1 year ago
Summer stretched tantalizingly before the young Aurors-in-training at Cambridge Academy. Like everyone else, Harry was looking forward to traveling, soaking in London's rare sunshine, and practicing the new spells he'd learned that year. But for the first Saturday on holiday, Harry was satisfied with a small birthday party in the backyard of Malfoy Manor, attended by his three-year-old godson and best mates, instead of dreaded half-acquaintances he had no skills to entertain.
Four friends sat around a folding table, half-watching a pink-haired Teddy play with plucked daisies in the freshly trimmed garden. Their other half was preoccupied with arguing the finer points of lemonade.
"You don't put ice in lemonade, you blithering idiot," said Draco, the insult the same as endearment when directed at Harry.
"It's hot outside. Ice is cold." Harry gestured wildly at the pitchers of lemonade and ice cubes he'd brought out. "It's simple logic."
"Logic, Merlin's baggy arse," Draco snapped. "Ice dilutes the flavor when it melts. Any dunce would know that. Back me up, Hermione."
"A simple Anti-Melting Charm would fix that problem," Hermione said reasonably.
"If we're going to use magic, a Cooling Charm would eliminate the need for ice," Draco countered.
"Or you can use ice," Harry pressed, picking up the pitcher full of it, "Which we have, and drink the lemonade before it melts."
Draco grabbed Harry's wrist as he made to pour the cubes. "Don't you dare."
Ron let out a loud huff. "For crying out…" He snatched the ice pitcher, and with a few waves of his wand and muttered spells, divided the lemonade into two portions - one with ice and one without.
"Good thinking," Hermione said, and Ron beamed.
"You're going to drink that?" Draco said with a haughtily raised eyebrow as Harry lifted his frosty lemonade to his lip.
"Want me to pour it on you instead?"
"Try it, Scarhead." Draco's voice lowered dangerously.
"Wouldn't want to make you cry," Harry replied mockingly.
"Dolt."
"Crybaby."
"Loud-mouthed pinhead."
"Arrogant twat."
"Boys!" Hermione interrupted sternly. "If you don't shut it, neither of you are getting cake."
A thoughtful pause. "Come on, 'Mione, we were just getting into our stride." Harry grinned. Beneath the table, his hand curled affectionately over Draco's knee. A moment later, Draco's fingers closed over his. "One time, we traded insults for an hour."
"Why?" Ron asked bewilderedly.
Draco shrugged. "To see how creative we could get." Only Harry noticed the blush on his pale face in the half-light - the night they spoke of hadn't ended in an argument, to say the least.
"You two…" Ron shook his head. "Stark mad."
As if we don't spend half our days bickering, Ron," Hermione pointed out, and before Ron could think of a reply, she called out to Teddy, "Come get some lemonade, love."
The hours of the warm evening lazily ticked by. Hermione and Ron volunteered to do the dishes, leaving Harry to tuck a yawning but petulant Teddy into bed.
"I'm not tired!" Teddy insisted, hair darkening to an angry scarlet.
"You have to sleep early tonight, Teddy bear," Harry said patiently, pulling the blankets beneath his godson's chin. "Auntie Dromeda is making blueberry pancakes tomorrow. You don't want Uncle Ron to eat them all before you wake up, do you?"
Teddy's eyes went owlish, and a blush of pink scattered the scarlet. "No!" He said emphatically and immediately shut his eyes tight.
Harry chuckled and bent to kiss his forehead. "Night, Teddy." He clicked off Teddy's bedroom lamp - sculpted in the shape of a ringed planet - and slipped into the corridor.
"That was fast," Draco remarked.
"We might find him sneaking back downstairs in a half-hour," Harry sighed. "I asked Hermione and Ron to keep an eye out if we go to bed first."
He started to head back down the stairs, but Draco stopped him with a hand on his shoulder. "Before we join the others…I want to talk to you. Alone."
"Oh?" Harry grinned.
"Head out of the gutter, Potter," Draco tutted, and he pulled Harry to the stairs. They sat at the top, Hermione's and Ron's murmurs and the clinking of dishes echoing indiscernibly through the banisters. "I talked to Andromeda earlier. About Teddy."
