salvation
Title: Salvation
Author: cassisluna
Word Count: 4,233
Rating: PG-13
Summary:
You still have to save everyone, Potter. Wake up.
Save me, he wanted to say.
Salvation
Two days have passed.
Forty-eight hours ever since Draco turned his back on everything he knew and stood for. Or at least, everything he thought he knew - everything he should have stood for.
Because how could anyone stand for what the Dark Lord did? What the Death Eaters did? ...What he did?
Draco shuddered, the disgust for himself and what he had witnessed for the past few weeks coming over to him in overpowering waves. He had to wrap his arms around his abdomen to stop the shivers that was partly due to his nerves and partly due to the cold, considering that he had given up his cloak for an altruistic deed.
He let out a sharp, raspy laugh that hurt his ears as it did his throat and chest.
As if altruistic deeds can save him now. As if it can erase the dark, dark things that he had been forced to do. That he had done.
As if it can make up for all the things that Harry Potter went through.
He was shaking. From his lips to the tips of his fingers to his toes.
He was disgusted with himself. He wanted to embed his fingernails - the fingernails that he had bitten to the point where nail met skin in the past two days - on his arm, on the Dark Mark, and scratch, scratch until the Mark was gone, until the skin was gone and all that was left was bone, pure-white amidst the red of his blood and flesh but at least the ink would be gone - at least he would be clean again, if just a little bit.
He gazed at the limp figure in the shadows of the cave, the body covered by the darkness of the cloak that he had given up. The face was so pale... the lips turning purple. The remnants of the dried blood on his forehead and cheek were a contrast to the pale, white skin that the light of the moon shone on.
If it wasn't for the almost imperceptible rise and fall of the chest, he'd think that the body was dead, and so he followed that movement - that one and only movement that he saw in the still of the night, the still of his world - obsessively.
Keep breathing, Potter, he thought desperately. You still have to save everyone. Please. Pleasepleasepleasepleaseplease
He hadn't slept for two days. His paranoia kept his eyes open, which was well and good because he didn't want to sleep. Not when Potter still couldn't wake up.
Not when Death Eaters were searching for them to kill them both. Not when the Order was searching for their beloved Potter, ready to kill anyone that posed a danger to the boy - like him.
It made him feel sick to think that he was still afraid of dying after everything he did. After everything he didn't do. He deserved to die. But death was such a frightening thing... And that was also what the Dark Lord thought, wasn't it? He had the same thoughts as the madman who was going around Europe killing off half-bloods and Muggles.
He tightened his hold on himself, trying to keep his shaking at bay as his attention turned to the blood on Harry's face.
Please live.
-
It was hard replacing the bandages around Harry's chest with shaking hands. The boy was still so cold. But Draco could rest easier now, knowing that color was slowly coming back to those cheeks.
He had managed to heal most of the broken bones and the open wounds on Harry's back that were due to both Stinging Hexes and whip lashes. He fervently wished that there was no internal bleeding. He didn't know how to heal that.
After the bandages were replaced and secured, he buttoned the boy's dirty shirt closed and covered him with the cloak again.
He inhaled deeply.
Fifty hours.
Harry was sleeping too long.
He cast a Warming Spell over the sleeping body and debated on using a Cleaning Spell to get rid of the dried blood, but no, that would just waste energy.
He needed enough energy to Apparate Harry to safety once he woke up, and Draco knew that, with no sleep or food for two days, he didn't have much left. He was simply running on adrenaline now. And fear.
-
Sometimes he'd fall into a half-asleep state, but those were short-lived and left him even more tired because they gave him flashes of memories.
Harry hanging from chains. The skin on his wrist chafed raw by metal. His mouth bleeding. His chest heaving with painful and noisy breathing. His immobile form in the corner of his prison. His broken glasses. Those green eyes. Bright, bright green against the darkness. The determination in those eyes and the will that refused to break.
Draco would wake up from that half-state and he'd shake and sob and plead, Please. Wake up.
-
He and Harry were not friends, even if he had stopped hating him. And he knew now that they weren’t enemies.
After Dumbledore died, Draco blindly followed his father and Aunt Bellatrix. But he knew, he knew that this was all doomed to madness, they were all doomed to madness, and that his family had become something unsalvageable.
He had become something unsalvageable.
Saving Potter from that prison didn't change that.
You still have to save everyone, Potter. Wake up.
Save me, he wanted to say.
But he wasn't that foolish.
-
He needed Potter to wake up. He didn't know where Weasley and Granger was, where the Order was, or what place in this forsaken world could still be called safe.
The Carrows had Hogwarts. Yaxley had the Ministry. St. Mungo's had also been infiltrated. His home, the Manor, the one place that should have provided him with a sense of safety and belongingness now housed a madman.
He didn't know where the headquarters of the Order was. But he needed to get Potter there.
-
Fifty-two hours.
All that were left of the wounds on Potter's back were red marks. Draco ran his dirty fingers over each of them, relief coursing through him with each one he traced.
And he gazed, as envious as he was enthralled, at the white skin, clean and unblemished with ink.
Unlike him.
A deep, shuddering intake of breath reached his ears and he straightened, taking out his wand and pointing it behind him, hand shaking, heart hammering in his chest and the sound of blood rushing in his ears.
The moon shone on as if mocking him.
