Harry's new owl didn't come back for a few days, and when it did, he awoke to it sitting atop its cage, staring at him expectantly.

He had left the window slightly open for her, but he hadn't quite expected a return to go quite like this. It had seemed more likely a few days ago that there would be more kicking and screaming.

He put his glasses on and sat up, staring at the owl. "I need to get you a name, huh."

She made a demanding screech.

"Right, yeah, I'll feed you something. Haven't got anything for myself either, hold on."

He got himself washed up and dressed, and then went down to the Great Hall, with the owl huffily following behind.

It perched on his shoulder just before he entered the Great Hall, digging its claws in through his cloak. "Thanks," he muttered. Real nice bird.

He took his regular seat beside Draco, at the end of the table, and Draco glanced up from reading the Daily Prophet as the owl fluttered off of his shoulder to perch on the back of his chair.

"Who is this?" he asked Harry.

Harry reached for a piece of bacon and tossed it at the owl, and she eagerly snatched it up. "Dunno."

Draco set down the paper fully and gave him a dubious look. "You...don't know? You just have some random unexplained owl following you around?"

Harry rolled his eyes as he started to fill his plate. "She's mine, Hagrid gave her to me for Christmas, she just hasn't got a name yet. Dunno what to call her."

"Hmm." Draco looked back down at his paper and picked up his toast to take another bite.

They ate in companionable silence for several minutes before Draco suddenly said, "Ceridwen?"

"Huh?" Harry asked.

"You wanted a name."

"I didn't say you could name it!"

"Well I don't see you doing it," Draco said reasonably.

"I— S-Speckle. I'll name her Speckle or something, look at her, she's speckle-y."

Draco grimaced. "Oh, Harry, that's absolutely horrid. Amarantha? That's a pretty name."

"Why do you insist on giving her a weird pure-blood name! She could be a— a Caity or something!" Harry had to admit to himself, though, that that sounded weirdly human in an uncomfortable way.

Draco huffed exasperatedly. "You named your first owl Hedwig!"

"I got it from a history book!" Harry defended.

"And so what's wrong with having another old name? Iolanthe. Or how about Saphronia?"

"How do you even come up with all of these names?"

"Made to study family trees growing up," Draco dismissed lightly. "A lot of them. Don't worry, I'm avoiding ones with...associations."

"Well that's...good to know? I guess?"

"How about Corisande? Or Apollonia?"

"I don't fucking know! Which one do you think is good?"

"Hmm..." Draco stared at the owl for a long time. "Saphronia means wise, so that would be rather fitting for an owl, but she does have those eyes too, so Apollonia wouldn't be bad either. Though maybe it's hubris to name something after a god. I wouldn't know." He finally turned his eyes to Harry. "You choose."

Harry sighed and glanced back at the bird. "Fine. Saphronia. I don't hate it."

"A ringing endorsement," Draco said dryly.

"Well that's all you're getting."

"I'll take it."

~*~

When classes began again, Harry welcomed it. As nice as the break was, he tended to get antsy without something to do, and he had, admittedly, kind of missed his students too. Even some of the more obnoxious ones.

He threw himself back into teaching with gusto, and was happy to note that his students seemed to be enjoying what he came up with — something that he certainly did not let slip by unsaid to Draco. Their rivalry returned with a passion, and they often stopped by each other's classes at the end of the day or during free periods to brag. Strangely, though, Harry noticed students starting to hang back more and more frequently when lessons had ended and they came to talk to each other. It didn't really seem to happen when Draco wasn't there, or on the rare occasion he was talking to another teacher, and something about it all just seemed odd to him, but he didn't really know what to make of it.

By the time February rolled around, the rest of the staff were avoiding them more avidly than ever, and Harry knew that they were probably being absolutely insufferable, but what else was he supposed to do in his spare time? Chat about the weather with Filius? He and Draco argued round and round in circles, but it was more like a game at this point, and Harry wasn't even quite sure what winning would look like.

