FEST GIFT FOR DM_P
Title: It doesn’t get easier to tell the truth.
Recepient: dm_p
Author: it’s a secret :)
Beta’ed: R
Pairing: Ron/Draco, Luna/Hermione, Ron/OFC (Stella Weston) friendship, Hermione/Draco friendship
Rating: Hard R/NC-17
Warnings: Swearing, Weapon Use, Fist Fights, Drinking, Sexual Tension, Bigotry, Angst, M/M Sex
Disclaimer: This story is based on characters and situations created and owned by JK Rowling, various publishers including but not limited to Bloomsbury Books, Scholastic Books and Raincoast Books, and Warner Bros., Inc. No money is being made and no copyright or trademark infringement is intended.
Summary: After he came out to his family five years ago, Ron Weasley was exiled from the magical world he grew up in. Now, five year later, one Draco Malfoy shows up on his doorstep to ask a favor, that would risk Ron’s life, but maybe save the memory of the deceased Harry Potter.
Timeline: Forget basically everything about the seventh book, especially the epilogue! This is set eight years after the war, and five years after the death of Harry Potter.
A/N: In a lot of fan fictions I read, the wizarding world is this great place where gay people are accepted. It’s a great idea, especially in a world were love is defined as between a man and a woman, but I wanted to write about a wizarding world that’s not so into gay rights. This isn’t a light and fluffy piece, but I feel it needed to be written. I hope you enjoy it!
Word Count: Over 13,000 words
It doesn’t get easier to tell the truth. It always gets harder. The deeper you go, the harder it gets. Start again. Go into your heart and find your own truth. That will always be untarnished, fresh, red as arterial blood. And pulsing.
- Erica Jong
The alarm fired like a canon ball, ricocheting painfully through Ron’s head and tearing his dreams of warm arms and soft lips to shreds. Grumbling, he swatted at the infernal mechanical device, subduing it into silence.
“It is too early for this bloody crap.” He muttered to the frigid air, running his hands through his gingery hair, causing it to stick on end. Blindly, he stumbled into the bath, which was no warmer than the rest of the tiny flat. Fumbling with the rusty knobs, Ron winced as the freezing cold water flowed from the shower, finishing the waking process without any kindness.
Clean, and warm due entirely to his clothes in varying shades of brown, Ron deftly made coffee in a pot on the outdated wood burning stove. The caffeinated brew was bliss as it hit his lips, it’s warmth burning away the chill in the air but did nothing for the coldness of resignation in his Muggle life. He poured the majority of the coffee into a thermos, only spilling a fraction over his hands. He sat down to pull on his heavy boots, glancing at the clock propped on the mantle.
“Shit.” He cursed violently. He was late. Again. And it was raining. Again. Silently cursing himself he wondered if his day could get any fucking worse, and if he should just pack it all in and go to America, or somewhere sunny. It was always sunny in Florida, or California, or some state like that.
Somehow, he was packed and outside of his flat, locking the door within five minutes. Jogging up the stairs to street level, Ron spun on the heels of his boots, only to run into none other than Draco bloody Malfoy himself.
“I see you haven’t lost your habit of barrelling into the unknown with both eyes wide shut, have you Mr. Weasley?” the man drawled, as he arrogantly brushed off his gray cashmere gun coat with his black leather gloved hands. He had the familiar stench of money about him that he carried all through the years of school, and it still made Ron’s blood boil as much as it did back then. Perhaps even more now given the even more blaring difference between the two men’s situation. Money was apparently a good insulator against the ravages of war.
“What the hell do you want, Malfoy? I’m late for work as it is.” Ron grumbled sourly as he took the canvas tarp off his old Honda motorbike, rolling it down the alley to the main street, his building looming over them.
“You’ve been summoned to testify in a war crimes trial.” Draco stated without any preamble. His face was politely blank under the brim of his oh so very proper hat, just like a good little diplomat. Daddy would’ve been so proud.
The demand infuriated Ron more than anything the wizard had said or done in the past five minutes, which was quite the triumph. Every fibre of his being was aching to punch the slimy git squarely in his perfect nose. He sat on his bike, feet firmly on the ground, and crossed his arms over his chest, glaring at his school adversary with obvious malice. “I’ve been summoned before, and you’re wasting your time. Now, I have to go to work.”
“I’ve been briefed, and it did come up that you would be reluctant to testify. That’s why I’m here, and not some junior barrister.” Draco crossed his arms over his chest, mirroring Ron and cocking his head in a challenging manner. Frustration showed in the set of his shoulders, the slight downturn of his thin lips. “I have to insist that you testify.”
In a flash, Ron was off the motorbike, his fists full of Malfoy’s very expensive wool coat. He lifted the smaller man off his feet, slamming him into the stones of the adjacent building. Draco’s head slammed against the hard stone with a dull thunk, his hat flying off and landing in the trash and slush that lined the alleyway. His storm gray eyes widened, his breathing hitched, and Ron felt a terrifying thrill curl in his stomach.
“I can’t go back to your world just to help some Death Eater scum shave a few years off his oh so very deserved life sentence.” He hissed into Draco’s face, his breath hot with anger, his hands curling tighter around the handful of wool he grabbed.
“It’s not some Death Eater scum that’s on trial, Weasley.” Draco managed to gasp around his own clothes obstructing his airway. “It’s Harry Potter.”
The name stopped Ron cold, and he dropped Draco as if the man had burned him. The thrill that had warmed him in the freezing rain turned into ice that ran in his veins quicker than any spell. “The man’s dead. Let him rest in peace.”
“I’ve tried to keep this out of the courts, but certain people are determined to tarnish Potter’s halo one last time.” A flash of bitter sadness and regret played over the wizard’s face, desperation and weariness showing in his even words. He crossed his arms over his chest, and glared at Ron.
“Why do you care so damned much what happens to him?” his voice was filled with bile as he spat the words into Draco’s face, “Is it the hardest case this year? Will it help you to take silk?”
“I already have silk, you dolt!” Draco yelled for the first time in the encounter, his pointed face red with anger and the brief lack of oxygen. “And how dare you insinuate that I am Harry’s advocate because it would help my career!”
“Hit a nerve, did I?” Ron taunted, a momentary flash of happiness coursing through him as he had finally succeeded in causing Malfoy’s icy composure to crumble.
“How can you stand there, not caring what people say about Harry?”
“Why do you?”
“Because I Owe him a Life Debt!” Draco stood there, his hands fisted in the expensive leather gloves, his hair falling out of its hair-slide to hang in his flushed face, his eyes wide with emotion, as if the admission of Owing Harry Potter cost him more than he was prepared to offer. He was desperate, and Ron could see that frustration in every move the man made. It almost made him seem almost...human and peculiarly sympathetic.
“Come inside.” Ron rolled his bike back to its parking place, lashing the tarp into place. He walked down the steps to his flat, Draco following like a gray shadow.
The flat was still no warmer then the rain outside, but it was dry and out of the wind. Without another word, Ron made his way to the wood stove in the corner and stroked the hot coals to life with an old edition of The Times and a box of matches he kept next to the kindling box on the flagstones. As the flames licked at the paper, he shoved a plain beeswax taper set in a cheap copper candle stick into the flames. He carried the light to the table, where an old fashioned glass lamp sat. He lit the lamp with the candle, adjusting the flame to illuminate the whole kitchen.
“Don’t you believe in warming charms?” Draco’s teeth chattered around the question, and he wrapped his arms around himself in effort to conserve body heat.
“If you’re that cold, put your coat back on, Malfoy.” Ron retorted, still in his heavy leather jacket. He filled the kettle with water and set it on the stove. “The fire’ll warm us both and make us a cuppa.”
“That doesn’t answer my question.”
“Maybe you should keep your nose out of things that don’t concern you.” Ron snapped over his shoulder as he walked to the telephone in the far corner of the flat by his bed. He carried the candle stick to light his way. He didn’t need the light for walking, but he knew that he’d need it to read the numbers on the infernal phone. “Sit by the fire for a minute. I have to explain to my boss why I’m not working.”
Draco pulled a heavy wooden chair from the kitchen set of table and chairs, no doubt a hand-me-down from one sibling or another, into the circle of heat that emanated from the stove. Weasley sat on his bed, talking into the black telephone receiver that was so utterly Muggle. Everything in the sparse flat screamed Muggle and obsolete, Draco noticed, from the stove to the small bed.
There was not a Muggle device in sight, if he ignored the telephone in the corner. The man obviously relied on a bevy of beeswax tapers and the few gas lamps for all his lighting needs. The floor was covered with thick rugs of every size, shape, and colour in the bed room, but the ginger haired man has evidently run out of funds to cover the floor in the kitchen or in front of the sagging sofa that more or less divided public areas from private. The walls were covered with bookshelves filled to the brim with books and scrolls of parchment. No photographs where anywhere to be seen, and for this Draco was glad, even if it struck him odd. It was bad enough dealing with one of the Weasley clan without having the rest glaring at him from behind the glass of their picture frames.
