Uncertain Future

by Dracavia

No one can ever be sure what the future holds. Will you only have one shot at love in your life, or will fate give you a second chance? HP/DM

Uncertain Future     by Dracavia

Rating: PG-13

Summary:  No one can ever be sure what the future holds.  Will you only have one shot at love in your life, or will fate give you a second chance?

Warning: Slash (male-male relationship) this is your one and only warning, if you don't like it please hit the back button now.

Pairing: DM/HP

Disclaimer: The characters from Harry Potter belong to the great J. K. Rowling.  I just play with them once in a while.

Spoilers: Since it's a ficlet, not many.

Feedback: Yes please! ;-)  Constructive criticism is, as always, greatly appreciated.  This is anything along the lines of "this line was OOC" or "You contradicted yourself here" or anything of a similar manner.  I am constantly trying to improve my writing and reviews of this nature are just as welcome as any other kind words :)

~*~*~*~

His seventh year at Hogwarts marked the most difficult year in his young life.  It was the final and most violent year of the wizarding war against Voldemort.  It was also the year that Harry Potter learned what it meant to have 'Loved and Lost.'

As Voldemort's activities and violence increased, so too did Harry's visions and nightmares.  Night after night he awoke in a cold sweat, having seen one macabre scene after another.

Not long into the year Harry could no longer bear to remain in the confining space of his dorm once he awoke.  And the only way he found he could be sure to stop the nightmares was to go to bed exhausted – even if that didn't stop the visions, it was nice to end the nightmares at least.  That was the start of his nightly trips to the Quidditch pitch.  Only when wrapped up in the thrill and adrenaline of flying could Harry forget the horrific scenes of his dreams.

But Harry wasn't the only one that used flight to escape his worries and nightmares.

Draco Malfoy, the Ice Prince of Slytherin, also sought solace in nighttime trips to the pitch.  Unlike the past six years, that year he'd been reserved and taciturn, going out of his way to avoid confrontations with anyone.

Draco had a choice to make, and his father had given him until the New Year to make it.  He could either join the Death Eaters, or face the consequences.  Lucius never said what those consequences were, but between what Draco knew of both his father and Voldemort, he was sure unpleasant would be the understatement of the century.

Draco was certain he never wanted to find out what those consequences were, but the alternative was just as bleak.  Draco knew he often presented himself as a conceited, overbearing, snarky bastard, but to be a Death Eater?  Well that was a whole different matter entirely.  Sure Draco loved to taunt and ridicule, it was a game, one that he excelled at.  But to torture and murder?  Draco didn't think he could do those things, and as a Death Eater he was sure to have to.

And so both boys found themselves traveling out to the pitch at night, trying to momentarily escape the worries and nightmares of their uncertain futures.

The first few times they'd encountered each other at the Quidditch pitch had been tense.  Both were sure the other would start a fight, and caustic remarks were always at the ready.  Eventually though, the pair came to an unspoken agreement.  Neither would bother the other, as there was more than enough room on the pitch for both to never be in near proximity to the other.

The nighttime flights became a ritual for the pair.  Each night they'd arrive, usually shortly after midnight.  Sometimes they'd exchange a greeting, oftentimes silence reigned, and quickly they'd take to the air.  Gradually it grew from simply sharing the space, to interacting and challenging each other, and through that a strange, but welcome, camaraderie grew.

Midway through October the talks began.  One night, after an especially intense session, Harry and Draco rested side by side in the stands before heading back inside.  Just as Harry was contemplating leaving, Draco spoke.  Over the weeks of shared flight the foundation of a fragile trust had been built, and Draco was venturing to add the next layer.  He told Harry about the choice he faced and the nightmares it caused.  While not a tear escaped the silvery-grey eyes, Harry could see the anguish in the pale, slender face.

When Draco finished, Harry was at a loss for words.  He'd never been one to make elegant speeches, and felt anything he might say would seem crude or trite.  Instead he simply placed a hand upon Draco's shoulder, squeezing gently in a reassuring manner, as he met the silver gaze with his own soulful green eyes.  The action garnered a small and hesitant smile from the blond's strained face.  After a few more moments of companionable silence the two stood and walked slowly side by side back to the castle.

