Thanks for the reviews on the last chapter!
Chapter Eighty-Two: Day of Glory
Harry studied the ring closely, then nodded and put it in his pocket. It would do. If he had done what he was supposed to do in the first place, and studied the joining rituals individually, as Draco had done, then he probably could have found something even better, but at least he'd been paying attention this time. "Thank you, Connor."
His brother hesitated for a moment, staring at him. That made Harry, in turn, hesitate to leave the sixth-year boys' bedroom in Gryffindor Tower. "What's wrong?"
Connor swallowed, then said, "Are you ready for this? Both tomorrow and—what the night will bring?"
Harry smiled reassuringly. He'd told Connor about the message he'd received from Scrimgeour a month ago now, warning him that his nameless source of information on Falco believed he would attack on Walpurgis Night. Since Harry also believed that, and he didn't think he could have kept battle preparations concealed from Connor anyway, he'd shared the information with his brother. Connor normally wouldn't attend Walpurgis Night given his Declaration and the fact that Harry was sure the prophecy meant for Draco to stand beside him and fend off Falco's attack, but he had offered to come with them, now, several times. "I'm ready, Connor. A year ago? No, I don't think I would have been." It made him smile more widely, to think how nervous he'd been about that Walpurgis ritual, his and Draco's first. "I've had time to get used to it now."
"If you're sure you don't need me," said Connor, with a tiny nod.
"I would like you along," said Harry. "But this celebration is supposed to be a private time for Dark wizards, and the ritual—well, it will be shared, but Draco and I need to be in the center of it."
Connor cocked his head and narrowed his eyes. "I'm not entirely looking forward to the sharing part."
"I hope you will," said Harry vaguely, and then waved his hand and departed from the Tower. Connor watched him with intent eyes all the way to the door, but made no other effort to keep him there.
Harry stopped walking once he was a few floors down from the Tower and examined the ring in his hand. This ritual, the Giving of Gifts, said that Harry needed to return the gesture Draco had made for him the year before, and give Draco some sign or signal of their partnership—ideally, an heirloom from his family line. Given that Harry had rejected the Potter name and his mother was Muggleborn, he was not entirely sure what to do about it. Regulus had offered him Black artifacts, of course, but given that Draco was half-Black himself, it had seemed vaguely incestuous. This part of the dance was about the joining of different facets of the partners' selves, not the same ones.
In the end, he had asked Connor if he could look at some rings inherent to the Potter line, and had chosen a golden one etched with lions and set with a topaz. What he planned to do with it would, he hoped, alter it enough to fulfill the confines of the ritual.
He ducked into an alcove as a prefect's footsteps scraped by, waited until she'd moved away, and then snapped the topaz out of its setting. He put it on a windowsill, spent a few moments composing and deepening himself, and opened his eyes to focus his gaze on the ring.
The gold began to soften and sag as he watched, turning slowly molten, but not hot. Just—soft. Harry held up his hands and parted them, and the ring spun in the middle of them, losing its shape, dripping in strands of metal that floated up to touch his fingers like the silk of a spiderweb. He moved his hands over each other, and thought of what he wanted to do.
He was becoming more comfortable working with his magic this way, the way that Lord-level magic was supposed to work. Jing-Xi had confirmed as much when he asked her. He could act through traditional spells, but they sometimes made inadequate casings for his power or wouldn't let him achieve the effect he wanted. Outside those spells, he had to use the hammer of his will to drive himself forward, rather as someone did when completing the Animagus transformation. It was tiring, but it was also more likely to result in what he wished.
Now he wished to use the gold of the Potter ring as a base to create something that would be unique to him, still an artifact of his family line, but, more to the point, an artifact of him. He could see the general shape of the ring in his mind, but deciding the symbols to put on it was harder.
Then he smiled, and presented the image of the ring in his mind's eye, and pushed towards it.
His magic surrounded him, not spreading out around his body like a pool, but thrumming through his veins. Harry could feel it building as pressure behind his eyeballs, in fact, a steady impress of song and blood and violent motion. He was climbing a mountain. It could be done, but it made his breath come short and the urge to vomit increase. And all through the contrary sensations, he had to keep seeing the ring, imagining, thinking of it.
