White Coat, Chapter 3.

warnings: handjobs

Thankfully Lucius was granted his own chair at dinner, their meal laid out in an elegantly intimate room. The table was small, allowing their feet to touch if either stretched their legs, which was something the blond tried to avoid and Potter persisted in. The young Auror asked him about his reading, a relatively safe topic they stayed on through the course of the meal until Lucius started to feel himself droop. Truly, it was only yesterday by his reckoning that he had been starving in a Ministry cell. His stomach was a swollen walnut pressing painfully on his other organs and he regretfully set his utensils down. It was irrational, but a part of him feared this whole day was little more than a pre-death hallucination. That any moment he was going to wake to his final Kiss and he fisted the white coat spilling over his lap. Of course, in his wildest imaginings he had never fancied himself married to Harry Potter.

"Ehmm," Potter hummed, rubbing his own stomach, "I'm stuffed. Time for bed, I think."

Lucius blinked, glancing to the clock he could see on the nearby side table. "It is barely past nine."

"I did not say I was going to bed. You're still recovering, fox. I'm sure you'd like a bath, as well. A nice, hot soak?"

A bath? That caught his attention like nothing else the man could have offered. While his person had certainly been cleaned since his arrival, he had no recollection of it and so still felt the stain of his imprisonment. Being allowed to properly cleanse himself would be most appreciated and he cautiously nodded. "An opportunity to bathe sounds agreeable."

Potter's mouth quirked. "So glad you approve."

A hot bath was indeed arranged, in a well appointed chamber located off of the chamber he'd woken in. A house elf saw to filling the large claw footed tub and then vanished with his clothes. Sweeping his long hair up off his neck with a clasp he located on the vanity Lucius eased his thinned frame into the hot water with a low exhalation of breath. A floral oil had been added to the bath, swirling lazily about his head. Lucius sank down until only his shoulders rose above the water, resting his head back on the cushion of a folded towel. Clean. He didn't even notice when his eyes drifted shut, drifting lazily towards sleep for an indefinite time.

The softest of touches slid across his collarbones and up to his neck, easing his head into the water. Feeling his hair freed Lucius murmured a complaint, but a deep voice reassured him. Nothing to fear here. Hands massaged his scalp, gently tugging at the yards of platinum. The sharp scent of flowers grew. Slitting his eyes open as his head was tilted back to carefully wash out the shampoo Lucius met luminous green eyes.

"There you are," Potter husked, bending down to deliver an upside down kiss before he straightened up and helped Lucius out of the bath. With chilled dignity the pale blond allowed the younger man to wrap his hair in an appropriately dark green towel and then accepted his hand in stepping out of the bath. He'd been stripped and violated by the Ministry with no recourse but to endure their cruel touching while incarcerated and Voldemort had similarly degraded him throughout his years of enslavement. This, this gentle quiet attention of Potter meticulously toweling him dry was near as painful, but for vastly different injury. The man seemed reverent and Lucius closed his eyes. He felt scalded.

"A robe, Lucius," Potter helped him into the Slytherin colored robe and then handed him the veela fur that had been carefully folded on its own stool next to the tub. He felt a scared child, but he could not help clutching at his coat, emboldened by its weight to follow Potter back into the bedroom. No matter what the Auror had said he well knew the man could take his coat back with the littlest provocation. With no wand and weakened by the muggle world, how could Lucius stop him? He didn't even remember how to put his coat on! It was a dead thing in his arms, a memory of a freedom he'd never had.

The brunette guided him to sit before the mirror at a dressing table and unwound the towel from his hair. A brush was retrieved from one of the dresser's many drawers and Potter set to working free the few tangles that had managed their way into the curtain of hair.

"Amazing how manageable all this hair is," Potter softly laughed, gathering the fall at Lucius' nape to more easily guide the brush from the crown of his scalp to the very ends some feet distant. Never having had anyone touch his hair in such a manner Lucius was disturbed to find himself relaxing into the low backed chair, eyes languidly blinking as he fought to keep his wits about him. His arms tightened about his coat.

