WARNING: Heavy slash. Since this chapter covers the Halloween ritual, it's pretty much all slash, so if you can't stand that, don't read this chapter. I've edited this to an M rating; if you want to read unedited posts, you can look at my LJ or my Skyehawke account, both of which links are available in my profile.

Chapter Forty-Four: Glory Be

Woodhouse did not understand why part of itself would ever want to leave. It preferred to dream and grow, and the current of magic that circled it paced the same path over and over again. With that, it could achieve a depth that the small rushing things would never understand. They thought that life consisted of traveling far and broad and wide. Only Woodhouse knew that life meant deep, knowing itself so well that no small rushing thing could ever fool it.

And now part of itself wanted to go away. Woodhouse sang to the small leafless tree in the dream, and tried to understand why.

The leafless tree's dreams flowed into it, and Woodhouse absorbed them and understood. The tree was not leaving them forever. It would still have a root system that extended back to the valley, and tied it to the hills and the soil. Those roots were more small rushing things who could become small leafless trees, as it had- not entering the dream, but bound to the dream. If Woodhouse would consider them part of itself, then it could still be whole.

Woodhouse was pleased. Other small rushing things would learn to be leafless trees, and then they would not wish to harm the valley, because they would be part of it. The dream would grow deeper, and not split into parts. And if the network of roots extended outside the valley, then Woodhouse's awareness would travel with the leafless tree, and they could always pull back and fold into the valley if they met with any trouble. Woodhouse would learn the far and the wide without ever sacrificing the deep.

It agreed, and went back to dreaming of winter.

Harry blinked and touched a hand to his head as he rose unsteadily to his feet. He hadn't- well, he hadn't expected that to happen, at least. If he understood correctly, Woodhouse now considered the werewolves who would stay here part of itself and would defend them, which was what Harry had wanted, but it would retain a connection to him, too, and consider the werewolves extensions of him, and thus also of itself. And it would keep a bond fastened to his mind, so that he could retreat to the valley whenever he wanted.

Harry looked around the hills and the trees, felt the battering current of place magic as it passed him in its endless rounds, and shook his head. At times he thought the worst mistake British wizards had ever made was letting knowledge of place magic pass away from them.

He turned back to the quadrangle of buildings in the center of the valley, and scratched his forehead. His scar didn't hurt, not exactly, but it tingled all over with a slightly itchy feeling, as if his skin were a little too tight for him. He'd been feeling that all day, since he ate breakfast, and somewhere in the back of his mind even while he communed with Woodhouse and should have been able to feel only the valley. He wondered what it meant.

As he entered the quadrangle of buildings again, the tightness on his forehead grew so bad that his head slewed to the side, like a unicorn's following the guidance of his horn. Harry gasped and stumbled for a moment, wondering if this was some odd side effect from being in close quarters with a karkadann. He had spent the last few days since he'd appealed to McGonagall to return to Hogwarts mostly with other people, but he had soothed her when he could, and ridden her once. He didn't think that her magic should be so sulky that she could summon him away from other things he was supposed to be doing.

"Harry?"

The pulling tightness to his skin vanished. Harry blinked up and realized he was standing in front of Draco, who must have come out a back door of the wooden house. He looked at Harry in puzzlement for a moment. Then his face broke into a smirk, and he nodded.

"What?" Harry demanded, a bit irritated to think that Draco knew what this strange thing was or meant, and hadn't bothered to share it with him.

"You're feeling it now," Draco whispered. "It is Halloween, after all, and this is the third time we've done this. I partially arranged the first ritual, offering you the gift of the ring, and you had to choose the setting of the second." His eyelids dropped, shading his eyes. "And now, this third time, the magic is arranging things for us. It makes you want to be close to me."

Harry just stared at him.

Draco laughed a little. "This ritual is old, Harry. And like all old rituals, it's partially a mold for the magic that comes into it, but it also directs and shapes the people who participate in it. And now it's directing and molding us. It wants you to touch me, to be close to me." He shrugged and reached out to put his arm around Harry's shoulders. "Not that I object. I want the same things, after all, and I don't have a problem giving in to those impulses." He bent and kissed Harry firmly on the mouth.

Harry returned the kiss for a moment, then broke away with a gasp. The air between him and Draco seemed stretched as taut as his skin, and the air whined and buzzed in his ears like the words of the vicious bird. He felt as if he might climb out of his skin and up the walls. "Wait- Draco- "

"Yes?" Draco just raised an eyebrow, and didn't move back from him.