Press, and suddenly the overwhelming urge came to him to clasp his hands together, so he did.
A blaze of white light gathered all the golden strands up, and Harry, squinting, thought he could see a small, hollow sphere forming in the middle of them. Threads clasped each other and interwove. If he was right, the new ring would not be a solid band, as the other had been, but a twined one, a braided one. That was all right, if he could still have what he wanted.
His magic surged up beneath and carried him. Harry felt a moment's thrill. He worked in partnership with his power, not commanded it, when it was like this—the way that Jing-Xi had told him it should be. His power carried him like a horse, and while he could direct it with reins and halter, there was still a great deal of strength and speed under him that might decide to do something else at any moment.
Kick, and soar, and descend, and then they were in a new realm, so that Harry felt as if small pieces of himself were being woven into the ring. He accepted the feeling. He didn't know if it were literal, but if it was, it just meant that the gift would be even more part of himself, and even more fit for Draco. The gold had been held by Potters, but reforged by him, who had no last name.
The strands shimmered and shook and grew slimmer. Harry felt tiny points sprouting from them, tiny indentations pressed into them, tiny parts of them extend and wrap with other tiny parts. The sensation increased until he didn't know if he had his own body any more, or if he were part of this ring, made for the fourth finger on Draco's right hand.
And then he was back in his body, spun out, dizzy, staring down at the new ring that lay in his left palm. Every single braided strand was a lynx, slim body twisted around, reaching ahead with outstretched paws to grasp the one in front and trailing a tail behind for the next to hold, heads lifted and wise ears pricked. The setting for the topaz still waited at the top.
Harry solemnly snapped the stone back into place, and then slid it into his pocket. He knew what he was supposed to do in the Giving of Gifts from having actually studied the ritual this time. Unfortunately, Draco also did, and would be angling for an early glimpse of his gift if at all possible. Harry didn't intend to give him one.
SSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS
Try as he might, Draco had not seen Harry's gift for him before they went to bed, which meant that he awakened on the morning of the Giving of Gifts not knowing what it would be.
He had lain awake last night debating what it could be, when he wasn't worried about the battle with Falco that Harry believed would come after nightfall and how they were going to accomplish it. There was so little that could count as an artifact of Harry's family. Had he chosen something Black? Something Snape? Well, come to that, Professor Snape probably didn't have any heirlooms, either, since his father had been a Muggle—Draco felt his lip curl, but it was mostly habit—and his mother had probably sold anything she had to help herself survive.
He lay next to Harry, and fought to keep from stirring. The moment he made any strong movement, the ritual would begin, and he wanted he and Harry to begin that motion together.
Harry opened his eyes at last, and smiled agreeably, sleepily, at him. "Good morning," he whispered, and grasped and kissed the back of Draco's hand. Draco gave him a smile that he hoped was coy, but Harry laughed, even though, without his glasses, Draco knew he couldn't see it well.
"You'll receive your gift in a short time, Draco," he said.
"You won't actually wait until noon, will you?" Draco hated how disappointed his voice sounded, but the requirement of waiting until noon to present this gift wasn't a major part of the ritual—more advice, like the terms that said the betrothed couple should wait until the end of the dance to share a bed. He had assumed Harry would disobey the rule.
"In this case, I want to." Harry considered him solemnly. "You don't really mind, do you?"
Draco swallowed an objection and shook his head. Harry was supposed to be the one guiding and leading in this ritual, since Draco had guided and led in the one last year, and had been the one to actually propose the three-year dance. He had shown an inclination to read up on it in the last few weeks and actually research what he was supposed to do, which had made Draco satisfied in a way that nothing else so far in their courtship had.
And he had kept his life safe for a month, as he had promised. Harry really had made an attempt to learn his lesson this time.
"Good." Harry's face relaxed, and he kissed Draco one more time, on the cheek. "Ready?"
Draco nodded slowly. His brain felt larger than normal, like liquid sloshing around in his skull. He and Harry inched away from each other, and then stood up and climbed out of bed at the same moment.
