Harry has a lot of flaws, but he has two in particular that have always gotten him into trouble.

First, he's got a bit of a self-destructive streak. It's not that he doesn't care about his well-being, it's just that he often lets other things take precedence to it.

Second, he's never really been able to leave well enough alone. When something catches his attention, however benign or even inadvisable, he follows it with a dogged determination that, if Harry's being honest with himself, can really only be described as unhealthy.

And that is precisely why Draco Malfoy is, and always has been, so exceptionally dangerous.

Not because he's a not-inexperienced Dark Wizard of some power and skill, though he certainly is, but because he is the honey in every trap. He is the precisely perfect foil, as though he was created with Harry in mind, hand-crafted to push every button and evoke every flaw in him.

It's why he comes to Nox next Friday and scans the room for the too-blonde hair, while at the same time tells himself that he should not let himself get too involved. It always goes too far with Draco Malfoy.

It's also why, when he spots him, he walks over anyway.

He is sitting straight-backed in a chair, long and lean and gorgeous and profoundly uncomfortable – an uneasiness not mended when he sees Harry.

"You came back," Harry says.

Malfoy purses his lips, and Harry takes a moment to look him over. All these years later, and Harry still feels like he could cut his palm if he slapped that pretty face of his.

"At least you have a shirt on this time," Malfoy snips. It's true – fitted, black, plain cotton. He sits down across from him.

"Sorry to disappoint you," he answers. "Though it's charming to see you remember what I was wearing."

Malfoy glares at him. Harry smirks.

"Pout and fuss all you like, Malfoy," Harry says, "but you wouldn't have come back if you weren't interested."

"I sunk eight thousand galleons on this establishment, Potter; I'd be stupid not to come back."

"Oh, of course," Harry says. "And you're a very assiduous investor, returning on a night when the owner isn't even here."

The glare intensifies, but Harry can detect prickles of defensiveness just beneath the surface. Malfoy turns his head away, and Harry is momentarily distracted by the arcing lines of his throat stretching under the skin.

"You know, you don't have to justify anything to me, Malfoy," he continues after a lapse of silence. "I am the last person in the world in any sort of position to judge."

"Quite right," Malfoy says, nostrils flared, pressing himself into the high-backed chair, keeping his eyes on anything – and, by the way they flit across the room, everything – that is not Harry. "I can't imagine that I'd have anything at all to say to anyone in this den of depravity."

"Den of depravity," Harry echoes, then laughs. "Ten years ago I would have wanted to knock your teeth in for sass like that."

Nervously, skittishly, Malfoy looks back at him. Everything about him is so pretty. Perhaps it always had been, and Harry had never let himself really admit it until all these years later, when time had dulled the anger and wisdom the resentment.

Harry stands for a moment, then slides three chairs around the round table so he's sitting next to him. Malfoy tightens all at once, watches him guardedly, his hands folded on top of the table and his shoulders setting. There are so very many things Harry can imagine doing to Malfoy – pretty, pale, pointy Malfoy – but a Dom is nothing without self-restraint, and so he settles on—

"May I touch your hand?" Harry asks.

The question catches Malfoy off-guard, clearly. "What?"

"May I touch your hand?" he repeats, patiently.

"What sort of a question is that?"

"It's not just a question, Malfoy, it's the ethical cornerstone of this den of depravity. Above all things, consent. Without consent, it's not BDSM, it's just torture. Are you going to answer my question?"

Malfoy is staring at him guardedly. His hands are still clasped firmly together, his eyes still trained with needle-sharp intensity on Harry.

"Fine," Malfoy says, and Harry is equal parts surprised and not surprised. He reaches out his own hand and ghosts his fingers along the shallow crescent of Malfoy's knuckle.

Malfoy swallows, transfixed, and so Harry moves it around to skirt across his palm. He can hear Malfoy release a single, sharp, abrupt breath.