He realized that the sound came from him. He was crying.
"Mal..."
His head shot up at the sound. In a second, he had turned Potter over and almost cried at the sight of those green eyes open.
Unfocused but conscious.
"Potter," he was saying, his voice cracking due to misuse and the tears. He looked into Potter's eyes desperately. "Potter, listen to me. Tell me where I can Apparate you. Where it's safe."
Harry barked out a laugh that ended up sounding very much like a cough in the end. "You look like shite, Malfoy."
Draco was only mildly affronted. "You don't look very dashing yourself."
Another dry laugh. "I imagine not."
Then, all humour drained from his face and he looked at Draco seriously. "Can I trust you?" he murmured.
This time, it was Draco's turn to laugh: a painful, bordering on hysterical kind of laugh that was devoid of all humour except an ironic one. No, he thought. No, you can't.
"I'm afraid you don't have much of a choice right now, Potter, unless you fancy Apparating by yourself in that state."
Harry grinned tiredly. "You don't look like you're in a very able state either."
Draco returned his dry humour. "I'm not the one who was tortured by Death Eaters for two hours."
"Point." Harry looked up at him, staring at him levelly. "Have you ever been to the Blacks’ ancestral home?"
His mother’s family home?
Draco inhaled sharply. That was it then. Potter's trust. That location could very well lead to the Order's headquarters, or at least, the whereabouts of some of its members. That location could spell Harry's safety and Draco's death, or... vice versa.
He let out his breath slowly. "Once or twice." He curled his hands into fists to keep them from trembling. This was it. If he delivered Potter to the front steps of the Order, he could very well face death. But even if he didn’t, after betraying the Dark Lord, he was doomed to die anyway. He swallowed down the whimper that threatened to slip out of his throat and took a deep, shuddering breath.
"I'm going to put Glamour and Disillusionment Charms on us, and then I'm going to Side-Along you there right now. Can I Apparate directly inside?"
Harry shook his head. "It's unplottable."
Draco nodded. He figured.
He opened his mouth to speak again, but Potter’s hand clutching weakly at his sleeve stopped him.
“I changed my mind. Apparate directly inside 12 Grimmauld Place.”
Draco groaned. “You shouldn’t have told me that,” he muttered, before another bout of hysteria consumed him momentarily and he laughed shakily. He was going to have to Obliviate himself after this. Trust Potter to make this whole thing harder for him.
He resolved to ignore Potter’s quiet gaze, even as it made him uncomfortable. It was too studious, too emphatic, too soul-searching.
"Stand up," he instructed, moved the cloak aside and helped Potter use muscles that he hadn't used for two days. Potter was shaky and hissing in pain as he got to his feet and he leaned too heavily on Draco once he finally got his arse off the ground. Draco frowned. "Can you stand on your own?"
Potter tried to move away from him, but wobbled as soon as he shifted his weight from Draco's chest to his legs. Draco's arms catching him kept him upright.
He cursed, clearly unhappy with himself.
Draco, while keeping a firm hold on Harry’s arm, knelt to pick the cloak up from the ground. He threw it around Potter’s shoulders and fastened the clasp in front closed. Potter didn’t comment.
Draco grabbed hold of Potter's arms and wound them around his neck, ignoring the heat of Potter's breath on the cold skin of his ear. "Hold on tightly."
Harry laughed as Draco cast the Glamour and Disillusionment Charms on them both. "You're shaking. Are you sure you can do this?"
"Like you, I don't have much of a choice either," Draco muttered, before wrapping his arms around Potter's shoulders. He took a deep breath and remembered the rules for Apparition: Destination, Determination and Deliberation.
If Harry found their positions weird, then he didn't say anything.
The pop of Apparition was the only sound that disturbed the still of the cave.
-
They landed in the middle of the living room.
Draco managed to duck just in time to avoid a hex going for his head, clutching Potter’s head to his chest tightly. His sudden action had him crouching and Potter sitting flat on the floor. Something that sounded like it was made of glass exploded.
Potter was yelling against his clothes with his throaty, raspy voice, “Wait, wait, wait, it’s me, Harry!”
“Reveal yourself!” someone yelled at the same time Draco did, “Finite Incantatem!”
The Disillusionment Charm gave way, as well as Harry’s Glamour Charm. He kept his own Glamour intact. If he wanted to get out of this alive, if he wanted to live another day, at least just one more day, then he wasn’t about to show anyone else who he was.
All at once, voices exploded throughout the room.
“Harry-!”
“Harry!”
“Wait, ‘Mione!”
“Molly, no!
“QUIET!”
Someone’s Sonorus Charm effectively shut off all noise.
Draco kept Potter pressed against him, hugging him tightly, but it was more for him than for the other. He was shaking terribly, his breathing failing him as he realized that he was in a room filled with people who would easily and willingly kill him if given the chance.
A throat was cleared noisily. “How do we know you’re really who you say you are?”
Potter’s voice was shaking when he spoke. “Professor Lupin,” he said, and he had to swallow before he spoke again. “In third year, on the train to Hogwarts, we were in the same compartment, a Dementor came and gave me the Kiss, and you gave me chocolate.”
Noise resounded in the room once more in the form of gasps and teary exclamations of his name.
“Something else,” Lupin commanded.
