Chapter Seven of 'For Their Unconquerable Souls'- Settled and Dreaming

[lomonaaeren]

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Chapter Seven—Settled and Dreaming

To watch Harry with his patients was at once a wonder and a source of concern to Draco.

He spoke softer words than Draco had known were in existence, and not at all like the kind of rough flirting he used with Lucius. Draco supposed that was because these patients had no former Death Eaters among them, but still, he would have anticipated more of a continuity of manner. That Harry could lower his voice, that he could lean in sympathetically and nod when a man with regrowing bones complained for the third time in five minutes about Skele-Gro not taking, that he could lift the fringe from the forehead of a boy who was sweating yellow, oily liquid from the poisonous combination of potions he’d swallowed, made Draco stir against the wall with restless desire. So Harry did have that gentleness Draco would crave towards himself from a lover. He could show it when he wanted. Draco’s problem was how to make Harry want to show it to him.

But he didn’t ask Draco for help, not once. He fetched the vials of potions himself. He spoke all the comforting words and never glanced over his shoulder as if he were at a loss and required a suggestion. He waded right into the fray when a thrashing patient nearly flung himself off the bed and restrained his limbs with a twitch of his wand. Then he murmured words as calm as the flow of a stream at dusk until the patient relaxed and listened to him, and he was able to remove the restraints.

Unused to depending on anyone else, content to pour the strength and the grace of his personality down an empty well until he was entirely drained…Draco had seen a disease like this before, in another student who was working towards her Potions mastery. She had primarily wanted to know how to handle Potions ingredients for the sake of her mother, who had one of the rare wizarding diseases that regularly needed new treatments. She hadn’t considered once whether she liked Potions, or what would happen when her mother died and she no longer had that force driving her. Draco could admire her selflessness as he could admire the skill behind a painting in a style he didn’t like. He couldn’t think well of it. There was the rest of one’s life to think about, and no matter what anyone might say, it wasn’t selfish to manage one’s own happiness.

Draco, as he watched Harry speak to a small girl named Mary who had lost her voice to poison and could only nod or shake her head in response to his questions, could see something like that happening to Harry, so easily. He would collapse one morning and stay in a coma the rest of his life, or he would become so numb emotionally that he would withdraw from the world, unable to Heal any more. He kept nothing for himself, no reserve of emotional strength that he didn’t pour into other people, and if he let anyone support him, Draco had yet to see it.

It was wrong. He was a Malfoy now. He should have the very best of all material comforts, beauty to surround and soothe his wounds of heart and soul, conversation to guide his mind to new intellectual heights, and the necessity of only working when he wanted to. Draco was willing to concede that Harry’s sense of honor might make his work more frequent than Draco would like, but he still should choose it, not sink into a constant haze of busyness because it was the right thing to do.

More irritating on a personal level, Harry had forgotten his presence. His entire being seemed to concentrate in Mary, and his face shone for her. Draco shifted his weight. He would not sink to making a vocal protest—not where they had an audience—but he still disliked the idea that he mattered less to Harry than this girl did.

Then he realized Harry was muttering and cooing to the girl about visiting her again that evening, even though he’d already spent almost half an hour with her, and despite the attack on Lucius this morning, and despite all the other patients he had visited. And, of course, he had to complete the all-important duty of settling Draco in his house and letting Draco seduce him.

“At seven, all right?” Harry said the last in a voice so caressing that Draco bit his lip. Damn it, he wanted to hear that voice directed at him. If he was careful and patient, then maybe he would.

“Can you afford the time?” he asked.

Harry glared at him. Draco didn’t know what the problem was. It was an honest question.

“Yes, I most certainly can,” said Harry. “And so can you, if you’re so intent on trailing after me.”

Draco stifled his immediate impulse to snap back that he was guarding Harry and trying to educate him, not trailing him. He was not a dog. “I’m accustomed to relaxing before the fire by then, Potter,” he said. He made sure to look carefully at Harry, and choose his next words with equal care. Harry would not get away with thinking that Draco was concerned only for himself and his father. “And you look like you could do with an hour when you’re not worrying about that nasty superior of yours or all the noble self-sacrifices you like to make.”

