Never Grow A Wishbone

By: ShanaStoryteller

She almost smiles, and true alarm starts to build in his chest. “I’m afraid
I’m not here for something so small. Professor Roberts has resigned.”

“Good,” Draco says honestly, “Would you like a list of suitable

alternatives? I know a number of competent potions masters abroad, but
then of course you’d have to hire another teacher to act as the Slytherin
head. I’m afraid you’ve dried up all the half decent Slytherin Potions
masters.”

“Not all of them,” she says quietly.

He blinks. She can’t be serious. “You can’t be serious.”

“Gravely,” she says, “Mr. Malfoy, I am not above begging.”

What the bloody fuck. “I don’t even like potions!”

Draco returns to Hogwarts.

He has a duty to his blood and his name and his house, and he will fulfill it.

Status: complete

Published: 2016-09-12

Updated: 2020-05-29

Words: 123544

Chapters: 25
Original source: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8017603

Exported with the assistance of FicHub.net

Never Grow A Wishbone
Introduction
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 1
Chapter 1

i didn't mean to write this, and yet here we are. yolo

title is from Clementine Paddleford: “Never grow a wishbone,

daughter, where your backbone ought to be.”

(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)

It’s early summer when Draco returns from an extended business

trip to Germany. So when there’s a guest at the manor door, he’s
expecting it to be any number of acquaintances wanting a piece of
his time now that he’s back in Britain. Someone who wants his
money, who think he owes him money, someone under his family
branch needing his help, or maybe even just one of his friends. But
instead one of his house elves, Milly, pops into his rooms and says,
“Headmistress Minerva McGonagall to see you, Master Draco.”

He stares at her for a moment, hoping that maybe she’ll say she
misspoke, but she doesn’t. McGonagall in his house can’t be
anything good. At least his parents are in France. “Show her to the
sitting room,” he orders, and Milly disappears with a pop. He’s twenty
four years old and it’s absolutely ridiculous of him, but he still checks
his hair and appearance before going out to meet her. He’s stopped
wearing black robes since the war, so the dark green will have to do,
regardless of the pointed comments it always gets about his house
allegiance. McGonagall wore green robes throughout most of his
schoolyears, so hopefully she won’t have anything to say about it.

He adjusts his cufflinks as he steps into the sitting room. She looks
the same as ever - all thirteen years he’s known her, and she hasn’t
changed at all. “Mr. Malfoy,” she greets, inclining her head.
“Headmistress,” he returns, crossing the room to stand in front of
her. Neither of them move to sit, and he doesn’t suggest it. “To what
do I owe the pleasure? I usually just get an owl when it’s time for
alumni donations.”

She almost smiles, and true alarm starts to build in his chest. “I’m
afraid I’m not here for something so small. Professor Roberts has
resigned.”

A no name halfblood who had been five years ahead of Draco in

school. He can’t say he’s surprised - the curse on the Defense
Against the Dark Arts position may have died along with Voldemort,
but ever since keeping the potions position filled has been almost as
difficult.

“Good,” he says honestly, “he was hardly qualified, either as a

Potions master or as head of house. I’m not sure what exactly that
has to do with me.” She just stares at him. He raises an eyebrow.
“Would you like a list of suitable alternatives? I know a number of
competent potions masters abroad, but you’re going to have to hire
another professor to act as the Slytherin head. I’m afraid you’ve
dried up all the half decent Slytherin potions masters.”

“Not all of them,” she says quietly.

He blinks. She can’t be serious. “You can’t be serious.”

“Gravely,” she says, “Mr. Malfoy, I am not above begging.”

What the bloody fuck. “I don’t even like potions!” If he was going to
take any position, he’d much prefer it be Flitwick’s.

“That didn’t stop you from getting formally recognized as a Potions

master,” she says, “nor listing it on your letter head.”

“My family deals with plant trading,” he snarls, hating how quickly
she’s managed to rid him of his calm façade, but unable to do
anything about it. “Since I wasn’t about to start giving a fuck about
herbology, I needed to be a potions master! Look, Headmistress, I’ll
be lucky if I get a seat in government by the time I’m forty, and the
war did a nice job of putting a significant dent in the fortune my
family has been building for hundreds of years . Not to mention half
the morons supervising our stocks and business trades got
themselves killed in the war, so I’ve spent the past seven years
managing the Malfoy estates on my own.” He glares and crosses his
arms, “So I really, truly don’t have time to play teacher at Hogwarts.”

She hasn’t looked away this whole time, still with that same
unnervingly even gaze that he remembers from school. “This past
year we only had four first year Slytherins. If something is not done
soon, I’m afraid that number will go down to zero. I don’t just need a
Potions master, Mr. Malfoy. I need a Slytherin. A real Slytherin.”

“There hasn’t been a Slytherin head of house born from a Slytherin

family in over fifty years,” he tosses back, even though his heart is
thudding in his chest. Only four first years? “Slughorn was fine, but
he didn’t come from an old family. He faked it well enough, he did his
job, but he wasn’t one of us. Snape wasn’t either, of course, and he
was only barely serviceable. Nothing need to be said of the string of
disasters you’ve hired since. You lot have done this to yourselves.”

“I know,” she says, and for the first time since he’s known her she
looks older, “I know. Draco, you were a leader at school and a leader
during the war,” that’s a generous description for what he was during
the war, “and I need you to be a leader with this. They need you.
Don’t abandon them now.”

“I fought on the other side of the war in case you’ve forgotten,” he

says acidly. He doesn’t appreciate poor attempts at emotional
manipulation, and frankly he expected better from her. “I’ve spent the
years since the war returning my family’s reputation to what it once
was, and while abroad the Malfoys are what they’ve always been, I
don’t think anyone in Britain will be thrilled with my appointment.”

“I don’t care,” she says, and it’s a struggle to keep the surprise off his
face. “I do not care. No one else can do this, and it needs to be
done. Please .”

Draco only barely keeps himself from sneering. “Headmistress, the

war may be over, but if something isn’t done there will be another
one. When this war ended it was about torture and power and killing
one annoyingly unkillable boy. But that’s not how it began .”

“The Blood Laws,” she says, and surprise colors her voice. “You
support them?”

“Don’t you?” he throws back, “If they’d been passed, Voldemort not
only wouldn’t have come to power, he wouldn’t even exist. But
thanks to this war, no one can touch the Blood Laws without getting
the accusation of Death Eater hurled at them. It will do what it always
does, building and getting worse until someone snaps, and then we’ll
have another war.”

“And you think you can stop it?” she asks, and she’s looking at him
differently, like he’s not what she expected. Which is her own fault,
really - Draco’s always considered himself to be rather transparent.
Unfortunately.

He shrugs, “I think I’m the only one who can. Old blood will follow old
blood, and who else is going to do it? Those of us who survived the
war are still hurting, and aren’t exactly eager to fight again. And
those of us on your side won’t risk their position by trying to
reintroduce the legislation in an environment where they know it
won’t pass. I’m going to spend the rest of my bloody life trying to get
a seat in government that without the war I would already have. So,
once again, I really do not have the time to play teacher at
Hogwarts.”

He expects that to be the end of it, that McGonagall will write him off
for a lost cause like she always has and Draco can go back to the
exhausting work of trying to singlehandedly restore his family’s
position.
Instead, she nods in that sharp, exact manner she has, and says,
“Very well, Mr. Malfoy. If you accept my offer and become head of
Slytherin house and our potions master, I will personally recommend
you for a seat at the Wizengamot this time next year.”

Draco’s eyes widen. If she supports him, if the purebloods in power

and the moderates who stand with him know that they won’t be
demonized for confirming his seat, then it’s almost certain he will get
it. “You - you’re serious?”

“I’ll take an Unbreakable Vow,” she says, and this is possibly the
strangest day of Draco’s life. “Accept my offer, Mr. Malfoy.”

He runs a hand through his hair, messing it up thoroughly. Being a

professor at Hogwarts is a prestigious, sought after position, and it
will do more to repair his reputation than all the last seven years
combined. But it’s also going to be difficult and miserable, and he
doesn’t actually like children. “Fine,” he bites out, “on one condition.”

“I’ve already talked to Filius,” she says promptly. “He’ll be delighted

to take you on as an apprentice.”

He blinks. “Is the all knowing thing something that gets passed on
when you become head of Hogwarts?”

She smiles, and he hadn’t noticed the tension she was carrying until
it was gone. “It’s always been your favorite subject, and you’ve
registered over a dozen new charms with the patent office since
graduating.” She hesitates, but says, “During the Triwizard
Tournament, those dreadful buttons you made had Filius nearly
floating he was so excited. He said it was the best charms work he’d
seen from a fourteen year old since he himself was that age. When I
say that he’ll be delighted to take you on, that is in fact a direct
quote.”

Draco resists the urge to rub at his temples. At least it won’t be a

total loss. He really does love charms. Besides, he would endure
much worse for a Wizengamot seat. “Very well, Headmistress.
Consider me hired.”

“Please,” she says, “call me Minerva. We are colleagues after all.”

Because McGonagall is far more cunning than she seems, the very
next day the Prophet runs a story about his upcoming appointment
as Potions master and the head of Slytherin house. If he truly is to
do this properly, he’s going to have to thoroughly attend the party
circuit this summer, and not just hit the usual ones. At least Pansy
will be happy.

“HAVE YOU LOST YOUR BLOODY MIND?” Pansy screeches.

Pippy discreetly appears at his elbow and hands him four fingers of
Scotch. Maybe all these blasted house elves are good for
something. “Not exactly, no.”

Blaise is standing at the other end of the room because he’s a

coward. “She’s got a point.”

“I thought you liked our arrangement,” he complains. “Twice the

parties and dinners means twice the amount of stupidly expensive
dresses I pay for.”

Pansy crosses her arms and scowls, “Being your marriage deterrent
is in fact one of the highlights of my social career. That doesn’t mean
I’m willing to send you off to Hogwarts like a lamb to the slaughter.”

“Don’t you think you’re being a touch dramatic?” he asks, “Just a

smidge?”

“No,” she answers. “I’m really, really not. You’ll be the only Slytherin
professor, and everyone knows what you did during the last war. You
won’t have your business contacts, your international friends, even
your damn money won’t do you any good in those halls. They’ll tear
you apart.”
“Well, I can’t have that.” He downs half his glass in one go. “There
were only four Slytherin first years last year.”

“Total?” Blaise says, incredulous. Pansy’s mouth is parted in

surprise.

“Total,” he confirms, and the weight of the mess he’s agreed to clean
up makes him want to say fuck it and hide in France with his parents.
“I’m a Malfoy and a Black, and I have a duty to fulfill to my blood. I
will fulfill it. The only question here is,” he turns to address the both
of them, “Are you going to help me or not?”

Blaise rolls his eyes. “Of course we are, don’t be daft. Are you sure
you want the goblins running your businesses and stocks again?
There’s a reason your grandfather took over the account from them.
They’ll take a fortune in fees.”

“I can afford it,” he says dryly. When he’d found out he’d been
named the heir to a half dozen dark families, it had surprised him,
but it shouldn’t have. They’re all related somehow, and leaving
everything to the Malfoys, a family that has weathered the brunt of
over a dozen wars, must have made sense to them. “Besides, it’s
worth it to know my business isn’t being mishandled in my absence.”

Pansy runs a hand through her hair, forgetting she’s braided it and
having to yank it out halfway down. “Fine. You’ve clearly already
made up your mind.”

Blaise smiles the beautiful, empty smile that he learned from his
mother. Draco hates that smile. “Let’s go to the ball.”

Draco attends every dinner and dance he’s invited to, either Pansy
or Blaise on his arm. If he’d had any doubts about his decision
before, he doesn’t now. Families who’d been downtrodden by the
war speak to him with a gleam in their eyes and a centuries old
confidence falling over their shoulders once more. He’s introduced to
a number of his future students, and they’re all wary of him. For
some, he’s the third head of house they’ve been introduced to.

What sticks out to him, what really sticks out to him, is meeting
young Raina Lestrange. He’d inherited a Lestrange manor from
Bellatrix and a couple of house elves, and he’d offered the lot back
to the head of the family, the ancient Lady Rosamond, but she’d
refused.

She hadn’t been the only one. Smart families didn’t want properties
that had belonged to infamous death eaters. If they’d been ancestral
homes that would have been different, but no one was foolish
enough to leave Draco any of those properties, thank merlin.

He’s at a garden party taking place at the Lestange Castle, old and
well maintained. War or no war, the Malfoys and Letranges had been
allies since before their families moved to Britain, and Draco always
accepts any invitation from them if he’s in the country. It wouldn’t do
any good to allow the war to break family ties that have been in
place for over a dozen generations. Pansy is busy so Blaise is his
date to this event, wearing pale lilac robes that are a stark contrast to
his dark skin. Draco cannot pull off pastels with his complexion, so
he he’s in navy robes that offset the light purple perfectly. Every eye
in the room is drawn to them, Blaise especially, and Draco can’t
blame them.

He mixes and mingles, and these sorts of parties are casual and
exclusive enough that he doesn’t have to always be on his guard,
that he can actually enjoy the good food and wine and conversation.
“Draco,” a smoke rattled voice says from behind him, and his smile is
entirely genuine when he turns to face Rosamond Lestrange.
There’s a girl hiding behind the older woman, and all he can see of
her is one dark eye and black hair.

“My lady,” he greets, inclining his head. “A delight, as always. I trust

you know my companion, Blaise Zabini?”
Blaise, the dramatic flirt, beams and kisses the back of Rosamund’s
hand. She’s too smart for that to work, but she is amused by him, so
Draco supposed she’s charmed either way. This is why he brings
Blaise places.

“Of course,” she says. She’s older than Dumbledore, but there’s
nothing but razor sharp intelligence in her eyes. “I just wanted to say
how absolutely delighted we all are with your recent career move,
Draco.” Before he has the chance to thank her, she pushes the
small, pale girl with inky black hair in front of him. “This is my grand
nephew’s daughter, Raina. She’ll be a third year.”

Draco is not good with children, but he’s not a barbarian, so he

smiles and drops on a bended knee so he can look up into the girl’s
in the eyes. The least he can do is give her the height advantage
since she’s clearly nervous. But when he gets a good look at her,
she seems afraid of all things, and he’s so taken aback by it that he
forgets to say anything. But she swallows and says, “Hello Lord
Malfoy. It’s very nice to meet you.”

“You as well,” he says, recovering and making his smile gentle. He

leaves his hands crossed over his knee where she can keep an easy
eye on them. “There’s no need to call me Lord Malfoy, however, I
must insist on Draco. Although I suppose once the school year starts
it’ll have to be Professor.” He winks at her and her lips turn up into
something that’s almost a smile.

“It’s really true then?” She takes a step closer to him, “You really are
coming back to Hogwarts? Even though - with - with everyone else
that’s there?”

He knows who she’s referring to. “It’s hard to fear someone when
you’ve seen them at eleven falling off their broom,” he says dryly,
and it’s a lie, but it’s an important one. “Yes, of course I’m returning
to Hogwarts. It’s time someone of merit was in the position, don’t you
think?”
“Yes!” she says, so excitedly he’s surprised by it. She’s beaming at
him, a very different girl than the one he met a few moments ago. “I’ll
study very hard for the rest of the summer, and I’ll be your best
Potions student,” she promises, and something hard settles at the
base of his throat.

“I’m looking forward to it,” he says, and he knew what he was, a

direct line from Black and Malfoy, old blood, Slytherins for
generations on both sides. He’d known what that would mean to
everyone else, but he hadn’t considered what it would mean to the
children.

She curtsies to him and her aunt, and then scampers away back
over to her parents, talking quickly and pointing over to him. “You
understand?” Rosamond asks, looking at him intently.

“Yes,” he answers, and he doesn’t resent her for this. It was a

necessary lesson, delivered in the kindest and most effective way
she could. “Thank you.”

The rest of party moves quickly after that, adults and cautious
children alike coming up to congratulate him on his appointment.
Blaise remains a charming and supportive presence at his elbow.

At the end of the night, he walks Blaise back to their carriage, a

proprietary hand on the small of his back. “I can’t just quit after a
year or two,” he says grimly. “If I’m going to actually make real
change, I’m going to have stick around. Damnit.”

There are still people watching them, so Blaise leans against his side
and kisses his cheek before allowing Draco to help him into the
carriage, using their closeness to say quietly enough that no one
else can hear him, “Looks like you’re fucked, mate.”

Draco restrains himself from laughing until he follows Blaise into the
carriage, but only barely.
Draco has spent most of his day arranging his accounts and signing
them over to the goblins, and this morning he’d finally popped over
to France to inform his parents of what was happening. His father
was doing better, but hadn’t really understood.

His mother hadn’t said anything. The war had stolen something from
all of them, but sometimes Draco feels like it’s his mother who lost
more than his father. Narcissa had been the youngest of the
indomitable Black sisters, gorgeous and educated, and she’d
married the heir to the Malfoy family, a man who’d been handsome
and powerful and had treated her with a kindness that their marriage
had not required he provide. She’d been a society queen, every bit
as cunning and intelligent as Lucius, and ferociously in love with her
life, a perfect wife and doting mother. With Bellatrix in Azkaban and
Andromeda married to a muggle, she must have felt like she’d
escaped some terrible fate.

Narcissa had done everything right and fought to keep her family
safe throughout it all, and she wasn’t unhappy in France with his
father, but she wasn’t happy either. But she refused to return to
Britain, refused to run the Malfoy Manor as would be her right until
he married.

Between that visit and negotiating with the goblins, he’s beyond
exhausted and just wants to collapse into bed. So, of course, that’s
when Milly appears besides him and says, “Excusing me, Master
Draco, but you have a visitor.”

“It’s nearly midnight!” he snaps. Milly’s ears droop, and he takes a

deep breath before asking, “Who is it?”

“It is Mistress Lovegood, Master Draco,” she says quietly.

Of course it’s Loony. Who else would come knocking at his door in
the middle of the night without a care in the world? “Let her in,” he
says wearily. He’s not going to bother making himself presentable for
her. She had attended family dinners until her mother died, after all.
It’s not like she’s going to care if his robes are ruffled or his hair
mussed.

By the time he walks into the sitting room, Luna is sitting upside-
down on the couch with her legs thrown over the back and her long
blonde hair piled on the floor. A cup of tea floats besides her, still
faintly sparking with elf magic. “Cousin!” she greets, beaming at him.

She’d stopped calling him that before their Hogwarts years, and had
only started again after the war. He wishes she’d stop. “Sit like an
adult,” he says, too tired to sound more than vaguely disapproving.
“What are you doing here?” He asks hopefully, “Do you want your
mother’s house back? The house elves have been taking care of it
but, I must reiterate, I truly have no use for a house in Japan.” He
doesn’t even do business there.

“Oh, no, you can keep it. Sell it if you don’t want it,” she somersaults
over the edge of the couch so she’s standing in front of him.
“McGonagall told me that you’re going to be the Potions professor!
Why didn’t you tell me?”

“I can’t sell the house,” he says, offended on behalf of Pandora, a

woman he honestly hadn’t even liked all that much while she was
alive, and he’s pretty sure the feeling was mutual. He has no idea
why she’d left it to the Malfoy family and not - well no, he doesn’t
suppose he’d trust Xeno with a family home either. “Four generations
of your mother’s family lived in that house, don’t be ridiculous.”

“Fine, keep the house,” she shrugs. “Cousin, you’re coming to

Hogwarts! We’ll be able to see each other every day!”

Merlin, he regrets this decision already. “I suppose,” he says. “Also,

McGonagall released an official notice of my appointment to The
Daily Prophet over a month ago. It hasn’t exactly been a secret.”

“You know I don’t read the Prophet,” she says reproachfully. “You
should have sent me an owl!”
“Luna.” He can already feel a headache building behind his eyes.
She has, for the record, always been this exasperating. “Is there a
reason you came here in the middle of the night? I can’t imagine any
of your friends are happy that you’re here. Is there some duty as
head of the family you need me to perform? Would you like a house
in Britain? I have enough of them.”

She quiets, her dark blue eyes going soft with hurt. Talking to her
has always been a minefield - she hadn’t been hurt when he’d
teased her all through Hogwarts, not really, but here they are having
a perfectly normal adult conversation, and now she’s upset.
Honestly. “We are family, aren’t we?” she asks quietly. “It shouldn’t
matter what my friends think.”

“Your father can’t like it either,” he says, feeling quite out of his
depth. He really doesn’t understand why she bothers talking to him.
Her father has always been happy to pretend his mother hadn’t been
born a Malfoy. She keeps staring at him, air tinged with sadness, and
he rolls his eyes. “Yes, Luna, we’re family. I’d hardly let anyone else
into the manor uninvited and unexpected, now would I?”

She smiles at him, too large and ridiculous, and he quirks his lips
back in return. She may be ridiculous and crazy, but she’s also his
cousin, and in between all the crazy she’s almost nice to be around.
“Do you want to hear about the interesting students?” she offers.
“Since they’ll be your students too.”

He is exhausted and he’s sure all of Luna’s information will be

spectacularly unhelpful, like what their favorite colors are and which
ones are being stalked by creatures he doesn’t believe exist. “I’d be
delighted,” he says, snapping his fingers. In the next moment there’s
a cup of steaming tea in his hands, and he kicks off his shoes to curl
up at the end of the couch. Luna follows suit, tea still floating and
growing cold beside her while she gesticulated wildly and begins a
story about what sounds like a very strange Hufflepuff fifth year.
It’s two weeks before the start of the school year. He’s ordered the
elves to pack up and deliver his belongings to his rooms, which he
thinks is rather straightforward, but there’s a hesitant tugging on his
pant leg. “Excuse me, Master,” Bip says, ears and eyes downcast.
These are good elves, they never speak without being spoke to.
Especially Bip - he was one of the Lestrange elves Draco had
inherited.

“Yes?” He looks down at the elf, “What is it?”

“We was just wondering,” he keeps his eyes lowered, “if there will be
anything you’ll be needing us elves to be doing while you’re gone?
Anything at all?”

Fuck. He hadn’t thought about the elves. The Malfoys have always
employed about a dozen elves to manage their properties, but after
the war he’d inherited about fifty more. Granted they also came with
numerous properties, but one elf per property was more than enough
if it wasn’t being used. To be honest, it was overkill. One skilled elf
could easily maintain five out of use properties with time to spare.
There was enough latent magic around the manor and some of the
other homes he’d inherited that they weren’t in any danger of
starving, but they’d need something to do. Something around people
-

Or children. Messy, demanding, hungry children.

“Bip, gather all the elves that can be spared from general duties,” he
commands, “You’re all coming with me to Hogwarts.”

The poor thing looks so excited Draco’s almost worried he’s going
faint. “Yes, Master Draco! Right away, Master Draco!”

He rubs the back of his neck, then goes to go draft a letter to

Minerva. He’s sure there’s going to be plenty of parents pissed about
this latest decision, but he really can’t find it in himself to care. The
only thing worse than a happy house elf is a morose one - he had
met Kreacher, after all, and that was the saddest excuse for a house
elf he’d seen since they’d employed Dobby.

He trusts the elves to make his rooms livable, but Draco’s going
through the potions classroom. He’s sure there are a few of them
familiar enough with the art that they could clean it without killing
themselves, but he’s not willing to risk it. It’s one thing to hit an elf for
failing its duty, and quite another for one to die for following orders
while under his employ.

If he wasn’t convinced that the previous potions professors had been

worthless before, trying to get the classroom in order would have
done it. The ingredients are stored in completely the wrong
sequence. What moron kept lion’s mane next to murtlap essence? If
something spilled, then the whole thing would explode. Before he
can even begin to deal with that mess, he has to clean the whole
classroom. There are numerous potions stains, and if he knew what
they were then he could use magic to get rid of them, but he doesn’t.
It’s not like he can just leave them there - all it takes is another
potion spilling on the stains, and the wrong combination will end in
an explosion. People truly underestimate how often potions end in
explosions. So, unless he wants to risk blowing himself up, he’s
going to have to do it by hand like a peasant. He snaps his fingers,
and Milly appears in front of him. “A pail of water, boiling hot. Another
pail, and at least three dozen rags.” She nods and his requested
items appear besides him. “Very good. Dismissed.” She disappears,
leaving him alone to his work.

He rolls up his sleeves and resigns himself to burning these trousers.

With a swish and a flick, all the desks and chairs in the room rise to
the ceiling. The water’s temperature never falls below steaming.
Hours later, he’s completed about two thirds of the classroom, his
hands have turned some horrid yellow color, and he’s identified at
least seven of the failed potions on the ground. Lovely.

“Draco,” an amused voice says behind him, “I hope we’re not

interrupting.”
He doesn’t look up from his scrubbing, “You are, actually, Minerva.
What kind of morons did you have in here? Or are all the students as
competent as Longbottom? It’s the only explanation for how the floor
is this much of disaster.” He pauses. She’d said ‘I hope we ’re not
interrupting.’

He looks up, hoping it’ll be Flitwick. He’s not nearly so lucky. “Harry
was quite insistent he greet you as soon as you arrived,”
McGonagall says dryly. She hadn’t told Draco about the meltdown
Potter had on hearing of his appointment, but Draco is confident he
had one.

Harry is staring at him like he’s never seen him before. He looks
good, the bastard. His gorgeous copper skin is the darkest it’s ever
been, and it’s a lovely contrast to his bright green eyes. His stupid
muggle clothes doing nothing to hide he’s just as fit as back when
they were on the quidditch pitch during school. Not that Draco isn’t,
but he’s also on his hands and knees scrubbing the floor like a
servant and absolutely filthy. “Potter,” he says, raising an eyebrow.
“While I’m touched that your heart’s all aflutter over my presence, I
am quite busy at the moment.”

“Uh,” he coughs, then flushes. “I - yes, I - sorry,” he finishes with

before turning on his heel and - Draco cannot believe this - running
away .

He stares and then slides his gaze over to Minerva. “What the hell?”

“That went quite well, I think,” she says.

He points an accusing finger at her, filthy rag still clenched in his fist.
“Don’t you start scheming too. If that’s a tradition, it’s one you should
break.”

She just smiles at him. It’s a new expression, and he’s still getting
used to it. Draco doesn’t think she’d ever smiled at him before this
whole mess began. “You know, heavier objects are harder to levitate,
especially over time.”
He crosses his arms, and his crisp white shirt is covered with stains.
It’s getting burned along with the trousers. “Yes, Minerva, I did pass
my first year charms class, thank you for asking. There’s a reason
children start out with a feather.”

She looks up at the ceiling, “How long have those been up there?”

He follows her gaze. All of the room’s furniture is still hovering

toward the ten feet in the air. “I don’t know, however long I’ve been
imitating a house elf. A couple of hours?” He scowls, “I am actually
an accomplished wizard, in case you’ve forgotten.”

Draco expects her to snap at him for his attitude, but she just keeps
smiling. “I haven’t forgotten,” she promises, then leaves him to his
classroom.

What the fuck.

It takes him another hour to finish cleaning the floor and walls of
suspicious stains. He lowers the furniture and intends to get started
on it, but after a thorough once over he’s not sure it’s worth it. The
tables are stained and scratched, with burn marks and strange
splotches. The chairs aren’t in much better condition.

He taps his wand against his chin. He’s a fair hand at transfiguration,
although it’s not his specialty. He could always call Pansy, who does
rather have knack for it. But he’s also one of the richest wizards in
the world, and half the reason he’s in this dreadful place is to make a
statement. So he’ll make a statement. He snaps twice and two of his
house elves appear before him. “Get rid of it,” he says, pointing to
the furniture that his magic has neatly stacked against the wall. “Burn
it, give it away, dump it in the ocean for all I care. But get it out of
here.”

“Yes, Master,” they say as one, and in the next instant his classroom
is bare. He’ll deal with that tomorrow. For now, he tackles the storage
cupboard, which is going to take up nearly as much time as cleaning
the bloody floor did. He has to entirely reorganize it, and half the
ingredients are expired. No wonder there were so many potions
stains. It’s a miracle any of them managed to make a complete
potion with this to work with. At the end of it, his classroom is clean
and the potions ingredients that are worth keeping are organized in a
way that won’t kill anyone. It’s also nearly dinner time, so he goes to
his own rooms next to the Slytherin dorms.

He steps inside and can feel the tension that had built up in his back
loosening. It’s decked out just like home with smooth, ancient lines
and a surprisingly pleasing palate of silver and deep purple. A house
elf appears at his side, and he looks down and realized it’s Bip. “Very
good,” he says, and the little thing puffs up in pride. “The potions
classroom should be safe now. Give it a thorough cleaning, but if you
see anything unusual, get me immediately.”

“Yes, Master Draco,” he squeaks before disappearing. The hearth is

crackling pleasantly, casting a warm, cheery glow over the rooms.
It’s not his country manor or his townhouse in France, but it’s not a
bad place to call home.

The shower feels luxurious after the day cleaning. He steps out from
under the warm spray of water and dries himself with a flick of his
wand. He stands in front of the wardrobe, tapping his wand against
his arm. Well, the elves did decorate his quarters in purple. Might as
well keep with the theme. He slashes his wand forward, then pulls it
quickly back. His wardrobe opens, revolving sets of clothes twirling
past. He chooses what he wants with quick flicks of his wand, and
when he leaves for the great hall he’s in a purple robe so dark it
almost looks black and soft grey trousers.

He takes a deep breath before entering the great hall. Into the lion’s
den he goes.

“Draco,” McGonagall says as soon as he enters, like she was waiting

for it. “You’re looking much better.”

“Well it would be difficult for me to look worse,” he answers, wry. “By

the way, I got rid of all the furniture from the Potions room, I couldn’t
possibly work with something that outdated. I’ll arrange for
replacements tomorrow.”

She raises an eyebrow. “Very well. It is your classroom.”

Draco feels like that was too easy, but it’s not like he wants to argue
with her either, so he just nods his thanks and lets his eyes glide
over the table. Potter, Granger, and Luna he expected, but not the
man avoiding his eyes next to Pomona. “Longbottom,” he greets,
gracefully taking his seat next to Filius, who winks at him. He hates
himself for finding it comforting. “I didn’t expect to see you here.”

“He’s my apprentice!” Sprout says cheerfully, “He’s just finished his

studies with the McCains, and came seeking an apprenticeship. How
could I refuse?”

Draco wrinkles his nose, unable to stop himself. Granger pounces on

him instantly, all bushy brown hair and dark brown skin and flashing
brown eyes. “Something to say, Malfoy?”

“The McCains are morons,” he answers readily, addressing

Longbottom instead of Granger. The other man won’t meet his gaze.
It’s like he’s talking to a house elf. “I’d do my best to forget whatever
they taught you and just go by Sprout’s word.”

“They were a great help during the war,” Granger says archly, like
that has any bearing on the conversation.

“That’s nice,” he says blandly. “Their gardens refuse to be tended by

them anymore, so it’s only a matter of time before they go out of
business. If they’re smart they’ll sell to someone who can salvage it
before they become destitute.” He pauses, thinking for a moment,
and then addresses Longbottom again. “Given your well known
proclivity for the subject I assume they were all too eager to throw
you at the problem. Much like smacking a bandaid on a stab wound.”

Granger’s red in the face, all ready to defend a family he’s sure she’s
never had more than a quick conversation with. He fatalistically
braces himself for impact, but instead of Granger’s yelling,
Longbottom finally deigns to speak. “Well,” he says, almost smiling,
“I did learn a lot.”

"That’s a fair point,” Draco says after a moment's consideration, “Did

you end up setting the singing tulips on fire? That’s what I
recommended when they came to me.”

“Why would the McCains go to you?” Granger asks. On one hand,

he appreciates the older professors letting them have their little dick
measuring contest without interfering, but on the other hand, he’s
hungry and this is boring .

“They tried to sell their estate to me,” he answers. “Unfortunately, I

mostly deal abroad and have neither the time nor the inclination to
maintain a greenhouse domestically. Too much fussy temperature
work when you can just grow the stuff locally and smack a
preservation charm on it.”

“Preservation charms aren’t as good as fresh product,” Longbottom

says, and at least now he’s looking at him.

“No, of course not, but the difference is negligible most of the time.
When it isn’t, people can always pay for a portkey transfer.”
Longbottom winces. Portkey shipments don’t come cheap since the
charm is such a pain to apply.

Granger inserts herself in the conversation. Again. “What about

people that can’t afford the portkey fee?”

He raises an eyebrow and drawls, “Well, if they can’t afford the

portkey transfer, then they certainly wouldn’t be able to afford the
giant markup on product I’d have to make to maintain profits if I was
also staffing enough herbologists to keep a tropical greenhouse in
the middle of winter.” She opens her mouth to say something else
irrelevant to the conversation, he’s sure, so he doesn’t give her the
chance. “I don’t know about the rest of you, but I for one am
starving.” He snaps his fingers rapidly, five times a row, and by the
time he’s done the food is set out and steaming in front of them.

Minerva takes a quick sip from her goblet to hide her laughter. Draco
pointedly ignores everyone but Flitwick for the remainder of the
meal. Luckily for Draco, he’s more than willing to be dragged into a
conversation about the minutia and limitations of the portkey charm.

He feels the weight of someone’s gaze on him throughout the whole

meal. He assumes it’s Granger, but when he looks up she’s deep in
conversation with Longbottom.

However, out of the corner of his eye, he does see Potter jerk his
head down so he’s staring at his plate.

Interesting.

i hope you liked it!

you can follow/ harass me at: shanastoryteller.tumblr.com

Chapter 2
Chapter 2

this chapter was so hard to write

note: i removed the platonic relationship tags not because they're

inaccurate, but because its taking a while to get to them. i'll re-add
them when they become developed in the story.

(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)

Diagon Alley is a step away from becoming muggle London at this

point, so Draco doesn’t even waste his time by going there.

He takes the Floo straight to Borgin and Burkes, his highest quality
robes sitting perfectly on his shoulders. They’re a blue as dark as the
night sky, and the buttons all up the front charmed to give a subtle
twinkle. If anyone were to look closely, different constellations can be
seen chasing each other on the robe’s hem. It had been his
mother’s, a family heirloom passed onto her from Great Aunt
Walburga on her wedding day. His name is written in the stars like all
the other Blacks, and he has as much of a right to wear this robe as
any of his ancestors.

Also, his mother now rarely wore anything with a hint of color to it,
instead choosing to cultivate an exclusively black wardrobe. He’d
appropriated her wardrobe not long after the war ended, and she
hadn’t said a word. He hasn’t yet been able to gather to courage and
ask what, exactly, she was mourning.

“Lord Malfoy.” Borgin comes forward, a steeped old man whose eyes
look too big behind his glasses. Draco reaches inside his cloak,
fingers brushing against his wand so that he can banish the ash from
the soles of his shoes.

“Borgin,” he greets, and the little old man unbends himself just a
little, standing that much straighter as he blinks up at Draco. “I need
some custom work done. I’m sure you can oblige? I’ll need Burkes’s
expertise as well.” They may run an antique shop, but the couple
also had a talent for magical craftsmanship. Borgin did the actual
material shaping, while his husband was particularly skilled at
seamless integration of opposing materials and locking and
protection spells. It’s impossible to make a living off that, however, as
even noble families bought things that were made the muggle way
and then just charmed the finished product. It was exponentially
cheaper, although the quality of course just wasn’t the same.

Draco pulls out his wand and summons the plans from his rooms at
Hogwarts. It’s unnecessary and a waste of magic, but it’s not enough
to just display his family and his wealth. Power is important too.
Borgin glances through the schematics, eyebrows rising nearly to his
hairline. “Of course, Lord Malfoy. However, it will be quite costly.”

“As superior arts should be,” he sniffs, and the sudden wash of pride
looks good on Borgin, it makes him look like what he is - a powerful
and respectable pureblood. “I need sixteen of them, and they must
be delivered to me at Hogwarts by the end of the month. At the
absolute latest.”

Borgin blinks, and Draco resists the urge to smirk. The end of the
month is ten days away. To create sixteen of the desk in that
timeframe, Borgin and Burkes will have to close the shop and work
straight through. Draco estimates the whole thing will cost more than
all the Weasleys make in a year, combined. Good.

“Absolutely, Lord Malfoy!” he says, displaying an enthusiasm that

Draco doesn’t remember seeing in him since he was a child. “We’ll
get started on this right away!”
“Excellent,” he says. “The goblins are handling my accounts.”
Another way to display his wealth, since few people have the money
to hire the operators of Gringotts. Fools, in Draco’s opinion. They
were goblins, and somehow always managed to almost double his
profits even after taking out their monstrous fee. He doesn’t know
what his grandfather was thinking when he’d fired them. It’s not like
they’d come under hard times. “Send the bill their way at your
convenience.”

“Thank you, Lord Malfoy,” Borgin says, and it’s a touch too sincere to
just be about Draco placing a large order.

Draco tucks his wand back in his robes, “Believe me, Borgin, the
pleasure is mine.” He apparates out of there before the man can do
something horrid, like smile at him.

He may be rich, but he’s not insane, so he orders the stools from a
reputable craftsman in the upper alleys - hand made, but not magic
made, and set to be delivered to his classroom in three days. He’s
just considering if he should put in an appearance somewhere for
lunch or head back to Hogwarts when an excited voice calls out,
“Cousin! - Ow, Mum, I mean, Lord Malfoy!”

“Draco is fine,” he says dryly, turning on his heel to see Diane Goyle
with a long suffering look on her face and surrounded by four
children. He assumes the two are connected. Diane is his great
aunt’s youngest daughter on his father’s side, if he’s not mistaken.
Not that it matters - after a certain point, everyone just gets relegated
to cousin to avoid the headache, and the only time anyone bothers
to get specific is when arranging a marriage. “Diane, a pleasure.”

“Lord Draco,” she smirks, going into a neat curtsey that the children -
including the boys - attempt to copy with varying levels of success.

“That’s not what I meant and you know it,” he says, because Diane is
a brat . Lucius had complained more than once that she and Draco
were too similar for their own good. “School shopping?”
“Cousin!” He looks down, and Diane’s son Markel grabs his hand,
tugging it until he obligingly bends enough to look him in the eye.
“You’re going to be my head of house, that’s so cool!”

Draco frowns, “You’re not old enough for Hogwarts.”

Markel scowls and pokes Draco in the side with his very bony
fingers, and Diane laughs because she’s a traitor. “I’m eleven!”

“Since when?” he demands.

“You were out of the country at the time,” Diane says, amused. “In
Russia, I believe.”

“Oh, yes. That.” A patch of Devil’s Snare had become

temperamental and started attacking its herbologists, which honestly
is what they’d deserved for putting Devil’s Snare in the same plot as
the gillyweed marshes. It had taken him two weeks to sort that mess
out and hire a whole new team of herbologists that weren’t going to
make his plants revolt against him. He says to Markel, “You better be
on your best behavior. You’ll be representing both the Malfoy and
Goyle families.”

“Marilyn can represent the Goyles,” he scoffs. “I’ll take the Malfoys.”

A tall girl that Draco knows to be the Goyle heir smacks Markel
upside the head. It doesn’t faze him, so Draco assumes it’s a
common occurrence. “You’re a disgrace to both families,” she tells
him, “You’re lucky Uncle Warren doesn’t lock you in the basement
like a squib.”

“Dad would never,” Markel declares. “I’m his only son! His precious
child! The light of his life!” A boy Draco is pretty sure is Luca
Greengrass raises both his eyebrows, and he has to bite the inside
of his cheek to keep from smiling.

“Didn’t he threaten to attach you to the ceiling with a permanent

sticking charm if you didn’t stop flying your broom into the rose
bushes last week?” asks a girl Draco doesn’t recognize, although
based on the stormy grey-blue eyes alone he assumes she’s an
Ollivander.

“Listen,” Markel says passionately. “There is no reason for us to

have ten foot tall rose bushes. None at all. They’re eyesores, just -
just a blight on our good name. I was doing him a favor, really.”

Draco’s almost certain he made that exact same argument to his

mother after one (or three, or four) too many run ins with the
weeping willows on the property, which unlike muggle ones actually
did weep, and did so extremely loudly after Draco would fly into them
and get caught in the branches. He trades a look with Diane,
because she was a beater during school, and he would be shocked
if she didn’t have a similar story. They have to quickly look away
from each other before they burst out laughing.

“I was just heading out to lunch,” he says, interrupting the kids before
a full scale argument can break out. “Would you like to join me?”

The children turn their faces up at him, like sunflowers. Then as one,
they turn to Diane, who’s back to looking long suffering. “We’d be
delighted,” she answers. Draco intends to offer her his arm, but
instead Markel and Marilyn each grab one of his hands and drag him
forward. Markel launches into a story about his latest flying
excursion, causing Marilyn to roll her eyes. Luca interjects whenever
he feels Markel is stretching the truth a little too much, but the
Ollivander girl doesn’t say anything at all. She just keeps glancing at
him with those oddly piercing eyes her family has.

Of course, as soon as they step out of Knockturn Alley, Diane’s face

smooths out to ice, no long his older mischievous cousin, but Mrs.
Goyle, a woman who may not have served Voldemort directly but
certainly knew people who did, and did nothing to stop them. The
kids’ smiles slip from their faces and they let go of his hands, falling
silent as they rearrange themselves so they’re walking a half step
behind the adults.
Draco did the same as a kid, remembers clearing his face of
emotions and walking in between and just behind his parents
whenever they were out in public. But Draco did it out of a place of
arrogance, was more than happy to stand there looking down at
people older and taller and more powerful than him because he was
the Malfoy heir.

It’s not the same.

He means to part ways with them after lunch, but somehow ends up
getting dragged around the rest of the day to help with the kids’
school shopping. They do it all in Diagon Alley, and Diane doesn’t
say anything, but Draco is sure before they bumped into each other
that she was planning to do her shopping in Knockturn.

He doesn’t return to the castle until the moon is high in the sky. His
robe is most beautiful at night, the constellations that sparkle along
the hem during the day aren’t so confined under moonlight. They
dance and twirl gorgeously across the rich blue fabric, and Draco is
sure he looks like an idiot standing in front of the castle looking at his
robe, but he can’t find it in himself to care. It’s the work of Aquila
Black over three hundred years ago, and one of the most impressive
charms he’s ever come in contact with. She’d spun the thread
herself and had made the dye from burning tulips harvested on a
three quarters moon, and then she’d woven the robe as a single
garment from that thread. There wasn’t a single seam or stitch on it.
The robe had over a hundred interlocking charms on it, so perfectly
merged that even after three centuries not a bit of the spellwork had
started to erode or fade. It was honestly easier to make an invisibility
cloak than to replicate everything Aquila Black had done to make this
robe.

Draco goes to his classroom, a reignited determination burning

inside of him. History is important, family is important, and he’s not
about to let a few pointless wars get in the way of over a thousand
years of tradition.
A soft chiming noise wakes Draco up, low enough not to be jarring
but persistent enough that he can’t ignore it and go back to bed.
“Milly,” he groans, flinging an arm over his eyes, “I told you not to
wake me up today.”

“I is very sorry, Master Draco,” his house elf whispers, and he forces
his irritation down because one of the worst ways to start a day is
with a crying house elf. “But Headmistress McGonagall sent a
message. You be having a meeting, Master Draco?”

“Not until eleven,” he says, and he wants to snap at her, but doesn’t.
Maybe he should start having Bip wake him up. The older house elf
wasn’t as nice about it, but he didn’t get upset over Draco’s morning
attitude.

“It is eleven fifteen,” she says.

Draco throws off his comforter and grabs his wand, cursing. “Milly!
You should have said that in the first place!” She looks at him with
big liquid eyes and twists her ears back, and Draco wishes not for
the first time that it was possible to use his magic on his own elves
as he slaps her hands away. “Stop that. Make my bed and prepare
my robes.”

Milly could complete both of those tasks with a single snap of her
fingers, but instead she does it by hand while he quickly applies
charms to his face and hair so he doesn’t look like a barbarian. He
almost yells at her for wasting time before remembering she had
been one of the Flint elves. They had a reputation of being rather -
harsh, with their elves. There was a reason most of the creatures
refused to work for their family anymore.

She lays out his silk Slytherin green robes, which are probably
overkill for a staff meeting, but everything he does is overkill, so Milly
probably has the right idea. “Very good,” he tells her before running
out the door. He sees her wilt in relief out of the corner of his eye.
Good.
He bursts into the meeting twenty five minutes late, robes billowing
out behind him. “How nice of you to join us,” Minerva says, and
before he would have taken it as a slight and said something acidic
in return, but now he’s very aware that she’s laughing at him.

“Don’t you start,” he says crossly, taking the empty seat between
Filius and Luna, “I’ve been up until dawn the past two nights
gathering mourning thistles.”

Pomona raises an eyebrow and Longbottom gives him an odd look.

“It’s the new moon.”

“Yes, that’s the point,” he huffs, snapping his fingers. A steaming cup
of tea appears in front of him and Granger throws him a disgusted
look. What’s the point of house elves if he has to make his own tea?

“Mourning thistles become poisonous when picked during the new

moon,” Longbottom continues, like Draco is a simpleton. “That’s why
they’re called mourning thistles. If you prick yourself on them, you’ll
die.”

“Well, unfortunately for you lot, I’m not planning on it,” he says.
“Dried mourning thistles picked on the new moon can then be
crushed into powder. Which, when left in a golden bowl covered in
an unbroken spider web under direct sunlight for thirteen days,
becomes -”

“Poor Man’s Faerie Dust,” Longbottom finishes. “Merlin, that’s a lot of

effort to go to. Doesn’t your family sell the stuff? For that matter, I
know the Malfoy land has faeries on. You could gather the real thing
easily enough.”

Granger’s looking back and forth between them so quickly he’s

surprised she hasn’t given herself whiplash. Potter just looks
confused. “If by easily enough you mean by trading my weight in
blood for it, maybe.” Didn’t Longbottom get on with the half-giant
oaf? No way Hagrid would have ever have suggested someone
gather faerie dust alo - then again, he did smuggle a dragon and the
acromantulas onto school grounds, so maybe he did. “Believe me, I
would love nothing more than to sign a great big check on behalf of
Hogwarts to myself for potions ingredients, but I’d be slapped with a
lawsuit before the ink was dry. It’s a toss up whether it’d be for
extortion or money laundering.”

“Why don’t you just continue buying them from wherever Hogwarts
usually gets their ingredients?” Potter asks.

Draco sniffs, but before he can say anything, Pomona interjects.

“And sign a check to his competition instead? I think not, Mr. Potter.”
She looks to Draco, curiosity in her narrowed eyes. “Are you
planning on growing all your own ingredients?”

“All the ones I can,” he says, doing his best not to show his surprise
at her reaction. “I don’t sell frog livers or unicorn hairs and the ilk
myself, so I have no problem buying them. There will be a few
ingredients that I’ll have to buy outright simply because of time
constraints, but I’ve already created an account with a supplier in
Japan.”

“Why Japan?” Granger asks, and at the very least she doesn’t look
like she has plans to murder him in his sleep anymore.

“Because I don’t sell in Japan, so at least I’m not giving money to my

competition,” he says. “I can see the headlines now - ‘Malfoy Doesn’t
Use His Own Product - What Dark Secrets Are His Peach Trees
Hiding?’ It would be a nightmare.”

Someone snorts in laughter, and Draco is almost impressed when he

realized it’s Longbottom. When he realizes everyone’s staring at him,
his ears go red, “It - peach trees, get it? Because peach pit paste is
the binding agent in the potion that - that sneakascopes get soaked
in?” Longbottom looks at Draco, “That was the joke, right?”

“Yes, Longbottom, that was the joke.” Luna is looking at both of them
and beaming. He wishes they were still kids so he could just steal
her shoes whenever she got annoying.
Actually. He casually touches his hand to the wand hidden in his
sleeve, and this charm is tricky to pull off without the wand
movements, but - almost - and with a pop of magic Luna’s big eyes
blink and she lets out a pleased laugh while Flitwick claps his hands.
“Very well done, Mr. Malfoy!”

“What did he do?” Granger asks.

Luna twists herself in an improbable position so her feet are high in

the air, “He vanished my shoes!”

“Malfoy,” Potter hisses, a glare replacing his look of confusion, which

at least makes him look more like a proper pureblood and less like a
dunderhead. “Can you try and not to be a jerk for five minutes?”

He’s not about to justify or explain his relationship with his cousin to
anybody, least of all Saint Potter. “Well I could try,” he drawls in the
most obnoxious way possible. He addresses Minerva before anyone
else has a chance to start yelling at him. “I submitted my lesson
plans last week, have you had a chance to go over them?”

“They’re perfectly acceptable,” she says. “Although, weren’t you

planning to make the sixth years make the Poor Man’s Faerie Dust
next month?”

“I was,” he says, “but I couldn’t be sure some of them wouldn’t

poison themselves on purpose out of spite. They’ll get the boring
potions until I’m sure they’re not willing to maim themselves.”

She gets a pinched look on her face, and he knows she wants to say
that he’s being ridiculous, but he’s really not. He’s certain there’s a
Gryffindor student stupid enough to risk their own life if they think it’ll
get him sacked, and he’s not eager to give them the opportunity.
Before the silence can become awkward, Pomona pipes in with,
“Well, I think growing and harvesting the ingredient yourself is a
lovely idea! It’ll give the students a real sense of responsibility. We
should partner up and see if the herbology classes can grow some of
those for you.” She turns to Longbottom, “Neville dear, do sit down
with Draco and figure out a schedule for what he needs, and when
he needs it.”

Longbottom looks like he’s being sent to the gallows. Draco is more
amused than anything else, which is a new development.

Draco is seated in front his vanity with his lesson plans spread out all
around him and Theodore Nott glaring at him from his mirror. “I really
don’t see what the problem is,” Draco says. His mother would be
appalled if she could see the state of his hair, but Theo’s seen him
scrambling to get ready for class in his underwear, so that air of
mystery has been gone between them for about a decade.

“The problem,” Daphne says, pushing Theo out of the way so she
takes up the majority of the mirror, “is that you didn’t tell us .”
Honestly, the oddest relationship to come out of the war had been
those two. Theo was the son of a sadistic Death Eater and Daphne
was a Greengrass . So strange.

“I don’t see why I would,” he answers. “Do you care if I spend my

days teaching snot nosed children how to make pepper up potion?”

“My family still has a Wizenmagot seat,” she reminds him, glaring. “If
you’re preparing to take office, you should have told me! We can
start softening up the other members for you.”

Daphne had always been able to see through all his bullshit. It’s one
of the reasons he’d purposely not hung out with her much during
school. “Why go through the effort? Neither the Greengrass nor the
Nott families have an alliance with the Malfoys.”

“It’s not the twelfth century anymore, Draco,” she says, rolling her
eyes. “Not everything is down to alliances and life debts.”

“Well, what is it down to then?” he demands, absently switching a

couple lessons around to give the herbology students some room for
error.
“Blood,” she says. Draco looks up sharply, because those are
dangerous words without any context. “You do support the Blood
Laws, don’t you?”

“Obviously,” he says.

She shrugs, “Good. Great Aunt Eliza does too.” Lady Eliza
Greengrass is beautiful and scary - her and Rosamund had gone to
Hogwarts at the same time, about thirty or so years before Albus
Dumbledore. “Draco, give it fifty years and no one will care about this
silly war. But you are Lord Malfoy, and with that titles comes a
reputation and power that my family simply doesn’t have.”

“The Greengrass family has been a part of the House of Lords and
Ladies far longer than the Malfoys,” he says, but she simply raises
an eyebrow at him and he almost grins. “All right, I understand, I’m
just saying.”

Theo squeezes back into the mirror to say, “Look, it’s not like anyone
cares where you come from or when your family came over from
France. You’re the son of Malfoy and Black, and when you speak
people will listen. We did.”

“We were children, and I was an obnoxious pain in the ass,” he

throws back. “Flattery doesn’t work when your target knows you’re
lying.”

“You were an asshole,” Daphne agrees, and Draco rolls his eyes.
“But you were fun, too. You were clever and ridiculous and charming
and powerful . You still are. That’s more than enough reason for
people to follow you.”

Draco stares at her for a long moment. Daphne has always been
able to see through all his bullshit. He hadn’t expected her opinion to
be anything close to positive. “Okay,” he says, and he has to clear
his throat before he can continue, “flattery does work sometimes.”
Daphne’s grin is wicked. Underneath all the lace and manners, she
is one of them, after all. “Now, we obviously can’t push for the Blood
Laws immediately -”

Pip appears next to him with a quiet crack. “Master Draco,” she
whispers, “Professor Potter is here for you.”

He sighs deeply. Maybe if he ignores him, he’ll go away? No, that’s

never worked for anyone in twenty four years.

“Getting abandoned for Potter,” Theo says. “Now I really do feel like
we’re back in school.”

“Sod off,” he grumbles. “We’ll talk later.”

“Looking forward to it!” Daphne says cheerfully before dragging Theo

out of the mirror’s frame. Draco cancels the two-way charm and
summons a sheet over the mirror for good measure before going to
answer his door, charming his hair smooth as he goes.

He’s not sure what he’s expecting, exactly. Accusations of being an

evil, a curse to the face, or maybe even for Potter to throw a punch.
What he’s definitely not expecting is Potter awkwardly shuffling
outside his door and fiddling with his shirt cuffs. “Hey, Malfoy,” he
says, smiling automatically before remembering they don’t smile at
each other and quickly forcing his face into an exaggerated frown. “I
mean Draco - I mean - Professor?”

Honestly.

“Don’t hurt yourself, Potter,” he drawls, leaning against the door

frame. “Call me whatever you like. You’ve never needed permission
before.”

“Right,” he says, running his hand through his hair. Has he never
heard of a grooming charm? Granger at least always manages to
look respectable, and she has enough hair to make sweaters for
several small impoverished countries. “I have a question.”
Draco waits. Potter continues standing there looking like he’d rather
be anywhere else. "Yes?"

Harry rubs the back of his neck and won’t meet his eyes. “I wasn’t
trying to see - it’s just, when you were cleaning floor, you had your -
your sleeves were rolled up.”

Draco stares. Is Potter trying to tell him he’s aroused by his

forearms?

“I saw your arm. There’s - are you using a charm to hide it?” Draco
keeps staring. Harry gives an embarrassed shrug, “I didn’t think you
could cover it is all.”

“Potter,” he says finally, “would you like to try that again, in English?
Or French, or German, or Latin. My Japanese is pretty rusty, but we
can get Luna in here if it means you’ll start making sense.”

“Your Dark Mark,” Potter snaps, flushing, and merlin, why couldn’t he
have said that in the first place?

Draco sighs and neatly rolls the sleeve of his left arm up to his
elbow, “Satisfied?”

Potter’s mouth parts in surprise. He absently takes Draco’s wrist in

one hand and him closer so he can raise Draco’s arm up to see it
better. He runs careful fingers over his unblemished skin, and Draco
doesn’t consider himself to be overly pale, but there’s such a stark
contrast between his colorless skin next to Potter’s. “I saw it,” he
says quietly, more to himself than Draco.

“It was just a muggle tattoo,” he says, and Potter’s eyes finally flicker
up to his. They are standing far too close for propriety. “Just a needle
and ink. My mother convinced Voldemort that it would be too much
of a risk during our sixth year for his magic to be on me, and then he
just - forgot, I don’t know.”

“Did it hurt?” Potter asks.

He’s probably asking about getting it, but he says, “I cut it out myself
with a silver dagger as soon as we got home from the Battle of
Hogwarts, because I’m an idiot . My parents aren’t well versed in
healing spells, so I ended up brewing a healing potion myself that
night. Dax was pissed.”

They are undoubtedly standing too close. “Dax?”

All it once it crashes down on Draco that this is Harry Potter, so of

course he doesn’t know the name of the elf that’s served Malfoy
Manor for three generations. He doesn’t know anything . He’s a
selfish, pathetic excuse for a pureblood, and the last thing Draco
needs to do is forget that even if they’re not enemies, they’ve
certainly never been friends.

“It doesn’t matter,” he says, stepping back with his head tilted up just
enough that he has to look down at Potter. “Is your curiosity
satisfied? May I return to my work?”

“Oh,” he blinks, hastily stepping back as well. “Yes, of course. Sorry.”

Draco slams the door shut with an imperious eye roll, then leans
back against it.

Must not forget that for all his other virtues, Potter is still a blood
traitor. Must not forget .

Milly pops in front of him and says, “Misters Borgin and Burkes for
you in the Great Hall, Master Draco.” It’s the day before the students
are set to arrive, so they’re cutting it rather close. But he supposes
that they managed to make his deadline at all is impressive enough.

“Excellent,” he says, grateful to shove aside the giant tome on spell

theory Flitwick has assigned him. If he has to read another sentence
about how wand movements correlate to voice volume, he's going to
gouge his eyes out.
He sweeps into the great hall, but pauses at the entrance way.
Borgin and Burkes are standing there in their best robes, spines
straight and sneers on their lips, as they should be. But that certainly
doesn’t explain why every other professor is standing there as well.
“Did any of you need anything?” he says, and everyone’s eyes land
on him.

“You didn’t say you were getting the desks from them,” Minerva says,
and he can tell she’s two seconds away from throwing up her hands
and walking out. This is her own fault. She knew exactly what he
was like when she hired him.

“You got desks from an antique shop ?” Granger questions.

Longbottom starts, “Oh, Hermione, no -”

“My husband and I,” Burkes says, glaring down at her, “are makers
of magical objects, which is the service Lord Malfoy has employed
us for.”

“This is brilliant!” Pomona beams. “What a wonderful addition to the

castle.”

Borgin and Burkes soften. Pomona has that effect on people, and
Draco doesn't even think she does it on purpose.

Draco is about to tell them all to scram, but, well, Borgin and Burkes
could use an audience. It’s been too long since they’ve had one.
“Very well,” he turns on his heel and walks away. “We best get
started.”

He doesn’t look behind him, but he knows they’re all following him.
He opens the door to potions classroom with a swish of his wand.

He’s spent the better part of the past week getting it ready, and the
looks of surprise and admiration on everyone’s faces make it all
worth it. The stones have been scrubbed until they gleam, and the
floor is covered with a thin layer of magic to protect the castle’s
stonework from absorbing any more spilled potions. It had taken
Draco and Filius that better part of three days to work out the correct
incantations, and every couple minutes the floor would spark and
glitter with their magic. He’s banished all the candles and sconces,
which had always been completely inefficient at providing enough
light to work by anyway.

Instead, scattered across the ceiling are glass orbs containing

suspended lumos charms, so a steady soft light fills the room. He’d
sacrificed the entire left wall for a glass storage case to contain the
dry ingredients, while the wet ones are kept in cabinets of darkly
polished wood. The right wall is a series of intricate shelves that
contain everything from the gold cauldrons needed for advanced
potions, to motar and pestles, to the different stirring spoons and
vials needed for varying potions. Draco has shoved all the unused
books in the old storage closet and installed a safe in the very back
for the truly dangerous ingredients, something he wouldn’t have
thought to do if he hadn’t remembered the ridiculous polyjuice
situation that Granger had gotten involved in during their second
year.

He’s turned the dark and dank room into something bright and
beautiful and glittering. Even Pansy had been impressed when he’d
taken her mirror around. “Everyone up against the wall,” he
commands. “Give them some room.” He temporarily cancels his and
Filius’s charm on the floor to prevent it from interfering. They can
recast it once this is over.

Everyone shuffles against the wall at the front of the classroom,

doubling up when they run out of room. Borgin goes to one end of
the room, and Burkes to the other. Burkes removes a stack of papers
from inside his robe, and with a dramatic twirl of his wand all sixteen
of them are arranged in neat rows on the ground. He raises his
wand, “On my count. One, two -”

“Three,” Borgin finishes, and as one they move their wands in a

complicated design, golden fire trailing from their wands. Each one
of them is sketching one half of a celtic knot. Once it’s complete,
they fling their wands forward and back like fishing poles so the
designs collide into each other, and the force of their combined
magic is so powerful that the castle shakes. The papers burn and
expand, twisting until they become perfectly polished rectangles of
obsidian. The sparks lengthen and grow until delicate threads of
shining iron curl under the blocks of obsidian and raise them from
the ground and grow into dainty legs. Once they stop expanding, the
last sparks dance along the legs and sides of the desk top, inscribing
runes into the surface.

Draco walks down the center aisle, running critical eyes over the
desks. They are more beautiful than he imagined. He looks to the
craftsmen and says, “Excellent work. As I expected.”

They give him shallow bows, “Thank you, Lord Malfoy. It’s always an
honor to service the Malfoy family.”

“As it is our honor to be so serviced by those of unparalleled skill,” he

returns. He casts a wordless summoning charm, and the matching
stools he’d commissioned appear alongside the desks. Perfect.

“Wonderful,” Pomona says, “absolutely wonderful! Come with me,

boys, I’ll show you two out.”

They leave with Sprout, the older woman still heaping compliments
on them as they walk out the door. “That was amazing,” Longbottom
says, and Draco decides to stop being surprised by Longbottom. At
this rate, it can only become exhausting. “My gran has a china
cabinet that’s magic made, and a few other smaller things. But
sixteen desks! Incredible.”

“They’ll probably outlive all of us,” Draco agrees. “At least we won’t
have any more life threatening potions accidents.”

“What do you mean?” Granger butts in, her fingers twitching like she
wants nothing more than to run her hands over the desks. “What are
those runes?”
“Protection,” Minerva says, and once again she’s looking at Draco
like he’s not what she expected. “The obsidian and iron absorb
excess magic to prevent it from affecting the potion, as well as acting
like a low level cleansing charm so objects or ingredients that have
been tampered with won’t be affected. The runes are for neutrality
and protection. Should a potion explode, the magic of the explosion
will be contained by the desks themselves.”

“But not the potion itself,” Draco points out. “Pomfrey will still be
healing burns every week.”

“That’s really impressive,” Potter says earnestly. Granger elbows him

in the side, and he winces but doesn’t look at her.

Filius pats Draco on the arm, which is the highest part of him he can
reach. “Truly a work of art, Draco. The students will be thrilled.”

The students. Who are arriving tomorrow.

Right, brilliant. Draco can do this. He can handle a few hundred

children.

It’s going to be fine.

i hope you liked it!

now that the kids will be here and class is in session things will start
moving much more quickly :)

feel free to follow / harass me at: shanastoryteller.tumblr.com

(i also post writing progress reports under the 'progress report' tag so
you can know what i'm up to!)
Chapter 3
Chapter 3

please take the slow build tag very seriously

(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)

Draco wears his silk Slytherin green robes to the sorting. He knows
the kind of attention it’ll draw, but he’s not ashamed of who he is, and
he won’t allow his students to be either.

“This is my favorite part,” Filius says, straining to get a better look at

the line of first years nervously walking into the great hall. “I love
beginnings!”

He rolls his eyes. Flitwick may be brilliant, and one of his coworkers
that he genuinely likes, but he’s also more than a bit odd. Draco
scans the row of first years, and he has no problem picking out his
cousin Markel who’s walking next to Marilyn, their heads held high.
They’ll go to his house, no doubt. Luca Greengrass and the
Ollivander girl follow behind, and Luca will likely be Slytherin as well.
Every Ollivander since Hogwarts’s founding has gone to Ravenclaw,
but that’s fine. Their family is loyal to the magic, and it always had
been. No matter what side of the war they fall on, they never forget
their duty.

The Flint twins will be sorted into Slytherin, of course. They’re

impeccably mannered vindictive little brats, if Draco’s memory
serves him correctly. There’s a Patil down there, and they’re always
a wild card. There are two Brown cousins, and they’ll go to Gryffindor
of course. He goes through the rest of the children, mentally ticked
off family ties and house allegiances as he goes.
There are six children he doesn’t know. Halfbloods then, or
muggleborns. There’s a boy that reminds him strongly of Pansy, but
he knows all the Parkinson children and he would have heard if one
had gone rogue and shacked up with a muggle, so he dismisses that
out of hand. However, the Parkinsons and Carrows do share a
common ancestor, and he wouldn’t be surprised at all if one of latter
lost their marbles and got attached to a muggle.

“Pay attention,” Luna says, elbowing Draco as Pomona begins

reading off the names.

There aren’t any surprises. The Patil goes to Hufflepuff, and

Slytherin gets the Goyles, the Flints, Luca, plus three more children
from respectable families and one of the kids he doesn’t recognize.
Nine is a small class, but not reprehensible, he can work with nine -
they’re only halfway through the sorting, but he’s not expecting any
more. All the others are either allied directly against them, or too
loyal to their family’s house to stray.

“Andrea Ollivander,” Pomona calls out, and Draco doesn’t even look
up. She’ll provide a strong alliance for his snakes in Ravenclaw. She
and Marilyn have been friends since they were toddlers, and it’s
unlikely that either girl will throw that friendship away now.

“SLYTHERIN!”

Draco whips his head up. He’s not the only one to do so. The hall
goes so silent you could hear a pin drop.

Andrea calmly takes off the hat and hands it to a wide eyed Pomona.
She looks straight at Draco and inclines her head while going into a
deep curtsey. Draco nods in return, mouth dry, and he cannot
believe this is happening. This has never happened before.
Ollivanders go to Ravenclaw, they always have. Marilyn shoves
Markel down the bench to make room for Andrea, and at that the
whole house comes alive, clapping to welcome to their new
housemate. It sounds especially loud since everyone else has barely
remembered to breathe.
“Merlin’s balls,” Luna says. “Even I didn’t see that coming. And I’m
the divinations professor.”

“Oh, knock it off,” Granger snaps, and Draco glances at her and
Potter. Neither of them understand what just happened, but it looks
like at least they understand that they don’t understand. He’s not
going to be the one to explain it to them. Let Longbottom take care of
that.

Luna raises an eyebrow, “There are mystical forces beyond our

control, Hermione. It does not do to be a disbeliever of the universe.”

Ever since she was a little kid, Luna has been able to say the
stupidest shit with a completely straight face. She’s not clinically
insane like Xeno, so Draco doesn’t know how much of the crap
coming out of her mouth she actually believes. But, he knows his
cousin well enough that’s it’s obvious to him that she’s messing with
Granger right now. Granger doesn’t know that though, which makes
it extra hilarious.

The rest of the sorting doesn’t go as expected. He gets two more of

the unknown students, and one of the Abbott cousins, which is a
surprise. They’re more flexible with their house allegiances, but they
almost always end up in either Hufflepuff or Gryffindor, bringing up
the total of his first year class to thirteen. That’s almost as many as
they used to have before the first war.

Draco looks down the table at Minerva, and she seems incredibly
pleased with herself. All the Slytherins keep glancing up at him like
he’ll disappear if at least one of them isn’t looking directly at him.

Luna nudges him in the ribs and he almost smiles at her. It is,
tentatively speaking, a massive success.

He strides into the Slytherin common room after the feast, and the
seventy three students he’s now directly responsible for are
assembled in neat rows. His thirteen new first years are in front and
a group of decidedly unimpressed seventh years in the back,
including one girl who’s outright glowering at him. He can’t decide if
he’s impressed or offended.

“Hello,” he says, folding his hands behind his back. None of them
respond, but he hadn’t expected them to. “Everyone from a noble
house step to the other side of the room.”

There’s a moment of confused stillness, but then half of his students

shuffle over to one side of the room. “Everyone who’s a pureblood
step to the left wall.” Most of the rest walk over, leaving fourteen
nervous children, including the three first years he hadn’t recognized.
“Halfbloods to my left, muggleborns to my right.”

Six muggleborns, and eight halfbloods, but only four years shared
between the muggleborns. He turns to address the halfblood group.
“You will be judged for the actions of your parents. It’s unfortunate,
and can’t be helped. But you are here now, and you are of magic.
You were born to be right here, in this world and with these people.”
He rubs the back of his neck, and it’s a sign of weakness, but it’s one
that makes the kids instantly relax, which had been the whole point.
“You know the line you walk better than most. Which is why it’s your
job to help your muggleborn classmates. They’re being thrown into
this world blind, and it is you alone who can explain it to them. You
know both the world they come from, and the world they’re now a
part of.”

Next, he looks to the noble children. He knows all of them of course,

knows their parents and their lords and ladies. “We must not allow
our muggleborn and halfblood brethren to fall behind and disgrace
our house. They must be educated, because Slytherins are
educated, and they’re one of us now. I require four volunteers to give
up two hours a day three times a week.”

“I’ll do it!” Raina Lestrange says, determination in every line of her

body.
Markel and Marilyn share a considering glance before they both step
forward. “We’ll help!”

“Me as well,” Liam Parkinson says, subdued. He’s probably only

doing it because he knows if he doesn’t, his Aunt Pansy will kill him.
Draco understands the feeling intimately.

Draco inclines his head in thanks, then makes a sweeping gesture.

“All of you back in one group.” They listen, mixing together once
again, but more than a few of them are giving him strange looks.
That’s fine. “Blood is important,” he says seriously, and the
halfbloods and muggleborns flinch. “It is the very foundation of our
society, the support structure to which our culture relies on.” He
looks at all of their angry and scared faces. “You are all here by right
of blood. Magic runs through your veins and makes it home in your
heart. Some of you answer to Lords and Ladies who guard your
family’s magic, some of you are from families who’ve always fulfilled
your duties, and some of you have no ancient blood in your veins,
are new and alone, adrift at sea.” He makes certain to look every
muggleborn in the eye, because the halfbloods may know this, but
he doubts the muggleborns do. “You are magic’s gift to this world.
You were born of it and you will die by it, and there will always be a
place for you here. But magic doesn’t come free, it doesn’t come
cheap. It will take, and you must be willing to give.”

The purebloods are looking at him, something solemn and ancient in

these children’s faces, because they have never forgotten their place
in this world. Their families know their debt. Marilyn, the heir to the
Goyle family, looks like she’s a moment away from crying, and
Markel takes her hand.

Magic isn’t pretty. It’s isn’t nice. It isn’t easy. Anyone who thinks
otherwise hasn’t been paying attention. The muggleborns and
halfbloods don’t understand, not really, but that’s okay.

They will learn. Draco has no more patience for blood traitors, for
betrayers, for those who take and do not give. Slytherins have
always guarded the ancient ways, and no matter what those muggle
loving fools like to think, they are needed now more than ever.

“How’d it go?” Pansy demands, crowding into his mirror. Draco

twitches because his back is to the mirror and he’s mostly naked.
He’s certain he’d left a sheet over his mirror for this very reason. “Did
Liam behave?”

Well, it’s not like Pansy hasn’t seen him naked before. “It went fine,”
he sighs, turning around. He freezes and glares, because Pansy isn’t
alone in his mirror. “Hello, Lord Parkinson.”

“Lord Malfoy,” William says. He’s Pansy’s cousin (great uncle once
removed, technically), and the old man is definitely laughing at him.
He tries to decide what would be less dignified, scrambling into some
clothes or continuing this conversation in his underwear. “I trust the
children are well?”

Whatever. He’s pretty sure Lord Parkinson changed his diapers at

some point anyway. “As well as can be expected, I suppose. We
have thirteen first years.”

Pansy beams and a slow look of surprise and pleasure comes over
William’s face. Draco’s glad to see it. He’s only a decade or so older
than Lucius, but the cheerful man had begun to look worn since the
war had ended. Things had gotten so much harder for them all after
the war ended. “That is very good news.”

“We got an Ollivander,” he says. Pansy shoves her cousin up against

the mirror in her excitement, and he can’t help but laugh at her.

“You’re lying!” she accuses, but her face is as bright and happy as
he’s seen it since they were children. Pansy is remarkably pretty
when she smiles. “They always go to Ravenclaw!”

William carefully pushes himself away from the glass and throws
Pansy a fondly exasperated look. “Who is it?”
“Andrea, the wandmaker’s niece if I’m not mistaken. She’s the, uh,”
he frowns and looks to Pansy. She knows the Ravenclaw families
better than he does.

“Third cousin twice removed from Lady Ollivander, and a second

cousin once removed to Lord Brown,” she answers promptly.

Both Draco and William stare at her. “The Ollivanders and Browns
intermarried?”

“Third cousins, the youngest of their families at the time,” Pansy says
dismissively. “Nothing to cause a scandal, unfortunately.” Pansy did
love a good scandal. It’s probably why she's even better than Draco
at tracking family lines. “Anyway, she’s not a prominent member of
the Ollivander family, unless they plan to marry her to the son of the
heir. Which rumor says they are, but nothing has been announced
yet.”

“Oberon?” Draco says, raising an eyebrow. Future heir or not,

Oberon is a funny looking kid. Nice, though, and he knows the
Ollivanders are into that sort of thing.

Pansy must know what he’s thinking, because she smirks and says,
“Now now, the Ollivanders are a wonderful, if strange looking,
family.”

“Just the men,” William says dryly. “The women have always been
quite lovely.” He gives Draco an appreciative once over, “We can’t all
be Malfoys, after all.”

Draco does a little twirl, and Pansy dissolves into peals of laughter.
“Being this pretty is a burden, but I suppose someone must bear it.”

William rolls his eyes, “Good night, Lord Malfoy.” He taps his wand to
the glass and it shimmers like throwing a stone in a lake before it’s
simply his mirror once more.
“Good night, Lord Parkinson,” he says, although the man is no
longer able to hear him.

For the first time in a long time, things are looking up.

Draco can’t help but be smug when he swans in the next day and
sees how exhausted the other heads of house look. The students
from the other houses in varied states of harried sleep deprivation.
His snakes, on the other hand, look perfectly presentable.

“Why are you so chipper?” Potter mutters, resting his chin on his
hand in a horrible attempt to hide the fact that he’s moments away
from falling asleep at the high table. “You must have been up half the
night with your students like the rest of us. Or do Slytherins consider
it beneath them to celebrate returning to school?”

His good mood is instantly halved. He takes his traditional seat

between Luna and Filius. “Most things are beneath us, or so I’m
told.”

Potter’s too tired to do more than glare at him, but it’s not like he’s
the sharpest tool in the box to begin with. A strong hand grabs
Draco’s wrist, and his eyebrows raise nearly to his hairline as twists
and watches Longbottom press Draco’s hand to his face. “Neville!”
Granger says, appalled.

Longbottom ignores her and looks down at Draco accusingly, still

holding his hand hostage. “Cinnamon and mandrake! You rotten
cheat!”

He smirks. “Oh, is intelligence cheating now? I suppose that’s why

you’ve always been so honest.”

Potter snarls, but Longbottom only holds out his other hand. “Malfoy,
Lord or not, if you don’t share I will drag you onto the grounds and
strangle you . Custom be damned.”
This is the best conversation he and Longbottom have ever had. He
should make sure he’s sleep deprived more often, “Did the ickle
Hufflepuffs keep you awake all night?” As Pomona’s apprentice,
Longbottom has rooms right next to hers, and therefore right next to
the Hufflepuff common room.

“They were bloody screaming until four in the morning,” he confirms,

glaring. “Hand it over!”

“Neville, what are you talking about?” Granger demands.

Luna leans her elbows on the table and shakes her hair over her
shoulders to hide her grin. “Well, Draco is the Potions Master, isn’t
he?”

