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lomonaaerenThis is the third part. Sorry for the spammage.
They met the sphinx on the ledge closest to Vault 910, where the smooth slope suddenly dropped away into rough, choppy darkness. Harry froze with his wand held above his head, the light just showing the edge of a shaggy, off-gold coat. The painting bobbed behind him, and tugged at the strands of spells embedded in him. Malfoy had halted, then, for the artifact to be affecting him just this way. Harry made a little scoffing sound under his breath and looked back.
“Come on,” he said.
“It’s a sphinx, Potter.” Malfoy’s mouth was pinched tightly shut, and there was a spot of faint color in his cheeks. Harry blinked. He would have said that the git was afraid if he didn’t know him better. But he couldn’t be, could he? After all, he’d always been looking for opportunities to show off in school.
But we aren’t in school, and we haven’t been for a long time now.
Harry bit the inside of his cheek to calm himself, and then said gently, “She already knows we’re here, I think. We haven’t made any attempt to hide. And the sphinx I met in the maze during the Third Task was actually very polite—“
He broke off into a grin when he realized Malfoy was staring goggle-eyed at him. It was nice to know that some things hadn’t changed, and he could still surprise the prat.
“Come on,” he coaxed, and waited, his patient, hopeful gaze fixed on Malfoy, until the other man stepped forwards. Together, they made their way around the last corner and confronted the sphinx, who lay solidly across their path.
That struck a chord of wrongness with Harry, too. He couldn’t imagine that the sphinxes normally obstructed the area where anyone might walk. She should have been lying in front of Vault 910, or whichever other one merited the high security around here. She gave them an amiable nod, and then swished her tail, showing more clearly than a snarl would have that she was there to guard the path.
Someone wants us to fail, Harry thought as he gave a little bow of his head to hide his frown. Badly.
“Greetings, lady,” he said, because he reckoned it was smart to be as courteous as possible. “My name is Harry Potter, and this is Draco Malfoy. We’d quite like to get by.”
“Oh, dear,” said the sphinx, and blinked at them. Her human head was framed by dark hair, and she looked a little like a mixture of Ginny and Hermione in the face. Harry told himself not to be ridiculous, or distracted by that. “Then I’m afraid there’s a problem. I was told not to let you by under any circumstances, you see.”
“Unless?” Harry asked, cocking his head.
“Unless,” said the sphinx, her smile growing, “you can answer a riddle.”
“Either one of us?” Harry demanded, just to be sure. He wasn’t growing to rely on technicalities when his freedom—and, probably, a good portion of Malfoy’s standing in the Ministry—rode on their success.
“Yes.” The sphinx stretched, the muscles in her leonine flanks rippling, and sat up like an attentive cat at a mousehole. “It’s quite a good riddle, if I do say so myself. Of course, fail to answer it and I’ll rip out your throat. But I do it quickly. I’m told it hurts very little,” she added, as if anxious that they shouldn’t think her impolite.
“This is insane,” Malfoy muttered next to him.
“I’d rather not kill her,” Harry muttered back, then stepped out of the way. Malfoy made his way forwards, his gaze on the sphinx oddly intent. Harry didn’t think it was a way that he’d look at a human, even one trying to kill him.
The sphinx bowed her head, her eyes glowing brilliantly golden in the wake of their Lumos charms. Then she began to recite the riddle. Harry told himself it was his imagination that each syllable was flecked with blood and spit and sweat and stone dust.
“Each of these by what comes first.
List them all, or I do my worst.
First is what comes of breaking the unbreakable oath.
Second is the bird that flies for Thoth.
Third is how long you’re bound by that vow.
Fourth is what I will never give you now.
Fifth is what makes of its pain its pearl.
Sixth is when you will be able to change the world.
Seventh is the creature hardest to tame.
Eighth is what you feel when you end the game.
Eight in a row—come, tell me each,
And as the final reward for what I have to teach,
Tell me what they spell, the child of mud,
The stones that men love more than their blood.”
The sphinx folded her paws beneath her when she was done and lay down, blinking now and then. Once she raised her paw to her mouth and licked her claws contemplatively; they shone when she laid them on the floor again.
Harry had no idea what the answer to the riddle could be, but that was all the more reason to keep quiet and let Malfoy work on it. He darted little glances at the other wizard—he couldn’t help it—but he did stay silent, and looked at his hands instead of him whenever possible.
*
Draco relaxed his breathing, and frowned slightly.
Each of these by what comes first…
Well, that was easy enough. He had to name the eight things, and the first letter of each would combine to spell out another word, the ninth answer, the “stones that men love more than their blood.”
And he knew some of the answers immediately. Death came of breaking an Unbreakable Vow—his mind seethed with bitterness for a moment, as he remembered the year when those vows had controlled his life—and the ibis was the symbol of the god Thoth, a connection that Egyptian Muggles had lifted from wizard mythology. The fifth word must be oyster, and the seventh dragon.
D, I,..O,. D, .
And that meant the answer must be “diamonds,” of course. But he still had to find answers to the other four parts of the riddle.
He had already shut his eyes, but he closed them more tightly now, and reeled into the complicated darkness of his own imagination. He made himself forget that his own life and Potter’s hung on the answer, and his career, and Potter’s freedom. He made himself consider this in light of the puzzle games that his father had given him as a young child, which were meant to train his mental muscles for the future. If he failed one of them, no worse consequence would come about than knowing that he’d have to work the same puzzle tomorrow.
Third is how long you’re bound by that vow—must begin with A. A measure of time.
Always.
Draco fought not to let a smile cross his lips. The other answers might not be so easy.
As it happens, though, I know the sixth one. A measure of time. Must begin with N. When will I have the power to change the world?
Never.
And the other two? his imagination asked in the voice of his father.
Deeper and deeper, Draco went, drawing on all his mental power, rejecting answers out of hand that began with the right letters but were obviously wrong. What did murder have to do with the fourth word, even though it began with M? The sphinx would be more than happy to kill them, and the fourth word had to be something she would never give them—
Mercy.
And the eighth, Draco? his mother asked, demanded, whispered, in the tone that she had used when he told her of the Dark Lord’s choosing him to complete the task of killing Dumbledore in his sixth year.
An emotion. What you feel when you end a game. Must begin with S.
Draco’s eyes opened.
“Death, ibis, always, mercy, oyster, never, dragon, satisfaction,” he said. “Those are the eight. And the stones that men love more than their blood are diamonds.”
For a moment, the light in the sphinx’s eyes dimmed. And then she sat up and drew back with a wry, familiar smile. It was the way his mother looked when Draco beat her at a chess game, which happened rarely enough to be a great event. Always, she looked this way because she thought she ought to have seen the gambit he employed against her and countered it.
“True enough,” she said. “You may pass. I shall have to devise another riddle—a harder one, the next time.”
Draco took a few steps forwards before he thought to turn and see what Potter’s face looked like.
It was shining, and the admiration in it was so fervent that Draco found himself arching his neck, showing off his own assets, his profile and the slant of his shoulders. He could be confident, when it was warranted. He sent Potter a look that was its own kind of flirting, and promised a great reward when they got out of here.
At least as good as his mother’s hot chocolate when he beat her at chess, Draco thought contentedly.
He had never had anyone believe in him like that whose name wasn’t also Malfoy.
It made a difference.
*
Harry studied the map doubtfully. They had passed Vault 990, and he knew they must be close to 1000. But the disturbing thing was that the map showed no monsters ahead.
And yet, he couldn’t believe that the goblins would have left the closest approach to this vault undefended. Even if Vault 1000 was empty and waiting for the picture, they would have wanted to protect whatever the others immediately around it sheltered.
“Potter?”
Harry started. Malfoy’s voice was closer at his back than he had realized; the last thing he knew, his fellow Auror was on the other side of the tunnel, examining the carvings that spelled out the less arcane curses due to fall on trespassers. “Yes,” he said, and shoved the map back in his pocket. “There’s no visible threat there. I think we’ll just have to chance it.”
“Not comforting,” Malfoy said almost into his ear. The breath and warmth close by made the hairs on the nape of Harry’s neck rise pleasantly.
“No,” he agreed, and lifted his wand higher. “But I’m afraid that I don’t prioritize comfort, Malfoy, as I already told you.”