It seemed, though, that every degree the staff inched away was another degree the students inched closer, lurking around them increasingly after classes and in the corridors, and now even the ghosts and portraits seemed to be intentionally lurking.

Maybe that part was in Harry's head, but he swore he had seen several of the same portraits following them through the frames down the corridors, and seen Nearly Headless Nick and The Fat Friar more than once looking suspiciously unassuming nearby in places they usually weren't. It felt like there were often some sort of eyes trailing along behind them in a mighty convenient manner as Harry and Draco good-naturedly poked at each other's teaching methods nowadays. Draco would probably tell him there was no such thing as coincidence, but Harry would like to not deal with whatever strange happenings may or may not be causing several heads at all of the tables to whip in their direction any time one of them laughed at mealtimes. It was much easier to believe it was in his head.

Unfortunately, as much as he would like to believe, he had never been good at leaving things alone, and the curiousity rattled in the back of his mind like a particularly insistent visitor disapproving of the deadbolt no matter how much he tried to ignore it.

Still, he tried to focus on other things instead, as if he could outrun the mystery, and did his best to try to keep planning interesting lessons for his students instead of worrying about what they were occupied with in their spare time. Valentine's Day was coming up, and it was a great opportunity for a topical lesson. Not only was a holiday lesson fun, but that made the students more excited and interested. Sometimes it made them feel like they were veering him off topic and getting a break from the real learning, and if Harry could trick them into learning things and enjoying it without noticing, then he would damn well do it.

On Valentine's day, he would be having second, third, sixth, and seventh years, so it was easy to split his seasonal plans into two: one for the upper years, and one for the lower years.

With the second and third years, he'd go over sirens: what they were, their distinguishing characteristics, and how to protect and defend against them.

With the sixth and seventh years, though, the lesson would be a lot more interesting, and he was excited for it. He was going to go over objects cast with a Dark infatuation spell.

The complexity of this lesson was fun, because he got to go over refining their Dark magic detection spells for the intended effects of the cursed object, and the differences in effects between a magical or Muggle person coming into contact with it, as well as how to counteract those effects.

And then there was the rest of the curse-breaking, too — how to tell what types of spells are best to use for what types of curses, the difference between trying to break a curse on an active versus inactive object, what to do if breaking the curse is connected to the wellbeing of someone under the effect of it, what to do if a curse-breaking spell backfires, and so much more. He wasn't sure he'd have time for it all in just the one lesson, but he might very well continue it over a few lessons if it seemed worthwhile.

He certainly hoped they'd be as excited for it as he was, because his inner Hermione was thriving.

~*~

Draco had found Harry's enthusiasm for holiday-themed lesson plans irresistibly infectious, but then when he'd sat down to think about it, all he could think was that this was a terrible idea.

Love potions, especially around adolescents, were always awful, and Draco wasn't one for entertaining much frivolity in his classes in the first place. Merlin, what would such a thing do to his reputation?

Yet, here he was, nonetheless. Because...he didn't actually know why. He just kept thinking of the way Harry had lit up talking about it, and maybe part of him wanted to make Harry smile like that. For some stupid bloody reason. One that apparently involved subjecting himself to teenagers making love potions and probably trying to sneak them out of the dungeons like the horrible little pubescent gremlins they were.

Draco sighed heavily and gave his sixth year class a flat look. "I have decided to participate somewhat in the festivities today, perhaps against my better judgement. I am trusting that this group is mature enough to handle it — do not make me regret that trust," he said, in a rather Snape-like dour voice.

The class perked up, excited.

A Slytherin raised his hand. "Are we doing love potions, sir?" he asked eagerly, apparently too excited to wait to even be called upon.

"Yes," Draco said, already cursing himself for bringing this woe upon him. "We will be experimenting with a very low level love potion. We will be brewing them so that the effects last for a much shorter time than usual, and trying them out during class, because you will absolutely not be taking any out of this dungeon. You will be graded on if they work and if the effects don't make me dunk your head in a cauldron of cold water. Don't test me — I don't care if you fancy someone in the class, you will be making it at a reduced potency, as instructed."

