Thank you for the reviews on the last chapter!
And Draco does what Draco would do in this chapter, since he's himself, and knows Harry, and is also very Stubborn.
Chapter Forty-Three: They Are Dancing
Draco sighed as he finished the last rune drawing. He did enjoy this class, but sometimes the tiny, endless, complicated variations on the runes made him want to scream. And they wouldn't even create some kind of amusing effect if you got them wrong, either. They just wouldn't work, and you wouldn't know it until you tried to use them.
Draco wondered why anyone would want to use them in battle, though he supposed their main use was outside battle situations. And yet there were those stories of rune-trained war witches and wizards…
He shook his head and tucked his thoughts back where they belonged, the same way he was slipping his book into his schoolbag. There was a time for thinking about class, and that was when he did homework or was actually in the classroom. Otherwise, he wanted to think about other things.
His mind returned at once to its favorite subject, of course. Harry.
Draco smiled slightly as he threaded between the desks and the other leaving students, heading for the door. He knew it was slow, that it would probably always be slow, but he and Harry were making progress. Harry had told him about Moody, and they watched the Defense professor together, though he made no more spectacular mistakes like trying to put Harry under Imperius. Harry didn't go provokingly out of his way to talk to other people just because Draco didn't like it. Harry noticed when something was wrong with him and asked about it.
Things weren't as perfect as Draco would like them to be, but they were not as stupid as they had been when Harry wouldn't talk about his mother, either.
And then, of course, Draco stepped out of the Ancient Runes classroom and found Harry leaning against the wall, waiting for him with a grave expression on his face.
"Why are you here?" Draco's mind sprang into motion, trying to find some explanation that didn't involve disaster for one or both of them. "Did you get hurt?"
Harry blinked, as though he thought it strange that that should be the first thing on Draco's mind, and shook his head. "Divination was canceled," he explained. "But I found something, and I wanted to tell you about it."
Draco let his shoulders fall, causing his bag to slip, and him to grab for it. Harry darted forward and steadied it with one hand. Draco glanced up at him. He felt his stomach tighten when he saw the gentle look in the green eyes, as though Harry were only waiting to break bad news.
"You did get hurt," he breathed.
Harry touched his shoulder, a motion so slight and swift that Draco barely felt it. He knew it had happened, though. He wasn't about to deceive himself when Harry made the rare motion to touch him first. "No," he said. "But I'm afraid that you may be about to. I need to speak with you in private, Draco."
Still not sure what this could be about, Draco nodded slowly. "No one should be in the further corners of the library at this time of the afternoon."
Harry sighed. "I'm afraid that won't do. Some room really private, Draco."
"Why?"
"You might…yell."
Draco linked the gentle look in Harry's eyes together with his behavior then. The idiot was about to make some other sacrifice. He would be convinced that it was for Draco's own good, of course, whatever it was. Probably he meant to end their friendship, or to back out on sharing things with Draco.
A heat shimmer of anger made its way up his spine. "There's a classroom on the second floor that's rarely opened," he said coolly. "Let's use that one."
Harry blinked, but looked just as happy not to have to climb staircases until they reached one of the classrooms on the seventh floor. "Let's," he said, and walked beside Draco as they turned down the hall. All the while, he looked at him out of the corner of his eye. His face was downcast but determined, and now and then he chewed on his lip.
Oh, yes. It's another sacrifice.
Draco could feel his anger baking his heart until it was hard as a coal. He did care about Harry, of course he did, but even a caring friend could get tired of these fits of his. And if what Harry wanted to take away from him was something that Draco also wanted, then he was prepared to fight for it. The gentle stubbornness Harry looked ready to exert was not going to be enough this time.
If he can't be selfish, I'm perfectly capable of it.
Draco extended his emotional senses. He'd been trying to keep them to himself in the past week, learning to drop the crutch of Harry's feelings and walk among other people, sensing only what he wanted to sense. The boy he loved was still the easiest target, however. He felt the slick stone of determination, smelled the honeysuckle scent of concern for him, and saw a brief flash of pink light that usually indicated Harry was about to do something "good" that he nevertheless didn't want to do.
