Chapter Twenty-Eight of 'For Their Unconquerable Souls'- New Information

[lomonaaeren]

Thank you again for all the reviews!

Chapter Twenty-Eight—New Information

Draco couldn’t stop staring at his father. He had never imagined that something like this would happen: that one member of his family would be dying in front of him and that he would be helpless to stop it. He could always do something. It was part of his charm, part of the invincible way that he faced and would conquer the world if he tried.

But Lucius was dying, and Draco had no time to brew a potion that would help, since Harry’s Congelo charm had failed, and his mother stood by with a look of pain in his eyes that made Draco want to kill, but their enemies were unknown and still beyond their reach, and—

Harry seized his wrist, pressing down on it until Draco gasped and stared at him. Harry’s face was flushed and his teeth were gritted, as if he intended to bite through his own tongue. Draco was about to remark that that wasn’t a productive use of time when his father was dying, but Harry spoke first.

“Invoke the Malfoy blood magic. Now.”

Draco opened his mouth. He wanted to say that he didn’t know if he could call it when he wasn’t in control of himself. The churning emotions bounding and boiling through him weren’t rational. What if he lost hold of them and Lucius was harmed as a result? Draco thought he could bear Lucius dying, but he didn’t know if he could bear having caused it.

Harry shook his head.

That one gesture made Draco seize control of his own will. He swallowed and closed his eyes, then dived into himself, seeking the magic.

It came to him, red and blazing, silver and brilliant, dragging Draco’s mind along with it into an invisible tide.

And then Harry spoke.

“Guberno carmen de Malfoy!” he said.

The magic altered. Draco knew it still sprang from within him, but now it was streaming through Harry, as if he had turned the course of the river that the magic resembled. And he was the one who reared with it like a breaking wave, and Draco was the one who had to resign himself to being a passive participant in the healing process, since he didn’t know the details of the spells Harry was casting.

“Congelo!” Harry said again.

His voice was the firmest thing in the world, Draco thought, and opened his eyes, suddenly and absurdly calm. Surely not even the Dark magic that Lucius’s enemies had cast on him could be firmer than this.

Harry stood in front of him, fists clenched, head tossed back far enough that Draco could make out his profile, his squinted-shut eyes, his forehead blazing with sweat. He could almost make out the shine around Harry that was the tamed Malfoy power, handled through a wand that shook with the ripples of pure magic.

This, he knew, must be the force of will Harry had used to defeat Voldemort.

He was not at all surprised to see the Mirror Maze spring into existence above Lucius for a moment, rippling like crystal seen underwater, lovely and deadly. Nor was he surprised to see it turn black and fall like volcanic ash across Lucius in the next moment. Of course Harry’s controlled magic would win. There was no way it could lose.

Lucius stopped bleeding as the time-stopping charm took effect.

Harry immediately cast another spell that burst in a fiery golden blaze above the bed, then formed a vision of a slowly breathing man in front of Harry’s face at eye level. Draco wasn’t sure what that one did, but it seemed to reassure Harry. He dropped his head forwards and took a deep breath, and his control over the Malfoy magic dissipated, so that it dropped back inside Draco like a weighted pack.

Then Draco had time to realize what had happened, as he saw his mother’s head droop and her teeth let her lip go.

Lucius was safe, for the moment.

And Draco had helped to heal him.

He gulped and moved his hand to cradle his wrist where Harry had squeezed him. A bruise was forming there. But Draco would have gladly borne a broken wrist for the sake of a healing father.

They had done something Draco truly believed was impossible.

Or, rather, he had provided the power, and Harry had directed it.

Harry turned around, and Draco frowned, because the expression on Harry’s face was not the look of pure joy Draco would have expected. He started to ask what was wrong, but once again Harry began to speak before he could.

“I could be charged and fined, if not placed in Azkaban, for taking control of your magic without your permission. If you want to do that, I won’t resist, but please wait until Lucius has been treated. I’ve studied the Mirror Maze deeply enough that I think I can find a solution and release him from the stasis spell in a few days.”

Draco had to bury his head in his hands, had to. An enormous weariness swept through him, followed by an enormous anger at the Muggles.

