The triumph of only eight hours previous seemed like a distant memory to Harry now. He was absolutely furious. It had been he and Ron who brought in the Auror office's largest haul in months. And what was his thanks? Getting kicked off the case to fill out the paperwork instead of interrogating their two suspects. And it wasn't like Ron had been ousted either, which made Harry seethe even more.
He looked up at the noise of someone walking towards his office cubicle and tried to look a bit less sour at Kingsley's appearance. He knew it hadn't worked because of the older man's rather knowing grin.
"Now, now Potter. You're far too close to the Draco Malfoy case. You know it's protocol to take you off it –"
"And yet Ron got to stay on the case," Harry argued for what felt like the hundredth time.
"Ah, but I needed someone with a lot of knowledge who wasn't so invested. Which I explained to you six hours ago. And five hours ago. And four –"
"Yes, all right. I get it. What have they told you?" Harry interrupted rather abruptly, trying to avoid yet another lecture on his diplomacy, or lack thereof. If they could get even a hint of where some of the other Death Eaters were hanging out, it would be a massive victory. Even if Draco only gave up one location, the Auror's office could do a lot with that kind of information.
"He refuses to talk beyond the regular posturing. Crabbe's not a heavy enough hitter, but he cracked under pressure and gave us Lucius and Goyle's location. I've sent a team to collect them now. It's been a good day, Harry. You should be proud."
Kingsley's face broke into another smile, one of pride in his best Auror. He had taught Harry from the beginning and was elated with the wizard he had become, the asset to their organization. He was precisely what the Auror's office needed. It also didn't hurt that he had become one hell of a dueller through his time with them.
Harry, for his part, looked down at the desk and tried not to smile. He was happy, pleased that he was continuing to contribute, that he was useful to Kingsley's department. He just wished he could be included in the interrogation effort is all.
"Thanks for the update. We knew Draco wouldn't be much of a talker, but I'm hopeful that with Crabbe and Goyle, we might be able to gain some more information. Not to mention Lucius! Did Crabbe give you anything on Marlisa?"
Before Kingsley could respond, the office became very noisy. More noisy than was expected. Harry and Kingsley both bolted from their seats and into the bullpen, where everyone was talking over each other. It was only with a loud whistle that Kingsley got them to shut up.
"Report. Auror Tyrell." The command was definitely back in Kingsley's manners. Harry wouldn't want to be the one to face that right now.
"Yes, sir. Sir, we found Malfoy Sr. and Goyle Jr., right where Crabbe Jr. said we would. We are processing Goyle Jr. now, but…"
Augustus Tyrell was a good enough bloke. Harry liked him, he was one of the younger men on the squad and looked like a tank. However, he was not the best at giving reports under pressure. Harry would have picked someone else.
"Yes?" Kingsley insisted.
"It's Malfoy Sr. sir. He DBW'd before we could get to him."
DBW was the term they used for "death by wand" or in this case "died by wand." Harry grimaced. It wasn't necessarily unexpected, but it might make the interrogation of Draco Malfoy that much more difficult knowing his father had suicided on the spot. But maybe…just maybe, this could work in Harry's favour.
"Kingsley," he muttered, touching the other wizard on the arm and indicating with a nod of the head to move to the side with Harry. Blessedly, his boss followed without question, a curious look on his face. "Let me break the news. Let me be the one to tell Draco."
"Harry," Kingsley said, exasperated. "You know I can't. You know it's against protocol."
"And would you rather that I crack Malfoy wide open or follow protocol?" Harry argued heatedly. Kingsley looked upon the point of getting angry with him, so Harry went for the killing blow. "I'm sorry, Kingsley. I know that we have an ace team here, you've built them from the ground up and I don't mean to question your judgment. But Marlisa was on my team and I want to be the one to find out if she's still alive or not. Please. I won't be able to sleep tonight knowing that I could have helped get closure for her family and didn't."
A pause. And then…
"Fine. But Harry, if you screw this up for us, it's my ass on the line. Not just mine, but yours too." Kingsley capitulated. He looked reluctant in the extreme, but this was his most prized pupil after all.
Harry could have sang with joy.
"Yes, sir. I won't let you down."
/
"Hello, Draco."
"Fuck off, Potter."
