Chapter 10
Dilemmas of Death, Decadence & Debauchery
By the thirteenth day of their capture the Slytherins had leaped to new heights in their immorality. So furious they were that Harry appeared not to have suffered as much as they had desired, they had thrown all reason and inhibitions into the wind, including that of the abhorrence of homosexual acts. Again it was profoundly apparent that the Slytherins, hard as it was to believe them homosexual, appeared to be doing it merely because it was against the norms of Wizarding society, such as one defaecating in public, or perhaps on stage. And of course they dared not touch Hermione for the unavoidable fact that she was of low, contemptible blood in their eyes, and that there was nothing sufficiently debauched for them about raping a girl.
Perhaps looking for the more effeminate-looking of them to appeal to things they were more familiar with – girls, they had tried to use Draco for their evil acts, but Harry had simply shifted in front of him, and it might have been that the Slytherins did not wish to endure the same injuries as Bellatrix had when she had nearly caused Draco harm by having Seamus sodomize him, so they left him alone. Of course particularly wishing to hurt Harry more than anyone else, and knowing that he cared much more for others than he did for himself, they had fought them to drag from the cage the third smallest boy: Seamus.
Seamus eventually at some point had no less than four penises poking into all of his holes. It was a ghastly sight to witness; Harry's stomach felt so concretely heavy with being so sick of it all that it couldn't even turn in unease as he saw Seamus coughing up bubbly semen through his nose as he sucked Malinga off and as his anus leaked with gallons of it while Bode and one of the tall Slytherins rammed violently into it at the same time, their semen and something greenish-brown trailing down Seamus' thighs and legs. Malinga viciously clapped Seamus, who was the only one fully naked, for coughing and gagging around his penis. Harry spat on the hay for the fourth time, trying to relieve his mouth of its excess saliva as he felt strongly nauseous.
The sounds the Slytherins made seemed almost as worse as the sight. The oldest of them, the two Slytherins, were making these deep, animal-like grunts as one banged in and out of Seamus' anus and the other his mouth, while Bode made panting noises and the occasional hiss with Malinga scarcely growling but largely breathing heavily as well.
It later seemed most of them were new to any kind of sex, never mind gay sex, for both Bode and Malinga – neither of whom was particularly striking in looks – couldn't handle their explosive orgasms and nearly collapsed on Seamus. Luckily one of the tall Slytherins wasn't finished with Seamus' mouth and so pushed Malinga off to fall into the hay, leaving Bode to rest on top of Seamus, catching his breath with half-closed eyes. When Bode and Malinga finally came to properly, Bode springing off Seamus and Malinga off the ground in embarrassment, one Slytherin climaxed with a muffled groan and a deep frown, spilling his seed into Seamus' mouth, and the other with a mere sharp sigh to shoot more semen into Seamus' anus.
After dressing themselves, cackling manly with each other, and jeering at Seamus crying, three of them left the dungeon, while Bode hurried Seamus up in recovering and getting up from the floor. It was a gruesome sight Harry thought would be hard to erase from his mind: Seamus hunched as he limped and plodded over back into the cage, his entire body gleaming not with sweat but with semen running down, and Bode giving him a half-jeering, half-repulsed smirk as he strode satisfactorily besides him. When Seamus entered after Bode unlocked the cage, the smell he came with was horrendous – it was a strong, sharp, pungent smell very characteristic of semen. Harry couldn't believe how much of it with which Seamus was dripping.
As Bode strolled towards the exit in an excessively relaxed pace, wonderfully sated, Harry together with the others approached Seamus with much apprehension as he plunked into the hay before them. There was a white pool of semen swirling in his navel, there were bubbles of it mixed with mucus running down his nose, pure streams of semen leaked from the corners of his lips, and his whole rear and the back of his thighs gleamed with it and that muddy brown slime as well, which appeared to be a mixture of blood and faeces.
Draco, Ron, Hermione, and Harry murmured his name and tried to touch him but gingerly, expressions of decorous horror and disgust on their faces, though on Hermione's there was also visible fascination, perhaps in seeing semen so naked as it was instead of being transferred from closed source to the other – penis to mouth or vagina.
"Those Slytherins have really outdone themselves this time," said Ron, shaking his head sympathetically down at Seamus as Hermione wiped Seamus' nose.
Seeing that Draco's robes were the most elaborate, hence they had much more material, she pulled his arm and so with them managed to wipe Seamus off completely before the semen could cake. When she came to wipe through his bum crack, Seamus jerked a little and hissed, while Ron and Harry looked aside, accidently glancing at each other.
"Sorry, Seamus!" squealed Hermione, and she became so ridiculously delicate in cleaning his crack she may as well floated completely over it.
"Those four were looking mighty chipper today," observed Blaise, as he stepped into the dungeon after the iron doors gave away. Fauss was just returning to his camping chair, ears glowing red. Blaise sauntered over to them carrying their dinner – grey, salty porridge.
"I'll bet," Draco murmured darkly, as he apparently couldn't help running his hand through Seamus' sweaty hair while he lay on the floor in the nude, covering his face red with humiliation, crying softly.
"And what happened to him?" Blaise asked. "You can't tell me he's not scoffing at the Cruciatus Curse yet – it's been nearly two weeks." He laid the tray in front of the gate.
Harry all of a sudden was very interested in Seamus' physique, scanning the nasty smear of smooth skin where he had been burnt, down to his light-pink knees, his slightly hairy shins, his pale feet, all the way back up to his sharp hip bone, to his flaccid penis based by a thatch of dark-ginger pubic hair. Hm, I think I'm bigger than him.
"Something worse, I believe," replied Draco, and continued with a shiver, "smells foul."
Blaise straightened up. With a frown, he twirled his wand and gave a swift glance at Harry, who was resolutely studying Seamus' body as though it were Adonis'.
"I could..." began Blaise in a casual tone, "...you know... maybe... you know... clean you up... hose you... you know..."
"Oh, Blaise, why didn't I think of that?" said Draco, slapping himself again.
"Because you didn't have a wand?" suggested Ron.
Draco ignored him. "Can you?" he asked Blaise, who whereupon nodded curtly. "Oh thank Merlin! We've been grimy for weeks!"
"You can stand up and I'll do it," Blaise said, as he glanced over his shoulder at the iron door.
Draco looked at the others indicatively. "Come on, Seamus, you want to have a makeshift shower?" he asked Seamus kindly. "Come on, yeah, I'll pick you up. Up you go..."
So the five of them stood up, Seamus looking unshakably at the floor and Harry acting similarly.
"Promise you won't try anything?" asked Blaise, as he stood poised to unlock the cage.
Draco gave him a demure look.
Narrowing his eyes, Blaise tapped the lock and opened the cage, at which point, Draco brushed past him delicately, smirking.
"Aguamenti," said Blaise, and he said this repeatedly to keep a steady flow of water to wash Draco as he twirled around and presented several body parts and places. Harry's penis thundered particularly when Draco at one point threw his water-logged hair back with his eyes closed, and Harry captured that moment like a snapshot, but then he felt a hot rush of anger when he spotted a similar bulge in Blaise's pants, and it was quite enough to lend him enough bravery to venture into Blaise's face, which was deeply studying Draco as he washed, the face which he had avoided since it came into the dungeon.
When Draco finished, he thanked Blaise more with his eyes than his soft smile before slipping back into the cage, gleaming with cleanliness.
"Go on!" he said to Harry, in a catching voice, and when Harry seemed reluctant to do so, he panted, "You can't smell yourself of course but trust me, you do – the Owlery's positively a florist shop compared to you."
