A/N: This chapter is a bit more mature than the rest of the fic: it contains the beginnings of an erotic scene, period-typical homophobia, and heavily misogynistic and classist comments. If you do not wish to read this, feel free to skip to the end of the chapter. There will be a TL;DR in bold summarizing the contents of the chapter there.
The knock at the door startled Draco, who was not expecting company so early on. Harry had slipped out of bed just two hours earlier, returning to his room before the first hints of dawn began streaming through the windows and the house was stirred into activity. It was a routine they had become accustomed to: before the sun even peeked through the first cloud of dawn, Harry would disentangle himself from Draco's arms, slip on his robe and slippers, and tiptoe back to his room down the hall. For the weeks they had spent at Rosebury together, it had been quite effective: not once had they had so much as a threat of discovery. Harry was stealthy, and he knew how to stay unseen, almost as if he were invisible. Draco, of course, could not complain.
But the knock at the door made him worry. It was early, too early: surely, the married ladies hadn't even rung their bells for breakfast yet. Whoever was at the door surely had business with him and Harry. He gulped down a bout of terror: had they been sighted? Who was this, then? A blackmailer? Worse yet— his father? He let out a shaky breath and, hastily wrapping his robe about him, went to open the door. He wouldn't know anything until he'd opened it, that much was clear.
His sigh of relief when he opened the door and saw Harry standing there was comically audible. So, too, was the irritation in his voice when he spoke. "What are you doing here?" he demanded of Harry in a sharp whisper, seizing the collar of his robe to pull him into his room and close the door quickly behind them.
"I wanted to see you," Harry shrugged, readjusting the glasses on his nose that had become lopsided with Draco's yank.
"To see me...?" Draco ventured, but Harry's hands were already loosening the knot on his robe. It dawned on Draco. "Harry Potter, you beast," he laughed, even when Harry's hands didn't stop, "you were here scarcely a couple of hours ago, and you're back?"
"Don't pretend you're not happy to see me," Harry said gruffly. He finished undoing the knot on Draco's robe: the green silk fell lightly off his shoulders and pooled at the carpet around his feet, leaving him exposed. Harry took a step back and swept Draco up and down with his gaze. "And can you blame me?"
"You're a flatterer," Draco said, but it had worked: his cheeks were warm with a blush.
Dropping a shoulder on his own robe, Harry stepped closer to Draco and wrapped an arm around his waist. "Come on, Draco," his tone was playful now. Against Draco's exposed torso, Harry was warm— and that warmth was extending down his naked back, down to between his legs—
"You wouldn't have let me in otherwise," Harry's voice had dropped down to a whisper, his lips brushing Draco's cheek as he spoke. That was too much for Draco: he lurched into action suddenly, his hands flying to the knot of Harry's burgundy robe and undoing it hastily, his lips already caught in Harry's as his hands worked. Out of Harry's throat poured a grunt of satisfaction, and as Draco undressed him he began steering them toward the unmade bed, the weight of his body forward shifting Draco with his movement.
Draco felt the mattress of the bed come up behind his knees and allowed himself to fall backward, his back hitting the mattress with a soft thud. Harry paused the kiss to fully remove his robe and cast it toward where Draco's lay; meanwhile, Draco inched backward to fully be on the bed, his head on the pillows. Once his robe was discarded, Harry pounced forward and broke his fall by setting both his hands on the mattress beside Draco's shoulders; then, lowering himself slowly, he let his lips touch Draco's again, moving his body down to press his chest against Draco's, his stomach against Draco's, his hips against Draco's...
Under him, Draco moaned contentedly into the kiss, deepening it as he felt Harry's body touch closer to his own. His hand snaked upwards to settle on the back of Harr's neck, his fingers tangling in the messy black locks at his nape. His other hand wrapped around Harry's back and pressed him even closer, narrowing the gap between their bodies until it was nonexistent. Harry kissed back almost aggressively, his teeth nipping at Draco's lower lip and sucking it lightly outwards. Slowly, his hips began rocking back and forth, reveling in the delicious friction of Draco's thigh against his groin. He felt Draco begin to harden under him, responding to the familiar stimulus with as much excitement as if it were the first time, with as much eagerness as if it had been more than a few hours since he'd been this close to him.
