FIC: Things That Change, 25/26
Title: Things That Change [25/26]
Rating: NC17
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.
Summary: After Hogwarts, everything changes.
Author's Notes: Thank you so much to my beta, B, without which I wouldn't have had the drive to finish this.
[Part 1][Part 2][Part 3][Part 4][Part 5][Part 6][Part 7][Part 8][Part 9][Part 10]
[Part 11][Part 12][Part 13][Part 14][Part 15][Part 16][Part 17][Part 18][Part 19]
[Part 20][Part 21][Part 22][Part 23][Part 24][Part 25]
1.
Harry knows something isn’t right as soon as he steps in the door. He can smell blood, everywhere, filling the house as he hangs his cloak in the closet. The metallic tinge in the air suffocates him; he can taste it on his tongue.
Pyrrha had left the Ministry a few minutes before him. She wandered up to the Auror Department and tapped him on the shoulder. “Ready to go, Dad?” she asked between nodding to a few of the other Aurors who smiled at her.
“Give me a few minutes,” Harry said. “I want to finish this report.”
Now he wishes he’d Flooed home when she did, because if something has happened to her or James or Malfoy-
Harry runs up the stairs, seeing the light shining from his bedroom. “What happened?” he shouts, pushing the door wider as he steps through.
And stops.
Pyrrha rises from where she was bent over Malfoy. James sits on the bed next to him, holding Malfoy’s hand.
“Oh God, what now?” Harry whispers.
“I came home and- James said that Daddy had been sleeping all day on the floor and I saw him and he was on the floor and-” Pyrrha shakes her head, crying. “What’s wrong with him, Dad?” Her chest heaves and she continues to shake her head. She grabs Malfoy’s hand and clenches it tight in her own.
Harry pulls back the sheet covering Malfoy, his own heart pounding. He should have known Malfoy would do something stupid, he should have known. Malfoy was being too quiet, too nice these past few days. Malfoy knew damn well what he was doing.
His voice catches in his throat. “Is it- was…he- was it a miscarriage?” he asks.
“No,” Pyrrha mutters. She holds up a small bottle of green glass and places it in Harry’s hand. The bottle is unlabelled. Harry sniffs it, but the potion has been emptied, leaving only a faint scent of oil through the bloody air.
“What did you do to yourself, Draco?” Harry chokes. “What the bloody fuck did you do?” His eyes rake over the sheets, covered in blood around his middle, his robes, too, the dark fabric matted to his skin with dried blood. Harry pulls at them, as gently as he can, but he wants to rip them from Malfoy’s body, too. His hands tremble and Malfoy gasps.
But he’s not awake.
“Go- go help your sister make some supper,” he tells James. Pyrrha shakes her head and mouths, “No” but Harry insists. “Go make something for all of us, all right?”
“Dad, please-” Pyrrha begs. “Let me help. I can call a Healer. I- I know a girl from Hogwarts. She could come, she wouldn’t say a word to anyone, I swear, I-”
Harry shakes his head wordlessly. Pyrrha bites her lip, the tears still falling as she leads James out of the room.
Malfoy isn’t conscious and his face is on fire. Harry’s hand burns against his sweating skin when he presses a palm to Malfoy’s forehead. There is no sound in the room except harsh breathing, his own, he realizes as he rips the robes from Malfoy’s body. The fabric tears, the sharp noise making Malfoy jolt and shiver, but still he doesn’t wake.
“So you did it,” Harry whispers, seeing the dried blood darkest between Malfoy’s pale legs. “Was it for your father?” he hisses. “I didn’t fucking care whether you were like that or not,” Harry moans. “God, why did you do it?” He pushes his hands against Malfoy’s stomach, pressing hard, wanting to dig his nails in and claw the poison from Malfoy’s insides. He can hardly breathe through the constriction of his throat, the lead weight rising and falling and encompassing his whole belly. He wants to cry. He wants to scream. He wraps an arm under Malfoy’s shoulder and heaves him up, wanting to shake the life into him.
“God, why did you do it, Draco?” he whispers into Malfoy’s neck. He can taste the salt of sweat on his skin, the skin that heats his lips as he presses frantic kisses across Malfoy’s jaw, his cheeks, the sides of his mouth.
He’s afraid of hurting Malfoy and when he starts to lay Malfoy back down on the bed, Malfoy suddenly opens his eyes, eerily white and huge, and heaves, before falling forward as he heaves, vomiting up whatever was left in his stomach. Harry kneels transfixed for a moment, in shock, perhaps, before he grabs Malfoy’s shoulders again and pushes him upright, slapping him hard on the back, fearful Malfoy will choke on his vomit, or fall unconscious again.
He’s covered in Malfoy’s acrid vomit and dried blood and the bedroom stinks. Harry casts a scourgify, but it does little to help, especially when Malfoy sucks in a breath between dying heaves and shivers. His eyes roll back into his head as his body falls slack into Harry’s arms.
And Harry can see the fresh blood starting to form between his legs again.
“God, what did you do?” Harry whispers, frantically checking Malfoy. His hands shake as badly as Malfoy shivers. He feels around, his hands slick with warm blood. He can’t find a source. This is no miscarriage, Pyrrha is right, but he can’t find anything, not behind Malfoy’s limp cock, not behind his balls either. He doesn’t know what he’s doing except he knows that Malfoy has done something because-
there’s nothing there anymore.
Nothing that he himself doesn’t have. Nothing extra.
And no source of blood, until Harry feels a little deeper, his fingers pressing a little harder and he feels the slightest of scars starting to form, nearly closed and nearly invisible to the eyes, to the touch of his fingertips.
He wipes his hand on the sheets, pushing them back from Malfoy to pull Malfoy’s body closer to himself, onto his lap. Malfoy shivers, his body alternating between hot and cold flushes, his teeth rattling and his skin sweating. Harry squeezes his arms across Malfoy’s shoulders, trying to make the shaking stop.
“If you die,” he says, his words choking on his tongue. “If you die, I can’t- I-”
And then, the faintest of voices, almost like the wind, except there is no wind in here, there is nothing besides themselves, both trembling, both falling onto the bed, covered in vomit and blood and tears, too, Harry doesn’t know anymore except that he can hear Malfoy mutter, “I’m not dead.”
2.
Harry doesn’t understand how Malfoy hasn’t killed himself yet. This hasn’t been the first time he’s come home to find Malfoy lying in a pool of blood and he has a feeling it might not be the last. Malfoy doesn’t speak much to him, he knows. Maybe Hermione was right.
“Why didn’t you tell me you were going to take some potion?” he asks.
