Chapter 25
Sacrifice
"Harry, come down here right now!"
Hermione stood at the mouth of the Quidditch pitch, her head turned up towards the figures in the air which were doing loops on an obsolete school brooms. Harry had still managed to leave Ron behind a good half a pitch. When he heard Hermione's scream beneath the light whistle in his ears he squinted down at her and pointed his broom towards the ground. Ron did not follow but took his chances, flying through the goal hoops.
This was an uncommon picture – Hermione was not usually found anywhere near the Quidditch pitch except during Gryffindor matches. Harry slowed to a smooth halt before her, hovering in front of her, quite under the vastly mistaken impression that there was a chance he would return to the skies after he talked to her.
"What's up, Hermione?" he asked, wiping sweat off his brow.
Hermione looked close to popping a vein. A white blur flew from somewhere around her person and slapped him in the face. When he stopped seeing stars he noticed she was holding out what appeared to be one of Dumbledore's letters.
"Professor Strolm," Hermione said very quietly as she struggled to breathe normally in her strain to keep from exploding, "is waiting for you in Dumbledore's office. I think your playtime is over. Get off that broom. And get to Dumbledore's office." Her stilted speech made her seem as though she were experiencing chest pains or could not breathe. It frightened Harry immensely. Not in concern of her safety but rather of his own. "You're keeping the man waiting! He doesn't have all day, you know! He's a professor at Vaux Uni…"
Harry, much like what had nearly happened with Hermione, had stopped breathing when she had been talking and been extremely vigilant as to signs that he was going to become violent. He finally breathed a little easier when she finished her short, fury-bounded sentences and Harry guessed he better make a run for it before she started up any further than she had already. Once she really began there was no way on earth he would be able to stop it. Hermione could sustain a diatribe without needing any assistance or further provocation from her victim. He quickly lowered his broom to the ground and took off for the broom shed to return the Shooting Star.
He caught himself just before he asked what the time was. Hell would have opened up and gobbled him up. But as though she had read his mind she screamed, "It's five minutes to four o'clock, in case you didn't know! You better make sure you're there within the next five minutes or you can forget about borrowing my notes for a month!"
Harry gaped at her silence, hurt by the low blow. He quickened his steps in indignation, furiously chanting in his mind, 'That's not fair!' but set off up the corridor while Hermione's glare kept up with him up the corridor. At some point her hot waves of anger seemed to subside. He suddenly appeared to have returned to the realm of reason and even a little abashed.
"Make sure you take down everything he says – the man's words are worth a Galleon a minute," she said.
"Yes, Hermione," Harry replied in army-like fashion. I shouldn't have mentioned Professor Strolm in the first place. Why on bloody earth did I mention Professor Strolm in the first place? And actually remind her about Professor Strolm today?
Hermione's gaze at him was stern and tinged with a slight shade of green.
Harry hurried towards the showers. Seeing this, "Oh, don't even think about taking a shower, Harry!" Hermione shrieked. "You'll just have to smell foul and leave a bad first impression on only the author of four books!"
"I can't even shower? Just a quick-" Harry stopped sharply at the intensified heat of Hermione's glare, and when she slowly and quietly pointed ahead with a quivering finger Harry obeyed without question. He ran until he reached the phoenix gargoyle that guarded Dumbledore's office. The last time he had been here was early Monday morning with the Order and Draco's parents in Dumbledore's office after returning from Malfoy Manor.
"Lemon Drops!" he panted to the statue, and the gargoyle obediently moved and revealed the spiralling stairs. Seconds later he rapped the griffin brass knock on the tall doors of Dumbledore and heard the familiar, cheerful, "Come in!" Mixed feelings exploded inside him. He proceeded into the office.
"Ah, you arrive at last," Dumbledore said with the usual bright smile and warm look on his face.
He had not said his name. Somehow Dumbledore's demeanour seemed accusatorily cheerful. The pride in his eyes seemed elevated now and his smile too warm. It seemed he was only too happy to see Harry, and the young Gryffindor found himself feeling accosted with that guilt all over again, making him question himself once more. How could he disappoint this man, who only wanted to see the right side triumph? Who only wanted what was best for everyone?
"Afternoon, Professor Dumbledore," Harry mumbled, looking down at his feet. He felt Dumbledore's gaze more piercing than usual even though nothing spoke of whether those eyes remembered that morning at all. It was harder to face Dumbledore without Draco at and on his side.
Dumbledore nodded. "Good afternoon to you, too, Harry. Professor Strolm will arrive in a moment. Mint Toffee?"
Harry's mouth nearly fell open with the shock. That was obscenely unfair. Dumbledore had to be doing it on purpose. When last had Harry been offered a Mint Toffee? It was two weeks ago and he had been in this office four times after that, and he had not be offered any Mint Toffees or Lemon Drops then. Harry could barely look at the man in the eye as he smiled tightly and tentatively grabbed a handful of candies from the proffered bowl. He sat down.
Looking at the less cluttered, neater office it then occurred to him how adversely he affected Dumbledore these days. A week ago he had obliterated Dumbledore's trinkets and bric-a-brac, and only days ago he had led Dumbledore to a duel with Voldemort that exhausted him to the point where he collapsed to the floor. Then came the Slughorn debacle when he failed to seduce his new Potions professor into giving him the memory. And now he had most likely disappointed Dumbledore and crushed his hopes when he refused to be trained in controlling his rage to use it as a weapon.
What happened to that fire of independence that had ignited back in the Great Hall when he had stood beside Draco, confident in his defiant stance? In this office he was confronted with the real truth, less the illusive embellishment that was Draco Malfoy. Without his fascination and attraction towards Draco colouring the background of his mental processes, everything was just bare, clearer, truer, less fantastical, less vague, less euphoric, and mercilessly rawer. It was back to the way things really were. It was like stopping to breathe, and it hurt.