"It is charmed," he whispered, slitting his eyes open to see Potter smile and nod in the mirror's reflection, wholly absorbed in his self-appointed task. By the time the man was satisfied with the sheen and drape of Lucius' mane the veela was again nearly asleep. Lips pressed beneath his ear as he was carefully lifted and carried to bed, but he was too tired to rouse himself. Gentle tugging unfurled his coat and then tucked it in about his supine figure. It was only a few hours later that the bed would dip under the weight of another body, but Lucius was still safe within his coat.

Though there was no sunlight to rouse him Lucius still stirred with the cresting of the morning, sleepily nuzzling into the warmth he curled into. For the first time in too long he actually felt the swollen weight of a morning erection and ghosted a lazy hand down. A knuckle stroked the sharp edge of his jaw, drawing him to tilt his face into a sweet morning kiss. Was this Harry, was he sweet? Fingers touched him beneath his coat, rubbing over the head of his penis, and his pleasure did not retreat.

"It's okay, fox," Potter whispered in his sleep roughened voice. "It's okay to take a little for yourself." A hand more calloused than his own encouraged him to fist his erection, to stroke it from root to head and the blond groaned. "That's it. Take it. Does that feel good? Yeah, that's it, that's it."

Lucius couldn't believe he was masturbating with Potter watching, but he hadn't touched himself in years. Not with the memory of Voldemort's clammy, claw-like hand squeezing his flesh. When he glanced down all he saw was his own white hand and Harry's tan one, warm and feeling so very good. Yessss, and then Harry fingered his sensitive piss slit, over and over, forcing him over the edge. He came into the brunette's hand with a helpless moan, eyes squeezing shut.

HPHPHPHPHPHP

Entering his husband's study after hearing the quiet permission to do so Lucius carried the two books he'd brought with him to Harry's desk and gently, near reverently, set them upon the polished wood. Lucius was familiar with the look of the documents Harry was reading, but Harry made no effort to hide the Auror reports.

"Hey," Harry greeted with his warm Gryffindor smile. "I thought I was going to have to drag you out of the library."

"I have questions," Lucius replied, too agitated to bother with pleasantries. "These books, they are too graphic. I cannot believe persecuted magical creatures gave them to you, their persecutor, a wizard."

The dark green eyes watched him carefully for what felt an eon before Harry slowly nodded. "I did not come to them as a wizard. When my thoughts turned to you I thought it was a spell and took my suspicions to Dumbledore. He confessed there was another reason for my interest.

"He explained that veela only mate for life with other veela. They may marry a muggle or wizard, father children, but that bond is not so resolute as the mating instincts between veela. They will abandon their old life, no matter how content they were, to join their destined mate. It is what happened to my grandmother and mother. My grandfather left them when he met his veela mate and my grandmother re-married to Theodore Evans. My mother's true father was never spoken about, but veela blood breeds true."

Lucius' quick mind leapt onto what Harry did not say, that his mother Lily was a veela. Like himself, which made her son quarter. But still veela.

"You are my mate."

Harry did not exactly look overjoyed, but he smiled. "Yes, Lucius. It's why I couldn't let anything happen to you. And before you ask, yes, I have my own coat. Dumbledore and Remus Lupin helped me through my first change."

He was married and mated to Harry Potter. That a month ago his prayers had been for a quick death to now have his life so irrevocably changed made his head ache. His mate. He couldn't remember leaving the study, whether he walked or ran, but he needed out. His chest felt too small, his heart struggling to beat, and he stumbled to his knees on the cobblestone path of the garden. It was as far as his freedom extended.

Married.

Mated.

Lucius threw back his head and screamed. The books he'd been plied with all spoke about the perfection of a veela mating, that it was a near joining of souls, but Lucius rejected all of it. He was caged and trapped, once again victim to his heritage. His father had cursed him to a deatheater destiny and his mother had provided the means of forcing him to it. Now he was enslaved to Harry be dammed Potter, his past and blood his shackles. From one master to another and he screamed out his frustration at the injustice. His father, Voldemort, and now Potter. His whole life he was destined to be someone's slave.

When his voice gave out he collapsed over his knees, clawing at stones with his blunt nails. He wanted out. He wanted to leave everything and just exist somewhere, no one and nothing anyone would care about. Just strip himself of every responsibility and escape into anonymity.

"Lucius, stop that," Potter snapped, kneeling in front of him to grab at his hands. "Hurting yourself is not going to make any of this go away."