“If you think you can change my routine to suit your self-indulgent notions,” Harry said, too obviously clenching his teeth behind his smile, “you’re wrong.” He turned back to Mary and nodded as if she were a queen commanding his attendance. “I’ll be here at seven,” he repeated.

He turned around and marched away. Draco followed him, gaze fixed firmly on his back. He knew he would glare at the girl if he turned around again, and with his luck, Harry would turn around, see it, and decide that Draco was despicable and a dastard forever.

Self-indulgent? Does he have any idea of how much time and kindness I’m prepared to give him, because of what he did for my father?

Draco released a careful, soundless breath through his nose. He didn’t know how he was to explain that things had changed to Harry. He had thought his behavior would be enough, but no, it obviously wasn’t. He bit at the corner of his lip and half-lidded his eyes, concealing, he hoped, both his vexation and his attempts to find a way to improve the situation. Harry would not like to be looked at as if he were a problem in Arithmancy.

“Do you think Mr. Smythe honestly believes that your father raped his daughter?” Harry asked. He walked with his eyes fixed straight ahead, his tone so casual that Draco could not assimilate the words for long moments. “Or is that a cover story for something more sinister?”

Draco choked. He had to yank his thoughts back from a very different track to the one Harry was trying to lay in front of him, and he could practically feel Harry’s smug enjoyment radiating from him. He must have a trace of politeness, though, or he would have turned around and gloated openly.

I reckon I should be grateful for that delicacy. We’re certainly adopting someone boisterous and crude as part of the family, but it’s not as bad as embracing a Weasley would have been.

Draco tried to force away the thought that he might be literally embracing a Weasley soon, if Potter’s friendship with them still held true, and make himself come up with an appropriate answer. “The Death Eaters wore masks, Potter.” He thought of the many accusations Lucius had been faced with after the Wizengamot declared him free, accusations that the people making them probably didn’t believe themselves; it was just a means to receive publicity and exercise grief. His voice tightened in spite of himself. “Nor did my father always wear his hair uncovered. Just because a masked Death Eater hurt a member of someone’s family—and I’m not denying that many of them did hurt quite a few people—doesn’t mean it was my father who committed the crime.”

Harry turned around. Draco blinked, but held his gaze. He knew his face probably looked too open for his father’s taste, but maybe it would do something for Harry.

And, indeed, Harry caught his breath and shifted towards him with a slight step that he probably hadn’t meant to take. Draco softened his smile, but decided against extending a hand. Harry seemed to resent his attempts at seduction. “I can promise you, if you like the expression I’m wearing now, I’m more than willing to present it to you as often as you wish.”

Harry stiffened and gave his head a half-toss, as if he were a horse flicking off the reins that someone had laid on his neck. Draco nearly growled under his breath. He was trying! He was trying to show Harry that he could be gentle, by speaking the words that Harry wanted to hear; he was trying to show that he was patient, by standing quietly in the corner whilst Harry spent hour after hour with boring people. What more could Harry possibly want?

“There is something I’d like to see more of from you, Malfoy.”

Draco felt heat gather at his groin and hope braid through his throat, together forming a halter that jerked him towards Harry. He couldn’t regret the step he took. He had been waiting for this all day.

“What?” he breathed.

“Your back,” Harry said, and turned his.

Draco clenched his fists for a moment, and then followed again without speaking or revealing his outrage aloud. Harry carried Lucius’s health in his beating heart. It wouldn’t do to allow him to get too far ahead.

But Draco was feeling less sanguine about the project to get Harry into his bed and introduce him to the comforts a Malfoy should accept than he had been three hours back. Harry was generous and noble and disinterested, but he had his faults, too. And one of them was that he didn’t appear to desire things any reasonable person should desire.

Draco didn’t know anyone who honestly disliked attention, flirtation, and the offer of companionship, though. Which meant Harry was lying to both Draco and himself.