Draco felt the Giving of Gifts begin. His mind went leaping out from what seemed to be the sides of his head, through his ears, curling like pearly liquid across their bedroom and into the Slytherin common room. He caught blurred glimpses of familiar faces, the fire, the dungeon walls, and then his perceptions flattened and streamed upward, lashing viciously into place.
Draco heard Harry give a slight moan, and guessed that his mind had stretched further, since none of Draco's family were actually in the school. He put out a blind hand, and Harry caught and squeezed it. Draco leaned against him, gasping a little, his brain reeling as he tried to adjust to being mostly in his own body but also there, in someone else's head, with random flashes of their reality intruding at random times.
This part of the ritual was designed to link the joined partners to their in-laws, and smooth out any problems between them by letting them share each other's mindset for a day. Both Connor and Draco's parents had accepted that this would happen, Draco reminded himself dimly.
He had not known how intense it would be. In the back of his mind, he supposed he had thought it would be like his own possession, where he could control what was happening. But he retained awareness of his own body and position. And he couldn't control it when a pair of eyes opened and stared at a canopy of red and gold.
Connor rolled over and sat up. Draco gasped a little at the feeling of an alien body, but more at the content of his thoughts.
He was—
It was so simple, his world. It was much like Draco's world, before he had changed his mind about certain fundamental parts of it, like the innate superiority of purebloods. Connor knew whom he liked and whom he disliked, and now that he was not playing the part of the Boy-Who-Lived, he saw little need to extend his sympathies unless he had to. At the same time, it was fringed with soft and moving shadows, what he called the noticing, which meant he picked up on other people's moods and preoccupations and started seeing them as more important, because they existed in the world, too, even as he did.
It wasn't something Connor was comfortable with, since he suspected it meant he was becoming an adult, and he tried to hide from it whenever possible.
The perceptions ended for the moment, and Draco staggered, leaning hard on Harry. A moment later, he opened his eyes and peered at his partner.
Harry had his eyes open already, and gave him a strained smile. "Ready?" he asked, holding out his arm. They'd both showered last night, so as to be able not to waste time this morning, or risk falling over in the loo from a sudden and dizzying burst of another person's thoughts.
"I'm going to be appreciating your brother before the day is out," Draco said in a faint tone, resting his hand on Harry's arm. "I'm not sure that I could ever be ready for that."
Harry laughed, and something in the laugh made Draco turn to look at him. "Are you all right?" he asked.
"Seeing through your father's eyes right now," Harry murmured, striding across the bedroom and managing to open the door more, Draco thought, by memory than anything else. "It's very strange. I never realized how much we do think alike, or at least how much we thought alike before I changed my mind and rejected my training."
"He's a Dark pureblood," said Draco simply. "Your parents largely raised you like one, Harry, whether or not they meant to. That's why we got along so well at first."
"No, that was your doing."
Draco started to respond, but stopped at the dazzling smile Harry was giving him. It was a sidelong thing, from the corner of his mouth, and Harry's eyes were still filled with whatever he was seeing of Lucius and Narcissa, and it was absent, and it was loving, and it was the most beautiful expression Harry had ever shown him. It accepted Draco's place in his past, even, instead of blaming him for the persistent sticking to Harry's side he'd done in their first two years.
Draco decided he could wait until noon and endure the perceptions of Connor Potter after all.
SSSSSSSSSSSSSS
Connor chewed a crust of toast thoughtfully, and wondered if Draco could feel it when he did that.
He was feeling some effects from the ritual, too, but they were smaller than what Draco would be experiencing. Now and then the memory of a pureblood dance he had never known would return to him, and it was like something he had only temporarily forgotten. Once or twice he had had the dizzying feeling of sitting at the wrong table, and there was flashes of excitement that he refused to look at much further.
If this helped Draco, it was all to the good, as far as Connor was concerned. He had done more to accept his brother-in-law so far than Draco had done to accept him. The Giving of Gifts might help Draco learn to live with him.
He ate another piece of toast and sneaked a glance at his brother. Harry had said he would be fine, both with the ring and the fight with Falco tonight. Connor was not sure. He would have liked to have been there to help.