This by itself lent Harry sufficient embarrassment to walk out of the cage and approach the boy who had fucked him besides Draco, and his embarrassment replacing his anger, he again couldn't look at Blaise.
"Aguamenti," said Blaise dispassionately, at which point a hose of water streamed into Harry, who started rubbing himself and washing.
The second-most relieved person to receive a shower was Hermione of course, naturally being a girl. Blaise didn't bat an eyelid when she removed her underwear. And so Blaise washed all of them in turn, and after this, he looked distinctly weary as he began slumping out of the dungeon.
"Enjoyed the show, did you?" Harry shot at Blaise's back, which whereupon gave away lethargically to a tired frown.
"What was that, Potter?"
"I said you enjoyed the show, did you?"
Blaise lazily raised an eyebrow. "You mean your show?" he asked, and despite that he doubtlessly felt drained, he evidently decided it worth it and took the effort to enjoy a small mocking laugh.
Harry's cheeks turned pink. "No! Not mine! Draco – I saw you!"
"And so what?" asked Blaise. "You don't think Draco's a sight to enjoy, do you?"
"What? I—no, that—wait—I meant—Of course he's a sight—no—not in that way—if you mean he's very—what are you saying?"
"You were a great fuck, by the way," Blaise tossed behind him, apparently in his exhaustion expediently deciding Harry was on a jealous trip, and he was quite right; Harry blushed, and he didn't have any more acidic words to say to Blaise afterwards, who turned back around and continued his trudge towards the iron doors.
This comment managed to put a smile on Seamus' face.
"What are you going on about?" asked Draco.
"Blaise!" exploded Harry. "He was eating you up with his eyes!"
"Babes, you do realize there're other people who lust after me besides you and Blaise, right? Or at least my handsome face; I think I've lost some shape – it's been a while since I did Quidditch practice."
"It doesn't mean I have to like it!" fumed Harry, and then shot at Draco as though he weren't complimenting him, "And you're beautiful everywhere!"
"Which makes me feel so special," deadpanned Draco, clearly referring to the tasteless tone of the compliment, but then went on with more pomp in his voice to sigh joyously, "Ha! I swear I'll sleep better like this! I'm not itchy with dirt anymore!"
"Yeah, that must have been hell for you, wasn't it, Malfoy?" said Ron. "Must've been the longest you've gone without washing."
"And in case you've convinced yourself otherwise, there is no shame in being clean," replied Draco smartly, "unlike of course not being a virgin."
Ron coloured.
"What happened now?" asked Harry in exasperation, clearly suspecting something must have gone on between Draco and Ron as it usually tended to.
"Your friend here is obsessed with you," supplied Draco. "I'm confident he would have buggered you in Blaise's place."
"I would never do that to Harry!" shouted Ron at once, fists arrayed.
"You'd never fuck Harry so that he wouldn't have to feel the pain of that potion anymore?" asked Draco, raising an eyebrow.
"I—that's not what I meant – that wasn't what you said first!" gibbered Ron, turning an explosive purple in the face.
"Not again," whispered Hermione irritably.
"Ron wanted to fuck me?" asked Harry, astonished.
"Oh yeah, no doubt about that," replied Draco. "I think he still has something for you."
"I – don't – have – a – thing – for – Harry!" hissed Ron, biting each word as he seethed. "We're best mates! He's a tossin' boy, for Merlin's sake! I'm straight, if you could get that through that thick, snow-white head of yours! And even if I was gay, he's nothing to look at—I mean, sorry, mate," he apologized swiftly, "but – hem hem – you're—I mean-"
"You don't think Harry's hot?" asked Hermione, sounding shocked, but then she paled, squeaked, and tried to hide her face with her arms, but the damage was already done: Ron looked horrified.
"You think Harry's 'hot'?" he whispered cautiously.
"I've always thought Harry's hot," remarked Seamus, frowning as though he found Ron questioning this as strange.
But Ron seemed not to have heard this, still staring at Hermione with horror in his eyes, while Hermione was taking her sweet time in revealing her face once again to answer his question.
"Thanks, Seamus," said Harry, glaring at Ron. "At least someone here cares about my feelings."
Strangely, he felt insulted by the fact that Ron didn't find him remotely attractive. What was with that?
Draco fittingly had a look of surprise on his face as he stared at Harry.
"I never thought of you caring about what you looked like before," he said. "What happened to that adorable 'I-don't-care-what-anyone-thinks' attitude?"
Harry blushed quietly but didn't even look in his direction, let alone answer.
After that... session... with Blaise a few days ago, it seemed to have put an irrevocable rubber stamp on his homosexuality more than had making his relationship with Draco official on Tuesday, 23rd September, a date which he'd never forget. Again he thought it was because his love for Draco was above homosexuality, it was something higher than that. So even though he had been under an aphrodisiac as he and Blaise had sex, the potion had began wearing off, and when it completely did so a long way before Blaise burned out – he had an unsurprisingly amazing stamina, hardly doubtful – there was a period where Harry was for the first time fully conscious of what was happening, a period where he felt and calculated the moment of each thrust Blaise drove into him against the wall. It was when he had stopped making the desperate noises but looked down chastely at his own flaccid penis.
Subsequently, he had peered up tentatively, taking in Blaise's sweat-gleaming chest, his toned abs, the smoothness of his slides, the smell of sex that hung between them, the actuality of what they were doing – having sex, and for the first his penis started throbbing to life as he felt lust for any other force than Draco. It was a devastating and new phenomenon.
He was turned on not by Blaise, but by the sexual situation itself.
And shortly after, he had grown conscious of how Blaise found him as a sex mate, wondered for the first time of his own physical stature. He had looked down at his small, thin thighs, paler than Blaise's, studied his own slight abs, his barely visible biceps, the non-existent shape of his legs, even his feet (he had blushed in deep embarrassment as he had noticed a thick black nail on his big left toe and tried to tuck it away as he scrunched that foot, cursing himself for being such a boy in not cutting his nails often).
He started feeling conscious of the way he looked against the wall, with his legs around Blaise's middle, wondering what shape he made, if he should arch his back more to make himself look more sexier, if he should pose in a certain way, but he had done little of this, for he had been smothered by the embarrassment that had arisen from this new self-consciousness, and so he had merely pouted quietly as he was engulfed by Blaise's build steadily moving in and out of him. Now he felt that new awareness of his body towards even Ron, even Seamus, and even Hermione of all people. And most particularly he started feeling bad about his looks after Ron's words that he was 'nothing to look at'. Did he want even Ron, his best friend, finding him attractive?
Yes.
He had never had esteem issues, but here they were, and he wanted to be told he looked good. It mattered to him most particularly now if it came from them people around him.
It was a poignant turning point, and he so wanted to put on that emerald robe that matched his green eyes so much right then...
But now he knew Seamus and Hermione thought it was hot, and that did much for his spirits, which should have been strange and uncomforting, but it wasn't.
"So you'd never fuck me, Ron, is that it, even in life-threatening situations?" Harry asked aloofly, ignoring Draco, but then immediately beat himself inwards for asking such a question. What kind of questions was it? How could he ask such a question to his best male friend?
Ron whipped his head round to him and gaped, relieving Hermione of his attention.
"You'd want me to fuck you?" he whispered.
Harry flushed deeply, and unbidden, a few disturbing images of Ron ramming into him against the wall streamed through his mind; his face dove into a deep crimson.
