lomonaaeren

Chapter Thirty-Seven.

Title: Ceremonies of Strife (38/45)
Disclaimer: J. K. Rowling and associates own these characters. I am writing this story for fun and not profit.
Pairings: Harry/Draco, Ron/Hermione, Lucius/Narcissa
Rating: R
Warnings: Violence, Dark magic, angst, profanity, sex (slash and het), character deaths (not the main characters).
Summary: Sequel to Soldier’s Welcome. As Harry and Draco head in to their second year of Auror training, they are resolved to try and balance the relationship between them with their personal difficulties. That might be a bit harder than they think when the difficulties include necromancy, Azkaban escapees, unicorn ghosts, the risen dead, a secret order of assassins…and the second war, guided by Nihil.
Author’s Notes: This is the second part of what I’m calling the Running to Paradise Trilogy, focused on Harry and Draco’s Auror training. A reader on AFF called SP777 suggested the idea for this series to me. I’d advise you to read Soldier’s Welcome first before you try to read this one, as this story doesn’t spend a lot of time recapitulating the first one.

Chapter One.

Thank you again for all the reviews!

Chapter Thirty-Eight—An Explosion

Harry had wondered how in the world he was going to deal with the knowledge that the balance of the world had been affected and they could all be in danger of—what? Dying? Not dying? Becoming Nihil’s slaves?

As it turned out, the only way to deal with it, once he got back to the trainee barracks, was to forget about it for right now and continue working on his exams and the new exercises that the Aurors were putting them through.

Lowell and Weston were the grimmest, but all the instructors seemed to have adapted to the new, darker world of war they had decided they were living in. Davidson was teaching them to disguise their magical signatures, which she said would help more when battling enemies from a distance than hiding their faces or bodies would. Coronante, meanwhile, was teaching them to follow someone else through the small specks of magic they shed on a daily basis, usually from their spells, but also from their robes and wands.

“Someone who carries enchanted objects,” Coronante had said, serious for once, holding up her finger as if she could command them all to pay attention to her by using it, “will always leave traces of enchantment behind. We can all thank Merlin that Muggles haven’t developed technology that picks up on it.” She paused, then added impressively, “Yet.”

Draco had muttered something about the impossibilities of Muggles doing any such thing, but even he had listened.

Hestia was drilling them in Quick Response to the point that Harry went to bed each night with his hands shaking. And Lowell and Weston were relentless, both in the ordinary lessons and the private ones they held with Harry and Draco. They had partnered up many of the trainees, who protested that they should be allowed to choose their own partners.

They stopped that when Weston turned around, eyes blazing, and hissed at them, “You cannot be expected to know your own strengths and weaknesses the way the instructors can. You cannot be expected to choose your partners based on true compatibility and fighting skill, but rather on juvenile notions such as attraction. We will make the choices, and you will accept and live with them.”

After that, the other trainees shut up and did as they were told, though Harry noticed that more than one of them glanced sideways at him and Draco when Weston said those words about attraction.

Since Aran was gone, of course the Spell Lexicon class was not the same, but some of the other instructors, including Lowell, Weston, and Ketchum, took it in turns to teach them as many spells as their heads could hold. Harry noticed that most of them were defensive. Apparently the instructors still believed that most of the trainees wouldn’t be in any full-scale battle.

Or needed to be able to defend themselves better than they could attack, Harry told himself, more charitably to the instructors, after watching half the class singe each other’s hair or ears with the offensive charms they were allowed to practice.

It was strange, both exciting and depressing. Harry had the feeling that they were part of a large group of young animals flopping around in the dark, slowly making their way towards the light and adulthood. The instructors thought so, too, if the way they gave narrowed eyes, sharp commands, and rare nods of praise or approval was any indication.

Meanwhile, Nihil seemed to stay quiet. The usual reports came in, of ghosts and the dead walking, but they weren’t connected to attacks so much as stray sightings. Harry wondered if he needed time to recover after the battle, or if he was planning something that required lulling his enemies off their guard.