“The bastard made pepper up potion for his house,” Longbottom

explains.

Draco scoffs. “Don’t be ridiculous. I had the fifth years do it. They
were more than happy for a jump on their extra credit.”

“Draco,” Longbottom says warningly.

He rolls his eyes, “All right, all right, there’s no need to be so

dramatic.” Filius snorts and Minerva develops a sudden cough,
which Draco ignores. He reaches into his robs with the hand
Longbottom isn’t holding onto, and with a twirl and pull of his wand, a
vial drops out of the air and into Longbottom’s waiting hand.

He uncaps the it and downs it all in one long gulp. He instantly looks
refreshed. “That was three doses,” Draco feels the need to point out.

Longbottom finally lets go of his hand and returns the vial, which
Draco vanishes back to his classroom. “Excellent. Now I just might
be able to make it to lunch.”

“Sure, Longbottom,” he says, finally reaching for his teacup. “Just

don’t come crying to me when you cough smoke for the next week.”
Longbottom frowns, and the man is well on his way to attaining a
herbology mastery. He should be well aware of the effect of
consuming too much powdered bicorn horn. “Call me Neville,” he
says, jutting up his chin like he’s daring Draco to refuse. “We’ll save
the last names for when we’re serving in the House together.”

He stares, and it’s not like it’s a bad idea. Draco’s on a first name
basis with the man’s grandmother after all, and, despite
appearances, Augusta can’t actually live forever, so one day her
grandson will take her place and become Lord Longbottom. But
Augusta knows better than to let a war get in the way of tradition.
Then again, there’s war and there’s years of petty bullying, and oddly
Draco figures one is harder to get over than the other. Look at
Snape.

Actually, comparing him to Snape is a disservice to both of them so

Draco puts the whole idea out his head and says, “Don’t be
ridiculous, Neville. Augusta is going to outlive both of us.”

Draco arrives late to his first class of the day because he can, and to
be honest he just wants to see what they’ll do when they’re left alone
for fifteen minutes. It’s Gryffindor and Slytherin third years, so he’s
half expecting his classroom to be destroyed when he walks inside.

Instead it’s dead silent. The houses appear to be having a staring

contest, which is ridiculous, but at least not destructive. He can’t tell
if he’s disappointed or not. “Gather your belongings and stand up,”
he orders. The Slytherins obey instantly. The Gyffindors take three
times as long, but Draco doesn’t give them the satisfaction of
repeating himself. “One Gryffindor and one Slytherin to a desk. You
have thirty seconds to pick your seats before I pick them for you.”

There’s a moment of stunned silence from both sides.

He raises an eyebrow. “Now you have twenty seconds.”

Raina runs to the middle desk in the front row, uncaring of who sits
beside her. The rest of his Slytherins exchange quick glances, then
they all take the left spot on the desks. The weakest of them sit in
the front, and strongest to the back to keep an eye on the rest.
There’s a reason Draco sat at the back of every class, and while he
wishes this wasn’t something his students felt the need to do, he’s
glad to see that they’re still looking out for each other. The
Gryffindors, as expected, spend fifteen seconds looking indignant
and then randomly throw themselves into whatever seat’s available
at the last moment.

“Congratulations,” he says, “The person sitting beside you is your lab

partner for the rest of the year.”

Raina looks horrified. She turns to glare at the cringing redheaded

boy next to her, who is obviously a Weasley, and it would be
completely unprofessional for Draco to laugh at her, but he’s sorely
tempted.

“Now,” he claps his hands together, “I’d introduce myself, but you all
know who I am. To start, put your cauldrons away, and take out a
notebook. Potions isn’t charms, or transfiguration. It’s dangerous and
one wrong move could end in you blowing up my classroom. I will be
very cross if you blow up my classroom.”

Gryffindors and Slytherins alike are glaring at him, so that’s a start.

All except Raina, who sits with her quill poised and ready.

He’s sending Rosamund a fruit basket. Thank merlin for the

Lestranges.

He has a stack student schedules in front of him, trying to figure out

a period of time that works for all of them. He considers adding in the
halfbloods, but it’s not worth the effort. They grew up with it, at least
in part, so he’ll let them know they’re allowed to sit in on the lessons,
but won’t require it. Once a week he’ll lead the lesson, and the other
two sessions he’ll leave up to the purebloods to tell the muggleborns
what they think they ought to know. Considering all the purebloods
who volunteered are also from noble families, it’ll be a good test of
their leadership skills.

He considers opening it the other houses, but decides against it. The
Gryffindors will be sure sabotage it, and it’s not like he can allow
everyone but them to join. He may recommend to Pomona and Filius
that they consider starting one. It’s foolish to think children will pick
up on traditions and duty on their own when there a plenty of adults
that don’t follow them.

He’s still turning it over in his head when he sits down in the great
hall for lunch. He leans around Luna to ask Minerva, “Are there any
empty classrooms I can take over?” He doesn’t want to hold it in his
potions classroom because they shouldn’t get used to doing non-
potions work there and risk them getting careless during class. Being
careless around potions ends in explosions.

She sighs, and he doesn’t know what he’s done to evoke that
reaction. “Any particular reason?”

He considers lying, not because he thinks Minerva will care, but

because he knows Granger’s going to kill him. Well, she had to find
out about it eventually. “I’m holding classes for the muggleborns.”
Granger manages to hold herself back, but they’re going to have this
argument anyway, so he tacks on, “They’ll never marry into good
families if they stay ignorant.” Which isn’t untrue. The best thing a
muggleborn can do is marry into a noble family. Back before these
ridiculous wars that’s exactly what they did, and the families were
more than delighted to accept new blood into the line. Fuck, it’s what
Lily Evans did.

“Excuse me?” Granger spits, and at least they’re having this

argument where there are a couple hundred witnesses. She
probably won’t Avada Kadavra him in the middle of lunch.

Neville is a future Lord, so Draco knows he understands the

necessity of educating the muggleborns, but he slinks down in his
seat anyway, shooting Draco an utterly betrayed look. Honestly, if
he’d thought Draco had become any less of an asshole, then that’s
his problem. “I won’t have uneducated children in my house, and
parents can’t teach them what they need to know. Besides,” he
sniffs, “that’s what Muggle Studies used to be before Dumbledore
made the brilliant decision to switch to it to being about teaching
wizards about muggles, an utterly worthless pastime.”

“Knowing about muggles isn’t worthless,” she insists, glaring.

He prepares himself for an argument. Whenever he’s around

Granger, he should probably be prepared for an argument. “What
can I, an adult wizard, learn from muggles?”

“Electricity,” she says, “Inventions, ingenuity, science - biology!

There’s so much wizards don’t know, and you stand there, so smug
in your ignorance, and have the audacity to call us the uneducated
ones!”

Luna and Neville won’t look at either of them, and Draco doesn’t
blame them for it. Granger is their friend, but she’s also wrong .
Surprisingly, it’s Pomona that says, “Marina de la Cruz froze a
lightning bolt out of the sky and used it to develop the first stages of
the lumos charm in the year three hundred forty five before common
era.”

“The first complete mapping of the human body was done by a

mediwizard in the year two hundred seventeen common era,” Fillius
adds, a single bushy eyebrow raised, “What is it, exactly, that you
believe your own kind to be lacking in?”

“Because just to be clear,” Draco cuts in firmly, “you are not a

muggle . You’re a witch. In case you’ve forgotten.”

Granger’s gone from red faced to pale, and that can’t be healthy. By
the look in Potter’s face, this is all news to him too. Despicable . The
son of James Potter doesn’t know anything about who he is, about
his family or his world. This is precisely why they need the Blood
Laws.

He takes a deep breath and gentles his voice, because for once he’s
not actually trying to be cruel to her. “There’s a lot that you don’t
know, Granger. Because no one thought to tell you. Sure, you read
about the history of Hogwarts, were probably the only one to pay
attention in history of magic. But goblin wars and the history of witch
burnings are interesting, and important, especially if you’re planning
to go into politics.” Which he’s fully aware Granger intends to do.
They’ll probably end up serving on Wizengamot together. “Do you
know why your boyfriend and I never got along?”

“Husband,” she corrects acidly. “Because you’re a self centered,

cruel hearted bastard who cares for no one but himself?”

“Miss Granger!” Minerva says, appalled, but Draco raises a hand to

silence her. Granger doesn’t know the insult she’s delivered, so he
won’t hold it against her. Besides, Granger is vicious when she feels
attacked. If she’d been marked as Voldemort’s nemesis, the dark
lord would have been dead by the time they took their OWLS.

He leans his elbow on the table and sets his chin on his hand, “We
have a three centuries long blood feud. On top of that, the Weasleys
are officially recognized as blood traitors.” He directs his next words
to Neville, “I’m surprised Augusta allowed you to be friends.”

Neville glares at him for dragging him into this, but Draco only raises
an eyebrow. He’s going to be Lord Longbottom someday; he has to
at least acknowledge his odd alliances. The House will eat him alive
otherwise. “She said that we had more pressing concerns besides
blood,” he says reluctantly, “and that they were still purebloods
besides - it’s not like they married muggles or anything.” As soon as
it comes out his mouth, he goes red, “Hermione, I’m sorry, I didn’t
mean it like that.”

“Don’t apologize,” Draco commands, “She’s not a muggle, why

should she be offended?”
“My parents are muggles!” she says, pushing herself to her feet with
her wand gripped in her hand. The students are going to start
noticing if she doesn’t calm down. “There’s nothing wrong with being
a muggle!”

“Of course not,” he says, and she’s so surprised that she actually sits
down again. Good. “There’s nothing wrong with dogs being dogs
either, or dragons being dragons, or centaurs being centaurs. But it
is what they are . It’s the way they were born and the way they will
die. And you, Granger, are no different. You were born a witch and
you will die a witch and its high time you started acting like it.”

There’s a dead silence at the table, and everyone is looking at him.

Bloody hell, he’d just wanted lunch. “Is there a classroom I can use?”
he repeats, looking back to Minerva.

She hesitates, but nods. “There’s a spare room at the base of the
East tower. Feel free to use that.”

“Thank you.” He looks down at his roasted duck, but everyone’s still
starring at him, and honestly he’s not even hungry anymore. “Excuse
me,” he says, getting to his feet. “I’ve lost track of time.”

He can feel their eyes on him as he walks away just as clearly as he

can feel a headache building behind his eyes.

He needs a drink. Thank merlin it’s Friday.

Draco makes it through the rest of the day. As soon as his last class
lets out, he floos Blaise, who is his friend for a multitude of reasons,
but mostly for the way he takes one looks at Draco’s face and says,
“Get back,” before stepping through the flames.

“I just wanted to talk,” he says but Blaise pulls him into a tight hug.
Shit. He must look miserable. “It’s not that bad.”
“Muggles got you in a mood?” he asks, pressing a kiss to Draco’s
temple. Blaise is rarely that affectionate in private, so he can’t help
but smile.

“It’s not the muggles,” he says, “If only.”

Blaise pulls back and throws another handful of floo powder in the
fire. “Pansy Parkinson.”

“This really isn’t necessary,” he says, but he’s ignored.

Pansy’s head appears in the fire, and she gives them both a quick
once over before saying, “I expected this,” and stepping through his
fire with two bottles of high quality firewhiskey in her hands.

“This really isn’t necessary,” he tries again, but Pansy bites the cork
off of one of the bottles and hands it to him while walking over to
bounce onto his bed. The bottle is smoking. Blaise takes off his
shoes and jacket before following her.

It would be impossible for him to count the days he’s spent lying
around his rooms, both at the manor and Hogwarts, in a messy pile
of limbs with Blaise and Pansy, and they haven’t done it in a long
time. So, he puts aside any other protests he can drudge up and
shoves Pansy over so he can fit onto his own bed.

He snaps his fingers and Milly appears in front of him. She smiles at
the sight of them all before she schools her face into a neutral
expression. He won’t hold it against her. He’s aware they look
ridiculous. “Yes, Master Draco?”

“Two bottles from my private stock,” he orders in between swigs of

the firewhiskey. “Dax will know the ones, he’ll show you.”

“Yes, Master Draco,” she says before disappearing.

Pansy rolls over so she can hook her chin over his hip, “How’s your
army of house elves?”
He groans and charms the firewhiskey out of the bottle so he doesn’t
embarrass himself trying to drink from it while lying down. Blaise
pokes at his side impatiently, so he directs the stream of smoking
alcohol in his direction first. “Lovely, actually. Having seventy three
spoiled, needy brats to care for is the best thing that’s ever
happened to them.”

“I’m sure all the latent magic around here doesn’t hurt either,” Blaise
says dryly, lifting his wand to direct the stream over to Pansy.

Draco pouts, but she only shifts enough to take two unreasonably
large swallows of the firewhiskey before finally allowing Draco his
turn. “Well, they certainly haven’t complained. ”

“They’re good elves,” Blaise says approvingly, “Very loyal, especially

now that they have a Master worth being loyal too.”

Draco drinks instead of responding to that, and Blaise sighs but

doesn’t push.

Milly returns with two bottles of iceberry wine. “Nice,” Blaise says,
and snags both bottles. “Very good,” he tells Milly, who beams before
vanishing.

“Have you been holding out on us?” Pansy demands, twisting herself
upright so she can steal one of the bottles from Blaise. “I’ve been in
your wine cellar, and I would have remembered these.”

“They’re from Russia, I got them the last time I was there,” he says.
“They came highly recommended.”

She uncorks the bottle, and wine needs to settle they aren’t
barbarians, except Pansy apparently is, because she tips back the
bottle and takes one long gulp. Draco’s appalled, but Blaise just
looks impressed. “That’s delicious,” she declares, then snatches the
other bottle away from Blaise, “These are mine now.”
Draco and Blaise catch each other’s eyes and grin. They discovered
Pansy’s weakness at her seventh birthday party, and are fully
prepared to take advantage of it to reclaim their wine.

They attack with tickling fingers, and she curses them out loudly
enough that Draco’s grateful he thought to put silencing charms on
his rooms.

It’s well past midnight and all three of them are thoroughly sloshed
when Bip appears next to them and says, “You is having a visitor at
your door, Master Draco.”

“Is it a student?” he slurs, because he’s enjoying being drunk and

he’s not going to cast a sobering charm if he doesn’t have to. Also,
he’s lost his shirt at some point during the night, and he’s going to
have to try and find it if it’s a student.

Bip shakes his head.

“Excellent,” he continues, standing up and then grabbing onto the

side of his bed for balance. Pansy laughs at him, but he ignores her.
He’s assuming it’s Luna, because coming and irritating him in the
middle of the night is one of her favorite pastimes. It’s a good thing
he doesn’t need a lot of sleep.

He flings the door open, “Luna, do you ever sl-”

It’s not Luna.

“Hello, Draco,” Granger says stiffly, face flaring red. “I’m sorry, I didn’t
mean to - to interrupt.”

He waves a hand and leans against the doorway, “Don’t worry about
it. You didn’t interrupt anything.” He wonders if she can see Blaise
and Pansy from the doorway, and if so how long it will take the
rumors to start floating around again - well, no, again would imply
that they ever really stopped. “What do you want?”
She swallows, clearly steeling herself for something, and dread
pools in the bottom of Draco’s stomach. “I want to join your
muggleborn classes.”

He blinks. That hadn’t been what he was expecting. “What?”

“You say I’m uneducated,” she bites out, “so educate me. I love
learning, I’ll pick it up. Teach me.”

Of all the - “You love knowing, not learning, those are two different
things,” he says, because he’s heard a hundred people say Granger
should have been a Ravenclaw, and every time he’s thought that
none of those people could have possibly met her. “Also, are you
insane? I’m busy enough as it is. Have Neville teach you, he knows
it all.”

He moves to close the door on her, and she shoves it back open.
“Neville won’t do it! Or he will, but he’ll be too worried about hurting
my feelings, and him and Ron are the same, they don’t know what I
don’t know, what I’m missing. They just assume that I have all the
same knowledge they do, but I don’t.”

“That was my point,” he says, and not for the first time he
understands how this woman helped end the war. She’s terrifying.
“No talking back to me in front of my Slytherins. If you think I’m being
a bigoted prick, and I assure you that you will, you keep it to yourself
until we’re alone. Understand?”

“Yes,” she says, and she looks so unbearably smug that Draco
instantly regrets giving in to her. She turns on her heel and walks
away without another word, head held high.

Draco sighs and closes the door. Blaise and Pansy are staring at
him. “Making deals with the devil?” Blaise asks.

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Draco grabs the nearest bottle, intent on

draining it. “The devil’s far more reasonable than Hermione
Granger.”
“Amen,” Blaise mutters, and it’s so ridiculous, the words so foreign
on his tongue and in the air that they all break down laughing.

It’s going to be fine. Everything will be fine. He survived Voldemort in

his home, he can survive Hermione Granger.

i hope you liked it!

feel free to follow / harass me at: shanastoryteller.tumblr.com

(i also post writing progress reports under the 'progress report' tag so
you can know what i'm up to!)
Chapter 4
Chapter 4

*shoves all my headcannons and stray thoughts into a single fanfic

and hopes for the best* sorry fam

also, since apparently this needs to be said - this is from DRACO'S

POV. draco believes he's right about everything. that doesn't mean
he IS. but until certain people understand what he's talking about,
what many people in this society feel, they won't be able to
intelligently argue against it.

so, keep in mind: draco is not right about everything. but he's not
wrong about everything either.

(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)

Draco wishes he could say he’d seen this coming.

“What the hell is this?” he demands, looking at his sixth years with
just enough despair that they shuffle and look at their feet. Liam
doesn’t, but then again he had at least managed an Acceptable
mark. “I know over half your families, and I know they’ve been
training you in the dark arts, which certainly means they’ve trained
you in the defense of them as well.” He’s a step away from
channeling his mother and tapping his foot.

“None of do well in Defense, Professor,” Nikole says eventually, and

he’d always been bull headed and stubborn enough that if his family
line wasn’t so loyal to Slytherin, he would certainly have been a
Gryffindor. “Well, the mudbloods do all right, but the rest of us - not
so much.”
“Language,” he says absently, because he’s an absolute moron, of
course his snakes are failing Defense. He supposes he should count
himself lucky that they’re not doing the same with Arithmancy. He
crosses his arms and huffs, “This is unacceptable.”

“Yes,” they all say at once, because they know. He assumes this is a
problem his whole house is having. This is really a conversation he
should be having with all of them.

He considers talking to Potter about it for half a second, but

dismisses the idea just as quickly. Self-centered, dunderhead Scar
Head will only make matters worse. “Okay,” he says, more to himself
than them. He can’t do this on his own. If he tries, it will inevitable
cause some other part of his life to fall to pieces. “I’ll figure
something out,” he says. “Spread this to the other years, all right?
Make sure one of you is attends class and takes diligent notes, but
beyond that I don’t care if you bother to show up. Make sure I
receive a copy of all these notes. Understand?”

“Yes sir,” Liam says. They’re all looking at him again, the same way
the old families have started looking at him, and it makes the back of
his neck itch.

He gives them a sharp nod and leaves, head spinning.

Given the choice, he’d get Millicent Bulstrode to do it. She’d always
been right behind him in terms of marks, and was terrifying enough
that none of his snakes would dare step out of line. But he doesn’t
even want to think about how much of a headache it would be to get
permission to be on the grounds without either Granger or Potter
catching scent of it.

Instead, he stomps his way down to the greenhouse, scowling. He

bangs open the door and says, “I need a favor.”

Neville looks up at him and wilts. “I’m not going to like this, am I?”
“Well,” Draco considers, “It will give you more chances to ogle my
cousin. Something I’ve been politely ignoring, by the way.”

Neville turns bright red and flings the Strangling Vine in his hands at
Draco, who quickly ducks out of the way and out of the greenhouse.

He’ll take that as a tentative yes.

Maybe it’s a mistake to ask Neville to teach his Slytherins, but he

doesn’t think it is. Neville, like Potter, fought in the war and against
many of the old families. Neville, unlike Potter, is a respected Heir
who doesn’t give off the same razor sharp energy, the same - Potter
probably likes to think he’s a pacifist, and he is, in a way. But the
years he spent as an Auror are legendary. He did everything with a
single-minded intensity that was both impressive and terrifying, from
all accounts.

Of course his snakes can’t concentrate in Defense, of course they

check out and don’t pay attention and skip class. How many of them
have family that died in the war, how many of them heard the rumors
of how the Slytherins were treated and demonized, how many of
them experience the brunt of that very same prejudice even now?

Draco knew Potter back when he was nothing more than a goody-
two-shoes brat, he knows what he looks like spitting up pumpkin
juice and after losing a match, remembers him with ink stains on his
face from falling asleep on his assignments. He knows that Potter is,
at his core, an annoyingly powerful wizard who means well, but is,
ultimately, a moron .

But the kids don’t know that. All they know is how they and their
families have been treated, all they know is the stories they were
told. So of course they don’t want to sit in a classroom and be taught
defense by Potter. Each of them believes the man would be equally
willing to turn his wand on them as he was Voldemort.
Never mind that Potter was never all the eager to face Voldemort, all
the way to the bitter end.

They are children, and children hardly thrive on logic. They belive
that one of their professors not only cares nothing for them, but
perhaps even wants them dead. It certainly explains Raina’s reaction
when he’d first met her at the party. Draco knows that it’s not true,
that at his very worst Potter is just an idiot. He’s not malicious,
especially to kids.

But these children are under his protection now, so he needs to fix it.
Sine he can’t go and have an honest conversation with him about
this, he almost wishes Potter would take his title like a proper
pureblood so he could challenge him to a duel and be done with it. In
lieu of that, there’s showing them that not all Gryffindors, not all war
heroes, are Harry Potter.

If he could, he’d show them that Harry Potter himself isn’t even that
terrible, that spiteful.

But maybe he’s wrong. It’s been a long time since they shared a
classroom, and people change.

Draco certainly did.

The night of the first muggleborn class, he and Granger arrive at the
classroom at the same time. He holds the door open for her, and she
glares at him like it’s a trick.

It’s not. He’s just holding open a door, for merlin’s sake.

“After you,” he says pleasantly, “I insist.”

She rolls her eyes but steps inside. He just barely restrains himself
from sighing.
“Children,” he greets. Liam snorts. His four purebloods and six
muggleborns are already there. Excellent. “Professor Granger will be
joining us for the foreseeable future. Please speak freely. While she
is in these lessons with us, she will neither issue detention nor take
away points. Isn’t that right, Professor?”

“Yes, Professor Malfoy,” she says, nose upturned just the slightest bit
at him. It’s a pity she hates them all so much. She’d have fit in quite
well with her attitude. “That is correct.”

“Excellent,” he says, and looks to the purebloods. “Now, which of you

will be leading today’s lesson?” Markel and Marilyn blanche and
Raina looks worried, but Liam slides down in his seat because he
knows what’s coming. “Liam, thank you so much for volunteering.”
That’s what the brat gets for showing him attitude. The kid was born
when Draco was a first year, and he remembers Liam’s mother
shoving the baby into his hands at one of Narcissa’s garden parties
and then laughing at his panicked fumbling. Payback is sweet.

Liam drags himself to his feet, managing to give the impression of

slouching even while his back remains perfectly straight. There’s a
vague possibility that the kid picked that up from him, actually.
“Where should I start, Professor?”

“Wherever you think is most relevant,” Draco says. Just because

he’s an adult doesn’t mean he’s not an asshole.

Liam narrows his eyes like he agrees, then lets out a long sigh. The
muggleborns look apprehensive, all except fifth year Georgiana. She
looks like she wants to spit on him, which he approves of in theory. If
she actually did it, then that would be a different matter. “Very well
then,” he says. “I don’t suppose anyone has any questions I can
address?” Granger’s hand shoots into the air. Liam blinks, clearly
having not expected that, and Draco doesn’t laugh at him. “Uh, yes,
Professor?”

“What’s with this whole lord thing?” she demands. “I tried looking it
up, but all I could find was that they were the heads of powerful
families.”

“Well, that’s it really,” Liam says. “If you’re the head of a family that’s
part of the House, then you’re a Lord. Or Lady.”

“House?” she asks. “Like Hogwarts house?”

Liam stares. “No. The House of Lords and Ladies. It’s uh,” he
frowns, “it’s like the Wizengamot if the Wizengamot fails, you know?”

Draco is so glad he never has to grade any of Liam’s essays.

“That’s a terrible way to put it!” Raina glares. “Before we had the
Ministry, we had Lords and Ladies who cared for us. We pledged our
allegiance to them, our land and our blood, and in return they gave
us their protection.”

“So it’s an old government system?” Niles asks, a second year

muggleborn who had the highest marks in Divination in his year.
Draco doesn’t know if that’s because he actually has a talent for it, or
if it’s just because Luna like him.

Liam winces and Raina looks appalled. Draco decides to put them
out their misery. “All right, sit down,” he says, rising to his feet and
taking Liam’s place. He pulls his wand from his robes, “That was an
excellent question, Professor Granger, and a solid place to start.”
She glares. He isn’t being sarcastic. “The muggle world is a world
based on a system of laws that are decided upon by muggles and
then enforced by other muggles. As such, this system of laws and
the manner in which they are decided varies by culture, time period,
and place.”

He drags his wand across the air and five small golden people
appear. “The magical world has never functioned this way. We have
different languages, different cultures, different spells, different
values. But across the world our underlying political system has
been the same.” He flicks his wand, and the five golden figure bow,
“We all have a House of Lords and Ladies, although it goes by
different names. Heads of noble families used to perform the same
role Wizengamot currently does. We would convene to discuss
issues, vote on laws and regulations, and put on trial those who
break our laws. That changed a couple hundred years ago.” He
doesn’t bother to keep the contempt out of his voice, “We were
replaced by the Wizengamot. For a long time, all Lords and Ladies
were guaranteed political seats, as is our due . Albus Dumbledore
spearheaded and passed a law so that we would have to be voted
into our positions, which was of course the beginning of our
downfall.”

“What do you mean?” Granger asks. “Isn’t that a good thing? Why
should people be given political positions just because they were
born?”

“Most of the muggle world relied on a familial monarchy system for a

few thousand years, if I’m not mistaken,” he says dryly. “But Lords
and Ladies must do more than simply be born .”

She scoffs, “Like what? Bow all nice and pretty and not upset your
parents, and you too will get to be rich and successful?”

“You’re wrong,” Marilyn says, and Draco raises an eyebrow. The

eleven year old is glaring at Granger, and Marilyn may be fairly
outspoken within the family, but not in front of strangers. “My father is
Lord Goyle, and I am the Heir to our family, but I might not become
Lady Goyle. That’s not something me or my parents get to decide.”

“Who decides then?” Granger asks, softening her voice now that
she’s speaking to a student.

Draco holds out his wand, “Did you choose your wand, Granger? Did
you pick one up and declare that this was the one for you and take it
home?”

“Of course not,” she snaps. “The wand chooses the wizard. Or
witch.”
“Yes,” Markel says. He’s speaking to her like she’s stupid, which isn’t
appropriate behavior, but it’s funny so Draco’s not going to call him
on it. "Exactly. The magic chooses you. Just like the magic chooses
our Lords and Ladies.”

“What ? That doesn’t make any sense!”

The purebloods look at her, then slowly slide their gazes to him,
disbelief on their faces. “Be nice,” he admonishes, “they didn’t grow
up like we did.” He turns to Granger, “My father is still alive, yet I am
Lord Malfoy. Because the magic rejected him.” His father, who
attended every meeting, who guarded their traditions, who taught
Draco to ride a broom and read him bedtime stories, and who the
magic declared unworthy. It’s not like he doesn’t understand why, but
that doesn’t make it hurt any less. “It chose me,” he says, and he
knows this is hard for outsiders to understand, but it’s so simple to
the rest of them. “The magic chose me, and here I am. Just as it
chose James Potter, just as it chose Augusta Longbottom, just as I’m
sure it will choose Neville to take her place. It’s extremely likely that
Heirs will become Lords, but it’s not a guarantee. “

Granger is staring at him, but says nothing. Finally, Niles asks, “But
what does being a Lord mean ?”

“Borrowed, not given. Earned, not taken,” Liam says, looking serious
for the first time. “Magic isn’t nice. It’s dangerous, and people like to
pretend that it’s only dark arts that lash out at you, but that’s not true.
The root of all magic is the same, and it can all turn its back at you. If
you, if any of you did something,” he looks to the muggleborns, “if
you made the magic mad, summoned something that shouldn’t have
been summoned, or made an inadvisable oath, you would be the
one who would suffer the consequences.”

“Purebloods are protected from that,” Raina says quietly. “We suffer
magical injuries, of course, but nothing truly terrible, nothing that
would curse our children, nothing that would mean the end to our
lines, our land, or our blood.”
Georgianna throws up her hands, clearly fed up with all of them.
“Why ?”

“Because Lords and Ladies paint great big targets on our backs,”
Draco say, and everyone shifts to look at him. “We are the root of our
family’s magic. Should someone under my protection, be it someone
that shares my noble blood or simply a member of a family who has
sworn fealty to my family, incur the magic’s wrath, then I will be the
one it attacks. I have the strength of my family’s magic, of
generations of excellent breeding and tradition and sacrifice on my
side, and it is likely that I will survive it while those under my
protection would not. But surviving it remains my burden, not theirs.”

“I’m a Goyle and a Malfoy,” Markel says quietly, eyes bright, “I’m
doubly protected. If for some reason I made the magic mad and Lord
Goyle couldn’t protect me, Professor Malfoy would.”

He can see they still don’t understand, can see Granger thinks
they’re off their rocker, so he says, “If Potter had had a Lord when
Voldemort tried to kill him, he wouldn’t have gotten that cursed scar.
James Potter would have gotten the backlash, and it probably would
have killed him, but Harry wouldn’t have it, understand? Those types
of curses are the things having a lord protects you against.” He
considers this, and the prophecy has become common knowledge in
the years since the war, so he doesn’t feel bad about adding, “That’s
probably why Voldemort didn’t go after Neville, actually.”

Granger’s so frustrated she’s red. He can’t even enjoy it because

they’ve said it so plainly, how can she not understand? She stands
and slams her hands on the counter, “What are you talking about?”

The children jump, and trade little grins, because if nothing else
seeing their cool and calm Arithmancy professor lose her temper is
absolutely worth the lost hours from their afternoon. Draco takes a
deep breath, and forces himself to try being patient for once.

“Voldemort,” Markel says, surprising Draco and speaking with a

renewed urgency, “explain it to them using Voldemort.” One of his
favorite things that have happened since the war is that people aren’t
afraid to use his name anymore.

Marilyn stares. “Cousin?”

“Tell them what he wasn’t,” Markel says, “so they know what we are.”

Raina and Marilyn trade confused looks. “What are you talking
about?”

He looks to Draco, who raises a hand, “No, I understand.” It’s not

something they like to talk about, any of them, but Markel is right.

“Lord Voldemort,” Granger says, considering, “Heir of Slytherin.”

Draco’s lips thin, but he nods. “Yes. Now - now okay,” he waves his
wand and a dozen silver figures pour out from the end of it. “There is
a connection, between lords and their vassals, right?” Silver strings
connect the silver figures to one of the gold figures. “It’s a one way
connection. I know when they die, and it’s by this connection that my
magic can protect them if, and only if, they do something to initiate
the,” he pauses, because there has to be words for this, language for
something that Draco has carried with him his entire life, but he can’t
think of it.

“It’s like the protective wards around Hogwarts,” Liam says. “They’re
always there, but they’re inactive until something triggers them. A
lord’s magic won’t affect anyone it’s connected too unless that
person’s magic triggers it. Then all it does is protect that person.
That’s how the connection between lords and vassals is supposed to
work.”

Draco nods his thanks. “Yes, exactly. Voldemort was not a lord. He
did not serve in the House of Lords and Ladies, he had no vassals,
and, most importantly, blood of Slytherin or not, the magic didn’t
choose him . People could swear fealty to him from dawn until dusk,
and the magic still wouldn’t take notice. So, what he did was he
created the dark mark. Something that’s almost like the connection
shared by lords and their people, except for all the ways in which it is
nothing like it, of course.”

“Voldemort wanted to be a lord really badly,” Raina says quietly, “but

the magic knew, it knew better than all of us, and it was never going
to recognize him.”

The muggleborns looks solemn and even Granger has gone

contemplative rather than combative. “What does being a lord really
mean?” she asks. “Politically speaking.”

Oh, merlin. All the purebloods slump in their seats, and Draco points
his wand at them. “Don’t even think about it, up you go. I’m not
writing out the family trees and alliances of all the pureblood families
on my own. Think of it like a pop quiz.”

The four of them are glaring at him, but they drag themselves to their
feet and begin drawing out the current blood maps. Draco could
conjure the self-updating one he has in quarters, but the last thing he
needs is a reputation of being nice.

It’s easier after that. Explaining alliances and duties and blood feuds
are something they’re all used to doing. Those concepts that change
and have to be re-explained so at least there’s a language for it.

Granger doesn’t say anything else for the rest of the lesson, letting
the muggleborn kids ask all the questions. She does keeps staring at
him however, which is more than a little unnerving.

When he wakes up at three in morning to someone sitting on his

legs, he doesn’t even have to open his eyes to check. He knows
exactly who it is. “Luna,” he groans, arm thrown over his eyes,
“couldn’t this have waited until dawn ? At least?”

“Hermione came and told me about the lesson you gave,” she says,
which means the answer to his question is a very firm no. “I’d never
thought of it, before, but - my mom never declared fealty to your
family, did she?”

He lowers his arm and opens his eyes. It’s too dark to see her face,
and he can’t reach his wand without her getting off of him, which she
clearly doesn’t plan on doing. “No,” he says, “she didn’t.”

“And she’d renounced her family in Japan,” she continues, and

Draco really wishes he could see her face. “So she didn’t have a lord
or lady, did she?”

“No,” he repeats, “she didn’t. But Luna, my father did consider her
family, as did I. Just because she didn’t swear loyalty doesn’t mean
she wasn’t one of us.”

“The magic didn’t, though.” It’s hard to tell just from her legs on his
legs, but he thinks she might be shaking. “The magic didn’t think she
belonged to anyone. Is that - is that why she,” Luna pauses and
takes a deep breath. When she speaks again she sounds like when
she was four years old, back when they were kids and before the
second war tore everyone apart all over again. “Do you think if she’d
had a lord she still would have died?’

Draco closes his eyes. He wants to say yes, to say nothing on this
earth could have spared her mother, wants to spare Luna the
wondering and the wanting. “I don’t know,” he says, keeps his voice
quiet and gentle in the darkness between them. “I don’t know what
spell she used, if it was something that our family magic could have
saved her from, or if it was just something small, something that was
terrible enough to kill her but not something that would have
triggered our protective magic.”

“Oh,” Luna says, then sniffs, and dear merlin he hates it when she
cries.

He pushes himself up and pulls her into his chest, tries to hug her
like his father used to hug him. Lucius was tall and strong and safe .
For all his other faults, his father loved him and protected him, and
maybe his home life wasn’t always easy, but he never doubted that
he was loved . He tries to hug Luna like that, tries to let her know by
his arm around her waist and hand cradling the back of her head that
she’s not alone.

He doesn’t know if he’s successful, if that’s still something you can

say with a hug when you’re not children anymore, but she clings to
him even as her tears drip down his neck, so he figures it’s not a
total loss.

He should be using his free period to grade the truly awful potions
essays his fourth year Ravenclaws had submitted.

(“They’re entirely accurate!” Byron had promised. They were also

twice the length requirement and went into so many offshoot
tangents that Draco wanted to rip his hair out. Only a Ravenclaw
could start at the uses for dragon scales and end up at thirteenth
century German immigration law.)

Instead, Potter has just stormed into his office. He knocks his inkwell
to the ground, causing it to shatter rather dramatically, and then
shouts, “What the bloody hell do you think you’re playing at, Malfoy?”

It’s just his luck that Potter finally goes off the deep end and knocks
his inkwell off the desk instead of on it. If Potter had spilled ink all
over those exhausting essays he may have just kissed him. “Good
evening, Potter.” He considers the ink and broken glass on his floor.
A repario and scourgify would take care of it, but honestly what’s the
fun in that? “Nice weather we’re having.”

“Malfoy,” Potter thunders, but Draco holds up a hand to shut him up.
Miraculously, the Gryffindork falls silent.

He’s just gone over this charm with Fillius. It’s difficult and requires
too much energy. Wasting the magic on something so small would
be just about be criminal. He pulls out his wand and waves it in
quick, neat circle over the spill that leaves a trail of bright red sparks
behind. “Tempus!” he casts. The magic leaves him in a rush as the
inkwell and ink come together again and fly back onto his desk.
Before the spell can go any further he shouts, “Finite!”

Draco slumps back into his chair, grinning. He should probably take
a shot of pepper up if he doesn’t want to fall asleep in the middle of
his five o’clock class, but that was awesome.

“Are you crazy?” Potter demands, crouching down in front of his

chair so he can look him in the eyes. “What spell was that?”

“Controlled time travel,” he yawns. “It’s the predecessor to the time

turner, an incredible waste of energy, and comparably quite
ineffective since it’s impossible to cast on yourself.” He looks at the
inkwell and smirks, “It’s bloody cool, though.” Potter almost smiles at
him. Draco doesn’t want to address that at all, so he asks, “Didn’t
you come here to yell at me for something?”

“Well, you were always excellent at ruining everything,” Potter says

wryly. He’s about to respond with something caustic when Potter
balances with one hand on Draco’s knee and presses his other hand
against Draco’s forehead. “Are you sure you’re all right? It looks like
that spell really tired you out, which isn’t an easy thing to do.”

Because Draco’s mind is a traitorous bastard, it conjures up a bunch

of ways that Potter could tire him out. Since Draco is an adult,
damnit, he pushes both those thoughts and Potter’s hand aside. “I’m
fine, it’s just an advanced spell. Not all of us have endless wells of
magic like you.”

Potter’s hand is still on his knee. “I spoke to Hermione. And Luna,

and Neville.”

“Okay?” He has no idea where this is going. “I would assume you all
speak fairly often, considering.”

Potter rolls his eyes, but it almost seems more fond than irritated,
which is a terrifying thought. “I know about the defense classes
Neville and Luna have been running, and the lessons you’ve been
giving Hermione, and I wanted to be mad, I am mad, but Neville kind
of explained it to me, and even Hermione said maybe I should listen
to you.”

Draco stares. “What? Are you talking about the defense lessons? My
kids are scared of you, I’m pretty sure if you made them face a
bogart, half the time it would turn into you. How can anyone learn
that way? Look at Neville. He’s not actually that horrible at potions,
it’s just Snape terrified him.” Potter’s paled, likely at the comparison
to Snape, which was probably unfair of him, considering. “It’s not
your fault, he says. “Mostly. They just can’t trust you, and they’re
certainly never going to like you.”

“That’s not what I -” he pauses, “Wait, why can’t they trust me?”

Draco snaps his mouth closed. He doesn’t know how to say it

without this ending in a duel or a punch to the face, how to tell Potter
that he’s the worst kind of blood traitor when Draco’s half sure he
doesn’t even know it. There was no reason to tell him as a kid, and
after war he’d made it more than clear he had no plans to follow the
ancient ways. “It’s complicated,” he says finally.

“Am I a lord?” he challenges, eyes sparking.

“You are not,” Draco hisses, standing so Potter’s hand finally slides
off his knee. “You are barely an heir, at best.” Indignation wells up
inside of him. He remembers Potter ignoring his outstretched hand at
eleven because he was an ignorant excuse for a noble that knew
nothing of their traditions. “You know what, Potter, what you are is a
disgrace . Do you think your family crossed the sea and settled here
so you could turn your back on everything they bled and died for?
Screw you, you shouldn’t even be able to call yourself a noble,
you’ve honored no alliances.” He thinks back to that day and
seethes, because Draco was a Malfoy and he was a Potter, and
even if they hadn’t been friends they weren’t supposed to have been
enemies, not then, not in those peaceful years between the wars
when alliances were supposed to matter. “You’re barely even a
pureblood.”

“I’m not a pureblood,” Potter grits out, hand already reaching into his
robes for his wand, probably unconsciously. “My mother was a
muggleborn, in case you’ve forgotten.”

Oh merlin, please tell him that Potter isn’t basing the social status of
his mother on an argument they got in as teenagers. “Lily Potter was
also Lady Potter, your family’s preference for informality non
withstanding, and she was a respectable witch who married into a
noble family. Your assumption that her blood in your veins would
make you anything less than pure is an insult to her memory and her
sacrifice.” The first war had changed things, changed language and
prejudices, but no war was powerful enough to change power and
blood. He might not have understood that as a kid, but he certainly
does now.

He walks away after that, furious at the both of them, and shockingly
Potter lets him.

That was a stupid argument to get into, one he’s kept himself from
having for years, and he’s absolutely certain he’s going to regret it.

He’s certain Potter is going to make him regret it.

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Chapter 5
Chapter 5

(See the end of the chapter for notes.)

He’s woken up at one in the morning by a forceful knocking at his

door. Considering he’s just gotten into an explosive argument with
Potter, it could anyone. Luna, to sigh at him but call him cousin
anyway. Neville, to come and look at him in a vaguely disapproving
fashion. Granger, to rip the skin from his face and set him on fire.

What’s he’s not expecting is to open his door and find Ronald
Weasley standing there with two bottles of firewhiskey.

“Those aren’t as flammable as you’d think,” he says immediately. “All

commercially sold alcohol has fire dampening spells applied to it.
Too many drunken accidents.”

Weasley blinks. “I wasn’t going - I’m not Hermione!” He looks down

at the bottles consideringly. “Do they really?”

“My grandfather spearheaded the legislation personally. Our family

has had to rebuild more than one greenhouse because of it.”

Weasley stares. “Why didn’t you just tell your employees to stop
getting drunk on the job?”

“What makes you think it was the employees?” he retorts. “By

historical record, my great aunt Vela personally blew up one
greenhouse and two potions labs. During her school years alone.”

“Huh,” Weasley says, and thrusts a bottle of firewhiskey at him.

Draco stares at it, uncomprehending. “Are you going to take it or
not?”

“Why on earth would I?” he asks, but accepts the proffered bottle.
Weasley uncorks his bottle and takes a long pull, smoke oozing out
of his ears. “Because we’re going to ignore the fact that our families
have a three centuries long blood feud and have a frank, adult
conversation with no cursing or malignant comments towards each
other.”

“Merlin’s balls, Weasley,” Draco says faintly, uncorking his own

bottle. “Why?”

He points his bottle at Draco, cheeks already flushed with alcohol.

“Because Harry has been bloody moping all over our place. I’m
having flashbacks to fifth year, and that’s just not on, do you hear
me, Malfoy?” He pauses, and then sighs. “I’m going to call you
Draco. If we’re going to get smashed and discuss politics, we might
as well be on a first name basis.”

“This is my worst nightmare,” Draco informs him, taking a large gulp

of the burning liquid. He’s going to need send an elf to his private
stores by the time the night is through.

Ron pushes past him and looks around his sleek and opulent living
quarters with a faint look of disgust. “I understand completely.”

He and Ron are sitting on the floor, their backs braced against the
couches and bottles littered on the table in front of them.

Draco has an intense urge to drink until he dies. “He can’t have no
idea about his duties. He’s a Potter! The Potter Heir!”

“He’s the last Potter. Who was going to teach him?” Ron asks. “Our
family doesn’t do that stuff anymore. Honestly, I probably don’t even
know the half of it.” Draco picks up on the trace of longing, and oh,
isn’t that interesting. “I know it’s important, or whatever, to you lot.
But the rest of us don’t really get it.”

“You can’t feel the magic anymore,” Draco says, his body numb. He
tries to keep the horror off his face, but by Ron’s grimace he’s not the
successful. It makes sense, too much sense, all of the purebloods
asking themselves what was wrong with the lot of them, and this was
it.

Ron sighs and takes another long drink before saying, “I don’t even
know what that means, Draco. So, no, I guess not.”

He’s still staring at Ron, and it’s probably gone past the point of rude
into unsettling, but he can’t stop. He knows the weight and taste of
his family’s magic, can sense a Lestrange at fifty paces, feels the
ancient magics of the castle humming beneath his feet, the whole
grounds nearly pulsing with the combined family magic that has
been sunken into the earth generation after generation.

“Your family’s magic feels like fire,” he says, and he shouldn’t be

saying this, alcohol non withstanding they still have a blood feud,
and it’s considered rude regardless. Families say it’s the hair or the
nose that’s their defining characteristic. But the truth is it’s the feel of
magic in the air. “It’s crackling, almost. Like embers. Sparks. It feels
like the color of your hair, and candle fire on your fingertips.” Ron is
the one staring now, mouth open and firewhisky forgotten. “My great
great grandfather once wrote that meeting the lord of the Weasley
family was like stepping into an inferno.”

The empty bottle falls from Ron’s loose fingers and rolls across the
floor. He clenches his hands and says. “What - why - do you know
why our families have a blood feud?”

“You don’t know?” he sputters. That would certainly explain a lot, but
how can a whole family just forget the start of a blood feud?

“Everything from that time was lost,” Ron says. “It’s in our old manor,
supposedly.”

“The one none of you can enter,” he rubs at his temples, and shit like
this is what happens when oaths don’t get honored and alliances are
broken. “I’m impressed it’s still standing, honestly.” He pauses, and
it’s really shouldn’t still be standing, actually. “Has anyone tried to
enter it?”

Ron scratches the back of his neck, “A great uncle, I think? But the
wards killed him as soon as he stepped foot on the grounds, so no
one was ever able to get his body.”

“What isn’t sacrificed willingly will be taken unwillingly,” Draco says

grimly. Why does everyone think magic is all fun and games? It’s
blood and pain, and anyone who thinks differently is an idiot.

Ron throws a cork at his head. “Saying vague and creepy stuff like
that is why no one trusts you guys, you know.”

“Oh, is that all?” He flicks the cork back over. and Ron catches it
before it can hit him in the face. “I thought it was the dark lords we
kept following.”

“That doesn’t help,” Ron concedes, “but it’s mostly the ominous
statements.”

He rolls his eyes, and it’s really none of his business, but if someone
doesn’t tell them something, someone else is going to end up dead.
“The Weasley line pre-dates the founders, Ron. It’s going to takes
more than a handful of generations for the magic to forget you. It
considers your debt overdue, and what you don’t give it will take.
Your ancestors knew that when they broke their line. That’s why they
closed up your manor to begin with.”

“That doesn’t answer my question,” Ron says, eyes focused. “Why

do our families have a blood feud?”

It’s considered impolite to bring it up. If they’ve truly forgotten, he

should get an intermediary like Neville or Pansy to deliver the terms
of their feud. But that’s a lot of pomp and circumstance that he
doesn’t have the energy for. “Our families had been allies for a long
time. Never close, but amiable since we came over from France. A
marriage contract was set up between my great grandfather and
your great great aunt Rea, if I’m not mistaken. Days before the
wedding, your lord announced that he would no longer be following
the old ways and that your family would live as simple witches and
wizards forever more. To have a lord marry your aunt regardless
would have been an insult, so the engagement was annulled. Rea
killed herself the next day. My great grandfather blamed your lord,
your family blamed mine for annulling the engagement, we blamed
you for entering into an engagement under false pretenses, you
blamed us for being pompous, we called you arrogant, and then the
next day my great grandfather - reportedly brokenhearted - enacted
the blood feud.”

Ron continues staring at him for a long moment. “Bloody hell, what a
mess. Why did we leave the House of Lords and Ladies so
suddenly? It certainly doesn’t sound like we were planning on it.”

He points at Ron with his bottle. “That, I’m afraid, is a secret buried
in your manor. No one knows, and the only way you’ll find out is by
going there. But considering the magic is more interested in blood
than playing nice, I wouldn’t recommend it.”

“Bloody hell,” he repeated, more mournful this time, and continues

drinking.

Draco pulls his leg to his chest and rests his chin on his knee. While
they’re talking about uncomfortable subjects, he has something else
he wants to discuss, even if it gets him cursed. He’s not sure how to
bring this up, because if he’s wrong it’s the equivalent to calling the
man’s wife a simpleton. But he doesn’t think he’s wrong. He sends a
prayer to his ancestors and barrels forward. “You know, Granger’s
been coming to my muggleborn classes, and she’s been perfectly
civil, and she’s quite smart, obviously, but I think, and don’t curse me
for saying this, I think she may not know what blood is.”

Ron rolls his eyes, and doesn’t even move to hit him, which is nice.
“She obviously does, what are you talking about?”
“I’m serious,” he says. “I thought it was obvious, that I was just
misunderstanding her, but I also thought all purebloods could feel
magic, so I’m clearly capable of being wrong. It’s the way she keeps
insisting she’s one of the muggles.”

“They did raise her,” Ron points out.

He shakes his head. “The Dursleys raised Potter, but that doesn’t
make them one of us. I think Granger thinks she’s one of them
because they raised her. I think she thinks our word for blood means
the same as their word for it. Like,” he stops, struggling, because he
doesn’t have words for this, for something he didn’t think needed to
be explained.

Ron frowns, but then his face clears, and he’s apparently much
smarter than Draco ever game him credit for. “Oh - oh you mean -
no, I mean - well, I can see how she’d be confused,” he says
defensively. “She didn’t know she wasn’t theirs until she was eleven.
And they did raise her Draco, they love her, they are her parents.
Even if they’re not her real parents.”

“That’s what I’m saying,” Draco insists. “She doesn’t understand that
when we say blood we mean magic, because our magic is our blood.
It’s family ties and alliances and literal blood soaked into the earth,
bone buried in foundations. Blood isn’t blood. It’s magic. I bet she
doesn’t know that most of the wizarding world doesn’t consider her
birth parents her real parents because they may share the muggle
concept of blood, but they don’t share magic. I think that she thinks
that we don’t differentiate. She thinks that when I say blood I mean
the same things muggles do, the stuff flowing in our veins and
genetics and all that rot.”

“But you don’t,” Ron says, eyebrows dipped together. “Obviously,

you don’t. You mean the lines of magic, family magic, all of it.” He
leans forward and puts his head in his hands, “She’s going to be so
mad when she finds out she didn’t know something!”
Draco pats him on the back consolingly. An angry Hermione Granger
isn’t a fate he wishes upon anyone. “You know you’re going to have
to explain this to Potter too, right?”

“Harry doesn’t know either?” he asks, looking longingly toward one

of the unopened bottles.

Draco hands it over. “If the cleverest witch of our generation hasn’t
figured it out on her own, what makes you think Harry ‘Dunce’ Potter
has?”

Ron slaps himself on the forehead and pulls out the cork with his
teeth. It’s a good thing his wife’s parents are dentists.

He skips breakfast the next morning and drags himself to his first
and favorite class of the day, banging open the door in a suitably
dramatic fashion. His seventh year NEWTS class looks nearly as
dead outside as he feels inside. “I am so hungover I want to die,” he
announces briskly. “I’m going to sit at my desk and try not to vomit.
The first team who brews me a successful hangover cure is exempt
from homework for the rest of the semester.”

There’s a moment of complete stillness before they all start huddling

together and flipping through their textbooks. Mariana, a Hufflepuff
muggleborn who’s notorious for her late night parties and early
morning study sessions, already has a flock of eager students
surrounding her.

He’s a little disappointed someone didn’t just throw a bezor at his

head and call it a day, but on the bright side they may actually learn
something about designing potions from scratch.

He’s on his way to the kitchens for lunch in an honestly humiliating

bid to avoid Potter and his posse for a few more hours when he’s
cornered by three fourth year Ravenclaws girls. The manic look in all
their eyes makes him slightly concerned for their wellbeing in
addition to his own. “Ladies,” he greets, raising an eyebrow. “Is there
something I can help you with?”

“We heard about what you did with the seventh years this morning,”
she says. “We want to experiment making our own potions too!”

“What.”

Dacia Zabini pouts at him in a way she almost certainly learned from
her aunt, “Could you start a potions club, pretty please, Lord
Malfoy?”

“With all my spare time?” he snaps.

The girls are unfazed. “We’ll do all the work ourselves,” the first one
continues, “we just need you to supervise us in the potions lab. You
can do your grading while we work. Please, Lord Malfoy?”

“It’s Professor Malfoy in these halls,” he corrects, and he can already

tell he’s going to regret this decision. “Very well. On one condition.
You must open your club to all years and houses. Understand?”

He’s going to take all their jumping around and high pitched
squealing as agreement.

Draco is flung out on the couch in his quarters, reading his first
quarterly reports on his holdings from the goblins. It’s in very neat,
small handwriting and so overly complicated he has the urge to call
up Terry Boot and whine at him until he puts his arithmancy mastery
to use and explains it to him.

But goblins are fickle, and proud, and a bunch of assholes. Draco
can respect that. They’ll never take him seriously if he can’t
understand his own accounts, regardless of how convoluted and
unnecessarily detailed their reports are. Milly pops into existence
next to him, “You is having a visitor at the door, Master Draco.”
“Who is it?” he asks, because if he stops in the middle of auditing the
main business account then he’ll have to start over again from the
beginning, and it’s painful enough only doing it once. If it’s someone
he can get away with ignoring, that would be preferable.

“Heir Longbottom,” she says. “Shall I be telling him you is busy,

Master?”

Bloody hell. Well, best to get it over with. “No, that will be all Milly.
Very good.”

She gives him a pleased little bow and vanishes. He pushes himself
up and onto his feet. He hopes that Neville won’t challenge him to a
duel. The Longbottoms and the Potters have never held an official
alliance, and since Neville is an Heir, and Draco doesn’t currently
have one of his own, he’d have to fight Neville personally. He’ll never
admit it out loud, but that’s not a duel he’s confident he could win.

He opens the door, bracing himself. “Finally,” Neville says

impatiently. “Can I catch a ride with you to the House? Gran’s finally
taking me to one, and she was supposed to pick me up in the
carriage, but she got tied up in a meeting and told me to meet her
there. But she gets irritable if I take the floo to official functions, and
merlin forbid I fly there like a commoner.”

Draco stares. “What the bloody hell are you talking about?”

“It’s the full moon?” Neville returns, eyebrow raised.

There’s a moment when they just stare at each other, and then
Draco goes, “Fuck! ” and slams the door in his face. He opens it
again a moment later to add, “Yes, you’re welcome ride with me. I’ll
meet you at the front of the castle in,” he checks the grandfather
clock next to the fireplace, and at least Neville had come to ask early
so he’s not completely screwed, “an hour.” He closes the door again,
pauses, and opens it, “You’re not wearing that, are you?”
“No,” Neville says, lips twitching, “I am not wearing my teaching
robes to a formal meeting.” Draco scowls at him and shuts the door
a final time.

He cannot believe he forgot tonight was the full moon, and therefore
the monthly meeting of the House of Lords and Ladies. This is what
getting into fights with Potter and drinking with Weasleys does to
him. He sends Bip to the manor to prep the carriage, but there’s still
the matter of his date.

He already knows neither Pansy nor Blaise are free this evening,
and likely each think the other is going to the meeting with him. He
tells Milly to set out his robes since she has a good eye for it, then
goes striding to the professor’s common room. He doesn’t show up
stag, as a rule, and he’s not about to start now. He bursts inside and
commands, “Loony, attend the monthly congregation with me.”

There are only four people in the room. Luna blinks at him, blue eyes
so dark they almost look black. “Don’t you usually go with Blaise?”

“He’s busy,” he says, unwilling to say he’s an idiot who forgot that it
was today. By the way Flitwick and Minerva are studiously focused
on their chess game, he bets they’ve both guessed that already. He
thinks he liked it better when they couldn’t read him so easily.

Granger crosses her arms. “What are you on about? Also, you could
be nicer about asking Luna to do things! You can’t just go ordering
people around!”

“He can, actually,” Luna says mildly, and gives an odd half smile.
Dread pools into the bottom of Draco’s stomach. She looks like her
mother when she does that, and Pandora was, among many other
things, a devious woman. “Of course, cousin. But perhaps you
should take Hermione instead?”

Minerva’s head snaps up, staring at Luna in horror. Filius doesn’t

look up from the board and moves a piece perilously close to her
queen. “Why?” he and Granger demand at the same time.
“You keep saying the books and theory aren’t good enough,” Luna
says to Hermione, “and this is a formal meeting of the House of
Lords and Ladies. When will you ever get a chance to attend again?”
She looks from Granger to him and adds, “She might learn
something.”

This is such a bad idea. This entire day is apparently dedicated to

bad ideas. “Fine,” he snaps, then addresses Granger. “If you want to
walk among the natives, you best act like one. No arguing, no
causing trouble. You can throw a fit about it all when we get back if
you must, but while we’re there you treat it like the muggleborn
classes. Understand?”

“I understand,” she says, glaring at him, and this is going to be such

a miserable evening.

“You don’t have anything to wear,” he says.

“I have-” she begins.

He holds up his hand, “That wasn’t a question.” He snaps his fingers,

and Milly appears beside him. “Professor Granger will be
accompanying me this evening. Find something suitable in my
mother’s closet and help her get ready.”

“Yes, Master Draco,” Milly says, and disappears in the middle of her
curtsy.

Granger is already purple in indignation. “Save it,” he says. “We work

together, it’s not like you’re low on opportunities to yell at me. Luna,
help her out,” he adds, and waits for his cousin to nod before
sweeping out of there as suddenly as he’d came.

Why does he keep allowing these things to happen? Everything was

so much easier when he and the Gryffindor crowd spent the years
after the war pretending the other didn’t exist. This is exhausting.
When Draco descends the steps of Hogwarts, Granger is already
there and waiting for him. Her hair is shining and tumbling down
around her, longer than he last saw it, but it’s possible it’s just an
effect of her curls being looser. When he sees what Milly chose, he
has to grin. “You look like a proper lady,” he greets.

She rolls her eyes, but not even her stubbornness can hide her
fascination with her borrowed clothes. She’s wearing a fortune, a
tight bright red acromantula silk gown and thin outer robe, clasped
only right below her sternum to show off the dress with a solid gold
broach. The outer robe is delicately crocheted and thin enough that
its nearly transparent, though a powerful warming charm was
integrated into the thread as it was spun, so that the wearer will
remain pleasantly cozy no matter the weather. Walburga Black
developed that particular spell herself.

“Sorry I’m late!” Neville yelps, running down the steps, “I was talking
to Harry - wow,” he says, wide eyed, “Hermione, you look great!
You’re going to give everyone a heart attack wearing that dress
though,” he adds, but he sounds more approving than anything else.

Granger looks down, forehead wrinkling. “Why?”

“My mother wore that dress on only a few occasions,” Draco says,
smiling. “It meant she was cross with someone in the House, and
that she and my father were out for blood. I imagine Milly chose it so
you’d feel more comfortable in your house colors, but some of the
old crowd has very particular memories associated with that dress.”

Before Granger can do more than frown at him, Neville adds, “She’s
missing something. Earrings?”

“What the point? They’ll get lost in her hair unless she puts it up,” he
argues, but concedes Neville has a point. He touches his wand in his
sleeve, and in the next moment he holds out a necklace of gold and
polished obsidian. “This belonged to my great grandmother on my
father’s side. It has a preservation and unbreakable charm on it, but
be gentle none the less.”
“Thank you,” she says, taking it from him with cautious fingers and
clasping it around her neck. “Luna said we were taking a carriage?”

“Status symbol,” he explains, because there’s no reason not to

speak plainly and turn this into a learning experience for her. “It’s
looked down upon to arrive in anything but a family carriage because
it implies there’s something shameful about the state of yours. The
more impressive the carriage, the more impressive your family.”

“Is yours impressive?” she asks, but there’s no malice in the

question, only curiosity.

Neville answers before he can, “Very.” He bounces on the balls of his

feet and admits, “I could have hitched a ride with someone else, but
I’ve been dying to ride in your carriage.”

Granger crosses her arms, suspicious. “What’s so special about it?”

Draco raises his hand and snaps twice. Almost immediately the air is
filled with the sounds of pounding hooves as his carriage rounds the
corner and stops in front of them. It’s a very well crafted carriage,
black stained mahogany, with the Malfoy family crest carved into the
doors, and gold detailing spelled to shine even in the dimmest of
lights. That’s not the interesting part though. That would be the
creature pulling it.

The midnight black horse is normal enough looking, tall and strong
with a dark coat that gleams almost blue. Except, of course, for the
enormous wings protruding from his back. The pegasus tosses his
head and stands even taller under their eyes. This is the first and
only time he can honestly say he’s truly shocked Granger. She’s
wide eyed with her mouth hanging open. He takes a moment to
savor it before saying, “Meet Nox. It’s not a terribly original name, I
know, but I did name him when I was a child. He’s worked for my
family for over twenty years.”

“Sections of the Malfoy land are preserved for pegasi mating and
birthing grounds, and are warded off against poachers as well as
some other unpleasant predators,” Neville explains, eagerly holding
out a hand for Nox to inspect. After a moment of deliberation, he
nudges his large head in Neville’s hand and allows the wizard to pet
him.

“As such, one pegasus from each generation works for my family in
exchange for this protection,” Draco finishes. “Their natural lifespans
are about three times that of a witch or wizard, so they’re not
separated from their flock forever, if you were worried about that.”

Granger closes her mouth. He doesn’t know for sure that she was
going to go on tirade about him enslaving creatures, but if so he
didn’t want to hear it. Nox is an incredibly powerful and incredibly
intelligent magical creature. If he didn’t want to be working for the
Malfoy family, he would have flown off long ago. Honestly, that’s why
he'd had such little patience and was such a brat when it came to
care of magical creatures in school. He was accustomed to magical
creatures that could take care of themselves.

“He’s beautiful,” she says softly, fingers twitching towards him.

Draco gives them both a couple more minutes to admire and pet Nox
before clapping his hands and saying, “Come on. If we’re late,
Augusta will be cross with me, which is never pleasant.”

He helps Granger into the carriage first, then Neville, and climbs in
after both of them. The door swings shut on its own. Nox takes off at
a full gallop, knowing where he needs to take Draco on a full moon.

“Wait a minute,” Granger says nervously. “If Nox has wings, does
that mean-”

She doesn’t have the chance to finish that question before the
carriage is lifted off the ground, Nox beating his powerful wings to
propel them into the air. Neville squashes his face against the
window while Granger stays determinedly in the center of the seat.
“Don’t worry,” he says. “Once he’s gotten us high enough, it’s a
smoother ride than it would be on land.”

“Delightful,” she says, and carefully edges her way to the window to
watch Hogwarts become smaller and smaller below them.

Draco hides a smile. Slowly, painfully slowly, he thinks she’s

discovering that not all aspects of pureblood tradition are repugnant
to her.

Of course, that’s likely to all be destroyed after a full night in the

House, but he can enjoy it while it lasts.

i hope you liked it!

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Chapter 6
Chapter 6

(See the end of the chapter for notes.)

The flight is short. Pegasi can only be reliable out-flown by dragons,

after all, and Nox is talented enough that the carriage lands
smoothly. Draco steps out first, then helps Neville out, then Granger.
Nox gallops off into the air, likely back to his manor until he calls for
him again.

“Stonehenge?” Granger asks, tilting her head to the side. The

massive, ancient structure looks almost silver in the moonlight.

“Not quite,” Neville says, beaming. He claps Draco on the shoulder.

“Thanks for letting me come with you. I’ll see you on the other side.”
He heads around to the opposite curve of the circle, careful not to
step too close until he finds the right spot.

“Where’s he going?” She frowns, “Where is everyone?”

He holds out his arm, and she takes it, stepping up beside him. He
leads her to the stone doorway in front of them, “Come now,
Granger, haven’t you learned anything about our world yet? Nothing
is as it seems.”

She opens her mouth, probably to yell at him, but they step into the
stone doorway and a wall of black flames bursts to life behind them,
and a wall of white flame surges up in front of them. They’re boxed
in, stone on two sides, and flames on the others. “Malfoy?” she
whispers, her grip bruising. “What’s going on?”

“Don’t panic,” he says. “You’ve faced something like this before,

haven’t you?”
She relaxes slightly. “In first year, it was Snape’s challenge. Do we
have to solve a riddle? I’m good at riddles.”

He shakes his head. “Snape had never been here of course, but he’s
heard of it. Trying to recreate what he could never have. Pathetic.”

Draco presses his hand against the rough stone, feeling for a sharp
edge. Once he finds one, he leans against it and slices open his
palm. “Draco!”

“It’s fine.” He reaches forward and pushes his bloody hand through
the fire. His blood slides from his skin into the flames, and the white
fire turns red, spreading out from his hand until the whole of the
flames are a bright, natural red shot through with orange. “There. It’s
just a normal fire now. Would you like to take care of it? Or perhaps
throw me into it?”

“Occidere!” she casts, rolling her eyes. On one hand, it’s over-kill to
use the predecessor to the avada kedavra curse to put out a fire, but
on the other hand, it’s incredibly cool to watch the pale green smoke
enfulge the flames and eventually dissipate. She slides her wand
back into her sleeve and tosses her hair over her shoulder, giving
him a look that puts her right at home with a bunch of snobbish
purebloods.

“Excellent,” he grins and winks at her, and before she has a chance
to respond to that, he leads her through the entrance. He watches
her face, watching for the moment she sees through the illusion.

The area within Stonehenge is much, much larger than it appears on

the outside. It’s not abandoned dirt, but instead a gorgeous,
manicured garden. They aren’t alone. Couples are stepping through
the stone doorways of Stonehenge. Lords, Ladies, and Heirs rubbing
at their hands even though the magic heals them as soon as they
step through. Neville is already at Augusta’s side, an attentive and
handsome presence at her elbow as she leads them up the garden
path.
“That’s a castle,” Grange says, looking up at the towering structure
that the long stone paths leads to.

“A small one,” he agrees. “No one lives there, after all. It’s mostly just
used for these meetings.”

She matches his pace as they walk towards it. “It looks old.”

“Helga Hufflepuff singlehandedly constructed this castle over a

thousand years ago after the previous structure was destroyed in a
magical backlash. It’s a little older than Hogwarts. She built this first,
which is why she was the architect for the Hogwarts castle.” He
nearly trips when Granger stops in her tracks, and he looks back to
see her giving him the strangest look he’s ever seen. He hopes she’s
not planning to set him on fire. He gently tugs her forward and
attempts to push his smirk into a smile in case she curses him for it.
“Not everything is in Hogwarts, A History. If you can go the whole
evening without embarrassing me, I’ll show you the West Tower.
That’s where the library is.”

“I’m holding you to that,” she says, carefully lifting her red silk gown
to walk up the steps of the castle. “What happens tonight?”

He leads her past the great hall into a side chamber. This castle
wasn’t built for beauty or splendor. It was built for practicality, it was
built in need, in desperation, it was built singlehandedly by a young
witch who had nothing but her name and refused to let it die.

The meeting room is the largest in the castle. In the center is a large
oval table, large enough to sit five hundred people.

Of course, far less than that are here tonight.

“We’ll convene for our meeting here first. Once it’s in session, don’t
speak. Only Lords and Ladies may speak - if an Heir has something
to contribute, they may tell their Lord or Lady, and they will choose
whether or not it needs to be said. But everyone else will simply
listen. Understand?” Granger nods. He pulls out her chair for her,
then sits beside her. No one says anything, quietly going to their
seats. Draco may not be allies with all these people, but he knows
them, of course. “After, there will be dancing and drinks. You may
speak then, although I would strongly advise that you do not relax .
The social aspect of these meetings is often more treacherous than
the actual session.”

Lord Parkinson is the last to arrive, his daughter and Heir sitting
down beside them. Paige Parkinson is like Pansy condensed - all the
terrifying power and airheaded demeanor pushed into a razor sharp
reputation. Paige reminds him of Blaise’s mother, and he adores her,
but he also stays far, far away from her.

Rosamund stands. As the eldest Lady present, she begins and

dismisses these sessions. Many people hate the Lestranges, but it’s
one thing to hate someone in the privacy of your own mind, and
quite another to stand against a woman who was rumored to best
Dumbledore in the ring until he refused to duel her any longer, back
when they were very different people in a very different time.

“I, Lady Rosamund Lestrange, hereby call this meeting of the House
of Lords and Ladies to session. All those in favor of continuing with
these proceedings, say aye.”

“Aye,” Draco and dozens of others say.

Rosamund lifts her wand, and with a flick all the torches along the
walls glow a little brighter. A large scroll appears in front of her, and
she unrolls it with an intimidating snap of the parchment.

“So mote it be. Let’s begin!”

Granger listens with rapt attention, but most of the meeting must be
boring, at least for her. It’s minutia about alliances, Rosamund pulling
up a blood map and all the lords confirming their alliances have been
maintained. A couple people have new alliances to add, but that’s
not terribly surprising. The war pitted many people against each
other, and after the dust settled, contracts were drawn up and Lords
and Ladies took on new families who wished to publicly associate
themselves with more favorable nobles. Draco hadn’t had to deal
with that, thank merlin. He did quietly take a couple of families from
the Notts, but the less said of that the better.

Next is the slate for the upcoming round of Wizengamot voting. Lady
Eliza Greengrass rattles off a list of the upcoming bills, and gives a
short summary of each. There’s heated debate over the newest
wand tracking spell that’s being submitted as a required component
of all future wands. Lord Ollivander is against it of course, although
Lady Patil points out that it doesn’t do much more than the
registration of magic required to get an appiration lesson. Ollivander
nearly goes purple in the face at that, and goes on a twenty minute
rant that involves a lot of gesticulating. Draco has a sturdy grasp on
advanced arithmancy, he has to, if he ever plans on taking the formal
examinations to become a charms master, but everything Ollivander
is saying is flying way over his head.

Granger is practically vibrating in her seat, biting at her lip. Draco

shakes his head, and she relaxes, although the grip she has on the
edge of the table is a little concerning.

“Lord Ollivander,” he says, “I’m afraid most of us aren’t up to your

level of mastery. Perhaps a simpler explanation would suffice?”

The old man turns his piercing blue eyes on him and cracks his
aging face into a grin. “Ah, the young thief speaks.” Draco stiffens,
because he has no idea what he’s talking about, he’s never crossed
the Ollivanders. Their families have amiable for generations. “I do
hope my niece is causing you as much trouble as she causes us.”

Oh. He’s talking about Markle’s friend, Andrea, the first ever
Ollivander to be sorted in Slytherin.

His heart rate settles back to normal and he grins. “She’s a model
student, I’m afraid. She clearly didn’t take after you.”
Ollivander barks out a laugh, “Oh give her time, give her time. She’ll
be your worst nightmare before you know it.” The old man scratches
at his beard and says, “All right, this new spell is a terrible bloody
idea because it interferes with the wand’s natural magic, which is
one thing when you’re our age and with our power, but for a kid?
One just starting out? It will be a disaster. Additionally, I don’t care
that the Ministry can track us anyway. They shouldn’t have a nice
easy way to do it. If history has taught us anything, it’s that when evil
comes knocking, the Ministry is the first to fall. They don’t need any
help hunting people down the line when the next war comes.”

When the next war comes. Not if.

There will always be another war.

Sometimes it feels like being a Lord is just spending a lifetime

preparing for a war you pray you won’t live long enough to see.

“Well, that’s very true,” Lady Nott says, the youngest lord or lady in
the room besides him. She’s still twice his age, but he likes her
anyway. She was a second cousin to the Lord before the war. After
the war, with Lord Nott dead, she was chosen as the next head of
the family. Draco thoroughly approves. “Who is in favor of it? It
sounds like a brilliant mix of stupid and unnecessary to me.”

“It’s well intentioned,” Augusta says, speaking for the first time.
“Although horribly misguided. It’s meant as a safety measure against
crime. Of course, that assumes that a criminal would be stupid
enough to use their own wand, knowing it could be traced back to
them by spell residue alone, even without this additional tracking in
place.”

“Well, if Lady Longbottom is against it, I am too,” Lord Brown says,

giving the woman a saucy wink. Augusta tilts her nose in the air.
Neville looks very uncomfortable.

“Motion to stall and block the bill?” Rosamund asks. Everyone

agrees, although some are more enthusiastic about it than others.
“Excellent. Those of us with Wizengamot seats will vote against the
bill, but if it passes the first level of votes we’ll set up a lobby system.
Minister Shackbolt is so annoyingly straight laced. You can’t bribe
that man! Believe me, I’ve tried.”

“Almost makes you miss Fudge,” Lady Abbot says wistfully. “He was
a train wreck, but for the most part he was an easily contained train
wreck. He responded particularly well to blackmail and bribery.”

Everyone grumbles in agreement, and Granger looks positively

scandalized. He supposes she believed that the supposedly ‘good’
families like the Abbots and Longbottoms and the Browns wouldn’t
do something like bribe and blackmail government officials.

He’s almost disappointed. She was willing to do all manner of

horrible things to achieve her ideals, was ruthless in her goal of
peace. Why wouldn’t they be?

The rest of the meeting proceeds in a similar fashion, and once the
list of upcoming bills has been exhausted, there’s talk of the new
businesses that are being started and the ones that are,
unfortunately, failing. Then the official business of the night ends as it
always does. A silver dagger appears beside every Lord or Lady.

Draco suddenly remembers that Granger has no idea what’s about

to happen. “Don’t panic, and be silent about it if you must panic.”

He picks up the silver knife and drags it vertically down the length of
his arm, and the confusion leaves her eyes and is replaces by horror.
He glares at her, shaking his head when she opens her mouth. His
blood flows into the center of the table, and the table looks and feels
as if it’s perfectly level, but all their blood mingles and pools together
until there’s a thin layer across the table. He’s just getting
lightheaded at that point, and it wasn’t always like this. There was a
time when each of them only had to give a few drops to fill this table,
to keep the wards intact.
It was a time far in the past, but it existed . Now they all lose over a
pint of blood each, Draco even more because he’s young and he can
stand the loss. If things keep progressing as they are, they’re going
to have to go back to ancient times and conclude every meeting with
a human sacrifice.

The blood sinks into the table, and there’s a blinging flash of light as
the wards are renewed and strengthened, as the magic takes what is
given.

All else may fall, but the House of Lords and Ladies must stand. If
every other bit of their culture and history is doomed to be overrun
and forgotten, then this must remain.

This castle, this circle, this library, this magic. They give more blood
than they can spare because the necessity of this place has never
been more dire, because their history has never before been so
close to being lost.

When the light dims, his arm is healed, not even a scar to show
where he’d cut himself.

Scars are how the magic gives a warning. If anyone leave the House
scarred, they would be smart to never return, lest they never leave it
again.

They’re silent now, and Draco rolls his sleeve back down and offers
his arm Granger. “To the garden,” he says, “and then you may
speak.”

Heirs and wives and husbands pretend they’re not supporting the
weight of the person they came with, pretend that this is normal
when it is not. He won’t allow himself to lean against Granger, but as
soon as they leave the castle he reaches into his sleeve and downs
a blood replenishing potion.

“Do you have more of that?” Neville asks from right behind him, and
Draco turns, cursing himself for not noticing.
“She won’t take it,” he warns, dropping a small vial in to his hand.
“She never does.”