"No, I didn't mean it like that—I mean, I wouldn't—if it's like life-threatening or something—no, but of course if it went to those extremes—I—I don't know—but you're my best mate! It can't be right, can it? No – no – no, I wouldn't want to – and you wouldn't want to, right?"
After a moment, Ron nodded so vigorously Harry was reminded of Tibby, but then this amusing thought vanished in the light of a more disturbing thought that entered his mind:
Why was he thinking of himself as a bottom...?
But with relief, he thought that it was because he had recently had sex with Blaise in that position, which he hadn't chosen, and because Ron was way bigger than him, both in height and stock, as was Blaise, and so it would have been weird to imagine someone smaller dominating someone bigger... Or perhaps it didn't matter in gay sex... Harry found comfort in the fact that he didn't know much about these kinds of things because he was only a novice in them; he found stout comfort in his limited knowledge of anything homosexual – it allowed him to feel that much redeemable, that much closer to heterosexuality.
There was a moment of silence which sizzled with sexual tension and tension of a different kind.
Ron, apparently reminded, turned back to Hermione and gave her a demanding glare.
"You were about to tell me if you found Harry 'hot'."
"Oh, Ron, forget about it!" grumbled Hermione, and then went on opportunistically, "It's something positively tiny compared to what you and Harry were discussing!"
Harry and Ron blushed quite by themselves.
"And I suppose my question's forgotten as well," drawled Draco.
"That's not fair, Draco!" hissed Harry under his breath, still stunningly red in the face while he made every attempt to avoid Ron's eye.
"I could cut the tension between you two with a knife," offered Seamus, at which point a red Harry and Ron looked close to eruption.
They all seemed to have forgotten they were all still naked from the shower Blaise had given them.
"Ron said he doesn't find me attractive in the least, so I don't know what you're talking about," said Harry tartly, crossing his arms and turning his face away from Ron and Seamus.
"I was just—don't take it so personally, mate," grumbled Ron quietly, scuffing his big toe in the hay guiltily.
And then of all things to do, Ron actually furtively – as furtive as he could be – raked Harry up and down with his eyes, taking in Harry's feet – many of whose toes had unsightly nails of significant length and dirt under them, which could be blamed largely on their current living arrangements; his short legs and nonexistent calves – which gave them a slight, girly shape, hence Ron's lust fluttered most alarmingly, no doubt; his knobbly knees, which did him no favours; his small, skinny thighs – the fact that they were not muscular therefore echoed those of females, with less attractive curve of course perhaps made them something to note for him; his penis – Ron quickly moved on, uninterested; his bony hips, nothing attractive in the least in that; his slight abs and torso, nothing worthy of ogling; his neck; and finally his face, cute in a 'I-want-to-prove-myself' kind of way.
Ron then seemed to grow confident as he looked up, looking self-assured; he may have judged Harry overall undesirable. He checked his penis and found it was still soft, no amount of stiffness in it at all; he may have felt affirmed in his heterosexuality.
Ron's eyes surprisingly went to Draco next, and luckily there was an uninviting and familiar expression on his face – a raised eyebrow – Ron quickly looked away, but then for some mysterious reason his eyes ventured back and took in Draco from the bottom up.
They took in the relatively neatly kept toes of the pale, veined, petite feet, giving them an all-around fragile, vulnerable look – Ron's eyes visibly widened in fear, but it appeared he couldn't stop himself even then, for his eyes carried on upwards to the legs, growing away from each other in a sexy arch past the pristine knees to the deflating penis – Ron looked relieved. He then went upwards to the abs there, the visible ribs, the pectorals, the long, slender neck, the well-known face which some might find very handsome but he may not. Ron again smiled in seeming satisfaction and relief. He peered down at his penis again – it had risen only negligibly in stiffness; Draco did have undeniably shapely legs, despite their skinniness.
"Ron!" whispered Hermione incredulously as she slapped him. She appeared to have caught Ron studying Harry and Draco. "I shouldn't think you'll be coming out too soon, yeah?"
Ron flooded with colour.
"Of course not!" he grumbled.
"Well after that detailed observation you can't blame me if you see me ogling over one of them when they're so deliciously naked again, can you?"
"Yes, I can!" objected Ron at once, forgetting to whisper. "You shouldn't be looking at any other bloke than me!"
"That's impossible with two of the hottest boys in Hogwarts around, Ron," argued Hermione good-naturedly.
Ron looked beyond insulted. "Is this what you say to your boyfriend? You don't think I could be the hottest boy in Hogwarts?"
"Of course you are!" said Hermione suddenly and loyally. "There's no one hotter than you, Ronny Riot!"
This term of affection managed to go a long way in disarming Ron.
"Hermione," he warned shyly, "that name's only for when we're-"
"So, Harry, you didn't answer my question – when did you start caring about what anyone thought about you, or at least body-wise?" asked Draco.
Harry held the hay between his big toe – with his unsightly long black nail – and the adjacent one and played with it until he thought Draco would forget about the question.
"Fine," said Draco shortly, apparently relenting.
"What do you think of me?" asked Harry suddenly. "Do you think I'm...?"
Draco frowned at Harry for a long while, taking in his sincere and worried face before he scanned Harry from his feet up (Harry buried his left big toe under the hay).
Draco smirked. "You're not too bad."
"What does that mean?" demanded Harry, with some annoyance.
Draco's eyes widened. "I mean," he said, looking at a loss for words for what Harry was demanding, "you're not particularly striking, sorry, but you do have your areas..."
"Areas of what?"
Draco exhaled sharply. "I like your... arse – it's nice and firm." Draco made a mysterious, irritated noise here. "... I like your hands – they look... powerful, like you could protect me always..." Draco swallowed uncomfortably while Harry brought his hands up and scrutinized and turned them over. "...I like your knees – I've never seen a more hideous pair." Draco smirked affectionately.
"Then why do you like them if they're so hideous?" asked Harry, thinking of how utterly ridiculous it was humans had to have knees; they surely weren't expressly necessary for locomotion, were they?
"Because they're so hideous!" answered Draco. "Therefore they're unique, see, positive spin!"
Harry pouted and glared at Draco. "Right."
"I like your... belly-button, but I think mine's cuter."
And it was, Harry realized, as he stared at it. He had never before seen a navel as something with the potential to be cute or measurable by beauty. He hadn't noticed Draco – or any other person for that matter – had a navel up until Draco mentioned it.
"Most of all I like your face. You're very handsome, Harry Potter, don't let anybody tell you otherwise, or they will have to answer to your executive boyfriend."
"What makes me handsome, then?" asked Harry, wishing to get more specifics, which was also an attempt at hiding his blush.
Draco looked put-out, but with a bracing sigh he went on, "Your cheeks – they make you look adorable-"
"I'm not adorable."
"Your lips, look so kissable..." Draco ran a finger over them, at which Harry averted his gaze bashfully to the ground.
"And that scar, rather smashing, I think."
"I would have thought is smashes up my image; at least you hated it – there couldn't be an insult that didn't have my scar in it."
"That was then."
"Right. So that's all?"
"Well, yeah, Harry! You're not – what's that man you were babbling on about? – Narcissus!"
"Sure, I'm not," said Harry, smiling, and he couldn't help placing a tiny peck on Draco's lips. "I'm just Harry Potter!"
Draco returned the peck with a longer one. "So you'd never want to see me with another person, would you?"
"Never!" hissed Harry grinningly, with his arms around Draco. "All mine!"
"Do you two want to maybe find a room?"
