lomonaaeren

Chapter Forty-Two.

Title: Ancient and Noble Houses (43/?)
Disclaimer: J. K. Rowling and associates own these characters. I am writing this story for fun and not profit.
Pairings: Harry/Draco, Ron/Hermione, past Harry/Ginny
Warnings: Angst, violence
Rating: R
Summary: Harry finds out that being the heir to the Black fortune—at least once he’s of age and residing in Grimmauld Place full-time—is a lot different than just inheriting some vaults and property. He’s changing in ways he doesn’t understand, both body and mind. Even with Draco Malfoy to help him, the chance that Harry can resist becoming the perfect Black heir, with all that implies, seems slim.
Author’s Notes: This story came from wondering exactly what the house part of “The Ancient and Noble House of Black” might mean. This fic will have short chapters, and update every Friday and Saturday.

Chapter One.

Thank you again for all the reviews!

Chapter Forty-Three—A Bath in Hyssop

“Master Harry is being welcome to the house.”

Harry took a deep breath and stepped inside the house, handing his cloak to Kreacher. Behind him followed Draco, openly because he could, and then Ron and Hermione under the Invisibility Cloak. Now that Harry knew it was one of the Deathly Hallows, he was more willing to trust that it would actually help protect them against anything that might happen to them. “Thank you, Kreacher,” he said formally, and watched the elf hang his cloak up before he turned back to him. There was a depth in Kreacher’s eyes, a darkness, that he had never witnessed before. “It’s time for the ritual bath.”

“The cleansing,” said Kreacher, as though the distinction was important. Maybe it was. Nothing Harry had read in the last week had given him that impression, but then again, nothing he had read had actually told him more about the ordeal than they already knew. Kreacher glanced at Draco, and hesitated.

“I’d like him there,” Harry said quietly. “For as much as he can be.”

Kreacher, as he’d expected, fussed and fidgeted, and wrung his hands a bit. Then he paused, and smiled. “Master Draco Malfoy can be being there because he is Black and Master Harry’s heir,” he said, and then lowered his voice. “But there is being one more condition.”

It took Harry a minute to realize what Kreacher was on about, but something else on page 87 of that book finally came back into his head. “Someone needs three strong reasons to attend a cleansing like this?” he finally hazarded. The book had given an example of those reasons as being a brother of the person cleansed, needing to help him because the heir was blind, and being a strong protector in a time of war. A man who fulfilled all three of those conditions had been allowed to attend a cleansing some time in the last century.

Kreacher bobbed his head and looked back and forth between them. Harry exchanged a baffled glance with Draco. Other than Draco’s Black blood and him being Harry’s heir, what third rule could exist that would permit him to attend the cleansing?

Then Harry realized the gaze was only baffled on his end. Draco moved forwards and stood staring down at Kreacher. Kreacher, meanwhile, tilted his head back and seemed utterly, quietly convinced that Draco would say the right thing.

“Yes, Kreacher,” Draco whispered. “I am Harry’s consort.”

Harry started to open his mouth. He was torn between saying that Draco didn’t have to do that just to get entrance to the bathing room, and also that if that had happened, he would have remembered it.

But then he heard an outburst behind him, quickly muffled, and spun around, letting his hand drop to his wand. Ron or Hermione, whoever it was, had muffled themselves, though. There was no disturbance there to tell him where the Invisibility Cloak was, and Harry let his hand fall to his side with a little exclamation of relief.

“Master is being followed,” Kreacher said, and went over to shut the door of the house deliberately. That still closed Ron and Hermione inside, though, and he gave no sign of noticing them. “The cleansing ritual is private to Master and Master’s consort.”

Harry stared at Draco again. He was taut, it looked like, every muscle outlined against his skin. In the end, Harry shook his head and let it go. Draco had probably only said it to make sure that they both got into the bathing room, and Harry had to have Draco with him.

Had to. In a way that went beyond the mere requirements of hoping to survive, and into something that felt as fundamental as flesh and blood.