Neville shrugs, eyes pinched around the corners, “I might as well try.
Thanks, Draco.”

He runs a hand through his hair then looks down at Granger,

surprised at her continued silence. “You can speak now, you know.”

She’s staring him, lips pressed into a thin line and eyes narrowed.
“I’m not sure where to begin,” she says finally. “I have no idea what
just happened in there. I mean. the discussions I followed, more or
less, although I had no idea you all kept such a close eye on
everything. I’m shocked anything happens without you knowing
about it.”

“It doesn’t, generally,” he says, and he can already see Lord Flint
heading towards them. “Look, the social aspect is actually rather
important. Can this wait until the dancing starts?”

Granger frowns, but gives a half-shrug that Draco is going to take as

agreement. Lord Giles Flint comes up to them, a man who’s as large
as his wife is tall. Draco has never liked him, ever since he was a
small boy who was forced to be polite to him at his parents’ parties.
“What are you doing all the way over here in the corners, my boy?
It’s quite unlike you,” he booms, looking only at him and not
addressing Granger at all.

“My apologies, Lord Flint,” he says, forcing himself to smile. “I had

not intended to disappoint.”

“Can’t be helped, I suppose,” his wife says, her eyes barely flickering
over Granger.

He wraps his arm around Granger’s waist and pulls her against his
side, praying she doesn’t smack him for it. She doesn’t, instead
leaning into him so Giles has no choice but to look at her or
awkwardly turn his face halfway to the side, and Draco does his best
to smother his amusement.

She really does fit in scarily well with his sort with that reckless pride
of hers.

Muggleborn, wife of a blood-traitor, and Gryffindor or not, Granger is

still his guest. She’s on the arm of Lord Malfoy, and Draco isn’t going
to let anyone get away with disrespecting her, mostly because that
means they’re disrespecting him .

Giles curls his upper lip in disgust. Draco asks, “Is there something
in particular you wanted to discuss with me, Lord Flint?”

“Yes, unfortunately,” he says. “I was hoping to ask a favor of you?”

“Of course you may ask,” he says pleasantly, and if this was
Rosamund or even Augusta he would agree without question, but
this is neither. The Flints are a strong, pure family who have never
wavered in their devotion to magic itself. That doesn’t mean the
family isn’t bursting with the nastiest sort of people Draco has ever
had the misfortune of dealing with, and Giles is as rotten as the rest
of them.

“One of the lesser families pledged to me has a daughter who

whelped a mudblood child,” he says. “The mother has died,
unfortunately. It is, of course, my duty to raise the child in my own
family. Perhaps you could offer some advice? You have taken in
several similarly tainted children, I understand.”

By some miracle, Granger keeps her mouth shut. “One must get new
blood where one can,” he answers, “but then, the Flints have been
so fortunate as to not suffer low numbers, unlike my own family.”

He hates this, and he hates himself, but he wants the same thing
Flint wants. The unfortunate thing is Flint knows he wants it, and will
force him to practically beg to relieve him of a burden he doesn’t
care for to begin with.
This is why wars are started, he thinks, there comes a point where
no one can stand the bloody politics of it all anymore.

“The Malfoy clan is looking a little thin, isn’t it?” Giles asks, his
smugness practically rolling off of him. Draco wants to strangle him.

His wife laughs and lays her hand on her husband’s shoulder like a
pale, glittering spider. “Oh, but Lord Malfoy, surely you could take
care of that problem with a well timed marriage? You are getting on
in years, after all.”

He is twenty four years old, and his parents may have gotten married
the very summer after his mother graduated Hogwarts, but their
marriage had been orchestrated by their parents, and besides that
they’d actually liked each other. The only one of high enough
standing he thinks he could tolerate being married to would be
Pansy, and they’d figured out that was a horrible idea by the time
they were fourteen. “Unfortunately, it’s not currently in the cards. It
seems I must expand my family by more… unconventional means.”

Twenty minutes and seven more pointed remarks about his family
line later, it’s decided that Draco will take charge of the toddler, and
she will become a member of his House. He’s trying to figure out
which cousin he can convince to take the child on when Granger
kicks him in the shin.

“Ow!” he hisses, “What was that for?”

“I would like some explanations now, please,” she glares. It’s not a
request. Light music fills the air, and there is a spaced cleared for
dancing.

“You could have just asked, there was no need for violence,” he
grumbles, leading Granger onto the dance floor in the middle of the
garden. It’s early in the night, and there aren’t that many people out
there, everyone instead sequestered in small groups with glinting
glasses of wine in their hands. He feels a stab of envy, but he’s
pretty sure if he doesn’t answer some of Granger’s questions soon
he may just feel stabbed, period.

He’s pleasantly surprised to discover she knows the waltz. He

wonders if she learned it for her wedding, since he can’t think of why
else she’d know it. She certainly hadn’t known how to dance when
they were kids at the Yule Ball. “What was the bit in the end, with the
blood and the light?”

“This is a sacred place, Granger,” he twirls her around. “Can’t you

feel it? It’s been around for over five thousand years. This has been
a place of magic and harmony and sacrifice for that long. It has been
maintained as such because Lords and Ladies have given back what
the magic has given us in the first place. We meet more often now,
give more now because so much of us are afraid, but we truly only
need to renew the wards once a year. Everything else is extra.
Insurance, if you will.”

“Barbaric insurance,” she mutters.

He grins, all teeth. “Of course it is, Granger. Magic is barbaric.

Nothing so beautiful comes for free.”

She’s silent for a while after that, and Draco clocks everyone around
them as he turns them across the dance floor. They have a few
confused or surprised sets of eyes on them, but nothing truly hostile,
which he’s grateful for. He doesn’t think anyone would be stupid
enough to start a duel here, of all places, but he’s certainly not willing
to find out.

Granger huffs, seemingly at herself, and says, “I don’t understand.

Flint said one of the witches he protects had birthed a muggleborn.
But that’s impossible. By definition, muggleborns are born of
muggles, not witches.”

“Ah,” Draco spins her again, thinking. “Well, no that’s not what he
said. He said she’d had a mudblood . Flint’s rather old, and he was
around for Grindelwald’s war, and his vocabulary hasn’t ever really
updated. Nowadays, ever since Voldemort’s initial rise to power,
mudblood has been used as an insult against muggleborns. But that
wasn’t always the case. Up until then, mudblood was a slur not
against muggleborns, but against magical children with a muggle
parent and a magical parent.” She’s looking at him, brows furrowed
in concentration, so he dips her while he thinks he can get away with
it. “It makes more sense, I think, that way. Muggles dirtying the
bloodlines, and all that, getting in the way of the magic.
Muggleborns, on the other hand, are born of magic itself. Nothing
dirty about that.”

“That’s not very nice to half-bloods,” Granger says. “I don’t think we

should use it to refer to anyone.”

“I suppose not,” he agrees, “but that’s what Flint meant. Half-bloods

are almost worse than squibs to the older generations. He may have
made me grovel for the privilege of taking the child into my family,
but the last thing he wants is a half-blood running around with the
name Flint.”

“You’ve done this before?” she asks, “He said you had.”

Draco shrugs, uncomfortable with the way she’s staring at him.

“Many people lost children in the war, my cousins included. When I
show up with a child at their door, they’re amiable enough to raising
them. I am their Lord, these are children, and the Malfoy line is
rather on the small side, comparatively. Besides, one good thing
about Voldemort’s rein is that I didn’t grow up with that particular
prejudice. My parents were much more concerned with raising me to
hate muggles and muggleborns than they were half-bloods.”

He expects her to yell at him for that remark, but instead Granger is
still just starring at him in a way that makes his shoulder itch. He very
much wishes she would stop.

“May we cut in?” a hoarse voice asks, and this isn’t quite the rescue
he’d been hoping for, but he’ll take what he can get.
“Of course, Lady Longbottom,” he smiles, bowing to her.

Augusta ignores him completely and takes Granger’s arm, leading

her to the other side of the dance floor. Draco blinks after their
retreating backs, and barely catches sight of Lord Brown looking
after Augusta longingly, likely because the old Lord is certifiably
insane. Augusta Longbottom terrifies him. He has no idea how Lord
Brown continues to nurse his frankly baffling crush on the woman.
Then again, if Augusta was truly adverse to his advances, Draco
figures she would have let Lord Brown know in some sort of suitably
horrifying and painful way.

“Sorry about that,” Draco pulls his gaze to Neville who grins
sheepishly and shrugs. “Want to dance?”

“Might as well,” he sighs, and he’s sure Neville was forced to attend
all the same formal dancing lessons he was, so he’ll actually be able
to do more than a half dozen steps with the man.

He loses track of Granger after that, and he’d be worried about it

except that every time he catches a glimpse of her she’s at
Augusta’s side. The rest of the evening is a blur, like it always is. He
discusses the progress of over dozen children in his house with
various Lords and Ladies, which is new, but the business talks and
subtle interrogation over the state of everyone’s treasuries and
family trees is old news. It’s nearing the end of the night when
Augusta deposits Granger back at his side without saying a word.
Granger looks rather dazed, which he thinks is only fair.

“Ready to go?” he asks. He’s already talked to everyone he needed

to, and also he’s afraid that if they linger any longer someone will
make a pointed comment about his guest, and then Granger will set
something on fire.

“You promised me a library if I didn’t embarrass you, and I didn’t. I

want to see the library,” she says crossly, but she’s also swaying on
her feet, so Draco figures there’s room for negotiation.
“If we can leave now, I will unleash you on the Malfoy family library
and I promise to take you back here and leave you in the library at
some point.”

She narrows her eyes at him. If she insists on the library, he

supposes he can find a comfortable table to sleep on top of. “Very
well,” she says. “I accept your terms.”

“Thank merlin,” he sighs, and almost smiles when she laughs at him.

The Longbottoms have already left, and Draco quickly says goodbye
to everyone else he cares about before he and Granger step through
the stone arch and come out the other side, this time without any
fire. Granger turns to look behind them, but Draco doesn’t bother. He
knows what she’ll see. An empty monument, the same as the
muggles do, with no indication of what lays behind them.
“Fascinating,” she breathes.

He raises his hand and snaps his fingers. Nox and his carriage lands
mere moments later, and he barely has the presence of mind to help
Granger into the carriage before following her in and collapsing on
the seat. On the surface, spending an evening dancing and talking
shouldn’t drain him this much, but he always leaves these things
feeling exhausted. “Well? What did you think?”

She turns her head from the window, and he takes a small moment
to feel gratified that she’s decided the carriage is safe enough that
she can look out the window without fear. “I think I have more
questions than ever, but that was quite… informative. Thank you for
taking me.”

She seems earnest, so Draco smiles at her like he means it, like
she’s his friend. “You’re welcome, Granger.”

“Oh, you might as well call me Hermione,” she says. “Everyone else
does.”
“In that case, I don’t suppose I can stop you from calling me Draco,
can I?” he asks, and this is a much better outcome than he was
expecting. Although, it was probably exactly the outcome that Luna
was hoping for, the meddlesome brat.

“No, I don’t suppose you can,” she says, satisfied.

They land on Hogwarts grounds, right in front of the castle. He’s just
helped Hermione out of the carriage and Nox is already in the air
back to the manor when he turns around and sees two people
waiting for them on the palace steps.

Draco is instantly offended. “What, you didn’t think I would return her
in one piece?”

“Don’t look at me,” Ron says, grinning. “This wasn’t my idea.” Draco
glances at a glowering Harry Potter, then quickly looks away. Ron
jumps down the steps and grabs his wife’s hand and twirls her
around like a ballerina. “Look at you, done up all pretty. I’m jealous.”

Hermione looks to Harry then rolls her eyes. “As you should be,” she
informs him, throwing herself at Draco so he has no choice but to
wrap his arms around her or risk her falling to the ground, which he
certainly isn’t going to allow while she’s wearing his mother’s dress.
“I want a divorce. I’m in love with Draco, this one night has changed
me forever. I’m sorry.”

“I understand,” Ron says easily, which at least makes one of them.

“But consider this. We stay married, and instead we just share
Draco?” He gives him an over exaggerated wink, and it’s physically
painful for Draco not to roll his eyes at them. “I don’t normally go for
blokes, but you’re so pretty that it doesn’t really count, does it?”

“It definitely counts,” he says dryly. “Will you take your wife? What
are you even doing here?”

“I don’t know.” Ron turns and yells up the steps, “Hey, Harry, what
are we doing here?”
Potter is giving them the kind of scowl that makes it clear that not
only did he kill a dark lord, but he spent years after the war hunting
down the darkest and most dangerous of wizards from the darkest
and most dangerous parts of the world. Draco is almost alarmed.
Potter doesn’t actually think he’d do anything to Hermione, does he?
Ron doesn’t seem worried, and he’s her husband.

“You two,” Harry grounds out between clenched teeth, “are a couple
of no good, back stabbing traitors.”

He stomps away after that in a melodramatic fashion reminiscent of

their Hogwarts days. Is this about the argument they had? Since no
one else seemed upset at him, he’d assumed Potter wasn’t that
upset either, but he must have been wrong.

Draco starts to ask about it, but Ron only claps him on the shoulder
and says, “Don’t worry about it. He’s just cross because we’re doing
what we told him not to do.”

“Which is?” he asks, blinking.

Hermione and Ron share a look that oddly reminds him of his
parents and all the silent conversations they used to have. “Don’t
worry about it,” Hermione says, echoing her husband.

He stares, completely unimpressed and just as confused as before.

Gryffindors. Honestly.

i hope you liked it!

feel free to follow / harass me at: shanastoryteller.tumblr.com

Chapter 7
Chapter 7

sorry for the long time between chapters! i hoping to update at least
monthly going forward

(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)

There are very few things Draco enjoys about his third year
Gryffindor and Slytherin class. Although, to be fair, it takes place on
Mondays at eight in the morning, so they’re already at a
disadvantage.

What does bring him enjoyment is watching Raina glare young

Albert Weasley into being a half decent Potions student. Before, he’d
barely been scraping by with an Acceptable, but the last two potions
he and Raina had turned in had earned them two Outstanding
marks. They sit front and center, so Draco knows it’s not just that
Raina’s doing all the work and then slapping Albert’s name on it. She
makes him do half the work, but pushes his hand away whenever
he’s about to do something wrong. Maybe if Raina had been around
to help Neville back when they were in school, he would have fared
better on his Owls.

“If your potion turns a pale blue color, then you’re doing fine,” he
says, walking in between the rows of desks. “If it’s a darker blue, you
can fix that by lowering the heat and stirring counterclockwise for
about two minutes.”

“Er, Professor?” asks Parker. He’s the most powerful Slytherin in his
year, which doesn’t do him much good in potions. “What if it’s
white?”
Draco rushes to the back of the classroom. He manages to push
Parker and his partner Sarah back from their desk, but doesn’t get
there in time to stop the potion from exploding.

The runes along the edges of the desk flare golden. The potion
doesn’t leave the confines of the desk, stopping and sliding down
midair as if they’ve hit an invisible wall. The explosive components of
the potion are channeled through the iron legs and into the castle’s
stonework, as intended.

Unfortunately, none of that prevented the wall of flames from leaping

up and burning his entire left arm and side. It’s incredibly irritating
that any fire preventative spells he could apply interferes with the fire
spells the students need to cast in order to heat up their cauldrons.
He really needs to find a work around for that.

He grits his teeth against the pain. It’s hardly the worst he’s
experienced, and he manages to put the fire out almost as soon as it
appears. Because it was a magical fire, that still means he’s dealing
with second degree burns, which is less than ideal. “Professor!”
Sarah exclaims. “Are you okay? I mean, you’re not okay, I’ll go get
Madame Pomfrey-”

“Sit down,” he says. Sarah’s eyes narrow, but instead of letting her
argue, he just points at her seat. She’s still glaring at him as she sits
down. Parker is as pale as a ghost. “Parker, you too.”

He drops into his seat like he’s made of stone, staring at Draco’s
burned left side and his blistering skin. Honestly, Draco’s more upset
about his robe than his skin. One of those will heal, and the other
cost him a hundred galleons. “Why did your potion explode?”

“I’m sorry,” he blurts out, “I didn’t mean to hurt anyone!”

“That’s not what I asked. Why did your potion explode?” he repeats.

“I really think you should go to the hospital wing,” Sarah says.

His eyes narrow. “Are you deaf, or being purposely obtuse? Answer
the question.”

He can see a couple people raising their hands in his peripheral

vision, but he doesn’t call on them. He knows they know how not to
explode their potions, because they didn’t do it. Parker and Sarah
did. They need to answer his question.

“We used the wrong ingredient?” Sarah tries.

“Is that a statement, or a question?”

She glares at him, but turns to the board. She looks between their
ingredients and those listed in the instructions, and frowns. “We did
not use the wrong ingredient.”

“No,” Draco agrees, “you did not.”

He turns his eyes from Sarah to Parker, and waits. He swallows,

then says, “Maybe, maybe we, uh, put them in the wrong order?”

“No,” Sarah says confidently, scanning both the board and her notes.
“We didn’t. We put them in the cauldron in the right order.”

Parker stares into the distance, silently counting something off on his
fingers. Draco sees the exact moment he figures it out, his face
clearing. “The fire! It wasn’t hot enough!”

“Why would that make something explode?” Sarah asks, wrinkling

her nose.

“Ashwinder scales explode if they’re not kept warm enough,” he

says. “That’s why they’re the main ingredients in fireworks. And we
had powdered ashwinder scales in the potion.”

“But the flesh eating slugs are supposed to stabilize them,” she
argues. A moment later she twists to read the board, then scowls.
“We didn’t mix the scales and slugs together before putting them in
the potion like we were supposed to. Instead, we just added them at
the same time. Which would have been fine, if our heat wasn’t too
low. But it was. So, it exploded.”

They both turn to look at him, and he’d clap if he wasn’t in so much
pain. “Very good. Five points each to Gryffindor and Slytherin for
being able to analyze and deconstruct an unexpected result.” He
turns and looks at the rest of his class. “If you go beyond basic
potion making, you’ll learn that being able to figure out what you did
after the fact to get the result you did is just as valuable as doing it
correctly in the first place. Understand?”

All the kids nod.

Albert raises his hand. “Er, Professor Malfoy, should you maybe go
the hospital wing now? Your arm looks kinda awful.”

Raina is glaring at him, which means Draco is definitely going to get

a letter from Lady Lestrange. She’s going to make fun of him
mercilessly, and it will come up at the next meeting of the Lords and
Ladies.

“Everyone put a stasis charm on your potion, bottle it up, then vanish
the rest,” he orders. “I’ll grade you based on what you’ve already
done. You get out of class early because I have to go get yelled at by
Pomfrey. Don’t get used to it.”

Few injuries or sicknesses are perilous enough to require more than

a day or two spent in the infirmary. Pomfrey ruins all the fun of being
sick, so as long as they’re not actively vomiting, kids tend to prefer to
just get healed and go back to class. Not even wizards have been
able to cure the common cold, but they can’t treat the symptoms to
the point that most people forget that they’re sick. Up until the spells
wear off, and then they crash and sleep for twelve hours. That had
happened to Draco more than once while he was studying for his
mastery.
Seeing as it’s Monday morning, Draco isn’t expecting anyone else to
be in the infirmary when he steps inside.

“Draco,” Potter says, green eyes wide under his ridiculous glasses.
“What happened to you?”

“What happened to you ?” he retorts, walking towards Potter since

he’s already seen him, meaning he’s lost his chance to run. He’s
shirtless and sitting on one of the beds, something that Draco would
probably find more distracting if it wasn’t for the large diagonal cut
starting from his sternum and curling over his hip. It’s not deep,
barely oozing blood, but Draco doesn’t understand how he got hurt
in the first place. “Is there a dark wizard running around the grounds
that you couldn’t resist the urge to capture? Or perhaps Hagrid has
gotten a giant cat to accompany his giant dog. How many heads
does this one have?”

Potter rolls his eyes so hard Draco’s surprised they don’t pop out of
his head. “I teach an extra curricular dueling class in the mornings.
One of the kids got lucky. It was a lot worse before Pomfrey got her
hands on me.”

“Which kid?” he asks. “I may make them a plaque. ‘More Competent

than Voldemort.’ In gold. Aren’t you supposed to be some sort of
badass auror? How did a kid get the drop on you?”

If looks could kill, Draco would be dead on the floor. “I was showing
them the wand movements and he cast it on accident. What was I
supposed to do? Cast a knock back jinx on a student?”

“Protego exists, and unless this kid is the second coming of Merlin, it
would have held,” Draco points out. “Seriously. Which kid?”

“Whenever I cast protego, the spells just bounce off. I didn’t want it
hitting someone else!” He runs his hand through his hair, reopening
the wound across his chest and causing it to start bleeding anew. He
doesn’t seem to notice. “Oberon did it. Don’t bring it up, though, he
feels awful.”
“Are you joking?” Oberon, the great grandson of the Ollivander lord,
has the look of a Picasso painting and reminds Draco painfully of
Neville when they were kids. “I’m going to owl his grandfather
immediately, he’ll be so proud.” He’s not joking. Lord Ollivander
might actually get the kid a plaque. “Also, your shield charms repel
spells instead of absorbing them because you overpower them.
Knock it off.”

“You sound like Kinglsey,” he grumbles. “It never works, no matter

how little power I put into them. Even when I barely use any magic,
everything bounces off anyway.”

Draco doesn’t roll his eyes, but it’s a near thing. “That’s because
your definition of barely any magic and everyone else’s differs to
laughable degree. But I suppose it’s only fair that you suffer some
downsides from being more powerful than Dumbledore.”

“I’m not,” he insists, and Draco gets the impression that he says that
a lot.

The last time they had a conversation that touched on tradition, it

ended in a yelling match. So far, they’ve been managing to talk
almost normally, and he’s strangely reluctant to ruin that. But not
saying anything almost feels like cowardice, and he got his fill of
cowardice during the war. “You are. You shouldn’t deny that.
Dumbledore’s power and yours are different. He wasn’t born with all
of his, he borrowed some of it, but you were, and you didn’t. All of
your power is your own. It’s impressive, and rare, and you should be
proud of what you are. Even if what you are is strange and different
from everyone else.”

Potter has a strange look on his face that Draco can’t place, but at
least he doesn’t seem angry. “So you’re saying I’m a freak, and I
should be proud of it?”

The way he says freak makes the hair on the back his neck stand on
end, and he can’t say why. He doesn’t like the turn this conversation
has taken, but for an entirely different reason than he was expecting.
“Well, you’re no more of a freak than the rest of us. You were given a
gift.”

There’s more he could say if Potter knew about his heritage, about
their traditions. He could say that it’s all borrowed in the end, and he
should enjoy it since he has it. He could tell him that his ancestors
paid in blood for his magic, that they would be pleased to know their
sacrifice wasn’t in vain. He could say that he’s from an ancient and
noble line and that comes with certain privileges and responsibilities,
and magic is a tool to help him in both.

But he can’t.

Because Potter may be the most powerful person to walk the earth
in a long time, but he doesn’t know where that power comes from,
what it costs. What it’s cost those who came before him.

Terrible, but great. That’s how some people described Voldemort, but
it was a stolen phrase, one that’s been around a long longer than the
dark lord, longer than Hogwarts itself.

Terrible, but great, is how young children are taught to think of

magic. Before they learn anything else, they learn that phrase.

They learn that nothing so beautiful comes without a price.

But Potter doesn’t know. All the other purebloods know, Ron knows,
blood traitor or not. But Potter doesn’t. The Heir to the Potter line
doesn’t know, and Draco doesn’t know what to do about that. He
doesn’t know if there is anything he can do about that, at least not
without it ending in a duel, one he’ll most certainly lose unless he
gets lucky.

They’re just staring at one another, the silence stretching between

them and become more awkward by the second, but Draco refuses
to be the one to break it.
“All right, Harry, this should take care of the - MR. MALFOY!”
Pomfrey screeches. He turns to see her coming out her office with a
healing potion in her hand. Her eyes are narrowed in fury. “What on
earth happened to you?”

“A couple of third years blew up a potion. I got in the way. I can heal
it myself if you’re busy,” he adds. He’s decent at healing charms, and
considering all her healing potions are ones that he brewed, he
hardly needs her for that. But whenever he heals himself, he always
ends up messing it up in some way, and he’s rather not to do that,
obviously.

“Don’t be ridiculous,” she snaps. She shoves the healing potion at

Potter, “Drink this.” He obeys without question. She taps her wand
against Draco’s back, and what’s left of his robe and shirt vanishes,
leaving him in nothing more than his trousers. It’s a good thing he
stuck his wand in trouser pocket on the way here. Harry chokes on
his potion, and starts coughing, his face red as he pounds on his
chest. “Really, Mr. Potter, I hardly think it tastes that bad.”

Pomfrey mutters a long string of Latin at his back, and there’s a

cooling sensation all over his left side, causing him to instantly relax.
“It’s supposed to taste like mint and strawberry,” he tells Potter, “It’s
made to be drank by literal children.”

“It wasn’t the taste,” he says defensively, done coughing but still red.
Draco would have thought his dark skin would help with that, but
Harry’s face is nearly the same color as Ron’s hair, which can’t be
healthy. “I just swallowed wrong.”

Honestly, it astounds him now that Potter survived the war since he
can’t even swallow a potion properly. “All done!” Pomfrey
announces. Draco looks down, and his skin is fully healed and back
to being pale and unblemished. “Now, if the two of you could keep
from getting hurt by your students, I so would appreciate it.”

She doesn’t wait for their answer, instead just turning around and
walking back to her office.
“Am I supposed to walk back to my room like this?” Potter asks
plaintively.

Draco considers his naked torso. “It’s been a while since you’ve
graced the cover of Witch Weekly, hasn’t it?”

Potter is glaring at him, but it doesn’t have any bite to it. “That’s not
funny.”

“I disagree,” he says, pulling out his wand. He summons a button up

shirt from his wardrobe, pulling it over his shoulders and quickly
doing up the front buttons. If Potter’s trying to hide his look of
longing, he’s doing a terrible job of it. It’s Potter’s own fault for not
being controlled enough in his magic to summon his own clothes. He
runs a critical eye over him, and he’s fit, he know he looks good, but
Potter has the type of muscles and width that come from spending
four years hunting down dark wizards, and Draco’s not sure he has
anything that will fit. He could try and transfigure something, and
while he’s sure it would be serviceable, transfiguration is far from his
best skill, and he doesn’t want to embarrass himself.

He summons a sweater from his closet that’s a couple sizes too

large, and hopes that Harry won’t reject it on principal. “Here.” Potter
looks at the green sweater in confusion. The little silver snakes
patterned across it probably don’t help. “You wanted something to
wear, didn’t you?” he asks impatiently. “It’s the only thing I have
that’s might be your size. Unlike you, I wear clothes that fit.” Only
after he says that does it occurs to him that he could have
summoned a normal shirt and just cast engorgio on it.

“Then why do you have this?” Potter asks, taking the sweater like it
might bite him.

Draco considers not answering him, or lying. For some reason, he

still can’t get Potter’s expression when he’d called himself a freak out
his head. “It’s nice to wear on chilly days if I’m not leaving the
house.”
He braces himself for laughter or mockery, but instead Potter just
smiles at him. “I used to steal Ron’s sweaters for that. He finally just
told his mom to start making my Christmas sweaters a couple sizes
too big.”

Draco has no idea how to respond to this piece of unsolicited

personal information, so he just says, “Return it whenever,” and
walks out of the hospital wing.

He’s picking up the halfblood baby from Lord Flint on Saturday

morning, which means he can do the adoption ceremony sometime
in the afternoon. Which only leaves the question of who’s going to
raise the kid. His family tree is spread out on his desk, and they’re
running short on living branches who haven’t intermarried with
another pureblood. This kid is being given to the Malfoy family, so he
wants them raised as a Malfoy, not a Malfoy who’s a Goyle or a Nott
or a Brown by marriage.

Diane’s younger sister, Annabel, got married to a Rosier a couple

years ago, an upstart auror who works long hours. Nora probably
doesn’t have the time for a baby, but Annabel might, and he’s pretty
sure she likes kids. She likes her sister’s, at any rate.

He calls her on the mirror he keeps on at his desk, and when she
answers she’s in the middle of putting up her hair. Based on that and
the angle, he assumes she’s speaking to him from her vanity. “My
lord,” she greets cheerfully, carefully pinning her mass of hair in
place. “What can I do for you?”

“We’re getting another baby,” he says. “I’m pretty sure if I try and
give Randolph any more kids, he’ll revolt.” The old man loves kids,
but he'ss currently raising three of them, and although Draco’s pretty
sure he’ll continue happily taking them until his house is bursting at
the seams, his wife can only handle so much before she snaps and
tracks Draco down to strangle him.
Annabel’s whole face lights up, which is a good sign. “Yes! We’ll take
him. Her. Them. Absolutely.” He hadn’t expected it to be that easy.
He must look surprised, because she says, “We’ve actually been
talking about it. I told Nora when she proposed that I wanted a lot of
kids, but she doesn’t feel like it’s a good time because she’s not
home often enough. But unless her career tanks, she’ll never be
home often enough, so there’s no point in waiting as far as I’m
concerned. I’ll check with her, but she already agreed in theory.”

“Why didn’t you talk to me?” he asks. “Just because I’m a professor
doesn’t mean I’m slacking on my duties as the family head.” He
hopes it doesn’t, at least. Have people been saying something?

She shrugs, “Honestly, Nora still wants to wait, but if there’s a baby
in need of a family, then we’re not going to turn them away. Let me
talk to my wife. I’ll call you tomorrow.” He nods, and she adds on,
“No one thinks you’re shirking your duties. We know you’re busy. But
we also know you’ll come if we need you.”

Oh, that’s good. He should really work on seeming less transparent.

“Talk to Nora, and let me know.”

“You should consider taking one of the kids,” she says, “You don’t
have an Heir, you know.”

He wrinkles his nose. His life is more than enough of a disaster

without adding a child to it. That’s a later problem. “No thanks. Keep
it up, and I’ll name Luna the Heir.”

“She’d be great at it, and Xeno would be furious, which is always a

plus,” she says, then blows him a kiss. His mirror shimmers as she
disappears from it. He marks down a couple more possibilities, and
then taps the family tree with his wand, banishing it back to the
manor.

He’s halfway through Dacia Zabini’s proposal for the potions club
when Milly pops into existence next to him. “Professor Granger is
being here for you.”
On one hand, he’s legitimately busy, but on the other, he doesn’t
want Hermione to think he’s avoiding her, which can only end in her
attempting to set him on fire. “Let her in.”

By the time he steps out his office, Hermione is sitting cross legged
in one of his chairs by the fire, a thick scroll held in her hands. “I
have some questions about the House,” she says, bushy hair pinned
in a bun on top of her head.

“It’s only been two days, how do you have that many questions?” he
asks, looking at her scroll in trepidation. She’s in his quarters, it’s too
late to run, so he just sits on the edge of his couch closest to her. He
snaps his fingers a couple of times, and by the time he’s done a
steaming pot of tea and two cups are on the table.

She glares at it, but seems to decide to pick her battles, and says,
“Actually, I wrote this the night we got back, but Ron said I shouldn’t
ambush you the next morning. So, I gave you two days. Aren’t I
nice?”

“Your kindness is appreciated,” he says dryly. He pours himself a cup

of tea, then says, “Okay, go ahead.”

“Why all the secrecy?” she asks. “What’s the point of hiding
everything?”

Now he’s just confused. “What secrecy? The House has been
meeting once a month on the full moon for over a thousand years.
Everyone knows. Besides, someone takes notes of what’s discussed
at every meeting, as well as how much blood was spilled, and it’s
stored in the library archives. In triplicate. It’s no more of a secret
than the Wizengamot meetings.”

“I didn’t know it was happening,” Hermione points out, “Neither did

Harry.”

“But Ron did, and Neville, and Luna, and a whole bunch of other
people,” he says. “Muggle raised folk are the minority in the magical
world. It’s not our fault you don’t know what’s going on. When
Dumbledore proposed that Muggle Studies be altered to be about
muggles in the early nineteen hundreds, most of the House was
against it.”

“But you let it happen,” she says.

He rolls his eyes, “Contrary to popular belief, we don’t actually

control everything that happens. We just try and know about it and
influence it. That doesn’t mean we succeed.”

“So, what, for nearly a hundred years you let muggleborns remain
ignorant? You let them be hunted down and prosecuted, for what,
exactly? Because Dumbledore changed the curriculum, so you all
threw your hats in and gave up?” she asks angrily.

He raises a hand. “Being against muggleborns is a new prejudice.

That didn’t start until the fifties, at least on a large scale. Of course,
people have always held prejudices, the Flints practically seem to
collect them, but there’s a difference between a few people being
assholes and a social movement. So, you’re right, we did nothing.
We didn’t think a few people not being raised knowing about the
world would break us. The House thought they would learn. That
even if there wasn’t formal classes about it, that it would be
impossible not to pick up. We were wrong,” he says firmly. “Maybe if
Voldemort hadn’t come to power, then everything would have worked
itself out, then it would have gone like the House thought it would.
But he did, and it didn’t. Ignorance was bred on both sides, and
anger, and Voldemort used that to make the war into something
other than how it started, and our whole society suffered for it.”

“So it’s Voldemort’s fault?” she asks, lips pressed in a tight line.

He’d love to say yes. He’d love to lay all the blame at the madman’s
feet, dust off his hand of the mess, and walk away. But he can’t. “No.
Voldemort came to power because people let him. Ignorant people
will always exist in one way or another, but people not knowing any
better isn’t an excuse for a thirty year guerilla civil war. Everyone
should have known, and someone should have stopped him.” This
hurts to say, but he has to say it, it’s only fair. “If my father had been
a Lord true to his oaths to protect magic, he wouldn’t have followed
Voldemort. He should have known better. He should have tried to
stop him. And maybe he would have died trying, but that was his
duty as Lord. To die for our people, and for the magic. But he didn’t.”

“You’re talking as if the war started over something other than blood
purity,” Hermione says, “but it wasn’t. All the history books say the
same thing. Voldemort initially gained power championing blood
purity and the exclusion of those who were not pure. How could
anyone support that and not be awful?”

“Because the modern notion of blood purity and the historical one
are different,” he answers. “Blood is magic, remember. Magic purity.
What that war began as, what every war before it was about, was
keeping the muggles away from us and away from our world. When
Voldemort’s war began, it wasn’t about muggleborns, or torture, or
any of that. It was about isolationism. The muggles were in the midst
of their own terrible war, using weapons so powerful that even we
feared them. People wanted to retreat, to hide, to go deeper and
closer to one another where muggles couldn’t unknowingly hurt us
with their war. More than a few wizards died from bombs dropped
across London.”

“They were already so separate,” she says slowly, “it wouldn’t have
been that much of a stretch to retreat even further apart.” She has an
odd look on her face, and Draco can only assume it’s occurring to
her that wizards have watched muggles face inhumane atrocities
throughout history, and done… nothing. At least as a society.

He nods, “Most people were in favor of it. People didn’t see why they
should have to die for a war they weren’t apart of and hadn’t started.
But there were a few problems. We weren’t a totally separate nation.
Halfbloods and muggleborns existed, and they had a connection to
the muggle world, had families they wanted to protect, that they
couldn’t abandon. But in refusing to either leave them behind or stay
with them in the muggle world, they placed the rest of the wizarding
world in danger. They wanted the wizards to get involved in the war,
to help, to fight. Some purebloods agreed and were of the opinion
that we stop hiding and help, while others were opposed, and said
that if we had to brake the secrecy laws it should not be in the middle
of a muggle war that threatened to wipe us out entirely.” He rubs the
back of his neck, and glances into the fire because he doesn’t want
to chance looking at her face. “That’s how the war started.
Halfbloods have been looked down on due to their parents’ choices
for a long time, but it wasn’t this violent, and muggleborns were
considered pure, a gift of magic. That’s how it began . This is how it
ended.”

“Well, how it ended is crap, and since you lot have so much power,
you should do something about it,” Hermione says, fire in her eyes.

Draco can’t even say he’s surprised. This is the woman who
champions the rights of house elves, for merlin’s sake. “What do you
want done?”

Surprise flickers over her face, like she expected him to argue with
her. “Reinstate the original muggle studies course, for one thing.
Dumbledore’s been dead for eight years, and nothing’s changed.
Your study group is helping, but only the kids in Slytherin, and it’s not
enough.” She bites her bottom lip, “I still think wizarding kids learning
about the muggle world is valuable, though. There’s so much of it.
There’s not needing something, and then there’s putting your head in
the sand and ignore the other ninety nine percent of the world.”

He initially thought Hermione was going to attempt to murder him for

holding the classes, and now she’s actively supporting them. His life
is so strange. “Keep the muggle studies class as is. Do I think
learning about muggles is inherently valuable? No.” She glares, but
this can’t be new information to her. “But I don’t think Ancient Greek
is inherently valuable ether, and it’s still an elective.”

“So we add a new class, a required one,” she says, “for the
muggleborns. Or even muggle raised.”
“Potter is a rarity, but yes, I agree,” he says. “However, I feel the
need to point out that introducing students to these concepts as first
years is more useful to them than leaving them to flounder for two
years and then forcing them to take it.”

“It’s also unfair that muggleborns gets one of their elective choices
taken away,” Hermione admits. “I agree they need to know it. But we
need to make it fair.”

Draco thinks the fair part is that they didn’t have to grow up
memorizing family trees until their eyes felt like they were bleeding,
but he knows Hermione isn’t going to buy that for a second.
“Replace History of Magic. Or alter it, I guess. Instead of being about
goblin wars that no one cares about, have it be about the actual
history of magic, the house and our traditions, all of it.” She opens
her mouth to argue, but Draco says, “Be honest, how useful was
Professor Binn’s class?”

She sighs and admits, “Not very. Fine, say we alter the curriculum so
History of Magic is about wizarding tradition and society. The
purebloods and other kids who already know it won’t want to take it,
nor should they have to. Now they’ll have a gap in their schedule.”
She sits up straight with a gleam in his eyes he knows he’s going to
grow to hate. “They should take Muggle Studies as a required class
instead.”

“No,” he says immediately, “Absolutely not.”

“It’s perfect,” she insists. “All of your sort want the muggleborns
educated about wizarding society, and all my sort want the wizards
educated about muggle society. Those in the middle don’t care, and
you’re right, absolutely no one is attached to History of Magic as is,
except maybe Binns.”

The thing is, she’s right, but he hates it. And he’s considered to be a
moderate as far as the house is concerned. “It will never pass.”
“It’s the only way it will pass,” she insists. “We’ll have it so taking one
of the two classes is a requirement for the first two years. After that,
they can both be electives.” He’s scowling, but she only shrugs.
“Look, intended or not, Voldemort’s war turned an ignorance about
muggles, muggleborns, and halfbloods into a hatred that ended in
thousands dead on both sides. Maybe you and I didn’t make this
mess, but we have to fix it. This will fix it.”

“This will get the other Lords and Ladies out for my head,” he glares.
Then, reluctantly, “Giving the kids three electives to choose from will
be popular, at least. You’re not the only one who thought having only
two was unfair. My mother just paid for a tutor over the summer, but
not everyone has that.”

“Especially the muggleborns,” Hermione says. “They can’t do that,

it’s not even an option, regardless of money. This will work, Draco.”

He can already feel a headache building at the base of his skull. He

regrets becoming friendly with Hermione Granger. “Fine. We’ll work
on it. You work on a proposal for a revised Muggle Studies class, I’ll
do one for a revised History of Magic, and we’ll turn them into
something that both sides won’t spit back in our faces. If we can get
an organized proposal together by the holidays, there’s a slim
chance we can push it through in time for the changes to take effect
next year.” Lord Flint is going try to poison him. Lord Brown will
support it, at least.

“How long should it be?” she asks. “I’ve never introduced new
legislation before.”

“About three feet to start, then we’ll go from there.” He eyes the
scroll in her hand, “How many questions did all that answer?”

“Three,” she says. Draco’s face drops, but she gets to her feet. “We
can shelve the rest for later, I have a proposal to work on.”

He stands to walk her to the door, but she waves him aside, and he
drops back down. “How considerate of you.”
“I saw Harry this morning, by the way,” she says, doing a very poor
attempt at seeming casual. “I liked the sweater he was wearing. It
looked good on him.”

There are times when Hermione’s obviously a genius, and then

there’s now, when he thinks she has to be insane. “That’s nice?”

It’s not until she’s out the door that he remembers that he lent Potter
his sweater this morning. It’s a good thing there’s no one around to
see how his whole face turns an unbecoming shade of red.

i hope you liked it!

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Chapter 8
Chapter 8

me: oh i'll mention house elves a bit, but won't get into, and then we'll
finally get into some romance!

also me: here's another chapter of people sitting around and talking
about world building i guess

note: before anyone feels the need to jump down my throat for not
explaining everything all at once, no, this isn't the last we'll see of
house elves, and this isn't the final word on it.

(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)

Draco is pretty sure that Filius is full of crap. “Wand movements

aren’t necessary for summoning charms, they’re just strongly
recommended.”

“They’re necessary if you’re to do it safely and well,” he answers.

“Just because you’ve been playing with fire since your school years
by vanishing your cousin’s shoes doesn’t mean that’s behavior we
like to encourage.”

He spends his mornings studying Flitwick’s office, because his

evenings are quickly becoming cramped. He has the muggleborn
classes, and he can let Liam take the reins on that mostly, but he still
has to make an appearance at least once a week. Then there’s
Dacia’s potions club, which he doesn’t want to approve and
supervise, but he just knows that the alternative involves them
brewing dangerous potions anyway, just without him to keep an eye
on them. Plus all the prep and grading for his own classes, and
keeping on top of account.
All of that, of course, pales in comparison to having Hermione
barging into his rooms at least twice a week to yell at him about
magic and politics, like he has anything to do with it besides being
the product of it. He’d be more irritated, but apparently she’s doing
the same to Neville and Luna, so he supposes he’s getting off light,
all things considered.

Draco could really use a time turner, though. He’s getting to the point
where he’s willing to straight up commit murder if meant getting
twelve straight hours of sleep.

“The twist at the end just gives it a path to follow as it vanishes,” he

argues. “If you don’t care where you’re vanishing something to, then
it doesn’t matter at all. And if you do care, then just concentrate and
don’t get distracted, it’s not that hard.”

“Just concentrate and don’t get distracted,” Filius repeats, amused.

“Well, that covers nearly all magic, so not incorrect advice, I
suppose.”

Filius is mocking him. Draco’s going to banish the stack of books

he’s standing on right from beneath his feet, and then maybe he
won’t be so mug. Draco’s not even going to use the wand movement
to do it, either.

“Did you finish the essay I assigned?” Filius asks before he can put
his plan into action.

“In all my spare time?” he drawls, but, well, he did. He taps his wand
against the air, and a thick scroll falls into Filius’s hands.

He weighs it in his hands then break out in a smile. “Very good,

Draco.”

When he starts smiling at receiving the same praise he gives his

house elves, it’s probably a sign that his life is spiraling violently out
of control, and he should do something about that.
He thinks he likes it, though. This whole professor thing isn’t turning
out to be nearly as bad as he thought it’d be.

The kids are all right, as far as kids go, and his coworkers aren’t
nearly terrible as he thought they’d be. Hermione is actually one of
the more tolerable people he spends his time around.

If only he could get some sleep, then he supposes he wouldn’t have

too much to complain about, really.

His elves don’t even bother telling him that Hermione is here
anymore. They just let her in and get out her way, because they’re
smart elves.

“I have a question,” she says, pushing open the door to his office.
He’d try a locking charm, but he’s pretty sure it wouldn’t work, and
would just make her mad.

“I’m shocked. Stunned. This is unprecedented. I don’t know if I’ll ever

quite recover,” he answers, not looking up from the fourth years’
potions quizzes. They did surprisingly well. Either he’s a better
teacher than he thought, or they’re all a bunch of cheaters.

He’s going with the latter. But he didn’t catch any of them in the act,
so he’s tempted to let it slide. Banding together to cheat on his
assignments isn’t the inter-house unity he was looking for, but he’s
not about to take it for granted either. Maybe if he makes the tests
ridiculously hard on purpose they’ll keep doing it, and keep working
with each other? Or they’ll just have a nervous breakdown in the
middle of class.

Either is sure to be entertaining, so he doesn’t have much reason not

to do it.

Hermione glares at him, hardly a new experience, but the way she
glares at him is different than it used to be. She rarely looks genuine
angry when she’s talking to him now, there’s always an edge of
warmth to temper the exasperation, and he has no idea what to do
with it. “You’re doing the adoption ceremony tomorrow, right?”

“Yes,” he answers. His cousin must have managed to get her wife on
board, because Nora had been the one to call him back the next day
to tell him that they’d take the child.

“And you’ve taken other halfblood children into your family before?”

“Yes,” he answers again. “And muggleborns, and pureblood children

who’s families hadn’t made it through the war.”

She takes a seat across from his desk and pulls out her scroll. “Does
anyone ever have a hard time adjusting? With being a Malfoy but
being a halfblood?”

Well, that’s easy. “No. They might have trouble adjusting for different
reasons, but there’s no doubt about their place as a Malfoy.” She
taps the desk to get him to stop writing and looks at him dubiously.
“You’re still thinking like a muggle. Stop that.”

“Oh, well, if you insist, I’ll just erase eleven years worth of memories
while I lived as a muggle,” she says, rolling her eyes.

“That would be ideal,” he answers, then, before she can yell at him,
he continues. “It’s a blood adoption. A magical adoption. A bit of the
family magic will be transferred to the child. They’re a Malfoy from
that point on, no matter what else happens after that, just as if they’d
been born into it. They get a place on the family tapestry just like
everyone else.”

“Family tapestry?” Hermione asks eagerly. “Can I see it?”

He sighs. He wants to say no almost just so she doesn’t have

anything else to ask more questions about, but he doesn’t think that
will work. “It doesn’t leave the manor.” He bites his bottom lip,
considering, and maybe Hermione’s spending too much time with
him, because she’s not arguing. She can see he’s thinking of
something, and is giving him the space to do it.

She’s not a member of his family, so he can’t give her unrestricted

access. He trusts her, which he hadn’t expected, but trust doesn’t
have anything to do with it. It’s just… something he can’t do.
Tradition, expectations, precedent, or some combination of all three.

But he can bend the rules a little.

“Dax,” he says, “a moment.” There’s crack so loud that Hermione

jerk to cover her ears, but by then there’s not point. He should have
warned her, but it hadn’t occurred to him that he’d need to.

Standing in front of him is a house elf, old and sturdy, steady in a

way most house elves aren’t. But most elves aren’t as old or as
experienced. “Lord Malfoy,” he greets.

“This is Hermione Granger,” he says, and Dax inclines his head.

Hermione does the same after a moment, stiff and uncertain. He
also should have probably told her that Dax was part of the older
crowd, although he doesn’t know if that would have meant anything
to her. “I want her added to the wards. She’s allowed access to the
sitting room, kitchens, and the library. Understand?”

“Of course, Lord Malfoy,” Dax says. If he’s surprised by this request,
he doesn’t show it. He snaps his fingers, and a silver dagger
appears along with a small smoky quartz bowl. “Miss Granger, if you
don’t mind.”

He holds out the items to her, but she hesitates to take them. “Am I
supposed to bleed into that?”

“Dax needs your blood to add you to the wards,” he answers.

“Just an ounce is fine, Miss,” he says, offering the dagger to her

handle first.
She still doesn’t take it. “If I give you my blood, am I agreeing to fall
under your lordship or house?”

He’s too impressed to be insulted. “Clever. But no. That’s a more

formal affair. Besides, you can’t be sheltered, you’re the wife of a
blood traitor, which means you’re a blood traitor too,” he points out,
which isn’t a hundred percent accurate, but he doesn’t want to get
into the nitty gritty details of it right now. He just wants to finish
grading his papers. She gets a look on her face that he’s fast
becoming familiar with, one that says she’s thinking of more
questions than he can possibly answer. “Blood first.”

She rolls her eyes and finally takes the dagger. She makes a shallow
cut along her upper arm and lets the warm red blood drip and
splatter across the sides of the bowl. That’s how she stays for nearly
a minute until Dax says, “That will do, Miss,” and snaps his fingers.

The wound on her upper arms closes and heals like it was never
there. Dax nods at them both then disappears with a crack. “He
didn’t call you Master,” Hermione says.

“Dax isn’t under contract,” he explains. “After a hundred years of

service, we just assumed he wouldn’t try and scratch our faces off if
we forgot to leave milk out.” She keeps staring at him, so he clarifies,
“That was a joke. The elves harvest their own moon orchids these
days, and Dax has been with the family since before contracts were
standard affairs.”

She just keeps staring at him, and he really does have to finish
grading these quizzes, so he wishes she would hurry this all up.
Instead, she asks, “What the hell are you talking about?”

He really doesn’t have time for this. “Ask your husband.” He doesn’t
even know what she’s confused about this time. She knows all about
the contracts, it’s what she keeps protesting whenever anyone
brings them up around her. Keeps on insisting that flowers aren’t
appropriate compensation for indentured servitude, or something. He
doesn’t know, it’s not like he bothered to pay attention to her before
she steamrolled herself into his social circle.

“I’m asking you,” she says.

Merlin’s beard. He likes Hermione, but he has grading to finish, and,

as she pointed out, an adoption ceremony to officiate tomorrow. He’s
on a tight schedule. “Expecto patronum!” A silvery lynx pours out of
his wand. “Go get Luna. Tell her that Hermione has some questions
and won’t leave me alone.” She twitches her whiskers, then goes
bounding away and through the wall. “I have to get this done, but
you can ask Luna. I don’t know why you’re so reluctant to ask your
friends these questions.”

“I do ask them, but they worry too much about hurting my feelings,
and I like making you do it,” she answers, then sits down across from
him and takes half of his remaining quizzes. “Here, I’ll help you
grade until she gets here.”

He eyes her suspiciously, but she was always right behind him in
potions, and right above in everything else except charms, so he has
no reason to doubt her. A few minutes later, Luna pushes open the
door to his office, but she’s not alone. Neville is behind her, which
means he was probably with her when she got the message and
isn’t that interesting.

“Hello, cousin,” she says cheerfully, sitting on the corner of his desk.
Neville, a normal human being, takes the chair next to Hermione.
“What questions?”

“Is Dax under contract?” he asks.

She snorts. Neville is appalled. “Careful where you say that!

Remember what happened to my Great Great Uncle Simon?”

“May he rest in peace,” Draco says solemnly.

“Pieces,” Luna corrects. “That’s what he gets for trying to negotiate
with his elf.”

Hermione, irritated, knocks her knuckles against the top of the table.
“What are you guys talking about?”

“We had a family elf,” Neville explains, “she’d worked for us for a few
generations, with no contract, and then my uncle tried to talk to her
about getting her a bigger garden since she’d worked for us for so
long. She tore him apart for the insult, and we haven’t seen her
since. My grandmother was only a little girl when it happened, and
she was heartbroken. She loved that elf.”

“No contract,” Hermione says. “How can an elf be attached to a

family without a contract? I thought that was the whole point.”

“I mean, these days uncontracted elves are a bit of rarity,” Neville

says. “But Dax has been serving the Malfoy family for what - three
hundred years? Four hundred? A contract at this point would just be
insulting. And insulting your house elves ends in death.”

Draco is back to grading, but he’s still keeping half an ear on the
conversation around him. He’d tell them all to get lost and to let him
suffer in peace, but it’s… kind of nice to have people around while he
works.

Not long after, his door opens, and he looks up just in time to see
Potter frozen in his entryway with his borrowed sweater clutched in
front of his chest like a shield. “Er,” he says, looking at everyone with
wide eyes. “I just, uh, I wanted to,” he holds out the sweater in
Draco’s direction.

Potter is a disaster. Also very, very dangerous. Not because of the

whole famous auror, dark lord killer thing, although that’s impressive
and all. But because he’s standing there looking like an idiot, clearly
embarrassed as he holds out the borrowed sweater, and Draco, for
some inexplicable reason, feels fond of him.
Dangerous.

He flicks his wand, and his sweater vanishes out of Potter’s hands
and back to his rooms. “Thanks, Potter.”

“Uh, yes,” he says, green eyes wide behind his ridiculous glasses.
He takes one cautious step back, but then Neville leans back in his
chair, grabs his wrist, and drags him over to join their odd semi
circle. Draco doesn’t think he deserves this. He was just trying to get
some grading done, like a responsible professor.

Luna transfigures a paperweight into what a farsighted person might

describe as a stool, and Neville pushes Potter into it as Hermione
scoots her chair over to give him more room. Potter catches his
eyes, looking uncertain and uncomfortable, and it’s not like Draco’s
the one who dragged him into this, it’s not his problem. “What are
you waiting for, an engraved invitation?” he asks sarcastically, and
Potter relaxes, just like he knew he would. “Although, wouldn’t it be
easier for you all to go somewhere else, maybe?”

They ignore him, like it’s not his office they’re in and his desk they’re
crowded around. Whatever. Don’t they have some actual work to
do? All of them except Neville are professors, and he’s an
apprentice, so he should be up to his ears and work. Draco became
a Lord and begin his potions mastery at the same time, and that was
one really terrible year. Not quite as bad as Voldemort living in his
house and torturing him and his family on a regular basis, but pretty
up there. They can sit around him and talk about whatever they
want, he has actual work to do.

He just drowns out what they’re saying, and has gotten mostly
through the quizzes and is just considering if he has the energy to
tackle the sixth year essays when Luna says, “They’re brownies,
Hermione, not children.”

He really hopes he’s missed some part of the conversation, or else

he’s going to have to stop directing Hermione to Luna for questions.
“What did you say? Don’t tell her we eat them!” That certainly won’t
help her deluded campaign.

“The muggle myth,” Luna says, reaching over to flick him in the
forehead. It barely even stings, but he’s still offended. “Brownies.
Little folk who enter the homes of muggles and clean at night, can
become invisible, and who expect milk or cream left out for them for
their efforts.”

Oh, right, he forgot the muggles used to know about them. Back
when things were less - divided. They used to know about a lot of
things.

“Those were house elves?” she asks. “Or were they just like them?”

“No, they were house elves,” Neville says. “You can probably find
some that are still around from then, who might have served a mixed
house.”

“Mixed?” Hermione asks, and he doesn’t miss the way her eyes dart
over Harry.

Luna doesn’t either. “Not mixed like me, or like Harry. Mixed as in
muggle and magical people in the same house. House elves only
appear from magical homes, but one or two witches or wizards was
enough to qualify back then.”

“Wish it hadn’t been,” he grumbles, “If we hadn’t had as many house

elves then, maybe I wouldn’t have so many now .”

Neville laughs at him, but joke’s on him. His family has almost as
many house elves he does, Augusta just spreads them out more.
One day it’s going to be Neville’s problem to manage all of that, and
then it will be Draco’s turn to laugh.

“But they’re not slaves in the myths!” Hermione protests. “Or as good
as. I don’t see how an eternal bond is worth some flowers.”
“And they don’t get milk like they did in the myths either,” Luna points
out. “It was always the moon orchids. We just used to harvest them
for the elves. We stopped because a couple finally got around to
saying we were awful at it and doing it all wrong, so we just grow
them and let them to what they want with them. Also, the bond isn’t
forever, just as long as we keep providing moon orchids. If we stop
providing orchids, then they’re free to kill us. Isn’t that nice?”

Harry scrunches his face up, and Draco thinks adorable before he
reign his thoughts back. “I don’t get it. Why do elves care so much
about some flowers?”

“They eat them,” Hermione says. “They can survive on a variety of

magical plants, or latant magic if there’s enough of it, but there
usually isn’t. Moon orchid is their favorite, but it’s difficult and
expensive to grow. It’s usually only found on the grounds of wizard’s
homes and in the forbidden forest.”

“They can grow other places,” Neville objects. “But the elves won’t
eat them. At that point, they’re just pretty flowers. Besides, the whole
reason we have this house elf problem is because the magic’s dying
to begin with. Before, it didn’t matter. Moon orchids could be grown
from almost any flower seed as long as it was planted in soil that had
been mixed in a witch or wizard’s blood.”

“Why would someone do that?” Harry asks, appalled. Hermione’s too

invested in the answer to be grossed out. Typical.

Luna shrugs. “House elves would just show up and start working.
Once an elf decided it was cleaning your home, you had two options.
You could either start growing moon orchids as a way to graciously
return their kind favor, or you could slowly let your sparkling home
spiral into chaos as the house elf got more and more upset that you
weren’t feeding it and didn’t want it’s obviously superior help
cleaning your home. Sometimes angry elves would just cause
mischief, sometimes they would break things or hurt people.
Sometimes people died.”
“Which wasn’t a big deal to the house elf, because there were far
more wizards than there were elves, and they’d eventually find
someone who was down for cleaning in return for some flowers,”
Neville continues. “But then the witch trials happened. Or, well, got
worse, because they’d pretty much always been happening. And the
magic shrank, for lack of a better term, and average wizards and
witches couldn’t make their own moon orchids anymore. So the
elves went to those who still could. Which was those with ancestral
homes. Now, we’re stuck on too many elves, not enough wizards,
which is how we got to contracts. The elves do as they’re told and
don’t destroy our homes or kill us, and we continue to provide moon
orchids.”

“I have a whole acre dedicated to the damn things,” Draco says.

“Since the manor is the ancestral ground for my family, all the elves
go to the Malfoy grounds to collect theirs.”

“What was going on with Dobby, then?” Hermione asks suspiciously.

“He wanted to be free.”

Draco snorts. “He didn’t want to be under contract, which my family

wasn’t going to do. Notice the first thing he did was come work for
Hogwarts, where he could have his fill of moon orchids.” He
hesitates, but so far being honest with Hermione hasn’t backfired on
him, so he says, “Dobby was the strangest house elf I’ve ever seen,
and no one was upset to see him gone. He routinely caused twice as
many problems as he solved. But my father’s method of trying to
beat the disobedience out of him was ineffective, and cruel. He didn’t
want to free him because he was trying to prevent Dobby from
turning into a boggart, but that’s not an excuse.”

Neville is looking at him strangely, and Luna is grinning so wide her

face looks like it’s going to break in half. They should both stop that
right now.

“From turning into a what? ” Hermione demands, and merlin, is there

never any end to her questions?’
“Unattached, morose house elves turn into boggarts given enough
time,” Harry says impatiently. “I’ve seen it happen. But, not that is
isn’t fascinating and all, but can we go back a bit? Wizards and
muggles lived together?” he asks, incredulous. “But we’re so
separate now! Why did we stop?”

Everyone goes quiet, and Draco knows Harry’s an idiot, but he can’t
be this stupid. The reason’s a little hard to miss, even for a
dunderhead. “The witch trials,” Hermione says. “All the books say it.
After the witch trials, everything changed.”

“Not,” Luna clears her throat, “not exactly.”

“Things have never been easy, historically speaking,” Neville says.

“Instances, of course, have been positive. Pockets of peace.”

“Which always gives morons false hope that we’ll have it again,”
Draco says acidly. “That it’s sustainable and practical and won’t end
up with more dead wizards and more magic lost.”

“We might. Just because it’s never been done doesn’t mean it can’t
be done,” Hermione argues.

“Well, keep me and mine out of it. If you want to kill what’s left of our
society forever, you won’t be using my people to do it,” he answers,
glaring.

She’s not actually trying to start a fight with him, so she just sighs
and rolls her eyes. “We keep having our own wars and killing
ourselves every few decades, I’m not sure why you think there’s that
much of difference. Not that I think it would necessarily all fall into
war, mind you.”

“That’s different,” Luna says before he can. “When we kill each other,
the magic stays. When they kill us, it’s gone forever.”

He doesn’t even have to look at them to know Hermione and Harry

have no idea what they’re talking about. “Borrowed, not given.
Earned, not taken,” he says, echoing what Liam said at the first
Muggleborn class. “It’s not who kills who that matters. It’s what’s
done with the bodies.” He swallows, looks at Harry, and says, “If
nothing else, never forgive Dumbledore for what he did with your
parents’ bodies. Leaving them to rot in a muggle cemetery was
despicable. They were Lord and Lady Potter, and should have been
treated accordingly.”

Harry doesn’t seem mad at him, which is nice, but Draco doesn’t
think he really understands him either.

“That’s how you give it back,” Hermione says, eyes alight. “Isn’t it?
Bodies.”

“Not pretty, and not free,” he answers. He wants to hit himself. He’d
known she hadn’t known the specifics, but he’d assumed she’d
known the basics, because everyone knew the basics, but clearly
they didn’t and he really needed to stop assuming they did. “Wizards
don’t have graveyards. We just have ancestral homes.”

“From the earth we came, and into the earth we go,” Luna quips.
“We have graveyards now, but it’s still on ancestral earth, so it
amounts to about the same. It’s just that it doesn’t stay within one
family anymore.”

Neville shrugs, “Which isn’t so bad, really. Less Lords and Ladies,
which isn’t ideal, but still magic, still wizards and witches, so it’s
different, but it’s there.”

“But not those killed in the witch trials,” Draco says. “Burned or
drowned, most of the time. Hanging, which gave us a chance,
because sometimes those bodies were buried. But that meant
opening up a fresh grave and stealing the body, all without being
caught. And it’s not like we knew who exactly was a witch or wizard,
and who was just an unlucky muggle caught in the crossfire, so it’s
very possible that even if someone managed to steal the body and
rebury it in time, it might not even be a witch or wizard, just a muggle
who’s not going to do any good besides fertilizer. Tracking charms
weren’t as good back then.”

Neville adds, “Some people say that anyone with magic could just
escape, but that’s just not true. Back then, we were split up, and
those that lived among muggles were the only magical person, or
one of a half dozen or so in the village. Cities were safer, but not by
much. So a witch could only escape if they had their wand, and no
one was looking, and they had a place to go. Which meant many of
them never escaped at all. They just died.”

Potter seems horrified, but Hermione is fascinated. “Explain that all

again, but slower, and more.”

“We weren’t born,” Neville says with patience than Draco has.
“Witches and wizards were made. Some ancestors long ago struck a
deal with some forgotten gods, or gathered magic for willow trees, or
the sun cracked open and we swallowed what came out. The details
are all different, but the core of it is the same.”

“We were muggles once,” Luna says. “The magic we have is

borrowed. It doesn’t belong to us, and we won’t be getting any more
of it. So once it’s gone, it’s gone forever.”

Or so they say. It’s a at the intersection of myth and religion, and

Draco doesn’t know which it is, and he doesn’t care. He just knows
the numbers add up, so how exactly they got here doesn’t matter
much. It just matters that they’re here, and that the rules they’re
living by seem to work.

“Where do you think all those empty seats in the House came from?”
Draco asks. “There are ancestral lands all across the world. Legends
say they’re the places where the sun’s touch first fell, or where the
first magic users were buried. It doesn’t matter why. We each contain
magic and the ability to control it. When we die, that magic has to go
somewhere. If we’re buried in the right land, we get to keep it.
Another magical child will be born, and magic will live on. But if not, if
our bodies are not put back in the earth in the right way, before a
certain time, the magic is just - gone. Forever.”

“How do you know if it’s before that certain time?” Hermione asks,
eyes wide.

Luna says, “Tracking spells work on corpses for about the first week
after death, because the magic is still there. Once it’s gone, then
there’s no point. It’s just a body. We’ll bury it, and we’ll mourn, but
the magic won’t come back.”

“Unless it’s a battlefield,” Neville says grimly. “Ancestral lands can be

made, with enough blood. Maybe they were all made, and we’ve just
forgotten.”

Draco snorts. “With enough blood, you can make anything.” He

gestures to the floor, “Hogwarts was built on the ancestral lands of
Helga Hufflepuff and Godric Gryffindor. Their land bordered each
other, so when it came time to make Hogwarts, the stuck it slap dab
in the middle of their property line. The Gryffindor common room is
on the side that used to be Hufflepuff’s land, and the Hufflepuff
common room is on the Gryffindor side.”

“Diagon Alley is ancestral land,” Neville says, “all the graveyards,

and most of the pureblood families have some too. It’s their ancestral
homes. With some runes, dedication, and, well, enough blood, it’s
possible to keep it in the family, so to speak.” He turns to Draco,
“When your family came over from France, how many feet down did
you bring over?”

“Twenty feet down, across about ten acres,” he answers. “Refilling

the place we’d left in France with muggle earth apparently took
weeks.”

Hermione frowns, then asks, “Do moon orchids only grow from
ancestral lands?”
She really is the cleverest of them all. It’d be irritating if he could stop
being so impressed.

“Do moon orchids only grow from earth that contains wizard’s bodies
and who knows how much blood?” Draco asks. “Yes.” Neville makes
a face, because there are a few ways to make them away from
ancestral lands, but none of them are worth the trouble.

“So right below us, and below all the old homes, and even Diagon
Alley,” Potter says slowly, “are… bodies?”

“No coffins, no preservation, just a death shroud,” Luna says.

“Hundreds of thousands of them. Because magic isn’t free.”

“So, what, if people aren’t buried in the proper place, we just lose
magic?” he asks. “That seems… How do we know that’s how it
works?”

Draco wants to be irritated with him, but can’t quite bring himself to
do it. Like he said, dangerous. Potter is dangerous. “The empty
seats at the House. The lower birth rates. The dozens of empty
classrooms in Hogwarts alone. There used to be more of us. And we
can’t just all agree to have a lot of kids for a few generations and call
it a day. The magic is gone. At a certain point, we’ll just end up as
squibs.”

Luna twists her body over his desk to elbow him in the side. “It’s not
quite that dire. Yet. We’d have to continue on for about a thousand
more years just as we are to die out completely.”

“But if we do continue on, just as we are, then we will die out?”

Hermione asks. “That can’t be right. Magic is - there’s so much of it.
We can’t just lose it.”

“We’re running out, and we’re running low. There’s only one source
of new magic we have, and this past war nearly destroyed it,” Draco
says.
Hermione gets up from her chair to glare down at him. She can only
get the height advantage while he’s sitting. “Well, what is it then?”

He tilts his head back and looks up to meet her angry brown eyes.
“You.”

Her mouth falls open. It’s clearly not what she was expecting. She
has to swallow before she can say, “What?”

“You,” he says again. “Muggleborns are the only new source of

magic we’ve been able to find. Your magic doesn’t feel like anyone
else’s. It’s new . People have tried everything - inadvisable congress
with magical creatures, dark rituals, the worst sort of potions made
out of the remains of - well, you get the idea. For hundreds, probably
thousands, of years, people have been trying to find a new source of
magic, because it’s been steadily declining for that long. But we’ve
only found one. Muggleborns.”

“Not like us,” Luna says, smiling, “The first of us were made.
Supposedly. You were born. You’re special.”

“A gift from magic,” Neville adds. “That’s how muggleborns used to

be thought of. It’s how they should still be thought of, or at least their
new magic should be acknowledged, considering how desperately in
need we are of it.”

“But then there was this war. And the hundred before it, and the
witch hunts, which may have gone under different names all across
the world, but they still happened all across the world. So we kill
each other, the muggles kill us, and we kill the only ones who can
save us,” Draco says. “All this killing, and sooner or later, we won’t
be able to do it anymore. We’ll just be dead.”

There’s a long, somber silence.

Why can’t they ever have normal conversations, about their students
or quidditch or even the weather? He really needs to hang out with
Pansy and Blaise. These people are just depressing.
at some point this universe's world and rules will be explained and i'll
stop getting side tracked. i originally wanted this to be a fun
professor darry fic with a little bit of world building. and now we're
here.

feel free to follow / harass me at: shanastoryteller.tumblr.com

i post writing updates in my 'progress report' tag if that's something

you're interested in keep track of :)
Chapter 9
Chapter 9

this is the chapter i'd had outlined and meant to write before getting
sidetracked by house elf lore

(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)

Dacia Zabini is going to make a fantastic potions master one day.

But only if she manages to get through Hogwarts without blowing
herself up.

“No!” he cries, swishing his wand to prevent her from dropping the
powdered unicorn horn into her cauldron. “Why would you do that?”

“I want to see what would happen,” Dacia answers, unrepentant.

Raina looks more intrigued than horrified, which isn’t exactly

comforting. Albert makes up for it though. He takes three steps away
and is about thirty seconds away from ducking underneath a desk.
Which isn’t really necessary, but it’s nice to see someone showing
some decent judgement. No one else in Dacia’s ridiculous club does.

Draco thought that opening up the potions club to everyone would be

a simple way to help facilitate the interhouse unity that Minerva is
always harping on about. One the bright side, he was right, but on
the less bright side, it turns on that the potions club is a wildly
popular idea. Dacia is far from the only one interested in potions, and
apparently the lack of competent professors over the last couple of
years means anyone with even the slightest bit of interest is
desperate for more instruction than they get in the classrooms.
There are three students to every desk, meaning his classroom is
about as full as it can be while potions are being made without it
becoming a safety hazard.

Although, he’s pretty sure Albert is just here as part of Raina’s

crusade to turn the boy into a half decent potions maker. There are
at least three Gryffindors that Draco thinks are only here to make
sure Raina doesn’t poison him, which seems like a wasted effort. If a
Lestrange wanted to kill someone, they wouldn’t do something as
subtle as poisoning.

“What would happen is that everyone would die,” he says to Dacia,

and breaks the spell that’s holding her arm frozen. She puts down
the unicorn horn, but she doesn’t look happy about it. “You’re trying
to make a healing salve. Why did you think that would work?”

“I didn’t,” she says, “I just figured it might do something interesting. I

couldn’t find any reference to someone doing it before, and I thought
it might be cool.”

“There is reference to it, just not in the healing books, because it

doesn’t heal anything. It is a fantastic base for a bomb, however, if
that’s what you’re trying to do. Dungbombs contain trace amounts.
Not a whole tablespoon, mind you.” He looks pointedly at the large
dollop of powdered unicorn horn that’s still holding.

Mariana raises her hand. He loves Mariana. She’s just quietly

making illegal moonshine in the corner like a reasonable student,
and not trying to kill them all. “In her defense, if she’d wrapped it in a
bit of acromantular silk first, it would have made a really nice
protective shield. Which is the opposite of an explosion.”

Dacia is ignoring all of them. “Healing bomb,” she breathes, then

looks up to Draco. “Can I make one of those?”

He has no idea how that would - okay, he has a couple of ideas,

maybe, but they’re going to have to get Neville or Sprout involved.
“Make a healing salve without killing anyone first, and we can talk
about it.”
Why does she look so put about that? She’s going to give him
nightmares.

Cory, a fifth year Gryffindor and one of the few people in his year
who isn’t buckling under the pressure of the impending Owls, waves
him over. “Hey, professor! I was trying to make a face cream, but it
seems like it might be poisonous? A little? But, also very
moisturizing, so there’s that.”

Just a place to practice, Dacia said. They would only need a little
supervision. He could get some grading done while they worked.

What a load of shit. Every time he takes his eyes off them for two
seconds, they’re either almost killing themselves or others.

Draco hates to do this, because it’s just not very fair, but it’s not like
he was ever interested in playing fair anyway.

“You’re my best friends, aren’t you?” he says to his mirror, where

Blaise is taking up one side, and Pansy the other. “You have my
back when I need it, even when it’s unpleasant, because you care
about me and you know I’d do the same for you?”

Blaise is glaring at him. “I hate when you do this.”

“It’s not even going to be something fun, is it?” Pany asks. “Want us
to kill some people? Take over a small county? Run away together to
a tropical island and watch as society collapse in on itself while we
drink alcoholic beverages with little umbrellas in them?”

The specificity of that last bit is a little concerning, to be honest.

Pansy seems to enjoy helping Paige run the family affairs, but it
might just be a front. Pansy’s good at those. Maybe they should take
a vacation somewhere? “I need help grading.”

“Oh, fine,” Blaise says. “Do you have a key or a rubric or something?
You know I’m crap at potions.”
How could he forget? He corrected almost all of Blaise’s potions
homework for seven years. Or just did it, when they didn’t have the
time for Blaise to be wrong first. “Yes, I have a rubric.”

Pansy wrinkles her nose, “I guess. Why can’t you ever ask us to do
anything interesting? First snubbing us both to take Granger to the
meeting, now this? These are grave insults, Draco.”

“Don’t try that with me, you both hate going to the meetings,” he
says. “It wasn’t planned, it just happened, and she didn’t even curse
anyone over it.”

“The Flints were pissed,” Blaise points out.

He rolls his eyes, “When aren’t they pissed? They’re so grumbly and
unpleasant.”

“That’s because whoever isn’t a raging dick gets disowned,” Pansy

says wryly. “Are we coming over now? Or do I have time finish typing
out my will and testament before I die of boredom?”

“I’m coming through the floo in your quarters,” Blaise says, then
vanishes in the next moment, his side of the mirror blurring with his
absence before it settles.

It’s just Pansy taking up the other half of his mirror, and he doesn’t
want to say something presumptuous or untrue and make her mad,
but he still feels like he should say something, otherwise he’s just a
crap friend. He’s only gotten as far as opening his mouth when she
says, “Sorry, I don’t mean to be a bitch.”

“You’re not a bitch,” he says, “or, well, you’re not being one right
now. Generally, it’s pretty up in the air.”

She rolls her eyes, but she’s smiling too, so he counts it a win. “I
know that it’s important work and someone needs to do it. I just don’t
know if I want that someone to be me.”
“Neither William not Paige will make you help if you don’t want to,”
he points out. “If you want to do something else, they won’t be mad.”

“The problem is I don’t what know what the something else I would
do is,” she says. “I just know I don’t think I want to do this, or politics,
or go back to school, or - well, anything.”

Draco wishes he could say something helpful or inspiring, but he just

can’t relate. He’s known what his role in life would be since he was a
toddler, and he knew exactly what he would have to do once he got
there. It hasn’t exactly been smooth sailing, what with the war and
all, but he still loves his position and his family and loves being Lord
Malfoy, even when it exhausts and frustrates him.

He’s always known what he was going to be. He hopes Pansy is

talking to someone that isn’t him or Blaise, because they’re both
useless at stuff like this. Blaise is just comfortably living off the small
fortune his mother has accumulated from her seven dead husbands,
which she may have killed herself, but hey, that’s neither here nor
there. He hadn’t felt the need to get any sort of gainful employment,
and doesn’t have to. Pansy doesn’t need to either, really, her Lord
and Heir would let her coast by on being a professional socialite. It’s
good for a prominent family to have a couple of those anyway, so it
wouldn’t even be a hardship.

“Worst case scenario, you can always marry for me for profit and
take over my house?” he offers.

“If you think I’m touching the responsibilities that come with being
your wife with a ten foot pole, you’ve got another thing coming,” she
says dryly. “Don’t worry about me, I’ll figure something out, and until
then I’ll help out Paige. I’m coming through the floo to help you grade
your awful papers.” The mirror shimmers, then Pansy is gone.

He walks out into his living room to see Blaise already seated with a
stack of papers in front of them. “Did you talk to Pansy?” he asks
without looking up.
Now he just feels like a dick. “Has she been feeling like this for a
while?”

