RP: An Overdue Visitation

[pb_fenrir]

Characters: Fenrir Greyback, Draco Malfoy
Date: 8 December 1999, Night
Location: Diagon Alley, Contego Terrace
Summary: Fenrir's overdue for a visit, sees what Draco has been up to.
Status/Warning: Private/None
Completion: Complete

Comments

[pb_draco]

He was counting the achingly slow stirs he made to a bubbling cauldron, eyes focused on his work. Six, seven, eight - very important to get exactly twelve-point-five stirs without stop, or the pale orange color he was after would shift to milky and he'd have to start over.

Nine, ten, eleven - his spine tingled, the wards on his stairs activating and alerting him. Far too late to be Granger, his father would have come through the Floo, no one else visited him. He dropped the stirring rod into the cauldron and gripped the table hard, cursing under his breath as the potion's viscosity changed with a sad bubbling sound. Greyback. Like he'd told Lucius, the wolf would just return over and over again.

Draco swore again, slamming the table hard with the sides of his fists. He had lessons with Granger the next day, and she would know it if he was distracted, unsettled, if lack of sleep or alcohol was affecting his work. Bastard couldn't have waited a day.

He slapped open the door to his lab, snapped his wand at the front door hard enough to crack the joints in his wrist, and stalked to one sofa to throw himself into it with enough force that it creaked in protest. Lighting a cigarette and damning his hands for already shaking, he propped his boots on the table and stared at the door. If he could keep anger boiling, maybe he could keep fear at bay.

It was worth a shot.

[pb_fenrir]

Fenrir heard the movements inside the apartment fairly clearly. From what he remembered of the layout, Draco had come out of one of the rooms into the den with the sofas. He grabbed something... probably something to defend himself with. A silver dagger? More likely his wand... most wizards felt naked without them. The silly sticks were merely instruments of magic... the real power lay in the person, or so Fenrir believed.

A soft landing. He'd flopped onto one of the couches. Great. He would have to deal with Draco being pissy tonight.

Fenrir spoke loudly enough that Draco would be able to hear him through the door, "If you're trying to pretend you aren't home, you're doing a piss poor job of it slamming doors and running about. I would like to remind you that your drapes have been open for at least an hour. You might want to take care to shut them, don't want anyone looking in to see us, do you? Use your wand if your hands are shaking too much."

[pb_draco]

Draco glanced at the door, a shudder running down his spine. He'd meant to snap it open, startle the wolf and set him off balance, but instinct had set him to seal it closed instead. Now they were starting off their meeting with Fenrir already irritated.

He burned a good inch off his cigarette in one long drag, holding the smoke in his lungs as he flicked his wand at the door to open it. In the same movement, he twisted his wrist and pointed at the door to the kitchen, and to the bedroom, where he'd left a candle burning steady under a charm since the day Fenrir had first broken into his home. "No one can see us," he said, ignoring the shake in his voice as those two doors closed. "Unless you plan to hit the bedroom, and I don't recall your tastes running that way except for toddlers."

[pb_fenrir]

Fenrir watched the door open, ignoring Draco. He looked around the apartment. The doors were all shut. Interesting. Draco wanted him to stay here, in this room. After softly shutting the door behind, his instinct to explore and remain free kicked in and he started walking around the room. The place was somewhat tidy, as if a cleaning service had swept through the room. There was something in the air though, and it wasn't almonds. Sniffing slightly, trying not to give away to Malfoy that he'd caught onto something, he edged across the room looking for its source. Fenrir's acute senses honed in on the chemicals in the air coming from a specific door. He smelled something faint... bitter... almonds? Almonds? Perplexed, he let it drop for the moment and just stood at the door he'd found. Whether it was a potion or a girl, putting himself between it and Draco would probably be advantageous.

Finally looking at Draco... he was somewhat surprised. The kid looked to be in better shape than he would have given him credit for. The last few days without werewolf company has obviously been good for him, though he couldn't say that his current condition looked anything better than frightened kitten balled up in a comfortable corner. "Drown yourself in comforts all you like, the real world will still be here."

Fenrir snorted, "I make time on my own for my personal amusements. This is business. I promised I would not harm your family in any way, and that I would protect you should you require it." Pocketing his gloves and removing his coat, Fenrir folded the bundle over one arm. "Now, do you have any communications from your father for me?"

[pb_draco]

Unconsciously, Draco reached up and touched his necklace, the small hoops in his ears. The bit of comfort he received from knowing that he was touching silver, wearing something anathema to werewolves, was slight, but it helped. Every little bit helped, and he needed everything he could grasp. He watched Fenrir stalking around his flat, watched the wolf examining his home.