Excited whispers erupted around the room. He truly hoped this class could handle it; they were a small one, even with all of the houses combined. Draco only accepted the highest O.W.L. marks for Advanced Potionmaking.

Draco sighed and began his lecture. "There is actually no clear line between what constitutes a love potion versus an affection potion, or even a lust or libido potion (although those two will certainly not be involved in the potion we are making today), and I think today's lesson will illustrate why classification can be a tricky subject, particularly when it comes to potions that affect emotion and behaviour.

"What we will be brewing today will be a modified version of a love potion, but won't have the intensity of effects usually associated with love potions — which, you should all know by now, is a misnomer anyway. No potion or spell can induce love in a person. They can, however, create positive feelings, obsession, and lust. Different potions balance those effects in different ways, but ultimately the naming of one potion versus another can be somewhat arbitrary."

Draco directed his wand toward the board, where the chalk began writing out in neat cursive:

Obsession = Love Potion

Positive Feelings = Affection Potion

Lust = Lust Potion (more feelings-centred) or Libido Potion

"Generally, however," he continued, "the more a potion falls to the side of inducing obsession, the more likely it is to be dubbed a love potion. The more it falls to the side of inducing lust, the more likely it is to be dubbed a lust or libido potion. And between those, the distinction is again blurry, but the more it's centred around feelings or a particular subject, it tends to be more likely to be considered a lust potion. If not, it tends to just be called a libido potion.

"Affection potions are more often a classification based on what they aren't, however. A lot of potions induce positive feelings, but is that their primary effect? Next, is it primarily focused around a particular subject?

"Those two are absolute — if a potion has another primary effect, or just gives a person a positive feeling in general, not toward anything, it can't be an affection potion — but then there are the more subjective questions, which may also have to be asked about love, lust, libido, or other types of potions that feel like they are somewhere between classifications. How similar is the potion in terms of ingredients and process to other potions? Are those potions all in a particular category? Does the amount of difference between the potion's effects feel like it supersedes the amount of similarity in their makeup? And, most vague and subjective of all: does it feel like it fits one label more than another?"

Draco flicked his wand at the board again, and the old chalk was erased, before a basic love potion began to write itself out down the left side of the board.

"So, you may see now, why there isn't always a clear answer as to what a potion should be identified as. If you create a new potion and ask three different Potions Masters what it should be classified as, based on its makeup and effects, you may very well get three different answers, depending on what it is. What we are making today could be called a love potion, or could be called an affection potion, and neither would be definitively right or wrong, but knowing that now gives you a better idea of what to expect both in terms of how we are going to make it, and what the effects will be."

The chalk finished writing out the instructions and set itself down with a click, and Draco fixed his students with a hard look.

"Now I'm just going to warn you. I haven't had to say this before, because I'd like to believe none of you are stupid enough to go feeding any of the dangerous potions we learn about to anyone, but I know love potions are disturbingly popular and readily available. We do not have a separate Ethics Of Potions or Ethics Of Magic class, and I would not have the patience to teach it if we did, but you should not, under any circumstances, use a love potion on someone, unless they for whatever reason agree to it. I know they're sold in joke shops, but they're not a joke, and they're not a game, and they can have very dangerous side effects. When I was a student here, someone nearly died because of a love potion — not Amortentia, just a run-of-the-mill owl order love potion that, predictably, caused erratic behaviour and almost led to his death had a bezoar not been handy."

Draco pointedly chose not to mention that it was his own fault more than that silly little Romilda Vane's, as, if he hadn't been trying to poison Dumbledore, Weasley never would have been in danger. The point still stood.

"Furthermore," he continued, "those of you who go into Potions as a career path will find that, whilst Amortentia is certainly different from most love potions, it isn't especially so, and the difference between most things is less than you think. The use of Amortentia is illegal for very good reason. A child born of it cannot feel love; The Dark Lord was born from it. But you may eventually come to find that that law is all but meaningless for a multitude of reasons. Not only is it laughably easy to just brew whatever you want yourself, but anyone could also just sit down and decide to make a potion that isn't Amortentia, not illegal, but nearly or just as strong, with possibly the same or worse side effects.

