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Disclaimer – This story is based on characters and situations created and owned by JK Rowling, various publishers including but not limited to Bloomsbury Books, Scholastic Books and Raincoast Books, and Warner Bros., Inc. No money is being made and no copyright or trademark infringement is intended.
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.~*~.
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In his room after returning to the palace, Harry pulled a jumper from the wardrobe and slid his arms into the sleeves. He shook his head and laughed to himself as he slipped his wand into a concealed pocket. He was having dinner with Draco Malfoy at a pavement café in Paris. What Ron and Hermione would say when he told them, Harry couldn't imagine. They probably wouldn't believe it. Hell, he wasn't sure he believed it himself. Pity it was Malfoy, really. Dinner at a pavement café in Paris would be one hell of a date. International Portkeys to France weren't difficult to arrange. He'd have to remember it next time he met a man he really liked.
Looking in the mirror, Harry ran his hands through his hair. Hopeless as ever, it was. He abandoned the futile attempt to make his hair lay flat for once, but continued to study his reflection. The rusty brown colour of the jumper brought out the green in his eyes—or so he'd been told. Personally, he didn't see it. He did think it fit him well, though. Especially his shoulders. He'd paired the jumper with jeans and black trainers. He didn't know what one wore for dinner at a café in Paris—casual, he reckoned, but this was Malfoy, after all. He doubted his idea of casual was the same as Malfoy's.
Malfoy . . . Harry was afraid this was going to be a very uncomfortable evening. What could they possibly find to talk about, he wondered? He could see the other man had changed from who he'd been before the war. And it certainly seemed he was a good teacher, if Émilie's praise of him that morning was anything to go by. Professor Dumbledore had once told Harry that if you wanted to see what a man was really like, you should take a good look at how he treats his inferiors, not his equals. Émilie had told Harry she was a Muggle-born that morning; it had come up when he'd asked her about flying as a child. Malfoy had been raised to despise Muggle-borns and everything about the Muggle world, but he had approached Harry about her hopes of playing professional Quidditch, and when he believed Harry had been giving her false hope about being scouted by a professional team, he'd shown how protective of her he was. Hell, he'd nearly shaken with anger where he stood. That had spoken to Harry more of the man Draco had become than anything else could have done. But that aside, Harry feared they'd end up sitting in an awkward silence, both wishing they were somewhere else.
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.~*~.
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They stepped out of the Floo terminal into a long, sheltered arcade filled with various shops and cafés, where a number of outdoor tables were half-filled with customers. The sun was at a low enough angle in the sky that the arcade was filled with warm, evening light, and long shadows cast by stone pillars stretched across the pavement.
"This is la Place des Vosges," Draco said as they passed through an arch and out onto the pavement. Across the street was a large square enclosed by a tall, black fence, inside which were what had to be well over one hundred small, ornamental trees. Built over the arcade they'd just exited were stately looking homes, all featuring the same façade of red brick with decorative pale-coloured stone masonry work and steeply pitched, grey slate roofs with dormer windows. "It is the oldest square in Paris," he continued. As they passed through one of the gates into the square, he went on to say, "It was built in the early seventeenth century by Henry IV on what was once a site were jousting tournaments were held."
"It's beautiful," Harry responded.
He looked around them. The square was filled with all kinds of people: old and young, families and couples and groups of friends his own age or a few years younger. People walked along unhurriedly, like they themselves were doing, or they sat and relaxed on benches or on blankets spread out on the grass. Inside the square, beyond the perfectly straight rows of neatly trimmed ornamental trees, the square was divided into four quarters by wide, paved walkways. Each of the quarters was bisected by a narrower walkway, at the centre of which stood an ornate, two-tiered fountain.
Nearby one particular family enjoying a picnic dinner on the grass caught Harry's attention. A man knelt on a blanket, a camera in his hands pointed at a second man and a baby boy, who Harry guessed was about one year old. The second man stood behind the child holding his hands as the child took a few tentative steps towards the man with the camera. Both men cheered as the child let go of the second man's hands and fell as much as walked into the first man's arms.
"It was here where Henry II was killed after an accident during a jousting tournament," Draco said.
Harry's attention was immediately pulled from his gazing. "I remember seeing that on some programme on the telly once. Some documentary or historical thing or something, it must've been. Probably something Hermione had on sometime. She loves those. Freak accident, wasn't it? Bit of a lance went through his helmet, didn't it? Got him through the eye. Or something like that, I think it was." Harry was surprised he'd been paying enough attention to whatever the show had been to remember that, but his surprise that he remembered it was nothing compared to his surprise that Draco knew it.
"Exactly that," Draco confirmed.
Harry itched to ask Draco how he knew how a French king had died centuries ago, but he refrained. Things seemed to be going well, and he didn't want to risk upsetting that.
When they exited the square, Draco pointed down the street. "Just down that way is la Maison de Victor Hugo."
Harry looked in the direction Draco pointed, wondering again at his knowledge of the Muggle world.
