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45. Into the fire [Tuesday, September 27th 2005]
Draco was exhausted. His shift had been supposed to end at eleven. He'd been planning to go to Grimmauld Place and have a midnight snack with Harry. He had been promised waffles, for Merlin's sake!
A nine-year-old Muggle-born had lost control of his magic and blown up his flat instead. The whole family – father, step-mother and two half-sisters – had been blasted with magic, which was why they'd been sent to spell-damages. But the boy had been buried beneath the rubble when the ceiling had caved in, so they'd given him to Draco. He guessed they'd been lucky the flat was on the top floor. Draco doubted any of them would still be alive if the building's ground floor had collapsed.
Grimmauld Place was silent when Draco finally made it there. Harry was probably asleep already, but Draco still touched his necklace to let him know he was there. Better to wake him than face the alternative. The necklace could protect Draco against Harry's magic, but it evidently wouldn't protect him from getting strangled by accident.
He debated going directly to bed but ultimately decided against it. Harry hated when he came to bed reeking of cleaning spells. Draco didn't like it either, but he wouldn't have dragged himself to the shower if he'd been sleeping alone without the risk of getting pushed out of bed. Which really wasn't all that unlikely.
Being the considerate partner he was, Draco cast a double silencing spell at the door and also the wall that separated the bath from the bedroom. It was a good thing too, because Draco cursed more than just a little bit when the water hit him, steaming hot from the start.
Harry was blinking up at him when he finally stumbled into the bedroom, already half-asleep.
"Time is it?"
Harry held the blanket open for him and Draco fell into bed face first. The blanket was draped around him and then he was dragged into blissfully warm arms.
"Quarter to four. Did you get my message?"
Draco had used the Protean on his necklace to tell Harry he would be late. He'd barely had a minute to himself before the healing had started.
"Do you think I would've gone to sleep if I hadn't?"
Draco sighed contently. "See? I get along just fine even without a Patronus. Also, it's hot. How many did you cast?"
Harry shrugged behind him and buried his face between Draco's shoulder blades. "Didn't count."
Draco closed his eyes and drifted off.
...
"You reek."
Draco sighed drowsily. "Your shower burned me. Again."
"Why don't you turn the temperature down if you know it's gonna happen?"
Draco grumbled, but didn't reply. Sleep.
…
He jumped when Harry suddenly whispered, "What happened?" what felt like an hour later. It probably wasn't, because it was still dark outside.
"Abusive step-mother," Draco muttered with only half his brain still working. "Muggle-born lost control. Or maybe he's half. Don't know about the real mother."
Harry tensed up. Draco knew he wanted to ask something else but didn't dare.
"They'll live," Draco added.
"And they're gonna give him back to them."
Draco flopped around and flung his arms around Harry, squeezing him as hard as his weak, aching arms would allow in the hopes it would shut him up.
"No. Let me sleep. Please."
"No? What do you mean, no?"
Draco groaned. "I filed a motion with the Ministry. They're going to see if they can find his mother's family or place him with S.U.M.O. if they can't. Sleep."
"Sorry," said Harry, suddenly in a much softer voice. He pressed a kiss to Draco's forehead and was finally silent.
~o~
Draco was rudely awakened when somebody shouted, "Fuck, fuck, fuck!" and the bed dipped a second later. Harry kissed him hastily, stuffing something into his sports bag.
"Gotta run, lost track of time. There's food in the kitchen, you can eat it whenever." Harry was already at the bedroom door, and shouted the rest of it from the hallway. "Be back at three!"
Then there was a hiss, but Draco guessed that it wasn't directed at him.
Draco turned around to find a more comfortable position and closed his eyes again. He sensed that he had reached the end of the bed, but couldn't be arsed to move away. He was tired. If Harry was leaving, it must've been close to eight. That wasn't nearly enough sleep for him if he wanted to be somewhat useful during his night shift.
Draco's second awakening wasn't any more pleasant. Something flicked his cheek, followed by a hiss directly next to his ear. Draco flung himself aside automatically and landed on the floor with a thump. His heart was racing as he grabbed his wand from the bedside table and chanced a glance at the bed.
It was only Emerald. Of course it was, because what else would it be?
"Merlin's underpants, you startled me." Draco reached over to stroke her little head and she flicked her tongue again. "Yeah, I know. I'm just a little disoriented. Merlin, what time is it?"
It was three in the afternoon. Not that Emerald was any help in finding out about it. He wondered if she could have told Harry, or if snakes didn't even have a concept of time.
Draco got up and then raided Harry's closet, nicking his favourite joggers and most comfortable sweater. There were some of Draco's own clothes in there too, but he decided to ignore that. Then he picked up Emerald and left the bedroom to find the breakfast Harry had talked about.
The attic was open.