The steam poured out of the kettle with a shriek that would put a banshee to shame, knocking Draco out of his assessment of the second youngest Weasley’s flat. He carried the kettle to the counter where a tea pot and canisters of tea sat. Measuring the correct amount of dry leaves into the pot, Draco let the tea steep as Ron finished his phone call with his boss by slamming the receiver on the cradle.
“I only have the day to deal with this, Malfoy.“ Ron informed him stiffly as he fetched two mismatched mugs from the high cupboard above the stove.
“We’ll have to set up a time for you to come to the Ministry to give your statement then.” Draco took a sip of the hot tea. It was a good brew, if very harsh and curiously smoky in taste. “It wouldn’t do for you to lose your job.”
“I haven’t agreed to give a statement yet!” He protested hotly. “And yes, it certainly wouldn’t do for me to lose my job.”
“Does your job matter more to you then the memory of your best friend?” he snorted, “And you accuse me of being mercenary!”
“I can’t go into the wizarding world,” Ron stated gruffly.
Draco snorted as he inquired, “What reason could you possibly have for living as an old fashioned Muggle - living without proper warming charms and lights?”
Ron whipped around suddenly, blue eyes blazing. “What reason could you possibly have for claiming to have a Life Debt with Harry?”
“Touché, Mr. Weasley.” Draco leaned back in his chair. The fire crackled, filling the silence that was heavy in the air. He finished his tea and stood, holding a hand out to Ron. “Well, Mr. Weasley, I do hope you reconsider your answer. It would be a boon to have your testimony on the case.”
His voice was professional, and it made Ron want to deck him just to see the warm, gushing of blood and feel the satisfying crack of cartilage. He didn’t. Instead, he stood and shook the bastard’s hand, ignoring the painful shock of magic that shot up his arm at the skin on skin contact, and asked, “How could I get in touch with you?”
Draco handed him a plain white card. “I have a phone and address for Muggle communication which you may use.”
Ron nodded, and showed the man to the door, the epitome of good manners. Only when he heard the characteristic crack of Disapparition did he let his anger crash over him in a wave, propelling his fist to punch a hole in the wall next to the door.
Every time Ron walked into the small magic shop on the corner of Main and Academy, he closed his eyes and took a deep breath. With the scents of burning candles, incense, homemade furniture polish, pipe tobacco, and mouldy old books wafting through the air, he could almost let himself pretend that he was in the wizarding world. If Stella was baking bread or drying herbs, he could easily imagine he was home in the Burrow. He felt a tinge of remorse at the thought.
“Hey!” Stella greeted him from her perch on the high stool behind the display counter with a cheery wave, breaking through his reverie. She had an uncanny knack for knowing how long to let him reminisce - never letting him linger in the world of maybes and what-ifs for too long. However, today his past clung to his mind like a thick fog, and Ron couldn’t help but notice her nails which where lacquered the bright, deathly, horrific green of the Unforgivables. He swallowed hard and forced himself not to flinch when she bounded towards him from behind the desk, her long black skirt swirling around her legs reminiscent of wizard’s robes. The shop keep’s choice of a thick black turtle neck jumper with stamped silver buttons marching up the neck and cuffs like Severus Snape’s robes didn’t help him break free of his thoughts. Lost in the past, he nearly let the girl’s next words float past unnoticed. “I thought you were working today? It’s dragon’s blood and orange, by the way.”
“What?” Ron shook his head, like a dog shaking off water from a bath. Looking the woman in the eyes, he forced himself to notice everything that was different, Muggle, and just plain odd about her words. “What are you talking about, Stella?”
“The incense. It has dragon’s blood and orange in it, along with the frankincense, juniper berry, and sweet grass.” She closed her eyes and took a deep breath, a small smile on her lips. She opened her eyes again, and grabbed his left wrist with both of her small hands, pulling Ron towards her as she walked backwards. “Come to the back, I was just making some tea. Ginger.”
He rolled his eyes, “When are you not ‘just making tea’?”
Stella giggled and rolled her eyes back at him. “You always look like you need warming up, like there’s something always leeching your energy away.” She said reflectively, “Makes me want tea.”
“I find it hard to believe that you want tea every time you see me.” He protested weakly as he allowed Stella to pull him to the kitchenette behind the bead curtain that separated the small room from the shop proper. He walked to the small cutting board next to the sink, fishing the paring knife out of the drawer. "How much do you need?"
“Well, maybe I just want to chat. Four tablespoons, skins on please, finely chopped." She stood next to him at the sink, filling a sauce pot with water by feel. "Find out things like why you’re not working, even though it’s a Wednesday morning.”
“I had some legal issues that showed up at my door when I was leaving for work. I dealt with them, and it took less time than I thought when I called gov to let him know I’d not be in.” Ron explained, his voice rougher then it normally was, and he prayed Stella won’t notice. His head was stuck in her root cupboard, muffling his words.
"They weren't after you, were they?" She frowned and pushed her long, dark red fringe from her bottle green eyes that were expressive even behind her thick glasses. They seemed to gaze through all of his smoke screens and defences, no matter how well constructed. Ron looked away before his mind could make any connection to Harry Potter. Scouring the rhizome with hot water, he began to chop the ginger as he had done a thousand times in potions class, and a hundred times more at Stella's side, which were much more fond memories in a myriad of ways.
“No, nothing like that. Some smarmy, fancy pants solicitor wanted me to testify as a character witness.” He sighed. "I went to school with the git."
"Ah. You can scrape the board into the water when you're done. Make sure to get all the juice." Stella's heels clicked on the hard wood floor as she pushed herself off the stove so Ron could add the ginger. She was the only one in this new Muggle world who Ron had told even the briefest details about his past, the war, and his world. In return, she had helped him navigate his new, and bizarre surroundings with every conversation they had peppered with nuggets of advice and motherly nagging. “Is it a military tribunal? If it is, then you don’t have a say in the matter. Would you?”
He shrugged, flopping into a chair at the kitchen table too small for him to stretch his lanky legs out in front of him. If he stretched he could reach the sink to his right, and the beaded curtain to the right. "We never followed any kind of military discipline, but that doesn't mean policies haven't changed."
Stella nodded, the motion causing her glasses to slide down her nose. She shoved them back with a finger impatiently and added the dried tea leaves and flowers to the boiling ginger water in pinches. "Would it be so bad if you did return?"
"I can't, Stella. If I could be a part of a wizarding community, I would. But, Disowning, it's part spell." Ron sighed, his lips twitching into a wry smile at the wistful thought of moving back into his parent’s house. "My magic is bound up with a spell that will trigger if I use any formal magics."
“But you can still do magic. I feel it rolling off you.” She pointed out as she added milk to the waiting pot. “Also, you helped the coven put up the wards around my shop and our homes last Mabon.”
"The magic you practice is more ritualistic and religion-based than the magic that the spell looks out for. It's older, and harder to use for complex spells. Formal magic is any magic that was taught to me in school. Divination and potions are mostly exempt, but I wouldn't be able to make any potion that had a formal magic incantation attached."
"What happens if you use the magic?"
Ron wrapped his hands around the mug of steaming ginger milk tea, looked his only friend in this world straight in the eye, and told her what he had never dared to say aloud before. “I die.”
Stella’s mug tumbled from her hands, breaking on the floor with a sickening crash.
“All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy...” Draco scribbled the nonsense phrase his Muggleborn staff where too fond of muttering under their breath on a scrap piece of parchment, his mind mulling over the Weasley issue, as he had dubbed it. Without Weasley’s testimony he could still conceivably win, but his case would be considerably stronger with both of Potter’s school mates telling the same story of a tragic hero, coming from a troubled home and overcoming the odds. The story would appeal to the most stoic of jurors, blinding them to the damning evidence of the prosecution.
With a world weary sigh, the blonde wizard pulled the file he had his staff pull together for him on the man. It was painfully thin, compared to the novel length dossiers he had on Harry and the Granger chit, filled to the brim with news clippings, photos, and reports. Weasley’s, on the very dramatic other hand, held a few blurry photographs, copies of official documents of his birth, time at Hogwarts, and Order of Merlin third class, a news clipping about his disappearing act after Potter’s funeral that was barely a paragraph, and a short summary page that was longer then the clipping by a mere three words.
Weasley, Ronald Bilius
Youngest male of the Weasley family. No inheritance in any wills of other Weasleys - living or dead.
Possibly Disowned.
Attended six years of schooling at Hogwarts Academy.
Close personal friends with Harry Potter (d.), Hermione Granger, and Neville Longbottom.
Order of Merlin, Third Class awarded for services rendered in the war effort.
He disappeared shortly after the funeral of Harry Potter five years ago.
He has had no known contact with any wizarding community since.