And then something else came along—something Harry should have remembered, something that shattered the relaxation he’d started to slip into against his will.

*

Draco frowned at the owl that coasted down to sit on the table in front of him. It was an enormous bird, with thick, silvery, almost white feathers, rings of black around its golden eyes, and talons that, in a mere nervous flex, carved deep scratches into the surface of the table. It obviously wasn’t a common post-owl, but he knew all his friends’ birds, and none of them had one like this.

Still, the usual spells revealed no charms or curses on the letter that it held out to him. Draco accepted it and fed the owl half his sandwich as he considered the seal holding the letter shut.

Heavy, as gold as the owl’s eyes, and decorated with a wolf’s head howling at the moon and stars. Draco ran a list of people over in his mind, and ended up shaking his head. The only werewolf he had known was Remus Lupin, dead in the Battle of Hogwarts, and no other family’s seal resembled this.

Perhaps this is someone who wants to make a new alliance, Draco thought as he slid a finger beneath the seal. Or someone who wants to try and blackmail me.

The seal broke with a slight puff of air. The air coalesced in Draco’s ears. He tried to hide his gasp of shock as his mother’s voice suddenly spoke to him in a soft whisper from that air, but he was afraid he wasn’t entirely successful.

“Draco. If you are hearing this than I have managed to send the letter with the seal of my new identity. I have fled from the Manor to Ireland, where I have a small house which an alternate identity of mine, Madam Rosegold, owns. Please allow her to communicate with you. Her seal is the wolf beneath the moon and stars, and I will use the seal to indicate whether I am free—howling—in danger—running and crouching—or moving to a new sanctuary—bounding away.”

Narcissa’s voice paused, and Draco closed his eyes. His forehead was tight with grief. His mother had not told even him about this identity or house of hers. He suspected he knew what was coming next.

“Your father,” Narcissa said softly, “saw you come into Wiltshire with Potter in order to fight a strange creature. I believe this creature is a necromancer; I do not know if your father has thought that far ahead in his attempt to determine its identity, or whether he cares about it, next to his fury at you. All he has talked about since that day is his desire to punish you. I do not know if he means to kill you, but he began to—do certain things to me.”

Draco choked. Harry stared at him in concern and reached out to put a hand on his shoulder, but Draco shook his head frantically. He had never heard of the spell that his mother had used to send her voice like this, and for all he knew, someone touching him might disrupt it.

“I have fled,” Narcissa said. “Keep yourself safe, my son. For right now, I believe you will be safer if I don’t attempt to communicate with you or visit you except in the guise of Madam Rosegold. Her first name is Clarinda, by the way. And there is one other piece of news. I have discovered that rumors that you were dating Potter, and certainly the knowledge that you were partnered with him, reached Azkaban last year, months before your father’s escape. I do not know what this means. I do not know why he acted like the knowledge was new to him when he came home. Perhaps it was in an attempt to take us both off-guard.

“Be well, my son, and safe. I love you.”

The voice ended. Draco sat where he was for long moments, eyes shut, fingers playing idly with the parchment in front of him. It was almost blank, he saw when he opened his eyes, with only a few lines telling him that Madam Rosegold had heard he was a fine young man, and could she speak with him? Her own son had been killed in the war, and since then she had been so lonely.

The real message would probably always come in the seals, Draco thought, sitting up and forcing his brain to function. It would be safer that way.

He hadn’t known his mother could do that. He hadn’t known she had a whole identity already in place, as opposed to having a bolthole or two where Lucius couldn’t follow her, or a name that would shelter her. His mother was more capable and resourceful than he had dreamed.

He told himself that, over and over, to keep from panicking when he thought of her possible wounds from Lucius. He reminded himself, too, that she probably would not have hesitated to ask him for any healing potions or ingredients for them that she needed.

Probably.

“Draco, are you all right?”

