Fic: Elemental (1/2) *NC17* D/B
Title: Elemental
Author: vexiphem
Rating: NC-17
Pairings: Harry/Blaise, Draco/Blaise, Harry/Theodore
Summary: Malfoy, Blaise muses, is like water. Harry is like fire, destroying everything in his wake. Blaise is the earth, the foundation of life. Draco is flooding him, seeping into him and drowning him, dousing out Harry, and slowly destroying them all.
Word Count: 13,068
Disclaimers: If you choose to sue, leave my CDs out of it.
Author’s Notes: For tornslayer. Terribly, terribly sorry this is so late; RL took over and I just didn't have enough time to finish this. This is the longest piece I've written in quite a while, and also the most experimental I think I've ever written. It's circular, so it ends where it begins, begins where it ends, all that stuff. I don't think this is quite what you were expecting, but I hope you enjoy it. And have a happy new year!
Elemental
I. In Love and In Lust
Harry Potter takes one last look around and buries his sins.
Malfoy, Blaise muses, is like water. Malfoy flows between the cracks of the foundation, liquid vines eroding the earth until there is nothing left but his prize. He’d freeze him, make him lighter, ensure they didn’t both drown.
Silhouetted against the stone wall is Malfoy. Potter, of course, does not notice. Blaise doubts he would care; Potter never cares about anything else when he’s got Blaise on his back and is ramming himself balls-deep into him.
Fuck you, Blaise mouths, vicious and brutal over Potter’s shoulder. He wants to take Potter apart at the seams. Malfoy takes the bait and storms off in a silent huff.
Blaise focuses on fucking Potter again. He would reach down between them, but Potter’s stomach is already stroking his cock enough, and truthfully, neither of them will long enough for it to make a difference.
Blaise comes back to the dorms late that night. Draco is still up waiting.
Draco chooses his words carefully: “Do you enjoy Potter’s company?” Not Do you like fucking him or Do you care about him. He’s not sure he wants the answer to those questions.
Blaise shrugs, his shirt rising just above his trousers. Draco does not appreciate the flash of skin he tries not to see.
“D’you think we talk?” Blaise says as means of reply. The candle on Draco’s bedside table flickers, casting dancing shadows to splay across the wall. Blaise’s mouth stretches into a Cheshire Cat grin and he strips off his shirt before reclining back into his bed, sated.
Draco says nothing. Of course they talk; they must. No one-no one-can spend that much time with another and not feel compelled to talk. Even a little, even if they’re only talking about-
“Why?”
Blaise’s laugh cuts through the air, ringing like perfectly sharpened sword slicing the air apart. “Does it matter?”
Draco bristles. “No,” he answers flatly, and blows out his candle.
Black.
The sun sets auburn crimson over the horizon. The last rays of light bleed through the branches of autumnal trees.
Draco looks up from his novel. He sees fire in those trees, feels the heat sear through his every nerve.
He burns, wants to burn, like a phoenix reducing itself to smouldering ash. He wants the vicious fragility, to teeter on the delicate balance. But unlike the phoenix, he will not rise from the earth.
The crunch of grass being stepped on greets his ears; someone is walking toward him.
“Get the fuck away from me, Potter.”
The footsteps stop. Then they begin again and seconds later, a body sits down beside him. Draco glanced over his shoulder.
“As you can clearly see, I am not Potter.”
Not thinking: “You may as well be.”
“Oh, fuck you, Malfoy.”
“Language,” Draco remarks and dog-ears a page. “What do you want?”
“I don’t know. To talk. To do some of that male bonding crap neither of us is any good at.”
Draco sneers, “I imagine you’ve done enough ‘bonding’ with Potter, Zabini. I’m merely an afterthought.”
Zabini’s cheeks tinge red as blood trickles to them, staining his pale skin. But instead of giving Draco the satisfaction of humiliation, he spits out, “Jealous?”
Draco’s lip curls involuntarily as he mutters, “Of you and Potter? No.” Zabini’s eyes penetrate and evoke sensations Draco does not want to acknowledge. “That you’re getting laid on a regular basis, yes.”
But then Draco pauses and thinks for a moment. “Although, truth be told, if I had to choose between celibacy and fucking Potter, I imagine I’d choose the former.”
Zabini snorts. “You couldn’t voluntarily live without sex if you tried.”
Draco arches an eyebrow. “Is that a bet I hear?”
Shaking his head no, Zabini replies, “Just a fact.”
After glaring for a moment, Draco rises to his feet, tucks his copy of How to Become a Dark Overlord under his arm, and walks off without another word.
Blaise draws in a huge gulp of smoke.
“Zabini.” Potter’s voice cuts through the thin air and distorts the smoke when Blaise exhales.
“Potter,” he says as a response. He takes another drag, his cheeks hollowing as he draws the sweet poison in. As he breathes out, he appraises Potter. “You’re too skinny, you know.”
Potter doesn’t answer, but he does step forward and take the cigarette from between Blaise’s thumb and forefinger. He tosses the cigarette down to the stone and grinds it out beneath his toe.
Blaise looks carefully down at the deceased fag, then back up at Potter.
Slowly: “Do tell me, Potter: What. The. Fuck. Was that for?”
Potter holds Blaise’s eyes with a stony gaze. “Cigarettes will kill you.”
Blaise shrugs. “And your point is?”
Potter mumbles that maybe he doesn’t really have a point, and then Blaise takes two hands to Potter’s shoulders and presses him into the stone wall.
“Next time, have a better explanation.”
Blaise meets Potter’s lips with bruising force, but Potter only shifts his hips against Blaise and kisses him back just as fiercely.
The heat of Potter’s body, the white light that sears past Blaise’s closed eyelids, the languid collapse against the wall: these things beg no explanation, and really, perhaps it’s better if they remain unexplained.
Draco is lying belly down on his bed with his feet up in the air and his head propped on his hands. He turns a dusty page in the book in front of him. He has moved on from How to Become a Dark Overlord because Nathaniel Roeper knows absolutely nothing, or else Draco knows everything. The diagrams in this book are crude and undefined. Draco doesn’t care. He memorises every rare ingredient, every meticulous procedure, and then when he hears the door creak open, clamps the book shut and shoves it under his pillow.
“What were you reading?” Zabini asks, stripping off his robe and shirt. He chucks them over his bedpost, where they both watch as the clothing threatens to fall. When they don’t, Zabini addresses Draco again. “What were you reading? Anything interesting?”
Draco shakes his head. “Just some novel by a Muggle author,” he says, realizing too late that a Muggle book is likely more damning than a Dark Arts one.
But Zabini just grins with maddening satisfaction, and then slithers under his covers.
A blue moon only occurs once every two and a half years. If Draco’s calculations are correct, the last blue moon had been forty three months ago.
This was not happening. The sheer improbability, the fucking impossibility, of this happening was proved by the simple fact that this was not happening.
Harry sat on the Quidditch field with his head in his hands. The bodies all around him taunted him.
Potter is slumped against the wall, his knees drawn close to his chest. A piece of parchment sits on his thighs and he is scrawling something hurriedly.
“Well, Potter, I never took you to be the academic type, but clearly I was wrong.” Blaise slides down the wall next to him, looking over at a mess of words. Potter’s handwriting is sharp and angular, like his shoulders, like his hips. Blaise figures he would have to squint to read it, so he doesn’t.
He doubts any of it really matters.
Potter stops writing suddenly and shoves the parchment into Blaise’s hands. The soft crinkle charges the air.
Blaise reads the first line, and then throws the letter on the ground.
“Are you honestly going to sit there and wait for me to read that entire thing? It’s two fucking pages and your writing is tiny.”
Potter chews his lip, and then turns away as he says, “Just read the fucking thing.”
Blaise picks up the parchment again, holds it in front of Potter’s face, and rips it down the middle, breaking the delicate words apart.
“If you have something to tell me, then say it.”
Potter says nothing.
Throughout the second Potions exam of the semester, Draco’s mind drifts.
3. Name the four rare ingredients in the Aegis Elixir and where they can be found.
Draco leaves it blank, because the only ingredients he can think of are the ones he knows he will need to retrieve by the end of November.
Snape approaches him two days later, Draco’s test clenched in his hand.
“Mr Malfoy,” he says, “what is this about?”
Draco sees the grade circled in green at the top right-hand corner. He should care more about receiving an F than he does.
Draco says simply, “I had forgotten about the test. I’m sorry, Professor.”
After everything, Harry thinks this death should be simple. He is not surprised, however, when it proves to be the most difficult.
On the evening of November twenty-fourth, Draco slips out of the dormitory and goes for a walk in the Forbidden Forest.
The autumn air chills Draco to the bone, but he does not mind. He wants to stay outside for as long as he needs to, until he finds the proper ingredients.
And he will. He knows he will.
“You wanted me to say something to you?” Potter asks, his eyes turned down.
“If the alternative is reading two pages of your microscopic handwriting, then yes.” Blaise stretches his arm in front of him, examining his nails. He folds his hands together in satisfaction, and then looks up at Potter expectantly.
“I, er…” Potter hems and haws, fumbling over his words.
“You…” Blaise prompts. Lifting one hand to Potter’s face, Blaise turns his head to force Potter to make eye contact.
Potter wrenches away, almost violently, and, in one very quick burst of defeat, mutters “I’m tired of this sneaking around.”
Blaise takes a hard look at Potter, gauging his intent. “By that, you mean you want to come out, don’t you? Are you fucking mad, Potter?”
“No, I’m not fucking mad!” Potter’s eyes fall and he chews his lip. “But don’t you-“
“No.”
“Won’t you at least-“
“No.”
“Oh, fuck you, Zabini. You’re hopeless.”
Blaise snorts. “At least, Potter, I’m not a hopeless romantic. That’ll get you killed in this world.”
Potter makes two quick strides. He cups Blaise’s face in his hands. “I’d rather have a heart than whatever it is you possess.” A flash of anger sweeps through Blaise, and he slams his lips against Potter’s, hot and searching.
Their tongues intertwine, Blaise’s reaching far into the depths of Potter’s mouth, like he wants to breathe him in, breathe him in and figure him out. And he reckons maybe he can, because Potter is everywhere, drifting and waiting for Blaise to come along.
But not now, because now is not the time for love or even for like.
Blaise pulls away and Potter’s lips follow until Blaise puts his hand against his face.
“Perhaps I have no heart, but you wouldn’t have me any other way. Face it, Potter. You need me to be heartless.”
