Chapter Nine of 'Bard of Morning's Hope'- Too Many Details
Chapter Eight.
Title: Bard of Morning's Hope (9/?)
Disclaimer: J. K. Rowling and associates own these characters. I am writing this story for fun and not profit.
Pairing: Harry/Draco, Lucius/Narcissa
Warnings: Minor character death, violence, angst, gore
Rating: R
Summary: The Bard of Morning's Hope is a seemingly unstoppable murderer stalking former Death Eaters and former Slytherins, enacting vengeance on them in an untraceable way. In the wake of Lucius Malfoy's savage death, Harry Potter becomes the Auror assigned to guard Draco and Narcissa Malfoy from a similar fate.
Author's Notes: This is based on a prompt by Kain, who requested, among several other things, Harry being hired to guard Draco and Narcissa from a killer who was murdering Death Eaters in revenge, Harry having a good relationship with the Weasleys, and a slow-burn romance between Harry and Draco. This story should be somewhere between twelve and twenty chapters, and will be updated every Saturday.
Chapter One.
Thank you again for all the reviews!
Chapter Nine-Too Many Details
“Not interrupting your little chats with Malfoys, am I, mate?”
“Ron!” Harry turned around with a grin on his face. He had expected someone to firecall him to report on the hint he had dropped off with the Aurors last night about Mariana Royal and Dennis’s photograph of her. He hadn’t known the reporter would be Ron, or that he would come in person.
Ron smiled and shook his hand, while glancing with exaggerated care over Harry’s shoulder for Malfoys. Harry shoved him into a chair and sat down next to him, gesturing with his own cup. “Do you want something to eat?” As usual, Kreacher had made a huge meal, and while Harry was keeping it under Warming Charms for Malfoy and Narcissa when they woke up, Ron wouldn’t make a huge dent in it.
“No, I’ve eaten.” Ron paused with his hands on the table in front of him. “There’s been a complication with Dennis.”
Harry nodded, not really surprised. There were always complications there, from Dennis’s popularity that wouldn’t let Harry arrest him to his relationship to the rest of the Muggleborn Legion and their support of their leader. “What is it?”
Ron hooked his thumbs together and twiddled them. “He said that he would speak about Mariana Royal, but only to you. And that you had to come to him alone, without Auror backup, and without-guests.” He met Harry’s gaze and twitched one eyebrow, as if Harry wouldn’t be able to figure that out himself.
“Yeah, I understand,” Harry said, and then met Ron’s eyes. “You know the favor I’m going to ask, right?”
Ron sighed slowly. “I understand, but I don’t have to like it.”
“I would never ask you to like it,” Harry reassured him. “I just don’t trust the Malfoys with anyone else right now. And look at it this way. You can torture them as much as being around them is going to torture you.”
Ron’s face lit up. “I never thought of it that way! Thanks, mate.” He pumped Harry’s hand and started to say something else, but Malfoy wandered down the stairs into the kitchen, and Harry got to see the inevitable confrontation a lot sooner than he’d expected.
Malfoy’s face was softly flushed, his hair sleep-tousled. Harry blinked. He had thought that Malfoy would be immaculately groomed and glaring at Ron, not turning his head slowly back and forth and blinking as though he could make Ron go away if he shut his eyes fast enough.
Malfoy was kind of cute this way, actually.
Harry snorted to himself. Yes, Malfoy was cute, all right, when he wasn’t doing something like insisting on going to a posh clothes shop so he could almost die.
Harry stood up and nodded to Ron. “All right. I’ll go interview Dennis, as long as you don’t have anything back at the office that needs to be taken care of and you can stay here for a while.”
“Count on me.” Ron drew his wand and carefully arranged his feet on the table, watching Malfoy. Harry could tell the minute he woke up and really began to notice. His face flushed and his eyes darted back and forth between Ron’s boots and the table as if he was waiting for the first scuff-mark to appear. Ron grinned at him.
“Potter promised that he would be here to protect us,” said Malfoy in glacial accents, and his eyes came back to Harry.