Harry moaned, and winced to hear himself. "Why would it be affecting us this strongly, just now?" he asked. "I thought the ritual proper doesn't begin until tonight."

"The Walpurgis ritual began at night," said Draco patiently. "The ritual on your birthday began during the day. This is the whole day. It began at dawn, properly. And why shouldn't it? This ritual is called the Breaking of Boundaries, Harry. It would be strange if it let itself be confined on one side of the divide of night or day."

Harry shivered. Now that he was close to Draco, he could feel the magic humming, contented, in his skin, no longer pulling on him. But he could feel other sensations, too, as if potions were brewing under his flesh, and his cheeks were already darkening with arousal stronger than anything he'd felt before. And he knew it was going to get worse; this was low tide.

Draco's hand rubbed his back. Harry leaned into the touch, closing his eyes, and felt the arousal calm a bit. "I didn't- I didn't know," he whispered into Draco's ear.

"I know," said Draco. "Why do you think I left those books on the ritual for you out, Harry? I wanted you to be warned. And I did tell you, two days ago, that we'd be spending most of this day together."

"I thought that was a ritual requirement, not a magical one." Harry shuddered and bowed his head. He was slipping along the edge of control, and he hated the experience. It had been hard enough for him to let go behind wards, when he knew the emotions from the Occlumency pools must be released. He could not imagine how he was going to get through this. What would happen if the barriers on his magic broke and he hurt someone else?

"If you would stop worrying about others for three seconds and enjoy yourself," Draco murmured into his ear, forcing Harry to hear him over the mad pounding of his heart, "you would know that you can't hurt them, Harry, not today. The ritual is drawing a circle around us. It wants us close together, it wants us focused on each other, and it wants us able to touch and influence only each other. Your magic could hurt me- if it ever would, which I know it won't- but today it can't do so much as raise a bruise on someone else's skin."

Harry frowned at him. "How did you know that I was thinking about that?"

Draco touched his forehead, slightly to the left of his scar, never taking his eyes from Harry's face. "The ritual opens up our minds, too, Harry, and mingles our thoughts. And your thoughts are loud. I wonder how Snape taught you Legilimency, if he could hear you shouting in his head all the time."

His voice was light and teasing, but Harry was beginning to panic again. He imagined the boundaries that could break, and now what struck him was not fear that he would hurt Draco, but fear of what Draco would see.

"Really, Harry." Draco's voice was somewhere this side of hurt. "After everything? You really think that I'd see something in your mind or your heart that disgusted me? You're really ashamed of showing me part of what you are?" He paused, cocking his head to the side. "And did you never think that I might be ashamed of showing off who I am?"

"You have nothing to be ashamed of," Harry whispered. "I- Draco, I- " His entire face felt on fire, and not because of the magic. He had never been so embarrassed in his life. There were- there were baser things in him that he hadn't wanted to share. Everyone had those, didn't they? But most people didn't enter a ritual that was going to break down the boundaries and force those secrets to splay like thrown dice over their unsuspecting partner's mind.

"Harry. Look at me."

Reluctantly, Harry lifted his eyes and locked them on Draco's, and to his shock, it was like falling down a tunnel. He could see into his mind, see into his thoughts, grasp them and understand them. The thoughts coiled around him like veins of ore in a tunnel, and he could follow them wherever they led.

There was a dark vein of obsidian that Harry looked into and found was hatred for Connor, simmered and baked deep. Draco still saw little use to the prat. He knew he was important to Harry, and for that reason, if nothing else, he tried to be civil to him, but still, Draco didn't see a single thing Connor had done so far that couldn't have been done more admirably and with more strength by someone else. He had been a fighter in the Midsummer battle, but they all had been. He was Harry's brother, but that was more a source of weakness than use. He had existed to take the Potter inheritance so that Harry wouldn't have to, but there were ways of changing the inheritance so that it was no longer linked to the Potter name, and then Harry could have had what few solid gifts his parents could have given him. He was just there, and he irritated Draco.

Reeling back from that, Harry banged into another, this one a vein of crystal. That was Draco's feelings about his father, unexpectedly turned clear and pure by the encounter he'd had with Lucius in the Ministry when they went there to end the rebellion. He'd seen the way his father's tactics failed against his mother's. He'd seen that just because one had a cool face and cutting words didn't make one into a victor. And he'd decided that what he wanted most was real strength, under the surface. Chill masks had their place; Draco would never deny that. But he hungered most for the strength that made the chill mask a natural part of one's armor.