Harry raised his brows in interest. "What about him?"
"I wanted to see what it would be like. To take care of him for a while, as a couple. She said we could take him to London over Christmas."
"He'd like that." Harry smiled fondly. "Does this mean you…?" He trailed off, leaving the question for Draco to finish.
"I've thought about this a lot, Harry. Really. I still don't think…" Draco nibbled at his lower lip, curling his knees to his chest. "I don't think I can support a child. We can't. Not by ourselves."
Harry bit his tongue as Draco paused. Over the years, he'd learned to listen, to let Draco talk himself through whatever he was thinking.
"Andromeda doesn't need much of our help," Draco continued. "She loves taking care of Teddy, and I think we should let her. But that doesn't mean I don't want to be absent from his life. I want to be there for him as much as I can. I know you do, too."
For years, Harry had held onto a dream, one that had faded nearly to tatters. In the English countryside, a cottage was filled with children tumbling through the garden, getting their new wands, and playing Quidditch in the backyard. Children that would have a childhood far better than his ever was. He would make sure of it.
And then he saw Draco's eyes, wide and afraid, not far from a boy himself, and Harry let the dream go. Teddy was enough. Draco and whatever he was comfortable with was enough.
"I do." Harry took Draco into his arms, and Draco melted against him, face turned into his shoulder. "Thank you."
"For what?"
"For being honest with me. If you don't want kids, that's fine with me. If you change your mind later on, that's fine, too." Harry paused, then laughed. "Took you a while to think about it, huh?"
"I cannot believe you're making fun of my vulnerabilities, Potter," Draco said, thumping his shoulder, but he was smiling.
"Seriously, though." Harry took Draco's face into his hands, thumbs ghosting over his cheeks. "You can talk to me about anything. I don't want secrets between us."
"Keep no secrets," Draco whispered and pressed a butterfly-light kiss to Harry's lips. "I promise."
• • •
Twin puffs of labored breath filled the cave. Harry listened carefully, waiting until one had gone. No other sound preluded Joey's disappearance - the usual crack of Apparation was absent. Harry wasn't sure if he should take that as a good sign.
Waiting was agony. Harry paced, drawing on the cave's vast magical reserves to try and heal his cut. The bleeding had stopped, but pain still shot through his skull, and Harry muttered the same spell over and over again, doing his best to heal himself.
He'd need all the strength he could get.
Harry was well aware that facing dozens of wizards on his own, unarmed, was reckless and stupid - precisely the kind of decision that Antigone had often warned him against. But Draco's life was on the line, and Harry would be damned rather than sit and do nothing.
The twenty minutes was hard to keep track of. Harry counted the drips of rain, spilling through unseen cracks and crevices to meet the underground stream. Finally, he figured he'd waited long enough and breathed deeply, picturing the area just outside the forest clearing. Harry twisted on the spot.
A wave of dizziness, brought on by Apparation, overtook Harry. Fresh pain shot through his forehead, and he steadied himself against a tree trunk, gritting his teeth.
"Focus, Potter," Harry muttered to himself and straightened.
The smoke from Draco's explosion had dissipated completely. Rain pattered gently on the overstory of leaves, many of them making their way through and dampening Harry's shoulders. He crept forward carefully, keeping his head on a swivel and listening for any signs of movement.
Harry dropped to the dirt at the first flash of red, rolled behind a bush, and peered through its leaves. He was terribly vulnerable, far from any substantial magic reserves and the safety of his wand. Harry wished for anything magical - one of those phoenix-infused amulets, a Strengthening potion, even the charmed necklace Draco had given him in their eighth year.
At the thought of Draco, Harry's heart clenched. He pushed back the fear threatening to spill over and squinted into the clearing.
Rabbit and Dao were joined by several other masked wizards and silvery Patronuses, swimming and trotting above their heads to keep the dementors at bay. Harry's spirits lifted - perhaps none of the dementors had gotten to Draco.
And then he spotted him. Listless, head bowed, Draco slumped against a tree, his wrists bound in rope. Harry bit back a gasp at his left arm - the sleeve had been torn clean off, revealing a Dark Mark that writhed blacker than it ever had.