Harry kept his right elbow on the mattress for support as his left hand trailed downwards along the side of Draco's body, tracing the path that was so familiar he could reproduce it even in his sleep. When his hand reached Draco's hipbone, which jabbed sharply outward, it turned inward toward the warm place under Draco's belly, brushing against hairs that were slightly darker than those on his white-blond head. Harry's hand kept moving down until it closed around Draco's length, almost fully erect. Draco felt Harry's hand grip him and let out a moan; pleased, Harry began moving his hand up and down, sending waves of a waking pleasure running up Draco's body. Eagerly, Draco bucked his hips upward to meet Harry's hips, which were still rocking in slow, rhythmic thrusts against Draco's thigh.
Both Draco and Harry's touches were passionate but measured, not meant to push either of them over the edge but to prolong the sensation as long as possible, to envelop them in this bliss until it felt like a small eternity. The warmth of their bodies was joined by the warmth of the sunlight as it trickled in through the gaps in the curtains, but neither of them was paying too much attention to the morning as it started in earnest. It was all too easy, after all, to get lost in the velvety draw of kisses, to slip into the thrill of skin against skin, to melt into the steadfast hands of a loving hold. Too easy to become sheltered from the world beyond the welcoming drapes of a four-poster bed. Too easy to forget that anything existed aside from each other.
Too easy to not hear the click of the latch as the doorknob was turned open.
"What is the meaning of this?"
The angry, all-too-familiar voice yanked Draco out of the lovely stupor; instinctively, his head jerked to face the door from where the voice had come, his face frozen in fear. Still suspended above him, Harry had done the same, gazing at the door as if it were the barrel of a hunter's shotgun and he was the defenseless prey.
In the doorway towered the terrible figure of Lucius Malfoy. His stern features were contorted in a grimace of disgust, his eyes blazing with a fury he was making no effort to conceal.
"Father!" squeaked Draco, and it was that word that rustled him and Harry back into action. Hastily, they untangled and grabbed for the sheets splayed on the bed to cover themselves up with, scrambling toward opposite ends of the bed to sit far away, sheets pressed to their chests with tardy modesty, looking wide-eyed at Lucius.
Lucius slammed the door shut behind him and turned the lock by the doorknob. Draco cursed himself for not doing the same when he'd let Harry in: the one time they'd forgotten, and the one time it had been absolutely necessary. Still looking furious, Lucius strode toward the bed, remaining at a distance that made it very clear that he did not want any part to whatever was happening in it. He stood there, nostrils flaring, his lips twitching with anger that threatened to morph into a lashing word very soon.
"Father," Draco said, venturing toward the edge of the bed, "father, I can explain, I can—"
"Really, Draco?" Lucius snarled, sweeping the scene with harsh eyes. "Because I do not see what isn't sufficiently clear so as to require an explanation. In fact, I believe I understand what this... this filth is altogether too well for my liking."
Draco's voice had almost risen into a wail: "But father, I—"
"Silence, Draco," Lucius barked. Draco cowered backward, his lips puckered with the silence his father had commanded. Satisfied, Lucius turned his attention now to Harry, whose distress had only become more marked. "And you, Harry Potter. I should have known to expect no better from the ward of Sirius Black. That he should have corrupted you with sodomy is unsurprising, but that you should spread it to my son—"
"I will not allow you to speak of Sirius in that way," Harry interrupted him, his voice shaky with a mix of terror and outrage.
"You are in no position to allow me to do or refrain from anything, Potter," Lucius raised his voice. "As I see it, I am the only person standing between your life as you know it and your life as a ruin. I should think you'd be nicer."
"Don't threaten Harry, father," Draco sprang meekly to his defense, but one piercing glare from Lucius was enough to quiet him again.
"You should not assume yourself to be excluded from that, Draco. The same goes for you."
Draco looked down like a kicked animal, his eyes glued to the white wrinkles of the sheets, the farthest away they could be from the cold rage of his father. It was, however, inescapable.