Harry turned again, and behind him was a glowing strand of emeralds, dark green flecked with gold, the lust Draco felt for him. And if Draco dreamed of fucking, of sex until they were exhausted, of days in bed when they could make love slowly and no one else would expect anything else of them, of a time when Harry would look at him with glassy eyes and begging body and nothing else in the world mattered to him- weren't those his dreams? Wasn't he entitled to dream them?

With an enormous effort, using the training Snape had given him in Legilimency, Harry jumped back and out of Draco's mind. He stood where he was for a moment, eyes locked on Draco's, chest heaving with his breath.

Then he Apparated frantically away, feeling his skin stretch yearningly towards Draco as he did so.

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Draco stood blinking in the aftermath of Harry's vanishing, and then shook his head lightly. He didn't have to wonder why Harry had fled, after all. The Breaking of Boundaries had already let him see the answer to that, blazing in his boyfriend's eyes and echoing in his thoughts.

Harry had had the chance to learn what the ritual was about. Draco had left the books for him, and hinted at it sometimes, and waited patiently for Harry to ask questions. And he hadn't. He had ignored the books, other than a few nervous sideways glances. And he'd always found something more interesting to struggle with or ask about when he could have been learning about a ritual vital to his future happiness.

Draco wasn't that surprised, he thought, as he walked leisurely towards the tugging. Harry was probably Apparating into several places around the valley, since the pull on Draco's skin changed direction constantly. He didn't mind. Harry would find out soon enough that he could not leave a certain radius. Even if he wanted to Apparate to the other side of the world, he couldn't do it.

No, he wasn't surprised. He was exasperated.

How many promises had Harry made that he would concentrate on things that affected him personally? How many times had he said that he wasn't afraid of what he and Draco would someday share? How many words had he spoken about wanting to spend time with Draco and think about his healing when the pace of events calmed enough to allow him to do so?

And Draco had waited, been patient even when it seemed as if his body was one low constant ache of arousal and need, and not complained. He had known when he fell in love with Harry that Harry wouldn't be able to return his love immediately, so he couldn't complain. It would be hypocritical if he did. He was only facing the challenges of a situation he had entered with his eyes open.

But he had relied on Harry's willingness to make an equal effort, and work against his training, and get used to being seen, and stop fucking running. And Harry hadn't done it. Oh, he had hidden his impulse not to do it well, because he had so many responsibilities and challenges of his own, but that didn't matter. Face him with the first true test, and he ran.

Draco lengthened his stride, and smiled a little. This wasn't a test that could be run from. The ritual was only the third spoke out of thirteen on a swiftly turning wheel. Their free consent to enter this three-year dance had given the magic the permission it needed to bring them closer together, and the fact that Draco had acted during the first ceremony and Harry had acted during the second one had been another confirmation, if one was needed. So now the Breaking of Boundaries was happening. Draco's hands itched with the need to touch Harry. His eyes watered, and what would best soothe them would be looking into Harry's eyes and reading his thoughts.

And Harry's boundaries would be falling, including the ones he'd put up to protect himself against those things he wanted and thought were ugly. Draco grinned, and didn't try to stop it. This was the first time, he thought, that Harry would come face to face with his desires, as opposed to lust he could always pretend was focused on Draco.

That was the main reason Draco was giving him a few minutes alone, instead of hurrying directly to his side now that the pull on his skin had settled into a steady tug towards the pine woods. Harry needed this time to face himself. He needed to acknowledge that not only could he want to be the source of Draco's pleasure, but he could want pleasure for its own sake.

And if what Draco had read on the surface of his thoughts was true of the bottom, that was the mildest of the things Harry was close to learning about himself. He had at least acknowledged, a time or two, that what they did in bed felt good.

Give him time, Draco told himself, and halted near one of the hills, leaning his face against the rock. His skin streamed with sweat in the chill air. Yes, I could have told him about this, but more to the point, he could have asked. And I want him to acknowledge that, yes, this isn't just about what the magic wants and what I want. It's about what he wants.

Snape and I can encourage him, but in the end, we can't fight his battles for him. We made that mistake once already, and he told us we were acting like Lily, and he was right. Now, he has to be the one to stop acting like James.

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Harry had Apparated to the outer ring of Woodhouse's hills, the place where they sloped down to the grass. He found he couldn't go any further. He could imagine London well in his head, and even Hogwarts, though that was a longer jump than he would have been willing to try under ordinary circumstances.

But he couldn't go there.

