WARNING: Cliffhanger.

Chapter Seventy-Five: On the Rise

Harry blinked and carefully closed the door of their bedroom behind him. It wasn't that it was all that unusual to come back to Slytherin and find Draco sprawled on his belly in the midst of a series of books and parchments. He had done it when he was still trying to visualize his Animagus form, and then again when he thought he would be able to transform a few weeks after he found it. And sometimes, when he had to write a Potions or Astronomy essay that he wanted to be near perfect, he would lose himself in a maze of words that even Hermione might envy.

Now, though, Draco had several maps hovering in the air around him, directing them with sweeps of his wand. He lay on his stomach over an enormous book, reading the words at the top of the page and moving gradually downwards as he finished one set of them. Sometimes he glanced up and waved his wand again, and one of the maps shot down to him. Draco would make a careful mark on it, and then send it back up to join the hovering circle.

Harry came nearer, making Draco jump when he sat down on the bed. He doubted Draco had seen him beyond the paper. "What are you doing?" he asked curiously. It had only been a day since his meeting with the Opallines and the Gloryflowers, and for Draco to have decided, already, that he was going to do something like this, whatever it was, was—

Unlike him. Unless he really has changed his mind about being lazy and wanting to reach for everything he can do in the last day.

Draco gave him a smile. Harry scanned it for traces of grimness or irony, and couldn't see any. "Calibrid reminded me that I need to make a place for myself in your alliance, Harry, and as more than your lover," he murmured. "But the Dark purebloods don't have any particular reason to listen to me over you; they already know you, mostly, and understand the advantages of allying with you. I don't have a pull with the undeclared wizards, and the Light purebloods are wary of me because of my family's reputation. You're better set-up to approach the magical creatures than I could ever make you, and Jing-Xi gives you a contact with the other Lords and Ladies. So I wondered what kind of political allies I could contact and initiate diplomacy with in order to make myself indispensable—"

"You already are indispensable, Draco," Harry said. "Please. You have to know that." The thought that Draco would think now that Harry didn't want him as a partner because his political connections weren't perfect hurt.

"Oh, I know." Draco leaned back, caressed Harry's knee, and then kissed his right hand, which hung down near him. "And if I only cared about your opinion and mine, then I might be content with that, Harry. But I can't. I need some political prominence and allies of my own. And I need to reverse the image that most of your allies have of me, as some spoiled and indulged pet who's allowed to run about biting their ankles and dirtying the carpet."

Harry choked. "Calibrid didn't put it quite like that," he pointed out.

"No, she didn't." Draco's face was politely blank. "But that's the way I think of it. And, right now, my opinion counts the most. I want to be better than that. And I've found a way." One of the maps zipped its way over to him, and he spread it out so that Harry could see it. "What is this of?"

Harry peered at it cautiously. It looked like an unfamiliar coast, dotted with unfamiliar wizarding communities. He was just about to say so when a name he knew caught his eye, though it looked much smaller on the map than it would in real life. That would come from the map showing only the magical part of the city, he thought, and not the Muggle part. "America," he said. "New York, and part of the coastline."

"Very good," Draco murmured. "We haven't heard from the American wizarding communities. Of course, some of them think this is a European war, and they don't think that much about what would happen if Voldemort won and left Britain. Or perhaps they think their Muggles would protect them." Draco snorted. "They live with them, and they can think that?" He waved his wand, and the map looped back into the air, dancing with the others. "But if that attitude turns out to be widespread among them, then it will make them that much easier to manipulate."

"You're looking to extend the alliance across the oceans, aren't you?" Harry asked flatly.

Draco looked at him.

"I don't think it'll work," said Harry, compelled to be honest. "Even the wizarding communities who are much closer to us aren't taking an interest in the war. They think I can defeat Voldemort, and they don't want to be noticed by him if I can't. How much more is that going to apply to the Americans, since they've got a whole ocean between him and them?"

