The poetic lines quoted here come from Swinburne's "The Leper," which probably wins for his most disturbing piece of poetry.

Chapter Forty-Three: Defending

"No. I'm sorry."

There was silence, but Harry thought that was mostly because Snape, Draco, and Regulus hadn't been anticipating such a calm response. When they figured out this was the only one they were going to get, they would press further and faster, of course. But for now, Harry sat back and enjoyed the cup of tea that Snape had insisted on fetching him when he heard about Voldemort's Heir-Call.

Snape shook his head slightly. Not surprisingly, he was the first to recover from Harry's refusal. "Voldemort could try this again," he said quietly. "And this time, no one might be there to save you. He might try it in dreams. From your description of the way he pulled on your mind, he did know that you were present in his head when you tried to view his plans. But could you detect him in the same way?"

"I don't know." Harry shook his head and sipped the tea once more. "I probably won't know until he does try."

"This is serious," said Draco. Harry wondered when he had ever done anything to suggest that it wasn't serious, but let that thought go when Draco continued, face earnest. At least this wasn't the scolding that he could easily have received just a little while ago, before Draco and Snape sought new ways to talk to him. "I think that you should take the last name of Malfoy, Harry, but I'll support whatever decision you make. Just choose one."

"I won't let Voldemort force me into doing this, any more than I'd let him pick a battleground." Harry set his teacup down gently on the arm of his chair. "I've chosen, Draco, and for now I choose to remain nameless."

Regulus sighed. "Harry, as much as I would like you to have free choice, you cannot. If the bonds of being the legal heir to Black were not enough to stop the Heir-Call, then the line of protection I counted on doesn't work. The Light defended you. Will it do that forever? Will it do that if Voldemort tries the Heir-Call again at Midwinter, when both he and the wild Dark want you?" He paused, nibbling his lip. "You know that I would like you to become Harry Black. But I agree with my cousin. Choose the name you wish to have."

"And Professor Snape would like me to become Harry Snape." Harry cocked his eyebrows. "He has as good a claim as you two do. He's my father."

Snape said nothing. He didn't need to, though. Harry could see the agreement and dissatisfaction with Harry's proposed solution moving in his dark eyes.

"And that's one reason why I won't choose," Harry continued. "Not until I have a distinct preference that I can argue for and defend." Which might be never. I enjoy being Harry, forcing people to view me without a convenient name to stamp on my forehead. "I don't want to cause competitions or resentment between you three. And, if I chose too quickly and without thought, my brother might wonder, justifiably, why I couldn't remain a Potter."

"Well, of course you couldn't remain a Potter," Draco said, disgust in every syllable.

Harry smiled and stood, stretching his arms over his head. Snape and Regulus both stood at once, as if he would fall. Harry rolled his eyes. His brain didn't hurt, and the pressure around his throat had faded with the effects of one of Snape's potions and the warm tea. He would tell them if he was hurting, now. That was one thing they'd earned by no preemptive scolding.

"I'm not taking a name," he said pleasantly. "Not right now. I do thank you for offering, but I won't."

He swept out of Snape's offices, with Draco trailing behind him. He knew he'd won the fight because he was the least desperate. The rest of them were more interested in Voldemort's threat than he was. It had come once, and he'd survived it thanks to his connection to his brother. He could survive it again, especially because he now knew the signs.

"Harry."

He looked over his shoulder. Draco's face had taken on a thoughtful expression it hadn't worn since he heard about the attack. Harry nodded to him, and waited for what he would say.

"Part of it is about politics, too, isn't it?" Draco cocked his head. "And not just us, or whether we'd resent someone else whose name you took. Not that I would," he added haughtily. Harry ducked his head in a swift nod of agreement, and to hide his smile. "If you become Harry Malfoy, the Malfoys are suddenly elevated to a position of acclaim and grace that my father's actions lost for us. Add Snape, and suddenly Professor Snape is an important political figure. And if you're Harry Black, then you're making claim to the Blacks' heritage of glory and madness."