And he does, he really does. Potter is so full of love, but he hurts so much, has lost so much, and he can’t find it in himself to hurt himself the way he believes he needs to be hurt.
At least, this is what Blaise believes when Potter doesn’t answer.
He shakes with fury. “Fine. Do it. I dare you.”
He clearly does not expect Harry to do anything.
Ron, though perhaps not the most observant bloke, does take note of the fact that Harry is coming in later and later every night, and of the dark circles under his eyes that are becoming more and more prominent.
He approaches Hermione about Harry’s sleeping habits, and when she bites her lip and turns her head away, he decides he does not want to hear anymore.
From that point on, Ron stops asking Harry where he’s been and instead begins to devise a plan to discover for himself.
With her hair tied up in a bun, Hermione is sitting at a long oak table in the library with books on ancient wars and leaders and strategies. She turns another page and rests her head on her arm, growing tired of reading the same analyses in new words, and sometimes not even.
She hears a chair being pulled away from the table, but does not look up.
“Granger.”
With sudden violence, Hermione bolts upright and slams the book closed. “What do you want?” she asks, narrowing her eyes.
Malfoy opens his mouth as if to say something of great importance, but then he closes it again and Hermione gathers up her books and prepares to leave.
“Wait.”
“What do you want?” Hermione asks again, turning back to face him quickly.
“I’m doing an extra credit project for Professor Snape.”
Hermione shifts the weight of her books to one arm. She tucks a loose strand of hair behind her ear. “Go on.”
Draco curses at himself as he walks down the staircase into the dungeons. Why he had decided Granger’s assistance was invaluable, he still is not sure.
But he remains certain that without Granger, his entire plan will go to hell.
It is worth a few slaps in the face.
Blaise toys with the idea of taking Potter up on his desire to go public a few times, once even going so far as to plan an announcement during breakfast in the Great Hall. But when the time comes, he stays quiet.
“Blaise,” Pansy starts, “can I ask you something?”
“You just did.” Blaise’s tone leaves no room for discussion.
Pansy takes a bite of toast and frowns. “Fine.”
Potter catches Blaise’s eye from across the room. As though embarrassed, Potter turns his head away and focuses intently on his tea. Blaise continues staring at Potter, tracing his slumped shoulders.
Eventually, Potter turns his head up again and their eyes lock. The tip of Blaise’s tongue peeks out and he runs it across his top lip. Potter flushes deeply and a slow smile of satisfaction spreads over Blaise’s lips. If such simple communication, Blaise muses, creates such a flurry in Potter’s stomach, then the boy would pass out if Blaise were to allow this mockery of a relationship go public.
Potter looks away and says something to Granger. She looks around for a moment before finding Blaise. Blaise quirks an eyebrow at her, daring her to say something.
Can you protect him, dear girl? Do you want to protect him from the big bad Slytherin?
She opens her mouth, as though to protest, but just as quickly she shuts it again and shifts her gaze. Blaise follows her line of sight, which he reckons could cut and bleed him. When his eyes fall on Malfoy, he blinks, and then looks away. He does not want to know.
Three days later, Malfoy comes in with scratch marks scored into his face.
Blaise does not ask, Malfoy does not tell.
II. Shadows Fall
“Fuck you, Potter. Just-fuck you.” His voice quavers and hangs in the air, as though he does not truly mean it.
But Harry can no longer bear to look at him, and so he must believe that he means it. When he does, all he sees are sins. He is unclean, unworthy, unsafe.
They are not two parts of the same person; they never were; they never will be. That is the way it is meant to be.
Harry says so.
“Have you figured out anything new?” Draco asks Granger. He doesn’t look at her, because he does not want to incur any more of her anger, but he knows that if she does have any new information he will have to pay a price.
She rubs a hand under his chin before tilting his head up to look at her.
“You,” she says pointedly, “are the most disgusting human being I have ever met. Why am I helping you?”
“Because Blaise is fucking your best friend.”
She visibly restrains from making a nasty comment, throws a piece of parchment at him, and storms out. The door slams behind her violently.
Draco is under the impression that he ought to care, but he just picks up the paper, reads the information carefully, and grins slowly.
He’s almost done.
The dreams (nightmares) are back, and Ron can tell even if Harry won’t admit it.
Whenever Ron wakes Harry up in the morning, his sheets are always twisted around his ankles, his blankets a mess, and Harry looks like a ghost with his face ashen and gaunt. The surest sign, however, is in the dulled jade of his irises. Once bright with life, Ron takes one look into Harry’s eyes and sees resignation to death.
Ron approaches Harry once and asks him if he’d, uh, like to talk about it, or something. This last part is said in a mumble, because even before the question leaves his mouth he knows the answer; Ron has always known the answer, and contrary to popular opinion, he is not thick enough not to notice.
He notices, all right; the problem is Ron speaks before he considers all aspects of a situation.
The look Harry gives him is one of pure disdain, and Ron tries to use all his mental power to remind himself that the disdain is not directed at him, but rather at the situation.
(Because it is. Right?)
Right.
Under the soft white light of the blue moon, Draco creates a bluebell flame beneath his cauldron on the brittle, crisp green grass beside the lake.
From his cloak he retrieves a small vial of partially crystallized solution; from the glass small sharp crystals protrude. Holding it up to the light, Draco watches as the moon colours the clear liquid blue, not from any blue light of its own, but through sheer mysticism.
The cauldron is empty for now, but Draco has a satchel at his side that is filled with various potions and mushrooms and unicorn horns and feathers of phoenixes; when the moon reaches its peak, Draco will begin.
From his bag, Draco pulls a blanket and lays it on the ground. He sits down and begins laying out the items.
A more curious looking assortment of items Draco has never before seen, and for a brief moment he wonders if Granger is playing with him. But he dismisses the thought quickly, and waits.
And waits, and waits, and waits.
Draco begins humming a tune he has just created in his mind, and decides that it does not sound altogether awful. Perhaps with a better voice, he might even be able to craft lyrics and make it a hit. But not tonight.
Draco, he reminds himself stubbornly, you must focus.
With nothing better to do, Draco traces Blaise’s name into the finely ground rose quartz.
Over and over and over again.
His fingers get so used to the motion that by the time the moon is a half hour from its peak at 4:17 a.m., he is writing Blaise in elaborate and involved script without conscious thought, as memorized a movement as playing a simple C major scale; the only reason he knows it is time to begin is his wand vibrates at his hip.
Snapping into action, Draco dumps the base ingredients in: a half litre of virgin water, the extract of ten mint leaves, a teaspoon of ground bicorn horn, a handful of wild mushrooms, and seven crushed nettles. This takes him a total of four seconds; he has precisely one hour to finish this potion-a half hour before peak and a half hour after-and he needs fifty-seven minutes of just waiting.
As the nettles dissolve, a putrid stench rises and the mint tries to cover it up, not unlike scented candles burning in a freshly whitewashed room, and the contrast of smell threatens to give Draco a headache. But he doesn’t back away and he watches intently; the moment the liquid turns clear, Draco turns over the egg timer. He focuses on each grain of sand as it files from top to bottom, every second dragging on.
After ten minutes, Draco unrolls a sheet of parchment and glances over the words for reassurance, but he knows that forgetting the verse is impossible at this point.
Once you start, Draco reminds himself, there is no going back.
(You can still get out of this. You can still save your dignity. You can still save your pri-)
With a deep breath, Draco opens his mouth and, in a loud, clear voice that disturbs the silence of the night, recites:
Beneath a blue moon’s light
My intent will take flight.
Once thy will is turned,
Thy love shall be spurned and
Comfort from thine’s own self he shall seek.
When such a request they speak,
His will shall be mine,
Mind, body, and soul divine.
Draco scoops up the powdered rose quartz in his hand and sprinkles it clockwise. With a wooden ladle, he stirs the potion five times counter clockwise.
The liquid is a blush rose color and steadily growing brighter. Draco thinks of hearts and butterflies and sunsets and champagne and all those things he swore he would never think about.
He pushes his thoughts to the back of his mind, recites the verse again, waits five minutes, and then infuses the venom of a wiper and the partially crystallized antidote into the cauldron.
(Bubble, bubble,
Toil and trouble,
Cauldron burn and cauldron bubble.)
With perfect precision, a large bubble swells until it almost begins hanging off the side of the cauldron. Like balloons, Draco wonders if it will hold shape or pop. He holds his breath and for ten, maybe fifteen, seconds he dares not even blink.
In the swirls of the bubble Draco can see himself wild-eyed and anxious. He decides needy is not a good look for him and stores the information away for a later, more important time.
Finally, a small hold forms at the crest of the bubble and the air hisses as it rushes out.
Draco peers in to look at the deflated bubble. A protective coating lies over the potion, stretching and moulding as the potion boils and boils.
If all goes well…yes, the film is dissolving. Draco stirs the potion and sprinkles in more rose quartz. He adds a shot of vodka and almost jumps back when a jet of bright pink liquid shoots up in the air. But he stands his ground and waits for the potion to cool to a simmer.
Ten minutes pass…eleven…twelve…
Draco retrieves a small vial from his robes and uncorks it. With determination, Draco dumps three strands of Blaise’s hair into the cauldron.
It hisses in response and turns so deep a black Draco cannot distinguish where the cauldron ends and the potion begins, like a shadow slipping into the night. He stirs with a phoenix feather and then lets the feather fall into the liquid.
For two minutes and forty seven seconds (Draco counts carefully) the potion boils and sizzles and evaporates.
And then, with a gratuitous puff of smoke, the liquid turns beautifully and perfectly clear, sitting at the bottom of the cauldron without the slightest ripple.
“Zabini, something’s on your mind.”
Blaise shakes his head. “Nothing that would be of any concern to you.”
Harry rolls over and licks the shell of Blaise’s ear, tracing the inner labyrinth with the tip of his tongue and breathing hotly. Harry smiles when Blaise lets out a soft sigh of approval, and then yelps as he finds himself on his back staring into Blaise’s eyes.
That he cannot read Blaise’s intentions disconcerts Harry some, but that doesn’t matter, not when Blaise is aligning his hips with Harry’s and grinding down oh so fucking perfectly.
“You want me.” It sounds like an accusation, but Harry nods wildly anyway. And then, as if to prove to himself something, Blaise stops moving and simply stares at Harry.
The intensity of Blaise’s gaze is like a thousand shards of glass tearing at the fabric dreams are woven from; Harry sees the real world in Blaise’s eyes, all the torment and the suffering of reality and not this sheltered hell everyone wants to live in. Harry never, ever, ever wants that sting of truth to go away.
