Title: The Most Dangerous Thing
Fandom: The Dresden Files
Pairing: Harry Dresden/John Marcone (with background Karrin Murphy/Anastasia Lucio, Charity Carpenter/Michael Carpenter)
Categories: Drama, Action/Adventure
Length: Long (27,690 words)
Warnings: References to kidnapping, torture, brainwashing. Major spoilers through Turn Coat
Author on LJ:
gehayiAuthor Website:
Gehayi Summary:
Falling in lust. Falling in love. Becoming aware of both, and deciding to come out to family and friends. Mix in a case involving supernatural politics, warlocks, conspiracies, faeries, Knights, gods and mortal enemies, and it's a typical day for Harry Dresden. Post-Turn Coat.
Written for the prompt: People have been kidding Harry Dresden about being gay for a while. Now Harry's come to terms with his bisexuality and fallen for a man, and while some of his family and friends can deal with this, others are having a plethora of problems--and causing a number of them as well.
Review:
Burned out after the events of Turn Coat, Harry starts visiting Demonreach regularly for some down-time. When John Marcone goes to the island to confront the place he'd been tortured and runs into Harry. They start meeting at the island, first by happenstance, then later on purpose. Harry grapples with his bisexuality and repressed attraction to men, as well as his fears about his friends reactions to his growing relationship with a mobster. Talking with some of his friends leads not just to realizations about his relationship with John, but also an epiphany about a conspiracy against them.
Written for the 2009
lgbtfest, this story explores what readers of the series may have noticed: Harry's appreciation for both sexes (and his seeming obliviousness about it). I especially enjoy the first part of the story, where Harry is dealing with the fall-out of past events and he and John start dating without realizing it. The villain of the story took me by complete surprise, and I wasn't thrilled with that part of the story, but the resolution is surprising and satisfying, though disturbing. The action is perfectly in-line with canon, and feels like it could have come right from the pages of Jim Butcher.
I'd just about figured out that I could be physically attracted to men. I hadn't thought very deeply about how much I enjoyed being around John. That he made me happy.
Shit.
It's a low blow to discover, while you're still more or less convinced that someone is just a friend who might, with luck, become a friend with benefits, that you've gone and fallen in love with the guy.
I don't do love well. I had no desire to have hideous bad luck attack John as it had Elaine, Susan and Anastasia.
It wasn't as if I couldn't give him up. Okay, yeah, I liked him, but I'd lived like a hermit before. Hell's bells, I had more dry spells than the Sahara Desert.
So why was the idea making me sick to my stomach?
The Most Dangerous Thing (AO3),
(LJ pt.1,
pt.2,
pt.3,
pt.4)