Harry focused his attention on Draco, his hands, his closed eyes, and splayed his own fingers towards him. "Amica Legilimens." Nothing. Harry clenched his jaw, but he shouldn't have been surprised. The spell was hard to pull off, even with a wand.
Wishing fervently for any kind of cloaking charm, Harry edged slowly around the clearing, cringing at every crackle of twigs or leaves. Luckily, the rain hid his blunders, and the wizards seemed too preoccupied to watch for intruders. Dao and Rabbit seemed to be leading the conversation, speaking rapidly in Thai with much gesturing to Draco and the dementors swarming above the Patronuses protective bubble. Harry counted seven wizards in total. A piece of cake for a fully-fledged Auror force. For a wandless twenty-something? Hopeless.
Still, he made it to Draco's tree without being noticed and faced the trunk, keeping himself hidden. "Draco?" Harry muttered, just above his breath. Hardly a moment had passed, and he was already considering raising his voice, but then…
"You came."
Harry almost jumped up and down for joy, but he kept still. "Joey's gone for help. I'll get you out of there."
"Already loosened my bonds. Just say the word."
Clever, clever bloke. Leave it to Draco to be frighteningly good at his job, no matter how reluctantly he felt about it.
"Do you know where our wands are?"
"Left side of the table."
Harry peered cautiously around the tree. A table, its sides uneven and its legs seemingly fashioned from driftwood, held a small array of objects that Harry couldn't discern.
"All of my potions are with them, too," Draco continued. "Got anything?"
"Only my wits."
Draco laughed as quietly as he could, then abruptly stopped. Rabbit had begun to march over, red robes swirling like an unending fall of blood. "Shit. Go."
"I'm not leaving you again."
Draco could not argue, for Rabbit had come within earshot. "Let us hope the Chosen One comes before your soul is taken," they said unfeelingly. "It would be a shame for you to endure all this pain for nothing."
"Luckily, he's here," Harry announced and stepped from behind the tree. Before Rabbit could react, he slammed both his hands into their face as hard as he could. It wasn't as effective as a punch, but he knew that his knuckles would not fare well against the wooden carvings, and he was right - his palms stung.
Rabbit let out a cry of pain and bent over, their face in their hands, blood dripping down their chin. Draco quickly yanked his hands from the rope and looked wildly around - he picked up a good-sized rock and offered it to Harry.
"Do the honors?"
"Thanks." Harry lifted the rock and cracked it over Rabbit's head. They dropped without a sound.
"Muggle fighting is so barbaric," Draco said with a sniff - Harry was elated to see that his disdain was intact, if not his energy. "Can't imagine why - mmph!"
Harry had dropped the stone and pulled Draco towards him, kissing him hard for as long as he dared. When they broke apart, the glint in Draco's eyes had been restored - he looked ready to fight.
"Couldn't die without doing that," Harry muttered.
"I'm not dying today," Draco said decisively. "Twenty-two is a stupid age to die." His gaze flitted towards the remaining wizards. "Duck," He said and yanked Harry to the ground as an array of Stunning Spells carved into the tree.
Fresh spikes of fear pierced Harry, but they were mixed with blooms of elation - no matter how hopeless their situation, at least he had Draco by his side.
"Foolish boy." Hundreds of voices boomed in unison across the clearing. Dao's tiger mask seemed to snarl as she raised her hands, and Harry and Draco were dragged like ragdolls to face her, their arms pinned to their sides. Harry noticed, with satisfaction, that Dao's hands were shaking. Though still having tenfold the power of an average wizard's, the spell that imprisoned him was weaker than her last.
Great power comes with a price. Perhaps they could outlast Dao and her followers after all.
"You have only hastened your undoing," Dao said triumphantly. "Rabbit?"
No answer.
Shattered eyes fell upon the crumple of red at the base of the tree. Dao made a noise of displeasure, then uttered a command in Thai. Two of the wizards behind her rushed forward to revive their comrade. The other three started after them, but Dao snapped, and they retreated.
