Disclamier: Yeah- I'm not J.K. So Sue me. No- really, you don't have to. I'm kidding! No, I do not own the idea, movies, books, or action figures of the Potterverse.
Beta: SHADOWFAX999 hehehe- she's back from her vacation!! Yay! So- I don't know precisely what that means for this fic... but it's good to know, no?
Title: The Ties That Bind
A/N: Below
Summary/ Warning: Dom/ Sub, HGRW, PPBZ, RLSB, LVBL …and of course HPSS.
Chapter 9: Managing the Madness
:Parseltongue:
"Conversational thoughts"
Private thoughts, shared memories
He walked into the Great Hall, and noticed immediately that he wasn't the last one to enter thankfully. Shrugging lightly, there was still a good bit of time before the first class so he went to sit in his usual seat. He was given the usual greetings from his friends, and as he reached for the bacon, he noticed Neville's closed expression.
"Hey, Nev. What's wrong?" The other boy glanced at him, and then resumed staring at his plate, a muscle in his jaw ticking methodically.
Harry glanced at Hermione in worry, and she leaned away from Ron to whisper to him, "He's taking it very badly that he's not sitting you-know-where with you-know-who."
Harry nodded in comprehension, glancing over his shoulder at the Slytherins' table for a moment to see what Draco was up to. The blonde was chatting merrily with Blaise and Pansy, but not in his usual spot. Instead, he was sitting at the end of the table, bracketed by his two friends, and doing his best to not glance over to Gryffindor table.
Harry turned back to Hermione with a raised eyebrow. "Well, at least Zabini and Parkinson are keeping him secluded."
She nodded, and added, "And Theodore Nott and Susan Bones are the other two who completed the bonding. So there are six of us now." Harry pursed his lips as she added "that we know of."
Ron leaned across Hermione to tell Harry "Imagine what Quidditch is going to be like, mate; bonkers, totally bonkers." Harry agreed immediately.
"Yeah- it's a good thing Nev doesn't play or else he might be ordering Draco to loose the game so Gryffindor could win. And at least with Hermione, when she cares about the game she wants Gryffindor to win." The three friends nodded, and took another peek at Neville. The boy was openly glowering at the blonde- or, rather the Slytherins surrounding him- and Draco was doing his best to ignore him.
"How long does this last again, 'Mione?" Harry asked in a strained voice.
The brown haired girl sighed. "It peaks at one week, and then settles. So it will be an… interesting… week, to say the least, until we all realized exactly how much we're willing to let people get away with."
"Huh." Harry said as he watched the interaction between the other two boys. If we don't get this worked out, there is going to be a lot of blood spilled by the time this week is over… Poor Neville.
Harry tuned into Severus' mind, unutterably relieved when he heard …I am going to kill the fool… Murder will get you sent to Azkaban, Severus, you don't want that… He grinned briefly.
"Hey, Sev. It seems like your death threats are going to become reality soon. Want an out?"
The immediate reply almost deafened him. "Yes! Get me away from these fools!"
"Haha, Severus. Very funny. But really- Neville is about to blow a fuse here because of Malfoy, and I was wondering if you could get Draco out of the Hall so Neville could calm down?"
He listened while his mate figured out that blowing a fuse was a bad thing, and smiled when he agreed. "I do not want to deal with Longbottom any longer than I have to, Potter. So hurry this up."
Harry watched as Snape stood abruptly from the Staff Table and started to storm down the aisle. Turning to Neville, he tapped the boy on his sleeve and whispered in his ear, "Professor Snape is pulling Malfoy out to talk to him. Maybe you could catch Draco when he's finished?"
And sure enough, Snape grabbed Draco by the back of his robes and dragged him out of the Hall, the blonde utterly confused. Neville shot Harry a grateful look, not caring about how the other boy had known what the Potions Master was going to do, and shot to his feet, grabbing his bag in one hand and racing out of the Hall.
"Company, Severus."