"You have disgraced not only yourself, but also me, and the entire Malfoy lineage," Lucius bellowed, the corners of his lips twitching ever more rapidly. "You have tarnished the good name of Ashcroft Manor and those who have occupied it through its long years. Do you understand what you have done?" When he received no response, Draco still hanging his head and refusing to look at him, Lucius's anger climbed. "I should disinherit you! I should cast you out and turn you out onto the street like a dog! This... this scene makes me think that I should no longer call you my son!"
The words hit Draco with the impact of a well-aimed blow, and he flinched backward as they reached him. Lucius, almost panting from the effort of his yelling, had leaned forward with his teeth almost bared, but now let out a breath and sagged back into his normal standing. "I can't bear to look at you any longer," he muttered, and began to pace the small rectangle of floor where he stood between the door and the bed.
Beside him, Draco heard a sharp intake of air. He knew the sound well from many a fall from a horse or a stubbed toe on the bed's edge: it meant Harry was trying his hardest not to cry. The mere sound made his heart crack in his chest, and perhaps that was what made him look up to finally meet his father's gaze.
"So what comes next?" he said softly, as if challenging Lucius. "What comes next, father?" He spit out the last word, knowing it would pain Lucius; when he saw the grimace flash across his father's face, Draco felt wickedly victorious.
"I will tell you what comes next," Lucius said, his words slippery in his thin mouth. "I will stay quiet to preserve your and your— consort's reputations, but make no mistake: it will all be an act, and for the sake only of appearances and the good standing of the Malfoy and Black names. And I protect the Black name not as a favor to you or your godfather, Potter," Lucius spat, "but because my wife is a member of the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black, and I should hate to see her disgraced because of your filthy doings."
"Thank you, father," Draco mumbled.
"Oh, spare me," drawled Lucius. "I am not doing this out of kindness toward either of you. I am merely looking out for my bloodline and its honor. You deceive yourself if you believe I care about you in the slightest, after this."
Even through the budding hatred throbbing in Draco's chest, Lucius's words stung. Draco felt tears begin to prickle at the corners of his eyes, and again there was that sharp breath drawn in by Harry next to him.
Lucius eyed them coldly and with contempt, making no effort to conceal the disgust that spread across his face as he surveyed the bed up and down once more. "Get dressed and go down to breakfast," he snapped. "I was coming in to see if you were awake, since you were late to the table this morning. I see now there was no need to rouse you."
With that, he directed one final look of loathing toward Harry; then, he unlocked the door and let himself out, slamming it behind him with a force that must have resonated through the entire hallway.
Draco and Harry cringed at the slam of the door, but remained frozen to their spots. They didn't even dare look at one another— they were too busy trying to keep everything inside them from shattering out of acute, terrified despair.
Among all of the things Hermione abhorred about being a lady (and there were a lot), high on the list was the obligation to engage in trivial conversation with the ladies in the library. Because all the married women took their breakfast in bed, they missed out on the lively chatter at the breakfast table, but that only meant that they were desperate to make up for what they'd missed by drawing everyone into the library with the lure of the tea and scones so characteristic to elevenses. Especially abhorrent was this one, where Hermione was crammed into an armchair next to Lady Aileen McLaggen, far away from Orlando —who was a few seats away exchanging pleasantries with Lord Black— and right across from Cormac, who had his eyes on her like a bird of prey on a small mouse. She especially rued the absence of Harry and Draco, who had come down to breakfast late and looking somber and had disappeared after the meal without saying a single word through its duration.
The bang of a hammer against something hard, however, sparked her attention. She turned her head toward the source of the sound and was delighted to see Ron standing by the ornate wood of the window frame, reaffixing a piece to the overall structure. When he felt her eyes on him, he glanced at her and smiled almost imperceptibly, so only she that knew him would know that he was happy to see her.
Across from Hermione, Cormac McLaggen's right eye twitched.
An idea flared in Hermione's mind. She moved her eyes from Ron and let them land on the tea tray that was placed neatly on the desk by the window where Ron was working. "More tea, anyone?" she crooned, layering her voice with uncharacteristic (but truly ladylike) sweetness.