He started to step forwards, but a hand on his shoulder caught him. He looked back in curiosity. Malfoy cleared his throat, staring straight at him.
“Do you think,” he asked, “that when we get out of here—“
“If we survive,” Harry felt compelled to point out.
“Well, yes,” Malfoy muttered, looking annoyed. “If we survive, would you—“ He broke off and shook his head.
“Yes,” said Harry, taking pity on him. He knew how hard the words were to say. Every boy he’d tried to ask out during his disastrous seventh year at Hogwarts had forced him to say the words, just so that they could turn him down flat or brag that they’d had the honor of the Savior wanting to date them. Harry would prefer to avoid any scene like that with Malfoy, for both their sakes.
Malfoy gave him a half-smile that made him look much handsomer than any amount of sneers or smirks, fascinating as those were. “Really?” he breathed.
“Yes,” Harry said again, and squeezed his arm briefly before he moved forwards. Malfoy was beside him in instants, so that the spells connecting them to the painting wouldn’t lag and force them to walk too heavily. Harry felt a private thrill of pleasure that they could move so well next to each other.
They passed Vault 991, and 992. Harry peered ahead, expecting a dragon at any moment, or some other monster that just happened to be invisible because it was hiding in a vault.
Nothing, and nothing, and nothing.
And then he halted, staring. The door of Vault 993 was open.
Inside, he could see the glitter of piles of Galleons and Sickles, but even as he watched, his perception of the silver shifted, and he realized he was looking at figurines and cups and necklaces, and shining steel swords with rubies in the hilts, and a Time-Turner with a delicate chain. More and more treasures appeared, multiplying as a shadow in the vault seemed to withdraw, revealing them.
Harry licked his lips and fought off a sense of rising nausea. This was magic, he knew it. But he wasn’t sure why the goblins would want to show a passer-by what lay in the vaults, even if wards defended them. The wizarding families who sheltered their monies down here wouldn’t appreciate the goblins infecting other families with desire—
Desire.
This, Harry was almost certain, was the result of the spells he had heard about, the ones designed to destroy a thief if he experienced the least spark of covetousness.
“Keep your eyes straight ahead,” he said tightly, clenching one hand around the back of Malfoy’s neck. “Don’t look at what’s in the vaults if you can help it.” Even as he spoke, though, he found that his eyes were being drawn irresistibly to Vault 994, which was full of glittering glass vials that looked as if they contained potions. “And if you have to look, don’t want.”
“You’re not making any sense, Potter.” Malfoy’s voice was strained and hoarse. Harry looked at him and saw that his eyes were wide as with fever.
“I am,” Harry said grimly. “These are spells, designed to lure you into the vaults by showing you treasures you desire. Keep walking.” He steered his own body and Malfoy’s forwards at the same time, though it felt like manipulating a pair of puppets. Longing prickled at him with salamander claws, even though he wasn’t someone who would want potions just because. Malfoy might be, though. He clung to sanity against the pull to step sideways, because Malfoy would need him.
Malfoy’s breath was coming in huge, hoarse gulps of air. They were opposite Vault 995. Harry looked out of the corner of his eye, and lost his own breath in surprise.
What looked like the entire Auror Department had gathered there, with Minster Shacklebolt at their head. Ron had his head humbly lowered, and Hermione was waving one hand, grinning madly, her soft gaze directed not at Harry but at Malfoy. Kingsley was nodding slowly, an expression of approval on his weary face.
This is what Malfoy wants most of all, Harry thought, even as the man tugged sharply away from him and towards the vault. The painting anchored them both for the critical moment it took Harry to wrap his arms around Malfoy. Respect from those people he chose to make his way among. He can’t get any from his parents’ world, since that world was destroyed with the Dark Lord. He’s been fighting to secure this for at least a year. Can he resist?
If he can’t, it’s up to me to resist for him.
“I know you’re stronger than this,” he whispered into Malfoy’s ear. “I know there are things you want more. Your own dignity. Your freedom. The ability to walk down the Ministry corridors and fool them all into thinking you don’t care. Come on, Draco.” His first name might work better than the last, which he would have heard sneered or drawled at him in contempt on every occasion. “Come on.”
*
Draco could hear a voice talking to him from an immense distance. He knew the voice spoke sense. There was no way that the entire Auror Department would turn out simply to congratulate him on a job well done—especially because the painting wasn’t in the vault yet, and so technically he hadn’t completed the mission.
But this was—
He wanted it so much.
He had chosen the winning side—by default, maybe, but he’d still chosen it. And then he’d labored to follow the Department’s every rule, and to show that he wasn’t just a poor wizard’s Auror, while people who didn’t have half the knowledge of defensive spells he did and never completed their paperwork on time were moved past him to the top of the ranks.
But now those people—
Weasley—
were standing with their eyes averted, unable to bear the sight of his shining glory. Draco felt a sneer wrinkle the edge of his lips. He only had to take a few steps forwards, and he would have everything he wanted.
He tried to take a step, and found arms around him, and a warm voice murmuring into his ear. He barely heard the words, but he found himself clinging to them when he did. This person, whoever it was, thought he had dignity and freedom, and more, that he deserved to have them, that he wouldn’t just have them when he managed to receive his assignments from the Head Auror like everyone else.
And then the voice said, “Come on, Draco,” and he knew it must be Harry Potter’s voice, because that was the way his voice had said Draco’s name in all the dreams Draco had had as a child, before he realized that it was impossible to have the friendship of the Boy-Who-Lived and that he would have to resign himself to not owning some things he wanted.
For one thing he wanted, he could forsake another. With an enormous effort of will, he forced himself to close his eyes and turn away from the waiting Auror Department. He breathed in the scent of sweat and spent magic and the flex of muscles instead. Potter clutched him closer in response, murmuring, “That’s it, that’s it,” until Draco thought he would go mad if he had to hear the words again and spoke to cut them off.
“How close was I to going into the vault, Potter?”
“Call me Harry,” the other man said, smoothing his hands up and down Draco’s spine. “It’s only fair. And you had your foot on the threshold before I stopped you. But the painting held you back, along with me.”
“Oh,” Draco whispered, and squeezed his arms around Potter—Harry—one more time before he stepped away again. Keeping his eyes from the temping glow of Vault 995, he fastened his gaze on Harry and asked, “Do you think I’ll see anything that pulls at me like that again? Or do you think I’ll have the chance to see you unmanned?”
“It wasn’t unmanning you,” Harry said, shaking his head. “Just—unnerving me.” Then he glanced down the corridor and closed his eyes.
“And from the sight of the door to Vault 996,” he muttered, “you might get your wish.”
Draco turned. Sunshine, the quiet, drowsy gold light of a summer’s day, streamed into the corridor ahead of him. He smelled fresh air, and flowers, and high grass radiant with the songs of insects.
He put his arms around Harry in preemptive caution, and they went forwards like a pair of men struggling against a heavy wind.
*
Harry could feel the breeze on his face. He could sense the warmth of the sunlight on his eyelids even when he turned his face away. The sun was shining right in front of him no matter where he turned.
What was the pressure of the arm around his ribs, compared to that?
His legs trembled and turned sideways no matter how hard he tried to keep them on the straight course. Malfoy—Draco—jerked and pulled him back towards him. The painting pulled, too. Harry panted. He reminded himself that he had only a few hours left in his contract, and then he could depart for good. Why should he risk breaking it for the sake of a sun that couldn’t be shining here in the darkness, anyway, under tons of stone and metal?
He could do this. He could. He wanted to complete the mission and fulfill his contract properly more than he wanted to go outside.
He thought.
He felt the desire growing, yanking on his ribs, constricting his breath and the beat of his heart. He did the only thing he could think of, turned with a grunt to the left, and buried his face against Draco’s neck.
Draco went still with surprise. Then he lifted a hand that trembled—trembled? That was interesting, Harry thought with the part of him that was still sane—and stroked the back of his neck, working into his hair. Harry sighed, and concentrated on the idea that he might go on a date with Draco Malfoy.
If they got out of this alive.
And they wouldn’t if he ran into the vault in pursuit of the sunlight.
Carefully, they shuffled sideways, not looking up, until Harry felt the warmth and the lure of the open air fall behind him, and knew they must be at least opposite Vault 997, if not further down the corridor. He lifted his head and smiled a little, weakly, in Draco’s direction. He was so close it was hard to see the expression on his face, but Harry thought he knew what it must be.