Draco stood rooted to the spot, staring up the silver stairs. Not once in all the time Draco had spent there had Harry just left it open. Draco supposed that Harry could've forgotten in his haste. Being late for practice with Greyson surely was a concern.
He turned his head and went downstairs without looking back. Harry trusted him enough to leave him alone in his home. Draco wouldn't break that trust.
There was a stack of waffles on the kitchen island and Draco's stomach rumbled in anticipation. He let Emerald slither onto the counter and dug in. The waffles were still warm and crisp, and Draco thanked Merlin that Harry was so adapt at warming charms. He certainly had enough practice from keeping his own body toasty.
Draco was on his third helping when doubt started to creep into his mind. Did he really think it was likely that Harry had simply forgotten about the attic?
If he was being honest, he didn't believe that. Harry was too pedantic, too paranoid. He wouldn't slip up like that.
Then Draco remembered that he had heard him hiss. Maybe he'd said goodbye to him first and then gone up there to do something before he left? Which meant that he'd never come down and had to be up there still. Merlin, was that why Emerald had woken him up?
Draco ran upstairs, taking two steps at once, calling "Harry?" several times.
Nobody answered.
Draco had to check. Just to make sure Harry hadn't fainted and bashed his head against the Pensieve. Draco didn't want to be that guy, the one who ate waffles while his boyfriend was in extremis.
He went up cautiously, afraid that he could be right. "Harry?"
"THERE IS NO HARRY POTTER HERE!"
A cold shiver ran down Draco's back. He took the remaining stairs in a flash, wand raised high. That certainly wasn't Harry's voice, but it sounded murderous. Who in Merlin's name was up there?
He was almost at the Pensieve when he realised that the voice had come from inside it and the attic was empty after all. Draco looked into it and watched a younger Harry, fourteen at most, trying to slam the door shut before a very big, very angry man could get at him. It was no use – the man slammed against the door so hard that it knocked Harry right over.
Harry didn't get up – maybe he thought the man (his uncle?) couldn't bend that far down, making this position safer. He lifted his chin up instead, refusing to look afraid, but Draco could see the way he braced himself against the floor with clenched fists.
"HOW DARE YOU GIVE THIS NUMBER TO PEOPLE LIKE — PEOPLE LIKE YOU!"
"I live here too!" Harry's voice was shaking, maybe with fear but definitely with rage.
His uncle didn't seem to have a real answer to that. He just lunged forward, grabbed Harry's upper arm and hauled him out of the room. Then he dragged him down the stairs, not caring at all when Harry stumbled several times and crashed into the wall, certainly not stopping to let him steady himself.
"Let go!" Harry yelled, but then there was a louder voice yelling, "Show him, Dad!" at the bottom of the stairs, and there appeared a blond boy as old as Harry but easily thrice as broad.
Harry's cousin looked gleeful as he yanked open the door to the cupboard under the stairs, and then his uncle pushed him inside, slammed the door shut and everything went dark. There was a loud thump, which was probably Harry throwing his whole bodyweight against the door. It must've been bolted from the outside, because it stayed firmly shut.
Draco grabbed the Pensieve with both hands, sure his wobbly knees wouldn't hold him otherwise. He must've touched the surface accidentally, because then the whole world flipped upside down and went pitch black.
"I filed a motion with the Ministry." It was barely a whisper, but Draco knew it was he who had said it.
Nobody had ever filed a motion for Harry. Draco didn't even want to imagine having to sleep inside that black hole of misery.
The memory faded away, thankfully, and was instantly replaced by the Defence classroom and Harry and Dumbledore standing at the desk.
"When one wizard saves another wizard's life, it creates a certain bond between them," Dumbledore said. "This is magic at its deepest, its most impenetrable, Harry."
The scene changed again suddenly. They were at the Manor. Greyback had pushed Harry to the floor, keeping him on his knees with a tight hand at his neck. Draco was right in front of him, so close.
"I don't know ... I can't be sure," his past self said tentatively, against better knowledge.
Harry's face may have been completely distorted, grotesque, but it didn't change his olive skin, the stupid wild mob of hair or the bright, green eyes looking up at him, afraid and confused. Of course it was him. Draco could've told by any one of those things alone.
And suddenly they were gone and the world was in flames. He was surrounded by piles of furniture, trinkets and books, and they all were burning. Smoke was clouding his vision and Draco forgot he was safe.
He started to run, down the only path that wasn't yet aflame. The fire roared behind him, leaping after him in the form of dragons and lions and gigantic serpents, devouring everything in their path. He was going to die here and there was nothing he could do – he didn't even have his mother's wand anymore. Mother – he would never see her again and she wouldn't know. How could she know what had happened to him?