From then on they did more than fly each night.  After an hour or so of their aerial acrobatics, to take the edge off their strained nerves, the two would sit in the stands and talk.  Sometimes only one talked while the other simply listened, other times they discussed the paths laid before them and where they would lead, and occasionally they would simply sit in silence, enjoying the temporary peace found in the other's presence.

It was one of those silent nights that changed the course of their lives, more so than any other before it.  As they'd sat in silence Harry dozed peacefully, when suddenly he was struck with one of the worst visions he'd ever, or would ever, receive.  Harry screamed and cried in agony and grief as he watched Voldemort and his men slaughtering a town full of innocent muggle men, women and children.

When Harry awoke from the vision, he found himself held close in strong arms, hands rubbing soothingly across his back, and a soft voice murmuring reassurances in his ear.  Harry raised his tearstained face from the comforting shoulder and locked gazes with worried sliver eyes.  As they sat there, Draco's arms wrapped protectively around Harry, they both felt a warmth and unfamiliar tension building between them, and they rapidly broke away.  Disconcerted by this new feeling they both gathered their things and walked briskly back towards the school.

Just before they opened the doors, Harry quietly muttered, "Thanks."

"What for?" came the puzzled reply.

"No one's ever been there to comfort me after a vision before, and that was the worst one I've ever had… so, thanks."

Draco simply nodded his head in acknowledgement and opened the door, allowing the other to step through first.

As the nightly meetings continued, hands began to frequently touch in passing, an arm around the other's shoulders was a more than welcome gesture, and as they began to understand the new feeling growing between them, less time was spent flying and more time in close proximity.

It was on a crisp night in late November, as the two sat close for shared warmth, that Draco initiated the first kiss and Harry willingly responded.  It was soft and hesitant, as though asking a question, and when they pulled away bright eyes locked, answering 'yes,' whatever that unspoken question was, the answer was yes.

They spent the remainder of that night held tightly in each other's arms, no words passing between them… no words were necessary in those moments.  Shortly before dawn they crept back into the castle, hoping neither had been missed, having stayed out far longer than usual.

December came, and with it the Christmas holidays.  In such troubled times few remained at the school, preferring instead to return to spend valued time with their families.  Aside from Harry and Draco only two others remained, a pair of lower year Hufflepuff twins, who had been orphaned by Voldemort's attacks, and had no family to return to.  Draco was forbidden to return home, and would receive no gifts from his family, as he had yet to give his father an answer and the deadline was rapidly drawing near.

On Christmas Eve Harry and Draco cemented their growing love and commitment to each other as they made love for the first – and what would later appear to be the only – time.  Afterwards they slept peacefully in one another's arms.

As dawn broke, Draco awoke his lover from his sleep, gently tracing the lines of his face with delicate fingers.

"Harry, wake up."

"Mmm… Draco?"

"Harry, there's something I need to tell you," the tone was soft but serious.

"What is it?  Is something wrong?"

A soft smile graced Draco's face, "No, nothing's wrong.  Harry… I need to tell you that… that… what I'm trying to say is that I've fallen in love with you."

Emerald eyes glistened with emotion as they looked deeply into the silvery-grey ones looking down upon him.  A contented sigh escaped him as he drew the pale boy closer, "I love you too Draco."

"And because of that I have a promise to make to you, Harry.  I promise you, that no matter what happens when I finally confront my father, no matter where I'm forced to stand, I will never fight against you.  I could never do that to you."

"Draco, you sound as though you expect the worst," the raven-haired boy spoke worriedly to his lover.

"Harry, don't fool yourself into thinking things will come out all peaches and cream.  We're living in a time of war and my father is against you.  There are some things even love, no matter how strong, can't overcome."

"Draco, please don't speak that way, I don't want to even imagine my life without you in it."

"Fine Harry, as you wish," the blond replied resignedly.