“Thanks,” he said quietly.
“It’s what you did for me,” Draco said, and for a moment Harry thought he would kiss him. But that evidently waited for later, because he just hooked his arm through Harry’s and turned them up the corridor again.
Harry found nothing in the other vaults to tempt him; the spells on them evidently functioned to tap different desires in the brain. Vault 996 had probably contained a spell that stimulated the desire for freedom, and Vault 995 for respect. Vault 997 was full of cool darkness that Harry didn’t understand—perhaps a spell that drew on the death wish, which he no longer had—and Vault 998 of crawling things that he had no desire to understand.
Vault 999 made his mouth water. Two barely visible shapes were tumbling about on a bed in a hazy, red light, and the moans that wafted up from them were hard to hear, but that only meant Harry strained all the harder to hear them. If he walked close enough, he knew, one of the figures would wear his own face.
And the other—Draco’s? The limbs of the second figure were long and slim, and Harry thought he could see fine pale hair if he squinted—
“That looks nothing like me,” Draco said flatly, affronted. “And I certainly hope that you aren’t that ugly naked.”
Harry laughed, and the spell was broken. They walked past Vault 999 with some confidence, and turned the final corner to Vault 1000.
Vinharsh stood just inside the doors, waiting for them.
*
Draco didn’t know what was wrong. He only knew that Harry had gone still at the sight of the goblin, and that there was an ugly expression on his face. That meant there was something wrong.
Oh, good, he thought wryly as he took up a defensive stance next to Harry, braced so that he could move sideways or to cover his back in an instant. Since we had an easy enough time getting down here.
“What do you want, Vinharsh?” Harry asked calmly, his wand swinging at his side. Draco smothered a grin. It was quite an interesting stance, as though Harry had learned exactly how far he could motion with his wand before the goblins would remember that he could do magic and shriek that he was breaking his contract. “Why wasn’t there an escort waiting for us at the lift? And why are you standing in front of the vault that I have to open?”
“I’m afraid that you won’t be allowed to complete your task, Mr. Potter,” said the goblin, though he was wringing his hands as if he were uncomfortable. His eyes went to Draco. “Neither of you will be allowed to complete your tasks, in fact.”
Draco’s lips tightened. The files he’d received said that he had to put The Battle of Ar-jash-arsh-ra into Vault 1000 in order to complete the mission. If it didn’t get there, or if it was left outside, or if was destroyed on the way, he would be considered to have failed, and God knew what the Auror Department would do to him then, with the damn painting supposedly able to start a war.
From the look on Harry’s face, he had also been told that he had to put the painting into the vault in order to fulfill his contract. For just a moment, he closed his eyes as though someone had told him his best friend was dead.
And then his chin came up, and an expression of fierce stubbornness filled up his jaw and hollowed out his cheekbones. Draco approved. He did wonder if Harry would wear that expression when Draco insisted on paying for their dinner, the way Malfoys always did on the first date.
“I understand now,” Harry said, voice jagged. “I can’t kill you and go free, but you’re in the way. And Draco can’t kill you, or we’ll start a war with the goblins. And if the painting’s destroyed, then the goblins are able to request even more in the way of reparations from the wizarding world.”
Vinharsh nodded. The worried motions of his fingers grew stronger.
Harry closed his eyes and swallowed, once. To Draco, he seemed to be swallowing all of his frustrations. When he looked at the goblin again, he asked, “Why is someone trying to interfere with Draco’s mission? Why was he assigned to this? Why is it so important that he fail?”
Draco opened his mouth to tell Harry that his failure was quite as important to some members of the Wizengamot as other Aurors’ successes, but the goblin was already answering, his voice eager, as if he thought the answer to his question would give them all a way out somehow. Draco shut his mouth and listened closely.
“They gave this mission to the most untrustworthy Auror they have. No one will be surprised when he fails, and there is even a perfect excuse in the knowledge that he was given suddenly before he arrived, that the picture held the secret of the difference between pure-bloods and Muggleborns. Everyone knows the beliefs of the Malfoy family on the matter, and will accept easily that he held the painting back to study it and destroyed it in the process—“
“What’s in the vault?” Harry interrupted quietly.
Vinharsh smiled as if this had been the question he was waiting for, and removed a pendant of stone that hung on a chain from his neck. Draco squinted as the goblin turned and pressed it against yet another, interior vault door, but he couldn’t make out the symbol on the pendant or what the chain it hung from was made of, though he thought it might be platinum.
The interior door flared once, and then simply vanished. Inside hung an enormous, familiar, and very ugly painting. Draco found himself gazing at The Battle of Ar-jash-arsh-ra.
“It’s a replica?” he murmured.
“No,” Harry said, and his voice was fierce. “I read about this. The books you gave me said the painting could move around, didn’t they? And that it would come to the call of those who most desired it? I can’t imagine anyone wanting this thing more than the goblins do. If a wizarding family really owned it, it would have vanished from their possession and come back to this vault.”
“Quite,” said the goblin, and gave them a faint smile. Even that was enough to make Draco wrinkle his nose at the amount of stained and yellow teeth it showed. “The painting the Twyller family owned for so many years really is a replica, made for them by an expert goblin painter.” He nodded at the canvas Draco had risked his life to protect, and which he was suddenly much more inclined to find ugly. “But now that it’s here, my people want to pretend to the outside world it was destroyed, and sell it back to them in secret. A way of making more money. Of making reparations for what should have been ours, and was stolen—even if this time the theft was not in reality.”
He fell silent, staring intently at Harry. Draco wondered if he could read the message in the goblin’s eyes. Draco doubted it.
But he could. It was the same look he had seen aimed at him for a year in the Ministry, and by teachers at Hogwarts—a desperate wish for a problem to go away, if only the person involved was smart enough to make it go away.
Draco’s colleagues and professors had wished for him to remove himself from their presences, or at least stop acting Slytherin. He had refused. This time, though, he thought he could give Vinharsh what he wanted.
He stepped forwards and cleared his throat. “If you don’t move out of the way immediately,” he said, “and allow us to complete the task of putting this painting in the vault, then I will immediately withdraw all Malfoy monies—such as are left to us—from Gringotts.”
*
Harry watched Vinharsh’s face change, and knew that, while this was along the lines of what the goblin wanted, it was not enough. The bank would suffer from a loss of prestige if one of their oldest clients walked away, but the gesture did not have the force it would have before the war. The Malfoy name was too diminished in power.
He swallowed. He had to do something, too. If only he knew what it was! He was horrible at reading silent messages like this.
“I suppose it is a start,” said Vinharsh, bowing his head. “But I’m afraid that my people would rather lose one vault than the reparations they’ve demanded in the past few years from the wizarding world. On account of Mr. Potter’s break-in, especially.” Again came the sidelong glance at Harry.
Harry understood, then.
He’d promised something to Griphook, two years ago. He had made an effort to trick the goblin, and paid the price for it, both at the moment and in the contract since. But there was no way to wash out the stain of the crime, or Griphook’s animosity—unless he managed to fulfill his true, original promise.
To make reparations.
He closed his eyes and held out his palms in front of him, wishing with all his heart. He wanted this for an unselfish purpose, he reassured himself. If he didn’t get it, there was every chance that another goblin rebellion would start. Or else Draco would charge ahead, because there was no way that he would let himself be used like this, and kill Vinharsh, and that would be even worse.
A heavy weight made his palms sag. Harry opened his eyes, and found himself gazing at the familiar gleam of the Sword of Gryffindor.
He smiled wryly, remembering the way Neville had summoned it to cut off Nagini’s head, and the legend Scrimgeour had confessed to him when he handed Dumbledore’s bequests to Harry. According to reliable historical sources, the Sword may present itself to any worthy Gryffindor. He hadn’t been sure that it would work without the Sorting Hat, but perhaps his need had been great enough—or perhaps it mattered that he had held the Sword of Gryffindor twice before, and that he had proved his courage in retrieving it the second time, and killing the basilisk with it the first time, and over and over again (he thought) in the times between and since then.
Or perhaps it was simply that no one else needed the Sword at the moment, and so it had come to the first worthy Gryffindor who called for it.
Harry didn’t plan to make a habit of calling for it. He held the Sword towards Vinharsh and asked, quietly, “Will this do?”