"Those oceans are going to look pretty damn small if he breeds flying creatures," said Draco. "Or enchants some device that could permit intercontinental Apparition. Or, for that matter, captures the Floo Network. I'm looking ahead. I'm sure I'll find some people among the Americans who want to do the same. Besides, Harry, you forget the larger import of your own work. It's not the war with Voldemort that will last and last all your life. It's your vates task. And there are magical creatures in America, too, bound so that they don't interfere with the Muggles. There are probably more of them, in fact, since European Muggles poured in so fast that the wizards and witches didn't have time to set up sanctuaries. They had to work with webs and do the best they could to hide them in plain sight. They knew the Muggles would kill them as exotica."

"And they're still bound," Harry summarized.

"Do you see the tide of Muggle occupation growing less, at all?" Draco's voice was dry. He waved his wand, and a different map flowed down to him. This time, Harry caught a glimpse of several lakes, and a peninsula shaped vaguely like a hand. "They had a terrible time with the freshwater sea serpents around Michigan. They're living practically under some of the Muggles now, because there isn't any better place to put them."

"And if my presence breaks those webs—"

"It's not going to be pretty," Draco finished. "There are too many magical creatures side by side with Muggles, instead of off in some remote mountains or forests the way they tend to be in Europe. Oh, some are hidden, but not enough. And the American witches and wizards have this—this delusion that the way they do things is oh so much better than the ways more established magical communities do things. That includes killing magical creatures who escape their bindings, rather than risk them being seen by Muggles and having to Obliviate the Muggles."

Harry hissed between his teeth, and the shadow of a black cat appeared beside him.

"I rather thought that would irritate you." Draco sounded amused. "And the Ministry has its own customs and ways of doing things, too, including an obsession with informality that, oddly enough, still makes them infatuated with formal rituals. They'll pretend to scorn me when I contact them, but they'll be secretly flattered that someone from an old pureblood wizarding family is doing it, and they'll be impressed that it's someone with such an important place in the alliance. I really don't think they would accept that someone like Calibrid Opalline could still be just as important to you. It'll look better that it's your partner."

"I—this is wonderful, Draco," Harry said, a little helplessly. He hadn't thought of reaching out to the Americans for help. He had so much to do that he'd focused on moving forward, and preparing to fight the concrete threats that Jing-Xi could tell him about. But perhaps it was time that he thought of the Alliance of Sun and Shadow surviving, even thriving, beyond the immediate purpose of freeing British magical creatures. "I don't know if you'll be ready to do all this immediately."

"Oh, I'm not." Draco indicated the immense book he lay on. "I've been reading the history of magical communities in America, and I'll read more. By the time I contact them, I want to be able to make them dance to my tune. I might be able to do that right now with a British wizard, but I'm smart enough to realize the limits to my knowledge. They just won't be limits much longer." He smiled.

He looked so smug that Harry couldn't help himself; he leaned in to kiss him, and Draco returned it with interest. When he heard parchment creak and crackle around them, though, Harry pulled back. "I'm interrupting your studying," he said innocently. "Of course you'll want to finish that first."

Draco groaned and reached out as Harry moved backward, though his hand fell short on the bed. "Harry, it's been a week…"

"But it won't be much longer," said Harry, and winked. "The vernal equinox is in just a few days, remember?"

Draco lifted himself on his elbows and stared at him steadily. Harry stared back. He knew Draco read the silent challenge in his eyes. So far, Draco seemed intent on keeping his promise to live up to his potential and strive for greatness, but it was only one day since Calibrid had so stung him. There was no saying that he would keep up his intensity until the vernal equinox.

"You'll be spending the day with someone you can be proud of, Harry," Draco said, when the stare had lasted long enough to make them both, apparently, feel slightly uncomfortable.

Harry inclined his head, and withdrew.

SSSSSSSSSSSS

Draco glanced at the bed. The papers and parchments he'd been studying earlier were safely out of the way. The enormous History of Wizards in America that he'd used to start working his way into, well, the history of wizards in America lay on the bedside table, nearly tipping it. Even their trunks were shoved back against the wall, and Draco had gently but firmly put Argutus out the door when the Omen snake had tried to enter earlier.