The two spent as much time as possible together over the next few days, talking and simply holding each other.  But no matter how strongly they felt for one another, there was nothing either could do when Lucius Malfoy arrived on New Year's Eve, and took Draco away from Hogwarts.

~*~

It had been five years since the end of the wizarding war against Voldemort.  Five long and lonely years for Harry Potter.

When the war was over, he'd discretely inquired about what had happened to Draco, but no information was forthcoming.  Lucius Malfoy, the only person that seemed to possibly have knowledge about his wife and son's whereabouts, had died in the final battle, leaving Harry with a dead end.  As time passed, and his resources and leads were exhausted, Harry's hope of finding his missing love slowly faded.  Despite his fading hope, a part of him refused to believe Draco was gone forever, even when the ministry pronounced him and his mother as presumably dead.  Just two more missing casualties in a gruesome war.

Harry eventually had tried to move on.  He worked for the ministry as a liaison to the British muggle government, a job that didn't require steady hours and was mostly a figurehead position, and while not his dream job, the respectable salary would allow him to more than just make due.

He'd dated, not extensively, but there had been a few, both men and women, but none ever lasted more than a few months.  All too often Harry discovered that his partner was with him solely for the prestige, and saw him only as 'The-Boy-Who-Defeated-Voldemort.'  Even on the rare occasion that the person sincerely was with him for the real Harry, he couldn't find it in himself to fully commit to the relationship, a part of him still waiting for Draco to return.

That was how Harry came to be sitting alone on a Friday night at the bar in the Silver Sickle pub in the heart of wizarding London, nursing his fourth Fire Whisky of the evening.  His latest relationship had ended two weeks before when Samantha had yelled and left him, insisting that until he moved on past his mysterious ex-lover, there would be no room in his life for someone else.

And as he sat there, Harry knew she was right, but he just couldn't put Draco completely aside.  A part of him still hoped that he was alive, it was the part that said if Draco had died he'd know because they were truly in love and their bond would tell him, and so it kept hoping.

The bell on the door to the pub rang lightly as someone entered.  Harry felt a shiver run up his spine as he listened to the footsteps of the one who'd entered through the door behind him.  Those footsteps sounded so familiar, but after all this time… they couldn't possibly belong to Him, could they?

The steps stopped directly behind him.  Harry set down his glass and turned around to face the person.  He was met with the sight of silver-grey eyes, platinum blond hair, and the refined aristocratic features he'd once known so well.  It was Draco.  A slightly older, taller, and lightly tanned Draco, but Draco nonetheless.

"I must have had one too many glasses of whisky," he muttered staring at the tall blond figure, "I'm hallucinating."

A small smile spread across the blond's face, and as he sat on the stool beside Harry, a low chuckle escaped him.  "No Harry, I don't know how much you've had to drink, but I'm most certainly real."

Harry's gaze remained focused on the man beside him, taking in every detail.  The years had changed those familiar features ever so slightly.  The harshness of his once so delicate features had been soften and filled out with maturity, leaving a man that while not the classic sense of handsome nevertheless held a stunning eye-catching quality.  Soft lines marked the edges of his eyes, mouth and creased his forehead, wherever the man had been all these years, he'd obviously spent much of his time frowning in worry or concentration.

Harry reached out a single hand, running it along the side of the face before him, as though to convince himself the man was real.  Suddenly pulling his hand away as though he'd been shocked, he asked the question he'd been searching for an answer to for five years.  "Draco, where did you go for all those years?  After the war ended I searched for you, but nowhere could I find a trace of where you or your mother had gone."

A sad, sardonic smile cross the man's features.  "You never found us because we didn't wish to be found."

"And now?"  Harry's voice became softly accusing, "After five years away, suddenly here you are.  If I wasn't meant to find you before, why come find me now?"

"You're right, you deserve answers… but can we go somewhere else… less open?"

Harry paused, than nodded slowly, "My flat is only a few blocks walk away, we can go there."

Harry paid for his drinks and together the men walked from the pub, no words passing between them.  When they reached the small flat, it was obviously the home of a bachelor, missing all the small touches one associates with a couple.

