Chapter 9
He wished he hadn't drank the last vial of the Sleeping Draught as he tossed and turned in bed, thinking about Potter and Granger getting reprimanded by Professor McGonagall.
It wasn't his intention to let it happen - in fact Draco wondered just how strangely warped the events from his past had become.
The outcomes barely changed even when he inserted himself into the picture.
Dragons and serpents filled his dreams that night, dancing in the air and under water in complicated loops and twists.
It reminded him of rare glimpses of a familiar selkie's performances in the lake.
Snakes, perhaps that was a clue his mind subconsciously came upon somewhere between his obsession with researching time turners and teleporting abilities of magical creatures.
Draco woke up late in the afternoon, with a crazy plan.
He spent the day finishing all homework, and playing chess against Crabbe, Goyle, and Pansy, intent on avoiding leaving the common room.
The House Elves were kind enough to leave snacks around most nights, and his mother sent more than enough sweets to stave off hunger for a single day, so he had everything he needed to survive.
When night eventually fell and everyone headed to bed, he put on Potter's Invisibility Cloak and snuck out.
The Restricted Section was laughably easy to access, with no traps or wards to mind even at night.
It was a wonder most students didn't sneak in there at some point, he thought.
Not everyone had as great of an interest in dark or powerful magic as Draco.
He looked around - there were countless familiar titles, some of which he knew from the Manor library.
A barely noticeable noise in the distance startled him from simply standing around and enjoying himself.
Now he had to rush. He quickly gathered the small pile of books he had listed on an unsigned permission slip, and as an afterthought quickly grabbed a dusty, ancient-looking book with serpent imagery embedded into its leather.
He began non-verbally shrinking the books to fit them all in his bag, but his hand was shaking from nerves. It was taking much longer than he would have liked. The library was eerily quiet. Suddenly, someone dragged him back by the collar.
"It's much too late to be catching up on homework, Mr. Malfoy." Severus Snape whispered, somehow sounding more scary than if he shouted. "What makes you think you are above my authority. How dare you go behind my back to do something I've expressly fobbidden!"
He was dead, he thought. He was absolutely not making it back to his friends. Severus looked ready to have Draco expelled.
If you just signed the permission slip I wouldn't have to resort to this, he thought, but didn't dare say that to an already fuming Snape.
"I thought I made myself clear, but this should get through this thick skull of yours. Fifty points from Slytherin, and detention."
"Fifty?!" Draco was glad it wasn't expulsion, but he didn't think the Head of Slytherin would want to hurt their chances of winning the House Cup this much.
"Would you prefer a hundred?" Severus picked up the crumpled book list and checked his pile, equally frustrated and impressed to see some of the books shrunken to less than a quarter of their original size.
"No... sir." Draco supposed he should have been patient until Severus gave in and signed the permission slip, instead. How was he going to keep researching if the books he wanted were out of his reach? He didn't know what other teacher would allow him access before their O.W.L year.
They walked in tense silence all the way down to the dungeons, where Draco was reprimanded once more. He tried not to be visibly upset when Severus finished by calling him a disappointment and walked off with a swish of his robes.
Once he was alone in the common room, he checked for Potter's cloak. It was right where he stashed it when he reached the library. At least he didn't create another reason for the Gryffindors to blame him.
He shook a small book out of his sleeve.
If Snape noticed him smuggling it out, he would have been in a lot more trouble, but it worked.
It was thinner than many tomes he had read in the past, but had an elaborate leather cover.
Draco wiped off heavy dust obscuring a title: 'Dunamis Apo Thusia Ofios'.
A book on ancient blood magic, obtained through sacrificial rituals with snakes, he understood from a long paragraph on the first page.
Flipping through its contents showed a number of gruesome diagrams.
Draco supposed he ought to read it eventually, considering the price he paid to obtain it.
"Another bad night?" Theodore asked him on their way to breakfast the next morning.
"You could say that, I was up reading."
"If only Greg and Vince absorbed an iota of that dedication to studying of yours, they'd be set for N.E.W.T.S." Zabini cut in, pretending he didn't push Crabbe and Goyle aside to get close.
"It's good to hear you hold me in due esteem," Draco joked.
"If you let me copy your Herbology essay, I'll hold you in even duer esteem," Zabini flashed a charming grin that betrayed his vanity.