"When I first figured out that I was into tying up and hitting people, I was terrified," Harry says, evenly, as his finger traces the lines of Malfoy's palm and gently pulls it away from the other. "I thought the war had somehow broken me, that I'd seen so much death and darkness that it had crossed the wires in my brain."

Malfoy is a bit breathless. "Did it?"

Harry smirks. "I don't know," he answers. "Maybe. That didn't turn out to be the important question, though."

"What is the important question?" Malfoy asks, voice drawn taut like a bowstring. Harry turns over his hand, splays his fingers across the subtle hills and valleys of his palm. Malfoy's hands are soft and cool to the touch, thin and elegant.

"The important question was how I dealt with it," he says. "May I touch your wrist?"

"Potter," Malfoy whispers.

"You can tell me to stop," Harry says, "and I will."

Malfoy is silent a while. Harry watches his throat as he swallows. "Yes," he says.

Harry's fingers move up, skating across the pale blue veins visible just beneath the milky skin. Harry can feel Malfoy's heartbeat under his fingertips as it starts to quicken.

"I could have ignored it," Harry says, "forced it down. I could have immersed myself in weird porn, foregoing the context. Instead I decided to explore it a little more. Carefully, of course. I may have wanted to tie up and hit people, but I didn't want to hurt anyone, not in the way I'd seen people hurt during the War.

"I studied up. I did some reading, some research. You can imagine my relief when I learned about the holy trinity of BDSM – safe, sane, consensual."

"Safe?" Malfoy said, and he's trying to sound brusque, but his voice is still tight with carefully restrained emotion. "Sane? There's a man ten feet away from us bent over a table getting spanked."

"What's insane about that?" Harry asks, looking up to meet Malfoy's eyes. "Who gets to decide whether or not he should like getting spanked? You?"

Harry's fingers trace the sharp curve of his wrist bone. Malfoy makes a sound – soft, nearly imperceptible.

"Your pupils are dilated," Harry says to him quietly.

"What," is all he can manage in return. It's not quite a question. Malfoy's body is curling slightly at the spine, tightening as Harry's finger follows the shallow artery up the underside of his arm.

"And there's a flush rising on your neck," Harry continues, his fingers moving ever closer toward his elbow. "Rapid heart rate, shallow breathing."

"Potter."

"Signs of physical arousal," he explains, and Malfoy actually moans. It's short, and it's soft, but Christ, it has to be the most intensely erotic thing Harry's ever heard in his life. There's a sudden ache in him, starting low in his belly and surging down toward his pelvis. It takes more self-control than Harry's ever had to exert in his life to keep himself sitting.

"I – Potter—"

"I've gotten very good at detecting them," he says, and he watches as Malfoy starts to fall apart at the seams.

Malfoy's eyes are half-shut. The arm that Harry is so carefully mapping starts to tremble.

"If you're this turned on by my hand on your arm and a conversation about spanking, Malfoy, I think you may need to admit to yourself what you want for your own mental well-being."

"I—" he begins, haltingly, as Harry traces the veins under his skin toward his elbow. "Potter, I haven't – I haven't done this before."

"Funnily enough, I got that last week when I saw you staring at that riding crop like it was some weird alien invention. May I kiss your arm?"

Malfoy moans again, somehow more delicious than the first time. "Potter," he says, "that's not what I mean. I've never – I haven't done anything."

The words may not have physically struck Harry in the face, but for their effect on him, they might as well. Harry's hands abruptly still, and he looks up.

"I'm sorry," he says, "what?"

Malfoy looks a bit flustered. His shoulders are tense, but he looks more upset than embarrassed. "Why did you stop?" he asks.

"Malfoy, are you trying to tell me you're a virgin?"

He colors slightly, swallows. "Pureblood, Potter," he hisses. "We're supposed to wait until marriage."

Right. Of course they are.

The thing is, Harry has rules. All Doms have rules. For Harry, most of the rules revolve around continued and verbally expressed consent. But there's an unwritten rule in there, too, one that's never needed much attention—

No virgins. Never virgins.