"Good. I'll be waiting for you and the other nitwits in the classroom."
Harry had to smile at the mock-harsh words, and grinned hugely when Severus added, "And be on time, or else I'll have to give you detention."
Harry chuckled at that, remembering his earlier thought, and turned his attention back to his friends, smiling widely. "Once you get used to him, his sense of humour is wicked."
Hermione laughed with him, but Ron merely looked at him like he was insane.
"Come on, Harry. He's- you know- him- he's been the scary dude for six years. His humour can't have changed that much."
Harry fought down the beast that demanded he avenge the slur on his mate and responded lightly, "Gee, I don't know how you put up with Hermione all the time, either, bookworm that she is."
Hermione, even knowing what Harry was feeling, shot him a death glare when he insulted Ron. The two dominants stared each other down, Ron starting to look worried, before Harry took a deep breath and apologized.
"I'm sorry, Hermione." He went to add something else, but it stuck in his throat.
She shook her head, though and replied, "No, Harry. It's fine. I'll explain it to Ron later." They smiled at each other in perfect accord, and went back to eating, ignoring the confused expression on Ron's face.
When they walked into the Potions class, they were surprised to see Neville and Draco sitting next to each other, and Harry asked without delay "Hey, Sev. Why are Nev and Draco sitting together?" The reply had him choking on his own breath.
"I have enough sexual tension and possessiveness in my life because of you right now, Potter. I don't need it from my top student, as well."
As he recovered from his coughing fit, he explained the edited edition to Hermione, who he was sitting in front of, who relayed it to Ron. This whole mind reading thing could be very useful, he thought to himself, but then Snape swept in and the room went quiet.
When he reached the front of the room, Severus turned to look at the assembled students. "Alas," he stated in what Harry recognized as a mock-mournful voice, "It seems you have all survived the weekend. Shame…"
He flicked his wand at the board, and the instructions for the day's potion appeared in his precise handwriting. "Before you begin your pitiful attempts at preparing potions this morning, you will move to your re-assigned seats." He smiled evilly at the collective groan, and then took ten points from Gryffindor for 'protesting the rights of a teacher'.
"Longbottom, Malfoy. Granger, Weasley. Zabini, Parkinson. Thomas, Finnegan. Crabbe, Brown. Goyle, Patil. Bulstrode, Nott." Snape finished pairing up the class, and when Harry was the only one without a partner, he gestured to the empty desk at the front of the room.
"For you, Potter," he spat the name out, and if Harry hadn't been able to read the undercurrents of amusement in his thoughts, he would have been worried, "The seat right in front of me. So I can see every mistake Ms. Granger cannot fix."
The Gryffindor groaned at his rotten luck, and Harry sighed as he moved to the front of the room, plopping ungracefully into the chair and crossing his arms sulkily. "Five points for cheek, Mr. Potter." Snape said, and his housemates muttered angrily.
"And now, the essay?" Snape paused as no one moved. "Do not tell me you forgot that I assigned you an essay?"
He waited as the students started ruffling through their bags, and raised an eyebrow as only the Slytherins and half the Gryffindor's produced a scroll from their bags. "Tsk, tsk," he intoned, and 'Accio'd' the parchments that were laying on the students desks. "Fifty points from Gryffindor, for failure to hand in an assignment." The other lions grumbled, and Snape raised a superior brow. "Do you wish for me to make it fifty points each?" The grumbling stopped.
Snape went to the front of the room and sat, starting to mark the papers on his desk. After a moment, he looked up, seemingly infuriated that they hadn't begun working yet.
"Well? Do you need a howler?" His acidic tone had the entire class scrambling for their equipment before he took more points away. Severus shook his head and went back to marking his papers, ignoring the appreciative snickers in the back of his mind.
The class had settled down a while ago, the new partners working well together, for the most part. Harry, alone in front of his cauldron, was biting his lip as he looked from the instructions to his potion, and back again. Finally giving in, he asked tentatively, "Severus? Could you help me?" The response had him biting his lip even harder.