“The treasure that we first requested two years ago, and which was unfairly stolen from us, returned again of his own free will by the man who tried to trick us?” Vinharsh’s hands were reverent as he took the Sword. “Combined with the threat that we might lose one of our oldest clients—I think that even Griphook would rather have honest reparations than false ones. And it is not as though many pilgrims will come to look in this vault, as far beneath the surface as it is, and realize there are two paintings here—for the short time before we can sell the Twyllers’ replica back to them. Sometimes the wonder is more in the possession than in the looking.” He moved away from the vault door with a little bow.
Harry stepped inside. Draco followed him at once, and together they released the spells and hung the replica next to the real painting. Harry glanced at the first one doubtfully. He didn’t know how someone could tell the difference, or why anyone would want to look closely enough at the two pictures to do so. Perhaps the coloring was less violently ugly in one. Probably the replica. Harry couldn’t imagine that a wizarding family, no matter how eccentric, would really want the original hanging on their walls.
Then he remembered that they didn’t send their children to Hogwarts, and reconsidered his opinion of their sanity.
“A pleasure doing reparations with you, gentlemen,” Vinharsh murmured behind him. “I’ll take you back up by cart.”
Harry turned and stepped away from the vault.
He knew he wouldn’t be able to cross the threshold of the bank until midnight, but already he thought he could taste fresh air on his face.
*
Draco looked at Harry as they both walked out through the bank’s front doors and down the steps that led into Diagon Alley, together. Harry had said that he could go back to the Ministry and didn’t need to linger until midnight in order to see him go free, but Draco had said that he wanted to, and he did. And then he’d helped Harry to get his trunk and broom down the stairs from his goblin-assigned rooms, purely for the pleasure of laughing at the expression on the other man’s face when he did so.
Harry was standing with his face turned up to the full moon now. Though it wasn’t the sunlight that had flooded through the vault of his desire, Draco didn’t think he was enjoying it any less. The expression of peace on his face was indescribable.
It was that expression, or remembrance of the way Harry’s face could harden, or simple curiosity, that made him reach out, slip his hand beneath Harry’s jaw, and turn it towards him.
Harry was the one who actually opened his eyes and kissed him, though, and Draco was the one who let him. He could feel Harry’s tongue exploring his mouth with thoughtful care, but no shyness. Perhaps, in the bank, around goblins who might not be honest but were rarely less than blunt, he had lost any shyness he might have had.
And then Draco lost the thought, in turn, because really, when he was having a brilliant snog, there were much better things to think about.
Harry pulled back at last, and stretched his arms above his head. Show-off, Draco thought, but he was still tasting the heat Harry had left in his mouth, and the thought was affectionate.
“I’ll need my own place,” said Harry. “And after I’ve found a flat as far away from Gringotts as possible while still being in London, then we can consider where to go on that date. There’s a new restaurant called Belladonna’s, Ron told me—“
“Which is three months old now, as you might not have realized, given that you didn’t get out much. Besides. You gave me the first kiss,” Draco said, “but you needn’t think you can make all the decisions around here.”
He was caught off-guard by the grin Harry gave him.
“And why would I want to?” Harry asked. “We do fairly well when we make choices together, I think.”
Draco didn’t have to agree, but there were worse things he could do than smile.
Especially when he considered what was going to happen when he walked into the Ministry tomorrow, to tell Minister Shacklebolt that he’d completed his case, with Harry Potter at his side.
As it should be.
They met the sphinx on the ledge closest to Vault 910, where the smooth slope suddenly dropped away into rough, choppy darkness. Harry froze with his wand held above his head, the light just showing the edge of a shaggy, off-gold coat. The painting bobbed behind him, and tugged at the strands of spells embedded in him. Malfoy had halted, then, for the artifact to be affecting him just this way. Harry made a little scoffing sound under his breath and looked back.
“Come on,” he said.
“It’s a sphinx, Potter.” Malfoy’s mouth was pinched tightly shut, and there was a spot of faint color in his cheeks. Harry blinked. He would have said that the git was afraid if he didn’t know him better. But he couldn’t be, could he? After all, he’d always been looking for opportunities to show off in school.
But we aren’t in school, and we haven’t been for a long time now.
Harry bit the inside of his cheek to calm himself, and then said gently, “She already knows we’re here, I think. We haven’t made any attempt to hide. And the sphinx I met in the maze during the Third Task was actually very polite—“
He broke off into a grin when he realized Malfoy was staring goggle-eyed at him. It was nice to know that some things hadn’t changed, and he could still surprise the prat.
“Come on,” he coaxed, and waited, his patient, hopeful gaze fixed on Malfoy, until the other man stepped forwards. Together, they made their way around the last corner and confronted the sphinx, who lay solidly across their path.
That struck a chord of wrongness with Harry, too. He couldn’t imagine that the sphinxes normally obstructed the area where anyone might walk. She should have been lying in front of Vault 910, or whichever other one merited the high security around here. She gave them an amiable nod, and then swished her tail, showing more clearly than a snarl would have that she was there to guard the path.
Someone wants us to fail, Harry thought as he gave a little bow of his head to hide his frown. Badly.
“Greetings, lady,” he said, because he reckoned it was smart to be as courteous as possible. “My name is Harry Potter, and this is Draco Malfoy. We’d quite like to get by.”
“Oh, dear,” said the sphinx, and blinked at them. Her human head was framed by dark hair, and she looked a little like a mixture of Ginny and Hermione in the face. Harry told himself not to be ridiculous, or distracted by that. “Then I’m afraid there’s a problem. I was told not to let you by under any circumstances, you see.”
“Unless?” Harry asked, cocking his head.
“Unless,” said the sphinx, her smile growing, “you can answer a riddle.”
“Either one of us?” Harry demanded, just to be sure. He wasn’t growing to rely on technicalities when his freedom—and, probably, a good portion of Malfoy’s standing in the Ministry—rode on their success.
“Yes.” The sphinx stretched, the muscles in her leonine flanks rippling, and sat up like an attentive cat at a mousehole. “It’s quite a good riddle, if I do say so myself. Of course, fail to answer it and I’ll rip out your throat. But I do it quickly. I’m told it hurts very little,” she added, as if anxious that they shouldn’t think her impolite.
“This is insane,” Malfoy muttered next to him.
“I’d rather not kill her,” Harry muttered back, then stepped out of the way. Malfoy made his way forwards, his gaze on the sphinx oddly intent. Harry didn’t think it was a way that he’d look at a human, even one trying to kill him.
The sphinx bowed her head, her eyes glowing brilliantly golden in the wake of their Lumos charms. Then she began to recite the riddle. Harry told himself it was his imagination that each syllable was flecked with blood and spit and sweat and stone dust.
“Each of these by what comes first.
List them all, or I do my worst.
First is what comes of breaking the unbreakable oath.
Second is the bird that flies for Thoth.
Third is how long you’re bound by that vow.
Fourth is what I will never give you now.
Fifth is what makes of its pain its pearl.
Sixth is when you will be able to change the world.
Seventh is the creature hardest to tame.
Eighth is what you feel when you end the game.
Eight in a row—come, tell me each,
And as the final reward for what I have to teach,
Tell me what they spell, the child of mud,
The stones that men love more than their blood.”
The sphinx folded her paws beneath her when she was done and lay down, blinking now and then. Once she raised her paw to her mouth and licked her claws contemplatively; they shone when she laid them on the floor again.
Harry had no idea what the answer to the riddle could be, but that was all the more reason to keep quiet and let Malfoy work on it. He darted little glances at the other wizard—he couldn’t help it—but he did stay silent, and looked at his hands instead of him whenever possible.
*
Draco relaxed his breathing, and frowned slightly.
Each of these by what comes first…
Well, that was easy enough. He had to name the eight things, and the first letter of each would combine to spell out another word, the ninth answer, the “stones that men love more than their blood.”
And he knew some of the answers immediately. Death came of breaking an Unbreakable Vow—his mind seethed with bitterness for a moment, as he remembered the year when those vows had controlled his life—and the ibis was the symbol of the god Thoth, a connection that Egyptian Muggles had lifted from wizard mythology. The fifth word must be oyster, and the seventh dragon.
D, I,..O,. D, .
And that meant the answer must be “diamonds,” of course. But he still had to find answers to the other four parts of the riddle.