“I did promise that,” said Harry, and he knew he was flushing a bit. “But I didn’t anticipate this. Someone who could be connected to the Bard-the Muggleborn I told you about who showed up the first day we were here and told me about a missing woman from the Legion-will only speak to me alone.”
Malfoy gave him a smile that made him resemble the sneering boy from Hogwarts, if someone had plunked that boy down in the middle of a dangerous situation and made him grow brains. Well, in a way, Harry thought, they had. “So you’ll go running off to visit someone who could be the Bard the day after you defeated the Bard? How wonderful.”
“No one has actually defeated the Bard,” Harry pointed out. “I foiled one attack. And with help.” Malfoy nodded absently as though remembering Harry’s explanation for the silver fire from Snape’s memories. “If Creevey’s the Bard, then he already knows about it, anyway, so I’m not giving much away.”
“Walking into his clutches-”
“Killing Harry would be stupid if he asked him to come visit when other people know where Harry’s going,” Ron interrupted casually. “And I don’t think the Bard is stupid. He’s obsessed.” He glanced at Malfoy for a minute. “So obsessed, in fact, that he doesn’t target people other than the ones that fulfill his specifications. Harry doesn’t.”
“That doesn’t explain the Bard’s attack on my mother a few nights ago,” Malfoy snapped, turning towards Ron. “And you don’t know anything about it, Weasley. So stay out of it.”
Ron grinned. “Don’t know anything about it? I’ve been one of the lead Aurors on the case for months.”
“Well, I reckon that’s why it hasn’t been solved yet, then,” Malfoy muttered.
Harry winced. He could just imagine how that insult would have ripped Ron out of his chair in seconds if they were back at Hogwarts.
But some people had changed since Hogwarts, and Ron proved he was one of them after a moment of sitting so intensely still that Harry could almost hear his bones creaking with the effort of it. Then he nodded and said, “We all have our opinions, Malfoy,” and took out a slip of parchment from his pocket. “This is the Floo address of the Muggleborn Legion,” he added, handing it to Harry.
Harry blinked as he looked down at the neatly-written words. They weren’t the same as the last address he had visited, when he’d gone to ask Dennis some questions. “They’ve changed headquarters?”
“Yeah,” Ron said, and met and held Harry’s gaze, and the silent surmise passed back and forth between them. Harry nodded and walked towards the door to pick up his cloak.
“I’ll be back in a few minutes,” Harry said, and that was as far as he got before someone grabbed his shoulder and turned him around. Harry locked his elbows against his sides and snatched up his wand.
Malfoy was the one who had turned him, though, not some mysterious force of the Bard’s power, and he was staring at Harry in a way that made his heart squirm a little. “So you’re going to go off and leave us under the care of our worst enemies, is that it?” he whispered. “After specifically promising that you wouldn’t do that?”
“I thought the Bard was your worst enemy right now, not the Weasleys,” said Harry, and held Malfoy’s eyes until he turned his head away a little. “Listen. I know you’re grieving. I promise that Ron can be a professional. He’ll defend you if the Bard comes back. He’s one of the few Aurors I trust to keep his promises and shield you completely. I promise that he has no sympathy for what the Bard has done.”
“Some of them do?” Malfoy looked a little sick.
Harry nodded gently. “No one I would ever assign to guard you. They’ve been pretty open about their sympathies, and I think they’re absurd. But please accept that I know what I’m doing, and you can survive a few hours without me.”
Malfoy looked away from him as if pondering in his head how long the last few Bard attacks had taken. Then he nodded, still looking away from Harry. “Then go, and get back as soon as you can.”
He walked over to the breakfast Kreacher had left. In the meantime, Ron had removed his boots from the table and was watching Malfoy thoughtfully. He made a little “go on” motion when Harry caught his eye, and Harry shrugged and went out the door, making sure he had his cloak slung firmly around his shoulders. He had cast a few defensive enchantments on it that made it his own portable set of wards. That should ease any attack he might suffer from Dennis or other Bard sympathizers.
Harry’s mind was already racing, reaching into the future. Why had Dennis asked to talk to Harry, specifically? Was it because he knew Harry had blocked some of the Bard’s attacks? Because he thought Harry had the best chance to take the Bard down? Because Harry was the one protecting the Malfoys?
