lomonaaeren | Chapter Eight of 'A Determined Frame of Mind'- Enemy Mine

Thank you again for all the reviews!

And here is the chapter that I suspect many people have been waiting for since the beginning of ‘A Reckless Frame of Mind.’

Chapter Eight—Enemy Mine

Draco stared at Harry, waiting for him to go on. But Harry only stared at the handwriting across the St. Mungo’s statement as though it would reveal its secrets of its own free will. When a minute had gone by without his blinking, Draco hissed and snapped his fingers together in front of Harry’s nose.

Harry jumped, harshly enough to push his chair back from the table. Then he shook his head and looked up at Draco. His eyes were sober and quiet. Draco drummed his fingers on the table and tried to avoid strangling him.

“I know who did this,” Harry said. “And I wouldn’t blame you if you wanted to stop helping me here and now. This man is powerful, and—“

“I want to know.” Draco didn’t think that anyone who knew the whole history of their recent interaction would blame him for having a clipped voice. Harry had the solution to the mystery and was holding out on him, now? Draco was within a few heartbeats of drawing his wand and using Legilimency on Harry if he wouldn’t tell him willingly. “Who is it?”

Harry licked his lips. Then his eyes closed as if he was stepping forwards to face his own execution, and he said, “Minister Scrimgeour.”

Draco sat back heavily in his own chair, and stared at the file. He said nothing, but his mind darted madly back and forth across what he knew like a hummingbird from flower to flower, picking up the pieces and laying them together in new configurations.

Scrimgeour. Of course.

Someone with immense power had ordered the St. Mungo’s Healers to cooperate in moving Harry to the Janus Thickey ward, and even if he had done his best to avoid notice by making it look as though Draco had given his permission for it, he would still have had to convince one person to forge Draco’s signature and turn their back on the Savior of the Wizarding World. There were a very limited number of people in the Ministry who had that kind of rank. Draco should have suggested they begin at the top and work their way down, instead of targeting the relatively powerless Lila Ambernight. Umbridge was more of a possibility, but still, the Healers were more likely to question her orders than Scrimgeour’s; she wasn’t a public figure to the same extent that he was.

And then there was the fact that he knew the relationship between Scrimgeour and Harry had been strained long before the Cassandra Curse was cast. Scrimgeour had used the Boy Who Lived, as he would have been a fool not to, but no one had ever accused him of liking Harry. In fact, hadn’t he tried to get Harry on his side before Dumbledore died, and produced a rather clumsy maneuver that actually turned Harry against him instead? Draco couldn’t remember, but he would be sure to ask in a moment.

And Scrimgeour had come into Umbridge’s office when Draco finished his private conversation with her. He had probably been alerted the moment Draco entered the Ministry, and he might have suspected, at least then, that Draco had a fairly good idea where Harry was.

And orders had come down for Shacklebolt from the Head Auror—but they had come through Umbridge, which was a strange thing when Pius Thicknesse could simply have called Shacklebolt in and given him the orders himself. But it wasn’t strange enough for Shacklebolt to question, of course.

And if Lila Ambernight did have any knowledge of this, the one person she might have been persuaded to keep quiet for, and the one she certainly would have served willingly if she didn’t know he cast the Cassandra Curse, was her Minister.

It all made too much sense, and it lit a fire of roaring anger inside Draco. So the Minister didn’t like Harry. So he resented his actions during the war, when Harry had acted under his own aegis and Dumbledore’s instead of joining with the Ministry. Even an idiot should have been able to see that Harry had no political ambitions. He didn’t want to trade on his name. And he had come to an accommodation with the Ministry after all, hadn’t he, being one of its Aurors and not abandoning it until circumstances forced him to? Years could have passed, decades, and still Harry would have been content with his low-ranking Auror job and not made a run for Minister, Draco was certain. Scrimgeour was more in danger from certain Heads of Departments, or his own Undersecretary, than he was from Harry.