Malfoy cracks an eye open and his shoulders shift, the slightest of shrugs. “It was none of your business, Potter,” he mutters.
“It damn well is my business!” Harry snaps. Malfoy’s been like this nearly three weeks now, lying in bed, recovering. He refuses to see any Healers but Harry hasn’t said much about that because he has been recovering. He hasn’t bled much since that first day, he mostly holds down the soups Dobby brings him and he walks around the house some, even if his steps are made gingerly and pained.
Harry goes to the Ministry to work and Apparates back in the rain. His hair is damp, the raindrops slithering through his hair to his scalp and the house is warm when he steps into it. He’s glad to have Malfoy there, even if he does spend a lot of time in front of the telly with James. Sometimes, the two will be sitting together, James close enough to be curled into Malfoy’s side.
He’s glad to have Malfoy, whole and healthy- mostly. He misses reaching out to Malfoy and finding a hand to squeeze at night. Malfoy is cold and the most Harry will get is a grunt and a turn of shoulders. He doesn’t know what to do. He knows what blokes do to each other, hell, eighteen years and he and Malfoy have done more than just sucking each other off occasionally.
Somewhere he knows that Malfoy doesn’t want to do anymore of that.
It frustrates him. Harry tosses off in the shower every morning. He’ll wake up hard and hot from dreams where Malfoy spreads his legs and smiles, that little smirk he makes when he’s pleased with himself, and Harry groans as his hands slide down Malfoy’s hips, cupping his hard cock and his balls. Malfoy moans and whispers his name, begging Harry to go further-
and then he always wakes.
He starts to stare longer at the secretary witches and trolly girls in the office. He watches the way their arses move and their hips swish as they walk by his desk, always polite and smiling, “Hullo, Mr Potter”. He starts to stare at the mouths of Natalie Vinewall, who has blonde hair and red lips, and even that of Evan Sloane who works in filing. He’s young and tall and his mouth curves thin and knowing when Harry nods to him. He feels guilty when he thinks of Malfoy, of the last time anything remotely similar to this happened, and yet he can’t stop himself either.
An owl arrives in November, on a Sunday afternoon, one of the sort where a grey cloud hangs over the city and permeates into the suburbs, dim and dismal. It stands on top of the porch railing, blinking at Harry. Harry starts to untie the package from its leg when the owl flaps its wings, bites his thumb and flies off.
He thinks of Hedwig and sighs. “Bloody bird,” he mutters, sucking the blood from his finger.
The package is damp with rain as Harry starts to pull as the tight twine tied around it. He flips it over to untie the last knot when he stops, seeing two letters:
D. M
“Malfoy,” he says, stepping inside the door, “this is for you.”
Malfoy’s eyes rise to meet Harry’s, widening as he takes the package. “Someone else knows,” he whispers. He taps his wand on the package, but no hexes spark. He pulls the paper back slowly, corner by corner as Harry watches over his shoulder.
A note inside flutters to the ground. Malfoy reads it aloud, his voice uncertain: “’You might like to see this’,” he says.
“Is there a name?” Harry asks.
“Father,” Malfoy says slowly. He unrolls the object. Harry can hear his shallow breathing stop with a whistle as a large tapestry lies on the floor. The Most Noble and Ancient House of Black, it reads.
“That’s just like Sirius’,” Harry says. “Did your father sneak into Grimmauld Place- that- it was condemned years ago! I signed the papers to raze the place just after Viola was born.”
“Every Black has one,” Malfoy says, his voice hollow. His fingers trace the names, rising and falling with the stitches. “This is my mother’s.” And then he scrunches his brow, his hands paused over one branch of the family. Harry doesn’t recognize this section from Sirius’ tapestry. There are no scorchmarks on this, no black spaces where new canvas has been stitched over to cover names.
“God,” Malfoy mutters. He moves and Harry kneels down to see what he’s pointing at.
Harry shakes his head.
Malfoy gapes. “We’re bloody- we’re related!”
Harry shakes his head some more. “I didn’t know- I don’t know who my grandparents were- oh my god,” he exhales and leans back against the front of the couch.
“It’s bad blood,” Malfoy says. He turns to Harry, his lip curling up and his nostrils twitching. “That’s why he’s a bloody squib. I’m being punished for this, with you, I know it!”
“Shut up!” Harry snaps. “What are you talking about?”
“Who’s a squib?” Pyrrha asks.
Harry and Malfoy glance to each other, then back to Pyrrha.
“No one,” Harry says, right as Malfoy hisses, “James is.”
“What is that?” Pyrrha asks as she crouches down beside Harry. “Is this- Daddy’s family?”
“And Potter’s too, it seems,” Malfoy snaps. “God, this is-” He swallows and leaves the room as soon as Harry sees James lurking in the doorway, wanting to see what everyone is talking about.
Pyrrha traces the names, too, her long fingers with the pearly-tipped nails moving over the branches and names, her mouth whispering each name. Phineas Nigellus. Sirius Black. Ones foreign to Harry, others too familiar. “You’re hardly related,” she says softly. “That’s what- third cousins, I think? There’s ones on here that are uncle and niece marrying.”
“The craziest ones,” Harry mutters. “Like Lucius Malfoy.”
“It’s not bad blood,” Pyrrha says. “And James isn’t a squib. I know it.”
Harry’s heart flutters with hope. “You’ve seen him do magic?”
Pyrrha smiles. “No, but I just feel it. He’s no squib.”
Harry wants to believe her. When he sees her reach out her arms to hug her brother, for a moment he does.
3.
Malfoy hangs the tapestry by the bed. Harry’s stomach sinks when he sees it hanging in the bedroom, a reminder of what he’s not getting, a fear of what he may never have again with Malfoy.
“Why did you hang that here?” he grumbles.
Malfoy narrows his eyes. “You know bloody well why, Potter,” he says.
Evan Sloane starts to look even more approachable at the Ministry. Harry sits at his desk and wonder why Malfoy bothers to stay with him. They have nothing together anymore. The potion and now the tapestry- those were the breaking points. Malfoy could go to live with his father; they might be safe in the Manor together, they’d have money, they’d have privacy and Ministry protection.
But every time Harry sees the glimmer from Evan’s brown eyes, the wink sometimes too, his heart stops for a moment because he can’t go through with it. He can’t just tell Malfoy to leave and Malfoy won’t be bothered to leave some place where’s he’s comfortable.
Their bed is cold, but neither one of them are. Harry refuses to be finished with Malfoy.
No more owls come from Lucius Malfoy. No more tapestries are hung on bedroom walls. Harry lets Evan Sloane hang about his desk more at the Ministry. They talk about asinine things: the weather, Quidditch scores, this and that. Harry feels guilty, always, but each time he tries to press his lips to Malfoy’s shoulder, he’s pushed away.
