Watching, Waiting Ch. 3

*Author's Note: A nice, fast update for you guys this time! I want to thank everyone for continuing to read this story, and I want to especially thank everyone who's reviewed. I love hearing from you guys. Enjoy chapter three!*

"Things are not always, things are not always how they seem
Will you be ready (will you be ready?)"

-Imogen Heap, 2-1

"Come on, Potter, put your back into it. I'm still like a foot away from the latch," demands Draco, his fingers extended before him, reaching. He's currently wavering several feet above Harry's head, his feet cradled in Harry's palms as the brunette hoists him up. The pair is outside a cookie-cutter suburban home. The house is two stories tall with generic off-white paint and generic finishings. The lawn leading up to this house is perfectly manicured and tamed, just like all of the other houses on this block. The only thing differentiating this house from any of the other dwellings in the neighborhood is the number on its address plate.

"Maybe if you weren't so damn heavy," grumbles Harry, straining to lift Draco higher.

"Muscle weight," retorts Draco. "I can't help that I'm so ripped."

"Yeah, right," mutters Harry sarcastically. "I'm sure that's it. You're going to be the next Arnold Schwarzenegger."

"Who?"

"Oh, right. He's a muggle actor. Guess you wouldn't know him." Sometimes Harry forgets that the world is divided in two like this: magical on one side and muggle on the other. It always takes him a while to calibrate his thinking for each world; telephones there, owls here. Football there, Quidditch here. His past there, his present here. He's never allowed to forget that polarization for long, though.

"This isn't going to work," declares Draco, giving up his attempt to reach the second story window. "We're just going to have to sneak up the stairs inside. You know, we should have brought a broomstick."

"Right," grumbles Harry, dropping Draco gratefully to the ground. "I'll keep that in mind next time I break into someone's home."

"You know, for a guy who successfully broke into a Gringotts' vault, you're not very prepared for this," points out Draco, sounding quite cheerful about this fact.

"Well luckily there are no dragons guarding this place," retorts Harry. "Come on, we'll sneak in through the back door. It's less likely to have as many anti-intruder charms on it." The two boys creep around the side of the house, hunching over to stay low to the ground and out of sight. This is the kind of neighborhood rife with bored housewives who have nothing better to do than spy on their neighbors. It wouldn't do to be spotted here. There are only so many people two boys can obliviate in one go.

The back yard looks just as bland as the front. A neatly mown lawn spreads out in all directions, its borders defined by tufts of carefully trimmed bushes. A small patch of tulips sits in one corner, giving the space a little color. Two lawn chairs sit in the middle of the grass facing away from the house. Based on the cobwebs clinging to them, they haven't been used in quite some time. Harry and Draco tiptoe up the steps to the back porch, slowly inching across it to the house's backdoor. Harry pulls out his wand, pointing it towards the metal of the doorknob.

"Alohomora," he whispers. Instantly, the lock on the door clicks open. Clearly this house's security isn't very tight. Draco reaches out to turn the handle, but Harry shakes his head, stopping him.

"Hold on," he murmurs. "Let me hide us first." Harry raises his wand over Draco's head, silently casting a disillusionment charm. Draco's body vanishes, invisibility melting over him like it has a physical form. Then Harry performs the spell on himself. Harry peers down, examining the air where his hands used to be. It worked. Disillusionment charms may only rarely cause complete invisibility, but when combined with darkness the effect is enough. No one looking at this porch would guess that two boys are standing there.

Something hard stabs Harry in the cheek.

"Ouch!" he yelps, indignant. "What the fuck, Malfoy!"

"Sorry," says Draco, not sounding sorry in the slightest. "Just making sure that's where you are. This whole invisibility thing is weird. I feel like I'm just talking to myself here."

"Then I recommend you shut up," advises Harry. "Now come on, let's head inside."

"Hold on," interjects Draco, and Harry suddenly feels fingers prodding his chest searchingly. Invisible fingers feel along the fabric of Harry's robes, inching sideways until they've found his arm. Then the digits grope downwards, sliding over the skin of Harry's palm and interlacing their fingers together tightly.