"The laws regarding potions are essentially arbitrary and meaningless to a Potions Master, but this is why you must learn, when you begin to advance to higher study, to govern yourself. The question should not be 'can I make it?' or 'is it legal?', the question needs to be 'is it ethical?'. If you want to brew something just to see if you can or what you can create, that can be a dangerous game, but I won't pretend I don't know it's inevitable at some point, so the question then needs to be 'if it would be unsafe or unethical, how do I prevent anyone else from having access to this potion or my notes, what can I use to safely test the effects if not myself, and how do I safely get rid of it afterward so that it cannot be used?'. If you can't do those things, you don't brew it.

"Because, the more things you learn, and the more skilled you become, the more responsibility you have to ensure you're using that knowledge and skill responsibly, and the more you must take time to question whether the things you take for granted as normal and acceptable are actually justified. If you remember one thing from today, please remember that. It's important to question things, and just because they're normal to you and the people around you does not mean they're right.

"I'm sure it does feel tempting to some people to use a love potion. It probably feels like the end of the world now if the person you fancy doesn't fancy you back, or you can't be sure, but honestly you likely won't even remember in five years, and I'd imagine, were the tables turned and someone you didn't like used a love potion on you, you'd find it incredibly violating. So just deal with it like everybody else."

He roved his eyes over the class again, and they merely sat there, silent and solemn.

"Is that understood?" he asked.

"Yes sir!" they all hastily agreed.

"Good," he said, turning away toward the board with a brisk nod, and picking up the chalk by hand to draw a line down the middle of the board, before writing: Proposed Changes across the top of the other side, in the same neat, flowing script as before.

"So. With that said, based off of your knowledge of love potions, their common ingredients, and how those ingredients, as well as the ones in this one tend to interact, can anyone tell me one possible way we might reduce the potency of this potion?" he asked the class, setting back down the chalk, and turning to face them once more.

A Slytherin girl slowly raised her hand.

"Yes, Miss Coppard?"

"No pearl dust?" Valeraine suggested.

"No," Draco said. "I see what you were getting at, I think — it's not a bad line of thinking. All the common love potions have pearl dust, Amortentia has pearl dust. That's the common ingredient, so maybe if we took that out and just used some of the various contributing ingredients we could make something closer to an affection potion...? But no. Amortentia's recipe is so different from other love potions, yet has this commonality precisely because you need pearl dust to create a love potion. In fact, affection potions and lust potions all have pearl dust too, which I believe speaks to some of the overlap we previously discussed. Some of the libido potions don't, so that's another good way to quickly tell the two apart, but with this recipe," he gestured vaguely back toward the board, "if we tried to omit the pearl dust, we'd either get some sort of mood-boosting potion, an inhibition-lowering potion, or a very nasty poison if we were unlucky, depending on what other decisions we made."

He gave a small, wry smile at the surprised looks on several of the students' faces. "It's wise to always keep in mind how easily things can turn into poison or just useless rubbish if you're not paying attention. You'd think you lot would have learnt that by now, after the incident with the toxic fumes in November. Not to mention whatever else you surely saw happen to your more hapless classmates in the last five years."

He looked over the class, many of whom were still hurriedly scribbling notes on what he'd said about the pearl dust and potion types. "Anybody else?" he asked.

A Hufflepuff boy raised his hand hesitantly.

"Mister Byrne?"

"Would using...rose stems, or maybe rosebuds instead of rose thorns and petals help?"

Draco smiled. "Excellent! Ten points to Hufflepuff. Care to explain your reasoning?"

"Well— Er—" Ciaran stuttered. "I know people aren't supposed to know the recipe for Amortentia, but I wasn't looking on purpose, it was just in Moste Potente Potions when you gave me a slip to study it for—"

Draco waved his hand to dismiss it. "It's fine, it's fine, plenty of people know what goes into Amortentia. It can be useful knowledge. Just, as I said, don't feed it to people."