“Snape floo-called today,” Malfoy says at dinner one evening.
Harry drops his fork. “What?”
“I said, Snape floo-called today,” Malfoy repeats, passing the salt to Pyrrha and avoiding Harry’s eyes.
“I heard you the first time!” Harry snaps. “Why?”
“We’re supposed to visit with him on Friday evening. Apparently one of the Potters has been ‘up to something’.”
“Did he say who? What’s Abraxas done now?” Harry groans.
“We’ll find out tomorrow, won’t we?” Malfoy says, lifting cold eyes to Harry’s gaze.
He doesn’t finish his dinner, not now, not Friday either. Harry leaves Pyrrha a twenty pound note. “In case you want to take James out for ice cream,” he says.
“It’s too cold, Dad,” she says, but Harry closes her hand around the bill and leaves it at that.
The school grounds don’t have the same grey atmosphere that lingers around London. Instead, the trees are bare and skeletal, but the air is crisp and cold. Harry ties his scarf tighter around his neck and reaches out for Malfoy’s hand.
Malfoy takes it and Harry warms inside.
“I don’t hate you, you know,” Malfoy murmurs through his own scarf. “But I-”
“We’re almost there,” Harry says thickly. He doesn’t want Malfoy to stop speaking, but he can’t hear whatever Malfoy has to say. Not yet. His chest hurts and his blood rushes in his ears louder than the whipping wind outside, but he just can’t.
As they walk through the school gateway and pass under the pointed vaulting, they both draw heavy hoods over their heads. The school is drafty and the corridors echo the soft moans of ghosts and clicking footsteps of students, but most are snug in their common rooms.
Snape never changes. It could be five, it could be ten or twenty years since school and he would look and act the same as ever. He looms in the doorway to his office, scowling and sour as Harry and Malfoy walk inside.
“You’re late,” he says.
“You didn’t tell us a time,” Harry responds.
“I told Draco seven. It’s half-past,” Snape says as he nods to a dusty grandfather clock.
Malfoy shrugs.
Snape turns and as the swirls of his black robes settle down, he sits and spreads out his hands. “So, Potter, tell me why I had to apprehend not one, but two of your children within days from each other?”
Harry blinks. To Snape’s right, Abraxas sits in a low-backed chair, hunched over. His lip curls and his cheeks are red. He stares at his feet and his hands which sit on his lap, the dim light of the dungeon catching the sheen of sweat on his palms.
To Snape’s left, Viola sits up high, her lips pressed tight. She glances to Malfoy first, then Harry and breathes in and out slowly, the only sound from either child.
“Both of them?” Harry asks. “I thought it was just-”
“Within two nights of each other I caught both sneaking into my storerooms, yet again, Potter. Do you not teach these children manners at home? To respect the property of professors? Clearly not. Just like their father.”
“What did they take, then, Professor?” Malfoy asks. Harry turns to Malfoy, but Malfoy shakes his head.
Snape opens a drawer in his desk and pulls a sheet of parchment out. He reads down his nose, his eyes moving back and forth across the page in tune with the ticking of the clock. “On Tuesday, your daughter was caught with a jar of pennyroyal leaves, a phial of goldenseal, two augury claws and a dried mandrake slice. On Thursday, your son was caught with Numidian beeswax, murtlap essence and Hellhound blood. On further discovery by a prefect in the dorms, it was discovered he had previously stolen liberal amounts of almond oil and three jars of star grass.” Snape sets the parchment down on his desk and folds his hands together, leaning forward. “Do you know how much those items are worth, Potter?”
Harry bites his lip from laughing at Snape. “I can imagine, Professor,” he says.
“Then I imagine you’ll take appropriate actions with your children to punish them or I will take the liberty of discussing suspensions with the Headmistress if these behaviors continue.”
“Is this what you insisted we come here to meet with you, for?” Harry snaps. “So that you can tell me how much you dislike my children and want them suspended, too, Snape? You’re no better than when I was a student! You’re just as bloody-”
“Shut your mouth, Potter!” Snape hisses. He whips his head to Draco, glaring for a moment, before adding, “I suggest you ask each of them what they were intending to do with my stores. I think you’ll discover some interesting things.” He puffs himself up like a bat, then leans back in his chair. Snape waves his hand. “Get out. All of you!”
Harry stands in the corridor. Viola and Abraxas stand in the shadows behind Malfoy. “What was Snape talking about?” he says slowly.
“Not here,” Abraxas insists.
“Can we go somewhere else?” Viola adds, glancing around. “There’s a corridor near the cloisters on the main floor. No one will be around. It’s nearly curfew anyway.”
The corridor is beautiful with the crescent moon’s glow shining down through the column pairs. It is frigidly cold here. Harry rubs his hands together and paces quickly while Viola and Abraxas sit on the ledge in their own heavy wool cloaks.
“So talk,” Malfoy drawls. “What did you need the beeswax and murtlap for?” he asks Abraxas.
Abraxas shrinks back, muttering something so low under his breath that even the stones wouldn’t hear it.
“What was that?” Harry asks.
“I said I saw a recipe!” he spits. “It- it’s none of your business. It doesn’t matter!”
“Yes, it does,” Harry says. “And you don’t cook with murtlap- it’s for wounds and abrasions and…” He lets himself trail off, thinking. “Oh my god,” he whispers. He stares at Abraxas, who turns away and sniffs. “Are you- was that for?”
“Was that for what?” Malfoy asks. “What are you talking about?”
“That jar,” Harry manages, “that’s in the bathroom, that jar we have- that’s pure murtlap essence and star grass salve that we used to…”
“Oh, God, stop!” Viola says loudly. “I don’t want to hear it! I don’t want to know about your sex life! That’s disgusting, Dad!”
“You’re…” Harry doesn’t say the word. It’s written all over the fierce red of Abraxas’ face, the way he won’t look at Harry, the way he swallows like he’s about to vomit. “It’s all right,” Harry says. He places a hand on Abraxas’ shoulder. “I don’t- we don’t think any less of you. You should have said something.”
“Said what?” Abraxas hisses. “Said that I’m as big a- a poof as Father?”
“Hey!” Malfoy cuts in. “I am not-”
“Shut up!” Harry says.
“Shut up all of you!” Viola says, louder. “I hear someone!”
They fall silent. In the distance Harry can hear the sounds of footsteps and the faintest meow. “Is Mrs Norris still alive?” he mouths to Malfoy.
“Who’s Mrs Norris?” Malfoy mouths right back at him.