He thinks that we would see him arrested because he saved my father’s life in a way that is not perfectly socially approved. The Muggles have crippled him. They’ve given him a conscience too sharp, which he only uses for cutting himself.

He heard his mother speaking then, and was grateful to her, because she would say what Draco found himself incapable of saying right now. “I am amazed,” she murmured, “though perhaps I should not be, that you think Draco would drag you before the Wizengamot for this. Professional Healer ethics do not seem to sit well with Malfoy ethics, however. It is no wonder that you feel so out of your depth here.”

Harry caught his breath and shuffled around. Draco knew he was looking at him again, and so he managed to look up.

“You just saved my father’s life,” Draco said. “Again. If you had to use my magic to do it, who cares? That means I got to have some part in rescuing him, which I needed, after my potion caused him such pain.”

Tears pressed against his eyelids and his throat. It was no plea to gain sympathy that made him shut his eyes and struggle against them.

“Draco, no!”

Harry embraced him, drawing him into one of his arms. Draco saw when he peeked that Narcissa was holding Harry’s other arm and showed no signs of letting him go. “That wasn’t your fault,” Harry continued earnestly. “It was completely the fault of whoever set up the spells so that giving him the dreambane purge would make the Maze react.”

You idiot, then—

Once again, his mother might have read his mind. She tapped Harry’s elbow and said, “And the reason that you had to take control of Draco’s magic comes from the exact same source. Whatever it may have cost, Harry, the result is worth it.”

Draco nodded. He had hidden his eyes against Harry’s shoulder, because that was easiest right now, and he was no longer strong enough to do what looked best. “You thought of a solution in the midst of all that—screaming,” he said. He glanced at the bed again, not quite able to believe that his father was lying there, horrid-looking but still alive, after the spectacle of his near-death. “I couldn’t have. I was panicking, which is something I was taught never to do.”

He briefly caught Narcissa’s eye, and saw agreement there, but she did not scold him. He knew that she had barely clung to her own rationality in the face of Lucius’s screaming.

“I was no better,” she said softly, because Harry could not be expected to understand the silent communication she and Draco had just exchanged. “Under other crises, I have managed to retain my coolness of temper, but my husband has nearly died too often in the past fortnight. We owe you yet another debt, Harry, or we would, if it were reasonable to talk of members of the same family owing each other debts. For that reason, accept Draco’s forgiveness and think no more of it. You have my blessing to do whatever you must in the name of saving Lucius.”

“Mine as well,” Draco added.

Harry’s head flopped forwards as if someone had turned all the bones in his neck to water. He sighed, deeply enough to make Draco want to embrace him; he would have if his position were a little less awkward. He whispered, “Thank you,” twice.

Draco nuzzled his nose into Harry’s neck for a moment, and then looked back at Lucius and opened the kind of space in his memory that he usually used when studying potions. Harry touched the back of his neck, and the bright curiosity in his eyes was question enough without his speaking the words.

“I’m trying to memorize the way he looks,” Draco said. “That way, I won’t be inclined towards mercy when we punish the ones who did this to him.”

He heard the soft but distinct sound of Harry’s teeth grinding.

He ignored it. They were different people, and he understood the codes of the family better than Harry did. Harry would just have to learn to live with the fact of vengeance. There was no reason he had to watch if he didn’t want to; of course, he wouldn’t get to take the criminals to Azkaban the way he desired, but that was too bad.

“I know nothing about how potions might interact with spells like this,” Harry said then, in a transparent attempt to distract Draco. “I’ll need your help to figure that out.”

Draco rested his forehead against Harry’s chin, mostly because he wanted to. “You’re hopeless at Potions, Potter,” he said softly.

For that, he received a kiss into his hair. Draco closed his eyes and let himself rest there for long moments.

He would need the remembrance of this closeness and love when he began to brew the potions that would take vengeance on his enemies and Harry’s Muggles.

*

“Mistress Narcissa.”

Narcissa turned around with the thinnest of smiles. She had spent long enough, she thought, gazing into the mirror and making sure that no trace of her grief over Lucius remained, and now she was ready to do her part in bringing their enemies to justice.