Harry took another shaky breath and pulled away from Draco to look at Lupin in the eyes. “It was Greyback who bit you.”
Harry was abruptly pulled from Draco’s arms to Hermione’s and Ron’s, soon followed by Molly who was crying openly as she threw her arms around the three teenagers.
Draco pulled back from them and landed on his arse, their touch and proximity making his panic worse, and he desperately held on to the knowledge - Destination, Determination and Deliberation - go, Draco, now, now, now
Harry’s hand reached out to stop him.
That was all that Draco could take. His panic exploded out of his mouth into a fit of hysteria. “ARE YOU MAD, POTTER?! I was about to Apparate! I could have splinched you! I did not get you out of a nest of bloody fucking murderers just to have you splinched. Do you have any idea - fuck, Potter, let go of me -“
Harry just gripped on harder. He emerged from that pile of sniffling bodies, pushing them gently aside to pull him close and hug him.
Draco was torn between laughing and crying because Potter really was mad.
“They’ll kill you, Draco,” Harry was saying, arms wound tight around his shaking body.
“Draco Malfoy?! ” That was Weasley, definitely Weasley.
“He saved me,” Harry explained, the words coming out in a rush. “He took me out of that cell and into a cave, and he healed me -“
Draco was aware that he was hyperventilating, and he wondered, through gulps of breaths, how Harry had known that if he had been unconscious for the past two days. He gritted his teeth and tried to calm down, unable to stop himself from clutching at the cloak around Potter, hating himself for how he held it like it was his lifeline - like Potter was his lifeline.
“But Draco Malfoy -“
“Ron, please -“
“I haven’t saved anyone,” Draco said, cutting in, tears falling hotly down his cheeks. He kept his face hidden in the safety of Harry’s arms. He wheezed. “If you keep me here, they’ll find you and they’ll kill all of you -“
“He kept me safe for days,” Harry said, making his voice loud to overpower Draco’s. “He didn’t sleep. Didn’t eat. He just kept watch while he waited for me to properly wake up. When I finally managed to keep my eyes open for more than a minute, the first thing he asked me for was a safe place that he could Apparate me to.”
“Potter -“
Again, Harry cut him off. But this time, his voice was soft and pleading. “You heard him earlier. How worried he was for me.”
Silence met him then.
A silence that stretched for far too long and Draco wanted to go away, go back to that cave, Obliviate himself, forget everything -
“Draco, dear,” a voice said. Soft and lilting. A mother’s voice.
It made him yearn for his own.
“Mum…” Weasley again.
The voice tried once more. “Draco. Thank you for taking care of Harry. You’re safe now. They’ll not be harming you here.”
Draco was so tired. He was so, so tired.
“Draco.” It was Lupin this time, his voice as soft and kind as it had been during third year when he had been their professor. “Let us take a look at both of you. You’re both wounded.”
Draco shook his head. “Potter is,” he said, voice cracking from tears. He swallowed and tried again. “Four broken ribs. A broken lower arm and both shoulders dislocated. Whip lashes and Stinging Hexes on his back, a bit on his chest. Wrists and ankles raw from the chains they suspended him with, and, and some more, I can’t remember. I healed them but I’m not very good. I don’t know if he has internal bleeding, I - I don’t know how to check for that.”
Gasps resounded in the room. He recognized one as Granger’s.
Lupin’s voice was slightly teary when he spoke next. “Thank you, Draco. Thank you.”
Don’t thank me, Draco thought, the tears still slipping from his eyes. Those wouldn’t have happened if I had done something in the first place.
“Come now,” Molly said, her voice thick with tears. Draco was comforted with the thought that he wasn’t the only one with the lost composure. “Let’s right you boys back up and I’ll fix you some supper.”
“Mal… Draco,” Hermione corrected herself. Her voice mimicked Molly’s and Draco hated it, hated the pity and the forced kindness - hated how desperately he welcomed it. Kindness was kindness, even if forced. “Draco, come with me and Ron.”
Draco tensed and his hands tightened their hold on Potter’s clothes at the same time that Potter’s arms tightened around him.
“I’m not letting him go.” Harry’s voice was firm and level.
Draco’s body shuddered with relief.
“Ron, Hermione.” This was another male’s voice, deep and tired. But it was soft. All of their voices were soft. They were so different from the harsh, cold tones of the Death Eaters. So different. It was warm here. Potter’s arms were warm.
That voice continued on. “Give Molly a hand, please. Keep Kreacher away from the kitchen and don’t hold back on the gravy, yeah?”
Draco recognized the attempt at humour. It twisted his heart because that humour that was light, and it made him remember suddenly the dark humour of those murderers, laughing while reminiscing about how their victims screamed and begged for their lives.
He hadn’t realized he was trembling again until Harry murmured in his ears, “Ssh, it’s okay.”
It was Potter who needed comforting. It was Potter who needed to be coddled and told that it was okay, the big, bad Death Eaters weren’t going to get him now, weren’t going to hang him in chains again and whip him and kick him and laugh about it.
Get a grip, Draco, he reprimanded himself. Pull away now, he told himself, even as the thought of meeting everyone’s eyes sent a sharp pang of fear through him.
“Mate,” Weasley said from behind Harry. “See you later, yeah?”
“Harry,” Granger said tearfully.
“I’ll be alright, Hermione. Chin up.”