It’s a sad day, when a former Death Eater has to teach the Savior of the Wizarding World honesty.

*

Number Twelve Grimmauld Place, the house Harry showed him to—at least, after they’d got past the illusion that concealed it in the middle of a Muggle neighborhood—was a bloody mess.

Everywhere, Draco could see the signs of long neglect: faint stains on the walls that magic had done its best to help but couldn’t erase; strips that showed repaired paper or paint; fainter scorch marks and the indefinable, half-there soot that was the result of careless use of Dark magic. The entrance corridor was far too small and dusky, with lamps that Harry lit with a flick of his wand. Draco curled his lip when he saw the narrow, dark stairs leading to the upper floor, and the doorway that led to the kitchen. That doorway had once borne mold or mildew. Draco could still smell it if he sniffed.

What was Harry thinking? With the staircase, particularly. Given his glasses, and his lack of sight without them, it was a wonder he hadn’t stumbled on it and broken his neck already. He needed a place where he could walk an entire wing without encountering stairs, and where the ones he did have to walk were broad and well-lit.

Somewhere like the Manor.

“I can’t believe you live here,” he said, because he planned to practice honesty with Harry now.

Harry gave him a glance that combined weariness, patience, and amusement. Draco snarled silently under his breath. Harry had no right to look as if it were costing him time and will simply to be around Draco. If anything, he was the one who ought to be given an Order of Merlin, Third Class, for dealing with Harry.

“My godfather left it to me,” Harry said. “I’m afraid your mother didn’t impress him as a trustworthy custodian.”

Make that an Order of Merlin, Second Class. That was an unworthy conclusion for Harry to jump to. Draco cooled his voice as he said, “You think I’m angry because the Black house didn’t pass into my hands? Good God, Potter. I wouldn’t live here if you paid me.”

Harry reached out and touched the banister as if he would topple over at that announcement, but he sounded happy rather than distressed, the way that Draco would have wished him to be. “And no one is paying you to dance attendance on me. You might as well leave now.”

Draco choked on Harry’s stubbornness and managed to swallow it in the end. It was time to laugh, to show that he was unaffected by words like that, so that eventually Harry would give up saying them. Even he wasn’t stupid enough to keep using weapons that wouldn’t work. “I was using the word ‘live’ in a more permanent sense,” he said, stepping past Harry to study a prominent stain on the nearest wall. He had to shudder fastidiously at the sight of it. Hadn’t there been a house-elf attached to the Black house? Why hadn’t it cleaned this spot better? Of course, considering Granger’s attitude towards house-elves and Harry’s attachment to her, he probably hadn’t driven it to rigorous enough pursuit of its duties. “Once you’ve come to your senses, I’m sure I can help you find a house you needn’t be ashamed to have company in.”

“I would be ashamed to associate with anyone you thought of as suitable company,” Harry snapped, and then stepped into the kitchen. Draco poked at the stain for a moment with his wand before he followed; a whispered charm had no effect on it. If Harry was going to put away the Dark artifacts that Draco was sure had once crowded the place, he could at least have cleaned up after himself.

And then the remembrance of what Harry had done for Lucius came back, and Draco stifled a sigh. Harry was blood, no matter what. Draco could have wished for a sensibility more like his own, true, but—

And then he stepped into the kitchen and jerked to a stop. At least this time he managed to curl his tongue in his mouth instead of curling his lip; Harry was seeing far too much of his open disgust as it was.

Harry was eating a sandwich from a plate of them that had sat in the middle of the table for God knew how long. From this distance, Draco could feel that there was no Preserving Charm on them. Next to them was a cup of tea with only a mild spell to keep it warm on the porcelain. And Harry was snapping at the sandwich like a large fish devouring a small one. He should have sat down to a calm, extensive meal after the magic and time and emotional commitment he’d spent today on his patients, and still he refused. Draco could have kicked the wall in frustration, but, like a mature wizard, he found an outlet in words instead.