More often than not, there's too much meaning there, too much emotional baggage that deserves to be addressed separately from the play. It demands a different kind of attention, one that Harry is not necessarily equipped to handle.

"Potter."

It's not that there's anything wrong with virgins, it's just that those who bring it up usually place some amount of value in it, and it's not Harry's place to question that value. Likewise, it's not his place to impose—

"Potter."

His eyes refocus. Draco is staring at him, breath still shallow, pupils still dilated.

"I don't want you to stop," he says, voice soft, face open and vulnerable.

And Harry realizes, all at once, that he is going to break his own rule, and that he is in a lot of trouble.

"Do you trust me, Draco Malfoy?"

Malfoy doesn't answer for a moment. The room is dark save for a shaft of pale moonlight filtering through the window. He faces away from Harry, silvered, hair illuminated to nearly white.

"Is that necessary when you're smacking someone about with a riding crop?" he asks.

"It absolutely is," Harry answers at once. "And I'm not going to use a riding crop on you."

Malfoy frowns, turns his head over his shoulder. "I thought—"

"Face forward," Harry interrupts. Malfoy stops short, then turns forward.

"Not sure how I feel about you dishing out orders, Potter."

"Then tell me to stop," Harry answers gently. "I will always stop when you tell me to."

Malfoy stays quiet.

"It's very important that you understand that," Harry says. "Not that I have any worries about you keeping your mouth shut for any length of time, but I never want you to feel like you can't tell me stop."

He makes a wide circle behind him. Malfoy is nothing but limbs, and Harry wants to map each one just as carefully as he did his arm.

"Many Doms don't need to be told," he says. "Many, including myself, are accomplished legilimens, who don't need to be verbally told when their sub wants to stop—"

"You are not going to go sift through my head, Potter," he says at once, hackles up. "And I'm not – I'm not a sub."

Despite himself, Harry laughs. It's not a reaction that does anything for Malfoy's temperament.

"Right," he says through his laughter, "my mistake. I was going to say that legilimency is usually only between those with some rapport, and it's never done without consent."

Malfoy goes quiet again, his paranoia apparently sated. Harry swallows the rest of his laughter.

"And I'm not going to use a riding crop on you, Malfoy," he continues. He threads his fingers through the hair hanging past Malfoy's shoulders, soft like gossamer. "This is your very first foray into BDSM and I am not your Dom. Using a riding crop on you would be insane."

"When we left, you said—"

"I know what I said," he interjects, and Malfoy's words fall off. His hair smells like floral soap. "May I undress you?"

Even without touching him, Harry can feel the shiver run down his spine. "Yes," he says, and Harry easily, unhurriedly, pulls his outer robe off over his shoulders.

"We have a lot of history between us, Malfoy," he says. "And a lot of context that we can't ignore. We have to do this right or not at all."

He pulls off his suit jacket next, and pops the buttons on his vest one by one by dragging the tip of his wand down his stomach. Malfoy's breathing picks up, deep but heavy.

"If you're that concerned with our history and context, Potter," he says, breathy, "then it might be inadvisable to take a riding crop to me, or whatever it is you—"

Harry takes the opportunity to do something he's been wanting to do all night – reach up, twist his fingers through Malfoy's hair, and pull sharply. He gasps, and his head falls back, and the lines of his throat arc. Harry stares at them hungrily.

"I disagree," Harry says into his ear, and Malfoy moans again. Harry's cock aches against his trousers at the sound of it, but he keeps his focus razor-sharp and unwavering. "I think it may be exactly what we need."

He tugs hard on the vest, and the shirt rips open with it. The posh bastard's shirt has self-mending buttons, of course, so Harry doesn't even have to feel bad about it.

"Put your hands behind your back," Harry whispers, and Malfoy, panting and shaking from the sudden cool air on his bare chest, obliges.