But then, Harry had said that this curse was a piece of personal malice and hatred, not a disinterested political move. Draco was certain Scrimgeour had spent years watching Harry, his resentment brewing, his agitation only sharpened when Harry did nothing and he had to suspect him of some long-range and especially cunning plot. And then he had found the Cassandra Curse, and probably seen it as a way to be rid of Harry with no blood on his hands whatsoever.

Draco knew how it must have been, and the fury he felt made it difficult to sit still.

He raised his eyes, and saw the expression of dread on Harry’s face, and knew what the prat would say even before he opened his mouth.

“I can’t ask you to shelter me anymore,” Harry said. “I’ll leave as soon as I can.”

*

Harry wanted to howl at the moon like an enraged werewolf, but the anger had to dim and die when he saw the expression on Draco’s face, and he fought it away. After a year under the curse when he hadn’t had any choice, he’d had enough practice.

The danger that this revelation would cause to Draco was plain enough. Scrimgeour was already aware of their investigation, and he must suspect that Draco was still in contact with Harry to have sent Kingsley. And he could destroy a man who had recently quit St. Mungo’s and was now affiliated with no organization, much less the Ministry, even more easily than he could one of his own Aurors.

Draco had been—kind to Harry, in numerous ways. Or he had acted out of self-interest, but it had resembled kindness and generosity enough that the effects were the same. Harry had to protect him. He couldn’t let Draco risk his neck.

Against Umbridge? Yes, though Harry would still have insisted on confronting her alone once they had sufficient proof. Against a host of lesser Ministry officials? Yes, and he might even have relied on Draco’s support then, because they were a breed of people that Draco would understand better than he would. But Scrimgeour was a difficult target, protected by more people than anyone else in the Ministry, including a special division of bodyguards instituted two years ago after a semi-serious assassination threat. Harry would have to think long and carefully about how to approach this. He couldn’t let—

“Fuck you, Harry,” Draco said flatly.

Harry gave a little nod. He hadn’t thought they would part on such bad terms, but no doubt Draco was thinking of the time, and even money, in the form of the lost salary at St. Mungo’s, he’d invested in this, and regretting that he hadn’t done something more productive. “I’d like to stay here a few days while I owl about for a flat. I’ll gladly pay you. I sent some of my Galleons into a side account that no one else knew about and which was supposed to support me in the Muggle world—“

Draco was on his feet a moment later, striding around the curve of table that separated them. Harry drew his wand, and tried to suppress the thrill that raced through him when he watched Draco’s tiger-like strides. Then he shrugged and let it through. After all, soon it wouldn’t matter how handsome he thought Draco was or wasn’t.

Draco seized his shoulders and gave him a small shake. This close, Harry felt a sudden renewal of uneasiness. He had anticipated a punch, which he’d dodge, or a spell, which he’d counter. But Draco looked—

Stubborn.

That was always bad news.

“Fuck you,” Draco repeated. “Do you think I’ll give up now? Of course not. I’m only disgusted that I didn’t see this earlier, that I haven’t proved a better adviser to you.” The hands on Harry’s shoulders flattened out and smoothed down the cloth they’d rucked up, and Harry’s skin burned where they touched. It was a motion disturbingly like a caress, though Harry knew it couldn’t be. Would Draco touch someone like that who had just put him in imminent danger of arrest or death? “We’ll fight him together. And you’ll need my intellect, that’s certain, to get close to a man as well-protected as he is.”

Harry would have bolted to his feet in alarm, but Draco being in front of him rather put an end to that plan. He settled for shaking his head violently, while trying to keep his eyes on Draco’s. Maybe he could convey his sincerity through his expression. Ginny had used to say that he was good at that. “No! I can’t allow that. I—“

His throat seized up as Draco leaned incredibly nearer, until Harry felt his breath fluttering the stubble on his own chin. He shut his eyes, so that he wouldn’t go cross-eyed and because he hoped it might lessen the effect. It didn’t. He was still so aware, achingly helpless in the face of what Draco represented.

