Chapter Thirteen of 'A Black Stone in a Glass Box'- The Golden Battle
Chapter Twelve.
Title: A Black Stone in a Glass Box (13/?)
Disclaimer: J. K. Rowling and associates own these characters. I am writing this story for fun and not profit.
Pairings: Harry/Draco, Ron/Hermione, Blaise/Astoria
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: Weird magic, DH-compliant in most ways but ignores epilogue, some angst, OC character death.
Summary: Harry has made a sacrifice to protect the wizarding world. And Draco Malfoy is going to find a way to reverse it if it kills him. After all, if he doesn’t reverse it, then he’ll only die of boredom anyway.
Author’s Notes: This is based on the fairy tale of Koschei the Deathless, which is where the familiarity in the plot will probably come from. It’s going to be an action/adventure and humor story more than a romance, mostly in Draco’s POV, and although the first chapter is fairly dark, the rest are definitely lighter
Chapter One.
Thank you again for all the reviews!
Chapter Thirteen-The Golden Battle
Draco hadn’t tried to Apparate because he had felt the wards that Potter had raised around the tunnel the minute he Apparated in. But now he was racing through the stone, heading further and further away from the point where Potter had appeared, and he knew that he would need to change matters fairly soon.
That didn’t seem to matter. Little lightning flashes of brilliance leaped and danced behind his eyes when he closed them, and his panting breath came out as gasps of laughter. He was doing well. He was doing brilliantly. He didn’t understand how he had lived the last five years while being deprived of Potter’s company.
He spun around a corner and reached a blank wall, with only a tiny crack high up where the stream of brown water ran from. Draco paused, fingering his wand in silence. He could try to blast an opening through, but he had no idea how much water had built up behind the wall. He could also try Apparating. He thought the spells might be weak enough here.
“Malfoy.”
Draco turned around with a smile that was welcoming in spite of himself, and in spite of all the reasons that he knew it had not to be. Now he knew why he hadn’t run faster, run longer, or tried to Apparate the minute he felt the spells weakening. He had a death wish, or else a wish to be closer to Potter for longer.
He bowed to Potter, who had come up behind him and stood watching him with those savage green eyes that shone even more radiantly than the snake’s golden ones in the darkness of the tunnel. “Are you ready for the duel?” he asked.
“I don’t want to duel you, because I would kill you.” Potter’s voice was clipped and cold, and he leveled his wand at Draco in a tiresome fashion. “Why don’t you leave, Malfoy? Give me the fang and go. I wouldn’t want to chase you further if you would leave me alone.”
“How disappointing,” Draco said, his blood leaping in his veins. His eyes saw a faint blaze of future motion around Potter’s limbs. He felt in this moment as though he knew how every blow of the duel might go, like knowing the moves of a chess game twenty minutes in advance. “I’ve caused you so much harm, so much frustration, and you would be willing to let me go, as if none of that had ever happened?”
“You don’t understand me,” Potter said, and took a step forwards. “I don’t care about you anymore. I never did.”
“Beating me up on the Quidditch pitch and the looks of loathing that you gave me in school suggest otherwise,” Draco muttered.
“That was when I was a kid,” Potter said, biting the words off as though being a child had nothing to do with being an adult. “I’ve come a long way since then, and I’ve learned what’s important.”
“Saving the world?” Draco inquired sympathetically, taking a step back and keeping his eyes on Potter all the while. Potter didn’t realize it, he couldn’t have or he would have stopped, but he had begun to circle to the right, the way that someone would in the process of a duel. Draco retreated in the opposite direction, and hoped that his manic grin of encouragement could be understood as something else, so that Potter wouldn’t leave before he could begin the strikes of his spells. “Is that what you want?”
“Yes,” Potter said. “You have no idea how bad the rumors of the Dark Lords were getting, Malfoy.” His face was flushed, and he gestured with one hand off to the left. Draco watched it, and thought how he would never be doing that if Draco hadn’t disrupted his stupid chain ritual and brought the real Harry Potter back. “People were terrified and suspicious and about to have another war on the strength of their suspicions.”
Draco shook his head. “That’s not what your friends said, is it?”
Potter started, hard enough that the gesturing hand fell back to his side and he gaped at Draco. “What do you mean?”