“Just on and off for the past decade,” Blaise says dryly. Oh. Well, he
sucks. “Don’t worry about her, she’ll figure something out. Pansy can
have whatever she wants, and she knows it. She just has to figure
out what that something is.”

“I guess,” he says, but he loses the chance to talk about it further

when Pansy steps thought his fireplace.

She’s wearing a shimmering, tight dress with a faintly sparkling white

robe that just barely makes the whole thing decent, and he’d only
been able to see her form the shoulders up while she was in her
mirror. “Where you going out? I didn’t mean to ruin your night, you
can leave me and Blaise to suffer.”

“Shut up,” she answers, sitting on the other end of the couch and
snapping her fingers. A cup of tea appears in front of her, then
disappears a moment later to be replaced with an ornate crystal
glass and a bottle of firewhiskey. Milly’s doing, Draco assumes. She
likes Pansy.

He does need the help, so he shuts up, sits in between his two best
friends, and gets to work.

Draco watches his first years file out of the room and drop their
potions at his desk as they go. At some point the Hufflepuffs decided
they liked him, because he didn’t eat them, or something. He doesn’t
know. But the Hufflepuff and Slytherin first years are one of the
highlights of his week, not only because it contains his cousins, but
watching Andrea wrangle two houses into listening her while looking
like she’s doing nothing at all is scarily impressive. He hopes she
does end up marrying Oberon, because she’d make a fantastic Lady.
Or, at the very least, she goes on to work in the ministry.
Markel and Marilyn are the last in line, but they don’t move on from
his desk. “Are you coming to lunch today?” Marilyn asks
suspiciously.

“We’ve missed seeing you there,” Markel adds, elbowing Marilyn in

the side.

He’s been taking a few meals a week in his rooms so he can use the
extra hours to read up on the reports the goblins and supervisors
send him, because unless he can get his hands on a time turner, he
only has so many hours in the day. He was planning to do the same
today, actually, but Markel is pulling some seriously impressive
puppy dog eyes. It’s no wonder he keeps getting away with flying his
broom into the rose bushes.

“I’ll put in an appearance,” he says. “Now shoo. I have to put the

samples away.”

Marilyn looks like she wants to argue, but Markel says, “Okay!” and
cheerfully drags her away.

They’re both such a pain. He kind of likes them, though.

He lied, just a little. The first year potions are simple enough that he
can grade them just based on color, and they’re all already out, so
he might as well just do it now. It shouldn’t take that long, almost
everyone got a perfect score.

He’s about halfway through marking down everyone’s scores when

there’s a knock. He’s in his classroom, and the door is open, there’s
no need to knock. He looks up, and there’s Potter hovering in his
doorway, and oh, okay, it was actually nice of him to knock, all things
considered. “Hey Draco,” he says. “Do you have a second? Can we
talk?”

“How ominous. Let me guess. You’re breaking up with me?” he asks,

leaning back in his chair. “It’s so sudden, so unexpected, and I’m just
not prepared. I thought we had something special.”
Potter rolls his eyes, but seems to take that as permission and
comes inside. Even though his classroom is full of perfectly good
chairs, he sits on the edge of Draco’s desk. What has he ever done
to deserve this? That whole Voldemort business clearly wasn’t it.
Talking back to his mother as a kid, probably. “I’m afraid it’s not that
simple. You see,” he pauses for dramatic effect, “I’m pregnant.”

Draco laughs out loud, at least half because he wasn’t expecting it.
When did Potter get a sense of humor? “Well, fuck, guess we’ll have
to get married. My mother will be appalled. How do you look in
white?”

“I look great in white,” Potter says, grinning, and Draco bet he would
too, all that dark tan skin against white silk and those ridiculous
green eyes under his stupid glasses. Potter would probably look
fantastic in white, and he needs to stop thinking about this, right now,
immediately.

“Did you come here for something in particular, or just to tell me

about our future spawn?” he asks.

Potter hesitates, never a good sign, then says, “Don’t get mad.”

Oh, he doesn’t like the sound of this at all. “Okay.”

“I mean it,” he insists. “Just - let me finish before you get mad.”

That’s a more reasonable request, and one he can stick to.

Hopefully. Maybe. Best not to make any promises, actually. “Sure.”

Potter is looking at him suspiciously, which is only fair. “Alright. So.

About the supplementary defense classes that Luna and Neville are
leading.” Draco tenses, but doesn’t say anything. “It’s just not
tenable to keep doing this. Luna has her own classes, and Neville
has his apprenticeship, although to be fair he’s handling that pretty
easily, which I don’t understand. I wanted to die every day of auror
training, but he’s getting plenty of sleep and Spout is thrilled with his
progress, I just don’t understand, I’d say it’s magic, but I have magic,
and it didn’t do me any good. Anyway. I gave them the syllabus for
all seven years so that’s not really an issue-”

“You did?” Draco asks, surprised. Potter didn’t say he couldn’t

interrupt, he just said that he couldn’t get mad. He’s not mad.

“Of course,” he says, blinking. “They’re my students, I want them to

succeed. But they’re my students, and I should be the one teaching
them. This is a stopgap measure at best. It’s working, you were right,
their test scores are improving and their spellwork is better, and
according to Neville they’re actually even better when I’m not
watching them. But this is absurd, and there has to be a better
solution. My students shouldn’t be afraid of me!”

He nearly shouts that last bit, chest heaving and cheeks flushed
pink. He doesn’t look like a dunderheaded Gryffindork right now, or
like the famous former auror. He looks like - Draco doesn’t know. But
he likes it.

“They’re not afraid of you,” he says. He’s smiling, and he doesn’t

want to be, but he can’t quite make himself stop either. “They don’t
know you. You’re not scary. They just know rumors. They think you
loved hunting down evil wizards, and that you think all Slytherins are
evil wizards, and that all the evidence they’ve seen to the contrary is
just faked sincerity. Don’t be too broken up about it. It’s not about
you. It’s about their perception of you.”

“But I don’t!” he says, sliding off of Draco’s desk so he can pace in

front of it. “I never have - I just wanted Voldemort gone! I wanted
people to be safe! I wanted - I wanted them to be safe too, so they
wouldn’t have to make the same choices that we did. I know not all
Slytherins are evil! Pettigrew was a Death Eater, and he was a
Gryffindor-”

“I know,” he says, and Potter stops in his tracks, looking over at him
with those piercing green eyes. “I was there, remember? I know what
you’re like, and what you wanted. I’m not afraid of you. I know what
you are.”
Potter’s not even blinking as he stares at him, and Draco should
probably find that unnerving, but can’t quite bring himself to be
bothered by it. “What’s that then? What am I?”

“An annoyingly powerful wizard who means well, but is, ultimately, a
moron,” he answers, but he’s still smiling, and none of it is actually
comes out sounding like an insult, which is good, because he
doesn’t mean it as one. “Anyone who knows you also knows that
you’d save the whole world if you could, regardless of its contents.”

Potter has never wanted for kindness. Some situational awareness

and a couple brain cells to rub together, maybe, but that’s been true
since they were kids.

“Oh,” he says, like that’s not what he was expecting. Draco doesn’t
know why, he’s an asshole, not blind, and Potter wears his heart on
his sleeves. It’s not exactly hard to figure him out. He’d wondered
once if Potter had changed, if maybe he’d become something
different than the stubborn, loyal boy Draco had known in school. But
he hasn’t. He’s just the same. “Well, how do we get the kids to think
that way, then? Or at least have it so that they don’t think I’m walking
around ready to throw around unforgivables at the drop of a hat.”

“I’ll talk to them,” he says, and he’s already dreading that

conversation. He knows some of them are going to have an awful lot
to say about - well, a lot of things he’s been doing lately. Better to
address it now before it boils over. And, hey, better to address it first
with the kids so he’s got some practice when people start flinging
accusations at the House. He has an idea, and almost doesn’t say it,
but, “Now it’s your turn not to get mad.”

“Okay,” he says instantly. Which, what? Okay then.

He rubs the back of his neck, and says, “It - it wouldn’t hurt. If you
would - maybe consider opening the Potter House? You don’t have
to live there, or anything, or let anyone go inside, and it would mean
officially being recognized as an heir, although you can probably
stave off the Lord bit, I think. But you might not. You can renounce it
even, and if you do it properly it would actually help things. People
don’t like change, usually, but it’s better than just ignoring it. You
know?”

Potter stares at him for a long moment, stone faced and silent, and
just, great, one step forward and a dozen steps back, as usual. He
shouldn’t have said anything, and now telling his snakes to maybe
give Potter a chance is going to be a lot more awkward now that
they’re back to barely being on speaking terms.

“The Potter House?” he says. “Do you mean in Godric’s Hollow?”

He blinks. “What? No. That was just - a house that your parents lived
in. I mean, normally Lords and Ladies are expected to live in their
ancestral homes, but there was a war on and everything. Exceptions
can be made.”

“I was told my family’s property and belongings had been destroyed

during the war,” he says. “Wouldn’t that include whatever ancestral
home the Potters might have had?”

It’s a good thing Draco’s sitting down for this conversation, because
he feels a little faint. “No, it - no. Your family and mine have an
alliance. Or, well, had, I guess. Our families mutually agreed to
ignore it during the war, and then there was no one left to change the
status of that. But your ancestral home is in Wiltshire. It’s not
destroyed. It’s just locked up.”

“Okay,” Potter says, and this has to be a huge shock for him, but he
just rolls back on the ball of his feet, and says, “Okay. So, I have a
house. Why would unlocking it make me a lord if I’m not one
already?”

If Draco was in Potter’s shoes, he’d need a minute or so to process

this at least, but okay, they can go straight to the practicalities.
“You’re not a lord because you’re the last of your family, and you
were made the last of your family when you were a baby. A baby
can’t become a lord. So, when that happens, everything - kind of
gets put on hold. In stasis. Until such a time that the child is grown
and ready to move on. Your family didn’t lock up the house before
they went into hiding, they didn’t need to, it has just as many wards
as the manor does, so anyone without the appropriate magical
signature that was there without permission would just get killed,
which would make it a great place to hide during the war, but only if
they planned to stay there and never leave until it was over, which
they didn’t. It locked itself up the day your parents died. So, you’re
the heir, but only - only in theory. Because it’s all still on hold, or in
stasis. Only you can break that, and move forward, or move on. If
you want.”

Potter is frowning, and Draco has no idea what he’s thinking, or what
he’d be thinking in his place. “Okay,” he says finally. “I don’t know
what I’ll do with it. But sure. It’s my family’s home, and I want to see
it, if nothing else. How do I do that?”

“You just need blood, which you have,” he says. “Maybe bring along
some people just in case anything nasty is waiting for you inside, but
I think it should be fine. Bring Neville, and maybe Hermione. Ron
too, for safety.” Not that Draco thinks he’ll need it, but he could
probably use the friends. There aren’t many things that are more
depressing than going through his dead family’s home that’s been
empty for over two decades. It’s not something that anyone should
do alone.

Potter nods and swallows, then turns to face him fully. He opens his
mouth, closes it, then says, “Will you come too?”

All Draco can do is stare. What?

“Please?” he tacks on, shifting his weight from one foot to the other.

“If you want me,” tumbles out of his mouth before he can stop it.
Seeing Potter look uncertain like that makes his stomach turn. “But
why?”
“So if there’s anything nasty in there, I can feed you to it,” he
answers.

Draco laughs more out of relief than anything else. How has this
conversation turned - not serious or tense even, just - heavy. It feels
heavy. “Sure, Potter, if that’s what you want. It’ll give me a chance to
pop over to check on the manor. At this rate, Hermione is going to be
there more often than I am.” She’d taken his invitation and ran with it.
She was rather cross that the library wouldn’t let her take out more
than one book at a time, so she’d taken to spending long evenings
reading there instead, and then taking whatever book she hadn’t
finished.

Potter’s smile slides off his face. He leans forward on the desk, and
there’s still a good foot of space between them, but now they’re
much closer than Draco thinks is wise. “One more thing,” he says,
and Draco can’t help but notice his lips are chapped, which is
ridiculous. They have salves for that, or spells, they are wizards after
all. Why is he walking around with chapped lips? “You don’t have to.
But could you call me Harry? You call everyone else by their first
name, and you don’t seem to mind that I call you Draco. So, you
should call me Harry.”

Dangerous, dangerous, dangerous. This whole thing is dangerous,

and if Draco’s not careful, he’s going to fall right off the edge into
something terrifying and forbidden, something he can’t have no
matter how much he wants it, just like he did when they were kids.
Absolutely not. He can’t do that, it will only make the rest of it so
much worse.

“Okay, Harry,” he says, still looking up at him, still with only a foot of
space between them.

His grin lights up his whole face, and this isn’t the worst decision
Draco’s ever made, but it certainly feels like it’s up there.

He can’t quite bring himself to regret it though. Not while Harry is

smiling at him like that.
Draco has set up an interactive map of his Slytherin’s class and
practice schedules, and there’s about an hour after dinner in two
days where it looks like they’re all free. He can use that to give his
speech about maybe facing their problems instead of slithering
around them, which is going to go terribly. He could hold it tonight
and just demand they all show up for a half hour regardless of what
they’ve got going on. But they’re going to be angry anyway, he
doesn’t need to start this meeting with them pissed at him for
interrupting quidditch or whatever club they’re in.

Milly appears next to him with a crack. “Heir Longbottom is here for
you, Master Draco.”

“Now?” he says, glancing at the clock. It’s not quite midnight yet, but
it’s still far too late for anyone to show up at his door. Except Luna,
who treats the passage of time like it’s an intellectual curiosity rather
than something she’s expected to live her life by. He’s shocked she
manages to arrive to her own class on time, although he suspects
that has more to do with Hermione than any sense of punctuality of
urgency his cousin may have developed.

Milly blinks. “Yes, Master Draco.”

That was almost something that could be considered sarcasm. She

must be hanging around Dax. “Well, let him in, I guess.”

She’s gone with a crack, and Draco waves his wand to open his
bedroom door so that Neville can find him rather than going out to
meet him. He’s still looking at the student schedules. Something
here seems off.

“Draco!” Neville shouts. He ignores him. It’s a straight line from his
front door to his bedroom, it’s not like he can get lost. “Draco, I know
you’re here, what are you-”

He assumes from the increase in volume and the footsteps that

Neville is standing behind him. “Yes?”
“Nice use of the copying and projection charm,” he says, apparently
distracted from whatever he came in here yelling about. “I’m going to
use this, it’ll be much easier to keep track of the plants feeding
schedules this way. Pomona just has a hundred different alarm
spells, and she knows what they’re all for, but I don’t.”

“Sure,” he says. “You know, my farms use an alarm system and

enchanted parchment, so the ones that need attention start flashing.
One of my herbologists managed to charm it so it sends a howler if
anything goes more than an hour without being fed. I promoted her
for that.”

“I want that spell,” Neville says, glaring, and Draco cracks a grin.
“But that’s not why I’m here. The Potter House is still standing?”

“Obviously. It’s only been locked up for what, twenty years? The
Weasley Manor is still standing just fine, and that’s been locked up
for three centuries.”

Neville rolls his eyes and says impatiently, “Yes, well, we can still see
the Weasley Manor, but there’s nothing where the Potter House
used to be. I just assumed it collapsed in on itself when James and
Lily Potter died. So did my grandmother. It would hardly be the first.”

He has no idea what conversation they’re having. “The Potter house

is still there, clear as day. The grounds are overgrown, of course, but
that’s only to be expected.”

They keep looking at each other in confusion, because they’re both

certain they’re right. But Draco has seen the Potter House with his
own two eyes, he can still sense the magic it gives off. It’s definitely
there.

Neville’s eyes widen, and he hits himself on the forehead. “Your

family had an alliance with the Potters!”

“So?” Draco says. “You don’t need an alliance to go see someone’s

property. Anyone can stroll up to the Malfoy Manor for a look. They
can’t cross the property line, but they can see it.”

“Yes, but your manor wasn’t put in an emergency stasis triggered by

the death of the last adult wizards in your family,” Neville points out.
“Who else had an alliance with the Potters?”

Okay, maybe Neville is onto something. It at least explains why

someone would have told Harry that it was destroyed, when it clearly
wasn’t. “The Ollivanders and the Prewetts. Maybe the Fawleys.”

Alliances were usually either matters of business or marriage, not

just getting along. The reason the Malfoy and Potter families had and
alliance wasn’t because they liked each other, but because they’d
been doing business together since before the Potters came over
from India, and since before the Malfoys came over from France.
Once they were on the same soil, an alliance just made sense. The
Malfoys grew it, and the Potters sold it. Even as their business
models and the businesses themselves changed, they still kept up
the alliance.

The Potters’ alliance with the Ollivanders was due to business as

well, what with them being wand makers and the Potters being
merchants, but the one with the Prewetts was because of marriage.
Their fringe family members had intermarried enough that they’d set
up an official alliance about two hundred years ago. Which was
probably why everyone spent years speculating that Harry was going
to marry one of Molly Weasley nee Prewett’s children.

They Fawleys dealt in magical creature trading, so it would make

sense for the Potter’s to have a business alliance with them, but
Draco can’t remember off the top of his head if they actually did.

Neville has a strange look on his face. “Do you think - if we’re right,
and houses under emergency stasis disappear to everyone but
those they’re allied with, that maybe there are still houses and land
out there that we thought were lost, but aren’t?”
Ancient ancestral land, ancient ancestral homes, all hidden from
view. “Even if they were, we wouldn’t be able to get in, we’d just get
killed.”

“Probably,” Neville agrees, even though there’s no probably about it,

they would just die. “But aren’t you curious? Don’t you want to know
if they’re there? Come on, let’s go to the House. All the ancestral
homes are recorded, we can see what ones went missing. Maybe
they’re still there!”

“Right now?” Draco asks, appalled. “It’s midnight!”

“They invented pepper up potion for a reason,” he says cheerfully,

tugging on the back of Draco’s robe like a child. “Come on, let’s go.
It’ll only take a couple of hours.”

This is insane, and hardly pressing. But Neville’s right. He is curious.

“Fine, but we have to go get Hermione. I promised to take her to the
House’s library, and if she finds out we went without her, she’ll set us
on fire.”

Neville shivers, because Draco’s right and he knows it. “Yeah, okay,
that’s fair.”

He doesn’t have a morning class tomorrow, which is clearly going to

be a good thing. He’s pretty sure this is going to take more than a
couple hours.

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Chapter 10
Chapter 10

(See the end of the chapter for notes.)

Draco should have probably taken a nap or something before doing

this, because he’s even more exhausted than usual. He’s spent
every spare moment of the past two days pouring over dusty records
with Neville and Hermione. Which has been illuminating and
interesting, but means he’s roughly at the point where he’s willing to
commit murder just to take a nap. His grading has managed to once
more pile up to the point where he’s considering banning essays in
his classroom just to save himself the headache.

So he’s in a great state of mind and mood to have this conversation.

Not.

“Are you fucking with us?” Georgianna asks, and he’d call her out on
her language, except that he doesn’t care. Besides, she’s managing
to rally a study group together between all four houses without killing
anyone, which is by no means an easy thing, so he’s inclined to give
her some leeway. Granted, it’s mostly because Oberon and Andrea
show up to every meeting and refuse to let it devolve into in-fighting,
but he’s comfortable giving Georgianna the credit anyway, since he
knows it was her idea to invite the two Ollivanders.

“Do I look like I have the energy to fuck with you?” he returns. A
couple of the first years are delightfully scandalized, which is nice,
because the rest of them are too mad to get a kick out him swearing
at them. “If you have a solution that doesn’t involve half our house
hiding like cowards, I’m all ears.” A couple of them open their
mouths. He tacks on, “Murdering Harry is off the table.” They all shut
their mouths. Typical. Should he be worried that his house in
unimaginative? Murder shouldn’t be their first and only solution to
their problems. Even if it works. Maybe especially if it works.
“Harry?” Liam repeats, and he’s trying for snide, but it’s a little too
obvious that he’s delighted. He’s going to tell his aunt, then Pansy is
going to find him so she can laugh at him to his face. “That’s new.”

“Professor Potter,” he says, because if they want to be like that, fine,

he doesn’t care, “approached me a few days ago with concerns over
the extra curricular classes. While I’m loathe to agree with him about
anything, he does have a point. After a year, Longbottom’s
apprenticeship will be over, and we can hardly expect Luna to
continue them on her own. She has her own classes and duties to
worry about. This is not sustainable.”

One of his third years scowls and crosses his arms. “So, what, Potter
comes and yells at you so you just roll over and play dead? I thought
you weren’t afraid of him!”

“There was surprisingly little yelling. No one is playing dead. And no

one with any sense is afraid of Potter,” he adds, just to watch half of
them squirm. “You don’t like him, fine. You don’t have to like him.
There are plenty of students that don’t like me, and they show up to
my class anyway.” He takes a deep breath, and he wants to just be
an asshole about this, because it’s easier, and he would really
appreciate it if something was easy around here. But if he tries to be
a complete hardass about this, he’ll just do more harm than good.
He forces his voice to soften when he says, “He’s hardly going to
curse you in the middle of class. Potter has always been an idiot with
a quick temper and little to no ability to know when to give up. But he
does not easily lend himself to cruelty.”

Raina raises her hand, biting her lip. “I - doesn’t he hate us, though?
He’s not like us, and he doesn’t like us, doesn’t like who we are. He
thinks we’re all like Voldemort.”

Yes, well, it’s possible that she’s right. Or that she was right, and isn’t
any longer. He’s warily poking at the overdue realization that it’s
possible Potter wasn’t so much as rejecting his heritage as entirely
unaware of it, and while that’s still insulting, while it’ll still make all the
stuffy Lords and Ladies of the House ruffle their feathers and let out
small, scandalized gasps, it’s still a very different thing than what
they all spent more than a decade thinking he was doing.

He doesn’t get into any of that. If this conversation is tiring him, one
about the accountability of Potter’s ignorance is sure to lull him
straight to sleep. Which sounds kind of nice, actually.

Merlin, he misses sleeping.

“He’s reopening the Potter House tomorrow,” he says.

They’d been pretty quiet before, but now this is a different king of
silence, a heavier one. Draco raises an eyebrow, waiting.

“That house disappeared with James and Lily Potter,” Andrea says
eventually, once it’s clear that no one else is interested in saying
anything, her head tilted to the side.

“Not to the Malfoys.” Or the Prewetts, as they’d discovered when

Hermione had convinced her mother-in-law to look in at the
supposed plot of Potter land. Hermione hadn’t seen anything but a
field, but Molly confirmed that she saw the same thing Draco did -
the Potter House, dusty and disused but very much standing. What
Draco found most interesting wasn’t that Molly could see it, but that
her children could too. Ginny and Percy had both confirmed they
could see the house, and wasn’t that fascinating, that the Potter
House still considers the Weasley children to be Prewetts. Which
has so many interesting implications for just a bit of wiggle room as
far as the magic is concerned. Magic almost never affords anyone
any wiggle room, so it seems a shame to waste it while they have it.
He just has to figure out a way to tell the Weasleys that without
getting hexed. “The house has been under a glamour. But it’s there,
and once Potter opens it, everyone will be able to see it.”

Marilyn is tugging on her ponytail in frustration, and Draco really

wishes she’d develop a nervous twitch that didn’t give him sympathy
pains. He doesn’t even like it when his hair gets caught on one of his
rings, and he can’t imagine that what she’s doing is much better. “I
don’t understand. I thought he didn’t want to be a Lord?”

“After he’s opened it, he may decide to permanently close it and

relinquish his connection to his blood,” he says, even though it
makes his stomach queasy just talking about it, “as is his right as the
last remaining member of a noble house.”

When the Weasleys did it three hundred years ago, it was a scandal.
They were a robust and ancient family, who’d been part of the House
for thousands of years. Because Harry is the Boy Who Lived, any
decision he makes will cause a scandal. But outside the eye of the
press, Harry relinquishing his nobility isn’t an unacceptable choice,
even to the staunchest members of the House. Unless he’s planning
to find a wife and having her pop out a dozen kids, then being the
sole bearer of his family’s magic is a burden that many people
wouldn’t be interested in carrying.

“He’s not perfect,” he says. “He’s Harry Potter. The man’s a walking
disaster, even at his best, and he’s almost as ignorant now as he
was as a wide eyed eleven year old. But he means well. He won’t
curse you, nor say anything about your family or allegiances.
Voldemort died seven years ago. Even at his most idiotic, Potter isn’t
stupid enough to blame a child for the actions of his family. None of
you have done anything to earn his reproach, so you won’t have it.”

“What if we do?” Georgianna asks, and Draco’s surprised she’s the

one asking. She’s a muggleborn. He’d think that she has less reason
to be suspicious of Potter than the others, but there’s a fury about
her that’s begging to bubble over. “What if he hates us?”

“Has he done anything to give you that impression in the last two
years?” he asks. “What little of his class you’ve bothered to attend, of
course.”

She shrugs. “He hasn’t done anything to give us the impression he

doesn’t. If we can hide our distaste, then why should we trust that
he’s not hiding his?”
He knows it’s not the right thing to do, but he can’t help it. He literally
laughs out loud at that. Georgianna’s girlfriend grabs onto her arm,
which he’s pretty sure is all that keeps him from being cursed.
“Sorry,” he says, and she seems to believe he means it because her
shoulders loosen. Nadine Carrow, a stuck up sixth year who’s
ancestors must be turning over in their graves due to her dating
choices, is giving him a glare exactly as nasty as he’d expect from
anyone in her family. He wonders if Georgianna gets her attitude
from Nadine, or if Nadine sought Georgianna out specifically
because she was attracted to her ever flowing well of anger. “Potter
doesn’t have the emotional capacity to be two faced. If you can’t
trust in his sincerity, then trust in his incompetence. If I’m wrong and
he’s terrible - well, he’ll be a Lord then. I can challenge him to a duel
and we can do this properly. Satisfied?”

“We’ll give him a chance,” Andrea says, and Draco is still beyond
impressed at how a twelve year old is managing to make seventeen
year olds listen to her.

Liam nods, then glares at Georgianna until she sighs and says,
“Fine, we’ll play nice with Potter. But at the first hint of him being
malicious, I’m blasting him through the castle wall. You’ll be paying
my barrister fees.”

“That’s fair,” he says, grinning, and holds out his hand. She stares at
him suspiciously, but takes it. Everyone relaxes at that, as if
Georgianna was the one bartering for all of them.

Andrea and Georgianna are startlingly different in every possible

way, except for how they both hold incredible sway over Slytherin
House.

Raina raises her hand, “Uh, no offense Professor, but maybe you
should go take a nap?”

He stares at them.

“Or at least add some glamour spells,” Nadine adds.

Georgianna shrugs, “Concealer works too.”

He summons a mirror. The bags under his eyes are particularly dark,
which just won’t do. “If I go sleep for two hours, do you think the lot
of you can manage not to start a revolt?”

The moment of considering silence isn’t comfortable at all. Then

someone starts laughing, and the remaining tension from his
conversation with them drains away. This was much easier than
speaking to the House is sure to be, but probably only because his
students aren’t quite comfortable enough to call him an adulterous
mudblood fucker to his face, which is apparently the insult of choice
that Lord Flint is tossing around. He has four Flints in front of him,
and he assumes they’ve all gotten wind of it, even the eleven year
old twins. He’s not sure if they didn’t bring it up because they respect
him, or because they think the others like him and don’t want to risk
their social position. He’s leaning towards the latter.

“I’ll get some sleep tonight,” he says, but only because he has to. If
he wants to be even a little bit useful tomorrow when Harry reopens
his ancestral home, then he can’t be working on three hours of
sleep. Also, he’s pretty sure he’s gotten to the point where his elves
are going to refuse to retrieve pepper up potions for him, since last
time he’d asked he’d gotten herbal tea instead, which he wants to be
upset about, but is probably a little fair. “Go, shoo. Brush up defense
before Monday so you’re not an embarrassment to the house.”

Most of the older years flip him off, which definitely isn’t behavior he
should encourage, but he’s still laughing as he leaves the common
room.

Draco has a small mountain of potions to grade, but he also has to

figure out this deaging charm by next week for Flitwick. Maybe he
should get a teacher’s aide. It’s too bad Raina’s only a third year,
because she’d love it, and she’d be good at it. Mariana, maybe.
Under all the charm and faked disinterest, she’s incredibly smart.
Actually, she reminds him of Blaise’s mother in all the worst ways,
and it absolutely keeps him up at night.

On one hand, it’s a little unusual to take on an aide as a first year

professor, but on the other hand, most first year professors aren’t
running a multilevel international business and acting as the sole
head and Lord for their family, so anyone who wants to make any
snide remarks can stuff it. He’s starting to understand all the pointed
remarks about him taking a spouse. He’d love to share at least some
of these duties. It’s a pity Pansy detests the work, because she’s
great at it, and his mum loves her. He’s always gotten along with
Lord Parkinson, and knows that the man would be pleased to see a
link between their families.

His mother could have kept her title as Lady Malfoy until he married.
The magic doesn’t treat spouses the same way, just because it
rejected Lucius doesn’t mean it rejected Narcissa too. He doesn’t
blame her for not holding onto it, merlin knows his mother’s been
through enough that she shouldn’t be expected to help him manage
the family on top of it, but - he just doesn’t understand why she
doesn’t want to. His mother loved being a Lady, was always proud of
the match she’d made and the position that marriage got her.

Maybe she’s not proud of that anymore. His parents’ marriage had
been arranged, something to solidify the alliance between the Black
and Malfoy families. But he’d thought they’d grown to love each
other. She must love him, otherwise why would she be in France
with him, instead of here with Draco?

The truth is, he doesn’t know if his mother is avoiding Britain out of
shame, or staying with his father out of love, and he doesn’t know
how to ask. Maybe it’s both.

None of which is the point, of course, and he really needs to get

some sleep so he can focus. Trying to perform a complicated charm
right now might just end with him turning his skin inside out, or
something equally horrifying, so grading potions it is.
“Bip,” he says conversationally, and with a crack the house elf is
standing in front of him. “Grab me a dose of pepper up.”

Bip doesn’t move. “That is not being a good idea, Master.”

“I wasn’t asking your opinion,” he says. “Pepper up. Now.”

He disappears with a crack, and a moment later a steaming mug of

hot chocolate appears in front of him. A second after that, a handful
of mini marshmallows are dropped into the mug by an invisible hand.

Short of going to go get the potion himself, he thinks that’s as good

as he’s going to get. Which he could do, but maybe he should just
listen to his elves. He sighs, picks up the mug, and summons his
grade book.

After a couple hours he’s nearly done with the fourth year plant
growth potions, which he’d added to the curriculum as a way to
thank Sprout for all the ingredients her students are growing for his
class. They’re mostly fine, and perfectly acceptable to give to Sprout.
Except Dacia’s. He wonders if she’d be offended if he moved her to
the front of the classroom so he could keep an eye on her. The thing
is, the potion is the wrong texture, color, and smell. However, when
he puts a couple of drops of it on a sunflower, it causes it to grow
three times larger than everyone else’s had managed.

It is a plant growth potion. It is not the plant growth potion he

assigned, and he’s honestly baffled how she made it in the first
place. Why is this girl determined to make his life difficult? Doesn’t
he suffer enough as it is? He’s tempted to call Blaise up and
complain about his cousin, but he’ll only laugh at him.

“Draco?” He looks up from his grading, and Luna is standing in his

doorway.

He wants to tell her to go away, because if he doesn’t get through

these potions tonight there is quite simply no hope for him. But the
fact that she hasn’t just walked into his office and started chattering
on about ridiculous things means that she’s feeling nervous or
vulnerable, or some other soft emotion where she might actually be
hurt if he’s mean to her, which has never been the point of being
mean to her. “Can I grade while we talk?” If she says no, he’ll listen,
but he also might cry.

She grins, but it’s a Luna grin, so it’s only a little bit with her mouth
and mostly with her eyes. Good, whatever she’s upset about can’t be
that bad. “Sure. You give too much homework.”

“You sound like my students,” he grumbles as she sits crosslegged

in the chair in front of his desk. He’s assuming she doesn’t sit on his
desk only because she wants to avoid knocking over any of the
several dozen vials covering its surface, which he appreciates. “I’m
trying to make up for years of differing potions professors of various
competence.”

He’s had to almost entirely scrap his lesson plan for the second
years. Their foundational knowledge is so patchy that he’s having
them do a lot of first year potions which are designed to teach and
reinforce the basics, which they’re less than pleased about, but he
doesn’t know what else to do. After the first quarter, they’ll hopefully
be up to scratch, and he can switch them over to the curriculum he’d
originally designed for them. But he’s either going to have toss out
some of the potions or push them through a year’s worth of material
in six months. Or maybe have half the class make one potion, and
the other half make the other? That way they’ll at least be aware of
all the potions, even if they don’t get the chance to personally make
them.

Luna rolls her eyes, “I just assign them to divine muggle lottery
numbers.”

He chokes. “Luna! That’s not fair! You know the Ministry puts up
blockers around that kind of stuff.” The last thing the economy needs
is wizards using magic to divine the muggle lottery, or any other way
of unfairly profiting in the muggle world, and then exchanging the
worthless muggle money for gold. There’s a reason Gringotts has a
limit to how much muggle currency can be exchanged in a calendar
year, and it’s exactly that. Nicolas Flamel wasn’t the first person to
figure out how to use magic to turn lead into gold, and just because
wizards have ways to notice the trick didn’t mean the muggles do.

“Yeah, I know, I told them that anyone who manages to get it right
gets an Outstanding for the rest of the year. They try everything
under the sun, and end up doing more divination practice on their
own than I would ever assign, and I don’t even have to grade
anything.”

“Why divination?” he asks, something he’s been wondering ever

since Luna took the position four years ago, but hadn’t wanted to
offend her by asking. Because, well, as far as he can tell the class is
useless. He’s pretty sure she won’t be offended now. “You’re not
even a little bit psychic.”

“Neither are most of the students,” she points out. “We can’t teach
kids to be psychic. Either they are or they aren’t. But we can teach
them to use the tools of divination to guide their choices or to help
them unveil the truth. Or even just to be able to tell when someone’s
trying to use divination to pull something over on them.”

Well, that’s fair enough. “What do you do if you get a kid that’s
actually talented?”

“I can still teach them, even if I can’t do it myself. If it’s beyond my

scope, which has happened twice so far, I send them to Firenze. He
hates it, but he hasn’t turned them away, so it can’t be that bad.” She
gets tired of sitting almost properly and twists so her legs are over
the arm of chair and upper back is over the other, her long blonde
hair trailing to the floor.

He rolls his eyes, uncapping the next potion. The color is off, but the
consistency and smell is good. It makes the flower grow about three
inches. It wasn’t heated for long enough before being bottled. “You’re
going to get killed going in that forest.”
“Hagrid usually comes with me,” she shrugs.

Well, there’s that, at least. He almost asks what she’s doing here,
what’s exactly is the problem, but if he presses her, she’ll just
change the subject and push her feeling down as far as they’ll go, so
he restrains himself. They sit in silence, Luna staring at his ceiling
and him going through his potions.

He hasn’t been keeping track of how much time has passed, but he’s
just getting starting on the sixth year potions when Luna asks, “Have
you ever been in love?”

His fingers go numb and potions falls and spills across his desk. He
curses, and pushes himself back from his desk, flinching back from
the layer of dry ice that covers everything. “Incendio,” he casts,
keeping the fire low and contained to melt the ice from his desk
without setting anything on fire. Luna hadn’t flinched, and is still
looking at him expectantly, and still upside down. “Why are you
asking me that?”

She shrugs.

“No, of course not,” he answers, and maybe the fire is a little too hot,
because his throat’s so dry it’s hard to swallow. Surely the closest
he’s ever come to love was his one sided infatuation with Blaise
when they were eighteen, which had thankfully cooled the same year
it began. Blaise is his best friend, and they love each other, but
Blaise has little to no interest in romance or sex, and since Draco is
very interested in both those things, it obviously wouldn’t have
worked out. Plus, he might have lost one of his dearest friends in the
process.

She frowns, and that obviously hadn’t been the answer she was
looking for, but he’s not sure why she would expect anything else.
It’s not like he’s keeping some secret paramour tucked away for safe
keeping. “Are you sure?”
“I think I might have noticed,” he says dryly. He cautiously sits back
down at his desk and picks up the next potion. He makes sure to
have a better grip on this one, so that if Luna asks any more heavy
questions he won’t turn his desk into an ice block. Again.

Luna just hums in response, and what is that supposed to mean,

anyway? “I think I might be in love with Neville.”

He freezes, but he doesn’t drop the vial. He does carefully set it

down, because he feels like he’ll regret it if he doesn’t. “Excuse me?”

“But I’ve also been sleeping with Ginny,” she continues, “so it’s all
very confusing.”

“You what? ” he demands, appalled. “Weasley?” Like there’s another

Ginny they know. Why is she even telling him this? He’s the head of
the family, technically he should do something about that, but it’s not
like he has any interest in dictating his cousin’s sex life, and honestly
if he did that’d be pretty weird.

“Especially because I’m a Malfoy,” she continues, apparently

deciding to ignore his outburst. Or it’s possible that she’s just so lost
in her own head that she hadn’t even noticed. “And say I do fall in
love with Neville, then what? We get married? I wouldn’t be able to
be a Malfoy anymore, not if I marry the Heir of another family, and he
has to marry eventually, so if it’s not me, it will be someone else. I
suppose I could be his mistress. That could be fun.”

He snaps, “If he ever dared suggest it, I’d skin him alive.” Luna’s self
esteem issues are complicated and confusing enough without her
playing second fiddle to Neville’s theoretical wife.

She takes a moment to smile at him, then continues, “Then there’s

Ginny, who I like rather a lot, and who is very pretty. All that
professional quidditch playing keeps her very fit, you know.” He did
not know, and he does not want to know, and he wishes she hadn’t
told him. “But that’s confusing too, because she’s a Weasley, so we
technically have a blood feud, and if I wanted to marry her I would
have to sever my connection to the Malfoy family, which I don’t want
to do, because it’s my family too. So, again, we could just not get
married. But I think I would like to get married. I want to be
someone’s wife.”

He is so unprepared for this conversation. If he didn’t think he’d fall

asleep at the first sip, he’d summon something alcoholic from his
rooms. “You know that you’ll always by my cousin, even if you sever
the magical tie between us. Even if you’re not a Malfoy, you’re still
family.” He’s pretty sure she cares more about the family part than
the Malfoy one, since the only time she’s taken advantage of her
privileges as a Malfoy was to foist her mother’s house on him and to
use their box seats at quidditch matches. Which, if she’s sleeping
with Ginny Weasley, she doesn’t even really need. What’s the point
of sleeping with a professional quidditch player if she has to pay for
tickets?

“I know,” she says, but she does push herself up from draped across
his chair, pulling her legs to her chest and resting her chin on her
knees. “But I don’t know what to do. Or if I need to do anything at all.
Maybe Neville and Ginny won’t grow to love me that much, and it will
all just fade, and I won’t have to make any decision at all.”

He doesn’t know anything about his cousin’s relationships, obviously,

he just knows Neville keeps looking at her like she’s carrying the
sun, and the only other time he’s seen that look on his face is when -

“Uh,” he clears his throat, “didn’t Ginny and Neville date?”

Luna nods, and she’s usually pretty good about acting nonchalant,
but even she can’t keep the flash of anxiety from crossing her face.
“They broke up. Obviously. But - what if - I’m just guessing here, is
all, I haven’t asked the runes or looked into a crystal ball,” it’s
worryingly obvious how desperately she wants to however, “but I
wonder if they just broke up because his gran didn’t like it.”

“Why would Augusta care?” he asks, then almost immediately adds,

“I take that back.” She may be one of the more liberal members of
the house, so she doesn’t take her blood purity all that seriously, but
she does care about the integrity of it.

Meaning no muggles, and no blood traitors. He knows for a fact that

the no blood traitor part is a bit of soft stance when it comes to the
more extended parts of the Longbottom family, but if Neville, her
grandson and Heir, wants to marry a blood traitor, he’s going to have
to wait until Augusta is in the ground to do it.

Luna on the other hand - well, Japanese wizards don’t consider

purity the same way they do, but Pandora came from an old family,
Xenophilius is a pure blood, Luna’s been attached to the Malfoy
name her whole life, and she only strengthened that connection after
the war was over.

From Augusta’s point of view, Luna is a more than acceptable match

for Neville, and she and Draco are friendly enough in the House that
she could count on him to approve of it. Not all marriages of his
family member require his approval, but this one would, because it
would be a member of his family relinquishing their hold on his name
and blood. Or, well, Luna could defy him and marry Neville even if he
refused, and there wouldn’t really be anything he could do about it.
But tradition would dictate that he and Augusta enact a blood feud
over it, even if they didn’t particularly want to, which would be a
hassle. And it wouldn’t happen anyway, because he has no interest
in standing in Luna’s way.

“I don’t think Neville is interested in you just because Augusta is

pressuring him to make a suitable match,” Draco says, hopefully
addressing the thing she’s actually upset about it. “What does Ginny
gain by sleeping with you? Nothing. So I can only assume she’s
doing it because she wants to.”

She better be, is all he’s saying. It’s… nice, being on almost friendly
terms with Ron and the others. But he won’t hesitate to destroy all of
that if it turns out Ginny is being cavalier with his cousin’s heart.
Luna nods, but doesn’t say anything. Okay, so he didn’t quite get it
right. He rubs the back of his neck and tries again, “You’re not a
placeholder. You’re nothing like Neville or Ginny, so them trying to
replace each other with you would be ridiculous.”

She flinches. That’s what it is. “What if I stop seeing them,” she says
quietly, “and then they start seeing each other again? Then they’ll
have each other, and I’ll have no one.”

“Neville wouldn’t do that to you,” he says, and actually he’s pretty

sure that Ginny wouldn’t do that either, but he doesn’t know the girl
nearly well enough to make any sort of assertation like that.

“But what if he does ?” she insists.

“Then he’s an asshole, and I wouldn’t have allowed you to marry him
anyway,” he says. “Because you’re my cousin, you’re a Malfoy, and
that means you’re not a placeholder. You are second best to no one.
If anyone treats you like you are, destroy them.”

She stares at him for a long time, and he stares back, no idea what
she’s looking for in his face, but hoping she finds it. She smiles, and
it looks sad, but it looks real too. “Thank you.” She points to the
potions still scattered across his desk. “Do you want help grading
those?”

“Yes,” he says, unsure if he he’s more relieved at the prospect of

getting this done in time for him to get to bed at a decent time, or at
being able to finally stop talking about his cousin’s love life.

Luna smirks at him like she knows exactly what he’s thinking, but
she doesn’t call him on it.

Thank merlin for small mercies.

i hope you liked it!

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Chapter 11
Chapter 11

(See the end of the chapter for notes.)

Draco’s starting to think that there’s a vague possibility that he may

have been cursed.

He’s tired. He’s more than tired. He’s been pushing through bone
deep weariness for what feels like weeks, he’s the level of exhausted
where it seems like just sitting and breathing is too much for him.

But he can’t sleep.

He’s in bed, staring at his ceiling, unable to settle enough to rest.

Tomorrow morning he’s going with a bunch of idiotic Gryffindors to
open a noble house that’s been locked up for over twenty years. He
needs to go to sleep.

That doesn’t really change the fact that he can’t seem to do that,
however.

He pushes himself out of bed, silk pajama bottoms swung low on his
hips as he stuffs his feet into his shoes, grabbing his sleeping robe
from over the bathroom door and pulling it over his shoulders. He
almost puts on a shirt and gets dressed properly, but he doesn’t plan
to be out that long. He goes to the fireplace in his living room, and it
roars to life with a vicious stab of his wand.

By the time he thinks to second guess himself, because he’s an

adult and this is ridiculous, it’s too late and he’s already stepped onto
the other side of green flames. He almost turns around and steps
back through, but a house elf pops into existence in front of him.
“Master Malfoy,” Flora squeaks in French. “We was not expecting
you. You father is asleep. Would you like us to wake him?”
“I’m not here for my father,” he answers, following her lead and
sticking to French. “I assume my mother is awake?” She always
went to bed after his father, she always has, even before the war and
what the war turned them all into.

Flora nods. “Should we be telling Mrs. Malfoy that you are here?”
Mrs. Malfoy, not Mistress Malfoy. Because they don’t answer to
Narcissa anymore, not truly. They obey his parents because he told
them to, not because they’re bound to them anyway.

When Draco was named Lord and got all the duties and privileges
that came along with it, the elves had known, without anyone
needing to tell them. They were very good at knowing who controlled
the magic, who truly had the power.

He shakes his head, and Flora curtsies and disappears with a crack.
He passes by the library, but it’s empty, so he goes out the back door
and into the garden. At first he thinks it’s empty, and he really will
need the elves to find her. Then he cranes his head up, and there
she is, nearly obscured by the branches of a tree on the other side of
the yard. She’s about halfway up the tree, seated on a long, thick
branch and leaning back against the trunk. Her hair is loose and
falling down around her shoulders, her limbs pale and bare in the
moonlight. She’s not wearing much, just sleep shorts and a shirt. “It’s
cold,” he says, and she startles, wand in her hand before she gets a
proper look at him.

“Draco! What are you doing here? Is something wrong?”

He shakes his head, and he’s not sure if his mother levitated herself
or climbed, but it looks easy enough. He grabs onto the first
handhold, heaving himself up until he reaches her, managing to
swing onto the branch in front of her without needing her to move. All
those years of quidditch were clearly good for something. “It’s cold,”
he repeats, and his mother’s skin is raised with goosebumps. “What
are you doing here?”
“I should be asking you that,” she murmurs, and she looks tired. She
always looks tired.

He shrugs off his robe and hold it out to her. She starts to shake her
head, but he says, “I can make it an order, you know. I can do that
now.” He says it like he’s teasing, but he’s serious. He doesn’t want
his mother getting sick because she’s running around half naked in
the middle of the night.

Narcissa huffs and takes his robe. “Now you’re even less dressed
than I am.”

Clearly he should have grabbed a sweater before leaving, but he

didn’t expect his mother to be hiding up in a tree. Luckily, he’s a
wizard, so he summons one. It’s not until he’s pulled it on over his
head that he realizes it’s the same one that Harry borrowed. It smells
like Harry’s body wash. But it’s not like he can take it off again
without explaining why to his mother, and that’s not a conversation
he’s interested in having. He doesn’t know why. It wouldn’t even be a
conversation, really, and why is he even thinking about this, it’s not
why he’s here. Although, he doesn’t even know why he’s here,
besides a childhood desire to go crawling to his parents whenever
anything has gone wrong. “Is everything okay? Do you need
anything? How’s Dad?”

She sighs, and runs her hand through his hair, pulling it over his
shoulder and finger combing it. “Everything’s fine, darling, you don’t
have to worry about us. What’s wrong with you? It’s a little odd for
you to come visiting in the middle of the night.”

“Why did you marry Dad?” he asks, and she stops moving. He didn’t
know he was going to ask that until he’d done it, and now it’s
hanging in the air between them. “I know he was probably the
highest ranked man who offered, but was there - was there anything
else? I know you had other offers.” She must have, she was a
beloved Black sister and gorgeous and smart.

Her face is carefully blank. “Why are you asking me this now?”
Thoughts of Luna, Neville, and Ginny rush through, and for some
reason he can’t make himself stop thinking about Harry wearing his
sweater, which isn’t at all relevant. “I don’t know. No reason.”

She hums like she doesn’t believe him but doesn’t push. She doesn’t
push about anything these days. “Lady Black wanted me to marry
into the Lestrange family, actually, and had already set up an
engagement contract by the time I was sixteen.”

“What?” he says, then, “You never told me that.”

“You never asked,” she returns, and there’s a beat of silence where
it’s clear she’s waiting for him to explain, but he still doesn’t have
anything to say, and she only sighs. “Your father and I weren’t
engaged. He was promised to Paige Parkinson before she was
selected as the Heir.”

“But then how did you two get married?” he asks. “How did you both
renegotiate your engagements?” It’s complicated and expensive and
Draco doesn’t know how they convinced their Lord and Lady to do it.

“We ran away.”

There’s a long stretch of silence where Draco can only stare, mouth
hanging open. Narcissa smiles and leans her head back against the
trunk of the tree, looking away from him and up into the sky.

“I tried to speak to Walburga, but she wouldn’t hear of it. Lucius’s

father beat him bloody when he talked about breaking his
engagement with Paige. So we ran away, to this very house,” she
says, fond. “Lucius was the Heir, so he didn’t need a representative
of his family present, and had Rabastan Lestrange and Paige stand
as his witnesses. She wasn’t interested in getting married at all, and
had no problem with aiding Lucius, and your father and Rabastan
were close during school. I had Rodolphus as my witness, because
having our fiances present was so important when it came to actually
getting away with this. But I needed a representative from my family
present to make this acceptable, and one that didn’t mind going
against Walburga.”

“Andromeda?” he asks, because the eldest Black sister had always

had a tumultuous relationship with her aunt, so she wouldn’t have
minded causing more trouble. It makes sense.

But Narcissa shakes her head. “She’d already run away from home,
and hated Lucius besides. Even if she could have helped me, she
wouldn’t have. It was the only nice thing Sirius ever did for me.”

“Sirius Black was a witness at your wedding?” he blurts. Harry’s

godfather?

“He was just barely seventeen,” she continues like he hadn’t said
anything. “The war was just beginning to bubble over. But he was
still the Heir, regardless of getting burned off the tapestry, and we
needed that veneer of respectability if we didn’t want to ruin the
social standing of both our families. Which we didn’t, of course. He
was furious and uncomfortable the entire time, and clearly one
wrong move away from cursing everyone there and getting the hell
out. Lucius was trying so hard not to upset him, because he knew
that we needed him, I would have thought it was hilarious if I wasn’t
so nervous.”

Draco can’t believe this. His prim and proper parents, who have
followed the traditional ways so strictly, ran away and eloped . “How
did you - wasn’t everyone mad?”

“Walburga was furious. Lucius’s mother never spoke to him again

after that, although after you were born she softened towards me a
bit. She loved you,” she says, bopping him on the nose so he goes
cross eyed. “It was - really bad, for a long time. But I loved Lucius,
and he loved me, and we thought it was worth it.”

“Was it?” he asks, and instantly regrets it. He doesn’t think this is a
conversation he’s ready to have. He doesn’t know if it’s one he’ll
ever be ready to have.
He’s half expecting her to close off, to become cold towards him, but
she only twists her hands in his. “I still love your father. I don’t love all
the choices he made, but - but he’s still the same man who I married,
underneath all the rest of it. And even if I didn’t, even if I’d fallen out
of love with Lucius, it would still have been worth it. Because we had
you.”

He squeezes her hands, forcing a smile. He could leave it here. He

should leave it here. But he asks, “Is he still the same man?”

His father’s never quite recovered from the torture he suffered at

Voldemort’s hands. He’s quiet and confused a lot, and he seems
scared so often. Most of the time he’s almost completely normal, just
a bit scattered, but there are other times when he looks at Draco and
doesn’t seem to recognize him, and each time that happens is a
thousand times worse than any crucio Draco’s endured.

“Last night he woke me up, frantic, because he couldn’t find you,”

she says, steady. “He was confused. He thought you were still a
baby. He went through the house searching for you, and couldn’t find
you, and was terrified when he came back to bed and woke me. I
eventually convinced him you were with my parents, and he fell back
asleep. He didn’t remember when he woke up the next morning, but
he asked me if you were visiting soon, if we’d heard anything since
you started teaching.”

Draco doesn’t realize he’s crying until his mum wipes his tears away.
“I - sorry. I’m sorry. I’ll visit more. I’ll write.”

“You’re busy,” she says, and it’s not judgmental, it’s kind. But she’s
making excuses for him, the same way she used to make excuses
for his father when Draco would cry into her skirts about Daddy
never being home and never playing with him. Which wasn’t even
true, because he knows there were nights when Lucius came home
exhausted and still tucked him into bed, or woke early to go flying
with him before he had to go into the office. But it had never seemed
like enough when he was a kid, even though Lucius was trying, it
always felt like his father was leaving.
The tables have turned in a way that would be funny if it didn’t make
his heart clench in his chest.

“I’ll be better,” he promises. “I’ll be a better son.”

“You’re a wonderful son,” she says, and it sounds like she means it.
“I know you’re busy, that you truly are busy, and I know how
sometimes it’s hard for you to see your father.”

He doesn’t want her making any excuses for him. He doesn’t want
there to be a reason for her to make excuses in the first place. “I’ll be
better,” he repeats.

Narcissa sighs and leans forward, pressing her lips against his
forehead, like she used to do when he was a kid. “Go and get some
sleep. You look exhausted.”

He kisses her on the cheek before he climbs back down and goes
back into the house. It’s not until he’s inside that he realizes she
didn’t answer his question, not really, but now it doesn’t seem
important enough to go back and ask again. He means to go straight
to the fireplace but makes a detour without really meaning to. He
pushes open the door to his parents’ room and silently walks inside.

Lucius is curled up facing Narcissa’s side, a hand stretched out

across the bed like he woke looking for his wife only to find her
missing. His father is barely fifty, and he doesn’t look old, exactly, but
he does look tired. Both his parents always look tired. He doesn’t
know how to fix it. He thinks maybe it’s something he can’t fix. It’s
late, he has to get back to Hogwarts, but he leans down and kisses
his father’s cheek. He whispers, “Sorry.”

Lucius starts to stir, and Draco’s not a Gryffindor, he’s fine with being
a coward. He backs out of the room before he can get caught and
hurries back to the fireplace.

He’s not sure what he would be caught doing, exactly, besides

seeing his father, but he’s too tired to examine that thought too
closely.

This time when he crawls into bed, he falls asleep almost instantly.

His sweater still smells like Harry.

Draco didn’t get nearly as much sleep as he should have, but when
he wakes up he feels oddly well rested, like he hasn’t in a long time.

He goes to Harry’s office, and blinks at the assembled people. “Am I

late?” he asks, even though he knows he isn’t.

Harry, Ron, Hermione, and Neville are already there. “No,” Harry
says, and he seems distracted, rubbing his thumb against a curved
white scar across his wrist. It’s a nervous gesture that he hasn’t
noticed before. Well, he supposes it’s only inevitable that Harry will
have developed new neuroses since their days as students. “I’m just
- I just didn’t want to be late.”

“Hermione dragged me here,” Ron yawns. “I could have met you

guys there, you know.”

“It probably would have better if you did,” Draco says, not unkindly.

Neville wrinkles his nose. “Oh, yeah, we’re taking the floo to your
manor, right? We could take the carriage. Or fly. Or go to
Hogsmeade and apparate.”

Draco rolls his eyes and waves a dismissive hand. “What good is
being the Lord of the Malfoy family if I can’t bring some a blood
enemy onto the grounds when I feel like?”

Ron blinks, “Er, sorry. I didn’t think of that.”

He shrugs. “If anyone finds out, maybe they’ll stop saying your wife
is cheating on you with me. Instead you can both be sleeping with
me in some sort of torrid affair. Won’t that be nice?”
Harry chokes on air and starts coughing. Ron rubs his back, and
seriously, how is Harry even alive?

“Are there rumors that we’re sleeping together?” Hermione asks.

Draco stares. Has she really not - well, it’s not like she hangs around
a lot of purebloods, and even the crassest of students aren’t stupid
enough to cross Hermione. He heard a rumor that she once cast a
heatless fire spell on a Ravenclaw student that called her a
mudblood just to watch them panic before realizing it was harmless,
and he hasn’t really had an opportunity to ask if it’s true. He kind of
hopes it is, because that would by awesome. “You showed up to the
House meeting in my mother’s dress. Half of them think I’m trying to
steal you away from Weasley as part of the blood feud.”

Ron is completely unperturbed by this information. Hermione taps

her bottom lip. “Can I come as your date again for the next meeting?
And can I borrow another of your mother’s dresses?”

“Why?” he asks warily. “Can you not cause trouble for me? Trying to
introduce the curriculem reforms is going to be difficult enough as it
is. I’m going to get poisoned.”

“I’m not going to cause trouble!” Hermione protests. Ron isn’t nearly
fast enough at hiding his skeptical look, and his wife elbows him in
the stomach. “I won’t . I’m just curious. And Augusta was so nice as
to introduce me around, I just wanted to continue some of the
conversations I was having, is all.”

Neville frowns and meets Draco’s eyes. He knows they’ve both had
the same thought, which is the frankly terrifying possibility that
Augusta introduced Hermione around specifically to people who
would assume the worst about her coming as his guest, and what
her motivations for that could be, exactly.

Augusta looking to cause trouble is an even more horrifying

possibility than Hermione looking to cause trouble, which is saying
something. He’d prefer if neither of them caused trouble. Or, if they
absolutely must, he was at least made aware of it so he could plan
for it.

In which case, it’s probably to his benefit to keep bringing Hermione

with him to the House. “Sure. Please save the activism until you’re
not on my arm. I have a reputation.”

“As an asshole,” she points out, and he can’t even get mad at her for
it.

“Yes. Don’t ruin it. Being a moderate in the house is enough of a pain
in the ass without you making it harder. I have alliances with a large
portion of the conservative families, and I do not want the hassle of
having to dissolve them because they’ve decided I’ve lost my mind.”

“Don’t worry, it’s better for me if you’re viewed as a moderate,” she

says, like that’s comforting in any way and not a proof that she’s
planning something, and also planning to get him involved in some
way.

Ron claps his hands together. “Not that is isn’t super interesting and
all, but. Potter house?”

“Don’t touch anything in the Manor,” he warns Ron. “I’m sure there’s
some stuff that’s cursed and tied to the family magic. Also, ignore the
portraits. They will yell at you.”

“Rude,” he says, then before Draco can snap at him he says, “Got
it.”

Hermione has seen the Manor of course, his library has practically
become her second home (or perhaps third home, considering the
flat she shares with Ron in Hogsmeade), and Neville has been here
a few times for official functions that his Gran dragged him to. But
Ron and Harry haven’t seen it, not really, because when Voldemort
and his supporters had descended upon it certainly hadn’t counted.
It had been dull and stripped bare and dark.
It's not like that now.

Hermione ends up pushing her husband along in front of her as he

looks over the elegant and sunlight filled manor, with its delicate
moving wallpaper and polished marble floor. The portraits aren’t
even yelling, which he’s pretty sure has more to do with his presence
than his ancestors spontaneously developing decorum. They’re
halfway across the room when Draco realizes they’re missing
someone, and he looks back to see Harry standing in the middle of
his sitting room and staring at the ceiling like an idiot.

He doubles back and grabs Harry’s wrist, and he immediately looks

down at him. “Come on,” he says, tugging him forward, “I’ll give you
a tour some other time.”

“Okay,” he says, his cheeks red, and he better not be getting sick,
this is so not the time for Harry to catch a cold.

They’ve made it outside by the time he realizes he’s still got his
fingers wrapped around Harry’s wrist, and he lets go, face burning.
Why hadn’t Harry said anything? Maybe he didn’t notice. He’s
probably just nervous and distracted about opening up the Potter
House.

It’s about two miles away from the Malfoy Manor, but they won’t be
able to apparate there until they get onto the road and off his land.
He and Hermione can apparate out of here, but the rest of them
can’t.

Soon enough they’re standing at the edge of the Potter property line.
“You really don’t see anything?” Draco asks Neville. Both he and
Hermione shake their heads.

Ron claps Harry on the back, “Your ancestors had a weird definition
of what a house was, mate.”

Draco wants to be offended on behalf of the Potters, but even Harry

looks skeptical. Honestly . “That’s not the Potter House! We’ll have to
walk through to get there.”

There’s a path from the edge of the property that leads up to a huge
dark red pyramid-tower structure with detailed carvings on each
level, with a dome on top of the massive construction. “Why do I feel
like I’ve seen this before?” Ron mutters.

“Probably because you have,” Draco answers. “It’s based on the

Brihadisvara Temple in Thanjavur. When the Potters immigrated to
Britain, they saw no reason why they couldn’t take India with them.”
Everyone turns to stare at him. He resists the urge to fidget. “What?”

“Why do you know that?” Harry asks, a look on his face that Draco
can’t quite map.

He shrugs. “The Potters and the Malfoys have an alliance, and the
war was over. We - I just - my family assumed,” he finishes, and
shrugs. The war was over, and the Potters and Malfoys had been
allies if not friends, had been neighbors if nothing else. If Harry had
been raised by James Potter, he would have learned all about the
Malfoy family history and estate. “Come on, spill and get this show
on the road.” Draco summons a silver dagger and offers it to Harry
hilt first.

Ron pushes Harry’s arm down before he can pick it up. “Wait. Draco,
this isn’t going to kill him, right? How do we know the magic isn’t
mad?”

“It’s only been twenty three years,” Neville answers, “That’s not
nearly enough time to cause a problem. Besides, the house has
been closed up and under stasis, not abandoned. There’s a
difference. The magic doesn’t have a reason to be mad.” He pauses,
“Also, I can’t see anything, so I have no idea what you guys are
talking about. Harry, please, I’m begging you. I’m so curious.”

Harry takes the dagger, looking from it to the looming temple. “So,
what? Do I just stab myself?”
Hermione snorts and Neville rubs a hand over his face. Draco grabs
him by the shoulders and twists him so he’s facing his grounds.
Harry has really nice shoulders. “Walk forward until you can’t
anymore. Slice your hand on the dagger, then press it against the air
until you hit something. Don’t stab anyone, yourself included, but
especially me, if you’re taking requests.”

When Harry doesn’t move, Draco lets go of his shoulders and

pushes him. Harry stumbles, looking over his shoulder to glare, but
Draco only shrugs, unrepentant. They’re burning daylight.

Harry drags the dagger across his palm, not even flinching as blood
wells against his skin. He walks forward, then pauses. Draco can’t
see anything, but he assumes he’s reached the barrier. Harry
reaches his hand out, and presses, leaning into it.

There’s flash of light that leaves him temporarily blinded, and then a
sound like glass shattering, but loud enough that it leaves his ears
ringing. When he regains both his senses, the grounds look different.
They seem manicured and taken care of, and the outside of the
temple is spotless, and there’s a large white stone path leading to
the doors of the temple.

“Wow,” Neville breathes, then frowns. “Did it look like that before?”

Hermione runs forward and clutches Harry’s arm. “This is amazing!”

Then she looks down and grabs onto Harry’s hand, who’s too busy
staring at his family’s ancestral home to notice. “There’s a scar!
Draco, you didn’t get a scar when you cut your hand at Stonehenge.”

He and Neville move at the same time, but Draco gets their first. He
pulls Harry’s hand up to his face. Sure enough, there’s a thin white
scar from where Harry just cut himself. “At least it healed,” Neville
says, but he doesn’t sound happy. This isn’t good.

“What?” Harry asks, “Is something wrong?”

“Your grass is cut,” Draco says.

He blinks, looking at the lawn and then back at him. “Yes? Is that a
problem?”

“I don’t suppose the Potters decided to start contracting their elves

and just didn’t tell anyone?” Draco asks, but he’s not talking to Harry.
He’s asking the universe at large.

“Probably not,” Neville answers, and pulls out his wand. “All right
everyone, keep your wands out.” He trades a look with Draco, then
takes a couple steps back. “Harry, you should lead, but keep Draco
close. I’ll take the rear.”

Draco would have preferred to be the one at the back of the group,
actually, but he’s not going to cause a fuss over it.

“Why?” Harry asks. “Why does my family’s grass being cut matter?”

“Because it means there’s someone or something who cut it,” Neville

says. “Something that’s stuck around for twenty three years.”

“Probably a house elf,” Draco clarifies, because he knows the others

won’t make that connection on their own.

Ron raises an eyebrow. “And we’re scared of house elves?”

“No,” Draco corrects, “We’re terrified of house elves.”

Unbound house elves who’ve had the run of the house for twenty
three years, who haven’t seen Harry since he was a baby if they
ever did meet him, who stayed when they didn’t have to. They’re
either very loyal, or very possessive.

If they’ve decided the house belongs to them, they may not want to
give it up.

i hope you liked it!

feel free to follow / harass me at: shanastoryteller.tumblr.com

Chapter 12
Chapter 12: Chapter 12

(See the end of the chapter for notes.)

Draco follows a half step behind Harry as they walk down the stone
path. He refuses to acknowledge that he’s comforted to have Ron
rather than Hermione at his back, because she’s brilliant, but Ron
has always been the stronger caster. Besides, he’s still an active
auror, so doing stupid shit like this is literally his day job. Hermione
follows behind her husband, and then last in line is Neville.

It’s a bright, cloudless day, but as soon as they pass through the
threshold of the temple they’re plunged into darkness. The temple
hadn’t had a door when they entered, but Draco is unsurprised to
find their only visible exit closed off when he turns around.

No one even has the time to panic before there’s a steady light up
ahead, and Draco peaks over Harry’s shoulder to see a house elf
holding a flaming torch and wearing a bright orange outfit that almost
looks like a sari, but is far more casual. She’s old, even by house elf
standards, and Draco feels a shiver go down his spine. She smiles,
her teeth bright white and pointed. Unbound house elves are
terrifying. His own family’s unbound elf would be scary, except for the
way he loves them all

Maybe he should have brought Dax to negotiate on their behalf? But

no, Dax is polite as needed, but has no patience for diplomacy. He
would have probably just started a war or a massacre or something
else equally messy.

The ancient house elf tilts her head to the side and speaks in a
melodic language that he hasn’t studied in thirteen years.
When she finishes, the silence stretches on until Draco pokes Harry
in the back. “Well? You’re up.”

“Uh,” he says, “Up with what? I can’t understand her.”

The elf’s eyes narrow. She doesn’t like that.

“You don’t speak Tamil?” he hisses. He hears the sound of someone

slapping themselves in the face. He assumes it’s Neville. “That’s
important information!”

Harry almost turns around to talk to him, but those years as an auror
must have been good for something, because he stops just short of
taking his eyes off the elf. “Why would I? I was raised by white
muggles.”

Oh, right. Merlin, Harry’s life is so fucked up.

He places his hand on Harry’s shoulder, getting as close as he can

without putting himself in front of him, which means basically
plastering himself along Harry’s back. Great. Awesome.

“Son,” he tries, jerking his head to Harry. The language feels

unfamiliar and awkward on his tongue after so many years. “Potter.
Son of Lord. Heir. ”

Harry feels like he’s so tense he’s going to snap, but mercifully
remains silent.

“I am Tay,” the house elf says, and her eyes look red thanks to the
light of the flames. Or maybe they’re just red. It’s hard to tell. “Who
are you to speak?”

She’s using easy to understand, simplistic phrases, and she hasn’t

tried to eat them yet. That’s good. She’s trying to help.

Maybe they’ll be okay.

“Um,” he bites his bottom lip. Who is he to speak to her in Harry’s
stead? He’s not family, not even a friend, just a co-worker and
childhood enemy who happens to know enough about this house to
be useful to bring along. Oh - wait, that’s who he is! “Lord Malfoy. ”
Their families have an alliance. He’s an ally.

“Young, ” she comments, and he doesn’t respond, because he

doesn’t know what to say. He is young. “Why do you come now?”

“Young,” he echoes. A glint of something that might be amusement

shows in her eyes. Or maybe it’s hunger. He hopes it isn’t hunger.
“Here now .”

She hums, rocking back on the balls of her feet. “It’s been too long,
even for a lost son,” she says in English. He’s not surprised, she’d
clearly understood them earlier. “If you want access to the house,
you’ll have to earn it.”

“It’s his house,” he says stubbornly.

“He’s a Potter in name alone,” she counters. “No language, no

heritage, no memories. Not born in this house and barely born of it.”

“He’s a Potter by blood, by magic,” he snaps, “Not even you can

ignore the rules of magic. He’s a Potter. This land is his. This house
is his.”

“I am not his,” she counters, and Draco swallows. “I care for the land.
I care for the house. If he wants the house, he must take it.” She
sighs, and stares at Harry for a long moment. “He does have his
father’s face, at least.”

“That’s because he is his father’s son and he should be treated as

such-”

She raises a hand and snaps her fingers, plunging the narrow
hallway into complete darkness. Her voice echoes all around them,
bouncing off the stone walls, coming from no direction and every
direction all at once. “Blood cake, blood cake, make me a man.
Make me one as fast as you can. Pat it, prick it, make it of the sea.
Put the trespassers in the oven for you and me.”

Her voice fades away, and the silence lasts until Neville says, “Fuck.”

“What the hell was that about?” Ron demands.

“I cannot believe we got a blood cake curse put on us. What is this,
the fifteen hundreds?” Neville asks.

“Be grateful,” he says, finally stepping away from the searing heat of
Harry’s back. “She could have just eaten us. Now we have a
chance.”

Hermione pushes past Ron so she can glower up at him. It’s a good
glower. He’d be appropriately cowed if the situation wasn’t so dire.
“Draco, if you don’t start making sense, I’ll strangle you.”

We’ll, that’s rather uncalled for. “We need to find the blood cake
before either the curse or her homunculus kills us. On the bright
side, if the curse kills us, we probably won’t get eaten. If the
homunculus kills us, we’ll definitely get eaten. By it and by her.”

“We should probably get moving,” Neville suggests. “Waiting around

here for this thing to find and kills us seems foolish.”

Draco pokes Harry in the back. “Cast a lumos charm and pick a
hallway. You have to lead, and it’s probably not a great idea for the
rest of us to cast magic right now if we can help it.”

Harry turns around, and now he’s glowering at him too, which is just
unfair. “You speak Tamil?”

“Barely. If us getting out of here depends on my fluency, we’re

screwed. I stopped taking lessons when I was eleven. I would have
kept it up if you hadn’t been such a complete prat.” This close, he
can still see Harry’s face, even though it’s almost entirely dark. It
twists, like it’s trying to look offended and confused at the same time,
but it just ends with him looking like an idiot. “Stop that. If you’d been
raised properly, you would have grown up learning French and all
about my family. We’re allies and neighbors. Obviously I was taught
to speak Tamil. My dad speaks more than I do, and my grandfather
was fluent, as was my great grandfather. Not really sure past that.
When terms between our families are good, we learn Tamil, and you
lot learn French.”

“So your parents expected terms to be good between us?” he asks.

Draco shrugs, thinking of how different things could have been if

Harry had taken his hand, if there’d been no war to escalate their
stupid schoolyard rivalry into something worse. “The war was over,
and you had to come home someday. We were the same age, so -
well, by the time you came of age and were able to take reopen the
Potter House, Dad expected us to be friends.”

“Well he got that part right,” Harry sighs, then swallows. “Didn’t he?”

Are they friends? They barely know each other. Except for all the
ways they know each other too well, of course.

“Guys,” Hermione says. “Explanation, and also not sitting around

and waiting for something to kill us, maybe?”

Harry silently casts lumos, the tip of his wand illuminating the space
between them, and his bright green eyes are looking at him, into him
even, and he feels pinned in place. This is so unfair . “Right,” Harry
agrees, turning his back to Draco, who feels relieved and
disappointed all at once. “She made a homunculus? House elves
can do that?”

“Not on their own,” Neville says.

“Your ancestors suck,” Draco interrupts helpfully. Or, well, he thinks

he’s being helpful, but Ron flicks him in the back of the head.
Neville does a poor job of turning a cough into a laugh. “We’re under
a blood cake curse, like we’re back in the days of muggles
murdering witches and wizards for fun. Some families were more
proactive than others. They would make a blood cake and hide it in
their own homes. Or, depending on the purpose, entrust it to a
friend.”

“Or a house elf,” Draco grumbles.

“Or a house elf,” Neville agrees. “When someone other than the
makers of the blood cake steps in the house, it enacts a curse. This
was supposed to prevent the very muggles who killed them from
being able to claim their property, but was also a way to ensure
family could still manage to claim the land and property. Or even that
other wizards who weren’t family could, if needed.”

Ron makes a considering sound in the back of his throat. “When you
say blood cake, do you mean blood as in blood, or as in blood
blood?”

“Both,” Draco answers, “and Harry is going to have to eat it. Because
finding the cake and eating it is the only way to break the curse.”

“Yuck,” Hermione and Ron say together, then grimace. “Sorry Harry.”

“Hold a on a minute,” Harry says, pausing his walk down the hallway
until Draco pushes him forward, but even then he only stumbles
forward a couple more steps. Harry’s clearly a disaster, but he
should still be able to manage walking and talking at the same. They
really shouldn’t linger in one place for too long. Harry takes a few
more hesitant steps. “I’m going to have to eat a cake made of
blood?”

“Legend says they’re sweet?” he offers. “But yes. It’s, uh, a sponge
cake. That’s enchanted. And it’s soaked up your ancestors’ blood.”

Ron snorts. “Like a sponge?”

“Yes,” Neville says, because it is, that’s part of the spell, that’s the
whole reason sponge cake is used in the first place. So many soft
crannies for intent magic to settle into. “Once Harry eats it, the magic
will recognize him, then Tay won’t have any more claim onto the
house, and she won’t have any reason to deny Harry. Which I’m not
sure she really wants to do anyway. Blood cake curses are a pain,
but if her honor’s been slighted then this is probably the most
reasonable course of action.”

“Unless we’re killed by a homunculus,” Ron says cheerfully.

“No one is getting killed by anything,” Harry says, but he’s stopped
walking again, which really runs counter to what he just said. Staying
still just makes them a target. Harry survived the war and worked as
an auror for a handful of years, Draco seriously doesn’t understand
what he’s doing right now. “How did an elf make a homunculus
anyway?”

“Elves that have been entrusted with a family’s blood cake can use
its power,” Draco says impatiently. “Evidently your ancestors were
fond of Tay. What are we doing? Why have we stopped walking?”

Harry shrugs, and Draco’s going to kill him. “I just - does this this wall
seem odd to you?” He reaches out to touch it, and Neville makes a
strangled sound, but Draco’s the only one close enough to do
anything.

“Don’t!” he shouts, grabbing onto Harry’s shoulders just as he

presses his hand against the smooth red stone. He means to pull
him backwards, but instead they both get pulled forward, stumbling
into the hard wall and passing through it. When they fall out the other
side, Draco has to cover his eyes and blink a few times, eyes
watering at the sudden bright light. “I guess this place was used as
more than an entranceway. I really shouldn’t be here.”

“Don’t leave,” Harry says automatically, looking around the room,

wide eyed. “Where are we?”
They’re in a tall, windowless tower. Based on the outside of the
temple replica, and assuming this exists in the same plane of matter,
it has to run right up the center of it. The light comes from thousands
of interlocking symbols floating in the air in front of them, some
clustered so thickly together that they’re impossible to tell apart.
They cover the whole tower, all the way to the top from what Draco
can see from tilting his head back.

Merlin. The Potters didn’t come to Britain until the eighteen

hundreds, but this is way more than a couple hundred years old.
This looks - maybe thousands of years old.

Maybe this isn’t a replica of the temple. Maybe the temple is

modeled after this one.

No, that’s crazy. Just because this tower is that old doesn’t mean the
rest of the structure is.

“The wards room,” he answers finally. “Ours is under the basement.