“You aren’t master of me,” Draco whispered into his ear. Harry felt his head roll limply back against the chair before he knew it was going to happen. Please, he thought fervently, let Draco not have heard the whimper he couldn’t prevent from escaping his lips. “And you aren’t master of my actions. And I’ve come this far in helping you. And it enrages me to know what he’s done to you, all because he’s a coward and a prisoner of his own misjudgment.” His hands moved from Harry’s shoulders to his hair and the nape of his neck, tugging and curling as if he were petting a cat to keep from getting too angry. “Do you know what I do when I’m enraged, Harry?”

God. Harry couldn’t have opened his eyes now for anything in the world. Draco could have announced he was betraying him and sending an owl to Scrimgeour, and he would have remained here, still as a trapped rabbit, until Draco took his hands away. Harry’s breathing and heartbeat were fast enough to make him dizzy, but he scarcely heard them because his ears were cocked for a sound of Draco’s voice.

If he turned on you, he could destroy you more ruthlessly than Scrimgeour ever dared dream of.

Harry felt a renewed surge of panic, because this was the one thing he had not wanted to happen, this dependence, and he knew he wouldn’t be strong enough to drive Draco to a safe distance, the way he should. But the panic welled and died away again like a single spring rising in the middle of a sea. The rest of him was caught in utter surrender. His lips parted, and he tilted his head, further exposing his neck.

He knew what he should do, but control of his body was shut off from his rational brain just as thoroughly as it was when he fell asleep.

*

Draco felt the moment when his anger transformed into lust, just as strong, just as savage. This was Harry with his defenses down, transparent and given over as he had been during the massage after their escape from the Ministry—except that, this time, Draco could see his face.

It would be so easy to gather him up and take him to bed now. Draco wanted it, so that his voice was hoarse when he did speak from the dryness of that yearning.

“Harry. Harry?”

Harry, rising from oblivion, it seemed, as if he’d been hypnotized, gave a hoarse, inquisitive murmur, and then his eyes fluttered and opened. The look he gave Draco was one of terrified wonder, the same gaze that he would give a dragon about to eat him, because by then he might as well feel something other than fear.

And that was tempting, too. Did Harry have any idea how much Draco wanted to fuck him right now?

But Draco clenched his teeth and held himself back. He knew that Harry would yield and let him have his way if he pushed. But this trance he was under could only last a few hours at the most. He’d wake up later, stare at Draco in hatred, and then vanish from Malfoy Manor. And then Draco would as helpless in the search for him as Harry’s friends and Scrimgeour were.

Better to use this obedience to make Harry promise that he would still let Draco be part of the investigation. So Draco bent and murmured into Harry’s ear, making his voice as much like a lover’s as possible, but also mock-reasonable. Instead of persuading Harry of the delights of the flesh—which would come later, though not by much, if he had anything to say about it—he needed to show him how deep his instant hatred for Scrimgeour ran, and come up with the beginnings of a scheme.

“When I’m enraged, Harry, I start hunting. But I don’t do it in a sudden or haphazard way, oh no. I wait, and I study my enemy, first by asking people who know him, and then by looking up all publicly available material on him. Do you know why I do that, Harry?”

Harry licked his lips. Draco wished he knew a spell that would provide him with the instant benefits of a cold shower.

“No,” Harry said at last, and even that sound was dragged out of him, as though he’d given up part of his heart to make it.

“I do that,” Draco said, and paused to admire the way his breath stirred the small hairs inside Harry’s ear, “because I want to make sure that my enemy can’t take me by surprise. Of course I’m cautious and am almost never taken by surprise anyway, but there’s always the small, slight chance. The day I start believing I’m perfect is the day I start thinking I’m infallible, and the day I start thinking I’m infallible is the day I’ll fall to some petty and insignificant detail that my descendants will hide their faces in shame from.”