Leaving the square, Draco led Harry down a narrow one-way street lined with fashionable shops. Traffic flowed towards them, and a motor bike sped past. The area was bustling, the way all big cities were, and there was graffiti here and there, but it was beautiful and charming. The buildings that lined the street were three or four storeys tall and built of pale-coloured stone, but the shops that occupied the ground floors were painted rich colours.
"Have you been a flying instructor long?" Harry asked conversationally.
"Since shortly after mother and I arrived in France."
"I wondered where you'd gone," he admitted. At Draco's sceptical expression, he asked, "What? I did. It didn't keep me up nights, mind, but I did wonder. You just seemed to vanish into thin air."
They passed a large stone building with an elaborate black iron and gilt entry gate bearing a coat of arms over two large doors. A large red banner hung beside the gate, "Musée Carnavalet, Histoire de Paris" written in large letters.
"It's called Disapparition—vanishing into thin air. Wizards do it all the time," Draco said in a condescending tone that Harry found amusing rather than irritating. His mates would've probably said much the same in much the same way.
"Funny."
Draco's face looked amused, but his expression changed in front of Harry's eyes. He drew a deep breath and let it out slowly. "You were right, you know," he said looking down at his feet. "I should've told them what I was up to. Cra—Crabbe and Goyle, I mean. Maybe then they might've listened to me later, after . . . when . . ." Draco's voice had got softer with every word, until it trailed off completely.
Harry remembered their first Apparition class at Hogwarts, how he'd positioned himself directly behind Malfoy and Crabbe to eavesdrop on their argument. "I tell my friends what I'm up to, if I want them to keep a lookout for me," he'd said, just loud enough for the two Slytherins to hear.
Draco inhaled and exhaled, and, having pulled himself together, he gestured to the corner in front of them. "We turn here, and then the café I had in mind is just ahead." Walking in silence, they turned the corner. "Sorry about that. I can get quite morbid all of a sudden sometimes," he said apologetically.
Harry glanced around self-consciously, thinking about the nightmares he still suffered from occasionally. They were passing a bakery, its windows filled with wonderful looking loaves of bread and brightly coloured sandwich biscuits; across the street was a shop selling Italian gelato. He cleared his throat. "I think everyone who participated in the war goes through that. I know I do."
They arrived at a café with a maroon awning stretched out over a row of tables set so close together, Harry didn't know how the person seated at the back of the table took their seat without picking the table up and sliding it out of his way. Half the tables were filled with diners, but, while he didn't say anything, Harry thought they were both too near the busy road and too near your neighbours to really enjoy a meal.
"Good. I thought it'd not be full yet. If we're lucky . . . ," Draco said as he walked past several open tables. The café was set on a corner: to one side was the street and to the other a tree-lined, brick alleyway with a street sign showing it was closed to traffic—Harry might not have been able to read a word of what was written on the sign, but the circle with a line drawn through it above a picture of a car being towed made their meaning clear enough. That, and the absence of any cars. "Yes, this is better," Draco said. He caught the eye of a waiter as he claimed one of a small cluster of tables next to the brick pavement. "Farther from the traffic and not quite so very cramped together," he added as if he'd read Harry's mind.
A menu was posted near the table Draco had claimed, and Harry looked over it. "Um, do they have an English menu?"
Draco smirked. "Non. You will just have to trust me, now. N'est-ce pas?"
"Just don't order me snails, yeah?" Harry said as he sat. The café had a wood panelled exterior and large windows. Their table was beside a tree and a narrow flower bed, and the chairs were wicker with caned seats and backs. Really, the spot was beautiful—intimate but still humming with activity. Also good, the table closest to them was occupied by a couple speaking German, or possibly Dutch, and so they were able to speak more freely than had English speaking Muggles been sitting there. "Nice place."
"This is one of the main streets in Le Marais. Just sitting and watching people go by is one of the best things to do in Paris, and I think this is one of the best places to do it."
A waiter approached them. "Bienvenue aux Philosophes," he said. He continued to speak, but that was the extent of what Harry understood, and only that much because the name of the café was written on the awning. When Draco answered the man in French, Harry watched him, fascinated. He'd wondered yesterday what Draco's voice sounded like when he spoke French, and now he had his answer—hypnotic. While he knew Draco and the waiter were talking about ordinary things like what the soup or specials du jour might be, Harry was entranced.
"Merci," Draco said, and the waiter left. "You're out of luck, Potter. All they've got on the menu today are snails."
Harry laughed and looked around them, watching people go by as Draco had said. It was relaxing. At home, he often liked to go to a park, maybe Covent Garden or St. James, and just sit and quietly watch the world walk past.
"I ordered us a glass of wine," Draco said. He repeated the specials and asked if Harry had an idea of what he wanted. "I asked for menus, if you'd rather something else."
Harry said he reckoned one had to have French onion soup while in France.
With a dramatic sigh, Draco leaned forward, elbows on the table, and pressed his fingertips against the bridge of his nose. He shook his head in mock exasperation. "Onion soup, Potter. Unless you want the wait staff to roll their eyes at you behind your back, you do not order French onion soup in France."
