A/N: Written for Draco's Den Secret Admirer gift exchange! The prompt was: Cupid is down on his luck and thinking of getting out of the love business altogether after a series of failed matching. Someone tries to help bring back Cupid's love of love.

Alpha/Beta love to brownlark42 and BirdieMing. Thanks, ladies!

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Pairing: Theo Nott/Harry Potter/Luna Lovegood

Summary: Theo has been shipping his friends for years, but when he attempts to ship Harry and Luna, all of his efforts fail.

Upstairs

In Theo Nott's opinion, the best part about owning a pub like the White Knight was the opportunity for people watching. Though there had been a point several years ago when he began to suspect that people watching wasn't quite doing it for him anymore, he soon decided to get involved in a scheme that was too lurid for him to ever tell another soul about. Shipping, he called it. A shortened term for relationship. Essentially, he looked at the people around him and decided who he thought would work best in a relationship before doing his damnedest to make it happen.

He nodded to Draco as he and his wife, Hermione, sat at a table. They were his first experiment, and if he were honest with himself, the easiest of the lot.

His first tactic was always a drinking contest, which was quite Slytherin of him because he offered the snookered couple a place to sleep afterward. He didn't bother informing either one of them that there was only one room available with only one bed inside. He wasn't a complete creep though. Two vials of Sober-Up potion were always on the nightstand.

Draco and Hermione had been married for four years already. The drinking contest gambit worked on quite a few of Theo's other regulars. Daphne and Blaise fell for it, as did Pansy and Percy Weasley of all people.

Some of his customers required a few additional…nudges. Ron Weasley was adamantly against Astoria Greengrass based entirely on the fact that she was a Slytherin. Of course, that didn't stop Weasley from staring at her any time he didn't think anyone else was looking. The drinking contest led to a Ron Weasley who was too pissed to even bother with the Sober-Up before passing out. Theo tried a different ploy: mistletoe. It was right around the holidays when he was working on Weasley and Astoria, so no one found the enchanted mistletoe unusual, especially when he complained some unnamed employee had brought it in. Nobody suspected him. Thankfully, the enchanted mistletoe worked and Weasley proposed to Astoria a year later.

Millie and Hannah were quite a different story. It took Theo no less than a year of contrivances to get them to admit their feelings for the other, plus an additional two months to encourage Millie to ask Hannah out. Theo wasn't the least bit surprised it had been Millie who was the aggressor there. She'd always been an assertive sort. What surprised him was the tenacity with which Hannah had held on to her relationship with Millie through the thick and thin over the last few years. Same-sex couples were still on the taboo side of the wizarding world. Well, in the British wizarding world. Theo had spent many a summer in France, and the LGBTQI community was thriving as a subset of the larger wizarding community there.

Theo frowned as he watched Harry Potter walk into the pub and order himself a drink before settling at the Malfoys' table. Potter had always been a tough nut to crack. Theo didn't think too hard about how well Potter filled out his Auror robes, although Theo definitely noticed when he chucked them off and rolled up the sleeves of his shirt. He looked away before he embarrassed himself by looking at forearms of all things.

Theo had tried the drinking gambit on Potter with several witches and hadn't had any success. Luna Lovegood was his most recent witch he shipped with Potter. He'd been at it for more than six months and nothing he tried worked thus far. The drinking gambit, which worked on the majority of couples he set up had failed spectacularly when Luna decided she'd rather Apparate herself home and splinched herself in the process. Theo still felt twinges of guilt when he caught sight of Luna's left hand. They'd managed to save all of her fingers, but there were still scars.

His trivia night pair-up scheme hadn't worked either, neither had mistletoe over the holidays a couple of months ago. He was still trying to decide what he ought to try for Valentine's day in two weeks, but he was determined to figure something out. Whatever that something was, it was the last shot for Potter and Luna. If that didn't get them together, Theo knew he had to try someone different for them both.

Luna entered the pub then, and Theo sighed. She was so ethereal, almost like a creature who did not truly belong on earth and was only gracing them with their presence. Why wasn't she interested in Potter? Didn't she see what Theo saw in him? Luna made her way to Theo's usual table in the back, where he had receipts and parchmentwork spread out to discourage anyone from sitting with him.

"Hello, Theodore." Luna smiled in a way that made his heart feel lighter.

"Luna, what brings you by this evening?"

Luna shrugged. "Someone got a promotion, I think?" She didn't look too concerned. That was another thing Theo liked about Luna. She just didn't give any fucks, and it was glorious.