He closed his eyes.

He knew now, humiliatingly, why he hadn't been able to do this so far. How many books had he read in which he'd seen some sentence about will, and how important it was? He could want to achieve this, but until he really focused his will and aimed it towards the desired end, he would always fail.

Now he did not intend to fail. He gave himself over to the swimming desire. He was in one place. The vision he wanted to reach stood at the other end. He had to cover the ground between himself and it, and this first time, he had to do it with nothing but will.

The books had advised him to go more slowly, but Draco had done that, and nothing happened. He simply couldn't be determined one day, and then slightly more determined the next. It had to occur all at once, or it would never occur.

Draco bent himself towards the task.

It was hard. He felt as if scrambled forward with an enormous load of rock on his back. His head was bent, and sweat trickled down his neck, and distracting noises came floating up from the Slytherin common room. He could hear Syrinx pacing on the other side of the door where he'd exiled her, if he listened hard enough. He could imagine Harry bursting into the room and disrupting his concentration.

He could imagine sagging back onto the bed and saying it was all too much. He hadn't told Harry about this, just in case he did fail. So there would be no one to scold him for not achieving it.

Except himself.

Wrong or not, the general magical community had an impression of him that Draco had never intended. It was up to him to correct that impression. Spreading rumors of his magical competence would not do it. Promising to work harder and then never working harder would not do it. Telling Harry of what he wanted and receiving praise would only mean that he put off the effort, because he could live for weeks on Harry's praise.

And that was another reason he was doing this, wasn't it? He had something unique to offer to Harry's alliance if he could master this. Oh, sure, there were a few other people helping Harry who could do the same thing, but they all had the advantage, or disadvantage, of being known for it. Draco could hide his skill, because no one would expect him to have it. That might save their lives on a battlefield someday, or on a spying mission. Voldemort would guard against those people he knew to have this skill, but not against Draco.

That got him past one twist and turn of the passage. The image he wanted to reach had drawn a little closer.

And there was the image of what Harry's face would look like if he found out that Draco could do it. Draco imagined a pair of arms gathering him closer, a pair of wide green eyes shining with approval and joy. Perhaps Harry would even break the self-declared fast of sex that was lasting until the vernal equinox, and share the bed with Draco for something other than sleeping.

The image was closer now, bristling. And Draco had the feeling that the hardest part of concentration yet lay ahead. Neither the thought of Harry's approval nor improving his own reputation would carry him through this rocky country; he'd already used them as climbing rope.

He panted. For a moment, his concentration did waver, and almost break into pieces. But then he leaped sideways, and caught the rope he needed.

He wanted to do this for his own sake, too. If he could be more than he'd always thought he was, if other people had seen this greatness in him and he hadn't, then he wanted to have that potential. The way to have that potential was not by making efforts and then slipping back. Other wizards might do that, but not a Malfoy. Not a wizard like him, always stronger and better than other people thought he was.

Not Draco.

He burst through the last stretch separating him from the image. And suddenly it was easier. The rocks he'd carried and climbed fell all about him, tumbling light. His body lowered and grew stronger, and then he was through, tumbling, his mental self colliding with the image and wrapping it all about himself.

Draco cried out as he felt his bones shift and his face elongate, his body shrink and his skin ripple and turn inside out. It hurt, an instant of compressed agony that might have been enough to make him give up the transformation. But all the books had said that once it began to happen, physically, the hardest part was past. It was the concentration that took all the time and effort.

He opened his eyes, aching as if someone had grabbed him by the scruff of the neck and slammed him into multiple walls, but also aware of an intense feeling of accomplishment. He stood and stepped forward. For a moment, human knowledge and animal instincts fought in him, and then the instincts won and Draco found himself moving easily on four legs.

He stared into the mirror he'd left leaning near the wall. After a moment, he spun around and examined his reflection from the back, because he positively could not believe that an animal could be so handsome.