"I will do this myself," Dao muttered, and the hiss of so many voices saying "I" sent a shiver down Harry's spine. She said something to her brethren, who all lowered their hands. The Patronuses slunk back, surrounding the Following in a hazy bubble of silver. Dao's tiger snapped at her heels, keeping the dementors at bay, but Harry heard their rattling breath and shivered as the warm rain abruptly turned to sleet. Dao gestured, and the tiger edged back just enough to let in a singular dementor, its gray silhouette slowly approaching.
"Take Harry and go!"
"No…no, not Harry, PLEASE, NOT HARRY!"
Without the security of a wand, Harry faltered, pushing back his parents' voices with his clammy hands clenched over Draco's shoulders - he, too, had begun to shiver, eyes unfocused, muttering under his breath. "Stop…stop it, don't hurt her…."
"Snap out of it," Harry whispered in Draco's ear, though he was commanding himself, too. "We'll make a break for it, okay? Draco?"
"Father, stop it…."
Dao's power was waning. Harry felt it, felt sure that if there were no dementors around, he could break through her spell, make a desperate leap for their wands and potions, buy more time for Joey.
Joey. A ray of hope, weak yet present, tiptoed through the sleet. Yes. Joey. She's coming, with loads of help.
"Yes…" The tiger mask's lips stretched wide over fangs, created the illusion of a cruel grin. Harry had no doubt that Dao's face had formed a similar expression beneath it. "Yours first, I think, Draco."
Don't use his name. You don't get to use his name. The words were trapped in Harry's throat. The ground was cold and damp beneath his knees - when had they stopped standing? Draco, thank Merlin, was conscious. He'd stopped muttering, but his eyes were wide in fear as the dementor stopped, hardly a meter away. Then something bright, something small, yet pulsing with blue, green, and yellow, began to gleam between Draco's lips.
"No!" Harry clapped his hand over Draco's mouth, but Dao's power, combined with the dementor's, drew Draco's soul slowly through Harry's fingers. "No…Stop! Stop it!" Harry was crying now, watching helplessly as the spark in Draco's eyes dwindled away.
Yet, this close, Harry could feel Draco's pulse, thumping like the slow wingbeats of a coasting bird. The feel of it gave him a smidge of hope - Draco was not dead yet, and neither was Harry. He was Auror Potter, the Boy Who Lived, the Chosen One. And he would not let Draco go this easily.
Then, Harry realized. Through the dementor's chill, the muted screams in his head, he noticed: Dao had used her magical power to its limit. The binding spell had fallen away; she depended now on the dementors to keep them down.
How wrong she was to underestimate Harry Potter.
Harry focused on the light of the tiger Patronus, the silvery protection that growled a few meters away. Whether Dao liked it or not, the light magic would grant him and Draco safety, too.
Harry lurched forward, dragging Draco with him, and they landed at Dao's feet. The glow slipping from Draco's lips abruptly returned within him as they reached the Patronus's circle of light, and he gasped like a drowning man coming up for air, lashes wet with fresh rain.
Dao growled, whirling to apprehend them, but Harry stood and aimed a hard kick at her stomach. Dao swiftly moved back, clenching her fists, and Harry was captured once more. He struggled, pressing his arms against the spell, fighting back with every ounce of energy he had left.
"Kayala did not lie about your strength," Dao muttered, seemingly to herself. The tiger flickered, and the dementors drew closer - the other wizards gasped in concern, and more Patronuses set forth once more. "Would you rather I take you first, Chosen One?"
Out of the corner of his eye, Harry saw Draco stand and begin to stumble forward. "What could you possibly have to gain?" He spluttered, keeping Dao's attention.
"Power beyond your wildest dreams." Dao's eyes narrowed - the violet seemed more fractured than ever.
"Oh, let me guess. Eternal life? Enough magic to conquer a nation?"
"Enough to conquer everything, between here and the stars. Enough to bring our people justice."
"'Our?'" Harry echoed. He wasn't sure he liked the sound of that.
"Oh, yes, Harry Potter." Dao looked over her shoulder, where Rabbit, flanked by two others, had begun to approach. "You will be the first price paid to the new age. You will join me, whether you like it or not."