"Very good," said Harry, and Draco blushed and even gave a little wriggle at his praise. Harry had to raise a hand in front of his mouth to cover his smile this time. In the small things, Draco was so easy to please. "Yes, that's another reason, but it's not as important as my wanting to have the choice. I'm already juggling several political balls." He sighed as he thought about the story that had appeared in the Daily Prophet that morning. Rita Skeeter had managed to ferret out the story about Squibs' Association, and though of course she put a flattering spin on it, the Daily Prophet was already printing letters claiming that Harry never should drain anyone's magic but an enemy's. "I don't need my enemies suddenly thinking that one group of my allies is more important to me than the rest."

"Would you consider Malfoy?"

And then there were some things with Draco that weren't so simple. Sometimes he did distrust what Harry said on the surface, and wanted to hear them over again. Harry turned to face him, reaching out to grip his shoulders. He let his fingers stroke reassuringly over cloth and skin as he stared into his partner's eyes.

"I promise I'm doing that," he said. "It doesn't mean I'll choose it, but it's one of my top three choices." He watched Draco preen, then added, "Though sometimes I think I should choose Opalline, and then I would have an excuse not to fight."

Draco scowled at him. "Don't even joke about that, Harry," he said, putting out a hand, gripping the back of Harry's robe, and pulling him tightly against him. "We need you in the war. The war needs you."

Harry rolled his eyes, safely out of sight, and put his head down on Draco's shoulder. The one thing I'm not going to forget is that.

SSSSSSSSSSSSS

"This is still just an experiment," Neville said as he put down the potted lily gently on the floor of the tunnel. "It doesn't mean that they'll work, you know. We have to test them."

"That you managed this at all is wonderful," said Connor, and watched in a little wonder as Neville swelled with pride. Is just speaking the truth enough to get people to behave that way? Well, truth and flattering lies, I suppose. Harry would use that line even if Neville's plants were useless. "Let's see what they can do."

They had two rows of the potted lilies, tall flowers with faint golden spots on their white petals, lining either wall of the escape tunnel out of Hogwarts that Parvati's spot of light had discovered. Neville set the last one down and stepped over to join Connor at the far end of the tunnel, towards the hole that led beyond the Forbidden Forest. At the other end, Peter waved to them.

"Here I am, just a regular Death Eater walking through the tunnel, not planning mayhem at all…" Peter sang under his breath as he began to walk between the rows of lilies.

He passed several without incident. Connor frowned, and avoided glancing at Neville. Maybe this wouldn't work after all.

But then one of the lilies quivered like a tuning fork, and the ripples and vibrations spread from flower to flower. By the time Peter reached the middle of the row, the lilies leaned towards him, their petals spread wide, their golden "tongues" writhing as if to catch his scent.

Then two of them reached out, and curled about his limbs with uncompromising strength. Peter made as if to reach for his wand, and the lilies tightened. Then the rest of them lunged.

There was a complicated moment when Connor had considerable difficulty in seeing what was happening. It ended with Peter on his back several inches above the floor, tendrils turning his arms and legs into a mass of green, lily petals locked on his face and attempting to suck his breath out.

"They work," Neville whispered in wonder.

"They do," Connor pointed out, "and now someone's got to stop them from hurting Peter."

Neville started, then clapped his hands. The lilies slowly lowered Peter to the floor and uncoiled from him, though many of them swayed as if asking Neville if he were sure about doing this. Peter took a deep gasp for breath and sat up, rolling back his left sleeve. Connor winced. He was bleeding from a gash near the Dark Mark, which had triggered the lilies into attacking.

"Oh, Professor Pettigrew, I'm so sorry—" Neville began in horrified tones.

"It's quite all right, Longbottom." Peter's voice was firm as he touched the wound with his wand and murmured Integro. Most of the bleeding slowed, though Connor knew he would need to visit Madam Pomfrey to have it healed completely. "Professor Snape and I will just have to remember that we can't possibly take this route out of the castle." He smiled and stood up. "Of course, if an attack does happen at Hogwarts, we'll probably leave another way in any case, since we'll be fighting."

"And any student can take this tunnel." Connor eyed the lilies. "How often do they need to be watered, Neville?"

"Not at all," said Neville proudly, as the lilies nodded and swayed towards the sound of his voice. "They grew up on water. They've drunk enough for a year of vigilance. They'll keep watch until next year, now."

Connor smiled and waved his wand to begin casting Disillusionment Charms on the plants. It seemed their defense for this section of the castle was complete.