Kreacher bowed his head to both of them and gestured down the corridor. “Master Harry and his consort be following. The bathing chamber is this way.”

*

Draco hadn’t made a decision about what would happen when he had to witness this part of the cleansing. Or maybe he had, and making the decision in the first place was—what necessitated everything else that followed.

Either way, he didn’t turn away when Kreacher began to take Harry’s clothes off.

Harry stood, arms extended, in the middle of the bathing room, which had turned out to be buried down a corridor Draco had thought held only storage rooms. It was made of grey stone, very subtly heated by a charm beneath the floor. In the center was a shining pool, water alight with white fire that also seemed to dance beneath the surface. And there were hooks on the walls, and shelves, and a steaming jar of unguent, and Kreacher moving in a circle around Harry, taking his clothes off.

Harry was the most beautiful thing there.

Draco hadn’t expected to think that. Maybe that Harry was handsome, or hard, or committed to defending himself. But no, he hadn’t expected to look at that scarred skin and those scrawny shoulders and the way Harry breathed nervously in and out, and think beauty.

Yet he was. And from the way Harry kept darting little glances at him, glances that flickered like flames and left comparable trails of heat behind, Draco thought his regard might be returned.

At the very least, he’s has to be curious about why I decided to claim that I’m his consort.

He became aware that Kreacher had stopped undressing Harry and was looking at him patiently. Draco licked his lips and regarded the house-elf, trying not to feel ill at the gleam of understanding in those eyes. Well, he supposed it was better than Kreacher deciding that Draco’s lust was for him.

“Master Draco Malfoy would like to be assisting Master Harry Black to be getting into the water?” Kreacher asked, inclining his head.

Draco stepped forwards before he had thought enough to know that a refusal would have been possible. Of course he was going to leap at a chance like that, the way he was feeling now. His fingers skimmed down Harry’s shoulders and ended up on his right arm, while Kreacher took his left. Together, they guided Harry towards that pool where the white light flickered. It was a cold bath, Draco knew, but the light made it seem warm.

Harry closed his eyes and bowed his head when he reached the rim of the pool. Draco hesitated, wondering if he had changed his mind about going through with the cleansing. It was true that they hadn’t worked out a way to survive the soul ritual. Some things that might help, but not a way to survive it.

Then Harry shivered once, in a way that Draco thought had little to do with the cold wind almost rising off the pool, and stepped into the water.

Draco let his arm down gently, and watched as Harry waded out into the middle of the cold, hyssop-infused water and extended his arms again. Kreacher snapped his fingers, and a small bridge extended from the stone rim over the pool. He was on it in seconds, bending down, rubbing a kind of rough soap into Harry’s skin and encouraging him in little murmurs.

Or, at least, Draco assumed the murmurs were encouraging. Of course, knowing Kreacher, they could be about murdering someone in a particularly fitting way.

Draco touched one hand to his groin, because he had to, and then pulled it back and watched, trying not to do anything else that would embarrass him beyond bearing.

*

“Master Harry is doing well…Master Harry is being a true Black…Master Harry is being in the water…”

Kreacher was muttering that and all sorts of other things, but Harry found that he wasn’t interested in listening to them. He was looking at Draco instead, and he had seen the little darting motion of Draco’s hand towards his groin.

For that matter, Harry thought he would have needed that himself if the water around him at the moment hadn’t been so bloody cold.

They might never know the truth of their feelings until after the ordeal, and perhaps then they would cool like this water and draw them apart. But Harry told himself he would remember at least two things. He was determined to remember them.

He would remember that Draco had claimed to be his consort willingly. And he would remember that they had at least liked each other physically.

By the time Kreacher helped him out of the pool and wrapped a silver chain around his neck and a towel around his waist, Draco was looking elsewhere, and Harry had had time to start worrying about whether Ron and Hermione had managed to sneak into the bathing room, and what they would think if they did. But his eyes were still on Draco, the lingering flush in Draco’s cheeks and the way he turned around to return Harry’s stare a second later, and that was where he wanted them to stay.

Maybe where I want them to stay for a long, long time.