Chapter Twenty-Two of 'The Long Defeat'- Lo, the Conquering Heroine
Chapter Twenty-One.
Title: The Long Defeat (21/?)
Disclaimer: J. K. Rowling and associates own these characters. I am writing this story for fun and not profit.
Pairings: Harry/Draco, Lucius/Narcissa, mentions of Ron/Hermione
Rating: R
Warnings: Some violence, some angst, ignores the epilogue.
Summary: Harry thought that becoming a slave to the goblins was about the worst thing that could possibly happen, except the sinking of the wizarding economy that the goblins had threatened if he didn’t. Then Lucius Malfoy showed up and offered to buy him instead, and maybe that was the worst thing. Or maybe not-at least, not if the Malfoys are sincere in their efforts to help him fool the goblins.
Author’s Notes: This is being written as a thank-you fic for
helenadax, who’s given me several virtual gifts and a lot of reviews over the years. She left this prompt of Harry being enslaved by the goblins and the Malfoys stepping in to help for the Draco Tops Harry fest a few years back, but although I intended to claim it, I didn’t get around to doing so before time ran out to submit fics for the fest. She asked for a happy ending and focus more on the con side than the angst side of the story. It does eventually get there, although with some angst at first. This story will be updated every Saturday evening.
The title is a phrase from The Lord of the Rings: “And together through the ages of the world we have fought the long defeat.”
Chapter One.
Thank you again for all the reviews!
Chapter Twenty-Two--Lo, The Conquering Heroine
“One more time.”
Harry nodded and closed his eyes. The small pile of stones in front of him hadn’t yet crumbled or turned to dust. He needed to make them do that if this plan was going to succeed. He took one deep breath, then another, and opened his eyes.
He thought of the goblins, their smug faces and the way they’d chattered to each other when they were at the Manor and Harry was playing the obedient slave as if he couldn’t hear them. As if he was nothing more than a statue that they might prop in the corner or have lick their shoes, if that was what they wanted, and expect to obey their every command. He thought of it, and felt the heat leak through his blood and curve up his spine and lift his lips in a snarl of hatred.
Draco sounded as though he had backed away. Harry couldn’t look at him, though, too involved in the sight of that small pile of stones and the goblin faces that his imagination had superimposed over them. He flung out a hand towards them, and imagined the goblin faces laughing at him and more voices requesting whether Lucius and Draco might share their slave.
“Yagh!” he yelled, and the magic broke from him and aimed at the pile of stones in the middle of the marked circle on the floor the way the sound broke from his mouth.
The stones smoked and twisted around each other, and then melted. A pile of slag lay where they had been. Harry blinked and massaged his hand. His fingers felt blistered, although he couldn’t actually see any marks on the tips, where the magic felt as if it had come out.
“Very impressive,” Draco whispered. He sounded shaken.
Harry looked at him and smiled a little. “That’s the first time I’ve done it without touching something, yes,” he said. “That means we’re ready to interact some more with those distance rituals, don’t you think?”
Draco still nodded, looking more than a little dazed. Then it was a brisk headshake and a return to the present before Harry could ask if he was all right about seeing Harry wield wandless magic from a distance. “Yes, quite. In the meantime--”
“In the meantime, I don’t think this partnership is going to work if you’re afraid of me,” Harry interrupted him, and briskly walked forwards.
Draco arched his neck and watched him come. He looked wary, concerned. Harry stopped in front of him and lifted his hands to frame Draco’s face, although he was careful not to actually touch him.
“Hey,” he whispered. “It’s still me. I’m still the one who only knelt at your feet because he had to. I’m still the one you can trust. It’s all right.”
Draco nodded, then nodded again as though trying to convince himself. Harry restrained the growl he wanted to give. Draco had probably never seen magic done like that without a wand. Or maybe it reminded him of something during the war that he would rather forget. The least Harry could do was be patient with someone who had given so much of himself and his time to training Harry.
“Yes,” Draco said, and then said it more strongly, “Yes,” and stepped into Harry’s waiting arms. They stood like that for a moment, with Draco’s breathing slowly falling into a normal pattern, making Harry aware for the first time of how fast it had been. He rubbed up and down Draco’s back, and murmured things that had no words. Draco leaned into him and said the same mindless kinds of words into his shoulder.
“I really need you,” Draco said, as if confessing a shameful secret. “And sometimes it appalls me how much.”
Harry let that go. He could understand the sentiment behind it, sometimes, when he really sat down and thought about what it meant that he was sharing his life with Draco, someone he couldn’t even have looked at a few years ago. “We’ll get past it,” he said instead, and let his head rest on Draco’s shoulder in turn. “The fear that we feel and that the goblins encourage us to feel.” He lifted his head to grin at Draco. “And maybe this means that you ought to tell your father to remove the gold from his vaults. We’re probably near the verge of a meltdown.”
*
Narcissa paused before she knocked. Most of the time, she wouldn’t have interrupted someone who seemed to need silence for his composition as much as Harry did, but on the other hand, he had been struggling alone for hours now.
And she thought she might have the solution to a problem that shouldn’t have become as complicated and knotty as it had. If he would listen, at least.
The door flung open, and Harry stuck out his head and snarled, “What?” in a way that changed immediately to a kind of droopy dog’s face when he saw Narcissa. He shook his head in a way that also reminded Narcissa of a dog shedding water, and said, “I’m sorry, I thought it was Lucius.”
“Would you have truly greeted my husband with that much violence?” Narcissa had to ask, interested despite herself.
Harry gave her a flat look, as though wondering why she was here if she only wanted to defend Lucius, and then sighed and said, “He keeps urging me to wait and not use the threat of melting their money against the goblins. He says that if he took his money out, they would see something was wrong and get the urge to investigate.”
