Not Slytherin (Drarry)

Chapter 24

"What are Dementors?" Harry asked when they were finally in the common room. Draco had asked Professor McGonagall if he could go to the Gryffindor common room instead of his own just this once. She must have felt bad about the Dementors because she agreed, although with a few strict assurances that if they did anything wrong, they would have detention for a month.

"You're asking that now?" Draco asked incredulously.

Harry shrugged. "I didn't want to ask in front of everyone else," he mumbled under his breath, eyes getting a distant look in them.

Draco felt a pang of sympathy run through him.

"Besides, didn't you see the faces Nott was making? He pretended to faint and everyone at the Slytherin table found it hilarious!" Harry yelled, face getting red. Either from humiliation or anger, Draco couldn't tell.

"It's alright." Draco sat down beside him. Harry threw one of his pillows at the wall, not looking at him.

"A Dementor is a creature that sucks all the happiness out of you," Draco started. That got Harry's attention because he stopped taking apart his poor bed and looked at Draco. The red slowly fading away from his face as his eyes got a new glint in them. One Draco recognized all too well: curiosity.

"They're attracted to negative emotions. They don't go after animals, only humans. They feed off the despair that comes off of you. Normally they're kept in Azkaban, but there are stories of the ones that roam free. The Ministry wasn't able to catch all of them, you know?"

"Catch them?" Harry asked.

"Yes, they were found on what would become Azkaban island. On the island was a fortress where an insane man lived. The creator of the Dementors. The only human that the Dementors never tried to kill. He died, but no one knows how." Draco said. Harry was slowly inching closer to him, like a child that was being told an interesting bedtime story.

"Normally, a Dementor would suck out the soul of any human being it came across. But his soul was so tainted that not even the Dementors wanted to take it." Harry's already pale face drained of what remaining color it had left as he gave Draco a look.

"Take your soul?" He asked in a small voice. It sounded so vulnerable that Draco was brought out of his reverie as he stared at Harry in concern. Had the Dementors affected Harry this much in the last timeline?

"That's what they feed on. Human souls," Draco answered. He knew how awful it sounded to anyone who hadn't grown up hearing the stories. The Muggleborns always paled whenever they talked about them.

"If the Professor hadn't been there..." Harry looked away, letting himself trail off. The thought of Harry dying made Draco's blood freeze. Harry couldn't die, he just couldn't. And Draco wouldn't let anyone take Harry from him. Not after all he had gone through just to be there!

"You would have been fine. You had us with you. Weasley would have scared them off with his atrocious fashion sense," Draco said in a tone of absolute conviction. A trait he had picked up from his mother. A tone that left no room for argument.

Harry gave Draco an appreciative smile. It was small but it was the effort that counted.

"Now, enough of the Dementor talk. I'm going to get you some nice chocolate cake and you can tell me what you did over the summer, hmm?" Draco started to get off the bed when he noticed Harry wince out of the corner of his eye. Draco turned back to him with a raised eyebrow.

"Something you want to tell me?" He asked when he noticed the shifty eyes and obvious layer of sweat on the boy in front of him. It was a look he recognized, a look he had seen on Father when faced with an angry Mother. A look he had seen an immeasurable amount of times this summer.