Dumbledore was smiling kindly at him, and his fingertips were touching each other, the charred blackened ones interweaved with the healthy, pale wrinkled ones. There was silence in the room. Dumbledore watched him calmly, still with that smile. The squishing and slapping sound of Harry's chewing could clearly be heard.
Then Dumbledore spoke.
"I trust you have resolved some issues surrounding yourself and Mr Malfoy?"
Startled by the words for the fact that they had broken the silence rather than their content, Harry sat wordlessly for a few moments, his green eyes shocked wide. But he tried to gather himself to reply.
"Er, yes..." he said, his mind not really committing to his words. Then he took several moments to lengthen his answer as he tried to ignore the heat rising in his cheeks. "We sorta talked it out, I guess." Screaming at each other, more like. Harry remembered the previous night: his confession, Draco crying, coming closer to him, and then finally believing him that he loved him. The kiss… Harry's face grew redder.
Dumbledore nodded sagely, his smile widening slightly across his face, to which action Harry blushed even harder. Then he remembered Dumbledore's eyes twinkling at him in this very office after the Order and the others arrived from Malfoy Manor, the moment after Dumbledore announced that Draco would spend the summer holidays with Sirius at number twelve, Grimmauld Place. This onslaught of embarrassing thoughts only worsened his hot flush and he looked back down at his knees, engulfed by sound mortification.
Wait…
Something was amiss here...
"Excellent. I do hope the two of you find your closure after enduring such terrible events that neither of you did not ask to get involved in," Dumbledore said kindly.
Harry looked back up, shaken out of his reverie. "Yes, sir."
Dumbledore smiled again and then looked around his desk. He frowned. "Hm. It seems I've forgotten my cup of hot chocolate in my chambers. Though at this age I should forgive myself." A chuckle.
Flabbergasted by this, Harry grew a frown. Hot chocolate at four o'clock in the afternoon? Harry knew Dumbledore was a little... quirky... but this was a completely new level of quirkiness. At least his previous cup of hot chocolate at midnight yesterday had granted him some semblance of normality, but this desire for it at four in the afternoon promptly took it back.
Then Harry saw the most amazing thing he had ever seen in his life. It should not have been, considering he had seen many things since his first step in the Wizarding world. But this somehow looked like a completely new kind of magic, a whole new kind of possibility. Astonishment stealing him, his green eyes popping out of his face, lips parted in pure fascination, Harry watched as a fat cup and saucer slowly floated down from the higher parts of Dumbledore's office and sank down towards him, making its quiet, slow, smooth way to Dumbledore's desk.
Dumbledore turned back around in his chair and placed the cup and saucer on his desk, brought the cup to his lips and took a generous sip of steaming hot chocolate at four o'clock in the afternoon.
"I never saw you as the showy type, Dumbledore," drawled Phineas Nigellus Black, his thin, black eyebrow raised, looking quietly impressed and a little surprised at Dumbledore.
Harry was left speechless. That was... that was... wow... It could not be possible, could it? Why could every grown wizard not do that? Why did McGonagall not do it? Or could she not do it? Why did Sirius or Remus or Mr Weasley, Kingsley, Fudge – the Minister for Magic, anybody not do it? Wandless magic... Wow... Harry was gaping and staring at Dumbledore sipping from his cup in utter incredulity. It was a different kind of magic. It was... Something that just seemed to act on its own, controlled by one like that? How could a person do that? How could he be so experienced as to do that? Was it experience? Was it even the person doing that? He had been fascinated by the Burrow when he first went there. Amazed by the self-washing dishes and self-knitting jerseys. But those were controlled by Mrs Weasley after she had cast a spell from her housekeeping books.
Harry did not know where to begin with his exploding questions. His previous self-blame and negative thoughts were categorically dismissed in the light of this awesome show of magical prowess.
"Sir," he breathed, licking his lips, feeling a brief stable of guilt and a sense that he had a nerve asking any questions considering his recent actions and their humbled reception from the man in front of him, "did you do that? Was that wandless magic? What you told me about? What you wa—wanted to t—teach me?" He faltered, only understanding just as he said his words that Dumbledore had wanted to teach him to do this ultimately possibly.
Dumbledore had said that one can control heightened emotions like rage and direct it in a positive, magical way such that it worked to one's discretion so that one can come to a point where one can control his magic so well that one would not require the use of a wand. Was that what Dumbledore had wanted to teach him? To do these kinds of... bloody brilliant... things?
Dumbledore bowed. "Indeed it is, Harry. My wish was to train you so that ultimately you could also be able to do such – forgive me – wonderful feats?"
Unable to answer, his mouth falling open again, eyes sparkling with wonderment, Harry slowly nodded in full agreement. Wonderful feats would be too modest a description.
As he raised his cup to his lips, Dumbledore twinkled his eyes merrily at Harry's taken expression.
Harry forced his bum back into his seat and shut his mouth closed. He had never seen this kind of magic. It was true there were a lot of things floating and existing untethered to anything here at Hogwarts, such as evasive Chocolate Frogs and the bopping candles in the Great Hall. But this... consciously effected performance by a single wizard, done under his will... A mere mortal performing this kind of magic. Just how bloody freaky can it get?
He recalled his conversation with Dumbledore a few days ago about wandless magic and his own suspicions of Voldemort being able to perform it as well, and imagined both of these extraordinary wizards – a description that admittedly applied to Voldemort as well – battling it out with mere hand-waving – without wands or anything – conjuring massive towers of fiery snakes and colossal torrents of water. Warring with magic so elevated, so rarer, on such an enormous scale, so much more powerful than the common man was able to perform... Harry shook his head to try to clear it. There was a whole new world of possible magic out there. A whole new, higher level of magic. And Dumbledore knew it.
"I could do that?" Harry all but whispered.
"Boy, he can dream," Black muttered derisively to his neighbour, who grunted noncommittally in vague agreement.