“You live a cramped life, don’t you?”

Harry continued wolfing his sandwich. Draco so strongly imagined stepping towards him, gripping his wrist, and wrenching the food away from him until he could eat properly that he was mildly surprised to find he hadn’t actually done it. “As before,” Harry said, obviously uninterested in his opinion, “you’re welcome to leave and go back to St. Mungo’s if you like. Or Malfoy Manor.”

And you really think I would go away without my new brother? Draco bit back the words, though. It was only too likely that Harry would decide to be relentlessly literal once more and point out that he and Draco hadn’t shared a womb. “You have no idea what a sacrifice of life force means, either.”

Harry turned around and stared at him then. Draco felt a faint tremble of hope. Maybe the love of direct explanations Harry seemed to entertain would work for him after all. Harry had curiosity and doubt warring together behind his eyes, because he had never learned to hide his emotions; Draco could work with either. “I know life debts can endure between wizards who neither trust nor like each other,” Harry said. “I can’t believe that you would insist on its importance the way you’re doing.”

He thinks to compare this to a life debt? Draco licked his lips to get rid of the taste of frustration, and decided that it was probably the best comparison that would occur to Harry, uneducated little wanker that he was.

There’s no reason I can’t dislike a member of the family sometimes, he addressed the ghost of Narcissa breathing reproach in his mind. Particularly when he’s so exasperating.

“It’s more than important,” Draco said. “It’s almost—it means—“

And all his fine intentions broke apart like light bouncing off shattered glass, because there was no room for the words he wanted to speak in Harry’s world. No ability to bridge the gap between them, as long as he lived in a house like this and didn’t have the sense of brooding danger that constrained Draco’s movements and emotions every time he was beyond the walls of his home. How was he to explain their constant danger to someone who had always had the world at his beck and call? Why should Harry want to trade his friendly perceptions for one of constant danger, anyway?

He made a small frustrated noise in his throat, shaking his head. “I don’t have the words to explain it. This would be so much easier if you were a pure-blood,” he finished. He knew he sounded as if he was nagging, but he didn’t care. Perhaps Harry would take the hint and begin to do research in the books that surely must occupy the Black family library here.

“I’ve made your life hard from the day I appeared in it,” Harry said. “Why ruin a fine tradition?” He packed the second sandwich into his mouth and ate it so hard that crumbs of bread and meat and cheese flew out of the corners of his lips. Draco winced. Harry, of course, not content with that performance, gathered up a third and strolled away towards the stairs.

Draco followed. He had no fear that Harry would get lost in his own house, but there was always the possibility of a fall from the stairs, and Draco actually hoped for one. That would let him get his hands on Harry’s body.

And there were no wards on this house, or nothing worth noticing. It made Draco so uneasy he tasted constant bile in the back of his throat when he swallowed.

“You’ll have a bedroom near mine, the better to hear me if I scream for help. I hope you won’t be too bored.” Harry spoke without looking over his shoulder, and with his mouth full of sandwich.

Fuck honesty. Let’s return to the flirting, and see if that has any effect.

“Listening to you scream for me could never be boring.” Draco deliberately made his voice low and breathy.

Harry continued climbing without looking around. “You shouldn’t lack for comforts here,” he went on. Draco scowled. Perhaps some of his concern about Harry’s comfort had sunk in after all, but of course Harry couldn’t apply those thoughts to himself. “Kreacher’s kept up all the bedrooms, and there’s a great deal more furniture in storage. He can prepare any food you like—“

“I wouldn’t have known, from that plate of sandwiches in the kitchen.” Or the way you eat them.

“That’s simply what I like to eat.” Harry turned around on the top step, shrugged, and then evinced a faint blush. Draco nearly blinked, then realized that he stood at a height that put his eyes at the level of Harry’s arse. If Harry thought he had done that on purpose, who was Draco to disabuse him of the notion? “You needn’t feel bound by my tastes.”

