Thanks for the reviews on the Intermission!
The title of the chapter comes (as is probably obvious) from the Bible verse Corinthians I 13:13, "But now abideth faith, hope, love, these three; and the greatest of these is love."
Chapter Ninety-Five: The Greatest Of These Is LoveMinerva found Harry talking to Hawthorn Parkinson in her guest quarters, with the door open as though to welcome anyone who might pass by. Minerva stood in silence a moment, watching them. Godric hovered close at her shoulder, but as a shadow, so that no one else could see him.
Harry was currently listening to a low-voiced stream of despair Hawthorn was pouring out, his hand clasping one of hers so hard that Minerva wondered she didn't wince. But it seemed bodily sensation was almost beyond her; what mattered were the words, and the ear willing to hear them. Whenever Hawthorn did stop to ask an anguished question, Harry responded instantly, though Minerva couldn't hear the answers, either. His hand stroked hers, and he never looked away from her face. Now and then he blinked, but he wasn't forcing back tears of his own. Minerva wondered that he could be so dry-eyed.
She hated to disturb him, but it had been three days since the battle, and that meant news had had time to spread—especially since some of the friends and older siblings of the children who'd died by the lake had combined knowledge of what Voldemort had said with knowledge of where their friends or siblings had died, and written their parents. Two of those parents were waiting in Minerva's office right now. She'd argued by Floo with them, until one of them threatened to confront Harry out of her sight and the other threatened to take this straight to the Ministry. Reluctantly, Minerva had allowed them to come through.
"Come in, Headmistress," Harry said, when a pause came in Hawthorn's narration.
Minerva started, then scolded herself. She'd been foolish to think that Harry was unaware of anything happening around him in the wake of a battle like that. She stepped into the room, nodding to Mrs. Parkinson. Hawthorn leaned back against the pillows of her bed, closing her eyes. The strain in her face had eased, Minerva thought.
"Harry, I hate to disturb you," she began.
"But there's someone who needs to talk to me?" Harry nodded and climbed off the bed. "I thought there would be." He turned to Hawthorn while Minerva was still trying to understand what that statement meant. "Don't worry, ma'am," he murmured. "I think it could go wrong, but you did what you did in the heat of the moment. If Indigena Yaxley is still alive—and most people seem to think that's what Thornhall being shut up in wards means—then we'll bring her down eventually. I won't say that her life is reserved for you to take, of course."
She was talking to him about her daughter, then, and the revenge she took on her daughter's killer, Minerva thought, and felt a surge of both helplessness and anger. Why are we leaning on him, depending on him to absolve us? It's ridiculous. We should be able to take comfort from someone else and let him rest.
Hawthorn gave a quiet laugh. "I would never ask that, Harry."
"Good." Harry smiled at her, and then turned to face Minerva. She was startled anew to realize that he was taller than he had been at the start of the year, his head almost reaching her collarbone. "Shall we, Headmistress?" He arched an eyebrow at her, and she nodded and led him down the hall towards the gargoyle.
She kept glancing at him as they walked, trying to gauge something of his mood. She couldn't. The expression on Harry's face was serene, bone-deep determination, and nothing more than that.
Minerva had been aware of him and his activities over the past few days, of course. It was hard not to be. Harry seemed to be everywhere: in the hospital wing, helping to heal young Mr. Malfoy of the gaping wounds in his mind; with his grieving allies, talking them out of their grief; listening in silence to those who needed to scream out their pain, whether or not that pain was directed towards him; helping to identify bodies and send them home to their families; helping Severus brew more potions, both the ones Mr. Malfoy would need and the ones he wouldn't; incinerating the giants' bodies; speaking with the creatures in the Forbidden Forest, to make sure there were no Death Eaters hiding in the trees.
Minerva had passed him a few times in the hallways, and asked if he was well. Harry had smiled at her each time and nodded, except for the last, when he'd said, "Yes, Headmistress. Believe me, I'm doing what I want to be doing. It's what I wish I could have done during the siege, but I was consumed with grief then. Now I can look outside myself, and I see how many other people need help."