They met Fred and George in the middle of another corridor, the one that led from Ravenclaw Tower down towards the major escape tunnel. The twins were standing, one above the other, on a broad section of the half-ramp, half-stair that was meant to insure the students didn't have room to lag, and arguing hotly with one another.

"—couldn't work, because we can't adapt—"

"To all Houses? Of course we can. Stop being such a—"

"Disbeliever? Sometimes, one must take you to task, dear brother—"

"Brother of mine, who doesn't understand the simplest thing about jokes—"

"Fred? George?" By the speed with which their heads turned towards him, Connor thought he knew who was who. He shook his head in private amusement. He'd thought the twins would have finished arranging their traps for potential Death Eaters already. "What's wrong?"

The twins pointed at each other. "He," said Fred, "wants to set up tricks that will track students by the House crest on their robes. He doesn't understand that we would have to arrange four different layers of spells, one for each House. That's too—"

"Much?" George leaned forward and pointed at Fred a little harder, as if that would convince Connor of his rightness. "I say that we can do it easily, use the same spell for every House at Hogwarts. But he won't believe me. Disbeliever."

"Idiot."

"Moron."

"Imbecile."

"Skeptic."

Connor hastily intervened; he'd been witness to several arguments like this in the Burrow, and he knew they could go on for hours. "Well, we have House crests." He touched the Gryffindor crest on his own robes. "Why doesn't George use the spell that he thinks will detect students from all Houses, not making it specific to Gryffindor, and we can test it?"

George leaned forward, seized his hand, and pumped it brutally. "You are a brilliant man, Connor Potter, sir," he said, in an uncannily good imitation of a house elf. "George Weasley is honored to work for Connor Potter sir."

Connor coughed, feeling his cheeks flush. Good thing we didn't have any house elves by the time Harry and I were born. I couldn't have commanded them anyway. "Yes. Well. What's the incantation?"

George straightened and cleared his throat as though performing for a bigger audience than his brother, Connor, Neville, and the very amused Head of Gryffindor. "Aediculae de Hogwarts protego!"

A colored smoke left his wand and sauntered through the corridor. Squinting, Connor could make out that the smoke was purple, changing to blue. It snapped abruptly into taut lines along the walls, and clung there, so faint that Connor needed a strong Lumos charm just to see where it had gone.

He moved cautiously forward.

The smoke didn't react. Connor walked the length of the corridor, to the foot of the tunnel that began the steep climb to Ravenclaw Tower, and came back, then had Neville do the same thing. No reaction. Connor glanced uneasily at George. "Is it supposed to do that?"

"Of course," said George. "Now watch." He took something from his pocket and fixed it to his robes with a few whispered words. Peter rolled his eyes.

"Do I want to know how you got a Slytherin House crest?" he asked.

"No, sir." George gave him an angelic smile. "I'm sure it would only distress a genial old man like yourself." He turned and strutted up the hall, his head lifted and a sneer on his lips. Connor bit his own lips to keep from laughing. He couldn't be sure that George was mimicking Draco—there were other Slytherins who walked the same way—but it would add to the authenticity of the illusion if he were.

Once again, he passed through the corridor without being stopped. By then, though, Fred had his arms crossed and was shaking his head smugly. "Of course you think that the spell works, dear brother," he said. "Having it do nothing is the prime requirement for being able to claim genius with no hard work."

George grinned ferally, and Connor saw, a moment before Fred, how he'd been smarter than his twin for once. "That's why we need someone who's not wearing a House crest at all to test it," said George, and then dragged his twin forward and down half the corridor before he could react.

At once, the glittering bars of a cage grew around Fred. Then they flipped him neatly upside down and hung him by his heels, with his robes dangling past his face. A smoking brand crept out of the wall towards his flank, as if it were going to burn a pattern into his skin.

Fred yelped and wriggled. George was laughing so hard that it was up to Peter to take his out his wand and say firmly, "Finite Incantatem."

Fred dropped to the ground, and spent a few moments wiping at his face and robes. George had fallen to the ground, laughing still. The brand disappeared back into the wall, and Connor heard the vigilant hum of the spell.

"I will get you back."

Fred was giving George the evil eye. George winked at him and sprang to his feet.

"Of course you will, brother mine," he said. "But at least you aren't a skeptic any more."

