Chapter 15

The sharp tingle of a scourgify brought Draco back to the present with a rush. Potter was already on his feet, straightening his clothing and patting at his hair in a vain attempt to calm its waywardness. Embarrassed by his momentary lapse in concentration, Draco rose to his feet quickly and tucked himself away. It wasn't a moment too soon; there was a perfunctory knock and Potter quickly grabbed a file as the door opened.

It was Ron Weasley. His gaze travelled rapidly over Draco and then visibly brightened as it landed on Potter.

"You ready, Harry? Robards says you have a brief for the team and then we're going out in the field?"

"Yeah." Potter smiled at him, cool as cucumber, displaying no hint that he'd just been performing fellatio on none other than Draco Malfoy.

"Can't wait to get out of the office to be honest, mate."

The warmth of the shoulder slap and grin Potter directed at his best friend pulled unexpectedly at Draco's emotions, bringing a slow trickle of regret for what might have been if his life had been different, mixed with a hint of jealousy and a hefty dose of resignation. He sighed and raised a laconic eyebrow.

"Shall we get on then?"

Weasley ignored him, although he managed to brush by so closely that the hem of his robes flicked across Draco's shins. Draco stood his ground and then followed Potter out of the room.

.

The briefing was blessedly brief. Potter was clearly animated by the possible breakthrough and easily communicated his enthusiasm to a specially formed team comprising himself, Weasley, Ranworth - who looked more like a mild professor than an auror - and bluff and well-built Briggs . An anonymous unspeakable was also attached for the fresh stage of the investigation, but was not actually present.

"So," Harry concluded, "Ranworth, the priority for you and Briggs is finding O'Keefe, Yoki and Romani. Start by tracking down their known associates and so on; Malfoy here will be able to give you some pointers there. Ron and myself will concentrate on the ex-Hogwarts' students, Crowfoot, Dangelos and Smithson."

He swung around to face Draco.

"Can you be ready to leave in 30 minutes or so? We'll check out some of those locations you gave me earlier."

Draco nodded, flinching internally at the barely concealed dislike on Brigg's face. It didn't matter, he reminded himself. He wasn't there to make friends and putting on an impenetrable front was second nature for a Malfoy, especially one who'd had the dubious pleasure of a noseless psycho as a house guest.

"I've made a list of the bars and restaurants, muggle and wizarding, where pure-blood visitors from overseas like to hang out. Some of them are for members only of course." He kept his voice cool and impersonal as he unrolled the scroll and pointed to the bottom of the list. "You'll no doubt be familiar with these haunts."

Ranworth nodded. "Good places to find customers for something illegal."

Draco handed him the list, fighting an urge to duck as a flock of paper memos skimmed over his head, bringing the disquieting sensation that he was under attack from a barrage of disapproving paperwork. He'd been out of the Wizarding world for far too long.

He fielded a few questions from the two aurors and then strolled over to Potter, who spared him a quick and thoughtful look before ushering them all into the lift. Minutes later they whirled into an unexpectedly fresh breeze at the apparition point not far from Tower Bridge.

Draco shivered and pulled his jacket closer around himself, eyeing the insidious creep of dark clouds across the uncomfortable looking grey sky with a feeling of foreboding. He hoped it wasn't an omen.

.

For the first few hours they worked their way steadily through muggle London. Shops, bars, clubs, restaurants. Sometimes they all entered, although Draco went alone into two of the more exclusive clubs. Potter and Weasley wore a variety of glamours and transfigured clothing, but Draco retained his Malfoy looks, tweaking his clothing to fit the location. By mid-afternoon they'd left a trail of subtle queries behind them that would leave no doubt in the mind of the right wizard or witch that a pureblood was seeking a business contact with some ex-schoolboys from a certain school in Scotland.

"That's it, mate," said Weasley finally, pulling up the neck of his jumper against the spit of cold rain. "That's the last restaurant I'm going in without getting something to eat."

Potter grimaced at the weather and shrugged his agreement. "There's a nice caf round the corner. I came down here a couple of times when I was working on the Muldoon case."