“I mean,” Draco said, “that your friends had a conversation with you. It wasn’t enough to keep you from coming here, but it was long enough to let me battle and almost destroy the snake. They didn’t agree with you, did they? They didn’t think the rumors were bad enough to have you sacrifice your heart and conscience to keep the wizarding world safe.”
Potter snarled at Draco like a wild animal, with saliva dripping from his jaws. Draco smiled back. Yes, this was the real Potter, and just knowing that he existed in the world again made a deep, coiled satisfaction settle at the base of Draco’s spine.
“Have you ever thought,” Draco whispered, “that the rumors were exaggerated in your eyes because you’ve fought one Dark Lord and kept the world safe from him? And that was a noble thing, and a thing I thank you for.”
“Only because it affected you.” Potter was twitching like a horse expecting the whip, never taking his eyes off Draco.
Draco laughed a little. “Of course that’s it. But I was a slave, and my father was a slave, and we’re free now. But have you overestimated from there how bad it is when someone starts talking about becoming a Dark Lord? How do you know there weren’t these kinds of threats before you did this little ritual? Voldemort wasn’t the only Dark Lord that appeared in the last fifty years, after all. There was Grindelwald, too. Somehow, the Ministry survived what came after him, despite the fact that other people must have wanted to imitate him, too, and probably set up rituals to gain power.”
Potter’s grasp had tightened on his wand until it looked as though he would snap it in two. Draco hoped not. Then Potter would probably be left using the Elder Wand, and Draco didn’t want to face that in battle.
“You’re ridiculous,” Potter whispered at last, in a tension that dragged sweet lines across the space between them. “You don’t know anything about the last five years and how bad they’ve been in Britain, because you weren’t here.”
“I know that your friends had something to say to you about it,” Draco said quietly. He didn’t need to speak loudly now. Potter was attending to his every word as if it were a flung curse, that much was obvious. “What did they say?”
“It’s none of your business,” Potter said, his voice gone flat and without emphasis this time. “You said before that you only cared about my killing Voldemort because it affected you. Well, this doesn’t. Why not back out of my business and leave me to do what I think is necessary to protect the wizarding world?”
“Because you’re my business,” Draco said, and smiled at the baffled look on Potter’s face. That only made it all the sweeter, really. The arrogant boy Draco had once thought Potter was would have accepted that of course he was the center of everyone’s universe, and Draco should be concerned with him. But Potter wasn’t really like that, Draco knew now, and that made it all the more wonderful to mess with him and make him think about what he was doing. “And you’re your friends’ business. Why didn’t you ask them about whether you should perform the chain ritual before you did it? I might not have anything to do with you, but they do. What did they say to you?”
“Shut up,” Potter snarled, and cast a Stunner at him that Draco spun neatly aside from. Those dancing lessons in Paris hadn’t come for nothing.
“What did they say to you?” Draco asked, catching himself with his hands on the back wall of the tunnel and standing there with a smile at Potter. He could feel his blood leaping again, and there was a faint, high, clear singing in the back of his mind, like someone running a finger around the rim of a wineglass. He knew what was going to happen next, and he knew how to move, and he doubted that Potter knew the same things. All of that contributed about equally to his joy. “What did they say to make you realize that they are part of your life, and you’d ignored them? What did they say to make you see-”
This time, Potter pulled off a nonverbal Disarming Charm, but Draco spun to the side, on one heel, and seized his wand as it flew past him. He wagged it at Potter and clucked his tongue. “How naughty of you, Potter. To not want to listen to someone who’s reminding you of the people who are the most important to you. As though I wanted to walk away and leave you to the tender mercies of your friends anyway, but if I’m going to, then I at least want to be reassured that you’ll listen to them. Will you?”
“Shut up.” Potter whispered the words as fervently as a prayer, moving forwards. “If you could know-if you had the slightest idea of the reasons I did this-but you don’t know anything about sacrifice.”
Draco met his eyes and dropped the mocking smile he had worn so far, answering earnestly because he thought Potter deserved that. “I had the Dark Lord living in my house, Potter, and my mother telling me daily that she might die, or I might die, or my father might die. And what to do if any of those things happened.” Then he paused and reconsidered. “Well, not if I died, of course. Then she focused more on what they would do, she and my father. As she should. The point is, I never had to make as many sacrifices as you did, but I knew I’d have to make them, and I was prepared to make them. And I learned something about sacrifice that seems to have escaped you.”
