Obsession and Her Trappings
(Pairing, summary, and ratings can be found in chapter one.)
*****
Chapter FiveHarry 3— A Night for Revelations
Harry Potter squinted, pushing his glasses up the bridge of his nose. "That's supposed to look like a bear?"
Hermione Granger looked up from her work. "Of course it is." She snatched the paper from him with impatient fingers. "See?" She pointed, careful not to touch the immaculate drawings. "That's its nose, pointing at the herdsman, and those are its paws along the bottom."
"I guess I just don't see these sorts of things," he said, shrugging his shoulders.
With a long look that was all too scrutinizing for his liking, she put the star chart away. "Well, I don't see how you managed to draw one that's any better. I consulted loads of sources on the best way to connect all the points, and I checked my sketches three times last week to make sure that they were accurate."
"When is this due again?"
She pursed her lips, contracting them into a hard line. "Tomorrow."
Harry's breath caught in his throat. He sputtered, choking on air. "You're kidding, right?"
"Harry, you haven't drawn this star chart yet?"
A miserable nod.
"But you knew it was due tomorrow; I specifically remember you asking Professor Sinistra it if we were to do it in ink the day that she assigned. It was the day before we had that huge Transfigurations test, when Fred and George gave out all those cookies…. You can't tell me that you forgot about it!"
But, naturally, he had forgotten; how could he have been expected not to? He remembered that day, of course— that was when he had received his prophecy. Ask for what you want, even if you know you can't have it. As if any horrendous, long-term Astrology assignment had been more than a passing cloud in the tempest that was blowing through his mind. A chill blew through him, rattling his teeth. This was just great, wasn't it?
Harry had been teasing Hermione earlier today that she was going to become a teacher, and he saw how accurate he had been. Her eyes were February-frosty, and her tone was that professorial blend of anger and disappointment. "This is the second assignment this week that you've forgotten about. Honestly, I don't where your mind has been lately."
Harry looked down at his hands; he hadn't realized that he had balled them into fists. If she only knew what had monopolized his thoughts lately, he thought ruefully. Ever since that awful fortune cookie, Draco Malfoy had taken up permanent residence in the back of his mind, always ready to swoop down and occupy his thoughts at the slightest provocation. And after that night in the Potions corridor, it had only gotten worse. In ways that he most certainly wasn't aware of, Draco was making Harry's life miserable.
Perhaps seeing his distress, Hermione softened. She rested a hand on his shoulder, and her eyes lost their coldness. "I'm sorry for getting on you like that. I can just tell that something's been bothering you lately, and seeing you like this has been driving me crazy." She smiled. "If there's something you ever want to talk about, you know I'll listen." The hand squeezed his shoulder. "Right?"
"Right," he said, hoping that he sounded convincing enough. "And I might just take you up on that offer soon." He didn't know about that, but she really did seem concerned. Maybe he needed to talk with someone, and Hermione had always been the one person that he'd trust this with. "But right now, I think I have a star chart to draw."
He glanced at her paper. "You wouldn't be willing to perhaps contribute all that effort to a worthy cause, would you?"
She raised an eyebrow.
"Thought not," he said. "Could you at least give me a general idea of where in the castle I should go to see all these blasted stars, then?"
"Normally, I'd be opposed to giving you any sort of unfair aid; it took me four days to find the right spot." She smiled. "But, seeing as we're not allowed to use the Astronomy Tower and you're in a rather desperate position, I'll tell you where I went."
"Great!" Harry stood. "Just let me go get my things, and then you can give me directions."
A branch knocked against one of the common room windows, and a gust of wind blew through the fireplace, almost putting the flames out. Hermione pulled her cardigan closer around her neck. "I'd grab your coat, too, if I were you," she said, a hint of humor in her voice. "It's going to be bloody freezing out there."