Draco could only imagine that Granger had nodded because the next thing he heard was the sound of footsteps on wood as they left the room.
The arms around him loosened. He forced his hands to do so as well.
“You’re safe now, Draco,” Lupin said softly once more.
I’m not, Draco thought. I’m not I’m not I’m not I’m not I’m not even as his heart firmly ached to believe that I am. I finally am.
-
There was no internal bleeding. Draco had managed to target every injury that needed targeting. Lupin looked impressed when he was finished with the diagnosis spells.
“No sharp pains, Harry?”
Sitting beside Draco on the couch, Harry shook his head. “Just a few aches here and there. My back hurts terribly.”
Draco stared unseeingly into the fire. He was fatigued enough that he was actually allowing himself to lean his head against Potter’s arm. Despite the constant chill in his hands and feet, the fire was pleasantly warm and reminded him that he hadn’t slept for more than two days.
He almost didn’t hear it when Lupin turned his question to him. “What about you, Draco? You sure you’re not wounded anywhere?”
Draco shook his head. “I’m fine.”
One edge of Lupin’s lips curled up into a rueful smile. “Would it be alright if I check anyway?”
He tensed at the thought of being at the receiving end of a wand. His nerves slowly crept back to him like spiders crawling on skin.
Lupin immediately raised his hands in front of him in a placating gesture. “Alright. No diagnosis spells. It’s fine.”
Draco nodded stiffly. “Thank you,” he breathed out.
Lupin nodded as well and pulled back, putting his wand in his pocket. He settled himself on one of the armchairs and looked at Arthur Weasley on the other one across from him.
A silent conversation passed between them.
Arthur leaned forward in his chair. “Boys,” he said, his eyes kind and pitying as he took in the image of the two boys, their dirty clothes and their dirty faces and the black circles under their eyes. He looked like he didn’t very much want to be doing this right now. “Is it too soon to ask what happened these past three days?”
Harry smiled weakly at him to tell him that it was okay.
Draco fought to keep himself awake.
“They wanted to get the headquarters of the Order out of me,” Harry was saying. “That’s why they kept me chained up. I don’t know why but they left after a while. I was unconscious, so I’m guessing that was when Draco came and took me away. The next time I woke up, I was in a cave and Draco was there, but I couldn’t stay awake for long. I woke up three or four times? Before I managed to talk. And then he brought me here.”
Draco tried not to be so disturbed at the thought of Harry witnessing his breakdowns and hysterics and instead focused on how Harry deliberately omitted his torture.
“If you’re looking for something more substantial,” Harry continued, smiling apologetically. “I got none. All I know is that while I was there - two, three hours maybe? - Voldemort wasn’t. I don’t even know where they took me.“
“The Manor -“ Draco interjected suddenly. His eyes felt heavy. The adrenaline that had kept him awake had subsided. So did the gripping fear. The fear was still there, ever present, but it had snuck away now, hiding deeper in his mind to wait and rest until a time where it could take centre stage again. He forced his eyes open. “They’re staying in the Manor.”
Arthur looked at him incredulously. “The Malfoy Manor?”
Draco nodded and felt another pang in his chest. His home. The history and royalty of the pure blood of his ancestors. They were all gone now. Tainted with dark magic.
“Draco.” It was Lupin again, and Draco tore his gaze away from the fire to look at the man. The eyes that looked back at him were sad. “Will you be alright?”
The concern in those eyes was what did him in. His mouth was moving before he could stop it. “They must know by now that Potter’s gone. That I took him. If they haven’t by now, my father can lie all he wants for my sake, but it’s only a matter of time before they find out. The Mark -“ A sharp intake of breath, and it took him a while to realize that it came from no one else but him. It still hurt him to be reminded of the ink snake slithering under his skin. “The Mark hasn’t burned for two days. He… The Dark Lord’s waiting. No matter what Father’s told him, ever since I failed with… Dumbledore…” He closed his eyes, fearing what he would see in their faces. “The Dark Lord doesn’t trust me very much, nor does he think very highly of me. So he’s waiting. Expecting that I’ll fuck up.”
His eyes were burning again and he blinked rapidly to hold the tears back. “I probably will,” he said. The paranoia and hysteria that were starting to come back to him were familiar now, like long-time friends that he shared toxic relationships with. He looked at Lupin desperately. “Obliviate me. Potter told me the address. They can’t know -“
A hand grabbed his. “They won’t,” Harry said, a fervent whisper from beside him.
Draco whipped his head to look at him and was instantly sucked into those green, green eyes and the memory: Those green eyes. Bright, bright green against the darkness. The determination in those eyes and the will that refused to break.
Lupin smiled in understanding. “I don’t know about you, but I think that the fact that Voldemort doesn’t trust you or think highly of you is a compliment,” he quipped.
Arthur laughed lightly. “Agreed.”
It was then that a sort of hope bloomed in Draco’s chest. The hope that he really was going to be safe here.
It was the dangerous kind of hope.
But he let it rest in his heart, wary as he was. He let it wash over him, let it allow his muscles to relax and his nerves to calm down, let it allow him to lean back against Potter’s warmth, and let it allow him to squeeze back the hand holding his.