The statement continued to make Minerva uneasy, but she wasn't sure what she could do about it. Most people in the castle did seem to look to Harry, even if only as a pair of welcoming, listening ears. And if Harry had adopted the role of his own free will and wasn't depriving himself of food and sleep to do so—and she had seen no signs that he was—then did she have the right to object?
Harry was singing softly under his breath, Minerva realized, when she came back to herself. "Who are the parents, Headmistress?" he asked, breaking off his song the moment he realized she was looking at him.
"Aurora Whitestag," said Minerva. "Her son Abelard was one of the children who died by the lake, a first-year Hufflepuff. And her daughter Heloise slid into a coma in the hospital wing and never woke."
Harry nodded. "And the other?"
"Philip Willoughby." Minerva hesitated a moment. "He's a Muggle. His daughter Alexandra was a first-year Ravenclaw. She died by the lake, too."
Harry blinked. "I'm glad our owl reached him. I wasn't sure how much the Muggleborn students' families knew about what was happening here."
Minerva pressed her lips together as she thought of the angry, grieving man she'd left in her office. "Mr. Willoughby was very involved in his daughter's life," she said slowly. "He was proud that Alexandra was a witch. He had a fireplace installed in his home so he could use the Floo connection, he regularly receives the Daily Prophet, and I believe that he was learning the history of the wizarding world with her."
"And?" Harry prompted.
Minerva gave him a look meant to chill him out of asking anything further. Harry just returned it with his serene one, and Minerva sighed. Harry might be one of her students, and in some things he could be treated as one, but not in this.
"And she was his only immediate family," Minerva admitted. "His wife died some time ago, apparently. He has no other children."
Harry closed his eyes.
Minerva turned to face him and gripped his shoulders. Now she did think of something she should have done, but, of course, too late, too late. Both Whitestag and Willoughby had threatened to "do something" if she wasn't back to her office with Harry in an hour at the most. Minerva should have talked about the children under the Life-Web with Harry, and how they mirrored her own sacrifice of killing children too wounded to live at Ottery St. Catchpole seventeen years ago. Minerva had acquired the full story from Severus, but not had any chance to talk to Harry about it.
"Harry," she said. "He will say many unfortunate things. He already has," she added, thinking of what he'd said through her Floo connection, which had finally been repaired the day after the battle. "That does not mean you should take them to heart. You did what you had to on the battlefield, what I think needed to be done and what no one else could have managed."
Harry opened his eyes and gave her a confused look. "That's not what I was upset about, Madam," he said. "I know that he'll be angry and grieving, and so will Aurora Whitestag. How can I possibly condemn them for that? I was only sorry that he'd lost his only daughter, and that Mrs. Whitestag has lost two of her children. I wished I could resurrect them, somehow, but I know there's no magic that allows one to return the dead to the living world, not truly."
Again, Minerva felt as if she'd missed something. Harry's face was already serene once more, and he started up the corridor, though he paused a few steps on to look back at her over his shoulder. "Headmistress? Are you coming? Did they ask that you be there when they spoke with me? Perhaps you should rest."
Minerva shook her head and caught up with Harry. As a matter of fact, she did need rest—all the professors did—but there was no way that she would let Harry face this alone. She had not had to do this, since the parents of the children massacred at Ottery St. Catchpole had been told that their children died of their wounds rather than being killed, but her fellow rescue-murderers had not left her alone in the days immediately afterward, either. Minerva would stand with Harry.
And if I can learn what I'm missing, then so much the better.
Harry had himself braced when he entered McGonagall's office. It could not have been easy to lose two children or to lose your only child. He told himself that, and kept grief and sympathy at the forefront of his mind. He kept, as well, his own determination to accept what came, and to balance it with the other duties that he had yet to complete. He could not act as if he were above the laws of the wizarding world, not and be a good leader. On the other hand, allowing these two parents to send him to prison just now would not serve Draco, or the grieving people in the castle who still needed to talk to him, or his arrangements for Edith Bulstrode to go to France with a private tutor—Harry had granted Henrietta permission to join the battle so long as she never tried to see her daughter, but Edith was too intolerably nervous with her mother in the same building—or the werewolf problem and the necessity to reply to a letter from Loki he'd received yesterday. He would explain his perception of the situation to Aurora Whitestag and Philip Willoughby, and hope they would be reasonable, and see that he couldn't stand trial for war crimes or anything else right now. He had too much to do.
