"Mr Malfoy," said Harry in an even, almost monotone voice. Normally he would stand to greet a visitor, would offer to shake hands, but then, he didn't normally have former Death Eaters coming into his office at Magical Law Enforcement. In fact, when Harry had seen the appointment appear on his daily agenda the day before, he'd assumed that either parchment or quill-probably both-would need to be replaced.
He just hadn't had time to request new, yet.
"Mr Potter," said Lucius Malfoy, eyes watchfully narrowed.
Harry looked him over, searching for signs that the man had been in Azkaban for most of the previous three years. Any sign, but he found precious little. Lucius' long hair was streaked with grey, now, and although he stood with the same proud bearing as before, he looked ever so slightly stooped.
Wishful thinking, maybe, Harry thought. He always had believed that Voldemort's willing servants had received obscenely light sentences. Those who could claim they'd acted under duress if not Imperius had been treated even more leniently, given brief spells of house arrests in most cases. An outrage, as Molly Weasley had said.
But clearly, the wizarding world had wanted to forget the past and move on. With Voldemort dead, there'd been little public will to treat the Death Eaters with the harshness they deserved.
Or perhaps, Harry thought darkly, the world had wanted to forget because so many of those doing the forgetting had been colluders, themselves.
Harry didn't ask Lucius Malfoy to sit down. He wanted this over with, and the man out of his office, as soon as possible. "What brings you to the Auror division, Mr Malfoy?"
"I think you know perfectly well what brings me here."
Cold, every word. The only problem was, Harry didn't know. "I have better things to do than play guessing games with you, Malfoy. Either spit it out or get out of my office. Are you reporting a crime, or lodging a complaint against one of my Aurors, or-"
"You," interrupted Malfoy. "I'm lodging a complaint against you."
Harry waved his wand to summon a scroll of parchment. "Well, then, there's the form. Please fill it out in the antechamber. When it's complete it will appear in my inbox." Harry indicated a wicker basket overflowing with various bits of business he had waiting. "I'll get to it when time permits."
Malfoy didn't even glance at the scroll unrolling itself on Harry's desk. "This isn't Ministry business, Potter."
"Then either state your complaint plainly, or get out of my office. I don't really care which."
Malfoy's lips twisted. "No, you wouldn't. And you've no intention of alleviating my son's suffering, have you?"
Harry stared the other wizard down. "Why would I give two straws about it?"
"You obviously don't," spat Malfoy. "Waste of time coming here. I told my wife it would be. If Draco dies it'll be on your head."
Harry clenched his teeth. "Draco, in my opinion, is a complete waste of magic. But if someone has cursed him, you can be sure that the matter will be fully investigated, no matter my personal view of you and yours."
"Of mine? That's rich, coming from you."
Now Harry was both annoyed and baffled, never a good combination. He didn't try to keep the exasperation from his voice. "Malfoy, what are you going on about? Whatever's happening to your son has nothing to do with me."
Lucius Malfoy went utterly still for a long moment, like he was weighing his words, or perhaps his options. In the end, though, he said only one short thing. "Forget I came."
With a whirl of cape, he was gone, and Harry was left listening to the tapof a cane retreating down the corridor's inlaid tile floor.
''''''''''''''''''
Harry did forget that Lucius Malfoy had come by. Or at least, he put it out of his mind. What was it to him if Draco Malfoy was "suffering," as his father had put it?
As far as Harry was concerned, the entire conversation was probably part of some plot or scheme. He wasn't letting himself get drawn into it. Most likely, Draco was absolutely fine. And in on it, whatever it was.
Harry had dinner with Ron, Hermione, and Ginny that evening. It was his usual Friday night routine, and he enjoyed it as he always did, but he couldn't help but feel, just slightly, that he was falling into a rut. A steak ordered medium-rare, with black coffee for dessert . . . Ginny's gentle smile across the table . . . Ron asking, not completely in jest, when they were going to set a date . . . Harry putting him off with a laugh while Ginny hid her disappointment . . .
It was like he'd lived through it a hundred times, and had nothing to look forward to except a hundred more. Perhaps if he would just set a date, he'd begin to feel differently. But something was holding him back. He wasn't sure what.
Or perhaps more precisely, he just wasn't sure.
Ginny slept over as she did every Friday night, but that, too, just seemed like another part of the pattern. When she flooed back to Bill and Fleur's, it was almost a relief. Harry knew he should propose soon, after all. They more-or-less had an understanding that he would, once he felt ready for such a momentous step.
But Harry was starting to wonder if he'd ever feel ready, or if there was just something wrong with him. What had happened to the thrill of being with her, of feeling like he'd explode in agony if he didn't kiss her? He hadn't really felt anything like that, not since he was sixteen. Oh, perhaps he'd felt a glimmer of it again the next year, but even then he'd known it was a pale shadow of what he'd felt the year before. And anyway, even that shadow was gone, now. He was twenty-one years old, and all he really felt for her was a strong affection.