He felt as if he were a horse on a great lead rein, plunging in a circle that widened only a few feet now and then, and shrank most of the time. The circle was centered on Draco. His muscles shivered and shook, his skin was so sticky with sweat that Harry felt as if he were about to slide out of his clothes, and when he Apparated back into the pine woods on the eastern side of Woodhouse, he had to fight to keep his mind from being taken over by a vision of Draco.

He landed hard on stones and roots and needles, and lay there gasping, painfully aroused, biting his palm as he struggled to hold in sounds that would betray him worse than his frantic panting did.

He could feel the magic of the ritual, wilder than the patient wearing-down of the air in the Sanctuary, more persistent than the place magic, diving into the depths of his mind and wrenching up memories he didn't want to look at and drilling through barriers he would have preferred to keep in place and forcing acknowledgments out of him he didn't want to make.

You want.

And he did, he wanted, there were times he wanted nothing so much as to wank until he came or throw Draco onto the bed and fuck him, and-

Harry gave a slick shudder of revulsion. He couldn't believe he felt this. It was so selfish. He didn't want to feel it. He wrapped his arm around his face and gasped into it, but that was no good, because the touch of other flesh or even fabric now was making him think things he didn't want to.

He refused to touch himself. He could do that.

Angrily, he twisted through the waves of lust that were attacking him. He knew what it must be. Most sixteen-year-old boys were victims of lust, or of their hormones, or of whatever name they wanted to give it. Harry had always been sturdily proud that he wasn't, that he'd managed to subdue those rare longings he had and get past them. His training had helped with that. He was grateful to his mother for it, because hormones would have proven a distraction to everything he had to do.

And now the barrier was broken, and they were attacking him.

Harry hadn't wanted it broken. He tried to imprison the emotions behind a wall, but if he could still build a decent one, the ritual's magic ate through it in a few moments. Harry made a harsh sound and shuddered.

Did he need to be ashamed of this? Draco certainly didn't act ashamed of it. But then, Draco wasn't vates, or leader of the Alliance of Sun and Shadow. He was important, of course he was, the most important person in Harry's life. But he could make political decisions when he needed to; he wasn't required to make them all the time.

Maybe you aren't, either.

It was the same voice that had accused him of wanting. Harry wasn't sure whose voice it was, his or Draco's or Snape's, but the more he listened, the more it sounded like a prim version of his own.

He wished his bones would stop telling him they would crawl out of his skin if he didn't go to Draco. He had fought stronger magic than this, and kept his sanity intact. He should be able to fight this. He was an adult, he said, he didn't need a guardian, and he should act like one. He set himself to fight.

Then he realized the problem with that. He wasn't fighting an exterior enemy casting Imperio or some other compulsion spell at him. He was fighting himself, his own buried wants and desires and longings that he'd suppressed because he didn't want to feel them. And now he had a voice insisting that those suppressed things were all right, that he didn't have to avoid them.

Harry shook his head in confusion, and then lifted his face in alarm. All around him, the pine trees were blazing. Had he lit them on fire? Since Woodhouse considered him part of itself, and thought that no part of the valley could attack any other part of the valley, it wouldn't necessarily stop him.

Then he realized this wasn't fire. This was pure magic. Coronas of color extended around the trees, deep purple closest to the trunks, blazing red and green and blue further out. As Harry watched, conjured birds blazed into being from the blue rings, doves colored almost the same as the pines, and wheeled around each other before they scattered across the forest. They took on more solidity as they went, and he doubted they would fade once they got out of range of his magic.

His power was breaking loose. And its first impulse was to create and drape beauty over the trees, not destroy things. Harry blinked and stared at the images for a long time before the flinches in his skin made themselves known again. Then he stared at his hand, and pondered what he'd learned.

I- I didn't destroy Woodhouse because I let my magic fly. I always assumed I would, and then I didn't.

Perhaps that meant that some of the other things he desired weren't as disgusting as he'd believed. And perhaps that meant that if he did break a barrier on occasion, and acted as he wanted instead of as he thought he must, the world wouldn't come to an end.

"Harry."

Harry lifted his head sharply. Draco stood a few feet away, his back against one of the pines, shivering as the light played over his shoulders like warm feathers. Harry could only imagine the self-control it was taking for him not to come closer right now. And then he didn't have to imagine, because looking into Draco's eyes made him know. It was like standing a step away from water when one was dying of thirst.