"Will you be a darling?" Lady McLaggen said, holding out her tea cup for Hermione to take.
"It would be my pleasure," said Hermione, letting the secret little rush of victory —someone had taken the bait!— gurgle inside of her.
She took Aileen's cup and walked slowly toward the desk, careful always to keep her back to the party so as to shield herself and her hands from their eyes. At the desk, she didn't grab for the teapot first; instead, she found a cartridge fountain pen and a scrap of paper, and scribbled a hasty message across it, just enough so it would be legible. She then folded the slip paper and fit it into her right hand, between her ring and middle fingers, so it would be hidden to the inattentive eye. That done, she poured the steaming tea into Aileen's cup, careful to fill it slightly more than she should.
She grabbed the teacup in her left hand and turned back around to face the party. She could feel Ron's eyes on her, and she smiled: it would work.
She took a step forward and then deliberately made it seem as though she had stumbled, lurching forward with a sudden jerk that send the contents of the teacup flying out and onto the carpet. Seeing her stumble, Ron immediately sidled up, offering up his arms to help her prop herself back upward. "Are you alright, milady?"
"Yes, perfectly so," Hermione said. Her right hand took Ron's in a gesture that, to everyone, would appear simply as an attempt to steady herself again. She loosened the squeeze of her ring and middle finger and let the scrap of paper fall into Ron's palm. Ron closed his hand right as Hermione took hers out of his, encasing the scrap in a loose fist. "Just my clumsiness. I'm afraid you'll have to wait just a bit longer for that tea, Lady McLaggen," she said with a slight giggle, and turned back around to the tea tray to refill the cup, this time for good. Out of the corner of her eye she saw Ron thrust his closed hand into his pocket, and the bulge of his fist collapse as he opened his palm and let the scrap fall into the pocket. The small victory gurgled again.
"Look at what you've done, Hermione," Lady Amelia said crossly, already reaching for the small silver bell on the table by the armchair. "I'll have to call in one of the maids to clean the carpet before it stains!"
"I'm ever so sorry, mother," Hermione said, but her voice was entirely detached from the thrill she felt. The long minutes until elevenses was over passed by in a blur, so lost was she in giddy anticipation for what came next. She didn't even pay mind to the sharp glances her mother sent her way when the maid came in with a rag and a pail of water. With the prospect of seeing Ron —provided he read her little note—, this all didn't seem quite so unbearable.
Even so, she almost wept with relief when Lady Amelia stood up to signal they could all go about their day. She had to contain herself so as to not break out into a sprint out of the library and toward the designated meeting place. When everybody had ambled out of the library, Hermione began walking out, her steps rushing almost into a run as she crossed the lobby toward the servants' stairwell. The first thing she did when she found herself in the narrow, moldy hallway was to bolt the latch into place (a necessary precaution when there were curious guests who might try the doors of the house, to keep them out of the servants' quarters). The second thing she did was try not to swoon when she felt a strong arm reach out of the darkness and dip her into a kiss that smelled strongly of sawdust.
"Ron," she said his name in a desperate breath, which was cut off short by the force of his lips finding hers again, by the squeeze of his hand on her waist as he drew her closer.
"So, I got your note," he said when he pulled away. They shared in a small laugh. "'Servants' stairwell, after elevenses.' You are quite the wordsmith."
"Hey, you got the message, didn't you?" Hermione protested, and punctuated it with another kiss. Her hands clutched at Ron's collar, while his closed passionately tighter about her waist. Somewhere in the middle, however, the giddiness of the kiss evaporated and melted into melancholy. Hermione found herself kissing Ron not with the unrestrained delight of a beginning lover, but with the almost-sad longing of a lover deprived.
When they separated again, Hermione felt her eyes dampen, and she lunged forward again to bury her face in Ron's chest. "Oh, Ron."
One of his hands left her waist and settled on her back comfortingly. "What's the matter, love?"
The endearment made Hermione's heart flutter faintly, and she clutched at Ron's shirt even tighter. "It's just so hard," she said, her voice quivering. "To want to see you all the time, to be away from you for so long and be with you for so little, it's just so hard."