A faint smile crossed Harry’s mouth, as though he were thinking about being amused. Draco stroked the side of his throat, and then pulled his head back upright; he’d get a crick in his neck if he lay like that for long. Harry yielded, his breathing deep and peaceful, eyes fluttering now and then as if he really had been drugged. Draco felt another moment’s regret that he couldn’t take him to bed right now. He had the feeling that Harry would be extremely—pliable—to whatever he wanted to suggest.

But Draco would keep this mood in mind. He hadn’t known Harry could be so brutally open to a lover. He’d remember.

“With the Minister,” he said, and only a slight tremor raced through Harry’s muscles as they tensed up again, “there’ll be lots of publicly available material. And there’ll be his enemies, who can tell me of weaknesses that he may not ever be aware he has. This will be an organized hunt, Harry. We have to make sure not only that he takes back the curse, but that he regrets, deeply and sorely, that he ever interfered with your life.”

Harry heaved a bit at that, and when he opened his eyes, they had some sense in them. “But I want to be free of this,” he whispered, “more than I want revenge.”

Draco stroked his fingers over Harry’s scalp soothingly. Harry arched his back, and gooseflesh broke out down the sides of his neck. Draco made a resolve to remember that, too. Perhaps Harry had fallen into this somnolent state at least partially because Draco had started to run his fingers through his hair.

“I know that,” Draco said. “But I want both. And believe me, if we can work on this together, it’ll be better than a plan that I come up with on my own. Besides. Think of how he’s likely to react when he knows that you know it’s him, and that you’re alive and dedicated to overcoming the curse, to remaining in the wizarding world, instead of killing yourself or fleeing. You don’t want to find him aiming at your back again.”

“I don’t understand,” Harry whispered then, and sat up, slowly, rubbing his arms as if he were cold. “Why did he cast it at all? Of course, he never liked me—nodded coldly at me in the corridors and all—and he didn’t want to award me that Order of Merlin I got. But I barely came into contact with him for five years. It’s not—I don’t—I don’t hate him, so why does he hate me?”

“Sometimes,” Draco said softly, “you have no idea what’s happening in another person’s heart, but you’re the center of the universe to them. They’d do anything to get even with you. You might go on about your days, uncaring, seeing them in a glimpse of the margins of your life every now and again, but meanwhile they always know where you are and where they are, and they’re planning. And the fact that you don’t respond to their overtures is just more proof positive that you deserve to be hated.”

He was unprepared for the way that Harry’s hand rose and caressed his cheek a moment later.

“That was you, wasn’t it?” Harry whispered. “I’m sorry. For whatever it’s worth, I’m sorry. And for whatever it’s worth, you have your revenge on me, now, since you occupy pretty much the same central place in my life.”

Draco blinked.

There was an old regret soothed, where he had least expected it to be.

And there was a sudden path to understanding why Harry had pulled away from him since they arrived at the Manor, in a way he hadn’t expected it to appear, either.

*

Harry froze the moment after he said the words, and he would have withdrawn his hand from Draco’s cheek if he thought there was any way to do it without inflicting more hurt.

Why did I do that? Stupid, stupid, stupid! Now he knows how much he means to me, and I’ve just given him license to destroy me whenever he likes.

He did cough and try to pull his hand back then, but Draco caught it first, and held it still. He moved, though, turning his head so that he could press a kiss to the center of Harry’s palm. Harry thought he also felt a very slight brush from the tip of a tongue, but his head had begun to spin for—various reasons—and he couldn’t be certain.

“That,” Draco said, in the tone of someone satisfied to have discovered a vast secret, “is the reason that I’m helping you, and the reason Scrimgeour was mad to cast the curse in the first place. He should have realized that you were too good to threaten him.” His fingers curled around the edge of Harry’s hand, and he kept it undeniably but gently in place, rubbing his cheek up and down against the palm. “You have a beautiful soul.”

“I do not,” Harry muttered, because he couldn’t think of any other response that that declaration deserved.