"I can't order steak tartare well done then, either, I reckon."
"Only if you're sure you can remember the way back to the Floo terminal on your own."
They both laughed, but then fell into a silence that threatened to become uncomfortable. At times it was easier making conversation with Malfoy than Harry'd expected, but at other times it was every bit as awkward as he'd feared. Anxious to break the silence before it could drag on, Harry looked around at all the people filing passed the café, hoping to find something to comment on. There were all types: fashionable Parisians and not-so-fashionable tourists, couples and groups of friends and several people, both men and women, carrying shopping bags from the numerous boutiques that lined the streets. Across the pavement, one man stood beside a doorway, smoking a cigarette. A moment later, the door opened and another man exited—the two greeted each other with a kiss before walking away together.
Harry blinked in surprise and looked away hurriedly.
"Does that bother you?" Draco asked, his voice tight and defensive.
"No," Harry answered, feeling a little defensive himself. He couldn't say he'd ever kiss a man he was in a relationship with in public like that—he was just naturally private about such things, even without the threat of negative comments from strangers or seeing it on the front page of the Daily Prophet the next morning—but seeing another couple do it, a little voice inside his head cheered them on, even if he had felt a bit like a peeping Tom seeing it.
"I'm sorry. Perhaps I'm a little over sensitive on the subject."
If Harry had been about to say something else, it died in his throat, completely forgotten. Had he got the reason Draco had been less than pleased with the attentions of that witch at lunch completely wrong?
The waiter returned with their menus, which Harry accepted gratefully. He opened the menu more out of habit than out of practicality since he couldn't read a word of it. "To say two men kissing bothered me would be hypocritical," he added with some reluctance as he glanced up at Draco.
Surprise registered in Draco's face, and the awkward silence returned.
Grasping at straws, Harry commented what a good idea the Quidditch school had been. "I'd have loved to have gone to something like this as a kid."
"I, too," Draco admitted, seemingly as eager to keep the thread of conversation on safe ground as Harry was. "But it wasn't my idea. We have our Muggle Studies professor to thank," he added drily. "Apparently, schools like this are very popular in some countries in the Muggle world."
Harry didn't respond. The rancour Malfoy spoke with surprised him. He didn't know what to make of it, but he didn't want to jump to conclusions. The evidence of seeing how Malfoy had been with Émilie weighed too heavily with him.
"It isn't that I don't think it's a good idea. It is," Malfoy quickly added. "And while we're only a day in, it seems to be going well. The kids all seem to being enjoying it so far, and I've made it a full twenty-four hours without hexing any of the professional players into radishes."
"Have the other players been giving you a hard time?" Harry asked, with a small laugh.
Their waiter returned with their wine and spoke to Draco, who responded, "On n'est pas encore décidés, désolé."
Harry looked down at the flowers in the bed beside their table—anything to avoid looking at Draco just then. It was stupid, Harry knew, but if Draco's voice had sounded well speaking French a few moments ago, it sounded doubly so now.
"Not all, but some. I think Mallard and Lafarge are on the verge of ripping open their pillows and counting the feathers to be sure the other hasn't got more. That, or using their pillows to suffocate the other."
"I'm surprised you've got both of them here," Harry said, his wine glass in his hand. He'd have liked to have drunk it down in one go, and then called the water over for a bottle. "Their rivalry is famous, even back at home."
For a moment, Draco's body language stiffened, but he relaxed again almost immediately.
"The fallout from having one without the other would've been worse, trust me. And not having them was unthinkable—they're adored here, for good reason. They really are excellent with the kids. They've always been very good with their fans. It's just anyone who has the misfortune to have to work with them who they drive mental." Speaking sincerely, he added. "I really would like to thank you for staying on, and for being so agreeable."
Feeling a little embarrassed, Harry said it really hadn't been an inconvenience.
"I doubt that," Draco said. "The owner of a Quidditch team in the race for first place for the first time in a hundred years, dropping everything on his schedule on a moment's notice to teach children to play the game?"
"I don't involve myself in the day-to-day running of the team very much anymore. Make it a point not to, actually."
On the safe topic of Quidditch, they talked comfortably for several minutes about the Cannons' turnaround and what all went into accomplishing it—mostly, Harry explained, finding the right players and assembling the right team behind the team: managers, coaches, trainers, scouts, etc.—and then staying out of their way and letting them do the job they'd been hired to do.
"That was a key problem before." When he'd played for the Cannons, the team had been owned by the same family for generations, and too many members of that family had been making too many decisions regarding the management of the team and hiring of players and staff they'd really not had the expertise to be making. "It took a while to fix what was wrong. There was a lot more I needed to handle personally back then, but we're in a good place now."
The conversation moved on to the team's chances for claiming first place, and from there back to the school.
"It was the Muggle Studies professor's idea, you said?"
"Madame Canfield," Draco confirmed. "Well, she turned the Ministry onto the idea."
"I've not met her."
"No. Nor will you. She's not here."