"I won't be able to know where you are otherwise," mumbles Draco, sounding slightly embarrassed. Harry wonders briefly if Draco's invisible cheeks are blushing beneath his disillusionment charm. Harry nods, then realizes that Draco can't see the gesture.

"Alright," he says, then slowly reaches out with his free hand to turn the knob and inch the door to the Fisher house open. The door creaks slightly, but other than that nothing happens as the pair slip into the dark house. No alarms go off, no curses blast them into unconsciousness. This is a house that has embraced the fact that the wizarding world is enjoying a period of peace. It's trusting, unprotected, like a hedgehog exposing its soft underbelly. Harry almost feels guilty taking advantage of that trust. Almost. He is here to do good, after all.

The two boys creep quietly through the house, staying close to the walls where Harry was once told that floorboards are less likely to creak. It's not hard to find the stairs to the second floor; the house's layout is quite straight forward and it isn't very large. Harry tiptoes up the steps dragging Draco along after him. He pauses after each step, listening for any movement in the hallway before them. The house is silent, though, devoid of any sign of life. Anyone here must be fast asleep, safely oblivious to the physical world around them. When the two boys reach the top of the stairs Harry stops, causing Draco to almost crash into him.

"Homenum revelio," whispers Harry. A small, golden ball of light expands in the air before him, illuminating the shadowy hallway. The ball pulses once, then floats off down the corridor, turning to sink into one of the doors on the left. That must be where Elliot Fisher's grandmother is sleeping.

"Muffliato," Harry mutters, pointing his wand at the door. Now they don't have to be worried about the elderly woman hearing them and waking up.

"She can't hear us now," says Harry to the invisible Slytherin behind him. "Come on, one of these doors must lead to Elliot's room."

"My money's on that one at the end of the hall," says Draco dryly. "The one with the sign that says: 'Elliot's room. Keep out.'"

"Right. I knew that."

"Obviously…"

The pair strides off down the hall, still holding hands. When they reach the door Harry stops, casting several diagnostic spells on the wooden frame. There aren't any defensive spells there, though, no booby-traps for an unwary burglar. Harry swings the door open.

"Lumos."

The room looks like that of a typical teenage boy. Clothes lie strewn about the floor, crumpled and unkempt. The walls are painted a cream color probably chosen by Elliot's grandmother, but most of that is covered with posters of Quidditch teams and wizard bands anyways. There's a twin-sized bed against one wall, a chest of drawers at its foot, and a desk opposite it. The room isn't big, and between the two of them it shouldn't take long to search. Harry tugs his hand free of Draco's.

"Let's split up," he suggests. "You search the drawers and under the bed, and I'll tackle that mess on his desk."

"Alright," agrees Draco, striding over and tugging open one of the bureau's drawers. A handful of socks float upwards through thin air, clenched in an invisible fist. It's an odd sight. Harry shakes his head, focusing back on the task at hand. Elliot's desk is a complete mess. Loose papers coat the desk's wooden surface, hiding it so thoroughly that it takes Harry a moment to figure out that the desk is even wood at all. Some of the papers are articles or pictures torn from magazines: an article on the newest Nimbus 3000, a schedule for an upcoming concert, an article on how to get in shape for the ladies. Some of the papers, though, are written in what Harry assumes must be Elliot's own hand. There are plenty of loose papers floating around that look like old homework assignments, crumpled and already graded. The grades scrawled on the essays are average, nothing to make the boy stand out either positively or negatively. Harry can see no reason here why Elliot would be the target of someone trying to control him. This boy didn't seem to have anything worth manipulating him for, nothing worth taking. It just makes no sense; why would someone choose this boy as their victim? What could they possibly gain aside from tips on how to get the best abs?

Something soft smacks Harry's back, clinging to his shoulder. Harry reaches up and drags it off of him, holding it up so that he can see what it is. A pair of grey boxer-briefs floats in the air above the desk.