"What's wrong, Harry?" A resigned sigh.
"My potion is all messed up."
"What color is it?" The impression of an eyebrow being raised in annoyance.
"Green?"
"What do the instructions say it should look like at the stage you have reached?"
Harry glanced over again, to make sure, and whispered "Purple." He heard Severus sigh again in the back of his head, and slumped.
"You added the snake fang after the coral scales, didn't you?"
Harry slid further into his chair. "I don't know. I don't think so." He ran through everything he had done, and said in a firmer voice, "I did it all right. I followed the instructions."
Severus sighed to himself, and thought. What could he have done to change the potion so much if he followed the instructions? Harry listened in more than slight awe as Severus ran through all the ways the simple Sleeping Draught could be deformed. How anyone could remember all this and be able to think about it at a moments notice is beyond me.
He waited for Severus to answer, staring into his cauldron in bemusement, also trying to figure out what he had done wrong. Finally, he felt Severus sigh and say, "Just add a pinch of dragons horn. It should make it a dull green. You should be able to fix it from there." Harry followed the advice, and the potion did turn the dull, ugly green. He sighed in relief, and thanked his mate before finishing the potion.
About ten minutes later, Snape got up and started his circuit of the room. Almost everyone was finished, and he had them all bring up vials of the now- for the most part- glowing purple potions and place them on his desk. He dismissed the class two minutes early, and the students ran out of the dungeons like their tails were on fire.
Harry took the opportunity to remain behind as he started cleaning up, smiling when Severus sealed the door magically. The older man came and stared into his still- full cauldron, trying to intuit what Harry had done wrong.
He smelled it, touched it, peered at it closely, and even tasted it before looking at Harry in puzzlement. "I don't know what you did, but it is fine. You probably just managed to change the colour without affecting the properties." Harry harrumphed, and stared into the cauldron in befuddlement.
"Dunno how I would have done that." He said, then shrugged and cast Evaneso, and started to put his things away.
Severus watched him curiously, and finally voiced the thought that Harry wasn't acknowledging. "Why do you hate Potions so much?" Harry stilled for a moment, then finished what he was doing before turning back to face his mate.
He clenched his jaw, and answered, not meeting Severus' eyes. "I hate cooking. And Potions is just like it." Severus heard the undertones of pain in his mate's voice, and resolved to get the details from the boy later. Harry made as if to go, but Severus restrained him, the submissive in him refusing to let Harry leave him disgruntled.
"Hey, what's this?" Harry furrowed his brow at the Potions Master, not bothering to listen to his thoughts. "No kiss? Every other time we get separated, you have to kiss me, but not this time? Fine. I understand." Severus could not believe that that had just came out of his mouth, and he resolved to forget he'd ever said such a thing as soon as Harry was out of sight.
But his train of thought cut off there, because suddenly a hot mouth was attached to his, and strong arms pressed him close to the smaller boy's body as an agile tongue slipped past his lips to invade his willing mouth.
It was a short kiss, by their standards, and Harry pulled away, his unhappiness of before forgotten. "See ya later Sev," he said jauntily as he left the classroom, leaving Severus with a small smile on his face. The teacher walked back to his desk to prepare the next class' lesson, and to consider the unusual hatred Harry had for cooking.
When Harry walked into Transfiguration with barely thirty seconds to spare he just ignored Professor McGonagall's disapproving gaze. Hermione looked at him with a pained expression as she took in his overly smug countenance. He sat down next to Hermione and Ron, the small smile still in place even as Professor McGonagall started in on an aspect of Transfiguration he absolutely did not understand.
An hour and a half later, Harry still had the small smile on his face, having managed to keep it plastered on even through the antics of the class. Neville had stared at everyone like they were all traitors, Draco had been fussing unusually loudly about his clothes, Pansy had pinned Blaise to his chair and had not allowed anyone near him, Dean had actually set up shielding spells around Seamus, and Hermione had threatened repeatedly to skin anyone who came near Ron.