In that case, it did make Harry wonder if he should leave the house and the Malfoys alone. He paused with one hand on the door and turned back.
But Ron was only watching tolerantly as Malfoy ate, and in the almost-supernatural way of best friends, he saw why Harry was hesitating. He made another “go on” motion, and clapped his hand over his heart. A silent promise, Harry knew. He wouldn’t let anything happen to Malfoy or Narcissa while Harry was gone.
Harry nodded back, and walked over to the Floo connection. He had settled on at least half-a-dozen reasons for why Dennis Creevey might want to see him, but nothing could beat going there and actually finding out.
*
Draco kept his back turned to Weasley as he started to eat. He wanted to take the plate back upstairs, but he knew what his mother would say if he woke her from a sound sleep. And he also knew what she would say about him fleeing the kitchen when a Weasley was there, not able to take even that much of one’s company.
Not that Draco would think of it as fleeing. But when he began thinking of it through his mother’s eyes, it was hard to stop.
“How did Harry keep the Bard off you yesterday, anyway?”
Draco twitched. He had thought both he and Weasley would observe the rule of silence, and that could be the way to avoid a duel that would destroy the house. But if one person wouldn’t observe it, the other one still could. Draco stood up. He didn’t need to go into the bedroom to eat upstairs, of course. He remembered a library that had looked interesting.
“I just wanted to know,” said Weasley. “He told me that he did it, but not the details of how. If there’s a good weapon against the Bard, then we ought to know about it so we can use it.”
Draco turned around. He knew he had a nasty smile, and perhaps later he would feel sorry about it. Right now, he didn’t. “What? In other situations, with people who deserve to be protected? Is that what you were going to say?”
Weasley stared at him. “Of course not, Malfoy, stop acting stupid. Even if the Bard is obsessed with you right now, though, there could be other victims any day. And we need to know the weapon. I’m surprised Harry didn’t tell me already.”
That led Draco to a rush of exhilarating conclusions. Without a doubt, the best one was that Potter hadn’t told Weasley about the silver fire because it was meant to protect Slytherins, or maybe because of where it came from, and that meant Potter didn’t trust Weasley.
Draco was going to reveal the secret, like a good little citizen concerned for people other than himself, and then Weasley might doubt that Potter was a saint. And perhaps he could affect their friendship along with it.
“He used a kind of silver fire,” he said, watching Weasley closely. “It surrounded the invisible force that the Bard manifested as, and bound it. He’s using the same fire to ward a photograph of my father upstairs.”
Weasley’s brow had been twitching in confusion that Draco valued, but now, he snorted and waved a hand. “Oh, that. Well, it’s true that would be of limited use in other situations. He would have to be right on the spot to unleash the fire. And we don’t know if the Bard always sends an invisible force to do his dirty work for him.”
Draco bit his lip hard in confusion, and then shrugged. It was hard to see why Potter would have kept the secret of the silver fire from Weasley, come to that. “What do you think about the Bard entering the house through my father’s photograph?”
“I think it was damn silly to keep it here, if that’s the source, or Harry even suspected it was.” For a moment, Weasley tapped his fingers on the table, and gazed seriously at Draco. “Why did he?”
“To ward it,” said Draco, and did feel a little twist of smugness, because he had just said that, which was a sign that Weasley wasn’t paying attention, which was a sign that he wasn’t fit to be watching over them.
Granted, Draco would probably have to contemplate that insight as he slid into the dark waters of unconsciousness or death because the Bard had come for him and Potter wasn’t here to stop the maniac-but at least knowing he had been right and Potter wrong would give him a bit of satisfaction.
“Well, that makes sense,” said Weasley, stealing his satisfaction, and got up to walk behind Draco to the sink. Draco tensed, but Weasley didn’t curse him, just calling, “Kreacher!” and starting to give him some instructions.
Draco stared at Weasley’s back, because he had to wonder what the fuck was going on here, and then he saw the way Weasley’s lips quivered and lifted. Of course. Weasley knew that acting as polite as he could would annoy Draco. It was why he had even taken his feet off the table without Draco asking him to. Well. Two could play at that game, and be sitting quietly when Potter came back.
