Neither one of us really spoke all night. Madam Pomfrey tried to force me to go to the dorms to get some sleep but once she realised I wasn't going anywhere she gave up and let me stay, setting me up a bed next to Draco's. I didn't sleep in it, the minute she left to go to bed Draco held his arm out and I crawled into his bed, the two of us holding onto each other for dear life, not bearing to let go. The next day when we were both eating our breakfast, still in the deserted hospital wing, was when Draco began to talk about things.
"Pansy wasn't meant to do that with the necklace." He suddenly said as I reached over him for another piece of toast.
"What?"
"When you were......cursed. She was supposed to take it somewhere for me, but she obviously couldn't do that simple task."
"She said you were leaving me for her, I didn't believe her-"
"Good, because that would never happen. Pansy just knows about the plan because she's a pureblood too, pretty much all the 28 pureblood families of Slytherin know what I have to do so she was asked to help by Snape."
"Where was she taking the necklace?"
He took a long gulp of pumpkin juice before dropping his voice to a whisper and saying "Dumbledore."
I put my head in my hands. "And you didn't think to tell me? When we were in the Three Broomsticks?"
"You and Potter were still close, I didn't want him to try and find out from you, I was scared."
"He's asked me more times than I can count what you're up to, every single time I've said I don't know. You trusted me with this secret and I was never going to spill it."
"Even after you got cursed because of me?" His eyes were swimming with tears as he looked at me.
"Draco, we're in this together. You're stuck with me" I wiped the tear that was falling down his cheek and smiled at him.
"Mine." He whispered.
"Mine."
"Belle?"
"Yes love?"
"I need to finish that cabinet."
"It's ok, I'm on it. You need to concentrate on getting better."
"No Belle, I said I don't want you involved."
"Can't you see? I'm already in way over my head Draco, I'm not letting you do this alone. I've got the instructions and I'm going to do it, for you."
Draco grabbed my hand and stroked it tenderly. "My brave Gryffindor."
Draco soon fell asleep and I left to get through my lessons, where Harry could barely even look at me, although once or twice I saw him looking when he thought I couldn't see. Ron was still acting normal towards me, promising me a game of exploding snap that evening and Hermione was sat, as always, with her head in a book. Everyone acted like it was business as usual, like they didn't care that one of their classmates was currently in the hospital wing being treated for injuries sustained as a result of an unknown spell. Rage rippled through my body, it took all of my energy not to hex them all there and then.
~
That evening, with a new sense of determination I headed to the seventh floor and the Room of Requirement revealed itself to me. I pushed the heavy door open and gasped as I took in my surroundings. Last year the room had been empty, except for some dummies that helped us to practice our spells on, but now it was crammed from floor to ceiling with various objects. Books, jewellery, even pixies were bouncing around the room, looking at me curiously as I made my way to the end of the room where I saw the cabinet waiting for me. The room of hidden things.
I pulled Borgin's instructions out of my robes and examined them.
The instructions said that when two cabinets are connected but one is broken, any item transported will be stuck in limbo. The only way to fix the cabinet was by testing items in the cabinet and saying the incantation that Draco and I had found in the book. An apple lay to the side of the cabinet, half eaten and rotting, which meant that Draco had taken my suggestion of using an apple on board, but it hadn't worked. I looked around me and spotted an old book, which I inserted into the cabinet and closed the door. "Well here goes nothing" I thought to myself as I closed my eyes and whispered "Harmonia Nectere Passus." I left it for a little while, reading an old potions book that I had found on a bookshelf before I opened the cabinet to see the previously in tact book now ripped to shreds. It hadn't worked. I kicked the cabinet in frustration, and heard a rustling from behind me. I turned to see a tiny bird in a cage flapping around and an idea sprung into my head. I took it out of the cage gently and placed it into the cabinet, shutting the door gently behind it. "Please." I whispered. This needed to work. I said the incantation one more time before deciding to leave the bird overnight and check on it tomorrow. It seemed that an object was able to leave hogwarts, but it wasn't able to return in one piece, and I really hoped this time the bird would come back alive.
As I headed back to the common room Ron was waiting for me to play exploding snap, and Harry headed out of the room and up to the dorms as soon as I sat down.
"Don't worry about him, he'll come round, he always does" Ron said as he saw my glum expression.
"I bloody hope so." I said back to him.