Sighted in the Edinburgh area most recently.
Reported to work as a clerk in a Muggle used book shop on Elm Street, Edinburgh.
Rides a Muggle motorbike.
Seen frequenting The Alchemic Cat “magic” shop (Ivy Lane, Edinburg).
“And looks damned hot in leather trousers.” Draco muttered to himself, recalling all too vividly Ron’s body pressed against his in the alleyway. Leaning back in his wing backed red leather chair, the man ran his hands over his face, trying in vain to wipe away the exhaustion he felt at the lack of cooperation. “It’s not even as though he’d he helping me. He’d be helping his dear friend. Saint Potter.”
Saying the name was a small stab at Draco’s heart, piercing through the lustful fog that had briefly clouded his head. The man had been dead five years, and yet even the thought of being with another made Draco want to throw up. He was just glad that his parents were long dead, and the pressure on him to pick out a nice little wife to produce heirs and spares with was nearly nonexistent. He didn’t fear Disownment, unlike the Weasley spawn.
He had to admit, it had been shocking to see the ginger man’s magic bound up in the characteristic barbed wires that Disownment left on a wizard’s aura. The Weasleys, as a family, had always been embarrassingly progressive, and Disownment was solidly a traditionalist practice. Although, they did also believe in a distressing amount of Muggle middle class morals like monogamy and marrying for love, rather than from dowry or bride price. It wouldn’t do for Ronald to marry, but then sleep around with a variety of lads.
It may be better for him not to have Weasley testify at all. He would have to get permission to not use Veritaserum, since the serum would kill his witness by activating the Disownment curse. He would also have to ask for all of the other Weasleys to leave the court room before bringing Ron in, since they would attempt to kill him if they saw him. And he would have to get some kind of earth shielding charm from a hedge witch for him to wear while in the Ministry, since the one wayward spell would cause his death.
The whole business gave Draco a headache. Ripping the thin silver reading spectacles off his face, the wizard rang the small sliver bell next to his writing kit to summon a house elf.
“Yes, sir?” the elf squeaked promptly as it entered the room.
“Another coffee and some headache drops, please.”
“Would sir be wanting anything to eat?”
Draco sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose. It had been a while since he last ate, and if he didn’t ask for anything, the damned elves would fix an entire seven course meal for him. “If we have any roast beef left over, a Ruben wouldn’t go unwanted.”
“Very good, sir.”
The elf returned promptly with a tray laden with food and drink. The smell of coffee that wafted from the French press was heavenly, and the Ruben sandwich looked more appetising than any other food he’d had to eat all day long. Draco poured the coffee into the Russian style sliver and glass mug, practically swooning at the rich colour. A slivery film appeared on the top of the glass as he added the headache drops from a small phial next to the plate of Ruben sandwiches. The combination of drugs, caffeine, and food banished his throbbing headache. Placing the reading glasses back on his pointed nose, Draco read over the facts he had written in his case journal once more.
Maybe, the answer was not bringing Weasley to the trial, but instead bringing the trial to Weasley. If he could convince Ron to write his testimony, and if he got the right judge, the written testimony could be read aloud at the trial, to support his case. Now the only problem was to get the man to agree to his scheme. That would involve meeting with him once more, and Draco had the sinking suspicion that Ron would break his nose if he ever darkened his doorstep unannounced again. But maybe someone else’s visit wouldn’t be so ill received?
Pulling a clean sheet of his stationary from the bottom compartment of his writing kit, he uncapped his fountain pen and twisted the nib into place. Moments later, he decide the note was perfect in its simplicity. Sprinkling drying powder over the wet ink, Draco folded the parchment neatly and rang the sliver bell once more. He sealed the missive with his personal seal in darkest purple ink, and left it on the desk for the house elves to take up to the owlery. Smiling like the cat who go the canary, the wizard extinguished the lamps with a causal wave of his wand and settled into his bed in the adjoining room.
Ron was going to kill Draco Malfoy. Murder him. To hell with the laws. To hell with mortality. He obviously didn’t have any. Otherwise, she never would’ve found him.
The day had started normally enough, even though Ron was jumpier then a paranoid schizophrenic mouse on crack. Every car bang was the crack of Apparition, every person in long trench coat was a witch or wizard.
“Oi, Charley!” his boss called him from the front of the store, where he sat every day dealing with customers, while he sent Ron running all over the store. The man was steeped with age, but made of iron wire. He smoked pack after pack of vile tobacco cigarettes, and was never sick a day in his life. He spoke three languages, and he could recall every book he ever read, sold, or heard about, but he had no gift for names. Every man was ‘Charley’, every woman ‘Sam’, and every kid ‘that punk’.
“Yea, gov?” Ron asked as he crossed the threshold form stacks to store proper, dust turning his red hair an odd mouse brown.
“Dust yourself off, lad. Sam over there says she wants to talk to you.” The man smiled knowingly, his crooked teeth stained parchment yellow from years of smoking and pressed a wad of notes into his hand. “I need more smokes. Take ‘er to the tabac while you chat.”
Warily, Ron walked past the old man, his hands working to remove as much of the clinging dust he could before he put his jacket on. Unsure of what he could do in case it was a Wraith from his past behind door number one.
He almost wished it had been a Wraith. Or a Death Eater. Or anyone else. But no, Hermione Granger, smartest witch in the world, was standing beside the window display, her thin hands wrapped around herself as she looked over the spines of the books. She reached out slowly, her fingers caressing the cracked leather spines as if they were a long lost lover. He twisted his scarf in his hands nervously and said the first idiotic thing that popped into his head -
“Hey, ‘Moine. How’ve you been?”
Hermione spun of her low heels in a heartbeat, one hand going to the small of her back. She wore a neat brown tweed pants suit under her open wool coat, her bushy hair pulled back into some semblance of order at the nape of her neck, her only vanity was an emerald the size of a large robin’s egg encrusted with shimmering runes pined to the throat of her high necked, ruffled blouse. Her doe brown eggs grew wide at the sight of him, her thin, rosy lips parted in shock.
“Oh, no, Ronald Bilius Weasley, don’t you grin at me like that. Not after you’ve been dead to me for five bloody years.” Her voice was strained, and her eyes narrowed dangerously, the shock gone from every part of her petite frame. “Your boss told me you’d have some time to talk?”
Ron knotted the scarf around his neck deftly, “Yep. He wants me to get him a pack of fags while I’m out. Hope you don’t mind.”
She nodded, pulling leather gloves out of her pocket and wiggling her fingers inside of them. She never buttoned the coat, confirming Ron’s guess that she was hiding her wand under it. “Lead the way.”
They walked the first block in silence, the sounds of the city all around them.
“Why did you run away, Ron?” she asked quietly, so unlike the girl he had known through school and the war. That girl who had been a crying bookworm, always sobbing at the end of every spat between them was long dead, and in her place was a grim woman who fired soft questions with a surgeon’s precision.
“The war changed a lot of things, Hermione. You should know that.” He glanced at her, “You would’ve been crying by now if I had pulled this in school.”
“The war changed everything, but we all changed together. Or I had thought so, until you ran away.” Hermione stopped walking suddenly, and Ron turned to see her entire body move as she sighed long-sufferingly, “Your mother is a mess. It was one thing to bury the twins and Harry. It’s another to have you run off.”
“She’s crying because I am dead to her, Hermione!” Ron shouted in her face. The urge to hit her was overwhelming, as it had been with the Malfoy git earlier in the week. His hands clenched into fists at his side, and her eyes darted to them, her stance shifting slightly, so all her weight was on the back foot, her hands resting on her hips where closer to her hidden weapons. She looked cool, causal, and ready for a fight.
“Now, there’s no need to be melodramatic -“ Hermione rolled her eyes and tilted her head to the side, her voice mocking and cruel.
Fuck it. If she wanted to play with fire, it was on her own head. With one step of his long legs, Ron was as close to as the woman as he could be without touching her. He lowered his face until it was inches away from hers, until he could feel her warm breathe on his lips, and hissed “Melodramatic! Is that what I’m being?”
“Yes! It is! You’re acting the right prat, and you are not the only one who lost a best friend in the war!” her voice may have been even, but Hermione’s eyes darted wildly around the surroundings as her hands reached behind her back. Her fingers locked tight around the hilt of the knife she carried at the small of her back, and the witch eased it out of the sheath, praying to every god in every pantheon she had ever heard of that she wouldn’t be forced to slam the knife into her friend’s gut.
“You think this is about Harry?” Ron laughed, all the anger rushing out of him with the bitter sound. His stomach cramping, he let his hysteria block everything else out. Dimly, he was aware of Hermione gently pushing him out of her personal space, and her hands working to put her weapon back in it’s holster.
“You disappeared after his funeral!” he heard her saying, absently noting that the frustration was back in her voice, “What were we supposed to think but that you went one under after he died?”