Dumbledore nodded. "Absolutely, Harry," he said with a bright smile. "You could. However, I understand that you do not wish to after this morning. I was deeply disappointed, I must confess, but with equal depth I recognize the importance of choice." Dumbledore's face held neither accusation nor disappointment. It was bright and incandescent with understanding and joviality.
Harry's heart was fluttering. He was actually reconsidering this – he could not be blamed. Flying cups and saucers? What else could it be? It could be summoning things from kilometres away. It could catching a Snitch without twitching a single muscle, or feinting and threatening Death Eaters by making his robes billow angrily and seem all-powerful to scare them off... It was here where Ron would, with immense feeling, exclaim, 'Blimey...'And pride in his friend would plaster a huge grin on his beaming face. Or—or... Draco's... He could imagine impressing Draco...
Wait, wait, wait, dammit! He had been against this mere hours ago. He still felt like Dumbledore had been manipulating him, did he not? And today it had stopped, right? Harry remained silent. He was torn, but he should not have been.
Dumbledore was engrossed by his steaming cup of hot chocolate, gleefully sipping away.
Harry looked aside, his eyes distant, conflicted.
It was betrayal to himself, betrayal to Draco.
What betrayal? Was this really betrayal? How was Dumbledore manipulating him?
When did this all begin? Harry thought back. It was when he had been very angry at Voldemort's depth of evilness and for raping Draco. Then he caused Dumbledore's office to explode in his rage. Dumbledore saw this and thought about exploiting this intense emotion to channel it positively for controlled use. It was not because he wanted to control him. Nor did he have any questionable motive – he was Albus Dumbledore. He's probably the whitest and goodest person on this planet! He's Albus Dumbledore!
Harry had second thoughts.
Would this really betray Draco?
The fireplace burst to life.
Unprepared, Harry jumped a foot in his chair as Professor Strolm entered Dumbledore's office in a blaze of green fire.
Dumbledore stood up. "Ah, Colin. Good afternoon. You finally join us."
The tall, strict-looking man with grey hair and a bald patch at the back of his head, dressed in a tawny tweed suit and with a small briefcase in his hand, smiled widely at Dumbledore and shook his hand.
"Afternoon to you, too, Albus." He then turned to Harry. "Ah, yes, our subject of the hour. Good afternoon, Mr Potter. Believe me when I say it's a pleasure to meet you – again." He extended his hand, which Harry shook after leaping out of his chair, giving the man a somewhat shaky and overcompensating smile of his own.
"Good afternoon, Professor. Pleasure to meet you, too, again."
Strolm looked impressed for some reason. His eyebrows wriggled up the broad expanse of his high forehead. He grinned down at Harry before looking back at Dumbledore. "Why is it you always find the most interesting of minds, Albus?"
Not understanding the question, Harry looked at Dumbledore. It registered to him that Professor Strolm's words were quite similar to those of Slughorn on Saturday morning.
Dumbledore chuckled as he resumed his seat. "I assure you I don't find the minds, Colin – the minds find me... willingly." Dumbledore rather emphasized that last word as he nodded slowly at Harry, a small, proud smile on his lips.
Flushing, Harry blinked rapidly as Strolm looked back down at him with the kind of large, indulgent grin he would find in Aunt Petunia's face whenever she spotted a dress whose price was slashed so much that she felt as though the shop was paying her to buy it. His slight jowls compressed into his neck as he pulled back slightly as though to survey Harry from a bird's eye view.
"So, Mr Potter, you're doing your fifth year at Hogwarts? How's the workload? Are you fairing well?" he asked innocently.
Phineas Nigellus snorted quietly. "I suspect not."
But Harry was not at all fooled by the light-hearted inquisition. There was an underlying strictness about this man, and Harry should not believe he could be honest with him and tell him his real academic scores because they were anything but impressive. And Professor Strolm, though coming across as kind and polite, might just take issue with them. He did, after all, have a doctorate under his belt, and that had to have come with some stupendous amount of hard work.
"Er, fairly well, not too bad," he replied evenly. Evasively vague but prudent at a time like this.
Professor Strolm nodded with a ready fashion, which suggested he was also quite aware they were exchanging superficial pleasantries with little or no truth in them. "I must say I was quite impressed by that Patronus Charm of yours the last time I was here. Not many can do that at your age. I still can't cast one to this day!" The man chuckled light-heartedly at himself. Harry gave a single, contrived bout of laughter to humour him. "Excellent, excellent. Well, I guess we should be going and getting started, then. Albus?"
Dumbledore was already shuffling about at his desk. "Oh yes, I will be out of the way in a moment," he assured him. He seemed to be collecting a few things from his desk, his voice muffled as he bent over behind his desk.
Harry frowned. Dumbledore was leaving? He was going to be tutored in his office? But what exactly was he and Professor Strolm going to do? If his memory served him correctly, Hermione, after he dismissed the DA meeting yesterday, had screeched that Professor Strolm had a PhD in Magical Philosophy. So he was going to learn about magical philosophy? What use would that be?
But all thought were chased from his mind as wonderment washed over him again at the sight of Dumbledore smiling as he crossed his office and an inkpot, a few rolls of parchment, some official-looking envelopes and a few gadgets Harry did not recognize followed him mid-air. Harry idly turned as Dumbledore and his floating went past. So captivated was Harry that he did not see Professor Strolm's expression of polite envy.
Dumbledore stopped by the doors, turned around and said, "I do hope you have an enlightening lesson with Professor Strolm here, Harry. Learn as much as you can. And enjoy!" He raised his cup at Harry and swept out of his own office. One by one his stationery slipped through the doors with in natural, shaky manner, further evincing the fact that Dumbledore was indeed controlling the objects.
Why had Dumbledore given them his office to use? Did he want to make Harry feel worse about himself with this overly generous gesture? Or perhaps he wanted him to feel more comfortable, possibly minding how fazed he had been at the start of their first meeting outside the Room of Requirement, where he had been in unfamiliar surroundings.