Draco started and looked up. Harry hovered beside him, his eyes so large that they looked as if they would fall out of his head. He looked down at the letter in Draco’s hands, then at his face, and seemed to make his own decision.

“Everyone out of the way!” he cried, leaping to his feet and cupping his hands around his mouth. Heads whipped towards him all over the dining hall, and more than one person stood up as if that would make getting out of here easier. “My partner’s going to be sick!”

After that, there were more than enough hands to pull chairs and tables out of the way and open doors for them. Harry ran along with Draco’s arm draped over his shoulder, loudly reassuring him that the toilet in their rooms would be the best one for him to use and that they were almost there. Draco held on firmly to the letter and Harry and shut his eyes, clinging on for the ride.

When the door of their rooms was locked behind them, Harry stretched him out on the bed and crawled in. He flicked his wand once. Draco blinked when he felt magic settle over the door instead of him, and then realized what had probably happened. Harry had cast a ward that would bring the sounds of retching to the ears of anyone who tried to listen in.

It was the sort of detail Harry wouldn’t have thought of a few months ago. Draco tried to be proud of the part he had played in bringing about Harry’s change, but it was hard to be anything except worried sick.

“What happened? Do you want to talk about it?” Harry’s breath was warm against his throat, his words soft in Draco’s ear.

Draco shook his head and reached up. Harry let him cling to his neck—though that was weak and childish, Draco had only one thought to spare for his own weakness before he simply gave up and cuddled closer to Harry—and stroked his hair, whispering soothing words into his ear. Draco shut his eyes and let his head loll to the side, until it found a comfortable resting place, a combination of Harry’s neck and the pillow.

He breathed into the silence, and listened to Harry’s heartbeat and his gentle murmurs and the swishing sound his hand made traveling through Draco’s hair. He could feel the touch too, of course, but for some reason it was the sounds that relaxed him more than any of the other things. He’d always been like that, and once his mother had realized it, she used to hold Draco close to her when he had a nightmare and let him simply listen to her heart until he fell asleep again.

His mother…

Draco’s throat and stomach were burning with an odd combination of resentment, fear, anger, and hatred. He had not thought his father so gone that he would turn on Narcissa, no matter how many months he had spent in Azkaban. He felt he should have been there himself to interfere, or at least tried harder to deceive his father or smooth over the mistake that had let Lucius see him fighting Nihil.

He didn’t know what he could have done, but he was sure of one thing: he should have been stronger, better, cleverer, braver, than what he had been.

He opened his eyes and blinked at the ceiling when he realized where his thoughts were tending. They were the exact sort of thoughts he had scolded Harry for.

Does he feel this way, this sort of guilt that he hasn’t done as well as he thinks he should, all the time? It’s worse than I thought. Worse to deal with than I thought, at least.

Draco finally lifted a hand and caressed Harry’s hair back. Harry immediately stopped whispering to him and fixed anxious eyes on his face. His free hand came up to cup Draco’s cheek.

“What can I do?” he whispered.

Draco had to shut his eyes a moment. That was Harry all over, always asking how he could help and how he could jump in to make things better. He didn’t do it as much as Draco had once believed he did—he got interested where he thought he could help, rather than trying to sacrifice himself for random strangers on the street—but that made it better, now that Draco was included in the circle of people Harry loved.

Draco allowed himself to soak that in for a time, the reminder that he didn’t have to stand alone, before he took a deep breath and told Harry what had happened.

Harry didn’t try to suggest that Draco might be wrong, or might be jumping to conclusions about what had happened to his mother, the way Draco thought Granger would have. He didn’t suggest immediate practical solutions to the problems, either, the way Blaise or Pansy would have. But he did listen, and he did stroke Draco’s hair, and his eyes took on a deepening fiery glow, and Draco thought that was quite enough for the moment.

When Draco finished his recitation, Harry kissed him and lingered there for so long that Draco had almost forgotten anything but the taste of his lips by the time Harry raised his head again. “How much time will you need?” Harry asked softly.