Draco nodded briskly. He was only confirming his guess, and he had nearly convinced himself that whatever he wanted and would fight for would be what Harry wanted and was willing to fight for, too.
I'm not about to abandon him in any sense. He'd better not ask me to.
They reached the classroom, and Draco entered with a cautious look around. Moody did sometimes use this room to show physical demonstrations to his students that the ordinary room wasn't large enough to accommodate, but now it was empty. Harry ducked in, and Draco locked the door.
He'll probably try to bolt the moment he realizes how serious I am.
Harry turned to face him, his eyes wide and his face open. Draco held firm against it. It was a beautiful, coaxing expression, and it was manipulative. Harry had frequently used it to urge Millicent and Pansy out of bad moods.
"Draco," Harry said, "I saw a new shade, blue, in that glass serpent you gave me. I went to the library to look it up, and realized that it meant romantic love. I know that you love me, now." He took a deep breath.
Draco stared at him, his own shock sweeping away the emotional sensations coming from Harry. This was not the way he had envisioned Harry finding out. He had plans for what would happen when he finally told Harry, or, as seemed more and more likely, someone in Slytherin let it slip to him. He had never thought of this.
Then he took in Harry's expression again, and felt the irritation and anger turn to rage, hard and deep.
"And you've come to tell me that you can't return that love," he interrupted. It was not the end of what he wanted to say—he could anticipate Harry's answer, in fact—but it was a necessary step in the conversation.
Harry shook his head, eyes widening even further. He could make a killing in politics if he could just use that expression to mean other things, Draco thought cynically. "It's not that, Draco. If I could afford to love someone else, then I would love you. How could I not? You're the person I feel I know best, the one person who's managed to really correct your mistakes when it comes to me, and force me to correct mine, too." A brief smile blazed across his face like a falling star, and vanished again. "You've been my friend since we came to Hogwarts, and you went through trials that would destroy any ordinary person, and you're still right here. But I know that you must have fallen in love with some imperfect part of me, a part that you're convinced is perfect. So I came to tell you that I'm not really just that part of me. I know that you'll hurt for a while, but it would be immoral of me to keep on lying, just because I want to enjoy you love and your attention." He paused and looked at Draco attentively.
Draco was past rage, and into sheerest astonishment, not that far from amusement. Of course Harry was reacting like this. The really funny thing was that Harry thought Draco would go along with it.
He laughed.
Harry blinked, then bit his lip and looked thoughtfully at him. "Was I wrong?" he asked. "Did the blue color really mean you love someone else?"
Oh, no, he doesn't. Draco took a few steps forward and grabbed Harry's hand tightly. It must have hurt, but Harry didn't wince or pull back. He just stood there, patiently waiting for Draco to explain things to him. He would not think there was anything wrong with what he'd said, of course.
"I've gone through a lot, you said," Draco muttered to him. "Trials that would have destroyed any ordinary person."
"I did mean that." Harry narrowed his eyes, his own temper obviously stung. "I'll repeat it as often as you want me to. I don't say things I don't mean—not to you."
Draco felt a rising sweetness threaten to distract his attention from the matter at hand, but he pushed it aside. He had a lot to make clear to Harry in the next little while. "I know you meant that," he murmured, leaning closer. Harry just stared straight at him, refusing to back down or be intimidated. That was one of the things Draco loved about him, and he let that shine in his eyes even as he glared. "What you don't understand, Harry, is that I'm not in love with some imperfect part of you. I've seen what you really are, all the irritating parts included, and that's the person I love."
"You can't," said Harry. "You stand condemned out of your own mouth."
Oh, yes, just try and play lawyer, Harry. You've never been good at it. Draco raised his eyebrows in polite question.
"You came to me and had a conversation with me, just before Christmas, about perfection," said Harry, lifting his chin. "You said that you felt there was only one witch or wizard out there for every other wizard or witch. That they could be perfect for each other. We disagreed, remember? I don't believe in that kind of perfection, Draco. But if you love me, and if that's what you think you've found in me, it's an obvious mismatch between what you want and who I really am. I don't believe in your ideal of perfection, and your perfect witch or wizard would have to do so."