The blond surprised himself by growling at the younger veela, but his mate ignored his struggles and protests, manhandling him onto his back with his hands pinned beneath Potter's straddling knees. Leaning over him Potter forced his head back and bit his throat, hard enough to make him choke and gasp. More surprising, though, was the immediate sense of calm Lucius felt, his body relaxing of its own volition. The pain of the bite faded as Potter laved the mark, licking up Lucius' throat and then to his mouth. It wasn't in the blond to protest the leisurely kiss, Potter's hands as gentle and coaxing as his tongue.

When Lucius didn't feel he had a solid bone left in his body Potter sat back, smiling softly. "There. Feel better now? I know you feel trapped, Luce, but please believe that I love you. Do you think you're alone in this confusion? I struggled for months accepting I was veela, and then that I had a mate. I felt too young. That it was totally unfair that I didn't get to sow more of my wild oats."

Lucius had not thought of that. Potter was barely into his twenties. To a wizard's lifespan he was barely a child and veela lived even longer. Besides having to take on saving the wizarding world the boy had had to deal with knowing he was mated to an enemy. An enemy he had gone to great lengths to save, and not just from the Ministry's retribution. Lucius panted under the sudden surge of his emotions and Potter returned to nuzzling his throat to calm him.

"Why don't we get to choose?" Lucius whispered. "Why are we trapped into every act?" The boy had done so much, he was at least owed the truth of his feelings. "Since birth I have been controlled at every turn and I am sick of it. I want my freedom."

Potter was quiet for several minutes then, buried into Lucius' neck and seemingly content to stay there. Kisses trailed up to his finely arched ear and fingers traced his mouth. "Don't you see this is freedom, Lucius? The outside world cannot enter here. There are walls to keep them out. Please don't think of our bond as enslavement. It is assurance, a confidence that to one person in the world you are everything. How many people can honestly make such a claim? It's liberating. You gave me the confidence to face Voldemort. It was for you that I fought. No one has cared about me, Harry, not the Boy Who Lived, since my parents died. No one has cared beyond my destiny to save them. When I accepted that you were my mate . . . I had doubted I was capable of such devotion never having known it. For the first time in my life . . . I don't right know how to describe it. I felt I could love. That I was free to love because you were mine."

Was that liberation? Pale blue eyes stared up into dark green in open confusion. "I do not know such love. Narcissa was arranged. I have never . . ."

"I know. And I'm not asking you to accept in a matter of days what took me months," Harry answered. "You are still healing." His hand slid down Lucius' trimly muscled chest. "In here. We're not going to undo years of abuse so quickly, but I will not allow you to hurt yourself. Scream and shout, growl at me all you want, but no physical abuse."

And that was how things stood. Lucius refused to acknowledge the little thrill of pleasure he felt at Potter's protectiveness, but he did not hurt himself again. He spent his days reading, in the library or the garden, left to his own except for meals he was not allowed to skip. A house elf always reminded him and the one time he forgot Potter came and collected him. Every night they slept in the same bed and Lucius did not protest Potter's embrace so long as he was allowed to keep hold of his coat. Several nights Harry pleasured him with his hands and mouth, somehow knowing when the blond veela would be receptive to his touch. The boy always seemed to know, taking Lucius in hand over lunch or in his study, working Lucius' pleasure with a confidence that left him weak and shaking afterward. Not once did Potter force him to touch his own interest though he would freely ejaculate after he'd satisfied his mate, burning gaze solely focused on Lucius' pale form. This too Lucius became used to and he started to watch Harry in turn, secretly pleased his interest seemed to fuel his mate's passion. Not once did Harry try to copulate with him and Lucius gradually relaxed into what was given.

It was through this trust that Lucius began to spend more of his evenings with Harry in his study. As a member of the Order of the Phoenix and a highly placed auror Potter's desk was always buried in correspondence and reports. The boy was in the thick of trying to win equal rights for Dark Creatures such as his friend Lupin , and themselves Lucius realized, while also keeping up with his other duties.

