The next day marked day four, which meant the Dark Lord had been without his family for three days. Evan expected a visit.

Harry hid the gift he'd been given from Jericho. There was no way he'd be allowed to keep it if Pharaoh knew it was from one of Evan's many lovers. His father had still not sworn fidelity to his Papa, but his Papa expected it all the same.

Ari was there when they came down for breakfast that morning. He looked bizarre, sitting normal as you please, spreading jam onto an English muffin. "Good Morning, my little family. I've missed you everyday."

Evan walked over to greet Ari and Ari pulled him into a kiss. "Did you sleep well, my love?"

"Did someone put Prozac in your coffee?" Evan asked.

"Prozac?"

"It's a Muggle drug, Pharaoh. He's wondering why you're so pleasant this morning," Harry smiled.

"Well, because I get to see the two of you. The Manor isn't the same without you. Evan—may I greet Harry?"

Evan nodded and Pharaoh held his arms out for Harry to come to them. "I've missed you my little snake. Have you been good for your father?"

"Yes, Pharaoh."

"And I hear you have a friend?"

"Yes. Draco, but Father refuses to call him anything but 'that Malfoy boy'."

Speaking of, the Malfoy's, either they'd already eaten, or had not come down yet, or…

"I sent them away," Pharaoh said when Harry looked for them. "I wanted to have breakfast alone with the two of you. Dark Lord's can do that kind of thing—walk into someone's home and take over. And yes, I imagine your father wouldn't call him Draco yet. He's just getting used to the idea of you having a friend—it was all my idea, did he tell you?"

"It wasn't all your idea," Evan denied sitting down. "Harry, take your seat please."

Harry kissed Pharaoh on the cheek and hopped down sitting next to Evan.

Ari chuckled good-naturedly.

They had a pleasant breakfast together. Everyone was in good moods; Evan even broke the news to Ari about Harry's name.

"Archer? I like it. How did you come up with that?"

"Many of my family were bowman," Evan lied smoothly. It wasn't all a lie, his family really had been bowman.

"And you are allowing Nagendra? After all the time you argued against it?"

"It's not like you do not call him that already."

"Yes, but it is unlikely for you to give in," he said suspiciously.

Oh for the love of… he becomes suspicious over the name he wanted, and not at all over the spontaneously conceived 'Archer?'

"I wore him down, Pharaoh," Harry chimed in. It was likely and sort of true. Evan wanted to give points to Slytherin.

"Very good my Nagendra," Ari praised.

"Oh, no! You can call him that in your 'snake language,' I will not suffer it."

Ari looked to Harry confused. "He said I may have it legally, only and that he won't call me something so foolish," Harry explained.

"In that case, I will have your name changed immediately—before he changes his mind. It will be easier than it would have, seeing as I rule the world now. I am going to announce you as my son Harry; my Dark Prince. Nagendra is fitting."

He smiled big at Evan. "I know that cost you, my Evan," he began putting a hand over his. "But you have made me very happy, indeed. I shall reward you. What is it you wish?"

Evan smiled viciously. "More time."

"Of course, I should have guessed that. Very well, you shall have it. You may have two more weeks in addition to the three."

"Thank-you, my Lord."

"Ari. Please Evan—call me Ari. Don't I deserve that much?"

Evan shocked the hell out of everyone. "Yes, you do. Ari, then."

AB

"Where did you send them, Pharaoh?" Harry asked as the trio strolled through the Malfoy gardens.

"Do you miss your friend?"

"A little, but I was mostly just wondering."

"They are here. It is a big place that is why you have not seen them. I asked them to avoid the gardens this morning."

Pharaoh and Father were hand in hand—a rare sight for Harry. He wasn't sure what had happened between his father and Jericho last night (other than sex) but whatever it was had made Evan think and that thinking led to Evan allowing Ari to do things far easier than he hand in the past.

They stopped at a midway point where the Garden veered off into four paths. There was a bench there and Ari gestured for Evan and Harry to sit, he looked nervous.

"Evan, you know I'm the type of man that takes what he wants. I've been forceful with you, arrogant and well a Bastard. I make you put up with me."

Evan immediately grew suspicious as to the Dark Lord's intentions.

"But my secret heart's desire is that one day you will choose me. I'll keep asking until you do, so I ask—Evan may I announce you as my consort at the Winter Solstice Festival? I would prefer to do it with your consent, but either way I will do it."

"You would prefer, but you will do it either way?" he asked rhetorically. "You are ridiculous! Why bother asking?"

"Because I was hoping the time away had brought you to your senses! That is what this is about, isn't it? This is just your new form of a tantrum."

"I am not having a Tantrum!"

"You took Harry," he accused. "I thought you'd left me."

"Leave? How can I leave? I can't, but it isn't enough for you that you have me in your clutches. Nooo! Not for you, Mister Dark Lord—you still want more from me. You want me to agree to my imprisonment! Well I won't! I won't agree to being your consort, you'll have to force me. That is my answer. Is this conversation finished?"