As Potter started to narrate the details of his short-lived imprisonment, Draco allowed himself to finally, finally sleep.
fin
Author: cassisluna
Word Count: 4,233
Rating: PG-13
Summary:
You still have to save everyone, Potter. Wake up.
Save me, he wanted to say.
Salvation
Two days have passed.
Forty-eight hours ever since Draco turned his back on everything he knew and stood for. Or at least, everything he thought he knew - everything he should have stood for.
Because how could anyone stand for what the Dark Lord did? What the Death Eaters did? ...What he did?
Draco shuddered, the disgust for himself and what he had witnessed for the past few weeks coming over to him in overpowering waves. He had to wrap his arms around his abdomen to stop the shivers that was partly due to his nerves and partly due to the cold, considering that he had given up his cloak for an altruistic deed.
He let out a sharp, raspy laugh that hurt his ears as it did his throat and chest.
As if altruistic deeds can save him now. As if it can erase the dark, dark things that he had been forced to do. That he had done.
As if it can make up for all the things that Harry Potter went through.
He was shaking. From his lips to the tips of his fingers to his toes.
He was disgusted with himself. He wanted to embed his fingernails - the fingernails that he had bitten to the point where nail met skin in the past two days - on his arm, on the Dark Mark, and scratch, scratch until the Mark was gone, until the skin was gone and all that was left was bone, pure-white amidst the red of his blood and flesh but at least the ink would be gone - at least he would be clean again, if just a little bit.
He gazed at the limp figure in the shadows of the cave, the body covered by the darkness of the cloak that he had given up. The face was so pale... the lips turning purple. The remnants of the dried blood on his forehead and cheek were a contrast to the pale, white skin that the light of the moon shone on.
If it wasn't for the almost imperceptible rise and fall of the chest, he'd think that the body was dead, and so he followed that movement - that one and only movement that he saw in the still of the night, the still of his world - obsessively.
Keep breathing, Potter, he thought desperately. You still have to save everyone. Please. Pleasepleasepleasepleaseplease
He hadn't slept for two days. His paranoia kept his eyes open, which was well and good because he didn't want to sleep. Not when Potter still couldn't wake up.
Not when Death Eaters were searching for them to kill them both. Not when the Order was searching for their beloved Potter, ready to kill anyone that posed a danger to the boy - like him.
It made him feel sick to think that he was still afraid of dying after everything he did. After everything he didn't do. He deserved to die. But death was such a frightening thing... And that was also what the Dark Lord thought, wasn't it? He had the same thoughts as the madman who was going around Europe killing off half-bloods and Muggles.
He tightened his hold on himself, trying to keep his shaking at bay as his attention turned to the blood on Harry's face.
Please live.
-
It was hard replacing the bandages around Harry's chest with shaking hands. The boy was still so cold. But Draco could rest easier now, knowing that color was slowly coming back to those cheeks.
He had managed to heal most of the broken bones and the open wounds on Harry's back that were due to both Stinging Hexes and whip lashes. He fervently wished that there was no internal bleeding. He didn't know how to heal that.
After the bandages were replaced and secured, he buttoned the boy's dirty shirt closed and covered him with the cloak again.
He inhaled deeply.
Fifty hours.
Harry was sleeping too long.
He cast a Warming Spell over the sleeping body and debated on using a Cleaning Spell to get rid of the dried blood, but no, that would just waste energy.
He needed enough energy to Apparate Harry to safety once he woke up, and Draco knew that, with no sleep or food for two days, he didn't have much left. He was simply running on adrenaline now. And fear.
-
Sometimes he'd fall into a half-asleep state, but those were short-lived and left him even more tired because they gave him flashes of memories.
Harry hanging from chains. The skin on his wrist chafed raw by metal. His mouth bleeding. His chest heaving with painful and noisy breathing. His immobile form in the corner of his prison. His broken glasses. Those green eyes. Bright, bright green against the darkness. The determination in those eyes and the will that refused to break.
Draco would wake up from that half-state and he'd shake and sob and plead, Please. Wake up.
-
He and Harry were not friends, even if he had stopped hating him. And he knew now that they weren’t enemies.
After Dumbledore died, Draco blindly followed his father and Aunt Bellatrix. But he knew, he knew that this was all doomed to madness, they were all doomed to madness, and that his family had become something unsalvageable.
He had become something unsalvageable.
Saving Potter from that prison didn't change that.
You still have to save everyone, Potter. Wake up.
Save me, he wanted to say.
But he wasn't that foolish.
-
He needed Potter to wake up. He didn't know where Weasley and Granger was, where the Order was, or what place in this forsaken world could still be called safe.
The Carrows had Hogwarts. Yaxley had the Ministry. St. Mungo's had also been infiltrated. His home, the Manor, the one place that should have provided him with a sense of safety and belongingness now housed a madman.
He didn't know where the headquarters of the Order was. But he needed to get Potter there.
-
Fifty-two hours.
All that were left of the wounds on Potter's back were red marks. Draco ran his dirty fingers over each of them, relief coursing through him with each one he traced.
And he gazed, as envious as he was enthralled, at the white skin, clean and unblemished with ink.
Unlike him.
A deep, shuddering intake of breath reached his ears and he straightened, taking out his wand and pointing it behind him, hand shaking, heart hammering in his chest and the sound of blood rushing in his ears.
The moon shone on as if mocking him.