Narcissa shook her head. “Of course they would do that, if they were given too much warning of the threat. But they shall not be.” She stepped into the bedroom, and Harry was so surprised that he let her come in, although he twisted around to watch her as though he wasn’t sure where she was going to end up. Narcissa stood in front of the cascade and let the water run through her hands, enjoying the cool touch, before she focused on him. “I wanted to offer to write the letter that you’re struggling with.”
Harry turned and glanced guiltily at what looked like a pile of dust and ashes on his desk. “I get so angry that I end up destroying the quill and the parchment every time,” he muttered.
Narcissa nodded. She had thought something like that might be the case. “Well, then. I wish that you will allow me to write it for you, and make it a masterpiece of elegant threatening. We will pretend that it comes from Lucius, of course.”
“Can you disguise your handwriting as his?” Harry followed her over to the table, where Narcissa sat down and pulled a fresh sheet of parchment towards her. She was pleased there was some left. It wasn’t long ago, she thought, that Harry would have let his magic flow over everything organic in the area if he was this frustrated. He was learning control, although sometimes Lucius muttered about it.
“I can do more than that,” Narcissa said. “I can disguise my phrasing as his, and they will have no suspicion they are reading a letter composed by someone else.”
Harry nodded as he watched Narcissa sharpen the quill and dip it in the ink. “I’m afraid that I’m just not good at this part of it,” he muttered, shaking his head. “Not good at threatening people, I mean. I want to just go and show them what my magic can do.”
Narcissa smiled and began to write, the words coming the more easily the more she thought about them.
To the goblins of Gringotts.
I have learned of the interference that you planned for my slave. I have learned of the way that you planned to put to use my vaults when I was briefly in Azkaban prison. I have learned of many things that you would have wished to hide from me.
Effective today, I will be removing all my money from Gringotts. Vaults are to be emptied and all coins, artifacts, books, and other objects that my ancestors or I placed within your keeping are to be returned, undamaged. If I hear that you have disobeyed any of these terms, I will tell the other wizarding banks of Europe exactly how well Gringotts keeps its promises.
You should know that I have also discovered what my slave has become-before my son made the announcement that has been horrifying British wizarding audiences in the papers-and he has other magic at his command that you may wish to consider. It is good that I was the one to take him in charge, and not you. He has the power to threaten all you love, as much as he can threaten a wizard’s wand. Meditate on that when you next plan to work around my generous gift of a vault, and may it choke you.
Lucius Malfoy.
Narcissa leaned back to admire her effect, both on the words and on the wide-eyed young man in front of her. He shook his head and swore under his breath, although not enough under his breath to avoid Narcissa hearing. He caught her eye and blurted out, “Is this something you do all the time?”
“Which one?” His reaction was even more gratifying than Narcissa had hoped. She touched the parchment and admired it for a moment. “Impersonate my husband? Or threaten people?”
“Oh, I assumed you did the second one,” said Harry, with so much seriousness that Narcissa’s brows rose and she had to wonder what Draco had been telling him. “But impersonating Lucius. He won’t like that, will he?”
“I assure you, he appreciated my efforts when he was in Azkaban.” Narcissa stood. “But it will also help to sow a bit of confusion. The goblins have undoubtedly heard about Draco claiming you as his bed partner.” It was the closest she could come to naming what Draco and Harry had pretended without wrinkling her nose in disgust. “They will wonder and be alarmed to hear that Lucius is now claiming you as his slave.”
Harry’s eyes lowered to the floor. Narcissa reached out and caught his chin without thinking, the same way she would do to Draco if Draco was acting ashamed in front of her for something he ought not to be ashamed of.
“Never let me see you mourn for a pretense that was forced upon you,” she told him. “It is not your fault, and certainly not your fault that the wizarding world found it convenient to abandon you to your fate when you had done so much for them. This is not what you should worry about. The only thing you need to concern yourself with is living well now. And your vengeance against the goblins, but I don’t think I need to persuade you to worry about that.”
“What about the contradiction?” Harry asked, and from the way he was staring at her, she had at least made him think, if not believe her. “The goblins might show someone that letter, and that person might report that I somehow belong to Lucius and Draco both at once.”
“That is the last thing I am concerned about, given the secretive nature of goblins.” Narcissa released Harry’s chin; he was getting uncomfortable, and she could tell. “They will keep the letter to themselves, and watch and worry. Perhaps they’ll try to persuade Lucius to keep his money in the bank, but even that will be a loss of face and a show that they are concerned about the threat a human can pose. I think it much more likely they’ll comply and spend months worrying about what they did and if it was the right decision.”
Harry’s eyes lit with the kind of fire that Narcissa often saw in Draco’s after she had praised him. “That’s more like it.”
“I thought so,” said Narcissa, amused, and made her way to the door. She did think it worthwhile to turn around once she had reached it and added, “Oh, Harry?”
Harry looked back up at her, so cautious that he broke her heart. Narcissa maintained the bland smile that he would probably expect of her, however, and murmured, “I want you to understand that this is your household, and you are welcome here. Anything I can do for you, I will. Is that understood?”
Harry opened his mouth, and Narcissa thought, from the old, cynical look in his eyes, that he was about to ask whether she could bring his parents back.
But a second later, he turned his head away and gave a tiny nod. “I’ve never had someone offer me that before and have me really believe they could save me,” he said. “I’ll keep it in mind.”
Narcissa could have said many other things, but she thought she had made her impression. She left, mind humming all the way down the stairs.
After all, if this was the young man Draco had chosen to share his life with, Narcissa ought to get to know him as well as she once would have expected to know her daughter-in-law.
Chapter Twenty-Three.
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