CHAPTER 35
October 16th 2001
Draco Malfoy slouched with an invisible burden over his back as he swirled the firewhiskey within his crystal tumbler. Inside a twilight filled Italian parlor, his seat of choice was a throne that once upheld the royal monarch of Louis XIV. A useless toy in his father's opinion, the ceremonial chair of an Italian muggle King, which was probably why it was stuffed into one of his smaller holiday homes along the coast of Positano.
"You know, as much as I knew your family had wealth." Potter spoke with a slight slur, "I never would have picked the Malfoys to buy royal muggle furniture."
"We didn't." Draco kept his eyes on the drink in his hand, ignoring the nosey wizard fumbling his way around the dining room.
"So why is it here then? Stolen? Don't tell me your family are a bunch of criminals, Malfoy." His sarcasm was thick when he drank.
"Criminals, yes. Theft, no."
Potter choked on the alcohol in his throat as he laughed at the truth behind the family's wealth, consciously choosing to not investigate any further.
Draco tipped his tumbler to his mouth and drowned his day within the magical liquid. The once tingly burn now numbed to a comfortable sting.
"One of my great grandfathers was gifted most of these elaborate chattels from the Italian Minister for Magic. They were an offering from King Louis XIV as a bribe."
"To let him use magic?"
Throwing his head back against the velvet cushion, Draco sighed. "Something like that."
The two wizards had spent the better part of their day, rampaging through southern Italy in search of Lucius, only to be left high and dry without a scent of the slippery bastard. Teams of aurors had also torn every Malfoy property apart within the other parts of Europe, or at least the ones they knew of. After discovering hidden tunnels within English manors, Draco and Potter suspected that not everything was as surface level as they originally believed.
Now, after tireless disappointment, they were abusing expensive alcohol left behind from a summer in between second and third year that the blond couldn't remember even if he tried.
"Seems like Astoria led you in the wrong direction." Potter stated, pouring himself a new serve.
"Or," Draco held out his glass for a top up. "Lucius is one step ahead of us and leading us on a false trail."
"You think your father is smart enough to do that?"
"He's got this far, hasn't he?"
Potter collapsed into a less extravagant armchair beside Draco, placing his own tumbler at the leg of the stool, before wiping his glasses clean. It was an odd sight to see, the two former arch nemesis' sharing a drink after a day's work, but to Draco it didn't feel odd at all… It almost felt, professed to be.
"Ginny and I went to our first Healer's appointment the other day." Potter's glasses squeaked as his shirt cleaned the prints.
"I take it you haven't told anyone else yet if you're still confessing to me?" Draco half rolled his eyes, half secretly caring about the future prodigy.
"It's a boy."
Not entirely annoyed at the idea of another redheaded Gryffindor being birthed unto the world, he raised his glass in a toast.
"Congratulations, Potter." He took a sip of his whiskey. "But for the sake of everyone else's sanity, keep your number of children limited."
"I will do my best."
Swirling around the crystal glass, Daco's reflection stared back up at him. The face of a man who had done nothing but try to please people his entire life, only to be the biggest downfall. And yet, beside him sat the man whose glory was served to him on a silver platter.
"Can I ask you something, Potter?"
"I may not have the answer." His slur, miraculously clearing for the sake of being the man of help.
"Oh, I truly doubt that."
With one last swig of his firewhiskey, Draco took a brick down from his wall and stripped away over a decade's worth of pride.
"How do you always know if you're doing the right thing? Whatever you do, everything always seems to come up Potter. Why am I fucking this up so much?"
"You know, Hermione asked me that same question a few weeks ago. Almost like you guys spend too much time arounch each other."
"That's not answering my question."
Potter inhaled deeply and exhaled slowly before answering, like he had given this speech before.
"I wasn't always right. I can tell you right now, I always got in my own head too much and other people steered me in the right direction most of the time."
"What do you mean?"
"Think of all the people that died in the war because I lead with my heart not my head. Cedric Diggory died because I thought sharing the Tri-Wizard Cup was the right thing to do, that only led to him being tossed away like a spare. I didn't want anyone to kill Pettigrew, and he escaped to bring Voldemort back. Most of the time when I made a decision myself, I fucked it up too."
"How do you not drown in guilt? All those people dying because of you?"
Draco hadn't meant for it to sound so harsh, but it was the reality in which they lived.
Potter shrugged his shoulders. "Who says I don't?"
"Please." He scoffed, "You make it look like less of a weight to carry than it really is.. I can barely keep Hermione in a fucking cottage."