Draco found himself closer to the edge of anger than he would have liked. Merlin, Harry, you manage to shove me around more effectively than anyone else ever has. He caught his breath before he could blurt out something hurtful.
"I was expressing an ideal, Harry," said Draco. "That's all. I'm not surprised that you took me the wrong way. I barely knew what I was saying myself, caught as I was between trying to state what I felt for you and keep you from guessing that it was you I felt it for. But suffice it to say that I can live with someone who doesn't accept just the same beliefs that I do. Very easily. I've done it for four years, haven't I?"
"Three and a half," Harry corrected.
"I'm not going to let your pedantry ruin this," said Draco. "I'm not going to let anything ruin this." He was walking a fine line. He really would have liked to yell at Harry about being stupid, or kiss him, or do something else that would dispense with the need for all this careful talking. But Harry would find it a lot easier to ignore those things. These words would go to the heart of him. "If you tell me to go away, then yes, of course I will. But everything else is just a remnant of those idiocies you've been told." I'll keep my promise not to hurt Harry's mother. I won't even mention her. "You said you would consider me if you could afford to love someone else. What did you mean by that? Why can't you afford to?"
Harry tugged on his arm, trying to back away. Draco wouldn't let him go. Harry hissed at him, and still Draco kept him close. He'd noticed that Harry liked to withdraw into himself when he discussed anything that touched on his training. A physical hold made it harder for that to happen, and the one thing Draco absolutely did not want to happen now was for Harry to find his own logic and start fighting back against Draco on equal ground.
Plenty of time for us both to be equal later. Not now. And if that makes me a sneaky, good-for-nothing Slytherin, so be it. I wasn't fair when Harry had just woken from that dream, either.
"You know the answer," Harry said at last, seeming to decide that he would settle for meeting Draco eye to eye if he couldn't back away. I'm not scared, his face proclaimed, while the way his hand shook betrayed otherwise. "I'm going to die in this War, Draco. It's almost certain. And if I survive, I'm not going to have any time for a lover. I'll have too much to do, for the other magical creatures and for the surviving wizards. It wouldn't be fair to you, either, to demand that you become some sort of war spouse who only waits at home for your husband to come back to you. I won't ask that of you. I would never ask it of anyone, but especially of you. You're as free as anyone else. You should have the right to choose your own life."
Pretty, Draco had to admit. I think there are a whole lot of people who would be convinced by that—either in thinking that they should choose someone else, or thinking that that meant Harry was just cold and didn't want any kind of companionship.
Too bad for them. I know him better.
"I'm never going to wait at home, Harry," he said. "I am going into the battles right alongside you so that I can fight at your side, and the politics so that I can plot with you, and whatever other arena you enter. I love you. I love everything that's in you. Nothing about you is strange to me, and no part of your life is going to be strange to me, either. I know that we're never going to be identical, and I've seen that since I summoned Julia Malfoy, but we can be equal." He paused for a moment, then shrugged. I've said other things that could sound stupid if Harry took them that way. I might as well say this. "I want sunlight love with you, if you're familiar with that term."
Harry's face washed of color. Then he said, "But you want moonlight love."
Draco blinked at him. He thought he'd done well so far, but he just couldn't keep up with Harry, the way he rushed up to the edge of a cliff made of logic, jumped off it, and landed on the far side of a different ravine altogether. "Why do you think so?"
"All that nattering about perfection." Harry had his eyes narrowed, as though he were examining a fly someone had dropped in his glass of pumpkin juice. Draco felt a surge of hope. You had everything planned out, didn't you, Harry? And then I rearranged it. "It's moonlight love that's called perfect. Sunlight love burns people, sometimes. It's too fierce. If you want someone perfect, then you want love like the moon."
"No," said Draco slowly. He could understand the confusion, but he didn't understand the pallor of Harry's face when he spoke of it. "I'm quite sure. I want love like the sun. I think everyone does, of course, unless they're mad and want the darkness, but most people have to settle for what they get. I'm not settling. I've got you, until the moment when you utterly tell me to go away." He clasped Harry's other hand while he was distracted.
