Titles: An Elf's Lament

Rating: PG-13

Word count: 2,040

Pairing: H/D + others

Disclaimer: Nothing you recognize belongs to me, including but not limited to the concept of elves as Santa's helpers.

Notes: It seems kind of amazing that I'm updating this fic after so long…it's been almost two years. But I hate leaving all the people who were kind enough to review hanging, and I was inspired all of a sudden, so here it is! I feel like I've added a bit more depth to the characters this time, but I'm suffering from sleep deprivation and too much caffeine, so who really knows. ^^; Please review and tell me what you liked and didn't like so I can continue this fic for you all! Thank you so much to all my previous reviewers!

Seduction, once one got used to the idea, was actually kind of fun. One just had to confuse the other person, catch him off his guard, draw out the suspense and anticipation until…

Harry entertained the notion that he might be a sadist.

Nah. He was the Savior of the Wizarding World, kind and generous to small children and dumb animals.

Hector floated past his head, doing the backstroke through the air as he sang the highly unoriginal "Harry and Draco, sitting in a tree."

Soon, however, Harry would find himself utterly unable to be kind and generous to one small, dumb, extremely aggravating Christmas elf.

"K-I-S-S-I-N-"

"Enough!" Harry snapped. "Sing some bloody Christmas carols or something. You are the worst Christmas elf I've ever seen!" He hoped that Hector would at least refrain from pointing out that he was the only Christmas elf that Harry had yet had the misfortune to meet.

Hector seemed much too cheery to point out small inconsistencies in Harry's theories.

"You, my dear sir, have hammered in the first nail."

Harry feared his brain would short circuit if he pondered that metaphor too hard, so he just glared at the small man.

Hector seemed to follow the path Harry's brain had plunged down, and he grimaced. "Oh for the love of Santa, it's an old elf saying! Once you plant the first nail, everything will hold together well enough for you to finish the job. I didn't mean…that is to say, you young people…ahem."

Harry was gratified to see that Hector looked as distraught as Harry felt. Maybe that would stop his future sex/toy metaphors.

Oh. Dear. Merlin. Did I just think the word "sex toy"?

Harry buried his head in his pillow and tried to make the images go away.

He had come back to his room after dinner to find Hector perched upon his bed as if he owned it, and they had gotten down to a plan of attack. The looks that Draco had given him in the Great Hall were full of dark suspicion, and it was obvious that the blond feared another mealtime attack. Harry was determined not to be so predictable.

What unpredictable thing Harry was determined to do, however, had actually yet to be determined.

So he and Hector had started an emergency strategy meeting. The curtains around his bed were drawn, with a Silencing Charm firmly in place; Harry knew that Ron wouldn't think it odd for him to go to bed at 7:30. Harry tried not to think about the fact that it wasn't normal for a seventeen-year-old boy to go to bed at 7:30 just to escape the world. No more moping. That's what he had decided.

And if his world felt empty and without purpose sometimes, then he just had to count his blessings. His life was no longer in danger, he had great friends, and…

He was being blackmailed into seducing his childhood rival by Santa Claus.

Well, one can't have everything.

So, still uncomfortable with the thought of what was supposed to happen at the end of this seduction, Harry had settled in to start plotting.

"Hey, Toy Soldier."

Hector kicked Harry none-too-gently in the ear.

"We're supposed to be strategizing, not fantasizing. Get whatever lecherous thoughts you were having out of your head and onto the paper. We've got squat here."

Harry came out of the pillow sputtering. Lecherous?

Hector merely rolled his green eyes – and really, bright green, those elves should consider that there's a limit to how far they should take the "Christmas" part – and jabbed a finger at the piece of parchment lying next to Harry's ear.

"Think. Faster."

Earlier, it had seemed to Harry that Hector really did care whether he and Draco got together or not. He had seemed happy at whatever the tension between them in the Quidditch shed had meant. Now, however, he was back to being his Christmas Sparkle and Cheer self.

No, Harry decided, there was no way he could be a sadist. Obviously, all the sadistic mojo was reserved for the Christmas elves.

He did not just think the words "sadistic mojo." He stored that word safely up on the top shelf of his mental bookcase, next to "sex toy." Back away from the bookshelf and…right, back to business then.

"How is it my fault if I can't come up with anything?" Harry shot another glare at the elf. "I've never seduced anyone before! Heck, I would hope I haven't seduced too many people at seventeen. You're old, right? Where's the love of your life?"

To Harry's surprise, Hector's cheeks flushed slightly at that comment.

"I've given you options! Pick one; they're all good."

Harry stared down at the parchment, lying oh-so-innocently on the bed next to him.

"One: Put a rose in everything he owns," Harry read. "First of all, I think if I stuck roses in his book bag and his bed, wouldn't he be covered in cuts from all the thorns?"

Hector rolled his eyes. "That's when you offer to kiss them and make them better. Obviously."

Harry quickly put a thick black line through number one.

"Two: Feed him pie. Three: Feed him grapes. Four: Feed him alcohol until he's so drunk that he – Hector!" Harry was scandalized. He immediately scribbled through the three options. "Why are all these about feeding him stuff, anyways?"

"'The way to a man's heart is through his stomach.' And I wrote this list while you were at dinner, enjoying one of Hogwarts' delectable dinners. Oh, how I suffer for the greater good!" Hector put on his best pained expression.