Knowing that Draco would never ask, Potter brought peace to the pitiful wizard's unsettled mind. "Ron sent a message today. Hermione is safe, she's healing well and has yet to make a run for it. But her escape is inevitable, so let's just hope we get this done before she finds a way out."
It wasn't much, but it felt like everything he needed.
"Can I ask you something, Malfoy?" Potter echoed.
"I may not have the answer." Draco mocked.
"Any reason why you don't call her Granger anymore?"
It was a rational question, and one that Potter had probably been holding in for quite some time. But Draco had a feeling that the scarhead already knew the answer he was looking for.
Potter hummed, picking up his tumbler from the ground. "I thought so."
"Don't start." He spoke in a hushed tone, embarrassed he could be read so easily.
"Malfoy, we're on the coast of Italy in search of your father, who faked his own death. Just so you could be friends with a muggle-born. A muggle-born mind you, who nearly died and refused medical help just to ensure you could live a free life. I love to break it to you, but it's pretty obvious this is more than social justice."
"It will pass." He clenched his jaw, "Unrequited feelings fade overtime."
"Are you sure?"
"What else do you expect to happen, Potter?"
"I mean, are you sure it's unrequited? Why are you so certain it's one sided?"
Draco pinched his brows together, "Don't do that. Don't give me this second handed hope like you know how she feels."
There was a pause that filled the air, a pause that spoke the language of possibilities.
"Is that why you left her there with Ron? At the cottage? Because you feel guilty that there is a chance she feels the same way?"
It was the truth behind his questions that caused Draco to put the brick back up on his wall, painting himself once more with that pride he used to disguise himself with.
"Just because I poured you a drink, doesn't mean I'm going to confess anything to you, Potter." He spoke with a harsh snap. "This is not a friendship. This is nothing."
The Gryffindor didn't feed into the facade the Slythering was portraying. Instead he sat patiently, waiting for the other wizard to finally take his mask off. The firewhiskey they were drinking must have been laced with a truth telling serum, because Draco had no idea why the following words came out of his mouth.
"I wouldn't know what true love feels like... But if it's anything like being with Hermione… I can't be near her anymore. Don't you get that?"
Potter lent his forearms on his thighs and clasped his hands together. "Malfoy, I cannot promise you that what you're doing is the right thing. I can't even validate your feelings. But if it's any consolation, you've proven that you're twice the man your father ever was. You deserve the love you think that you don't."
Draco didn't know why those words affected him so much, but a slither of his cold shattered heart felt like it had been glued back together. As much as he despised his childhood enemy, deep down he always wanted Potter's respect. Perhaps, losing his father would gain him the restoration that he craved.
The blond cleared his throat, afraid if he went any further, he would bear his whole soul. A humiliation he could not bear tonight, or any night.
"So what now?"
Potter sat up straight, pulling his shoulders back to show the auror in him had come to rule once more, "Do you have any family here? Anyone that would be helping Lucius lay low?"
"No. The only families around here are other purebloods that dropped my father the moment Voldemort's lifeless body hit the ground."
"Any chance they'd know where he is?"
"We can try. But I lack certainty in that they'd endanger their newly built reputations in order to hide him under their floorboards."
Potter blew air through his mouth, sinking low into his seat in near defeat. "It's worth something."
The dusk filled Italian parlor was politely interrupted by the glisten of a silver dragonfly floating through a beach sided window. Wings gracefully hovering as the unexpected Patronus flew it's way over to alert Potter.
A melodious female voice spoke to her leader, "We have found a letter addressed to Lucius. Come quickly to the Bourgogne Estate."
Draco widened his eyes, inching closer to the shimmering insect in desperate hope that it held more information. Any information. He was only met with disappointment as the dragonfly bid it's farewells to fly back where it came from.
Potter stood, straightening his robes. "First Italy, and now France. If I knew any better, I'd think your father is begging us to play this bloody game."
"You know this is bait, right? Father would not have left a letter by accident, unless it was to lead us to a dead end."
Picking up his tumbler off the floor, and taking Draco's off his hand, Potter possessed a grin spread across his face that revealed he had no plan to back down.
"Dead end or not, Lucius gave us something to work with. We'll get him, Malfoy. Trust me."
Draco could count on one hand the amount of times he had felt the need to put his trust in Harry Potter. Tonight however, he may just have to add a second.
Not an hour later, the two wizards jumped from the sea coast of Italy to the countryside of France. The beauty of travelling with an auror whose track record was undefeated, was how easy it was to roam from one side of Europe to the next. Even more so than being the department head for International Magical Cooperation.
Potter stood with his arms crossed against his chest as a team of law enforcement officials fed him information on the updates in their investigation. The blank facial expression stuffed behind his infamous round glasses, showed just how little leads they held.