He'd locked his own emotions deep in Occlumency pools, and called on his magic to support his body and mind. He really should have done this during the siege, but the grief had been too strong for an Occlumency pool then and his magic too occupied with other things. No one was calling on him to use his magic now, except in healing Draco, but his ear and his mind and his money and his political power. So it could go to making sure his mind stayed clear and thoughtful, and his body strong when it wanted to collapse, and his possible soul-wounds in abeyance.
A woman and a man waited in chairs in front of McGonagall's desk. Aurora Whitestag, when she faced him, had a cascade of dark hair that reminded Harry of her daughter Heloise, before they'd arranged transportation of her body home to her mother. Her robes were white, lined with silver, and simple—the robes of an undeclared witch. Her dark eyes were narrow as she studied him, but she actually nodded to him, and a soft smile ran across her lips. Harry inclined his head back, and turned to face the man.
Philip Willoughby was an impressive figure, fully as tall and strong as Bill Weasley, though considerably heavier. His brown hair was frazzled, and his hazel eyes, which Harry thought were probably as kind as Connor's normally, already bore the look of too many tears and not enough sleep. He stared at Harry as if he were the answer to a riddle he'd been pursuing for years. Harry did his best not to let it disconcert him as he nodded back.
"Mrs. Whitestag, Mr. Willoughby," said Harry, and took a third chair that sat off to the side of McGonagall's desk. She'd placed him closer to her than to the parents, Harry noticed, and subtly shoved the chair back to a more neutral, central position when the Headmistress wasn't looking. "My name is Harry. Please, ask me any questions or tell me anything you wish."
"I want to know the circumstances of my daughter's death," said Philip. "Obviously." His hands clenched over and then into each other, almost tearing the skin. He hadn't blinked yet.
"I would also like to know the circumstances of my son's," Aurora added, in a softer voice.
Harry nodded. "Voldemort attacked the school on the eighth of June, thirteen days before Midsummer," he began calmly. "Besides having Death Eaters attack the carriages that were taking students home, he captured a dozen children—mostly first-years and second-years—and put them in a Life-Web." He looked questioningly at Aurora, but her face reflected blankness, and of course so did Philip's, so Harry explained. "A Life-Web gathers many lives and puts them in the control of the caster. Voldemort could will them to die, injure themselves, go mad, become wounded, or suffer in many other ways as long as he held control of that web. Other magic could still affect them, but only until he noticed and ended the spell's effects. And only he could undo the spell."
Aurora was staring at him. Philip was looking down at his hands.
"I did what I could to ease their suffering," Harry said. His grief and rage were somewhere far under the stony surface he'd constructed for himself. He couldn't be blinded by his own emotions right now. His magic traveled in a smooth, continuous flow through his body, easing muscles that might have tightened, supporting him when he might have sagged, eating built-up weariness. "I tried a healing spell, and I tried to eat the Life-Web—"
"I don't understand," said Philip abruptly, looking up. "Eat it?"
"I can eat magic," said Harry. "I tried to absorb the web into myself. It didn't work. There are some laws of magic that can't be broken, and apparently the Life-Web being altered only by its caster is one of them." He sighed. "Voldemort said he would free the children if I went down to him."
"And you didn't even consider that?" Philip's voice sounded as if the words were torn out of him, probably carrying large chunks of his throat with them.
"Voldemort doesn't keep his promises," said Harry. "I would have gone down to him, and he would have continued torturing them."
"But you don't know that," said Philip intently, leaning forward. "Perhaps he would have kept this one. How can you know?" Harry winced; his voice was gradually edging upward. "How do you know that Alexandra isn't alive only because of your selfishness, and not because of—"
"Because Harry is the only one who can kill You-Know-Who," Aurora interrupted. She had never looked away from Harry. Her voice was as soft as her smile had been. She leaned back, hands clasped around her knee. Harry eyed her. He found it hard to read her. "He's the Boy-Who-Lived. If he went down to him, the war would be over. Alexandra might have lived, and Abelard too, but the war would be over."
"I could have taken Alexandra back home," Philip said. "No one would ever have to know. She loves this world, and so do I, but I'd trade it for her life."