Harry let out a deep breath. "I chose this," he said, getting to one knee and then managing to stand. He knew his clothes had many small rips in them from rolling around on the stones, and that blood might be trickling over his skin, too. He didn't care. The rush of well-being that had swallowed him on seeing Draco was already fading, and other urges were making themselves felt just behind it. "And I have been remiss in keeping my promises. If I hadn't been, then this wouldn't be striking me so powerfully now."

Draco nodded. Sweat was already matting his hair to his cheeks and the sides of his face. Harry swayed forward a step, and then forced himself to stop. If he touched Draco now, that would be the end of rational speech, and he didn't want Draco to think he'd been dragged into this unwilling. Draco had to understand.

"I want this," Harry said clearly. His vision was awash with fire and light and magic and wonder, the barriers in him breaking more rapidly now that he was so close to Draco. "I do. And for once, I'm not going to be afraid of it."

Finally, finally, he gave in to the magic that was sliding around him and tugging at him like many small impatient hands, and walked forward. He caught Draco's mouth with his own and Vanished his clothing and Draco's.

There were rocks on the ground, roots, dirt, and needles. Harry willed some of them to transform into a cushion, and that ceased to be a problem.

He found it very hard to stop kissing Draco. It felt as if he had never understood before what it was like, to have someone else's tongue in his mouth. And then he realized that he hadn't, because he had never allowed himself to concentrate on his own feelings to that extent. He'd been too preoccupied, waiting for his training to come back, or worrying that he was hurrying or hurting Draco.

"Stop thinking, already," Draco insisted, tugging his mouth away and than yanking on Harry's hair with both hands. Harry hissed at the pain, but even that ran along his nerves as if it had new paths to travel for the first time. "Feel, Harry."

And Harry leaned forward, and did.

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Draco knew the difference now. He had thought Harry relaxed and uninhibited when he'd lured him into bed after the release of his emotions from the Occlumency pools, but now he knew Harry had been constraining himself, keeping up a barrier so that his magic would never do anything potentially frightening and Draco had nearly to coax him into orgasm.

Not this time.

Harry rolled him onto the cushion, his magic giving his muscles strength Draco doubted he would have had in any ordinary situation. Draco caught his breath for only a moment before Harry landed on top of him, driving it out again.

And then they were kissing, and who cared about breath?

Draco licked every corner of Harry's mouth he could reach, knowing it was enormously wet, and not caring. Harry's glasses were going to get broken between them- but the moment he thought that, they were gone, safely Vanished. Harry's eyes were open, full of falling green, and staring directly into his, and he'd read Draco's thoughts.

Draco could read his now, too. Harry was being forced to question those opinions he'd relied on for so long that he'd thought of them the same way he thought of objective reality. He no longer thought he was evil for wanting to simply reach out and take control sometimes, not if the person involved was inviting and welcoming the control. And he no longer thought it was selfish or base to want to feel the pleasure he felt when he was in bed with Draco.

He wanted to scoff, he really did, that Harry could ever have thought he was selfish, but Harry was tearing free of his mouth abruptly, and that hurt, both to lose the kiss and to break eye contact, and Draco hissed an obscenity, and Harry hissed something back, practically in Parseltongue, and rolled down his body, ignoring the way his elbows jabbed Draco's stomach in his haste.

Draco was not sure what he expected. He pushed himself up on his elbows just as Harry let his breath ghost over his groin. Draco blinked, and then his head fell back and he moaned loudly.

Harry might not have known what he was doing entirely. Draco wasn't much help. His mouth was shaping words, but they weren't the most articulate words around. He rolled almost off the cushion at one point, but Harry seized his thigh and held him in place. He tried to express his enthusiasm in some way other than the violent pulling on Harry's head and jerking of his hips, but he didn't think he was successful.

Harry chuckled. Draco almost screamed. Merlin, so close already, he wanted to, he wanted to, and he didn't think he had ever cared so much about one thing. Of course, his body had wanted this since he woke up this morning, or, at least, wanted contact with Harry.

He made himself sit up and look down at Harry, reaching out one hand to cup his cheek. Harry glanced up at him, and their eyes met.

Draco looked for a moment straight into pure power, pure exultation and pleasure, swifter than riding on a broom above the Quidditch pitch and wilder than a ride on a karkadann- the first time in his life that Harry had ever forgotten self-restraint and simply taken joy in what he could do.

Draco felt spiral trails of triumph and pleasure rise and dive through him, seeming to originate from the crown of his skull and his stomach, and when they met as a helix in the center of his chest, he shuddered and shook in a way that seemed the fulfillment of all the twitches he'd experienced since waking this morning. Harry was laughing, but Draco didn't much care. He'd never felt anything so good. When he shut his eyes and thus cut off his gaze with Harry, tilting his head back, the pleasure lessened only a little.