“I want-“
“Shut the fuck up, Potter. I said no.”
A flash of fury streams through Harry. “You’ll shag me, but you won’t even acknowledge me in public?”
“Do you have a problem with that?” As if to demonstrate exactly what Harry would be missing, Blaise slowly presses his groin into Harry’s. They release simultaneous moans. “I could go right now, if that’s what you want.” But Blaise says this a bit breathlessly and takes his time in rocking against Harry again.
“Yes,” Harry manages, “but don’t go. Please, just-fuck-don’t go.”
Harry cherishes the smirk that curves over Blaise’s lips, cherishes the way Blaise mutters, “You’re nothing but a two-bit whore, you know that?”
As long as he can keep Blaise in some capacity, Harry thinks maybe he’ll get through this goddamn war with his sanity in tact.
But then Blaise slips his hand casually into Harry’s trousers and Harry forgets all about sanity. All he feels is heat and he can’t wait to burn.
“Don’t you ever get tired of fucking Potter?” Draco asks as soon as Zabini steps into the dormitory.
“Who would I fuck instead? You?” Zabini scoffs, even as he takes a purposeful look at Draco, as if to convey he doesn’t find the idea entirely distasteful.
Draco steels his gaze and stares down Blaise in what he hopes is both disgust and infuriation. He figures if he weren’t tensed with need, it might work.
Through gritted teeth, he says, “Don’t delude yourself, Zabini. Just I wish you would be a bit more discreet. You can be quite loud.”
Zabini laughs. “You were waiting for me. You can’t tell me I’m not discreet.”
Narrowing his eyes: “I was only up because I didn’t want to be woken up at-“ Draco glances at his clock, “-2:38 in the morning.”
“Well,” Zabini says curtly, “I’m back. Go to sleep.”
There is only one choice left to make.
Except it’s not really a choice; despite what people say, Harry Potter is no martyr. Harry Potter has no desire to die for this cause.
He stares at the boy-for that is all they are: boys-in front of him and a deep rage courses through him, a rage filled with indignity, hurt, disgust-and yes, love, too.
Potter.
Harry listens to the chime of his name ringing through the air. He utters it with such nonchalance that Harry wants to scream and dig his nails into his flesh, just to provoke a reaction of some sort.
The next morning at breakfast, the coffee is placed so that Zabini must reach across Draco. As he leans over Draco slips the potion into Zabini’s mug, just a few drops to barely cover the bottom.
Draco presses his thigh against Zabini’s and says carelessly, “The Canon’s won yesterday.”
Zabini turns his head as he pours his coffee and replies that he, unfortunately, already knows.
The name Weasley darts through Draco’s head, but he dismisses the thought as quickly as he can.
It doesn’t take long because the pressure of Zabini’s thigh against his sends dizzying waves to his head, but he doesn’t move and every passing moment finds him more and more light-headed. But all he does is take a bite of toast and, out of the corner of his eye, watches Zabini take a long sip of coffee (black, no sugar).
Now all Draco has to do is wait.
It’s a shame he’s impatient.
Harry is like fire, destroying everything in his wake. He knows this, accepts it, and decides to use it to his advantage.
He meets Blaise down in the dungeons, in a room hidden from public view.
“How did you find this place?” At this point, Harry is speaking from pure curiosity.
“All the Slytherins know about it. You used to have to sign up to use it, but it’s gone out of fashion this year.” Blaise chews his nail, and Harry gets the impression there is more to the story. “What did you want to see me for? I’ve got homework to do, so make this quick.”
Oh, I can make this quick. I can make this painless and easy.
Harry strides toward Blaise until their noses are touching. “Are you sure you want me to make this quick?” Harry’s voice is low and dark. He sneaks a hand under Blaise’s button-down white Oxford and trails his fingers over his abdomen. Blaise’s muscles twitch under Harry’s touch.
Blaise wets his lips and in effect, wets Harry’s. “On second thought, I deserve a break.”
Slowly, carefully, Harry undoes Blaise’s top button as he smiles.
“Breaks,” Harry says as he licks Blaise’s collar bone, “are a wonderful invention.”
Under Blaise’s delicate, pale skin, Harry feels his pulse thrumming against his tongue. Hungrily, Harry sucks and bites until he tastes metallic. Iron and copper: pure life.
Blaise arches into him after that, his breathing heavy and erratic. Harry feels stubs of nails digging into his back and shoulders, a sweet and lovely sting. Harry’s tongue swipes on last time at Blaise’s broken skin and then moves swiftly downward. Unbuttoning Blaise’s shirt rapidly, Harry traces a swirl over and over on Blaise’s chest, abdomen, and hipbones-oh, Harry loves Blaise’s hipbones.
“Potter…” Harry detects a note of urgency in his voice, but refuses to give in just yet. He moves away from Blaise’s hips and swirls his tongue around Blaise’s nipple, catching it with his teeth and biting sharply enough to elicit a quick gasp followed by a slow moan. He repeats this with the other nipple, but this time he makes good use of his hands and runs them smoothly over Blaise’s arse and squeezing tightly, delighting in the firm curves. Blaise’s hips buck forward.
“Hard already?” Harry taunts. “I’ve barely even begun.”
Blaise shoots a glare at Harry, and then in one breathless stream remarks, “so are you, and I haven’t done anything to you.”
Harry pulls back in response, but in a flash Blaise is on him, knocking him to the ground in violent abandon. Falling, Harry hits his head with a flash of white, and then he tastes metal in his mouth again, only this time it’s his. Blaise’s hands are busy ripping Harry’s shirt off and he kisses Harry hard, sucking his bottom lip into his mouth.
Without missing a beat, Blaise undoes Harry’s buckle with minimal fumbling…and then stops.
Harry tears his lips away from Blaise and growls. “What the fuck are you playing at?”
Blaise laughs, a deep, husky laugh from deep inside him, and it makes Harry shiver, though he tries not to show it.
“You’re so fucking impatient, Potter,” Blaise says as way of response. His breath is hot in Harry’s ear and does nothing to ease his already mounting impatience.
“You,” he reminds Blaise, “are the one who couldn’t wait to tackle me to the floor.”
“True. Why should I wait for what we both want?”
By now, Blaise has somehow got his hand wrapped around Harry’s cock and with the word ‘want’ he slides his hand down the length. Harry cannot contain his groan.
“Like that?”
Harry answers by kicking off Blaise’s trousers and underwear and running one hand over his arse and the other slowly, torturously slowly, along Blaise’s cock. It twitches in his hand and Harry smiles.
Both have their hands on the other’s cock and for a long, endless, breathless moment neither moves.
And then Blaise slithers down Harry’s body with serpentine grace and somewhere along the way Harry realizes not only has he lost control of the situation, but he does not care, either. His body is tensed with anticipation, his stomach muscles clenched tightly as he fights the temptation to press his erection into Blaise’s warmth, that warm wet heat that is so close now. Hips trying to jump when Blaise blows a breath of cold air on the head of his cock, Harry is restrained by Blaise’s fingers pressing tightly down on his hips. They will leave bruises.
Nevertheless, when Blaise licks a long, slow path from the base of Harry’s cock to the tip, Harry feels a drawn-out moan escape his throat and he pushes against Blaise’s grip to bury himself deep in Blaise’s mouth, his entire body vibrating with need. With a drawing pull, Blaise wrenches another moan from Harry, and from then on he is relentless, constantly varying pressure and speed, keeping Harry strung taut as a bow. Harry’s getting pulled tighter and tighter, just waiting for release. His fingers scrabble in Blaise’s mop of hair and he tugs at the roots, knowing the glimpses of pain that tingle through his spine are appreciated. Blaise answers as Harry had hoped, with quick, fast jerks he knows will get Harry off faster.
Blaise is pressing down even more tightly now and Harry cannot move his hips and really, does not want to; the pressure is great enough so that he knows bruises are forming even now without any assistance from him. None of that matters, though; all that matters is the tightening in Harry’s balls, the shallow pants, the sight of Blaise’s rose red lips wrapped around Harry’s cock, Blaise’s hollowed-out cheeks, the flush that has spread all over both of them, lost in heated, unadulterated need.
Because Harry knows that even if Blaise does not want to admit it, he needs this just as much as Harry does.
Harry needs this, this abandon that allows him to close his eyes as he falls very far very fast that all he sees are bursts of colour behind his eyelids and he feels weightless and lost in terminal velocity. The entire world is dissolving around him, melting like the sugar in his coffee that morning, fading away like the memories of Sirius, which fade and fade no matter how hard he tries to hold onto them. The only difference here is he wants the world to melt away, wants to not have to deal with it anymore, just for a moment, and so Harry lets go and his hips arch up and he’s careening, blissfully unaware of everything except the honeyed fire that’s blazing through his veins.
“Granger.” Malfoy grabs Hermione’s arm and pulls her into an alcove.
Hermione rips her arm out of his grasp. “What do you want? I’ve done everything you’ve asked for, and more.”
With a look at the speckled stone floor, Malfoy starts, “How long does…”
“How long does…?” She knows what he is asking, of course, but she has an urge, suddenly, to hear him say it, to see Draco Malfoy use magic to get a bloke.
“Fuck it, Granger,” he snaps. “You know what I want to know.”
Hermione tilts her head. “Perhaps.”
Malfoy closes his eyes and visibly counts to ten, his chest rising and falling evenly ten times.
“How long until the potion takes effect?”
Hermione very nearly laughs, but catches herself just in time. A self-satisfied smirk escapes anyway. For a moment, Malfoy’s desperation makes him seem almost human.
She turns serious. “The time varies. In some cases, it only took a few hours, in others, weeks. In a few cases, it took several years.”
The anxiety immediately present in Malfoy’s eyes is more satisfying than Hermione ever thought it would be.
Blaise is the practiced look of casual nonchalance as he calmly buttons up his white Oxford as though he hasn’t just spent the last hour fucking Harry Potter senseless.
It makes it that much easier, that air of condescension, for Harry to just blurt out what he meant to say an hour and a half ago.
Blaise’s eyes flash with a sign of pure emotion lurking somewhere in his segregated brain, and, without a word, he walks out.
Harry, still naked and leaning against the cold cold stone, sinks to the ground and thinks, That was easier than I thought.
And, he adds, much more pleasurable besides.
Draco is curled up under his covers, quietly moving his hand over his hard cock when Zabini throws open the door looking and acting like a natural disaster. His eyes are dark and stormy, and the yellow candlelight casts an unearthly glow onto his pale skin.