"Piss off, Weasley, or else close your eyes if can't handle it!" And in defiance, he kissed Harry deeply, tipping his head backwards.
"Our dinner is getting cold!" said Ron.
"Who's stopping you from eating?" asked Draco between kisses.
Ron stared at them kissing, teetering on their feet, their erect penises poking each other's abdomens. His face screwed up as he went over to the iron bars to collect the bowls through the gaps. When he tried to hand a bowl to Seamus and Hermione, they were both too enthralled by what was happening between Harry and Draco.
The iron doors swung open.
"Really now," drawled Blaise at Harry and Draco, strutting towards the cage.
"We haven't started with them!" protested Ron, as he rushed to gobble up his gruel.
"Well, what were you doing all this time?" Blaise asked.
Ron dramatically pointed over to Harry and Draco making out.
"Blaise, won't you join us?" panted Draco, at which point Harry froze.
"No, thanks," said Blaise with a dismissive wave of his hand, "some aren't too pleased about me."
"Oh don't mind him – he's just getting himself sorted out properly. Tell me him you think he's gorgeous like me – but of course not really like me – he would appreciate the input."
"I don't care what he thinks of me!" said Harry, firing up.
"I don't find you attractive in the slightest. You're skin and bones, quite frankly, and I don't really do boys – appreciate that I told you the truth, Potter, nothing more and nothing less."
"Yet you find Draco 'a sight to enjoy'?" countered Harry seamlessly. "He's barely less skinny than I am."
"Well, yes," agreed Blaise unflinchingly, "Draco here has something about him I can't really... explain... He's just... gorgeous... but you – there's really nothing I can say makes my heart go like that."
"That doesn't make sense, can you hear yourself?" argued Harry, tapping his temple in something of a loony gesture.
"What do you want me to say, Potter? You actually care about what I think of you?"
"No I don't, actually!"
"Then why are we arguing?"
"Because Draco said something totally untrue!"
"Then blame your boyfriend, then. Are you finished with those?" Blaise pointed at the bowls, whereupon those who hadn't started on their dinner promptly did so under Blaise's rolling eyes.
"You just have to work on what you think is your best feature and focus on it and develop it while you tinker with some of the other things," advised Draco, wolfing down his gruel for the sake of energy than pleasure.
"But I don't think I have a 'best' feature – that is it!" complained Harry honestly.
"Your face," said Blaise, as though he were part of the conversation. "Work with your face."
Draco raised his eyebrow up at Blaise, who shrugged elegantly.
Harry blushed wordlessly, now quite unable to look into Blaise's eyes, never mind glare into them as he had minutes prior.
"I would have thought your eyes!" said Draco.
"Me too, your eyes!" agreed Seamus readily.
"Especially after you got your contact lenses!" said Hermione enthusiastically. "I mean, it's like they have this brand new spark to them! Those glasses – or 'windscreens' – were weighing you down badly, and when you didn't have your contacts you had still that glazed, unseeing look to your eyes like a dead spider – sorry, Ron – but now, when you can see clearly it's like you do that 'blazing thing with your eyes' like Parvati said but just all the time!" Hermione trailed off, seemingly close to having an orgasm as she stared into Harry's mesmerizing eyes.
"But how on earth can I work with my eyes?" asked Harry, poking his gruel furiously as his face shone red.
"Just get used to giving us certain looks, you know," said Seamus, "striking looks, that is."
Ron snorted. "Like what, posing with his eyes? I can just see him in the doorway fuming that Draco had forgotten to put the toilet seat down and giving him a 'blazing' look!"
"Ha, ha, ha," drawled Draco, "but you essentially got it right." Ron scowled. "But don't go overboard with it – be simple, but talk through your eyes."
"So why did you say my face?" Harry shot at Blaise, and then after a moment said, "Oh if one more person says I'm adorable..."
"You're adorable."
Harry glared at Blaise, who merely smirked smugly down at him.
"In a bad way, if that makes you feel any better."
"It doesn't, for your information."
"I wasn't aiming to make you feel any better in the first place – that's Draco's job – I'm not your boyfriend."
"As if I'd ever want you to be my boyfriend," muttered Harry.
Blaise raised an eyebrow and then snorted.
"Adorable, see?"
Harry swore at him under his breath.
"Wow, so you've completely moved onto the other side," said Blaise with innocent wonder, "you're like full-circle gay now? Sorry, I don't get these things."
"What makes you say that?" asked Harry.
"Just... you apparently caring what I thought of you-"
"I don't."
"Right. Some words you use... A lot of it is subconscious, mind you."
"I don't know what you're talking about," said Harry curtly. "I love Draco, and that is all."
Blaise had a cunning look on him.
"For the record, you I really enjoyed our fuck – you were one of a kind."
Harry didn't look up.
"I was poisoned."
"Really? After a while I could have sworn you were acting like you are right now – all adorably shy – are you poisoned now?"
Harry's neck turned redder.
Blaise quirked an eyebrow in satisfaction.
"Are you finishing up? I must get going."
"What day is it, Blaise?" asked Draco. "How far is it from full moon?"
"Two days."
Several of them snorted up their gruel and coughed.
"Two days?" stammered Seamus.
"Two days, Finnigan," said Blaise gravely.
Draco left his meal and sat back on his bum. He seemed on the verge of spitting out the gruel in his mouth.
"So what are they going to do, let some werewolves loose on us, again?" he asked, looking around the enclosed dungeon.
"Don't know, as I've told you," replied Blaise. "I need to get going; Fauss expects me out anytime soon; can't be making him suspicious any more than he is."
They finished their meals in quiet and handed their bowls over to Blaise, who placed them on his tray and swept out of the dungeon. After, they put on their robes and each kept to him- or herself.
It had been a blur of decadence for so long that had blinded them temporarily from this imminent point, and all those issues left before it came back with a force – the fact they were would left to the mercy of some werewolves once more, and that Draco after all was a Horcrux.
The latter presented a convenience – they did not have to hunt for the individual Horcruxes anymore. However, this convenience came with a terrible price: killing Draco, of which, Harry thought, he wasn't capable and of which rather Draco himself was more so.
The next afternoon, as per Seamus' hypothesis, the group of four Slytherins returned.
"Hey, pretty boy!" said Bode, striding into the dungeon confidently, leering at Seamus, whose eyes instantly bore a horrified fear and who immediately backed up into Hermione.
"Oh, how sweet, running away from us, he is!" said Malinga, amused.
"Come on, pretty boy, we've come back for more," said Bode, as he grabbed his crotch and squeezed it.
"Don't you boys have anything better to do?" Hermione shot at them.
"Ooooh!" the Slytherins lilted jeeringly.
"No, actually, if you want to know," answered Bode. "School's a drag, so we just wanted to relieved ourselves on his sweet boy cunt."
"But don't worry, Semen—I mean, Seamus-" There were outbursts of snorts and chuckles, but Vic continued, "-we'll let you rest for a bit – see how considerate we are? No, today, we thought we'd give someone else a chance for a taste of how wonderful Harry felt. You looked liked you had a lot of fun, didn't you? Did you have fun yesterday?"
Quite contrasting to the light tone with which Vic spoke, there was no doubt he was less than happy about it.
"Much," answered Harry shortly.
Vic's slightly sharp stare hardened to a downright glare for a moment, but then he said, "Right. So you would understand of course why I'd like for the rest of your friends to enjoy themselves as much as you did?"