*****
It was bloody cold, Harry groused as he trudged through the snow. His ears were stinging and the wind was swirling around him, stirring up the snow so that it blew into his face. He wiped his eyes and lowered his head, instead focusing on his feet. They crunched the snow, sinking in several inches with each step. Turning around, he could see a trail of ungainly holes that marked his passing. He felt like tiptoeing then, or floating, so that the ground remained pristine.
For some reason, Harry thought of a TV program he had been shown in Muggle primary school, about the first man to travel to the North Pole. Imagine— miles and miles of virgin land, untouched by man. Plains of pure white, unspoiled by the failures and folly and fame of humanity, pure visions of snow and sky. A land of eternal ice. How beautiful, how wonderful in it own horribly lonely way.
The path that he treaded was rambling and faint, weaving through mottled brush and trees. It was only discernable by the gold ribbons someone had tied on the tree trunks to mark the way. He reached over and tried to touch one, but it slipped from his grasp. (Of course a path around a magical school would have magical markers.) Moonlight streamed through the canopy, and he could see the sky past the spindly reaches of the bare trees.
He was on his way to a clearing outside of the other end of the castle. In the center of it, there was an old bench, carved by one of the school's founders and covered with pictures of the constellations. Hermione had read about the place in Hogwarts, a History; it was the best place for stargazing besides the Tower. Something about the orientation of the bench with the North Star— he hadn't really been listening to that part.
Harry was reasonably sure that Hogwarts was to his left; Hermione had said that the path weaved through the beech grove that surrounded its oldest sections. The trees grew thick and tall on either side of him, but they lacked the sinister shadows of those in the Forbidden Forest. He was skirting the outer edges of it, keeping far from its mysterious depths.
Harry looked up at those dratted stars. They were so distant, existing billions of kilometers from earth. Their fires burned, but only for themselves— they could never share that warmth with anyone. He glanced about him, making sure that no one was nearby. With a sigh, Harry closed his eyes and blew a kiss to those stars. He knew what it was like to love in vain, after all.
Something howled from deep in the Forest, and his eyes snapped open. Now was no time for romantic nonsense, he reminded himself. He was still too close to the Forbidden Forest for comfort; he wouldn't have come out here if he could have avoided it. There were plenty of hungry beasts and other nighttime nasties that trawled its outer edges, creatures he was sure a fifth year Defense Against the Dark Arts student was not competent enough to handle. Even one with experience in fighting the powers of evil.
He wished he had the Marauder's Map with him; the thing was an invaluable guide at times like these. Somehow, his father and his friends had managed to cover every inch of this school in their nocturnal journeys. They probably knew even more about it than Hermione's books did. He had lent it to Seamus last night, who had needed to find a quiet place for one of his 'study sessions' with a bubbly Ravenclaw. Now, trekking through the aftereffects of a blizzard with a nose that was becoming numb, Harry regretted being so magnanimous.
Even the Invisibility Cloak
would have been a blessing— but no, he had forgotten all about it in his
rush. He shivered, and briefly
considered going back to get it. There
wasn't time, though; he had to finish this tonight. Much as he missed its warmth, he didn't dare risk going back for
it. If he ran out of time, and missed
yet another assignment…. The thought
was too distasteful to complete.
Malfoy. If it weren't for that prig he wouldn't be out here. Stupid cookies, too; they were what had really started him on the road to tonight. Before the Weasleys' shoddy invention, he had been able to keep his Draco fascination to a bearable level. True, the sight of that slender figure did always jolt him and send his nerves whirring, but he had been able to manage his secret and keep it from interfering in his life.
After that fortune, though, the bloody floodgates had opened. Ask for what you want, even if you know you can't have it. The nighttime dreams got worse (or better, he supposed; it was all a matter of perspective), the daydreams became nearly incapacitating, and his schoolwork began to slide as Arithmancy derivations were slowly replaced in his notebooks by looping D's and H's. That fight after Potions only exacerbated the tension. Damn Malfoy to hell!