"This isn't—" said Harry, and then stopped. He tugged against Draco's grip. Draco ignored the motion. Harry looked away from him for the first time, staring down at his own hands. "You want sunlight love," he said, his voice suddenly clipped. "That's fine. That's perfect. I hope you find it. But you're not going to find it with me."
Draco gritted his teeth. He felt sick to his stomach, but he also remembered all the idiocies that Harry believed about himself. This was probably directly traceable to another of those idiocies. "Why is that? Do you not want it yourself?"
"I want it myself," Harry said. "But it's a stupid dream. A child's dream, like you said. Most people have to settle for what they get. And I've got something else. I've got a duty that won't go away, and if I let myself start thinking that I'll get a spouse or a lover, it'll disrupt things. I was made to help other people, Draco. I stay in the background, and I make them happier. That's what I'm supposed to do." This time, he pulled violently enough that Draco was forced to loose his left hand.
It was still going much more positively than Draco had expected it to go at this point, though. For one thing, Harry could have used his magic at any time to break free, or pin Draco to the wall, or make him shut up, and it hadn't even occurred to him. He was vibrating with distress, but he hadn't called his power.
For another, Draco knew the enemy, now, and he could attack it with every weapon at his command.
"That's stupid, Harry," he said, keeping his voice low and compelling. "Why should everyone else have a lover, and you don't get one? What's the big exception about you?" He cocked his head. "You're the one who's said before that other people are far better than you are, that you weren't anything special." That statement had always made Draco want to laugh himself sick, but he knew it was what Harry himself believed.
"That's the thing about me," Harry said. He was trying to put the shattered pieces of his mask back in place, and failing. "They're better than I am, Draco. Everyone is wonderful. You deserve someone who can make you happy, who can love you the way you want. And I'm not going to be that person."
"It's not that you're not that person by nature, Harry," said Draco. "It's not even that you don't want to be that person. What is it?"
"It isn't—" Harry swallowed. "There's not—" He stopped, looking utterly lost.
Draco understood. Harry saw where this road led as clearly as he did. If Harry admitted that one fundamental truth like this about himself was a lie, he would have to admit others were. The house of cards would start coming down, even if it took years for it to fall completely. Harry wouldn't be able to hide any more behind stupid, illogical assurances like everyone else being a better person than he was. He would have to give in and admit that he was just fine in some ways, and good in others, and engage with people as a wizard and not some distant, aloof benefactor.
It was frightening, Draco supposed, and that was why Harry was currently fighting the realization with all his might. And the method he chose would have worked, with someone else who knew him less well than Draco did.
"I've done horrible things, Draco. You know that. I summoned Dark magic. I haven't cared enough. I've made so many mistakes. I knocked you out and left you behind last year when you wanted to go with me. I valued Connor over you until the end of last year, and I know that always irritated you." Harry turned wide eyes on him once again. "Don't you see? Those are parts of the kind of person I am, too."
"I know that," said Draco. He was feeling calm, past the initial surge of emotions that had fastened him to Harry's side in the first place. "And what you don't seem to understand, Harry, is that I forgive you for those. Your own credo. I know you hate its being used against you, but there you go. Sometimes we can't choose what our friends do. Or our lovers, for that matter."
"Don't you understand?" Harry wrenched backwards. Draco let go of his right wrist and took his left one. "This could happen again."
"Then I'll get angry," said Draco. "And then I'll forgive you, and then we'll be back here again. Unless you tell me to leave you alone, Harry, that you don't want to love me in that particular way. I'll leave you alone, then. But you have to tell me first. Your attempts to frighten me away don't frighten me in the least."
Harry glared at him helplessly. Draco rearranged his face in his best helpful expression.
"Damn you, this isn't funny," Harry hissed at him.
"I know," said Draco. "I never said it was."
"It's—you can't love me like that," said Harry.