His path was cut off by a fiery griffin, setting the row of trash and treasures in front of him aflame. There was no way out, he had nowhere to go. He would die here all alone and the world was burning. He fell to his knees, squeezing his eyes shut. He didn't want to see it happen.
"Crabbe!" someone was screaming and he looked up to his left.
On top of a large pile of stuff, there he was, a younger Draco, just as scared. Harry was reaching down to him now, saving him from certain death, and a second later the burning pile of furniture he had climbed on was collapsing, crashing towards the Draco who was cowering beside it now, the one Harry hadn't pulled onto his broom.
Everything was orange and red and yellow and smoke and he could feel it, Merlin, he could feel the heat, it was burning him, eating him alive –
Everything was black and quiet. In the distance, so far, far away, the wind was howling, rain was drumming on the ground.
"Let's go!" someone yelled, his voice echoing all around him.
Draco was sitting on the floor, if there even was one. It wasn't really that everything was black – it was just nothing at all. Was this what death felt like?
"Burned," someone whispered from far away, the same voice again. And he was right, Draco was burned up, devoured by the Fiendfyre. He looked down at his hands, but they were pale as ever, completely intact.
"Marked," the voice said, and Draco pushed up his left sleeve, but it was still there.
The Fiendfyre hadn't been able to rid him of the scar on his arm or on his soul. He wished he had never received the Mark. He wished he had declined, just refused to take it. Why hadn't he been braver? Why hadn't he done what was right? There must have been a way, something he hadn't considered back then.
"I must not tell lies," the voice said. And it was right. Draco was deceiving himself here. There had been no other way, because Draco was not special or brave or important. He was no Chosen One.
"One of a kind," his voice whispered.
And maybe that was still true as well. He had fucked up his life by joining Him, well and truly – even if that really had been the only way. He had been pardoned because of Harry's testimony, but could he ever really redeem himself? He would have to live with that thing on his arm forever, marking him as an outsider. Not in Azkaban, but never really free either.
"Well, that was unpleasant," Harry said right beside him and Draco's own voice in the distance was his echo.
Draco looked up and there he was, just the two of them surrounded by the Nothing. Harry reached down for him and Draco took his hand and let himself be pulled from the memory and back into the attic.
"Well, I should be mad," Harry said with crossed arms and a frown as Draco's heart was beating in his throat. "But that would be pretty hypocritical."
"Hypocritical?"
Harry sighed, brushing some of his hair out of his face. "I can't pretend that I never accidentally looked at other peoples' memories."
Draco cleared his throat anxiously. "Accidentally."
"About as accidentally as you just did," Harry said pointedly.
"The door was open! I just went in to check that you weren't up here, dead or something."
"I know." Harry sighed again. "Emerald told me. It's my fault for not checking it was closed properly. I must've slurred the words in the hurry."
"So ... you're not mad at me?"
Harry frowned. "I wanted to be, but you didn't exactly pick the best memory to fall into. Seems like punishment enough."
"I didn't pick anything; it was already going on when I fell in! If anything, you picked that." Draco gestured over his shoulder, not keen on looking at the Pensieve ever again.
Harry took his arm gently and finally escorted him out of the attic.
"Had to get it out of my head."
"Yeah. I'd like to get that out of my head too. Permanently."
Harry closed the attic (Draco hoped he'd never have to see it again) and then turned to face him. "I don't anymore."
"Don't tell me you like to remember that! You're not that good a liar."
"Oh, it was literal hell; I'm not saying it wasn't. I just think that the Fiendfyre was one of our defining moments too."
He didn't mention any of the other memories. Draco wasn't going to tell him that he had seen more than the one. He remembered how it had felt to realise that Harry had seen some of his weakest moments – Rowle, Dumbledore – and could imagine how Harry would feel if he knew Draco had seen how terrible his childhood had really been.
"What, you think you wouldn't like me anymore if you didn't remember almost being burned alive?"
"I'd be afraid that maybe I wouldn't love you as much if I forgot the less terrible parts of our history."
Had Draco's mouth been this dry the whole time? He couldn't even say, but he was sure that his heart hadn't been beating this hard a second prior.
"Do you?" – Love me?
Harry grinned and took his hand. "Yeah."
"Okay," said Draco, who never had anyone confess their romantical love for him before. "Good."
"Good?" Harry huffed a laugh.
"Brilliant."
"Wow, you're rubbish at this."
Draco lifted his chin up. "I think I'm handling this better than you did."
"I'm pretty sure I kissed you. Enthusiastically."
"You kicked my arse first."
Harry threw his hands up in mock despair, nearly flinging Draco's hand in his own face. "Will you ever let that go?"
"Maybe. I could see myself forgiving you when I'm on my death bed."
"Why do you get to die first?"
"I'm older than you."
"Barely! Also, my job is more dangerous. So, if anything, I'm dying first."