Professor Strolm cleared his throat, snapping Harry out of his answerless musings. "Yes, well, we should get started. I didn't expect to be doing our lessons in this office," he admitted offhandedly as his eyes roamed around the office in seemingly happy reminiscence. He paced slowly towards Dumbledore's chair as he swept his gaze around the room. "I remember this to be generously more cluttered than this in my days here at Hogwarts."
And who was to blame for that? Harry. He did not speak but resumed his seat.
Was Professor Strolm going to sit in Dumbledore's chair? Harry found himself getting increasingly defensive and indignant as his tutor neared the chair. Harry watched him grasp the arms of the chair with repulsive firmness and lowered himself into the seat with obscene pleasure. This was conflicting heavily with the old, engraved image of Dumbledore and only Dumbledore sitting there with far superior and heavier presence, fingertips touched together just as they were today, and an encouraging smile. This was not right. Harry shifted in his seat, quite unsettled. But he willed himself to just stay calm. Professor Strolm cleared his throat again and leant forward, touching his fingertips together his hands and resting his elbows on Dumbledore's desk, just as Dumbledore was inclined to do.
By Merlin…
"Well, Mr Potter, we should begin. Your headmaster contacted me a few weeks ago to persuade him me to tutor you. Needless to say he didn't have to try hard. And here I am about to attempt to teach you about magic. Personally it defies credulity that he felt he needed to invite all the other experts as I think my capacity is single-handedly capable of teaching you what you need to learn. I think Magical Philosophy is by far the most important subject of all. All those other lesser teachings, they are comparatively frivolous. If one could unlock the very secret of Magic itself, of what relevance is Transfiguration or Charms or Defence Against the Dark Arts...? Care of Magical Creatures?"
He burst into chuckles and a drop of saliva shot out of his mouth. As he rode himself to an outright laughing fit, some portraits had raised their eyebrows, looking quite far from amused, while Harry was very quickly finding that he did not like Professor Strolm. He was proud and pompous. He had summarily dismissed Professor McGonagall, Lupin, Moody and Hagrid.
Professor Strolm composed himself shortly before stooping down and hauling up his brown decrepit briefcase onto Dumbledore Dumbledore's desk. He opened it and pushed aside several items in it. Harry could not see what was in the briefcase since the lid was facing him.
"I'm going to teach you about what magic really is," Professor Strolm went on. "I think this is a fascinating topic which has seen many of my university students becoming my protégés." He smiled, as smile that was the closest thing to a smirk, a proud smirk. He leant back into the tall-back chair.
"There are four recognized but forevermore unofficial definitions of Magic. We call them MU-1, MU-2, MU-3 and MU-4. Professor Dumbledore, your headmaster, proposed the latest, most recognized and comprehensive definition – MU-4. He says Universal Magic is a bodiless, non-discrete, dimensionless energy that exists in parallel to, but does not occupy, the atmosphere. The most well-known magical philosopher that had proposed one of the other three definitions was Hester Gamp. Intelligent lady, excellent lady. She had developed MU-2 in her well-known book, Fundamental Magic.
"Dumbledore's definition was a point of much contention, primarily because it says that magic does not occupy space and that it defines magic as energy. However, there were far too many merits in MU-4 to dismiss it – it explains a lot about the behaviour and properties of magic." Strolm scrutinized Harry after he finished speaking.
Harry had a good grasp of what Professor Strolm was talking about, which was not comforting to him as they had not come to the hard part he was certain was coming. When Strolm had been speaking of Dumbledore he had berated himself for actually feeling proud of his headmaster. He had no right to feel proud. He had no business being, not after behaving the way he had towards him. He tried to push aside his feelings, as well as his newfound dislike for the man in front of him, and listen to his words.
Then he remembered Hermione: he was supposed to be taking notes. Finding himself panicking after imagining Hermione's face when he would failed to produce a single piece of parchment to her, he try to scramble into action, but Strolm was speaking again.
"Your headmaster is a great man, Mr Potter," Strolm was saying to him with great depth.
Harry averted his eyes. "Yes, sir."
Professor Strolm nodded. He did not appear reluctantly reverent. "Well, I thought there were going to be two of you – Dumbledore had told me there might have been a chance you were going to invite a new friend of yours?"
Harry's face was instantly arrested in awe.
"A new friend?" he whispered.
"Yes. So I supposed he isn't coming?"
"'He?'"
Strolm seemed taken aback. "Well, I assume your friend to be male, yes. Well, unless-" He cleared his throat, flustered for some reason. "-you prefer to surround yourself with the opposite sex rather." The man gave Harry a wary, appraising once-over. "Or Dumbledore has misinformed on that part."
He could not be talking about Hermione.
He had to be talking about the grey-eyed enigma.
Dumbledore had told him he might invite a new friend. It had to mean Draco.
Harry could not believe it.
"Can I—Can I...?"
Strolm frowned dismissively. "Oh absolutely! I can wait while you go fetch... her." Again, Strolm looked distinctly uncomfortable.
Vaguely registering the words, Harry took off, and a few minutes later he was taking the stairs up two at a time and landed on the fifth floor. He quickly crossed the hallway and swerved at a halt where Dumbledore and Draco had stopped yesterday. Only then did it hit him. He had been running fast in elated spirits all the way and had not realized he did not speak Mermish to make the wall shimmer and reveal the secret corridor. Struck senseless, panting from his running, having absolutely no idea on how to get to Draco, Harry just stood there dumbly, turning his head left and right, and looking back at the unyielding, positively solid wall.
Shit.
Harry could not believe his situation. He could not so energized just to be brought down so harshly by an unforgiving and still positively solid wall. Harry looked left and right of the empty corridor again before he gathered his wits about him and yelled, "Draco!" The wall instantly shimmered away and the dull, small passage appeared in front of him. After being momentarily frozen in incredulity at the rare instance his luck worked for him Harry slipped inside and stood in front of the door on which hung the portrait of an attractive mermaid perched on a rock surrounded by a tangerine sea and a dusky sky. The mermaid was twirling its long, black hair. Harry smiled imploringly at her. Perhaps his rudeness the previous day would play against him.