"You're still an idiot."

"Moron."

"Imbecile."

Connor rolled his eyes and left them to it.

SSSSSSSSS

Henrietta had decided it would be a good idea to take a walk. If she carried two pasties with her from the kitchens, and one was made of blueberries and one of raspberries, that did not mean anything. They steamed gently in her pocket, and were companions while she moved.

She went into the Forbidden Forest, watching as the branches arched overhead to frame a sky gone blue with one of the last fair days they would have before winter truly descended. Now and then ice glittered from a sheltered nook, but the snow that had fallen four days ago had failed to establish a lasting hold. The main presence in the Forest was the leaves that rustled and eddied around her, stirred by her robes and sometimes her spells into swirling patterns of color.

She had thought that might make it easier for him to find her. And it did. Halfway through a complicated dance of gold and orange, she saw him leaning against a tree, staring at her with dark eyes.

"Greetings, Evan," Henrietta said, then made the leaves dance through her widespread arms. She took out the blueberry pasty, hefted it in her hand for a moment, and tossed it towards him. He caught it handily and bit into it, never taking his eyes from her the while.

"I know what you are doing," he said.

"Good." Henrietta made the leaves settle on her head like a crown, and smiled at him. "This would have been boring if you didn't. You know that I enjoy enemies who can challenge me."

He licked his fingers as he finished his pasty, and then cocked his head. "Blueberries? That says that you are sorry for me, Henrietta, that you expect me to die. You only enjoy challenges you can win."

She shrugged gaily. It was not her fault that Evan Rosier did not completely understand her, while she walked as close as anyone could to understanding the shadows of his madness. "I didn't know that I was going to win when I held you down and raped you, the night you came to 'convince' me to join the Death Eaters. I only knew that you excited me more than anyone I'd ever known, and I wanted to fuck you."

His eyes had darkened further with the mention of the rape. Henrietta breathed softly, watching him, then shook her hair and let the leaves drift out of it, filtering down behind her with a crack-rustle.

"I will kill you," he said. "I need your help, and I will have it, and then I will kill you. But I will rape you first."

"You can't rape the willing, Evan." Henrietta took a step closer to him. "Do you want to feel how willing I am? My thighs are wet. They always are when I face you." The sky above them was very bright, and the grass around her stark with color. The ice glittered from its nooks.

His eyes stared at her. Henrietta understood him, and waited.

"There is a task that someone has asked me to help her with," Evan whispered. "Juicy targets, plump targets. Let me have the other pasty that you carry. I can smell it."

"Smell that, and not my arousal?" Henrietta took out the raspberry pasty and tossed it to him. "You're getting slow, Evan, very slow."

He ate a few bites, paused halfway through, and said, "That is the task that I will ask you to help with."

"I know, Evan," said Henrietta patiently. "I once told you that we were destined to meet and duel out our hatred, that enmity shared bound us to do more than taunt each other now and then. I will be happy to help you destroy these enemies, because it moves us one step closer to that moment."

Evan finished the pasty, delicately licked his fingers, and then handed her a brilliant smile. "Because you are the only one who has ever brought me sweets," he said, "I will warn you of this. Midwinter will be hard. And another blow falls soon, one that hands the victory to my Lord if you are not careful. At least, it hands him victory over the minds and hearts of the people."

Henrietta shrugged a little. "Harry will handle that. You and I have another dance, Evan, another way to walk." For a moment, she thought she heard a roll of thunder in the sky, but when she looked up, the heaven was as high and fair as ever.

In that moment, Evan crossed the distance between them and seized her by the throat, bearing her back against the trunk of an oak. Henrietta smiled at him, and tilted her head so that he could see the place where her pulse beat. That made the skin pull tight against his hold, and her vision wavered and burst into poison ivy as he held her hard enough to threaten the flow of her air. Beautiful, so beautiful, the sky was so beautiful and clear.

"I shall have you," Evan said.

Henrietta knew what he meant by that better than he thought she did. He would break her, he meant. That was what truly infuriated him about Henrietta, the reason that he was a pawn in her games instead of the other way around. Other people feared him, such as Hermione, the girl he had taken prisoner before he freed Durmstrang and sliced with the Severing Curse in the Midsummer battle. He could get inside them, leave his presence as a shadow in their heads. Henrietta had never been afraid of him, and she was a shadow in his head.