"Ah. I see," Harry said, believing he now understood Draco's earlier sarcasm.
"She's American. Insists on calling it summer 'camp.'"
"Seems an odd thing to call it."
"One would think she expects tents to be pitched all over the grounds," Draco agreed. "Anyway, she'll be leaving after next year."
"You don't seem like you'll miss her."
Draco drank his wine, a pensive look on his face. "She comes from money, and she's accustomed to throwing her weight around and getting what she wants, while leaving all the work to others. If I'm being honest, she hits a little too close to home."
Wanting to keep the conversation from drifting somewhere too personal for a second time, Harry changed the subject. "We passed a bakery a few shops up the road with all these colourful little biscuits in the window. I thought I might buy some and send them home as gifts."
"Macarons, they'll be. Brilliant little biscuits. I can tell you the best places to find them—and the places to avoid if you don't want to wait half an hour or longer in a queue to pay €3 a piece for flavours like fois gras and lime or strawberry and wasabi."
"Er, I was thinking more like vanilla, chocolate, strawberry, lemon."
"Not very daring when it comes to trying new foods?"
"I admit, I'm pretty plain. Meat and potatoes, and I'm a happy man."
Draco picked up his menu. "Fortunately, we eat meat and potatoes in France, too. I recommend the beef bourguignon and mash. The gazpacho here is very good too, if you don't have your heart set on onion soup."
"Gazpacho? In Paris?"
"And made by a Japanese chef."
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.~*~.
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After Harry awoke the next morning, he stayed in bed for several minutes thinking about last night. All in all, it had been a very pleasant evening. There had been some moments early on when the atmosphere had been tense, but they'd got through them, and after they had, conversation had come surprisingly easy. They'd stayed with safe topics, true, but Draco had an unexpectedly dry sense of humour that Harry found he quite enjoyed. Harry had gone down to breakfast in the dining hall rather hoping to see him again and had been disappointed when he'd been nowhere to be found. Now, heading out to his morning classes, he wondered whether they might run into each other at lunch as they had yesterday.
"Good morning, Meester Potter," Émilie greeted him.
She'd spoken in English, and Harry reckoned he could manage a simple bonjour.
Émilie grinned in response. She eyed him carefully as if summing him up before saying somewhat shyly, "I 'ope you enjoyed your dinner wizz Meester Malfoy in Le Marais last night." She'd spoken slowly, carefully pronouncing each word, but there was a mischievous sparkle in her eyes.
"Now, how do you possibly know about that?" Harry asked.
Émilie shrugged and waved her hand nonchalantly through the air. Her face was a mask of innocence, apart from the sparkle that remained in her eyes. "Everyone knows it."
Harry blinked and was left speechless for several seconds.
Falling back in to her natural French and turning serious, she said, "There are very few students from the United Kingdom, I think. Far fewer than from other countries. All of us Beauxbatons students have noticed it."
"Er, yes. There are," Harry admitted. He felt almost guilty for the fact under Émilie's scrutiny.
"Because of the things Mr Malfoy did during the war, yes?" she asked bluntly.
Uncomfortable, Harry busied himself with the box containing the practice Snitches Draco had given him to use during his lessons. Émilie was one of Draco's students, and Harry didn't think he'd appreciate Harry's talking about his involvement with the war with her.
"But you are here," Émilie continued while he'd still been contemplating how to respond.
Harry looked at his assistant. Had he given it any thought, he'd have expected her to immediately launch into questions about the flying exercises he'd put her through yesterday and if he really thought she'd done that well.
"I know more about what Draco's—Mr Malfoy's—actions were during the war than people who only read articles written with the intent of stirring up emotions and with very little attention paid to the facts." He also knew Draco had held his life in his hands twice, yet there he stood. "He showed tremendous bravery on more than one occasion," Harry said feeling a little like he was presenting an award. It was true, though. He would never forget seeing Draco clutching Gregory Goyle's unconscious body in the Room of Hidden Things, trying desperately to keep them both from falling. "And he is fiercely loyal to those he cares about," he said.
"And that is why you are here?" she asked, her head tipped to a slight angle.
Harry laughed. He was here for two reasons: He hadn't wanted to be away from Teddy for two weeks, and Draco had been desperate to replace Krum. But as to why Andromeda and he hadn't cancelled Teddy's enrolment like so many others had, she was largely correct.
"Mr Malfoy is a good man," she said. "But he has not been happy, I do not think." An enigmatic smile spread across her face. "There is an excursion tomorrow afternoon to the Lac des Champs Elysées. That is a favourite place of Mr Malfoy's, I believe. Perhaps he will go."
The children arrived for their first lesson of the day, led by another one of the Beauxbaton's students working at the school.
"I am glad you are here, Mr Potter," Émilie said, glancing back at him as she stepped forward to greet the children and their escort.
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.~*~.