“God,” Potter said. His wand, which had been dangling at his side, started to rise to the side of his face again. “Do you never stop talking?”
“I learned that sacrifices are things you shouldn’t make unless there’s no way of avoiding them,” Draco went on, gazing earnestly into Potter’s face, which seemed fixed in a permanent snarl. “Not things that you rush into with a lover’s embrace. You don’t understand because you grew up with them and thought they were normal. But they aren’t. They’re dumb. You should have thought about other choices. But you didn’t.”
Potter tried to crack the stone apart at his feet and drop Draco into a pit, but he had hesitated too long, and given Draco time to cast charms on his own feet. That meant Draco was running up the side of the tunnel already, towards the roof, his body turning tightly sideways like a spider’s to avoid the spell. Potter roared again.
Draco hung upside-down, with his arms folded, and considered him from that angle. “Well, at least you’re living up to one stereotype of Gryffindors, and sounding like a lion,” he told him. He thought Potter might appreciate that.
From the Blasting Curse that nearly hit Draco’s temple in the next instant, Potter didn’t appreciate that, at all. Draco shook his head, sighed, said aloud, “All geniuses are unappreciated in their own time,” and flipped over, using a nonverbal Finite to break his feet’s hold on the tunnel roof. The next curse went over his head, and Draco rolled forwards over the rough stone and the dirty water, nearly to Potter’s feet.
Potter tried to angle his wand down at Draco, and his mouth opened for what would doubtless be a fruitless shout. Draco was tired of listening to him, really, and that gave him an idea for his next tactic. His wand flicked, and Potter’s voice vanished under the pressure of his Silencio.
Potter had already shone that he could do nonverbal magic, so that didn’t keep him from being dangerous. But Draco, scrambling to his feet and surveying his work with some complacence, thought it was an improvement.
Potter didn’t even stop or slow down to try and fix his condition. He lunged at Draco, with what would have been a deep sound of passion if his voice had been working. His arms were spread wide, as though to catch Draco if he should try to dodge to the sides.
Draco had no intention of running away, especially when he was winning. He gave Potter a sweet smile and stepped forwards, so that Potter’s braced body touched him, but didn’t get knocked over the way Potter had doubtless expected. Potter flinched, as though the touch of Draco’s skin to his was a branding iron.
And Draco positioned his head the right way with the help of one hand buried in Potter’s thick hair, and kissed him.
Potter didn’t like that at all.
He wrenched his head to the side and spluttered, so that it would have made kissing him more unpleasant than Draco was willing to put up with. But Draco stepped back, and bowed to him, and flipped aside when Potter aimed another curse at hm.
“You’re mental,” Potter shouted at him, having finally fixed his voice. He was charging up the tunnel after him, wand busily trying to create nets around him that Draco couldn’t cut his way through.
Draco had had better training in the Severing Charm than Potter evidently gave him credit for, though, and sliced through every web, while rolling his eyes at the loud exclamations from behind him. “If you really thought that, you would be trying to capture me and take me to St. Mungo’s, not shooting random curses at me. You can’t tarnish Gryffindor honor by shooting curses at the poor mental idiot, can you?”
“I’m trying to stop you.” Potter dropped to one knee and aimed his wand at the stone behind Draco. He opened his mouth to chant.
Draco flicked out a hex that gave Potter the sensation of being kicked in the jaw. Potter spat as if he thought he would have to spit teeth, and then turned and glared at him, his hand coming up to his mouth.
“You shouldn’t use spells that take a long time,” Draco told him seriously. “That just gives me the chance to interfere.”
Potter spun to face the wall again, and his voice rang out, persistent, commanding. Spiderwebs of cracks began to race up through the stone, aiming for the ceiling, and Draco clucked his tongue and leaped back towards him, casting the Stabilizing Charms that he had learned from Louis when it was time to repair his house’s foundation.
“You can’t just use spells that will collapse the tunnel on top of yourself, either,” he explained. “Potter, learn some self-preservation.” He cocked his head and then said, “And I should remember who I’m speaking to, right?”
