Disclaimer: First of all, I don't own the characters or any of the canon details, those are the wonderful Ms Rowling's. Secondly, sorry Ms Rowling for corrupting your boys in this way.
Pairings: HPDM
Warnings: Slash, obviously. Swearing, sex, etc etc. Rated for a bloody good reason - do not read this if you are under the age of consent in your country.
Beta: BlueRubyBeat
Lucius hovered outside Draco's bathroom door. His shoulders slumped at the unmistakable sound of laughter coming from within, followed by the usual fervent chatter and the occasional splash of water. He could force his son to wash, it seemed, but not to let go of his absurd belief that he could communicate with Potter from beyond the grave.
He'd been less obsessive about it at first, or at least more rational. 'I know this is going to take a lot for you to believe father,' he'd started, 'But I can hear Harry... In my head...'
Lucius had stared at him, dumbstruck and slack-jawed. After Draco's outburst at the Ministry he'd expected dark days would follow: Those where Draco would shed his denial and come to accept his loss – those where Lucius would have neither the words nor the power to put any of it right, and it would break the both of them. It hadn't happened that way.
At first they'd tried to reason with each other. They'd worked together to find someone who could prove or disprove Draco's assertions: Unspeakables, Seers, Necromancers… they'd travelled from all over the country - the world even - each one with a different assortment of tests and questions, but in the end all of them provided the same conclusion: 'I'm afraid there's just no way, Mr. Malfoy… It's not possible…'
'Well of course it's bloody possible!' Draco had shouted at the last one, 'I can fucking hear him, can't I?'
The old gnarl of a man had shaken his head and quietly suggested to Lucius that it was 'time to get the mind-healers in' as he'd hobbled his way into the fireplace.
Lucius hadn't - couldn't bear to.
From that point on Draco had started to retreat into himself. He stopped talking about Potter but he also began to shun the company of others whenever he thought he could get away with it - which, given his sharp mouth and general hostility, proved fairly easy for him. The only person he hadn't yet managed frighten away was that awful Weasley boy and Lucius often struggled to see the good in that.
With a great deal of effort, he forced himself to come away from the door. Soon he found himself wandering aimlessly through the empty corridors of the manor, and before he knew it he was in front of another door, one he bitterly recognised as his own father's former study. The door was sealed; Lucius had done it himself many years ago in a futile attempt to keep the memories in.
They hadn't been on fantastic terms by the time Abraxas – his father – had died. Their last words had been fairly spiteful, the sort of thing that haunts the surviving party. Lucius didn't believe back then that he would care much, after all, he was the one on the right side of their feud. His father had preached all his life about the importance of blood. Well, Lucius was actually doing something about it, wasn't he? He was out there fighting for that brave new world where yes, blood did matter, and yes, it would be protected from all the riff-raff that sought to infect it.
Lucius understood the difference now between what his father had meant and how he himself had tried to enact it.
He reached for the door handle, thinking to confront the old portrait hanging abandoned on the wall inside, but just as he did a crack sounded behind him.
"Mr. Malfoy, sir."
"What is it Flotter?"
"You is having a visitor, sir. In the reception hall. The Minister for Magic, sir."
Lucius sighed and rubbed a set of rough fingers over his eyes.
"Very well," he said, and the elf popped out of sight.
He did his very best to stand tall when he arrived to greet the other man.
"Minister," he inclined his head with a grim smile.
"Arthur," the other man corrected. "Let's not pretend with the formalities shall we? We've known each other too long for that."
"Despised each other you mean."
Arthur didn't deny it, and Lucius could see a flash of that old rivalry in his counterpart's eyes before it settled into something else. Determination perhaps.
"You're well I take it?" Arthur said as they took up seats in the guest parlour.
Lucius knew that the answer ought to be something that conveyed his incredible gratitude at being pardoned from Azkaban on the frankly rather thin basis of his warning about Avalon. That, and the premise that he needed to care for his heroic son, the ever-lauded saviour of basically every school-age child in wizarding Britain.
"I'm utterly crap if you must know."
Arthur raised an eyebrow. Lucius poured him an extra-large measure of firewhisky.
"How is he?"
"He's…" Lucius struggled to find the words. "In a great deal of pain."
"I can well imagine," Arthur nodded solemnly. "We all are, I think."
"But you aren't the ones hearing voices," Lucius pointed out.
"True." Arthur braced himself. "I think it's time we thought about getting him specialist treatment."
Lucius unconsciously looked up through the ceiling in the direction of Draco's rooms and Arthur prepared for an argument. It didn't come.
"I don't want it to get to that," he said, but there was very little fight behind the words. Arthur wondered if that was because Lucius knew he was right or if he was simply aware of how little power he actually held in the situation.
Arthur leaned forward and set his glass on the carpet. "I think it already has."