"Why?" Draco asked. "Is this your telling me to go away?" He braced himself. He would hate it, it would hurt, but he honestly felt as though he would have jumped off a cliff at that moment if Harry told him to.
"No," said Harry. "It's impossible like you flying without magic is impossible. You can't. If you could really see my soul, then you wouldn't love me. You're still seeing a bit of me, and convincing yourself that I can be good based on that. But that part isn't me, Draco." He looked a bit calmer now that he was twisting logic back into tortured shapes, Draco thought. "I'm not what you think I am."
"How do you know that?" Draco asked. "You're not in my head, sharing my judgment."
"Because I know myself," said Harry, and smiled slightly. "And if you love me, then you must not know the truth. One implies the other." He looked half-relaxed.
"You've looked into my mind, and seen what I feel." Draco could keep himself going in the face of this. He could. Breaking down into a tantrum would feel good, but it would not help, and Draco was past the point when he flew into anger or tears just because it felt good. "Can you think me mistaken, after that, Harry?"
"You could believe that I really am as you see me. That doesn't mean it's the truth."
Fight poison with poison, then. "And how do you know that your own view of yourself is correct? Unless you're suddenly manifesting magical talents that you haven't bothered to share with me, you can't see your own soul, either."
Harry's smile withered. Draco lifted his head. I thought so. He isn't back in his secure view of himself, yet. I can still take his wobbly tower down with a statement as simple as this one.
"Because I know," said Harry, his voice growing tight. "Because I've been told that all my life—" He stopped.
Draco rubbed his hand gently, making the motion a contrast to his harsh words. "Because your mother told you, isn't that right, Harry? Your mother whom you know lied to you and abused you?"
"Stop it." Harry lunged around him for the first time, heading for the door. Draco spun, but kept his feet anchored, holding Harry still.
"No," he said. "I won't. I promised that I wouldn't hurt her or insult her, but I never said I wouldn't speak the truth, Harry. And I certainly never promised that I wouldn't insult you. The truth is that you're being a coward. You're so scared of what it means if you're better than you think you are that you want to run away from me."
Harry turned back around. A soundless scream was issuing from his mouth, and he panted with tears in his eyes. He shook his head madly as he backed up from Draco. "No," he whispered. "This isn't—it can't be what you want it to be. Because it isn't. And I know it doesn't make sense, and I know that you'll say that, and I don't care, because that's the way it is."
Draco took a deep breath. He wanted badly to let Harry go, let him regroup. They would have the rest of their lives to work these things out. On the other hand, let him go now, and he didn't know if he would get this far again. Harry was going to build his walls high and strong, and come up with more logical arguments to distract Draco's attention from the illogicalities sitting right in the middle of him. And in another mood, Draco didn't think he could be as generous and forgiving as he was right now.
Or maybe you're just scared of living with Harry when he knows that you love him.
Draco acknowledged that, and put the thought away, because it wasn't useful right now.
"Listen, Harry," he whispered. "Is there anyone whose judgment you would trust to be unbiased, someone who could see your soul and tell you the truth about it?"
"The Seer," Harry muttered. "Vera. The one you met the night you summoned Julia. But she's back in her Sanctuary now. There's no one near me whose judgment I would—"
Abruptly, he froze. Then he said, "You wouldn't really make me go to them, Draco, would you?"
"Go to whom?" Yes, I will. I'm sorry, Harry, but even if you don't choose me after all, I want you to have this. Vera might have made you look at your soul, but then she went away again. This has to be a gaze you can't back away from.
"The unicorns," Harry breathed. "They can recognize innocence. They can recognize goodness. I think I know how to break their web now." He turned those wide, appealing eyes on Draco one final time. "But that wouldn't be right, would it? Because I would have a selfish purpose in breaking the web, and that wouldn't be in accord with what a true vates should do. So we could wait—"
"And then you would have an even more selfish purpose in waiting," Draco cut in. "Besides, Harry, you told me that a true vates is supposed to know himself inside and out, and shouldn't that include whatever truth the unicorns can tell you?"
Harry closed his eyes. His expression was of someone who knows that he can't stop the boulder already falling.