Harry winced, and kept his voice respectfully low as he said, "Mr. Willoughby, Hogwarts keeps records of all its students. Voldemort targets Muggleborns particularly, because he thinks they're polluting the wizarding world. He would have learned about Alexandra's existence and come after you eventually."
"You don't know that," Philip insisted. "You don't."
Harry inclined his head. "Perhaps I don't."
"I would like to finish listening to the story," said Aurora mildly.
Harry turned back to her. "I had to choose. While Voldemort taunted me with the children in the Life-Web, other children were dying behind me on the battlefield, and since my magic is so strong, and I can eat my enemies' power, I could make a difference in turning the tide there. I didn't know of a way to make Voldemort's captives stop suffering. I didn't know of a way to free them. So I chose to give them heart attacks, as quick and painless a death as I could. Voldemort didn't sense the spell in time to stop me, and I think he believed I would never kill them anyway, so it worked. And then I turned to rescuing the others." He turned his hand up. "That was what happened."
"You don't seem that torn up about it," Aurora said, her voice cool for the first time.
Harry met her eyes. "That's because I'm using Occlumency to suppress my emotions, ma'am," he said. "I spent a lot of time grieving during the siege of Hogwarts, enough that I almost went outside and let Voldemort have me. My brother made me promise not to, but it was a near thing. And right now, if I let what I was really feeling through, then I'd be weeping too hard to talk to you, and certainly too hard to tell you what really happened or listen to your grief and understand it."
Aurora stared at him again, but Philip had another question. "And if you really can kill You-Know-Who," he asked, knuckling one eye as if that would keep the tears from falling, "why didn't you kill him, and free the children from the Life-Web that way?"
"Because I'd tried before," said Harry, "with the strongest curses I know. Nothing happened. Voldemort has made arrangements to keep himself immortal; that shows because I bounced his own Killing Curse back at him the night he came after me and my brother, and he still survived it. I've wounded him now, and he has to hide. That means I have time to figure out what's keeping him immortal, destroy it, and then kill him."
"You can't, really," Philip whispered. "I thought when Alexandra told me about this Boy-Who-Lived nonsense that it was just that, nonsense. And it is. If you can't kill him when he holds a dozen children captive, then when can you do it? I think you chose your life over theirs." His voice was rising again. "I've been reading wizarding history. Dark Lords, Light Lords, this supposed vates—it's all the same, all about power, and they'll grant exceptions to powerful wizards that they won't to anyone else.
"Well, no more. You may be a powerful wizard, but you're still a murderer, and I'll see you brought to trial for that."
Harry flinched, but forced himself to nod. "I don't know if you would win, but I don't intend to blast your head off or use compulsion to change your mind," he said quietly. "I think there is one difference between me and a Lord, sir. I try not to hold myself above others, and if that means submitting to wizarding law because the Ministry has decided to try me for war crimes, then that's what it means."
"Harry," said McGonagall sharply.
Harry glanced at her with a frown, wondering why she had interrupted. She wouldn't want them to think that she was ignoring their children because she's prejudiced in my favor. The Headmistress of Hogwarts has to be more neutral in public than in private. "I'm not done explaining yet, Headmistress," he said calmly, and then turned back to Aurora and Philip. "I do have other problems to handle first," he told them. "People I'm trying to heal of wounds they received in the battle. Arrangements to make regarding political struggles I'm a part of. Accounts to set up. So, while I certainly can't dictate how you react, that's where I'm coming from. It's not that I don't care about what happened, or feel guilt." He wished he could let a bit of the grief out, but it was too powerful. It would mingle with his grief for Pansy, Charles, Cho, and all the others who had died, and leave him a sobbing wreck. "But I can't stop living my life and only care about what trial you might put me through."
"I, for one, will not be calling for a trial," said Aurora Whitestag quietly.
Philip snapped, "I don't really need your help. I'll pursue this on my own, if I have to, but first I'm going to talk to some of the other parents who lost children."
"Why?" Harry asked her. In some ways, he thought she would have been even more likely to demand a trial, since she would understand the consequences of the magic and the ways of the Ministry better than a Muggle.