Much as he would love to ignore it, though, the thought of Draco did warm him. Strange, because he always looked so cold; Harry had imagined that the touch of Draco's hands would freeze him. And yet, that night in the corridor, his body had been aflame. It was funny that, in all these years at Hogwarts, this was the closest Harry had ever gotten to him— their bodies pressed on the floor, both attempting to beat the shit out of one another. Close enough to kiss him, perhaps, but definitely close enough to mar that alabaster skin. Maybe they had been close enough to do both.
There had been a raw intimacy that night, a strange slithering something that had affected him. Their bodies, seeped in adrenalin, had pounded against one another in a fashion that was primal, pure, and wonderful. It had transcended their rivalry, moving past anything that trivial. Somehow, in a flurry of punches and kicks and scratches, they had stripped each other down to their very cores in a way that was almost sexual. Surely Draco had felt it. Ask for what you want, even if you know you can't have it.
Harry had returned to Gryffindor tower bruised and aching, both inside and out.
Ron, who had been whipping Neville at Exploding Snap, had seen his black eyes and the way he was cradling his left arm, holding it against his body as if it were an infant. Rather than explaining what had happened, however, he had just shuffled into the empty dormitory, and crawled into bed.
Feeling the heavy weight of his covers on his chest, he had closed his eyes. Plummeting into deep fantasy, he had pretended the blankets were Draco's body, pressed against his own again. He sucked in a breath of crisp outdoor air, and remembered jerking off— hand wrapped around himself, moving violently, those eyes in his mind, pretending that he was back in that corridor and that those were Draco's elegant fingers teasing the head of his cock. Ask for what you want, even if you know you can't have it.
When he had realized that he was about to come, he had shoved his other fist into his mouth to stop himself from calling out that name. He bit down on his knuckles, drawing blood that he had sucked desperately, telling himself that it was Draco's and not his own. The thought had pushed him over the edge.
Harry blinked, and realized that he had stopped. The memory had been so vivid that it had impaired his thinking— for a moment there, he had been almost sure that he was back in bed that night. Never mind. Hadn't he just scolded himself for not keeping alert? He looked up at the stars, and they winked at him. A strange thought flitted through his mind— perhaps it was by their design that his mind had wandered? Shaking his head, he started walking once more. He had work to do.
Tonight, though, did not seem like a time to be working. A night for revelations, a night for battles lost and won, a night for cities to rise and civilizations to crumble— but not a night for homework. Yes, he could imagine Rome on a night like this, its denizens warm and safe, sleeping without ever imagining the barbaric hordes that were using the darkness to steal into the city. Harry turned around; he was almost sure he had heard a whispered echo of the past. Not a time to be productive, indeed.
It was all the stars' doing, he decided; it was on their watch that this strange sense was arising. They provided the forest with a stark glow; they watched like opera patrons as the Greek tragedy of human existence played out below them. The trees were merely cardboard props, the night that hung at the edges of Harry's vision merely the curtains at the wings of this stage.
With a shrug, Harry nodded to the sky in acknowledgement. He resigned himself to this; the star chart just wasn't getting done right away. Another victory for the forces that be. He smiled, letting it wash over him— the stars, the snow, the sky. Maybe he'd do his work later; he didn't want Hermione to chew him out again. But the important thing now was to appreciate it all. There would be time enough for work.
Harry walked on, happy to exist. The stars were grinning down at him, and he smiled back. It was still cold and his feet were still wet, but it was okay. He was heading towards something, and he was content to be led there. Best now just to enjoy the way. He saw the shadows of the forest, listened to the night sounds, and felt the wind as it whistled through the trees.
There was the clearing. The trees pulled back suddenly; they fled and left a naked patch of snow-white ground. There was the bench, as gnarled and old as one of those magical trees the Druids used to worship. And there, standing before it….
Ask for what you want, even if you know you can't have it.
Draco Malfoy.
*****
(end part five)
Note: I'm sorry this chapter was so late in coming. Real life stepped in, as my beta would say. My sincerest apologies if I've kept anyone waiting. Chapter Six will be up in much less time than Five was, I promise.
-E.H.