"All right," he whispered. "Yes. I—we'll go to them."
Draco nodded. "Right now."
Harry opened his mouth, but obviously saw it would do no good. He gave a tiny nod.
Harry was shaking as he walked along the path into the Forbidden Forest, ducking beneath branches slick and starred with ice-flowers. It wasn't from the cold, nor yet from the tight grip that Draco had on his wrist, the grip he hadn't once released, though that felt too good. It wasn't even from the thought of facing the unicorns.
It was from the thought of facing what came after the unicorns were free, of not being able to hide any more.
A hoof sounded off to the side. Harry knew it was the centaurs watching them, and kept his eyes focused dead ahead.
One way or another, he was going to have to go forward from this. This was a crossroads, and someone had shut the gates behind him.
Harry darted a glance at Draco. No, not some mysterious someone. I know his name perfectly well.
A glimpse of white showed through the trees to one side—a falling snowflake.
He was not going to be able to change what happened.
A convulsive shiver gripped him, and Harry held himself with his free arm.
Bells rang through the Forest.
Startled, Harry jerked to a stop, and felt oddly naked for a moment. The last time he'd been in the Forest, the Many snake had ridden his arm, and he'd been able to use that to distract Tybalt and John. Since December, however, the Many snakes had been all together in their den, tending the eggs about to hatch, and Harry had nothing but his own magic and the courage of his convictions, which felt like very far from being enough.
The bells rang again, and a unicorn stallion walked onto the path.
Harry watched him come, his coat catching the quick winter light in mirror-colored shimmers. His golden hooves rose and fell in odd motions that didn't seem to echo the chiming sound of them. His head bobbed, his neck rolled, and his ears twitched in motions that mimicked a deer's more than a horse's, but all of the motions only seemed to rush into light that rippled towards that silver horn.
Unicorns are creatures of clear sight—honesty, Light. He knows what I've come for.
Harry put out one hand. The unicorn came to him, but halted just shy of a touch, his head lowered and his horn pointed towards Harry's left shoulder.
Harry took a deep breath and closed his eyes. When he opened them, he could see the blazing web that crawled over the unicorn and crept into the Forest to encircle the others. He knew, from hints he'd read in the books during his research on unicorns, that Dobby had been right in what he said about that web. Ancient wizards had bound the unicorns because they were too beautiful.
But they had also bound them because they were beautiful. They wanted unicorns always nearby to look at. They could not bear the thought of them dispersing, the way they would, naturally, and living one or two at a time, apart from each other, in places that they would hallow. They could not bear the thought of going a lifetime without seeing one, or only catching a glimpse of a white shape darting through a clearing, and a distant, muffled sound of bells.
But that distant, hurried glimpse by sunlight or moonlight was what should have happened, and what the unicorns wanted to happen, and it was what Harry was finally ready to give them.
He forced himself to ignore his own motivation, and Draco standing motionless, rigid with wonder, at his side. He reached out, and dipped under the web, and found the weak spot in the center of it.
Wizards were complacent now, knowing exactly where unicorns lived and what had to be done to keep them that way. They might come and stare a few times in their lives, but then they would go away again. Those ancient wizards had been desperate for a glimpse of beauty, and their desire had kept the web strong. As desire faded, the strands in the center of the net were also unraveling.
Harry now had to conquer, mainly, his own desire to keep that beauty snared and near.
And it was harder than he had expected. He pictured never seeing a unicorn again in his life, and though he had seen them only a few times, and once had been to watch Quirrell kill one, he struggled. It was like being asked to yield one of the colors he had always known. What would his world be like if he could suddenly no longer see silver, or white, or gold? The others would still be there, but they could not take the place of the one he had lost.
The unicorn stallion made no motion to help him one way or the other. He stood watching, waiting. A subtle shine permeated his coat.
Harry closed his eyes more tightly, and found the answer in his own habit of sacrifice and what the unicorns would want. He could give up this one thing he liked. He had given up things that meant more.