"Because I do believe that you are the Boy-Who-Lived, and the only one who can defeat You-Know-Who," said Aurora. One hand trembled, but she quickly caught it with the other and hid it in her lap. "We need you. A trial will only divert your attention and sap your political strength. At the same time, chaos seems to follow in your wake, and having you at Hogwarts is a danger to the other children. So, for the sake of those children who are still alive, and not because I think Heloise and Abelard deserve to see you be imprisoned, I'm going to push for you to be put in private custody, Harry, somewhere far away from Hogwarts, and trained until you can defeat You-Know-Who." She met his eyes, her own open and honest and quietly determined. "Our world needs you. But it needs its safety, too."
McGonagall leaned forward. "Mrs. Whitestag, Mr. Willoughby," she said. "You should understand that Voldemort's early attack was not Harry's fault. The wards failed to protect the children as we thought they would. The blood of the children who died that day is on the hands of Voldemort and his Death Eaters, not on Harry's. And a quick death is surely better than—"
"You wouldn't say that," Philip snarled at her, "if you had lost a child of your own."
McGonagall's eyes were glacial when she looked back at him. "I did, Mr. Willoughby. I am the Headmistress of this school. Every child who died, on the battlefield and before the siege, is a child of mine. And I've been responsible for not just deaths, but suffering, and being the guardian of the suffering and trying to ease them. Harry has been asked to play a role that no one else has, that of guardian and protector of our entire world, and for us to condemn him for the consequences of that role is selfish and hypocritical."
"Someone who is guardian and protector of our entire world should be more responsible," said Aurora. "Not only with his safety, but with the safety of others." She nodded to Harry, her face like a glass mask—set, with light shining from behind. "I am sorry, Harry. I truly think this is the best course. The protection of the living is more important than vengeance for the dead."
"On that, we can agree," said Harry. "But I don't think that imprisoning me is the best answer, Mrs. Whitestag."
"I said nothing about imprisoning you," she murmured. "I do think you should be kept in a private location and trained. Our world needs you, Harry, and not as a student in a school. You have to take on an adult role, and that means that you need to be treated like an adult." She rose and nodded to McGonagall. "Thank you for taking the opportunity to meet with me, Headmistress. I will be in contact." She strode over to McGonagall's fireplace, taking out a pinch of Floo powder and casting it into the flames. A name that Harry couldn't quite catch, and she was gone.
That left Philip, who was leaning back with his head against the chair behind him, his chest heaving as he struggled to control sobs or shouts; Harry didn't know which. He let some moments pass, and then said, "Mr. Willoughby."
Philip's eyes snapped open, and he gave Harry a look of acute loathing, enough that Harry recoiled. Then he rose like an old man and stared at McGonagall.
"I'm going home now, too," he said. "Be sure I'll be in touch, Headmistress."
Harry watched as he hobbled to the fireplace and called, "Willoughby house!" as he used the Floo powder. Harry swallowed all his mingled emotions as he watched him go. He wished Philip wasn't doing this, but how could he condemn the man? He was acting out of love and grief.
"Harry."
Harry started and turned to look at McGonagall. She had her mouth set in a thin line, and she had leaned over and taken hold of his hand without his noticing it.
"Willoughby will have a difficult time bringing you to trial," she said. "You are underage as yet. Wizarding law usually refuses to try someone for war crimes and murder until they are at least seventeen." Harry nodded, thinking of Evergreen, the sixteen-year-old werewolf, whom the Wizengamot had preferred to keep in Tullianum indefinitely rather than condemning him to a permanent stay there, and Gilbert Rovenan, who would have suffered no worse than expulsion and wand-breaking. "I am worried about Whitestag, however. She may press the Wizengamot into trying to take custody of you precisely because you are the Boy-Who-Lived as well as underage. I think few of the Wizengamot members who sat in on your parents' trial would really believe that you do not consider the ethical ramifications of your actions, but in light of what is happening with the werewolves, they may do—something unfortunate—in the name of the safety of the wizarding world."
Harry nodded again. He knew. "What do you think is the best course then, Headmistress?" he asked.