He realized that the sound came from him. He was crying.
"Mal..."
His head shot up at the sound. In a second, he had turned Potter over and almost cried at the sight of those green eyes open.
Unfocused but conscious.
"Potter," he was saying, his voice cracking due to misuse and the tears. He looked into Potter's eyes desperately. "Potter, listen to me. Tell me where I can Apparate you. Where it's safe."
Harry barked out a laugh that ended up sounding very much like a cough in the end. "You look like shite, Malfoy."
Draco was only mildly affronted. "You don't look very dashing yourself."
Another dry laugh. "I imagine not."
Then, all humour drained from his face and he looked at Draco seriously. "Can I trust you?" he murmured.
This time, it was Draco's turn to laugh: a painful, bordering on hysterical kind of laugh that was devoid of all humour except an ironic one. No, he thought. No, you can't.
"I'm afraid you don't have much of a choice right now, Potter, unless you fancy Apparating by yourself in that state."
Harry grinned tiredly. "You don't look like you're in a very able state either."
Draco returned his dry humour. "I'm not the one who was tortured by Death Eaters for two hours."
"Point." Harry looked up at him, staring at him levelly. "Have you ever been to the Blacks’ ancestral home?"
His mother’s family home?
Draco inhaled sharply. That was it then. Potter's trust. That location could very well lead to the Order's headquarters, or at least, the whereabouts of some of its members. That location could spell Harry's safety and Draco's death, or... vice versa.
He let out his breath slowly. "Once or twice." He curled his hands into fists to keep them from trembling. This was it. If he delivered Potter to the front steps of the Order, he could very well face death. But even if he didn’t, after betraying the Dark Lord, he was doomed to die anyway. He swallowed down the whimper that threatened to slip out of his throat and took a deep, shuddering breath.
"I'm going to put Glamour and Disillusionment Charms on us, and then I'm going to Side-Along you there right now. Can I Apparate directly inside?"
Harry shook his head. "It's unplottable."
Draco nodded. He figured.
He opened his mouth to speak again, but Potter’s hand clutching weakly at his sleeve stopped him.
“I changed my mind. Apparate directly inside 12 Grimmauld Place.”
Draco groaned. “You shouldn’t have told me that,” he muttered, before another bout of hysteria consumed him momentarily and he laughed shakily. He was going to have to Obliviate himself after this. Trust Potter to make this whole thing harder for him.
He resolved to ignore Potter’s quiet gaze, even as it made him uncomfortable. It was too studious, too emphatic, too soul-searching.
"Stand up," he instructed, moved the cloak aside and helped Potter use muscles that he hadn't used for two days. Potter was shaky and hissing in pain as he got to his feet and he leaned too heavily on Draco once he finally got his arse off the ground. Draco frowned. "Can you stand on your own?"
Potter tried to move away from him, but wobbled as soon as he shifted his weight from Draco's chest to his legs. Draco's arms catching him kept him upright.
He cursed, clearly unhappy with himself.
Draco, while keeping a firm hold on Harry’s arm, knelt to pick the cloak up from the ground. He threw it around Potter’s shoulders and fastened the clasp in front closed. Potter didn’t comment.
Draco grabbed hold of Potter's arms and wound them around his neck, ignoring the heat of Potter's breath on the cold skin of his ear. "Hold on tightly."
Harry laughed as Draco cast the Glamour and Disillusionment Charms on them both. "You're shaking. Are you sure you can do this?"
"Like you, I don't have much of a choice either," Draco muttered, before wrapping his arms around Potter's shoulders. He took a deep breath and remembered the rules for Apparition: Destination, Determination and Deliberation.
If Harry found their positions weird, then he didn't say anything.
The pop of Apparition was the only sound that disturbed the still of the cave.
-
They landed in the middle of the living room.
Draco managed to duck just in time to avoid a hex going for his head, clutching Potter’s head to his chest tightly. His sudden action had him crouching and Potter sitting flat on the floor. Something that sounded like it was made of glass exploded.
Potter was yelling against his clothes with his throaty, raspy voice, “Wait, wait, wait, it’s me, Harry!”
“Reveal yourself!” someone yelled at the same time Draco did, “Finite Incantatem!”
The Disillusionment Charm gave way, as well as Harry’s Glamour Charm. He kept his own Glamour intact. If he wanted to get out of this alive, if he wanted to live another day, at least just one more day, then he wasn’t about to show anyone else who he was.
All at once, voices exploded throughout the room.
“Harry-!”
“Harry!”
“Wait, ‘Mione!”
“Molly, no!
“QUIET!”
Someone’s Sonorus Charm effectively shut off all noise.
Draco kept Potter pressed against him, hugging him tightly, but it was more for him than for the other. He was shaking terribly, his breathing failing him as he realized that he was in a room filled with people who would easily and willingly kill him if given the chance.
A throat was cleared noisily. “How do we know you’re really who you say you are?”
Potter’s voice was shaking when he spoke. “Professor Lupin,” he said, and he had to swallow before he spoke again. “In third year, on the train to Hogwarts, we were in the same compartment, a Dementor came and gave me the Kiss, and you gave me chocolate.”
Noise resounded in the room once more in the form of gasps and teary exclamations of his name.
“Something else,” Lupin commanded.