Ciaran nodded vigorously. "Well, you just mentioned the differences between Amortentia and normal love potions, and I remembered that it uses rose tea and dried, powdered rose petals, on top of the rose thorns, whereas most regular love potions just use fresh petals, or fresh petals and thorns. The stem is a lot less...magically charged part of the plant, and a rosebud is less mature, so I feel like it stands to reason that it would have some similar effect, but not make it nearly as potent."

"That's exactly right," Draco praised, flicking his wand back toward the blackboard again to direct the chalk to write: Substitute fresh rosebuds for other parts.

He saw Ciaran give a small, pleased smile. Good. He was much too hesitant for all the brains he had in that Hufflepuff head of his.

"If we're just using rosebuds, though, whilst that does a good job of lowering the potency, it also leaves another potential problem open. Can anybody tell me what that is?"

Two hands shot up, and Draco smiled internally, very pleased with his students. He had confidence in them; they were a very smart group.

~*~

Harry's sixth year class came in very excited. He had been incredibly pleased with the lecture on sirens he had gone through with his third years and both classes of second years this morning, and he was eager to go in depth on the infatuation spell now.

"Alright! We're going to talk about some seasonally appropriate stuff today!"

The students who had just been in Potions compared Professor Malfoy's reluctance and Professor Potter's exuberance toward the Valentine's Day lesson plans, and a few of them exchanged smirks, suddenly connecting a few dots for themselves, blissfully unaware that their beloved Defence professor hadn't intentionally tried to sway the Potions Master into a seasonal lesson at all, let alone forcing him into it with some sort of special relationship privileges.

"We're going to be talking about more cursed objects, but specifically those with Dark infatuation spells on them!" Harry started excitedly.

A Gryffindor girl raised her hand. "Sir? We did love potions in Professor Malfoy's class. Are love potions and infatuation spells related?"

Harry smiled widely. "Did you? Brilliant! Yeah, they can be. The spells we're talking about today are Dark magic, and there are some potions that cause infatuation or other similar states that involve similar Dark spellwork in the brewing process. Usually those ones are intended to cause a deeper and longer term change than your average love potion."

"Do they cause nauseating peppiness?" another Gryffindor mumbled in the back.

His friend smacked him. "Let him be happy today!" he hissed back, too low for Harry to properly parse.

Harry was confused. "No? Or, it's not impossible, I guess, but definitely not usual. Why?"

There were a few titters amongst the students at the way the comment flew completely over Harry's head.

Harry frowned. "They really aren't to be taken lightly — just like with most Dark magic, there's a good reason it's not looked well upon. A normal love potion can create an obsession, but it needs to be redosed often, and these... Not only do they not need to be, but they do more than just create an obsession.

"There are, unfortunately, several different Dark potions that would generally fall somewhere under the category of 'infatuation' that involve spellwork either during the brewing, after the person has ingested it, or both, and there are even more spells with no potions at all. Either way, they're very complex, like a lot of the Dark magic you run into will be, if you go into curse-breaking or the Auror corps, or anything else that heavily requires Defence Against The Dark Arts.

"A usual love potion produces infatuation, or even obsession, but these can do so much more."

The students listened intently, looking morbidly fascinated, so Harry continued with his impromptu lecture.

"A person who's under the effects of a regular love potion will act erratically, but a person under the effects of one of these isn't even the same person. Sadly, most of the time, they're so convinced of their new reality themself, and so persistent, that often people just accept that the person suddenly changed. It's usually done by someone close to the victim too, or several people, and if they're also upholding the story, it gets very difficult to insist that something is wrong, especially when the victim appears to be satisfied with their new life. There weren't many, but the majority of cases like these that I knew of as an Auror only came to light because the spellcaster died, usually decades after the initial casting, and even then it was years of confusion before the victim had enough of a semblance of an idea of what was wrong to even come to us."