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Draco was once again sitting in his office in front of stacks of parchments. He'd allowed himself a bit of a lie-in that morning and had had the school's elves send his breakfast to his quarters, but now it was back to work. He was reading over the evaluations the retired players had given him of their first groups of students. All the kids had arrived able to fly a minimum of twenty feet off the ground, which was good. It had been a stipulation of enrolment, but regardless, he'd not have been surprised if it had not been the case.
Standing, he walked over to his window and looked out at all the various groups of children on their brooms all over the grounds. He smiled, pleased with the work so many of his Beauxbatons students were doing.
His eyes drifted across the grounds towards the spot where he knew Potter and his group were located. He'd enjoyed their dinner the night before rather more than he'd expected. A lot more. Potter had been tactful when Draco's occasional melancholy had snuck up on him, and he'd been both funny and interesting to talk with. They'd both tacitly redirected the conversation when it threatened to veer into dangerous waters, but that hadn't happened often. They'd found enough to talk about, and when Draco had told him about some of the more interesting bits of Muggle France's history he'd learnt from François over the two years they'd been together, he'd listened attentively. Draco even thought Potter had been particularly impressed by his knowledge on the subject. As he had yesterday after Potter'd had Émilie fly drills for him, Draco felt gratified that Potter saw something worthwhile in him.
Only because Potter had saved his life, Draco told himself. He was glad Potter saw that his life had been worth saving, that he hadn't risked his own, and those of his closest friends, only for Draco to go on being the same as he'd been before.
A knock at the door drew Draco away from the window, and returning to his desk, he called, "Entrez."
One of his Beauxbatons students came in, a seventeen year old called Philippe, one of the Chasers for Malecrit House. "Bonjour, Monsieur," he said as he handed him some letters that had arrived in the post the night before whilst he'd been away from the school.
"Est-ce que vous serez là pour l'excursion au Lac des Champs Elysées demain, Monsieur?" Phillippe asked in a tone that, after all the years he'd spent working with teenagers, set Draco on his guard.
"Pourquoi? he asked suspiciously.
"Émilie m'a dit que M. Potter avait particulièrement envie de venir, et comme vous aviez diné avec lui à Le Marais hier soir, je—"
"Et comment est-ce que tu sais ça?
Draco resisted the urge to sigh. He was well aware how quickly news spread at Beauxbatons. At Hogwarts, it was only the portraits covering almost every square inch of the walls which talked; at Beauxbatons, Draco thought it was the walls themselves, if not the very blades of grass. Or maybe it just seemed that way to him now that he was almost thirty rather than fourteen. "Ou bien est-ce que je ne devrais même pas demander?" Never wanting a student of his to feel they had no one to turn to if they found themselves in trouble in any way, he'd always striven to build a relaxed student/professor relationship with his Quidditch players. Perhaps he'd succeeded too much.
"Non, Monsieur. Peut-être pas," Philippe said with a grin Draco never would've given one of his professors.
"Tu peux y aller," Draco said, breaking the wax seal on one of his letters.
"Oui, Monsieur. Au revoir, Monsieur," Philippe responded with feigned formality.
Once the door closed, Draco set the letter down on his desk unread. Alors, Potter joining prévu de venir demain après-midi à l'excursion au Lac des Champs Elysées. The resort was so popular with French wizards that the name Champs Elysées brought images of the lake to the minds of French wizards as instantly as they did traffic, noise, and hordes of tourists to the minds of French Muggles. But it was virtually unknown to British wizards. He was rather surprised Potter'd ever heard of it.
Picking up the previously abandoned letter, Draco tapped it on its edge against his desk. He'd not planned to accompany any of the afternoon excursions they'd arranged, but he did love the Lac des Champs Elysées. There was nothing so pressing on his calendar that it couldn't be put off until the following day. Perhaps he would go. He'd put in quite a lot of work in for the school, why shouldn't he take an afternoon off?
Yes, Draco decided, that was just what he would do.
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.~*~.
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That afternoon at lunch, Émilie passed Philippe and another friend of theirs. They caught each other's eye and winked.
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.~*~.
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When Harry returned to his room that night his feet ached, and he dropped himself down on his bed, his arms flung out to the sides. He'd given a bit of solitary sightseeing a go, and he felt exhausted and rather disappointingly underwhelmed. He'd gone to the Eiffel Tower, and it was . . . well, a tower. A pretty tower, yes, but a tower. With queues that would have taken him hours to get through. He didn't know why, but as world famous as it was, he'd expected something more. He'd got a photo, said "oh" and "ah" and left. The Arc de Triomphe was beautiful, but with the circle of traffic swarming around it—without the aid of lanes or traffic lights—he'd had no idea how to get to it short of Apparating. He had got another nice photo, though. Next, he'd walked along the Champs Elysees, where there where quite possibly more people packed in than at a World Cup championship match, and something to drink had cost him €8. For a street called the most beautiful in the world, there had been rather a lot of Muggle retail chains, and while the architecture of the buildings was unquestionably beautiful, the two rows of trees had not been enough to screen the noise from the ten lanes of traffic. He hadn't even bothered to take a photo. His last stop had been the world famous Louvre museum to see the equally famous Mona Lisa. The gallery which housed the painting—which was far smaller than he'd realised—was so crammed with visitors, he'd been jostled by people trying to get closer and elbowed in the side of the head by someone trying to take a photo.