He was a white fox, just as he had seen in his vision. His fur was a deep cream color, so that he wouldn't shine unnaturally beneath the moonlight, but stood some chance of blending into snow. His paws were neat, quick, and light. His eyes were gray, and he had no marking anywhere on his body except a slight strip of black around his muzzle and mouth that served to accent his equally black nose.

His nose! Scents were flooding him, when Draco could pay attention to anything but the way he looked. His ears flagged up and down, and he could hear sounds through the walls that his Housemates would be embarrassed by if they knew about them. His brush swished softly back and forth, a living thing on its own. When Draco paid attention to it, then it grew heavy and awkward and slow, but it picked up speed again the moment he started watching it from the corner of his eye and mind.

He had done it. He had achieved his Animagus form before any of the others had. And he had done it because of the strength of his will.

Smug, Draco reached for the will to transform back, and found that this came much more easily. He knew what it was like to be a wizard, after all, had known for most of his life, and the shape of large limbs and an unsensing body snapped into place about him. Draco found himself staggering, half in and half out of his clothes, and blinking at the mirror.

He tried to change back into a fox.

A short uphill struggle this time, and he could do it. Draco turned around to admire the color of his fur again.

The bedroom door opened. Harry's irritated voice said, "Draco, why were Argutus and Syrinx outside—"

Draco turned and trotted towards him. He heard Harry's voice die. When he looked up, he couldn't read his expression well—not only was he further away from Harry's face than usual, but his fox eyes saw things differently—but he didn't have to. The flush on those cheeks and the scent around him told how much he approved.

Draco jumped neatly into Harry's arms, and settled back, and waited for praise.

SSSSSSSSSSSSS

Connor decided he'd had enough of that.

"That" was Draco staring at him all the damn time. Granted, he mostly did it in Defense Against the Dark Arts, given that that was the one class where Draco sat behind him and could do it most easily, but sometimes he stared at meals, too, and whenever they passed each other in the corridors. When Connor came to visit Harry in the Slytherin common room, Draco sat on a chair nearby and rarely tried to join the conversation unless specifically invited, instead murmuring a few "yes" or "no" responses, and staring at Connor.

He caught Draco's arm as the other boy left Defense Against the Dark Arts, and turned him so that his back was to the wall. Draco smirked at him, and glanced down at Connor's hand. "I hate to tell you this, Potter, but I'm already thoroughly taken."

Connor dropped his arm as if it were made of dragonfire, before realizing that was exactly what Draco had intended him to do. He settled for a snort and a disgusted look.

"You've been watching me," he said. "I want to know why."

And then Draco paused and licked his lips and looked nervous. As the moments passed and there was no Slytherin, sly answer forthcoming immediately, Connor's interest grew. So this wasn't a game after all, then, or an attempt to make him feel uncomfortable around his future brother-in-law. It was something more serious, and that might mean Draco wasn't perfectly confident. Connor preferred that. He had some chance of disconcerting Draco in turn.

"I've been trying to see the past Connor and the future Connor in you," said Draco, which sent Connor back into a state of confusion.

"What do you mean by that?"

"It—there was that Pensieve Harry gave me for Christmas," Draco said. "Filled with memories of times I hadn't actually shared with him, mostly childhood memories. And you're there so often. In so many of them, the most important person in Harry's life. I wanted to know what you were like." He made a vague gesture at Connor's chest. "And I wanted to know how you could be like—this. You've changed since then, but I don't know how you did it."

"Of course you don't," said Connor, and stepped back from Draco, relaxing. It wasn't so very wonderful that he should want to know, was it? Draco was practically shouting his intention to change to the whole school. Since Connor had had to shift his own perception of and actions around Harry so dramatically, he was probably the best one suited to give him advice. "Not even Harry knows. By the time he really started looking, I'd already accomplished most of it."

"So tell me how," Draco said.