That’s a secret, by the way.” It’s actually a huge secret, he absolutely
shouldn’t be telling its location to anyone outside the family. But he’s
in the Potter wards room right now, an ally but still an outsider, and
it’s wrong . He has to level the playing field at least a little, even if it
makes his stomach roll. “Although I suppose no one can be mad at
me for getting chatty with the family secrets during my final
moments.”

He’s trying hard not to panic, to keep a calm head, because as soon
as he sinks into the fear clawing its way up his throat, he loses, he’s
dead, and that’s just the end of it. So he can’t panic. But it’s very,
very hard.

“What?” Harry snaps, looking down from the wards to stare at him.
“What are you talking about? Are you hurt?”

He’s already reached a hand out towards him, but Draco shakes his
head, and he lets it drop. “I’m not - it’s usually a lot harder to get into
a wards room, you know, you have to do a bit more than touch a
wall, this isn’t exactly like catching the Hogwarts Express.”

Harry’s eyebrows dip together. “Okay? Is that supposed mean

something? If you’re trying to tell me something, you should just
come out and say it, I don’t think we have the time for you to be
vague and unhelpful.”

“I’m not-” He cuts himself off, frustrated. He’s not vague and
unhelpful on purpose . He always thought he was being clear, it’s not
his fault that Harry was raised by a bunch of ignorant muggles. “Tay
put a blood cake curse on us, which might potentially end in all our
deaths, but could also mean that we all get out of this alive with no
injuries, and she didn’t have to do that. She could have just killed
and eaten us, and we’re strong, but there’s a good chance that a
house elf of Tay’s age is probably stronger. So murdering us wouldn’t
necessarily be difficult for her. But she didn’t do that.”

“Would she really eat us?” Harry asks, for a moment looking as
green as his eyes. “Wouldn’t we - I mean, we’re a lot bigger than she
is.”

This really isn’t what Draco wants him to be focusing on. “Well, I’m
sure that somewhere in your mansion you have a freezer, or even if
you don’t then your powerful unbound house elf could probably
manage an ice spell. They get power from eating flowers made of
magic. We’ve got magic in our blood, and she would use that blood
to make moon orchids. She’d drain our bodies of bodies of blood and
feed our flesh to her homunculus. So she could and would eat us,
and we’d taste delicious. But that’s not the point here.”

“Er, right, sorry,” he tilts his head for Draco to continue.

He resists the urge to sigh. It seemly oddly right that he spends

some of his last moment being exasperated by Harry. “Tay gave you
a task that you have a chance of winning. Walls give way to bring
you to the innermost part of this temple. Tay wants you to succeed.
The magic wants you to succeed. But it also wants you alone, I
wasn’t supposed to be here, it was just an accident. Which means
the next time I touch a wall or step on the wrong set of flagstones of
something equally ridiculous, the house is going to push me to be
somewhere else. Alone. Everyone else is together, but I’ll be alone,
so the homunculus will almost certainly kill me first. Or maybe
something else will. Who knows, it’ll be a fun little surprise.”

Or maybe he’ll be fine, and nothing will happen, and he’ll just have to
wait around for the rest of Harry’s friends to come find him. That
would be nice, but he’s not holding his breath. He’ll still be wandering
around alone in unopened wizard’s house, and he’s sure there are
plenty of traps waiting to catch him unaware and murder him.

Harry is staring at him with his mouth hanging open. It should be a

crime against humanity that he manages to look attractive even then,
even acting like an absolute moron. “I don’t want you to die!”

“Thanks,” he says dryly, “We’ve really progressed since our school

days.”

Harry scowls and steps forward to grab his hand with same force as
if he were punching him. Draco stares at their intertwined fingers
uncomprehendingly. “There. Now no magical force can come and
snatch you away without grabbing me too, so if you get taken, it will
have to take me too, and you won’t be alone. We’re alone together
or not at all. Happy?”

Absolutely not. “Did any of that make sense as it was coming out of
your mouth?” he demands. “Let go of me.”

“No. I don’t want you to die, and I don’t have any idea what I’m
doing, so I’m going to continue holding your hand, and if anything
comes for you, be it that house elf or the homunculus or magic itself,
it will have to get through me first,” Harry says firmly. “So stop
worrying about that, and help me figure out where this blood cake is.
Which is gross, just so we’re clear, this whole ancient magical ritual
business includes far too many bodily fluids for my comfort.”
There’s absolutely a joke in there to be made about comfort and
bodily fluids, but since it looks like Harry’s determined not to let him
die, and their friends are in danger, now is a horrible time to
proposition him. Not there’s ever a good time to proposition him,
because Harry is… he’s… an idiot, right. There are plenty of reasons
that Draco has for not falling for Harry Potter, he made a list once,
it’s just rather hard to think about what those reasons are when
Harry’s holding his hand and going on about willing to fight things for
him.

“Right,” he swallows. “Okay. Um, well, the magic wants you in the
wards room.”

“So the cake is somewhere in here?” he asks, looking around like

there’s going to be some sort of convenient pedestal with a cupcake
on it.

“Unlikely. But if the magic wants you in here, it either wants you fix
something, or it wants,” he pauses, frowning, “well, something else
that if definitely doesn’t want, so don’t worry about it.”

Harry glares at him. “Considering how my luck has been running my

entire life, whatever horrible thing you just thought of is what’s going
on, so you might as well just tell me now.”

“It’s kind of,” he searches for a word that won’t freak him out, then
gives up, “gruesome. Also, I promise it’s not what’s going on. If it
was, you’d already be dead, so we shouldn’t waste time talking
about it.”

Harry stares at him, hard, for several long moments, but he doesn’t
flinch. “Tell me later then. How are we supposed to fix it? Can you
read Tamil?”

“Poorly,” Draco admits, looking at all the interlocking symbols and

spell work. “But that’s not Tamil. It’s Sanskrit. If I thought the house
was going to pull you here, I would have told you to bring a Patil.
They’ve been doing all their warding and spell building in Sanskrit for
generations. The prestige of attending Hogwarts might outweigh our
use of Latin and Greek based spells, but only barely, according to
Lady Patil.”

“Well, if neither of us can read it, how are we supposed to fix it?
Should I bleed on it? That’s how you lot solve your problems, isn’t
it?”

Draco wants to be offended, but bleeding on it does actually solve a

lot of magic based problems, assuming it doesn’t kill you. “No, just -
look, it would absolutely be easier if either of us could read Sanskrit,
but this is your family’s magic. It’s your magic. Just grab it, and look
for a missing link.” He looks down at their hands. “Which would
probably be a lot easier to do with both your hands.”

“If I let you go, is there a chance something will happen to separate
us?” Draco doesn’t answer. “Yeah, no. If I let you die, Luna will cry,
and Luna crying is actually the worst thing in the whole world.”

“If you take too long to figure this out and find the others, they might
all die, so maybe you should prioritize a little bit?” he suggests. Why
is he trying to talk Harry into letting go of him and risking his death?
Maybe Harry isn’t the only idiot around here. Well, he’s been far
worse things than a hypocrite.

“Hold on to my waist, and then I can use both my hands,” Harry

says. Draco blinks at him. Maybe he’s already dead and it just
happened so quickly that he didn’t notice. “Also, I have no idea what
you mean by just grab it. Grab what? The floating glowing symbols?”

“Yes,” he answers. “What, am I supposed to just hold on to you while

you’re doing this?”

He shrugs. “You can look over my shoulder and tell me when you
see whatever this supposed missing link is.” Draco doesn’t think he
can be serious, because this is insane, but Harry turns around and
then tugs him forward until he stumbles into his back. He wraps
Draco’s arm around waist, then impatiently reaches for his other
hand when he just stays frozen against his back. “Come on, you
were the one just saying we’re under a time limit.”

“Right,” he swallows, and clasps his hands against Harry’s stomach,

pressed up all against him. He’s not quite tall enough to hook his
chin over Harry’s shoulder, so instead he awkwardly presses the
bottom part of his face into his shoulder, so he can still breathe and
see what’s happening but he doesn’t have to go on his tip toes.
Harry’s warm and solid and smells vaguely of some sort of lemon
soap or shampoo, maybe both. “Well, grab it.”

Harry turns his head to glare at him, and he’s flushed a bright red.
Well, good, he’s glad that Harry thinks having Draco draped over him
like this is embarrassing. It was his idea, and Draco shouldn’t be the
only one suffering because of it. “Seriously?”

“If I do it, it will kill me,” he says, “so I can’t demonstrate. Just grab
one a random, the rest will figure themselves out. Trust me.”

He regrets saying that as soon as it’s out of his mouth, but Harry
doesn’t argue anymore. He reaches out for one of the glowing
Sanskrit characters and as soon his fingers touches it, the rest of
them light up. Draco hides his face in Harry’s back to get away from
the glare, only peeking back over his shoulder when it subsides.
Harry’s still blinking, trying to regain use of his eyes. “Ow.”

“Sorry,” he says, “mine don’t do that, but I touch it pretty frequently,

so.” The wards have come together like some sort of gossamer thin
floating ribbon, spiraling all around them and up to the top. Harry
slides his fingers across it, and Draco can feel the way he shivers at
the touch. “Just keep doing that, until your reach the end, or you find
a problem.”

“How will I know if there’s a problem?” Harry asks, but he’s already
doing as Draco said. As soon as he pulls the ribbon through his
hands, the part he’s touched disintegrates, allowing the glowing
Sanskrit to float back up to its proper place around the tower.
Draco’s wards burn his hands when they need repair, but he knows
that’s not a universal concept. At least a few of the Irish families’
wards let out angry bagpipe noises, and others feel wet, and he’s
heard of a few who tickle. “You’ll know.”

Harry sighs, but doesn’t argue, which is a small miracle. It’s

unfortunate that Draco’s the only one to witness it and that no one
will believe him.

The Malfoys are relatively new family to the House, considering, and
it’s only in the last half century or so that they’ve bothered to
maintain family wards like these, instead of just relying on natural
defenses and the Lord’s own wards and magic. They’re all in French,
and they float along the wall in lazy pattern, shifting and changing,
interlocking and breaking apart as needed. It’s planned, precise and
masterful and graceful.

The Potter wards aren’t like that.

It’s mostly Sanskrit, but every now and again he catches glimpses of
something familiar, small sections of Tamil or Hindi or some other
language he doesn’t recognize. It’s not graceful or small or pretty. It’s
huge, easily a hundred times the size of the Malfoy wards, and
Draco can’t even pretend to be surprised that there’s something in
need of repair. These wards are so old that it’s a miracle that the
magic hasn’t eroded in spots, and there are places where he can
almost guess what something is for. Instead of taking out and
replacing a new section of wards when needed, the Potters had
simply added to it, refusing to erase any of their ancestor’s
handiwork. Instead, it’s more complicated, it’s languages tumbling
over each other and commands contradicting each other and fighting
against one another, pulling and pushing and none of it ever fading,
the magic pulsing thick and strong in this tower.

It's not delicate, not pretty. But it is beautiful. And powerful . Even if
someone managed to undo or outsmart one section of the wards,
there’s at least a dozen more just like it, waiting for the chance to
burn bright and gold.
“Here,” Harry says, and Draco focuses. It’s a bit of Sanskrit, and it
doesn’t any different from the others to Draco, but that’s why he’s not
the one doing this. “It’s broken.”

“So fix it,” he says.

Harry sighs with his whole body, and Draco doesn’t bother to hide
his smile since Harry can’t see it. “I don’t know Sanskrit, Draco. We
just went over this.”

“Well then why don’t you focus and tell me what it’s connected to,
and I’ll tell you how to fix it,” he suggests. “It’s your magic. Sanskrit
or no Sanskrit. Tell me what it does.”

He’s silent for a long moment, and Draco hopes he’s actually
listening to him and not just standing there being an idiot. “It’s…
connected to the garden? The - the flowers. It’s the magic that goes
into the flowers?”

He groans and hits his head against Harry’s back. “Well, that
explains Tay, at least.”

“Draco, I swear if you don’t start talking like a normal human being,”
Harry begins, irritated, then pauses. Draco drudges up what little
patience he has and waits. “Wait. It’s not just any flowers, right?
Normal flowers don’t need magic. It’s the moon orchids. Ever since
this was broken, whenever that was, the moon orchids haven’t been
growing.”

“Maybe you’re not as much of a dunderhead as I thought,” he says,

but Harry only snorts. “Right. So if Tay’s stuck around, she’s owed a
debt of magic. Which is probably why you scarred when you opened
the grounds, and let me tell you, that’s actually a huge comfort. I
thought it was going to be something way worse and harder to fix.”

“But why do I owe her a debt?” Harry protests. “I didn’t ask her to
stay! There’s nothing to keep her here!”
He rolls his eyes. “Don’t say that where she can hear you. It doesn’t
matter. She’s a house elf, it’s not like you get a choice about it. You
can either fix the wards, apologize for the horrible circumstances
she’s found herself in, commend her loyalty, and then offer her all the
magical flowers she can eat. Or you can insult her and then we die.”

Harry frowns. “That doesn’t seem like much a choice at all.”

“Yes, exactly,” He nudges his chin into Harry’s shoulder, and has to
bite back a laugh when he tries to squirm away. “Come on, hurry up
and fix the wards.”

“How many times do I have to tell you that I don’t know Sanskrit?”
Harry snaps. “I can’t fix it.”

Draco wants to snap back, but takes a deep breath instead. “You
don’t have to do it in Sanskrit. Some of these are in Tamil or Hindi.”

“I don’t know those either,” he says, something quiet that might be

misery in his voice, and Draco’s suddenly itchy all over.

“It doesn’t matter,” he says. “Wards aren’t like spell building, where
it’s all arithmancy and precise language and wand movements.
Wards are as old as magic itself, so they existed long before we had
any of that. You just have to speak and have intent and focus, you
have to use your own personal magic to add to and alter the wards,
and it’ll work. All magic was in the beginning was intent. Do it in
Latin. Do it in English. It really doesn’t matter. You’re a Potter, and
the magic knows you and responds to you, and that has nothing to
do with what language you speak to it in.”

“Any language?” he asks, looking down at the strip of ribbon wound

between his hands.

“Any language,” Draco confirms. “So you’ll be the first Potter to add
English wards, who cares? That’s not the important part.”

Harry hums, distracted, then says, “I’m not going to do it in English.”

Draco frowns, because he’s pretty sure that Harry isn’t fluent in
Latin, but well, it’s not like fluency is required, at least at Harry’s
power level. He could pretty much say a bunch of gibberish, and as
long he focused enough, the magic would find a way to make it work.

Harry opens his mouth, but it’s not Latin, and it’s not English.

It’s a low, hypnotic language that’s not quite words, but isn’t just
hissing either. The ribbon of wards snaps apart, spinning around
them and glowing the longer Harry speaks. There’s a heavy weight
in the air, and Draco should have specified, he should have told
Harry that this isn’t a problem he has to push every spare bit of
magic at. But he didn’t, so the room gets warmer and warmer, the air
thick as syrup with magic, and all Draco can do is tighten his arms
around Harry’s waist and hope this works.

It does.

A chilling breeze pushes through the room, and the written version of
Parseltongue looks a little like Tamil, all soft curving characters, The
newest bit of the wards glitters brighter than the rest of it.

“See?” he says, ignoring the way it comes out sounding breathless,

because who could blame him really. “It wasn’t that hard. You did
great.” Harry slumps backwards, and Draco tightens his grip to keep
them both upright. “Harry? Harry!”

“M’fine,” he mumbles, turning in the circle of Draco’s arms. They’re

so close. Too close. He should let go of Harry now, it’s probably safe.
His eyes are hazy, and Draco thinks that they might also be glowing
a little, which he doesn’t think should be happening. His eyes don’t
glow when he alters the wards. “You smell nice.”

“What?” he asks, and it absolutely doesn’t come out as a squeak.

Harry presses against him, so Draco takes a step back, then

another, then another, until he has nowhere else to go. He has the
cold stone wall to his back, and Harry warm against his front, and he
hasn’t always made the best choices, but surely he’s never done
anything to deserve this level of torture. “I’ve always liked your eyes.”

“You what ?”

Harry lets go of Draco, and he only has one insane moment to miss
the feeling of his arms around him when Harry’s pressing his hands
flat against the stone wall on either side of his head, leaning
impossibly closer. They’re already so close, how could they get
closer?

Draco doesn’t get to find out, because at that moment he falls

backwards through the wall, the same way they entered. Harry
follows, and he ends up on his back with Harry on top of him. That
probably would have hurt more, except that Harry had cupped the
back of his head so he hits Harry’s hand instead of the floor.

“Um. Guys?” Draco tears his eyes away from Harry, and notes that
they’re in a completely different hallway than the one they
disappeared from. Ron is standing there with Neville unconscious on
his back, and Hermione is next to him. They all look a little singed,
and at least half of Ron’s shirt has burned away revealing a painful
looking burn. Hermione’s clothes are intact, but she’s covered in a
worrying amount of blood.

“Neville?” Harry asks, looking away from Draco, his voice higher in
worry. But he still doesn’t get off from on top of him.

“He’s fine,” Ron says. “He helped Hermione kill the homunculus, and
I found the blood cake.” He pauses, looking at them significantly.
“So, while we’ve been fighting for our lives and finding the way to
break this curse, what have you two been getting up to?”

“Or going down on,” Hermione mutters, almost quietly enough that
he can pretend he didn’t hear it.

Almost.
Maybe it would have been better if he’d just let the homunculus eat
him. There’d be more dignity in that, at least.

having to eat a blood cake to break a curse is a real thing but in the
myths it's faeries, not house elves

i hope you liked it!

feel free to follow / harass me at: shanastoryteller.tumblr.com

Chapter 13
Chapter 13

(See the end of the chapter for notes.)

Neville regains consciousness in time to see Harry holding the blood

cake, which is roughly the shape and color of a brick. Draco waves
at his unfocussed gaze, and he only feels a little bit guilty at how
grateful he is that Neville didn’t see Harry pressed down on top of
him, because that means Augusta won’t hear about it.

Well, actually, she probably will, what with Hermione determined to

accompany him to the House meetings and Augusta determined to
have all her allies make friendly with her favorite muggleborn. “You
gotta eat it,” Neville says, his voice only a little slurred.

The rest of them startle, since they hadn’t noticed him waking up,
and Ron asks, “How you doing there Neville?”

“I’ll be fine. Eat the cake,” he insists.

Harry blinks, eyes still glazed. He’s clearly understand even less of
what’s happening around him than usual, so Draco explains, “Once
you’re the Lord of the house, Tay will heal Neville if you ask. So the
sooner you eat that, the sooner all this is over with.”

He looks at it dubiously, like it might attack him. “I’m not a vampire.”

Draco is going to take that cake and smash it into Harry’s face if he
doesn’t hurry up. “No, you’re a petulant, absent Heir, and Tay is
doing us a favor but not directly challenging you for ownership of this
house, so accept her olive branch and eat the cake.”

Hermione winces and Ron sighs, but Harry is unbothered. “You’re

cute when you’re mad. I used to love riling you up in school just
because I like the way your nose scrunches.”
“Merlin above,” Ron mutters, horrified.

“Um?” Neville says, voice annoyingly high pitched. “Is Harry drunk?”

“The idiot overpowered the wards and channeled enough magic that
he’s gone mad,” Draco snaps, grabbing his wand to transfigure one
of his buttons into a fork and going to stand next to Harry. He digs
the fork into the corner of the blood cake, lifting it into the air and
shoving it in front of Harry’s mouth. “Now shut up and eat the bloody
cake before you say anything else that you’ll regret.”

Harry keeps looking at him with those bottle green eyes, too dark to
be emeralds, but something else, like moss, like something clean
and good and useful. Draco has his father’s eyes, grey like a
rainstorm or gravestone. Harry opens his mouth and leans forward
enough to close his lips over the form, sliding off slowly and
swallowing.

“What’s it taste like?” Hermione asks.

Harry doesn’t look away as he says, “Sweet, but tangy too. Like
barbecue sauce.”

“Your ancestors’ blood tastes like barbecue sauce?” Neville

demands.

He shrugs, then opens his mouth again, waiting.

“You can’t be serious,” Draco says flatly. Harry raises an eyebrow, a

challenge, and he’s always been a stubborn bastard determined to
ruin Draco’s life, so he should even be surprised really. He wants to
be stubborn in return, but one of them has to be reasonable, and it’s
clearly not going to be Harry. So he stabs another piece out of the
cake with the fork, then shoves it into Harry’s mouth, glaring.

His eyes crinkle at the corner, like he wants to laugh at him. He

makes Draco feed the entire blood cake to him, piece by piece.
When they get out of here, Draco’s going to kill him, alliance be
damned.

He’s barely swallowed the last bite when everything shifts, and
Draco hadn’t realized how dark the hallway was until it was lit up,
bright and cheerful, and the whole think expands, no longer narrow
and confining, but rich reds and golden picture frames and side
tables. Fucking Gryffindors.

Tay appears beside them, no longer quite so terrifying as before,

sharp teeth tucked away and red tinted eyes only looking brown in
this light. “You’ll do,” she says to Harry, who grins, like he knows how
important that is, how valuable her praise is, no matter how faint.
She turns to him and says in French, sly, “Ally, are you? Is that what
they’re calling it these days?” Neville chokes, because he mastered
the language by the time he was nine, and Hermione smirks at him
in a way that is incredibly uncomfortable, and oh great, he hadn’t
known that she spoke French, just fantastic. At least Harry and Ron
look confused.

“It’s not like that,” he responds, irritable, stepping away from Harry,
which makes him frown at him. “He didn’t channel the ward magic
properly, that’s why he’s like that.”

“You keep saying that,” Harry says, eyes narrowed. “I don’t think-”

“Isn’t there something you’d like to say to Miss Tay?” Draco

interrupts.

Harry purses his lips, but sighs and turns to the house elf. “Thank
you for continuing to watch over the Potter home even after the
flowers stopped growing. I am honored by your loyalty to my blood. I
owe -” Draco and Neville flinch, and Harry pauses, then says, “In
return for your kindness, I would like to gift you as many moon
orchids as you desire, to show how grateful I am to have you in my
house.”
Tay cackles, pressing her hands to her thighs and inclining her head
in Harry’s direction. “You can be taught, it seems. Don’t worry, you
have shown your appreciation most thoroughly.”

They must all look confused, because Tay raises her hand and
snaps her fingers. In between one breath and the next, they’ve
moved, no longer inside the house, and instead in the front yard.
Draco hadn’t even felt the magic moving them. He vows to never
piss Tay off, because she’s scarily powerful, even for an unbound
house elf.

At first, Draco thinks the front yard has been covered in a blanket of
snow. The stone path leading to the front door is the only place left
untouched by the layer of white, but after a closer look, he’s sees it’s
not snow, but flowers.

Thousands upon thousands of moon orchids stretch across the

Potter land, so densely packed together that it’s impossible to see
the ground underneath them.

“You carry your family’s magic, their blood is your blood, and this
house is your home,” Tay says, then holds out her hand. “Come,
Harry Potter. It is time for you to open this house and take your place
as Lord of the Potter line.”

Harry reaches for her hand, and they both disappear.

“Harry!” Hermione shouts, and Ron’s wand is already in his hand.

“It’s okay,” Neville says before Draco can, finally sliding off of Ron’s
back. He lifts his shirt, revealing his completely intact torso. “If she
healed me, she must be confident he’ll survive it.”

Draco gestures to the moon orchids, “Of course he’ll survive it! Do
you see this?”

“Survive it,” Hermione repeats dangerously. Ron places a hand on

his wife’s arm, but he looks as angry as she sounds. “What are you
talking about?”

“Don’t worry, he’ll be fine,” Neville says. “She’s probably taking him
to the ward room. Blood to blood. He’ll bleed on some stuff, the
magic will accept him as Lord Potter, and everything will be fine.”

“What if it doesn’t accept him?” Hermione demands, “What if it

demands he sacrifices more than blood for the privilege of his
magic?”

Draco tries and fails to bite down on a smile. She really is the
cleverest witch of their age. That sentence would have sounded like
nonsense to her a few months ago, but now she says it easily. “It
won’t. Harry hasn’t given it a reason to.”

“Because magic always listens to reason and makes sense and

doesn’t sometimes act bloodthirsty and ruthless for no bloody
reason,” she hisses.

“Uh,” he takes a step back and considers hiding behind Neville, “it
doesn’t? There’s always a reason, even if we don’t agree with it. But
you really don’t have to worry, weren’t you listening to Tay? Harry
belongs to her now. She’s exchanged ownership of the house for
ownership of him.”

Ron’s face twists. “We own elves, not the other way around.”

Neville snorts and Draco makes a so-so gesture. “Depends on the

elf.”

“There used to be a whole etiquette about kidnapping because of

house elves,” Neville starts, and Hermione looks fascinated, but
Draco’s heard about this a thousand times and he doesn’t want to
hear it again. As the only child of the head of the Malfoy family, he
would have been prime kidnapping and bargaining material, except
no one was ever quite stupid enough to go against both his parents
and Dax.
Before Neville can get to into it, there’s a ripple in the air, and the
hair on Draco’s arm stands straight while Neville goes deathly pale.

For a moment, it’s like his blood is freezing in his veins, like all the
warmth has been stolen from his lungs and like he’ll never be warm
again. Then it’s gone, and his fingers are tingling with warmth. Ron
and Hermione only look confused, but, well, they’re not members of
the House.

“Did you feel that?” he asks Neville, even though the answer is
obvious. He nods, rubbing his arms, as if trying to chase away that
phantom chill. “Well, the good news is you’re almost certainly going
to be made a Lord after Augusta. Isn’t that nice?”

“Fantastic,” he says, dry, looking towards the house, his eyebrows

dipped together.

He’s clearly thinking the same thing that Draco is. If he felt that, then
the other members of the House must have felt it too. They were
trying to be quiet and controlled about this, but that’s just been
thrown out the window.

Oh, shit.

“The kids,” he says, eyes widening. “I told the Slytherins. I don’t think
I mentioned anything to Filius, did you tell Pomona? I don’t even
remember if the Hufflepuffs have any heirs. Hermione, did you tell
the Gryffindors?”

Neville curses, shaking his head, and Hermione frowns. “No, why
would I?”

“We have Heirs at Hogwarts right now - even more than usual, since
Lords and Ladies try and coordinate that type of thing for alliance
purposes,” Neville says. “If I felt that, there’s a chance they did too.
Except they’ll have no idea why, just that the magic did something
strange that hurt, so for all they know something terrible happened.”
“Fuck,” Hermione says, reflexive, “Okay, right, let’s go,”

She turns to Ron, who only raises a hand. “I know. I’ll stay here with
Harry until he’s done doing… whatever the hell he’s doing. You go
take care of the kids.” His blue eyes sweep over them, and for a
moment Draco is uncomfortably reminded of his mother. “That goes
for all of you.”

Draco thinks it’s fine, he doesn’t think there’s anything to worry about
now that Harry’s a Lord (Merlin’s sagging ball sack, Harry Potter is a
Lord ) but he doesn’t know, and Ron may be a pureblood, but he’s
been removed from this stuff for so long he’s nearly as useless as
Harry.

“I’ll stay,” Neville says, stepping back so he’s next to Ron. “You two
go. Make sure you check in on the Hufflepuffs for me.”

“I will,” he and Hermione say at the same time, and he kind of hates
himself. He grabs her hand and pulls her into a side long appiration
to the manor, and he should have given her a heads up before doing
that, but he had to get out of there before Ron said something
horrifying and true, and Hermione’s too good to splinch herself
anyway.

She shoots him a dirty look when they arrive, but then the fireplace is
filled with bright green flames, and they have more important things
to do, so she steps through them, Draco barely a step behind her.

Georgianna is pacing in his living room while Milly wrings her hands
in the corner of the room, large eyes even wider than normal.
“Master Malfoy! I know I is not be letting students inside, but it is an
emergency, but Mister Dax is saying you should not be being
bothered-”

“It’s fine,” he says, cutting her off before she can work herself up any
farther and focusing on Georgianna. “What happened?”
“Everyone’s fine,” she opens up with, and he can’t decide if that’s
comforting or not. “We knew what was happening, so we told
everyone. Sorry. But everyone was freaking out.”

“What happened?” Hermione demands. “Where are the heirs? Are

they okay?”

“I said everyone was fine. They’re in the great hall,” she answers.

Draco blinks. He can understand wanting to keep an eye on them,

but that seems a bit much. “Why not the headmistress’s office? Or
the hospital wing?”

“Because they wouldn’t all fit in there,” she says, raising an eyebrow.
“Aren’t you wondering why I’m the one here, in your private rooms,
and not someone who’s at least related to you?”

That’s an excellent point. “Well, I am now.”

Georgianna sighs, walking towards the door. “Come on, you can
explain to everyone what’s going on.”

He resists for a moment, but then Hermione kicks him in the shin, so
he followers her out. “You know, sometimes I get the impression you
don’t respect me.”

“I set Roberts on fire,” she says shortly.

Hm. Well, in that case. “I rescind my previous complaint.”

She grins over her shoulder before pushing the door open to the
great hall.

It’s one of the strangest things he’s ever seen, which he thinks is
really saying something considering the day he’s had. The hall is too
warm, and he’s instantly hit with a wave of heat. Most of the school
is there, but half of them are in shorts and tank tops, while the other
is buried in blankets, mugs of steaming drinks in their hands as their
non temperature challenged friends hover around them. When they
enter, it’s like watching a ripple across the water. The kids closest to
the door stop shivering and look towards him, shedding their
blankets and putting their mugs aside. Then it spreads like a wave,
until all the kids are tugging off layers of clothing and rushing
forward, everyone talking all at once and over each other so it’s
impossible for him to hear anyone at all. He can see Luna at the
back of the hall, with her arms around two Ravenclaws who are
doing their best to burrow into her side like a pair of nifflers. She
looks worried. He doesn’t like it when Luna looks worried.

He’s too taken aback to respond, but almost immediately Markel

elbows his way through the crowd, his arm hooked with Marilyn’s so
he can drag her behind him. Her eyes are worryingly glazed.
“Cousin!”

Draco reacts without thinking, opening his arms so they can press
their faces into his robe. “Are you two all right?”

“Marilyn is acting weird,” Markel answers, his voice muffled. “Weirder

than normal.”

She scowls, and when Draco looks at her again, her eyes seem
clearer, somehow. “It - you felt it too, don’t give me that!”

“You felt,” he starts, but then Hermione places her hand against his
back.

“Draco,” she says softly, “they’re all nobles.”

He doesn’t understand at first, then he looks back over the crowd of

students, and it clicks. She’s right. All the kids who’d been bundled
up had been those from noble families. That’s why Georgianna was
in his rooms instead of Markel, or any of his other numerous distant
cousins currently attending Hogwarts.

“Professor Granger. Professor Malfoy,” McGonagall says, her voice

managing to both cut through all the yelling and quiet it. Draco would
be more impressed if she wasn’t saying their names like shed to
when they were students. “Did it go well or poorly?”

What? What is she - oh. His snakes told everyone where they were
and what they were doing, and they know something big happened
with the magic, something big enough that all the noble children felt
it, but they don’t know what. Maybe what they’re feeling is the violent
destruction of one of the noble houses.

“Lord Potter is in the process of reopening the Potter House,” he

says, pitching his voice like he’s at a House meeting. “He’s
accompanied by Tay, the house elf who’s maintained the home in his
absence, and Heir Longbottom.” He doesn’t mention Ron, because
he doesn’t think mentioning that the newly anointed Lord is with a
blood traitor is going to help anything.

The relief that sweeps through the hall is nearly a palpable thing.

After they get the students sorted and back to their respective
dorms, Draco goes back to his rooms. He’s standing in front of his
mirror, tapping his wand against his palm, because he just knows
that this isn’t going to be an enjoyable conversation.

Well, he can’t avoid it forever.

Pansy answering his call almost immediately isn’t that unusual, she
does spend a lot of time in front of the mirror, but when she answers,
her face is bare, her hair’s in a lopsided bun, and there’s a dreadful
scowl on her face. He considers hanging up on her, but then she’ll
kill him, and Blaise will absolutely help her hide the body. “Draco,
darling, is there something you would like to tell me, perhaps?
Something to do with your favorite moronic Gryffindor, perhaps, just
in case anything slipped your mind?”

“If I’d know that everyone even remotely connected to the House
was going to feel it when he became a Lord, we would have done
the press release first,” he says. He also wants to object to Pansy
calling Harry his favorite Gryffindor, but he does still have some self
preservation instincts. “It’s personal. It was supposed to be private .
His mum and dad’s house. It wasn’t my business to tell.”

He’s not off the hook, but she does soften slightly. “Like that’s ever
stopped you before. You do have a press release planned, don’t
you?”

“Hermione’s off with a Daily Prophet journalist right now. One of the
Brown cousins, so it should be fine.”

She wrinkles her nose. “Candy or Charlie?”

“Candy,” he answers, and doesn’t say that Charlie is perfectly good

at her job, and that Pansy is just bitter that she trades in cash rather
than favors like every other half decent journalist. Personally, gauche
or not, Draco much prefers handing over a sack of gold to being
strong-armed into introducing someone to someone else or having to
speak out against a bill he doesn’t particularly care about. “I need a
favor.”

“Of course you do,” she sighs. “You’re lucky you’re so dear to me,
otherwise I’d replace you with someone who wasn’t quite so
inconvenient.”

“I have bought half your wardrobe,” he reminds her, because all the
annoying things he has her do come with benefits. “I need you to
accompany Harry to the next Lords and Ladies meeting. It can’t be
Blaise because he’d eat him alive, and if he doesn’t bring someone
respectable the House will destroy him.”

Pansy doesn’t deny it. “Why not Luna?” He only has a moment to
flounder before Pansy grins, wide and all knowing. “Oh, I see, you
want someone who will protect him.”

Luna would protect him by distracting everyone, by making herself

the center of attention, by opening herself up to scorn and laughter
to keep their scrutiny off of Harry. That’s not what he wants. It’s one
thing when he makes fun of Luna, it’s quite another when anyone
else does it. “Please.”

She shrugs, “Well, you know I do live for the drama. You’re buying
my dress, of course.”

“Of course,” he echoes, smiling. “Thank you. I don’t suppose you

want to come over?” This whole professor thing makes seeing his
friends kind of annoying, since he can never go to them.

Pansy doesn’t answer, but she does blow him a raspberry and then
disappear from the mirror. He calls Blaise next, and his friend’s face
shimmers across the glass. “What the fuck was that about?”

“Hi Blaise, nice to see you too,” he says dryly. “I saw the inside of the
Potter House and Harry put his hands all over me. Pansy is going to
come over and drink my sorrows away. Want to join?”

He tilts his head to the side like he’s seriously considering it, then
says, “Well, at least you’re not denying your huge embarrassing
crush on Potter anymore. That’s an improvement.” He hangs up
before Draco can respond, but he takes that as an agreement. He’s
just changed into sweatpants that are slightly too big and a long
sleeve shirt that he thinks must have belonged to Pansy at some
point, because it’s tight across his chest. Actually, on second
thought, it’s entirely possible that these sweatpants used to belong to
Blaise and Draco just stole them during their schoolyears.

He makes way too much money to be stealing his friends’ clothes.

Clearly he should put a pause on buying stupidly expensive robes
and invest some gold into loungewear.

His fireplace roars to life with bright green flames, and clearly they
got the memo without him having to say anything at all, because
Blaise is in shorts and a too large sweater, while Pansy is in leggings
and one of his old quidditch jerseys from, merlin, when he was
thirteen, maybe. It does make him feel better about the clothes
stealing.
They both have bottles of alcohol clenched in each fist. Being best
friends is knowing when someone want to get lazy drunk without
them having to say it. “Do you think we should develop healthier
coping mechanisms?”

Blaise pulls the cork from one of the bottles with his teeth. “No.”

Well, okay then. Good talk.

Draco really must be cursed. It’s the only explanation as to why

there’s someone knocking at his door in middle of the night after he’s
consumed over a bottle of alcohol. Why does this keep happening to
him? Maybe it’ll be Hermione again. They’ve progressed in their
relationship, he could probably just summon her a bottle and be
done with it. If it’s not Hermione, it’ll be Luna, and she’s absolutely
brilliant to drink with, so either way it won’t be terrible.

Unless it’s a student. He really doesn’t want it to be a student.

“Milly!” he calls out, and with a crack his house elf appears. “Is it a
student?”

“No, Master Malfoy,” she says, her face scrunching up the way it
does when she’s doing her best not to laugh at him.

“Wonderful,” he says briskly, forcing himself to stand and only

swaying a little. Or maybe a lot, considering the way Pansy is
giggling into his throw pillow and Blaise is judging him with his
eyebrows.

He walks over to the door, flinging it open, grin already on his face.

It’s neither Hermione, nor Luna.

“Er,” Harry says, eyes wide. “Am I, uh, interrupting something?”

“Why do you keep getting midnight visitors from Gryffindors?” Pansy
calls out, stretched on his couch in his old jersey while Blaise stands
next to her, dangling some grapes above her lips. He’s also shirtless,
for some reason. Where did his shirt go? Did he spill something on
it?

“Shut up,” he says to Pansy, then leans against the doorway. “How
did the rest of the day go? Is something wrong?”

“Uh, it was, I mean, no, you don’t have to,” he cuts himself off,
frustrated, glancing over Draco’s shoulder to Pansy and Blaise with a
look Draco doesn’t quite understand. He’s seen Harry direct
friendlier faces to Voldemort. “I didn’t know you’d have company. I -
sorry.”

He turns to leave, but Draco reaches out without thinking, curling his
fingers in material of his shirt. “Don’t worry about it, they don’t count
as company anyway.” Okay, now Harry is glaring, which just seems
very unfair, Draco hasn’t done anything to deserve a glare, at least
not recently. “Is everything okay? How’s the house? How’s Ron?”

“Fine,” he says, the edge coming off his flinty stare. “I just wanted - I
was going to say-” He looks over Draco’s shoulder again, which
seriously, what is he doing, he knows Pansy and Blaise aren’t that
interesting. “Never mind. It can wait.”

“Okay,” he says, and he thinks he’s too drunk for this conversation,
he feels like he’s missing something, but the world isn’t one hundred
percent upright right now, so analyzing Harry’s behavior is a little
outside his depth at the moment. “Do you want to join us?”

He shakes his head, rocks back on the balls of his feet, then gives
Draco a wooden smile before leaving his doorway and walking down
the hallway. Draco closes the door, feeling far more confused that
before he’d opened it.

“Draco,” Blaise says with uncharacteristic seriousness. “How could

you not tell us about this?”
“This is big news! We should have been the first to know, I’m
offended,” Pansy says, which may be true, but she looks far too
gleeful for him to take her seriously.

“What are you guys talking about?” Maybe he should have stopped
drinking earlier.

Blaise crosses his arms across his broad chest and scowls. “Why
didn’t you tell us that Potter finally wizened up and figured out he
liked you back?”

“He doesn’t, don’t be ridiculous,” he says firmly.

Pansy and Blaise don’t look like they’re letting this go. He’s seriously
weighing the indignity of fleeing his own rooms against talking about
his embarrassing twelve year crush on Harry Potter.

There’s not enough alcohol in the world for this conversation.

sorry this took so long, live is v hectic

feel free to follow / harass me at: shanastoryteller.tumblr.com

Chapter 14
Chapter 14

(See the end of the chapter for notes.)

Harry isn’t avoiding him. It’s impossible for Harry to avoid him,
because they barely saw one another to begin with, and any of his
feelings to the contrary are him just being a self absorbed twat.

“Why is Harry avoiding you?” Neville asks. Luna scoots down so he

can squeeze in next to her at the head table. “Did you say something
awful again? Not that that’s ever given Harry much pause in the
past, mind.”

If he wasn’t in full view of all his students, he’d let his head drop
forward into his mashed potatoes. “No. I don’t think so.” Neville
raises an eyebrow. “After Harry opened the Potter House, Pansy and
Blaise came over and we got drunk. Harry came looking for me, but
it’s all a bit blurry. I asked after his house and if he wanted to join us,
but then he left. I don’t think I said anything terrible. Is he secretly
some sort of prohibitionist or something?”

“Not if the stories about him at the auror parties are true,” Neville
answers, which obviously piques his interest. He hasn’t wild heard
any stories about Harry during his stint as an auror, which is bullshit,
he has a couple cousins in that department. “Really, you offered him
a drink and he said no?”

“Maybe he hates Pansy and Blaise?” he tries, even though as far as

he knows Harry doesn’t have much of an opinion about them beyond
them being prats, which, well, they are .

Luna sighs and gives them both one of her disappointed stares.
Draco’s skin starts to itch and Neville’s shoulders hunch. “You’re
both wrong.”
“Well, what is it then?” he asks, but Luna just kisses him on the
cheek before getting up out of her seat and leaving. Neville looks
jealous he didn’t get a kiss on the cheek too.

“Please don’t blow anything up,” Draco begs, sitting cross legged on
his desk in green pajama bottoms and a black long sleeve. It’s a
quarter hour before midnight, he’s not doing this in his teaching
robes. They’re lucky he doesn’t just nap in the corner and leave
them to their fate.

The potions club is all huddled around a massive cauldron, ignoring

him completely. He could fall asleep on top of his desk and they
wouldn’t even care until they needed him to answer a question.

He loves these kids.

“Is it supposed to be this color?” Raina ask anxiously. “Should we

add more beetle wings?”

“Only if you want to create noxious gas that will kill us all,” Albert
answers, mostly hiding behind her shoulder like the potion might
gain sentience and kill him anyway, no beetle wings needed. Raina
throws him a proud look that makes him puff up a bit, and Draco has
to muffle his laughter. A Lestrange and a Weasley being friends.
Clearly times are changing.

Cory scowls, leaning dangerously close to the flames. “She’s right

about the color though. Not beetle wings. Uh - unicorn horns?”

“Oh, because that’s less volatile,” Raina snaps.

Marianna is curling her hair with her wand as she thinks, just like
he’s seen Pansy do a thousand times before. “Something powerful
enough to stabilize the mermaid scales, but not explosive enough to
- well, explode.”
“The sixth years just finished making the Poor Man’s Faerie Dust,”
Dacia says. “That would work.”

They all wince. “It should .” Marianna agrees. “Poor Man’s Faerie
Dust acts almost exactly the same as normal faerie dust.”

“Almost,” Albert echoes darkly. Draco’s constantly impressed that a

Weasley has self preservation instincts. Clearly it skips a generation.

Raina twists to glare at him, like she’s just remembered he’s there.
He rests his chin his hand to hide his smile. “If only someone had
access to real faerie dust. Just a pinch would do, really.”

The rest of kids pause, then turn to look at him, eerily in sync. He
raises an eyebrow. “Are you talking about Hagrid? I don’t think he’s
awake right now, but you can certainly try.”

“Midnight is in fifteen minutes!” Dacia snaps. “We don’t have time for
that.”

He shrugs, because he could be sleeping right now, but no, these

kids are out to ruin his life.

“Cousin,” Raina says, and she’s trying for pleading, but ends on
reproachful.

He snorts, caving in under all their glares. “Alright, alright, put down
your pitchforks.” He snaps his fingers, “Milly.”

There’s a crack, and his house elf is standing there. “Yes, Master
Malfoy?”

“Grab a half cup of faerie dust from my private stocks back at the
manor,” he says. “Ask Dax if you have any trouble, he may have put
some sort of protection spell on it, he does that sometimes.”

She nods and then disappears.

The kids are still staring at him, although this time they just look a
mix of confused and shocked. “Half a cup of faerie dust is… a lot,”
Cory says finally.

It’s worth about a hundred galleons, and truly a ludicrous amount to

use for anything.

Except.

“Two weeks ago you guys added in a ground femur of a bear. You
were only supposed to use a clavicle,” he says. “Adding in this
amount of faerie dust is about the only way to salvage this potion.”

They all curse, using language that he should absolutely give them
detention for, but he’s too busy laughing.

“Why didn’t you tell us!” Dacia cries. “We could have fixed it if we’d
known when we did it!”

Albert asks the important question. “Why didn’t you stop us?”

“This isn’t a class. It’s a club, where the purpose is to experiment

and do things differently,” he shrugs. “You won’t learn if I never let
you get anything wrong. I’m here to make sure you don’t end up in
the hospital wing, and I guess to act as your living encyclopedia,
since none of you can be bothered to look anything up yourself. But
the rest is up to you. The only reason I’m helping you now is
because I refuse to do this again. We all have class in the morning,
and we won’t be done until two if we’re lucky .”

Also, he has a paper due for Filius in a couple days that he should
absolutely be working on, but it’s not like he can tell the kids that.
They’ll either start listing off the couple dozen projects they have to
do, like it’s a competition he’s definitely losing, or they’ll tell him to
stop assigning so much homework if he wants more free time. It’s a
lose-lose situation.
“I’ll kill you,” Dacia says with the type of calm confidence that only a
Zabini has when contemplating murder.

There’s two loud cracks. “What could you possibly need a cup of
faerie dust for?” Dax demands, Milly standing behind him and
wringing her hands nervously. “Are you using a sleeping potion on
the whole castle? Making a portal to another realm?”

“That can be done?” Marianna asks, more contemplative than he’s

entirely comfortable with.

“Hello Dax,” he says. He points to the giant bubbling cauldron in the

middle of the room. There’s another crack, and Dax is standing on
Albert’s shoulders, peering down into the cauldron. Albert sighs, like
he’s used to people climbing all over him. He must have younger
siblings.

“Terrible, just terrible, who made this?” he asks.

The kids all guiltily raise their hands.

Dax turns enough to glare at him, and Draco shrugs, “Hey, it’s not so
bad. It might even work.”

“Faerie dust isn’t a commodity,” he scolds. “You can’t just use it to fix
your problems at the last second.”

Draco has been pressing his luck with Dax since he was a toddler.
There’s no reason for him to stop now. “I mean, technically, I totally
can.”

Raina looks horrified. Her great grandfather was murdered by an

unbound elf.

That’s because her great grandfather was an asshole.

Which, well, he is too, so maybe her concern isn’t totally unfounded.

Dax scowls and disappears, reappearing a moment later with his
arms full of ingredients, still on Albert’s shoulders. He mutters angrily
under his breath, “Stupid, foolish children mucking about make a
mess of everything, oh, just throw some faerie dust at it, who cares if
it’s done incorrectly, never mind centuries of brewing technique, let’s
just throw things together like savages.”

“Um,” Albert says tentatively, “I could transfigure you a ladder, or

something, if you like?”

“You’ll do,” he answers, “just stay still.”

Draco bites his lower lip. Dax had made an effort to appear at least
slightly deferential in front of Hermione when he first met her, but he
doesn’t bother with the kids. Most of them have their own house
elves, but they’re all bound, they’re paid servants rather than
caretakers and family members. Watching them react to Dax is
hysterical.

Dax scowls, looking down at the potion, which is now a pale, glittery
silver. Draco genuinely has no idea how the house elf did that. “I
need - I’ll be right back, don’t touch anything.”

As soon as he’s gone, his kids turn to him and glare. Cory even
raises his hands in a clear what the hell gesture. Not laughing is the
hardest thing he’s ever done. “What?”

Raina opens her mouth. There are twin cracks. Dax is back, but he’s
not alone.

“Tay,” Draco greets, inclining his head.

She grins at him, all teeth, “Young Lord Malfoy. I haven’t seen you
around the house. Are you avoiding me?”

He snorts. “I’m not the one avoiding anyone.”

Oh, shit, the kids are way too smart for them not to pick up on that.
Fuck.

Tay cackles. Dax tugs on her arm impatiently. “Stop harassing my

boy and be useful.”

“I can do both,” she says, but there’s another crack. Dax is back on
Albert’s shoulders, while Tay is on Raina’s. She tsks disapprovingly.
“What a mess.”

“Midnight is in two minutes, can you fix it or not?” Dax demands,

speaking to her in a way that Draco would never do personally,
because he values his life.

“It would be shame if I took that as an insult,” she says, grinning.

Sometimes, Draco wonders how much of the Malfoy-Potter alliance

is because their families decided it was mutually beneficial, and how
much of it is because their unbound house elves are friends.

The Potter land used to be part of the Malfoy estate, all that time
ago. They’d dug the earth out themselves, proudly presenting the
Potters with a huge crater to call their own, and ceding some of their
power to keep them close.

Their families’ history might run a lot a little deeper than Draco’s
revealed to Harry. It’s not like it’s a secret, he could ask Neville or
Lavender or his own damn house elf, considering she was there for
all of it. But somehow telling him how close they used to be is -
embarrassing, considering how far apart they’ve drifted.

They were enemies during the war, even though they were allies. It’s
not the first time it’s happened, but never quite so badly, never quite
so final, as this last time. Then again, Draco supposes that’s what
happens when a noble house is all but obliterated, when the only
one left is a baby raised as an outsider. And it’s not like the
purebloods have anyone left to blame but themselves at this point.
Tay sprinkles something into the pot, and it all turns a bright golden
color, faintly glowing in the giant cauldron. Dax and Tay seem
satisfied, but for the first time Draco is concerned. “Uh, guys? What
did you make?”

“Timeless youth,” Dax answers, “obviously.”

“What else?” Tay asks. “Isn’t that what you were trying and failing to
create?”

Draco rubs at his forehead. The kids are wide eyed, looking at the
cauldron like it’ll disappear if they blink. That potion should
technically only be made by Masters, and its distribution is tightly
controlled. The side effects are… unpleasant. “I - no. How did you
even make that without unicorn blood?”

The main ingredient of the potion is another reason it’s not

commonly made.

“How does one make a philosopher’s stone without unicorn blood?”

Tay shrugs. Draco can’t tell if it’s a riddle, a philosophical query, or a
real question.

Dax crosses his arms. “What were you trying to make?”

“We wanted to see if we could combine wolfsbane with a slow acting

healing potion,” Raina pipes up. “We were making a big batch so we
could test how it reacted during different moon phases.”

“Oh,” Dax and Tay say together.

Tay snaps her fingers and the potion disappears. Draco’s not stupid
enough to think she got rid of it, but at least it’s not his problem
anymore. “Well, in that case, I apologize for ruining your potion.”

“We forgive you,” Draco says, like they have any choice. “However, if
you’re interested in being helpful is some other manner…”

Dax rolls his eyes, but Tay almost smiles. “I’m listening.”
“Clearly, you know more than I do,” he says, because of course they
do, he doesn’t even know why he bothered getting his potions
mastery. Dax can do everything he can do, except better. “If you’d
perhaps be interested in teaching a class or two…”

“A class taught by a house elf?” Tay asks, eyes sparkling, “What will
the old crowd say?”

“If they have their own unbound elves, I imagine they’ll say nothing
at all, and if they don’t, well, perhaps they need some reminding
about what you are, exactly.” He pauses, and adds, “Maybe the new
crowd does too.”

They’re not slaves, but after inheriting so many house elves - it’s
clear some families have abused the binding spell, and obviously
Hermione’s initial idea to just free all of them is insane, but it’s
possible the arrangement of their relationship could use a little
reworking. He’s dreading saying so to Hermione, because he just
knows she’s going to be unbearably smug for days about the whole
thing.

The House will throw an absolute fit, but he wants the goblins to do
it. They’re one of the few creatures that can take an unbound house
elf in a fair fight, and they’re more particular and detail oriented than
any other species. Also, it’ll be pretty impossible to find any wizard
barristers that will manage to be both impartial and informed, so
using another species is their best bet. He definitely doesn’t want the
centaurs to do it, then it will just drag on forever.

“Very well,” Tay agrees magnanimously, then turns her suddenly red
eyes onto the kids. “Shouldn’t you be asleep already?”

Draco’s never seen his classroom clear out so quickly.

“What are you going to do with that potion?” he asks, now that they
aren’t surrounded by a bunch of eavesdropping ears.
Tay just blinks innocently, like she has no idea what he’s talking
about. Dax scowls and pokes him hard in the thigh, causing Draco to
squirm away from him. “Young lords should be asleep along with
their even younger pupils.”

“I’m an adult,” he tells Dax, but because he’s not an idiot, he heads
out the door.

It still takes him a long time to fall asleep, his mind turning over a
question he’s never thought to ask before.

Is the house elves’ long lives natural or artificial?

Whatever is making Harry avoid him doesn’t seem to be affecting

anyone else. He grabs Hermione before lunch and pulls her back
into her classroom, shutting the door behind them.

“You know, the hallway was full of students who saw that, and this
really isn’t going to help the rumors that we’re having an affair,” she
points out, but she doesn’t seem that bothered by it.

“I’m not married, it’s not my problem you can’t resist me,” he shoots
back.

A few months ago he would have gotten punched in the face for that,
but now she just laughs. “What did you want to talk about?”

“The House meeting is tomorrow,” he says.

She grins. “Good. Am I allowed to wear my own clothes this time?”

“Not unless you’ve recently gone on a very expensive shopping trip,”

he answers. “Luna can handle it, if you don’t want to borrow my
mother’s clothes then you can wear hers. Or I can just pay for your
clothes, I do it for Pansy.”
She rolls her eyes. “That really won’t help the rumors about our
affair.”

“Neither will you wearing my mother’s dresses, so pick your poison,”

he says. “Anyway, that’s not the point. Harry has to go to the House
meeting.”

Hermione’s smart, so it only takes a moment for the smile to slide off
her face. “He’ll have no idea what he’s doing, and those people are
vicious. Can Luna or Neville-”

“He’s an Heir, he can’t escort anyone but his Lady,” he answers,

ignoring the part about Luna. “I already asked Pansy to do it. I was
planning to tell Harry about it, but I haven’t had the chance.”

She blows out a breath, crossing her arms. “Oh, lovely, Harry is
always so thrilled when people make decisions for him about his life
and don’t consult him first.”

“He did this to himself,” he snaps, “I would have told him earlier if he
wasn’t avoiding me like a child. But he is, so can you tell him? Pansy
will meet him on the front steps of the castle I already cleared it with
Minerva. Tell him to have Tay send his carriage. I think my dad said it
used to be pulled by horses, so those if he has them. We didn’t get a
chance to check the stables so who knows if Tay bothered to keep
that stocked. If not, there are spells for that, Tay will know the ones,
and Harry’s certainly powerful enough to cast them.”

“Like Cinderella?” she asks, like it’s a joke.

If only. “Exactly like Cinderella.” Ella had been one powerful

muggleborn, even if she hadn’t known she was a witch at the time,
having been raised by muggles. It’s lucky for all of them that the
prince had also been a wizard, and recognized her as being far too
powerful to lose, even after just a night of dancing.

She blinks. “You’re shitting me.”

“Once upon a time, wizards and muggles lived differently. Most
muggle fairytales have a grain of truth in there somewhere,” he
answers.

Her eyes gleam in a way that has him edging towards the door.
“About that-”

“Have to meet Filius, got to go,” he says, slipping out the door before
she can trap him in another exhausting conversation.

He should probably go find Filius, actually. He’d finished his essay,

even if his penmanship near the end is a little horrible. He’d been
falling asleep while writing it, so he counts himself lucky that it’s even
legible.

Filius isn’t in his office or his rooms, so Draco tries the teaching
lounge next. He’s there, along with Minerva and Pomona, all of them
bent over a large piece of parchment and scowling. “Having a head
of house meeting without me?” he asks, but it’s mostly a joke. He’d
just left Hermione in her classroom, after all.

They all look up at him. Draco doesn’t think he’s ever seen them look
guilty before. It’s a bit of disorienting moment. Filius taps his wand on
the parchment, and it folds itself up and disappears. “Ah, Draco,
hello.”

It’s a good thing Dumbledore hadn’t tried to make Filius act as a spy
during the war. He may be a dueling master, but he’s an atrocious
liar. Then again, the man had sent Hagrid to be a spy, so clearly
nothing had been beneath him. “What was that?”

“How are the mourning tulips my fourth years made for you working
out?” Pomona asks, all dimples and sunny disposition, like he didn’t
just catch the three of them acting very suspiciously. “The poor dears
were buried under too much ash I fear, but I think the color turned
out quite lovely anyway.”
Oh, that would explain the vibrant purple color of the petals, he’d
wondered - wait, no, focus. “What was that parchment?”

Minerva opens her mouth, but Pomona continues, “Oh dear, did the
ash cause a problem? I rather thought it was just a cosmetic thing,
but we can have the third years give it a hand if you need it?”

“What, no - it’s perfectly fine, I’ll just warn the kids the color of their
potions will be a little off from the textbook,” he says. “But what were
you-”

“Glad to hear it, glad to hear it,” she continues, walking over to hook
their elbows together and walking them out the door. He wants to
resist, because he knows exactly what she’s doing and he’s not
amused, but also if someone takes his arm, he should escort them,
to do otherwise would be rude. He’s perfectly fine with being rude in
all sorts of ways, except for the ones that would make his mother
disappointed in him. “I just got an order in of venomous lemon
plants, if you’d take a look. Seems to me like they’ve got a few too
many teeth, but I thought it just might be because it’s a local strain,
and I certainly don’t want to complain if it’s local strain. You’ve got
some experience with Russian herbologists, don’t you? I’ve heard
their plants can be a bit aggressive!”

They’re already halfway down the hall, the teachers’ lounge behind
them. He sighs, giving in. “A bit, yeah. What are you going to do with
venomous lemons? They’re so finicky.”

“Oh, I just thought they’d brighten the place up a bit,” she says.
“Besides, they do make the best lemonade! Good thing they’re
venomous and not poisonous,” she nudges him in the side, smiling.

“Good thing,” he agrees.

He hadn’t even had the chance to give Filius his essay.

Draco’s just finished fiddling with his cufflinks when there’s a knock
at the door. He swings it open and leans against the side, eyebrow
raised. “Augusta using the carriage again?”

“Yours flies, ours doesn’t,” Neville says. “You’re going there anyway,
you might as well take me with you.”

“What if I’d said no?” he asks, because he was just about to leave.
Neville’s cutting it a little close.

He shrugs. “I would have caught a ride with Harry. Or just flown there
and endured Gran’s disapproving look.”

“I wish that on no one,” Draco says, because he doesn’t. He pulls the

door shut behind him and walks with Neville to the courtyard. “Was it
your idea to get the venomous lemons?”

Neville’s face lights up as he talks about them, because he’s insane.

He’s the herbology equivalent of Hagrid. Next he’s just going to start
keeping deadly snares around the castle for the atmosphere. Well,
on second thought, that would still probably be less hazardous than
the moving staircases, which no one has bothered to do anything
about in a thousand years, so.

Wasn’t there a rumor that there was a deadly snare in the castle
during their first year? He wonders if it’s still around.

“Finally!” Hermione exclaims, her bushy hair pulled back into a high
ponytail so there’s nothing to get in between them and her scowl.
“We’re going to be late.”

“We’re not going to be late,” he says, giving her an appreciative look

up and down. She’s wearin a clingy burnt orange robe that’s just
barely appropriate to wear to a House meeting, only made so by the
snowy white outer robe that’s made of some sort of velvet. “Nice
dress. Who’s is it?” It’s not his mother’s, and he doesn’t think it’s
Luna’s either. He’s been to most of the same formal events she has,
and he doesn’t ever remember her wearing it.
“Mine,” says a familiar voice, and Draco’s already smiling by the time
he turns around, grabbing Pansy’s elbow and pulling her close
enough place a delicate kiss on her cheek, careful not to mess up
her makeup. He knows better. He steps back and blinks, thrown by
her appearance. She winks at him. “I’d bought it for the meeting, but
clearly I didn’t need it.”

She’s wearing a long, sparkling dress that isn’t exactly a robe, but
isn’t exactly a sari either. It’s a deep green color glittering with
sparkling threas and embroidered gems, with her hair soft and
curling around her face. “Where did you get that?”

“My mother’s closet.” Draco looks up the stairs, and his sarcastic
comment about Harry finally deigning to speak to him dies on his
tongue.

Harry has on a long shirt with a high collar and that matches Pansy’s
outfit, but the accompanying bottom half, a dhoti if he remembers his
lessons, looks like loose fitting pants and is a soft cream color that’s
divine against his dark skin. He’s pretty sure there’s a proper term for
the top part of Harry’s outfit, but he can’t remember what it is, and he
can’t figure out a way to ask without looking like an idiot.

Hermione whistles. “Wow Harry, you look great!”

“Thanks Hermione,” he says, but for some reason he’s not looking at
her, for some reason he’s looking at Draco, and he can’t make
himself look away, feels trapped by Harry’s eyes. They’re the same
color as his shirt.

Pansy kicks him in the shin, and he manages to unstick his tongue
from the roof of his mouth. “You clean up nice, Potter.”

He frowns, continuing to walk down, but instead of going towards

Pansy, he goes towards him, until they’re far too close. The last time
they were this close was in his house. “I thought it was Harry now?”
Fuck. Right. “You look nice, Harry,” he says, and he means for it to
come out sarcastic or mocking, but instead it’s soft, a little too
appreciative for him to get away with. Damnit.

He’s supposed to be irritated with Harry for ignoring him, not telling
him how attractive he is.

“Um, guys?” Neville says, then a moment later, “Ow!”

Draco takes a step back, frowning as he looks over. Did Hermione

step on Neville’s foot?

“Er, right,” Harry says.

Draco raises his hand and snaps his fingers twice, and almost
immediately he hears the sound of hooves in the distance. “Does
your stable still have horses?” he asks.

Harry flushes. “Not quite.” Before Draco can question him, he licks
his lips and whistles, low and piercing, almost sounding more like an
owl than a human.

There’s another set of sounds like an animal running, but it doesn’t

quite sound like hooves hitting the earth.

Their carriages arrive at the same time, Nox pulling up and tossing
his head proudly as he looks down at the Potter carriage.

Which isn’t exactly a carriage. It’s a gorgeous red and gold palki with
intricately carved windows, and instead of having the poles for
bearers to carry it, it just floats about three feet off the ground.

Harnessed to the front of the palki isn’t a horse or any sort of

reasonable beast.

“You’ve got to be kidding me,” he says flatly.

Harry nudges him in the side. “I’m sure he doesn’t even remember
you.”
Buckbeak snaps his beak in a way that makes it very clear that he
does remember him, and is absolutely ready and willing to go for a
round two.

“Brilliant!” Neville says, wide eyed. “Which one do you think is

faster?”

“Nox, of course,” Draco says at the same time that Harry answers,
“Obviously Buckbeak.”

They narrow their eyes at each other. Draco only barely restrains
himself from putting his hands on his hips.

“Well, there’s only one way to settle this,” Neville says gleefully.
Pansy groans. “A race!”

Harry grins, and Draco doesn’t want to smile back, but he can’t seem
to help himself.

“No,” Hermione says sharply.

He points out, “You were just complaining that we were going to be

late.”

“No,” she says again, but she sounds more resigned than angry,
which means he’s won.

“Loser owes the other dinner?” Harry offers.

This is such a bad idea. He should have listened to Hermione.

“Okay.”

This is either a lose-lose situation, or a win-win one. He’s having a

hard time deciding.

i hope you liked it! sorry it took so long, life is still pretty hectic :) <3

feel free to follow / harass me at: shanastoryteller.tumblr.com

Chapter 15
Chapter 15

(See the end of the chapter for notes.)

“That was cheating!” Harry shouts, jumping out of his palki as soon
Buckbeak hits the ground.

“It’s impossible to cheat at a contest that lacks predetermined

parameters,” Draco says smugly.

Hermione kicks him in the shin. She’s so violent. She’s not yelling at
him, he assumes, because she’s still worried about throwing up on
him, since her hand is pressed against her mouth and she’s looking
a little green around the edges. Or, well, probably more worried
about throwing up on Pansy’s dress. She’d probably find throwing up
on him to be rather satisfying.

“How did you do that?” Neville asks, stepping out after Harry and
helping Pansy out.

“Shortcut,” he answers succinctly, and this time he takes a step away

in time to avoid Hermione’s abuse.

Harry scowls. “What kind of bloody shortcut-”

“Lord Potter.”

His mouth snaps shut, and his face turns an unhealthy shade of red
as he turns around. “Hello Augusta.” Draco sighs and Neville shakes
his head. “Er, I mean, Lady Longbottom.”

Augusta looks up at Harry while still giving the impression that she’s
looking down at him. “It’s nice to have your family back at the table.”
“Thank you,” he says after a beat, and it doesn’t come out as a
question, so there’s that at least.

Augusta nods, then flicks her gaze over to her grandson. Neville
winks at them before going forward to offer her grandmother his arm
and escorting her inside.

“You’re going to get killed in there,” Draco says in the ensuing

silence.

“Pansy said murder wasn’t allowed!” he says, offended.

She shrugs. “It’s not. The magic is the only one allowed to kill in
there. But surely you know there’s more than one way to die?”

Harry’s starting to look genuinely panicked, and Draco must be

losing his mind, because he steps forward and places his hand
against his back. “Relax, you’ll be fine. Pansy will be right there, and
you have friends in there.”

“And you?” he challenges, and his panic is gone, but Draco doesn’t
like this focused, serious look any better. At least not when it’s
directed towards him.

“I’m Lord Malfoy. We’re allies,” he reminds, “and that’s more valuable
than friends.”

Harry doesn’t say anything, and Draco can’t read his face.

“Come on,” Pansy says, slipping her arm through Harry’s. “We’re
going to be late.”

Hermione doesn’t so much as take his arm so he can escort her than
she grabs him and drags him towards the stone circle. For a moment
he’s worried Harry won’t know where to go, but he only hesitates a
second before he and Pansy head to the opposite side.

When they step through the smoke, Hermione once against having
great fun with extinguishing the flames, it’s just in time to see Pansy
and Harry do the same. Already some people are moving towards
him, and in fact had probably been waiting for him, since, really, they
should all be in the castle by now. They’re trying to say hello or at
least catch his attention, but he doesn’t pay attention to any of them,
instead heading straight for them. It’s Pansy who makes the
appropriate acknowledgements as they cut across the lawn. Harry
doesn’t seem to even notice the huge castle in the center of the
stone circle that hadn’t been there before.

“Not a great start,” he says when Harry’s in hearing distance.

“What?” he says, eyes unfocused. “Is there a river around here?”

Draco blinks, then turns, as if a river could spontaneously appear

after a few hundred years of being absent. “No. What?”

“Oh,” he says, disappointed, which, seriously - what the blood hell.

Why is Harry always so strange?

Hermione yanks on his arm even as she glares at Harry. “We’re

going to be late!” she says, and, okay, she’s right, they should get
going.

Once they’re inside, everyone’s eyes are on Harry. He doesn’t

hesitate a second time, instead walking over to two of the chairs that
have been empty ever since Draco’s been allowed in the House and
pulls one of them out for Pansy.

He wonders if Harry realizes the last people to sit in those chairs

were his parents.

Rosamund stands, and if she’s curious or upset of feeling any sort of

emotion about Harry at all, she doesn’t show it. “I, Lady Rosamund
Lestrange, hereby call this meeting of the House of Lords and Ladies
to session. All those in favor of continuing with these proceedings,
say aye.”

“Aye,” Draco and the other Lords and Ladies echo.

Rosamund makes a flamboyant swish with her wand, and all the
torches in the room flare to life. The scroll of parchment in front of
her unrolls with a satisfying thwack, and she lifts her head to stare at
them, her smile all teeth. “So mote it be. Let’s begin.”

“Mr. Potter,” Lord Flint says, almost before Rosamund has finished
speaking, which, okay, Draco wouldn’t risk his life that way because
he values it, but if Flint is eager to be murdered by the Lestranges,
Draco certainly isn’t going to be the one to get in the middle of that.
“What a pleasure it is to see one of your line in these halls again
after you’ve been away for so much longer than expected.”

This is the part Draco’s worried about the most. Pansy can’t speak
here, she can only look at the Flints like they’re something stuck on
the bottom of her shoe. Which is a nice touch, but not helpful in a
direct sort of way.

Harry seems taken aback for a moment before his eyes narrow. “It’s
Lord Potter. And I imagine this seat would not have sat so empty for
so long if perhaps we could go more than a generation or two
without getting in another bloody squabble.” He deliberately lets his
eyes sweep over the other empty chairs. “It seems to be a rather
empty room tonight.”

Draco wants to bang his head against the table. Pansy is pulled
between looking supportive of her escort, furious at him for having
less than no tact, and her obvious urge to laugh right in the Flints’
face.

“I agree,” Lady Greengrass says, and Harry blinks, startled. “We

have war after war, and for what? Just to do it all again in a handful
of decades. Enough is enough.”

Oh, merlin, no. Not tonight. Not this conversation again.

“Oh, wonderful idea Eliza, it’s not like anyone’s thought of that
before,” Lord William Parkinson gripes. “We’ll just all mutually decide
not to get into any more blood ending fights about magic, and all of
our decedents will listen to us forever, and everything will just be
wonderful. It’s so easy, I don’t know why I didn’t think of it before!”

Rosamund smacks her hand against the table. “Enough, we’re not
wasting valuable House time to get into this debate for the hundredth
time.”

“Why not?” Augusta challenges, and Draco slumps into his chair.
Hermione is obviously curious, but he just shakes his head and taps
his finger to his lips, a quick remainder that she’s not allowed to
speak here, no matter how much she might want to. Not for the first
time, he wishes they could just get rid of that rule. Blaise and Pansy
make much better companions when they’re allowed to talk. And if
he keeps bringing Hermione, she’s going to end up bursting a blood
vessel. “We all know how to fix it, how to stop all these wars and
death and all of it, but we don’t, and inevitably another dark lord
rises, and our numbers fall once again!”

Lord Ollivander scowls. “We can’t do it, you know we can’t, and you
know why.”

“I do not,” Augusta snaps, “we can go back to the old ways, we’ll do
it better this time. We don’t even have to enchant logs, we’ll just
exchange a muggle child for a magical one. The muggles have
orphanages full of them, we’d be doing a good thing. A magical child
grows up with a magical family, and a muggle child gets a family,
what’s the problem?”

“Kidnapping is frowned upon, generally,” Lady Ollivander says

blandly.

“So is child abuse and neglect,” Lord Brown returns. “And raising a
magical child in a muggle home can hardly be called anything else.”

Draco holds his hand open flat on his knee, even as he continues
looking around the room with bland disinterest. There’s a beat, and
he’s just about pull away when Hermione slides her hand in his with
a bone crushing grip.
Pansy’s hand is on Harry’s shoulder, but it’s not doing much good.
“Hold on!” he shouts, and the room quiets. “What the bloody hell are
you all talking about?”

“The Blood Laws!” Augusta snaps.

“Not that we can ever decide what those are,” Lady Nott grumbles.

“The original Blood Laws, not all the nonsense since then,” Augusta
says. “It was working fine until we decided to ruin it.”

Lord Flint rolls his eyes. “They were not. Not that I have anything
against the In Between spell, but you could drain us all dry and there
still wouldn’t be enough blood to do it.”

“Well, they didn’t just use blood,” Lady Abbot points out. The room
groans. “They didn’t! Not according to the stories. With enough
planets in alignment-”

“There are never enough planets in alignment, or a meteor shower

gets in the way, or there’s some other reason the spell won’t work,”
Lord Ollivander cuts in gruffly. “It won’t work. Even if we could do it, it
still wouldn’t work, and you know it. The muggles are different now.
They don’t respect the earth the same way, and there’s not enough
of it left untouched even if they did. So stop suggesting it.”

William rubs at his forehead. “And say we do enact the old Blood
Laws, and go back to child swapping. What do we do with the
muggleborns who are already here? What of the muggleborn
children currently enrolled in Hogwarts? No one’s allowed to suggest
murder in a way of anyone as a solution.”

Too many people look put out by that suggestion for Draco’s comfort.

“We’ll do nothing at all,” Augusta says. “It’ll be on a going forward

basis. The muggleborn children can be given leave to visit their
muggle relatives if they so desire. They’ll stop visiting at some point.
They always do.”
Draco’s pretty sure Hermione’s nails have drawn blood, but he can’t
bring himself to pull away.

Harry looks confused and angry. It’s just like seeing him as a
teenager all over again. He demands, “Someone explain to me what
these blood laws are.”

“They’re a set of laws,” Lord Brown explains, and it sounds like he’s
being patronizing, but that’s just how he talks. “They dictate the
relations between muggles and magic folk.”

“They’ve changed over the years,” Augusta says, “becoming more

lax and strict over time at each renewal period. But they’ve always
been in place.”

“Until the Wizengamot took over. They’re too worried about losing
their seats to vote one way or another, so they lapsed, and now
we’re here dealing with - whatever the bloody hell this mess it is,”
Eliza scowls.

Lady Nott says, speaking mostly to Harry, “The Blood Laws were
always enforced and maintained by the House. But since the House
isn’t in power anymore, we can’t do that. Not that all the families
have ever agreed on the best way to go about it,” she allows, “but at
least we could vote and do something . Instead of just adhering to
the statue of secrecy in the loosest way possible with absolutely no
room for special circumstances.”

“You’ve been awfully quiet, Lord Malfoy,” Rosamund says,

“especially considering your companion.”

Oh, fuck. He sighs. “We need the Blood Laws. The way things are
now is intolerable. That said, Grindelwald made the last set of laws
implausible, and they’re in need of an update.”

“Surely you’re not suggesting we get involved in muggle affairs?”

Lady Flint asks, wrinkling her nose. “Why should we have to clean
up their own mess? I’d rather not be the living version of their little
bomb.”

“We should interfere sometimes,” Lord Ollivander says, “we can’t just
keep standing by and doing nothing-”

“That’s exactly what we’re going to do,” Augusta says. “You think
what they do to each other is awful? Imaging what they could do with
us. No, we stay away, and we don’t get involved. They have enough
weapons of mass destruction without adding our magic to it. All we
would do is make the death toll climb even higher.”

“Not everything is war,” Lady Ollivander protests.

August sneers. “Of course it is. Haven’t you been paying attention?”

Draco takes a look around the table, but none of the other Lords or
Ladies look interested in jumping into the conversation. Probably
because they value their sanity. “Look,” he sighs, “we’ve been
debating the Blood Laws for the past century, and it’s not something
we’re going to solve tonight. Even if we did, it would never pass in
the Wizengamot. So why don’t we discuss something we can
affect?”

“You never did say your stance,” Lord Flint says, eyes narrowed. “Of
course none of us agree. But what would your Blood Laws look like?
At least in regard to the muggleborn children.”

Now everyone staring at him, Hermione and Harry included. Great.

Just great. “I - Lady Longbottom, I’m sorry, but stealing children
probably isn’t our best bet. We’ve done it before, and they inevitably
find out we took their child, or replaced the child with an enchanted
inanimate object, and then they hate us even more. Changeling
children are not the solution.” He pauses, “That said, we do both the
parents and child a disservice when we leave them to their own
devices until the child’s eleven, and then we just spring it all on
them.”
“You think we should tell them sooner?” William asks.