A moment passes before Malfoy says, aloud, “And why were you stealing Snape’s stores, Viola?”
She turns to her brother for a moment and scowls. “Don’t you dare bloody say anything,” she warns.
“Why?” Harry presses.
Abraxas starts to smirk. “She says a ghost got her pregn-” Viola lunges over to Abraxas and grabs his collar, baring her teeth.
“Shut up, you poof!” she shouts. “I said don’t say a bloody word!”
“Shut it!” Malfoy snaps, pulling the two apart. He draws his wand in the air between the two of them. “Did you just say-”
“Oh, God,” Harry says. “Are you-”
“She is!” Abraxas answers.
“Shut up!” Viola cries. “It’s none of your business!”
It was with Viola, too, that Malfoy tried it. Harry remembers Hermione’s voice: Wormwood, pennyroyal and goldenseal…those are all natural abortifcants. “You are, aren’t you?” he whispers.
Viola doesn’t hang her head, instead she sits a little higher as her mouth twitches. “Yes, Dad,” she says slowly.
“No,” Malfoy hisses. “You can’t be!”
“She is!” Abraxas says. “Susan Fox heard her in the bathrooms at lunch last week. She goes there all the time- morning sickness, or whatever it is. Snape knows, too, he said it before you got here.”
“No,” Malfoy says, his voice even weaker.
“Who?” Harry asks. He shakes his head, not believing. And yet he can remember Viola in the summer, always locked in her room, the sounds of toilets flushing frequently. He remembers hearing noises from her room. “Tell me this much,” he says, “did you ever sneak someone into our house?”
“No, Dad,” she says.
Harry feels ill himself. He places a hand on the stone balustrade to steady himself, but the sinking feeling inside doesn’t dissipate.
4.
“It’s not possible,” he says. “That’s impossible.”
Malfoy lies on the bed. “You say that every night,” he says.
“Maybe it’s some sort of phantom pregnancy,” Harry offers.
Malfoy snickers.
“I’m serious!” Harry shouts. “She’s fourteen- aren’t you even the least bit concerned, Malfoy? She’s fourteen! What if she was raped and made up some story about this? How do we know any different?”
Malfoy sighs and rolls over. “I don’t know, Potter. I’m not happy, either.”
“About this?” Harry asks. “Or everything?” He grabs Malfoy’s shoulder and pulls him onto his back. “God, what’s wrong with us?” he mutters, letting go of Malfoy and flopping back onto the pillows.
Malfoy is quiet for a long moment. Harry lies still, listening to the sounds of Pyrrha moving around in her bathroom, flushing toilets and turning the bath on. The lights flicker in the hallway, then dim completely.
“Did you read Viola’s owl?” Malfoy whispers. “She sent one today. She said-”
“I know,” Harry says. “I saw. She’s keeping it. She’s fourteen.” He swallows the lump in his throat. “She’s too young, Draco.”
“I know that,” Malfoy says, his voice hollow.
“You can’t-” Harry sits up and pushes himself off the bed. He can’t sleep, not like this. He hasn’t slept in two weeks, not very well. All he can think about is how everything is all wrong. Viola is too young and Abraxas- he kicks himself inside for not realizing, for not understanding. James never speaks a word to Malfoy and Malfoy hates Pyrrha’s boyfriend and sometimes, sometimes Harry doesn’t blame Malfoy because Dennis is almost as old as they are and things like this aren’t supposed to happen.
“Stop pacing,” Malfoy says. “It’s irritating me.”
Harry stops. He leans against the wall, pushing his weight onto one foot and one hand spread out on the cool wall. The edge of the Black Family Tree tapestry brushes the side of his hand, tickling the skin.
“You can’t get pregnant from ghosts,” Harry says slowly. “And not one that hasn’t shown itself- ever- and not one from someone who died twenty five years ago! I think- I think maybe she’s just fascinated by Cedric- she can’t. He’s dead. He’s not a ghost. He would have haunted me first if he was!”
“Potter,” Malfoy says, “I had four children. With you.” Harry can hear Malfoy sigh heavily in the darkness, then he feels a hand brush against his hip.
Harry stiffens, his heart starting to race. He closes his eyes, relishing the feel of Malfoy’s hand snaking across his hip bone. It’s been so bloody long, he thinks. He starts to pant as Malfoy’s hand stays, stroking the skin through the thin fabric of his pajama trousers. He can feel his hands shake, anxious, afraid, as Malfoy pulls on him harder, turning him around.
Malfoy holds his hand out. “Just come to bed,” he says. “Please…Harry.”
“Will you let me-”
Malfoy hesitates on Harry’s question. Harry says, “Forget it, then.”
“Give me time,” Malfoy mutters. “I swear. Please, give me time.”
He wakes some time before dawn, the memory of sleep foggy. Did he? Harry rubs his eyes, picking the crusties from the sides of his eyes as he puts his glasses on. His side and chest are warm from where Malfoy had curled up beside him. He can hardly remember that, either, but his skin speaks for him and he smiles as Malfoy continues to sleep.
Hope.
It is something, at least. And enough for now.
He walks into the hallway, his stomach grumbling with the hope of food, and his mind pulsing with the anticipation of strong, strong tea. Pyrrha is awake, and James, too- he can hear them talking in the kitchen as Pyrrha opens and closes cupboards, cooking something that smells of muffins, or scones, baking in the oven and wafting through the house.
Harry starts to walk down the stairs, but stops himself when he sees the doorway to Viola’s room swung open. It hasn’t been touched since September, besides James or Pyrrha occasionally venturing inside. Harry bites his bottom lip and stills, before turning around and walking into it.
He can see a rare morning sun shining through the window, a pane of light across the carpet. Scattered are books and two folded towels wedged into the side of a dresser. Harry picks them up and places them under his arm. He steps over a pile of books toward the window.
Something moves. A soft flutter and a gust of air against his ear. Harry shivers and turns around, but nothing is there. He glances back to the window, but it is closed tight and the pine trees and bare elm branches unmoving outside.
“Weird,” he murmurs, stepping back across the floor towards the hallway. Out of the corner of his eye he notices one of the books on the floor now lies open, the pages staring up at him, the images dated, the photographs tinged with sepia and sadness.
He recognizes the book as he flips it over, the cover an old book of his from school. And on the page the book is open to is a photography with four students smiling tight and standing awkwardly as a woman walks around them, flashing a large fluffy quill about.
Triwizard Champions: Viktor Krum of Durmstrang, Fleur Delacour of Beauxbatons, Harry Potter of Hogwarts-
“And Cedric Diggory,” Harry whispers.