Connor shrugged, and half-closed his eyes, forcing himself to return to memories that, by now, had lost their sting and become part of his daily reality. "After—Sirius killed himself, and I heard the truth about the prophecy and watched Harry free the Dementors, I realized how much of what I'd believed was built on lies. Harry helped me a bit with the grief, and so did James and Remus, but so many people had sheltered me from the world most of my life. I wanted to think about things on my own. So I pretended I was more healed than I actually was. Harry was so tied up in his attempts to get along with Dad, and then with dealing with the beginnings of this alliance he's got now and with Snape, that he didn't notice. Dad might have, but he was more occupied with getting Harry back from Snape, and Remus was grieving for Sirius.

"So I could think about things like the end of considering myself as the Boy-Who-Lived without anyone interfering. And I saw two roads I could take. One ended in resentment of Harry, jealousy of him for having the title I'd always believed I was mine. And the other ended with being content with my own ordinariness, and a support for him instead of a rival or an obstacle. That was the road I chose. I worked as hard as I could to accustom myself to what I am now. I told myself every day that Harry was the Boy-Who-Lived. I made myself try to see the way Dad and Mum—I mean, James and Lily—" Connor had fallen far enough into his story to forget himself "—had really acted around him, instead of just assuming they'd treated us the same. When I flew, I remembered that Harry could do better.

"And I saw all the things he'll never have, all the things I can do that he never can. He doesn't even notice when someone loves him, most of the time. I know when someone loves me. He has a hard time asserting his own will and insisting on his own rights. I don't. He torments himself over his mistakes. I don't. I love Harry, but there is no way under the sun that I would want to be him."

He thought, for a moment, of telling Draco about the noticing he'd started to do lately, and how he thought that was probably Harry's fault, not Parvati's. But he couldn't bring himself to. For one thing, he still sort of hoped the noticing would go away, and he wouldn't have to be what it was calling him to be. For another, Draco didn't really care about that, about him. Connor was wise enough to know that. Draco cared about him in relation to Harry, and if he could understand Connor better, he would get along with him better, and that would please Harry. What Draco Malfoy did, he did with himself as the center of the universe and the only point of reference.

And, finally, Connor wasn't sure how to describe the noticing without sounding stupid. So he'd noticed that Lavender Brown was very kind to the Gryffindor fifth-years, and that Dean always stared off into space just before he started panting, and that Neville had kept a little plant alive on his windowsill for weeks that wasn't supposed to stay alive in this climate? So what? It sounded stupid.

"Thanks, Connor."

He opened his eyes, and blinked. It wasn't like Draco to call him by his first name. But now he had, and now he even nodded and moved away stiffly, as if cradling the new knowledge to himself made it difficult to walk.

Connor shook his head in bemusement, and went to go study his Animagus transformation. He had made it part of the way to the boar image last night before falling back. That was all right, Peter had said. Just keep driving forward, and he would reach it eventually. And a boar was a perfectly fine form to have. Blunt, strong, cleverer than many people thought they were, able to bring down barriers that separated them from others.

On the way back to Gryffindor Tower, Connor noticed three secret sneers, one blossoming romance, and the sources of two future disputes. The result was that he flopped back on his bed when he reached the Tower and scowled at his ceiling instead of beginning to study right away.

Stupid noticing.

SSSSSSSSSSSSSSS

Harry woke on the day of the vernal equinox feeling both smug and hopeful. He thought, he really thought, that Draco had changed enough that what he'd planned for the first day of spring could happen after all.

He'd worked through most of his correspondence and all his homework during the rest of the week, and he was sure that leaving for a few days would harm nothing. And he wanted to leave for a few days. He wanted to show Draco what he had planned, and he wanted—

He wanted a holiday, damn it.

He'd wrestled with the thought for a long time. He'd thought, at first, that it was selfish of him, and then that Christmas ought to be enough, or the upcoming Easter holidays. But Christmas had been ruined by the news of the Horcruxes and what he'd have to do to neutralize them, and Harry couldn't be sure something else wouldn't happen between now and Easter to upset his plans. So he was going to take Draco away for a few days following the equinox, the balanced day of Light and Dark, the moment when power passed from Dark to Light, and he would refuse to worry about any of the other problems that could plague him for the space of that time.