He had already shut his eyes, but he closed them more tightly now, and reeled into the complicated darkness of his own imagination. He made himself forget that his own life and Potter’s hung on the answer, and his career, and Potter’s freedom. He made himself consider this in light of the puzzle games that his father had given him as a young child, which were meant to train his mental muscles for the future. If he failed one of them, no worse consequence would come about than knowing that he’d have to work the same puzzle tomorrow.
Third is how long you’re bound by that vow—must begin with A. A measure of time.
Always.
Draco fought not to let a smile cross his lips. The other answers might not be so easy.
As it happens, though, I know the sixth one. A measure of time. Must begin with N. When will I have the power to change the world?
Never.
And the other two? his imagination asked in the voice of his father.
Deeper and deeper, Draco went, drawing on all his mental power, rejecting answers out of hand that began with the right letters but were obviously wrong. What did murder have to do with the fourth word, even though it began with M? The sphinx would be more than happy to kill them, and the fourth word had to be something she would never give them—
Mercy.
And the eighth, Draco? his mother asked, demanded, whispered, in the tone that she had used when he told her of the Dark Lord’s choosing him to complete the task of killing Dumbledore in his sixth year.
An emotion. What you feel when you end a game. Must begin with S.
Draco’s eyes opened.
“Death, ibis, always, mercy, oyster, never, dragon, satisfaction,” he said. “Those are the eight. And the stones that men love more than their blood are diamonds.”
For a moment, the light in the sphinx’s eyes dimmed. And then she sat up and drew back with a wry, familiar smile. It was the way his mother looked when Draco beat her at a chess game, which happened rarely enough to be a great event. Always, she looked this way because she thought she ought to have seen the gambit he employed against her and countered it.
“True enough,” she said. “You may pass. I shall have to devise another riddle—a harder one, the next time.”
Draco took a few steps forwards before he thought to turn and see what Potter’s face looked like.
It was shining, and the admiration in it was so fervent that Draco found himself arching his neck, showing off his own assets, his profile and the slant of his shoulders. He could be confident, when it was warranted. He sent Potter a look that was its own kind of flirting, and promised a great reward when they got out of here.
At least as good as his mother’s hot chocolate when he beat her at chess, Draco thought contentedly.
He had never had anyone believe in him like that whose name wasn’t also Malfoy.
It made a difference.
*
Harry studied the map doubtfully. They had passed Vault 990, and he knew they must be close to 1000. But the disturbing thing was that the map showed no monsters ahead.
And yet, he couldn’t believe that the goblins would have left the closest approach to this vault undefended. Even if Vault 1000 was empty and waiting for the picture, they would have wanted to protect whatever the others immediately around it sheltered.
“Potter?”
Harry started. Malfoy’s voice was closer at his back than he had realized; the last thing he knew, his fellow Auror was on the other side of the tunnel, examining the carvings that spelled out the less arcane curses due to fall on trespassers. “Yes,” he said, and shoved the map back in his pocket. “There’s no visible threat there. I think we’ll just have to chance it.”
“Not comforting,” Malfoy said almost into his ear. The breath and warmth close by made the hairs on the nape of Harry’s neck rise pleasantly.
“No,” he agreed, and lifted his wand higher. “But I’m afraid that I don’t prioritize comfort, Malfoy, as I already told you.”
He started to step forwards, but a hand on his shoulder caught him. He looked back in curiosity. Malfoy cleared his throat, staring straight at him.
“Do you think,” he asked, “that when we get out of here—“
“If we survive,” Harry felt compelled to point out.
“Well, yes,” Malfoy muttered, looking annoyed. “If we survive, would you—“ He broke off and shook his head.
“Yes,” said Harry, taking pity on him. He knew how hard the words were to say. Every boy he’d tried to ask out during his disastrous seventh year at Hogwarts had forced him to say the words, just so that they could turn him down flat or brag that they’d had the honor of the Savior wanting to date them. Harry would prefer to avoid any scene like that with Malfoy, for both their sakes.
Malfoy gave him a half-smile that made him look much handsomer than any amount of sneers or smirks, fascinating as those were. “Really?” he breathed.
“Yes,” Harry said again, and squeezed his arm briefly before he moved forwards. Malfoy was beside him in instants, so that the spells connecting them to the painting wouldn’t lag and force them to walk too heavily. Harry felt a private thrill of pleasure that they could move so well next to each other.
They passed Vault 991, and 992. Harry peered ahead, expecting a dragon at any moment, or some other monster that just happened to be invisible because it was hiding in a vault.
Nothing, and nothing, and nothing.
And then he halted, staring. The door of Vault 993 was open.
Inside, he could see the glitter of piles of Galleons and Sickles, but even as he watched, his perception of the silver shifted, and he realized he was looking at figurines and cups and necklaces, and shining steel swords with rubies in the hilts, and a Time-Turner with a delicate chain. More and more treasures appeared, multiplying as a shadow in the vault seemed to withdraw, revealing them.
Harry licked his lips and fought off a sense of rising nausea. This was magic, he knew it. But he wasn’t sure why the goblins would want to show a passer-by what lay in the vaults, even if wards defended them. The wizarding families who sheltered their monies down here wouldn’t appreciate the goblins infecting other families with desire—
Desire.
This, Harry was almost certain, was the result of the spells he had heard about, the ones designed to destroy a thief if he experienced the least spark of covetousness.
“Keep your eyes straight ahead,” he said tightly, clenching one hand around the back of Malfoy’s neck. “Don’t look at what’s in the vaults if you can help it.” Even as he spoke, though, he found that his eyes were being drawn irresistibly to Vault 994, which was full of glittering glass vials that looked as if they contained potions. “And if you have to look, don’t want.”
“You’re not making any sense, Potter.” Malfoy’s voice was strained and hoarse. Harry looked at him and saw that his eyes were wide as with fever.
“I am,” Harry said grimly. “These are spells, designed to lure you into the vaults by showing you treasures you desire. Keep walking.” He steered his own body and Malfoy’s forwards at the same time, though it felt like manipulating a pair of puppets. Longing prickled at him with salamander claws, even though he wasn’t someone who would want potions just because. Malfoy might be, though. He clung to sanity against the pull to step sideways, because Malfoy would need him.
Malfoy’s breath was coming in huge, hoarse gulps of air. They were opposite Vault 995. Harry looked out of the corner of his eye, and lost his own breath in surprise.
What looked like the entire Auror Department had gathered there, with Minster Shacklebolt at their head. Ron had his head humbly lowered, and Hermione was waving one hand, grinning madly, her soft gaze directed not at Harry but at Malfoy. Kingsley was nodding slowly, an expression of approval on his weary face.
This is what Malfoy wants most of all, Harry thought, even as the man tugged sharply away from him and towards the vault. The painting anchored them both for the critical moment it took Harry to wrap his arms around Malfoy. Respect from those people he chose to make his way among. He can’t get any from his parents’ world, since that world was destroyed with the Dark Lord. He’s been fighting to secure this for at least a year. Can he resist?
If he can’t, it’s up to me to resist for him.
“I know you’re stronger than this,” he whispered into Malfoy’s ear. “I know there are things you want more. Your own dignity. Your freedom. The ability to walk down the Ministry corridors and fool them all into thinking you don’t care. Come on, Draco.” His first name might work better than the last, which he would have heard sneered or drawled at him in contempt on every occasion. “Come on.”
*
Draco could hear a voice talking to him from an immense distance. He knew the voice spoke sense. There was no way that the entire Auror Department would turn out simply to congratulate him on a job well done—especially because the painting wasn’t in the vault yet, and so technically he hadn’t completed the mission.
But this was—
He wanted it so much.
He had chosen the winning side—by default, maybe, but he’d still chosen it. And then he’d labored to follow the Department’s every rule, and to show that he wasn’t just a poor wizard’s Auror, while people who didn’t have half the knowledge of defensive spells he did and never completed their paperwork on time were moved past him to the top of the ranks.
But now those people—
Weasley—
were standing with their eyes averted, unable to bear the sight of his shining glory. Draco felt a sneer wrinkle the edge of his lips. He only had to take a few steps forwards, and he would have everything he wanted.