Harry took another shaky breath and pulled away from Draco to look at Lupin in the eyes. “It was Greyback who bit you.”
Harry was abruptly pulled from Draco’s arms to Hermione’s and Ron’s, soon followed by Molly who was crying openly as she threw her arms around the three teenagers.
Draco pulled back from them and landed on his arse, their touch and proximity making his panic worse, and he desperately held on to the knowledge - Destination, Determination and Deliberation - go, Draco, now, now, now
Harry’s hand reached out to stop him.
That was all that Draco could take. His panic exploded out of his mouth into a fit of hysteria. “ARE YOU MAD, POTTER?! I was about to Apparate! I could have splinched you! I did not get you out of a nest of bloody fucking murderers just to have you splinched. Do you have any idea - fuck, Potter, let go of me -“
Harry just gripped on harder. He emerged from that pile of sniffling bodies, pushing them gently aside to pull him close and hug him.
Draco was torn between laughing and crying because Potter really was mad.
“They’ll kill you, Draco,” Harry was saying, arms wound tight around his shaking body.
“Draco Malfoy?! ” That was Weasley, definitely Weasley.
“He saved me,” Harry explained, the words coming out in a rush. “He took me out of that cell and into a cave, and he healed me -“
Draco was aware that he was hyperventilating, and he wondered, through gulps of breaths, how Harry had known that if he had been unconscious for the past two days. He gritted his teeth and tried to calm down, unable to stop himself from clutching at the cloak around Potter, hating himself for how he held it like it was his lifeline - like Potter was his lifeline.
“But Draco Malfoy -“
“Ron, please -“
“I haven’t saved anyone,” Draco said, cutting in, tears falling hotly down his cheeks. He kept his face hidden in the safety of Harry’s arms. He wheezed. “If you keep me here, they’ll find you and they’ll kill all of you -“
“He kept me safe for days,” Harry said, making his voice loud to overpower Draco’s. “He didn’t sleep. Didn’t eat. He just kept watch while he waited for me to properly wake up. When I finally managed to keep my eyes open for more than a minute, the first thing he asked me for was a safe place that he could Apparate me to.”
“Potter -“
Again, Harry cut him off. But this time, his voice was soft and pleading. “You heard him earlier. How worried he was for me.”
Silence met him then.
A silence that stretched for far too long and Draco wanted to go away, go back to that cave, Obliviate himself, forget everything -
“Draco, dear,” a voice said. Soft and lilting. A mother’s voice.
It made him yearn for his own.
“Mum…” Weasley again.
The voice tried once more. “Draco. Thank you for taking care of Harry. You’re safe now. They’ll not be harming you here.”
Draco was so tired. He was so, so tired.
“Draco.” It was Lupin this time, his voice as soft and kind as it had been during third year when he had been their professor. “Let us take a look at both of you. You’re both wounded.”
Draco shook his head. “Potter is,” he said, voice cracking from tears. He swallowed and tried again. “Four broken ribs. A broken lower arm and both shoulders dislocated. Whip lashes and Stinging Hexes on his back, a bit on his chest. Wrists and ankles raw from the chains they suspended him with, and, and some more, I can’t remember. I healed them but I’m not very good. I don’t know if he has internal bleeding, I - I don’t know how to check for that.”
Gasps resounded in the room. He recognized one as Granger’s.
Lupin’s voice was slightly teary when he spoke next. “Thank you, Draco. Thank you.”
Don’t thank me, Draco thought, the tears still slipping from his eyes. Those wouldn’t have happened if I had done something in the first place.
“Come now,” Molly said, her voice thick with tears. Draco was comforted with the thought that he wasn’t the only one with the lost composure. “Let’s right you boys back up and I’ll fix you some supper.”
“Mal… Draco,” Hermione corrected herself. Her voice mimicked Molly’s and Draco hated it, hated the pity and the forced kindness - hated how desperately he welcomed it. Kindness was kindness, even if forced. “Draco, come with me and Ron.”
Draco tensed and his hands tightened their hold on Potter’s clothes at the same time that Potter’s arms tightened around him.
“I’m not letting him go.” Harry’s voice was firm and level.
Draco’s body shuddered with relief.
“Ron, Hermione.” This was another male’s voice, deep and tired. But it was soft. All of their voices were soft. They were so different from the harsh, cold tones of the Death Eaters. So different. It was warm here. Potter’s arms were warm.
That voice continued on. “Give Molly a hand, please. Keep Kreacher away from the kitchen and don’t hold back on the gravy, yeah?”
Draco recognized the attempt at humour. It twisted his heart because that humour that was light, and it made him remember suddenly the dark humour of those murderers, laughing while reminiscing about how their victims screamed and begged for their lives.
He hadn’t realized he was trembling again until Harry murmured in his ears, “Ssh, it’s okay.”
It was Potter who needed comforting. It was Potter who needed to be coddled and told that it was okay, the big, bad Death Eaters weren’t going to get him now, weren’t going to hang him in chains again and whip him and kick him and laugh about it.
Get a grip, Draco, he reprimanded himself. Pull away now, he told himself, even as the thought of meeting everyone’s eyes sent a sharp pang of fear through him.
“Mate,” Weasley said from behind Harry. “See you later, yeah?”
“Harry,” Granger said tearfully.
“I’ll be alright, Hermione. Chin up.”