And the unicorns…
Harry pictured them as free, which they would be when he was done with them, and then he was crying, tears streaking his face, and then he reached out and took hold of the web, and it parted like dead skin in his hands. Someone had finally, finally, wanted the unicorns to feel pleasure more than he wanted to feel it himself, and that had been all it took. Harry mourned, that the unicorns had been enslaved for so long for so simple a reason.
Then the mourning vanished.
Harry opened his eyes.
And, for the first time, he looked straight into the heart of Light, and he understood, in that flash, why his mother and Dumbledore both loved it so much.
The unicorn shone against his surroundings, beauty of the kind that was higher and brighter and richer than what was around him, beauty that did not make the bracken and the withered leaves and the ice seem worthless, but transfigured it and lent back his own light to glorify it the more. For the first time, Harry knew what color joy had.
Then his own skin began to blaze.
Startled, Harry looked down at himself. His skin had turned transparent, and he could see a deep, clear green light welling from his arms and his wrists. It spread, pulsing, down his body, and then acquired a tinge of gold. Gold-green, the color of leaves in sunlight, the colors that Harry knew meant, together, a soul on the edge of both darkness and light, but also one that was entering into the summer of its being, and had a summer to offer others.
That hid inside him. If it was not the color of his soul, it was, at the very least, a color of who he was.
The realization chopped the legs out from under him. Harry sank into the snow of the path, and the green-golden light came with him, beaming, growing brighter now, soaring out of him, bringing a radiance to the Forest that made it look as if it were bathed in a burning spring. Harry felt Draco kneel down beside him and embrace him. He tried to speak, but he couldn't. His throat was tight with sorrow and elation keen enough to kill him. He couldn't hear what Draco was saying; the world was one madly thrumming mess, thanks to his heart going in his ears.
That could not cover the sound of his thoughts, though, and they repeated one thing over and over. My mother was wrong. Oh, she was wrong.
And out of the trees came the other unicorns, their legs bending like reeds, their necks bobbing like swans courting, every step light enough to be a dance. They gathered, and then they began to gallop, an enormous, turning circle around Harry and Draco, each one blazing like a stained-glass window with the sun shining through it, gratified and fulfilled and exalted.
Harry felt the lump in his throat dissolve, and he cried again, hard as he tried to resist the tears. The barriers were broken, and he had come out of the autumn and winter into summer and spring.
The circle began to blur, gaining speed. The unicorns trailed clouds of glory now, streaks of blue and red and gold and green as well as the more usual white and silver. The path and the Forest filled with the radiance of a hundred thousand dawns, rising straight up into the sky, like an aurora.
With the light went the unicorns, whirling ascending, not distinct shapes but winds of light now, the smaller shapes the foals, the larger shapes the mares and stallions, rippling through an endless spectrum of shades.
But Light. Always, Light.
They reached a point about a hundred feet into the air, and then they trembled. For a moment, the whole vision froze. Harry could hear Draco gasping beside him. He looked up, to remember this. For sure, he would never see anything like it again. The unicorns were free now.
There came a moment when he wished it could be permanent, and then he discarded that, because change was the law of life.
Then the image resounded with one musical cry, and broke apart. Burning streaks raced away towards all the edges of the horizon. The unicorns were scattering through the world now, Harry thought, and Muggles might glimpse them speeding along the streets of their cities or grazing in a back garden as easily as the wizards would see them in wild forests or galloping along the edge of the sea. Unicorns went where they pleased, and now, for the first time in centuries, they could do it again.
The silence and the dimness that fell seemed very foreign, after that, or would have, were it not for the aftertastes of light still lingering on the bracken and the ice, the leaves and the path.
Harry's green-golden shine gently faded, though some motes flashed, lingering like last notes of music. Harry could hear his own gasping now, too. He closed his eyes tightly and strove for some sense of self-control.
"You know," he whispered, "that it might be a long road to walk before I can love you just the way you love me."
"I know," Draco whispered. His voice was hoarse. "But are you going to refuse to walk that road, now?"
Harry shook his head, and then found the courage to turn, open his eyes, and look at Draco.
Draco was smiling at him. There was summer in his eyes.