Draco smiled innocently, sat down, folded his arms in front of him on the table, and asked, when Weasley turned around, “How has life been treating you?”
Weasley’s dropped jaw was absolutely priceless.
*
“Thank you for coming to see me, Harry.”
Harry raised one eyebrow as he took the chair across from Dennis. It might be true that the Muggleborn Legion had moved their headquarters-though since Harry had come in by Floo, it was hard to be sure of that-but Dennis’s office hadn’t changed at all from the last time he saw it. It was still a large, grey room, the desk with its chair facing away from the door and into the corner where the large hearth loomed. Photographs and small scrolls hung on the walls, detailing people the Legion wanted to recruit and enemies they planned to fight against. Dennis kept mostly paperwork on the desk, and the photograph that Harry had noticed before. Mariana Royal.
Dennis picked up the picture and handed it to him. Harry turned it around to make sure he hadn’t been mistaken, hard to imagine as it was that he would be. No, the same tall dark-skinned woman smiled at him and waved.
“Mariana is a half-blood,” said Dennis calmly. “Her father was a Muggle. She understands the prejudice and the need to fight against it better than a lot of half-bloods do.”
Harry looked up and held Dennis’s eyes as he handed the picture back. “Like me, I suppose you mean.”
“You’re an Auror,” said Dennis quietly. “You believe in these abstract ideals of justice that don’t apply much to the real world. When pure-bloods control the justice system, how much leverage do you imagine Muggleborns get to use?”
“I’ve never let a criminal go because of who they are or who they’re related to,” Harry said.
“And the cases that actually get to come to trial? The ones that the Wizengamot decides on? The laws that get passed?” Dennis shook his head slowly. “You can’t influence the whole of the justice system, Harry. Even though you might come closer than other people, with the power that your name has.”
Harry rolled his eyes a little. “You know, I am sympathetic to your cause, but not when you put people in danger because you want greater justice.”
“They won’t give it to us, so we have to take it,” Dennis said simply. He leaned back, watched Harry once more, and then added, “You don’t sympathize with the Bard at all? I know that Lucius Malfoy was your enemy, and so was Draco, and yet you put your life in danger to protect them yesterday.”
Harry sat very still. Then he drew his wand.
Dennis held up his hands. “I didn’t instigate the attack. You could use Veritaserum on me, and it would still be true.”
“But you saw something,” Harry said quietly. He was thinking of the way that Dennis had showed up at Grimmauld Place long before the officials details of Lucius Malfoy’s death had got released. “I want you to come with me, and explain what it is you saw.” He added, when Dennis’s mouth opened, “Hermione thinks the Bard might just be a roving curse, conjured by someone who wanted revenge on Death Eaters. It would be interesting if that caster was among the Legion, wouldn’t it?”
Dennis rolled his eyes and stood up to come around the desk. “You have no idea,” he said. “I have tried to give you some clues, like Tatyana’s name, but you really have no idea.”
Harry nodded grimly. That was enough to take him in for suspicion, if he had been helping or spying for the Bard and had told no one. “Even if they’re Death Eater lives, they’re still lives,” he said, as he bound ropes around Dennis’s wrists. “It should be up to the justice system to deal with them, the way they put Lucius in prison for a while. Not you.”
“I’m not the one dealing with them,” said Dennis, and stared straight ahead at the wall even when Harry walked over to catch his eye. In the end, Harry had to shake his head and take Dennis in without getting the answers right then.
But he did wonder. He wondered about someone who could manage to do the smuggling he knew Dennis had done, and fool some seasoned Aurors if not Harry, and who had a photograph on his desk that was the copy of the one hanging in the back of Madam Royal’s shop. He had to wonder if someone who was clever enough could conjure the curse when he wanted it, pull it back when he didn’t want it, and open doors like this through the help of someone else’s magical theory. After all, there were more than a hundred people in the Muggleborn Legion, a lot of them experienced wizards.
No matter that Dennis’s own magic wasn’t powerful enough for this. His help might be.
Just one of the things I’m going to find out, Harry promised himself, and laid a careful, heavy hand on Dennis’s shoulder as he escorted him out.
Chapter Ten.
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