Frantically, Draco thinks of the most disturbing thoughts he can-his parents having sex, Dumbledore jerking off, being burned on his penis, that frilly white dress shirt no one knows he has-but all he can focus on is the anger and power in Zabini right now, and unable to help it, he grows harder. Even the brush of his sheets is sensory overload.
Please don’t come over here. Please please please.
But he does, and Draco considers trying to hide his erection, but it’s futile now, and so he acts as though it’s nothing unusual.
Zabini, on the other hand, takes one look at Draco’s cock jutting out from his body and, without the slightest warning, slithers up to kiss Draco just once, and then back down to wrap his mouth around Draco’s length.
Draco, hard as he tries, can’t think of anyone who does this better.
His last thought before he lapses into mindlessness is this is just one more reason he hates Potter.
For days, Harry sees very little of Blaise. He steals glances at him during breakfast, lunch, supper, during classes, in between classes, in the corridors, but that is all useless and empty, and leaves Harry with a heavy sense of isolation. Before long, Harry comes to realise that feeling means he misses Blaise with quiet desperation.
He begins to formulate a plan to get Blaise back.
(He wouldn’t take him back, not now.)
“Hey!” Harry shouts, running after Theodore Nott. Theodore turns just in time to see Harry catch up.
“Potter?” Theodore looks curiously at Harry, but it’s more curiosity, not contempt or disgust.
That, Harry believes, is a good sign, and so he ploughs on.
“Yeah. Look, would you maybe want to go to the Tree Broomsticks for a drink with me sometime?”
Theodore arches a suspiciously perfect eyebrow. “A date, Potter?”
Harry weighs his options: “Uh, yeah.”
(Please say yes. Please please please say yes. I’ve heard the rumours, now just say yes.)
Harry can sense his answer before Theodore makes any indication of his response. A long moment passes, and then Theodore nods, once, sharply and decisively. “Sure, why not?” Theodore falls silent and a look ghosts over his face, as though a thought has just occurred to him. Harry prays it is not what he thinks it is.
But then the look is gone and as Theodore says, “Owl me anytime,” Harry suddenly finds his eyes drawn to Theodore’s lips. Blaise’s lips are thin; Theodore’s are plump and full and Harry wants to tug the bottom lip into his mouth and suck. Theodore seems to sense this because without warning he leans forward and places a feather-light kiss on Harry’s lips.
(So the rumours were true.)
“You’re a curious sort, Potter. I like that.”
And with that, Theodore flashes Harry a smile and slips away.
Smiling to himself, Harry starts back to the tower and sees Blaise watching intently. They stop and time freezes as their eyes lock in a silent duel. Harry blinks; Blaise walks toward him.
Blaise grips Harry’s forearm and digs his fingers in. Harry tries not to wince.
Coldly: “Don’t even wait until the sheets are cold, do you?” But then Blaise laughs, a clear and sharp shard of ice that pulses with Harry’s heart, and remarks, “But then, I didn’t either, so why should I expect you to? I am, after all,” he says, his eyes turning dark, “the one that’s supposed to be upset.”
Blaise regards Harry like he is a crude specimen he must examine in Care of Magical Creatures, and then smiles, but it is a smile only by definition; there is no warmth or happiness in the slow curvature of his tightly pressed lips.
Standing in place, Harry watches as Blaise strides down the corridor until he fades into the shadows.
As the sound of footsteps falls away, Harry decides his plan is not so much a plan to get Blaise back as it is a plot to evoke jealousy.
He notes with certainty that it does not appear to be working.
Ron’s worried. Hermione can tell, because he’s biting his nails until they bleed and his scarf is unravelling from all the yarn he’s pulled out and his buttons are mismatched and there are dark circles under his eyes.
There’s nothing you can do now, she tries to tell him, tries to convince him.
All you can do is be a friend. He has to learn to make his own choices.
They’re teenagers, all of them, and they’re too young, far too young.
They have become adults trapped in the bodies of children, their minds racing as they struggle to find new plans of attack and new plans of defence and new routes out of the castle and into Hogsmeade.
We’re only teenagers. He’s going to make mistakes, and he’ll learn from them. I promise, Ron.
Ron stares at her, wide-eyed and bewildered.
“Make mistakes?” he bellows, and Hermione cowers, just a bit, from the sheer force of his yell.
But she recovers quickly and retorts, just as loud and far more shrilly, “You can’t expect him to be perfect! He’s human!”
“Harry can’t fucking afford to make mistakes, not right now, and not with fucking Slytherins!” Ron throws his arms up in frustration, and then jabs a finger at Hermione. “When this over, when we don’t have to worry about our fucking lives, he can make all the mistakes he bloody well wants to and hell, I’ll probably make more, but right now, right fucking now, he needs to get his goddamn priorities straight!”
Ron heaves a huge sigh and collapses onto a plush red armchair.
“I…I just worry about him, Hermione. He doesn’t know what he’s doing. He’s blinded.” His voice is shaking and his face is red and he’s almost in tears, and Hermione can’t help but walk over and sit on the armrest and stroke his hair.
Everything will be okay.
“It won’t be,” Ron says, and cranes his head to look at her, “but thanks for trying.”
Hermione wants to say that Harry is blinded, yes, but perhaps being blinded in this time of chaos isn’t an entirely awful thing, that perhaps he needs that shield from the world to keep going, but just then Harry walks in, sees Hermione and Ron, and she can tell he knows they were talking about him.
She opens her mouth to explain, but before she has the chance to speak, Harry gives them both a hopeless stare filled with unspoken pain and she thinks better of it. Hermione stands up from the armrest and walks toward Harry, uncertainty reigning supreme. But he accepts her hug and returns it, and gently smoothes down her wild brown hair.
I love you. The whisper is so soft she wonders if she’s imagining it, crafting words out of air. But then he whispers something else, and for the first time in a long time, Hermione believes that things might really be okay.
The day Theodore accompanies Harry to Hogsmeade is a cold, crisp day in December. The sky is clean and bright, and the sun shines brightly down on the snow, and everything is white white white.
As they’re walking, shoulder to shoulder, their steps falling in sync, snow begins to fall, swirling in a gentle wind. Harry is taken aback when, in a show of uncharacteristic immaturity, Theodore flashes a brilliant grin at Harry and runs a few steps ahead of him, and then turns, throws his arms up, and spins around and around and around, laughing, like he’s calling down the angels to earth.
Harry catches his arm and pulls him so they are face to face, their eyes locked. Theodore has such long eyelashes, Harry observes.
“You’re…beautiful,” he blurts out, and then looks away, blushing. “Sorry, I, uh-“
He’s cut off because Theodore rests his hand on Harry’s jawbone and turns his head so he’s looking right at Harry when he closes the small distance between them and kisses him, deep and searching.
Breathless, they pull apart.
“Uh,” Harry stammers, “let’s get that drink, yes?”
Laughing lightly, Theodore nods, grabs Harry’s hand, and together they weave through the throng of shoppers searching for Christmas gifts for their friends and families and significant others, everyone bundled up in scarves and hats and gloves and coats. Harry doesn’t like hats and he lost a glove a week ago and the coat he’s wearing he bought last year; Theodore only has a coat and his nose is tipped in rose, and his cheeks are flushed with cold, only Harry keeps thinking about how he must look when he’s flushed with heat. He makes a note to find out sometime.
Theodore presses his leg against Harry’s the entire time they are inside, and even holds his hand for some time. They discuss the concept of time until they have both gone mindless.
Only then does Harry see that Theodore is everything Blaise is not.
“What the fuck’re you doing, Zabini? Have you gone mad?” Draco yells, but his voice is quickly stopped by the blow Zabini lands to his stomach. He does not like the wild look in Zabini’s eyes, the desperate dark anger, and wants to get as far away as possible. He bruises easily, and purple-or worse, yellow-green-blends in terribly with his complexion.
“What did you do, Malfoy? Tell me what you did.”
Oh.
A slow, satisfied sneer turns the corners of Draco’s mouth up.
“Me? Oh, I did nothing,” Draco says with an air of innocence that he knows Blaise will not believe.
“Nothing. Nothing. Fuck nothing.” Zabini’s eyes are dark, darker than his hair, darker than the night descending around them even though it’s only just after four.
He turns, as if to leave, but Draco reaches out a hand, grabs a handful of his shirt (so white) and then their lips are pressed together, though it is less of a kiss than an attempt to suffocate one another.
And then, and then, and then…
Draco breathes, tries to breathe Zabini in, tries to breathe in his essence, tries to gasp when Zabini’s fingers score his skin through the thin cotton of his shirt, tries-and succeeds-to moan when Zabini begins rolling his hips in harsh, rhythmic circles against Draco’s groin.
He’s starting to feel faint when Zabini rips his mouth away from Draco’s and latches onto his neck, teeth scraping at his tender skin, and Draco doesn’t bother to think about what that’ll look like in a few hours because it feels too damn perfect.
Draco entertains the idea of getting Zabini’s clothes off, but then decides whether they are dressed or not is irrelevant; Zabini is pressing into him, his entire body crushing Draco to the dormitory wall, and all Draco can do is hang on and hope his knees don’t give out before he comes.
Moments later, the last remnants of sanity have flown out of Draco’s head and his hips buck against Zabini, hard and fast, the urgency overwhelming.
But Zabini does not let go quite yet; he closes his eyes and grinds his hips so viciously against Draco that Draco almost cries out from the over stimulation of his hypersensitive nerves.
Only after Draco feels Zabini’s convulsions and feels liquid heat seeping through his clothes does Zabini pull back, breathing heavy, but standing steadily. Draco, on the other hand, slides to the ground, his limbs languid and tired.
“You,” he says quietly, sleepily, “are one fucked up bloke.”
Zabini snorts. He drops to his knees and moves to Draco’s side. Draco lets his head drop onto Zabini’s shoulder, and he melts into the arm Zabini wraps around his shoulder. With all concerns for his own well-being dissipated, Draco’s eyelids slide shut.
“What,” Zabini says very, very softly, his voice sounding just like a rustle of sheets, “did you do to me?” He strokes Draco’s hair and Draco snuggles into him, smiling happily.
“Mm,” he hums. “Potion.”
Zabini curses under his breath, but Draco doesn’t hear because he’s already fallen asleep.
When Draco wakes, Zabini is sitting cross-legged with a book across his lap. It looks suspiciously old, suspiciously like-
Oh, fuck.
Draco lets loose a stream of obscenities and Zabini finally looks up.