The Dark Lord nodded, dumbly.

"Good, I'm going. Come along, Harry."

"May I stay with Pharaoh for a bit, Father?"

"Yes, please do. I hope you knock some sense into him my little Archer."

Oh brother, Harry thought, a new way for them to fight over me.

It didn't take Ari long to catch on. "Yes, stay with me Nagendra," Ari smirked as Evan stormed away.

"Must you do that to him? He'll be a nightmare for days."

"He is very temperamental. I apologize."

They both watched Evan leave. "Did you remain to counsel me my little snake?"

"Wouldn't dream of it Pharaoh," he said. "But if you'll allow it, I would like to share something with you."

"Yes?"

"My father loves you. Deeply."

"Has a funny way of showing it," he muttered.

"I don't think he knows he loves you and if he did he wouldn't know how to show it."

Ari looked confused so Harry continued. "Do you think he loves me?"

"That man lives and breathes for you."

"Yet he's only put words to it recently. If he cares about me as much as you say and he's carefully hid if from me for so many years, how long do you think it will take him to admit he loved you? To you? To himself?" Harry laughed. "My father still holds the belief that he only loves one person; that he only needs to love one person. The truth is; he loves more than just me and it terrifies him. Love makes one vulnerable. Love is weakness."

"You know far more than you let on, young man."

Harry said no more; his eyes twinkled in the sun and Ari was grateful.

AB

Ari found Evan in the room he and Harry occupied at Malfoy Manor. He looked a far sight happier than he'd ever seen him. He sauntered up to Evan exuding all his masculinity and captured him in a kiss that defied legends. It took Evan's breath away; he moaned in spite of himself.

Ari pulled away. "I'm leaving."

That's when Ari saw it there—the cold shock, the desperation, the 'you're not leaving me, leaving me?', the hurt… Inside he smiled.

"But you… you only just got here."

"Yes, but you are here to have time away. Harry convinced me I should respect that."

"He did?"

"Not in so many words, but the end message was the same. It is what you want, isn't it?"

"It is," Evan said, but Ari thought that maybe he didn't sound so sure.

Ari was right. Inside Evan crumbled; he didn't want Ari to go—they hadn't even fucked yet, but he wasn't about to loose face. How dare he play this game with him? Well Evan could play it too and he could play it better.

"The sooner you leave, the better. I've got company coming."

"Company?"

"Company." He challenged Ari with every nuance in his face daring him to leave now. He implied that 'company' could mean male company by the way he said 'company' and by the way he pushed his chest out.

It was too easy. The Dark Lord looked furious. "There will be no 'company'," he said framing the word company in air quotes. "You have Lucius to visit with. That's plenty company."

We all know the 'company' was fictional. Evan wanted to make the Dark Lord jealous, though only Hades knows why when a jealous Dark Lord at the height of his rage is not something to behold, but something to run from. But Evan decided to push. "You do not own me! I might be your whore, but I am not your husband! And even if I were, you still wouldn't be able to tell me what company I may keep."

Evan was slammed against the wall faster than, well, faster than he expected and Ari's voice was hot as a blade in his ear. "Allow me to make it plain. If I find out you had any sort of 'company,' I will make Harry pay for it in addition to peeling the skin from your back with my whip. I will lock him in a tiny cupboard for an infinite period of time and with only your behaviour to dictate when I let him out." Ari stepped away releasing Evan violently and waiting 'till Evan formed his reaction to Ari's words.

It was every bit as delicious as Ari imagined it. Evan's skin became white as porcelain and he looked every bit as fragile too, his eyes gave away what he never did: The cold fear that arrested him whenever there was a threat to Harry—Ari had always noticed it, even if Evan tried to pretend he didn't worry and he revealed in it: In Evan's fear… In the control.

"I know your secrets Evan. All of them—do not make angry."

The Dark Lord had taken Evan by surprise, which was a tricky thing to do, he wasn't willing to push the Dark Lord any further. Ari loved Harry, but he loved controlling Evan more.

Evan nodded despite knowing Ari could not possibly know all of Evan's secrets. He would kill Jericho if he knew about him, but it was enough that he knew of Harry's fear of cupboards—the thing that happened when he was with the Muggles.

"No. Say it. Say you will obey me."

"I will obey you, Master," Evan said in a tone that suggested he would rather stab out his eyes.

Ari didn't care. Ari only cared that he had the upper hand and that his wayward consort knew who he belonged to whether he wanted to admit it or not. "Behave yourself, or the next time I come, it will be to bring you both home."

"Yes Lord Ari."

As the Dark Lord stormed away, Harry passed by, his Pharaoh didn't even say good-bye to him. "He won't do it, Father," Harry assured him.

Evan grabbed Harry's wrist and tugged him along to their bedroom, speaking as he went, "don't be a fool, child. He would do it and he would enjoy it. Not because he'd want you to suffer, understand? Because of how I would suffer."