To justice. Her tongue tapped against her teeth as she repeated the words to herself. They were strange words for a Malfoy to speak, and stranger for a Black. She wondered when she had begun to think of justice instead of vengeance.

When Harry came into my life. Many things changed then.

She focused on Rogers, who stood before her with a sheet of parchment in one hand. “Yes, Rogers?”

“Master Harry and Master Harry’s clever friend is finding out who hurt Master Lucius,” said Rogers gravely, and he held out the parchment.

Narcissa glanced at it, and almost smiled. The names there were familiar, very much so. Burne-Jones. Neverlong. Yes, they were families with Death Eater connections, as well as connections to the hospital administration. And Narcissa, though she had not visited the women of the family in a long time, had connections that would make such a visit at the moment seem not unusual.

Her eyes lingered for a moment on the name of Foxe. A nephew killed with Lucius’s wand. Yes. It could be so, but I think not.

Of course she would investigate Foxe, simply to be sure. Someone who had hurt her husband would not be allowed to get away with it. But Narcissa knew to trust her instincts. She would visit Burne-Jones and Neverlong first.

She rose to her feet, faced the mirror again, and began to breathe deeply. She would not need to cast many glamours this time, as she had when she visited St. Mungo’s, save to cover the marks of worry and lack of sleep. But the face she assumed when she went among the Death Eater wives was a mask of its own.

Mouth curved like a scimitar’s blade. Eyes that looked wider and more knowing than they really were. Hands that flexed open and shut again, and rested at her waist as if she clasped the hilt of a sword, or the shaft of a second wand, between them.

“I am going,” she said to Rogers, and swept out of the bedroom, absently casting the glamours as she went.

“Mistress Narcissa is having good hunting,” said Rogers, in a tone too deep and bloodthirsty for a regular house-elf.

Narcissa let her lips curve a touch more. That kind of statement was why Rogers was her favorite house-elf.

*

Draco was so tired the words were blurring before his eyes. It seemed that his rest had been broken lately by worry about Lucius, worries about Harry, or the kind of intense and enervating dreams he usually had when he was trying to memorize all the aspects of a new potion.

And perhaps he was tired because of the drain of the Malfoy blood magic that Harry had pulled from him.

But still he read, because he needed to heal Lucius, and he needed to punish their enemies, and he needed to punish the Muggles. His thoughts were winging in six different directions at once. He dragged them back to the page in front of him and began to read against about potions ingredients that might be affected when used on an individual who had been under the Congelo charm.

Then Harry touched his shoulder and said, “Come on. You need to rest.”

Draco stared up at him. He didn’t know what his face looked like, but Harry’s expression softened, and he kissed Draco on the cheek, his other hand sliding so gently through his hair it made Draco want to weep.

And if that wasn’t a sign of how tired and desperate he was, he didn’t know what was.

“I know the solution is here,” Draco whispered. “I know it is. If I can just find it—“ His hands scrabbled over the sides of the table for a moment, and then he flushed and made himself stop. There’s no excuse for such a display of weakness even if I am tired at the moment. “What if I go to bed, and that means I miss a discovery that could save his life?”

“That won’t happen.” Harry gently pulled him from the chair and towards the bedroom. Draco heard him murmuring Cleaning Charms as they went. He couldn’t find the strength of will to be insulted. “Lucius is under the Congelo charm. It won’t fade.”

“They might have put on some spell that could dissipate it.” Draco twisted restlessly in Harry’s arms, but that had more to do with wanting to stop the babble coming out of his mouth than it did with wanting to be free. Harry’s concern felt like a touch of healing coldness on a burn. “We don’t know enough about the Mirror Maze to say that they didn’t.”

“I know that much,” Harry said. “I’m absolutely sure they didn’t foresee this happening. In fact, the magic they used in the Maze might actually help the stasis spell endure, because they wanted him to remain alive as long as he could under the stress of such pain.”

A sob slipped out of Draco before he could stop it. Harry laid him on the bed in his bedroom then, and his lips brushed Draco’s cheek, ears, and mouth.

“Do you mind sleeping in your clothes?” Harry asked. “I’m afraid I don’t have enough strength myself to undress you.” Draco heard a yawn almost rip his jaw apart a moment later.