For peace of mind, Draco reached into his bag and handed over the scroll. Being in good graces of a few Slytherins would also help him, once they worked out who lost so many points overnight.
"Make sure to change the wording. If you get caught, you're going down alone."
"...That easy? Are you finally admitting we're friends?" He poked Draco on his cheek.
"Get lost before I change my mind."
The four Gryffindors he kept getting entangled with sent him dirty looks across the Great Hall all through breakfast. He wasn't sure whether it was Potter or Weasley who seemed more furious.
He carefully folded a note, asking them to meet him at one of the nearby classrooms after breakfast, and sent it flying across the hall.
"I see the team is whole again, you must really enjoy being almost completely obsolete, Weasley." He said when they arrived. He didn't know why he couldn't control his vitriol when it came to these people, but he wasn't in the mood for being nice after the night he had.
"Shut up, Malfoy." Weasley's fists shook beside him.
"What do you want, haven't you done enough?" Potter asked.
Draco only pulled out the Invisibility Cloak and threw it at him in reply. Granger and Longbottom exchanged an exasperated look with almost coordinated sighs.
"How could you leave them to get caught like that? I bet you're so happy now." Weasley huffed in annoyance.
"Come on, Ron," Granger placed a calming hand on his shoulder, making him visibly relax. "It was our fault for forgetting the cloak."
"He probably hid it from us." Potter didn't back down.
Longbottom didn't say anything, but it didn't stop him from looking doubtful and betrayed. Draco wondered if the Gryffindors blamed him for getting a Slytherin involved. It almost made him want to take responsibility.
"I got them up to the tower without any problems. They got sloppy on their way back." He looked him directly in the eyes. Something in Draco needed him to believe his good intentions. "I did my part of the deal, Longbottom."
"You could have stopped us from leaving. If it wasn't on purpose, what took you so long to catch up?" Potter relented somewhat.
He couldn't exactly explain his ritual of remembering Dumbledore's body falling from the tower, or imagining what it would feel like if he fell that night, instead.
"Don't pretend you would've listened if I tried. It's not my fault the only thing between your ears is hot air. Honestly, I expected Granger to remember it. She is the only one with brains in this group of yours, after all."
The young witch looked puzzled, as if she couldn't decide between being angry or strangely flattered.
"Besides," he continued. "Once I noticed your cloak, I ran after you. It was too late to help."
The Gryffindors stood in stunned silence. As he took his chance and briskly walked away, Longbottom jogged up to him.
"Malfoy... thanks," he smiled widely. "I should've known you'd keep your word. I'm glad you didn't dob them in, and you tried to help too!"
Before he knew what was happening, they were shaking hands. Draco really didn't know how to deal with this unexpected connection with Longbottom. Out of all people at Hogwarts, it seemed preposterous for a child of his aunt's victims to put so much faith in him.
In a convenient turn of events, Draco found a good opportunity to avoid troublemaking, famous Gryffindors and their friends.
Theodore decided to take him up on the offer of teaching him some advanced spells.
That Monday, they started off with a couple trickier second year charms. While Theodore picked up the engorgement spell within a half-hour, the freezing charm proved more difficult for him.
"You know, something's been bothering me since Christmas," he said while they took a rest. Draco shook little snowflakes from the spell out of his hair before they started to melt, and raised an eyebrow. "What possessed you to tell your parents that Granger's a mudblood? And then defend her, too?"
"I wasn't defending her specifically."
"It sounded like it was important to you. That they knew she's muggleborn."
Draco wondered at the attitude, and his own defensiveness at the line of questioning.
Why wouldn't Nott be confused by another descendant of the Sacred Twenty-Eight suddenly raising someone muggleborn to their level.
He had outright challenged the claims of blood purity of most of his housemates in front of their parents.
The fact remained that the longer he thought about everything he was told about pureblood superiority, the more cracks showed in the beliefs held by his family for centuries.
Draco could hardly fathom they could all have been wrong, and felt there was some truth to their axioms he was missing.
After all, a system which led to two wars couldn't possibly be built on such shaky foundations.
Perhaps the cursed time travel he was struggling to escape was in fact a well-concealed gift of hindsight.