Except…
Well, he couldn't. He was Declared Light, and he could feel the hovering Dark of Walpurgis as a faint, indistinct threat when he felt it at all. He wouldn't be welcome at whatever celebration Draco and Harry would attend, and which Falco planned to attack. This ritual, the Giving of Gifts, was the only thing he had ever known in detail about what Harry did on this night.
An elbow poked him in the side. Connor turned to Hermione and blinked intelligently, especially when he saw that Hermione was still buried in her book and had no reason for poking him.
"Ginny's asked you to pass the marmalade twice now, Connor," Hermione pointed out.
"Sorry." Connor handed the jar down the table, and Ginny nodded at him before smearing it over her toast. His gaze went straight back to Harry and Draco as if nailed there, though, and he knew why.
He knew why Harry concerned himself with Walpurgis so much. He might not have been a Dark wizard, but he had a commitment to celebrating with them because he hung between both Dark and Light. That should mean that he could come to Light celebrations as well, though.
Now Connor just had to think of a holiday he'd like to share with his brother. Their birthday wouldn't work, even though it was near the old celebration of Lammas, because that was the day of a joining ritual between Harry and Draco.
Midsummer might do, he decided slowly. He had read a little about Midsummer traditions last year, before Peter had decided it was more important that he study other things. And Merlin knew that Harry could use better memories of that day. Losing his hand on it one year and fighting a battle the next was not guaranteed to make him like it.
Connor hummed under his breath, pleased with himself. He hoped that Draco could feel the pleasure, and knew the cause of it. Just because he liked Draco now, and had accepted that the other boy would play a phenomenonally large part in Harry's life, didn't mean he had to stop teasing him.
SSSSSSSSSSSSSS
Harry ran a hand through his hair and shook his head as he and Draco headed towards the outer courtyard.
He had learned more from Lucius's mind than he would ever have suspected. The man really was going to make Draco his heir again, something Harry and Draco had both assumed was only a joke when Narcissa told them about it, papers notwithstanding. Harry had not tried to find out why—Lucius had only agreed to participate in the ritual if Harry did not probe too deeply into his mind and his secrets, so he was floating on the surface, away from anything Lucius did not want him to know—but it was real.
He had changed.
And his world was colder and dimmer than Harry had ever suspected it was, or, where bright, was lit only by the kind of light that gleamed on and through icebergs. Harry could not help feeling a bit sorry for him. Family and pride and power were everything, tinted, a little, by love for that family and the respect for power that Draco had told him about, or warmed to sea-blue or soft green by some unexpectedly philosophical thoughts like the difference between power, strength, and might. Harry had a much better idea now of what it had done to Lucius when Narcissa left him, and when Draco turned his back on him to follow Harry.
Not that that made those things any less Lucius's own fault, of course.
He and Draco stopped in the middle of the courtyard, and turned to face each other. Harry looked around. Though he knew the wild Dark was hunting behind the stars, humming in readiness for its descent and the Walpurgis celebration tonight, the overwhelming impression he received was one of sunlight. The clouds were trotting swiftly as chariots towards the west after an early rain, and the sun's weak flower in the midst of that was the stronger for its setting, not at all diminished.
It was right, Harry knew, turning back to Draco. The Giving of Gifts opened a new year and turned the old year back on itself. It insisted that the partner who had been more passive last Walpurgis take the lead this time, and if Dark had been worshipped, now was the time of Light.
They were wise, those ancient wizards, Harry thought, as he pulled the golden, lynx-made ring out of his robe pocket. They knew that both Light and Dark have a place in our lives, even if they were Dark themselves. I wish the people now alive had one tenth as much wisdom.
Draco frankly gaped on seeing the ring. "Where did you get that?" he whispered.
Harry merely smiled at him. The words he was about to speak, adapted from a set of ritual phrases he'd found in one of Draco's books, would give him the answer.
"The gold comes from my family," he said. "The family of blood and birth, the Potter line. But I made the ring." He paused a moment to let Draco imagine the magic that must have gone into that, then held it up, so that if Draco had missed the lynxes that made them up, he could see them now. "The lynx is associated with keen sight, and with guardianship," he said. "May I never lack in either duty towards you."