Harry pulled back, wiping his mouth when Draco peeked again. He was smiling, still smugly self-content.

Time to test how much he's really changed, Draco thought, and fought past the lassitude in his muscles that wanted him to lie down and go to sleep. "You're going to let me return that," he said, eyes locking on Harry's.

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Harry felt his own breathing speed up, and wasn't afraid of what Draco might think the reason was. Draco was meeting his gaze, anyway, and he knew what the reason was.

The thought of someone doing that to him made him want to leap out of his skin with excitement, and at the same time roused old spasms of fear. He didn't want to lose control. More to the point, he didn't want to take a position that could possibly be construed as stronger than Draco. He didn't want to control anyone.

Draco's gaze sharpened. "This is my choice, Harry," he said. "And it's going to happen, I promise you."

Harry closed his eyes and swallowed. His arousal was painful by now, and if he didn't allow Draco to touch him with something soon, mouth or fingers, then he was going to have to wank. And Draco was offering freely, and Harry wanted it. For a moment, desire battled desire, and Harry wondered if he could show even Draco this much trust.

Then he opened his eyes, fastened them on Draco's, and nodded, lying back on the cushion and spreading his legs.

Draco's grin lashed across his face like a whip. He leaned forward first, and, too quickly for Harry to read his intent out of his eyes, sucked at the place on Harry's neck that he hated, because it was so sensitive.

Now, with his skin stretched tight and hot over most of his body, it made Harry scrabble madly at the cushion with his hand, his cries incoherent; he thought he started on a curse but didn't manage to finish it. He wanted to come, damn it. He hooked his legs around Draco's and pulled him forward, chest to chest. If Draco was going to be a tease, then he could damn well rub against Harry like a rabid animal and finish what he was starting right here.

But Draco pulled away, shaking his head, his mouth twisting as if he wanted to smirk but was too astonished to do so. "Remind me to ask for this side of you again," he murmured, inching down the bed until his mouth was promisingly close to Harry's groin. "It's not in the same room with cringing and shy."

"Are you going to bloody do this, or not?" Harry demanded, and Draco didn't give him a wounded look for the demand. He only smiled. Harry felt a fear so old he'd barely known it was there any more char and die. He could speak in a sharp tone, be something other than the perfect pureblood who asked for more with a tone of cold courtesy in his voice or the diplomat who expected a refusal, and it was not the end of the world. Draco, in fact, was looking at him as if he wanted to fuck him.

"Of course I'm going to bloody do this," Draco murmured, and then leaned forward.

Harry had wondered what this would feel like.

It was incredibly different. Harry screamed, and then bit the palm of his hand. Draco said something- Harry didn't know what it was, but he found his hand whipped away from his mouth by an invisible tug of magic. He supposed the point was that Draco wanted to hear him, not hear him hold back.

He didn't. He fell into some realm where all that mattered was what he felt. He could sense the heat around him, eating up his skin, and the magic of the ritual inside him, eating through any wall he tried to raise, and the softness of the cushion behind his back, shifting as he rolled from side to side, and the slick trickle of saliva and sweat and wetness-

He came.

Unlike the two other times this had happened, there was no reluctance in him to pour himself out, to enter a moment when the pleasure was so keen that he couldn't keep track of his body or his magic. Harry knew he made some sound, deep and embarrassing, by the feeling of rawness in his throat when he floated back down, and he knew he was tired and limp and so sated that the relaxation seemed to travel into his bones. And for a moment he had been sure he knew what standing in a British Red-Gold's fire was like.

But it was done, and he couldn't even move. He slitted his eyes when Draco crawled up beside him, and tried to say something, but wound up shaking his head as a yawn strained his jaw.

Draco read it from his eyes, anyway. And for the first time in far too long, his smile was without an edge. This is what he wanted, Harry realized, as they kissed, slowly and lazily this time. To see me completely open to him, not worrying about what would happen tomorrow, or making shagging him just one among many things I needed to do, or thinking of anything but him.

That's what I wanted, Draco's thoughts agreed. Now go to sleep, Harry. You want it.

And Harry did want it, no matter how much he thought he should stay awake, because it was the kind of thing someone honorable would do. He blinked and curled himself into Draco's arms. The heat was flying away from him now, but being against Draco's bare skin brought it back, and the ritual magic remained shining in his chest like a phoenix egg.

Then he did what he wanted, feeling better than he ever had.