy turned ever so slowly to face Harry, a strange look on his face that Harry had never seen before. He looked dark, sinister, but oddly blank. For a moment, it almost seemed like Malfoy didn’t recognise Harry at all; Harry could almost see his brain working, trying to figure out what had happened. Then, finally,

“Potter,” he spat.

“Malfoy.” It came out sounding more wary than Harry would have liked, but he was completely flabbergasted by Malfoy’s unusual display of emotions. “What are you doing here?” he added quickly, hopefully in a more vicious tone.

“I’ll answer that when the Charms classroom becomes your private property,” Malfoy said flatly, pushing Harry out of the way to continue down the corridor.

Harry glared after him, seething, momentarily wishing they were eleven years old again so he wouldn’t look completely undignified by throwing a fit and screaming about how much he hated that stupid, pointy faced git. But, alas, he was sixteen; much too old for temper tantrums. So instead, he took a deep breath to calm himself, then continued into the brightly lit classroom.

He took a careful look around, wondering what business Malfoy could possibly have in a classroom on a Saturday. Nothing really seemed out of place; one of the panes on the window was broken, but nothing else.

With a disinterested shrug, Harry grabbed a chair and pulled it over to the window, settling down to watch the activity below. A small crowd was coming back to Hogwarts while a few students looked like they were just leaving, but no one Harry particularly cared about.

If he were a little more observant, or paying just a little more attention, he would have noticed the splatters of blood on the broken window pane and the blood smear on Flitwick’s desk.

“Where do you think he is?” Dean asked, “Back at Hogwarts?”

He, Hermione, and Seamus had left Madame Puddifoot’s and did a thorough search of Hogsmeade. Once he and Seamus had become convinced that Ron wasn’t even in the village anymore, they forced Hermione to stop the search for just a moment. They were currently huddled up at a small table in the back of the Three Broomsticks, sipping on butterbeer.

Hermione shook her head sadly. For once, she was at a loss. “I don’t know how he would have gotten back. He was hurt, you should have seen him, he could barely stand.” Despite being certain of Malfoy’s involvement, she also knew it was very unlikely that Malfoy carried him back to the school.

Seamus drained his third butterbeer, watching their exchange. “Ron’s definitely not around here, though,” he said seriously. “We searched everywhere – twice!”

“Maybe we should go back,” Hermione said softly, not even bothering to hide her defeated tone. “I just... I don’t want to accidently leave him here; hurt and possibly unable to walk, stranded in some alley where no one will find him...”

“We’ll find him,” Dean reassured her, “If nothing else, when we get back to Hogwarts, we can have Harry check his map again for us.”

She nodded distractedly, “Yes, good idea.” She set down her unopened bottle of butterbeer – which she had been rolling around in her hands simply as a distraction – and stood up. “Let’s go.”

Dean quickly followed her out of the Three Broomsticks, as did Seamus, as soon as he swiped her butterbeer from the table.

Ron stared down at the bags Draco had brought from Hogsmeade, unable to work up the will to even touch them. After he had recovered from Draco’s assault, his eyes had landed on the bags, and even though he thought he had finally exhausted the last of his tears, a whole new flood of them somehow emerged again. The guilt was unbelievable. Even though he knew it wasn’t his fault, that Draco was just overreacting, he couldn’t help but feel horrible when he saw this testament of Draco’s love for him.

But more than that, it hurt more than anything to think that Draco, who loved him so much that he would organise a shopping day in Hogsmeade for him, was just as likely to hurt him as he was to shower him with affection.

So here he sat, his hands resting over his mouth and half of his face, trying to hold back the last of his tears as he stared down at the bags. He didn’t want to touch them, much less open them. But he couldn’t just stay in that room forever; he had to get back to Gryffindor Tower, and that meant taking the bags with him.

Slowly standing up, Ron took a deep, shuddering breath, coughing slightly. He could do this. Just as long as no one was around, he was sure he could make it. All he wanted to do was get back to his dorm and take a nice long nap and try to pretend that this whole day was just a terrible nightmare.

He took up all the bags in one hand, surprised and feeling another sting of pain in his heart when he felt how heavy they were. Drawing on his last bit of Gryffindor courage, he steadied himself, wiped the stray tears off of his face, and slowly pushed the door open. After a careful look both ways down the corridor to make sure he was alone, he stepped out of the safety of their classroom, closing the door behind him.

The walk back to Gryffindor Tower had always been a fairly long one, but now it felt like an eternity to Ron. His whole body hurt; his leg was horribly sore, burning and stabbing with every step; he still felt a light twinge of pain every now and then from the rape incident; and his throat and chest continued to ache from Draco’s attack. As he started up the countless flights of stairs, he could hear his breaths coming out in low, pained wheezes.

Even so, he couldn’t hate Draco for what had happened. He could barely bring himself to be angry. He loved Draco so very, very much. Nothing could ever change that, especially not this little fight. They would make it through, they always did.

Fortunately for Ron, he didn’t run into anyone on his way to the Tower. A few portraits questioned his wellbeing, but they were ignored. He only spoke once, and that was to rasp the password to the Fat Lady. She looked at him in concern, but said nothing as she allowed him into the common room.

Ron tucked the bags from Draco under his bed, determined not to open them. Once they were well hidden, he grabbed an overlarge Chudley Cannons t-shirt and his longest pair of pyjama bottoms (that were still way too short) out of his trunk, then went to the bathroom to inspect his injuries.

He was working on pulling off his jumper when he entered the bathroom, but froze as soon as he saw his reflection in the mirror. His throat was swollen, red and bruised, and there were deep red marks running down each side where Draco had dug in his nails. Ron stared at it for a long moment in horror, fighting back the tears that threatened to overwhelm him once more. He hadn’t realised how fortunate he was when he hadn’t met anyone on the way to Gryffindor Tower; his jumper didn’t hide anything.

Finally breaking his stare, he turned his back on the mirror so he could change clothes, and then left the bathroom without a second glance at the mirror. He started to just throw himself into bed and fall asleep, but he quickly realised something had to be done about the marks on his neck. He returned to his trunk, this time digging out his hideous, bright orange turtleneck that his mother had knitted him a few years ago. He never wore it; it was no secret that he hated it. The sleeves probably only covered about three quarters of his arms. But he had no choice, it would cover his neck, and that’s all that mattered.

He crawled into bed, bringing the turtleneck with him, then securely closed the curtains. He put the ugly old garment at the end of his bed for easy access when he woke up. Once everything was in place, he curled up under the blankets, making sure they were pulled up high enough to cover the marks on his neck just in case someone opened the curtains to check on him, and then, he slowly drifted into a fitful sleep, tears trickling unnoticed from his eyes.