Ensconced on the study's rather comfortable couch, Lucius barely took note of the changes affected around his claimed area. A low table moved closer. A floor lamp placed at one end to afford better reading light. A quill and ink with an oddly bound sheaf of blank paper to take notes found itself onto the table. The additions were so quietly done and behaved so unobtrusively that Lucius' inclusion in the room seemed to come about quite naturally. So much so the blond did not blink when Potter casually handed him a report on the recent increase of migration in the werewolf population.

"Is it known why they're heading to Denmark?" Lucius asked once he'd finished the report.

"No, and the Ministry wants nothing to do with it," Harry answered without looking up from the stack of papers he was shuffling. "The Order wants to send Remus to check things out."

"A team of aurors should go as well," Lucius said, his suggestion prompting his mate to glance up.

"Why? No werewolf is going to talk to aurors."

Lucius pursed his lips. "They may not know the truth to why they are traveling to Denmark. The offer of asylum could be a trap. Aurors acting in an official capacity will focus the local government on them and allow Lupin greater freedom."

"A decoy?" Potter smiled, obviously liking the idea.

"Yes, though they might learn the truth themselves." That of course depended on the aurors, but that wasn't Lucius' concern.

The next evening there was a stack of reports waiting on the table when Lucius wandered in, a silently discreet invitation. It was his choice to ignore the reports and he did at first, reading his book for a good two hours before his curiosity got the best of him. None of the reports concerned deatheater activities or anything that might remind him of his old life. They weren't even all interesting, one having to do with zoning. Potter was obviously sounding out what interested him.

Lucius made notes on each report for the next several evenings. At his desk Potter was shuffling his mountains into new arrangements and the blond could easily guess what they were: what Lucius could look at, what he could not, and what required immediate attention since that stack was the smallest and seen to first.

There was more than Ministry reports, of course, the piles of mail having to pick themselves up from the floor several times a night from when Potter would angrily and gleefully shove them off. Mail floated about the desk like lazy moths and grew daily in volume since Potter seemed to open none of it.

"Potter," Lucius said after setting aside the zoning report he'd saved till last, "do you ever answer your mail?"

His mate's brow furrowed at the question. "Not most of it, no. It's all fan mail and requests for interviews I don't have the time to give." He batted at one of the letters. "They all want The Boy Who Defeated Voldemort and I frankly don't have time to be him."

Nor do you want to be, Lucius knew, but having been a politician he also knew the importance of pleasing the public. Potter needed a press assistant and Lucius was game enough to give it a go.

"Would you allow me to answer your mail?" Seeing his husband's surprise the blond rolled his eyes. "You don't need to write books to these people. Just short 'thank you's."

"I don't want to thank them, I want them to leave me alone," Harry grumbled.

"Well, that's unlikely to happen," Lucius snapped back. "You want the power to change things, then you need to stay in the public's attention. No one is going to listen to a recluse shacked up with his deatheater husband."

"Ex-deatheater," Harry shot back, "and you're welcome to read and answer all the fan mail you want. Though no," he frowned at the stack precariously holding to a corner of his desk, "some of the stuff is dangerous. One I opened had some love potion powder inside. Dumbest attempt ever since what I sneezed on was my coffee cup. Couldn't let go of the thing for days."

Lucius softly laughed at Harry's disgusted expression. If he had his wand he knew of a spell that would illuminate the harmful missives. As he didn't he simply told Harry instead.

"Good suggestion," Harry said, pulling his wand and quickly casting the spell. A good number of the mail glowed a bright blue and those Potter flooed away, but the rest floated themselves to Lucius' table, shuffling up into neat stacks. Proper parchment appeared next to them, magicked to seal and address itself.

It was months of unanswered mail, but Lucius found most of it pathetically amusing. Letter after letter praising Harry Potter as the savior of the world and gradually Lucius began to appreciate why Harry had retreated to this estate in the muggle world. The thousands of letters painted a frightening picture of god-like idolization. Not just in the British Isles either. There were post marks from as far away as South Africa and Lucius wondered if there was one place in the world his mate's status did not precede him.

No place but here and as Lucius wrote politely brief personalized notes of acknowledgement and thanks he realized Harry was as trapped here as he was. That this was what he meant about the walls keeping the world out. It was only here he was free to shuffle around in his worn muggle clothing and bare feet. Free to act and behave as he liked without the entire world watching.

And the only person he had invited inside was Lucius.

TBC.