He doesn’t mind being weak in front of me. He’s showing his weariness, his concern, his tried patience. This is what it means to really be honest.

And that realization gave Draco courage enough to say what he did next.

“I mind sleeping alone,” he said, and held out his hand.

Harry smiled and took it, climbing into bed with him. Draco turned dazedly towards him, resting his head in the crook between Harry’s neck and shoulder.

It’s like a Gryffindor to find weakness charming, he decided, but there was no rancor in the thought. He would find it difficult to muster rancor for Harry in the future, he decided.

A strong, warm hand stroked down his spine. Harry spoke soft words, or maybe only made wordless sounds, into his hair.

Draco fell asleep too quickly to hear Harry’s own breaths deepen and slow, but he was certain they did.

*

“And I wanted to show Aunt Lina and Uncle Pierre my new dress robes, but I can’t when they’re by themselves all the time,” Angela Burne-Jones finished with a dramatic sigh, throwing her hair behind her shoulder.

Narcissa made clucking noises of sympathy, holding her teacup in such a way that it shielded her mouth somewhat from the girl. She had been told before—mostly by Lucius, but he was not always a poor observer—that her mouth was most likely to betray her emotions, at least to a stranger.

She had had better luck than she had suspected. Instead of finding Lina Burne-Jones at home, she had discovered her niece Angela, a sixteen-year-old witch with boundless energy for shopping and displaying herself and a confidence in Narcissa that included a conviction she was of low intelligence, simply because she was older than Angela.

It was an inexplicable attitude, and Narcissa could only trace it to the girl’s having never attended Hogwarts. Her Death Eater uncle and aunt, who had raised her, had been too nervous about having her exposed to Mudbloods. Instead, they had kept her home and had her tutored. Angela had been able to rule all the tutors just as she apparently ruled her family, and so had never learned to respect the authority of adults. She knew the entire world, her flashing eyes and rising and falling hands proclaimed; they didn’t.

So far she had told Narcissa that her aunt and uncle had been recluses for the past few weeks, which was promising; it made matters sound as if they feared vengeance or had been involved in planning the complicated curse that had felled Lucius. Narcissa did not have proof yet, but—

“Oh, yes, this is the new painting that Uncle bought!” Angela said abruptly, clapping her hands together and beaming at Narcissa. She had risen from her gloom as suddenly as she had fallen into it. Narcissa was glad she had insisted on a traditional education for Draco. He had never been as open as this child, however much of himself he felt forced to expose around Harry. “Isn’t it pretty?”

Narcissa looked up at the wall.

And then her breath rushed out of her lungs, because the picture that hung there was the same as a painting she had seen in the Neverlong house she had just come from visiting. It depicted a five-pointed star, but the mesh of lines within the star worked back and forth in such a complicated pattern that Narcissa could feel her head swimming when she tried to trace them with her eyes.

It also looked remarkably similar to the pattern the Mirror Maze had formed for a moment above her husband this afternoon, just before Harry neutralized it.

Narcissa changed her smile from hungry, which she knew it would have become the moment she recognized the pattern, to appreciative, and turned to Angela. “It’s very pretty indeed, Angela,” she said. “When did your uncle acquire it?”

“Oh, recently,” said Angela, and moved up close to touch one gleaming red line. She tried to follow it with her finger, but had to give up. “The last few weeks. He said it was important, but not why.” She turned to Narcissa and dropped her voice confidingly. “I think he’s planning to make it the centerpiece of an art display that he’s putting together for this autumn.”

Oh, doubtless, Narcissa thought. For a moment, she considered whether Angela’s story could be true, or the connection with Neverlong merely a coincidence. It seemed unbelievably arrogant of their enemies to have the Mirror Maze’s pattern out where anyone could see it.

But then, it had been arrogant of them to attack Lucius in the first place. And they had no reason to think that Narcissa would visit them, singling them out from among the enormous number of wizards who could have constructed the curse. And the painting was not marked in any way; most people who saw it, even if they assigned a sinister meaning to it, would assume it marked the beginning of a new Order rather like the Death Eaters, rather than that it formed a Mirror Maze.