All in all, he'd had a much nicer time when he'd had dinner with Draco the night before.
Sitting up, Harry opened a paper bag containing the treats he'd bought himself. By far the highlights of his afternoon were the fact that not one single person had paid the least bit of attention to him, and the contents of this bag. He pulled a black box with fancy silver embossing from inside the bag and opened it eagerly. Macarons—Draco had been right, bloody brilliant they were. Indulging himself, Harry chose a pistachio with dark chocolate filling and bit into it. He hummed with pleasant surprise—not the pistachio at all, but rather the mint. In addition to the mostly safe flavours he'd chosen, he'd also tried some more unusual ones, but nothing so out there as strawberry and wasabi or—what was the other Draco had said, fois gras and lime? He'd even tried a rose flavoured one, but he hadn't cared for at all. Tasted like the soap Hermione kept in the guest loo.
He hadn't seen Draco at all that day, but he hoped he would tomorrow. As he finished the macaron, Harry wondered which flavour was Draco's favourite. Maybe he should've picked up a small box as a thank you gift for dinner yesterday.
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.~*~.
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Wednesday morning brought the first accident of any real significance; though, fortunately the injuries had been minor. The Charms professor had seen to it that the grounds were covered with protective charms to safeguard the children attending the school. They would be protected if they crashed landed or flew into the goal posts or Quidditch stands—or anything else. The only thing that hadn't been protected by cushioning charms were the students themselves, and that morning, two boys had collided nearly head on. Fortunately, a badly sprained shoulder had been the worst of the injuries, and Draco had healed that, along with a few bumps and bruises, easily. As a precaution, he'd contacted the Beauxbatons' mediwizard, who'd agreed to make himself available to treat any injuries beyond Draco's ability, and he'd come and checked both boys over for concussion or any other injuries. After they'd been pronounced sound as Snitches, Draco'd had to contact the boys' families to make them aware of the accident.
That had been his morning, and now that it was drawing time for the carriage to depart for the Lac des Champs Elysées excursion, he was more than ready to get away for a few hours.
The carriage stood outside the west courtyard with a throng of students and several chaperones standing nearby, waiting to board. The gamekeeper tended to the dozen Abraxans, hovering around their massive heads on a broom and checking their harnesses. He called down to Draco that they would be ready to go presently.
Draco saw Potter standing in the centre of the group of about forty children, including the British students, and talking to Émilie and her friend Nicole Pape, the second Chaser for Malecrit House. The thought that maybe he ought not accompany the afternoon trip after all occurred to him briefly, but Draco pushed it aside. He'd not seen Potter since they'd returned to the palace the night before last, and Draco wondered if he'd ventured out to see something of France yesterday afternoon and evening. Besides, there was something about hearing English spoken properly—without Madame Canfield's dreadfully nasal American accent—that appealed to him far more than he'd have expected it to.
Next to Potter was his impossibly orange-haired godson. It might not have been appropriate, but Draco admitted he'd paid particular attention to the comments made about young Mr Lupin by the retired pro players. By all accounts, he was quite a good little flyer. Draco wondered if his mother had played whilst she'd been at Hogwarts.
"Bonjour, Monsieur Malfoy," Nicole greeted him. "Les enfants sont tous prêts."
"Très bien. On peut monter, alors?" he responded.
The children were escorted into the carriage by Nicole, Émilie and the other Beauxbatons students chaperoning the excursion and Harry and Draco followed them up the stairs.
"Nicole was just telling me how nice the Lac des Champs Elysées is," Potter remarked.
Draco responded that it was considered by some to be the most beautiful place in the world.
"Are you one of them?"
"Without question."
On board the carriage, Harry and Draco sat separately from the students, but Draco ran his eyes over them now and then. The school was going well, he though. There'd been a few kids who'd already known each other, but most had arrived as strangers. Now, three days in, groups of friends had been formed. He wanted to be sure there were no kids left out, that everyone was finding their way.
"Teddy is enjoying the school so far?" Draco asked.
"First chance I've had to talk to him, really. I've not wanted to embarrass him. You know, hanging around when he wants to be with his new friends. But he's loving it," Harry answered, going on to recount how he'd got cold feet a couple of days before the school began. "I promised if he didn't like it after a couple of days, I'd come get him. I think it's safe to say he's staying."
"You've not noticed any kids seeming to have trouble making friends in your training sessions? They all seem to be getting on well?"
"Yes. Quite well. Monday they were a little stand-offish still, appraising each other, like. Less so, yesterday and today. I've not noticed any child in particular having difficulties, if you're worried about that."
"You'll let me know if you do?"
"Of course. Have any of the other coaches raised concerns?"
"Oh, no. No, not at all. Just wanting to keep look out."