"For Severus to remove you from the school as soon as possible," said McGonagall bluntly. "You need time to rest, to recover, to heal, Harry, and I do think it would be better done away from Hogwarts, where there are not so many memories to plague you. And if you were in an isolated place where no one could find you easily, then we could easily tell Mrs. Whitestag and anyone who asked that you had gone for training. They would not know the difference. By the time you returned to Hogwarts at the end of August, then we could claim, in turn, that you had completed your training and now were on the path to defeating Voldemort."
"I don't know if I can learn the truth about defeating him in that time," Harry said.
McGonagall laughed. It was not a happy sound. "There are times when you need to think more like a Slytherin, Harry," she said. "Of course we won't give out any details when Whitestag and her supporters demand them. They could leak back to Voldemort, wherever he's hiding. We need to keep them secret for the good of the wizarding world. So you can pursue research when you have time for it, and if it takes a while—no one can blame you for not defeating Voldemort immediately."
Harry stirred uneasily. He knew the perfect candidate for the isolated place where he would convince most people that he was training in ethics and in magic. The Sanctuary's location was unknown to many, Vera had reassured him, and the "shadows" surrounding it, which tended to delay owls, also made it impossible for anyone with hostile intent to find it.
But if he went there with the situation still unresolved and brewing, wouldn't it look like he was running away from efforts to bring him to trial, when he needed to show everyone that he didn't consider himself above the law?
He said as much to McGonagall. Her answer was unexpected.
"That is what I have been missing," she exclaimed, slapping her hand onto her desk. Harry blinked at her.
"I had the idea that something was strange about you, Harry, but I couldn't tell what it was," she said, her words burring slightly. "You are doing what you can to heal others and help, but you have once again pushed your own healing away."
"I haven't," said Harry. "I promise you, ma'am. I haven't been neglecting myself the way I used to whenever I got angry. I haven't drowned in grief. I'm only maintaining this mask over my emotions until I have some time to grieve. And that isn't yet. As you pointed out, there are other people to be healed."
McGonagall said nothing, simply watched him as if he were a mouse. Harry was the one who shifted after a moment. He needed to go speak to Connor, and then talk to Snape about his upcoming Apparition to Cobley-by-the-Sea. There were some treasures there, powerful and magical but capable of nothing useful, which Harry intended to drain of their power. He would do his best to restore the magic of the children who had been turned into Squibs when that was done.
"Can I go, Madam?" he asked after a moment.
"Go," McGonagall murmured.
Harry stood up, nodded to her, and walked out of the office, wondering at his own urge to flee.
"Severus. If you have a moment?"
Snape turned in surprise. McGonagall stood watching him from the doorway. Snape smothered his irritation that he hadn't heard her approach. She had probably had one of the Founders remove his wards.
"Minerva," he said, with a shallow nod, and cast a temporary charm on the Veritaserum to hold it in its current stage. "Is this about Harry?"
McGonagall smiled faintly and moved into the room. "Of course," she murmured. "What else would I speak to you about?"
"I am Deputy Headmaster." Snape folded his arms and told himself he would not get huffy. No one but Dumbledore had ever been able to make him get huffy. "The defense of the school and the continuation of my brewing healing potions seem likely items."
"This is not a problem truly concerned with defense of the school, though some people would think it is."
McGonagall described the meeting between Philip Willoughby, Aurora Whitestag, and Harry, and what the parents of the dead children intended to do about it. Snape stood still throughout. He noted the names, and thought distantly that it was a pity neither of them was a werewolf.
"And they think they can do this?" he hissed, when McGonagall was done. He had other questions, including why he hadn't been summoned to this meeting, but that was the most prominent.
"When word gets out of what happened to the children in the Life-Web, as it inevitably will?" McGonagall massaged her forehead and sighed. "With the Minister on a short leash with the Wizengamot at the moment? With Harry's name linked, rightly or wrongly, with so much other trouble in our world? I fear that there will be many queuing up to help them."
Snape coiled his wandless magic back inside him. It wanted to lash out and break a head, or at least a leg. But since McGonagall was the only person in the room with him, that wouldn't be productive. "Then he must be taken away," he said. "Your solution is the only one that makes sense, to remove him from the school and pretend that someone is training him to defeat the Dark Lord." He permitted himself a sneer, feeling as if he would burst if he didn't. "As if one could be trained to do that. If that was all it took, Moody would have trained himself into readiness long ago."