"Please tell me these are clean," groans Harry, throwing the underwear away hurriedly and wiping his fingers off on his trousers.

"I'm not convinced any of this stuff is really clean," comments Draco with disgust, chucking a pair greying socks onto the carpet.

"Hey!" protests Harry. "We've got to try and keep everything where it is. It can't look like anyone else has been here."

"Have you seen the state of this floor?" asks Draco. "I doubt anyone is going to notice one more pair of socks in all this mess." Harry says nothing, but silently, he agrees. This boy really didn't seem to care about tidiness. At all.

Harry turns his attention back to the desk, shifting aside a pile of nudie magazines. A busty woman winks at Harry from one of the magazine covers, squeezing her ample breasts together with both hands. Harry flushes, quickly looking away and covering the woman with an essay on the uses of fairy dust in potion making. As Harry is moving the magazines, though, a small slip of paper falls out from between the porno's slick pages. Harry reaches for it, unfolding the crinkled parchment.

11:30 p.m., The Milk of the Serpent, 546 Nocturn Alley

The handwriting is different than on the rest of Elliot's papers, elegant and neat. There's something old-fashioned about the lettering, like the swirly script found on official documents in the 17th century. Even though the note looks slightly hurried, the person who wrote this clearly cares about their penmanship.

"Hey, do you know anything about a place called 'The Milk of the Serpent' on Nocturn Alley," Harry asks Draco, frowning down at the note in his hand.

"Yeah," replies Draco, pausing briefly in his ransacking of Elliot's dresser. "It's a tavern. Got a real nasty reputation. You won't find a single person in there with good intentions, that's for sure. A lot of dark wizards meet there when they have business meetings of a more… sensitive nature. It's a good place to meet without being overheard. The people in there are too dangerous to eaves drop on, even on each other. My father has been there once or twice, to, um, sort a few deals out. Why?"

"There's a note here with that bar's address on it," explains Harry. "There's a time, too. 11:30 p.m. Looks like someone was arranging a meeting with Elliot there."

"No meeting at The Milk of the Serpent is a good meeting," says Draco ominously, sounding worried. "I can't picture some straight-laced teenage boy just waltzing in there. That place means business, serious business. Only people really messed up in dangerous things meet there. Even I would hesitate before going in there alone." Harry frowns at these words, and ominous feeling clenching in his gut. The pieces of the puzzle are starting to come together, and Harry doesn't like the image they're making.

"Oh, crap. Hey, Potter, come and look at this," exclaims Draco suddenly. Harry turns, walking over to the dresser. A thin, black shape floats up and out of one of the drawers. It's a mask. As Harry reaches out to touch it, fingers skimming over its smooth surface, he realizes that it's made out of metal. The mask is big enough to cover someone's entire face, with a small, angular hole for each eye and a long slit above where someone's mouth would sit. The features carved into the mask are perfectly blank, its expression stony and cold.

"This mean anything to you?" Harry asks, running his fingertip along the mask's sharp nose.

"Only through rumors, whispers and rumors," murmurs Draco, his voice close to Harry's ear. Whispers of masked men meeting in the dark, in the shadows. Stories of their hatred, of their anger, of their need for revenge, their longing for power. Men whose faces are unknown, identities hidden behind plates of metal, their expressions forever cold and impassive and unchanging. Their anger is hot though, their fury burning. They lost before, their leader taken from them, but they will not lose this time, not again. The brands on their arms have just turned to scars now, but they remember. Their loyalty is not forgotten; they will serve their master even now, even after he's long since dead and gone. To them, the war is not over; it's just on hiatus. The battle will begin again. Peace is just a comforting story people tell themselves. It can't last forever.

"How can you tell it's one of theirs?" Harry asks. He doesn't need to specify who 'they' is.

"Here, on the underside," says Draco, flipping the mask over. Inside, on the bottom corner of the mask is a small brand, a maker's mark. Three serpents twine together, their interlaced bodies forming a neat circle. In the middle of this circle is a symbol that almost looks like a cross, but the top of it is a loop instead of just a straight line.