It was not a long carriage ride to the Lac des Champs Elysées, and they sat quietly for the rest of the journey: Harry looking out the window, watching the mountains pass by below them, and Draco reflecting on the improbability that there would have ever been even a comfortably civil relationship between them, let alone the relaxed way they'd come to interact in such a short time. He even dared to hope it wasn't only amongst the students where friendships were being formed.
"I ventured into Paris yesterday afternoon," Harry said as they landed.
"Did you?"
The children were led off the carriage by the chaperones, and Harry and Draco followed them down the stairs. Harry began to say something, but stopped. Draco turned to look at him— Potter was looking around them in amazement.
The Lac des Champs Elysées was one of the hundreds, if not thousands, of glacial lakes that dotted the Pyrenees mountains. Sitting in a valley not far from the Atlantic Ocean, it enjoyed warm summer temperatures, while the permanently snow-capped mountain peaks were clearly visible in the distance. The water was a magnificent range of blue-green colours, from aquamarine at its shallowest to a dark teal at its deepest. On the side closest to them, the limestone that formed the lakebed extended well past the water's edge, creating a solid stone beach, beyond which lay a grassy meadow with purple and pink wildflowers and large limestone boulders interrupting the field of green. On the far side of the lake, the earth rose up in a steep cliff, and a waterfall cascaded down from a mountain river.
"Well, what do you think?" Draco asked. "The most beautiful place on Earth, or not?"
Harry agreed.
"Les Champs Elysées," Draco said. "The Elysian Fields."
"Is that what that means?" Harry asked. "It fits this place far better."
The chaperones and children had staked out a spot of beach, and the chaperones were covering it with thick blankets as the children shed their robes in favour of the swim attire they wore beneath.
Potter told him of his experiences the afternoon before, and Draco had to resist the overwhelming urge to role his eyes. He had made every rookie tourist mistake possible. True, though, it wasn't as if it was the man's fault. He hadn't known he'd be spending more than a few hours in France until he'd arrived. Of course he hadn't had any time to think about what—of everything Paris had to offer—he most wanted to see. Draco felt rather guilty. He should've thought of that and at the very least made recommendations on what not to do, if not what to see.
"Did find that place you recommended and bought some wonderful little macarons, though," Harry said. "Didn't try the fois gras and wasabi, but the champagne and strawberry dipped in chocolate were lovely."
"Champagne and strawberry?" Draco asked. That was not a flavour he'd have thought Potter have chosen.
"Had these little sugar roses and white chocolate swirls. Almost too pretty to eat."
To the east of the lake stood a beautiful hotel, reflective of la Belle Époque during which it had been built. Its pale pink façade with bright white decorative stonework and Juliette balconies was striking against the deep blue sky.
"They don't serve a proper English tea, but their coffee is excellent and their pastries are even better," Draco said as he guided Harry towards the hotel's outdoor dining terrace.
"Pudding before dinner is one of my favourite things," Harry said.
Draco rather agreed. He put it right up there with a nice long lie-in. Although lie-ins, like pudding before dinner, were best when shared.
They were greeted by the maître d'hôtel, and Draco asked for a table on the terrace, adding they'd not be ordering a full meal, rather coffee and pudding.
"Merci," Draco said to the man once they'd been seated. "Paris is one of the world's most interesting cities to visit, but you made two mistakes," he said to Harry. "You tried to do too much in too little time, and you didn't look into making any arrangements before your visit—not that you'd have had the time, given the circumstances." He explained there was a pedestrian tunnel under the roadway to reach the Arc de Triomphe, and tickets for the Eiffel Tower could be purchased in advance to avoid at least some of the queuing up—though there were better ways to see the tower. There was nothing, really, that could be done to improve a visit to the Avenue des Champs-Elysees other than to advise skipping it entirely. "It may've once been the world's most beautiful streets, but it's been a long time since. Not since all the Muggle retail chains took up residence. Essentially, there are four types of people when it comes to the Avenue des Champs-Elysees—the tourists who are impressed by designer names and who love it, the tourists who don't care about any of that and are unimpressed by it, the rich Parisians who wish there weren't so many tourists, and the rest of Paris who don't think it's anything remarkable." Why someone would want to shop there when there was the option of such lovely boutiques and charming eighteenth and nineteenth century passages couverts, Draco could never begin to imagine. "And as for the Mona Lisa, it draws too big a crowd and you're kept too far back to be able to appreciate it, but the Louvre does have a vast collection of Muggle artworks well worth seeing."
Harry replied that by that time, he'd only wanted to return to the palace, and he'd not spent long at the Louvre after leaving the Mona Lisa's gallery.
Draco dropped his head into his hands. "Tomorrow, you and I are going to Paris," he said. "You are going to see it properly."
"I've got to ask, how do you know so much about Muggle Paris?" Harry asked sounding genuinely curious. "And French history?"
The table they'd been given was against the railing and had a lovely view of the lake and meadow. Before answering, Draco let his eyes roam. Their waiter approached the table, and Draco asked for wine and to be brought the cheese tray, buying himself more time.