Sitting on the couch Draco asked if Harry had any wine, a firm believer that alcohol made confessions easier.  The raven-haired man returned from his kitchen with two glassed of red wine and settled in a plush chair across from the blond, waiting to hear the explanations he was owed.

Taking a sip of his wine, Draco began to speak.  "Before I tell you where I've been all these years, I have a question for you.  Did you ever tell anyone about us after I left?"

Harry nodded his head, "Yes, I was distraught, I needed someone who's shoulder I could lean upon.  Hermione already had it half figured out, and when she confronted me about it, I told everything.  I was heartbroken Draco, could you expect anything else of me?"  His response was met with the slight shake of a blond head.

"No Harry, that's as I expected it.  You never told anyone else?"

"No… Ron, he wouldn't have understood, especially as you were no longer there to prove you weren't the jerk he thought you were.  And after the final battle, well I couldn't tell him then, now could I?"

"I don't know what you mean."

"He was killed Draco.  I thought perhaps you would have heard that.  Our side lost many before the final battle ended," Harry's voice was laden with guilt and loss.

"Oh Harry, I had no idea, I'm sorry."

"I don't need or want pity Draco, just explanations.  Will I ever get them?  That was the reason we came here after all."

"Yes, I owe you that much.  I suppose the best place to start is always the beginning.

"When my father took me from Hogwarts we returned home, my wand was taken and I was locked in my room; told I had two days to either decided to join him or prepare myself for the fait that would await me.  Late the first night my mother snuck into my room.  She asked me what my decision would be, and I told her I'd never join my father and his murderous rebellion.  She wanted to know why I was so willing to die, as surely that would be the end result of my fait if I refused.

"I told her all the reasons I had given you in our long talks… and one more.  I told her about us, about the promise I made to you that night.  She was surprised to say the least, but she understood.  She told me to gather what few important things I had that I could carry on me, and to be prepared to leave within the hour.  A short while later she returned to my room with money and her own few possessions to take along.

"We flooed to London where we arranged muggle transportation to the continent under false names.  Eventually, through a combination of both muggle and magical means, we reached some of my mother's distant relatives in Greece.  They lived in a small, secluded town of magical folk, that few knew about.  My mother said that while my father knew she had some distant relatives on the Mediterranean, he was unlikely to be able to find us before the war ended… and she was right."

"So you both escaped from him… the ministry declared you both presumed dead, at Lucius's hand.  Obviously they were vastly mistaken.  But why didn't you come back when the war ended that following summer?"

A blond head was shaken disparagingly.  "One of the reasons the town was such a safe place for us to hide was it's seclusion.  It was virtually totally cut off from the rest of the world, both magical and muggle.  I didn't even know the war had ended and my father was dead until almost a year and a half after it was over."

"That was three years ago, it still doesn't explain what took you so long to come back."

"It wasn't that simple.  The reason my mother had been so eager to help me escape was because my father was abusive to her."  A startled breath from Harry was the only sound that breached the momentary pause.

"He rarely touched her, preferring to use hexes and curses to torment my mother… even trying out new ones on her that he couldn't be certain of the exact results."

The dejection that came from the blond ached at Harry's heart.  Regardless of how Harry may have felt betrayed by Draco's lack of return, he still loved the man before him and wanted nothing more than to take him in his arms as he once would have, and sooth away the hurt.  But he wouldn't allow himself to, not yet.  Not until he gotten a full explanation for his abandonment.  "Go on," he prompted gently.

"The curses had left permanent damage to my mother, and as time passed, though she was no longer being harmed, the effects were beginning to be scene.  She gradually grew grievously ill, and by the time I knew the war was over, she was in no condition for the arduous journey it would have required to return to England.  So I stayed by her side, I couldn't just leave her behind to die.  She left all she'd known to make sure I was safe… I don't think she would have ever actually left if she hadn't know father was going to kill me as well as her… She passed away two months ago, that's when I decided it was time for me to return."