Part 2
Author: vexiphem
Rating: NC-17
Pairings: Harry/Blaise, Draco/Blaise, Harry/Theodore
Summary: Malfoy, Blaise muses, is like water. Harry is like fire, destroying everything in his wake. Blaise is the earth, the foundation of life. Draco is flooding him, seeping into him and drowning him, dousing out Harry, and slowly destroying them all.
Word Count: 13,068
Disclaimers: If you choose to sue, leave my CDs out of it.
Author’s Notes: For tornslayer. Terribly, terribly sorry this is so late; RL took over and I just didn't have enough time to finish this. This is the longest piece I've written in quite a while, and also the most experimental I think I've ever written. It's circular, so it ends where it begins, begins where it ends, all that stuff. I don't think this is quite what you were expecting, but I hope you enjoy it. And have a happy new year!
Elemental
I. In Love and In Lust
Harry Potter takes one last look around and buries his sins.
Malfoy, Blaise muses, is like water. Malfoy flows between the cracks of the foundation, liquid vines eroding the earth until there is nothing left but his prize. He’d freeze him, make him lighter, ensure they didn’t both drown.
Silhouetted against the stone wall is Malfoy. Potter, of course, does not notice. Blaise doubts he would care; Potter never cares about anything else when he’s got Blaise on his back and is ramming himself balls-deep into him.
Fuck you, Blaise mouths, vicious and brutal over Potter’s shoulder. He wants to take Potter apart at the seams. Malfoy takes the bait and storms off in a silent huff.
Blaise focuses on fucking Potter again. He would reach down between them, but Potter’s stomach is already stroking his cock enough, and truthfully, neither of them will long enough for it to make a difference.
Blaise comes back to the dorms late that night. Draco is still up waiting.
Draco chooses his words carefully: “Do you enjoy Potter’s company?” Not Do you like fucking him or Do you care about him. He’s not sure he wants the answer to those questions.
Blaise shrugs, his shirt rising just above his trousers. Draco does not appreciate the flash of skin he tries not to see.
“D’you think we talk?” Blaise says as means of reply. The candle on Draco’s bedside table flickers, casting dancing shadows to splay across the wall. Blaise’s mouth stretches into a Cheshire Cat grin and he strips off his shirt before reclining back into his bed, sated.
Draco says nothing. Of course they talk; they must. No one-no one-can spend that much time with another and not feel compelled to talk. Even a little, even if they’re only talking about-
“Why?”
Blaise’s laugh cuts through the air, ringing like perfectly sharpened sword slicing the air apart. “Does it matter?”
Draco bristles. “No,” he answers flatly, and blows out his candle.
Black.
The sun sets auburn crimson over the horizon. The last rays of light bleed through the branches of autumnal trees.
Draco looks up from his novel. He sees fire in those trees, feels the heat sear through his every nerve.
He burns, wants to burn, like a phoenix reducing itself to smouldering ash. He wants the vicious fragility, to teeter on the delicate balance. But unlike the phoenix, he will not rise from the earth.
The crunch of grass being stepped on greets his ears; someone is walking toward him.
“Get the fuck away from me, Potter.”
The footsteps stop. Then they begin again and seconds later, a body sits down beside him. Draco glanced over his shoulder.
“As you can clearly see, I am not Potter.”
Not thinking: “You may as well be.”
“Oh, fuck you, Malfoy.”
“Language,” Draco remarks and dog-ears a page. “What do you want?”
“I don’t know. To talk. To do some of that male bonding crap neither of us is any good at.”
Draco sneers, “I imagine you’ve done enough ‘bonding’ with Potter, Zabini. I’m merely an afterthought.”
Zabini’s cheeks tinge red as blood trickles to them, staining his pale skin. But instead of giving Draco the satisfaction of humiliation, he spits out, “Jealous?”
Draco’s lip curls involuntarily as he mutters, “Of you and Potter? No.” Zabini’s eyes penetrate and evoke sensations Draco does not want to acknowledge. “That you’re getting laid on a regular basis, yes.”
But then Draco pauses and thinks for a moment. “Although, truth be told, if I had to choose between celibacy and fucking Potter, I imagine I’d choose the former.”
Zabini snorts. “You couldn’t voluntarily live without sex if you tried.”
Draco arches an eyebrow. “Is that a bet I hear?”
Shaking his head no, Zabini replies, “Just a fact.”
After glaring for a moment, Draco rises to his feet, tucks his copy of How to Become a Dark Overlord under his arm, and walks off without another word.
Blaise draws in a huge gulp of smoke.
“Zabini.” Potter’s voice cuts through the thin air and distorts the smoke when Blaise exhales.
“Potter,” he says as a response. He takes another drag, his cheeks hollowing as he draws the sweet poison in. As he breathes out, he appraises Potter. “You’re too skinny, you know.”
Potter doesn’t answer, but he does step forward and take the cigarette from between Blaise’s thumb and forefinger. He tosses the cigarette down to the stone and grinds it out beneath his toe.
Blaise looks carefully down at the deceased fag, then back up at Potter.
Slowly: “Do tell me, Potter: What. The. Fuck. Was that for?”
Potter holds Blaise’s eyes with a stony gaze. “Cigarettes will kill you.”
Blaise shrugs. “And your point is?”
Potter mumbles that maybe he doesn’t really have a point, and then Blaise takes two hands to Potter’s shoulders and presses him into the stone wall.
“Next time, have a better explanation.”
Blaise meets Potter’s lips with bruising force, but Potter only shifts his hips against Blaise and kisses him back just as fiercely.
The heat of Potter’s body, the white light that sears past Blaise’s closed eyelids, the languid collapse against the wall: these things beg no explanation, and really, perhaps it’s better if they remain unexplained.
Draco is lying belly down on his bed with his feet up in the air and his head propped on his hands. He turns a dusty page in the book in front of him. He has moved on from How to Become a Dark Overlord because Nathaniel Roeper knows absolutely nothing, or else Draco knows everything. The diagrams in this book are crude and undefined. Draco doesn’t care. He memorises every rare ingredient, every meticulous procedure, and then when he hears the door creak open, clamps the book shut and shoves it under his pillow.
“What were you reading?” Zabini asks, stripping off his robe and shirt. He chucks them over his bedpost, where they both watch as the clothing threatens to fall. When they don’t, Zabini addresses Draco again. “What were you reading? Anything interesting?”
Draco shakes his head. “Just some novel by a Muggle author,” he says, realizing too late that a Muggle book is likely more damning than a Dark Arts one.
But Zabini just grins with maddening satisfaction, and then slithers under his covers.
A blue moon only occurs once every two and a half years. If Draco’s calculations are correct, the last blue moon had been forty three months ago.
This was not happening. The sheer improbability, the fucking impossibility, of this happening was proved by the simple fact that this was not happening.
Harry sat on the Quidditch field with his head in his hands. The bodies all around him taunted him.
Potter is slumped against the wall, his knees drawn close to his chest. A piece of parchment sits on his thighs and he is scrawling something hurriedly.
“Well, Potter, I never took you to be the academic type, but clearly I was wrong.” Blaise slides down the wall next to him, looking over at a mess of words. Potter’s handwriting is sharp and angular, like his shoulders, like his hips. Blaise figures he would have to squint to read it, so he doesn’t.
He doubts any of it really matters.
Potter stops writing suddenly and shoves the parchment into Blaise’s hands. The soft crinkle charges the air.
Blaise reads the first line, and then throws the letter on the ground.
“Are you honestly going to sit there and wait for me to read that entire thing? It’s two fucking pages and your writing is tiny.”
Potter chews his lip, and then turns away as he says, “Just read the fucking thing.”
Blaise picks up the parchment again, holds it in front of Potter’s face, and rips it down the middle, breaking the delicate words apart.
“If you have something to tell me, then say it.”
Potter says nothing.
Throughout the second Potions exam of the semester, Draco’s mind drifts.
3. Name the four rare ingredients in the Aegis Elixir and where they can be found.
Draco leaves it blank, because the only ingredients he can think of are the ones he knows he will need to retrieve by the end of November.
Snape approaches him two days later, Draco’s test clenched in his hand.
“Mr Malfoy,” he says, “what is this about?”
Draco sees the grade circled in green at the top right-hand corner. He should care more about receiving an F than he does.
Draco says simply, “I had forgotten about the test. I’m sorry, Professor.”
After everything, Harry thinks this death should be simple. He is not surprised, however, when it proves to be the most difficult.
On the evening of November twenty-fourth, Draco slips out of the dormitory and goes for a walk in the Forbidden Forest.
The autumn air chills Draco to the bone, but he does not mind. He wants to stay outside for as long as he needs to, until he finds the proper ingredients.
And he will. He knows he will.
“You wanted me to say something to you?” Potter asks, his eyes turned down.
“If the alternative is reading two pages of your microscopic handwriting, then yes.” Blaise stretches his arm in front of him, examining his nails. He folds his hands together in satisfaction, and then looks up at Potter expectantly.
“I, er…” Potter hems and haws, fumbling over his words.
“You…” Blaise prompts. Lifting one hand to Potter’s face, Blaise turns his head to force Potter to make eye contact.
Potter wrenches away, almost violently, and, in one very quick burst of defeat, mutters “I’m tired of this sneaking around.”
Blaise takes a hard look at Potter, gauging his intent. “By that, you mean you want to come out, don’t you? Are you fucking mad, Potter?”
“No, I’m not fucking mad!” Potter’s eyes fall and he chews his lip. “But don’t you-“
“No.”
“Won’t you at least-“
“No.”
“Oh, fuck you, Zabini. You’re hopeless.”
Blaise snorts. “At least, Potter, I’m not a hopeless romantic. That’ll get you killed in this world.”
Potter makes two quick strides. He cups Blaise’s face in his hands. “I’d rather have a heart than whatever it is you possess.” A flash of anger sweeps through Blaise, and he slams his lips against Potter’s, hot and searching.
Their tongues intertwine, Blaise’s reaching far into the depths of Potter’s mouth, like he wants to breathe him in, breathe him in and figure him out. And he reckons maybe he can, because Potter is everywhere, drifting and waiting for Blaise to come along.
But not now, because now is not the time for love or even for like.
Blaise pulls away and Potter’s lips follow until Blaise puts his hand against his face.
“Perhaps I have no heart, but you wouldn’t have me any other way. Face it, Potter. You need me to be heartless.”
And he does, he really does. Potter is so full of love, but he hurts so much, has lost so much, and he can’t find it in himself to hurt himself the way he believes he needs to be hurt.