Harry didn't answer, and to his utter horror, Vic's face twisted into a malevolent grin as his hand drifted into his robes to pull out something, but then his hand emerged and it came out empty-handed, and Vic splashed his hand at him in a bluff, whereupon the Slytherins roared with laughter at the panic so eloquently written in Harry's face.
"As if we'd have another twenty-three Galleons to waste on them!" said Bode.
"His face went white like that, did you see?" wheezed Vic.
"You faggots!" said Harry furiously, his heart still thundering fast, and feeling quite disgusted and truly up to here with them.
But this specific derogatory term had a powerful effect on the Slytherins.
So powerful that they felt brave enough to dare take Draco for their sordid sex fest, and Harry tried with all his might to fight them. Harry's fists and kicks flew at them, but one of the tall Slytherins after Harry got his jaw quickly growled, "Incarcerus!" and Harry was bound by thick ropes to drop to the floor, where a harrowing panic took hold of him.
"Gag his mouth or something, Seth!" shouted the other tall Slytherin to the other.
"Okay, okay! I'm sorry, I'm sorry! You're not faggots! Please leave him alone! Leave him alone!"
Draco screamed unmanly as Bode and Malinga tried to drag him out of the cage, but Ron and Seamus were giving a tough fight. Bode let go of Draco's legs to land a breathtaking punch in Ron's stomach, while Malinga dropped Draco's arms to get Seamus square in the jaw, and he fell and writhed wordlessly to the floor. Bode made sure Ron hit the ground by giving him another blow to the cheek, at which point Ron returned it with a mighty, graceless swipe of his fist, which nearly did have the intended effect of knocking Bode out of it, but Bode simply stumbled but then came with a furious wayward punch which Ron ducked to give him a good kick into his groin, but before he could do this, Malinga swung his leg into his face, and he fell to the ground, holding his face, writhing similarly.
"Incarcerus!" Bode yelled at Ron, who was promptly bounded by ropes.
"Incarcerus!" said Malinga at Seamus, who was roped as well.
Meanwhile, Draco had streaked back for the cage, and Harkins was pushed his knee viciously against Harry's face, deterring him from somehow blowing out a green jet of fire.
"Sorry, I'm so sorry...!" cried Harry, as he watched Bode trip Draco and Malinga grabbing him. "DRACO!"
"You're not sorry yet," hissed Seth Harkins, driving his knee deeper into Harry's jaw. "Ethan, don't be gentle with her!"
After these words, Ethan Ravenport gave Hermione a wide-swung clap, at which point she too found the ground after she had bitten, and scratched, and kicked him.
The iron doors swept open.
"What's going on in here?" boomed Fauss.
Bode and Malinga held tightly onto Draco, who continued flailing about with a crazy flight.
"Nothing to your worry your head about – go back to stargazing on your little chair," said Bode.
"You watch your mouth, you. I can have you out of here like that! Just a little white lie to sweet ol' Bellatrix is all it takes."
"You wouldn't dare!" growled Malinga.
Fauss bared his teeth at him.
"It's nothing, just we're having a little fun with them, is all," said Bode.
"It doesn't look like fun to me," said Fauss. "I say you were going to do something to Draco there, no?"
"Something like what?"
"THEY'RE TRYING TO KILL ME!" shrieked Draco, struggling energetically in their holds.
"They don't have the guts for that," said Fauss darkly, looking around Bode, Malinga, Harkins, and Ravenport.
"You're right, we don't, so sod off, you troll!" said Bode.
"I wanna see the show," said Fauss, and he leaned against the wall.
"There's no bloody show to see, Fauss, get the fuck out!" shouted Malinga.
"Oh?" said Fauss. "What are you doing with Malfoy then?"
"Just teaching him a lesson for that tongue of his, you know how he is," Bode told him.
"Fine, I'd like to see," said Fauss, readjusting his huge, folded arms.
After growling loudly in annoyance, Bode and Malinga dropped Draco to the floor. Bode whipped his wand out and cried, "Crucio!" and Draco started screaming; Fauss yawned and two minutes later he left the dungeon and settled himself back into his camping chair.
Malinga clucked his tongue loudly after the iron doors ground to a close. "Fuckin' nosy idiot!" he growled, as he and Bode dragged Draco forward, at which point Draco resumed kicking and screaming at the top of his lungs.
"HARRY!"
But Harry could not scream back – his mouth was shut tightly by Harkin's knee.
"I want him to watch this!" said Ravenport, grinning down at Harry as he kept a foot on Hermione.
Returning his grin, Harkins swooped down on Harry and locked his arms around his head, clamping his jaws down together. He then carefully rose with him until he was on top of Harry to suppress all his limbs, while his arms kept Harry's head upright to allow him to watch Bode ripping off Draco's robes and Malinga tearing off his pants. Tears leaked from Harry's eyes as he bared his teeth, unable to open his mouth.
Bode slipped Draco's Barmees off his struggling legs, which he was sitting on.
"Alex, Vic, I'm begging you with my life, don't this!" cried Draco, but to no effect, as Malinga stripped his shirt off and tossed it aside, thereafter pulling down his zip, but soon enough Malinga had moved on to join Bode at Draco's anus, for Draco had tried biting off his penis more than once more when Malinga tried to make him suck it. And so two penises were sliding in and out of Draco now, Malinga below Draco holding his arms and Bode above him holding his thighs down onto his stomach. Harry bore every painful moan and groan from Draco.
When Bode and Malinga were apparently close to climaxing they pulled out of Draco, who was too traumatized to move, and starting masturbating whilst they towered over him. Draco didn't resist as Bode held his wrists together above his head and as Malinga apparently couldn't keep running his hand up and down his chest, stomach, perineum, and through the crack of his bum cheeks. Bode didn't have time to frown at this, as with a muffled groan he spilled his seed onto Draco's face, and soon enough Malinga joined him and drops of his semen landed onto Draco's stomach, which Malinga bravely touched and spread around as he revisited those areas he had covered with his hand.
"Shoulda had a taste of that," panted Bode, squeezing the last drop of semen out of his penis to shake onto Draco. "Best fuck ever."
"I'll take your word for it," sneered Harkins, as he let go of Harry and stood up, leaving Harry crying softly into the hay.
"That'll teach you not to try us again, yeah," said Ethan, as he removed his foot from Hermione and went over to the cage gate. Bode picked up Draco single-handedly and carried him past Ron and Seamus and over into the cage, and laid him on top of Harry properly. Thereafter, he and Malinga pushed Ron and Seamus into the cage, unbounded them and Harry, and then locked the cage. The Slytherins laughed as they went out the dungeon.
"Draco, are you okay?" asked Hermione, but Draco had buried his face into Harry's neck, around which his arms had tightened.
"His clothes, they left them outside," sniffed Seamus wetly, pointing at Draco's clothes lying on the hay nearly in the centre of the large, circular room.
"Let's get you cleaned up," suggested Hermione, holding onto her stomach where Ethan's foot had so recently been.
Draco didn't respond to her.
Harry then motioned he wanted to get up, at which point Draco rose from him. Harry came to his haunches and stared at the streaks of white cream hanging off Draco's face; he took his robe and cleaned him up. Then Hermione wiped something off his hair – semen from when Draco had held onto him on his back; Harry flung his soiled robes to a corner of the cage.
"They'll pay for this, you'll see," he said quietly.
"What happened?" asked Blaise, wincing slightly as he entered the dungeon.
Draco didn't answer, and Blaise did not enquire further. He glanced aside to see Harry dispiritedly broken more so than on Blaise's first visit here.