"I know," Ron said, the hand on her back moving upward to caress her hair lovingly. "I know. I feel the same. I want you all the time, and I live for little moments like these, moments that I'm with you. But they're worth it."
"Yes, they are," Hermione whispered into his chest. "They are, Ron, no question of it. I just wish we didn't have to hide."
"Well, then," boomed a sly voice from the top of the stairs, "it will delight you to know that it is all now in the open."
Ron and Hermione's heads whipped toward the source of the voice. A light flickered on in the dark staircase, and the sound of steps coming down was terribly audible. The steps went around the bend that marked off the beginning of the next flight, and there he stood, a terrible grin splitting his face.
"Cormac," Hermione hissed.
"So this is why you've been so reluctant toward my advances," Cormac said, coming down the stairs with the deliberate slowness of sadistic enjoyment. Ron and Hermione held each other tighter. Against her chest, Hermione could feel Ron's heart frantically beating. "This is why you've been sneaking around like a rat. The little slut has been slumming it with the scum."
"How did you find me?" Hermione said. Unconsciously, she found herself shifting to turn Ron away from McLaggen, almost protectively. Ron's hands were white-knuckled and firm on her back.
Cormac reached the landing and stood there, looking at them. "It was dreadfully simple— in fact, I am surprised that you hadn't been caught before. I saw you stumble quite stupidly with the teacup, and grab onto the handyman's hand. Then I waited around the corner to see you come out, and just bided my time. I saw you disappear into the door —the servants' stairwell is located in the same corner as at Glencarrion, mind you— and simply went up a flight of stairs to enter the staircase from there. Then it was just a matter of listening, and waiting for the right moment."
Hermione pictured Cormac crouching in the shadows just a few steps above them, listening to their exchange and their kisses, and felt a stab of repulsion.
"Hermione..." Ron said precariously.
"And as for you," McLaggen now turned to Ron. "I should have known it. I could almost laugh at you, believing trash like you could aspire to her. Trying on my suit? Fixing her sink in the middle of the night? And I'm correct in guessing that she was with you the other night, when she came into her room in the early hours, no?"
"I thought no one had heard me," Hermione said softly, dully, her gaze trailing down to the floor.
"Evidently, you thought wrong," Cormac said, that awful grin appearing again. "Well! Now that the cat's out of the bag, I believe it only remains to be seen what we will do about this."
"Milord, please," Ron said, disentangling himself slightly from Hermione to step forward, between her and McLaggen. "Don't make Hermione pay for this. It was me, I seduced her, I—"
"Silence, handyman," Cormac spat. "Besides, that is a lie. I know the lady was willing. Why else would she resist me?"
"Maybe because you're a git," Hermione mumbled.
Cormac's eyes fixated on her. "That may be so," he conceded, chuckling to himself, "but all the same, this git now holds over you the possibility of a scandal that would entirely dash your marriageable prospects. Just think of how livid your mother will be!"
"No," Hermione said, her eyes widening.
"Ah, don't worry. I'm merely amusing myself," Cormac said, pushing back at his nails. "No, Hermione Granger, I will not tell. I won't tell because I will spare your parents the disgrace of having a whore for a daughter. But," he dropped his voice, walking toward Ron and Hermione in an almost catlike pace, "if I can't have what I want, you won't either, and I will make sure of that. You can take my word for it."
He stopped right in front of Ron and Hermione, eyeing them with contempt and an evident malicious pleasure. He let them tremble for an instant before he broke away toward the stairwell door. "Now, if you'll excuse me, I must rejoin the guests." Giving them a snakelike smile, McLaggen lifted the latch from the door and let himself out, leaving Ron and Hermione trembling in the solitary lightbulb of the staircase.
TL;DR: Draco and Harry are caught in Draco's bed by Lucius, who has come to see why Draco isn't yet at breakfast. Lucius will keep their secret to keep the Malfoy and Black families in good standing, though he makes it clear he is repulsed. During a secret rendezvous in the servants' stairwell, Ron and Hermione are caught by McLaggen, who has followed them there. He, too, says he will not tell to spare Hermione's parents, but he threatens Hermione, saying that since he couldn't get her, he will make sure she is unhappy.