Draco couldn’t help himself. One thing Harry had a talent for, besides exasperating people and mediwizardry, was straight lines. “If your taste runs to bondage—“

“You’re quite certain your mastery isn’t in innuendo?” Harry had a bite of ice in his voice now, and he gestured Draco towards three of the shut doors with all the regality of a king dismissing the knight who had fucked around with his wife. “All those rooms are fitted as bedrooms. Choose which one you like.”

Draco wanted to stamp his foot. It wasn’t fair, that none of his strategies were working. He would simply have to change tactics again. Perhaps Harry would like some information about his life, and he had already brought up Draco’s mastery, which would give him an opening.

“I decided to take a mastery in potions partially in remembrance of Professor Snape,” Draco said, and opened the first door. He knew at once he wouldn’t take it—he simply couldn’t deal with that large an unwarded window—but he kept talking so that Harry wouldn’t think Draco was rejecting his hospitality too quickly. “But soon enough I realized a passion for the art that I hadn’t had in years. It reminded me of simpler times, before I had to make decisions that could have meant life and death for my entire family.” He let himself shudder as the memory rose. The sixteen-year-old he had tried desperately to kill still lived in his dreams. “I recaptured some of that whilst I worked on the earlier stages of my mastery. It was as if I were growing through a childhood and adolescence I’d missed into a stronger person. Now that I’m working on the more stringent potions, I can finally feel like an adult.”

There was a shuffle behind him, as though Harry had been about to step forwards and thought better of it. Draco disliked how much the small stab of hope pricking his belly meant to him. At least that was a better reaction than he’d received so far. He shut the door of the first room and opened the second.

The wards glowed more thickly here, to the point where Draco could sense the tingle of the magic along his nerves instead of squinting and prying after it, and the walls were thicker. His shoulders relaxed, and he decided to let Harry see that, too. “I’ll take this one.” Perhaps he should mix in some flirtation again. He let his eyes dart quickly over Harry. “Unless you meant the offer of sharing your bed with me, of course,” he added.

“There is nothing I want to do less right now,” Harry said.

But Draco had seen the leap and flicker of interest in his eyes, like flames rising from banked embers. It made him remember the way Harry had looked when he cast the Heart’s Blessing spell, and he longed to lean forwards and wrap his fingers around Harry’s chin and jaw. He’s lying. He’s interested.

“Except possibly explaining your presence in my house to my friends,” Harry had to say then, and douse Draco’s lust with images of Weasley and Granger.

A sharp hiss cut through the silence between them. Draco nearly drew his wand until he noticed the faint emotion on Harry’s face: irritation, not surprise. He sighed. “Stay here for a few minutes,” he said. “Come when I call you.”

Draco bowed. He had not the least intention of obeying; if he were to understand Harry, he needed to watch him when he was in company with people he would have more natural reactions to. “A skill I haven’t yet had the pleasure to learn, but would be more than happy to master for you,” he said.

Harry whirled away too suddenly for the gesture to be casual. Draco smiled—and he didn’t think it was a desperate and strained smile, and, even if it was, no one was looking at him—and cast a silencing charm on his boots, then waited a count of one hundred before he carefully followed.

It was the first time this afternoon he’d been able to analyze his emotions for a moment instead of simply feeling them. He was stunned to realize that he was quite enjoying himself, for all the frustration that Harry provided.

It had been years since anyone but his mother or father had provoked reactions this strong, and the surprises Harry handed him were infinitely more pleasurable than the panic of his father’s illness.

I was right. I needed a challenge. And I’ll have him yet. No one can ignore the ties of blood forever.

Chapter 8.

Comments

[ravenqueen55.livejournal.com]

I love pouty Draco, with his desire to stomp his foot in frustration and all his talk about unfairness. Just too cute!!! (In a completely snarky, sexy way, of course...)

[lomonaaeren.livejournal.com]

Thank you! I'm glad you don't think he's too childish.

[ravenqueen55.livejournal.com]

No, I don't think he's too childish at all. I mean, he's a bit childish, but I think that's totally in character for Draco, and I find it wonderfully amusing!