This time it wasn't Draco who revolved to present the various places of his body to the torrent of water coming from Blaise's wand, but Blaise himself circled a stationary Draco and aimed the flowing water at some parts of Draco, who was gazing through the dungeon wall, his eyes glassy.
That night they all slept together, broken in unity, unified in brokenness. Draco lay on top of Harry, who slept directly besides Seamus, on whose other side snored Ron and Hermione directly next to him. At some point during the night, Seamus rolled over on top of Ron, whose arms then came up and encircled him loosely. When they woke next morning, Draco and Hermione, both of who usually woke up first, made goo-goo eyes at the sight of Seamus and Ron embracing each other somnolently and did nothing to change it.
"I think it would do his homophobia a world of good," said Draco, changing the tilt of his head as he looked down at them amorously.
"Sadly, I agree," replied Hermione. "I hope he thinks his morning 'wood', as he calls it, is because of Seamus!"
"How evil, you!" said Draco, impressed by Hermione.
"Never mind that. Are you going to stay like that all day?"
Draco gave his naked body a brief glance before his eyes found his clothes yards away lying in the hay. He tightened Harry's robes around him. "What can I do?"
"True," sighed Hermione, though she looked nothing close to unhappy about this, and whenever Draco's eyes ventured somewhere safe and his robes would drift apart, she would take a swift glance down his body, particularly at his penis; she was a girl.
"So," said Draco, whereupon Hermione hastily averted her gaze and looked at him in the eye, "what do you think's going to happen today?"
She subsequently peered up at the circular ceiling.
"One thing for sure that will be opened."
Draco peered up the dungeon as well, squinting at the ceiling. A shiver ran up his body.
"Seems like you're the least worthy. Maybe they'll take you out first."
"Thanks," said Hermione flatly, and she gulped.
"Voldemort'll probably have me in his lap, safe from the werewolves – he wouldn't want to let them misplace a single hair of his pretty catamite, would he, or the 'container' of his Horcruxes."
Hermione gazed at him wordlessly.
"What?" said Draco, after a long while.
But Hermione was still gazing at him quietly. She seemed to be making up her mind.
"Granger, it's rude to stare."
"Harry's not capable of it," Hermione said quietly, "but I can't find another way."
"Another way for what?"
"You have Voldemort's Horcruxes in you, Draco," said Hermione, "and we need to destroy them."
Draco crossed his arms.
"I know Harry'll never ever be able to do it – he loves you too much... But... for the sake of... everyone... thousands of lives... it has to be done..."
Draco gazed into Hermione's eyes.
"How would you do it?" he asked, after a very long time.
Hermione appeared to release a breath she had been holding during that long spell of silence, and her eyes grew shiny.
"I don't know – we could—we could maybe tackle or somehow trick one of the Slytherins into coming into the cage alone or something, then steal his wand-"
"You think you're capable of casting the Killing Curse, do you?" asked Draco, with a piercing, narrow-eyed look.
Hermione recoiled slowly, taken aback by the look's intensity.
"You think it's that simple? It's not – you couldn't even make a shower of green sparks. Trust me, you of all people won't."
Wide-eyed, Hermione looked away from him and her eyes landed on the person beneath Seamus.
"He wouldn't too," said Draco shortly. "It takes more than hatred to kill someone."
"Ron doesn't hate you," Hermione said doubtfully. "But what if—what if you care about someone too much, but you wanted to save many more lives," stuttered Hermione, "so you would want to sacrifice that person you loved for them?"
"Listen to yourself. How can you kill someone you care about too much?"
"I don't know! But we need to find a solution...! I can't believe I'm talking like this...!"
"Welcome to war, Hermione," said Draco tersely.
"Discussing a person's life like this like it's nothing!" gibbered Hermione, shocked by herself.
"We need to do it," stated Draco decisively. "Harry won't want me to, but I just know with all my being that Voldemort has to go – forever..." He shook his head, stomping on the hay to try to turn off the waterworks. "I just know he has to die, there's no other way, he's not human – he doesn't belong here..."
"Draco..."
"No." Draco wiped his tears hastily. "I have to do it, even if... even if it means I have to die... I could maybe make Fauss or the other Slytherins angry enough, but I doubt they would do it. Maybe Bellatrix, but she would rather kill herself than betray any of her master's orders. Maybe Blaise – I could make him do it! He could do it! He's not heartless, but he can be! That's a true Slytherin – he'll do what he needs to! He'll just have to make sure he escapes afterwards or he won't see the light of day again."
"So you'll ask him to do it?" asked Hermione.
"Yeah, when he comes for breakfast." His small frame shaking slightly, Draco turned to Harry on the floor, open-mouthed, Seamus' leg over his.
Hermione gaped, but she promptly closed her mouth, her eyes going over Draco, perhaps capturing him finally, for it might be the only chance she would get.
"I hope he'll still be asleep," murmured Draco, as he stared at Harry.
"Or you could ask Blaise to Stun him," suggested Hermione.
"I'm sorry, Harry, but I have to do it."
"He'll never forgive me for this," said Hermione quietly, staring down at Harry.
"Yeah, well, in our situation forgiveness is a luxury, no?"
They waited quietly for the hours to pass until half past eight o'clock, listening to Ron's snores and Harry's and Seamus' soft breathing. Finally, when the iron doors slid apart, they revealed Blaise duly approaching them with a tray with six bowls.
"Morning," he greeted, as he stooped to place the tray on the hay.
"Blaise," said Draco, nodding, as Hermione did. "I need another favour."
Blaise sighed softly. "What, you want soap too to go with your showers?"
"No, but that would be nice."
"I don't think I can slip in a bar of soap past Fauss, not matter how dumb he looks – he searches at random, see."
"I want you to kill me."
"Ah, right," said Blaise, standing back up. "And how would you like it?"
"I prefer a curse – I'm not good friends with pain, see."
"Hm," said Blaise, pursing his lips, "I don't think I can do that."
"And why not?"
"Well, it would be against orders, see."
Draco looked at Blaise.
"Blaise, I'm serious… Voldemort-" Blaise flinched. "-sorry, Voldemort said—said he put his Horcruxes into me."
"His what?"
"His Horcruxes – pieces of his soul, so he can't die as long as I live. He did it because he knew Harry would protect me no matter what and therefore protecting his own immortality."
Blaise was frowning deeply. "What's all this now? I don't—his Horxi—what?"
"Horcruxes. Voldemort has torn his soul into seven, and he had apparently hid them in some objects. He said he sent Nott to Hogwarts and Bellatrix to her vault and to order some other house-elf with a ghastly name to get back those objects that stored his soul."
"And just what are these objects?" asked Blaise, an eyebrow aloft.
"I don't know, but that doesn't matter now because those pieces of his soul are in me now! That's why my insides burn whenever he's around, and apparently I was caught hissing at some point. I just need you to cast the Killing Curse on me, that's all."
"Even if I manage to do it-"
"You have to!"
"-I would be killed myself, or even worse – crucified," said Blaise, gulping.
"You don't have to – you just have to borrow Harry your wand afterwards so that when Voldemort gets back he can deal with him-"
"You're expecting Potter to rally all of us against the Dark Lord and all his Death Eaters and get us out of this place even as he doesn't know how we got here?"
Draco looked into Blaise's eyes, looking hopeless.
"I don't know, okay! But you'll sort the rest of that stuff after! And besides, Harry has a famous knack for slipping through Voldemort's hands, doesn't he? Something will happen somehow, I know it!"