Yes, she would accept the evidence that had been handed to her.

“That’s so pretty, Angela darling,” she said decisively, “that I think I have to copy it for my son.” She stopped herself from saying “my sons” with difficulty. It was not yet common knowledge among the pure-blood families that the Malfoys had adopted Harry Potter. “Do you have some parchment and a quill about?”

Angela gulped, and her eyes widened. “Oh, but I think Uncle would object if someone else had it on their wall before he showed it!” she said.

“I don’t plan to display it publicly.” Narcissa leaned forwards and lowered her own voice. “To tell the truth, dear, my husband is feeling rather—poorly at the moment. We will be staying close to home for the next short while. But we would love to have this painting as a source of beauty to gaze at.”


There. If Burne-Jones questions her, Angela could tell him a story that should satisfy him Lucius is still suffering.

“Oh, of course.” Angela gave her a glance of shining sympathy. “I know what it’s like to have to stay confined to the house all the time! I’ll send a house-elf to fetch the parchment and quill right away, and you can borrow my owl.” She tripped off.

Narcissa gazed at the painting again, this time forcing herself to comprehend the angles and diagonals and subtle spiral pattern that the lines made. She would copy this for Harry, and he, at the least, should be able to diagnose whether it resembled the Mirror Maze.

And in the meantime…

Narcissa started to take up her wand, but hesitated. She had moved without thought to cast a plague spell that would ensure the Burne-Jones family suffered in lingering pain for at least two decades, but now Harry’s face was in her head, blotting out even the pattern.

He would hate it if I took vengeance.

He need not find out…

But he is a mediwizard. He is more likely to find out than otherwise.

Narcissa paused one moment more, on the brink between action and inaction. Then she tucked her wand back into her sleeve as Angela skipped across the drawing room to hand her the parchment.

The trust and love of my son means more to me than suffering that I will not even observe.

Chapter 29.

Comments

[laila2605.livejournal.com]

Oh, this is so good. One of the best fics I have read in a long time. Nad I'm already crawing for the next chapter.
Please hurry with it - please, pretty please.... *SS*

[lomonaaeren.livejournal.com]

Thank you! I'll be posting the newest chapter in a little while.

[tray-la-la.livejournal.com]

awesome! even though i obviously knew what was going to happen, reading this story has really allowed me to get caught up in the plot anew. i still feel the same worry and anxiety and hope, even though i know how it ends! it's just such a fantastic story.

i love harry coming to the rescue in this, and him being the one to take care of draco for a change. i can't get enough of the small signs of affection between them. and narcissa was great at the end. i love her maternal side, because she's still so absolutely slytherin, even if harry's moral code has started to affect her.

[lomonaaeren.livejournal.com]

Thank you! I'm glad the emotions remain high; it's very easy to get bored with hearing a story the second time around.

Narcissa debates a bit more about that moral code, and whether she should be allowing it to affect her, in the next chapter.

[duchessa.livejournal.com]

I'm actually glad Draco is so blithe to Harry's stance on revenge. It makes the upcoming 'bomb' all the more sweet. Oh, yes.
I don't think I can ever gush about this Narcissa enough. To think she started out to as my least favorite Malfoy (not that I dislike her or anything, but Lucius and Draco were more in the spotlight in BbU)! I love the last line - I may be a teensy bit biased, but I think she made the right choice.
Awesome to see more of pureblood culture too. That line about Harry being adopted to the Malfoys not being public knowledge yet makes me wonder how society would treat them once they know. Lucius speculated a little, but hasn't gone into specifics. Will Harry be expected to participate in some of their, er, traditions? Even ones that involve other pureblood families? Oh boy.

[lomonaaeren.livejournal.com]

That will probably be Chapter 30! (The 'bomb').

I think you will like her even more after the next chapter.

Harry probably will be eventually, but it doesn't really come much into this story.

[sethra2000.livejournal.com]

Yay, next chapter..*happy dance*. I am loving this POV story more and more. The Malfoy's are just so intriguing.

[lomonaaeren.livejournal.com]

Thank you!

[ravenqueen55.livejournal.com]

I loved this chapter in the original fic, and I love it just as much here. I'm always thrilled when I see this updated!