The air around him whispers yes.
Rating: NC17
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.
Summary: After Hogwarts, everything changes.
Author's Notes: Thank you so much to my beta, B, without which I wouldn't have had the drive to finish this.
[Part 1][Part 2][Part 3][Part 4][Part 5][Part 6][Part 7][Part 8][Part 9][Part 10]
[Part 11][Part 12][Part 13][Part 14][Part 15][Part 16][Part 17][Part 18][Part 19]
[Part 20][Part 21][Part 22][Part 23][Part 24][Part 25]
1.
Harry knows something isn’t right as soon as he steps in the door. He can smell blood, everywhere, filling the house as he hangs his cloak in the closet. The metallic tinge in the air suffocates him; he can taste it on his tongue.
Pyrrha had left the Ministry a few minutes before him. She wandered up to the Auror Department and tapped him on the shoulder. “Ready to go, Dad?” she asked between nodding to a few of the other Aurors who smiled at her.
“Give me a few minutes,” Harry said. “I want to finish this report.”
Now he wishes he’d Flooed home when she did, because if something has happened to her or James or Malfoy-
Harry runs up the stairs, seeing the light shining from his bedroom. “What happened?” he shouts, pushing the door wider as he steps through.
And stops.
Pyrrha rises from where she was bent over Malfoy. James sits on the bed next to him, holding Malfoy’s hand.
“Oh God, what now?” Harry whispers.
“I came home and- James said that Daddy had been sleeping all day on the floor and I saw him and he was on the floor and-” Pyrrha shakes her head, crying. “What’s wrong with him, Dad?” Her chest heaves and she continues to shake her head. She grabs Malfoy’s hand and clenches it tight in her own.
Harry pulls back the sheet covering Malfoy, his own heart pounding. He should have known Malfoy would do something stupid, he should have known. Malfoy was being too quiet, too nice these past few days. Malfoy knew damn well what he was doing.
His voice catches in his throat. “Is it- was…he- was it a miscarriage?” he asks.
“No,” Pyrrha mutters. She holds up a small bottle of green glass and places it in Harry’s hand. The bottle is unlabelled. Harry sniffs it, but the potion has been emptied, leaving only a faint scent of oil through the bloody air.
“What did you do to yourself, Draco?” Harry chokes. “What the bloody fuck did you do?” His eyes rake over the sheets, covered in blood around his middle, his robes, too, the dark fabric matted to his skin with dried blood. Harry pulls at them, as gently as he can, but he wants to rip them from Malfoy’s body, too. His hands tremble and Malfoy gasps.
But he’s not awake.
“Go- go help your sister make some supper,” he tells James. Pyrrha shakes her head and mouths, “No” but Harry insists. “Go make something for all of us, all right?”
“Dad, please-” Pyrrha begs. “Let me help. I can call a Healer. I- I know a girl from Hogwarts. She could come, she wouldn’t say a word to anyone, I swear, I-”
Harry shakes his head wordlessly. Pyrrha bites her lip, the tears still falling as she leads James out of the room.
Malfoy isn’t conscious and his face is on fire. Harry’s hand burns against his sweating skin when he presses a palm to Malfoy’s forehead. There is no sound in the room except harsh breathing, his own, he realizes as he rips the robes from Malfoy’s body. The fabric tears, the sharp noise making Malfoy jolt and shiver, but still he doesn’t wake.
“So you did it,” Harry whispers, seeing the dried blood darkest between Malfoy’s pale legs. “Was it for your father?” he hisses. “I didn’t fucking care whether you were like that or not,” Harry moans. “God, why did you do it?” He pushes his hands against Malfoy’s stomach, pressing hard, wanting to dig his nails in and claw the poison from Malfoy’s insides. He can hardly breathe through the constriction of his throat, the lead weight rising and falling and encompassing his whole belly. He wants to cry. He wants to scream. He wraps an arm under Malfoy’s shoulder and heaves him up, wanting to shake the life into him.
“God, why did you do it, Draco?” he whispers into Malfoy’s neck. He can taste the salt of sweat on his skin, the skin that heats his lips as he presses frantic kisses across Malfoy’s jaw, his cheeks, the sides of his mouth.
He’s afraid of hurting Malfoy and when he starts to lay Malfoy back down on the bed, Malfoy suddenly opens his eyes, eerily white and huge, and heaves, before falling forward as he heaves, vomiting up whatever was left in his stomach. Harry kneels transfixed for a moment, in shock, perhaps, before he grabs Malfoy’s shoulders again and pushes him upright, slapping him hard on the back, fearful Malfoy will choke on his vomit, or fall unconscious again.
He’s covered in Malfoy’s acrid vomit and dried blood and the bedroom stinks. Harry casts a scourgify, but it does little to help, especially when Malfoy sucks in a breath between dying heaves and shivers. His eyes roll back into his head as his body falls slack into Harry’s arms.
And Harry can see the fresh blood starting to form between his legs again.
“God, what did you do?” Harry whispers, frantically checking Malfoy. His hands shake as badly as Malfoy shivers. He feels around, his hands slick with warm blood. He can’t find a source. This is no miscarriage, Pyrrha is right, but he can’t find anything, not behind Malfoy’s limp cock, not behind his balls either. He doesn’t know what he’s doing except he knows that Malfoy has done something because-
there’s nothing there anymore.
Nothing that he himself doesn’t have. Nothing extra.
And no source of blood, until Harry feels a little deeper, his fingers pressing a little harder and he feels the slightest of scars starting to form, nearly closed and nearly invisible to the eyes, to the touch of his fingertips.
He wipes his hand on the sheets, pushing them back from Malfoy to pull Malfoy’s body closer to himself, onto his lap. Malfoy shivers, his body alternating between hot and cold flushes, his teeth rattling and his skin sweating. Harry squeezes his arms across Malfoy’s shoulders, trying to make the shaking stop.
“If you die,” he says, his words choking on his tongue. “If you die, I can’t- I-”
And then, the faintest of voices, almost like the wind, except there is no wind in here, there is nothing besides themselves, both trembling, both falling onto the bed, covered in vomit and blood and tears, too, Harry doesn’t know anymore except that he can hear Malfoy mutter, “I’m not dead.”
2.
Harry doesn’t understand how Malfoy hasn’t killed himself yet. This hasn’t been the first time he’s come home to find Malfoy lying in a pool of blood and he has a feeling it might not be the last. Malfoy doesn’t speak much to him, he knows. Maybe Hermione was right.
“Why didn’t you tell me you were going to take some potion?” he asks.
Malfoy cracks an eye open and his shoulders shift, the slightest of shrugs. “It was none of your business, Potter,” he mutters.