"You're making no sense, Draco; I think the claustrophobia has gotten to you."
"I'm not claustrophobic! I need to die!"
Blaise shook his head, looking terrified. "I'm not killing you, Draco – that would be the last of me – of all of us! You haven't even thought it through properly! Are you even prepared to die?"
"Don't ask me stupid questions like that!" screeched Draco. "I just have to, okay – there is no other way. I want him to go down with me, if that's what it costs. Blaise, he killed my parents, he killed Severus, he killed my innocence – he took everything from me!"
Blaise shook his head, gaping uncouthly, drifting backwards.
"Blaise, we can get rid of him once and for all! Just be brave enough to do it, for me, Blaise, please…"
But Blaise merely continued shaking his head, stepping backwards away from the cage.
"Blaise!" whispered Draco furiously, his eyes brimming. "Come back here, don't do this to me!"
"I can't kill you, Draco," whispered Blaise, before he loped out of the dungeon.
"You fuckin' coward of a swine!" yelled Draco, upsetting Seamus, who started rousing on top of Ron. Draco held his forehead, breathing deeply.
"Well, I don't know what else we were expecting, honestly," said Hermione with a certain amount of relief, taking a bowl of gruel. "Breakfast, Seamus."
"Are we having a ceilidh?" Seamus murmured, rubbing his eyes.
"Nargh, Hermione, I told you not to leave it in…" slurred Ron.
Hermione waited for it.
"SEAMUS! GET OFF ME!"
"It's your arms that were around me!"
"That makes no sense, I thought it was Hermione!"
"It's still not my fault!"
"Who's more to blame here?"
"Hermione, is Ron usually overly touchy?" Seamus asked.
"Kind of, yeah."
"See, you put me on top of you."
"Makes no kind of sense!" said Ron angrily, but he was suddenly disarmed when he took his yawn and stretched, a serene calm blanketing him now. There may as well been a fan nearby to flutter his hair.
"What was Hermione not supposed to leave in?" asked Seamus, as he went over to one of the cool iron bars and put his shoulder against it.
Ron and Hermione flushed silently.
Soon enough, all the boys were awake and eating their porridge. Draco and Hermione gave no allusion to their previous conversation.
"Today's the day!" trilled Seamus, with false cheer but certain fear.
"What do you think he meant by it being 'quite the reunion', though?" asked Ron, as he pushed his bowl aside.
"We have another appointment with the werewolves again, don't we?" deadpanned Harry. "Wonder where he got them from. I thought we took them out. But I guess those couldn't be all of them, but we got their great leader Greyback too."
The doors gave way to Blaise, who collected their dishes without looking once in Draco's direction.
"What's he miffed about?" asked Harry, looking at Draco glaring at Blaise's retreating back as though it were guilty of the highest treachery.
"Nothing to worry your gorgeous self about," answered Draco through a tight grill of teeth.
Ron gagged.
They passed the time as always by playing with the little that they had salvaged. Harry watched as the remaining and still shrunken Snitch discs flipped, rolled, and spun all by themselves. He pulled out his new dazzling emerald-green robes and caressed them on the palm of his hand. For the first time since they were captured, when afternoon arrived slowly, the iron doors did not sweep open again to reveal Bode, Malinga, Harkins, and Ravenport entering, instead it remained decidedly locked, not that Harry and friends could tell if it were afternoon or not. However, there was one person to pay them a visit with both a most unpleasant meal and the most untoward news.
"I should tell you to prepare for the Dark Lord's arrival – he'll be here anytime soon," announced Blaise, as he strode into the dungeon, tray in hand.
A ripple rang along them.
"So the big bad snake himself is coming again?" asked Ron cautiously.
"You don't miss a trick, Weasley," said Blaise, and he bent over to place the tray in front of the gate, straightening back up and giving them an odd but cool sweep of his gaze, which found its end on Draco, who was glaring up at him as though accusing him of murder, or of not committing it.
"Oh well, I guess we should wash and dress up for the occasion, then," said Harry, as he rolled his eyes to the gauzy, circular ceiling.
"I don't need your snide comments, Potter," said Blaise, as he struggled to tear his gaze from Draco. "And indeed you should prepare, for the worst. I so do not envy you right now."
"Yeah I suppose sucking Voldy's prick is far better than being almost mauled by werewolves for the second time."
For a moment Blaise had a weird expression on his face: he appeared as though he couldn't believe that Harry just said that, let alone react to it, but soon after he narrowed his eyes to slits and said in a deadly quiet voice, "I kind of missed that, Potter, what was it?"
"I said-" began Harry.
"I'm begging you," said Draco softly. "Do it."
"Suck Voldemort's prick?" Harry asked Draco incredulously. "I was only kidding, Draco…"
Far from looking insulted anymore, Blaise again locked his disbelieving gaze on Draco.
"It will be the death of me," stuttered Blaise, again with unseemly uncouthness as he dithered in front of them. "You can't ask such a thing. My head'll be on the floor! You're not even serious yourself!"
"I am serious!" shouted Draco, as he for the second time became a white blur to leap to his feet. "I need you to do it!" he said in a more desperate voice. "It's the only way!"
"Of all the people you could've asked, of all the times you could have asked, of all the things you could have asked!" Blaise purled around and made a beeline for the iron doors.
"Blaise!" yelled Draco, his voice cracking.
"Okay…" said Harry vaguely, looking from the closing doors to Draco's livid face. "And what was that about…?"
"Shut up!" snapped Draco, at which point Harry's eyebrows rose, and he looked across Draco behind his back to find Hermione's eyes, but Hermione gave a rather jerky and clueless shrug as she stared straight ahead of her, her neck muscles taut.
"That fuckin' snake of a bastard!" hissed Draco, and he kicked bare-foot at the iron doors, after which he cried and hopped on one foot, caressing the other. Harry further nursed it by kissing and rubbing it for some minutes to follow while the rest ate their pathetic breakfast and his grew cold.
Eating with his hands had been an enormous disgrace for one person in the beginning, but now one could have observed that Draco was an expert at, his bowl licked completely clean. He pulled back his foot after realizing Harry wasn't soothing it anymore, as Harry was staring vacantly at his clothes strewn in the hay beyond the iron bars in the centre of the room, where Bode and Malinga had raped Draco, one more people to add to the list of whose who had done wrong upon him.
And tonight, there would be more with which to append the list.
"What's the ruddy hell with you now?" Ron asked Draco through a mouthful of grey grits, his hand pawing at the inside of the bowl for more.
Clearing his bowl, Seamus remarked, "I'd hazard you're hung up on him if I didn't know any better… And in fact I do know better and so forget I ever mentioned anything and get to know my breakfast a little better…" Seamus subsided as he turned his back on an incensed Draco, though he had no breakfast with which to acquaint himself, for his bowl was sparkling empty.
"So what exactly is happening tonight?" asked Ron with a pale face and gulping. His bowl was sparkling clean as well.
"Another installment of Ronny the Werewolf Slayer," said Seamus, suddenly miserable. "I thought it'd be the last time we see them that night, I'd thought…"
"Well, clearly that isn't going to stay that way," said Hermione. It would have been in that moment that Harry imagined Hermione would come to her feet and started pacing, saying, 'We need some kind of plan. There must be something we can do.' But this didn't happen – in actuality, there was only despair in Hermione's face.