Draco trailed after them, stepping through a flutter of premature fallen leaves, the first he'd seen that season. Autumn was coming, the summer months lost in a blur of anxiety and fear and the winter now not far ahead. The year was spiralling down, he thought, rather like his life.

It was a typical old-style London cafe that Potter took them to, the coffee available with or without milk and no fancy frappes or skinny lattes in sight. Misted windows, scarred formica on the table tops and the type of chairs with tubular chrome legs.

Potter pulled out one of the chairs with a grating noise.

"Food is great," he promised them, tugging the laminated plastic menu out of its holder.

It was no wonder Potter liked the place, thought Draco wryly, holding the slightly greasy menu with his fingertips: bacon sandwiches; cottage pie; treacle tart. None of it would have looked out of place on Hogwarts' tables. He settled for a mug of tea and some cheesy chips and sat picking at them, while Weasley scoffed down an enormous mixed grill and Potter ate his way steadily through cottage pie and a large slice of treacle tart.

"You should eat more," observed Potter suddenly, a spoonful of tart halfway to his mouth as he frowned at Draco's barely touched plate.

Weasley snorted, muttering something through his food about "posh" and "ferret".

Draco forego his urge to say something. sarcastic, instead ignoring them both, shoving his hands into his pockets and fixing his gaze on an ageing, homeless man in a brown coat, who was settling down in the doorway of a vacant shop opposite the cafe. Nameless and lost, invisible because he'd somehow fallen through the cracks in the society in which he'd lived. It was an uncomfortable thought and far too close to home.

Potter had said something, he realised, was watching him with those intense green eyes, his knee nudging Draco's beneath the table and sending a shiver up his thigh.

Whatever it was, Potter clearly wasn't going to repeat it, although the firm pressure of his knee remained. After a moment, Draco excused himself and fled to the safety of the basic toilet until the warm heat in his cheeks subsided.

He called at the counter on the way back, ordering a takeaway coffee and bacon sandwich and catching the end of Weasley's puzzled comment about it being "bloody odd" to see Harry worrying about Malfoy, rather than something the ferret was doing.

"I'm just saying, mate, it takes a bit of getting used to."

"Let it go, Ron," said Harry, his voice mild although his expression was tight as he stood up. "C'mon, we'd better get back to it."

Draco followed them out, rolling his eyes at Weasley's baffled expression when he handed the coffee and sandwich over to the shop doorway resident.

"Diagon Alley then?"

Potter was looking directly at him as he spoke and Draco nodded reluctantly; this was the part he'd been dreading. They ducked into a quiet corner just before they reached The Leaky Cauldron where Potter cast a hasty but powerful glamour that left Draco with brown hair, glasses and a light beard.

Minutes later they were in Diagon Alley with Draco's heart thudding and a sick feeling in his stomach. Believe in the glamour, he told himself; no-one knows who you are. It was a weird feeling, being back on a wizarding street, far more so than being in the Ministry. The last time he'd been in Diagon Alley, he'd been hexed twice and someone had thrown a piece of masonry from the Gringotts' repairs at him. The hatred had been palpable and far too visible.

"Knockturn first?" murmured Potter in his ear.

"Yes. Just myself though, I think, unless you're going to glamour yourselves."

"You go ahead. We'll work our way through the Diagon establishments, see if any of our reliable contacts know anything."

"Our snitches," snorted Weasley, smirking.

"Don't mind him," Potter explained. "Arthur found out that's what muggles call informants."

"Oh," said Draco faintly. "I'll get on then." He swallowed hard, pulled himself together with an effort and stalked off in the direction of Winch's Potent Potions.

.

Harry, safely esconsed in an archway behind a concealment charm, watched Malfoy approach. He would have preferred it if they'd been able to work together, but could see the merits in a solo approach to the more undesirable establishments. It was just that the other man seemed so on edge, although that was understandable, bearing in mind his recent ostracisation from the wizarding world. It didn't look as though his nerves had settled in the time they'd been apart.

"Over here," Harry called quietly, rewarded by the quick turn of Malfoy's head. After a rapid check to see the coast was clear, he slipped into the alley alongside Harry and waited, fingers tapping restlessly against his leg, as the concealment charm was reinstated.