Harry grinned. "Dobby wouldn't let you back into the kitchens, would he?"

"Nasty things, house elves. Never trust an elf with mismatched socks, I always say." Harry noticed the elf's own socks were red and flashed the words "Santa's busy, but I've got a package for you too." As Harry tried desperately to throw that image up onto the top shelf of his mental bookcase with "sex toy" and "sadistic mojo," Hector continued, "Shall we move on? Option five was…"

Harry looked back at the paper. "Five: Take Draco on a date." He looked up. "Well, that seems easy enough."

Hector smiled slowly. "By "take," I meant kidnap. And when I said "date," I meant out to a bar, where you could feed him-"

Harry cut in hastily. "I'll decide what to do about the date. You can just sit back and relax, okay?"

He didn't like the gleam in the elf's eye when he agreed.

*

Though Harry had quickly rejected the insane elf's idea of a "date," the kidnapping part of the plan hadn't been a bad idea. After all, Draco and Harry weren't on friendly terms; asking him out on a date would just lead to suspicion and awkwardness.

Whereas kidnapping was just strange and hostile enough to work. Not to mention unpredictable.

Harry was beginning to like that word. If there was ever any reason why a relationship with Ginny wouldn't have worked out, that was it – too predictable. Not Ginny, per se; she had spunk and courage and could be quite a handful. But Harry and Ginny together would be the first step down the path to a cookie cutter life – a house, kids, a job.

Which was what he had always wanted, right?

Once the war ended, and things calmed down enough to allow Harry to go back to Hogwarts for his seventh year, he thought he would finally get that life. He had even considered asking Ginny out on a date. Then, less than a month into the semester, he had realized it – he was bored.

Not just a little bored, but mind blowingly and mind numbingly bored.

There were no puzzles to work out, nothing to solve or fear or stress over. No enemies, no expectations, no challenges. Asking Ginny out would have been simple and easy – and not a challenge.

She would say yes. Harry knew it, Ginny knew it, and he knew that neither of them was especially happy about that fact. Harry deserved a challenge, and Ginny deserved to be a challenge.

So he hadn't asked her out, and they were both better off for it.

And now Harry was left with this new puzzle in his hands, this question of how to seduce Draco Malfoy. Because no matter what Hector said about Malfoy's heart's desire, he knew that there was no way Malfoy would just fall into Harry's arms at request. Harry didn't even know if he would catch him if he did.

It was that unpredictable factor that Harry liked. A challenge, just like he needed. The enigma that was Malfoy, and all of the thoughts and emotions Harry experienced around him. Today, in the locker room, Harry had felt stressed and trapped and excited and panicky – but he hadn't been bored for a single moment of it.

He was ready to start the kidnapping.

*

Draco was not sure how he had ended up in Madam Puddifoot's with one Harry Potter, but he was sure it had had something to do with the potion he had tasted in his pumpkin juice at lunch.

Yesterday's Egg Attack had unnerved Draco, but he hadn't really thought Harry would try something again so soon. But only Potter could be talented and clever enough to defeat the Dark Lord, while still failing to understand that if you put a mild sleeping potion in pumpkin juice, the juice would infallibly taste of butterscotch and peas.

Draco quite liked butterscotch, and besides, he had decided, anyone unsubtle enough to try doping up a Potion Adept with one of the most common potions in existence could not possibly serve as a threat to him.

He had been half right. Potter wasn't dangerous. Just potentially insane.

But you never knew with the crazy ones…

"Alright, I'll bite, Potter," Draco drawled. Potter's head shot up, as if he had just noticed Draco was there. It seemed he had been dozing while waiting for the potion to wear off. Constant vigilance, indeed.

Harry's eyes met his, and the Boy Wonder gave him a half smile. "There's no need for biting just yet, Draco. Perhaps I'll take you up on your offer at a later time."

Draco stared at him. Was he…flirting?

Harry managed a smirk before his cheeks flooded with redness. It was good to know that if Potter was flirting, at least he wasn't managing it with any sort of finesse.

"I do apologize, Potter," Draco said. "I hadn't realized that your mind lived in such dirty places. Let me revoke that offer and clarify my statement – what the hell am I doing with you in this awful, Godforsaken – and bright pink, might I add - place?"

Though fading, the red was still visible in his cheeks, but Harry had obviously managed to collect himself. "We're on a date," he said matter-of-factly.

Draco just stared at him.

"…and?"

The brunet looked confused. "And what?"

The Boy-Who-Lived-To-Be-Frustrating was trying too hard to look innocent, Draco noticed. Can't trick a trickster, can't swindle a swindler, can't fool a – well, anyways, Harry was up to something.

"And why did you find it necessary to drug me and drag me out here with you? Most people just ask."

"You'd have said no."

Draco frowned. "So if you force me to come here against my will, then it counts as a yes?"

Harry grinned broadly and spread his hands out as he shrugged. "Who knows? You might be surprised at what your answer will be."

At that moment, what seemed like a dozen waitresses – all dressed in disgustingly pink dresses with pink aprons – descended upon their table, depositing cake after cake after cake. Tiny, heart-shaped cakes, each with a single letter written in hot pink icing on top of a white icing background.

The message was clear:

D & H K I S S I N G

And in the very middle of all the smaller, sickeningly pink cakes was a larger cake, pure white, with an elaborate green Christmas tree in the very center.

The only thought Draco could come up with was – what is it with Potter and food?