"The worst — the most insidious — one I dealt with was...honestly quite impressive, from a technical standpoint, actually. Usually it's pretty obvious that the person is different, although that could always just be the bias of the ones we know of, but this one... She was elderly at the point she came to us, and she brought a friend to corroborate as much as was possible, and as I said, that one was strange because the others had stories of people insisting they were different and them not wanting to hear it, but in this case, the change was so subtle it was impossible to put a finger on or point to what exactly was strange or wrong, her friend just had the persistent feeling that her friend was suddenly not quite right, and there was something increasingly not quite right about every decision she started to make, even though they were all explained away reasonably enough.

"And when her husband died, the victim never had the notion that she hadn't made any of those decisions, or had been under any control, or even that she was remembering anything she had forgotten, except the sense that she felt as if she didn't really understand why she had lived most of her life she way she had. She knew why she had, she remembered her thoughts and the justifications, it just slowly started making less sense, and she wondered when exactly she had changed so much and why and how she hadn't noticed. After talking to her friend, she went to St Mungo's, and the residual traces of Dark magic were still unmistakably there, so she came to us. Unfortunately there wasn't much we could do at that point, but it served a lesson, if nothing else."

Some of the students started to take out parchment to scribble notes as he talked.

"These potions and spells aren't easily caught at all, and even if someone does recognise something is wrong, it can be impossible to get them help. There was only one I remember that someone was persistent enough in their belief that something was wrong to get help, and they actually had to go so far as to poison their friend to get them into St Mungo's, and then repeatedly press them to specifically look for more deeply ingrained Dark spells. And these things aren't completely reversible, either — so much of whatever was lost can't be gotten back, or whatever was added can't always be gotten rid of. That's why they're Dark arts. That's why they shouldn't be done.

"So, yes, I suppose it's possible for someone to become extraordinarily chipper, but more likely they'll become reclusive and distrustful, and only want to rely on the person they've been directed to become attached to. Or they'll have strange gaps in their memory, or remember things differently, or especially remember a different person differently. Sometimes it's removing memories of a specific person entirely, or sometimes it's replacing the relationship in a person's memories with someone else, or sometimes it could be creating entirely new memories. Often, large parts of their personality and relationships change due to the massive alteration of their mind and their perception of the life they've experienced, so even when done as intended, it can have a lot of unintended ripple effects. And when done incorrectly, it can be absolutely catastrophic.

"And that is why we will simply be learning theory," Harry finished, sweeping a serious look over his students (most of whom were now surprisingly studiously taking notes, despite him really just nattering on about old Auror work rather than it really being part of the lecture. But he supposed there was some useful information in there). "For now, at least. If you're all still interested and we've covered it thoroughly enough, I may curse an object with a Dark infatuation spell intended to be transferred by touch. But you will all be wearing gloves, and you still won't be touching it anyway. Trust me, you don't want that."

A Ravenclaw girl Harry was pretty sure also took Draco's Advanced Potionmaking raised her hand when he finished.

Instead of asking something related to what he's just talked about at great length, however, when he nodded at her, she asked, "Is it true that when you were a student, someone nearly died from a regular love potion?"

Harry choked on his spit. "What? Who told you that?"

"Professor Malfoy," she said eagerly. "He said that someone was dosed with a regular love potion and would have died if there hadn't been a bezoar handy."

Harry tried to contain himself for three long, extremely valiant seconds, before forcing out a strained, "Give me one moment," and then absconding to his office with as much haste as he could manage without flat out running.

Harry shut the door, turned away, and pointed his wand at his own face to cast a silencing spell.

He clicked his tongue and blew out a heavy breath, and when neither made a sound, he proceeded to scream at the top of his lungs. It also made no sound, but it felt good to let it out at least. It was something he had found himself doing all too often when he was still an Auror.