At night – or rather when it was night for Draco, because it never really got dark where Harry was – Draco would sleep and Harry would go about the business of exploring his odd little corner of hell.
He'd pluck Voldemort up from his place on the hall table, next to the vase of ever-fresh flowers, and sling him over his shoulder. A quick trot along the corridor and down the many flights of stairs, stopping every so often to peer out of the windows - he never saw any active sign of life, just the remains of it, like all the people had simply vanished the moment he'd arrived.
When he reached the bottom he'd survey the windows there too, but still nothing. He couldn't shake the feeling that something was out there, skulking, waiting to take what was his. Each night, he'd contemplate venturing outside but a cloying, choking feeling always held him back.
Separating himself from the Horcrux made it worse. In the beginning he'd conducted experiments to see how long he could withstand his paranoia – and the inevitable screaming – before he snapped and rushed to gather the thing back up in his arms. In those moments he felt completely disgusted with both himself and the creature. Each time he put himself through it the contempt swelled up even further until finally he decided that he needed to stop trying.
On his way back up to the top of the tower he'd stop to explore different floors. He was generally gratified to find his original hypothesis correct: the lower floors were repulsive, the flats leading off them stank of cat piss and rotting meat, but they got less reproachable the higher he went, almost as if they were ascending out of this hell-hole, which Harry supposed they were.
The very top floor was different somehow, and not just because it was the most presentable. He still couldn't get any of the other doors to open, but he'd started to notice something odd about them - like the way one of them had a Chudley Cannons doormat, and another smelled distinctly of Hermione's perfume.
One night, after Draco had attempted to explain the whole situation to Ron, Harry could have sworn he'd seen a flicker of light coming through the keyhole of the Chudley Cannons door, but he still couldn't get the handle to turn. Harry wished he had a Luna-door, he suspected that it would have been pinned open with a flashing neon 'welcome' sign over it, but Luna had gone about a year before he had, and was hopefully sitting up on a cloud somewhere surrounded by nargles and dirigible plums.
Each morning, Harry would position himself back in the flat that linked him to Draco and wait patiently for their conversations to begin again.
"Y'mn'wake?"
Harry had to laugh – it barely sounded as though Draco were conscious enough to be asking the question.
"I don't sleep, remember?"
"Mmn."
Harry's face lit up. He settled himself into the nest of cushions and rugs he'd made for himself and let the excitement in his chest bubble over.
"Sleepwarmgood."
"Is that right?"
"Brrrrmnumun."
"Shall I let you get back to it then?"
Harry heard nothing back for an extended moment. Then, "I'm up!"
"Did you miss me?"
"Nope."
Harry raised his eyebrow even though nobody was there to see it.
"Nope?"
"I had the good dreams. You were there."
"Ah, well you'd best fill me in on my dream-based antics then."
"You were a pirate. Only you had a badger instead of a parrot and a bionic leg instead of a wooden one."
"Urrr… right. I see."
"We sailed the high seas with a winsome band of ragamuffins and you told me you loved me every day."
"Well I do love you."
"I know."
Harry could hear the self-satisfaction in Draco's voice and it made him feel incredibly accomplished.
"I missed this."
Draco coughed on a thread of almost-laughter, "Oh yeah, remember that time you were trapped in a hell dimension and everyone thought I was a nut-job."
Harry rolled his eyes. "You know what I mean. Just us talking, no drama. Like we're back in your old room at Hogwarts. Like it's that first night again."
"Need I remind you that you're the one who created all of the drama?"
"If I could throw something at you right now, I would you know."
"Just giving you more of an incentive to get your arse back here, Potter."
"As if I needed it."
Draco paused. "Do you?"
Harry felt the colour drain away from his face. "Of course not. But we haven't figured out how yet, have we?" he asked, praying to himself that the answer would still be 'no'.
"See, that's what I'm talking about, that, right there. I'm back here trawling through books and slaving over theories and you're sitting on your arse willing me to fail. It doesn't feel like there's very much 'we' in this situation, Harry."
"I'd never-" Harry started to protest before cutting himself off. "I'm scared," he said honestly.
"I gathered that."
"This world... it gets under your skin. When I'm here, with you, it's fine, but out there... And what if I can't get back to you, here or in the living world? What would happen to you?"
"Well that won't be an issue."
"What if it is?"
"It just won't, okay? See, you defied the odds to bring down Voldemort for all those thankless fucks out there. Now me? I'm full of thanks, and a darn good fuck - as you well know - so if it's odds that need defying you'd best just get to it already, for both our sakes. Alright?"
Harry swallowed carefully. "Yes, sir."
Draco relented. "I know I'm being hard on you. I just need you home now, things are really going to shit and I-"
"I get it," Harry assured him. "We'll fix this. Together, yeah?"
"Together," Draco agreed.
A/N: Thoughts and comments always welcome.