Draco blinked. “For what? Mourning my mother? I hope that I won’t have to mourn her, although—” He heard his voice rising, and shut his eyes.

“It’s all right,” Harry said, voice so earnest and sweet that Draco was doubly glad he had his eyes shut. “No. I meant the time that you’ll need to take off from your training so that you can confront your father.”

Draco stared at him in shock. “What?” he asked at last, when he thought he would say something sensible instead of stumbling and stammering over his words. “Harry—you can’t possibly be thinking—”

“This has to end,” Harry said, not loudly, but forcefully enough that Draco shut his mouth. “It can’t continue, Draco. Your father can’t threaten you, and threaten your mother, and potentially appear from the distance to hurt you at any moment. You’re not going to be under his shadow the way I was under Voldemort’s shadow. I wouldn’t have let anyone I loved go through that. I’m not going to condone it now, either, now that the war’s over.”

Draco reached up and slid a hand down the side of Harry’s face. He couldn’t help the gesture, and he couldn’t help the way he blinked rapidly to keep back the tears. But he didn’t mind Harry seeing that.

Harry gave him a slow, generous smile, and proved he understood the importance of silence by waiting for a long moment before he asked, “Will you let me help? Do you agree that we should get rid of the threat that Lucius poses as soon as we can?”

Draco nodded twice, in case Harry thought he was only responding to one question, and then buried his head against Harry’s chest. Harry’s arm curved around his shoulders and he began to hum beneath his breath, a song that Draco didn’t recognize but which had a soothing tune. He seemed to understand that Draco liked sounds to comfort him, as well.

I don’t have to do this on my own. I can get answers about my mother and make my father step away and stop trying to take control of my life.

Draco closed his eyes and sank deeper into the warmth.

*

Harry put on a grave expression. He was glad that they had sent him to talk to Portillo Lopez. He would have had to lie to another Healer, and he didn’t think he was very good at it. But he could tell Portillo Lopez the truth, or at least part of it, and as long as he looked sufficiently grim to anyone who passed the office, he shouldn’t attract suspicion.

“You are aware that I must report any serious illness to the Aurors?” Portillo Lopez spoke without looking at him, her head bowed and her hair falling to the sides as she wrote something down on a piece of parchment. She wore a scarf, green fringed with gold, over her hair, as she usually did. Harry studied it as he answered.

“I know. But he’s not really sick.”

Portillo Lopez moved with impressive fluidity, spinning away from the parchment and drawing her wand. Harry didn’t have time to breathe before it was pointed straight at him. He blinked and said nothing, since Portillo Lopez’s eyes were flat and she was speaking.

“You have enchanted him with your necromancy? You plan to raise the dead for him?”

Harry shook his head, wondering if Portillo Lopez would insist on inspecting Lucius for signs of deadness if Harry told her the whole story. “No. His father’s been making threats against him. He has to stop it. Draco needs time away from the Auror program to make him stop, though. I thought it would be simpler to use the excuse of sickness than involve the whole wizarding world in what should be a private family affair.”

Portillo Lopez stared at him levelly, without lowering the wand. “His father is in Azkaban. What can he do from there?”

This was the part where Harry did have to lie. He leaned forwards, never looking away from her eyes, and then had a brief moment of panic as he wondered if he was overdoing it. Would someone who was telling the truth look away? Would he stare at the floor as he confessed the threat to his beloved partner’s life?

But he decided in another moment that he couldn’t worry about it. He had to worry about what he would do, not what someone else would.

“If you know anything about the Malfoy family,” Harry whispered, “and especially what Lucius used to be, when the Ministry still trusted him and he was free, you wouldn’t ask that.”

“But he is not what he used to be, and he isn’t free,” Portillo Lopez said. Her wand still hadn’t moved. Harry tried to keep from looking down at it, but it was hard. “So. Tell me. What can he do to Trainee Malfoy from inside prison? And why do you assume that the Ministry would do nothing when one of its trainees is threatened?”

