Everything Black | Harry Potter

16. Harry and Draco Fuck with Dumbledore

There's a strange juxtaposition, an oxymoron if you will, concerning the concept of Occlumency. On the most basic level, it involved clearing one's mind — "empty yourself of emotion, Potter!" — to prevent a Legilimens from perceiving one's emotions and thoughts.

The more advanced Occlumency, according to Harry's handy-dandy 'A Guide to Occlumency', involved 'suppressing only the thoughts, emotions, and memories that would contradict whatever it was an Occlumens wished a Legilimens to believe'. In simpler terms, the point is to produce an artificial mental layer; to totally throw off the perspective of whoever was peeking into your mind into thinking that said layer is the legitimate one, so you can hide all the things you don't want them to know as a layer deeper within.

It would be an understatement to say that Harry found Occlumency difficult. It was like telling him not to think of a pink elephant – of course he was going to bloody think about a pink elephant! Everyone knows that deliberate attempts to suppress certain thoughts just make them more likely to surface!

But Harry digressed.

Despite initial trepidations, he had been making some decent headway. While he was no-where near the level he needed to be to prevent any sort of invasive attack, between Draco's tutelage and setting aside time to meditate every other night, he'd somewhat managed to calm his mind. Enough so, at least, that his thoughts weren't spilling out for all to hear. Enough so, that the nightmares seemed a slice less extreme upon waking. Enough so, that he could confidently stand before Dumbledore's probing eyes and not mentally blurt out all his deepest secrets.

"Lemon drop?" Dumbledore offered the two boys.

They politely declined.

That night – or rather that very early morning – had seen Draco dragging a barely conscious Harry back to his dorm after he sent the signal. Quirrel a pile of ashes, Voldemort gone and Dumbledore undoubtedly on his way, the two had made themselves scarce. They had no intention of dealing with either the headmaster or the entire school body knowing of their escapade. Too many eyes, too many questions, too much scrutiny. Harry had lived through it once before and had no intention of living through it again, especially now that he had something to hide.

Hence why, for the most part, Harry and Draco endeavoured to leave as little physical and magical evidence when going through the 'challenges'. They'd barely even touched the first four rooms, breezing through them leaving nary a footprint (quite literally in the chess room's case). The troll of course was a surprise, but its injuries will easily be laid at Voldemort's feet. By making their own fire resistance potion, there was next to zero proof that anyone else had been present in the chamber. It had been a clever detail admittedly, Snape making sure that the potion only had enough solution for two people to pass through the flames.

Too bad it had been made completely redundant by a spot of good planning.

In short, Harry and Draco had created a fool-proof plan to fool a previously thought-to-be fool-proof trap.

So yeah, as he stood before Dumbledore Harry was confident that even though they were clearly under suspicion for the moment, he and Draco wouldn't – couldn't – be linked to the events of that night.

Nervous, yes (those twinkling blues will always make him nervous), but confident.

Harry gave himself a mental shake as Dumbledore sighed, calmly pulling himself away from the events of last night and focusing on the now, allowing himself to pull vague confusion and innocent nervousness to the forefront of his mind, hopefully creating a thin smoke like layer of protection between the headmaster and his more damning thoughts.