[lomonaaeren.livejournal.com]

Thank you!

[nolagal.livejournal.com]

Narcissa is so fantastic The trust and love of my son means more to me than suffering that I will not even observe.
I also liked Draco's reactions after the spell! This was my favorite part in Bloody but Unbowed!

[lomonaaeren.livejournal.com]

Thank you!

[quill-lumos.livejournal.com]

The trust and love of my son means more to me than suffering that I will not even observe. Harry is having SUCH an effect on the Malfoys. He has become their conscience. They in their turn are desperately trying to teach him his worth, the relationship between them is becaoming rather beautiful.

Still loving this story

*hugs*

Lucie xx

[lomonaaeren.livejournal.com]

Thank you! I really like the way you put that. It's true that they're trying to consciously influence him to adopt their ways, while his influence is mostly unconscious, but his might be even more powerful precisely because of that.

[delamna.livejournal.com]

Guh. Yes! This chapter is FULL of win. We get to see each (awake and coherent) character in his/her element, functioning at his/her best. AND at their most vulnerable. Packed chapters rock like rock stars.

And while it might be like a Griffyndor to find weakness "charming", it hasn't done much, when manifested in Harry, to drive the Malfoys away! :P

I like the Narcissa-Harry connection. In BBU, Harry had these moments when he was more vulnerable to Narcissa than he was to Draco, because of his longer-standing desire/need for a mother figure - and here it's this delight to realise (really really, because in BBU somehow it was easy to ignore aside that moment in St. Mungo's after Harry was attacked) that she is vulnerable to him.

And I like how each Malfoy has these different connections with Harry, different areas where they understand each other and get along on those lines.

Rogers is lovely. he truly is.

Guh. Guh. Guh re: the healing scene. I cannot state it enough. Pig Latin inclusive. (Unless it's actual Latin?)

[lomonaaeren.livejournal.com]

Thank you!

Draco has weird ideas about weakness. If he was confronted with the contradictions in them, then he might learn something.

Narcissa has a habit of never confessing her true thoughts to anyone else. I think writing this story without her POV would have been a sad loss.

It's actual Latin as far as I know, though sometimes I doubtless mess up the grammatical constructions.

[delamna.livejournal.com]

Ah. I tried to find a Latin translator online, but those things never work. For some reason my head refused to understand what "Guberno" meant when I ws writing that comment.

[star-faerie.livejournal.com]

Wow. That was a fantastic chapter.

Narcissa and Draco were love :)

[lomonaaeren.livejournal.com]

Thank you!

[quicksilvereyes.livejournal.com]

I've been loving this story so much! I read "Bloody But Unbowed" right before, but this story completely holds my interest. It's like a totally different story and it takes real talent to pull that off.

PS - I hope you don't mind me friending you. :)

[lomonaaeren.livejournal.com]

Thank you! I'm glad you're liking this.

And no, not at all.

[cassie-black12.livejournal.com]

I love it!!!

That last line just sums up how much change Harry's presence has wraught in the Malfoys psyche - especially Narcissa's.

Really enjoyed the interaction between Harry and Draco too. It's nice to see Harry looking after Draco for a change.

[lomonaaeren.livejournal.com]

Thank you!

Harry does some more looking after in the next chapter, though in a way that he doesn't really realize he's doing it.

[yanagi-wa.livejournal.com]

Great chapter. I really like the way Harry is being eased into the Malfoy family. I'm not sure he even realizes what's happening. Great work.

[lomonaaeren.livejournal.com]

Thank you!

And no, he really doesn't.

Cuddle

[gummibearthief.livejournal.com]

Does anyone else just want to cuddle Narcissa and Draco for this chapter? Cause I could, I really, really could! Dear, dear author, I adore you for the insight into the other half of the story and how well you've fleshed out all the things you never knew you missed with the first one!

Re: Cuddle

[lomonaaeren.livejournal.com]

Thank you! I'm having a lot of fun with this, especially because some of my favorite chapters are coming up.

[kawanale.livejournal.com]

*grins*

[lomonaaeren.livejournal.com]

Thank you!