"I know, Severus." McGonagall leaned forward. "And I think the Seers' Sanctuary, where he intended to go anyway, is the best choice. But for the deception to be complete, you will have to disappear as well, to make it seem as if his guardian decided this was the best thing for Harry. And I know that you have no wish to go to the Sanctuary."
Snape snarled. "I do not." There were locked boxes in his soul that no one had the right to touch, and doors that would remain shut. But, on the other hand, it was not as if he were going to be healed, as Pettigrew or Lupin had, as Harry and Draco would. He was certain he could remain himself even in the midst of people anxious to "help" him. "But I have never yet spent a full summer with Harry since I have known him, and I think that has helped hurt him." He met McGonagall's eyes. "I wish to spend this one with him."
McGonagall closed her eyes and nodded. "Thank you, Severus," she murmured. "Good. But then, of course, we have another problem. Harry thinks he will be seen as running away from wizarding law if he goes to the Sanctuary, and that is not something he wants."
Snape smirked. This one, at least, he knew how to approach. "Leave that to me," he said.
"You think you can persuade him?" McGonagall frowned. "Forgive me, Severus, but Harry's convictions of justice are so strong that—"
"Not me," said Snape. "I agree, he would think I was acting solely out of a guardian's duties, and he would refuse to listen, because he thinks his own duties more important. But there is someone whom he will never resist."
"Perfect." The relief in Harry's voice was unmistakable to Draco, even more so than the tendril of Legilimency he used to stroke Draco's mind as he retreated from yet another healing of wounds. "They're coming along nicely, Draco. The last big holes are almost closed. Some of the effects will linger for a time—that's what the potions are for, of course—but you should be able to go to the Sanctuary as early as the day after tomorrow."
Draco opened his eyes, and gave Harry a smile he knew was strained. But Snape had come in earlier and explained exactly what Harry was doing to himself and why, and Draco was horrified and disgusted and more than a little disappointed in Harry. After everything he promised…
"And you won't be coming with me, will you, Harry?" he asked.
Harry started, and then he relaxed and smiled. Draco reached out intently now, and caught the faintest whiff of roses—Harry's magic. It was working to make that relaxation and the smile look natural. Draco growled softly under his breath. He's relying on his magic just to function. He said he wouldn't.
"Of course I will, Draco," Harry said. "I promised. I can't give you an exact date, yet, but I should be no more than a week or two behind. At the very latest. It might take three weeks to settle the werewolf problem—I'm still debating how to reply to the letter Loki sent me—but—"
"You promised otherwise," said Draco, and heard his voice grow darker all on its own. He thought he might have had to feign the emotion. No need. "You promised, Harry. When I was wounded, you said that we would go to the Sanctuary together, and you would spend your time thinking about healing and about me."
Harry's stare sharpened. "Did Snape put you up to this?"
Damn, damn, damn. Draco felt as he had when he confronted his father. Potentially devastating emotional consequences were spinning past him, and he had to choose which one to ride.
He chose the truth.
"He told me what you've been doing," said Draco. "Helping everyone else. Putting aside your own grief. Yielding to these mad plans to bring you to trial or force you to remove yourself from Hogwarts. And now I can smell your magic, Harry. You're using it to just to keep your feet."
Harry ran his hand through his hair, and looked put out. "It would be stupid to do something I've promised I wouldn't, Draco," he said. "I haven't been skipping meals or sleep, I promise. The only reason I've tamped my emotions down with Occlumency is because otherwise I would be a sobbing wreck, and I would get nothing done, including healing you, which I need to happen." The look in his eyes as he said that almost took Draco's breath away. "I can't show that I think I'm above the law, or that I'm frightened of what they can do to me. And yes, I'm using my magic, but it's only to get everything done that I need to. The world doesn't stop spinning just because there was a battle here, Draco. Loki has not stopped being an idiot, for example."
"There are two words you need to learn, Harry," said Draco.
"Only two?" Harry cocked one eyebrow, and the very last remains of Draco's empathy let him catch what felt like a quiver of anger. Harry was enraged, or close to it, but keeping it mostly off his face and out of his voice.
