Previously: Draco and Matt got into a fight with Harry and Benjamin, but now Matt's asking Draco to tell him about the mark. Will Draco reveal the mark? How's Draco going to handle his mission if his Death Eater status has been revealed?

"If I tell someone else your secret, you'll be able to repay that by telling others about my secret." He fingers his scarf.

"So how is it a secret? If you're willing to tell me, I mean."

"If people knew, I'd be hated and treated as lesser." He replies solemnly. "I've only told Madame Pomphrey because she needed to know. A couple of others have figured it out on their own. Not many, though."

"Are you sure that people would hate you?"

"Hagrid has also received plenty of hate," He replies, "and I'm more ... rare, you could say."

I stare at him, pondering. It would be nice to talk to him. And if he was a half-breed, like he seemed to be implying, there were plenty of people who would be interested in his secret. Those who would make life difficult for him. "Show me your secret first, and I'll tell you mine."

In one quick motion, he pulls off his scarf and turns. There, underneath his hair, are several small blue spikes, protruding out of his skin. Little, frosted blue scales surround the area. "I pluck the rest." He admits, "But between the spikes and the potential nerve damage, I can't safely remove those scales." He turns back to me, slowly wrapping his scarf back around his neck. "I'm not naive." He says, his mouth a firm line, staring at me with wary black eyes. "I know what happens to dragons. Our 'beloved' headmaster has found twelve separate uses for the blood that runs in my veins. And that's just him. I don't know how they'd react to a half-dragon, like me, especially since ..." He pauses, "Since my human mother almost certainly used illegal magic to make ... me ... happen. I might be hunted, executed, or experimented on. My mother might get hurt too. I'm," He takes a steadying breath, "putting everything on the line, just to help you."

I reel back, thinking it over. "Why me?"

He sits down, contemplating for a moment. "You've always looked lonely to me. And now, you look scared, horrified. I've been an oddball, I guess. Hufflepuff, yet a loner. I guess I finally have the confidence to be your friend."

"Wait, I thought you were a first-year."

He blinks in surprise. "What! I'm in my seventh year!"

"You're older than me?"

Matt nods, "I'm even in Hufflepuff's quidditch team."

Oh. How did I not know this guy?

Matt sighs, "You know what, never mind. Let's go. Tell me your secret later, too many people about."

Matt leads me into the banquet hall. He lets me sit at my house table before ...

... sitting beside me.

I look at him in surprise. "Shouldn't you sit with your house?"

"Why?" Matt asks, piling a load of food on his plate. "It's not like I've got friends there."

"Then make some. I- if my father ..."

"Make friends, huh?" Matt considers this. He stands up, and that's when I noticed the stares he's accumulated.

"Is he an idiot?" "He's sitting at the wrong table?" "Is he okay?" "Hey, check out that stupid Hufflepuff!" "Why hasn't Malfoy noticed?" "What's a nice Hufflepuff doing with those nasty Slytherins?" "We should hurt him hard for sitting with us." "He's sitting next to Malfoy!" "What's wrong with him?" "How come he's sitting with a rotten Slytherin like that sleazy Malfoy kid?"

The last whisper hits me hard.

Matt, oblivious, walks up to the Ravenclaw table and speaks directly to Erin. After a long moment of whispers and Matt waving his arms erratically, he comes back, grinning, with Erin in tow. Erin, very stiffly, sits next to another Slytherin and me, and Matt walks off again to the Ravenclaw table. This time, he walks to a male, and a more intense discussion takes place. The whispers die down as everyone watches in curiosity.

Finally, the boy Matt spoke to, a taller boy, probably my year, with spiky black hair and eyes, stands up slapping the table. "No!" His voice resounds around the room. "If it came down to it, I would rather sit with those venomous snakes at the Slytherin table than sit anywhere close to you," The Ravenclaw manages to sink so much bitterness and venom into that one word that everyone else flinches.