"Er, hello," he said softly. The young mermaid continued to squeeze her hair dry and blinked at him with exquisite dispassion.
"Er, I—I was hoping to see the bloke that lives here," he giggled.
The mermaid blinked but her continued twirling her hair in silence.
Harry was out of ideas so he decided to knock on the door instead. Perhaps he did not need to talk to her at all. There was no answer so he rapped again on the door, giving a quick glance up at the portrait to see if she wore a triumphant expression but she was merely staring blankly at him. Harry thought he could not really get pissed off by her even if he wanted to as she had not done anything wrong to him. And she understood only Mermish, and that likely meant Dumbledore had given Draco the Mermish secret code. But then why did the wall give way when he had yelled Draco's name...?
The door swung open and Draco appeared. He had changed out of his school uniform and now wearing an unbuttoned, plain-white shirt that was not tucked into his black, satin slacks. And he was barefoot.
"Potter?"
Whatever irritation Harry felt at Draco using his last name evaporated upon sight. Harry was silenced for a while as he scanned Draco's form slowly from top to bottom, unable to help himself. Then his head whipped back up to eye level. "Draco," he muttered, turning a cute crimson.
Draco leant on the frame of the doorway and extended his neck expectantly. "Yes?"
Harry forced himself to speak. Then his prior excitement came back with a force. "Draco, Professor Strolm is here. We can have the lesson together! Dumbledore told him he was going to teach the both of us!" He was panting, sweating, grinning madly.
Draco studied him with a closed-off expression for a while before taking his hand and pulling him into his room, slamming shut the door behind him. Harry was a little taken aback by the aggressive motion but did not mind – he would take being forcefully invited into Draco's room. He looked around. It was not bad at all and the floor was at least tiled.
"Merlin, Potter, you smell like you've never heard of a shower."
Harry flushed as he watched Draco stride over to his bed and sit on the edge, crossing his arms haughtily.
"So Professor Strolm finally arrived, the man who co-wrote Theories of Magical Unknowns."
Harry nodded enthusiastically, vaguely recalling seeing that name in the citation on the parchment Draco had given Hermione after the DA meeting. "Yeah, we can both learn about Magical Philosophy. He's waiting for us right now, in case you didn't know. So come on, get ready!" Harry could not help his eyes doing another once-over on Draco: black and white, barefoot, long, blond hair. Blast it.
"So Dumbledore's calling in experts to teach you stuff to prepare you for the war or something?"
"Yeah!"
Draco shook his head, giving Harry a much colder and less flattering once-over of his own. "I pity you."
Harry's good mood instantly went with the wind. "What's that supposed to mean?" Why did he always have to encounter some form of negativity with Draco?
"The Boy Who Lived, forced to fight the Dark Lord, forced in a fight he didn't start. Has your life always been like this, Potter? Was there always something you had to live up to? Someone you had to listen to?"
"Don't start, Draco."
Draco rolled his eyes and then gave Harry a less harsh once-over. A tiny smile curved his lips. His eyes all of a sudden seemed mistier, and Harry found himself blushing. Draco stood up and stalked over to him.
"You don't have to go back, you know – you can stay with me. We never really finished what we started yesterday because of your early climax," Draco all but purred.
Harry's throat was rid of all moisture. His face could rival the sun in temperature. "What?" he stuttered.
Draco's tiny smile transformed into a smirk as he drew nearer. Harry was unknowingly backing up.
"I said you don't have to go back. Stay with me."
It was not so much the seductiveness of the look in Draco's eyes. Nor was it the way he purred his words. But the fact that his words were a question. Draco was asking him to stay with him – he was giving Harry the chance to elect free-willingly. And what they were going to do if he were to stay was totally irrelevant – he would be with Draco. That was all that mattered.
"I—I—I can't. Professor Strolm is waiting for—Draco!"
Harry was surprised to find himself panicking. He was backed up against a wall with Draco right in front of him. He had all but yelled Draco's name to stop him from approaching any further because Harry was quickly reaching a place where his passion was already stoked. He had a major hard-on, with a raging heartbeat and a sensation was roiling up, springing out of his gut the closer Draco came. Harry was sure he would have another one of those early, embarrassing climaxes.
It was a weird and almost pathetic space in which he found himself: he was so attracted to Draco, so utterly in love with his everything that everything, even the simplest of things such as Draco standing in front of him was ridiculously intensified and elevated. There was still a considerable amount off space between them but it appeared vastly smaller. And Harry felt a live, humming current between them that was drowning his senses into delirium as his body reacted in ways he did not know it could, and doing so in laughable overreaction.
Draco did not seem to have heard Harry for he did not stop closing the distance between them. "Kiss me."
A shock to the system.
"Come on, kiss me." Draco puckered his lips playfully.
Wait, he had not been prepared for this.
Wait, he had been prepared for this: they had kissed the previous night.
But... Draco had been the one to initiate it, and it was not as though Harry had been completely conscious. Something had simply taken over him when their lips had connected. Perhaps it was the basic instincts of human love that drove Harry to seek whatever he wanted. Draco had been the main actor, he had been the one needing the kiss the most, such had been his fragile emotions. Hence it had been easy for Harry to do – he had just opened his mouth and let Draco do whatever, being the provider, and all he had to do was just try to keep up. It had not been a real kiss as Harry would have thought, which he was judging from whatever he knew about kisses in films and having seen a few couples kiss around the school. It had been too desperate, and too awkward, and too necessary.
But now that things were far much calmer Harry was floundering, absolutely bereft of a backbone, without a how-to guide to help him through this. This was different – voluntary. Harry was the one that was now expected to lean forward on his own accord and touch those lips. He had done it in Charms class today amidst his schoolmates, so why was he afraid now? Because Draco was now wide awake.
"Er..."
"Kissing doesn't require speaking, Harry," Draco chided in a sweet lilt, smiling a little. He remoistened his lips and puckered them again. "Come on."