Harry almost did a double take before recognizing that he would probably act the same way – they were enemies, after all. Too many years of mutual hatred and being on opposite sides had seen to that. Harry would have to use everything he had learned in training and his time at Hogwarts to flip Draco. This wouldn't be a physical or deceitful interrogation; Draco was far too smart for that and far too trained by Voldemort to resist Veritaserum and torture, even if Harry was so inclined to use the latter of those methods. Which he wasn't, despite Severus's insistence that it was the most effective method of interrogation. Severus. Harry felt a pang, not as strong as it once had been, but enough to make him grimace. Focus, Harry.
"Fair enough. I'd like to have a little chat. I've been meaning to get caught up with you, but you've been slippery ever since leaving the safety and comfort of Malfoy Manor."
Draco said nothing. Not unexpected. Harry knew this would take a while, but they might miss their window of opportunity. So far, they had been able to keep everything from the press, but that could only last so long before the information leaked that they had captured three Death Eaters and watched another DBW. Harry knew common decency dictated that he should lead with the news about Draco's father and Goyle's capture, but his gut was telling him to hold off, to leave it as his ace when he needed Draco to crack. And crack he would. Harry just needed to be creative.
"How have you been since going on the run, anyway? I would have thought that Voldemort would keep you safe, and yet here you are."
Draco scoffed and finally looked up at Harry sitting across from him. Still nothing, but Harry smiled. At least he'd make some sort of dent.
"Yes, I can see why that would be amusing for you. We both know how charitable Lord Voldemort is, especially to his most loyal servants."
"You don't know anything, Potter."
"No? I know you've been on the run for the past four years, ever since you and your father couldn't hide who you were any longer. I've seen some of your safe houses, Draco. And I know you haven't been able to use magic for a good long while because your wand was checked when you got here. He had you living like Muggles, the very thing both he and you profess to hate."
"Profess? Potter, Muggles are the scourge of this earth and if you can't see that, even with your upbringing, there's something wrong with you," Draco spat, grey eyes flashing. Harry had hit a nerve, clearly.
"I won't pretend that my Muggle relatives were kind and fair, Draco. But they are a minority," Harry explained quietly. "I digress. Your friend, Crabbe, doesn't know where the Death Eater stronghold is any more than we do. You and I both know that he's a lackey and would never be trusted with such important intelligence; however, you are one of Voldemort's professed favourites."
Harry paused to pull out a case file and flip through it. Pages of intel they had gathered thanks to Severus's work as a spy.
"According to our sources, you followed in dear old dad's footsteps and became a top general and adviser to the Dark Lord. Most recently, however, you haven't been invited to those high-level meetings."
"Potter, you don't know what you're talking about," Draco repeated. "I've been to every meeting the Dark Lord has held with his advisers for the last ten years. They happen every mon –"
Draco broke off abruptly, cursing furiously at himself and looking down at the table he was seated at. His chains clinked and rattled as he shifted uneasily. Harry did not press his advantage – taunting Draco now would get him nowhere.
"Before our intelligence ran out, Draco, we were hearing chatter that Voldemort was meeting with his top three advisers every other week. Bellatrix Lestrange, Antonin Dolohov and…Severus Snape."
Harry felt a bit of a stronger pull on his heart after speaking the name aloud, but held back any other emotion. It hurt less and less the more he said the name and the more he thought the name, but Harry was convinced it would always pain him.
"You and your father weren't at those meetings, Draco, because Lord Voldemort doesn't do well with useless followers."
Draco's jaw clenched, hard, and Harry knew he was slowly chipping away at the other man's defences. He did not let this show, he could not. He let Draco's jaw loosen before speaking again, softly.
"He didn't need you as much, so he shunted you off from safe house to safe house and told you that nothing had changed. He's treated you like dirt for four years and you can't even see it." Another long pause as Draco continued to stare down at the table and clench his fists. "Your service is no longer valued, Draco. You've become a pawn."
"I am not his pawn," Draco rasped, incoherent with rage. "I will never be his or anyone else's to control. Not like your precious Snape, who let himself be everyone's puppet."
A knife this time, straight to the heart. He could control himself when he was the one bringing up the topic of his dead lover, but not so much when other people did. Draco pressed his advantage, the tables turned.
"That's right, Potter. I saw him for what he was before he died, we all did. A coward stuck between two sides and pandering to two masters – or should I say three? He was fucking you, after all."
Harry's fists clenched underneath the table this time, but he let nothing show on his face. He had been trained too well to allow a suspect get to him, no matter how much the conversation was hurting him. Draco laughed and continued to meet his eyes, knowing despite Harry's effort at hiding that the words stung.