The cacophony of voices speaking from behind her mask seemed to take on new meaning. Harry's blood ran cold with the thought of his joining them.
Six ruby-red silhouettes, joined by their Patronuses, circled Harry. Dao uttered a command, and slowly they began to back away, letting in another dementor.
Suddenly, an earsplitting blast wrought through the clearing. Harry dropped to the ground, and he winced, covering his ears as the aftershocks rippled, a high-pitched ringing echoing through his head. The earth had been torn apart, clods of dirt flung everywhere. The Following had all been flattened by an invisible force, coughing from smoke Harry could not see.
A wand flew handle over tip through the rain, and Harry caught it. Magic hummed through his body, crackling like electricity, and he grinned as the rain turned to steam around him.
Draco kneeled in the freshly-turned earth at the epicenter of the explosion. Harry began to call to him until he saw that the dementors, dozens of their faces turned towards Draco, had descended. Draco's wand hand hung uselessly by his side.
Fear was immediately followed by a sudden sense of calm. The dementors, blurred by the rain, were too far for the range of a Patronus Charm. Which meant Draco needed to cast it himself.
Or, Harry considered, with a bit of help.
"Amica Legilimens."
Draco's mind, muddled with fear, was easy to enter. Harry heard the same sounds he did: a deeper, male voice, shouting, and the shrieks and pleading of a woman.
Draco?
Harry? Draco's shock muted the voices for a moment, and Harry felt him reach out as if he were right there next to him. Time slowed, the raindrops sliding through the atmosphere like honey down a spoon. The laws of the universe itself bent to allow the extraordinary spell to do its work; Harry felt his energy waning as he conducted it.
I'm here.
Why?
I'm going to help you cast a Patronus Charm.
A disbelieving pause. I can't.
You have everything you need, don't you?
In answer, warm memories bloomed between them. The bubbling steam of a potion, their dimly lit kitchen, laughing himself hoarse with Ron and Hermione, sharing tiramisu on the stairs of Malfoy Manor. These moments were special to both of them, and Harry knew they'd need them all.
You know the incantation, Harry encouraged. I'll give you a little push, that's all.
I'll try.
Come on. Wand up.
With a trembling hand, Draco lifted his wand. Time began to move normally again, and the closest dementor whooshed straight towards his face, but Harry didn't break the connection.
"Expecto Patronum."
The two wizards spoke the spell in unison, and a silver light beamed through the forest clearing with an intensity that felt like a nuclear explosion. Harry shielded his eyes, but he smiled and knew that Draco was, too. The shared spell flowed between them, each one's magic magnifying the other. Harry felt as if he could fly, but he only opened his eyes as the light faded.
The dementors were gone, and in their place fluttered two pearl-silver birds, spiraling and diving around each other in a jubilant dance.
"Sparrows." Harry heard Draco's voice as if he was standing next to him. Gently, Harry severed the mind-reading spell, but the Patronuses didn't disappear, wings catching currents of invisible wind as they darted through the rain.
Then, steely ropes flung themselves around Harry, and he was pushed unceremoniously to the ground. His wand was yanked from his hand, and one of the sparrows disappeared.
Draco shouted something unintelligible, running towards him.
"Time to return your little favor," Rabbit snarled, picking Harry up by the scruff of his uniform. Their right fist crackled with lightning, and Harry closed his eyes tight on instinct.
Then Rabbit gasped. The ropes suddenly tightened around Harry's chest, knocking the air out of him. Woozily, he opened his eyes.
Rabbit's fist was covered in oozing blisters; they hissed in pain. Harry's eyes widened as his sideways gaze took in several gray-robed figures, led by a familiar witch in brightly colored Muggle clothes.
"It's been a while, Rabbit." Harry's old Defense professor, Dahlia Balengchit, her brown eyes as hard as stone, flicked the tip of her smoking wand, and the hex began to crawl up Rabbit's exposed wrists, making them cry out. "And you, Harry!" She added with a warm grin. "Nice to see you."
The shock of her appearance did not improve Harry's light-headedness. He fainted.