Draco’s eyes flashed open, and he pinned Harry with a gaze so intense that he couldn’t move. This was unlike the helpless, captive sensation that he’d felt before, though. This made him feel awake, like flying on a broom always did, the keen cold wind flashing past his ears, the ground spinning beneath him, death and glory soaring at his heels.

“Yes, you do,” Draco said, almost grinding the words out. “I’ve seen it, remember? And even in the midst of your own pain, you reach out to me, and try to make amends for the past, whether or not it can be made up for.

“That’s the reason I’m going to help you, too, by the way. I’ve never known anyone like you, and I want to go on knowing you. I want to see you happy. I want to see you able to take your place in wizarding society again, if you want it. If you don’t, that’s fine, but you should be a recluse or live in the Muggle world by choice, not because some evil wanker of a Minister drove you to it.” He leaned nearer again, one of his eyebrows rising. “Don’t insult me again by suggesting that I draw back and try to save myself at your expense.”

Harry’s mouth was dry again, but for a different reason this time. He felt the way he had when Ron and Hermione had declared that they would come with him on the Horcrux hunt. There were some bonds that could not be parted, and it would be a desecration to try.

It still felt odd to him in some places, bewildering. He knew exactly why he was friends with Ron and Hermione. When had it started with Draco? Why had it started with Draco? Despite his claims that Harry had a beautiful soul, Harry had seen his, too, and knew it was at least as beautiful, and deep in ways that his never could be.

It was like the gift of a bit of soul to him, he decided, half-fretful even as Draco gazed at him and waited for his answer. He saw no reason for it, didn’t know why he should be honored that way, and was inclined to throw it back in the giver’s face because—because it made no sense, that was all.

But it was clear that, with respect to that piece of soul, he’d made at least one horrible mistake.

Hesitantly, he curled his hand around Draco’s, and nodded. “All right,” he said. “I’ll accept your help, though I don’t want you to go unaccompanied into danger, and I’ll insist on playing an equal part.”

Draco nodded briskly. “Good. I want to talk to you about your relationship with Scrimgeour, first—“

Harry cut him off with another soft squeeze of his hand, and finished. “And please—um, I don’t know if you’ve started, but don’t—don’t bother researching ways to take the piece of soul out of me.” Draco’s eyebrows climbed higher, and Harry found himself blurting, “I was wrong to say that I wanted it gone. It’s too good a gift. I don’t deserve it, but I’ll try to. Um. Thank you for giving it to me.”

He had never known that Draco Malfoy could smile smiles dazzling in their sweetness. It was his second grand revelation of the day.

*

Draco knew his hand was shaking as he reached out to touch Harry’s chest, the place near his heart where the core of soul was conventionally said to be located—and thus the place where the fragment of his own soul was—but he didn’t care.

He had never felt like this before, this expanding, exploding mixture of emotions, soft and gentle flame at the center of a whirlwind of fire. His eyes and his lungs hurt, and to hold back from embracing or kissing Harry was difficult.

He settled for touching his chest, and after a moment, Harry reached out and mimicked the gesture, laying his hand over Draco’s heart. Their mingled heartbeats made the next moment something close to holy.

“All right,” Draco whispered, because he couldn’t think of any words more graceful to end this interlude. Anything would sound awkward and wrong. “Let’s get started, shall we?”

Harry hesitantly smiled at him. Draco was torn with the sudden impulse to never confront Scrimgeour at all, so he could keep Harry here in the Manor and be the only one to see such smiles. He was greedy of them. He wanted to hoard them.

But it would be even better to win them fairly.

“Let’s,” Harry whispered.

Yes, much better.

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kittie8571.livejournal.com

Just sat down at the computer and much to my delight, new chapter pops up! You had me holding my breath right along with them. Cannot wait to see what plan Draco concocts.

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Chapter Eight of 'A Determined Frame of Mind'- Enemy Mine

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