Draco, choosing to stay hidden in the shadows, leant against the fireplace of his father's second study of their French Chateau. As the aurors rambled with their briefing, he observed the layer of dust that sat on top of the executive desk. An odd accessory for the homeware of someone who was supposed to be living here secretly.
"Malfoy, come here." Potter waved him over as the group separated back to further search the house.
Dragging himself away from the fireplace, he strode over to where the lead auror stood. "Anything worth following up?"
"Possibly. Take a look at the letter that was supposedly left behind."
In no rush, Draco slipped a crumpled piece of parchment out of Potter's hand. Skimming as it read:
Lucius,
My men have tracked your son in Romania with the mudblood. They appear to be sharing one room, and dining with one another after their work within the ministry. Both have been successfully threatened, and your son has agreed to return to the manor within the week.
A house in Madrid shall be open for you to stay once everything has been lined up for your supposed passing. I expect next week's galleons on my desk by Friday.
Crawford
Draco read the letter three times before he lifted his head. His mind was starting to ache from how hard he was trying to wrap his head around the note.
"It doesn't add up, does it?" Potter raised his brows in question.
"Those men were not successful with their threats in Romania. Granger even obliviated the one that singled her out."
"I take it you didn't share one room either?"
"No. Nor did I agree to return to the manor as a result of anyone's influence. I made that decision on my own accord once we returned back to Britain."
Potter pursed his lips in thought, sewing together all the theories that floated in his head.
"Didn't you say that Lucius was paying Crawford months in advance with hidden galleons? It seems unlikely that there would be any demand for a weekly payment if that was already set up."
"Crawford didn't write that letter." Draco stated with certainty. "Whoever did, has written it like they only know half of the story. As if they are just trying to clean their tracks."
"So you think there's more people in on this than just your father and Crawford?"
"Perhaps. Only question is who?"
Taking one last look at the note, Draco scanned the parchment, almost entirely missing the biggest clue written directly in front of him.
"The person who wrote this was a pureblood." He pointed to the beginning letter that had been drawn over several times.
Potter shook his head in disbelief. "How do you know that?"
"Only those who grew up in the finer pureblood families were homeschooled before Hogwarts to write with a bolded starting letter. It was supposed to make us stand out, and show confidence in what we wrote. You wouldn't know because the Weasleys were probably taught how to read and write by their mother."
A spark flickered behind Potter's green eyes. "Crawford isn't pureblood."
"Exactly. Now we know for certain that he did not write this to my father, and whoever did is within the sacred twenty-eight."
Feeling confident in his lead, Draco marched back over to the desk and swiped his finger across the wood to reveal the build up dust. Potter squinted his eyes, understanding without words what Draco was explaining.
"Whoever wrote this note knew we were coming here, and planted it for us to find. I'd bet my best galleons that they've also left something for us to stumble upon on Crawford's Madrid home."
"We're not actually going to go there are we?" Draco blew the dust off his hand.
"We won't. But… What we will do is make Lucius think we have."
"How exactly are we going to do that?"
Potter curled his finger around his chin, pretending to think about the next move he had already decided on.
"I think the Daily Prophet may need an update on where this investigation is going."
Going on a hunch, Draco attempted to conclude the assignment. "You're going to lie and tell the papers we have sent aurors to Madrid after finding a clue, aren't you?"
"Oh, I am not going to lie." Potter grinned. "I'll send aurors to Madrid. In fact, we'll play into Lucius' game he's got going. Only, I think it best that you and I remain exclusive in our own investigation."
"You want to go off record? Do this under the radar?"
"Yeah, something tells me we can't trust anyone until this is over."
Draco tilted his head as he let an impressive smirk peak through his lips. This must have been the kind of rush the Gryffindor trio thrived on in Hogwarts, humble heroes running off to slyly save the day.
"So if your aurors are galivating through Spain, where exactly should we be headed?" He asked, curious to see what rebellious plan had already been conjured.
"I think Narcissa is playing off less than she knows. Are you ready to face that wrath?"
Wincing at the idea of his mother's fury, Draco was tempted to keep his sanity, but rather chose to not be the coward for once.
"My ego may need plastering after saying this, but I think you are right. My mother is a terribly good actress, and has used her talents to fool me more than once. It would not surprise me if there was a white lie told for the sake of her pureblood heritage."
Potter grabbed a piece of parchment off the executive desk and began writing with a near dried up quill. "So it's agreed. Tomorrow morning The Daily Prophet will be blasted with news of the Madrid lead in the Lucius case, while you and I head to Malfoy Manor."
"Agreed."