Black Truth [READ DESCRIPTION]

chapter twenty-seven

Chapter Twenty-Seven: Letter in Blood

As the first week of February started, Hermione rolled into studying-for-exam mode with a relish that Harry and Ron wouldn't even try to match. They suffered in silence through her insistence that they create study-guides for themselves so that they could prepare for the exams that were only months away. Ron, on Wednesday, was persuaded to start his own list of things to study. Harry believed this was not for the good of his exam grade, but for the good of his budding relationship with Hermione. Harry, of course, was safe from Hermione's cajoling. He would merely say that Draco had them covered.

And Draco was also studying, although a whole lot more passively than Hermione was. His idea of studying involved going over the material a little each night before bed until the exams actually came, instead of constantly working to re-memorize everything in one sitting at the library. Of course, Draco didn't care if Harry studied or not. But since Draco and Hermione never compared notes on Harry's study habits, he slipped through as if exams were the months away that they were.

Harry was getting used to Draco falling asleep after he did, the light from the blonde's wand slightly illuminating the room.

"What is it tonight?" Harry asked as he slid into Draco's bed.

Draco looked over at Harry's bed on the other side of the room and then at the boy next to him with a strange expression. "Potions. I'm reviewing Dragon's Bane. Why are you over here?"

"Well, I thought there was no real point in getting into different beds anymore." Harry shrugged as if it were obvious. "We're going to end up in the same bed by morning anyway. Besides, if I'm over here I can hear you read out loud."

"And why would I read out loud?"

"I noticed that your mouth moves when you study things, as if you're speaking them. Since it's something like Potions, I figured you could just read it out loud and then I could listen until I fall asleep."

"You think you'll fall asleep while listening to potions ingredients?" Draco asked, amused.

"Well, if it weren't for Snape, I'd gladly sleep through the morning Potions classes."

"Fine. Get comfortable then."

Harry found it a lot harder to fall asleep than he thought. It was relaxing to listen to Draco's voice go over something that he was interested in. And while Harry felt the tug of sleep overtake him, something in Draco's voice always seemed to call him back to what the other boy was saying.

Draco was slightly surprised when Harry sleepily asked him to go over what he was explaining again. After a moment's pause Draco repeated the steps to adding the powdered leopard canines while stirring the potion, first clockwise four turns and then counterclockwise five turns. Harry nodded sleepily and Draco continued with the instructions, surprised that Harry was actually listening.

Ron grumpily surveyed the headlines of the Daily Prophet, noticing that an attack was once again the highlight of the day. Wordlessly, he passed it to Hermione and proceeded to pay complete attention to his eggs as if they were the cause of the constant flow of things that he should be sure to remember for such-and-such exam that came from the brunette next to him.

Hermione didn't even look at the headline, passing the paper to Harry as she continued her explanation of the second Troll and Goblin war.

Harry looked over the headline with a frown. Another attack. Blocking out Hermione's explanation of the Troll leader whose name he couldn't hope to pronounce, much less spell correctly on an exam, he began to read the description of the attack. An orphanage had been attacked. Over one hundred muggle children, about his age and younger, had died. No one had yet been able to find out how the orphanage had been attacked, the building had been burned to the ground before anyone had seen the Dark Mark in the sky. Voldemort wasn't hiding it now, Harry thought. It's obvious now that they're Death Eater attacks, but there's still no point. The orphanage had been a few miles outside London, and other than the sheer horridness of it, Harry could see no other gain that this particular attack gave Voldemort. Maybe that's the point, Harry wondered, as he put the paper back down on the table. He doesn't have to do these attacks, and yet he's going to do them anyway to show exactly how powerful he is.