He nods. “We know if a child has magic from the moment it’s born.
There’s no reason not to tell the family immediately, and to offer
them a choice. They can keep their child, who will grow up with
abilities they’ll never have and one day enter a world they’ll never
know. Or . We take the child, place them in a good magical home,
and we offer the muggles a replacement child and a memory charm.
If they decide to keep the child, then they’re required to socialize
them with other magical children, and we don’t take their memories.
If they give up their child, we take away the memories of it, as well
as their knowledge of the wizarding world.”

Hermione hasn’t let go of his hand, but she’s leaning away from him.
He breaks propriety, and turns, looking at her instead of the House.
Her eyes are wide and she’s frowning, but she doesn’t look angry.

He continues, “Every child deserves to grow up in a home that

understands them. Muggle parents may love their magical children.
But at the end of the day, we live in different worlds. Most
muggleborns fall out of contact with their families by the time they’re
adults. It’s all just too strange and different for them. We won’t steal
children away in the night like criminals. But there’s no reason for
them to grow up isolated if they don’t have to, and no reason to force
muggles to raise a child they can’t understand or handle if they’re not
prepared for that. Magical children are difficult. We just are. We
break things and make them float. When I got upset as a baby, my
cries would age the wood around me until it turned to dust. My
parents were magical, so they just had to look up some time reversal
charms, or use a few reparos, or they could have just lined my
nursery with stone and given me a crib of iron if they didn’t want to
keep repairing things. But they had solutions to those problems.
Muggle parents would have just lost a whole house just from having
me in it. They don’t have magical solutions, and so it’s not fair of
them to be forced them to deal with magical problems.”

“But it’s their children,” Neville says, following his lead and breaking
propriety. Heirs are allowed to speak, technically, but they’re
expected to speak only to their Lord or Lady, so as to not speak over
or contradict them. But Augusta doesn’t snap at him, so he
continues. “What if they want them anyway? Some will give them up.
Maybe even most, when they learn their kids can start fires with their
nightmares and summon rattlesnakes under their cribs. But what of
the parents that don’t care about any of that, and want their child
anyway?”

“They’ll keep them,” he says. “But they have to agree to keep them
involved in the magical world from a young age. None of this
throwing them into the deep end when they’re eleven crap. I’m
supervising an independent muggle studies class, and the
muggleborns are picking it up, but it’s not stuff they should be
learning in a classroom, when there’s already so much they’re trying
to master. They should learn early, like the rest of us.”

“And if they refuse?” Neville presses.

Draco shrugs. “How can they? Where can muggles run that wizards
can’t find them?”

“What if the child is a squib?” Paige asks. William sighs, but doesn’t
protest. Obviously she wasn’t going to stay silent once Neville
started talking. “We can track when a child with magical blood is
born, but what if they’re a squib? No one’s managed to create a spell
or potion or anything that’s able to test a baby’s ability to manipulate
the magic inside of itself, instead of just having it with no business to
access it.”

Okay, now here’s the really hard sell, which, honestly, it’s entirely the
Gryffindor crowd’s fault that he’s started thinking this way. “Does it
matter?”

“Excuse me?” Lady Flint says.

“Does it matter?” he repeats. “Squibs aren’t muggles, and they

shouldn’t be treated like they are. They’re still magic. They see the
things we see, and feel the things we feel. Even if they don’t attend
Hogwarts, there’s no reason for them to remain ignorant of the world
they come from. How many squibs raised as muggles have seen or
felt things they couldn’t explain, and thought they were insane
because of it? They’re part of our world, whether any of us like it or
not, and they should know that our world exists.”

There’s about ten seconds of absolute silence.

Then everyone starts screaming at each other. About the Blood

Laws, about changelings, although mostly about squibs, and about
whether or not they really have a place in their society, or if they
should all just be slaughtered in their cribs to save everyone the
trouble. No one’s quite stupid enough to say that last bit out loud, but
there are a couple of families that are heavily implying it.

He slumps back in his chair with a sigh. Hermione raises an

eyebrow, and he shrugs. “After,” he promises, and she nods.

Man, they should learn sign language or something. Although he’s

pretty sure everyone would be pretty irritated if they started ignoring
the spirit of the rule, even if they followed the letter of it.

The meeting takes twice as long as it normally does and Harry

manages to set off three more slightly less intense arguments,
although Draco’s pretty sure that at least two of them are on
purpose. By the time it all draws to a close, everyone’s cranky and
hungry, and honestly he just wants this meeting to be over. A silver
dagger appears in front of every Lord and Lady, and Draco’s never
been so grateful to slice himself open. Harry rolls his eyes as he
does it, but dutifully drags the dagger up his arm, his blood sliding
down his hand onto the table and pooling with everyone else’s. The
light flashes as the blood sinks into the table, and he runs a hand up
and down his arm, trying work some blood back into it ever as he
stands. He hadn’t thought having Harry here would make that much
of a difference, but it does, he feels like everyone’s blood stretched
just a little bit further than it normally would, and he doesn’t feel quite
as light headed as he normally does.
He slips Neville an extra dose blood replenishing potion on the way
out, because if he can get Augusta to take it then that’s better for
everyone. They’ve barely stepped back into the garden when
Hermione opens her mouth. “One second,” he says, then takes his
own dose of blood replenishing potion. He then twists his wand to
summon one of the glasses of wine on the tables into his hand and
says, “Okay, go.”

“What the fuck was that?” Harry demands, and Draco turns to see
Harry glaring at him.

Pansy takes his glass of wine from his hand. “Hey!”

“I need it more than you do,” she says, then tilts her head back and
drinks it all in one long swallow. So, okay, maybe she does.

Draco summons another for himself rather than attempting to reclaim

his back from Pansy. “Harry, you’re going to have to be more
specific.”

“Kidnapping?” he asks.

Hermione waves her hand. “Changelings have to come from

somewhere, I suppose. What’s the In Between spell?”

“Have you ever met an Icelandic wizard?” Pansy asks. Harry and
Hermione start to shake their heads, but she continues, “Of course
you haven’t, it’s a saying, or a joke, or whatever. It means like - I
don’t know, it means something that doesn’t happen. Like if
someone asked me if I was wearing polyester, I’d ask if they’d ever
met an Icelandic wizard. Because no one has, because they cast the
In Between spell like a thousand years ago. Or two thousand. It’s
been a while..”

“Okay,” Hermione says slowly, “but what is it?”

Pany must give up on explaining, because she takes his drink from
his hand. Again. He sighs. “It’s - it’s what a lot of people would like to
do. I’m not quite sure if it’s worth it, or perhaps a good idea at all, but
like Lord Ollivander said, it’s a moot point anyway.” Hermione’s eyes
narrow. “It’s - okay, so when we create unplottable land and houses
and things that are bigger on the inside, we have to fold them into
the nearest dimension to get them to fit, right?”

“What?” Harry asks at the same time that Hermione goes, “Of
course.”

“The In Between spell is like that,” he says, “except instead of putting

part of an object in a different dimension, you can put a whole
person there. Or many people, several mansions, and a whole
society. You just - shift everything, a little bit. Everything moves over
into the space between atoms, so you’re still there, but not. That’s
the In Between spell.”

“You know what atoms are?” Hermione asks, impressed.

He rolls his eyes. “Who doesn’t?”

“Hold on,” Harry raises his hands in front of him. “All of magical
Iceland just stuck themselves in the nearest dimension?”

“They don’t have any more problems dealing with muggles,” he says,
“mostly because the muggles know they’re there and even try and
protect them. They call them Huldufolk. One of the problems of
moving a whole society like they did is that it still needs to be
anchored to our dimension to remain stable. Which means they
needed someone on the outside to make sure certain landmarks and
natural formations that were intrinsic to the spell’s makeup weren’t
altered.”

“I still don’t get how they got the muggles to do it for them,” Pansy
says, “it’s the strangest thing. Even more muggles know of them
than before, but since they’re their friendly dimensional hoppers,
they suddenly treat them like they’re benevolent?”

Hermione blinks. “Wait, are they trapped there?”

Pansy shakes her head. “No, but they can’t leave the barrier line
without becoming disconnected from their sideways dimension
completely. So they can only influence things within a specific area.
They help families out in exchange for the families promising to keep
that land protected.”

Harry’s face scrunches up. “Sounds a bit like house elves to me.
What do they do about muggleborns? Do they kidnap them?”

Draco means to answer that, but his mind’s still caught on what
Harry’s just said. It does sound a bit like house elves, actually.

“Worse,” Pansy says before she taps her chin, considering. “Or
better, actually, depending on the way your look at it.”

“It’s definitely worse,” Draco says, pulling his attention back where it
belongs. “The muggles will just leave kids they think belong to them
over their barrier. Kids that are strange or do things they can’t
explain.”

Harry shrugs. “That sounds better than kidnapping?”

“Except that not every strange or talented child is a magical child,”

Hermione says, looking the appropriate amount of horrified. “What
do they do with the muggle children?”

“They don’t take them,” Pansy says. “It would be cruel if they did.
That whole dimension is structured around the existence of magic.
Sometimes up doesn’t even mean up - it means down. Muggles
wouldn’t survive there. Or so the rumors say.”

Draco adds, “Not to mention, muggles have gotten the property lines
wrong in the past. Or just been plain stupid. So they leave their kids
alone in the wilderness, and magical or not, if they’re not in the right
place, the Huldufolk can’t go get them even if they want to. Or they’ll
just toss their kids in the stream because they think the magical
people are below the surface. They’re not. Which is how they end up
with a lot of dead muggle kids, since magical kids can sometimes
use magic to save themselves. The muggle ones just die.”

“That’s horrible!” Harry says.

Pansy nods. “No system anyone’s worked out seems perfect. The
problem is muggleborns,” she says, looking at Hermione
apologetically. “Otherwise we could just hide ourselves and leave the
muggle world to crumble. But we can’t detach ourselves completely.
Because we need some way to be able to get the muggleborn kids.”

“The problem and the solution all at once,” Hermione sighs. “Lovely.”

“LORD POTTER!” Someone shouts, and they all jump. Draco looks
over Harry’s shoulder to see Lord Selwyn striding towards them.
“Lovely to see you my boy!”

Merlin, but Lord Selwyn is obnoxious. Judging from Harry’s panicked

look, he knows this first hand, Draco assumes from his time as an
auror. “Well, see you later, Harry,” he says hastily, offering Hermione
his arm even as he backs away.

Harry twists to grab the edge of Draco’s cloak, preventing him from
running away. “You’re not leaving me alone with him.”

“Let go,” he hisses, trying to pull himself free without making a

spectacle of himself. Hermione and Pansy walk quickly over to
Neville and Augusta, the absolute traitors.

“Ah, Lord Malfoy,” Lord Selwyn enthuses, all bright shiny teeth and
an equally bright shiny bald spot. “It’s been so long, we really must
catch up. Have I told you about the singing tulip strain I’ve been
cultivating? I’ve taught them to sing the Weird Sisters!”

“Fascinating,” he says, and if it was anyone else it probably would

be, but anyone else would give him a five minute explanation and let
him be on his way. If he gets pulled into a conversation about
herbology with Lord Selwyn, then he’ll spend the rest of the night
stuck listening to boring minutia that he doesn’t even care about
when his managers are telling him about his own greenhouses.

“We’d love to hear about it,” Harry enthuses, and Draco really will
murder him, “but Draco owes me a dance, so if you’ll please excuse
us.”

Lord Selwyn’s eyebrows rise to his forehead. “Oh, ah, I suppose if he

- owes you a dance that’s. That’s fine.”

“Thanks!” Harry says brightly before hooking his arm with Draco’s
and dragging him over to the dance floor.

“That was really the best you could come up with?” Draco hisses.
“Why did I have to be involved at all? I’ve been successfully avoiding
him for years!”

Harry rolls his eyes. “Oh, shut up.”

“Do you even know how to dance?” he whines.

They step onto the dance floor, and Harry pulls him close, pressing
his hand against the small of Draco’s back and grabbing his hand
with the other. He easily pulls Draco into the middle of the waltz the
instruments are playing, not stumbling or missing a beat.

Draco raises an eyebrow, impressed. Harry’s leading, and he’s good

at it. “When did you learn how to do this?”

“We have to take dancing lessons as part of auror training,” he

admits. “I wasn’t half bad at ballet, actually.”

He laughs, and he’s the one the misses a step, causing him to press
himself even closer to Harry. He tries to take a step back, but Harry
doesn’t let him, modifying the dance so they don’t get in each other’s
way. “Harry. Everyone is watching.” They really are, he can see them
out of the corner of his eyes. He’s had far too much attention on him
these past couple House meetings, and he’d like it to stop.
“So? I’m dancing with my friend. Nothing interesting at all.” Draco
gives him a flat stare because he’s dumb, but he’s not that dumb. He
cracks a grin. “Let them talk. What’s the worst they can say?
Everyone knows you came with me to reopen the Potter House, and
our families are allies. They should be happy that we’re getting
along.”

“I suppose,” he answers, because he’s not wrong about anything,

but. “I don’t usually dance this close with Blaise and Pansy.”

Harry smiles at him, something different about it than usual.

Something softer. “That’s because they’re your friends.”

“You just said we were friends,” Draco points out exasperated.

“We are,” Harry says, “we are friends.”

Draco wants to ask what the difference is, then, why Harry is oh so
close, and why he’s looking at Draco like that. Is he trying to kill him?

He wants answers, but he doesn’t want to ask any questions. At

least not yet. He doesn’t want to ruin it yet.

So he lets Harry hold him close, dancing with him in front of the
whole House of Lords and Ladies, and leaves questioning and
poking at it for another day.

i hope you liked it!

feel free to follow / harass me at: shanastoryteller.tumblr.com

Chapter 16
Chapter 16

(See the end of the chapter for notes.)

Draco opens his door in the morning, and finds four children on the
other side, arms tucked behind their back and smiling at him. He
considers just backing into his room, closing the door, and hiding
their for the rest of the day, but he’s pretty sure they can smell
weakness.

“Can I help you?” he asks, eyebrow raised. He steps out and closes
the door. He walks in the direction of the great hall. He’s taller than
all of them, he’s pretty sure he could outrun them.

Curse his need of dignity.

Markel pokes him in the side. He sighs, and Andrea laughs, while
Lucas and Marilyn just roll their eyes. “We spoke to Aunt Pansy, who
talked to Aunt Paige, and she said that you and Professor Potter
were real cozy during the House meeting.”

Why is Pansy gossiping with first years? No, she probably told Lyle,
who then told everyone else, because he likes making Draco’s life
miserable. Joke’s on him, because Draco’s going to assign him to
make a potion with the most disgusting ingredients he can think of.
And maybe beg Pansy to stop gossiping about him with his students.

“We’re allies,” he says calmly.

“Is that what they’re calling it nowadays?” Andrea asks, and he

nearly trips. What a brat.

“I have no idea what you’re implying.” Andrea prizes her innocent,

demure reputation, and he’s pretty sure she won’t jeopardize it to
make fun of him. But who knows, twelve year olds are vicious.
Marilyn frowns. “But you’re both Lords now. I didn’t think you could
do that.”

“Lords and Ladies are often friendly with each other,” he points out.
The only way this whole damn system works is if they manage to
tolerate each other. He still thinks Dumbledore pushing them out of
the Wizengamot was stupid, but he can admit, if only to himself, that
a governing system built on mutually assured destruction isn’t the
most stable of things.

“Not that kind of friendly,” Lucas says.

Draco sighs. If he’d for some reason lost his last bit of common
sense and decided Harry was worth pursuing, and if Harry had gone
insane and decided on the same - well, that was for sure off the table
now.

Any relationship between them would have to be a dalliance, at best.

What adults do behind closed doors is entirely their business, but it’s
unacceptable for two heads of a family to… court, for lack of a better
word, since it’s impossible to combine families’ magic through
marriage, so it can only ever be a fling. Unless, of course, one of
them is tossed aside by the magic and found unsuitable to be a Lord
or Lady, and then they could marry, but that would be so disgraceful
to whoever still remained in power that it would pretty much never
happen.

Of course, Potter is in a unique position, what with him being the last
of his family and adored by all, so if anyone could get away with
shutting down a noble house unscathed, it’s him. Best not to think
about that though.

“If pressed - which you are clearly doing - I will say Professor Potter
and I are friends. But that’s something I’m sure you’re all clever
enough to figure out on your own.”

The kids don’t look impressed. He’s seriously considering running.

“Professor Malfoy!” Saved by McGonagall.

He turns, smiling at her as she charges down the hall. “Hello

Headmistress.”

“Apprentice Longbottom has need of you,” she says curtly, pointedly

not looking at the students.

Draco doesn’t like the look around her eyes. What the hell could
possibly have happened to Neville, and why is she coming to him of
all people? “Okay,” he says calmly. He taps Markel on the shoulder.
“Go tell Professor Granger she might have to cover my morning
class. Tell her to grab Marianna or Raina if she needs an assistant.”

Markel nods, and Andrea asks, “Is Heir Longbottom okay?”

McGonagall doesn’t answer, instead turning on her heal and walking

away. That’s. Not good.

Draco nods at the students before following her, and he waits until
they’ve turned the corner to ask, “What’s going on?”

“Not here,” her eyes dart around, glancing over a couple students
who are laughing as they pass them. What the hell? He’s never
known McGonagall to be paranoid before. What could be so bad that
she won’t even whisper it to him in a hallway where no one is paying
attention to him?

They had up to her office, and once the statue swings shut behind
them, he tries again. “Okay, seriously, what’s going on?”

She doesn’t answer, instead entering her office and immediately

collapsing in the chair behind her desk.

Neville is pacing the length of the office, and Augusta is seated in

front of McGonagall’s desk. They both look fine. They’re not dead or
hurt. “Augusta,” he greets. “Neville.”

Neville glances at him and away, then continues pacing.

Augusta turns to face him. She looks perfectly calm and composed.
That’s good. If something had managed to ruffle her, he was
planning to run in the other direction of whatever it was first and ask
questions later. “Draco. Tell me something. When your father was
rejected as a Lord, what happened?”

He would have been less surprised if she took out her wand and
threw the killing curse at him. “Excuse me?” They don’t talk about it.
No one talks about it. Draco had gone to his first House meeting at
seventeen with his mother at his side, exhausted and scared and
unprepared, and no one had said anything about it. They’d all known
what it meant, of course, but they hadn’t said anything more than
greetings. They’d been manipulative and conniving, but it was just
the same as they’d been to his father, just the way they are to him
now.

“You know I wouldn’t ask if it wasn’t important,” she says.

Okay, well, that’s true. Augusta can be exhausting, but she’s not -
she wouldn’t break the rules or propriety without a good reason, not
with how tightly she herself clings to those rules. “It was the scar,” he
says. “He still - Voldemort wouldn’t let him attend meetings, as you
know, not towards the end, but it was the night of a full moon. Of a
meeting. He woke up screaming, and he - his entire arm was
covered in scars.”

They hadn’t thought that missing the meeting would matter, in the
long run. Lords and Ladies have been imprisoned before, and the
magic hadn’t really seemed to care. People have done far worse
things than his father ever did and retained their position, but he
does his best not to dwell on it too much. What’s done is done.

“What kind of scars?” she presses.

He scowls, crossing his arms. “Does it matter ?”

She pushes her sleeves up to her elbows. So faint that they can
barely be seen are scars, spreading across her skin like tree
branches.

“Lichtenburg figures,” he breathes, rubbing at his arm in sympath.

The pattern of scars people get when they’ve been struck by
lightning. Or been sent a warning from magic itself. “Look, my
father’s were much deeper. You’re old, I know you’ve been struggling
to give the amount of blood needed for years, it’s probably just
because if you stayed in your position it would kill you. Maybe it’s
better this way, you can still assist Neville and he’s not stuck with
mourning your death and becoming Lord Longbottom at the same
time.”

There’s a beat of heavy silence that he doesn’t understand. Then

Neville says, “I’m not a Lord.”

Ah. What? Draco had been so sure. He’s been a good Heir and a
good grandson, Draco can’t think of why the magic wouldn’t have
chosen him. Then again, it’s not really his place to question it. “I’m
sorry,” he says, “but it’s not something that can be reversed, you’ll
just have to accept whoever the new Lord or Lady Longbottom is.”
Or they could arrange for them to be murdered, which had certainly
been done in the past, but Draco doesn’t think they’ll be eager to
accept that option. Or at least Neville won’t, he wouldn’t put anything
past Augusta.

“That’s the problem,” Neville says bitterly, “we don’t have one.”

Draco blinks, uncomprehending. “What?”

“I’m still the Heir,” Neville says, “but no one in our family has
inherited the rank of Lady. Or Lord. How long did it take for you?”

“It happens at the same time, just like when a Lord or Lady dies.
You’d know,” he says, eyes sliding to Augusta. Like being a
monarch. As soon as their predecessor took their last breath, the
Heir took their place. It was like being hit with a sledgehammer, the
sudden rush of magic and information, and it hadn’t made him
stronger, really, because none of that magic was his to use, but it
was there, heavy on his shoulders and warm against the back of his
neck, a constant reminder of who he was and what he had to do.

It wasn’t exactly a pleasant sensation.

Neville rubs a hand over his face. “Well. Fuck.”

“Language,” Augusta says sharply, but Neville only waves a hand at

her. “We’re certain this has never happened before?”

McGonagall blinks.

“No,” Draco answers. “The House has been around for - fuck, at
least a thousand years, and we have records for all of it. The ones
from before Hufflepuff built it in the middle of Stonehenge are a little
dicey, but they exist.”

“Never mind every other country’s version. We could always

convene an international meeting to ask,” Neville says.

Draco nearly chokes. “Not - not that I don’t understand the severity
of the situation, because I do, but doesn’t that seem a little
extreme?”

“It’s not just us,” Augusta says quietly. “It’s Rosamund too. Maybe
others.”

He can still feel them, all of them, but he has to yank his sleeves up
to check, just in case. His skin is clear of anything. “You know if we
announce this to the world, that our House is, uh, weakened,” he
decides on, instead of using the word he’s thinking of, which is
crumbling, “we’ll get the full attention of the worldwide magical
community on us, and I’m not entirely certain if that’s what we want.”

Neville opens his mouth to argue, but Augusta sighs. “He’s right.”

“Gran!” he snaps.
Augusta shakes her head. “No. We need to at least know what’s
happening before we announce it to the world, if that’s what we
decide to do.”

“We don’t have to tell the House yet,” Draco says, and three sets of
eyes land on him. For some reason McGonagall’s feels heaviest of
all. “We have time. The next meeting isn’t for another month. That’s
a month to figure out what’s going on, to try and fix it, before we
send everyone into a panic. Which is exactly what would happen,
and you know it.”

“Do you have a suggestion?” Augusta asks. “Trying to comb through

such a high volume of records is going to takes us more than a few
weeks.”

Well. That depends entirely on who’s doing the combing. “We should
put Hermione on this.”

For the first time, Augusta shows an emotion besides resigned calm.
She’s looks angry. “That girl’s a muggleborn and the wife of a blood
traitor, and you want to trust her with this, and send her digging
around for even more secrets?”

“She’s the cleverest witch of our age, and if you want to figure out
what the hell is going on, she’s your best bet,” he says firmly. “Put
her under an unbreakable vow if you have to, but she’s the person
you want on your side.”

Augusta looks furious. Neville asks, “Does this mean our family and
those pledged to us aren’t protected?”

Oh, fuck.

“You’re still an Heir, right?” Draco asks. Neville nods. “Well. It’s - it’s
theoretically in place.”

“I’m an Heir, which means I’m protected, not a protector,” he says.

“What happens if someone does something stupid in that month’s
time? If they need our help in a magical way, and not just a financial
one? We don’t have anyone capable of taking those blows, of
shielding them.”

“I can take some of them,” he says, but his voice comes out
sounding more doubtful than not. He’s strong, he’s got a large family
and a lot of magic under his disposal. But so do the Longbottoms. To
take their whole network under his wing overnight, to not build up to
it slowly like these things are usually done - that might be out of
reach for even his family and magic.

McGonagall speaks for the first time to ask, “What did the Weasleys
do?”

They all turn to look at her. “What?”

“What did the Weasleys do?” she repeats, frowning. She’s speaking
like she’s thinking it through, like she’s not totally sure what the next
words out of her mouth are going to be. “This isn’t the first time
something like this has happened, at least. The McGonagalls used
to be pledged to the Weasley family. Now we’re not under anyone,
but no one in my family has ever fallen under a curse, or gotten ill.”

“That’s impossible, you must be under someone’s protection,”

Augusta says. “You’re hardly the first person to experimenting with
spells, Minerva. If you really didn’t have anyone protecting you, the
magical rebound should have killed you ten times over.”

“Yes,” she agrees. “Yet I’m still here. Why? What did the Weasleys
do? Or, barring that, what did everyone else do after the Weasleys
left the House? My family doesn’t keep those types of records. We
have some family diaries, and there might be some from that time. I’ll
look, but you should ask around. We weren’t the only family under
them.”

Neville rubs the back of his neck and says, “The House library has
all the old blood maps and records in it. It shouldn’t be that hard to
find.”
“No,” Draco says slowly, “but you know were we could definitely find
that kind of information? Where information about the Weasleys
would almost certainly be, if anywhere?”

Neville knows him best, so he picks it up first. “Oh, absolutely not, no

one is going to be okay with that. What are you going to do, just
send the whole family to the slaughter until their manor lets them in
again?”

McGonagall shakes her head, and Augusta says, “It’ll never work.”

“Did you know,” he asks gleefully, “that the magic recognizes Molly
and Arthur’s children as being Prewetts?”

“It will kill them!” Molly shrieks, and Draco resists the urge to duck
and hide behind Ron. Merlin, this woman is scary. He wishes
someone besides the Weasleys was here with him. But Hermione is
holed up in the House library, Harry has class, and Neville is
covering his class while Luna covers Hermione’s, so here he is,
alone.

Luna had apparently decided to just combine her divination class

with transfiguration. McGonagall had been appalled, which had been
hilarious, but in all honestly Draco has no idea what his cousin is
doing. It’s entirely possible she’s just making all of this up as she
goes.

Charlie rubs his chin. “It might not kill us too.”

“Oh, well in that case,” Arthur snaps. “No, absolutely not. I’m sure
our ancestors had a good reason for shutting down our manor and
leaving the House, and we’re not going to go causing trouble by
mucking about in a decaying manor.”

Decaying is a bit of a strong word. The paint is peeling, but

underneath is redwood, undamaged and clearly just in need of a
good polish. Although, all the windows are broken, and not a single
thing is growing in the yard. There is a skeleton in the front yard,
however, just over the property line. The cousin who tried to get into
the manor, he presumes. It’s not the most welcoming picture.

Bill looks just as dubious as his father. “Look, as someone who deals
with cursed and locked away things for a living, even we know better
than to mess with blood magic.”

“That’s because your blood wasn’t connected to any of those

curses,” Draco says. “This is different.”

Ginny picks up a stick and throws it over the barrier. Nothing

happens. Because it’s not alive. What kind of test is that? “What’s
your crackpot theory again? That because we’re Prewetts the magic
will only kill us halfway? That’s still half dead.”

Draco ignores her. “Your family has been here a long time. This earth
must be your family members for a mile down. Nothing should be
dead here, not without that much currency in the ground.”

“Do you think we moved them?” Percy asks, adjusting his glasses.

“The bones, maybe,” George says dubiously. “Noble families don’t

use preservation charms.”

He wrinkles his nose, and then does his best to smooth out his
expression before they notice. What a waste. Those charms don’t
last forever, and just interfere with the magic being reabsorbed into
the earth, just delays the body returning to the earth. The body will
decay and break down eventually, just the same as if the
preservation spells had never been applied at all. In the meanwhile,
it’s just something taking up space in the earth, and not doing
anyone any good.

Wasteful.

“If you had, you’d have a blood feud with more than my family,” he
says, “It’s one thing for you lot to just turn your back on the house, it
makes you blood traitors, but pulling magic up from the earth, even
your own earth? People would have rioted.”

“Okay,” Ron says dubiously, “so why does our yard look like we’ve
spent several years dousing it with weed killer?”

“Can we go back to the plan, and how it sucks?” Ginny asks.

“Seriously, just walk over the magic line and see if it kills you, which
you know, it’s killed our family members before.”

He pulls out his wand and stabs it into the air. “I’m not saying you
should go in empty handed.”

“A jar,” George says dubiously, looking at the glass container that’s

suddnely hovering in front of Draco.

He’s going to pull something from rolling his eyes this much. He
summons a half dozen more jars, except these are all filled with a
dark, thick liquid.

“We have a blood feud,” he reminds everyone, dragging his wand

down his wrist so his blood pours into the container. Arthur looks a
little green around the edges. “If you want a peace offering to your
angry, murderous mansion, Malfoy blood isn’t a bad way to go.”

“Gross,” Ron says, grabbing one of the floating jars out of the air. “Is
this all yours?”

“Do I look drained dry to you?” he asks, healing his arm before
reaching into his pocket to pull out a blood replenishing potion. “No, I
made some house calls last night, and grabbed some from Luna this
morning. Let me tell you, people get really concerned when their
Lord knocks on their door at six in the morning asking for blood.”

Percy is looking uncertainly between them. “This is a big deal, isn’t

it? This is a lot of blood. A lot of Malfoy blood.”
“This is a huge deal,” he says, glad at least someone is
understanding the breadth of this. “I’m ending our blood feud. We’ll
have to have some sort of reparations between us, like a wedding to
replace the one that didn’t happen a couple hundred years ago,” he
doesn’t look at Ginny, but he can see her perk up out of the corner of
his eye. Luna had been delighted when he told her what he was
doing.

It didn’t help Neville at all, since this little snag notwithstanding he

was still going to be a Lord one day, and Ginny will still be part of a
family of former blood traitors, and Luna is still unwilling to relinquish
her claim on the Malfoy family, so. But at least Ginny and Luna can
be together, if that’s what they want. At least Luna can be the wife to
someone she loves, if not all the people she’s in love with.

Arthur looks gobsmacked, and Molly has her hand pressed to her
mouth. “You’re really - just like that?”

“Just like that,” he says. “You end a blood feud by exchanging blood.
This isn’t a gift. It’s a loan. If this doesn’t kill you, you’ll have to come
to the Malfoy Manor and poor your blood on our lands, and the feud
will be considered wiped from our ledgers.”

“If it doesn’t kill us,” Ginny echoes. “And you think because the
magic thinks we’re also Prewetts, who are still part of the House, and
we’re carrying your blood, that it won’t?”

He’s kind of glad Hermione isn’t here for this. The lack of logic, the
gamble, the faith needed for this would drive her mad. “Yes.”

The Weasley family is old . So much magic, so much blood, must

have seeped into this ground that’s it’s practically impossible it’s
barren like this. It should be lush and overgrown, an unmanageable
mess, sure, but bursting with contained life and magic. Maybe it just
needs a nudge along.

Molly shakes her head. “No. Draco - Lord Malfoy - thank you. But it’s
too much of a risk. We can’t.”
Ron says, “Too late.”

They all turn, and he’s across the barrier, alive. His hand is bleeding,
having opened the barrier the same way as he saw Harry do it. He’s
poured blood onto the ground, and it sits there, heavy and
congealed. It doesn’t seep through the ground.

But Ron’s alive.

“Is it supposed to do that?” he asks.

“No,” Draco says, wondering if it’s worth having a heart attack when
that worked, but seriously, he could have waited for some protection
spells, at least?

“RONALD WEASLEY!” Molly shouts. “What the bloody hell do you

think you’re doing!”

Ginny grabs a jar, hops over to the other side, and dumps the blood
on the ground. It reacts the same as Ron had. The rest of the
Weasley siblings look at each other, shrug, and do the same. Molly
and Arthur jump to go after them, to stop them or pull them back, but
Draco fists his hand in the back of their robes and yank them back.
“Stop! You don’t have their protections.”

“I’m a Prewett, aren’t I?” she spits. “If that’s why they can go across,
then I should be able too.”

“No,” he says firmly. “The only reason this is working is because

they’re both, because they’re Weasleys and Prewetts. If either of you
try to go in there, you’ll die.”

“Mum, it’s fine,” Percy says, leaning down to inspect the blood. It’s
not absorbing into the ground at all, like they’ve just poured it on
glass instead of dirt. “Does this mean we still have a feud?”

“No,” Draco says, “but it does mean you have to get tilling.”

“I like gardening,” Ginny says.

“Does it think we stole it?” Ron asks. “Is this like the creepy ritual
used in fourth year to get a body back? One of the ingredients was
blood of the enemy forcibly taken. So intent must matter.”

Merlin, he forgets how smart Ron is sometimes. “Intent changes the

magic,” Draco confirms. “But this was all willingly given, and I made
sure I went to the more liberal members of the family for this. If
absolutely nothing else, my blood should have worked. And Luna’s.”

Bill frowns. “How many blood feuds have you ended?”

“None,” Draco says. “And neither has anyone else in recent history.
Most people don’t end blood feuds. They just wait for one of them to
die out.”

“That’s morbid,” George comments. “So, it’s possible we’re missing a

step here, right?”

“Yes,” Draco admits, “but I don’t know what it could be.”

Percy taps his wand against his hand a couple of times. “Well,
bleeding on it usually solves the problem, right?”

Draco wishes people would stop saying that. They’re right, but it
really downplays all the important cultural bits. “Not exactly. I don’t
really recommend it.”

He shrugs then drags his wand down his arm and blood wells up
from the deep cut. Arthur growls, “Percy!” but he just tips his arm to
the side so his blood mixes with the Malfoy blood.

There’s a moment where nothing happens, and Draco’s about to tell

him to knock that off before he passes out. Then there’s a shift, and
the ground is moving and rumbling beneath them. Draco takes
several hasty steps back.

He’s expecting something dramatic. But it settles, just the same as it

was before, only now Draco can smell it. He hadn’t realized he
couldn’t until it was filling his nose, something stale and old and far
enough past rotted to just be dust. The Malfoy blood has sunken into
the earth, and where it was is a scattering of green grass and young
moon orchids. Everything else is just as dead as before.

“At least there’s probably not any murderous house elves in here?”
Ron offers. “I’m pretty sure you can cross if you want to.”

Well, if it will let anyone cross, it’ll probably be him, with his and his
family’s blood in the earth. He hopes this doesn’t kill him, Luna will
be pissed. He steps across the barrier.

Nothing.

He lets out a breath. “Oh, good. This still isn’t right. It feels - it feels
dead here. It feels like there shouldn’t even be enough magic here to
have maintained the wards. But that’s ridiculous. A family as old as
yours doesn’t go from being an inferno to a spark just over a couple
hundred years.”

“I have no idea what you’re saying.” George says, “but wasn’t the
whole point of this to go get answers? Why don’t we stop standing
around here talking about it, and go inside the manor and poke
around.”

It was one thing when he was with Harry doing that, when their
families have been allies and neighbors for generations. But to go
sticking his nose around the Weasley manor, when they’ve only just
gotten rid of the blood feud - it’s the very definition of improper.

His emotions must be all over his face, because Ron snorts and
claps him on the back. “Go on and help Hermione research. I’ll send
a patronus if we need the help."

Oh, thank merlin. “Good luck,” he tells them all seriously.

Ginny flips him off, and he sticks his tongue out at her before
apparating away.
i hope you liked it!! we're getting there guys :)

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Chapter 17
Chapter 17

(See the end of the chapter for notes.)

Hermione is passed out, her head pillowed on her arms over and
open book on the blood lines in the thirteenth century. Draco
summons a blanket to drape over her shoulders and doesn’t hold it
against her, and also doesn’t wake her up like she’d demanded the
first time she’d fallen asleep in the middle of a book. She’s been here
for hours longer than he has, and last he checked her husband and
the rest of the Weasleys were still in the middle of rifling through their
manor, so he feels slightly responsible for making sure she doesn’t
exhaust herself.

“Hey,” someone says, voice soft, and he looks up to see Harry

leaning against the doorway to the library. Draco and Hermione have
been the ones up researching for the past couple of days, but for
some reason Harry looks even more exhausted than he feels.

He also takes a moment to appreciate how weird it is to see Harry in

the House, even though he’s a Lord now and he has every right to
be here. Standing there in his muggle jeans and messy hair, a
Chudley Cannons long sleeve that looks like it used to belong to Ron
loose around his neck.

“If you’re looking for Hermione, she just fell asleep,” he says. “Is
everything okay with the Weasleys?”

“Last I heard,” he answers, running a hand over his face.

Draco crosses the room, stepping closer even though it seems

dangerous, in the quiet, in the silence, with Harry looking so tired
and soft, looking approachable and touchable in his too big shirt and
stupid ill fitting jeans. He’d give anything if Harry would let him take
him to his tailor. “What’s wrong?”

Harry looks at him, biting his bottom lip, white teeth pressing into soft
pink flesh, and merlin, this is such a horrible idea, being around
Harry is such a horrible idea. “I - you’ll think I’m crazy.”

“Well, I already think you’re crazy, so I’m not sure how that will
change anything,” he says. Harry glares at him, but he ignores it.
“Tell me.”

“Can you really not hear it?” he asks, glancing around the walls.

He doesn’t say anything for a long moment, trying to listen for

whatever has Harry so agitated. All he can here is the cavernous
silence of the house and Hermione’s soft breaths. “Hear what?”

“The river ,” he snaps, except it doesn’t really have any bite behind it
because he looks so distressed.

This again? “Harry, there is no river.”

“There is! I heard it when I was in the Potter House, but it was - I
don’t know, quiet, easy to ignore. But ever since I came here I’ve
been able to hear it, and I can’t get any bloody sleep because of it,
and I’m going to snap if I don’t get at least a couple hours of
uninterrupted rest,” he finishes.

Draco blinks, taking a second to parse through all of that. “You can
hear the river you think is here from the Potter House and
Hogwarts?”

“No, well, yes, but it’s - it’s the same river,” he says, “just. Bigger. It
runs under Hogwarts too.”

“But there’s no river under Hogwarts,” he says gently, “You know

that. And there’s no river near our lands. The Malfoys built our ward
rooms beneath the earth, we would know if there’s a river.” He thinks
about other things that Harry can hear that no one else can. “Is it a
snake? Like hissing that sounds like running water?”

Harry gives him a flat glare. “If it was a snake, I wouldn’t hear
hissing, I would hear English.” Oh, right. “See, I knew you’d think I
was crazy.”

“I don’t think you’re crazy. Well, any more than I do normally. I just
think you’re wrong,” he says.

“Then what am I hearing then?” he demands.

Draco has no idea. He’d suggest that Harry’s been cursed with some
sort of hearing jinx, but he’s pretty sure he’s already thought of that
and checked for it, considering his years as an auror and all. “Let’s
go find out.”

“What?” He seems startled.

Draco doesn’t understand what part of what he said is confusing.

“You said it’s louder near here, so theoretically it’s close. So let’s go
find it. Or find nothing, and you can stop thinking there’s some sort of
river that we’re keeping from you. I could use a break anyway.”

Harry doesn’t look as excited at this prospect as Draco thinks he

should. “It’s, um. It’s not near here.”

“But you said it was loudest when you were outside-”

“Not near here,” he emphasizes, “but right here. I didn’t know where
the library was, I was just - trying to follow the noise.”

“And it’s strongest here?” he demands. Okay, maybe there’s

something to what Harry is saying. Helga Hufflepuff made this
house, who’s to say that she didn’t - he doesn’t know, booby trap it?
Stick some sort of hidden water system in the walls? It would explain
why Harry heard it in Hogwarts too, since Hufflepuff also built that
castle. It wouldn’t explain why Harry seems to think he hears
something by their lands, but he supposes they’ll just have to handle
one mystery at a time.

Or, well, several mysteries at time, considering they’re literally right

in the middle of researching the House and Longbottom and
Lestrange debacle. A maximum on the amount of mysteries they’ll
have at one time, then.

Well, first things first is proving to Harry that there’s no river. Then
they can try and figure out what it actually is.

“If you heard it here, why did you go up?” he asks. The library is on
the top floor. “A river would be down, in the ground, right?”

Harry’s face twists. “Yes, but - I couldn’t find the basement. I’d gotten
to the point where I was just trying to find anything, really.”

How long has Harry been here poking around? He’s afraid to ask, so
he decides not to. “Come on, I can take you to the basement. But it’s
not the deepest level, that’s the dungeons, not that anyone has
bothered to go down there in, I don’t know, at least a few decades.”

They don’t talk the long trek down the stairs, and then as they’re
about to sink lower, Draco grabs one of the torches off the wall and
hands it to Harry. “Forgot how to cast a lumos charm?” he asks.

Draco huffs. “No, but don’t go throwing magic around down here.
Keep it to a minimum.”

“Why?” he asks, then answers himself, “Is this whole place booby
trapped? What is it with purebloods and leaving traps everywhere?
I’ve been strangled by at least four coat racks on raids, you know.”

“Well, they must not have been very efficient coat racks,” he says.
“We’re both Lords, it shouldn’t cause a fuss, but you never know.”

Harry frowns. “If it’s only not going to try to kill us because we’re
Lords, should we have have left Hermione alone?”
“She’s asleep, how much trouble can she possibly get into?” he
asks. Harry’s look of alarm is pretty fair, actually, now that he thinks
about it. “She’ll be fine. Try not to knock anything over.”

“Knock over wha-” he starts, then Draco pushes the door open, and
he falls silent. “Ah.”

“It’s possible,” Draco says generously, “that there’s a river

underneath all this crap and it’s just no one’s see the bottom in a
couple hundred years so we’ve all forgotten.”

The basement is overflowing full of stuff , centuries worth of things

crammed in here, stacked and shoved and almost certainly magiced
into place, regardless of conventional wisdom on why that’s a terrible
idea.

“Is that a sarcophagus?” Harry squints.

Draco raises his torch a little higher. “Hm, what do you know, I think it
is. Do you suppose there’s a river in there?”

“Is there a mummy in there?”

He looks at it, considering. “Maybe. Possibly we stole it so we could

grind it up and eat it, and kept the outside because gold is pretty. Or
cursed.”

“Grind it up and-” he stops, takes a deep breath. “Is cannibalism

common practice then? I’m going back to the muggles.”

He rolls his eyes. “Hey, they did it too, and it didn’t even do them any
good, they’re just dumb. Besides, cannibalism, while technically true,
doesn’t really seem to fit the spirit of the thing, you know?”

Harry turns to him, big green eyes wide. “Draco. For the love of
merlin - what the fuck?”

He snorts. “Ancient Egyptian mummification not only preserved the

body, but preserved the magic as well. Something to do with what
they filled the body with, the purification salt, and the spells that were
slipped beneath their bindings. The magic didn’t release back into
the earth, or even get lost to the air. It stayed trapped within the
body. The muggles found the muggle mummies. We didn’t care for
those ones. We’d already managed to steal all the magical ones by
then. Well, theoretically. They think there are still more, hidden under
a few thousand years of cloaking spells, but so far no one’s had
much luck finding anything.” He pauses and reconsiders. “Except for
that Carter fellow, but then they all got cursed and died, and no one
even got to eat Tut’s body anyway, so it was a bit of waste for all
involved.”

Harry looks like he’s going to throw up.

Draco’s used to this, and if it makes his stomach roll to talk about it,
well, he’s had a lot of practice. “Which part is upsetting you most,
currently? The grave robbing or the cannibalism? Or is it the
desecration of a corpse?”

“Isn’t - didn’t - that’s illegal?” he tries. “And gross. What is the point of
eating people, exactly?”

“Oh yeah, we had a whole war about it in the seventeen hundreds,”

he says. “We only opened our borders to each other this past
century, and even then it’s pretty touch and go. Bill’s a pretty big deal
over there, actually, and he’s done a lot these past couple decades
to patch things up. Maybe I’ll even get to visit Egypt without the
threat of imprisonment some day.”

“Ron and his family went when we were kids,” Harry points out.

Draco rolls his eyes. “Yes, well, when you’re the family of one of the
Egyptian government’s favorite curse breakers, I imagine that’s a
little easier to swing. Although how he even managed to get them to
allow him in the country to climb to that position baffles me. And
considering by the last estimation the Malfoy family owes - let’s see if
I can remember it off the top of my head - oh, thirty seven
mummified corpses to the current regime, I don’t see that happening.
But if Bill can get them to lighten up a little on the reparations, that’d
be nice.”

“You ate people?” Harry asks, but he’s asking it suspiciously rather
than incredulously, like he already knows what the answer is but has
to ask just to double check. “Also, please explain the eating people
thing to me. Do ground up mummies taste especially delicious?”

Ew. “No,” he says. “Not that I’ve ever eaten one myself, mind,
because that’s super gross. It started off a cure for squibs, and it’s
the only one we’ve ever found. Well, that and unicorn blood, but
most squibs choose a magicless life over a half one. And the blood
sucking, and no sunlight and all that. By ingesting the mummy, they
ingest their magic, and they can become almost like a normal witch
or wizard.” He shudders. “Of course, they tend to die rather young,
for magical folk. Most don’t even make it to hundred.”

“That’s old for muggles,” Harry points out. “You had thirty seven
squibs in your family?”

Draco sends him a flat eyed glare. “Do you think my family has really
managed to piss the magic off enough times to get a squib thirty
seven times? No of course not. It also makes extremely potent
fertilizer, especially for magical plants.”

There’s a long, terrible silence. “Draco,” Harry says, “that’s one of the
most amoral, disgusting, and horrifying things I’ve ever heard of.”

“Yeah,” he says, and Harry blinks, surprised. Was he expecting

Draco to disagree with him? Harry’s a Lord now, there’s no farce of
perfection to maintain. “My great great great great grandmother was
ah, how do you say, a giant fucking bitch. She claims she didn’t
know where the fertilizer was coming from, only that it was very
expensive, but that’s a crock of shit.” He thinks back to what he said
earlier, and clarifies, “I don’t actually think it’s unfair of the Egyptian
government to demand back replacements for the bodies we stole,
even if I personally find it disgusting and upsetting and sometimes
get nightmares about the whole thing.” Hm, that was honesty than
he’d been intending. But what self respecting pureblood wouldn’t get
queasy about their bodies being taken from the ancestral earth? The
Egyptians might have had a different culture and reasoning behind
their anger, a different way that they processed their magic, but it
didn’t make it all any less horrifying to Draco, personally. Their
ancestors were so fucked up. “It’s just that it’d be nice if I got to visit
the place where so much of my business takes place. Besides, I’ve
heard it’s beautiful. I’d really like to visit a talking tomb if nothing
else.”

Harry raises an eyebrow.

It probably says something about him that that’s all it takes for Draco
to launch into another explanation. They’re wasting a lot of time
talking. Didn’t he used to find Harry’s ignorance annoying? But he
does like talking about this stuff, and he likes Harry, so. “We learned
how to make talking portraits from them, only they’ve been doing it
for much longer and are much better at it than we are. Their
hieroglyphics are brought to life and can speak on their own. That’s
the voices muggles sometimes claim to hear, if they’re particularly
sensitive to that sort of thing. It’s part of their magical conservation,
and it’s cool as hell.” He hopes Harry doesn’t ask him to explain the
particulars, because he doesn’t know. He just knows that it sounds
fascinating and wonderful and wishes his great great great great
grandmother had been a little bit less of an opportunistic psychopath.

“Okay,” Harry says at length. Then, “Does my family owe any

bodies? Whatever that means. I’m assuming it’s not literal,
considering how protective you all are over your corpses.”

Why is it that whenever Harry describes their practices, he makes

them sound weird? Like, it makes sense to be concerned of magical
containing corpses and what happens to them, thank you very much.
“We’d have to check the records, but I don’t think so. If you did, it
was probably in the transport and trading, and you wouldn’t be on
the hook for anything in that case. They decided to come down on
those who’d ended up with the things rather than the middlemen.”
Harry makes a face he can’t read, so he doesn’t even try. “Come on,
let’s go find your theoretical river.”

“This is a lot of sass from a cannibal,” he says, and Draco has to

look over his shoulder and catch the glint of amusement in Harry’s
eyes before he’s totally sure he’s joking.

Harry’s such brat.

They hang the torches from the wall, and it takes them close to an
hour to push their way through the sea of priceless junk, which is
really the best way to describe all of this stuff.

“You’re really sure that you can’t just throw all this stuff out?” Harry
asks, the muscles of his back shifting under his shirt as he hauls a
box of clinking, enchanted china onto a high shelf. Draco considers
helping, but he’s finding watching to be the more preferable activity.
“It doesn’t belong to anyone anymore, really, right?”

“It belongs to the House,” Draco says, “we’re allowed to borrow what
we need, so long as we sign it out first.”

The floating magical scroll has begun to trail behind them, waiting to
be used. He doesn’t actually plan to take anything though, so the
poor thing is going to be dissapointed.

Harry turns and glares at him, wiping sweat from his brow. “Really?
You need this? Just in case?” He reaches out and grabs the closest
artifact to him, which ends up being an ancient Mongolian bow with
delicate characters curving up the length. “And if you did, what’s to
stop you from just taking it? It doesn’t look like anyone’s done a
proper inventory of this place in a decade.”

“It’s all cursed,” Draco says, and really, Harry should know better. He
was an auror for years. Everything is cursed. It’s why he’d been so
nervous about having Ron in his house, worried about how many
things around the manor had some latent malevolent magic, just
waiting to be poked awake by a man with a blood feud between
them just casually walking the halls. “Here, look, we made it.”

He unceremoniously shoves a person sized vase aside, finally

revealing the door to the dungeons. Harry walks over, absently
reaching for his wand before remembering not to do that. “Is there a
reason we couldn’t just apparate there?”

“You can’t apparate beneath the earth,” Draco reminds him.

Harry’s nose scrunches up. “Why not?”

“Because you can’t. The layer of magic in the earth always

interferes,” he says, then stares. “You haven’t, have you?” If Harry
just casually breaks through the type of barriers that have been
dictating their apparation for hundreds of years, he quits, he quits
right now, and Harry can go searching for his imaginary river on his
own while Draco goes and takes a nap.

“I’ve never tried,” he admits. “Wait, you mean you can’t apparate into
any basements? Ever?”

“No!” he exclaims, “Not unless you want to go get splinched. Merlin,

how did you pass your apparation exam?”

Harry is silent for a long moment, then rubs the back of his neck and
looks at the ceiling.

Oh, merlin above.

“You didn’t take your exam?” he demands, unsure why out of all the
rule breaking and bullshit Harry’s done through the years, this is the
thing that scandalizes him. “What, you’ve just spent the last eleven
years apparating around the planet without a license?”

“No one’s ever asked?” Harry offers.

Unbelievable.
“Whatever,” he shakes his head, tugging on the dungeon door. Then
tugging it again when it refuses to budge. He steps back, and he
doesn’t see a lock, but that doesn’t mean there isn’t one.

Harry leans forward, wrapping his hand around the handle and trying
to pull it forward. Draco can’t help but smirk when he fails. “What
now? Should we bleed on it?”

“No!” he snaps. “Why would we do that?”

He shrugs, unrepentant. “It usually helps.”

Draco ignores him, running his hand down the center of the door,
feeling with the pads of his fingers for any indents or rough patches.
He finds one, then another, and then his fingertips are awkwardly
pressed against the door. They look normal, but feel rough and also
slightly spongey. He reaches up, searching for something else, but
when he finds them he lets out a frustrated breath. There’s a set of
divots in the center of the door, and another set up top, but he can’t
reach both at the same time. Did the person who set this up have
freakishly long arms or something?

“Here,” Harry says, grabbing his wrist and pulling it away before
reaching up and fitting his hand into the divots near the top of the
door. “Now what?”

He’s barely finished asking when there’s a soft click, and both their
hands start to sink into the door. “Fuck! This is your fault, Harry!”

“Mine?” Harry demands, more offended than afraid as their bodies

are absorbed into the door. He tries to pull back, but it’s too late. The
more force that he uses to pull away, the more force is used to tug
him forward and through, until he pops through the other side.

The first thing he notices is how clean it smells. The dungeon is

underground, but there’s has to some sort of access to the outside.
Harry pops through beside him a moment later, apparently not
having put up much of a fight so the door had taken longer to pull
him through. “That wasn’t so bad,” he says cheerfully, patting him on
the back.

He throws Harry a furious look. “How is that you can be eaten by a

door and not even panic a little?”

“I find panic to be unhelpful,” he says.

Draco finds Harry to be unhelpful. “Lets just hope that there’s

another door to get us out of here.”

Harry hums and nods. They don’t have to talk about it, they both felt
it. The magic sucking them forward and through, the feel of soft, cool
molten rock rushing over their skin. Magic like that tends to only work
in one direction. They can try to use the same door to leave as they
had to enter, but Draco isn’t sure how successful they’d be. Actually,
he is, and it’s not at all, actually.

“Think we can cast a lumos without blowing this whole place up?”
Harry asks. “I can’t see anything.”

Draco blindly reaches up the wall, feeling for the bracket and then
the smooth, soft wood of the torch. He’s almost certain that he’s
right, but he takes several moments to trade the runes burned into
the wood to double check. He says, “Incendio,” but doesn’t reach for
his wand or his magic or anything at all.

There’s a sound like a groan, and then the torch he’s touching
flickers to life, a clear, cheerful little flame crackling at its end.
There’s a half second delay, and then the rest of the torches along
the wall are lighting themselves, providing a warm orange glow all
down the corridor.

“No spell?” Harry asks, frowning.

Draco shrugs, removing his hand and resisting the urge to rub at his
palm. It’s tingling, like he’d just cast a too powerful spell while
holding his wand, but it’s probably just a phantom sensation.
“They’re inscribed with the symbols for the eternally burning flame.
You just have to tell them what to do.”

“You can make spells just with runes?” he asks, stepping closer and
pearing more closely at the torch along the wall.

Draco uses Harry’s distraction to shakes out his hand, trying to get
rid of the strange phantom sensations. “Well, I can’t, and neither can
anyone else these days. It’s probably like warding, you know, using
inscriptions to guide the magic rather than wand movements and
words. Only there’s some sort of trick to it we haven’t been able to
figure out. And yes,” he adds before Harry can ask, “we have tried
bleeding on it.”

He snorts then looks around him. He runs his hand over the stone
and asks, “How long has it been since someone’s been down here?”

“A while?” he tries. “Most people don’t bother. There’s nothing here.

We can’t use the dungeons for prisoners, there aren’t any cells, just
rooms. I suppose we could use it for storage.” Maybe clear out the
cavernous basement and set up some sort of reasonable system. He
thinks that might just encourage more Lords and Ladies to dump too-
powerful and unwanted artifacts onto the House to get out of having
to deal with them.

It’s too bad he couldn’t ask Arthur and Bill Weasley to come deal with
it. Between them, they’d wrestle the whole place into order, and
might even enjoy it. But since Draco likes having his head attached
to his neck, he’ll let someone else suggest that. Maybe Harry. It’s not
like he can get any more controversial than he already is.

Not that Draco will tell him that. He’ll take it as a challenge.

“Are you sure about that?” Harry asks, holding up his hand.
His clean hand.

Draco frowns and runs his hand over stone. There’s no dust or dirt,
and more than that - these stones don’t look old or forgotten. They’re
so smooth they almost feel polished.

The air feels fresh, it feels good to breath it. Nothing stale or wasted
or anything like that.

“Huh,” he says, reaching for his wand. “Okay. Maybe there’s an

eternal cleanliness spell around?”

“Sure,” Harry says agreeably, “because if such a thing exists, that’s

where I’d put it. The dungeons. And not, say, the main hall. Or any
sort of other well trafficked area.”

Draco doesn’t understand how someone hasn’t strangled Harry by

now. Then again, maybe they’ve tried and failed. “Okay, and what,
you think someone is just living down here and cleaning it?”

“Does the House have any house elves?” he asks, and then a
strange look crosses his face. “Hey, uh - so the house part of house
elf is like, generic, right? Not specific?”

What? “I swear you’re speaking English, and yet I have no idea what
you’re saying.”

Harry rolls his eyes and opens his mouth to clarify, but before he
gets the chance, there’s a thunderous, echoing crack. Draco grabs
Harry’s arm and pulls him back, sure that they ceiling is collapsing,
or something else equally terrible.

It’s not the ceiling.

“How did you get in here?” Tay snarls, her teeth looking extra sharp
and eyes especially red in the flickering light of the torches.

Harry answers her, but Draco’s not paying attention.

“You shouldn’t be here,” Dax informs him severely, and Draco’s so
confused. “Humans are not meant to be in here.”

“Maybe it’s time for them,” Tay says, “if the door let them in.”

“The door let them in because your boy is too powerful for his own
good, and mine’s too smart for his own good, and they should both
leave if they know what’s good for them,” Dax scowls, glaring at Tay
with a look that would have sent Draco ducking for cover.

She’s uneffected. “Well, unless you want to obliviate them, I don’t

see what choice we have.”

“Knowing what’s good for me isn’t exactly my specialty,” Harry says,

wry, and Draco suddenly feels itchy all over. “Which one of you is
going to explain what the hell is going on?”

Tay and Dax lock eyes, each silent and glaring at the other, and
Draco raises a hand to rub at his head. He has a feeling this will take
a while.

i meant for more things to happen plotwise, but i got distracted by

mummies. and yes, we really did grind up mummies and put them in
medicine, paint, and fertilizer, ect.

i hope you liked it! feel free to follow / harass me at:

shanastoryteller.tumblr.com
Chapter 18
Chapter 18

(See the end of the chapter for notes.)

Draco can’t actually follow most of whispered argument between the

house elves, but it ends with them leading him and Harry to the end
of the hallway, down a long winding staircase, and into a deep
unground cavern.

He has a healthy fear and respect for unbound house elves because
he’s not idiot and he likes keeping all of his internal organs inside his
body, nice and warm and right where they belong. He doesn’t argue
with Dax, not about anything serious, not about something that
matters, because no matter how old or powerful he gets, not matter
how clear it is that Dax loves him, deep down he’ll always be a little
boy on his father’s knee, hearing horror stories of offended elves
tearing a home down from it’s foundations.

But this is too much.

“I told you there was a river,” Harry says, the pale light reflecting onto
his face.

Deep below the House, flowing far beneath the earth, is a river.

But it’s not water. It’s silver and giving off a fain glow, darker in some
parts than others, but rushing past too quickly for him to make out
anything else.

He reaches out to touch it but Dax grabs his wrist before he can.
“Don’t.”

“Is it unicorn blood?” Harry asks, then shakes his head. “No, it can’t
be, there aren’t enough unicorns in all of Britain to make this.”
“And unicorn blood evaporates after being exposed to the air for
more than a couple of hours,” Draco points out, tugging his hand out
of Dax’s grasp but not trying to touch it again. “You - this is why the
magic has been disappearing? You’ve been hoarding it?”

This is magic in it’s brightest, purest form. He hadn’t know it could be

a liquid, hadn’t know it could or would take a physical form. It looks
like unicorn blood because unicorn blood is full of such concentrated
magic that it’s as close as magic having a physical form as it’s
possible to get.

Or so he thought.

This is so huge he doesn’t know how to comprehend it, he isn’t

really, he sees it and he understands what he’s seeing, but it’s all -
it’s too much.

Dax pinches him in the thigh, and he jerks away from his strong
fingers. “How would we even do that? How can we pull magic from
the air and bottle it? Don’t be foolish.”

“You can’t pull it from the air,” Harry says, eyebrows dipped together.
“But you can pull it from the ground.”

Tay grins, looking more like a proud parent than a deadly house elf,
and at first Draco has no idea what Harry’s talking about, and then it
clicks.

“The moon orchids,” he says, numb. “You made all this with moon
orchids?”

How many flowers must have this taken? Over how many years?
How many house elves? They all knew they were giving magic to
their house elves, but not likes this, not for this.

“We don’t need them to survive, and we don’t eat them,” Tay says,
and yeah, no shit.
“Did you ever?” Harry asks, and Tay shakes her head.

Merlin above. Every house elf, for hundreds of years, collecting their
due and bringing it here and somehow turning it into this -

“How does one make a philosopher’s stone without unicorn blood,”

Draco says suddenly repeating the question that Tay had asked him
in his classroom. He’s such an idiot, why didn’t he think to question it
then? Instead he’d just shrugged it off and moved on, when, really,
he should have demanded an answer to her question. Since the
answer, apparently, is this.

Dax snorts. “Philosopher’s stones are child’s play. They’re nothing to

this.”

Harry’s frowning as he leans over the rushing river of magic, and Tay
edges a little closer, hand halfway outstretched to pull him back in
case he gets too close. “Why? Why did you do this?”

Tay and Dax freeze, and Draco feels a chill go down his spine.

What couldn’t they do with this much magic?

They’re silent for a long time, long enough that Draco wishes he
could pick them up and shake them until answers fell out. Harry at
least looks calm and patient and not like he’s heard the most earth
shattering news of his life. Then again, Harry doesn’t know so much
that finding out earth shattering pieces of information must almost be
par for the course for him at this point.

“We knew it would happen again,” Dax says finally, and Tay glares
but doesn’t move to stop him. “Magic ebbs and flows, but it’s not a
renewable resource, exactly. To make magic, one must have magic,
and to make it stick - magic can’t just be thrown out in the world and
expected to stay. It leaves, soaking into the earth or floating into the
air. And yes, there’s a benefit to that, to bringing life back to a dead
thing, but it doesn’t help us. Our community gets smaller, our people
less, and if we want the magic to stay,” he stops, hesitating.
“It needs a container,” Tay finishes. “It needs something that will
grow it, and nurture it, and claim it for it’s own. And not just anything
will do. Not just anyone will do. We’ve been testing it.”

“Testing it,” Draco repeats faintly. He really wishes there was

something he could sit down on.

Dax is staring at him as he says, “You were taught that muggleborns

are magic’s gift to the world. That’s wrong. They’re our gift to magic.”

“About a cup of this in the local muggle water supply is usually all it
takes to get a couple wizards and witches born that year,” Tay adds.

Harry rubs at his head. “Wait. Stop. You make muggleborns? You
poison the water supply to make muggleborns?”

“Poison is rather harsh,” she says, “it’s not like the muggles get hurt.”
She pauses, looking to Dax for confirmation. He shakes his head,
and she repeats, firmer this time, “The muggles don’t get hurt.”

It - it can’t be. Can it? Muggleborns, the only thing keeping the magic
afloat, their only source of new magic, aren’t just born. They’re
made.

By house elves and their super secret magic river.

Please, merlin, let this be a bad dream or some sort of strange

reaction to a healing spell.

“Why do you care?” Harry presses. “You clearly don’t need us as a

source of moon orchids, or magic, or anything really. Why use this to
help us? You don’t need us, and if anything it seems like you’d all be
better off without us.”

That’s a very good question, actually.

They’re both hesitating again, and it takes Harry reaching out and
pressing a hand against his back to keep him from snapping.
This time it’s Tay who breaks first. “Weren’t you listening? Because
there’s no us without you. We are the same people.”

He blinks. “Like - bonded house elves? But if we died the bond

would snap, and you don’t even need us anyway, Harry’s right about
that.”

“No,” Dax says, glancing at Tay before continuing, “when the magic
dipped too low, when our extinction seemed inevitable and the
collapse of our society a surety, Helga built this castle, gave the
House a home. She nearly bled herself dry on Stonehenge and
pulled magic up from the earth, from all the grave mounds of this
area and jump started it all over again. And made it so we’d have
insurance against it ever happening again.”

“The blood sacrifices of the Lords and Ladies,” Draco says, because
there’s a reason they bleed during every full moon. A reservoir of
magic, to keep the House standing and have some sort of protection
for people even if every Lord and Lady fell. It was supposed to be
going to maintaining the wards and protection spells around the
castle, so they’d outlast them, so people would have a place to go to
shelter them from magic’s storm if the Lords and Ladies weren’t
there to do it for them.

That’s what they’d all been told. But it was a lie.

“No,” Harry says slowly, “no, Draco, you’re not listening to them. Our
extinction. Our society. So we ’d have insurance.”

It’s so obvious, so glaringly obvious, and even still it takes a long

moment for it to click into place. It’s the most ridiculous thing he’s
heard all night. “That’s insane.”

“You knew Hufflepuff personally?” Harry asks, apparently skipping

right past the impossibility of it all.

Draco doesn’t care if it ruins his robe. He sits down on the cold floor,
digging his fingers into his temple like it will make all this start
making sense.

“We all did,” Tay says, “We knew the sacrifice when we crafted this
spell, when we drank that potion. Breaking the cycle of magic
wouldn’t come without a price.”

“No one knew, except for those who took our seats of course. They
couldn’t know. This whole plan wouldn’t work if they knew, people
would just panic or try and claim the river for themselves. So we had
to find a way to get people to give us their magic without them
questioning it, without them knowing we were making something
powerful with it. Besides, that wasn’t their burden to carry. It was
ours,” Dax adds.

Draco finally lifts his head, because clearly ignoring this all won’t
make it go away. “You were a Lord?”

“I was,” he says gently, peering into his eyes. “Not all of us were,
although we all did it willingly. The magic wouldn’t work if we weren’t
willing.”

“I was a squib,” Tay volunteers.

Harry crouches down next to Draco, so he’s at eye level with the rest
of them. “What happened? How did you go from a Lord to - this?”

“It was fine, for the first few hundred years,” Dax continues, “We
were House elves, and we looked like this, and we couldn’t use our
wands anymore. But the way we were able to interact with and affect
magic had changed, we could now squeeze it out of things and store
it for our own. Then age took its toll on us, or maybe it was the magic
backlashing against our thievery after so many years. Some of us
became - vicious, with the families we worked with, with our people.
House elves had never been nice, mind you, becoming like this had
made us harder and meaner almost overnight, but we weren’t cruel.
But then we were forgetting why we’d done this, were becoming
bitter and angry and lashing out. We were hurting the very people
we’d given up our humanity to save.”
“You’re soft,” Tay says, “we didn’t do this to save people. We did it to
save a community. Killing some rude wizards didn’t slow anything
down. Their bodies always got buried in the right place.”

Dax rolls his eyes. “You’re cold. Most of these people are our
descendants, or related to them in some way. Some of us were fine
with the bloodlust, learned to temper it and control it,” he gestures to
himself and Tay, “while others - couldn’t. So they chose a different
path.”

Tay shudders. “Worse than what we did to ourselves with Helga if

you ask me. I’d rather have my head cut off.”

“Dead House elves gather no magic,” Dax says, “and gathering

magic, if nothing else, is why we did this.”

Draco can see where this is going. He’s seen bound house elves all
his life, grew up with them, saw how they were and how they acted
compared to Dax, and always, always found them lacking. “The
bound elves-”

“It was their idea,” Tay says. “Mad, if you ask me, but no one did.”

“We didn’t have to,” Dax sighs. “You made your opinion very clear.
That didn’t stop you from helping me brew the potion.”

She shrugs. “I wasn’t going to drink it. Am not going to drink it,” she
looks towards Harry, eyes narrowed. “I like you, but I’m not opposed
to some recreational wizard killing, got it? I’m not drinking that bloody
potion.”

“Okay,” Harry says, “keeping in mind, I have no idea what you guys
are talking about.”

“What would you do,” Dax begins, and for the first time he looks sad,
“if you could feel your mind slipping, if you found yourself hurting
those you wanted to help and with no way to stop it? If your death
would be just as harmful as continuing to live and lash out?”
“Get ahold of yourself and move on,” Tay says, but only sighs when
Dax turns his sad eyes on her. “Bound elves did that to themselves
too. House elves were the ones to propose the bond. Because it
forces us to continue the task we set out to do, even after our mind is
gone. All house elves know what do to with moon orchids and where
to bring them. But many of them no longer know why. The know
longer know who or what they once were.”

Bound house elves had trouble speaking. They were easily

frightened and easily confused, the only thing that ever seemed to
make them happy was cleaning and being left alone, he had always
thought they were so simple compared to the terror of unbound
elves. Sure, bound house elves can kill them if they don’t hold up
their end of the bargain, they can sever the bond themselves if they
really try, but he’s never heard of one doing so, of an unbound house
elf taking advantage of those loopholes and provision in the binding
that were there specifically for their benefit -

- and now he knows why.

“They’re lobotomized,” Harry says slowly, “and they - they did it on

purpose?”

“Even we did not know how bad it would get, when wizards no longer
had any reason to fear them, to respect them,” Dax says, “and even
if we did, it wouldn’t have mattered. We’d already sacrificed so much
to get this far. What’s our humanity, in comparison?”

Humanity. Because they were human, even like this, even a

thousand years old and twisted into different shapes and different
powers and all of it - they were human. They were Lords and Ladies
and regular wizards and even squibs, both the protectors and
protected, who had sacrificed more than everything. Because
everyone in the House took death as a risk for carrying the family
magic, but this is worse than death, longer, more painful, more
humiliating, and Draco can barely comprehend it. He clung to his
pride by his fingernails when he had nothing else, and the idea of
sacrificing that hurts in a way nothing else ever has.
“Merlin,” Draco says, ragged, dragging his hand down his face. “And
we all just-”

“None of that,” Tay says sharply. “If you didn’t care before, you don’t
get to care now. They are still living beings, they have emotions, they
understand pain and they understand kindness. Finding out they
used to be just like you, finding out that they did it for you shouldn’t
make a difference at all. It doesn’t change anything.”

“Why not?” he demands. “It changes everything!”

Dax shakes his head. “It shouldn’t. You know better. Tay is right. If
you didn’t care before, there’s no reason for you to care now.”

“I didn’t know they didn’t have a bloody choice!” Draco explodes, and
if he were less messed up from all of these revelations he wouldn’t
be doing something as stupid as yelling at a couple of unbound
house elves, but he’s furious and shocked and so desperately sad
for all those people a millennia ago that made a sacrifice they never
should have needed to make. “We knew - look, okay, fine, some
families, by which I mean quite a lot, have twisted the binding spell to
be abusive, okay? My family did it, I did it until I grew up and figured
out how not to be the same kind of terrible as my parents, and that’s
fucked up of us, of all of us. But we didn’t know they couldn’t leave!
Or wouldn’t. There are other magical plants out there, if they wanted
to break the bond we thought they could! It’s set up for in the fucking
binding, they just can’t harm us after. That was the whole point of
this to begin with, that’s what we thought it was, a bargain with the
deadly creatures who wouldn’t leave us the fuck alone, a way for us
to coexist without literally killing each other. We didn’t know they
couldn’t leave and fuck you and every other unbound elf for putting
the both of us in this position, because you knew, and you didn’t say
anything!”

His chest is heaving, because they’re right, his terrible treatment of

house elves, and his family’s and other people’s treatment runs the
gambit of poor to absolutely horrendous, and there’s no denying or
excusing that, and he has no idea if it would have made a difference
to anyone if they’d known where their house elves wouldn’t leave
them no matter the abuse heaped on them. Plenty of them tortured
and killed muggles and muggleborns because it was the fashionable
thing to do, so it’s not like they’re dealing with the best of people
here or anything. But maybe they would, and they should have
known, someone should have told them.

Tay’s eyes flash red, and her pointy teeth shine in the light from the
river. “Careful there, boy.”

Dax is pissed too, but he still glares at Tay when she says that, so at
the very least the family house elf isn’t going to turn on him. Who’s
actually some sort of transformed wizard, stockpiling magic for the
day that it runs low once more.

There’s not enough alcohol in the world to deal with this.

“Okay, enough,” Harry says sharply. “Maybe the purebloods

shouldn’t have been a bunch of power tripping assholes, and maybe
the unbound house elves should have done more to protect the
bound ones. But us screaming and threatening each other over it
isn’t going to solve anything.”

Tay scowls, but she looks a little bit less monstrous in the flickering
light.

“And how are we going to do solve anything? Tell everyone? We’ll be

in the thick of another war by breakfast,” he snaps, because it’s true,
because Dax and Tay are right. “We can’t tell anyone about this river,
they’ll tear themselves apart to get to it, and we won’t be able to stop
them.” Harry opens his mouth, and Draco continues, “And even if we
could, it wouldn’t matter. Someone will always be after it once people
know about it, and we won’t always be around to protect it.”

“You’re not going to solve anything,” Dax says. “It’s not up to you.
This isn’t your decision.”
Draco gapes while Harry pinches the bridge of his nose. “Then why
even tell us? Why risk showing us this? Unless you do plan to kill
us.”

Tay points to the river, “Look, can’t you see? It’s too high. It’s nearly
at the banks. If we don’t do something it’ll flood, and then it’s a
waste.”

“So dig another river?” Harry tries. “It already flows under Hogwarts
and most of the pureblood homes. Can you just make it bigger?”

They both shake their head. “No. We’ve gathered this magic for all
this time, but it’s enough. We’ve gathered enough, done enough.
The House rejecting so many of the Lords and Ladies is proof of
that.”

“Enough for what?” Draco snaps. “And what does what happened to
Augusta and the others have to do with this?”

“Why do you think Helga built that castle, why do you think she
turned the House meetings from something that was about little
more than updating alliance charts and gossiping to something that
was about power and politics and influence and blood?” Tay asks.
“Helga was a good woman. A fair woman, if nothing else. Do you
truly believe she would have asked us to sacrifice so much, to take
on so much, and offered to do nothing to help?”

“The blood we give at every meeting,” Draco says, because he’d

already figured that part out.

Tay nods. “We would do our part, and you all would do yours. Each
family had a debt to pay, a certain amount of magic they had to
contribute. By taking families under your protection, you took on their
debt. The larger and more powerful a Lord or Lady and the vassels,
the more blood the House would demand. Not that Helga told
anyone this, of course. The whole point was to do it in a way where
people wouldn’t know that we were gathering the magic.”
“So the Longbottoms and the Lestranges paid their debts?” Harry
asks, “and they get kicked out of the House for it?”

“That’s what Helga turned the House into,” she says, and now even
Tay looks sad. “A way to collect magic, and a way to protect people
from the magic as they did it.”

Draco rubs at his temples. “Wait. Are you saying - is the magic not
always like this? Not always so-” Cruel seems too harsh a word, and
demanding too soft. “Deadly?”

“No,” Dax says, “but that’s what happens when you steal the magic.
When it’s not borrowed, not given, not earned. Only taken. It’s mad,
as much as non-sentient thing can be mad. It’s feels the loss, and it’s
trying to get it back any way it can, trying to restore the equilibrium
any way it can. We’ve taken magic, and so the magic takes it from
us if we’re not careful, if we don’t protect ourselves.”

“But once a family’s debt is paid, once they stop actively taking
magic, it - settles. They fall off the radar, in a way. The magic doesn’t
see them anymore, and so doesn’t target them,” Dax explains.
“There’s nothing to do for those families who lost their seat, because
there’s nothing wrong with them. Harry joining the House brought a
tremendous amount of power to the table and into the river, except
unlike the other Lords and Ladies he doesn’t have several hundred
vassals to cover, so his magic was used to complete the debt of
members who were close to completing it on their own. The only
reason it didn’t just reject him is because the Potters themselves
aren’t even one of the families that owes magic, and so they don’t
have a debt to fulfill. But once the river if full, the castle will push
everyone out, regardless of their family history.”

Harry slaps his hand against the wall, and it startles Draco so much
he jumps at the sound, but Harry isn’t looking at them. “The
Weasleys!”