They had all tried to be very subtle and sneaky about their protection of their mates, but McGonagall had been teaching for a very long time and knew instinctively when students were up to something, and everyone else knew what was going on anyway from the essay they had all had to write, or should have known. Needless to say, Professor McGonagall had given out three detentions and a two foot punishment essay pertaining to the proper uses of ones wand, due at dinner.
Harry had watched the goings on with amusement, seeing the others in a light that he'd never thought he'd see them in. Pansy protecting someone? Neville in a permanent bad mood? Hermione anything but proper? Dean serious? Harry had sat back and watched the show, knowing not to interfere, unlike some students.
He felt vaguely sorry for Crabbe and Goyle, for example, the victims of Neville's rather vicious stinging hex. They had tried to help Draco with his work, and Neville had come to the end of his tether. He was currently being yelled at - rather loudly- by a very irate Head of House, the rest of the class watching in ill- disguised fear.
McGonagall, finally tired of screaming at the unrepentant student, turned away to stare at the class. They kept quiet, waiting for the expected explosion. Instead, she said,
"Longbottom, Malfoy, Granger, Weasley, Thomas, Finnegan, Parkinson, and Zabini. The rest of you- get out. Now."
Five seconds later most of the class was gone, not willing to try the infuriated Professors patience. Harry and Theodore looked at each other in appraisal, taking in the subtle signs of another dominant, and stayed in their seats. Minerva looked enraged that they had not left, and was opening her mouth to demand an explanation when Hermione interrupted.
"Um, Professor?" She said meekly, flinching a little when the older woman looked at her. But while she was still angry, she just gestured stiltedly for Hermione to continue.
"Um, I assume you told the rest of us to stay behind to… discuss… our rather… overprotective… natures?" The teacher nodded and her raised eyebrow the only indication that she cared what Ms. Granger had to say. Hermione swallowed, and went on. "They are also part of a… pairing… and should probably hear what you have to say."
There was silence as the remnants of the class turned to face the two boys. They stared back grimly, wondering what their reception would be. Slowly, shocked expressions started to form on the faces of some of the watchers, and Harry shifted in his seat. They're probably thinking the same thing Dumbledore did. Crap.
"Hey Potty," Draco called out, "I bet you're the Sub." He shrugged innocently when Neville, who had apparently started paying attention again, gaped at him.
"You've obviously forgotten, Draco, what position you-" he was cut off when Malfoy's hand magically appeared over his mouth. The group cracked up at the implications, and Draco shrieked and pulled his hand away to wipe it on his robes, scowling hard at his laughing mate.
McGonagall stopped the hilarity with a raised hand, and looked around the group as they all eyeballed her warily. She sighed gustily and walked over to her desk, transfiguring a feather into a quill and an over used piece of parchment into a clean sheet.
Her scratchy handwriting wrote out Dom and Sub at the top, and she glanced at them over her glasses as she sat, quill poised. When no one volunteered information, she said "Well, Ms. Granger? Start us off. In pairs, please." Hermione sighed.
"Hermione Granger, Dominant." She glared at Ron when he kept silent, and he squeaked "Ronald Weasley, Submissive." Someone muttered "Obviously," but no one admitted to it when Hermione's face turned an interesting shade of puce and her hand itched towards her wand.
"Moving on," Seamus said quickly, gathering everyone's attention away from Ron, "Seamus Finnegan, Submissive and loving it." Dean dragged the unrepentant Seamus against his side as he growled "Dean Thomas, Dominant."
"Pansy Parkinson, Dominant." She merely shrugged gracefully when Draco intoned "So what else is new?" Blaise spoke up. "Blaise Zabini, Submissive."
"Neville Longbottom, Dominant."