Harry conjures a long, red ribbon with a silent spell and ties a loose but secure knot around his wrists.

"I know you've developed a fascination with it," Harry says as he ties, "but the riding crop has a lot of power behind it. It is normally used for horses, after all. No responsible Dom would use it on a sub's first go-round."

"Stop calling me that," Draco hisses, "I'm not a sub."

"Whatever you need to tell yourself, Malfoy," Harry says, biting back more laughter. "Do you want me to stop?"

Malfoy hesitates, and the hesitation lingers. Harry watches the subtle shifting of the muscles on his back as he breathes.

"Then lie down on your front," Harry continues.

A moment later, he does, stripped from the waist up, on Harry's bed, and Harry feels as though he's in physical pain at the sight of it. He wants to map every inch of his skin with his tongue, wants to take him apart just so he can see how such a beautiful creature fits together.

"Look at you," he mutters, climbing onto the bed over him. "Wrapped up like a present."

Malfoy's hands flex and writhe in the ribbon. "Potter…"

"What did I tell you when we left Nox, Malfoy?"

He hesitates. When he opens his mouth to respond, Harry bends down and sinks his teeth lightly into his shoulder.

Malfoy releases a strangled moan, burying his face in Harry's pillow. Harry bites down harder, feeling him quaver.

"Y-you said you'd sate my curiosity," he gasps.

Harry withdraws. The mark left behind is shallow. Harry lifts a hand and rubs a thumb into the depressions.

Malfoy groans again, and his hips arc up off the bed. "Potter—"

"Accio deck," Harry says.

"What—?"

His deck of playing cards flies across the room and lands on his outstretched hand.

"Deck?" Malfoy asks, through his labored breathing. "What's a deck?"

"A deck of cards," Harry explains, thumbing open the aging cardboard box.

"Deck of – what?"

"The riding crop is far too severe," Harry says, tugging out the first card in the deck and turning it over between his fingers, "so we'll start with something lighter."

"I…"

Harry sits back, straddling Malfoy's legs. What an exquisite canvas he has to work with. A lean, pale back full of unobtrusive muscles, slender arms bound at the wrist, thin shoulders, and all that neck. He must be part swan.

Lightly, Harry traces his spine with the corner of the card, moving slowly and deliberately. He wants to savor this just in case Malfoy comes to his senses.

"I don't understand," he whines, squirming deliciously against the ribbon binding his wrists, mussing the comforter. "How does a deck of cards—"

Harry gives the card a flick with his finger, and – SNAP. A short, hot explosion of sparks against his kin.

"—aah!" Malfoy arcs, twists, and bends simultaneously away and toward it. The card leaves a smudge of red skin behind, and Harry wants to devour him whole.

"Did I not mention? They're exploding snap cards."

He gives the card another flick. SNAP.

"Nnnhhaaaah!" Another red mark on white skin.

It is always an exercise in self-control when he is with a submissive, but Harry has never had to pull quite so hard on his own reins before. Malfoy is nothing but long, writhing limbs and desperate gasping, as perfect a foil as he ever was.

"Always you, Malfoy," he mutters, tracing the corner of the card lower as Malfoy shakes, gasps underneath him. "When we were in school together I was convinced I wanted to beat you bloody. If only I'd known I wanted this instead. We could have saved ourselves a lot of hassle."

"Potter," he half-sobs, then – SNAP. "Hhnaaa—!"

Harry pushes a hand up along Malfoy's arm, still bound, still squirming. "Do you want me to stop?" he asks lowly.

Rather than answer, Malfoy arcs up against the card, body tense, muscles trembling.

"No, Malfoy, you have to say it."

"Potter, you tosser—" Malfoy sobs.

"This is non-negotiable," Harry says firmly. "I can't use legilimency to get a reading on what you want, and body language cannot always be trusted, so you have to say it. If you want me to keep going, you say it. If you wane me to stop—"

"If you stop I will kick you in the head, Potter!"