Harry heaved in another breath, and then let out another wordless, silent scream, before beginning to curse Draco. "YOU STUPID FUCKING PRICK! YOU WOULD SAY THAT! AND NOW I HAVE TO FUCKING PRETEND IT WASN'T BECAUSE OF ONE OF YOUR SEVERAL EXTREMELY SHITTY FAILED MURDER ATTEMPTS! YOU ARE DOING THIS TO ME ON PURPOSE, YOU BASTARD, YOU FUCKING HAVE TO BE."

Harry took a deep breath and let it out slowly, and then again. "Okay. Okay, I'm fine. I'm fine. But I want the record to show that I didn't say shit and anything that comes from this is your own stupid fucking fault."

Harry turned back around and left his office, unsilencing himself and clearing his throat.

He gave the class a small, fake smile in response to their mildly concerned looks. Mildly, because this was somehow not the weirdest thing he had done so far as a teacher. Also, he was pretty sure at least two of the people in this class had directly seen him fall through the stupid fucking vanishing step that he still wasn't used to being on that staircase.

"I'm fine," he said tightly. "Yes, that technically happened. I have no clue why he decided to tell you that, though. Let's not talk about it anymore. We've a lot to cover in today's lesson."

He scrubbed a frustrated hand through his hair, and turned back to the board, picking up a broken, stubby piece of chalk. "Okay, tell me the initial steps for assessing any Dark object, and then we'll expand on that for these specifics. Just call them out, anyone."

Several students started calling out the steps, which Harry was satisfied to hear at least some of them remembered, and he began writing them down. With any luck, by the end of this lesson, they could all just forget about the whole love potion thing.

~*~

At dinner that evening, the Great Hall was decorated sickeningly. Pink, red, and white covered nearly every surface, and random showers of colourful confetti hearts were spontaneously raining down on couples every so often, making the already boisterous Great Hall briefly get even louder with whoops and teasing every time it happened to another blushing pair of students.

As soon as Draco sat down, he voiced his disdain. "This is the tackiest holiday of the year, and it's high time it should be put out of its misery."

Harry laughed as he started to fill his plate. "But it makes for at least one fun class. Didn't you do love potions today?"

"Only with my sixth years. I definitely don't trust those hormonal third and fourth years with them, and the first years are certainly too young."

"Well maybe you shouldn't have trusted the sixth years either," Harry said wryly, pouring himself a bit of pumpkin juice. "Some of them came to my class afterward and they were acting a bit funny. I just brushed it off at first, but the longer the lesson went on, the more giggly they all got — it spread to the rest of the class too. They kept giving each other looks and saying all these cryptic little things." He sighed. "And why in Merlin's name would you tell them about Ron almost dying because of your shitty murder attempt?"

Filius, on Harry's other side, started coughing violently.

Harry didn't appear to notice, as he continued right on. "You know, while conveniently leaving out that key fucking detail. You must've known they'd ask me about that."

Filius managed to get himself under control after a few moments and took a large gulp of pumpkin juice. "No, no, I'm fine Pomona," he reassured the concerned Herbology teacher to his left. "Something just went down the wrong tube."

Draco rolled his eyes. "I was just impressing the gravity of love potions on them."

"By fucking lying?" Harry's voice went high.

"Well it was technically—"

Harry bulldozed right over him. "And putting me in a position where I have to either uphold your stupid lie, or come out with oh right, yeah, well that was one of your Potions Master's dastardly plots to kill the headmaster, which almost killed my best friend. You know how it is. Whoopsies!"

Draco started laughing, and it went on for long enough that all Harry could do was shake his head in exasperation.

"Do you honestly think anyone ever forgets for a single second that I tried to kill Dumbledore? Amongst plenty of other things," Draco finally said.

"Honestly? Yeah. I'm pretty sure most of the students do. I don't think they even think about you being a Death Eater. Hell, I don't think they even remember I'm Harry Potter anymore. We're just their teachers. They see us all the time, and we're just people, and don't you remember Lockheart? Even the most dedicated fans couldn't keep it up the whole year, not with that."

"Well he was an incompetent disaster," Draco dismissed, waving his hand. "Hard to believe he was capable of much."