"You asked me to deliver that list and I did so. You didn't say you expected a response immediately." Fenrir hesitated outside his potion lab and Draco could almost sense the werewolf sniffing the air. He swallowed, hoping that Fenrir knew very little about potions, and couldn't identify the substances he'd been using in his brew. Cyanide wasn't illegal, and he had a specific purpose in mind for it that had nothing to do with its toxic properties, but he didn't want any idea to arise in Fenrir's mind that he was willing and able to work with poisons.

[pb_fenrir]

Fenrir made an affirmative sound, acknowledging Draco had spoken, but that was all he'd give. This scent was very intriguing, more so when Draco made some inconspicuous self-comforting motions towards the silver jewelry he was wearing. As if that would stop a werewolf who wanted you dead. I'm insulted.

"No I did not. As a matter of course, you may assume that when I visit I expect to receive any communication from Lucius that he has put in your care to be delivered to me. If he hasn't... then he hasn't," he answered casually. Lucius's messages were of great importance to Fenrir, but the less Draco was involved with them the better. This curious nature that kept asking 'why this, why that' was annoying and needed to be stamped out before Draco stumbled upon information he shouldn't be trusted with to keep to himself.

For all his casual airs in his speech, he'd fixed Draco with a cold stare in order to get the point across. Fenrir loved playing with expressions and emotions, and toying with Draco was just so easy. To his delight, it never got old.

Being rather curious himself at the moment, he decided to see what Draco would do when he turned and opened the door, "I'm going to use the loo. No, don't get up, I can find it on my own."

[pb_draco]

"O-of course." The stammer was brought on by the icy look Fenrir had sent at him, and Draco glanced away. Meeting the bastard's eyes only reminded him that what looked human was an animal, and one that would probably be more than happy to rend him into small, Malfoy-flavored steaks, should the opportunity arrive. "If he gives me anything for you, you'll have it."

He choked on his cigarette when Fenrir opened the potions lab, sitting bolt upright and wheezing for breath. "Not in there," he said, his voice tightening. A little voice in the back of his head suggested that he tell Fenrir to go out on the terrace and find a wall like all good doggies did, and he fought it back hysterically. For once in his life, he was going to keep his tongue under control if it killed him.

If he didn't, Fenrir might kill him instead.

[pb_fenrir]

Draco's reaction was predictable. Fenrir had hit home on something, and now it was time to find out just why the boy was nearly swallowing his cigarette. "Hmmm? What is this?" Now opening his eyes and ears to the concoction left on a table. The room was obviously a potions lab. Draco had taken after his father in that field of expertise. The equipment was in great shape, and came in abundance and good quality to boot. Fenrir let out a low whistle.

Attention coming back to the potion, the smell was definitely coming from the mixture. More bitter, not quite almonds but not quite anything else either. It was very different from the almond scent that a lady would have worn: a lady wishes to attract men by encouraging simple memories, a potion wishes to kill men by covering whatever smell the poison would have given off...

Poison...

Fenrir turned his head and tilted it, letting one cold blue eye fall on the boy behind him.

"Draco. Come here."

[pb_draco]

Draco froze. Rattling in his head, screaming in the back of his brain, was a long stream of every profanity he knew, from English through French and right into the small bits of Bulgarian and Russian he'd picked up from the Durmstrang students. That, as little as he knew, was the most satisfying, but it didn't help in the slightest.

He crushed his cigarette out, his hand shaking so much that he tipped the ashtray and spilled ashes onto the coffee table, then slowly stood. Fenrir was blocking the door, taking up too much space, and the very idea of approaching the werewolf was making Draco's heart pound harder than the first time he'd sent his broom into a power dive from hundreds of feet in the air.

Still, reluctant as he was, he obeyed the order - and there was no mistake that an order was exactly what it had been. He'd have stayed out of arm's reach if he thought it would do any good, but didn't bother with what he knew would be a futile attempt at avoiding Fenrir should the wolf want to grab him. He wasn't that fast. Nothing came out of his mouth when he opened it to ask what Fenrir wanted, and he gaped for a moment before snapping his teeth together and staring at the floor.

[pb_fenrir]

After seeing Draco get up and start to walk over, he smiled and entered the potions lab. Moving around the table where the cauldron sat, he looked at the apparatus and determined whatever Draco had been making it had probably been interrupted by Fenrir's visit.

"Your lab, I take it? What were you making?"

A hundred thoughts and plots danced in Fenrir's head, revolving around Draco's potion making ability. He finally put forth one of them, "Say, are you familiar with the Polyjuice Potion? And what sort of sleeping potions are there? I might be interested in using the first, the second type... well let's just say I'm curious. Especially concerning any time delayed sleeping potions."

[pb_draco]

Draco leaned against the doorframe, extremely disappointed that the ward Granger had put on his lab to keep animals out hadn't blocked Fenrir from entering. Apparently in his human state, it didn't count. Damn.