Harry was near hyperventilating, and he was pissed at himself for it. Was he not just the shining example of virginal naivety? The quintessentially morally innocent? Harry almost felt disgusted with himself at the roaring pulse in his ear and the synchronous thump of his penis with his heart. His eyes darted between Draco's eyes and his shining, shell-pink lips. Harry decided to just delve into it all. He leaned forward.
He closed his eyes.
Draco giggled against Harry's lips undoubtedly amused at Harry closing his eyes as Harry sealed their lips together. He let Harry flounder on his own without any help for a few moments as though allowing him this freedom that he had not had before.
Harry just awkwardly pressed their lip, smooching and pecking away at Draco's lips innocently, eyes closed not least because he was not prepared to risk seeing Draco's eyes shining with hinged laughter at his pitiful attempts at intimacy. But even this drew further back in his mind as he became rapidly absorbed in kissing Draco. Then without warning, Harry felt Draco's hand at the back of his head meshing their lips together. Draco opened his mouth further and pried Harry's lips open wider with his own before he started leading them backwards towards the bed.
This was already getting too much for Harry. He was on the edge.
"Do you want me or Professor Strolm, Harry?"
Harry panted the obvious and desperate reply as his legs moved forward by their own volition, as his penis raged against the fabric of his pants, as his forehead creased and straightened with every spike of overwhelming sensation that passed through him.
This was too much.
The world gave way under his feet as he fell on top of Draco on the emerald, silk duvet.
"Draco, I can't…"
He was feeling too good. His drawers were already wet with his pre-ejaculate. But Draco did not heed his words and continued to flick his tongue in his mouth, exploring it. Harry tried to turn his head away but Draco followed it. He devoured Harry's lips like a writhing, restless snake, shooting shocking beads of titillating pleasure down Harry's spine.
Too much…Harry moaned almost pleadingly while Draco gave his own brand of moaning, sounding that sexy, breathy mewl of his.
A foreign power was decidedly in control of Harry's body now. It had to be. He just had to reach that place again. He hips grinded sinuously into Draco's groin, his lips pushed harder onto Draco's, his tongue became a ferocious little muscle that did battle with its other equal. He had not kissed like this before but he was being driven to expert status by this unnamed force, a simple overwhelming need to have and to be completed.
"Draco," Harry panted, almost crying his name.
"Harry."
Draco's hands weaved through Harry's wild hair. Harry's hands pulled and glided through Draco's long hair. Draco's hands slid down Harry's back and squeezed his bum cheeks. Harry's hands slid down Draco's sides and squeezed those pale mounds.
Hands were finding new places, tongues were learning their motions, erections were finding satisfying rhythms. Everything was just…
Harry gave a stuttering, crying moan and his hips jerked wildly as he came violently, his whole body being wracked and overtaken by waves of his orgasm as he arched into Draco. His eyes shut, his face twisted, his breathing stopped, his hands clenched, his toes curled, and his balls asunder. He had not lived those three seconds on this planet. The wave passed and left him as a panting, quivering mass of flesh and bone. When? Why? How? Those were mere questions. He was... he was... he was so... weak... so weak, he could not even lift his eyebrow, could not even twitch his fingers, could not do anything but lay on top of Draco as heavy, blackening exhaustion fell upon him.
"Harry?"
He could hear the words but he could not move to respond, could not even speak. Debilitating weakness … So... weak...
Harry felt Draco shaking him.
"Harry!" he heard Draco hiss more urgently.
Draco had finally had enough and pushed him off.
Then Harry suddenly felt his strength flowing back into his limbs. Moments ago an impenetrable wall of lassitude had fallen on him but he could now move again. He raised his head slightly to look at Draco but quickly left it to fall back on the bed. He remained in that position as he soaked it all up, trying to gather his entire being about him again, for he felt he had exploded in a million different directions. His breathing had normalized for the most part but his eyes remained a little droopy.
The boy next to him said, "Bloody hell, Potter." The words did not even contain due derision but simply astonishment. "So you really are practically a virgin."
Harry did not answer and he did not hear any more questioning statements from Draco. He did not know whether he felt ashamed of himself or not. It really was not his fault – his life had been too tumultuous to focus on relationships. With Voldemort returned and his attacks in various forms in previous years, he simply had not had the time and freedom to experiment and gain experience.
"Harry, I'm really not trying to be rude or anything… But that was even worse than your first time," Draco said as gently as he could, it sounded.
"I haven't had the time, okay?" Harry growled angrily, flying to his feet off the bed, and just as his feet hit the floor, everything came rushing back: the lesson. Professor Strolm.
"Bugger! Professor Strolm!" he hissed. He gave Draco a hesitant glare before his body prepared itself to set off in the direction of the door.
"Come on, Harry," Draco whined. "You know you don't want to go there. Sod Dumbledore and his experts. Face it: you can't go anywhere – you stink, and you're pants were all mushy, I'm sure. You should... take a bath... I also haven't bathed, you know..."
It was twofold: the words first travelled to his ear. Then, like a delayed sonic boom, the meaning a ghastly long moment afterward as he slowly connected the two concepts. Harry did not relax his body, he could barely believe he just heard it. But in a flash his eyes were on Draco.
"Bathe with you?" His words came out quite calm and composed. Draco only gave a come-hither smile.
Draco was truly insufferable, Harry thought, as he was led to the bathroom. His eyes were on the Slytherin's back as he walked in front of him. Was he going to see this body naked? Harry shook his head and dug his heels into the floor, pulling at Draco's hand in the opposite direction.
"Draco, I really have to get back to Dumbledore's office – the man's waiting for me, don't you understand that?"
"You want to go?"
Somehow, in some way, that question did not seem fair. Harry checked the question in every direction possible but found himself unable to answer. "Yes," he replied. But his eyes darted left and right uncertainly, and the hand holding Draco's hand suddenly became inherently awkward and extremely sensitive.