He tried to take a step, and found arms around him, and a warm voice murmuring into his ear. He barely heard the words, but he found himself clinging to them when he did. This person, whoever it was, thought he had dignity and freedom, and more, that he deserved to have them, that he wouldn’t just have them when he managed to receive his assignments from the Head Auror like everyone else.
And then the voice said, “Come on, Draco,” and he knew it must be Harry Potter’s voice, because that was the way his voice had said Draco’s name in all the dreams Draco had had as a child, before he realized that it was impossible to have the friendship of the Boy-Who-Lived and that he would have to resign himself to not owning some things he wanted.
For one thing he wanted, he could forsake another. With an enormous effort of will, he forced himself to close his eyes and turn away from the waiting Auror Department. He breathed in the scent of sweat and spent magic and the flex of muscles instead. Potter clutched him closer in response, murmuring, “That’s it, that’s it,” until Draco thought he would go mad if he had to hear the words again and spoke to cut them off.
“How close was I to going into the vault, Potter?”
“Call me Harry,” the other man said, smoothing his hands up and down Draco’s spine. “It’s only fair. And you had your foot on the threshold before I stopped you. But the painting held you back, along with me.”
“Oh,” Draco whispered, and squeezed his arms around Potter—Harry—one more time before he stepped away again. Keeping his eyes from the temping glow of Vault 995, he fastened his gaze on Harry and asked, “Do you think I’ll see anything that pulls at me like that again? Or do you think I’ll have the chance to see you unmanned?”
“It wasn’t unmanning you,” Harry said, shaking his head. “Just—unnerving me.” Then he glanced down the corridor and closed his eyes.
“And from the sight of the door to Vault 996,” he muttered, “you might get your wish.”
Draco turned. Sunshine, the quiet, drowsy gold light of a summer’s day, streamed into the corridor ahead of him. He smelled fresh air, and flowers, and high grass radiant with the songs of insects.
He put his arms around Harry in preemptive caution, and they went forwards like a pair of men struggling against a heavy wind.
*
Harry could feel the breeze on his face. He could sense the warmth of the sunlight on his eyelids even when he turned his face away. The sun was shining right in front of him no matter where he turned.
What was the pressure of the arm around his ribs, compared to that?
His legs trembled and turned sideways no matter how hard he tried to keep them on the straight course. Malfoy—Draco—jerked and pulled him back towards him. The painting pulled, too. Harry panted. He reminded himself that he had only a few hours left in his contract, and then he could depart for good. Why should he risk breaking it for the sake of a sun that couldn’t be shining here in the darkness, anyway, under tons of stone and metal?
He could do this. He could. He wanted to complete the mission and fulfill his contract properly more than he wanted to go outside.
He thought.
He felt the desire growing, yanking on his ribs, constricting his breath and the beat of his heart. He did the only thing he could think of, turned with a grunt to the left, and buried his face against Draco’s neck.
Draco went still with surprise. Then he lifted a hand that trembled—trembled? That was interesting, Harry thought with the part of him that was still sane—and stroked the back of his neck, working into his hair. Harry sighed, and concentrated on the idea that he might go on a date with Draco Malfoy.
If they got out of this alive.
And they wouldn’t if he ran into the vault in pursuit of the sunlight.
Carefully, they shuffled sideways, not looking up, until Harry felt the warmth and the lure of the open air fall behind him, and knew they must be at least opposite Vault 997, if not further down the corridor. He lifted his head and smiled a little, weakly, in Draco’s direction. He was so close it was hard to see the expression on his face, but Harry thought he knew what it must be.
“Thanks,” he said quietly.
“It’s what you did for me,” Draco said, and for a moment Harry thought he would kiss him. But that evidently waited for later, because he just hooked his arm through Harry’s and turned them up the corridor again.
Harry found nothing in the other vaults to tempt him; the spells on them evidently functioned to tap different desires in the brain. Vault 996 had probably contained a spell that stimulated the desire for freedom, and Vault 995 for respect. Vault 997 was full of cool darkness that Harry didn’t understand—perhaps a spell that drew on the death wish, which he no longer had—and Vault 998 of crawling things that he had no desire to understand.
Vault 999 made his mouth water. Two barely visible shapes were tumbling about on a bed in a hazy, red light, and the moans that wafted up from them were hard to hear, but that only meant Harry strained all the harder to hear them. If he walked close enough, he knew, one of the figures would wear his own face.
And the other—Draco’s? The limbs of the second figure were long and slim, and Harry thought he could see fine pale hair if he squinted—
“That looks nothing like me,” Draco said flatly, affronted. “And I certainly hope that you aren’t that ugly naked.”
Harry laughed, and the spell was broken. They walked past Vault 999 with some confidence, and turned the final corner to Vault 1000.
Vinharsh stood just inside the doors, waiting for them.
*
Draco didn’t know what was wrong. He only knew that Harry had gone still at the sight of the goblin, and that there was an ugly expression on his face. That meant there was something wrong.
Oh, good, he thought wryly as he took up a defensive stance next to Harry, braced so that he could move sideways or to cover his back in an instant. Since we had an easy enough time getting down here.
“What do you want, Vinharsh?” Harry asked calmly, his wand swinging at his side. Draco smothered a grin. It was quite an interesting stance, as though Harry had learned exactly how far he could motion with his wand before the goblins would remember that he could do magic and shriek that he was breaking his contract. “Why wasn’t there an escort waiting for us at the lift? And why are you standing in front of the vault that I have to open?”
“I’m afraid that you won’t be allowed to complete your task, Mr. Potter,” said the goblin, though he was wringing his hands as if he were uncomfortable. His eyes went to Draco. “Neither of you will be allowed to complete your tasks, in fact.”
Draco’s lips tightened. The files he’d received said that he had to put The Battle of Ar-jash-arsh-ra into Vault 1000 in order to complete the mission. If it didn’t get there, or if it was left outside, or if was destroyed on the way, he would be considered to have failed, and God knew what the Auror Department would do to him then, with the damn painting supposedly able to start a war.
From the look on Harry’s face, he had also been told that he had to put the painting into the vault in order to fulfill his contract. For just a moment, he closed his eyes as though someone had told him his best friend was dead.
And then his chin came up, and an expression of fierce stubbornness filled up his jaw and hollowed out his cheekbones. Draco approved. He did wonder if Harry would wear that expression when Draco insisted on paying for their dinner, the way Malfoys always did on the first date.
“I understand now,” Harry said, voice jagged. “I can’t kill you and go free, but you’re in the way. And Draco can’t kill you, or we’ll start a war with the goblins. And if the painting’s destroyed, then the goblins are able to request even more in the way of reparations from the wizarding world.”
Vinharsh nodded. The worried motions of his fingers grew stronger.
Harry closed his eyes and swallowed, once. To Draco, he seemed to be swallowing all of his frustrations. When he looked at the goblin again, he asked, “Why is someone trying to interfere with Draco’s mission? Why was he assigned to this? Why is it so important that he fail?”
Draco opened his mouth to tell Harry that his failure was quite as important to some members of the Wizengamot as other Aurors’ successes, but the goblin was already answering, his voice eager, as if he thought the answer to his question would give them all a way out somehow. Draco shut his mouth and listened closely.
“They gave this mission to the most untrustworthy Auror they have. No one will be surprised when he fails, and there is even a perfect excuse in the knowledge that he was given suddenly before he arrived, that the picture held the secret of the difference between pure-bloods and Muggleborns. Everyone knows the beliefs of the Malfoy family on the matter, and will accept easily that he held the painting back to study it and destroyed it in the process—“
“What’s in the vault?” Harry interrupted quietly.
Vinharsh smiled as if this had been the question he was waiting for, and removed a pendant of stone that hung on a chain from his neck. Draco squinted as the goblin turned and pressed it against yet another, interior vault door, but he couldn’t make out the symbol on the pendant or what the chain it hung from was made of, though he thought it might be platinum.
The interior door flared once, and then simply vanished. Inside hung an enormous, familiar, and very ugly painting. Draco found himself gazing at The Battle of Ar-jash-arsh-ra.
“It’s a replica?” he murmured.
“No,” Harry said, and his voice was fierce. “I read about this. The books you gave me said the painting could move around, didn’t they? And that it would come to the call of those who most desired it? I can’t imagine anyone wanting this thing more than the goblins do. If a wizarding family really owned it, it would have vanished from their possession and come back to this vault.”