He leaned forward and slipped the ring around the fourth finger of Draco's right hand. His own silver ring, a Black heirloom, shimmered brightly. Draco stood looking down at the gift for a moment, in a daze.
Then he looked up swiftly and reached out for Harry, grasping his shoulders and pulling him into a kiss. Harry resisted, until he could guide it for himself, and choose exactly how hard their tongues and lips should meet.
He felt a tender protectiveness, less frantic than the fear he'd felt for Draco's life in Rosier's hands but nearly as strong, surge up in him. He could guard Draco, then, and it didn't have to be a matter of preventing him from doing what he wanted to do, or exercising tyranny over him. What he did was not compulsion. If Harry took the dominant position at times, that did not mean that he was ruling others inappropriately, or that he had become a Lord. Sometimes, he was the stronger one and better-suited to protect and defend, that was all.
His wonder at the realization was such that he almost missed Draco saying hoarsely, "Tease."
Harry raised a brow, and then realized Draco was panting, flushed, more affected by the simple kiss than Harry was. Harry smiled. Well. He should be, since I'm the guide right now.
"No tease," he said brightly. "Just thinking about myself right now, as well as you." He'd done that last weekend, too, when he'd met with Elder Juniper and said he would be making his acceptance of the Order of Merlin public, which he thought had taken the older wizard by surprise. And that hadn't damaged him, or made him evil. The feeling that filled him right then was such that he had to keep from bouncing on his toes as he reminded Draco, "When nightfall comes, then you can choose to go to bed with me if you really want to."
To his surprise, Draco immediately shook his head. "No," he murmured. "We have a battle to fight, you and I. I helped you face Dumbledore, and I'm going to face Falco with you. But I'll think of some other gift to give you before we go, Harry."
Harry gently touched his cheek. "Good."
They turned and went back into the school. Draco kept studying the ring on his finger. Harry continued to expect some comment along the lines of gold being a Gryffindor color, but apparently the gold was also rich enough—or the craftsmanship of Harry's magic was beautiful enough—to impress him.
SSSSSSSSSSSSS
Narcissa stood gazing thoughtfully into the fire. She had come to stay with Regulus in Number Twelve Grimmauld Place for the nonce, which translated to "until her cousin was able to sleep without potions." Regulus had sulkily insisted he was fine. Harry's quiet talk with Narcissa had said otherwise, and Narcissa was inclined to believe Harry, on the balance of the evidence.
Right now, though, Regulus had been napping for an hour, with nary a nightmare to his name, and that left Narcissa free to think and reason through the many things that this day meant to her.
In a few short hours, she would be going to a Walpurgis celebration—but not a normal one, for they all expected Falco Parkinson to interrupt halfway through. Harry would have his allies there to defend him, but none knew if they could, given the presence of the prophecy.
In a few short hours, she might be facing battle with a Dark Lord, a man she could have been swearing allegiance to under other circumstances.
In a few short hours, her son's fifth joining ritual would be done, binding him and Harry together virtually for life. Someone else could still interfere, in the sense of proposing marriage or joining to one of the partners, until the Halloween ritual—as the seventh of the thirteen, it was the fulcrum on which the others swung—but Narcissa considered Harry her son-in-law already.
In a few short hours, she would lose her sense of what went on behind Harry's eyes, which the Giving of Gifts had currently inspired.
She leaned her head on the mantle and closed her eyes. When she did, then she could catch odd pulses of Harry's thoughts, fragments of his consciousness whirring through her own like startled birds. She doubted that Harry had looked as deeply into her own head, or wanted to look. He had no problems with her as he did with Lucius. He would think he understood her already.
Narcissa at least hoped that he had seen she loved him.
But she used her lesser access to his thoughts to probe while she could, to understand.
Broken webs and burned bridges and a mind rebuilt from scratch several times were her dominant impressions so far. And so was a sense of self-worth that pranced on the edge of an abyss. Narcissa wondered if the Alliance of Sun and Shadow, or the werewolves, or others who depended on Harry for strength and guidance, realized how very fragile their vates was at times.