"You think you know me. You think you know how to hurt me, Draco?" asked Harry, unclenching his fists at last. "You can't hurt me anymore. My heart was torn from me the day he died. I have no more heart to hurt, you see. It's too late for me."
Harry laughed bitterly and Draco's eyes flashed down to the table, uncomfortable once more with his enemy's rather cavalier attitude. Good. Harry needed to keep him guessing, ruffled.
"But I know it's not too late for you."
Again, Draco's eyes snapped up to meet Harry's, a bit of fear creeping into them, despite his best efforts to hide.
"Oh, yes. Draco Malfoy's heart, his soul, is not so damaged as Harry Potter's. There's still time for that heart, Draco. There is still a way out of the misery my own suffered."
"I fail to see how, Potter," Draco argued. "I've done unspeakable things, you must know that. All for him, a half-blood coward hiding behind men, women and children much weaker than him. If I did all that for him, despite knowing that, what makes you think I'll help you eh?"
A pause, now. Longer than any of the rest. Both men stared at each other, trying to discern what the other was thinking.
"Because he's the reason your father's dead."
Another pause and a widening of grey eyes. Quicker, heavier breathing than before. A shake of the head and then an explosion.
"You're lying!" shouted Draco as he slammed his fist down on the table. "You couldn't have found him –"
"We did, Draco. A team was dispatched once Crabbe gave up his and Goyle's safe house. Goyle was subdued peacefully, but your father chose death by wand. He killed himself, Draco."
Panic, desperation and pain all intermingled on the pale, handsome face. Torn between not daring to believe it was true and knowing it was, the young man pulled at his hair and began rocking back and forth in his seat. Harry knew he needed to be gentle now, apply a more deft touch. Now that he'd succeeded in breaking Draco's cool exterior, he knew he needed to tread softly. He let Draco process the news, knowing how his heart was breaking into a thousand pieces.
"Selfish fucking prick. Not a bloody care, even at the end."
Draco's laugh was anything but happy and Harry heard his enemy's voice crack as he continued to rock and grip his hair. He wasn't looking at Harry anymore, but at the table. He was lost, as lost as Harry had been in his own grief.
"I won't deny that what he did was selfish, Draco. He took his own life to escape Azkaban, to be done with the hiding and fighting. He left you," Harry uttered softly. "Your father didn't care, you're right. But you care. You've never been like him."
"You've never seen me in battle, Potter. I'm a great deal like him. In many ways," Draco spat.
"But not in the ways that count. You don't have the stomach for killing children; not like Lucius did. You also don't like hurting the defenceless. You want the challenge. Killing for the sake of killing isn't sport. Torturing to you isn't a game, isn't an art, isn't fun. It was to him. You're nothing like him, Draco. Nothing."
Draco looked up briefly before resuming his nearly frantic rocking and hair tugging. He was shattering. All Harry had to do was sweep up the valuable pieces.
"The Dark Lord is holding one of my Aurors at this very moment, Draco. She's got no wand, is scared and is probably being tortured just for the hell of it. They'll know that she isn't high enough on the food chain to know anything of value, but they'll take their time with her anyway."
"Like they did with Snape, you mean," Draco mumbled, not trying to hurt, but clearly remembering. Harry clenched his teeth for the briefest of moments before continuing.
"Yes. And how pointless is that? How pointless is it to lose another life for no reason except that she was in the wrong place at the wrong time? I know you're tired of fighting too, Draco. Tell me where she is and I'll end it. Tell me where she is and I'll finish him so we don't have to fight anymore."
"'We'?" Draco asked in such a small, piteous voice that Harry almost felt sorry for him.
"I'm tired of fighting too, you know. Losing friends, family, colleagues. I want it over, too. Help me end it, Draco."
In the next few minutes, they said nothing to each other. Harry found himself thinking that if this didn't work, if he'd sprung the trap too early, Marlisa would just be another death on his conscience. His gut ached with the pain of it, but Draco hadn't flat-out refused either. And so he waited. And then…
"The cliffs of West Dorset. That's where he's hiding."
"Those cliffs stretch for ages, Draco. Where?" Harry demanded. Draco's eyes came up again, red and swollen.
"The place reeks of Dark magic, Potter. And besides, you'll need someone with a Dark Mark if you don't want to meet a most untimely end."