"Well, it would have been a terrible idea to pretend she wasn't. Can you imagine if they assumed the Grangers were a pureblood family from abroad, like the Burzynskis?"
They both admitted the situation sounded rather funny in theory.
"Honestly, I don't see the problem in acknowledging her blood status.
She is, after all, the closest to my marks.
Don't you think most of us scoring worse than a muggleborn is more damaging?
Why would you lot struggle keeping up with her if we're not equal?
" Draco took in a deep breath and smirked with unearned confidence.
"I don't need such excuses to prove superior - and I won't fail. "
If Theodore ever had these thoughts cross his mind before, it didn't stop surprise showing on his face as he nodded. Draco wondered if he would be as baffled if the roles were reversed. Would he have accepted a shot at his beliefs or rejected it with sarcasm and anger?
"So, are you trying to be friends with the Gryffindors? I heard you've gone off with them a couple times." He changed the subject.
"Not in this life," Draco almost made himself laugh. "They're just as obnoxious as ever."
"What's the deal then?"
"Just... satisfying my curiosity. You have to admit, mocking idiots and the occasional jinx aside, the Slytherin House hasn't been even remotely engaging this year."
"You're telling me out resident bookworm wants more excitement?" Theodore was getting swept up in the amusement.
"Believe me, we really need it. You lot aren't even exceptionally dull - that would be too intersting."
Theodore laughed, and set them both off into a fit of giggles. Somehow, despite the initial tension, everything turned out fine. When they finally calmed down enough to cast again, the spell held out a little longer than before.
Over the following couple of days, Theodore followed him around, constantly complaining that he wanted to learn something outside of the curriculum.
Something advanced. Draco had to give in when Crabbe and Goyle begged him to make Nott stop freezing their shoes and socks every morning. It was rather amusing, Draco thought.
He spent most of that time deciding what spell would be difficult, but achievable for a twelve year old. On Thursday, just after their last lesson finished, they walked to the edge of the lake and lit a small bonfire of a pile of twigs and broken branches.
"I'll show you how to make butterflies out of vapour from smoke." He explained as they warmed their hands.
In their lessons with Professor McGonagall they never turned an object in one state of matter to another - it was much more difficult than regular transfiguration.
But they did begin learning about it in Alchemy.
Draco remembered his passion for the subject trying to draw him away from the Vanishing Cabinet, especially after he found a number of interesting theory and spell books in the Room of Requirement.
The spell he chose was the easiest he knew, as both the vapour and a butterfly shared a connection through the element of air.
He cleared his throat and with unnecessary flourish released a kaleidoscope of amber-hued butterflies from the smoke above them.
Draco watched his friend struggle, and pointed out the mistakes ruthlessly for at least an hour afterwards.
He intended to keep his promise to not give up until Nott got it right.
"I broke into the restricted section at night, and got caught." He blurted out as the fire crackled with Theodore's another attempt, staring far across the surface of the lake. "That's why we lost so many points."
"I know." Came a calm reply. Theodore stopped casting to talk to him.
"You do?"
"We figured it out. To be honest, we thought it'll happen sooner or later considering how many books you've been getting through.
" Draco wondered which other Slytherins have been paying as close attention to his free time as Theodore.
Somehow they managed to be both endearing and annoying in equal measure.
"Don't tell me there's a betting pool." Draco cringed at the thought.
"Not until now. Thanks, Pansy and Blaise will love that idea."
"Don't you dare even think about telling them."
"Tell me what you're researching, and I'll forget all about it." He offered.
"Or I could just threaten you to be quiet. I know quite a few powerful hexes."
"I don't think it wouldn't stop me for long, and we both know you like my company."
Draco groaned in frustration. The git wasn't entirely wrong.
"...Time manipulation, mostly."
Theodore's eyes shone in excitement. Draco knew he was interested in working on magical objects before, but he never realised how early that passion began, or that the objects had anything to do with messing around with time.
"Can I see your notes?"
"No."
"Come on... I'm your best friend."
"That's Pansy."
"I'm your favourite male friend?"
"At this point I'm even willing to consider Zabini before you. Or Longbottom."
"Please? I'll owe you a favour." Draco pretended to consider it, knowing that it was already a lost cause now that Theodore was interested. He should have lied about it.
"You'll owe me ten."