Here, Harry felt comfortable enough to sneer. “As if all the Aurors feel that way. Haven’t you noticed that most of them look sideways at Draco and don’t do anything good for him if they can help it?”

Portillo Lopez did lower the wand then, her mouth tightening. “Yes, I have. But I can still help. Tell me what the threats are, and I will find a way to settle them.”

Harry entertained a wistful image of Portillo Lopez and her Order showing up on the doorstep of Malfoy Manor. But Lucius could probably use wards to fry them or something. And since he wasn’t dead—Draco had been certain of that, especially since he and his mother would have received news from Azkaban if Lucius had died—an order of anti-necromancers wouldn’t have any power over him.

“Draco says that he thinks they’re threats against his mother,” Harry said, improvising by telling part of the truth, again. “And he isn’t making them public. Draco doesn’t want other people dragged into this, either. We have to handle it ourselves. We need someone to cover for us. Will you?” His second choice had been Ketchum, but Draco was unhappy with that idea.

Portillo Lopez gave him another of those slow, deep, uncomfortable looks that seemed to scour his soul. Harry tried to stand still instead of wriggling.

“You are still strange,” Portillo Lopez whispered. “I can sense the taint of necromancy in you, but necromancers do not risk themselves for others. They do not feel love or compassion, either.”

“Maybe I’m not as tainted as you think,” Harry said. “Or maybe you don’t know as much about necromancers as you think.”

“I have tracked and killed over sixty,” Portillo Lopez said, absently, not as if she intended to impress him. Then, while she was still studying Harry and Harry was still trying to react to her casual announcement of that many assassinations, she murmured, “No, it is something else. And I am interested enough in the difference between you and a being like Nihil to aid you. Perhaps you hold the key to something my Order has sought for years.”

“What’s that?” Harry asked, snapping in his relief. He hadn’t meant to do that, he’d meant to thank her, but this was too important to both him and Draco. “A better way to kill them?”

“No,” Portillo Lopez said. “A way to redeem you.”

*

Draco looked up when Harry slipped back into their rooms and shut the door behind him. He tried to smile, but he knew it looked brittle and false on his face. “Did you get what we needed?” he demanded.

Harry strode across the room to kneel in front of him and take his hands. Harry had been touching him a lot more since the letter came, Draco thought absently, as if could sense how much Draco needed that touch. “Yes. Portillo Lopez is going to tell everyone that you’re badly sick, and that I’m already infected since I spend so much time with you. She’ll pretend that we’re staying in her private infirmary while we’re in Wiltshire.”

Draco nodded. “In Wiltshire doing what, though?” This was the part he didn’t understand. He had thought that Harry wanted to get him time away from the Auror program so he could check on his mother. But Harry had argued, with both force and good sense, that Draco didn’t know enough about where his mother was staying, and that he would give her disguise away to Lucius if he did find her.

“Making sure that your father stops threatening you.” Harry’s face was grim.

Draco sighed. “And how can I do that? Exposing the fact that he’s out of Azkaban isn’t an option,” he added, when he saw Harry opening his mouth. “I don’t want more scandal attached to our name than I can help.”

“I know,” Harry said. “That’s why I’m going to do most of it, so if this news does come out, we’ll get away with it.”

Draco sucked in his breath a little and looked at Harry with admiration. He hadn’t thought Harry would ever use the power of his own name that way, but once again, he decided, Harry would do things for other people that he wouldn’t do for himself. “So what’s your plan?”

“I said it already.” Harry’s fingers moved in gentle patterns over Draco’s knuckles. “Make him stop threatening you.”

“But how—”

“I’m not picky.’

Draco shivered. Harry’s face was so cold, and his power so intense, that Draco could feel the chill around them both at that moment as if he had stepped into the middle of the necromantic ritual again.

He leaned up and pressed his lips against Harry’s, just for a moment.

If I don’t have the power to fight my father on my own, the next best thing is being beside someone who does.