“in a way, I did.” He muttered, running his hands over his face and through his hair. “I’ve got something for you to research, Hermione Granger - Disownment. Come back when you understand what it means.”
“I already know what it means, and I also know full well it’s illegal.”
“Correction, Granger -“ he spun on his heel to face her once more, “it’s only illegal to list someone who has been Disowned as dead. Falsifying records and the whole bit.” He was in her face now, she had to look up at him to glare him in the eyes. In school, and even for a time after the war, it had been hard for her to be intimating when she had to look up to him, but somewhere along the way, she had learned how to stand her ground. She wasn’t giving a bloody inch.
“Why were you Disowned?” the question was quiet, but it shook Ron more than anything else Hermione had said or done.
“Because I’m bent, and I refused to lie to you anymore.”
“What? Lie to me? And me thinking you where dead for years wasn’t enough of a lie?”
“Did it ever occur to you that their where no gay couples in all of wizarding Britain?” Ron asked, his arms crossed over his chest. “We have a gay pride parade up and down Main every year here. Why don’t the gay wizards ever have a gay pride rally?”
“I’ve never -“
“You’ve never wondered?”
“There was a war, Ron! I never thought I’d live to get married, or to fall in love, or whatever!”
“And now that’s it’s over?”
“The trials, and Harry’s death...”
“Look, Hermione, there are no gay wizards. Do you understand that? There are no gay wizards because every wizard grows up and gets married and has lots of babies.”
“But, why?”
“Because it’s the natural” Ron stressed the word with a sneer Malfoy would’ve been proud of. It twisted his face and looked too horribly wrong for words. “thing to do.”
“It makes sense, Hermione. You’re more Muggle then Ron or all of the other Weasleys, and more than that, you fit into the Muggle world. You understand how everything works there. Because of that, you miss things in the wizarding world.” Luna sighed wistfully, her fingers twirling a piece of hair, “Like the whole house-elf thing. You see it as slavery, wizards see it as a contract that was laid down between our two species eons ago. We honour that contract, which is why everyone got upset when you tried to break it.”
“Why didn’t you explain it, then?” Hermione asked exasperated. She had hung up her coat and jacket before sitting on the sequenced pillows that Luna preferred to chairs, and the black leather of her weapons holsters stood out against the white of her shirt. “I would’ve understood if you just explained thing to me!”
“Milk and sugar?” the woman asked as she poured the tea into blue teacups with purple stars. Her bangles jingled loudly as she fixed the two cups, and handed one to her guest, who murmured her thanks. Only when Luna was settled with her tea did she answer Hermione’s questions. “We didn’t because it’s our culture. We, the wizard raised students, didn’t understand that you didn’t understand, because it’s one of those things that everyone knows. Harry understood these things because he didn’t fit into the Muggle world. He made an effort to understand our fairy tales, our histories.“
Hermione smiled sadly as she sipped her tea, “I remember he was always reading children’s books after the war. I used to tease him about it whenever he asked me why I was learned who to shoot and fight.”
“He used to complain to me about it.” She smiled softly, remembering.
Hermione’s hand strayed to the thick leather straps, her fingers stroking the material that had brought her piece of mind in the post-war world. “Does my being armed bother you that much?” she asked quietly, half fearing the answer.
“I don’t understand them.” She sighed wistfully, “You never carried weapons in the war, and that would be the time. I don’t understand why you need them now that we’re not fighting for our lives.”
She shrugged one shoulder as she reached for the one of the “I don’t like to feel helpless. I don’t see the wisdom in relying on only one weapon when there are others that I’ve been trained to use. Besides, it would look odd to the Muggles I work with to not have a gun.”
“How is work?”
“About the same. They keep threatening to send me to Israel to help with the situation there from a magical point of view.”
The blonde witch’s forehead creased in mild confusion, her thumbs tabbing the edge of the tea cup as she thought aloud. “I thought you were an investigator, not a peacekeeper.”
“These days, it doesn’t matter what you’re trained in. If you’re in any kind of enforcement, you end up going over to the Middle East for a spell.” Hermione smiled grimly, recalling the hours of confidential briefings she had endured over the weeks, “The goal is that is we can get the two magical communities to stop magically influencing the Muggles to keep bombing the hell out of each other. Either way, I won’t be going until the trial is squared away.”
“Will Ron be testifying, or just you?”
“I have to talk to him again about it. We got distracted the last time we talked...” she sighed and smiled brightly at Luna, “How’s the novel coming along?”
“Not very well, now that you mention it - Lucinda’s still freaking out about her lack of job security, and I can’t figure out a way to get her and Tess to fall in love. I thought once they moved in together, nature would help, but...” she explained as she refilled both of the tea cups, talking about the characters in her newest romance novel as if they were real people, as she always did. Hermione let the words wash over her in a relaxing wave, taking her to a land where her problems didn’t exist. Instead, she let her mind puzzle over the broken hearts and other meaningless troubles of Lucinda and Tess.
“Maybe Lucinda doesn’t realize that she’s attracted to Tess? When your raised without knowing any gay people, it can be hard...” she trailed off, Ron’s words floating in her mind. “Luna. Do you publish in the Muggle world because they won’t sell in the wizarding world, or because it wouldn’t be safe for you to publish your romances here?”
Luna bit her lip, twirling a lock of platinum hair, her blue eyes wide as she looked at her friend. “I don’t think Lucinda knows at all. Do you think that she would run to Tess’s aide if someone threatened her?”
“I don’t know.” She whispered hoarsely, reaching across the table to tuck the lock of hair Luna was playing with behind the other woman’s ear. Her pale skin was so soft to the Hermione’s gun calloused hands, and the hair felt like silk. She felt like time had stilled as Luna reached out, bangles tinkling gently, mirroring Hermione. Slowly, she let herself be pulled over the table, her lips meeting Luna’s in the barest of kisses.
Putting the tea cup down on the table with a clatter, Hermione struggled to get to her feet in a burst of speed, emotions warring inside her. “I have to go. I’ll see you later.”
As she Disappeared away, she tried to forget the hurt in Luna’s clear blue eyes.
The knock on the door came just as Stella had flipped the sign from “open” to “closed”. Poking her head outside the door, she saw a slender, drenched, woman with brown hair that was flying away from her pins standing in the rain.
“I’m sorry, but we’re closed.” She told the woman, smiling slightly.
“I know...” the woman trailed off, staring into Stella’s face, her brown eyes widening in shock as her lips moved mutely.
Stella glared sharply at the woman, “Didn’t your mother tell you it’s impolite to stare at someone?”
“I’m sorry. Your eyes remind me of a friend, that’s all.” Hermione cleared her throat, “Er... Could you tell Ron that Hermione Granger stopped by? I’m a... old school mate.”
“He stared at my eyes, when he first saw me.” Sighing, she opened the door and motioned for the witch to come into the store. “Come in and have a cuppa. Ron’ll be by shortly.”
“Thank you,” Hermione muttered, still shaken by the woman’s eyes.
Stella pushed her glasses back up her nose and shoved her hands into the deep pockets of her plum cardigan. “If you leave your coat on the pegs above the radiator in the shop, it’ll be dry by the time you leave.”
“Do you mind if I leave my gun holster there too?” she asked as she stripped off the sodden coat. “A bus splashed me on the way here with what felt like a gallon of water.”
Stella blinked in confusion and looked at the witch again. She didn’t see any lumps that could be a gun anywhere on the woman’s tailored suit, but as soon as she took the blazer off, Stella saw the thick leather straps crossing her back. “Be my guest.”
Outside, a motorbike roared up to the alley beside the shop, and Hermione had her gun in her hands before she could think. Heart pounding in her ear, she whirled on her heels, and dropped to the ground. She hands were steady as she flicked the safety off with her thumb and pointed the muzzle at the ginger man who just walked in the unlocked door.
“Police! Stop!” she barked across the store at the man. One hand was in the pockets of his brown leather jacket, the other was holding the motorbike helmet. Either hand could be a hiding place for a gun, grenade, bomb, poison gas, knife - the options ran through her mind at warp speed. “Helmet on the ground, hands above your head! Now!”
Eyes wide at the sight of his long time friend crouching behind a serious looking hand gun, Ron froze in place. “Hermione?” he asked, not believing what he was seeing. “It’s Ron.”
She blinked owlishly, as if she only just realized what she was doing. Who she was pointing her gun towards. “Oh, gods...” the witch whispered to herself, sick to her stomach. Closing her eyes to fight off the oppressive wave of nausea that crashed over her, images of Ron laying on the gleaming hard wood floors in a crumpled heap, her bullet lodged in the door frame, and the back of his head blown off in a shower of brains and vermillion blood played on the backs of her eyelids - her own private movie theatre of horrors. Her hands are shaking so badly it takes three tries for her to holster the weapon again. Her hands feel stiff, and the buckles that hold the weapons to her body are impossible to undo.