"Yes," said Draco. "In this case, only two."
"And what are they?" Harry's rage was almost gone again, but it reassured Draco to know he had felt it.
"Sod off," said Draco.
Harry nodded once, his lips tightening, and started to turn away. Draco caught the stump of his left wrist.
"I didn't mean that you had to sod off, Harry," he said, lifting one hand to hold Harry's cheek. He could feel him shaking from this close, and his determination increased. Yes, he wanted this for himself, wanted Harry beside him as he healed and rid his soul of Voldemort's taint, but, by Merlin, Harry needed this, too. He'd fought so hard for them to have a summer free of war, and now he was going to sacrifice it on an altar to grief and misguided honesty. Draco wouldn't let him. "I meant, tell them that. There's a point at which you're not granting people reasonable requests, but letting them take advantage of you."
"I know that!" Harry snapped, and the headboard of Draco's bed rattled. Harry's eyes closed, and he pulled himself away until only Draco's grip on his wrist held him there. "You and Snape keep talking about it," Harry went on. "But I don't know where it is. And when I do indulge my grief, it's a horrid mistake, and then when I don't, it's another horrid mistake again. I don't understand you." His mask broke for a moment. Draco could see the misery battering away just beneath the surface, combined with guilt and Harry's terror of doing the wrong thing. Then they went away again as Harry bolted the serene lie back on top of them. "I'm erring on the side of caution," he whispered. "If the choice is between giving up a summer holiday and being a leader, or hiding myself away from the outside world and ignoring problems that won't solve themselves…if I can prevent evil, Draco, and I don't, that's evil, too. And Merlin knows what the werewolves would do if I was out of contact for that long, or the Ministry, or the parents of the dead children. And yes, I hate that they're talking about bringing me to trial, or else taking me away from you and Snape and everyone else I love, and part of me wants to tell them to go fuck themselves. But I don't know where that point is where they're taking advantage of me. Maybe a trial is a perfectly right and reasonable thing to request, and I'm heading down Dumbledore's paths by trying to justify those children sacrificed in the name of war. I don't know, Draco. I've lost my footing, and all the roads look the same unless I can ease pain somehow."
And Draco knew what to do, then. The tumbling swords of consequence could fall where they will. He knew what to say and how to say it.
"And that's why you need to come to the Sanctuary with me, Harry," he murmured, gently. He stretched up from the pillows, ignoring his pounding head, and put his hand behind Harry's neck, pulling him closer. "They can help you find your footing again. I want you with me because I want you there as I heal. I want you there because I want to see you healed. And I want you there because I can see a life beyond the war. This war won't last forever, Harry. What happens if you make yourself into a leader and a weapon, and then someday, our world doesn't need you to be those things anymore? You would fall apart, I think." He tugged Harry forward again, until their foreheads rested against each other. "And I don't want you to fall apart," he whispered. "I want you to stay alive for a good long time."
Harry said nothing. His breathing had a sound of tears. Draco held himself still, and waited. Snape had thought Harry wouldn't be able to resist a plea from him, which was wrong, of course. But more than that, Draco thought Harry deserved a choice, with all his options laid out starkly before him.
"All right," Harry whispered.
Draco felt his heart clamp closed. He pulled away and considered Harry's face, the tight lines and still-shut eyes, carefully. "You mean that?" he said at last.
"Yes." Harry forced his eyes open. "I'm just so tired, Draco. I can't do this for much longer. And even though I do think it's self-indulgent, in some ways, it would be better to retreat and heal myself than break down when the Wizengamot questions me, or when one more person asks me why I didn't save his friend or her sister. I want some joy in my life again. And I don't think I could really have let you go to the Sanctuary alone." Harry swallowed. "I promise. Three days. I promise. I give you my word by bone and blood and breath that I'll go with you then."
Draco couldn't find words to explain what that meant to him. So he kissed Harry instead, the fiercest kiss they'd shared yet, flavored with teeth and tongues and blood. Harry kissed back, forcing some of his grief and rage out, Draco thought. When that was done, Harry hugged Draco hard enough to make his head throb.
"Thank you again," Harry said, "for loving me and having faith in me."
Draco closed his eyes, and let the warmth soak in.