"See you." Luna smiled again, floating away toward the table occupied by the Malfoys and Potter. Potter lifted his beer toward Theo in a silent salute. Theo nodded in return and turned back to the parchment in front of him. What was he going to do about Valentine's day this year?

"Cupids?" Pansy asked with distaste. "That's so…"

"Tacky?" Percy suggested. Theo sighed. He was out of ideas and Valentine's day was in three days.

"They are already booked," Theo said. "Besides, it's too late to change it now."

"You could cancel them and just offer half off drinks," Pansy suggested. Her nose was still wrinkled in disgust.

"Well, it's not like they'll bother you and Percy," Theo said. "They will only seek out the single. Or rather, that's what they're supposed to do."

"What exactly are they?" Percy asked. It was a valid question. The wizarding world was full of many different sorts of creatures, but Cupids were not actually classified as creatures.

"They are fairies that someone crossed with garden gnomes," Theo said. He pulled out the brochure he found stuffed under his door a week ago and showed it to them.

"Oh, gross." Pansy grimaced. "They are basically garden gnomes with wings. They're pests, Theo!"

"I spoke with the owner!" Theo protested. "He said they are very well behaved and well trained."

"Don't you remember second year?" Pansy asked. "With Lockhart and the Pixies?"

"But these are fairies."

"Same thing," Percy said. His face always looked like something smelled foul, but his expression now was even more pronounced.

"Well, it's too late." Theo was sick of arguing about it. He wished he hadn't brought it up at all, but he'd been having second thoughts. He had hoped that Pansy and Percy would see his side, but it was clear they didn't. Maybe he should have asked someone who was single.

"Whatever, we'll be here to watch the place burn then," Pansy said. Her smile was sweet, but her tone was mean. Theo glared at her. It would be fine. It had to be.

It was not fine. The 'cupids' wreaked havoc across the establishment, and Pansy's prediction of fire wasn't too far off the mark when a back booth had gone up in flames. They'd been able to get it under control before the rest of the pub went up, but it was a near thing and it cleared out about half the patrons on what should have been one of the busiest nights of the year.

It was after midnight now, and the pub was only a quarter full. Theo looked around glumly and didn't spot Potter or Luna. His last-ditch effort failed more spectacularly than any of his other shipping efforts. Maybe he should give up shipping entirely. It wasn't worth all this.

Grumbling, he took a seat at the bar and ordered a drink for himself. He was not in a habit of drinking at his own establishment, but he was downright depressed over the failed events of the evening. Someone sat at the bar next to him, but Theo didn't even bother looking at them. Whoever it was could go hang.

"Rough night?" Potter asked from his right. Theo sighed. Of course, it was bloody Potter who was sitting next to him. He glanced at him from the corner of his eye and swallowed hard at seeing Potter's naked forearms. They flexed deliciously, and Theo breathed out sharply, quickly moving his gaze off of Potter and back to the bar in front of him.

"Yeah, rough night." Theo nodded. "Been trying to work on a project for a few weeks and well…tonight was the last horrific try and clearly, it hasn't worked."

Potter laughed. Theo frowned. He hated being laughed at.

"Oh, Nott. I'm interested in sleeping with you, not Luna. I was wondering when you were going to give up on setting us up." Potter laughed some more, but Theo was gobsmacked. Had Potter just said what Theo thought he said?

From his left, Luna arrived. "I'll have what Harry's having."

"Wait, what?" Theo was flabbergasted. He looked between Potter's smirking face and Luna's soft smile in confusion.

"Why do you think we," indicating himself and Luna, "are here all the time?" Harry asked, settling a hand high up on Theo's thigh. Theo sucked in a sharp breath at the contact. "We're here because it means we get to see you."

Theo still wasn't sure he understood what was going on when Luna let out a soft snort. She put her hand on his cheek, turning his head to face her fully, and kissed him fully on the mouth. Theo couldn't help but respond. Potter's hand migrated higher and began fondling Theo's cock through his trousers. He grew hard so quickly that his face started to glow with embarrassment, and Luna pulled away.

"Maybe we should go upstairs?" Luna suggested.

"Let's do it," Potter nodded, drinking the last of his beer.

"Right." Theo nodded. He Summoned a key to one of the rooms upstairs and led Luna and Potter up. This wasn't what he had in mind at the beginning of the night, but he found he was quite looking forward to what laid ahead. His attempts at getting Potter and Luna together weren't quite the success he'd been looking for, but he definitely wouldn't call it a failure.

~Fin~