She had been grateful before, passionately grateful, that Draco had Harry. He was what Draco had wanted, the boy, and then the man, for whom Narcissa had taken risks, and the cause and the person for whom Draco had pushed himself to become more than a small seed growing in his father's shadow. Draco was grander and finer than he ever would have been if he had not met Harry. So Narcissa believed.
And now she was just as passionately grateful that Harry had Draco. Neither of them was necessarily strong on their own; her son, her beloved son, could collapse into a spoiled brat, and Harry into a pile of shards. But together, at least, they supported each other like a pair of entwined trees.
Not that the battle, and Harry's existence in general, and thus Draco's existence, did not still seem like dancing on a volcano.
"Dark, keep them safe," Narcissa whispered, and would have liked to believe that somewhere she heard a great wolf howl in answer.
SSSSSSSSSSSSSS
Draco had decided on his gift for Harry a few hours before nightfall, and it was torture to wait patiently until they had finished dinner in the Great Hall and were on their way back to the Slytherin common room to give it to him. He tugged gently at Harry's hand, drawing him towards a sheltered alcove, and Harry went without question. Draco hid his eye-roll. For the most part, Harry had handled the demands of the Giving of Gifts well. He should know better than to simply give in when someone else hauled on him, though—or at least, when Draco hauled on him.
"What is it?" Harry asked, as he turned and faced Draco across the small expanse of stone floor between them.
"There's something you should know," said Draco, and wished he had his wand out to hold and make himself feel better. The consciousness that they were going to battle in a few hours, accentuated by the uneasiness that all Dark wizards felt on this day of the wild Dark, put him on edge. Of course, he would probably have simply twirled the wand in his hand and revealed his own nervousness. "Something I certainly never guessed before today, so I couldn't have told it to you."
By now, Harry's eyebrows had risen all the way, and his mouth had tightened with concern. "Draco," he whispered. "What is it?"
Draco met his eyes, and realized Harry thought he was about to say something awful. Of course, he wouldn't stain the day of their glory in such a way, but Harry didn't know that; awful gifts, home truths, were just as legitimate a gift as any other kind in this ritual.
He leaned forward and kissed Harry gently, then pulled back before it could be seen as violating the constraints of the ritual. "It's nothing bad," he said. "Just—unexpected."
Harry motioned for him to go on.
"I think your brother's all right," Draco muttered.
Harry responded with a great peal of laughter richer than any Draco had heard from him in months. Draco managed to pout, the way Harry would think he had to in the wake of being laughed at, although he wanted to smile, or perhaps stare in fascination. Harry leaned forward again and kissed him on the nose, then enveloped him in a hug.
"Connor caught me after Charms to say something of the same kind," he said. "I'm very happy that you can both get along, Draco."
In the simple statement, Draco heard an ocean's worth of relief, and he sighed himself, resting his face gently against Harry's neck. Harry would get to have what he should always have had: a loving family. And Draco and Connor would make some effort to get along, since they were both part of it.
Harry might not be able to express that in words. It was all right. Draco knew how he felt.
They stood there a moment longer, and then heard Snape's quick, hurried footsteps. They broke apart just as he came around the corner and stopped on seeing them with a jerk that made his robes swirl behind him.
"Do you both have your wands?" he asked them.
"Yes, Severus," Harry said, though Draco knew for a fact that he mostly preferred to work without a wand now. "Are you ready?"
Snape inclined his head. He would not have let Harry go to battle alone, Draco thought, no matter how much he might hate the uncontrolled nature of the Walpurgis celebrations.
"Then we go," said Harry, and started towards the common room again. Draco followed just behind him. Not really noticing what he was doing any more than he had noticed the smile this afternoon, Harry reached out and put an arm around his shoulders, tugging him towards him.
Draco could feel Snape's stare. He put his head up and ignored it. He was quite happy to walk within Harry's protection for a short time before fighting beside him, if only because of what it promised for the end of their ritual and their future.
And we will have a future. I say so.