"How'd it go?"

"Not bad. Quite promising actually."

The precise nature of Malfoy's diction left Harry in no doubt that the man was severely rattled. He reached out and stroked a tentative finger over the cool wrist next to his own, shocked by the depth of emotion that surged through the brief contact - nostalgia, loss, distress.

"I'm sorry. This must be hard for you, after..."

"After serving time in Azkaban and being banished from wizarding society?"

Malfoy jerked his wrist away and rubbed at it absently, the set of his mouth bitter.

"I used to love coming here," he added suddenly. "If I did well, Father would take me to Fortescue's or Quality Quidditch Supplies. Everyone who was anyone would come up and want to speak to him. I thought the sun shone out of his arse, Potter. I thought he loved me and I wanted to be just like him."

He laughed, the sound of it harsh and despairing.

"Then he let that psychopathic narcissist move into the Manor and I realised he only loved himself."

He ran his fingers through his hair in a distracted manner, flicking his troubled grey gaze in Harry's direction.

"They didn't respect him at all, any of them. In the end it was the same obsequious hangers-on who were baying for his blood at the trials."

He took a shaky breath.

"If I dared to take this glamour off now..."

Empty words would not help, so instead Harry caught hold of the hand next to him and gave it a quick squeeze, maintaining the contact when Malfoy did not pull away. After a moment the other man sighed and leaned in slightly, so that a little of his weight rested against Harry's shoulder.

"Shall we call it a day?" Harry asked quietly.

"Still saving me, Potter." Malfoy noted wearily. "No. We're here now. I might as well call in at The Hag's Skeleton."

Harry suppressed a grimace. "Be careful; the customers..."

"Are the wrong sort."

The other man's mouth was very close, the symmetrical curve of his lips attracting Harry's eye and quickening his pulse.

"You forget, though," Malfoy continued. "I am one of the wrong sort."

"No," said Harry, a bit breathless from wanting to kiss the corner of that perfect mouth. "No, you're not. Not any more. What you're doing, it could really make a difference."

"Well, I hope it does," said Malfoy. "Because otherwise I'll be back in Azkaban."

Without waiting for a response, he slipped his fingers free and was gone. Harry swiftly applied a glamour and followed at a distance, progressing steadily down a series of increasingly unsavoury alleys and side streets. Eventually Malfoy turned into a dank courtyard that looked and smelt as though it never saw the sunlight.

The Hag's Skeleton public house was a looming structure, its odd collection of dark roofs partly obscured by the acrid smoke belching out of several scarily leaning chimneys. Malfoy strode across the courtyard, cast a glance at the caged and mouldy skeleton suspended over the doorway and ducked inside. There was a brief blast of wild music and hard laughter and then the door shut behind him.

Harry waited, slouching casually against a damp wall and wishing he'd brought some extendible ears along. George would be ashamed of him.

About fifteen long minutes later there was a muffled thump. Harry straightened, wand tight in his fingers as he began to make his way across the slimy cobbles, but he'd only taken a few paces when there was a massive pulse of magic from inside the pub. The grimy glass exploded from the window frames as blue light and smoke roared out of the chimneys. Harry ran, a shower of broken tiles clattering down around him as he raised his wand and vanished the door.

Malfoy was in the centre of the tap room, surrounded by prostrate and cowering customers and the debris of broken chairs and tables. He was shaking, his gaze fixed on an open door behind the only wizard remaining on his feet, although perhaps saying he was on his feet was an exaggeration, rather he clung to the remnants of the bar, his dirty robe glinting with shattered glass as a puddle of escaped beer grew around his feet.

"It's alright," Malfoy bit out, turning around sharply. "Just a bit of a misunderstanding."

He stormed outside, leaving Harry with little choice but to follow.

"Hey, wait a minute! What happened in there?"

"Someone recognised me."

"They saw through the glamour?"

"They didn't need to see me. Apparently my smell is very distinctive."

He walked away, throwing a comment over his shoulder. "We're done here, Potter."

Harry followed him, sending a quick patronus to Ron to let him know that they were alright and that he'd meet him later to explain.

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