Everyone said that love mellowed and aged over time, that falling in love was something different from the kind of love that lasted a lifetime, but should Harry's feelings have mellowed so quickly? Ron and Hermione still looked at each other like they found excitement in each other's eyes.
But with Ginny, Harry felt like he was just going through the motions.
Even in bed.
But then again, sleeping with her never had been the mind-blowing experience he'd been expecting. He didn't blame her for that. If anything, he figured there was something wrong with him. He'd lived most of his life as the unknowing host for part of an evil wizard's soul, and if that wasn't enough, he'd walked straight into his own death, and come back again.
If he couldn't feel things deeply, after that, Harry thought that was only to be expected.
She left Saturday morning after breakfast, as usual, and once she was gone, Harry settled into his favourite armchair and switched on some soft jazz.
Unfortunately, his peace and quiet didn't last long. An owl began tapping its beak against the study window. An owl he didn't recognise. Harry ignored it for a while, since anything truly important from work would have arrived by Floo, but after a few minutes he began to feel sorry for the bird, which was clearly going to sit on the sill all day if he didn't let it in.
The owl came swooping in, dropping its letter atop Harry's lap. Proof enough, if Harry needed it these days, that there was nothing dark or cursed in it; if that were the case, the owl could never have crossed his wards.
Before he could reach forward to open it, however, the letter unfolded itself and dissolved into a wavery mist. Inside it, he could see the figure of Narcissa Malfoy preparing to speak. Harry almost swept the whole thing off his lap, but one thing caught his attention enough to keep him motionless: Draco's mother was on her knees, her hands raised slightly and clasped before her as if in prayer.
"Harry Potter," she said, her voice cracking with desperation, "Draco has been failing worse, ever since my husband came to see you. It is as if the binding you've uncovered has come to know you will not claim him. He is my son, my only son, my flesh and blood. He lies near death now, and you have put him there. I beg you now, I beg you on bended knee, to finish what you have begun. I helped you once, helped you conceal your state of life so you could complete your great work-"
Ha, thought Harry. You helped me only so you could find out if your son was still alive.
"Will you not now help my son live instead of die? Lucius says there must be another way, a way around, a way out, but I know he is mistaken, and any more delay will be too much. I beg you, Harry Potter . . . claim my son."
Harry blinked. Draco Malfoy might be dying; he neither knew nor cared very much, but Harry certainly hadn't done a thing to cause it. Finish what you have begun . . . binding you've uncovered . . . none of it made much sense at all. Especially not those last three words.
He absently summoned some owl treats for the bird, and tried to tell himself that it wasn't his problem. Because it truly wasn't. They were wrong about it having anything to do with him.
He knew they were, but he couldn't get the image of Narcissa Malfoy kneeling out of his mind. She had helped him just before his final duel with Voldemort. She'd done it for selfish reasons of her own, but she had done it.
And he was an Auror, in charge of the whole department ever since Shacklebolt had left it permanently to stand for Minister, and it really did sound like somebody had cursed Draco Malfoy. With something very nasty. Strange that his father had been right there in the office and hadn't properly reported it, but Harry's oath as an Auror wouldn't let him overlook a crime just because the victim's parents were taking a very strange approach to it.
Sighing, Harry scribbled out a reply to Narcissa and yelled Malfoy Manor as he tossed it, along with powder, into the Floo.
He didn't use owls these days, not if he could help it.
''''''''''''''''''
The reply to his letter came within seconds, but what was even more surprising was what it said.
No, of course the Manor is not warded at present. I am expecting you. Come now.
So, Harry did.
The whirling journey through the Floo Network didn't give him enough time to prepare himself for a visit to the Malfoy's ancestral estate. His last memory of the place was a dreadful one of a painfully swollen face, and Hermione's terrible screams, and then afterwards, having to bury Dobby.
About the only good thing to come out of it had been Wormtail strangling himself. One less Death Eater to deal with during the battle at Hogwarts.
Another memory surfaced, though, as Harry stepped out into a drawing room about half as large as his entire house. Draco, refusing to identify him. Or, nearly refusing, saying he couldn't be sure. And not all of that could be attributed to the swelling obscuring Harry's scar and features; Draco had only reluctantly confirmed Ron and Hermione's identities, the way Harry remembered it.
But then, he hadn't done a thing to help any of them after that, so perhaps he'd just been off his game. After all, Draco had been paler than usual and looking quite ill, really, as if the life of a Death Eater wasn't everything he'd been expecting.
"Mr Potter," gasped Narcissa, her robes looking like she hadn't changed in days. "Upstairs, please. There isn't much time."
Harry's wand was at the ready. Of course it was; he was no fool. But Narcissa seemed frantic rather than scheming, and her blue eyes looked strangely defeated as she beckoned for Harry to follow her.
Harry kept his wand out, all the same.