“Quite,” said the goblin, and gave them a faint smile. Even that was enough to make Draco wrinkle his nose at the amount of stained and yellow teeth it showed. “The painting the Twyller family owned for so many years really is a replica, made for them by an expert goblin painter.” He nodded at the canvas Draco had risked his life to protect, and which he was suddenly much more inclined to find ugly. “But now that it’s here, my people want to pretend to the outside world it was destroyed, and sell it back to them in secret. A way of making more money. Of making reparations for what should have been ours, and was stolen—even if this time the theft was not in reality.”
He fell silent, staring intently at Harry. Draco wondered if he could read the message in the goblin’s eyes. Draco doubted it.
But he could. It was the same look he had seen aimed at him for a year in the Ministry, and by teachers at Hogwarts—a desperate wish for a problem to go away, if only the person involved was smart enough to make it go away.
Draco’s colleagues and professors had wished for him to remove himself from their presences, or at least stop acting Slytherin. He had refused. This time, though, he thought he could give Vinharsh what he wanted.
He stepped forwards and cleared his throat. “If you don’t move out of the way immediately,” he said, “and allow us to complete the task of putting this painting in the vault, then I will immediately withdraw all Malfoy monies—such as are left to us—from Gringotts.”
*
Harry watched Vinharsh’s face change, and knew that, while this was along the lines of what the goblin wanted, it was not enough. The bank would suffer from a loss of prestige if one of their oldest clients walked away, but the gesture did not have the force it would have before the war. The Malfoy name was too diminished in power.
He swallowed. He had to do something, too. If only he knew what it was! He was horrible at reading silent messages like this.
“I suppose it is a start,” said Vinharsh, bowing his head. “But I’m afraid that my people would rather lose one vault than the reparations they’ve demanded in the past few years from the wizarding world. On account of Mr. Potter’s break-in, especially.” Again came the sidelong glance at Harry.
Harry understood, then.
He’d promised something to Griphook, two years ago. He had made an effort to trick the goblin, and paid the price for it, both at the moment and in the contract since. But there was no way to wash out the stain of the crime, or Griphook’s animosity—unless he managed to fulfill his true, original promise.
To make reparations.
He closed his eyes and held out his palms in front of him, wishing with all his heart. He wanted this for an unselfish purpose, he reassured himself. If he didn’t get it, there was every chance that another goblin rebellion would start. Or else Draco would charge ahead, because there was no way that he would let himself be used like this, and kill Vinharsh, and that would be even worse.
A heavy weight made his palms sag. Harry opened his eyes, and found himself gazing at the familiar gleam of the Sword of Gryffindor.
He smiled wryly, remembering the way Neville had summoned it to cut off Nagini’s head, and the legend Scrimgeour had confessed to him when he handed Dumbledore’s bequests to Harry. According to reliable historical sources, the Sword may present itself to any worthy Gryffindor. He hadn’t been sure that it would work without the Sorting Hat, but perhaps his need had been great enough—or perhaps it mattered that he had held the Sword of Gryffindor twice before, and that he had proved his courage in retrieving it the second time, and killing the basilisk with it the first time, and over and over again (he thought) in the times between and since then.
Or perhaps it was simply that no one else needed the Sword at the moment, and so it had come to the first worthy Gryffindor who called for it.
Harry didn’t plan to make a habit of calling for it. He held the Sword towards Vinharsh and asked, quietly, “Will this do?”
“The treasure that we first requested two years ago, and which was unfairly stolen from us, returned again of his own free will by the man who tried to trick us?” Vinharsh’s hands were reverent as he took the Sword. “Combined with the threat that we might lose one of our oldest clients—I think that even Griphook would rather have honest reparations than false ones. And it is not as though many pilgrims will come to look in this vault, as far beneath the surface as it is, and realize there are two paintings here—for the short time before we can sell the Twyllers’ replica back to them. Sometimes the wonder is more in the possession than in the looking.” He moved away from the vault door with a little bow.
Harry stepped inside. Draco followed him at once, and together they released the spells and hung the replica next to the real painting. Harry glanced at the first one doubtfully. He didn’t know how someone could tell the difference, or why anyone would want to look closely enough at the two pictures to do so. Perhaps the coloring was less violently ugly in one. Probably the replica. Harry couldn’t imagine that a wizarding family, no matter how eccentric, would really want the original hanging on their walls.
Then he remembered that they didn’t send their children to Hogwarts, and reconsidered his opinion of their sanity.
“A pleasure doing reparations with you, gentlemen,” Vinharsh murmured behind him. “I’ll take you back up by cart.”
Harry turned and stepped away from the vault.
He knew he wouldn’t be able to cross the threshold of the bank until midnight, but already he thought he could taste fresh air on his face.
*
Draco looked at Harry as they both walked out through the bank’s front doors and down the steps that led into Diagon Alley, together. Harry had said that he could go back to the Ministry and didn’t need to linger until midnight in order to see him go free, but Draco had said that he wanted to, and he did. And then he’d helped Harry to get his trunk and broom down the stairs from his goblin-assigned rooms, purely for the pleasure of laughing at the expression on the other man’s face when he did so.
Harry was standing with his face turned up to the full moon now. Though it wasn’t the sunlight that had flooded through the vault of his desire, Draco didn’t think he was enjoying it any less. The expression of peace on his face was indescribable.
It was that expression, or remembrance of the way Harry’s face could harden, or simple curiosity, that made him reach out, slip his hand beneath Harry’s jaw, and turn it towards him.
Harry was the one who actually opened his eyes and kissed him, though, and Draco was the one who let him. He could feel Harry’s tongue exploring his mouth with thoughtful care, but no shyness. Perhaps, in the bank, around goblins who might not be honest but were rarely less than blunt, he had lost any shyness he might have had.
And then Draco lost the thought, in turn, because really, when he was having a brilliant snog, there were much better things to think about.
Harry pulled back at last, and stretched his arms above his head. Show-off, Draco thought, but he was still tasting the heat Harry had left in his mouth, and the thought was affectionate.
“I’ll need my own place,” said Harry. “And after I’ve found a flat as far away from Gringotts as possible while still being in London, then we can consider where to go on that date. There’s a new restaurant called Belladonna’s, Ron told me—“
“Which is three months old now, as you might not have realized, given that you didn’t get out much. Besides. You gave me the first kiss,” Draco said, “but you needn’t think you can make all the decisions around here.”
He was caught off-guard by the grin Harry gave him.
“And why would I want to?” Harry asked. “We do fairly well when we make choices together, I think.”
Draco didn’t have to agree, but there were worse things he could do than smile.
Especially when he considered what was going to happen when he walked into the Ministry tomorrow, to tell Minister Shacklebolt that he’d completed his case, with Harry Potter at his side.
As it should be.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2007-10-14 04:29 am (UTC)And this line:
“That looks nothing like me,” Draco said flatly, affronted. “And I certainly hope that you aren’t that ugly naked.”
is so perfectly Draco. It made me giggle.
no subject
Date: 2007-10-14 05:10 pm (UTC)Harry is usually a bit sarcastic around the Dursleys in the books (and other people he doesn't like, such as Snape). I think he'd turn that way to keep from going mad.
I wondered if anyone would notice how similar Draco and Harry's responses were! For this one, I wanted to do a similarity story more than opposites attract, and have them drawn to each other by the qualities they saw reflected.
Hee. That line made me giggle, too.
no subject
Date: 2007-10-14 04:45 am (UTC)Loved this line: “I think it’s wand-envy."
Heehee!
And this was so good:
Harry was standing with his face turned up to the full moon now. Though it wasn’t the sunlight that had flooded through the vault of his desire, Draco didn’t think he was enjoying it any less. The expression of peace on his face was indescribable.
And I love the promise of the relationship to come. And such a fascinating plot! I was really intrigued by the history of the painting! All in all, such a good read.
no subject
Date: 2007-10-14 05:11 pm (UTC)Only after I wrote the 'wand-envy' line did I realize how it probably sounded. :)
So glad you liked the painting! That's an artifact that I don't think I've seen in the Harry-and-Draco-find-an-artifact stories I've read so far. It was going to be a staff, but I liked the idea of the painting much better.
no subject
Date: 2007-10-14 05:26 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-10-14 05:12 pm (UTC)I hope the fandom doesn't quiet down permanently because it's been the last book. Of course, sometimes the level of activity dies down but what's left are good fics produced by genuinely interested fans (that happened in LOTR fandom after the movie fervor died down). Maybe that will happen here.