"It's the Egyptian symbol 'Ankh'. It represents eternal life," explains Draco. "The rumor is that the group has adopted it as their crest to celebrate the Dark Lord's reincarnation." Draco's voice sounds thin here, tinged with fear.

"Why not just use the Dark Mark?" asks Harry.

"I'm not sure, really," admits Draco. "I think it's to show that this time it's different. Like, they're not going to lose again. Kind of like a rebirth of not just the Dark Lord, but also their entire group. I'm just guessing here, though. I'm not even sure the Dark Lord is really back. It's all just heresay, just words."

"I can't imagine how it could be true," Harry murmurs, more to himself really than for Draco's ears. "When we defeated Voldemort we were really thorough. We tracked down every last bit of him, every segment of his shattered soul. We did our homework. I can't imagine that we missed anything. We examined every memory of Voldemort's past we could get our hands on, learned all of his little habits and ways. He definitely only made seven horcruxes. He had a thing for that number: the most powerfully magical number. It clicked with his ego to have his soul split that many times. I can't imagine him deviating from that. And I was supposed to be the seventh: the most special. By taking out the one person destined to kill him he would be sealing his immortality. To make that the kill necessary to make his seventh horcrux would practically be like poetry, and Voldemort cared about symbolism. Underneath all of the brutality he really liked all of that pomp and ceremony. It meant something to him. I can't see him deviating from that, and without that there's no way for him to be alive now. None. I saw what would happen to him in the afterlife, and there's no coming back from that. No way."

Draco just listens to all of this in silence, absorbing this information, taking it in. He had served Voldemort for years, had listened to his father describe him for his entire life, and he had never heard anyone talk about the man like this. No one had ever known Voldemort so well as the boy who killed him, except maybe Dumbledore. Perhaps there is a little poetry in that fact, as well.

"What's it like?" Draco asks softly. "To be dead. What happens to you?"

"I'm not sure I really know 100%," answers Harry honestly. "I was in more of a transitional place. Where I was I could choose to move on, to something, I don't know what, to death, or I could return here, to life. I chose to live. I don't know where it would have taken me if I'd chosen otherwise."

"What was this transitional place like?" presses Draco, his curiosity piqued. Death had been all around during the war; he had come face to face with it over and over during those few long months. Dumbledore had died, not at Draco's own hand, but through Draco's cowardice, his inability to accept the older man's offer of protection and safety. Crabbe is dead, his flesh burned away before Draco's very eyes. He wonders where they are now, what they've moved on to. He wonders what he himself, someday, will move on to.

"At first it was just white, everywhere," explains Harry patiently, thinking back. He understands why Draco is asking, how the other boy's conscience burns with guilt for those who died during the war. "Then, slowly, shapes began to form, almost like they'd always been there. For me, it looked a lot like King's Cross Station. It took me a while to realize that, though. At first, it just looked kind of familiar. I was given a choice: board a train onwards, or go back. I chose to go back. But I don't know how helpful this description will be. I got the impression that that place is different for everyone, that it was all just happening inside my head. I think it was only King's Cross Station because that's what I made it."

"I see," murmurs Draco, picturing it. For a moment the pair just stands there in silence, contemplating Harry's description, what happens after one's life has been used up and one's time is depleted.

"We should go," says Harry gently. "It's going to be light soon and we need to get back to the castle. We'll take the note and the mask with us. We might need them."

"Alright," agrees Draco. He may have nodded, too, but Harry has no way of knowing. The two join hands and disapparate with a loud crack.

*Author's Note: And the mystery progresses! I hope you guys have enjoyed this most recent addition. Please review with any feedback or requests you may have. Also, I've heard back from many of you about whether or not you think Draco should become part of a romantic triangle with Tom and Harry. Many of you liked the idea of a little competition, but some of you just wanted them to remain friends. So I have chosen... not to tell you guys which way I'm going to go! You're just going to have to wait and see whether or not Draco and Harry's relationship becomes romantic. Thank you all so much for reading!*