This surely couldn't be the end of them, could it? Voldemort wouldn't endanger Draco's life by leaving him to his werewolves' mercy knowing he had incased his Horcruxes within him, would he? He needed them for him to stay immortal in a sense. But what if he just needed Draco to be only within an inch of his life? What if he had decided he would let the werewolves ravage him as well until he was just hanging on by a thread? After all, Harry supposed, Draco needed to stay alive if his Horcruxes were to stay alive. And what about him? Voldemort wouldn't let his werewolves free on him, Harry, after he had expressed his uncertainty on causing him harm, would he? But what if he had found out what he had wanted to from those supposed Seers he had been meeting?
"I don't know what he's thinking, but werewolves don't make for great pets," said Ron.
Hermione sidled towards him and rested her head on Ron's shoulder, and Draco replaced his foot on Harry's lap as he took his hand and squeezed strongly on it. Seamus glanced despondently at the heap of hay next to the wall before he held onto himself.
Sighing sadly himself, Harry took his own bowl and tucked in, but then at some point he was suddenly coughing heavily; everyone looked up at him in alarm.
"You all right, Harry?" asked Ron, plainly seeing that Harry was not.
Harry coughed until his face went red and then he threw out his mouth a soggy piece of parchment, holding onto his neck. Draco reached for it – evidently the only one willing to brave Harry's spit – and unfolded the slimy corner of parchment. He frowned down on it as the rest of them closed in.
Fauss has your wands.
"And what was the use of telling us that?" asked Ron, with a raised eyebrow.
Before anyone could answer, however, the iron doors groaned open, and Blaise swept through.
"Especially if he could have told us face to face?" continued Ron.
With a stoic face and with white, thinly pressed lips, Blaise waited for each of them to return their bowls, after which he rose to his feet.
"What's this?" Draco asked Blaise, flapping the piece of soggy parchment at Blaise, who wordlessly turned around and headed for the doors. "Oi! You better answer me, you!" But the iron doors met each other again and put him out of sight. Draco kicked the iron bars again and Harry kissed them better. "He should have at least given me a shower!" bleated Draco, pouting as Harry massaged his toes. He took the piece of parchment and read it again.
"You could've been nicer," said Harry.
"'You could've been nicer'," mocked Draco in a dumb voice, rolling his eyes.
Harry flung his foot away.
"I'm sorry!" moaned Draco, batting his white eyelashes at Harry, who shook his head and resumed massaging his toes.
"Think this is all a joke, do you?" Harry said.
"I'd rather enjoy a laugh than revel in my misery like you," sneered Draco. "Do that middle one, hurts the most… ooh… I'd rather prefer to laugh my last days off than sulk, thanks…"
"What do you mean your 'last days'?" asked Harry darkly, and he stopped rubbing Draco's toes.
Draco crossed his arms, looking anywhere but at Harry.
"Draco," said Harry, looking at him seriously.
"There's no other way for it," said Draco.
"Don't speak like that. There is!" said Harry. "There always is! There's always something we can do!"
"Like what, Harry, like what?" asked Draco.
Harry went quiet as he stared at the pale foot in his lap, scanning the blue veins that thrummed with life-giving blood beneath, stared at the individual toes and the nooks and crannies in between…
"That extract you gave Hermione," he said. "It said when you kill someone you tear your soul into two. What if you cast enough Killing Curses to shred Voldemort's souls in you?"
"You're babbling, Harry," deadpanned Draco.
"No I'm serious! It's like tearing and tearing his soul repeatedly until he has got nothing left or too small a soul to live any longer!"
"But, Harry, don't you think that as long as he has even just a piece of soul left, he still couldn't die?" asked Hermione delicately.
"Precisely, Hermione," agreed Draco sweetly.
There were a few moments of silence.
"It seems to me I'm the only one who cares about you living," observed Harry suspiciously. For some odd reason he glanced over at Hermione, with whom he had been friends with for so long he couldn't fail to notice she had blanched somewhat. "And it also seems like you've got accomplices in your little plans to kill you."
"He made me promise, Harry!" squeaked Hermione guiltily.
"Bitch!" roared Draco in betrayal.
"Oi, hang on there, mate! Tʼe shitting Pixies was that about now? You take that back!" said Ron in angry confusion.
"You know what? Fine, you can plot to kill yourself, see if I care," said Harry, crossing his arms and ankles and staring flatly at the iron doors. It wasn't encouraging to find out that he was the only one hoping for Draco's survival.
"Harry, come on," said Draco.
"Don't touch me," said Harry, and he refused to touch the foot in his lap but left it there for Draco to remove with his own free will – it was this after all that allowed him to plot his suicide. He could go ahead with it – it was his own life – Harry didn't give what he did then. Harry was tired of forever fighting against the tide, against every force beleaguering them, against trying to keep Draco whole and safe where Draco himself was contemplating his own destruction. He was finally tired of fighting a losing battle…
"Harry babes…"
"I said, do not touch me, did you hear me? If you want to take your life, fine by me, see if I care. Go ahead, Draco, it'll bring me one step closer to destroying Voldemort, takes a hell of a lot off my plate, which is quite full at the moment without your help. Do it, I couldn't care less, doesn't matter to me. You've never cared about my own feelings – it was always me to look after you, me to save you, me to do everything for you. I'm sick and tired, sick and tired. You've always acted without thinking about me – growing tantrums, changing moods at the switch of the hour and whenever you felt like it. I always had to go to you, I always had to search you, convince you I was worthy, convince you I could do anything for you, and you've never, never understood how much I love you. I was always doing the work, and here when I ask you to do something for me just once – stay alive for me – you turn you back on me, even for your own life, even when you know how much you mean to me you still never think about me, so kill yourself, why don't you, it's a noble way to die. Your Salazar would be so proud."
For once, Draco appeared to have so much shame he couldn't look Harry in the eye, nor could Hermione.
"I—I—I'm sorry, Harry," said Hermione in broken whispers, her eyes tearful and misty with disbelief at her own self. "But—I—I thought it was the only way… I knew you'd never…"
But Harry wasn't listening – he had resumed his deadpan stare at the doors.
"I—I know how much… how much you love me."
"Just shut up, Draco, it's too late," said Harry colourlessly. He looked down and played with Blaise's note, turning it over to see another message on its reverse: I've never stopped looking out for you, Draco. You're the bestest friend I could have hoped for. Always loved you. He tossed it at Draco, who collected it idly but didn't look at it.
"I'm sorry."
"Right."
"I just—I just can't see another way."
"You wouldn't."
"I love you, Harry, you know I do."
"You can't love me if you want to kill yourself. Do you even understand what that word means, Draco, Slytherin Sex Prince? No you don't. You have no idea of it whatsoever. But how can anyone blame you with a family like you used to have. I bet you even your mother didn't smile at you around Lucius. You just disgust me right now."
Harry couldn't say he hadn't seen the fist into his cheek coming.
"Aren't you glad we don't have relationship problems like they do, Hermione?" whispered Ron, throwing his thumb in Harry and Draco's direction.
The slap in his face couldn't have been unexpected.
The three hours to come after this was one of increasing fear and tension. Despite his disgust at Draco that he was so unbelievably selfish, and his sore jaw courtesy Draco's sharp knuckles, Harry still feared for him and the rest of them, and being so high-strung suspended in the build-up to the moment, it was almost a relief to hear the iron doors slide apart to reveal Blaise, Massice, Warrington, Carrow, Bode, Malinga, Harkins, Ravenport, and Fauss.
Draco and Seamus bowed their heads.
"Tis time you lads got ready for the show!" said Fauss, grinning in malevolence.