Tay smiles. “Yes. Precisely. The last Lord Weasley discovered all
this, and was horrified by it. By continuing to give blood, to hoard
magic, he was making his family and all those he’d sworn to protect
targets. But at the same time he understood that the debt needed to
be paid, that we were gathering all this for a reason. He funneled all
the magic of his manor and the family graveyard into moon orchids,
so Saji, his unbound House elf, could convert it to the river. It paid
his family and their vassals’ debt, but he couldn’t return to the
House, and he had to cover up what he’d done. So he made a big
fuss of leaving the House and of boarding up his ancestral home, so
no one would notice that it was dead inside, that all that had made it
ancestral, all that had made it matter, was gone. The wards you
broke through weren’t made by magic, but by him and his wife, to
ensure that no one would stumble across the truth, including his
decedents. But you just had to go and be clever about it. For the
record, it was your blood that got them across the barrier and ending
the blood feud that took down the wards for everyone else.”

That explains so much. Why the Weasley’s left the House so

suddenly, why their manor was reacting so oddly, why they’ve
managed to go without being attacked by the magic for so long. Why
it felt so dead and empty, like an echo.

“But it’s open now!” Harry protests. “Won’t people figure it out?”

“Maybe,” Dax says dismissively, and this really doesn’t seem like
they type of thing they should be dismissive about, “but it doesn’t
matter. The river is nearly full. Others will start being pushed from the
House, until there’s no one left, until every family has done their part
to contribute.”

“The House was not born with Helga Hufflepuff,” Draco snaps, “this
doesn’t make any sense, it’s been around - forever! It just can’t end
now because we’ve given the blood this river needed!”

“The House as it exists now was created by Helga, to fill a need that
we had to preserve our magic and our people,” Tay says. “Before it
wasn’t - it wasn’t this. It was a governing council. It was made up
alliances and property lines and protection spells. We worked with
magic, we were of it and for it and because of it, and the House was
gentler. Weaker. Less than this. Helga created the House anew so it
would have power, because power was what we needed. But soon
that power will serve no purpose.”

“There will be another war,” he says bitterly, because people love

power, and now it’s going to get torn away from them.

He can barely even think about this properly in terms of himself. So

much of his identity is twisted up in being a Lord, it’s what he was
raised to do, and it’s not like he won’t have magic and money and
influence without it, but it’s so - integral to the society to was raised
in, to the person he was raised to be, that he’s not sure, exactly, who
he is if he’s not Lord Malfoy.

Or well, he supposes he’ll still be Lord Malfoy, he’ll still be a member

of the House, but it won’t mean the same thing anymore. And maybe
that’s a good thing, it probably is, if it means people stop having to
suffer magical backlashes, if it means they don’t have to bargain
their blood away for just the idea of hope. But that doesn’t make it
hurt any less.

And he’s basically a liberal these days, and he cares about his
people more than his power, and that’s not exactly a common
attitude in the House, no matter their political leanings. They can’t
just pull out their whole system of existence out from under them and
expect them to take it gracefully.

He doesn’t know if he’s even capable to taking it gracefully.

“Why do you think we’re showing this to you?” Tay asks scornfully.
“Once the river is full, then all this is over, and everything will
change. You need to lead this change. It has to be both of you.
You’re the only one they’ll all listen to, both sides. If just Harry does
it, he’d just someone new and ignorant tearing down what he doesn’t
understand. If just you do it, then you’re a power hungry Slytherin
who’s doing this to weaken the rest of them. But if you do it together,
you might be able to avoid war. If you two are the ones that tears the
castle to its foundations, then maybe all of you get to survive this.”
“Tear the castle down?” Draco yelps.

Harry’s eyes narrow. “Wait. What happens when the river’s full? You
keep talking about it, but you haven’t said what it means, what you’ll
do with all this.”

“Yes we did,” Tay says calmly. “We release it into the muggle water
supply. Not just some, not just a cup here and there. All of it. And
magic runs strong again, our people survive, and there’ll be no
turning back after that.”

“Your blood laws are going to need another update,” Dax says.
“Because there’ll be no hiding the wizarding world when it doubles in
size, when muggles everywhere have magical children. Helga
thought the In Between spell was cowardice, thought hiding was
cowardice, even if it was a necessary evil while we built up this river,
while we had to protect ourselves against muggles who were actively
hunting us. It’s the only thing her and Salazar ever agreed on.”

Even Harry looks gobsmacked. Even Draco couldn’t guess at the

expression on his face right now. “You can’t be serious.”

Dax ignores him, because of course he is, of course he’s serious.

“This isn’t just going to be the end to the House as you’ve always
known it. It’s going to be the end of the statue of secrecy, of society
as you’ve always known it. Muggleborns are our only source of new
magic. So in order to survive, we’re not going to be able to hide
ourselves away from the muggles any longer. The cost of this is
going to be high, but we’ve paid our price. Now it’s time for you to
pay yours.”

from the first sentence, i've been building up the house just to tear it
down. this was always where this fic was heading and i'm so excited
to finally be here.

i hope you liked it!

feel free to follow / harass me at: shanastoryteller.tumblr.com
Chapter 19
Chapter 19

(See the end of the chapter for notes.)

There isn’t enough alcohol in the world to deal with this, but that
doesn’t mean he won’t try. His family has been stockpiling expensive
and potent wines and liquors for generations for exactly this reason -
or, well, not exactly this reason. but because one day, one of them
was going to need it.

“Er,” Harry says from right behind him, “I don’t know if this is the best
idea.”

“Do you have a better one?” he asks, biting his thumb and running it
against the side of the bottle. The more expensive bottles are
warded against being opened by anyone outside the family, while the
really good ones can only be opened by the head of the family.

He wants to get extremely drunk and forget this whole night ever
happened, and it seems an awful waste to drink any of the top shelf
stuff for this, when really enough of anything will do. But getting
drunk on swill in response to the world ending seems strangely
disrespectful. Or well, not the whole world, just the world as he
knows it.

The cork pops off as the wards undo themselves, and he raises his
bottle to his lips to start chugging.

“Is Master Malfoy needing anything?”

He jumps and spills at least half a glass’s worth down the front of his
shirt. “Shit!”

Mipsy’s ears droop and her big eyes fill with tears. “I is being so
sorry Master Malfoy!”
“It’s all right,” he says, before she can work herself into hysterics. He
pauses, staring at her, trying to find the hints of who she used to be
in her long nose and too sharp chin, but he doesn’t know. At the
sorting ceremony he’d managed to pick out the children from nearly
every pureblood family on facial features alone, and here is this
house elf who’s served him for years, and he hasn’t a clue about
who she used to be. She twists her ear back, and he’s never liked
her doing that, but now, after everything, it’s unbearable. He reaches
down and grabs her wrist, gently tugging it away from her face. “It’s
okay, Mipsy.”

She hesitates, then says, “Yes, Master Malfoy,” before disappearing

with a crack.

“Fuck,” Draco says, pinching the bridge of his nose. “I can’t deal with
them right now, and they’re fucking everywhere.”

“I know some place we can go,” Harry says, and Draco nearly jumps
again, having almost forgotten that he was there. “But you’re going
to need to change clothes.”

He raises an eyebrow.

A pair of jeans and a leather jacket later, Harry apparates them to

the middle of muggle London. “You can’t be serious.”

Harry flashes a grin and grabs his hand, leading him into a loud,
bustling bar. “There’s no house elves or anyone you care about to
witness your little mental breakdown.” That’s extremely
condescending, but he’s sure he won’t care once he’s had a few
drinks. They grab a table, and Harry says, “Wait here.”

“Get something expensive!” he shouts after him. He hopes Harry has

muggle money, because he certainly doesn’t, or at least a
confoundus at the ready, which he doubts. He slumps in his chair,
rubbing his hand over his face. He just really needs not to be sober
for a little bit. He likes drinking, especially with friends, but he’s never
really used it as a way to blunt his emotions or experiences before.
Then again, he’s never had to deal with something like this before
either, so he thinks perhaps it’s a time for some new things.

A tall crystal bottle is placed on the table, and it at least looks

expensive. Harry sits across from him and pours their drinks. “So,
what’s the plan?”

“Death by alcohol poisoning?” he answers, taking a long sip of the

liquor, and it’s surprisingly not terrible, smooth and bold and even
exceptionally good, actually, even without taking into account it’s non
magical origins.

Well, if nothing else they’ll all be able to greet this new world order
properly medicated.

Harry sighs. “A real answer, if you don’t mind. I know this isn’t ideal,”
Draco shoots him a sharp look and he rolls his eyes, “You know what
I mean, don’t look at me like that. But from the way they were talking
it doesn’t sound like we have much choice in this. It’s going to
happen whether we like it or not.”

Draco opens his mouth to try and explain, to try and make Harry
understand what the House means to people, what it means to him,
and comes up blank. Harry just found out about it, while Draco’s
spent his whole life knowing and hearing about the House, about the
spot at the table that would one day be his. So he can’t. It’s too
much. “This might be the thing to destroy us.”

“If it would destroy us, they wouldn’t be doing it,” Harry says, as if
he’s known those elves his whole life, if as he understands them,
which is impossible, because he doesn’t even understand himself.
He didn’t know he was a wizard until he was eleven, didn’t know
what being a Potter meant until a few months ago. “The whole point
of this is to save us.”

“By forcing us into another war with both each other and muggles?”
he mutters. “Because if so, brilliant, it’ll certainly do that.”
Harry shakes his head and leans back in his chair. Draco realizes he
should actually drink something, even if only for his own sanity.
“Draco, take a deep breath. Relax. You’re still not listening to them.”

“Listening to them about how this is all going to go to shit? I heard

that just fine,” he snaps.

He shakes his head. “Okay, look. At its core, this whole thing has
been a foreign policy debate, right?”

It’s shocking to him that Harry just casually used the term foreign
policy. Maybe all the whispers he heard of Minister Shackbolt
offering Harry the Head Auror position were actually more than
rumors. “I suppose.”

“It is,” he insists, and if he wasn’t planning on accepting a half

answer then Draco doesn’t know why he even asked. “It’s all about
isolationism, in it’s varying degrees, or segregation, maybe, from an
unflattering angle. But why Draco? Why go to so much effort to keep
it all hidden? You told me months ago.”

He stares, uncomprehending.

Harry sighs. “To survive . We were dying, our magic was dying, so
we hid. Nothing more, nothing less, right? And any consequences of
those actions - dead muggle children, families torn apart, land and
money lost - it was worth it, to make sure the wizarding world would
live to see another day. Wasn’t it?”

“Yes,” he answers, because how can he say anything else, when

he’s been taught his whole life that the choices his ancestors made
were for the common good, were worth the sacrifice.

“Well, now it’s the same question,” Harry says. “What are you willing
to give up to keep the magic strong, to ensure our survival? How
much are you willing to sacrifice?”

Everything, of course. That’s what being a Lord means.

“Couldn’t you have let me wallow and be dramatic for like, an hour?”
he complains, but he sits a little straighter, the weight on his
shoulders a little more bearable. This is going to suck, but if it’s for
the good of their society, to ensure future generation grow up with
the magic he’s coveted his whole life - then it’s worth it. It has to be.

It doesn’t matter if he hates it, if he hates muggles and their way of

life, if it’ll send the whole wizarding world into fits, if he has to tear the
House down to the foundations, stone by stone. All that matters is
that he fulfill his duty, to his name, to his house.

All that matters is he do everything he can to ensure there continues

to be magic in this world.

Harry smiles and leans close, “No. But we can still get drunk if you’d
like.”

“We fucking better,” he retorts, and Harry is laughing as he pours

them another glass.

He holds up his glass. “To the end of the world as we know it.”

“So more it be,” he intones, as if this is the beginning to a House

meeting, and it’s a struggle for both of them to take their shots
between giggles.

“WHAT THE FUCK?”

Draco tries to pry his eyes open, but they feel glued to his face, and
it takes him several long moments to place the heavy feeling in his
limbs and then the voice screeching in his bedroom. “Hermione? Am
I late for class?” he groans, turning his head into his pillow.

Except it’s not a pillow. It’s a shoulder. And it’s not Pansy or Blaise.

He finally manages to open his eyes, and it’s to see Harry sleeping
soundly in his bed, apparently immune to Hermione’s screeching
after all these years. All their clothes are still on, and he has vague
recollections of getting so drunk that Harry had to sidelong apparate
them to his manor, where the plan was to take the floo from his
bedroom at the manor to his bedroom at Hogwarts, but it looks like
they’d just both fallen into his bed right then and passed out there
instead. “It isn’t what it looks like.”

“Where’s a camera when I need one?” Ron complains, and Draco

looks away from Harry so he can see how many people, exactly, are
in his bedroom.

Luckily it’s just the two of them. Hermione is doing a wonderful job of
pretending to be scandalized while Ron just looks amused. “How did
you even get in here?”

“Dax let us in,” she says. Of course he did. “You shouldn’t have given
me an open invitation to your manor if you hadn’t wanted me to use
it.” He can see that now. There’s no way he’s dealing with these two
alone.

He jabs Harry in the side with his elbow until he groans and blinks
himself awake. “Your friends are here.”

“They’re our friends,” Harry mutters, rubbing at his eyes. If he’s

having any sort of freak out or reaction to waking up in Draco’s bed,
he’s keeping it to himself. “Hey guys, what’s up?”

Ron and Hermione share a glance, and the joviality drains away.
“We were going through the Weasley Manor, and we found
something. Or, well, Bill found something, technically. It’s about the
House.”

Shit.

“Oh, the whole bait and switch gathering magic thing?” Harry says.
“We already know about that. Did you find anything interesting about
the river?”
“Uh,” Ron answers.

Draco bolts upright, grabs a pillow, and starts hitting Harry over the
head with it. “You bloody idiot! That’s a secret!”

Harry puts up with that for about ten seconds before pulling the
pillow from his hands, grabbing them, and rolling them over so he’s
sitting on Draco’s upper thighs and holding his arms behind his back.
It happens so quickly that Draco doesn’t even think to react until it’s
already over.

Stupid fucking auror training.

“Hey hey hey! My eyes, think of my eyes!” Ron shouts, and there’s a
slapping sound which Draco assumes is Ron covering his eyes.

“Please, continue,” Hermione says.

Draco twists his head to glare at her, but she only winks at him. “Ha
ha, very funny. Harry, let me up, and stop talking!”

Harry gets off of him. “But it’s Ron and Hermione.”

“You can’t just tell them everything because they’re your best
friends!” he shouts, rolling off the bed getting to his feet.

The honest confusion on all three of their faces would be endearing

if it wasn’t so infuriating. “But,” Harry says, “they’re my best friends.
Weren’t you going to tell yours?”

“No!” he snaps. “Are you crazy? Think of the position that would put
them in!”

Harry stares.

“The Parkinsons are House members, and she lives in the same
house as both her Lord and Heir. Blaise is a noble who’s family is
allied to mine, and if I tell him something that could endanger his
family’s protection, he’s supposed to tell them, so they can separate
themselves from me. If I tell him and Pansy they have to choose
between keeping my confidence and betraying their family! I would
never do that to them,” he finishes.

“Okay, that makes sense,” Harry says, “but consider this: they’re
your best friends.”

Merlin’s sagging ballsack.

“Well, we don’t have any investment in the House, and also, we

already knew that stuff,” Ron says. “There was a cursed journal in
the master bedroom that talked about it.”

Of course there was, and of course the family has a world renowned
curse breaker in it, so he’s assuming a centuries old curse cast by
the head of an extremely powerful magical family took Bill, oh,
maybe a couple hours to undo.

“Except for the river,” Hermione adds, “Are you talking about the river
you thought you heard at Stonehenge?”

He hates them.

“Actually,” Harry starts.

Draco scoops up his pillow and throws it at him. “Stop that!”

Harry glances at Ron and Hermione, and says, “Okay, well, I’ll, uh,
just go then. And not tell them anything.”

“Right,” Ron nods seriously, “he’ll just keep us completely in the

dark, like he does, you know.”

Draco’s going to kill someone. Everyone in this room is eligible as far

as he’s concerned, including himself. “Seriously, don’t.”

“Seriously,” Harry says, “relax. You’re so high strung.”

Draco goes to throw another pillow at him, but instead Harry grabs
onto Ron and Hermione and apparates away, which isn’t something
he should be able to do, technically, but he’s Harry bloody Potter,
and their families are allies, so he’s not sure that he can even be
surprised that the wards allowed that.

He runs a hand over his face. There’s no reason to have Luna and
Neville covering his classes now, since apparently there’s no serious
problem in the House that he and Hermione have to research, but
it’s not like he can tell anyone that, of course. He’s going to have to
create some sort of bullshit story about that, or maybe just keep up
the pretense of searching for answers, or something.

But that can only last so long, can only get them so far. He can’t
keep up the ruse forever, of course, and the House will crumble all
on its own if he does nothing, so that’s what he can do, right? He can
do nothing, and the House will fall, and the House elves will release
the magic into the water supply, and magic will be restored, and all of
that will happen, if he does nothing, so there’s no need to do
anything at all.

Right?

He needs another drink.

He strips off his clothes from the day before, and considers putting
on real clothes, and going about his day like his whole life hasn’t
been turned upside down, but he just can’t bring himself to do it. He
pulls on sweatpants and a t-shirt, and he considers breaking his own
rule, considers calling Blaise and Pansy and telling them everything,
begging them to help him figure out what to do, how to handle this.

But it wouldn’t be fair to them. If he swore them to secrecy, they’d

honor it, if he gave them the choice of helping him or remaining
ignorant, they’d choose to help him. But it would tear them up inside,
because they’re both so loyal to their families, as they should be,
and he can’t bring himself to be the one who ruins that for them.
He can’t go back to the House and whoever might be waiting for him
there, waiting for answers, nor can he return to Hogwarts for the
same reason, and staying here seems like a trap, staying in his
manor and pacing back and forth and worrying like a caged animal
seems the worst of all options, so he’s certainly not going to that
either.

It only takes a simple spell to the light the fireplace, and then with a
pinch of floo powder he steps over to the other side.

“Master Malfoy,” Flora squeaks in French.

“Hello Flora,” he says, and he looks at her a long time. He doesn’t

know of any other unbound house elves who can speak more than
one language, and she is bound, he can feel the crackling magic of
the bond between them, but - how does it work, exactly, he wonders.
Is it the more they fight against it, the more it holds them back, or are
they all just forced into a reduced version of themselves no matter
what?

She doesn’t say anything, waiting, and he wants to ask, he even

opens his mouth to ask, but instead what comes out is, “How’s my
father?”

Flora perks up. “Mister Malfoy is having a good day. Do you want me
to be getting him?”

“No,” he says, then tacks on, “thank you.” Tay said that it shouldn’t
make a difference, and she’s probably right, but it does, to him, it
matters to him that they sacrificed and bound themselves for the
benefit of their descendants and their people, it matters to him that
they didn’t have the out he thought they did, if they ever came to
hate their lives and their families. Perhaps that makes him terrible,
that he cares for that reason and not just as a matter of course, but
it’s not like him being terrible will exactly be news to anyone.

Flora tilts her head to the side. “Mrs. Malfoy then?”

“Yes,” he says, then, “Don’t let my father know I’m here.”

“Yes, Master Malfoy,” she says, and she’s looking at him strangely,
probably because he’s acting strangely, but he can’t help that. “Are
you wanting me to bring her to the sitting room?”

That’s a good idea. “Thank you,” he says, nodding, and her face
twitches, but she doesn’t say anything else before disappearing with
a crack.

He means to sit down and wait, but can’t quite manage it, pacing
almost as soon as he enters the room.

“Darling,” his mother’s voice says, and his shoulders have relaxed
even before he turns around, “I certainly home you haven’t come
from class wearing that.”

“It’s the newest style,” he says, kissing her cheek and forcing himself
to take a seat after her instead of continuing to pace so she doesn’t
question him about his nerves, as if she hasn’t noticed already.

“That seems doubtful,” she answers, arranging her skirts around her.
“Now, are you here about about the House? Have you figured out
the business with the Lestranges?”

He stares. “Mum. You’re in France.”

“What an astute observation,” she says, and her eyes are sparkling,
intrigued and amused in way she hasn’t seemed in a long time.
Since before the war, even.

He glances around them, as if the sitting room will reveal any

answers. “How do you know what’s going on from here? That’s
supposed to be a secret!”

“We get mail in France, and have a stable floo connection. Is it true it
affected the Longbottoms too?” Two floating teacups appear next to
them, and Narcissa plucks hers out of the air without looking.
Well, if she already knows some of this, hopefully it’ll make the rest
of this conversation less strange. “Yes. Don’t tell anyone.”

“Poor Augusta,” she says, and sounds like she means it. He doesn’t
have any reason to believe she doesn’t, since as far as he knows his
mother and Augusta got on when they both attended the House
meetings. “Have you figured out what went wrong? Did her son have
some sort of illegitimate child running about who inherited the Lord
title in Neville’s stead? That was my guess.”

Oh, actually, if it hadn’t happened to multiple families, and they

hadn’t gotten it confirmed by Dax and Tay that that was very much
not the case, that would be a very reasonable explanation. It’s too
bad the Lestrange’s are too proud to go along with a lie, that would
make his life far too convenient. “That’s not it, but good guess. We’re
still trying to work it out, but we’re close.” It’s almost not a lie, so he
almost doesn’t feel terrible for lying to his mother. “Can I ask you
some questions?”

She raises an eyebrow. “More questions, dear?” She doesn’t wait for
an answer. “Of course, ask whatever you’d like.”

There’s no way he can tell her everything, or anything close to it, but
he - he wants her help, just like before when he was upset about
Neville, Ginny, and Luna. And just like before, he can’t tell her
exactly why he’s asking. “Was being part of the House important to
you?”

It’s clearly not the question she was expecting, and she raises her
cup to her lips, he knows taking a sip more to giver herself a moment
to drink than anything else. She lowers the cup, putting it back on the
saucer floating next to her. “No, it wasn’t.”

He waits, because there has to be more to it than that. She was a

noble, part of a Lady’s family, who was expected to marry well, and
marrying a Lord or Lady of the House is basically the definition of
marrying well.
“It was,” she says, her hands clasped in her lap. “When I was a girl, it
was very important to me. It’s what I was meant for, you understand.
Others in the family were meant to do different things - lead us, like
Sirius and Regulus, or advance the family’s standing, or go to
prestigious schools or sit the barrister’s exam, because merlin knows
our family was always in need of a good lawyer, but for me, and my
sisters - that wasn’t our path. That wasn’t how we were meant to aid
the family. We were supposed to grow up, and be very beautiful, and
smart, and charming, and we were to marry into the family of another
Lord or Lady. So marrying into the House used to matter to me a lot,
and then I met your father.”

Something doesn’t make sense. “If Lady Black wanted you to marry
into a House family, then why didn’t she want you to marry Dad? He
was the Malfoy Heir. Marrying you made you Lady Malfoy.”

“Yes,” she says, “but what was important was why Walburga wanted
us to marry well. It wasn’t just as a status symbol. It was so we could
influence our husbands, it was so we could dictate their actions and
their policy, control their policy and their family from within, and so
control their seat in the House.”

Ah.

When the war resurfaced, things changed, and not because his
parents had wanted them to change, but they did. Before Voldemort
saw fit to ruin all their lives, things were different. His father always
listened to his mother, always took her advice, and they were
partners in every sense of the world. But Lucius was headstrong and
stubborn and had gotten into more than one mess that Narcissa had
needed to get them out of when her husband couldn’t. And he’d
mellowed with age. There’s no way Walburga would have looked at
his father as he was when he was Draco’s age and seen anyone she
would be capable of controlling.

“I see,” he says instead of articulating any of that, “you always took

the roles of Lady Malfoy so seriously.”
“It was a serious matter, as you well know, but I did it because we
had to, because your father was the Lord and I was his wife, and
that’s what had to be done.” She reaches over to grab his hand.
“You’re handing the weight of it much better than we did, it seems,
and you’re so much younger than we were when you had to carry it.”

He licks his lips. “What do you think the function of the House is in
our society?”

She frowns. “Darling?”

“What does it do, really,” he says, “and I don’t mean the magical
protection we provide as Lords and Ladies. I mean the institution of
it, the power we give it. What is the purpose of that power?”

Narcissa pulls her hands back and reaches for her teacup. Her bright
blue eyes are peering straight at him, unblinking, and he can’t read
her face for the life of him. “Oh dear. Well, you are quite a brilliant
boy, so perhaps I shouldn’t be surprised. You’re much younger than
we were when we started asking those questions, but you’ve been
doing it for longer too. I was hoping it would not wear on you. I had
hoped you would marry Pansy if only for that, because she’s such a
wonderful companion for you, and such a smart girl.”

Wear on him? What does she mean? Sure, being a Lord is a lot of
work, and House meetings are exhausting. But that’s what they’re
supposed to be. Right? “I didn’t know you wanted me to marry
Pansy.”

“Or Blaise,” she clarifies, “of course, I married for love, so I want for
you to do the same, and they are your best friends, who have been
so lovely to go with you these past years.” She pauses. “Your recent
companions have been very interesting.”

Draco’s been imagining his mother as shut in up here, looked at his

parents moving to France as them cutting themselves off from
society and putting it all the behind them. Clearly, at least in his
mother’s case, that was an erroneous assumption. “That’s certainly a
way to put it.”

“I heard that Mrs. Granger is looking lovely these days,” she says.

His head shoots up and he looks up at her with a terrible sort of

horror. “Mum, not you too! Hermione is just a friend.”

“A friend,” she repeats, “of course.”

She doesn’t sound like she disbelieves him, which is ideal, of course,
but makes the rest of this seem very confusing. “I’m serious.”

“I know you are,” she says, then smooths out her skirt. “I just can’t
help but think of the last time you visited, and the questions you
asked, is all.”

“Thank you,” he says, “but no. And would you and Dad really be
okay with me courting a muggleborn regardless? A muggleborn
who’s currently married to a blood traitor, might I had.”

“Well, at least we no longer have a blood feud with the Weasleys,”

she says, “which was such a nice gesture.”

This might be the strangest conversation he’s ever had with his
mother, and that’s saying something. “Do you think I’m trying to
seduce Hermione by being nice to her husband?”

“No, darling,” she says, “I think you’re trying to seduce her friend.”

He blinks. Her friend? Who’s Hermione friends with? Surely she’s not
talking about Lavender Brown. She’s nice, and terrifying, but also
extremely annoying. “Her friend.”

Narcissa nods. “Yes. It’s all right darling, if that’s what you want. If it’s
what will make you happy.”

He came her to try and get her opinion on dissolving the House
without actually asking that, and this has gotten so hopelessly turned
around that now he doesn’t even know what they’re talking about.
“Mum. Please speak plainly.”

She wrinkles her nose, then smooths it back out. “I’m just trying to
say, dear, that if you want to court Harry Potter, then we support
you.”

What the ever loving fuck.

i hope you liked it!

feel free to follow / harass me at: shanastoryteller.tumblr.com

Chapter 20
Chapter 20

(See the end of the chapter for notes.)

Maybe, Draco thinks distantly, he’s having a stroke and this is all a
hallucination, including the whole cursed house elves and magical
river affair. “What?”

“Honestly, dear,” she says, affecting a patronizing tone of voice that

would normally make him grit his teeth, but he’s too distracted by
what she’s saying to waste energy at being irritated at how she’s
saying it. “You’ve been obsessed with him since you were a boy, it’s
not exactly like this is a surprise.”

“I, that’s not,” he pauses, taking a slow, controlled breath and

smoothing his hands down his thighs. He wants to say that isn’t true,
but if he wants to convince his mother that she’s wrong then he
probably shouldn’t start out by lying to her. “That’s not relevant.
Harry and I are friends, of a sort, but I’m not courting him, nor do I
intend to court him.”

There’s a long, awkward moment where Draco tries to appear

resolute and unruffled and his mother just seems confused.

“Oh,” she says. Then, “Why not?”

“Why not?” he repeats, and if his voice comes out sounding a couple
octaves too high at least it’s only his mother here to witness it. “What
do you mean why not? We - we were on opposite sides of the war,
we’ve hated each since we were kids-”

“Darling,” she says, reproachful, and he flushes. “That’s all in the

past, isn’t it? Rosamund said she saw you two dancing together.”
No wonder his mother is so well informed, if she’s still gossiping with
Rosamund. “It was just a dance, and more to avoid Lord Selwyn
than anything else.”

That momentarily distracts her. “He is dreadful. The head of an

interesting, vibrant family, and he’s as interesting as watching
flubberworms molt.”

“His daughter’s interesting, not that you’d know it from speaking to

him,” he says, because she is. Phyllis is whip smart, a highly
acclaimed potion mistress, and easily the scariest Hufflepuff he’s
ever met. She’d proctored his potions mastery exam, and every once
in a while he still has nightmares about it.

Well, better nightmares about potions exams than some of the other
things his subconscious cooks up.

“She’s lovely,” Narcissa says briskly, “but that’s hardly the point of
discussion. We have a long history of being friendly with the Potters,
if not quite friends. Dismissing this past war or two, your union is
hardly surprising.”

Right, like sweeping under several generations of war mongering is

that easy. Just look at the goblins. They can’t seem to go more than
a handful of years without some sort of skirmish breaking out, even if
these days they relegate their victories to hostile company takeovers
rather than the battlefield. “Mum. Even if that was something he
wanted, or I wanted,” he hurries to add at Narcissa’s raised eyebrow,
“it’s just not on the table. I can’t court another Lord, even one we’re
allies with. Especially one we’re allies with.”

“Yes, well,” she says, “rumor has it that Mr. Potter won’t be a Lord for
long.”

For a single, terrifying moment, he thinks that she’s talking about the
inevitable crumbling of the House. Then he remembers that Harry
had all but announced his intention to abandon his seat and to close
the Potter House for good before he’d even opened it. “Is that really
what you want? To lose another Lord? It’s not like we have all that
many left.”

She sips her tea again, then rearranges her skirt, but Draco has a
lifetime of experience at outwaiting his mother. “Well,” she pauses,
then continues, “I suppose he could adopt a couple dozen children,
properly of course, and fill that house of his up with Potters, and
revive his family that’s all but died out. If that’s what he wants.”

“Why wouldn’t he want that?” he asks. It makes sense to him. Harry

didn’t get to grow up like he did, didn’t grow up with a family who
loved him, in a world that was made for him, or with the knowledge
of his inevitable place in the world. He grew up lonely, and it seems
the easiest way to fix that is to build a big family, and it’s not exactly
like he’d have a hard time getting people who were interested in
being Potters.

Although, he’s not sure if Harry likes kids. He could hire a nanny or
something if he doesn’t, but then again a house full of kids he
doesn’t even like probably sounds more like a nightmare than
anything else. But he chose to be a professor, he didn’t even have to
be coerced into it like Draco did, and it wouldn’t really make sense
for him to do that if he didn’t like kids.

His mother smiles. “He’s never seemed one for looking to the past,
to try and recapture something he’s lost. For better or worse, that
boy likes to move forward. Trying to relive the lifestyle and priorities
of ancestors he’s never met doesn’t exactly seem to be his style.”
She reaches out, resting a hand on his knee, her eyes warm. “No
less than three different people approached me to ask why I hadn’t
made a public announcement about your relationship to Harry Potter.
These are people that have known you since you were a toddler, that
have been serving in the House with you for years. These are people
that not only nominated Mr. Potter for the position of Auror, but
worked alongside him during his tenure. They’re not strangers. And
they looked at one dance and saw something more.”
“Well, they saw wrong,” he says, his patience starting to wear thin.
“Just because we’ve managed to spend time in each other’s
presence without reaching for our wands doesn’t mean anything
more. Really, come on Mum.”

Now she looks sad, and he hates that, hates her downturned lips
and the heaviness around her cheeks. “Draco. I fear you’re too close
to this to see it clearly.”

“Too close to my own non-existent affair with Harry to see it clearly?”

he repeats, as sarcastic as he dares when speaking to his mother.

She sighs, but another voice says, “Oh, are we doing this now?”

He turns, of course already knowing who it is, and his father stands
in the doorway. Flora was right, today is a good day. Lucius is
standing tall, wearing navy trousers and waistcoat with a silver
undershirt. While Naricssa seems to wear nothing but black these
days, his father wears anything but when he’s in his right mind. His
hair is washed and combed, and there’s a bright intelligence in his
eyes, an awareness that comes and goes.

Draco’s body does a peculiar thing where it tries to tense and relax
at the same time, and fails to do either. On one hand, this a
mortifying conversation to have with his mother, he has no desire to
extend the mortification by bringing his father in on it. On the other
hand, today’s a good day. His father looks like himself, is holding
himself normally, he knows where and when he is. Draco wishes he
were a better person, a kinder and stronger person, but he isn’t. He
still shies away from his father’s illness, from the blank look in his
eyes, and it’s a relief not to flinch.

“Dad,” he says, shooting his mother a quelling look, “we were just
talking about-”

“Your embarrassing fifteen year long infatuation with Harry Potter?”

he finishes, eyebrow raised.
Narcissa laughs, a light, pleasant sound, and the denial dies on his
lips as he turns to stare at her. Lucius smiles, crossing the room to
sit next to his wife and brushing a hand over Draco’s shoulders as he
passes. Draco doesn’t realize he’s leaning into the touch until it’s
already gone. Narcissa hold out hand on her knee, palm open, and
Lucius doesn’t hesitate to take it.

His eyes feel tight and scratchy, all of sudden. How long has this
been happening? Is it new? Or is this just what his good days are
like now, and Draco’s been missing them because he’s too afraid to
face his father on his worse days?

“Our son was just telling me that there’s nothing going on between
him and Harry Potter, and how he has no intention of courting him,”
she says.

If he could just die now, Draco thinks, that would solve at least some
of his problems.

His father snorts. “You’ve been courting him since you were eleven.”

“How are you okay with this?” Draco asks. “It’s not true, but if it was,
how can you - why don’t you mind?”

Lucius’s smile dims, but Draco wants to know, and it’s not like he
could ask when his father isn’t having a good day, when he thinks it’s
some time before the war or sometimes still in the middle of it. He
doesn’t want to hear the opinions of the past Lucius, he wants to
hear about the current ones. Narcissa squeezes his hand, and his
father squares his shoulders before addressing him, and Draco’s not
sure how to feel about that. “I’ve endangered your happiness and
wellbeing too many times to count, when those are the very things I
should have been focused on protecting. You’re my son. I want you
to be happy. If Harry Potter is what it takes to make you happy, then
that’s what I want you to have.”

“I am happy,” he says, and he means it, but for some reason it still
rings false. “Aren’t I?”
He should be. He’s a respected Lord, a Potions Master, and he
thinks he’s been doing okay with this whole professor thing. He has
a family who supports him and friends he loves, has Blaise and
Pansy at his side to laugh with and grow with. What else could he
possibly want?

His parents exchange a look, and this time it’s his mother who says,
“We’re just worried, dear. You’ve barely had a chance to catch your
breath since you graduated, and when you do, when things slow
down, we don’t want you to feel as if you’re lacking something.”

“Maybe that something isn’t Harry Potter,” his father says, and
doesn’t exactly sound broken up by the idea, “maybe it isn’t
romance, or new people, or anything like that. But we want to make
sure you have a life that you chose for yourself, and not one that you
let get chosen for you just because you think it’s what’s supposed to
be done.”

“You didn’t choose your life,” Draco says, mouth on autopilot

because his brain is too busy going everything they’re saying. It’s
ridiculous. He’s known the path of his whole life, since he was a
toddler, and he’s never had a problem with it. He loves his family.
Why wouldn’t he want to do everything he could to support them? If
it was hard, if it was stressful, if there were parts of it that he didn’t
particularly enjoy - well, that was the job, wasn’t it? One of the first
lessons magical children learn is that nothing comes without
sacrifice, that magic doesn’t come free.

He hardly sees why anything else in his life should be different.

Lucius looks to Narcissa. “I chose the important part.”

Right. Because his traditional, conservative parents had eloped, had

turned their back on their traditions and their betrothed if it meant
being together. It had ended up working out in their favor, because
they obviously hadn’t wanted to plunge either of their families into
disgrace, but what if it had? Would it have mattered? Clearly not.
They gambled, and won, but for the first time Draco wonders what
would have happened if they’d lost.

His father never would have been a Lord. He and Narcissa would
have been shunned by their families, and Lucius would have been
disinherited, at least. Narcissa likely wouldn’t have been, since
Walburga didn’t disinherited Sirius after all the crap he pulled, but
then again he was the Heir and her son, and Narcissa had just been
her niece, so even then that wasn’t a guaranty.

“What would you have been,” he asks, “if you weren’t Lord and Lady
Malfoy? Or if things had been - different, like if you still had your
responsibilities to our family but the House duties weren’t so
imposing?” Maybe he can still get an answer to his question after all,
can get his parent’s opinion on life without the House without having
to spill any secrets at all.

“I was going to be a stable hand,” his father answers, confirming the

questions that had just run through Draco’s head. If their families had
cast them out for their actions, they would have just left. “I’d always
loved taking care of our horses and the pegusi on the grounds, and
there aren’t many people with that type of experience. Pegusi are
tricky beasts to care for, and there’s whole conservation groups
made up of people who’ve never even touched one.”

“I was going to be a tutor,” Narcissa says, smiling. “Teaching rural

children in the middle of nowhere France. Neither of those plans
were very long term, of course, but they would have kept us afloat
for a while.”

A conservationist and a teacher. Both of those seem so far away

from the people his parents ended up being that the contrast is
almost jarring.

“What about you?” Narcissa asks. “If you hadn’t had to take up our
spot so young, if you hadn’t been born into a noble family at all, how
would you have wanted your life to turn out? What would you
change?”
The question takes him aback, even though obviously it shouldn’t.
He got a potions master more out of a distaste for herbology than
anything else. He would have probably gotten his charms mastery
immediately, instead of slowly working his way there nearly a decade
later. At the rate he’s going it’s going to take him a whole other
decade to complete, since he barely has the time to do Filius’s
assigned reading, never mind any of the assignments. On one hand,
the idea of burying himself in academia is incredibly appealing, in
instinctual, basic sort of way. But on other hand -

“Nothing,” he says, without really thinking about it, but finds that he
means it. His parents look disappointed, so he tries to explain, his
thoughts barely forming before they’re falling out of his mouth. “I
don’t care for the business side of things, and I hate double checking
the accounts, the monthly meetings are mostly an exercise in
frustration, and as much as I want a seat on the Wizengamot for the
advantages it will give me, I don’t think it’s something I’ll enjoy all
that much.”

“It sounds like you don’t like anything about your life now,” Lucius
says, sardonic and sad at the same time.

“I like a lot about my life now,” he argues. “That’s what I’m saying. I
like being a Lord, I like being the head of our family, being the face of
our family. I like that I get to arrange adoptions into our family and
pay for all the cousins’ schooling. I like being the person people
come to for help, and I like being able to help them. I like that
everyone in our family knows me, and likes me, and trusts me.” He’d
be embarrassed to be so earnest and forthright with anyone besides
his parents, and even still he can feel a flush crawling up his neck.
“So I wouldn’t change anything. I want to take care of the people
who have always taken care of me, and if it’s stressful and a lot of
work, that’s okay, because it’s worth it, to me. I’m okay with working
hard to make sure our family has enough money to support anyone
who needs it, and dealing with the other heads so the other’s don’t
have to, and even if I don’t care for the minutia, I like the idea of
having the power to make the sort of changes that will keep us safe,
and happy. I wouldn’t change anything.”

He couldn’t run. He’s glad his parents love each other so much, of
course, and obviously he’s glad they took that gamble, but he
doesn’t think he could do that. Not for anyone, not even if Harry got
on his knees and begged him to run, not even if Blaise or Pansy
asked, Draco doesn’t think he could do it.

He loves his family, loves those his family shelters, and now he even
loves those couple hundred brats who trudge their way through his
classroom. If the responsibility feels heavy on his shoulders, then
good, it should. It keeps him grounded, keeps him from doing things
like running to a foreign country to elope.

Which, he thinks, means he can’t run away from the issue with the
House and the magic river and the house elves, even if he’d like to.
If he did that, he’d be doing his family a disservice, would be turning
his back on the responsibility that he professes to covet, so
obviously he can’t do that. So he can’t sit back and just let things
take their course, he has to be proactive and do something about all
this.

Not exactly how he was planning to get his answer, but he’s gotten it
all the same.

“Oh,” Lucius says, a smile at the corner of his lips. “Well, then. If
you’re sure.”

He flushes, but his parents are smiling at him, soft and proud, and
what is there to want except what he has right here? Not much, and
certainly not Harry Potter.

He and Harry have more important things to worry about than his
ridiculous crush that he may or may not have had since he was
eleven years old, after all.
When Draco floos back, he makes a pit stop at the manor,
determined to look through the family’s library and see if he can find
anything that details the function and form of the House pre-
founders. He’d check the library in the House, which is supposedly
supposed to have these types of things, but he’s assuming that the
house elves have done some selective editing and purging over the
years to keep anyone from stumbling over their secret.

Granted, there’s no reason to think the family library should be any

different, since there’s no reason that Dax wouldn’t do his own
selective editing here as well.

He’s halfway to the library when he freezes and has to resist the
urge to slap his forehead. Right, Dax. And presumably Tay, and any
other free elves that are wandering about. If he wants to know how
the House functioned pre-Founders, he can just ask.

Since they used to be people just like him and are something around
a thousand years old.

Maybe it wasn’t the magic that turned them mad. Maybe it was just
having to be a servant for a thousand years. Draco imagines that
would turn him mad all on its own.

There’s a familiar crack, and Dax is standing in front of him, just like
he could hear Draco thinking about him. “Heir Longbottom is here to
see you. He seems distressed.”

“Fuck,” Draco says, because obviously Neville and Augusta are

looking for answers, and he assumes all the other affected families
are dying to get their hands on him too. Maybe he should just hide
here, because he knows for a fact that not a single Lord or Lady is
above using their children to get to him. “Is that what he still is? An
heir?”

Dax gives him a dry, unimpressed look. “The feudal system predates
Helga’s last ditch attempt to save us all. We still had lords and ladies,
and they still served those who answered to them. Not everything
you hold dear will come crumbling down.”

That’s because Draco is an outlier in caring more about the function

of his position than the power his position gets him. There are plenty
of people who will react to the power structures of their society
breaking down as if Draco would react being told all his students
were going to be executed in front of him. The Japanese emperor is
going to be the absolute worst about this.

Shit.

He has to tell the Japanese.

He has to tell everyone.

Fuck, at least he doesn’t have to tell Hermione, since he’s sure Harry
will. She’s going to be absolutely insufferable about all of this.

“Whatever you’re thinking about, stop it,” Dax orders. “Neville

Longbottom. Downstairs. Wants to see you.” Draco doesn’t respond,
mind still spinning about what this all means. They will have to
arrange for an international conference, and that’s going to suck so
much. Rosamund keeps up with everyone, at least, since the politics
of the international community does seem to run on gossip. Which is
something she’s always excelled at.

Wait, can Rosamund even lead anymore, since the House rejected
her? Not that that’s a statement of her fitness to lead them,
apparently, but it’s not like he can explain that to everyone before
they have the meeting where they’re supposed to explain this to
everyone. Are they going to have to hold a whole round of elections
before they can even start to call an international meeting?

“Draco!” Dax goes on his tiptoes to snap his fingers in front of his
face. “Focus.”

“What am I supposed to tell him?” he asks.

Dax shrugs, and it seems backwards that he’s the one being cavalier
about this. “Whatever you want. We’re going to release the magic no
matter what. It’s nearly full, and when it is, that’s it. Magic will flow
into the muggle communities, we’ll get a staggering influx of
muggleborns in about a decade, and that’s that. Our work is done.
How you lot sort out your own mess is up to you.”

Draco doesn’t actually believe that Dax and Tay and all the others
went to this much effort to suddenly not care if their society comes
collapsing down as a result, which either means they think the
magical community is much sturdier than Draco does, or they’re
putting a lot of trust in him and Harry to figure something out.

He really, really hopes it’s the former.

“Okay,” he says, running a hand through his hair. “Okay. Good. I’ll go
talk to Neville, then.”

“Wearing that?” Dax wrinkles his nose, and Draco does something
he’s never done before, and flips Dax off as he walks down the hall.

Dax’s laughter follows him, and somehow his family’s ancient,

powerful, sarcastic house elf laughing at him is enough to make
everything feel not quite so terrible.

Which, of course, lasts up until he sees Neville pale, pinched face.

He looks a whole lot worse than when Draco saw him last, and
irritation swells up before he suppresses it. “He told you.”

“He did,” Neville says. “Don’t be mad, I was waiting for him when
they got back to the castle. You know Hermione’s the only decent liar
out of the lot of them.”

That’s true, although Harry gets away with lying an awful lot because
no one’s paying attention, but that’s a separate issue entirely. “Did he
tell anyone else?”
“Not when I’d left,” Neville sighs, rolling his eyes as he says it. “But if
McGonagall even looks at him too long you know he’ll break, to say
nothing of what’ll happen if my grandmother gets ahold of him.”

“He was an auror, they must have taught him to withstand torture,”
Draco answers, because on the bad side of Augusta Longbottom is
a terrible place to be.

Neville’s smile is there and then gone, and the silence stretching
between them is heavy. “So,” he says finally, “what are we going to
do? They don’t get it, not really, how much of a mess this is going to
be. Are the house elves all British? Because no matter where this
started, they certainly didn’t stay in Britain, and I guarantee you there
are some people who are going to have a lot to say about their
magic being gathered for the benefit of British wizards.”

“Actually, I’m pretty sure that the whole suddenly muggleborns

everywhere thing is going to be more a global event than a local
one,” he says. “There’s - a lot of it. Too much just for Britain, unless
their plan is to wipe muggles out of this country entirely.”

There’s an awkward beat of silence.

“Please never repeat that,” Neville says quickly.

Draco’s nodding before he’s even finished speaking. “Right, yes. Er.
No need to give anyone any ideas.”

Framing it that way could be to get the worst of their power structure
on their side, but not before Hermione killed him for it. And it’s not
like Draco wants to get rid of all the muggles anyway, he just wants
them to leave him alone.

Which isn’t an option anymore, unfortunately.

“We can’t wait,” he says, “magical children won’t start popping up in

schools for about twelve more years, but we shouldn’t wait until then.
If we’re going to break down the barriers between the muggle world
and magical one, we’re going to have a year or two, at best. We
have to get to the families when the kids are still young, when
hopefully they haven’t done any accidental magic yet.”

“Do you want to break down the barrier between the muggle and
magical world?” Neville asks.

Obviously not. “It doesn’t matter what I want. What matters is what’s
best for our community, and what’s best for our community is to
increase the amount of magical children in the world, to restore to
humanity the magic we used to have. Even if we could get a
consensus on the Blood Laws that maintained the separation, it
wouldn’t matter. Considering the number of magical children that are
going to be popping up, maintaining the statute of secrecy is going to
be basically impossible, as would any of the House’s previous
terrible plans with how to deal with muggleborns. We’re not stealing
hundreds of thousands of babies. There’s literally not enough people
to care for them.”

Neville rubs a hand over his face. “Okay. Look. We tell the House
first, then we call an international meeting, and then we can - I don’t
know, figure it out from there. But we can’t tell them about the river,
or the house elves.”

Draco actually takes a step back at that. “Excuse me? What are we
supposed to do, make something up?”

“Yes,” he answers. “Something about the failsafe Helga put in

reacting in an unexpected way, which isn’t necessarily untrue.”

“But.” He’s so, so glad that Hermione isn’t here to give him crap over
this. “But we can’t not tell everyone about the house elves. For one,
they’ve literally sacrificed their whole lives and spent over a
thousand years gathering magic for our benefit. For another, we
have to end all the house elf contracts, and it’s going to be
impossible to convince people to do that without telling them why.”
“Well, we’re going to have to figure something out,” Neville says
stubbornly. “The truth is insane and we’re going to have a hard
enough time managing all of this without trying to convince people of
a fairytale on top of it.”

He snorts. “Send Tay and Dax to talk to them, I’m sure they’ll be
straightened out after that.”

“Draco,” Neville reproaches.

He’s not even a little bit sorry. “Fine. We’ll lie, in the beginning. But
after everything gets sorted out, we tell the truth, and we find a way
to free all the house elves that won’t end in dead wizards or elves.”

“Fine,” he agrees, but he doesn’t exactly sound enthusiastic about it.

“What about now? Do we call the meeting? Gran is impatient for
answers.”

“I know the feeling,” he mutters. “But no. Best we figured out exactly
what we’re going to say before we say it. We need to make sure
we’re all on the same page for this.”

“Okay,” he agrees. Then pauses. “Are you really going back to

Hogwarts wearing that?”

Draco’s pretty sure he’s offended. He’s wearing sweatpants, not

rags. “Someone who walks around covered in mud and goo and who
knows what else don’t get to have opinions on my wardrobe.”

That makes Neville crack a grin, at least.

He refuses to change on principal, though.

i hope you liked it! feel free to follow / harass me at:

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Chapter 21
Chapter 21

(See the end of the chapter for notes.)

Draco spends two days locked in a room with Neville, Harry,

Hermione, and Ron, and if it’s not quite the nightmare he once
imagined it being, it’s not exactly pleasant either.

None of them can agree about anything. He and Hermione are intent
about the house elves being freed, for entirely different reasons and
completely different ideas about how best to go about it, while Ron
won’t budge on creating a stable transitional system being the most
important part, and Neville and Harry keep circling back to how the
individual families will react, and now it’s something like three in the
morning, he hasn’t slept more than a couple hours each night. He’s
sitting on the steps of the castle, where the air is slightly too chilly
and he’s wishing he’d taken up some sort of disreputable habit in his
youth, like smoking, so he could be doing something out here
besides being exhausted and cold.

“Hey.”

“Fifteen minutes of peace, Hermione, I’m begging,” he says tiredly as

she drops down beside him.

She sighs, but leans against him, and he warms where she’s
pressed against him. There are several blessed moments of silence,
then she says, “Do you remember what you said to me?”

“We’ve known each other since we were eleven, I’ve said a lot of
things to you. You’re going to have to be more specific,” he says. He
hopes this isn’t about to start another argument.

“It was in the Great Hall, when you were asking Minerva for a spare
room to use,” she says. “You told me that I was born a witch and that
I’ll die a witch and it was time I started acted like it.”

Not his best moment, but certainly not his worst. It was true, after all.
“And?”

“No one had ever said that to me before,” she says, but she doesn’t
sound mad or offended. She sounds soft, almost wonderous. “I was
so scared when I was a kid that I’d get expelled, or I’d wake up, and
it would all be a dream. I’d have lost everything. I thought being
magic was something I could lose, and I was always so afraid to let
being a witch define me, because I was never sure that it wouldn’t be
taken away from me. I was afraid that my wand would get snapped
and I’d be obliviated and I’d lose all the things that I’d gained.”

“Snapping your wand wouldn’t do much to slow you down,” he points

out. Her grasp of wandless magic is terrifying. Possible for this very
reason, which is a thought too sad to linger on. “You can’t unbecome
a witch, Hermione. Even if you had your wand snapped and lost all
your memories, you’d still be who you are.”

“I know,” she says. “I know that now, and I even knew it when we
were kids, mostly, but that’s not the point. I’d felt like this world was
borrowed my whole life, like I could be cast aside from it.”

Draco is so tired and so, so confused. “Well, you couldn’t. You’re a

witch whether you like it or not. You can’t unbecome yourself. Why
are we talking about this?”

“I was a born a witch, and I’ll die a witch,” she says. “You were born
a wizard and will die a wizard. The house elves were born as witches
and wizards. What will they die as?”

He blinks. “I - what?”

“What is a dead house elf?” she asks. “Is he a wizard? Or isn’t he?”

Fuck. He doesn’t know. A wizard, he’d say, because even malformed

and messed up and over a thousand years old, they’re still magic,
still working for the good of their kind even to their own detriment,
and maybe they’re not human anymore, but they are certainly
wizards, at least according to him. If only because if he’d sacrificed
what they’d sacrificed, he’d want to still be considered a person at
the end of it. “They’re wizards and witches, Hermione. Why?”

“Because I think we’re asking the wrong questions,” she says. “It’s all
about what we can do for them, how we can save them, but maybe
that’s not our place. They’re stronger and older and smarter than we
are. Maybe the best thing we can do is give them the ability to save
themselves, and once they can save themselves, maybe they’ll do
what they’ve been doing all along, and save us too.”

Fuck smoking, he needs a bottle of something alcoholic in his hand

right now. “Hermione, please. What are you saying?”

“You have more house elves under you than anyone else,” she says.
“Some of them were just normal people, but some of those house
elves are nobles, maybe even Lords and Ladies. Break the
contracts. Then let them take their seat in the House. There are so
many empty seats in the house. There has to be house elves that
belong in some of them.”

He would love it if this was a dream he could wake up from. “Excuse

me? You want us to stick a house elf in the House and what, watch
everyone froth at the mouth and call for my dismemberment?”

“I want you to let the house elves speak for themselves,” she says
calmly. “We’ve been trying to decide how we can explain this, how
we can make the House understand without jeopardizing the work
that’s been done for centuries. And the answer is that we can’t. But
they can.”

He’s pretty sure lack of sleep is the only reason he’s even
entertaining this crazy idea. “If we were to do that, we’d have to tell
them about the river. It’s too dangerous to do that until it’s been
distributed, which won’t be until it gathers another couple of months’
worth of magic. At least. And we can’t just come into the next House
meeting empty handed.”

She’s silent for a long moment, and for a delirious moment Draco
thinks that she’s actually starting to see reason, but then she says,
“I’ve read the journals from the Weasley Manor, Draco.”

He waits a beat. “Okay?” He doesn’t see how it’s relevant. Although

apparently the Weasley kids are working on fixing the place up,
since a manor drained of magic is still a fair sight better than the
patchwork house their parents live in now.

She keeps staring at him in an intent, significant sort of way, like he’s
supposed to figure out what she means from her eyebrows alone,
but that’s not happening. He’s too tired to divine meaning from her
eyebrows. She sighs, then says, “You can do what they did.”

“What they did,” he repeats. Lied to everyone and hid?

“She’s saying,” Ron says, stepping forward to sit next to his wife, and
Draco blinks because he hadn’t even noticed that he was there, “that
you can move up the timetable of the river of magic being released if
you did what the last Lord Weasley did. Instead of giving magic
slowly, bit by bit, you can give it all at once, and pay the debt of the
other members of the house. You are an old and powerful family. If
you drain your ancestral home of magic, then it might be enough to
fulfill the castle’s purpose.”

“No,” he says, reflexive and flat. It’s unthinkable. Unspeakable.

Hermione bites her lip. “Neville can’t because his family’s already
paid its debts. If both you and Harry do it, then I think it’ll be enough.
Harry’s already agreed to do it.”

“Well it’s different for him than it is for me,” he snaps, numbness
being replaced by anger. “He doesn’t have a family to answer to! I
do! You want me to,” he pauses and his stomach rolls. “You know
what makes an ancestral land.”
Ancestral land is made by ancestral death. Generations of Malfoys
are in that soil, giving the last thing they could to serve their family,
and it’s one thing, to give a little of his magic, of the family magic,
away once a month, and another thing entirely to drain away their
shared magic, to destroy the literal foundation of their family and
leave them with nothing more than the magic they each possess. If
he lets things happen as they are then at the end of it they’ll still
have their lands, still have their wards, still have the magic their
family has saved for centuries.

The Weasley land and manor is a dead, barren place. No magic

resides there, no magic can make a home there, and the thought of
taking that away from his family is enough to make him sick.

It’d be less damaging if he drained the family vaults and left them
penniless. Magic is a type of currency he can’t replace.

“Draco, please,” Hermione says softly. She reaches out a hand like
she’s going to touch him, but something stops her and she puts her
hand back in her lap. “I know-”

“You don’t,” he cuts her off. “I know you don’t, because you can’t feel
magic. The Weasleys lost their ability to feel magic after what they
did. You don’t know - it must be - I can’t just fucking gut and blind my
family.”

She winces, but pushes on, “I don’t think that’s a problem with the
manor, actually, it might not even happen to you. And even if it does,
it’s not just about your family, it’s about everyone, it’s about what’s
best for everyone.”

“It is just about my family!” he snaps. “I’m not the Lord of the whole
bloody world, Hermione. I’m Lord Malfoy, which means first and
foremost my responsibility is to the Malfoy family. I’m not
Dumbledore, I can’t stab someone in the chest and say it’s for the
greater good and then fucking live with myself after.”
Ron’s face is blank, and Draco hates how he’s learned to do that,
how to hide whatever he’s feeling, because when they were kids
every though Ron had was painted across his face if it wasn’t
coming out of his mouth, and now it’s not.

“I understand,” she starts, and he can’t sit here and listen to this
because no, she doesn’t.

“It’s not the same,” he says flatly. “What you did to your parents isn’t
the same. It sucks. I’m sorry you had to do it. But obliviating your
parents isn’t anything close to this. It’s not - you can’t compare them.
They’re not even on the same level.”

She’s pressed her lips together in a thin line, eyes narrowed. She’s
mad at him now, but he means it. That’s a terrible decision she had
to make, but it’s not the same, just based on numbers alone. Her
parents are two people. His family is small, and it’s still over a
hundred people each carrying the name Malfoy.

“Let’s call it a night,” Ron says. “Clearly we’re not going to figure this
out tonight.”

Hermione turns to him, pleading. “We have to-”

“Honey,” he cuts her off, his tone some mix of firm, understanding,
and cajoling. Draco doesn’t think he could replicate it if he tried. “Not
tonight.”

She scowls, but agrees, “Fine. Not tonight.”

Draco knows he should let it go. She doesn’t understand what she’s
asking, not really, and she’s been up for days trying to think of a
solution just like he has. Against his better judgement and best
efforts, he likes Hermione, he knows she means well and doesn’t
want to punish her for trying to help, even if her suggestion is
horrifying.
But he’s too keyed up to go to sleep now, he’s full of adrenaline even
as exhaustion pulls at his eyelids, which is a terrible combination.
“I’m going to go for a walk.”

“Draco,” Hermione reproaches, her stubbornness having softened

into concern. “We should all go to bed.”

He waves her off then shoves his hands in his pockets. “Go on, I’ll
be back soon. Get some sleep.” One of them should, and it
obviously isn’t going to be him.

She calls after him again, but he ignores her, taking a path around
the castle. He can’t tell if he’s not thinking of anything as he walks or
if he’s thinking about too many things all at once, discarding them as
soon as they come to mind.

It’s not until he’s on the edge of Hogsmeade that one clear, sure
thought breaks through.

He’s going home.

Almost as soon as he thinks it, he’s apparating away, standing in a

tucked away series of hallways of the manor, where his ancestors’
paintings line the wall. There are plenty of empty frames scattered
throughout the house for them, but their real paintings are kept
hidden away where no harm can come to them. His parents had
packed up the family portraits during the war and put them at the
back of their vault at Gringotts, knowing that whatever damage the
manor took, those had to be protected.

He goes deeper, to the last hallway at the edge of the house. Where
the portraits of the past Lords and Ladies of the Malfoy family are
hung.

At the start of the hallway are his grandparents. His grandfather

sniffs disdainfully at him as he passes and then gets elbowed but his
grandmother for it, but his great grandfather gives him a wink.
He’s surprised to see them there, and is expecting mostly empty
frames, but to his surprise his family members rush over, jumbling
past each other as someone has clearly told them all he’s down
there. Each one settles into their proper frame as he passes, and
many of them don’t look happy about it, or him, but, well.

He’s never told anyone this, and he never will, but at seventeen,
when he has not idea what he was doing and his mother barely had
the time to accompany him to House meetings, never mind anything
else, he’d gotten a little help.

The portraits of the Lords and Ladies of the past had been there for
him when he’d needed them, when he’d spent hours in the family
library learning everything he thought he’d have decades to master,
when the house needed repair and didn’t want to respond to his
magic, when his father had nothing but bad days and so couldn’t
offer any aid at all in helping Draco take over his responsibilities.

He’d spent hours and hours talking to the portraits, getting advice,
hearing stories. And it’s pathetic, it’s shameful, that he had to be
taught to do his duty to his family by bits of paint, but it’s what had to
happen.

It’s a secret he’ll take to his grave, how desperate and scared he’d
been while taking over the mantel of Lord Malfoy, how it had felt so
wrong and ill fitting during those first few years when he could barely
manage to keep his family afloat.

“What’s wrong, boy?” Elaine asks, the Lady Malfoy of four hundred
years ago. She’d been the first one to talk to him, interrupting his
time in the library to lecture him on how important it was to cover the
education expenses of all the children in their family. Some others
had disagreed, saying it was the parents’ responsibility to provide,
and Draco should only step in if needed so the children would know
to look to their parents first, but he’d ended up agreeing with Elaine.
It’s what his father had done for the family when he was a Lord, after
all, and Draco hadn’t been interested in changing it. Education’s
important, obviously, and if he wants to elevate his family higher, he’s
going to need for them to be educated, and that doesn’t need to be a
burden parents have to worry about carrying or something they
should have to ask for.

That had caused a bit of row with half the paintings, pulling them all
in to a lively debate about the best way to support the family that
they never would have engaged in otherwise, and Elaine had
grinned as the whole family had argued, not at all bothered and very
satisfied with herself. Draco hadn’t known what to do with gratitude,
then, overwhelmed and exhausted and finally having people to talk
to who could help him. He’s still not sure what to do with it.

“I have a problem,” he says.

“We have an answer,” she says, cock sure and calm, as she is with
everything, and it must have been so comforting to have her as a
Lady, to have her bright, confident gaze on them and know that
whatever happened, she was there with an answer. He finds it
comforting now, when she’s nothing more than paint and magic.

He runs his hand through his hair. “As the master of this manor and
Lord of this family, I’m ordering you not to discuss or communicate
what I’m saying to anyone else but me when I’m in a room alone.”

There’s a fission of magic in the air as his order settles in. Their main
portraits live in his house, and he can order that type of thing and
make it stick. Him being a Lord doesn’t have any effect on it, it’s
more to remind them of his place than because it can actually stop
them from disobeying.

Everyone stills, and people leave their frames to huddle closer to

where he’s standing. No one dares enter Elaine’s frame, though.
Evan among giants she stands taller than all the rest.

They’re waiting, generations of grey eyes watching him, and he

says, “If you have to choose between the wellbeing of the family, or
the wellbeing of society, what do you choose?”
He can’t believe he’s asking this. But he understands what Hermione
is saying, even if he wishes he didn’t. They can’t just wait until the
river business sorts itself out to address this, the House would never
let them dodge answering for that long. But if they’re going to do this,
lay it all on the table and give them no way to wriggle out it, to shove
the truth in their face and demand a reasonable response to it -

It’s never something he would have thought to do. It’s insanity. It’s
such a Gryffindor thing to do, reigniting the idea that the two are one
in the same. But he thinks it might work.

Gently moving the House in a different, more liberal direction is

something that would take years, the way he was planning on doing
it, slowly and through nudging legislation through the wizengamot.
It’s how things have gotten done, generally.

But they don’t have time for that. Regardless of how effective it is or
isn’t, time isn’t on their side. They can’t lie now and just wait for
everything to take its course, and then walk back that deception and
ask people to trust and listen to them.

But they can’t tell the truth to everyone before it happens. Because it
is going to happen, it’s not something that could be prevented even if
Draco called an emergency House meeting right now. Draco doesn’t
even think it’s something that should be prevented. His whole life
has been about mitigating magical damage, about trying to sustain
their people, and here he finds out that instead of magic just being
this inherently dangerous it’s been warped into a different shape for
their benefit, here he finds a solution to their dwindling population.

As terrifying as it all is, as much as he doesn’t want to lose the

stability he’s just managed to regain for his family, getting all that
seems worth the cost of losing the power of the House.

Speeding it up a little doesn’t seem worth the cost of taking away

something that seems integral to his family’s identity, to their security,
it doesn’t feel worth the cost of wiping out the work and legacy of his
ancestors, what they’d sacrificed their very bodies to give his family.
But he’s not sure, so he’s here, asking.

The portraits all start talking over each other, some spouting off
opinions based on that question alone, others demanding more
information. Elaine only raises an eyebrow.

Atticus, who’d been married to the Lord during the late seventeen
hundreds, elbows his way to the front and pitches his voice above
the others. “We are part of society, are we not?”

Everyone else quiets, not as easily as they had before but quieting
all the same. “We are,” Draco says, taken aback at his vehemence.
He’s barely heard Atticus speak during all the years he’s lived in the
manor, but he’s downright vehement right now.

“Then we have a duty to that society and we can’t abandon it,” he

says, glaring.

Richard squeezes his way out of the crowd, coming to stand behind
his husband. “Love, I’m sure it’s not like it was with us.”

“Maybe,” he says, not looking away from Draco. “Is it?”

He has no idea, because he has no idea what they’re talking about.

“Probably not, but I really can’t say unless you get more specific.”

Atticus opens his mouth, closes it, and shakes his head. Richard
places his hand on Atticus’s shoulder. “Draco is the Lord now. It’s
allowed.”

“I’m pretty sure you just saying that because you like him,” Atticus
accuses, which is news to Draco. “But fine. You can’t just shove the
whole family into a pocket dimension for a decade because you’re
afraid. We’re not the huldefolk, and we have no idea if it really
worked for them anyway, and muggles are still people .”

What. “What?” he demands, his blood pressure spiking just thinking

about it. “Why would we do that?”
Now all the Lords and Ladies are quiet. It’s Richard who sighs and
says, “We’ve been here for a long time. But back then, we still had a
lot of family in France, and times were - uncomfortable. We used to
be fairly integrated with the muggles back then, and there was
concern that not only was our family obviously not safe, but perhaps
if this trend continued, that nowhere would be safe.”

It takes Draco a moment, but he finally connects the dots. “You were
so worried about the muggles’ French Revolution that you
considered folding the family into a pocket dimension?”

“We ended up just having the extended family move to England,

obviously,” Richard says, “and it wasn’t our idea. But it did get
discussed.”

“You have a duty to society because you are a part of it,” Atticus
says firmly. “Society involves the muggles, whether we like it or not,
and to turn our back on them just because we find their existence
inconvenient and their ways of life backwards says more about us
than it does about them. We have a duty to each other, as people,
and it’s been several centuries and still no one is interested in acting
like it.”

Draco understands now why he’d never heard Atticus speak before.
Already some of the other portraits look ready to commit murder.
“But how far does that extend? If something is to the benefit of
society, both ours and the muggles, but it ends up hurting our family,
is that acceptable?” It’s not. Right? It can’t be. But he’s not sure,
obviously, because otherwise he wouldn’t be going to portraits for
advice.

“Hurting our family how?” asks Alejandra, the daughter of a Spanish

mistress who was never intended to be Lady Malfoy but was chosen
none the less. It caused quite an uproar if the family records are to
be believed. “Killing them? Bleeding them dry?” She shoots an
unimpressed glance to Richard and Atticus, who sneer in return.
“No,” he says, because if it was that then this wouldn’t even be a
question. “It would take away our family’s ability to sense magic.
Maybe, apparently that one’s up for debate. It would destroy the
manor. It would unravel the wards and petrify the ancestral land,
draining it of magic.” Draining it of the magic imbued into it by the
decaying bodies of all the people in front of him now.

It’s completely silent now, people looking at him as if he’s insane,

some smiling nervously like they think he has to be joking even
though he obviously isn’t.

Elaine’s face is still the same, completely calm, as if he hasn’t just

suggested the worst thing she’s ever heard. “It’s your magic, and
your family,” she says. “If you feel as if it’s what’s best, then I’m sure
it is.”

That breaks everyone out of their stupor, and immediately the yelling
is so loud that Draco would be able to feel a headache coming on if
he hadn’t already had one constantly the past couple of days.

“Enough,” Elaine says, not yelling because clearly nothing is capable

of making her yell, but firm and leaving no room for argument. No
one tries, silencing themselves with mothing more than resentful
glares. “Draco. What do you, personally, have to gain by doing this?”

“Nothing,” he says honestly, because if it was just him this wouldn’t

be a discussion. “But our family won’t gain anything either.”

They’ll only lose. Draining the manor won’t change what he is, he’ll
still be the Lord of his family, still be more powerful than most, still be
manage his businesses and handle the family’s money and perform
their adoptions and officiate their weddings. The way magic connects
them is more ancient than Helga Hufflepuff, and that’s not a
connection that will be severed. But he won’t have the magic to help
protect them anymore, and their status and society will take another
blow, when they’ve barely clawed their way out of the last one.
Reputation may be intangible, but it’s also invaluable.
Alejandra hums, tossing her dark hair over her shoulder with a flick
of her head. “What will we lose if you don’t?”

Nothing, that’s the problem. They only lose, not gain. There’s no way
his family comes out on top in all this.

Well. That’s not quite true. Maybe they will lose something by not
doing this.

A chance, maybe, at most, to be something different than they’ve

always been by doing something they’ve never done. The new world
is coming whether they like it or not, the separation they’ve fought so
long and hard to maintain is going to come crashing down and the
muggle and magical worlds are going to collide and make something
not quite like either of them. Draco doesn’t want to be behind in all of
it, doesn’t want his family left behind. If they do this and use it to get
in front of it all, maybe they can lead it instead.

Elaine is smiling, just a little, the corners of her lips barely upturned.
Most of the portraits now look contemplative rather than terrified,
looking at him differently than they had moments before just because
of whatever emotions are playing out across his face. “It’s a risk,” he
says. If he does it, it’ll be the riskiest thing he’s ever done.

She shrugs. “Fortune favors the daring, darling.”

“How Gryffindor of you,” he says, wry, half his mind already on the
mess of a family meeting he’s going to have to call about this.

She hums, looking him over, then says, “Yes, well, the sorting hat did
say I would do well there. But I had other obligations.”

He blinks, taken aback. Elaine Malfoy, of all people, a Gryffindor? It’s

ridiculous. But he glances at the other portraits, and in addition to a
lack of surprise, there’s a sea of challenging gazes and defensively
raised chins.

The implication of that takes a moment to sink it.

Not Gryffindor, necessarily, but other houses that would have been a
better fit and were discarded for simply not being what was
expected. Is their legacy of a Slytherin family, then, something
inherent to them, to being a Malfoy, or is it just manufactured,
something they chose for it’s own reasons rather than something
they just are?

And, in the face of everything else, does it even matter? To choose

Slytherin is to be Slytherin, after all, and if centuries of Malfoys could
choose to be something they’re not for the good of their family, then
he too can choose to change, to be something he isn’t - to be more
tolerant, more accepting, more forward thinking than he’s ever
wanted to be - if that means his family thrives rather than merely
survives.

So he can’t do it just for the benefit society. He’s not the selfless.
That hat didn’t hesitate to put him in Slytherin, after all. But he can
do something that hurts his family if it might help them later, he can
choose to put the wellbeing of his family in the future above their
wellbeing now, even if he doesn’t like it. And if he helps society while
he’s at it, all the better.

Great. Now he owes Hermione an apology.

“Thank you,” he tells them all earnestly.

Some just harrumph and roll their eyes, others toss him a smile and
a wink before wandering away, but Elaine stays in her frame, looking
straight at him. “I like you,” she says. “Don’t mess this up.”

It’s a little pathetic how much the opinion of a painting means to him.
“Thank you. I won’t.” He’ll try not to, at least, although messing this
all up in some sort of fashion seems rather inevitable.

He heads upstairs, considering going back to his room at Hogwarts,

but if anyone needs him his house elves know where to find him.
He’ll talk to Hermione and Ron tomorrow, consult the Weasley’s
journal and figure out exactly how to unmake the life his family has
spent a millennia building.

One more peaceful night’s sleep in his manor, while he can still feel
the magic under his feet, while his family’s magic still holds strong,
before he starts work on undoing all of it.

Of course, he should have known that he couldn’t even have that.

He’s wakes up already on his feet, clutching his wand and a

desperate, sleep addled protego on his lips. He’s half convinced
some sort of muggle bomb has been dropped on top of his house,
but nothing is even out of place, his home is perfectly intact, not
even the signs of an earthquake. So why is he covered in cold sweat
and why is his heart beating like a hummingbird’s against his ribs?

“Dax,” he says, or tries to. His mouth’s so dry that it comes out as
more of a croak.

He appears in front of him, eyes narrowed. “Feel that, do you?” he

says.

“What is it? Is it the river?” he asks. He’s trying to calm down, he’s
trying to keep ahold of his composure, but he feels like he’s right on
the edge of a panic attack.

Dax looks at him for a long moment, and Draco thinks it might be pity
in his gaze. “No, not that. It’s a rather Potter thing to do, to lead by
example, and do it all alone.”

“Lead by example,” he repeats, wondering if he’s supposed to know

what in merlin’s name that’s supposed to mean.

When he figures it out, he runs.

He doesn’t stop to change or even to grab shoes, because he can’t

take two seconds to even think logically, the only thing on his mind is
getting to the Potter house as quickly as possible.

He runs as quickly as he can, cutting through the grounds because

he can’t risk apparating there, and it’s barely a minute before Nox
gallops up beside him, pausing for Draco to climb onto his back and
then flapping his wings until they’re soaring into the air.

Harry’s draining the Potter House of magic, by the sound of it with no

one there beside him, and Draco doesn’t know what kind of state
that’s going to leave Harry in, he just knows he doesn’t want him to
be alone.

in my outline i had them discussing the inbetween spell to avoid the

black plague, but that seemed to topical now so i changed it to the
french revolution

i hope you liked it!

feel free to follow / harass me at: shanastoryteller.tumblr.com

Chapter 22
Chapter 22

(See the end of the chapter for notes.)

All the plants are dead.

That’s what Draco notices as he flies over the Potter grounds. The
grass is brown and the trees are barren and blackened, the flowers
and fauna little more than dust. Nox lands in front of the house and
Draco slides off his back and his side gratefully. He rushes through
the front door, then feels a bit lost as he stands in the foyer. The
feeling off a bomb going off all around him has subsided. He doesn’t
know if that means it’s over or not.

“It’s a bit rude to come in without permission, isn’t it?”

Draco turns to find Tay standing there, arms crossed and gaze even.
“Where is he?”

“What concern is it of yours?” she asks.

“Tay!” he shouts, and normally he’d be concerned about offending

her and getting his eyes scratched out, but he can’t bring himself to
care right now. “Why are you even letting him do this?’

“I’m his house elf, not his mother,” she says. “I’ve helped out his
family for generations and liked most of them. But I’ve never let them
do anything, much like they’ve never let me do anything, which is
why I’m still here.”

“I thought you liked this house,” he says desperately, “I thought you

felt like it was yours after so long of living in it.”

She seems to soften at that, looking around the room they’re in. “I
liked the people inside it. I liked helping them. I liked that they liked
me.” She shrugs. “A house, no matter how beautiful and how well
loved in the past, is just a house. You can’t make a home out of
empty rooms.”