"You really want to go?" Draco asked, like a child attempting to stave off the feeling of abandonment that would come when his parents left.
But now this – persistence – Harry could deal with.
"He's waiting for me, Draco! I have to go! I wanted you to come with me! Let's just go, all right? We we—we can..." Harry grew two pinks spots on his cheeks. "...We can bath later... if you still want to... withmeImean."
Draco just glared at him for a while in silence but then his eyes lost all its heat. "Fine, go," he spat, withdrawing his hand to let Harry's arm hang awkwardly. Draco folded his arms haughtily again, and Harry could spy a slightest crinkle to his nose – the faintest vestige of a sneer.
"Draco, don't be like this."
"The door is right there, Potter," Draco said, with a gracious sweep of his arm.
"Fine!" Harry said loudly, and he started stomping away.
"Don't I get a goodbye kiss?"
Harry stopped dead in his tracks and spun around. His hesitation crept in but he quickly mastered himself. He was tired of acting the big-eyed, innocent virgin. Without thinking about it, which was necessary, and surprising himself, he carried the heat of his attempted exit, went forward with blind and ferocious determination and kissed Draco fully on the lips. He was getting used to this feeling, and that vague, lustful, condensed, springy feeling he always felt in his groin – starting his erection – came again, but not with embarrassing speed.
Draco – Slytherin to the core – capitalized: Harry was not leaving.
All too soon Harry had found a rhythm with Draco's lips. All too soon he started getting that soft sizzle in his groin. Draco's arms first encircled his waist and Harry left his arms were they were.
Only now did he realize that, in front of him, he had a person he could do anything with. Or rather, the person permitted him to do anything with him. A few minutes ago he had squeezed Draco's bum as they kissed, and he had not been reprimanded. Here, again, Harry took the same liberty and heartily squeezed Draco's bum cheeks, really delving in it and feeling it, all its softness and fullness. His hands occupied by that, and his lips occupied by Draco's, Harry thought he had found a wonderful thing here – intimacy – a sweet he had not—could not taste before.
Draco led him into the bathroom. He pushed the door open and walked backwards inside without stopping kissing Harry, who was growing increasingly addicted to this kissing thing. Really, it was something else. So soft, intimate, pleasurable, sweet. And so innocent as well.
The pale hands started making quick work of Harry's school robes, tie and shirt.
"Take my clothes off."
The separation of lips this commanded necessitated allowed Harry to regain enough coherence to undo Draco's buttons – or the rest that were not done. Almost desperate to see what would come of his actions, what his fingers would reap, Harry hastily undid the buttons as he intermittently kissed Draco with his eyes open this time. Ah, and heavenly, pale skin was his reward – alabaster, smooth, blemish-less, simple, perfect. It felt like home to see this again.
With increasing viciousness Harry tore down the rest of Draco's clothing as the other boy did the same to him. Draco had been easy to unclothe, but Draco removed his own clothing with impressive speed and suspicious dexterity. Indeed more questions arose here than ever before about Draco's. But they were vague and misguided and utterly irrelevant to what Harry was experiencing.
As Draco tore himself away to start running the water, and now temporarily bereft of the blazing sensations, Harry realized he was going to be naked with Draco. That his body was going to be exposed to someone. He all of a sudden felt immensely self-conscious as Draco stooped down and regulated the water to the right temperature, splashing in a couple of colourful bubble bath potions into the water and causing it to start foaming instantly.
"You know, this isn't fair," Draco said. "You've seen my body already so it's nothing new to you."
Refusing to just stand there and blush any longer, Harry thought about Draco's words. "Well," he started with uncharacteristic daring, a slightly devilish grin spreading on his face, "there's one thing I haven't seen of yours."
Draco raised a perfectly sculpted eyebrow and folded his arms. "Oh, and what's that?"
Harry did not speak for a moment, hesitant. Bloody hell, what am I thinking? Perhaps it was too bold and inappropriate. But we're bathing together, for Pete's sake! Inappropriate? Harry mustered his courage and quickly assumed the same adventurous air that made him begin his sentence.
"Your arse," he finished. It was true: in his dreams Draco had been always been facing him, so he had not been able to see his backside at any time. This was one more bow-tied present he could open up: he wanted to see Draco's arse. He knew what if felt like.
A dark shadow slowly crossed Draco's face, making Harry's grin falter.
"I'm sorry," Harry rapped immediately. He knew there had been good reason for his hesitation – Draco's bum had been the focus of his rape experience. Perhaps Draco was sensitive about that area of his body.
"Sorry about what?" Draco asked, the shadow shortly departing, replaced by a soft, inquiring smile.
"About what I said – it wasn't right."
"There was nothing you said that was wrong," Draco replied as he approached Harry and gave him a long, deep kiss. "Take my pants off," he said between kisses.
A few minutes later they were surrounded by warm water and a sea of purple foam. The initial colours of the potions had combined and formed this deep purple. Harry was never adept in Potions so he could not argue potion colours. He had giggled and impulsively slapped Draco's arse as the pale boy waggled it in front of him. After the initial embarrassment Harry had started feeling more comfortable with being seen nude by another person. Ron had never seen him naked, nor has he seen Ron naked before. But it was just another boy, right? He had gotten an idea of the male physique. He judged that he and Draco were more or less similarly built. But of course he was certain he could never approach Draco's sexiness, that effortless provocativeness that he had seen in motion in his... nightmares? Dreams…?
They sat separated by a channel of purple foam. Harry's legs were open against the walls of the tub while Draco had folded his own underneath him. He had filled the bathroom to the maximum, so much to Harry's chagrin there was really little he could see.
"Why did you come in here stinking like a Giffy in mating season?" Draco asked, as he explored his body.
"I was flying with Ron. And what the bloody hell is a Giffy?"
"M-"
"Yes, Muggle, I know," Harry deadpanned.
Draco smirked and flicked a jet of water at Harry playfully.