“It damn well is my business!” Harry snaps. Malfoy’s been like this nearly three weeks now, lying in bed, recovering. He refuses to see any Healers but Harry hasn’t said much about that because he has been recovering. He hasn’t bled much since that first day, he mostly holds down the soups Dobby brings him and he walks around the house some, even if his steps are made gingerly and pained.
Harry goes to the Ministry to work and Apparates back in the rain. His hair is damp, the raindrops slithering through his hair to his scalp and the house is warm when he steps into it. He’s glad to have Malfoy there, even if he does spend a lot of time in front of the telly with James. Sometimes, the two will be sitting together, James close enough to be curled into Malfoy’s side.
He’s glad to have Malfoy, whole and healthy- mostly. He misses reaching out to Malfoy and finding a hand to squeeze at night. Malfoy is cold and the most Harry will get is a grunt and a turn of shoulders. He doesn’t know what to do. He knows what blokes do to each other, hell, eighteen years and he and Malfoy have done more than just sucking each other off occasionally.
Somewhere he knows that Malfoy doesn’t want to do anymore of that.
It frustrates him. Harry tosses off in the shower every morning. He’ll wake up hard and hot from dreams where Malfoy spreads his legs and smiles, that little smirk he makes when he’s pleased with himself, and Harry groans as his hands slide down Malfoy’s hips, cupping his hard cock and his balls. Malfoy moans and whispers his name, begging Harry to go further-
and then he always wakes.
He starts to stare longer at the secretary witches and trolly girls in the office. He watches the way their arses move and their hips swish as they walk by his desk, always polite and smiling, “Hullo, Mr Potter”. He starts to stare at the mouths of Natalie Vinewall, who has blonde hair and red lips, and even that of Evan Sloane who works in filing. He’s young and tall and his mouth curves thin and knowing when Harry nods to him. He feels guilty when he thinks of Malfoy, of the last time anything remotely similar to this happened, and yet he can’t stop himself either.
An owl arrives in November, on a Sunday afternoon, one of the sort where a grey cloud hangs over the city and permeates into the suburbs, dim and dismal. It stands on top of the porch railing, blinking at Harry. Harry starts to untie the package from its leg when the owl flaps its wings, bites his thumb and flies off.
He thinks of Hedwig and sighs. “Bloody bird,” he mutters, sucking the blood from his finger.
The package is damp with rain as Harry starts to pull as the tight twine tied around it. He flips it over to untie the last knot when he stops, seeing two letters:
D. M
“Malfoy,” he says, stepping inside the door, “this is for you.”
Malfoy’s eyes rise to meet Harry’s, widening as he takes the package. “Someone else knows,” he whispers. He taps his wand on the package, but no hexes spark. He pulls the paper back slowly, corner by corner as Harry watches over his shoulder.
A note inside flutters to the ground. Malfoy reads it aloud, his voice uncertain: “’You might like to see this’,” he says.
“Is there a name?” Harry asks.
“Father,” Malfoy says slowly. He unrolls the object. Harry can hear his shallow breathing stop with a whistle as a large tapestry lies on the floor. The Most Noble and Ancient House of Black, it reads.
“That’s just like Sirius’,” Harry says. “Did your father sneak into Grimmauld Place- that- it was condemned years ago! I signed the papers to raze the place just after Viola was born.”
“Every Black has one,” Malfoy says, his voice hollow. His fingers trace the names, rising and falling with the stitches. “This is my mother’s.” And then he scrunches his brow, his hands paused over one branch of the family. Harry doesn’t recognize this section from Sirius’ tapestry. There are no scorchmarks on this, no black spaces where new canvas has been stitched over to cover names.
“God,” Malfoy mutters. He moves and Harry kneels down to see what he’s pointing at.
Harry shakes his head.
Malfoy gapes. “We’re bloody- we’re related!”
Harry shakes his head some more. “I didn’t know- I don’t know who my grandparents were- oh my god,” he exhales and leans back against the front of the couch.
“It’s bad blood,” Malfoy says. He turns to Harry, his lip curling up and his nostrils twitching. “That’s why he’s a bloody squib. I’m being punished for this, with you, I know it!”
“Shut up!” Harry snaps. “What are you talking about?”
“Who’s a squib?” Pyrrha asks.
Harry and Malfoy glance to each other, then back to Pyrrha.
“No one,” Harry says, right as Malfoy hisses, “James is.”
“What is that?” Pyrrha asks as she crouches down beside Harry. “Is this- Daddy’s family?”
“And Potter’s too, it seems,” Malfoy snaps. “God, this is-” He swallows and leaves the room as soon as Harry sees James lurking in the doorway, wanting to see what everyone is talking about.
Pyrrha traces the names, too, her long fingers with the pearly-tipped nails moving over the branches and names, her mouth whispering each name. Phineas Nigellus. Sirius Black. Ones foreign to Harry, others too familiar. “You’re hardly related,” she says softly. “That’s what- third cousins, I think? There’s ones on here that are uncle and niece marrying.”
“The craziest ones,” Harry mutters. “Like Lucius Malfoy.”
“It’s not bad blood,” Pyrrha says. “And James isn’t a squib. I know it.”
Harry’s heart flutters with hope. “You’ve seen him do magic?”
Pyrrha smiles. “No, but I just feel it. He’s no squib.”
Harry wants to believe her. When he sees her reach out her arms to hug her brother, for a moment he does.
3.
Malfoy hangs the tapestry by the bed. Harry’s stomach sinks when he sees it hanging in the bedroom, a reminder of what he’s not getting, a fear of what he may never have again with Malfoy.
“Why did you hang that here?” he grumbles.
Malfoy narrows his eyes. “You know bloody well why, Potter,” he says.
Evan Sloane starts to look even more approachable at the Ministry. Harry sits at his desk and wonder why Malfoy bothers to stay with him. They have nothing together anymore. The potion and now the tapestry- those were the breaking points. Malfoy could go to live with his father; they might be safe in the Manor together, they’d have money, they’d have privacy and Ministry protection.
But every time Harry sees the glimmer from Evan’s brown eyes, the wink sometimes too, his heart stops for a moment because he can’t go through with it. He can’t just tell Malfoy to leave and Malfoy won’t be bothered to leave some place where’s he’s comfortable.
Their bed is cold, but neither one of them are. Harry refuses to be finished with Malfoy.
No more owls come from Lucius Malfoy. No more tapestries are hung on bedroom walls. Harry lets Evan Sloane hang about his desk more at the Ministry. They talk about asinine things: the weather, Quidditch scores, this and that. Harry feels guilty, always, but each time he tries to press his lips to Malfoy’s shoulder, he’s pushed away.