The hatred between them was something very nearly sacred, almost like the bond that Harry and Voldemort shared, but Evan did not want that. He did not want to be bound to anyone like that.

Too bad. He is.

Henrietta leaned up and kissed him on the side of the mouth. He dropped her as if she had tried to poison him and reeled back, wiping at his face, spitting out foul insults.

Henrietta watched him with half-lowered eyelids, her breath coming fast. When she shifted, her thighs moved against each other with squelching sounds, and she felt the soft tingle of arousal building to a more insistent pressure in her belly. She would have liked to come now. But, of course, Evan would never consent to watch her do it, or to offer her assistance in the doing. There were limits to his sadism. Always, always, they concerned her.

She stood straight and met his eyes. She could see the madness beyond the blueberry-darkness, the screaming pit that he had only escaped by a few steps. She could drive him into it, if she wanted.

She chose not to. Today.

"'Love is more sweet and comelier,'" she whispered, "'than a dove's throat strained out to sing.'"

She saw his eyes flash with rage and recognition. She had taken lines that he would have liked to say, and turned them back on him. She smiled, and advanced another step. He backed up.

"'Yea, though God hateth us, he knows that hardly in a little thing,'" she said, and Evan stumbled trying to get away from her, "'love faileth of the work it does till it grow ripe for gathering.'"

Evan jerked his head, bared his teeth, and vanished. Henrietta watched a scrap of pasty fall to the ground in his wake; he must have been holding it in his hand, but not tightly enough for it to follow him in the Apparition. She came to it, knelt down, and held her nose to it.

It was blueberry.

She murmured the final stanza to the piece of pasty, to the Forest, to the dancing leaves and the frozen ones.

"I am grown blind with all these things:

It may be now she hath in sight

Some better knowledge; still there clings

The old question. Will not God do right?"

SSSSSSSSSSSS

Lucius examined the letter in front of him with a faint smile. It was by an oversight that it had come to him. Doubtless, the wizards and witches who had written it had imagined the Mr. Malfoy in residence at Malfoy Manor to be Draco. And his son was supposed to come by in a few hours, to collect his post and have his weekly serious talk with Lucius, as though he imagined his father had any choice now but to follow both him and Harry with serious devotion.

This letter, though—

He had not known Draco's ambitions extended so widely.

He studied it again. It was from a group of Aurors in the American Ministry, who were indicating dissatisfaction with the American Minister's decisions in the past. One of them was a choice not to help Britain with its "small problems," including Voldemort and the broken Statute of Secrecy, but only one of them. Yes, they were interested in hearing more about the British vates whom Draco thought they would have to deal with sooner or later anyway, considering all the magical creatures bound with webs in America, and perhaps getting on his good side now.

Interesting.

Lucius had already memorized all the pertinent information, including names and those details that might allow him to contact the American wizards again, and he knew he could feign his son's handwriting fairly well if necessary. Now he was pressing the letter carefully back into the envelope, and casting charms that would make it seem as if he had never opened the envelope at all.

Draco was doing what he had to do to raise the Malfoy name back to prestige and make the world a little more comfortable for both himself and Harry. That much, Lucius approved of. And, of course, Draco had evidently started this correspondence when Lucius had fled, and he had never thought that he would have to deal with his father again.

But he might be going about it the wrong way. The letter indicated that the American wizards were letting Draco's age influence them. They were trying to take him for what they wanted while ignoring his own demands. And while Lucius knew his son could resist such crude manipulations for the most part, he still might lose something that he didn't want to lose.

It was time for Lucius to intervene.

Not under false pretenses unless he had to, of course. He would tell the Americans who he was, and doubtless endure some abuse before they listened to him. But money spoke, and so did past power, and the assumed innocence of his crimes that his acquittal in the First War had won him. He was a Dark wizard, yes, but he was not so Dark as to be a willing servant of Voldemort, they might well think.

Lucius would play with them. Find out what they wanted with his son and the man who was essentially his Lord now. Coax them into revealing more than they had to Draco. Show them what a master player of the game was like, while at the same time maintaining the obsequious tone that most American wizards expected of most British.

It was, after all, only self-defense.