PART TWO
Recepient: dm_p
Author: it’s a secret :)
Beta’ed: R
Pairing: Ron/Draco, Luna/Hermione, Ron/OFC (Stella Weston) friendship, Hermione/Draco friendship
Rating: Hard R/NC-17
Warnings: Swearing, Weapon Use, Fist Fights, Drinking, Sexual Tension, Bigotry, Angst, M/M Sex
Disclaimer: This story is based on characters and situations created and owned by JK Rowling, various publishers including but not limited to Bloomsbury Books, Scholastic Books and Raincoast Books, and Warner Bros., Inc. No money is being made and no copyright or trademark infringement is intended.
Summary: After he came out to his family five years ago, Ron Weasley was exiled from the magical world he grew up in. Now, five year later, one Draco Malfoy shows up on his doorstep to ask a favor, that would risk Ron’s life, but maybe save the memory of the deceased Harry Potter.
Timeline: Forget basically everything about the seventh book, especially the epilogue! This is set eight years after the war, and five years after the death of Harry Potter.
A/N: In a lot of fan fictions I read, the wizarding world is this great place where gay people are accepted. It’s a great idea, especially in a world were love is defined as between a man and a woman, but I wanted to write about a wizarding world that’s not so into gay rights. This isn’t a light and fluffy piece, but I feel it needed to be written. I hope you enjoy it!
Word Count: Over 13,000 words
It doesn’t get easier to tell the truth. It always gets harder. The deeper you go, the harder it gets. Start again. Go into your heart and find your own truth. That will always be untarnished, fresh, red as arterial blood. And pulsing.
- Erica Jong
The alarm fired like a canon ball, ricocheting painfully through Ron’s head and tearing his dreams of warm arms and soft lips to shreds. Grumbling, he swatted at the infernal mechanical device, subduing it into silence.
“It is too early for this bloody crap.” He muttered to the frigid air, running his hands through his gingery hair, causing it to stick on end. Blindly, he stumbled into the bath, which was no warmer than the rest of the tiny flat. Fumbling with the rusty knobs, Ron winced as the freezing cold water flowed from the shower, finishing the waking process without any kindness.
Clean, and warm due entirely to his clothes in varying shades of brown, Ron deftly made coffee in a pot on the outdated wood burning stove. The caffeinated brew was bliss as it hit his lips, it’s warmth burning away the chill in the air but did nothing for the coldness of resignation in his Muggle life. He poured the majority of the coffee into a thermos, only spilling a fraction over his hands. He sat down to pull on his heavy boots, glancing at the clock propped on the mantle.
“Shit.” He cursed violently. He was late. Again. And it was raining. Again. Silently cursing himself he wondered if his day could get any fucking worse, and if he should just pack it all in and go to America, or somewhere sunny. It was always sunny in Florida, or California, or some state like that.
Somehow, he was packed and outside of his flat, locking the door within five minutes. Jogging up the stairs to street level, Ron spun on the heels of his boots, only to run into none other than Draco bloody Malfoy himself.
“I see you haven’t lost your habit of barrelling into the unknown with both eyes wide shut, have you Mr. Weasley?” the man drawled, as he arrogantly brushed off his gray cashmere gun coat with his black leather gloved hands. He had the familiar stench of money about him that he carried all through the years of school, and it still made Ron’s blood boil as much as it did back then. Perhaps even more now given the even more blaring difference between the two men’s situation. Money was apparently a good insulator against the ravages of war.
“What the hell do you want, Malfoy? I’m late for work as it is.” Ron grumbled sourly as he took the canvas tarp off his old Honda motorbike, rolling it down the alley to the main street, his building looming over them.
“You’ve been summoned to testify in a war crimes trial.” Draco stated without any preamble. His face was politely blank under the brim of his oh so very proper hat, just like a good little diplomat. Daddy would’ve been so proud.
The demand infuriated Ron more than anything the wizard had said or done in the past five minutes, which was quite the triumph. Every fibre of his being was aching to punch the slimy git squarely in his perfect nose. He sat on his bike, feet firmly on the ground, and crossed his arms over his chest, glaring at his school adversary with obvious malice. “I’ve been summoned before, and you’re wasting your time. Now, I have to go to work.”
“I’ve been briefed, and it did come up that you would be reluctant to testify. That’s why I’m here, and not some junior barrister.” Draco crossed his arms over his chest, mirroring Ron and cocking his head in a challenging manner. Frustration showed in the set of his shoulders, the slight downturn of his thin lips. “I have to insist that you testify.”
In a flash, Ron was off the motorbike, his fists full of Malfoy’s very expensive wool coat. He lifted the smaller man off his feet, slamming him into the stones of the adjacent building. Draco’s head slammed against the hard stone with a dull thunk, his hat flying off and landing in the trash and slush that lined the alleyway. His storm gray eyes widened, his breathing hitched, and Ron felt a terrifying thrill curl in his stomach.
“I can’t go back to your world just to help some Death Eater scum shave a few years off his oh so very deserved life sentence.” He hissed into Draco’s face, his breath hot with anger, his hands curling tighter around the handful of wool he grabbed.
“It’s not some Death Eater scum that’s on trial, Weasley.” Draco managed to gasp around his own clothes obstructing his airway. “It’s Harry Potter.”
The name stopped Ron cold, and he dropped Draco as if the man had burned him. The thrill that had warmed him in the freezing rain turned into ice that ran in his veins quicker than any spell. “The man’s dead. Let him rest in peace.”
“I’ve tried to keep this out of the courts, but certain people are determined to tarnish Potter’s halo one last time.” A flash of bitter sadness and regret played over the wizard’s face, desperation and weariness showing in his even words. He crossed his arms over his chest, and glared at Ron.
“Why do you care so damned much what happens to him?” his voice was filled with bile as he spat the words into Draco’s face, “Is it the hardest case this year? Will it help you to take silk?”
“I already have silk, you dolt!” Draco yelled for the first time in the encounter, his pointed face red with anger and the brief lack of oxygen. “And how dare you insinuate that I am Harry’s advocate because it would help my career!”
“Hit a nerve, did I?” Ron taunted, a momentary flash of happiness coursing through him as he had finally succeeded in causing Malfoy’s icy composure to crumble.
“How can you stand there, not caring what people say about Harry?”
“Why do you?”
“Because I Owe him a Life Debt!” Draco stood there, his hands fisted in the expensive leather gloves, his hair falling out of its hair-slide to hang in his flushed face, his eyes wide with emotion, as if the admission of Owing Harry Potter cost him more than he was prepared to offer. He was desperate, and Ron could see that frustration in every move the man made. It almost made him seem almost...human and peculiarly sympathetic.
“Come inside.” Ron rolled his bike back to its parking place, lashing the tarp into place. He walked down the steps to his flat, Draco following like a gray shadow.
The flat was still no warmer then the rain outside, but it was dry and out of the wind. Without another word, Ron made his way to the wood stove in the corner and stroked the hot coals to life with an old edition of The Times and a box of matches he kept next to the kindling box on the flagstones. As the flames licked at the paper, he shoved a plain beeswax taper set in a cheap copper candle stick into the flames. He carried the light to the table, where an old fashioned glass lamp sat. He lit the lamp with the candle, adjusting the flame to illuminate the whole kitchen.
“Don’t you believe in warming charms?” Draco’s teeth chattered around the question, and he wrapped his arms around himself in effort to conserve body heat.
“If you’re that cold, put your coat back on, Malfoy.” Ron retorted, still in his heavy leather jacket. He filled the kettle with water and set it on the stove. “The fire’ll warm us both and make us a cuppa.”
“That doesn’t answer my question.”
“Maybe you should keep your nose out of things that don’t concern you.” Ron snapped over his shoulder as he walked to the telephone in the far corner of the flat by his bed. He carried the candle stick to light his way. He didn’t need the light for walking, but he knew that he’d need it to read the numbers on the infernal phone. “Sit by the fire for a minute. I have to explain to my boss why I’m not working.”
Draco pulled a heavy wooden chair from the kitchen set of table and chairs, no doubt a hand-me-down from one sibling or another, into the circle of heat that emanated from the stove. Weasley sat on his bed, talking into the black telephone receiver that was so utterly Muggle. Everything in the sparse flat screamed Muggle and obsolete, Draco noticed, from the stove to the small bed.
There was not a Muggle device in sight, if he ignored the telephone in the corner. The man obviously relied on a bevy of beeswax tapers and the few gas lamps for all his lighting needs. The floor was covered with thick rugs of every size, shape, and colour in the bed room, but the ginger haired man has evidently run out of funds to cover the floor in the kitchen or in front of the sagging sofa that more or less divided public areas from private. The walls were covered with bookshelves filled to the brim with books and scrolls of parchment. No photographs where anywhere to be seen, and for this Draco was glad, even if it struck him odd. It was bad enough dealing with one of the Weasley clan without having the rest glaring at him from behind the glass of their picture frames.