“Snape floo-called today,” Malfoy says at dinner one evening.
Harry drops his fork. “What?”
“I said, Snape floo-called today,” Malfoy repeats, passing the salt to Pyrrha and avoiding Harry’s eyes.
“I heard you the first time!” Harry snaps. “Why?”
“We’re supposed to visit with him on Friday evening. Apparently one of the Potters has been ‘up to something’.”
“Did he say who? What’s Abraxas done now?” Harry groans.
“We’ll find out tomorrow, won’t we?” Malfoy says, lifting cold eyes to Harry’s gaze.
He doesn’t finish his dinner, not now, not Friday either. Harry leaves Pyrrha a twenty pound note. “In case you want to take James out for ice cream,” he says.
“It’s too cold, Dad,” she says, but Harry closes her hand around the bill and leaves it at that.
The school grounds don’t have the same grey atmosphere that lingers around London. Instead, the trees are bare and skeletal, but the air is crisp and cold. Harry ties his scarf tighter around his neck and reaches out for Malfoy’s hand.
Malfoy takes it and Harry warms inside.
“I don’t hate you, you know,” Malfoy murmurs through his own scarf. “But I-”
“We’re almost there,” Harry says thickly. He doesn’t want Malfoy to stop speaking, but he can’t hear whatever Malfoy has to say. Not yet. His chest hurts and his blood rushes in his ears louder than the whipping wind outside, but he just can’t.
As they walk through the school gateway and pass under the pointed vaulting, they both draw heavy hoods over their heads. The school is drafty and the corridors echo the soft moans of ghosts and clicking footsteps of students, but most are snug in their common rooms.
Snape never changes. It could be five, it could be ten or twenty years since school and he would look and act the same as ever. He looms in the doorway to his office, scowling and sour as Harry and Malfoy walk inside.
“You’re late,” he says.
“You didn’t tell us a time,” Harry responds.
“I told Draco seven. It’s half-past,” Snape says as he nods to a dusty grandfather clock.
Malfoy shrugs.
Snape turns and as the swirls of his black robes settle down, he sits and spreads out his hands. “So, Potter, tell me why I had to apprehend not one, but two of your children within days from each other?”
Harry blinks. To Snape’s right, Abraxas sits in a low-backed chair, hunched over. His lip curls and his cheeks are red. He stares at his feet and his hands which sit on his lap, the dim light of the dungeon catching the sheen of sweat on his palms.
To Snape’s left, Viola sits up high, her lips pressed tight. She glances to Malfoy first, then Harry and breathes in and out slowly, the only sound from either child.
“Both of them?” Harry asks. “I thought it was just-”
“Within two nights of each other I caught both sneaking into my storerooms, yet again, Potter. Do you not teach these children manners at home? To respect the property of professors? Clearly not. Just like their father.”
“What did they take, then, Professor?” Malfoy asks. Harry turns to Malfoy, but Malfoy shakes his head.
Snape opens a drawer in his desk and pulls a sheet of parchment out. He reads down his nose, his eyes moving back and forth across the page in tune with the ticking of the clock. “On Tuesday, your daughter was caught with a jar of pennyroyal leaves, a phial of goldenseal, two augury claws and a dried mandrake slice. On Thursday, your son was caught with Numidian beeswax, murtlap essence and Hellhound blood. On further discovery by a prefect in the dorms, it was discovered he had previously stolen liberal amounts of almond oil and three jars of star grass.” Snape sets the parchment down on his desk and folds his hands together, leaning forward. “Do you know how much those items are worth, Potter?”
Harry bites his lip from laughing at Snape. “I can imagine, Professor,” he says.
“Then I imagine you’ll take appropriate actions with your children to punish them or I will take the liberty of discussing suspensions with the Headmistress if these behaviors continue.”
“Is this what you insisted we come here to meet with you, for?” Harry snaps. “So that you can tell me how much you dislike my children and want them suspended, too, Snape? You’re no better than when I was a student! You’re just as bloody-”
“Shut your mouth, Potter!” Snape hisses. He whips his head to Draco, glaring for a moment, before adding, “I suggest you ask each of them what they were intending to do with my stores. I think you’ll discover some interesting things.” He puffs himself up like a bat, then leans back in his chair. Snape waves his hand. “Get out. All of you!”
Harry stands in the corridor. Viola and Abraxas stand in the shadows behind Malfoy. “What was Snape talking about?” he says slowly.
“Not here,” Abraxas insists.
“Can we go somewhere else?” Viola adds, glancing around. “There’s a corridor near the cloisters on the main floor. No one will be around. It’s nearly curfew anyway.”
The corridor is beautiful with the crescent moon’s glow shining down through the column pairs. It is frigidly cold here. Harry rubs his hands together and paces quickly while Viola and Abraxas sit on the ledge in their own heavy wool cloaks.
“So talk,” Malfoy drawls. “What did you need the beeswax and murtlap for?” he asks Abraxas.
Abraxas shrinks back, muttering something so low under his breath that even the stones wouldn’t hear it.
“What was that?” Harry asks.
“I said I saw a recipe!” he spits. “It- it’s none of your business. It doesn’t matter!”
“Yes, it does,” Harry says. “And you don’t cook with murtlap- it’s for wounds and abrasions and…” He lets himself trail off, thinking. “Oh my god,” he whispers. He stares at Abraxas, who turns away and sniffs. “Are you- was that for?”
“Was that for what?” Malfoy asks. “What are you talking about?”
“That jar,” Harry manages, “that’s in the bathroom, that jar we have- that’s pure murtlap essence and star grass salve that we used to…”
“Oh, God, stop!” Viola says loudly. “I don’t want to hear it! I don’t want to know about your sex life! That’s disgusting, Dad!”
“You’re…” Harry doesn’t say the word. It’s written all over the fierce red of Abraxas’ face, the way he won’t look at Harry, the way he swallows like he’s about to vomit. “It’s all right,” Harry says. He places a hand on Abraxas’ shoulder. “I don’t- we don’t think any less of you. You should have said something.”
“Said what?” Abraxas hisses. “Said that I’m as big a- a poof as Father?”
“Hey!” Malfoy cuts in. “I am not-”
“Shut up!” Harry says.
“Shut up all of you!” Viola says, louder. “I hear someone!”
They fall silent. In the distance Harry can hear the sounds of footsteps and the faintest meow. “Is Mrs Norris still alive?” he mouths to Malfoy.
“Who’s Mrs Norris?” Malfoy mouths right back at him.