At least, this is what Blaise believes when Potter doesn’t answer.
He shakes with fury. “Fine. Do it. I dare you.”
He clearly does not expect Harry to do anything.
Ron, though perhaps not the most observant bloke, does take note of the fact that Harry is coming in later and later every night, and of the dark circles under his eyes that are becoming more and more prominent.
He approaches Hermione about Harry’s sleeping habits, and when she bites her lip and turns her head away, he decides he does not want to hear anymore.
From that point on, Ron stops asking Harry where he’s been and instead begins to devise a plan to discover for himself.
With her hair tied up in a bun, Hermione is sitting at a long oak table in the library with books on ancient wars and leaders and strategies. She turns another page and rests her head on her arm, growing tired of reading the same analyses in new words, and sometimes not even.
She hears a chair being pulled away from the table, but does not look up.
“Granger.”
With sudden violence, Hermione bolts upright and slams the book closed. “What do you want?” she asks, narrowing her eyes.
Malfoy opens his mouth as if to say something of great importance, but then he closes it again and Hermione gathers up her books and prepares to leave.
“Wait.”
“What do you want?” Hermione asks again, turning back to face him quickly.
“I’m doing an extra credit project for Professor Snape.”
Hermione shifts the weight of her books to one arm. She tucks a loose strand of hair behind her ear. “Go on.”
Draco curses at himself as he walks down the staircase into the dungeons. Why he had decided Granger’s assistance was invaluable, he still is not sure.
But he remains certain that without Granger, his entire plan will go to hell.
It is worth a few slaps in the face.
Blaise toys with the idea of taking Potter up on his desire to go public a few times, once even going so far as to plan an announcement during breakfast in the Great Hall. But when the time comes, he stays quiet.
“Blaise,” Pansy starts, “can I ask you something?”
“You just did.” Blaise’s tone leaves no room for discussion.
Pansy takes a bite of toast and frowns. “Fine.”
Potter catches Blaise’s eye from across the room. As though embarrassed, Potter turns his head away and focuses intently on his tea. Blaise continues staring at Potter, tracing his slumped shoulders.
Eventually, Potter turns his head up again and their eyes lock. The tip of Blaise’s tongue peeks out and he runs it across his top lip. Potter flushes deeply and a slow smile of satisfaction spreads over Blaise’s lips. If such simple communication, Blaise muses, creates such a flurry in Potter’s stomach, then the boy would pass out if Blaise were to allow this mockery of a relationship go public.
Potter looks away and says something to Granger. She looks around for a moment before finding Blaise. Blaise quirks an eyebrow at her, daring her to say something.
Can you protect him, dear girl? Do you want to protect him from the big bad Slytherin?
She opens her mouth, as though to protest, but just as quickly she shuts it again and shifts her gaze. Blaise follows her line of sight, which he reckons could cut and bleed him. When his eyes fall on Malfoy, he blinks, and then looks away. He does not want to know.
Three days later, Malfoy comes in with scratch marks scored into his face.
Blaise does not ask, Malfoy does not tell.
II. Shadows Fall
“Fuck you, Potter. Just-fuck you.” His voice quavers and hangs in the air, as though he does not truly mean it.
But Harry can no longer bear to look at him, and so he must believe that he means it. When he does, all he sees are sins. He is unclean, unworthy, unsafe.
They are not two parts of the same person; they never were; they never will be. That is the way it is meant to be.
Harry says so.
“Have you figured out anything new?” Draco asks Granger. He doesn’t look at her, because he does not want to incur any more of her anger, but he knows that if she does have any new information he will have to pay a price.
She rubs a hand under his chin before tilting his head up to look at her.
“You,” she says pointedly, “are the most disgusting human being I have ever met. Why am I helping you?”
“Because Blaise is fucking your best friend.”
She visibly restrains from making a nasty comment, throws a piece of parchment at him, and storms out. The door slams behind her violently.
Draco is under the impression that he ought to care, but he just picks up the paper, reads the information carefully, and grins slowly.
He’s almost done.
The dreams (nightmares) are back, and Ron can tell even if Harry won’t admit it.
Whenever Ron wakes Harry up in the morning, his sheets are always twisted around his ankles, his blankets a mess, and Harry looks like a ghost with his face ashen and gaunt. The surest sign, however, is in the dulled jade of his irises. Once bright with life, Ron takes one look into Harry’s eyes and sees resignation to death.
Ron approaches Harry once and asks him if he’d, uh, like to talk about it, or something. This last part is said in a mumble, because even before the question leaves his mouth he knows the answer; Ron has always known the answer, and contrary to popular opinion, he is not thick enough not to notice.
He notices, all right; the problem is Ron speaks before he considers all aspects of a situation.
The look Harry gives him is one of pure disdain, and Ron tries to use all his mental power to remind himself that the disdain is not directed at him, but rather at the situation.
(Because it is. Right?)
Right.
Under the soft white light of the blue moon, Draco creates a bluebell flame beneath his cauldron on the brittle, crisp green grass beside the lake.
From his cloak he retrieves a small vial of partially crystallized solution; from the glass small sharp crystals protrude. Holding it up to the light, Draco watches as the moon colours the clear liquid blue, not from any blue light of its own, but through sheer mysticism.
The cauldron is empty for now, but Draco has a satchel at his side that is filled with various potions and mushrooms and unicorn horns and feathers of phoenixes; when the moon reaches its peak, Draco will begin.
From his bag, Draco pulls a blanket and lays it on the ground. He sits down and begins laying out the items.
A more curious looking assortment of items Draco has never before seen, and for a brief moment he wonders if Granger is playing with him. But he dismisses the thought quickly, and waits.
And waits, and waits, and waits.
Draco begins humming a tune he has just created in his mind, and decides that it does not sound altogether awful. Perhaps with a better voice, he might even be able to craft lyrics and make it a hit. But not tonight.
Draco, he reminds himself stubbornly, you must focus.
With nothing better to do, Draco traces Blaise’s name into the finely ground rose quartz.
Over and over and over again.
His fingers get so used to the motion that by the time the moon is a half hour from its peak at 4:17 a.m., he is writing Blaise in elaborate and involved script without conscious thought, as memorized a movement as playing a simple C major scale; the only reason he knows it is time to begin is his wand vibrates at his hip.
Snapping into action, Draco dumps the base ingredients in: a half litre of virgin water, the extract of ten mint leaves, a teaspoon of ground bicorn horn, a handful of wild mushrooms, and seven crushed nettles. This takes him a total of four seconds; he has precisely one hour to finish this potion-a half hour before peak and a half hour after-and he needs fifty-seven minutes of just waiting.
As the nettles dissolve, a putrid stench rises and the mint tries to cover it up, not unlike scented candles burning in a freshly whitewashed room, and the contrast of smell threatens to give Draco a headache. But he doesn’t back away and he watches intently; the moment the liquid turns clear, Draco turns over the egg timer. He focuses on each grain of sand as it files from top to bottom, every second dragging on.
After ten minutes, Draco unrolls a sheet of parchment and glances over the words for reassurance, but he knows that forgetting the verse is impossible at this point.
Once you start, Draco reminds himself, there is no going back.
(You can still get out of this. You can still save your dignity. You can still save your pri-)
With a deep breath, Draco opens his mouth and, in a loud, clear voice that disturbs the silence of the night, recites:
Beneath a blue moon’s light
My intent will take flight.
Once thy will is turned,
Thy love shall be spurned and
Comfort from thine’s own self he shall seek.
When such a request they speak,
His will shall be mine,
Mind, body, and soul divine.
Draco scoops up the powdered rose quartz in his hand and sprinkles it clockwise. With a wooden ladle, he stirs the potion five times counter clockwise.
The liquid is a blush rose color and steadily growing brighter. Draco thinks of hearts and butterflies and sunsets and champagne and all those things he swore he would never think about.
He pushes his thoughts to the back of his mind, recites the verse again, waits five minutes, and then infuses the venom of a wiper and the partially crystallized antidote into the cauldron.
(Bubble, bubble,
Toil and trouble,
Cauldron burn and cauldron bubble.)
With perfect precision, a large bubble swells until it almost begins hanging off the side of the cauldron. Like balloons, Draco wonders if it will hold shape or pop. He holds his breath and for ten, maybe fifteen, seconds he dares not even blink.
In the swirls of the bubble Draco can see himself wild-eyed and anxious. He decides needy is not a good look for him and stores the information away for a later, more important time.
Finally, a small hold forms at the crest of the bubble and the air hisses as it rushes out.
Draco peers in to look at the deflated bubble. A protective coating lies over the potion, stretching and moulding as the potion boils and boils.
If all goes well…yes, the film is dissolving. Draco stirs the potion and sprinkles in more rose quartz. He adds a shot of vodka and almost jumps back when a jet of bright pink liquid shoots up in the air. But he stands his ground and waits for the potion to cool to a simmer.
Ten minutes pass…eleven…twelve…
Draco retrieves a small vial from his robes and uncorks it. With determination, Draco dumps three strands of Blaise’s hair into the cauldron.
It hisses in response and turns so deep a black Draco cannot distinguish where the cauldron ends and the potion begins, like a shadow slipping into the night. He stirs with a phoenix feather and then lets the feather fall into the liquid.
For two minutes and forty seven seconds (Draco counts carefully) the potion boils and sizzles and evaporates.
And then, with a gratuitous puff of smoke, the liquid turns beautifully and perfectly clear, sitting at the bottom of the cauldron without the slightest ripple.
“Zabini, something’s on your mind.”
Blaise shakes his head. “Nothing that would be of any concern to you.”
Harry rolls over and licks the shell of Blaise’s ear, tracing the inner labyrinth with the tip of his tongue and breathing hotly. Harry smiles when Blaise lets out a soft sigh of approval, and then yelps as he finds himself on his back staring into Blaise’s eyes.
That he cannot read Blaise’s intentions disconcerts Harry some, but that doesn’t matter, not when Blaise is aligning his hips with Harry’s and grinding down oh so fucking perfectly.
“You want me.” It sounds like an accusation, but Harry nods wildly anyway. And then, as if to prove to himself something, Blaise stops moving and simply stares at Harry.
The intensity of Blaise’s gaze is like a thousand shards of glass tearing at the fabric dreams are woven from; Harry sees the real world in Blaise’s eyes, all the torment and the suffering of reality and not this sheltered hell everyone wants to live in. Harry never, ever, ever wants that sting of truth to go away.