She hurried down a hallway and up a gracefully curving set of stairs, then opened the third door at the top of the landing, and waved as though to usher him inside.
There, curled up on his side on an enormous bed, lay Draco Malfoy. He was naked and panting, his lips nearly colourless, sweat running off him in rivulets as he grasped the sheets beneath him and moaned.
And kneeling at his bedside was his father, one hand stroking over Draco's hair, which was lank and damp.
"For God's sake, cover him," bit out Harry, turning his eyes away. He'd never liked Draco, but that didn't mean he wanted to see him this way.
"He can't bear it," said Lucius wearily, standing up. "Narcissa, I thought I told you that Mr Potter doesn't know what this is all about. Why have you brought him here?"
"Why do you think, Lucius?" Narcissa didn't look defeated then; she strode forward like a lioness defending her young. "He's Draco's only hope. You know that!"
"As long as he doesn't know what he's done, there may be another way out!"
"I don't know what either one of you is talking about," Harry cut in. "And I don't know what's wrong with you, either. Your son belongs at St. Mungo's. Let's just get him there, and then you can tell me who might have had any reason to curse him. Probably a long list, but-"
"You really are as thick as Severus always said."
"Lucius!" said Narcissa, raising her voice.
"My son, my son and heir, my bloodline!" Lucius bared his teeth. "I won't see it all his."
"Then you'll see your own son dead!"
Harry's Auror instincts would normally kick into full swing, hearing words like those, but this time, he could tell they weren't meant as a threat. They were nothing but the simple truth. Not that he understood, really.
"If you won't take him to St. Mungo's, I will," he said, stepping forward to scoop Draco into his arms. The minute he touched him, Harry's alarm spiked. Draco was burning up with fever.
"He's not been cursed," insisted Narcissa, stepping in front of Harry to block the door. "Don't you understand yet? He doesn't need a healer, he needs you!"
"You're barmy, all of you." Remembering her letter, remembering how she'd said the Manor wasn't warded at all just then, Harry focused himself so he could spin around-
"No!" shouted Lucius hoarsely, rushing across the room to grab Harry by the sleeve.
Disgusted, Harry shook him off, but his concentration had been broken.
"No magic," said Narcissa, falling to her knees right in front of Harry. "He couldn't bear so much as conjured ice to cool him. Apparition or the Floo will kill him, the state he's in. You must claim him!"
He doesn't need a healer, he needs you . . .
Harry hadn't believed that; how could he? Now, though, he could begin to see that it was true. The naked body in his arms was warm now, not blazing hot, and Draco was beginning to breathe more deeply. Fuck, thought Harry, shaking his head. He didn't know what was going on, but it seemed clear by then that Draco's illness, whatever it might be, was somehow connected to him.
And what was also clear was that he hadn't had his wand at the ready for a while, now. Lucius and Narcissa didn't seem to have noticed. They had eyes only for Draco.
"He's better when I'm holding him," said Harry, sighing. "Can I sit somewhere? Maybe you could explain. Did someone perform a curse linking us, or- how did you know it was linked to me, of all people? Or did you just think of his worst enemy as the most likely prospect?"
"There's no curse, Mr Potter." By then, Lucius was sounding somewhat resigned. "Please, sit."
Harry sank into the chair he'd pointed at, cradling Draco on his lap. Pretty awkward, really, with Draco naked as the day he was born and both his parents looking on. "Maybe he could tolerate a sheet or something, now," said Harry, swallowing. He didn't think he'd ever felt this uncomfortable.
Instead of summoning one, Narcissa walked to a tall cabinet and fetched a fresh sheet out. Harry took that to mean that she was dead serious about how Draco was reacting to magic at present. "You must do it," she said quietly, unfurling the sheet before pressing the edge of it into Harry's hand.
The pale blue fabric was so light and fine it seemed woven of nothing more substantial than air. As Harry draped it across the man in his lap, Draco shifted closer to Harry, almost snuggling up to him. His laboured breathing eased still more, until he seemed relaxed and sleeping.
Lucius and Narcissa sat down side by side on Draco's bed, their expressions ranging from guarded to tortured as Harry watched. "Well?" he finally asked. "Are you going to explain? Because I can't sit here holding him forever, you know. When I let go is he going to start to get worse, again?"
"Yes." Lucius' jaw clenched. "I was hoping to avoid this. At first there was no hope, of course. I was convinced you'd done this deliberately and were drawing it out for your own pleasure. But then it seemed you didn't know what you'd done, which I thought might grant us time to find some other solution, any other solution. It seems not, however. There is nothing else to be done, now."
"Nothing else but what?"
As Lucius made an impatient noise, Narcissa reached out to clasp one of his hands in both of her own. "Strength, my dearest. For Draco."
Lucius lifted his wife's hands to his lips, then dropped them and looked at Harry. "Narcissa is right. If our son is to live at all, you must claim him. It is simple, Mr Potter. Your family, you see, has always owned mine."