"Oi!" Harry squeaked indignantly. But as he sat in the tub gaping at Draco, he captured this image right now in front of him and made sure to engrave it in his mind so that that moment would live forever it: Draco smirking, not maliciously but cheekily, half of his alabaster-pale chest gleaming wet, his long, platinum-blond hair matted, stringy and littered with balls of purple foam, and silver eyes glowing with amusement. Harry felt a fuzzy flutter rising in his chest as a huge smile spread across his face. In access and euphoria he most ignominiously said, "You're beautiful, Draco."
And Draco's features instantly morphed.
Bugger.
"Merlin, Potter, what the bloody hell was that? A bloke doesn't say just what you said to another bloke! What's wrong with you?" Draco seemed frighteningly genuine. "Promise me you will never go all-" He gestured vaguely and wildly with his hands. "-fluffy, Hufflepuffy again like that. Promise!"
Harry, instead of feeling mortified, burst out in laughter, amused at his own words and Draco's near panic. Draco looked both taken aback and offended by this.
"Potter!"
"Okay, okay, I promise!" Harry managed to hiccup. He calmed himself, letting out a deep, smiling sigh. And right then, in that moment, feeling high-spirited and content and wonderful, Harry could almost say he was the happiest bloke alive.
Merlin. Is this what people look for in... er... relationships? This contentment, this happiness, this fulfilment that was really beyond anything of this world, beyond the materialistic and the physical? Was Harry beginning to understand that secret behind those sickening daytime soapies Aunt Petunia always indulged in from dawn till dusk? Was this what they were trying to show them? Was this love? After all he had confessed before that he loved Draco. Perhaps his mind was now catching up to that fact or to that promise to Draco.
"'Beautiful…'" Draco snorted, shaking his head.
Harry grinned. He was in full agreement with Draco he should refrain from such horrendous sentimentalities, even though he could feel them literally hanging on the tip of his tongue. 'I've never felt like this before, about anyone,' 'You're beautiful, Draco,' 'I feel so happy when I'm with you,' 'I love you.'
"So what the hell is a Giffy?" Harry asked conversationally.
"It's a—er..." Harry looked on expectantly at Draco as he played with the foam. "It's a..." Draco swam closer. "It's this... rather ugly, smallish animal..." Harry felt Draco's legs graze his own. His prick was hardening with impressive speed. "It lives in the bushes just after the greenhouses behind the gardens of the manor..." Draco slowly straddled him, mounting his middle. Every feline motion was sinuously fluid in the water.
Harry was doing well to remain calm. He made a noise to indicate for Draco to continue.
Draco's hands slowly felt up Harry's arms and then rested on his shoulders. "It's a cross between a hippogriff and a Phiggle..."
By – the – gods… They were naked now. It was totally different now. No rough clothes in the way, no form of... protection or buffering. No, Harry was not going to think like this – he did not want be the hesitant virgin anymore. It was time he started growing a hard head and act resolutely. It was time he stopped being scared and quivered like the shame of manhood. Draco's words after they had kissed on the bed about Harry climaxing prematurely had stung more than he would like to admit. And they stung more because Draco had not intended to be derogatory, instead honest. Draco had been amazed at his lack of experience. Harry did not want to feel inadequate – not to a bloke whom he could fly loops around in a Quidditch match, the bloke he could just overpower in a corridor duel.
Harry's hands came up and slowly roamed over the gleaming, wet skin. "Now what the bloody hell is a Phiggle?" he asked, as though nothing was amiss, staying in scene.
Draco clucked and smirked, nearing his face into Harry's. "Oh, Potter, you're bloody worthless, you know that?"
"Really?" Harry whispered rather incompetently as Draco put his lips to his again.
Draco deepened the kiss as he sunk lower into Harry, who felt the head of his penis graze one of Draco's butt cheeks. Harry drew back slightly from other lips to gasp but Draco sought him out again and recaptured his lips. He sank lower and Harry felt his prick sliding so wonderfully through the channel of the crevice between the mounds of Draco's arse. Draco jumped backwards as though he had touched a live wire under water, and a look of horror gripped his face in his flight before it was quickly done away with as the boy landed back on the bathtub floor with a comical sort of nonchalance.
"Draco! I'm sorry, I—I-" Harry spluttered.
"It's not your fault," Draco said in a low, flat voice as he looked down at the water.
Harry watched Draco quietly. It was harder, Harry surmised, to deal with a boy since males did not bare their emotions in the open as women did. He knew he was treading on eggshells if he spoke again. He probably should not – Draco would not want to talk about his horrors.
"Do you want me to go?" Harry asked.
"Yes."
Okay, wow, Harry thought breathlessly. That was… Okay… Reeling from his unexpected dismissal Harry dazedly, and a little awkwardly, rose out of the purple, foamy water and stepped out, foam running down his legs and water dripping off his feet onto the floor. He looked around the bathroom wildly in his exposed state, searching desperately for a towel. Draco pointed it to a dark-green fluffy one hanging from a rail next to the toilet. He reached for it and dried himself very quickly before tiptoeing out of the bathroom.
"You can use my lotions and stuff. They're in the wardrobe," Draco said, in an even flatter tone and as he continued to stare at the bathwater.
Harry looked back and nodded before he closed the door behind him. He ended up using only a fraction of Draco's cosmetic collection: the lotion and some deodorant. Skipping to the door, he threw his clothes back on and ran out of the room for Dumbledore's office, the last image his in mind being of a pale, crestfallen face: Draco was still reeling from what had happened to him back in Malfoy Manor. He had some psychological baggage to sort out, and Harry hoped that he knew he was there for him, ready to help him through it...
The face floated in the front of his mind, crestfallen, scared, broken, terrified, horrified… But then it was superimposed with a flat, chalk-white one bearing deadly, crimson slits… Voldemort was the cause of this, the cause of Draco's shattered psyche. And Harry was so going for him – Voldemort was so going to pay for this. Harry decided to learn wandless magic.