Draco could only imagine that Granger had nodded because the next thing he heard was the sound of footsteps on wood as they left the room.
The arms around him loosened. He forced his hands to do so as well.
“You’re safe now, Draco,” Lupin said softly once more.
I’m not, Draco thought. I’m not I’m not I’m not I’m not I’m not even as his heart firmly ached to believe that I am. I finally am.
-
There was no internal bleeding. Draco had managed to target every injury that needed targeting. Lupin looked impressed when he was finished with the diagnosis spells.
“No sharp pains, Harry?”
Sitting beside Draco on the couch, Harry shook his head. “Just a few aches here and there. My back hurts terribly.”
Draco stared unseeingly into the fire. He was fatigued enough that he was actually allowing himself to lean his head against Potter’s arm. Despite the constant chill in his hands and feet, the fire was pleasantly warm and reminded him that he hadn’t slept for more than two days.
He almost didn’t hear it when Lupin turned his question to him. “What about you, Draco? You sure you’re not wounded anywhere?”
Draco shook his head. “I’m fine.”
One edge of Lupin’s lips curled up into a rueful smile. “Would it be alright if I check anyway?”
He tensed at the thought of being at the receiving end of a wand. His nerves slowly crept back to him like spiders crawling on skin.
Lupin immediately raised his hands in front of him in a placating gesture. “Alright. No diagnosis spells. It’s fine.”
Draco nodded stiffly. “Thank you,” he breathed out.
Lupin nodded as well and pulled back, putting his wand in his pocket. He settled himself on one of the armchairs and looked at Arthur Weasley on the other one across from him.
A silent conversation passed between them.
Arthur leaned forward in his chair. “Boys,” he said, his eyes kind and pitying as he took in the image of the two boys, their dirty clothes and their dirty faces and the black circles under their eyes. He looked like he didn’t very much want to be doing this right now. “Is it too soon to ask what happened these past three days?”
Harry smiled weakly at him to tell him that it was okay.
Draco fought to keep himself awake.
“They wanted to get the headquarters of the Order out of me,” Harry was saying. “That’s why they kept me chained up. I don’t know why but they left after a while. I was unconscious, so I’m guessing that was when Draco came and took me away. The next time I woke up, I was in a cave and Draco was there, but I couldn’t stay awake for long. I woke up three or four times? Before I managed to talk. And then he brought me here.”
Draco tried not to be so disturbed at the thought of Harry witnessing his breakdowns and hysterics and instead focused on how Harry deliberately omitted his torture.
“If you’re looking for something more substantial,” Harry continued, smiling apologetically. “I got none. All I know is that while I was there - two, three hours maybe? - Voldemort wasn’t. I don’t even know where they took me.“
“The Manor -“ Draco interjected suddenly. His eyes felt heavy. The adrenaline that had kept him awake had subsided. So did the gripping fear. The fear was still there, ever present, but it had snuck away now, hiding deeper in his mind to wait and rest until a time where it could take centre stage again. He forced his eyes open. “They’re staying in the Manor.”
Arthur looked at him incredulously. “The Malfoy Manor?”
Draco nodded and felt another pang in his chest. His home. The history and royalty of the pure blood of his ancestors. They were all gone now. Tainted with dark magic.
“Draco.” It was Lupin again, and Draco tore his gaze away from the fire to look at the man. The eyes that looked back at him were sad. “Will you be alright?”
The concern in those eyes was what did him in. His mouth was moving before he could stop it. “They must know by now that Potter’s gone. That I took him. If they haven’t by now, my father can lie all he wants for my sake, but it’s only a matter of time before they find out. The Mark -“ A sharp intake of breath, and it took him a while to realize that it came from no one else but him. It still hurt him to be reminded of the ink snake slithering under his skin. “The Mark hasn’t burned for two days. He… The Dark Lord’s waiting. No matter what Father’s told him, ever since I failed with… Dumbledore…” He closed his eyes, fearing what he would see in their faces. “The Dark Lord doesn’t trust me very much, nor does he think very highly of me. So he’s waiting. Expecting that I’ll fuck up.”
His eyes were burning again and he blinked rapidly to hold the tears back. “I probably will,” he said. The paranoia and hysteria that were starting to come back to him were familiar now, like long-time friends that he shared toxic relationships with. He looked at Lupin desperately. “Obliviate me. Potter told me the address. They can’t know -“
A hand grabbed his. “They won’t,” Harry said, a fervent whisper from beside him.
Draco whipped his head to look at him and was instantly sucked into those green, green eyes and the memory: Those green eyes. Bright, bright green against the darkness. The determination in those eyes and the will that refused to break.
Lupin smiled in understanding. “I don’t know about you, but I think that the fact that Voldemort doesn’t trust you or think highly of you is a compliment,” he quipped.
Arthur laughed lightly. “Agreed.”
It was then that a sort of hope bloomed in Draco’s chest. The hope that he really was going to be safe here.
It was the dangerous kind of hope.
But he let it rest in his heart, wary as he was. He let it wash over him, let it allow his muscles to relax and his nerves to calm down, let it allow him to lean back against Potter’s warmth, and let it allow him to squeeze back the hand holding his.
As Potter started to narrate the details of his short-lived imprisonment, Draco allowed himself to finally, finally sleep.
fin