Harry nodded gently.  "I understand why you didn't come home sooner, no one could have expected you to leave her after all that."  Now his gaze took on a slightly harder look, "That still gives no explanation for why you didn't communicate with anyone, with me, after you knew it was safe.  I spent three years looking for you, trying to find any trace of where you'd gone.  I never gave up believing you were alive, even after the ministry gave you up for dead, the least you could have done was send me a letter, let me know you were ok."

This time Draco's face took on a scathing appearance, "Oh yes, you were obviously so heartbroken over my absence.  After the war was over I made a point of getting a hold of the French paper, they showed just how depressed you were," he finished sarcastically.

"And what the hell is that supposed to mean?  How dare you claim to know what I was feeling!"

"Well you sure seemed to have moved on, all those men and women by your side as you attended ministry functions, yes you seemed entirely heartbroken over my absence!  Honestly Harry, how can you sit there and say to my face all this rubbish about missing me?  It seems to me you moved on rather quickly!"

The accusations reached a fevered pitch, voices raised loud and cruelly.

"Did you ever once stop to think that the reason I was with so many different people was because I couldn't give my heart to any of them?  My friends set me up with those people, Hermione was the only one that knew about us, they meant no harm.  And none of those relationships lasted.  I broke up with Samantha a couple weeks ago, she was a wonderful woman, kind, caring and thoughtful.  We were together for almost a year.  And do you know why she left Draco?  Do you have the faintest clue?!"

"Because you're a self-centered prick?" was the harsh reply.

Harry suppressed a growl of frustration.  "No, you egotistical arsehole.  She left because she said I wasn't fully committed to our relationship, that I didn't love her, that my heart obviously belonged to someone else.  And do you know what?!  She's right, despite how much I'm currently pissed-off at you, I still love you!  For the life of me I don't know why, but I do, I love you Draco, and it hurts that you didn't think I was worth even a letter to know how you were doing!"

Draco's voice softened, a look of mild chagrin on his face.  "I didn't know if I was ever coming back Harry.  You seemed to have moved on, I did what I thought was best.  If I was never going to come back, knowing I was there, keeping in touch, it only would have been more painful… for both of us."

"Didn't I have the right to be involved in such a decision.  And what's to say I wouldn't have gone to be with you, did you ever think about that?  You helped me get through that year.  First being together, and then fighting to get you back, to find you.  Merlin Draco, I would have gone to Greece to be with you."

"Don't you think I realised you'd do something like that?  You've always been too selfless Harry.  I didn't want you throwing your life away for me.  You're Harry Potter, no matter how much you dislike the fame, you have it and a responsibility because of it, especially after such a desecrating war as that one.  You needed to be here, for all of your other friends and family, and for the rest of the wizarding world.  In comparison I was insignificant, it was better that way."  The blond sighed in resignation.

Harry drained the last of his glass and sat back in his chair.  "Gods Draco, whoever thought you'd be so altruistic."

Draco smiled wryly, "Well that's me, Mr Unpredictable."

Harry tried to suppress a burst of laughter, but failed, and both laughed heartily, washing away the tension that had risen.

When the laughter finally died down, Draco could see a serious expression settle on Harry's face.  "What is it Harry?"

"I… well, I just need to know Draco.  Are you back for good?  Or are you leaving again?"

"That depends…  Do you want me to stay?"

Harry shook his head in indecision.  "Things can't just pick up from where they left off, Draco.  You've been gone for five years, both of us have gone through things…"  He looked up to meet silver eyes, "But I would like to try again, if you're willing.  I've missed you so much, and if I don't give us another shot I know I'll never forgive myself."

Draco smiled and moved to kneel beside Harry's chair, a hand placed on Harry's knee.  "I would very much like that, I've missed you as well."

Harry leaned in, placing a gentle kiss on soft lips.  It was short, sweet and almost chaste, but the kiss held promise, and hope.  "Stay here tonight?"

Draco stood, pulling Harry into his arms with him.  "My pleasure."

Neither could be sure if things would work out for them, if people would accept their relationship.  No one can ever be sure what the future holds, not even the best seer can be certain.  But the one thing they did know was that fate had given them a second chance and they were going to make the best of it.

~finis~