What a bunch of bullshit. You take those empty rooms and you fill
them up. But arguing about homemaking really isn’t why he’s here.
“Tay. Where’s Harry?”

She just looks at him for a long moment, and he’s considering just
starting to open random rooms and shouting for him, when she says,
“Only because it’s you,” and snaps her fingers.

There’s a disorienting moment where everything is too warm around

him, and then he’s on his feet in a different room, one he’s been in
before. The Potter ward room.

It’s dark.

Instead of bright, shimmering chains of wards floating around the

room, the room is dark. He has to swallow down the taste of bile in
the back of his throat. All that history, all the work from generations
of Potters, and it’s just gone. The room is missing all that now, is
empty now.

Well, it’s not entirely empty.

Harry is sitting in the center of the room, looking at the wall. His back
is to Draco, which is probably why he startles when Draco shouts,
“Harry! Are you okay? Why are you so stupid?”

He falls to his knees next to him, hands hovering over him, not sure
if he wants to hold him or shake him, not sure if Harry wants him
there at all.

He’s not sure what he’s expecting. Tears, anger, for him to have
totally lost his mind. Instead Harry just turns and blinks at him,
looking much the same as he always does. “What are you doing
here? Is something wrong?”
Actually, he’s going to strangle him. “Is something wrong? Is
something wrong? Are you fucking with me right now? I wake up to
the feeling of you tearing your home apart and then Tay starts trying
to talk philosophy with me, and you’re asking me if something is
wrong ?”

Harry’s got a small smile on his face which Draco would probably
find attractive in different circumstances. “Well, you do seem a little
stressed.”

“Harry,” he says through gritted teeth, “Are you okay?”

He laughs, reaching out to pat Draco on the leg and then just leaving
his hand there, warm and heavy on his thigh. “I’m fine. I didn’t mean
to freak you out.” He grins. “Did you just come here straight out of
bed? You really sleep in silk?”

“What else am I supposed to sleep in?” he demands. Harry opens

his mouth. “No, shut up. What do you mean you’re fine? How can
you be fine? Your ancestral home is destroyed!”

“So dramatic,” he teases. Draco’s just going to say that the magical
backlash killed Harry and hope no one looks into why there are
bruises the shape of his hands around his neck. Harry nods at the
wall. “Look.”

Draco’s not sure what he’s supposed to be seeing, but his eyes have
adjusted to the darkness of the room, and the wall’s not blank. It’s
filled with silvery letters that he barely recognizes, and he twists his
head around to see that it’s not just this wall, that it’s this whole
room. The wards that are carved into the walls now, not completely
gone but no longer active, no longer alive. “I don’t understand.”

“There’s not enough magic in the lands to power them anymore so

they’ve gone dormant,” Harry says, and points to a bit that’s in the
swirly, foreign language of Parseltongue. “The way to do this
properly is through the warding, which means dumping the magic is
a function of wards, not something that destroys it. They can be
reactivated with enough magic.” He smiles. “The magic is gone, but
the work remains. It’ll probably take a few years terraforming to get
enough ambient magic for them to draw from, though, considering
how old they are. They’re not exactly efficient, even if they are
effective.”

Draco feels like he’s speaking a whole different language. Is this how
Harry feels around him all the time? It’s exhausting. “What? Why
would - I don’t understand.”

Harry squeezes his thigh. “All this running around and bleeding on
everything, and you seem to forget there’s more ways to harness
magic. The level of protection and connection Lords and Ladies have
to their families can only be maintained though blood magic. But
once the magic calms down, it’s not going to be so volatile, and
you’re not going to need that level of connection, right? But things
like wards still need a source of magic to feed off of. I suppose we
could all go back to doing what we’ve always done.” He pauses. “Or
we could do something different. We don’t have to rebuild with blood.
If you cultivate enough magical plants, and invite faeries to move in,
then there’s a second source of naturally occurring, external magic
to draw from. But you already know that. Your home is already set up
that way.”

Harry’s right. It’s part of why his grounds are a home for pegusi and
fairy dust can be gathered naturally in his forests. It’s true that
converting the source of magic for the wards could be done relatively
quickly in his case, but that’s still months without them. Beyond that,
the Malfoy grounds are huge, much bigger than most families, so
that’s not something that many people can rely on. Most people
aren’t going to be eager to abandon what they’ve been doing for
generations to do something entirely new that requires a lot of
maintenance, even if it’s more sustainable. “The main ground that
the manor is on will still be sucked dry, even if the forests remain
unscathed, so that’s not as much of a comfort to me as you probably
think it is. And most people neither have the space to set up that kind
of ecosystem nor the knowledge of how to do it.”
“Neville’s working on that,” Harry says easily. “Once the House is
changed, people are going to be forced to adapt to new things
already, so he seems to think it’s a good time to throw that into the
mix.”

“Without the family magic behind me, I’m not going to be able to
protect my family and those allied to me in the same way,” he says.
“Even if my wards become functional again, it’ll only extend that
protection to those on the grounds, since it’s being powered by that
magic.”

“Once the debt is fulfilled, they won’t need your protection the same
way,” Harry says. “That’s true of everyone. Isn’t it better this way?
That you and Neville and everyone won’t be targets for magical
backlash?”

“There’s still going to be some!” Draco says. “People who aren’t

allied, people whose debts have supposedly been paid, still get
caught up things that are too big for them to handle. I’d rather be the
one that gets the backlash. That’s my job.”

Harry waves a hand, and for a moment Draco’s so enraged by that

dismissal that he’s speechless with it. “Hermione is working on it,
something to do with runes and wards and linking everything
together. Apparently being protected by wards is what gives people
magical sensitivity, something about having foreign magic linked to
your magic that makes people able to feel it in other forms and how
close or affected by the wards someone is. Or something like that.
So if that’s something people care about maintaining, then they just
need to make their own wards, or do whatever Hermione figures
out.”

Draco wants to tear his hair out a little bit. “Harry, you understand
that that’s not something most families can do, right? Wards are
extremely volatile and complicated. There’s a reason Bill Weasley
has made a very successful career in dealing with them.”
He brightens. “Oh, hey, that’s a good idea! I should tell Hermione to
go ask Bill, he’ll probably be able to help.”

“I feel like you’re missing everything I’m saying,” Draco says,

covering his eyes with his hands and taking a deep breath.
Everything has just seemed like too much to handle for weeks and
now this, being woken up in the middle of the night to worst feeling in
the world and having to endure Harry cheerfully talking at him about
impossible things.

Harry reaches out for his wrist, gently pulling his hand from his face.
He doesn’t let go, and they’re so close, there’s so much touching
and so much of Harry being very, very close. “Draco, if you don’t
want to take the risk of draining your family magic, I understand. I’m
not going to make you, and neither is anyone else. What I’m saying
is that change is coming whether you do it or not, that things are
going to change. If you can’t risk the security of not having that
magic on hand should you need it, I’m not going to hold it against
you. I don’t think you’ll need it, I think you’re better situated than
almost anyone else to do this, but that’s not my decision and I’m not
trying to make for you. You love your family. You love them so much.
How is that supposed to be something for me to criticize? I wish
someone had loved me that much.”

“Don’t be stupid,” he snaps, even as his heart beats too fast in his
chest. He really wishes Harry wasn’t so close. “What are you
saying? Your parents loved you that much. Sirius Black loved you
that much. The Weasleys adopted you pretty much the second they
saw you. Hermione would happily take everyone who’s ever looked
at you wrong and turn them inside out. The people who loved you
died, and that sucks, and I’m sorry, but that doesn’t make their love
any less real.”

“Well, there was that decade in the middle of my parents and the
Weasleys that wasn’t great,” he says.

Oh. “Right,” Draco says. He sometimes forgets just how rubbish

Harry’s muggle relatives were.
But he doesn’t seem angry, he’s smiling, and Draco is so, so tired,
on every level, sitting in the Potter ward room that’s been reduced
and if not destroyed then still torn apart in a fundamental way that if it
isn’t horrifying to Harry is still deeply upsetting to Draco. The work
they did is still there, which is good, but the magic they put into it is
god, Harry’s ancestors’ magic is gone, and while Harry doesn’t seem
to mind the loss if it, Draco does. And this hasn’t really changed his
mind about this whole thing one way or another, he still thinks it’s
only worth it, if it’s worth it at all, for the political advantage it’ll give
them, to be the people who will shape the new world rather than just
reacting to it. But he still needs to talk to his family first, he’s not like
Harry. He has people that he has to answer to, and he can’t just pull
the rug out from under them without warning.

“Hey,” Harry says, leaning over to nudge him in the side, as if they’re
not close enough already. “You okay?”

“Just tired,” he says, instead of unpacking the rest of it. No need to

rub it in that he has family that he needs to consult about these types
of things and Harry doesn’t.

“Well, you did run here right out of bed,” he teases. “You really
shouldn’t interrupt your beauty sleep like that.”

“Because I need it?” he asks crankily. “Sorry I didn’t stop to brush my

hair before checking to make sure you weren’t dying or something.
Next time I’ll just ignore the possibility that you could be in alone and
in pain and be sure to grab my moisturizer.”

Harry rolls his eyes. “That’s not what I meant, Draco. Do you
misunderstand me on purpose?”

“No need, you’re very confusing,” he answers. “You don’t make any
sense and it’s exhausting. Even without being woken up in the
middle of the night because of your theatrics, I still lose sleep over
you.”
Harry stares at him for a long moment, and Draco runs what he’s just
said through his head, trying to find the thing he said that was
apparently more insulting than anything else he’s said to him
recently, and comes up blank.

“Draco,” he sighs, but he doesn’t sound upset or disappointed,

instead he just sounds fond.

He waits, eyebrow raised, but Harry leans into him again. Draco’s
expecting another obnoxious nudge to the ribs, which is why he’s
entirely unprepared when Harry tilts his head just enough to kiss
him.

He freezes, his ability to form capable thought fading to the

background, and the only thing he can focus on is Harry’s lips on his.
They’re warm and a little bit chapped and absolutely the best thing
he’s felt in his whole life.

He still hasn’t moved, still frozen, and Harry pulls back. “Draco?
Sorry, I thought-”

Draco grabs the front of Harry’s shirt and yanks him forward, except
he’s not paying attention and falls backwards as he does it,
smacking his head on the floor and pulling Harry down on top of him.
He only has half a moment to be mortified at himself before Harry’s
kissing him again, their legs tangled together and Harry’s arms
bracketing Draco’s head, holding himself up just enough to make
kissing him easier.

He’s kissed a lot of different people in a lot of different places, boy

and girls and others, in clubs and during tedious potions conferences
and in lots of different greenhouses, and nothing has felt better than
this, than lying underneath Harry as he smiles through their kisses,
eager and clumsy, with a dull ache on the back of his head from
where he’s his it that he couldn’t care less about if he tried.

“Wait!” he shouts, pushing Harry off of him and sitting up. “You’re not
thinking clearly!”
Harry blinks, flat on his back with his clothes rumpled and lips
swollen. He turns on his side and props his head up on his hand.
“Oh, this’ll be good. Do tell.”

“It’s not funny,” Draco snaps. “You just drained your ancestral home
of magic, you’re just - confused, you don’t actually want this, and
merlin, Hermione’s going to turn me inside out when she finds out.”

Harry pushes his glasses up the bridge of his nose. “Okay, first of all,
Hermione actually likes you now, which is really annoying only
because of the long lectures she gave me at the beginning of the
year about how you’re still an unforgivable prat and that I better not
to fall into old bad habits. But now she thinks you’re great, if still kind
of a prat, so you don’t need to worry about her. Second of all, I’ve
wanted to kiss you since I was sixteen, so I doubt the magical bit is
really influencing anything.”

He stares. He’d been intending to respond to that part about

Hermione, but this last bit can’t be ignored. “Sixteen?”

“Well, sixteen is when I figured out that I wanted to kiss you,” he

says. “Ron says it’s earlier and he’s probably right, but sixteen is
definitely the latest. I’ve wanted to kiss you for almost ten years, or
possibly even longer, so if we could go back to doing that, I think
that’d be really neat.”

His mother is going to insufferable about this.

“Sixteen?” he repeats, incredulous. “Why didn’t you say anything?”

He shrugs. “Well, you were an asshole, and also very hot and kind of
intimidating and seemed to hate me a lot, so saying something just
seemed like it wouldn’t end very well for me. Plus there was a war on
and all.”

“I’m still an asshole,” he says faintly. He’s going to have an aneurysm

right here, right now.
“And still very hot, but slightly less intimidating, and it turns out you
don’t really seem to hate that much,” he says. He pauses, and
swallows. “If you don’t like me, and it kind of seems like you do, but if
you don’t, then, uh, sorry, I didn’t - but if you’re worried that this is
something that I don’t want, or something I’ll regret, then you really
have nothing to worry about there. The only thing I regret is not
kissing you sooner.”

He can’t just say things like that, Merlin. “We can’t - do you have any
idea how it would look, if we, right when I say and do all this stuff
about tearing down the House? Could you have worse timing?”

“Probably,” he says, seeming completely unconcerned with the

damage this could to his reputation, to both their reputations, and the
political implications of it all, because of course he is. “Hey, would
that have worked? Could I have just seduced you away from
Voldemort?”

Merlin, probably, Draco was a dumb kid and Harry had always been
very beautiful. “I feel as if you’re not taking my concerns seriously.”

He sighs. “If I promise not to tell anyone, can I kiss you again?”
Draco glares. He’s seen how Harry handles secrets. His lips twitch
into a smile and he modifies, “If I promise not to tell anyone but our
very close friends, and swear them to secrecy, can I kiss you again?”

That’s more realistic, but Draco still has reservations. “You won’t let it
ruin our dealings in the House? And you’re very certain that you
want this and you’re not going to regret it?”

“I promise I won’t let kissing you get in the way of our social and
political revolution and also that I’m going to want to keep kissing
you,” he says. Draco pinches himself, just in case. Maybe he hit his
head harder than he thought. “Draco!”

“Alright, alright,” he says. “Yes, you can kiss me.”

Harry grins and gets to his feet only to grab Draco’s hand and pull
him upright. He settles his hand on the small of Draco’s back to
shove them together and uses the other to cup Draco’s face, rubbing
his thumb against his cheek. “You’re not going to push me away this
time, are you?”

“No,” he says, “I’m not going to push you away.”

Harry kisses him again, this one softer and slower this time, so
Draco gets the chance to appreciate the shape of Harry’s mouth
against his. His hand slips under his shirt, pressing against his back,
and he tries to get impossibly closer to him, digging his thumbs into
Harry’s hips in a way that makes him gasp into his mouth, a soft, wet
sound, and suddenly Draco is harder than he’s ever been in his life.

“So,” Harry says, “not that this isn’t good - this is great, so happy to
continue doing this - but do you want to, uh, y’know?”

Merlin. They might as well be sixteen. “Have sex?”

Harry nods, looking so hopeful, as if Draco’s going to say no with

Harry’s hands all over him and his mouth wrecked from Draco’s
mouth. “What kind of girl do you take me for? You’re not even going
to buy me dinner first?”

“Counter offer,” he says, because it’s obvious that Draco is messing

with him. “You sleep with me tonight and I’ll buy you dinner for the
rest of our lives.”

Merlin, Harry can’t just say things like that, fuck. He kisses him again
and apparates away, yanking Harry into a sidelong apparation with
him, which is very dangerous to do with no warning, but Draco isn’t
going to splinch him. Having parts of Harry become unconnected to
other parts of him would really ruin his new plans for the evening.

They land on his bed back in the manor, Harry under him, because
Draco’s brilliant. He straddles his hips, with Harry’s hands on his
thighs, and smiles down at him. Harry looks really good in his bed,
his messy hair and wide grin against his sheets.

It’s about a thousand times better than all his teenage fantasies.

Draco wakes up the next morning to Harry curled around him in his
bed, which isn’t new, but he’s naked, which is.

He grins and props himself up to look at Harry in the morning

sunlight. He’s drooling a little and his hair is looks like a bird’s nest,
which Draco supposes is a little bit his fault considering how much of
last night he’d spent with his hands in Harry’s hair.

He checks the time and it’s still far too early considering what time
they want to sleep, but a normal time to be awake otherwise. He
could go back to sleep, could press his forehead to the warm skin of
Harry’s shoulder blade, could slide a leg between Harry’s thighs and
fall asleep just like that in the morning sun.

But there’s something he needs to do. He presses a kiss to Harry’s

cheek and gets out of bed, rummaging thought his draws for the first
pair of sweatpants he can find and a shirt with the name of one of
the most boring herbology symposiums he’d ever attended sparkling
across the back. The best thing about the symposium had been this
shirt. He picks up Harry’s hand and leaves a quick note traced into
his palm, since his hand is the only place that Draco can think of that
Harry couldn’t possibly miss, before heading downstairs.

It’s one thing, to keep things like how the way they view society is
fundamentally incorrect and deep flawed from his friends for their
own good, and another thing entirely to not tell them things that he
has no reason to keep from them.

He taps his wand against the mirror he keeps in the hallway. “Pansy
Parkinson.”
The glass clouds over and shimmers for a moment before clearing.
She’s sitting at her kitchen table in her apartment and Draco can just
barely make out another place setting from this angle, but she’s still
in her pajamas which drastically narrows down who it could be.
“Draco! We were just talking about you.”

He raises an eyebrow. Pansy tilts her mirror enough to show Blaise

sitting across from her. He smiles at Draco, but it’s cautious, and
Draco has to push down the simmering feeling of guilt in his
stomach. He’s been avoiding them ever since he’s started
investigating the issue with the House because he hadn’t wanted to
lie to them. “Is it just you two there?”

“Yep,” Pansy says, reentering the mirror. “What’s up?”

“I can’t say anything about the House business, so don’t ask,” he

starts. Pansy huffs and Blaise relaxes slightly, picking up what Draco
isn’t saying, which is that’s the only reason he hasn’t spoken to them
recently. He waits until Pansy has raised to her teacup to her lips to
say, “I slept with Harry last night.”

She drops the cup, spilling tea across the table, and he bites back a
grin. Blaise sighs deeply and rubs at his forehead. “Slept like fells
asleep next to each other, or-”

“Well, that too,” he says, “but he’s naked in my bed right now, so.”

“Draco,” Pansy says sternly, “if you’re not walking out of my floo in
thirty seconds I’m going to go to yours, and you will not be happy
about it.” She pauses. “Bring the good champagne.”

He laughs. “Yes ma’am.”

“Less talking, more doing what I’ve said,” she says pointedly, and he
blows them both a kiss before walking towards the nearest floo
connected fireplace.
He’d feel a little bit bad about this, except if he knows anything about
him, it’s that Harry’s going to do the exact same thing to Ron and
Hermione the moment he wakes up.

Better they get it out of the way now.

They have dinner plans, after all.

it only took 110k for them to kiss

i hope you liked it!

feel free to follow / harass me at: shanastoryteller.tumblr.com

Chapter 23
Chapter 23

(See the end of the chapter for notes.)

He’s definitely not making it out of here in time for dinner.

Considering Ron and Hermione had invited themselves along, in
what Draco is sure will be the first of many double dates, he can’t
bring himself to be too broken up about it. They’d already floo’d him
to make fun of him, after all, so Harry can deal with round two of that
on his own. It’s a pity that Harry isn’t good enough friends with Pansy
or Blaise yet for Draco to throw Harry at them, but he’s certain that
will change soon. Pansy had already been talking about them all
going out to brunch together and Blaise had said nothing but smiled
like he was looking forward to it, or possibly contemplating murder,
or both. Draco’s never been really serious about anyone before, it’s
a little heartwarming, or heart stopping, to see Pansy and Blaise’s
reaction to it. It’s not like he and Harry could be anything but serious,
after all, not with everything between them.

He is, perhaps, a little sad about missing dinner, even though

obviously this is more important. He and Harry have been together
less than a day and all he wants to do is like, hold his hand and look
into his eyes. He’s disgusted with him himself, he’s like a lovesick
Gryffindor fourth year.

Cramming everyone in his family into the ballroom of the Malfoy

Manor shouldn’t actually be a problem, nor should it be all that
cramped, but Draco feels like he can’t get enough space. Granted,
that probably has something to do with the hundreds of eyes on him,
which isn’t something he normally has a problem with, but this isn’t
exactly a normal situation. It’s not even literally everyone, since he
hadn’t summoned any of the children or those who also belonged to
other noble families, like Diane. This wouldn’t affect her the same
way since she was tied to the Goyle family, and even if she’d like a
say in it, he couldn’t. She’d be obligated as a member of the Goyle
family to tell them what she knew, and he couldn’t have that.
Annabel and Nora are here though, since Nora had married into the
Malfoy rather than Annabel joining the Rosiers.

Everyone who’s here now has take an unbreakable vow so he can

be assured of their silence. If they’d refused, he would have sent
them away. Luckily, no one had.

He casts a silencing spell on everyone, which gets him a few

exaggerated eyerolls, but not much else. He can’t afford to be
interrupted during this, not before he gets it all out. And if he lets
people interrupt, he’ll never get it all out.

Luna is standing front and center and gives him an encouraging

thumbs up. She knows everything, of course, Harry having told her
the basics and then Neville filling in the rest. By the time she’d gotten
to Draco to harass him about finally getting together with Harry, there
hadn’t been anything else for him to tell her about the whole House
situation. Not that she’d seemed very concerned about it. Xeno’s
glaring sullenly in the corner, his arms crossed. Draco’s surprised he
showed up at all, and he’s pretty sure that has more to do Luna
dragging him here than with Xeno suddenly deciding to play nice
with the rest of the family.

He’d invited his parents, but they’d decided not to come, even when
he’d told them how important it was, if not anything specific. He can’t
help but be a little bit grateful. It would be harder for him, with them
there, and they know that. Technically, his dad doesn’t get a vote,
even if is part of the family, since he’s a rejected Lord. Besides,
weirdly, he’s already pretty sure he knows what his parents would
say.

“I’m going to say things which sound unbelievable,” he says, “but I

need you to believe me, beyond any doubt, so.” He pulls something
out of his sleeve, and no one can make any sounds, but there are
plenty of shocked faces around the ballroom. He’s holding a silvery
blue feather only slightly shorter than his forearm. “I borrowed this
from Bill Weasley. I see that many of you recognize it. For those that
don’t, this a Ma’at feather from Egypt. It glows white when I’m the
person holding it is telling the truth and black when they lie. My name
is Draco Malfoy,” the feather glows white, “and I’m a member of the
Weasley family,” it glows black. “Understand?”

Everyone nods.

“Okay,” he says, “okay. Good.” He drags a hand down his face. He’s
never wanted to do anything less, and he thinks he might be
including that time he was forced to do Voldemort’s bidding for a
year, but it has to be done. Doing what has to be done is his job as
their Lord, after all.

He starts slowly, explaining what most of them already know, about

how the Longbottom families had been affected and how Augusta
and Neville had come to him for help. Then about the research he
and Hermione had done, then about Harry hearing a river and going
in search of it. He doesn’t say where it is or how to find it, because
he trusts his family but he’s not stupid. But he explains its origins and
its function, explains what its going to do and the effect that it will
have on the world.

He tells them about Helga Hufflepuff and what she’d done, what the
house elves were and what their purpose has been all these
centuries, and what was going to happen to the world.

What they couldn’t stop from happening, but what they could speed
up, and how they could use that to try and take control of the
situation, could try and get ahead of it and use it to their family’s
advantage while also giving them the chance to do all that without
outright lying to the rest of the House, to the other noble families.

He tells them that when all is said and done, they probably won’t
need the magic they’ve spent generations coveting, that losing their
seat in the House as it is now won’t matter because the House is
going to change. He tells them that this is a change that is going to
affect the whole world. He tells them that they can’t stop it, they can
only choose how they respond to it. They can choose to let it
happen, hold onto as much of their power and prestige as they can,
and try and weather the storm of this revolution.

Or they can choose to take a risk. They can gamble everything they
have for something different, maybe even something cleaner,
something less bloody.

“Earned, not given, borrowed, not taken,” he finishes quietly. “We’ve

always understood that our magic didn’t exactly belong to us, that as
much as we coveted and cultivated it, it wasn’t ours . We earned the
magic our family has stored in this manor and in these grounds. No
one can say otherwise. And we can hold onto it if we choose. But to
borrow means to one day return. If we don’t do this, the magic will
still run free throughout the world. But we’ll be just as incidental, just
as much of a contributor, as every other noble family through the
years. There will be nothing to separate us from the rest of them. Or
we can choose to give up what we have and become something
different. Maybe even something more.”

There are plenty of angry faces in the ballroom, but not as many as
he’d expected, not as many as he’d feared.

“I have nothing left to say. you know everything that I can tell you,”
he says. The feather has stayed glowing white this entire time. “Take
the rest of today to talk about it. Sleep on it and send me an owl in
the morning. Even if you’re sure of your answer now, take the time
anyway. If a majority of you are in favor of this, I’ll do it. I am your
Lord. I do not need permission. But I’m your family first, and I won’t
do this if you’re all against it, even if I think it’s what we should do.
Those who are against this are welcome to leave the family. I’m sure
the Parkinsons will take you gladly. I know the Longbottoms will.
Doing so would be your choice, and I won’t hold it against you nor
will I make it for you.” Even just one of his family members leaving to
join another family, without some sort of acceptable reason like a
marriage or adoption, would be enough of a scandal to keep high
society gossiping for weeks. Fortunately, or unfortunately, he’s pretty
sure that there’s going to be something much interesting to grab their
attention, so he’s not too worried on that front.

He aches at the idea of any of his family choosing to leave them, but
he can’t force anyone to do this. He’ll do it if most people are in favor
of it, but he won’t force those who are against it to suffer the
consequences. This is too big and too muddled for that, it’s not
something like tolerance for muggleborns that he can force on
everyone and not feel bad about their grumbling.

He lifts the silencing spell and had to immediately cast a sound

dampening spell to keep the portraits from shaking from the noise.

Merlin, he needs a drink.

It’s nearly midnight, way passed any sort of acceptable dinner time,
and he’s just finished ushering the last pair of arguing cousins out
the door. The only upside here is that since he’s made it clear he’s
leaving this decision up to a vote by the family, they’re more
interested in yelling at each other than in yelling at him, although
there’d been plenty of that too.

He’s propped up on the arm of the couch in the manor’s front sitting
room, pressing a chilled glass of whiskey to his forehead. He thought
he’d be able to tell how the family was leaning, that the vote would
be more of a formality that anything else, but the way the arguments
had shifted and changed, and the way he’d seen several people
switch sides throughout the night, tells him he actually has no idea
how this is going to go.

“I thought you handled that really well, if it helps.” He looks up to see

Luna walking through the door. She’s shed her formal, silver robe
and is in jeans and an old Gryffindor quidditch jersey that he’s pretty
sure used to be Ginny’s.

“I thought you left,” he mutters.

She sits on the opposite side of the couch, stretching her legs so her
ankles are pressed against his. She holds out her hand, eyebrow
raised, and he sighs before handing her his glass. She takes a
delicate sip and makes a face at the taste, but doesn’t give it back.
Typical. “I brought Dad back home before he goaded someone into
punching him in the face.”

“No one needs an excuse for that,” Draco mutters. Luna is well liked
in the family, but her father isn’t. Nothing for it, he supposes, when
Xeno has spent decades talking about how much he hates their
family. It’s no wonder he’s managed to alienate most of them. That
he has a good reason for his hate is neither here nor there.

Luna snorts, taking another small sip. “He’s mellowed with age.”

He has not. “Are you here for any reason in particular or just to
annoy me?”

“Mostly to annoy you,” she says easily. She’s been proud of irritating
him since they were kids, so he doesn’t know why he thought she’d
hesitate to the say any differently. “The kids are worried about you.
And Harry. And Hermione.”

“It’ll be over soon,” he says. Either way, he’ll be back to teaching

potions, back to his kids getting on his nerves and eating up his free
time. Merlin, to think he’d originally taken this position because he’d
thought it’d get him a Wizengamot seat that he hadn’t even really
wanted. “How do you feel about representing the family in the
Wizengamot?”

Luna laughs, but he’s not joking. She seems to realize that and trails
off, raising an eyebrow. “Why don’t you want it?”

“It’s boring,” he says. “You don’t have to, I’ll take it if none of the
smart cousins feel up to it.”

“Don’t let any of the dumb cousins here you say that,” she says and
he cracks a grin. “How long do you think you’ll have to close the
manor for?”

He looks around. So much of his home runs on magic, the family

magic and not just spells. The floo network and the lights, the
defensive magics and what’s probably thousands of little spells cast
by his family over the centuries, layers of layers of magic that won’t
have anything to sustain them. “Neville thinks as little as three
months, but I’d say four, maybe even five. He wants to set up a root
network under the house to deliver magic, probably using wailing
willows which is going to be murder on the ears, and that’s going to
take as a month to lay down properly all on its own. Everything else
is just a matter of movement.” He doesn’t have to grow anything
from seeds, doesn’t have to try and entice faeries to move onto his
grounds, none of that. It’s already there. He just has to move
everything around, is all, which sounds simple but is pretty much
anything but. One wrong move and the delicate little ecosystem of
his grounds will be destroyed.

Well, that’s probably a bit of an over exaggeration, but it could cause

a lot of damage if everyone involved isn’t very, very careful. If he
didn’t employ enough herbologists to fill Hogwarts he’d probably be a
lot more worried about it than he is.

“That’s not too bad,” she says encouragingly.

He glares at her, and she softens but doesn’t shrink back at all,
because she’s never been intimidated by him for a moment. “It won’t
be the same,” he says. The magic will be different. It won’t feel like
home in the same way. It won’t be the same home.

“I know,” she says. “But it’ll be okay.”

“Maybe they’ll vote against it and it won’t even be an issue,” he

mutters, even though doing this and not doing it each come with their
own set of problems.

“Maybe,” Luna echoes, but she doesn’t sound convinced.

He can’t decide if that’s comforting or not.

Considering he spends hours walking through the halls and doesn’t

go to bed until nearly dawn, it’s way too early for him to be awake
right now. “G’way,” he grumbles, sticking his head underneath a
pillow. Warm hands grab his hips and turn him over. Draco
stubbornly takes the pillow with him, keeping it pressed to his face.

Harry sighs. “Honey, please.”

“Honey?” he demands, pulling the pillow away to glare at him.

Harry’s grinning, his hair a disaster as always, but he’s in proper

clothes for once, which only leaves Draco feeling more disheveled.
“No? What about babe? Sugar? Sweetie? Pumpkin? My little treacle
tart? Those are my favorite, and you’re my favorite, so I think it fits.”

“Do not call me a tart, the press will have a field day,” he orders, but
he’s struggling to keep from smiling.

Harry leans down to kiss him, but Draco turns his face away,
because hello, morning breath. Harry rolls his eyes but settles for his
neck instead, and okay, that feels pretty great. “Just in private, then,”
he murmurs, pushing Draco’s head back so he can suck on the on
the pulse point underneath his jaw. Things are just starting to get
interesting when Harry bites on his earlobe and says, “You’re so
beautiful, my little treacle tart,” and then they’re both laughing. Draco
shoves Harry off him, and he falls to the side of the bed, hands
behind his head and looking supremely satisfied with himself.

Draco uses his sleeve to wipe the spit from his neck. “Gross,” he
complains, talking about both his neck and that tragedy of a pet
name. “Honey is acceptable.”

“What will your nickname for me be?” he asks, but he’s still smirking
so Draco doesn’t take it very seriously.
“Scarhead,” he answers promptly, and gets a pillow to the face for
his trouble. He pushes himself upright, getting out of bed and
heading to the bathroom. He brushes his teeth so Harry can kiss him
and calls out, “What are doing here anyway? Not that I mind,”
although it comes out a little unintelligible thanks to the toothbrush in
his mouth.

Harry pushes himself up in his bed and admits, “Well, I did want to
see you, but I’m mostly here because Luna told me to come over.
She said that you might want to the company. You have a pile of
letters waiting for you downstairs, I saw them when Dax let me in. He
hadn’t opened them, but he said the last one came in over an hour
ago.”

For a moment he’s confused, but then it all comes rushing back.
Those will be the votes. He spits in the sink, rinses his mouth, and
does it again. “Ah.”

“I can go, if you want,” Harry offers, and he doesn’t sound resentful.

Draco shakes his head. “No, it’s fine.” He runs a hand through his
hair. He’d been planning to take a shower, to drag Harry in there with
him, but that’s suddenly lost all it’s appeal. He casts a couple quick
cleaning spells on himself and heads to his closet. He smooths his
hair back and ties it at the base of his neck, then reaches for the
robe made by Aquila Black, dark blue with enchanted constellations
running across the hem. It’s as close as he gets to armor without
wearing actual armor. Harry is still looking at him, a little dip between
his eyebrows, and Draco’s walking over to him before he can think
not to, raising his hand to smooth the skin between his eyebrows
with his thumb. “I’m fine.”

Harry grabs his hand and turns his head to press a kiss to his wrist,
but doesn’t say anything, which is about as damning as it can get.

They go downstairs and they have to check a few places before they
find the letters.
Dax and Tay are sitting at the dining table, cups of tea in their hands
and a half eaten meal in front of them. There’s still food for him and
Harry, and it’s still steaming hot, but it’s still strange to see house
elves sitting at the dining table, even with everything he knows about
them. In the center of the table is a pile of nearly stacked, unopened
letters.

“Sorry,” Dax says, not sounding sorry in the slightest, “We were
going to wait for you, but figured you were going to take longer.”

Tay wiggles her eyebrows at them, which is something that is going

to show up in his nightmares.

“It’s fine,” he says, pulling out a chair for Harry, a gesture that’s
ruined when Harry only looks confused until Draco looks pointedly at
the seat and raises an eyebrow. He does grin rather brilliantly when
he figures it out, so there’s that. Draco sits next to him, and Harry
starts piling his plate with food, but he can’t bring himself to do the
same. He just stares at the letters, his stomach twisting itself in
knots. Food has never been so unappealing.

“Oh, just open them,” Tay says, rolling her eyes.

He glares at her, but Tay just takes another delicate sip from her
teacup. He pushes his plate away and waves the letters forward, and
they scoot in his direction until they’re were his plate was a moment
before. The first letter is from Luna, which he’s sure is by design.

Aye . It’s a single word with her name signed on the bottom,
although not in ink. Ink can lie, after all.

Blood can’t.

Luna’s letter is signed in blood. He’d felt the hint of her magic as
soon as he picked it up, just like he’s sure he’ll feel all the others.
Blood ink quills weren’t intended as torture devices or tricks, after all.
They were just a cleaner way to sign in blood, when one had a need
to do so.
He picks up the next letter, then the next, opening them and then
putting each of them aside. Harry is silent, but Dax and Tay keep up
a quiet conversation between themselves, although he barely
registers that they’re talking, never mind what they’re saying.

The results are nothing like he’d expected.

A little over eighty percent of the family has voted in favor of it

draining their family magic.

Of those that had voted against it, not a single one had elected to
leave the family. He’d thought he’d lose a couple dozen of them, at
least.

He starts rifling over the letters again, feeling the magical signatures
more carefully, trying to see if they’d been tampered with in any way.

“Oh, stop it,” Dax says, loudly enough to catch Draco’s attention.
“They’re not forged.”

Of course Dax had already looked through them. “Are you sure?”
Dax rolls his eyes. “Right.”

He must look especially bewildered because Tay takes pity on him

and says, “It’s because the magic hasn’t rejected you.”

“What?” he asks, glancing down at his hands as if expecting to see

lighting scars across them. “Why would it?”

“Exactly,” Tay says. “If you were acting dishonorably, if you were
disrespecting the magic, if you were unnecessarily endangering the
family past the point of acceptability, the magic would reject your
status as Lord Malfoy. But it hasn’t, and your family has clearly seen
that it hasn’t. Your lot is full of a bunch of uptight, traditionalists who
believe in magic in a way lot of people don’t these days. You didn’t
lie to them, and the magic didn’t reject you, so no matter how insane
this path seems to them, it must be acceptable, otherwise you
wouldn’t even be able to do it, because you wouldn’t be Lord
Malfoy.”

He pulls a face even though she’s probably right. “I can do it so I

should do it? Seems like a bit of a self fulfilling prophecy to me.”

“Well, people like those because it lets them feel right,” Tay says. “It’s
what you wanted, isn’t it?”

Is it? He doesn’t know. But he made a case for it, put it to a vote, and
his family voted in favor by more than a two thirds majority.

He stands up, “Okay, let’s do this.”

“Draco!” Harry grabs his arms and tries to tug him back into his seat,
but he doesn’t budge. “Right now? Don’t you want to - I don’t know,
have something to eat first?”

“Do I want something to eat?” he asks, swallowing. “Does it hurt?”

Harry blinks, but takes a moment to think about it before answering.

“Not - exactly. No. It doesn’t hurt. It’s like - it’s throwing up, a little bit.
Or putting down something heavy. It’s a strain, but not pain, exactly,
and then after I felt lighter, I guess. Not in a bad way.”

Draco doesn’t want to feel lighter. He likes the weight of his

responsibilities, likes being the one that carries them. “If it’s going to
feel like I’m throwing up, then I don’t think I want to eat. Let’s do it
now.”

Harry still seems but concerned but is smart enough not to continue
arguing with him. “Okay. If you’re sure. Do you want me to come with
you, or to just wait here?”

Does he want Harry there with him? It would be fair, to let Harry see
the Malfoy wards in all their glory, with their original magic, but he
doesn’t know if he wants Harry to see him as he does it, if he wants
Harry to have something to compare the ward room to once it’s all
lying dormant.

“Just wait here,” he says. “Eat some breakfast.”

Harry nods, cautiously letting go of him to pick up his fork, like he’s
trying to show Draco that he’s listening to him, and Draco’s lips quirk
up at the corner before he turns and heads to the basement.

To the wards room.

i hope you liked it!

feel free to follow/harass me at: shanastoryteller.tumblr.com

Chapter 24
Chapter 24

(See the end of the chapter for notes.)

In some ways, of course this is harder for Draco than Harry. His
family is still alive, and here, there are people that both answer to
him and to whom he answers to, so of course it’s more complicated,
and besides all that, Draco grew up with this mattering to him, grew
up being taught it was important and valuable and worth protecting,
while Harry only became exposed to this part of their world fairly
recently.

In other ways, Draco feels guilty about feeling bad at all.

He steps into the wards room, the cool blue light reflecting on his
face. The wards, shimmering ribbons of French, move in a type of
synchronized dance along the edges of the room, interacting and
interchanging with each other, and creating beautiful, sinuous
shapes. The Malfoy wards have beauty on top of function, are
meticulously planned and meticulously maintained, but.

They’re not that old.

The Potter wards are a millennia old, at least, made up of several

languages and hundreds of different magics, building on top and
around and threw each other. They’re beautiful, but messy, a
culmination of thousands of years of family, of being passed on and
changed.

The Malfoy family wards were started by his great grandfather.

They’d had wards before, of course, but not ones fueled by family
magic, instead ones run on ambient magic or personal magic. They
would degrade, or lose their source and break apart, and would be
recast all over again. There are advantages to that, a flexibility in not
investing too much in them, so as soon as they become unsuitable
or undesirable in some way, they were tossed aside and replaced by
new ones. It wasn’t until his great grandfather decided that he was
tired of constantly recasting and reworking and relearning the wards
to protect his family that these were started, that these were made
into something more permanent.

Draco knows exactly who’s touched these wards. His great

grandparents, his grandmother, his father, and him. That’s it. And on
one hand, it’s not like Harry, who’s wards are product of the work of
countless, unknown people. But on the other, it’s his family, it’s
people he knows, the work of people he cares about. He hadn’t
known his great grandparents, of course, but he’s only one person
removed. His father had told him stories growing up, and he knows
their portraits, and it all seems like such a loss, such a tragedy, to
ruin the hard work of people he knows and loves, more so than
doing the same to the idea of distant ancestors long past.

It won’t be ruined. Not forever. He’s breaking them now, but with a
plan to fix them later, so it’s not all bad.

He sighs, reaching out for the wards, and they flow easily into his
hands. They’re warm to the touch, and he swallows as he takes out
his wand.

The incantation isn’t complicated. Translating it to French, to

something his wards could more easily work with, took him all of five
minutes. He spends much longer than that standing there, feeling
the warmth of his family’s magic, and knowing that he won’t feel it
again.

He opens his mouth and starts speaking.

His words form wards in front of his face, each word out of his mouth
turning into a shimmering bit of magic in front of him. The words link
together as he says them, growing brighter, until he finishes and the
incantation attaches itself to the edge of his wards.
Draco can’t breathe.

There’s pressure on his chest and in his ears, and his whole body
feels stretched out, like he’s taffy being boiled. Then it’s gone and
he’s on his knees in the middle of the ward room, chest heaving as
he gasps for air.

He feels a like he does after he flies too high for too long, the air in
his chest tight and cold, but the discomfort lessens quickly, until it’s
barely there at all, until it’s just the strange lightness that comes from
carrying his family’s magic every day since he was seventeen years
old and unexpectedly thrust into the role of Lord Malfoy, and now not
having anything to carry.

The room is cold.

He looks around, and the wards have inscribed themselves into the
wall, just like Harry’s, and he reaches out to touch them but pulls his
hand back. He knows what they’ll feel like, which is nothing at all, so
there’s no reason for him to check, to feel disappointed, so he
doesn’t reach out.

The wards will be alive again. Soon, in the grand scheme of things, if
Neville has anything to say about it.

It doesn’t feel as terrible as he thought it would, to lose everything

his family had spent so long coveting, not when he knows it’s not all
lost, not when he knows he’s doing this with the support of most of
his family.

He spends a long time sitting there, tracing his eyes over the wall.
He reads through every word of his wards, double checking to make
sure they’re all still there, that he hasn’t lost any of them. He hasn’t.
Every line of it is still there, laid dormant and carved into the walls for
when he has the magic to reignite them once more.

He sighs, rubs a hand over his face, and heads upstairs.

The house is mostly dark, and the windows have all shut themselves
up, but there’s just enough light that Draco doesn’t feel the need to
cast a lumos.

Then he hears the yelling.

He picks up his pace, heading back to the dining room. Harry is

standing with his arms crossed and glaring, while Neville and Pansy
are screaming at each other, a sight so strange that for a moment he
wonders if hadn’t gotten things a bit knocked around down there,
and now he’s seeing things. “What happened?”

Everyone turns to him.

“What the hell is going on?” Pansy demands.

Draco blinks. “Um - well, you see.” He really hadn’t come up with a
good excuse to tell everyone on why he’d drained his family magic
and where it had been sent to. Someone should have definitely
thought of that.

Neville gives a small shake of his head now that Pansy isn’t paying
attention to him and says, “It’s not just you Draco, everyone’s
ancestral homes just got locked down. No luck using the wards to
get everything up and running?”

Um, what?

“What do you mean everyone’s homes got shut down?” Fuck, what if
something he did - but no, that’s literally impossible, his wards are on
a closed loop, and they may power the protection and screening
spells on their floo network, but they aren’t connected to the network
itself, so they shouldn’t be able to affect anything but the Malfoy
grounds in any way

Pansy runs a hand through her hair. “I don’t know! All the houses are
in lock down and no matter what they do to the wards, they’re not
budging, and Paige says that nothing is wrong with our wards
anyway. What about yours?”

“Uh,” he says, “well, no, the Malfoy wards are behaving as

expected.” It’s true. They’re drained and dormant as anticipated.

“We can worry about everyone’s homes closing up later,” Neville

says, “we have to get to the House. Now.”

He was planning to have a drink, finally eat some breakfast, maybe

spend the rest of the day having sex with Harry somewhere where
no one would bother them, like maybe the apartment he keeps in
Russia. “Now?”

“Draco!” she snaps before looking at Neville and throwing up her

hands, “Fine!” She apparates away, still scowling.

“Okay, what the hell is going on?” he asks.

Neville shakes his head. “I don’t - something is wrong, I think. Or

right. I don’t know.”

“Thanks, that was super helpful and really cleared everything up,” he
says. “Forget Luna, you should clearly be the divination professor.”

Whatever’s going on is so bad that Neville doesn’t take the time to

be irritated at him. “Go to the House,” he says before he’s gone with
a crack.

Draco looks to Harry who just shakes his head, “I don’t know, there
was a lot of screaming, and I was trying to keep them from searching
the house for you. Are you okay?”

Is he okay?

He has no idea, but luckily or unluckily, he apparently doesn’t have

the time to stand around and self analyze, so it’s clearly a later
problem. “Let’s go see what all the fuss is about.”
The apparate to right outside of Stonehenge, and Draco is prepared
to do the same ritual he’s always done, cutting his hand on the stone
to be let through the fire, but this time there’s no fire and no blood,
he just steps through the stone archway and the spells hiding it peels
back as soon as he’s through the arch.

“Oh, fuck,” he says, and Harry’s arm come around his back like he’s
worried about him fainting. He’d yell at him about not being too
overly familiar in public, except that he really can’t think of that, right
now.

The House, the castle that Helga Hufflepuff designed and helped
build with her own two hands, is lying in rubble.

Lords and Heirs are furious and shouting, more people arriving by
the moment as word spreads about what’s happened. People are
picking through the debris, some people are crying, and Draco
knows for sure this couldn’t have been something he caused. “I’m
going to,” he starts, but doesn’t bother finishing that sentence,
darting back through the stone arch so he can apparate back to his
manor. “DAX! DAX, SOMETHING IS WRONG!”

There’s a pop, but it’s not Dax, instead it’s Milly, and he really doesn’t
have time for that right now. “Milly, I need Dax.”

“I heard,” she says, and he freezes. Her voice is cool and amused
and there’s an awareness and intelligence in her eyes that he’s
never seen before. She’s unboud now. Is this because he drained
the family magic? He’d kind of assumed all their bonds would
transfer to him personally, although now that he takes a second he
can’t feel them. He probably would have noticed that eventually, if he
hadn’t left the ward room and immediately gotten pulled into
something else even stranger and more horrifying than everything
else already going on.

“Are you going to try and kill me?” he asks cautiously, already half
reaching for his wand.
Milly just rolls her eyes. “That would rather defeat the purpose of all
the work we’ve put into you, wouldn’t it?”

“What?” he asks, but Milly snaps her fingers and they’re both gone.
He stumbles when they land again, and Milly’s already moving away
from him. It takes him a moment of staying very still with his eye shut
for his stomach to settle, but when he opens them he almost wishes
he’d kept them closed.

He’s back in the underground cave, with the silvery river of magic,
and all around him are house elves. Not just his own, but hundreds
of them, talking amongst themselves and snapping at the water,
performing some sort of spell that he can’t see the effects of. They’re
all clearly unbound.

“I heard you making a fuss.”

Draco blinks and looks beside him, to where Dax is leaning against
the wall and watching everything, a supremely satisfied look on his
face. “Dax - the House - and all these house elves, plus for some
reason everyone’s ancestral homes!”

That didn’t make any sense, which he realizes pretty much the
moment he finishes speaking, but Dax doesn’t ask for any
clarification. “We didn’t tell you everything,” he says calmly. “Don’t
take it personally. Helga built that castle for one specific purpose, to
force and bend magic in a way that it was never supposed to be
bent. Now that purpose is over, and so the castle has no reason to
exist.”

“So you destroyed it?” Draco demands, outraged.

Dax waves his hand, like it doesn’t matter. “Not personally, no. It was
always going to do that, it’s how Helga built it. She almost definitely
didn’t include it in her plans for Hogwarts, if it makes you feel better.”

It really doesn’t. “And you didn’t tell me?”

“I didn’t tell you lots of things,” he says calmly.

Draco rubs his hand over his face then gives his ponytail a couple
hard yanks out of frustration before he says, “Okay, well them to tell
me now. Please.”

“I was planning on it before you got all hysterical,” he murmurs, and

Draco wants to strangle him. “This river flows through more than
Britain, and this involves more than Britain. It originated here,
because this was all Helga’s bright idea, but it runs through all seven
continents. Parts of it are quite deep. We’ve also been colleting
globally, and I imagine you’ll start to get reports of Houses falling in
other countries soon enough.”

Draco looks to the river, wide eyed. “You mean - but, why? I know
why,” he tacks on, because if the goal was to create more magic in
the world, creating the river to be as large as possible and to affect
as many people possible obviously makes the most sense. “Why
didn’t you tell me?”

“The binding on the house elves has been broken,” he continues,

ignoring Draco’s question. “All of them, everywhere, so you lot are
going to have to figure out how to do your own dishes from now on.
We don’t have any reason to stick around and most of us won’t.
That’s something I added to Helga’s enchantment when we decided
to use the bindings as a temporary solution, just in case I wasn’t
around to undo them myself. That’s why all the houses are boarded
up, by the way, everyone did that before they left. It’s for your own
good, you’re going to have to figure out how to navigate your homes
without elf magic, which some of you lot have never done. Don’t
worry, we’ve all filled in at least a few people in each country, so you
won’t be stuck giving the same debriefing over and over again for the
next month. Your welcome.”

There’s a deep, echoing sort of pop, and then the river starts rushing
faster and the house elves let out a cheer.
Dax smiles. “The river’s starting to drain. It’ll take about a day or so.
We’ll stick around until it’s done, but then we’ll start heading out.”

“Where will you go?” he asks plaintively.

“Most of us will probably join the huldufolk,” he says. “They’re our

cousins, of a sort, and this way no one can bother us.”

Okay, that has some interesting implications that he’d love to dive
into if there weren’t a thousand more pressing problems at this
moment. “Will you be leaving too?”

“I have better things to do than mop your floors, Draco,” he says

irritably.

“No, I know,” he says, feeling just like when he was a little kid and
he’d try and get Dax to play with him. It’s just he grew up with him,
and so did his father, and so did so many generations of their family,
and maybe it wouldn’t matter so much, except Draco’s already lost
so much, and he doesn’t want to lose Dax too. “I just meant, I mean -
we could get tea, or something. You could check in to see that I
haven’t ruined everything.”

Dax pauses, and he’s softened when he says, “I’m not going in to
hiding. Tay and I have plans. We’ve had plans for a really long time,
and now we get to do them, so - that’s what we’re going to do. But
we can get tea. And if you’re really need me, I’ll still hear you it if you
call my name.”

Draco smiles, but he’s suddenly so tired, not like he hasn’t slept but
an exhaustion that he can feel in his bones. “Okay. So - so all things
I’ve been freaking out have been for nothing? We don’t need to tell
all the countries what’s going on because it’s happening there too.
We don’t need to figure out how to help the house elves because
they’re all already freed. I didn’t need to give up my family magic to
move this along in the House, since the House has been destroyed.
Dax, why did you let me do that? Why did you let Harry do that?” he
asks, and he thinks he should be angry, should be furious, but
instead he just sounds small.

There’s a moment’s hesitation, then Dax reaches up to pat his arm.

“It’s not like that. The House isn’t destroyed, it’s just going to be
different than the one you’ve known. The magical structures that
have run our society since we’ve managed to build one haven’t
changed. You and Harry gave up your family magic for the exact
same reason as before - so you wouldn’t have to lie to the house, so
they they’ve have a reason to look to you and trust you. If you’d
waited, there would still be a House, of sorts, made up of all the
people you’d lied to. You’d never be able to get anything done like
that. Besides, we’ve sacrificed so much. I knew you were the right
choice, that you would make the right choice, but the others wouldn’t
let me choose you without making you earn it like I made the others.
You have given up something precious, but you’re going to get
something precious too. If you hadn’t been willing to sacrifice your
family magic to continue being a force of good within the house, not
only would you not have earned this, but it would be pointless to give
it to you since no one would trust you.”

He’s so, so confused. He feels bad for Harry, this is exhausting.

“What are you talking about?”

Dax snaps his fingers and they’re in the manor library. He waves his
hands and the shelves slide backwards into each other, folding into
themselves and tucking themselves away. Dax snaps his fingers
again.

The library stretches and dozens and dozens of pale ash shelves
pop out, each of them filled with thick books bound in red leather
with gold lettering on the spine. There’s over a hundred new shelves
and still going, down past a hallway Draco can’t see the end of
anymore. “These belong to you now,” he says. “They’re copies of
every book any house elf has ever gotten their hands on, plus our
notes from the past millennia, and our recommendations for how to
rebuild the state of magic. There’s also a detailed explanation of how
different cultures functioned within the magical system before Helga
and I started messing with it, although I wouldn’t necessarily go back
to a lot of them. Don’t worry, six other Lords or Ladies across the
globe have been given copies of the same books, they can take care
of their own regions. Although the seven of you will sit down and
figure out the rest at some point, I’m assuming. You’ll like some of
them at least.”

He thinks he’s going to have a heart attack. This is like finding the
Library of Alexandria ten times over. “Dax. I don’t know what to say.”

“Well that’s a first.” Draco doesn’t even stop staring at the rows of
books long enough to glare at him. Dax hesitates a moment before
adding, “It would be nice if you’re still a professor when I visit. It
might be good to visit the castle again.”

“Again?” he blinks, finally tearing his eyes away from the books to
look down at Dax. By the way he says that, he’s not talking about his
time as a house elf. “You attended Hogwarts?”

“Something like that,” he says. “The other elves thought I was being
biased about you because you were in my house, which is
ridiculous, plenty of people have been sorted into my house and I
disliked them just fine.”

“Your house,” he says slowly, and an absolutely insane idea is at the

back of his brain, but he really can’t bring himself to say it aloud.

Dax nods, bouncing on the balls of his feet. “I rather wish Helga had
come up with a better explanation than me leaving them all behind,
but Godric and Rowena would have come looking for me if they
didn’t think I was leaving for a terrible reason. I suppose I didn’t have
to do this at all, but it seemed rather disingenuous of me to ask of
others what I wasn’t willing to do myself, after all.”

He needs to sit down. “Are you saying you’re-”

“We should bring Harry along too, then we can visit my chamber,” he
says brightly. “I haven’t seen it in so long, it must be in a rather
terrible state. Maybe you can clean it for me? Turnabout only seems
fair after all.” He pats Draco on the hip and says, more serious than
he’s been so far, “You’ll be fine, Draco. We picked you for a reason.
Good luck.”

“Dax!” Draco shouts, but he’s already gone.

He gets the feeling that that was last time he’ll be seeing Dax for a
while.

By the time he makes it back to Stonehenge, all the Lords, Lades,

and Heirs are there, and have managed to work themselves into
proper hysterics.

Draco and Neville eventually manage to calm everyone down, and

it’s a good thing that he still has the Ma’at feather that Bill lent him,
otherwise they would have been standing around in Stonehenge
arguing for the next month, at least. This is the second time Draco’s
given this speech, so that helps, and Neville helps him fill in all the
things he accidentally skips over. It’s all very efficient, which means it
only takes them about twelve hours to get through everything.

If Draco thought he was tired before being forced to explain to the

House why the castle had collapsed, and where all their house elves
had gone, and why their homes were boarded up, and all the other
related bit, and oh, how there’s going to a magical and muggle
revolution in about decade whether they liked it or not, then he’s
basically dead on his feet after.

Of course, because there’s no justice, he doesn’t get to collapse into

bed. He probably shouldn’t spend the night at the manor until it’s up
and running again, but there’s his bed at Hogwarts, or any of the
many properties he owns or manages, or even better than that he
could go to Harry’s apartment and sleep in his bed, with Harry, which
sounds delightful.

He doesn’t get to do any of those, however.

Instead Neville grabs his arm, looking on vaguely apologetic, and
Harry comes up to his other side to grab his free arm, not looking
apologetic at all. “We’re acting on orders,” Neville says.

“Yes, yes, go ahead and kidnap me, my day hasn’t been long
enough already,” he sighs.

Harry’s still laughing when the apparate away and he’s only a little bit
surprised to find himself in Ron and Hermione’s living room. Blaise,
Pansy, Luna, and Ginny are also there.

Pansy punches him in the arm immediately. “You should have told
us!”

Clearly someone has filled them in.

“You both had conflicting loyalties,” he grumbles, rubbing at his arm

even as he collapses on the couch between Blaise and Ginny. “You
especially.”

Pansy puts her hands on her hips. “Well, I don’t accept that, we’re
your best friends and you’re supposed to tell us the truth even if it
puts us in impossible situations and forces us to either betray you or
our family!”

Blaise coughs into his hand. Draco looks around and sees Ron
rubbing the back his neck sheepishly while Ginny laughs at him, and
this all makes more sense. “He tried to lecture you about sharing
among friends, didn’t he?”

“It would have been adorable if it wasn’t so insulting,” she says, then
bends down to kiss his cheek. “Thank you for protecting us.”

Blaise shifts enough to kiss his other cheek, and he groans and
pushes them both away. “Gross, stop it, you’re welcome.”

“I heard you got a library!” Hermione says, brown eyes sparkling.

How could she possibly know that?

“Dax came by earlier,” Luna says. “It was mostly to give me a lecture
on looking after you since he wasn’t going to be around to do it
anymore, but he filled us in on some other stuff. Including the library.”

Oh. “It’s going to have to wait until the manor is connected to the
new magical network before anyone us can go hanging out in there.
But I can grab some books off the shelves and we can start there,”
he says.

“Sounds like we’re going to have a lot work to do,” Blaise sighs.

“Yeah,” Draco says, but he can’t help smiling as he says it.

They won’t be doing it alone because they’ll have each other, and
that part mean’s it’s no so bad, not so daunting.

They’re going to do this together.

i hope you liked it!

feel free to follow/harass me at: shanastoryteller.tumblr.com

Chapter 25
Chapter 25

(See the end of the chapter for notes.)

One Year Later

“Raina, are you sure you want to do that?”

She pauses, holding the nettles above her bubbling potion. “Yes?
Why wouldn’t I?”

“Well, it’ll ruin your healing salve,” Draco points out, “and considering
you’ve spent the last few potion club sessions working on it, it seems
like perhaps that’s not something that you’d want to do maybe.”
Thank merlin for stasis spells, otherwise he’d never get these brats
out of here. This way they can stretch out brewing over several
weeks instead of being stuck in the lab for two days straight.

McGonagall had suggested he put a hold on the potions club,

considering he was most of the way through his charms mastery and
he had all the work he was doing to help untangle the mess left
behind by the House’s collapse and how many world leaders have
no problem with making the sort of demands on his time that make
him want to cry a little bit, but the kids had put up such a fuss at the
idea that she’d dropped it.

Throwing his fiancé at them was a nice trick, though. Harry couldn’t
care less about someone’s political and social power if he tried for a
week, and he had no problem cheerfully cutting their floo collection
or burning their howlers and sending back the burnt letters with
helpful suggestion on how to better get in touch with his future
husband.

Being one of seven people with unlimited access to most of the

world’s knowledge on how magic functions outside the confines of
the House didn’t make him popular at dinner parties, exactly, but it
did make him popular with a lot of very important and powerful
people who he’d really wish would just leave him alone.

“Who said we were making a healing salve?” Albert asks. Raina

elbows him in the side and he dramatically falls over, clutching his
side. “No, how could you! This is domestic abuse!”

Raina looks disdainfully down at her boyfriend, but the overall effect
is ruined by the soft look in her eyes. “Can you not be such an
embarrassment?”

Albert claws his way back up, still mostly on the ground as he rests
his chin on the table. “No?”

“Do I want to know what you’re making, then?” he asks.

She and Albert look at each other, then at him, and say, “No.”

This is all his fault, really. He let them spend too much time with
Mariana, who’s a brilliant potion maker and who he’s sure will make
an equally brilliant criminal one day.

Dacia raises a hand. “If I add acromantula venom to this, will it blow
up?”

It’s so nice that they ask him these types of questions instead of just
doing it and seeing what happens. “Probably.”

Cory leans over from his - actually, Draco doesn’t remember what
he’s making. It currently looks a little bit like a thinned out version of
lava, but his flame is set to simmer, so it’s likely the potion is
lukewarm at best. “Hey, can I use it if you’re not going to?”

Dacia is extremely suspicious. “What could you possibly need this

for? You’re making a hair mask.”

That is not a hair mask.

Unless it is.

He should probably start paying closer attention, but these days as

long as brewing it isn’t going to harm any of them, he really just
doesn’t care.

“Who said I needed it for the potion?” he asks. “Maybe I just want it
for me. Acromantula venom is fantastic at smoothing and adding
shine all on it’s own. I probably should find a way to add it to the
potion, actually, but that means finding a binding agent that allow me
to add it without messing up the consistency. Some sort of fatty
product. Maybe an oil?”

“Try honey,” Albert says. “It reacts better to the venom and won’t
break down as quickly, assuming the pollen is from a magical flower.
But it’ll reduce the shelf life of the hair mask overall, so that’s
something you should keep in mind.”

“How could you possibly know that?” Draco demands. “And I’m
talking to you both, Cory and Albert.”

“Do you really want to know?” Albert asks at the same time that Cory
says, “I got my hands on some venom and then I put in my hair to
see what would happen.”

The whole potions club pauses to turn at look him.

He’s entirely unrepentant.

Draco loves these kids.

He steps foot into his rooms and is only a little bit put out to see
Neville there waiting for him, and it’s not that he doesn’t want to see
Neville, he was just kind of hoping it was Harry. “Hey, what’s up?
Nothing going wrong with my manor, is there?”
The house has been up and fully operational for nearly five months
now. It’s turned out Draco hadn’t been the one who’d slowed things
down, because once Neville had switched from planning to doing,
he’d turned out to be so obsessive and neurotic that the implications
and effects of every stone they moved had to be checked, double
checked, and maybe even triple checked if one of Neville’s
girlfriends hadn’t forced him into getting something approaching or
normal night’s sleep. Even though it’s done, and has been for
months, Neville still goes over to check on it every day and who
knows what else, probably to pet the flower petals and sings lullabies
to the lilies or something equally ridiculous.

Draco would have thought he’d have his hands full with working on
the Potter grounds and all the demands he has from nobles to
redesign their manors as well, but apparently not.

“No, it’s fine, I was there this morning.” Of course he was. He

swallows, rubbing his hands together, his face pale and bit splotchy
at the same time.

It’s been so long since Draco’s seen Neville nervous around him that
it takes him a moment to recognize it. “Well, what’s wrong then?”

He takes a deep breath, and Draco’s actually starting to get

concerned, until he says, almost too quickly for Draco to understand.
“I need to talk to you. Bu not you you, Lord Malfoy you.”

He knows exactly where this is going. “I’m Lord Malfoy all the time,
it’s not like I have some weird split personality. But please, Lord
Longbottom, do continue.”

Some of Neville’s nervousness fades away as he crosses his arms.

“You’re enjoying this.”

“Me? No, not at all, I don’t know why you’d think that,” he says.

Neville clearly doesn’t believe him, but he’s also calmed down
enough to not seem like a complete disaster, so there’s that. “Lord
Malfoy. I’d like permission to marry Luna Lovegood, but not to take
her into the Longbottom family.”

That could be considered really insulting, except that Draco knows

Luna doesn’t want to leave the family, which had been the whole
issue before.

Such a thing would have been unacceptable before, when the role of
the House and people in it were different. People still probably aren’t
going to be thrilled about a Lord having a wife who’s refusing to
leave her family, but Draco assumes that’s where Ginny comes in.

“Have you asked Xeno yet?” he asks.

What little formality Neville had managed to scrape together falls

away. “Merlin, no, that man hates me. I’m going to just send Ginny to
do that.”

Okay, wait, now he might be angry. “Did you already ask Ginny?”

“No!” He coughs. “She asked me.”

Well, that’s fine then. He’s a little surprised Ginny waited this long.
“So Luna’s going to ask Ginny?” Neville nods. He’s going to need to
grab one of the family rings for her, then. Pandora hadn’t worn one,
and he’s not going to have her propose to Ginny with some sort of
store bought ring like she doesn’t have a family to offer her. Unless
that’s a thing they’re doing. He hadn’t. He’d given Harry a family ring
carved out of a ruby, and Harry had spent a week with Pansy sorting
though the Potter vaults to pick the ring he’s wearing now, a band
with alternating yellow diamonds and sapphires. He glances at
Neville’s hand. “Did Ginny buy you a ring?”

“Merlin, no.” He hurries to add, “I would have accepted anyway, but

no. It’s her uncle’s.” He holds up his hand, and it’s basic, but still
masterfully made, silver with a delicate design inlaid in what he
thinks is obsidian. “I think she asked Gran what would be
appropriate.”
Well, it’s not like Ginny’s ever backed down from a fight. “Augusta
still hates her?”

“Oh yeah,” Neville says with feeling. “Ginny isn’t planning to quit
working to play Lady Longbottom after we get married, which I really
don’t care about. Luna isn’t either, but Gran’s less pissed about that
than the whole refusing to magically marry into the family thing. I
don’t need my wives to help me manage the family anyway, that’s
what cousins are for. But don’t tell Gran I said that.”

“Said what?” Draco asks and Neville flashes him a grin. “Anyway.
Yes, Lord Longbottom, you may marry Luna Lovegood, although the
Malfoy family doesn’t relinquish its claim on her.”

“Thanks,” Neville says, “Want to see the ring?”

“Obviously,” he says.

Neville flicks his wand and the ring drops out of the air and into his
hand. It’s platinum with opals on the side and a blue diamond that’s
almost comically large in the center. “Bloody hell, Neville. You know
you don’t have to go that grand, right? Luna would be happy with a
ring of glass.” They better cast a tracking and sticking spell on that
ring. Luna can be kind of forgetful at times, and she’s lost plenty of
jewelry over the years because of it.

“I’m only getting married once. Hopefully. Besides,” he adds, “I’m

hoping giving her the most expensive ring in the vault means people
will think twice about making comments about her family situation.”

“You know she doesn’t care about that either,” he says. Also that it
probably won’t work. People are still stupid enough to make
comments about him and Harry’s plans to combine their families,
even though considering they’d both drained their family’s magic it
was a rather perfect time to go about it. “However, as the head of her
family, and also as her cousin, I’m glad you’re valuing her
appropriately.”
“Thank you,” Neville says, banishing the ring back to his vault.
“Where’s Harry? I kind of expected him to be here. His rooms are
more of a storage closet these days, so I doubt he’s there.”

Draco looks around, like he’s expecting his fiancé to materialize out
of nowhere, and admits, “I have no idea, actually. Let’s go find him.”
He leaves his rooms and Neville trails behind. He goes the way that
leads him to the Slytherin common room rather than back into the
hallway. “Hey! Has anyone seen Professor Potter?” Harry usually
entered his rooms through the common rooms so he can spend
some time hanging out with the Slytherins, which some of them hate
but most of them love. The house’s collective defense grades of his
house have improved dramatically ever since Harry had gone to the
effort to make himself a nuisance in the common room, so Draco
can’t complain too much.

Marilyn doesn’t look up from the game of chess she’s playing with
Markel. “Your fiancé hasn’t been through here, Draco.”

He sighs. He does sometime complain, and exactly for this reason.

“You should really call him Professor Potter.” Outside of the common
room or great hall, Draco doesn’t really care if the kids call him
professor, and it seems especially weird to insist on it from the kids
he’s related too or who he’s known their whole lives. When Liam
calls him professor, it’s almost always to be annoying.

“When you’re married, I’m going to call him cousin,” Markel says
brightly. “I can’t wait. Hello, have you met Harry Potter? Why, he’s
my cousin, of course.”

Andrea snorts behind the book she’s reading, and Lucas looks up
from his essay just to scowl at him. “That’ll just make you
insufferable, Markel.”

“And? I’m insufferable now, I might as well be insufferable and well

connected,” he says reasonably.

He’s such a Malfoy. Clearly he got all the good genes from Diane.
Nadine calls out from the other side of the common room, “I saw
Potter heading to the quidditch pitch with Granger. Finnegan was
with them too. They might still be there.”

“Thanks,” he says, “Don’t blow anything up while I’m gone.”

“Okay, we’ll wait until you get back,” Georgiana says.

He really wishes it was socially acceptable to flip off his students.

Hermione hates flying, so Draco’s not surprised to see her sitting in

the stands, probably grading the huge test she’d just given and his
snakes had been complaining about for weeks, but Harry’s not flying
alone. Seamus and Ron are up there, with Harry playing keeper
while Ron and Seamus act as chasers. Probably for the best, as
Seamus isn’t that great at quidditch and having Ron play keeper isn’t
really fair to anyone.

One of the worst things out of all this has been his reluctant
friendship with Seamus Finnegan. His and Hermione’s plan for the
new Muggle Studies course had been approved, since the need for it
was fairly obvious considering everything, but there were a very
limited number of people who were equally qualified to speak on
both the magical and the muggle world, and Seamus had been one
of them and also bored at playing journalist.

It was very upsetting to Draco to discover how deeply, truly hilarious

Seamus was. He’s legitimately one of the funniest people Draco
knows, and he really enjoys hanging out with him. It’s the worst.

He shields his eyes as he looks up. The amount of frozen lumos

charms hanging about so they can manage to fly in the middle of the
night is a little excessive and is probably more for Hermione’s benefit
theirs.

“Hey!” Ron shouts, and both Harry and Seamus look down at them.
“Neville! I head my sister is making an honest man out of you!
Welcome to the family!”
Neville rolls his eyes. “Hi Ron.”

The three of them float down so they don’t have to do quite as much
screaming to hear each other.

“Mum wants you to have the wedding at the Weasley Manor, now
that it’s all nice and shiny again,” Ron says.

“If you don’t have the engagement party at the Malfoy Manor, I will
make scathing remarks about your sensibilities where society
reporters can overhear me,” Draco threatens.

Neville looks very put upon. “I guess my grandmother will just have
to happy with having the reception at our place.”

“She’s not going to be happy about that, is she?” Seamus asks. “She
doesn’t seem like the type to be happy about it, is the thing.”

Draco’s not even sure if Seamus has met Augusta.

“There’s going to have to be carriages,” Draco says. “Lots of them.

Having guests floo or apparate isn’t a great look.”

“Yeah, I know. I’m going to have to rent a ton,” he sighs.

“You can borrow Nox and the Malfoy carriage for you, Luna, and
Ginny,” he says. It highlights the fact that Luna is still a Malfoy, and
he knows that Neville loves the carriage, so everyone wins. “Harry
and I can take his.”

“We’re just having our wedding at the manor, right?” Harry asks,
leading over on his broom to give Draco a quick kiss. “This is
exhausting just to listen to.”

“I have no idea,” he says. “Mum hasn’t really told me anything and

Dad just shakes his head whenever I ask.” His parents have slowly
started edging their way back into society. His dad had more good
days than bad days now, and Narcissa thought planning her son’s
wedding to Harry Potter would be the best way to make that
reentrance in a way that was both grand - because that’s what the
wedding would be - and subtle, since the wedding wouldn’t be about
them, after all.

He and Harry were just happy that they didn’t have to plan it.

Ron waves his hand. “Well, that’s a later problem. Fancy a game?
Luna’s out with Ginny tonight, so you’re going to have to wait to
propose until tomorrow anyway.”

“Also if you could stop yelling and get back in the air so I can
concentrate, that’d be great,” Hermione says, still bent over her
papers.

Ron blows her a kiss and she catches it without looking up.

“Yeah, okay,” Neville sighs while Draco summons a couple of the

school brooms with a flick of his wand.

When his alarm goes off the next morning, he regrets staying out so
late.

“No,” Harry moans, burrowing back into the bed. “Honey, why? It’s
Saturday.”

“It’s a library Saturday,” he reminds him, stumbling out of bed and

towards his closet. “We had to skip last week because of the full
moon, so the weeks are reversed now.”

“Uhg,” Harry grumbles, huddling back under the covers.

Draco rolls his eyes, tugs down the blanket enough to give his fiancé
a goodbye kiss, and heads towards the floo. “Antarctica Library.”

He’s barely spelled the soot off his robes when a familiar voice says,
“You’re late.”
“Hello Chen Guang, I had a lovely couple of weeks, thank you for
asking,” he says, walking over to take his place at the table between
Alinta, the representative from Australia, and Josephina, who
represents North America.

“Really, Chen Guang, no reason to be so snappy,” Ghufran says.

“Did you have a tough full moon? Catch any rabbits?” He and Chen
Guang are the two representatives from Asia, from Pakistan and
China respectively, and they hate each other.

Unfortunate for them, hilarious for everyone else.

Denno, here on behalf of Africa and from Kenya specifically, rolls his
eyes. “Can we just get started please? I don’t want to have to be
stuck here all day again. Must we make fun of Chen Guang for being
a werewolf every meeting? Surely we’ve run out of jokes by now.”

“Not really,” Fernando says. “It’s her own fault for saying she hates
cats.” He’s from Peru and representing South America. He and
Josephina will complain about the rest of them in Spanish, which is
forcing the rest of the group to learn Spanish so they can’t do that
anymore.

“Really,” Chen Guang says flatly, “that’s what we’re blaming this on?
I think actually you guys are all just assholes, so.”

“Hey!” Josephina says. “I don’t make fun of you for being a werewolf.
I make fun of you for being short tempered, it’s completely different.”

“You know,” says Alinta, “it seems like you really only mind when
Ghufran does it. Young love can be so tempestuous, don’t you
think?”

There’s a single moment of still, horrified silence and then both

Ghufran and Chen Guang are yelling while everyone else laughs at
them.
They’re clearly not getting to get through the agenda in a timely
manner, but Draco can’t really bring himself to care all that match.
The way the muggle leaders are going on, they’re not going to end
up making any public announcements about the existence of magic
for another two years anyway, so they have time.

He’s excited to invite them to his wedding. They’re all disasters and
it’ll be hilarious.

He makes a mental note to apologize to his mother.

“Exploding snap?” Fernando offers.

Draco checks the clock, looks over the agenda, and considers how
much yelling is still going on. “Yeah, okay. You know, I could still be
in bed right now if we weren’t going to do be productive.”

“You could,” he agrees, “but who would want to miss this?”

Ghufran’s voice goes so high that it cracks and Draco can’t help
laughing.

That’s an excellent point.

This isn’t anything close to how he thought this was going to be,
what he thought these people were going to be like, but this is better.

They have a lot of work, and a lot of responsibilities, but each of

them have their own people who are helping them, and they all try
and help each other, and between the seven of them they’ll
eventually figure out a way to roll out the truth of magic to the
muggles in a way the muggle world leaders will accept.

But for right now they play exploding snap while discussing the
effectiveness of different governing structures they’d read about in
their respective red leather bound books since the last meeting.

Really, the only bad thing about this is that they’ve set up their
headquarters in Antarctica. Maintaining the heating spells is the
worst.

“Do you think we could move the meeting hall to Fiji?” Draco asks. “I
know we wanted to keep it in neutral territory, but there’s really no
reason we can’t be doing this on a nice beach house somewhere.”

“Shut up,” everyone says at once, although about half of them look
like they agree with him.

Draco has no idea what Dax was talking about. He doesn’t like some
of them.

It turns out he likes all of them.

The End!

I started this fic over three and half years ago, and it's gone thought
a lot of twists turns since then. Thank you all so much for sticking
with me, and I hope it was an enjoyable ride.

<3