The steam poured out of the kettle with a shriek that would put a banshee to shame, knocking Draco out of his assessment of the second youngest Weasley’s flat. He carried the kettle to the counter where a tea pot and canisters of tea sat. Measuring the correct amount of dry leaves into the pot, Draco let the tea steep as Ron finished his phone call with his boss by slamming the receiver on the cradle.
“I only have the day to deal with this, Malfoy.“ Ron informed him stiffly as he fetched two mismatched mugs from the high cupboard above the stove.
“We’ll have to set up a time for you to come to the Ministry to give your statement then.” Draco took a sip of the hot tea. It was a good brew, if very harsh and curiously smoky in taste. “It wouldn’t do for you to lose your job.”
“I haven’t agreed to give a statement yet!” He protested hotly. “And yes, it certainly wouldn’t do for me to lose my job.”
“Does your job matter more to you then the memory of your best friend?” he snorted, “And you accuse me of being mercenary!”
“I can’t go into the wizarding world,” Ron stated gruffly.
Draco snorted as he inquired, “What reason could you possibly have for living as an old fashioned Muggle - living without proper warming charms and lights?”
Ron whipped around suddenly, blue eyes blazing. “What reason could you possibly have for claiming to have a Life Debt with Harry?”
“Touché, Mr. Weasley.” Draco leaned back in his chair. The fire crackled, filling the silence that was heavy in the air. He finished his tea and stood, holding a hand out to Ron. “Well, Mr. Weasley, I do hope you reconsider your answer. It would be a boon to have your testimony on the case.”
His voice was professional, and it made Ron want to deck him just to see the warm, gushing of blood and feel the satisfying crack of cartilage. He didn’t. Instead, he stood and shook the bastard’s hand, ignoring the painful shock of magic that shot up his arm at the skin on skin contact, and asked, “How could I get in touch with you?”
Draco handed him a plain white card. “I have a phone and address for Muggle communication which you may use.”
Ron nodded, and showed the man to the door, the epitome of good manners. Only when he heard the characteristic crack of Disapparition did he let his anger crash over him in a wave, propelling his fist to punch a hole in the wall next to the door.
Every time Ron walked into the small magic shop on the corner of Main and Academy, he closed his eyes and took a deep breath. With the scents of burning candles, incense, homemade furniture polish, pipe tobacco, and mouldy old books wafting through the air, he could almost let himself pretend that he was in the wizarding world. If Stella was baking bread or drying herbs, he could easily imagine he was home in the Burrow. He felt a tinge of remorse at the thought.
“Hey!” Stella greeted him from her perch on the high stool behind the display counter with a cheery wave, breaking through his reverie. She had an uncanny knack for knowing how long to let him reminisce - never letting him linger in the world of maybes and what-ifs for too long. However, today his past clung to his mind like a thick fog, and Ron couldn’t help but notice her nails which where lacquered the bright, deathly, horrific green of the Unforgivables. He swallowed hard and forced himself not to flinch when she bounded towards him from behind the desk, her long black skirt swirling around her legs reminiscent of wizard’s robes. The shop keep’s choice of a thick black turtle neck jumper with stamped silver buttons marching up the neck and cuffs like Severus Snape’s robes didn’t help him break free of his thoughts. Lost in the past, he nearly let the girl’s next words float past unnoticed. “I thought you were working today? It’s dragon’s blood and orange, by the way.”
“What?” Ron shook his head, like a dog shaking off water from a bath. Looking the woman in the eyes, he forced himself to notice everything that was different, Muggle, and just plain odd about her words. “What are you talking about, Stella?”
“The incense. It has dragon’s blood and orange in it, along with the frankincense, juniper berry, and sweet grass.” She closed her eyes and took a deep breath, a small smile on her lips. She opened her eyes again, and grabbed his left wrist with both of her small hands, pulling Ron towards her as she walked backwards. “Come to the back, I was just making some tea. Ginger.”
He rolled his eyes, “When are you not ‘just making tea’?”
Stella giggled and rolled her eyes back at him. “You always look like you need warming up, like there’s something always leeching your energy away.” She said reflectively, “Makes me want tea.”
“I find it hard to believe that you want tea every time you see me.” He protested weakly as he allowed Stella to pull him to the kitchenette behind the bead curtain that separated the small room from the shop proper. He walked to the small cutting board next to the sink, fishing the paring knife out of the drawer. "How much do you need?"
“Well, maybe I just want to chat. Four tablespoons, skins on please, finely chopped." She stood next to him at the sink, filling a sauce pot with water by feel. "Find out things like why you’re not working, even though it’s a Wednesday morning.”
“I had some legal issues that showed up at my door when I was leaving for work. I dealt with them, and it took less time than I thought when I called gov to let him know I’d not be in.” Ron explained, his voice rougher then it normally was, and he prayed Stella won’t notice. His head was stuck in her root cupboard, muffling his words.
"They weren't after you, were they?" She frowned and pushed her long, dark red fringe from her bottle green eyes that were expressive even behind her thick glasses. They seemed to gaze through all of his smoke screens and defences, no matter how well constructed. Ron looked away before his mind could make any connection to Harry Potter. Scouring the rhizome with hot water, he began to chop the ginger as he had done a thousand times in potions class, and a hundred times more at Stella's side, which were much more fond memories in a myriad of ways.
“No, nothing like that. Some smarmy, fancy pants solicitor wanted me to testify as a character witness.” He sighed. "I went to school with the git."
"Ah. You can scrape the board into the water when you're done. Make sure to get all the juice." Stella's heels clicked on the hard wood floor as she pushed herself off the stove so Ron could add the ginger. She was the only one in this new Muggle world who Ron had told even the briefest details about his past, the war, and his world. In return, she had helped him navigate his new, and bizarre surroundings with every conversation they had peppered with nuggets of advice and motherly nagging. “Is it a military tribunal? If it is, then you don’t have a say in the matter. Would you?”
He shrugged, flopping into a chair at the kitchen table too small for him to stretch his lanky legs out in front of him. If he stretched he could reach the sink to his right, and the beaded curtain to the right. "We never followed any kind of military discipline, but that doesn't mean policies haven't changed."
Stella nodded, the motion causing her glasses to slide down her nose. She shoved them back with a finger impatiently and added the dried tea leaves and flowers to the boiling ginger water in pinches. "Would it be so bad if you did return?"
"I can't, Stella. If I could be a part of a wizarding community, I would. But, Disowning, it's part spell." Ron sighed, his lips twitching into a wry smile at the wistful thought of moving back into his parent’s house. "My magic is bound up with a spell that will trigger if I use any formal magics."
“But you can still do magic. I feel it rolling off you.” She pointed out as she added milk to the waiting pot. “Also, you helped the coven put up the wards around my shop and our homes last Mabon.”
"The magic you practice is more ritualistic and religion-based than the magic that the spell looks out for. It's older, and harder to use for complex spells. Formal magic is any magic that was taught to me in school. Divination and potions are mostly exempt, but I wouldn't be able to make any potion that had a formal magic incantation attached."
"What happens if you use the magic?"
Ron wrapped his hands around the mug of steaming ginger milk tea, looked his only friend in this world straight in the eye, and told her what he had never dared to say aloud before. “I die.”
Stella’s mug tumbled from her hands, breaking on the floor with a sickening crash.
“All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy...” Draco scribbled the nonsense phrase his Muggleborn staff where too fond of muttering under their breath on a scrap piece of parchment, his mind mulling over the Weasley issue, as he had dubbed it. Without Weasley’s testimony he could still conceivably win, but his case would be considerably stronger with both of Potter’s school mates telling the same story of a tragic hero, coming from a troubled home and overcoming the odds. The story would appeal to the most stoic of jurors, blinding them to the damning evidence of the prosecution.
With a world weary sigh, the blonde wizard pulled the file he had his staff pull together for him on the man. It was painfully thin, compared to the novel length dossiers he had on Harry and the Granger chit, filled to the brim with news clippings, photos, and reports. Weasley’s, on the very dramatic other hand, held a few blurry photographs, copies of official documents of his birth, time at Hogwarts, and Order of Merlin third class, a news clipping about his disappearing act after Potter’s funeral that was barely a paragraph, and a short summary page that was longer then the clipping by a mere three words.
Weasley, Ronald Bilius
Youngest male of the Weasley family. No inheritance in any wills of other Weasleys - living or dead.
Possibly Disowned.
Attended six years of schooling at Hogwarts Academy.
Close personal friends with Harry Potter (d.), Hermione Granger, and Neville Longbottom.
Order of Merlin, Third Class awarded for services rendered in the war effort.
He disappeared shortly after the funeral of Harry Potter five years ago.
He has had no known contact with any wizarding community since.
Sighted in the Edinburgh area most recently.