"Oh please. A patient tried to hit me with her own severed arm yesterday. Also, how long do you think you'll get to play Quidditch? Another fifteen years, if you're lucky. I'm going to be a Healer until I drop dead. Because one of them killed me, probably. Just after I forgive you for beating me up, of course."
"I didn't 'beat you up'! I can see it already; By the time you're ready to forgive me – which will be in a hundred years, when you're old as fuck – it will be for beating you within an inch of your life. With a bat, probably."
"Well you certainly won't have any witnesses left by that point, so it's going to be your word against mine. And who would accuse a dying man of lying?"
Harry glared at him half-heartedly. "Great, why don't you remind me that all my Muggle friends are going to die of old age long before we will?"
"More than I already did?"
"Don't you have to go to work? Like right now?"
Draco grinned viciously. "Night shift, darling. You get to enjoy me another seven hours."
Harry groaned. Draco knew not to take it seriously, because then Harry took his hand again and led him down the hallway to the staircase. "Come on, you can help me peel the potatoes."
"You never do that by hand," Draco countered, but he followed him to the kitchen nonetheless.
"Fine, you can help me make the potatoes peel themselves."
~o~
The potatoes had just jumped out of their skin when the window opened and Odysseus flew in. Draco picked up Emerald, who was coiled in a sunny spot on the counter, and retreated to another corner of the kitchen. He told himself it was to keep her safe, seeing as he had first met her with a serious raptor wound, but if the snake managed to keep the owl at bay, that was just as well.
Harry took the scroll and read it, wand still pointed at the potatoes so they would scrub themselves in the sink. He cast a fleeting glance at Odysseus and grabbed a pen from the drawer to scribble his answer. He then handed the parchment back to Odysseus, but the owl lingered. Of course. Probably did it on purpose to show Draco who was boss.
Draco decided to just ignore it in the hopes that Odysseus would get bored and scatter. He placed Emerald in his front pocket and said, "So, what does he want this time? He literally saw you half an hour ago."
"The Wasps are putting in Sherwood as Seeker on Sunday. Kimbrough is at Mungo's."
"And ...?" Draco prompted.
"Nothing important, apart from that. The Catapults' Seeker quit unexpectedly. Seems like his girlfriend got relocated to Italy and he went with her. But seeing as we already played them on your birthday, I don't really care about that."
Draco waited, but Harry didn't say anything else. He also wasn't really meeting his eyes, looking at the owl instead.
"And …?"
Harry gave him a fleeting look. "Why do you think there's more?"
"Well, you looked guilty, for one. Also, that's a very long letter for that little information."
"Alright, fine." Harry sighed under his breath. "I wanted you to have a look at something, actually."
Draco rolled his eyes at the ceiling. He continued to ignore Odysseus (which was not that easy, because he was still sitting right next to where Harry was standing) and came over. "What did you do?"
"Well, remember I told you we were going to hold try-outs for Reserve Beaters today …?"
Now Draco groaned. "Where did the Bludger hit you?"
Harry leaned against the kitchen island and lifted his shirt. "It was the bat, actually," he said quite unnecessarily, because yes, Draco could see that.
"You're definitely going to die before me," Draco said in his most stern voice. "I'm surprised Greyson didn't make you go to St. Mungo's after practice."
He pointed his wand at the area of impact while Harry shrugged and pointed his own wand at something over Draco's shoulder (probably the potatoes).
"He might have."
"And you lied and told him you would go?" Draco tapped his wand against Harry's torso to heal the fissure in one of his ribs and then summoned essence of arnica from upstairs.
Harry grinned at him while Draco applied the paste to his chest. "Why would I go there if I know where to find you? You are the official Team Healer, right?"
"Ah, so that's why I'm here, is it? I've been starting to wonder."
"Well, if you want, you can stay for dinner too. It's the least I can do to pay for your services."
"How very generous," said Draco. "Inviting me to dinner at half past four, half an hour after I've had lunch."
"Not my fault you're sleeping the day away, is it? Besides, it's never too early to eat, especially if it's drowned in cheese."
Draco pulled Harry's shirt down and took a step back. "Well, I'm definitely not going to eat here if that owl stays any longer. That's just unsanitary."
Harry grinned and finally managed to coax Odysseus out of the window several minutes later.
~o~
"So, did the witch hit you with her arm yesterday?" Harry asked when they had finished eating and the plates were washing themselves.
"No, her aim was off." Draco grinned fondly at the memory. Trauma really was something else. "It was her wand arm she was throwing at me."
Harry laughed. "That's just poor planning on her part."
The rest of the evening until the start of Draco's night shift was spent in the sitting room, Draco working on his research and Harry studying his notes on the Wasps' Reserve Seeker with Emerald draped around his shoulders.