A few eyebrows rose at that. Not all of them had actually believed the interaction between Neville and Draco was an indication of reality. Neville nudged Draco after a long moment, and the blonde pouted and said finally, "Draco Malfoy, Submissive."
Everyone laughed at his face, and he added sulkily "And if anyone tells my father, I'll have Neville kill you." Not even Seamus laughed at that, though a few shoulders did tense. They all knew of Lucius Malfoy's affiliation with the Dark Lord.
There was a short pause before they turned to Theo. He said quietly "Theodore Nott, Dominant. Susan Bones, Submissive." The only sound was Professor McGonagall's quill on the parchment. They turned to Harry, and he glanced at Hermione before speaking. She gave him an encouraging smile, and a weak and fleeting one passed over his face.
"Harry Potter, Dominant."
They waited for him to continue, excited to know who his Sub was. But he just sat there, and Neville sucked a sudden breath in as he finally put two and two together and got five. His wide eyes met Harry's, and he shook his head in disbelief, tearing his gaze away from mildly amused green eyes to seek out Hermione. She smiled tightly, and nodded.
"Holy shit," he breathed, and a slim smile graced Harry's face as he chuckled a little in response.
"Yep. That's about exactly what I thought too."
"Please, fill us in, boys." Professor McGonagall sounded polite, but they heard the impatience under her calm tone. Neville shook his head.
"It's not my place to say, Professor," as he slowly reasoned with himself, trying to ignore Draco's annoying and frequent pleas to be let in on the secret.
She turned to Harry expectantly, and he just smiled sweetly at his favorite teacher, saying in a serene voice, "Headmaster Dumbledore knows, Professor. If you desperately need to know, I'm sure he would be happy to tell you." Her lips pursed, and as she nodded, she made a mental note to ask Albus as soon as possible. For now, she just wrote Harry's name under Dom and a question mark under Sub. Rolling up the parchment, she stood again and turned to her students.
"Alright. I am going to be speaking to the Headmaster about the situation we find ourselves in. Before you leave, know that this is the largest amount of pairings we've ever had at Hogwarts. Ever. It is rare to have more than two pairings, three is unusual, and six has never happened." She stopped and looked at the attentive faces watching her. "I don't know what the future holds, but know one more thing." McGonagall waited until all of
the faces were looking at her.
"In the Wizarding World, people joined together by the Subdo Revilio potion are considered married. Even if the formal ceremony has not take place." She paused, and looked at the pairings in her class. "Many of you will face criticism, even hate, for the fact that you are caught in this sort of relationship. I will recommend that you establish close ties with those others who are also paired." Smiling at Hermione, Ron, Seamus, Dean, Harry and Neville she added, "Though I know this will not be a hardship for some of you, some still need to get over the House prejudices that have divided you for so many years."
McGonagall slipped the scroll into her sleeve, and gestured for the students to precede her out of the classroom. "I will not collect the essay due at dinner tonight from you. Now go, get to your next class." With a wave of her wand, a folded note appeared in each of their hands. "Well? Go. Try not to get in anymore trouble for the rest of the day, alright?"
She turned and walked away, conveniently not seeing the ten students coalesce and form a closely knit group. They should work this out as soon as they can, anyway. She turned her path to the Headmasters office. I do have a free period now, and I know he's there.
Behind her, the seventh years formed a group and studied each other. They stood with their mates, most of the Dom's holding onto their Subs in a way that declared their territory. Harry and Theo stood next to each other and they all waited for someone to break the silence.
It wasn't who they expected.
Hi! So a bit of a longer chapter today- mainly because it's early... I won't be able to post on Monday because I'm going to be working from 10am to after 5pm, and I don't want to chance not getting it up on time. So here you are.
ANd I know- it's a bit of a cliffie, and I'm sorry, but I had to cut it off here or the chapter would have been too long. But next Monday you'll see you it is, and I hope you all like the guy! I know I do...
Ta Ta For Now, Lovely Reveiwers
Netrixie