Reported to work as a clerk in a Muggle used book shop on Elm Street, Edinburgh.
Rides a Muggle motorbike.
Seen frequenting The Alchemic Cat “magic” shop (Ivy Lane, Edinburg).
“And looks damned hot in leather trousers.” Draco muttered to himself, recalling all too vividly Ron’s body pressed against his in the alleyway. Leaning back in his wing backed red leather chair, the man ran his hands over his face, trying in vain to wipe away the exhaustion he felt at the lack of cooperation. “It’s not even as though he’d he helping me. He’d be helping his dear friend. Saint Potter.”
Saying the name was a small stab at Draco’s heart, piercing through the lustful fog that had briefly clouded his head. The man had been dead five years, and yet even the thought of being with another made Draco want to throw up. He was just glad that his parents were long dead, and the pressure on him to pick out a nice little wife to produce heirs and spares with was nearly nonexistent. He didn’t fear Disownment, unlike the Weasley spawn.
He had to admit, it had been shocking to see the ginger man’s magic bound up in the characteristic barbed wires that Disownment left on a wizard’s aura. The Weasleys, as a family, had always been embarrassingly progressive, and Disownment was solidly a traditionalist practice. Although, they did also believe in a distressing amount of Muggle middle class morals like monogamy and marrying for love, rather than from dowry or bride price. It wouldn’t do for Ronald to marry, but then sleep around with a variety of lads.
It may be better for him not to have Weasley testify at all. He would have to get permission to not use Veritaserum, since the serum would kill his witness by activating the Disownment curse. He would also have to ask for all of the other Weasleys to leave the court room before bringing Ron in, since they would attempt to kill him if they saw him. And he would have to get some kind of earth shielding charm from a hedge witch for him to wear while in the Ministry, since the one wayward spell would cause his death.
The whole business gave Draco a headache. Ripping the thin silver reading spectacles off his face, the wizard rang the small sliver bell next to his writing kit to summon a house elf.
“Yes, sir?” the elf squeaked promptly as it entered the room.
“Another coffee and some headache drops, please.”
“Would sir be wanting anything to eat?”
Draco sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose. It had been a while since he last ate, and if he didn’t ask for anything, the damned elves would fix an entire seven course meal for him. “If we have any roast beef left over, a Ruben wouldn’t go unwanted.”
“Very good, sir.”
The elf returned promptly with a tray laden with food and drink. The smell of coffee that wafted from the French press was heavenly, and the Ruben sandwich looked more appetising than any other food he’d had to eat all day long. Draco poured the coffee into the Russian style sliver and glass mug, practically swooning at the rich colour. A slivery film appeared on the top of the glass as he added the headache drops from a small phial next to the plate of Ruben sandwiches. The combination of drugs, caffeine, and food banished his throbbing headache. Placing the reading glasses back on his pointed nose, Draco read over the facts he had written in his case journal once more.
Maybe, the answer was not bringing Weasley to the trial, but instead bringing the trial to Weasley. If he could convince Ron to write his testimony, and if he got the right judge, the written testimony could be read aloud at the trial, to support his case. Now the only problem was to get the man to agree to his scheme. That would involve meeting with him once more, and Draco had the sinking suspicion that Ron would break his nose if he ever darkened his doorstep unannounced again. But maybe someone else’s visit wouldn’t be so ill received?
Pulling a clean sheet of his stationary from the bottom compartment of his writing kit, he uncapped his fountain pen and twisted the nib into place. Moments later, he decide the note was perfect in its simplicity. Sprinkling drying powder over the wet ink, Draco folded the parchment neatly and rang the sliver bell once more. He sealed the missive with his personal seal in darkest purple ink, and left it on the desk for the house elves to take up to the owlery. Smiling like the cat who go the canary, the wizard extinguished the lamps with a causal wave of his wand and settled into his bed in the adjoining room.
Ron was going to kill Draco Malfoy. Murder him. To hell with the laws. To hell with mortality. He obviously didn’t have any. Otherwise, she never would’ve found him.
The day had started normally enough, even though Ron was jumpier then a paranoid schizophrenic mouse on crack. Every car bang was the crack of Apparition, every person in long trench coat was a witch or wizard.
“Oi, Charley!” his boss called him from the front of the store, where he sat every day dealing with customers, while he sent Ron running all over the store. The man was steeped with age, but made of iron wire. He smoked pack after pack of vile tobacco cigarettes, and was never sick a day in his life. He spoke three languages, and he could recall every book he ever read, sold, or heard about, but he had no gift for names. Every man was ‘Charley’, every woman ‘Sam’, and every kid ‘that punk’.
“Yea, gov?” Ron asked as he crossed the threshold form stacks to store proper, dust turning his red hair an odd mouse brown.
“Dust yourself off, lad. Sam over there says she wants to talk to you.” The man smiled knowingly, his crooked teeth stained parchment yellow from years of smoking and pressed a wad of notes into his hand. “I need more smokes. Take ‘er to the tabac while you chat.”
Warily, Ron walked past the old man, his hands working to remove as much of the clinging dust he could before he put his jacket on. Unsure of what he could do in case it was a Wraith from his past behind door number one.
He almost wished it had been a Wraith. Or a Death Eater. Or anyone else. But no, Hermione Granger, smartest witch in the world, was standing beside the window display, her thin hands wrapped around herself as she looked over the spines of the books. She reached out slowly, her fingers caressing the cracked leather spines as if they were a long lost lover. He twisted his scarf in his hands nervously and said the first idiotic thing that popped into his head -
“Hey, ‘Moine. How’ve you been?”
Hermione spun of her low heels in a heartbeat, one hand going to the small of her back. She wore a neat brown tweed pants suit under her open wool coat, her bushy hair pulled back into some semblance of order at the nape of her neck, her only vanity was an emerald the size of a large robin’s egg encrusted with shimmering runes pined to the throat of her high necked, ruffled blouse. Her doe brown eggs grew wide at the sight of him, her thin, rosy lips parted in shock.
“Oh, no, Ronald Bilius Weasley, don’t you grin at me like that. Not after you’ve been dead to me for five bloody years.” Her voice was strained, and her eyes narrowed dangerously, the shock gone from every part of her petite frame. “Your boss told me you’d have some time to talk?”
Ron knotted the scarf around his neck deftly, “Yep. He wants me to get him a pack of fags while I’m out. Hope you don’t mind.”
She nodded, pulling leather gloves out of her pocket and wiggling her fingers inside of them. She never buttoned the coat, confirming Ron’s guess that she was hiding her wand under it. “Lead the way.”
They walked the first block in silence, the sounds of the city all around them.
“Why did you run away, Ron?” she asked quietly, so unlike the girl he had known through school and the war. That girl who had been a crying bookworm, always sobbing at the end of every spat between them was long dead, and in her place was a grim woman who fired soft questions with a surgeon’s precision.
“The war changed a lot of things, Hermione. You should know that.” He glanced at her, “You would’ve been crying by now if I had pulled this in school.”
“The war changed everything, but we all changed together. Or I had thought so, until you ran away.” Hermione stopped walking suddenly, and Ron turned to see her entire body move as she sighed long-sufferingly, “Your mother is a mess. It was one thing to bury the twins and Harry. It’s another to have you run off.”
“She’s crying because I am dead to her, Hermione!” Ron shouted in her face. The urge to hit her was overwhelming, as it had been with the Malfoy git earlier in the week. His hands clenched into fists at his side, and her eyes darted to them, her stance shifting slightly, so all her weight was on the back foot, her hands resting on her hips where closer to her hidden weapons. She looked cool, causal, and ready for a fight.
“Now, there’s no need to be melodramatic -“ Hermione rolled her eyes and tilted her head to the side, her voice mocking and cruel.
Fuck it. If she wanted to play with fire, it was on her own head. With one step of his long legs, Ron was as close to as the woman as he could be without touching her. He lowered his face until it was inches away from hers, until he could feel her warm breathe on his lips, and hissed “Melodramatic! Is that what I’m being?”
“Yes! It is! You’re acting the right prat, and you are not the only one who lost a best friend in the war!” her voice may have been even, but Hermione’s eyes darted wildly around the surroundings as her hands reached behind her back. Her fingers locked tight around the hilt of the knife she carried at the small of her back, and the witch eased it out of the sheath, praying to every god in every pantheon she had ever heard of that she wouldn’t be forced to slam the knife into her friend’s gut.
“You think this is about Harry?” Ron laughed, all the anger rushing out of him with the bitter sound. His stomach cramping, he let his hysteria block everything else out. Dimly, he was aware of Hermione gently pushing him out of her personal space, and her hands working to put her weapon back in it’s holster.
“You disappeared after his funeral!” he heard her saying, absently noting that the frustration was back in her voice, “What were we supposed to think but that you went one under after he died?”