"Well he did obliviate loads of actual heroes, so he was good at something."

Draco scoffed. "Yeah, one spell. And seeming innocent and trustworthy enough that he had a chance to actually use it after stealing their whole life stories."

"Whatever. I still think most of the students would be shocked to be reminded, even if they technically know the basics."

"Please, the war wasn't that long ago, and I was in the papers for fucking ages, thanks to you."

Harry looked at him seriously. "Draco. They're still pretty young. Unless they had a family member who died—"

"Which isn't unlikely," Draco reminded him. "And we're talking about the sixth years. They were older."

"Maybe, but they were still pretty young, and they probably weren't being let in on any of the specifics. They just had a general impression, and fear, and knowing that a lot of people died."

Draco rolled his eyes again. "Believe me, Harry, I still get nasty letters from parents all the time. They know. Yes I didn't tell the full story on purpose, no I don't particularly want them to look into it, but it doesn't really change much if they do. Unlike you, I think before I speak."

Harry gave a disgruntled huff. "I also think before I speak! But I still think you're wrong. Even their parents probably don't know all the specifics. Surprisingly few people do. I know it's easy to forget, because we were right in the middle of everything, and so was everyone around us, but most people don't actually know all the details."

"I still don't think it matters. I don't think it would make them hate me more than they already do, knowing how and when I tried to kill Dumbledore."

"The students don't hate you, though," Harry said.

Draco looked away. "Right."

He sounded less believing than Harry thought he should, for someone who was constantly fighting with him over which of them was the most beloved teacher.

He let it go, though, and they finally started their dinner, eating in silence for a few minutes, until Harry picked up his pumpkin juice and paused, thinking better of taking a sip.

"You're sure you properly impressed upon them not to mess with love potions outside of class?"

Draco gave a disgruntled huff. "Yes, Harry."

Harry just frowned at his drink. "They were suspiciously giggly, though, and I never did find out what they were whispering about—"

"Everyone's giggly lately ⁠— I swear, the portraits have been more gossipy than ever ⁠— it's fine. Who do you think I am?" Draco demanded, setting down his silverware and giving Harry an incredibly unimpressed look.

Harry returned it.

After a moment, Draco wilted slightly, and his face softened. "Harry." He put a hand on Harry's arm and met his eyes seriously, and Harry could have sworn the conversation in the room increased twofold. "It was only an affection potion, not even a true love potion, but even so, there was absolutely no way I let a single drop of it out of my classroom."

Harry raised his eyebrows, but a small smile crept onto his face. "You're telling me you can account for every single drop of the potions that get brewed in your dungeon? I don't believe you."

"You should. I can."

"I refuse. That's impossible."

"What, do you need a medieval poison tester now, King Harold?" Draco teased, but he was smiling now too.

"My name isn't even Harold!"

"Oh yeah? Do you even have a birth certificate? Can you prove it?"

Harry pouted. "That's just mean."

Draco laughed.

"And so what if I do need a poison tester? I've been nearly love-potioned enough times in my life, thank you very much."

Draco smiled wider and snatched his goblet from his hand. "Long live the king," he said dryly, before taking a sip.

Harry let out a small laugh against his will.

"There. Happy?" Draco said, handing the goblet back. "I feel fine, I didn't sense any telltale peppermint or lavender scent, and there was no unfamiliar taste. Completely safe, normal pumpkin juice."

"Hmph." Harry accepted the goblet, but watched him suspiciously for a long moment, and only when he'd determined that Draco didn't seem suddenly inexplicably in love with him, did he finally hesitantly take a drink from the goblet as well and set it back on the table. "I suppose it's okay," he said reluctantly.

A shower of pink confetti exploded over them.

And Harry wasn't sure quite what could have caused it, but he swore the way the noise in the Great Hall increased exponentially couldn't possibly be just in his head this time.

Draco brushed the little paper hearts off of his hat and robes.

"Tacky holiday," he muttered, but he couldn't quite keep the smile off his face.