"I'm sorry," Potter hastened to say after the man had left. "It's none of my business. I shouldn't have—"
"Non," Draco responded, slipping into French accidentally and earning himself a quizzical expression from Potter. "No," he said, returning to English. "It's nothing of any significance. Until recently, I was seeing a Muggle from Paris for two years. He was a historian."
Harry made an appropriately sympathetic expression. "Two years sounds rather significant," he said. He really had a very expressive face, Draco thought to himself. Charmingly so, in his own way. He'd not noticed it when they were younger, probably because the only expression either of them had ever given the other then was a sneer.
Draco shrugged, downplaying it. "It isn't time that establishes intimacy. We were both keeping secrets from each other. I never told him I was a wizard. He never told me he was married."
Harry winced. "I'm sorry."
"Don't be sorry for me. I'm not the one who was in love with him." Draco would never forget the way François' wife had looked at him. She'd taken one look at him standing on her doorstep and her husband's panicked, ashen face, and she'd known. Possibly, she'd had suspicions before, but she hadn't known till that moment. "I'm more angry than anything else. Be sorry for his wife. I know I am."
"Does Beauxbatons hire many non-French professors?" Harry asked, tactfully changing the subject.
His pronunciation of the name caught Draco's attention immediately—not the typical English 'boh-BAT-tons,' but rather 'bo – batton.' After teaching at Beauxbatons for a year, Madame Canfield still didn't pronounce the name correctly.
"I don't know of anyone from outside Britain ever teaching at Hogwarts," Harry continued.
"No," Draco answered stiffly. "Not usually."
"I keep putting my foot in it, don't I?" Harry asked, his face showing his embarrassment.
"Not at all. You recall I mentioned Madame Canfield comes from a wealthy family? Something put the notion in her head that teaching at a European school for a couple of years would be jolly fun, so her father made a donation to the school, and she got a job."
Harry's eyebrows rose. "Seems very out of character for Madame Maxime."
"Indeed. She was highly indignant. However, the donation was enough to provide full scholarships for ten students from disadvantaged families for the duration of their schooling."
"Ah," Harry said, nodding his head slowly in understanding. "An offer one can't refuse."
"Very much so, yes. It was an affront to her pride, but for the sake of the students and their families, she accepted both the money and Madame Canfield. And to be fair, she—Madame Canfield—does know the subject as well as anyone could. She's a half-blood, raised in both worlds, and can move easily between them. No one could fault her knowledge and ability. No amount of money would have persuaded Madame Maxime to take her on otherwise."
"And she'll be leaving at the end of the coming school year? Teaching at a European school not as jolly much fun as she'd thought?"
"She was taken on for two years. She could apply to stay on, I suppose—"
Their waiter returned with their wine and a tray hovering beside him covered with several different cheeses and some nice red and green grapes. Not knowing what Harry might like, Draco made a selection of cheeses ranging from sharp to mild and hard to soft.
"But you hope she won't," Harry said once they were alone.
Draco broke a piece off a palm-sized loaf of bread and added a generous sample of brie. He handed it to Harry, telling him to try it, before helping himself.
Rubbing his fingertips together to brush off a few crumbs, Draco said, "She has the most annoying habit of speaking to me in English anytime she sees me, even when we're amongst people who do not speak it. And she will do it in the loudest voice possible without actually yelling. Dreadfully rude." He broke the bread and chose a sharp, hard cheese this time. "Try this one," he said, passing it to Harry before helping himself again. "She says what a relief it is to take a break from speaking in a foreign language all the time. We are working and living in France. It is English that is the foreign language. You know, when you said 'Beauxbatons' a minute or two ago, you pronounced it correctly. She's been teaching here a year and still calls it 'boh-BAT-tons'."
"I've just heard Fleur say it and picked it up from her, I reckon," Harry said.
Draco asked him which cheese he'd preferred, and based on his answer recommended one or two others for him to try.
"Do they have any crackers, do you think?" Harry asked as he cut himself a small slice of one of Draco's recommendations.
Draco cringed. "That's blasphemy, that is. It is physically impossible to eat French cheese with crackers," he replied stiffly. "The cheese will throw itself onto the floor sooner than allow itself to be consumed on a cracker."
"Oh, er. Okay," Harry responded sheepishly as he broke a piece off slice of baguette.
"But that's just what she's not done," Draco said, returning to their conversation. "How many times do you think she's heard the name said, and yet she's still not picked it up? Her French may be grammatically perfect, but her pronunciation is rubbish." Cutting a piece of Roquefort, Draco said on a different subject, "They do a fabulous crème brûlée here. Also, tarte Tatin, which is caramelised apples with puff pastry. It's served warm with vanilla or dulce de leche ice cream. Or there's cream puffs with chocolate sauce or . . ."
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Hope you liked chapter 5! Seeds are being planted.
Authors note: Everywhere Harry and Draco will go is a real place, with the exception of the wizarding places, but even those are based on real places. The history Draco tells Harry about la Place des Vosges is real. To create the Lac des Champs-Elysées I combined several pictures I found on line of lakes in the Pyrenees.