Harry physically bites his tongue to keep himself in check. He traces the upper hem of Malfoy's finely-tailed trousers – SNAP. Malfoy shouts – a hoarse "yes!" – and his body bucks and his legs curl and twitch under Harry's weight.

"You're doing very well," Harry tells him, trying his best to keep the hunger out of his voice, and his finger following the same path the card took, pressing lightly at the shallow red welt. "May I take off the rest of your clothes?"

"Yes, you bastard," Malfoy gasps at him.

"You're awfully pushy for a sub."

"I'm not a—" (SNAP) "—aaaaaahhh!"

Harry's fingernails curl against the skin of Malfoy's hip. "On your back."

Malfoy struggles to catch his breath and desperately wrenches around. Even in the darkness, Harry can see the flush down his neck and chest, see the tension in his body, hidden by such a thin layer of skin. Malfoy rests awkwardly on his still-bound hands, back arced uncomfortably. Harry tugs at the clasp of his trousers and pulls. The rest of Draco Malfoy is just as lovely, just as tense with arousal, and his cock – aching hard but utterly untouched – lies hot against his stomach.

"Potter, please," he gasps. The word all but pulses around Harry's arousal.

"Say it again," Harry whispers onto Malfoy's skin.

Malfoy snarls around a sob, hips arcing off the bed. "Please," he gasps.

Harry bends to gnash his teeth against the arc of his hipbone. He presses the flat of the card against his stomach – SNAP. "Hhnnhhhhaammmerlinyes—"

He keeps his hands steady even as his heart hammers in his chest, holds back even as he wants to let go, aches with every shout of pleasure.

SNAP. "Nnn— nnhaaa—!"

Malfoy's bound hands writhe, his hips buck upward into the air, and Harry keeps him steady with one hand on his waist while the other drags the card ever lower, down the sinews of his stomach, the shallow V of his pelvis – SNAP.

"I – M-Merlin, I can't—"

Harry's hand curls tighter around his waist. The card draws lower, down the front of his thigh – SNAP ("Potter!") – around, then upwards, and Malfoy's legs fall open so perfectly, so willingly, even as he struggles against his bindings – SNAP ("God – yes, it's – I can't—") – and his muscles are drawing ever tighter, and Harry almost wonders – but surely he isn't—

One last SNAP, right along the soft skin where his thigh meets his pelvis, and the spark lands just to the left of his swollen red cock, and Malfoy throws his head back and howls, and Harry realizes that he is coming, beautifully, arching and writhing and shouting, striping his stomach and all the little red welts left there with come, his cock completely untouched.

For a moment, Harry is too entranced to speak. Malfoy bucks and jerks with every wave of his climax until, trembling, he collapses again, head thrown back, chest heaving.

With all the blood that has summarily abandoned Harry's brain for his cock, it takes him a while to put together a sentence.

"Christ, Malfoy," he says, "you are a work of art."

No answer. Reluctantly, he tears his eyes away. Malfoy's mouth is half-open, eyes shut lightly. Harry knows that expression. He's pulled it out of his past partners enough times. Body surging with adrenaline but physically exhausted beyond cogent thought – he's in sub space, and he's not coming out for a while.

Ten minutes later, Draco Malfoy is unbound, naked, halfway between asleep and unconscious, tucked safely in Harry's bed. A room away, under hot jets of water, back pressed against the porcelain, Harry tugs at his cock with an urgency of which he did not know he was capable.

Images of white skin and blonde hair burn fresh and hot in his mind's eye – desperate shouts of pleasure, pleas for more, the intoxicating rush of Draco Malfoy hanging so desperately on the razor edge of Harry's attentions—

He bites down hard on his opposite hand, because if he doesn't, he'll likely wake him up. He comes so hard that he's blind for a moment, his head full of nothing but Malfoy.

It is not after several long moments that Harry comes down from the rush, slumped against the wall of the shower, and he realizes however much trouble he thought he was in before was a profound underestimation.