He went down to breakfast humming quietly, and received the owl that came from Hogsmeade with a smile. Draco was late, but Harry had expected that. Since it was the equinox itself, Draco would want to do something dramatic. Harry ate with an eye on the doors to the Great Hall.

Draco stood there a moment later. He came at once to Harry, his stride more confident than it had been since long before the day when Calibrid scolded him. Harry allowed himself to sit back and admire for a moment. Draco looked so much better when he forgot to worry about defending his own sulky desires, and instead set about influencing what other people thought of him.

If he wants to dispute the Grand Unified Theory, he should write against it, Harry thought, as he stood. Not whinge about it and expect people to listen to him that way.

Draco met him with a kiss and a murmured instruction to sit down. Then he drew his wand with a flourish. "I have a new spell to show you, Harry," he said. "One that I'd been thinking about for the past few days, but which I just worked last night."

Harry sat down with what he knew was a giddy smile on his face, but he didn't care. What mattered was that Draco had made a new spell. He loved the moments when Draco showed off his power and his will and what, together, they could produce. If nothing else, it moved Draco further out from under his shadow, and gave him more freedom and independence.

Draco held his wand in front of him and closed his eyes. A moment later, a trickling yellow light began to play from it, and formed into a ring in the air. Harry leaned forward, seeing an unfamiliar image through it. It looked like a coastline, a rocky one that might have been in Northumbria or Ireland or Scotland itself.

The incantation Draco used must have been nonverbal, because Harry continued to hear no words as the image slowly swayed back and forth, seeking something. Then it focused on a figure walking majestically towards the water's edge.

Harry hissed in his breath. "Falco!" he whispered.

"Yes," Draco said. His voice trembled with strain. "The spell—seeks out one of your greatest enemies, and then shows them to you. I was going to try for—Voldemort, but I thought it was too risky."

"Too right," Harry muttered, eyes focused on Falco. He had knelt beside the rocks, and stirred one hand in the shallow waves now, eyes fixed on what looked to be water no deeper than a tidepool.

Then the water wrinkled, and a sleek head lifted itself from the surface, long yellow hair flooding down its shoulders. Harry hissed again. It was a siren, one of the merfolk Voldemort had freed from their web in Greece and hunted Britain's coasts with for a time. Scrimgeour had warned Harry that Falco seemed to be spending time near the coasts, but Harry had not known that he had come so far as to get a siren to speak to him.

Falco said something now that the spell didn't pick up. The siren nodded, and pulled her head back beneath the water. Falco stood up, still gazing into the ocean, a tired expression on his face.

He Apparated. The spell's image went dark for a moment, and then he appeared in a clearing that made Harry sit up. He knew that clearing. It was in the Forbidden Forest, not so very far from Hogwarts.

Falco extended his hands, and they were full of wooden disks, which were familiar to Harry from a certain attack Voldemort had instituted on the autumnal equinox the year before last. He began to place the disks in a circle around himself. Harry had no doubt that he intended to use them the same way, to command sirens to attack up bays and rivers and so on as Voldemort had—perhaps even send them up the Thames into London itself.

"Draco," Harry said. "Does this spell show what's happening right now?"

"It's supposed to," Draco said warily.

Harry stepped away from the table, his breath already rushing freely in his lungs, his hand clenched. The silver hand flexed and bent a bit, but still wasn't accustomed enough to his body to obey him completely.

"Listen, Draco," he said. "You've definitely earned what I meant to give you for the equinox, but now it appears that I have to teach Falco a lesson."

"Harry—"

Falco, in the image, raised his hand.

A moment later, the sirens' compelling voices rang out from the Hogwarts lake, striking through the school's wards as if they weren't there, twining around the ears of students and making them face the doors of the Great Hall glassy-eyed.

Harry grimaced and ran, weaving wards behind him that ought to keep the other students inside for at least a little while; under compulsion, they wouldn't be thinking rationally enough to dismantle them immediately.

So much for my holiday.