A moment passes before Malfoy says, aloud, “And why were you stealing Snape’s stores, Viola?”
She turns to her brother for a moment and scowls. “Don’t you dare bloody say anything,” she warns.
“Why?” Harry presses.
Abraxas starts to smirk. “She says a ghost got her pregn-” Viola lunges over to Abraxas and grabs his collar, baring her teeth.
“Shut up, you poof!” she shouts. “I said don’t say a bloody word!”
“Shut it!” Malfoy snaps, pulling the two apart. He draws his wand in the air between the two of them. “Did you just say-”
“Oh, God,” Harry says. “Are you-”
“She is!” Abraxas answers.
“Shut up!” Viola cries. “It’s none of your business!”
It was with Viola, too, that Malfoy tried it. Harry remembers Hermione’s voice: Wormwood, pennyroyal and goldenseal…those are all natural abortifcants. “You are, aren’t you?” he whispers.
Viola doesn’t hang her head, instead she sits a little higher as her mouth twitches. “Yes, Dad,” she says slowly.
“No,” Malfoy hisses. “You can’t be!”
“She is!” Abraxas says. “Susan Fox heard her in the bathrooms at lunch last week. She goes there all the time- morning sickness, or whatever it is. Snape knows, too, he said it before you got here.”
“No,” Malfoy says, his voice even weaker.
“Who?” Harry asks. He shakes his head, not believing. And yet he can remember Viola in the summer, always locked in her room, the sounds of toilets flushing frequently. He remembers hearing noises from her room. “Tell me this much,” he says, “did you ever sneak someone into our house?”
“No, Dad,” she says.
Harry feels ill himself. He places a hand on the stone balustrade to steady himself, but the sinking feeling inside doesn’t dissipate.
4.
“It’s not possible,” he says. “That’s impossible.”
Malfoy lies on the bed. “You say that every night,” he says.
“Maybe it’s some sort of phantom pregnancy,” Harry offers.
Malfoy snickers.
“I’m serious!” Harry shouts. “She’s fourteen- aren’t you even the least bit concerned, Malfoy? She’s fourteen! What if she was raped and made up some story about this? How do we know any different?”
Malfoy sighs and rolls over. “I don’t know, Potter. I’m not happy, either.”
“About this?” Harry asks. “Or everything?” He grabs Malfoy’s shoulder and pulls him onto his back. “God, what’s wrong with us?” he mutters, letting go of Malfoy and flopping back onto the pillows.
Malfoy is quiet for a long moment. Harry lies still, listening to the sounds of Pyrrha moving around in her bathroom, flushing toilets and turning the bath on. The lights flicker in the hallway, then dim completely.
“Did you read Viola’s owl?” Malfoy whispers. “She sent one today. She said-”
“I know,” Harry says. “I saw. She’s keeping it. She’s fourteen.” He swallows the lump in his throat. “She’s too young, Draco.”
“I know that,” Malfoy says, his voice hollow.
“You can’t-” Harry sits up and pushes himself off the bed. He can’t sleep, not like this. He hasn’t slept in two weeks, not very well. All he can think about is how everything is all wrong. Viola is too young and Abraxas- he kicks himself inside for not realizing, for not understanding. James never speaks a word to Malfoy and Malfoy hates Pyrrha’s boyfriend and sometimes, sometimes Harry doesn’t blame Malfoy because Dennis is almost as old as they are and things like this aren’t supposed to happen.
“Stop pacing,” Malfoy says. “It’s irritating me.”
Harry stops. He leans against the wall, pushing his weight onto one foot and one hand spread out on the cool wall. The edge of the Black Family Tree tapestry brushes the side of his hand, tickling the skin.
“You can’t get pregnant from ghosts,” Harry says slowly. “And not one that hasn’t shown itself- ever- and not one from someone who died twenty five years ago! I think- I think maybe she’s just fascinated by Cedric- she can’t. He’s dead. He’s not a ghost. He would have haunted me first if he was!”
“Potter,” Malfoy says, “I had four children. With you.” Harry can hear Malfoy sigh heavily in the darkness, then he feels a hand brush against his hip.
Harry stiffens, his heart starting to race. He closes his eyes, relishing the feel of Malfoy’s hand snaking across his hip bone. It’s been so bloody long, he thinks. He starts to pant as Malfoy’s hand stays, stroking the skin through the thin fabric of his pajama trousers. He can feel his hands shake, anxious, afraid, as Malfoy pulls on him harder, turning him around.
Malfoy holds his hand out. “Just come to bed,” he says. “Please…Harry.”
“Will you let me-”
Malfoy hesitates on Harry’s question. Harry says, “Forget it, then.”
“Give me time,” Malfoy mutters. “I swear. Please, give me time.”
He wakes some time before dawn, the memory of sleep foggy. Did he? Harry rubs his eyes, picking the crusties from the sides of his eyes as he puts his glasses on. His side and chest are warm from where Malfoy had curled up beside him. He can hardly remember that, either, but his skin speaks for him and he smiles as Malfoy continues to sleep.
Hope.
It is something, at least. And enough for now.
He walks into the hallway, his stomach grumbling with the hope of food, and his mind pulsing with the anticipation of strong, strong tea. Pyrrha is awake, and James, too- he can hear them talking in the kitchen as Pyrrha opens and closes cupboards, cooking something that smells of muffins, or scones, baking in the oven and wafting through the house.
Harry starts to walk down the stairs, but stops himself when he sees the doorway to Viola’s room swung open. It hasn’t been touched since September, besides James or Pyrrha occasionally venturing inside. Harry bites his bottom lip and stills, before turning around and walking into it.
He can see a rare morning sun shining through the window, a pane of light across the carpet. Scattered are books and two folded towels wedged into the side of a dresser. Harry picks them up and places them under his arm. He steps over a pile of books toward the window.
Something moves. A soft flutter and a gust of air against his ear. Harry shivers and turns around, but nothing is there. He glances back to the window, but it is closed tight and the pine trees and bare elm branches unmoving outside.
“Weird,” he murmurs, stepping back across the floor towards the hallway. Out of the corner of his eye he notices one of the books on the floor now lies open, the pages staring up at him, the images dated, the photographs tinged with sepia and sadness.
He recognizes the book as he flips it over, the cover an old book of his from school. And on the page the book is open to is a photography with four students smiling tight and standing awkwardly as a woman walks around them, flashing a large fluffy quill about.
Triwizard Champions: Viktor Krum of Durmstrang, Fleur Delacour of Beauxbatons, Harry Potter of Hogwarts-
“And Cedric Diggory,” Harry whispers.
The air around him whispers yes.