“I want-“
“Shut the fuck up, Potter. I said no.”
A flash of fury streams through Harry. “You’ll shag me, but you won’t even acknowledge me in public?”
“Do you have a problem with that?” As if to demonstrate exactly what Harry would be missing, Blaise slowly presses his groin into Harry’s. They release simultaneous moans. “I could go right now, if that’s what you want.” But Blaise says this a bit breathlessly and takes his time in rocking against Harry again.
“Yes,” Harry manages, “but don’t go. Please, just-fuck-don’t go.”
Harry cherishes the smirk that curves over Blaise’s lips, cherishes the way Blaise mutters, “You’re nothing but a two-bit whore, you know that?”
As long as he can keep Blaise in some capacity, Harry thinks maybe he’ll get through this goddamn war with his sanity in tact.
But then Blaise slips his hand casually into Harry’s trousers and Harry forgets all about sanity. All he feels is heat and he can’t wait to burn.
“Don’t you ever get tired of fucking Potter?” Draco asks as soon as Zabini steps into the dormitory.
“Who would I fuck instead? You?” Zabini scoffs, even as he takes a purposeful look at Draco, as if to convey he doesn’t find the idea entirely distasteful.
Draco steels his gaze and stares down Blaise in what he hopes is both disgust and infuriation. He figures if he weren’t tensed with need, it might work.
Through gritted teeth, he says, “Don’t delude yourself, Zabini. Just I wish you would be a bit more discreet. You can be quite loud.”
Zabini laughs. “You were waiting for me. You can’t tell me I’m not discreet.”
Narrowing his eyes: “I was only up because I didn’t want to be woken up at-“ Draco glances at his clock, “-2:38 in the morning.”
“Well,” Zabini says curtly, “I’m back. Go to sleep.”
There is only one choice left to make.
Except it’s not really a choice; despite what people say, Harry Potter is no martyr. Harry Potter has no desire to die for this cause.
He stares at the boy-for that is all they are: boys-in front of him and a deep rage courses through him, a rage filled with indignity, hurt, disgust-and yes, love, too.
Potter.
Harry listens to the chime of his name ringing through the air. He utters it with such nonchalance that Harry wants to scream and dig his nails into his flesh, just to provoke a reaction of some sort.
The next morning at breakfast, the coffee is placed so that Zabini must reach across Draco. As he leans over Draco slips the potion into Zabini’s mug, just a few drops to barely cover the bottom.
Draco presses his thigh against Zabini’s and says carelessly, “The Canon’s won yesterday.”
Zabini turns his head as he pours his coffee and replies that he, unfortunately, already knows.
The name Weasley darts through Draco’s head, but he dismisses the thought as quickly as he can.
It doesn’t take long because the pressure of Zabini’s thigh against his sends dizzying waves to his head, but he doesn’t move and every passing moment finds him more and more light-headed. But all he does is take a bite of toast and, out of the corner of his eye, watches Zabini take a long sip of coffee (black, no sugar).
Now all Draco has to do is wait.
It’s a shame he’s impatient.
Harry is like fire, destroying everything in his wake. He knows this, accepts it, and decides to use it to his advantage.
He meets Blaise down in the dungeons, in a room hidden from public view.
“How did you find this place?” At this point, Harry is speaking from pure curiosity.
“All the Slytherins know about it. You used to have to sign up to use it, but it’s gone out of fashion this year.” Blaise chews his nail, and Harry gets the impression there is more to the story. “What did you want to see me for? I’ve got homework to do, so make this quick.”
Oh, I can make this quick. I can make this painless and easy.
Harry strides toward Blaise until their noses are touching. “Are you sure you want me to make this quick?” Harry’s voice is low and dark. He sneaks a hand under Blaise’s button-down white Oxford and trails his fingers over his abdomen. Blaise’s muscles twitch under Harry’s touch.
Blaise wets his lips and in effect, wets Harry’s. “On second thought, I deserve a break.”
Slowly, carefully, Harry undoes Blaise’s top button as he smiles.
“Breaks,” Harry says as he licks Blaise’s collar bone, “are a wonderful invention.”
Under Blaise’s delicate, pale skin, Harry feels his pulse thrumming against his tongue. Hungrily, Harry sucks and bites until he tastes metallic. Iron and copper: pure life.
Blaise arches into him after that, his breathing heavy and erratic. Harry feels stubs of nails digging into his back and shoulders, a sweet and lovely sting. Harry’s tongue swipes on last time at Blaise’s broken skin and then moves swiftly downward. Unbuttoning Blaise’s shirt rapidly, Harry traces a swirl over and over on Blaise’s chest, abdomen, and hipbones-oh, Harry loves Blaise’s hipbones.
“Potter…” Harry detects a note of urgency in his voice, but refuses to give in just yet. He moves away from Blaise’s hips and swirls his tongue around Blaise’s nipple, catching it with his teeth and biting sharply enough to elicit a quick gasp followed by a slow moan. He repeats this with the other nipple, but this time he makes good use of his hands and runs them smoothly over Blaise’s arse and squeezing tightly, delighting in the firm curves. Blaise’s hips buck forward.
“Hard already?” Harry taunts. “I’ve barely even begun.”
Blaise shoots a glare at Harry, and then in one breathless stream remarks, “so are you, and I haven’t done anything to you.”
Harry pulls back in response, but in a flash Blaise is on him, knocking him to the ground in violent abandon. Falling, Harry hits his head with a flash of white, and then he tastes metal in his mouth again, only this time it’s his. Blaise’s hands are busy ripping Harry’s shirt off and he kisses Harry hard, sucking his bottom lip into his mouth.
Without missing a beat, Blaise undoes Harry’s buckle with minimal fumbling…and then stops.
Harry tears his lips away from Blaise and growls. “What the fuck are you playing at?”
Blaise laughs, a deep, husky laugh from deep inside him, and it makes Harry shiver, though he tries not to show it.
“You’re so fucking impatient, Potter,” Blaise says as way of response. His breath is hot in Harry’s ear and does nothing to ease his already mounting impatience.
“You,” he reminds Blaise, “are the one who couldn’t wait to tackle me to the floor.”
“True. Why should I wait for what we both want?”
By now, Blaise has somehow got his hand wrapped around Harry’s cock and with the word ‘want’ he slides his hand down the length. Harry cannot contain his groan.
“Like that?”
Harry answers by kicking off Blaise’s trousers and underwear and running one hand over his arse and the other slowly, torturously slowly, along Blaise’s cock. It twitches in his hand and Harry smiles.
Both have their hands on the other’s cock and for a long, endless, breathless moment neither moves.
And then Blaise slithers down Harry’s body with serpentine grace and somewhere along the way Harry realizes not only has he lost control of the situation, but he does not care, either. His body is tensed with anticipation, his stomach muscles clenched tightly as he fights the temptation to press his erection into Blaise’s warmth, that warm wet heat that is so close now. Hips trying to jump when Blaise blows a breath of cold air on the head of his cock, Harry is restrained by Blaise’s fingers pressing tightly down on his hips. They will leave bruises.
Nevertheless, when Blaise licks a long, slow path from the base of Harry’s cock to the tip, Harry feels a drawn-out moan escape his throat and he pushes against Blaise’s grip to bury himself deep in Blaise’s mouth, his entire body vibrating with need. With a drawing pull, Blaise wrenches another moan from Harry, and from then on he is relentless, constantly varying pressure and speed, keeping Harry strung taut as a bow. Harry’s getting pulled tighter and tighter, just waiting for release. His fingers scrabble in Blaise’s mop of hair and he tugs at the roots, knowing the glimpses of pain that tingle through his spine are appreciated. Blaise answers as Harry had hoped, with quick, fast jerks he knows will get Harry off faster.
Blaise is pressing down even more tightly now and Harry cannot move his hips and really, does not want to; the pressure is great enough so that he knows bruises are forming even now without any assistance from him. None of that matters, though; all that matters is the tightening in Harry’s balls, the shallow pants, the sight of Blaise’s rose red lips wrapped around Harry’s cock, Blaise’s hollowed-out cheeks, the flush that has spread all over both of them, lost in heated, unadulterated need.
Because Harry knows that even if Blaise does not want to admit it, he needs this just as much as Harry does.
Harry needs this, this abandon that allows him to close his eyes as he falls very far very fast that all he sees are bursts of colour behind his eyelids and he feels weightless and lost in terminal velocity. The entire world is dissolving around him, melting like the sugar in his coffee that morning, fading away like the memories of Sirius, which fade and fade no matter how hard he tries to hold onto them. The only difference here is he wants the world to melt away, wants to not have to deal with it anymore, just for a moment, and so Harry lets go and his hips arch up and he’s careening, blissfully unaware of everything except the honeyed fire that’s blazing through his veins.
“Granger.” Malfoy grabs Hermione’s arm and pulls her into an alcove.
Hermione rips her arm out of his grasp. “What do you want? I’ve done everything you’ve asked for, and more.”
With a look at the speckled stone floor, Malfoy starts, “How long does…”
“How long does…?” She knows what he is asking, of course, but she has an urge, suddenly, to hear him say it, to see Draco Malfoy use magic to get a bloke.
“Fuck it, Granger,” he snaps. “You know what I want to know.”
Hermione tilts her head. “Perhaps.”
Malfoy closes his eyes and visibly counts to ten, his chest rising and falling evenly ten times.
“How long until the potion takes effect?”
Hermione very nearly laughs, but catches herself just in time. A self-satisfied smirk escapes anyway. For a moment, Malfoy’s desperation makes him seem almost human.
She turns serious. “The time varies. In some cases, it only took a few hours, in others, weeks. In a few cases, it took several years.”
The anxiety immediately present in Malfoy’s eyes is more satisfying than Hermione ever thought it would be.
Blaise is the practiced look of casual nonchalance as he calmly buttons up his white Oxford as though he hasn’t just spent the last hour fucking Harry Potter senseless.
It makes it that much easier, that air of condescension, for Harry to just blurt out what he meant to say an hour and a half ago.
Blaise’s eyes flash with a sign of pure emotion lurking somewhere in his segregated brain, and, without a word, he walks out.
Harry, still naked and leaning against the cold cold stone, sinks to the ground and thinks, That was easier than I thought.
And, he adds, much more pleasurable besides.
Draco is curled up under his covers, quietly moving his hand over his hard cock when Zabini throws open the door looking and acting like a natural disaster. His eyes are dark and stormy, and the yellow candlelight casts an unearthly glow onto his pale skin.