He folded his arms, tucking his hands into his robe sleeves to hide their obvious shaking. "Just an experiment. It didn't work."

He closed his eyes at the questions, not even needing to wonder where they were leading. Snape was dead, and he doubted that Fenrir knew many other people who were skilled at potions. "Polyjuice is complicated, takes a month to brew. I'm ... very familiar with it."

His hands twisted inside his sleeves, fingers digging into his forearms. "Sleeping potions, there's a wide variety of those. Dreamless Sleep, Draught of Peace." He swallowed hard and his voice lowered. "Draught of Living Death."

[pb_fenrir]

Lingering around the potion, Fenrir wondered more and more about just what Draco would be able to produce. The Ministry of Magic was once infiltrated by Potter... it wouldn't be too hard to plant misleading evidence or hint at conspirators working within the building. His mind came upon the wonderful pun for working with Draco: And so the plot thickens.

Draco was shaking slightly, he looked like a nervous wreck. Fenrir came over and put a hand on his shoulder. He spoke with a mockingly concerned voice, "Are you alright? You shouldn't get that upset over experiments you know. Sometimes you've got to break a few he-" almost erupting into a laughing fit, he covered it with a cough and excused himself, "eggs to make an omelet."

Clapping him on the back, he walked out of the potion lab brushing past Draco. There wasn't much room, and he sort of dragged him along by the hand that hadn't left Draco's shoulder. "That is good. I would like you to start some now. I'll be expecting it in one month, as well as four liters of that last one you mentioned... the Draught of Living Death. I'll let you know if I need anything else, and I'll give you plenty of time to prepare. Wouldn't want you to be under pressure because of me."

[pb_draco]

Draco stiffened under Fenrir's touch, slamming back against the door frame and popping his spine in the process. In the small space, he couldn't run, and with a shamed flush building across his cheeks, he made a soft whimper. As hard as he tried to stifle the sound, he still made it, unable to stop himself entirely with a werewolf's paw on his shoulder. "I don't ... I don't have the ingredients, the lacewing, the antimony."

Scuffing his boots in the carpet as Fenrir practically hauled him across the room, Draco grimaced at the tight grip on his shoulder. "Four liters?" Even frightened, he still turned to gape at the werewolf, shock clear in his eyes. "No, not possible. There's no way I could get that amount of supplies without it being suspicious. The wormwood alone is out of season, I'd have to buy dried or imported, and that would set off alarms with someone if I bought that much!"

[pb_fenrir]

Draco seemed to be telling the truth. Fenrir looked at him, trying to spot any difference in speech or expression. He found none. "Don't worry about getting the ingredients. I can do that much. Just write it all down on some paper and I'll have it to you by the end of the week. I'll make sure its untraceable to you."

[pb_draco]

He really, really did not want to know what Fenrir would do to get that many supplies, those specific supplies, by the end of the week. Draco could do it, he had the money, but it would be blatantly obvious what he was buying and what for, and there would be no way for him to avoid leaving records behind. That Fenrir said he could do it without trace was almost more frightening than anything Draco could imagine that he'd do with the potions.

Fenrir's grip slackened and Draco jerked away, knocking into the sofa with one hip. He shook his head, already running the ingredients he'd need through his mind, and found a quill and parchment, then slipped on his glasses and huddled at the table to write with his shoulders hunched. The list took several minutes to complete, Draco's professional pride over anything to do with potions causing him to write very specific and detailed instructions - "gathered on a Thursday with a bone-handled sickle", "Under a waning moon in February, dried on silk squares not less than six inches per side", and more. A few of the lines he had to scratch out and rewrite, the tremble in his fingers making his handwriting illegible even to him.

Finally he sat up and shoved his hair out of his eyes, pushing the parchment across the table and tossing the quill down to rub the cramp from his hands. "There. I listed a few alternatives, but for a lot of those, there is nothing else that will work properly. And for the Polyjuice, I'll need samples of whoever you plan to imitate." Pinching the bridge of his nose under the rims of his glasses, he shuddered. "And they don't need to be dead to get the sample."

[pb_fenrir]

Humming to himself while Draco made the list, he took the opportunity to more closely inspect the apartment. He silently walked over to the sofa where he noticed long brown hairs. They were very interesting, as if he almost recognized them... but he couldn't place it. Obviously not Draco's. There were a few on the floor as well. Kneeling to check his bootstraps, he quickly sniffed the air around the couch. It was very faint now, but it was there... almonds.

He took the list and scanned it. The instructions were a bit much, but he supposed his supplier would have use for them. Fenrir had never put much study into potion making, only caring about the application end. "Not a problem. I'll see you again Thursday night with all of this ready."

"Of course, I'll be sure to get you samples. Try not to think too much of it if I show up with fingers or ears though, I'm not a very picky person when it comes to window shopping."