(no subject)
From:no subject
Date: 2007-10-14 07:10 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-10-14 07:10 am (UTC)(no subject)
From:no subject
Date: 2007-10-14 08:26 am (UTC)I loved Draco and Harry's interaction/flirting. *laughs*
♥♥ =)
no subject
Date: 2007-10-14 05:13 pm (UTC)I had fun with that flirting. It's hard for me to imagine ordinarily, because they have such different personalities that they're likely to take flirting as a personal attack, but here they were closer to one another.
no subject
Date: 2007-10-14 09:21 am (UTC)i HATE goblins, stupid buggers that they are. poor harry.. loved the flirting, though, sooo mach!
loved it, as always...
no subject
Date: 2007-10-14 05:14 pm (UTC)The goblins do have factions in this story; Vinharsh is slightly more sympathetic to Harry, for example.
no subject
Date: 2007-10-14 09:48 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-10-14 05:15 pm (UTC)I find myself wondering what sort of Minister Kingsley is. Would he make Harry answer for his mistakes, like this one, that have wider political implications, or not?
The goblins got twisted them up in their own reparations (and I didn't have the plot fully worked out before I started writing the story, so that came along as a way to make sense of everything I'd already introduced).
no subject
Date: 2007-10-14 10:44 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-10-14 05:16 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-10-14 11:47 am (UTC)What better traps to have near the end than showing humans their desires, after risking life and limb most men and women would be tired and have their guard down. Gotta admire those wily goblins. I expected one vault to contain the manor and another Harry's parents, although after his experience in DH when he walked to his death, he might not have been so easily swayed into thinking he could have them back.
The interaction between the lads was a joy to read and this, for me, is the crux of H/D: they are equals. Or at least I see them that way. Thank you so much for taking the time to write this for me. That you can, along with regular updates of your WiP's, teach and work on a PHD just boggles my mind. Were you a child prodigy?
no subject
Date: 2007-10-14 05:17 pm (UTC)I would have also tried to figure out the riddle, but I don't think I could have gotten as far as you did. I'm terrible with spoken riddles; I have to be able to stare at them and see what they're like for a while.
(no subject)
From:no subject
Date: 2007-10-14 12:01 pm (UTC)I loved this Harry and his interactions with Draco!
no subject
Date: 2007-10-14 05:19 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-10-14 01:26 pm (UTC)And then the voice said, “Come on, Draco,” and he knew it must be Harry Potter’s voice, because that was the way his voice had said Draco’s name in all the dreams Draco had had as a child, before he realized that it was impossible to have the friendship of the Boy-Who-Lived and that he would have to resign himself to not owning some things he wanted.
That killed me. *snuggles Draco*
no subject
Date: 2007-10-14 05:20 pm (UTC)Harry is actually more sarcastic than people realize; the "You don't have to call me sir, Professor," is just the classic example. :) I can see him learning it as a defense mechanism when he didn't have much contact with his friends.
Draco fought so very, very hard in this story to protect the vulnerable parts of himself.
(no subject)
From:no subject
Date: 2007-10-14 02:10 pm (UTC)PS: Thanks again for the new vocabulary I like to improve my knowledge of the English with your fics 28 new words.
Thank you.
no subject
Date: 2007-10-14 05:21 pm (UTC)And I'm very glad I can teach you new words. :)
no subject
Date: 2007-10-14 07:07 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-10-18 01:34 am (UTC)I liked the detail, but it made writing the fic frustrating, since I thought at any moment it would be Stopping Now, and instead it rolled right on.
(no subject)
From:no subject
Date: 2007-10-14 10:37 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-10-18 01:34 am (UTC)God knows what I'll think up for the other prompts. It seems almost entirely random.
no subject
Date: 2007-10-14 11:55 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-10-18 01:34 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-10-15 12:08 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-10-18 01:35 am (UTC)I kind of wondered about the goblins, too. Obviously every loose end couldn't be wrapped up in that epilogue, but I would have enjoyed a brief mention of what wizard-goblin relations were like at the moment more than most of the information we did receive.
no subject
Date: 2007-10-15 12:32 am (UTC)And this story! Yet again, you've produced something intelligent, intriguing, and so utterly engaging that it stays with me long after I've read it. It isn't very often that someone can write the boys so utterly well and it is even more rare when that person can introduce more of the fascinating world that JKR has created and make me believe in it and breathe it.
You did that with the goblins at Gringotts, the painting, the twisted reparations double-dealings, Vinharsh, Kingsley, Harry's ordeal, and Draco's. The spells that they utilized, the creatures they fought, and the riddle!!! I loved that their paths were parallel with each other, both growing through the hardships they faced to become better and stronger. I love how they so totally compliment each other's strength and just thinking about this Harry and Draco teaming up as Auror partners...the world will never be the same.
Again...you just make me so happy whenever you write that I always end up rather embarrassed at just how much I fangirl and squee over you! XD I adore everything you write madly and I always look forward to whatever you post next. (I swear I'm not a stalker...O_o)
no subject
Date: 2007-10-18 01:37 am (UTC)I love making small additions to the canon world. Of course, then I spend time delving through the books and the Lexicon trying to make sure that my additions don't contradict something previously established...
I think out of what you mention, I'm most proud of the painting and Vinharsh. I knew I wanted a painting and a somewhat sympathetic goblin in the story from the beginning. The twisted double-dealings, I admit, were a result of my getting to the end of the story and going, "Oh shit oh shit oh shit, I've introduced all these factors that contradict one another, how do I resolve them?"
I find myself wanting to write the sequel to this story, though, where Harry and Draco are Auror partners.
Believe me, it would take a lot scarier behavior than this to make me think you were a stalker. :)
no subject
Date: 2007-10-15 02:23 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-10-18 01:38 am (UTC)I am considering a sequel to this. Out of all the one-shots I've written, I think it has the most material to propel one.
(no subject)
From:no subject
Date: 2007-10-15 08:16 pm (UTC)The sphinx was awesome. And the temptation tests--amazing!!! There's probably more I could say, but I can't spend all day praising you. Well, I could, but I have bills to pay...
no subject
Date: 2007-10-18 01:39 am (UTC)I've seen a very few other H/D stories that involve the goblins, but none from the DH landscape. I want more people to write them now; I'd like to see what others do with the ideas.
I think Harry would have had to be hardened and confident just to survive. But in "Determined," it pays for him to stay down and quiet and unnoticed.
no subject
Date: 2007-10-15 08:34 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-10-18 01:39 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-10-15 09:07 pm (UTC)nice set up and even better execution. love the way the boys come together. bravo!
no subject
Date: 2007-10-18 01:45 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-10-15 09:41 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-10-18 01:45 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-10-16 04:02 am (UTC)your obstacles were really creative. like the manticore they can't kill without getting in big trouble.
i loved them flirting with each other from the first moment they were together in the lobby.
i completely agree with you that canon!harry shows an aptitude for sarcasm while (at least) snarking at the dursleys.
nice parallel with the painting that goes to the ones who want it most and the sword that comes to the gryffindor that needs it most.
and your funny lines, like That looks nothing like me, and I certainly hope that you aren’t that ugly naked. were very funny. :)
the one thing that confuses me is that i thought -- in canon -- griphook ended up with the sword of gryffindor?
no subject
Date: 2007-10-18 01:47 am (UTC)If he had not been on contract, Harry might have killed the manticore and happily. Or maybe not; a year in Gringotts really did change his perspective on the way the bank functioned.
The flirting sort of surprised me, but I thought it was a good way to underscore their essential similarity here.
As far as I know, the last time the Sword appeared in canon was when Neville used it to cut Nagini's head off. It may have gone back to the goblins after that, but if so I don't remember a passage saying so.
(no subject)
From:no subject
Date: 2007-10-17 12:54 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-10-18 01:47 am (UTC)Good luck with finding Gringotts fics! They're pretty rare, though sometimes I run across a gen one.
Reparations 3/3
Date: 2007-10-17 07:41 pm (UTC)Re: Reparations 3/3
Date: 2007-10-18 01:47 am (UTC)