Potter stared at him in silence, his hair hanging over his face. Draco would have felt sorry for him if he hadn’t seen the way that Potter reacted to pity. So he remained, quiet, intelligent, poised, waiting, and letting his helpful face absorb the thick stare Potter was giving him.
“Why did you kiss me?” Potter whispered.
Draco smiled at him. “Finally, a sensible question.” He hurried on when he saw the scowl descending to darken Potter’s face, because there was every chance that he wouldn’t remain sensible for long, and Draco shouldn’t waste the time that he did have with him. “Because I wanted to. Because the fire that’s coming back to you is a beautiful thing. I wasn’t attracted to you when I first saw you in the Ministry and you were being-stupid, but I was a little while later, when I realized how brilliant you were as the fire came back to life in you.”
“What is that fire and your perceptions of beauty next to the chance to keep the wizarding world safe?”
Potter paused after the question and stared at him. That was the only thing that allowed Draco to clear his throat politely. “That was supposed to be a serious question, right?” he asked, just to check.
Potter showed his teeth.
Draco lifted his hands placatingly. “Right, right. Okay. But yes, I think that fire is worth more than protecting the world. Because you can’t protect the world, Potter. You made it secure against Dark Lords, assuming I believe you when you say the rumors were declining after you performed your ritual. Not that you would know, would you, because you weren’t paying enough attention to rub two brain cells together.”
Potter opened his mouth, but Draco went on. “But you didn’t protect the wizarding world against Dark wizards, or the Ministry, or the Unspeakables going mad with artifacts. You can’t protect it against human stupidity, which ultimately is what gives Dark Lords their power. No one tortured the Death Eaters into following the Dark Lord during the first war. No one even tortured me at first. That came later.” He swallowed, a bit noisily. “But the point is, you can’t hold the world safe against all threats.”
“I wasn’t trying to do that.” Still kneeling, Potter beat his fist against his knee. “Just against the threat that’s my responsibility.”
Draco felt himself rise to attention on his toes. As for Potter, he turned red, looking as though he wished he had said something else.
“Your responsibility,” Draco repeated delicately. “Ah, I see it now. I know what I’m dealing with.”
“Your stupidity?”
“Your contributions are distracting and not appreciated, Potter.” Draco held up his hand a little and shook his head. “No. We’re dealing with Gryffindor guilt, the unreasoning, irrational guilt that makes you want to sacrifice yourself in the first place. Defeating the Dark Lord was arguably your fate. You couldn’t escape, and someone had to do it, so you did it. But what does defeating future Dark Lords have to do with what you did the first time around? Why should you, and you alone, be the one to keep the world safe from future ones?”
“Because no one else will.”
“I bet that’s not what your friends think,” Draco said, and wagged his head wisely. “I bet they would have been happy to help you, if you asked. I bet they would suggest that other Aurors could help, too, and the Ministry could do something other than sit around with its thumb up its arse. Granger would say that. I can almost hear her saying that.”
“Will you stop harping on my friends?” Potter rose to his feet with a glare hot enough to melt steel. “You’re not helping.”
Draco blinked at Potter. “I don’t mean to help with your sacrifice and your guilt. Quite the opposite, if anything. If you haven’t grasped that by now…” He shook his head, a bit lost for words.
“You need to stop talking about my friends,” Potter said, though in such a low voice that Draco could pretend he was talking to himself if he wanted. He thought he might do so. “You need to stop thinking that they think the way you do.”
Draco smiled. “What did they say to you?”
Potter flew at him, quickly enough that Draco actually was unprepared. But it wasn’t like he would let Potter see that. He coiled his legs beneath him and sprang towards the other side of the tunnel-
Straight into a net Potter had been weaving that he hadn’t noticed. It seemed that Potter hadn’t wasted all that time he was kneeling down after all.
As Draco hung there, splayed and helpless, Potter approached him and reached for the snake’s fang that Draco still clutched in one hand. He was panting, and his face was flushed while he stood there, breathless and triumphant. Draco had seldom seen him so beautiful.
“Thanks for this,” Potter said sweetly, turning Draco’s wrist so that he had to give up the fang or have his hand wrenched. Draco never chose pain when he could avoid it, so he let the fang go.
But since Potter was there, and so beautiful, and not paying attention to the way Draco’s head was moving…
Draco leaned forwards and kissed him again, and sod what Potter would do to him in return.
Chapter Fourteen.
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