“in a way, I did.” He muttered, running his hands over his face and through his hair. “I’ve got something for you to research, Hermione Granger - Disownment. Come back when you understand what it means.”
“I already know what it means, and I also know full well it’s illegal.”
“Correction, Granger -“ he spun on his heel to face her once more, “it’s only illegal to list someone who has been Disowned as dead. Falsifying records and the whole bit.” He was in her face now, she had to look up at him to glare him in the eyes. In school, and even for a time after the war, it had been hard for her to be intimating when she had to look up to him, but somewhere along the way, she had learned how to stand her ground. She wasn’t giving a bloody inch.
“Why were you Disowned?” the question was quiet, but it shook Ron more than anything else Hermione had said or done.
“Because I’m bent, and I refused to lie to you anymore.”
“What? Lie to me? And me thinking you where dead for years wasn’t enough of a lie?”
“Did it ever occur to you that their where no gay couples in all of wizarding Britain?” Ron asked, his arms crossed over his chest. “We have a gay pride parade up and down Main every year here. Why don’t the gay wizards ever have a gay pride rally?”
“I’ve never -“
“You’ve never wondered?”
“There was a war, Ron! I never thought I’d live to get married, or to fall in love, or whatever!”
“And now that’s it’s over?”
“The trials, and Harry’s death...”
“Look, Hermione, there are no gay wizards. Do you understand that? There are no gay wizards because every wizard grows up and gets married and has lots of babies.”
“But, why?”
“Because it’s the natural” Ron stressed the word with a sneer Malfoy would’ve been proud of. It twisted his face and looked too horribly wrong for words. “thing to do.”
“It makes sense, Hermione. You’re more Muggle then Ron or all of the other Weasleys, and more than that, you fit into the Muggle world. You understand how everything works there. Because of that, you miss things in the wizarding world.” Luna sighed wistfully, her fingers twirling a piece of hair, “Like the whole house-elf thing. You see it as slavery, wizards see it as a contract that was laid down between our two species eons ago. We honour that contract, which is why everyone got upset when you tried to break it.”
“Why didn’t you explain it, then?” Hermione asked exasperated. She had hung up her coat and jacket before sitting on the sequenced pillows that Luna preferred to chairs, and the black leather of her weapons holsters stood out against the white of her shirt. “I would’ve understood if you just explained thing to me!”
“Milk and sugar?” the woman asked as she poured the tea into blue teacups with purple stars. Her bangles jingled loudly as she fixed the two cups, and handed one to her guest, who murmured her thanks. Only when Luna was settled with her tea did she answer Hermione’s questions. “We didn’t because it’s our culture. We, the wizard raised students, didn’t understand that you didn’t understand, because it’s one of those things that everyone knows. Harry understood these things because he didn’t fit into the Muggle world. He made an effort to understand our fairy tales, our histories.“
Hermione smiled sadly as she sipped her tea, “I remember he was always reading children’s books after the war. I used to tease him about it whenever he asked me why I was learned who to shoot and fight.”
“He used to complain to me about it.” She smiled softly, remembering.
Hermione’s hand strayed to the thick leather straps, her fingers stroking the material that had brought her piece of mind in the post-war world. “Does my being armed bother you that much?” she asked quietly, half fearing the answer.
“I don’t understand them.” She sighed wistfully, “You never carried weapons in the war, and that would be the time. I don’t understand why you need them now that we’re not fighting for our lives.”
She shrugged one shoulder as she reached for the one of the “I don’t like to feel helpless. I don’t see the wisdom in relying on only one weapon when there are others that I’ve been trained to use. Besides, it would look odd to the Muggles I work with to not have a gun.”
“How is work?”
“About the same. They keep threatening to send me to Israel to help with the situation there from a magical point of view.”
The blonde witch’s forehead creased in mild confusion, her thumbs tabbing the edge of the tea cup as she thought aloud. “I thought you were an investigator, not a peacekeeper.”
“These days, it doesn’t matter what you’re trained in. If you’re in any kind of enforcement, you end up going over to the Middle East for a spell.” Hermione smiled grimly, recalling the hours of confidential briefings she had endured over the weeks, “The goal is that is we can get the two magical communities to stop magically influencing the Muggles to keep bombing the hell out of each other. Either way, I won’t be going until the trial is squared away.”
“Will Ron be testifying, or just you?”
“I have to talk to him again about it. We got distracted the last time we talked...” she sighed and smiled brightly at Luna, “How’s the novel coming along?”
“Not very well, now that you mention it - Lucinda’s still freaking out about her lack of job security, and I can’t figure out a way to get her and Tess to fall in love. I thought once they moved in together, nature would help, but...” she explained as she refilled both of the tea cups, talking about the characters in her newest romance novel as if they were real people, as she always did. Hermione let the words wash over her in a relaxing wave, taking her to a land where her problems didn’t exist. Instead, she let her mind puzzle over the broken hearts and other meaningless troubles of Lucinda and Tess.
“Maybe Lucinda doesn’t realize that she’s attracted to Tess? When your raised without knowing any gay people, it can be hard...” she trailed off, Ron’s words floating in her mind. “Luna. Do you publish in the Muggle world because they won’t sell in the wizarding world, or because it wouldn’t be safe for you to publish your romances here?”
Luna bit her lip, twirling a lock of platinum hair, her blue eyes wide as she looked at her friend. “I don’t think Lucinda knows at all. Do you think that she would run to Tess’s aide if someone threatened her?”
“I don’t know.” She whispered hoarsely, reaching across the table to tuck the lock of hair Luna was playing with behind the other woman’s ear. Her pale skin was so soft to the Hermione’s gun calloused hands, and the hair felt like silk. She felt like time had stilled as Luna reached out, bangles tinkling gently, mirroring Hermione. Slowly, she let herself be pulled over the table, her lips meeting Luna’s in the barest of kisses.
Putting the tea cup down on the table with a clatter, Hermione struggled to get to her feet in a burst of speed, emotions warring inside her. “I have to go. I’ll see you later.”
As she Disappeared away, she tried to forget the hurt in Luna’s clear blue eyes.
The knock on the door came just as Stella had flipped the sign from “open” to “closed”. Poking her head outside the door, she saw a slender, drenched, woman with brown hair that was flying away from her pins standing in the rain.
“I’m sorry, but we’re closed.” She told the woman, smiling slightly.
“I know...” the woman trailed off, staring into Stella’s face, her brown eyes widening in shock as her lips moved mutely.
Stella glared sharply at the woman, “Didn’t your mother tell you it’s impolite to stare at someone?”
“I’m sorry. Your eyes remind me of a friend, that’s all.” Hermione cleared her throat, “Er... Could you tell Ron that Hermione Granger stopped by? I’m a... old school mate.”
“He stared at my eyes, when he first saw me.” Sighing, she opened the door and motioned for the witch to come into the store. “Come in and have a cuppa. Ron’ll be by shortly.”
“Thank you,” Hermione muttered, still shaken by the woman’s eyes.
Stella pushed her glasses back up her nose and shoved her hands into the deep pockets of her plum cardigan. “If you leave your coat on the pegs above the radiator in the shop, it’ll be dry by the time you leave.”
“Do you mind if I leave my gun holster there too?” she asked as she stripped off the sodden coat. “A bus splashed me on the way here with what felt like a gallon of water.”
Stella blinked in confusion and looked at the witch again. She didn’t see any lumps that could be a gun anywhere on the woman’s tailored suit, but as soon as she took the blazer off, Stella saw the thick leather straps crossing her back. “Be my guest.”
Outside, a motorbike roared up to the alley beside the shop, and Hermione had her gun in her hands before she could think. Heart pounding in her ear, she whirled on her heels, and dropped to the ground. She hands were steady as she flicked the safety off with her thumb and pointed the muzzle at the ginger man who just walked in the unlocked door.
“Police! Stop!” she barked across the store at the man. One hand was in the pockets of his brown leather jacket, the other was holding the motorbike helmet. Either hand could be a hiding place for a gun, grenade, bomb, poison gas, knife - the options ran through her mind at warp speed. “Helmet on the ground, hands above your head! Now!”
Eyes wide at the sight of his long time friend crouching behind a serious looking hand gun, Ron froze in place. “Hermione?” he asked, not believing what he was seeing. “It’s Ron.”
She blinked owlishly, as if she only just realized what she was doing. Who she was pointing her gun towards. “Oh, gods...” the witch whispered to herself, sick to her stomach. Closing her eyes to fight off the oppressive wave of nausea that crashed over her, images of Ron laying on the gleaming hard wood floors in a crumpled heap, her bullet lodged in the door frame, and the back of his head blown off in a shower of brains and vermillion blood played on the backs of her eyelids - her own private movie theatre of horrors. Her hands are shaking so badly it takes three tries for her to holster the weapon again. Her hands feel stiff, and the buckles that hold the weapons to her body are impossible to undo.
PART TWO