Frantically, Draco thinks of the most disturbing thoughts he can-his parents having sex, Dumbledore jerking off, being burned on his penis, that frilly white dress shirt no one knows he has-but all he can focus on is the anger and power in Zabini right now, and unable to help it, he grows harder. Even the brush of his sheets is sensory overload.
Please don’t come over here. Please please please.
But he does, and Draco considers trying to hide his erection, but it’s futile now, and so he acts as though it’s nothing unusual.
Zabini, on the other hand, takes one look at Draco’s cock jutting out from his body and, without the slightest warning, slithers up to kiss Draco just once, and then back down to wrap his mouth around Draco’s length.
Draco, hard as he tries, can’t think of anyone who does this better.
His last thought before he lapses into mindlessness is this is just one more reason he hates Potter.
For days, Harry sees very little of Blaise. He steals glances at him during breakfast, lunch, supper, during classes, in between classes, in the corridors, but that is all useless and empty, and leaves Harry with a heavy sense of isolation. Before long, Harry comes to realise that feeling means he misses Blaise with quiet desperation.
He begins to formulate a plan to get Blaise back.
(He wouldn’t take him back, not now.)
“Hey!” Harry shouts, running after Theodore Nott. Theodore turns just in time to see Harry catch up.
“Potter?” Theodore looks curiously at Harry, but it’s more curiosity, not contempt or disgust.
That, Harry believes, is a good sign, and so he ploughs on.
“Yeah. Look, would you maybe want to go to the Tree Broomsticks for a drink with me sometime?”
Theodore arches a suspiciously perfect eyebrow. “A date, Potter?”
Harry weighs his options: “Uh, yeah.”
(Please say yes. Please please please say yes. I’ve heard the rumours, now just say yes.)
Harry can sense his answer before Theodore makes any indication of his response. A long moment passes, and then Theodore nods, once, sharply and decisively. “Sure, why not?” Theodore falls silent and a look ghosts over his face, as though a thought has just occurred to him. Harry prays it is not what he thinks it is.
But then the look is gone and as Theodore says, “Owl me anytime,” Harry suddenly finds his eyes drawn to Theodore’s lips. Blaise’s lips are thin; Theodore’s are plump and full and Harry wants to tug the bottom lip into his mouth and suck. Theodore seems to sense this because without warning he leans forward and places a feather-light kiss on Harry’s lips.
(So the rumours were true.)
“You’re a curious sort, Potter. I like that.”
And with that, Theodore flashes Harry a smile and slips away.
Smiling to himself, Harry starts back to the tower and sees Blaise watching intently. They stop and time freezes as their eyes lock in a silent duel. Harry blinks; Blaise walks toward him.
Blaise grips Harry’s forearm and digs his fingers in. Harry tries not to wince.
Coldly: “Don’t even wait until the sheets are cold, do you?” But then Blaise laughs, a clear and sharp shard of ice that pulses with Harry’s heart, and remarks, “But then, I didn’t either, so why should I expect you to? I am, after all,” he says, his eyes turning dark, “the one that’s supposed to be upset.”
Blaise regards Harry like he is a crude specimen he must examine in Care of Magical Creatures, and then smiles, but it is a smile only by definition; there is no warmth or happiness in the slow curvature of his tightly pressed lips.
Standing in place, Harry watches as Blaise strides down the corridor until he fades into the shadows.
As the sound of footsteps falls away, Harry decides his plan is not so much a plan to get Blaise back as it is a plot to evoke jealousy.
He notes with certainty that it does not appear to be working.
Ron’s worried. Hermione can tell, because he’s biting his nails until they bleed and his scarf is unravelling from all the yarn he’s pulled out and his buttons are mismatched and there are dark circles under his eyes.
There’s nothing you can do now, she tries to tell him, tries to convince him.
All you can do is be a friend. He has to learn to make his own choices.
They’re teenagers, all of them, and they’re too young, far too young.
They have become adults trapped in the bodies of children, their minds racing as they struggle to find new plans of attack and new plans of defence and new routes out of the castle and into Hogsmeade.
We’re only teenagers. He’s going to make mistakes, and he’ll learn from them. I promise, Ron.
Ron stares at her, wide-eyed and bewildered.
“Make mistakes?” he bellows, and Hermione cowers, just a bit, from the sheer force of his yell.
But she recovers quickly and retorts, just as loud and far more shrilly, “You can’t expect him to be perfect! He’s human!”
“Harry can’t fucking afford to make mistakes, not right now, and not with fucking Slytherins!” Ron throws his arms up in frustration, and then jabs a finger at Hermione. “When this over, when we don’t have to worry about our fucking lives, he can make all the mistakes he bloody well wants to and hell, I’ll probably make more, but right now, right fucking now, he needs to get his goddamn priorities straight!”
Ron heaves a huge sigh and collapses onto a plush red armchair.
“I…I just worry about him, Hermione. He doesn’t know what he’s doing. He’s blinded.” His voice is shaking and his face is red and he’s almost in tears, and Hermione can’t help but walk over and sit on the armrest and stroke his hair.
Everything will be okay.
“It won’t be,” Ron says, and cranes his head to look at her, “but thanks for trying.”
Hermione wants to say that Harry is blinded, yes, but perhaps being blinded in this time of chaos isn’t an entirely awful thing, that perhaps he needs that shield from the world to keep going, but just then Harry walks in, sees Hermione and Ron, and she can tell he knows they were talking about him.
She opens her mouth to explain, but before she has the chance to speak, Harry gives them both a hopeless stare filled with unspoken pain and she thinks better of it. Hermione stands up from the armrest and walks toward Harry, uncertainty reigning supreme. But he accepts her hug and returns it, and gently smoothes down her wild brown hair.
I love you. The whisper is so soft she wonders if she’s imagining it, crafting words out of air. But then he whispers something else, and for the first time in a long time, Hermione believes that things might really be okay.
The day Theodore accompanies Harry to Hogsmeade is a cold, crisp day in December. The sky is clean and bright, and the sun shines brightly down on the snow, and everything is white white white.
As they’re walking, shoulder to shoulder, their steps falling in sync, snow begins to fall, swirling in a gentle wind. Harry is taken aback when, in a show of uncharacteristic immaturity, Theodore flashes a brilliant grin at Harry and runs a few steps ahead of him, and then turns, throws his arms up, and spins around and around and around, laughing, like he’s calling down the angels to earth.
Harry catches his arm and pulls him so they are face to face, their eyes locked. Theodore has such long eyelashes, Harry observes.
“You’re…beautiful,” he blurts out, and then looks away, blushing. “Sorry, I, uh-“
He’s cut off because Theodore rests his hand on Harry’s jawbone and turns his head so he’s looking right at Harry when he closes the small distance between them and kisses him, deep and searching.
Breathless, they pull apart.
“Uh,” Harry stammers, “let’s get that drink, yes?”
Laughing lightly, Theodore nods, grabs Harry’s hand, and together they weave through the throng of shoppers searching for Christmas gifts for their friends and families and significant others, everyone bundled up in scarves and hats and gloves and coats. Harry doesn’t like hats and he lost a glove a week ago and the coat he’s wearing he bought last year; Theodore only has a coat and his nose is tipped in rose, and his cheeks are flushed with cold, only Harry keeps thinking about how he must look when he’s flushed with heat. He makes a note to find out sometime.
Theodore presses his leg against Harry’s the entire time they are inside, and even holds his hand for some time. They discuss the concept of time until they have both gone mindless.
Only then does Harry see that Theodore is everything Blaise is not.
“What the fuck’re you doing, Zabini? Have you gone mad?” Draco yells, but his voice is quickly stopped by the blow Zabini lands to his stomach. He does not like the wild look in Zabini’s eyes, the desperate dark anger, and wants to get as far away as possible. He bruises easily, and purple-or worse, yellow-green-blends in terribly with his complexion.
“What did you do, Malfoy? Tell me what you did.”
Oh.
A slow, satisfied sneer turns the corners of Draco’s mouth up.
“Me? Oh, I did nothing,” Draco says with an air of innocence that he knows Blaise will not believe.
“Nothing. Nothing. Fuck nothing.” Zabini’s eyes are dark, darker than his hair, darker than the night descending around them even though it’s only just after four.
He turns, as if to leave, but Draco reaches out a hand, grabs a handful of his shirt (so white) and then their lips are pressed together, though it is less of a kiss than an attempt to suffocate one another.
And then, and then, and then…
Draco breathes, tries to breathe Zabini in, tries to breathe in his essence, tries to gasp when Zabini’s fingers score his skin through the thin cotton of his shirt, tries-and succeeds-to moan when Zabini begins rolling his hips in harsh, rhythmic circles against Draco’s groin.
He’s starting to feel faint when Zabini rips his mouth away from Draco’s and latches onto his neck, teeth scraping at his tender skin, and Draco doesn’t bother to think about what that’ll look like in a few hours because it feels too damn perfect.
Draco entertains the idea of getting Zabini’s clothes off, but then decides whether they are dressed or not is irrelevant; Zabini is pressing into him, his entire body crushing Draco to the dormitory wall, and all Draco can do is hang on and hope his knees don’t give out before he comes.
Moments later, the last remnants of sanity have flown out of Draco’s head and his hips buck against Zabini, hard and fast, the urgency overwhelming.
But Zabini does not let go quite yet; he closes his eyes and grinds his hips so viciously against Draco that Draco almost cries out from the over stimulation of his hypersensitive nerves.
Only after Draco feels Zabini’s convulsions and feels liquid heat seeping through his clothes does Zabini pull back, breathing heavy, but standing steadily. Draco, on the other hand, slides to the ground, his limbs languid and tired.
“You,” he says quietly, sleepily, “are one fucked up bloke.”
Zabini snorts. He drops to his knees and moves to Draco’s side. Draco lets his head drop onto Zabini’s shoulder, and he melts into the arm Zabini wraps around his shoulder. With all concerns for his own well-being dissipated, Draco’s eyelids slide shut.
“What,” Zabini says very, very softly, his voice sounding just like a rustle of sheets, “did you do to me?” He strokes Draco’s hair and Draco snuggles into him, smiling happily.
“Mm,” he hums. “Potion.”
Zabini curses under his breath, but Draco doesn’t hear because he’s already fallen asleep.
When Draco wakes, Zabini is sitting cross-legged with a book across his lap. It looks suspiciously old, suspiciously like-
Oh, fuck.
Draco lets loose a stream of obscenities and Zabini finally looks up.
Part 2