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Heraclitean Fire	By : Lomonaaeren Category: Harry Potter > Slash - Male/Male > Harry/Draco Views: 4220 -:- Recommendations : 1 -:- Currently Reading : 1
Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter and I am not making any money from this story.

Chapter List
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Title: Heraclitean
Fire

Disclaimer: J. K.
Rowling and associates own these characters. I am writing this story for fun
and not profit.

Pairing: Harry/Draco

Rating: R

Warnings: Heavy
angst, sex, violence, profanity, dub-con, minor character deaths, no epilogue.

Summary: Hit by a
curse that will slowly destroy him, Harry makes his will and looks about for
something to fill the last fortnight of his life. An invitation from Draco
Malfoy to help him clear an inherited property haunted by something other than
ghosts may be just what Harry needs�in more ways than one.

Author�s Notes: This
is a fairly dark story, and will be irregularly updated. I�m anticipating nine
to ten chapters. The title refers to a concept advanced by the Greek writer
Heraclitus, about the primordial nature of things: �This world, which is the
same for all, no one of gods or men has made; but it was ever, is now, and ever
shall be eternal fire.�

Heraclitean Fire

�� Chapter One�Your Wildest Nightmares

�� There�s no
doubt. I�m sorry, Mr. Potter.�

�� Harry
closed his eyes. It was odd, he thought, but the voice of the Auror Healer in
front of him held more sorrow than he could feel himself right now. It was
probably because, from the moment that blue light had hit him from the wand of
the Dark wizard he was trying to capture�the first Dark wizard, since he�d just come out of Auror training�he�d
felt it was something serious. Ron had laughed and clapped Harry�s shoulder
when they ended up bringing in the wizard anyway, telling him not to worry, but
the conviction had remained in the back of Harry�s mind, gnawing a place for
itself.

�� Thanks for
telling me,� he said, his voice creaking. �For being honest.� He opened his
eyes and smiled at the Auror Healer. Her name was Aphrodite Mistborn, and she
smiled back through her tears.

�� I�m so
sorry,� she repeated.

�� I know.�
Harry heaved himself to his feet with a sigh. �It isn�t even an obscure curse,�
he muttered, �but one well-known and understood. I wonder if he thought about
that when he was casting it at me?�

�� Oh, most
likely not.� Mistborn sounded a little shocked. �Wizards like Herne aren�t�they aren�t sane. He knew by that point that you would stop him, and he wanted
you to suffer. That was why he chose the Withering Curse.�

�� Harry
nodded, shook Mistborn�s hand, and then left the Healers� division of the
Department of Magical Law Enforcement, walking back to his own office. The
people who passed him whispered under their breaths or behind their hands and
gave him compassionate, shocked looks. Harry ignored that as best as he could,
continuing to walk with his head held high. He wouldn�t break down in front of
people who all but fed on his misery, who couldn�t feel for him as a fellow
sufferer but were only interested in �how the Savior would bear his agony,� as
the Prophet would have phrased it.

�� The
Withering Curse. It would destroy him slowly, wilting various parts of his
body: twisting his limbs, shutting down his inner organs, making him forget
things and suffer from personality changes as it attacked his brain. It was an
old curse, invented centuries ago, but studied thoroughly since people began to
use it. There was no cure, and the pain was awful.

�� Well, Harry thought again, because
Mistborn had been precise, there is one
cure, but one I won�t take. He would have had to murder an innocent in cold
blood, splitting his soul. Through some mystical magical theory Harry didn�t
understand, the Withering Curse connected body and soul. A murder affected the
victim in such a way that it would disrupt the curse�s hold on the body and
free the victim from it.

�� But Harry
would never do that, and he didn�t even have to worry about someone doing it
for him; the murder had to be performed of the victim�s own free will, or it
meant nothing. He was going to die.

�� It was
over.

�� He reached
his office, grateful that Ron wasn�t there right now, and sat down, his legs
extended to the fire while he thought. He knew what he wanted to do�run
screaming�and he knew what he had to do. He wanted Number Twelve Grimmauld
Place, the Potter and Black vaults, his Invisibility Cloak, and his other
things to go to people who could appreciate them. That meant a will.

�� It seemed
so strange and so foreign that he could almost have laughed. He�d got through
the war with Voldemort, he�d survived Auror training that he thought sometimes
would kill or break him, and he�d even fought off a few people who had turned
murderous along the way because they�d been so jealous of him or seen a chance
to get famous by killing the Savior. He�d come into what was supposed to be the
prime of his life, twenty-two years old, ready to arrest the people he�d spent
the last three years training to defeat.

�� And now he
was going to die.

�� It helped
to think about that fact over and over, Harry decided, pounding it into his head
like a blunt nail. Otherwise, he might start hoping and dreaming, shoving the
start of the curse away into the future. Mistborn had confirmed that he had a
fortnight from today�seventeen days from the day of the curse�before the pain
would begin. Seventeen had been an important number to the original creator of
the Withering Curse, because his little sister had wasted away from a disease
that took seventeen days to kill her, and, in hatred against an unjust world he
believed could have helped her, Jeremiah Dill had decided that anyone affected
by his curse would suffer anticipation for as long.

�� They
understood everything, from Dill�s madness to the best way to solve the
problem, Harry thought. They couldn�t hope for a sudden, miraculous cure out of
nowhere. Hermione had spent the last three days with books, but Harry knew it
wouldn�t help. Mistborn had told him the truth: the lore on the Withering Curse
was extensive and had been centrally organized from the beginning. It just
wouldn�t help.

�� The door opened.
Harry glanced up and saw Ron standing there, his face twisted.

�� Mistborn
confirmed it?� he whispered. Their last hope had been that Herne, the wizard
they�d been hunting, hadn�t used the Withering Curse, but some other spell.
That was why Harry had visited Mistborn this morning, after having given the
Healers some time to examine his body for traces of the curse.

�� Harry
nodded.

�� Ron closed
his eyes and gave a single, long, tearing sob.

�� Harry stood
up and made his way across the office to his friend, patting him clumsily on
the shoulder before he hugged him. Ron grabbed him and hugged him back, a
pressure that made Harry grunt and feel as if his ribs would stave in his
lungs. But Ron continued to hold him, and after a minute, Harry could think about
what he was feeling and understand.

�� They stood
there for so long that Harry wondered if he�d need to take Ron home, but his
friend stepped back, wiping his hand across his nose and sniffling without a
thought for how it would make him look. Harry had to turn back to the fire.
When Ron didn�t care about looking manly, then he really was affected.

�� What are
we going to do?� Ron�s voice was low, still tear-choked, but expectant. Harry
knew that he was looking to Harry to be the leader he always had been, during
their adventures at Hogwarts and the Horcrux Hunt and during Auror training.
Harry had told Ron that he was just as good at thinking for himself, like the
way he�d reasoned out the strategy for the chess game when they went after the
Philosopher�s Stone, but Ron grinned and said he preferred to have someone else
do the leading, whether that was Harry or Hermione. That way, he could come in
with the idea that saved everyone at the last instant and get the glory with
none of the work.

�� Those thoughts
made Harry smile and take a deep breath. Ron and Hermione and the rest of the
Weasleys were still going to be here when he�d gone. The least he could do was
think of ways to make their lives happy and comfortable.

�� I need to
go home and think about what I�m going to leave where,� he said. �But I can
make the will tomorrow. Right now, you can come home with me and get roaring
drunk.�

�� Ron pounded
him on the shoulder in approval, and they left together, Harry determined not
to think beyond the next few hours.

*

�� And to my
son, Draco Malfoy, under the terms of my will��

�� Draco
raised his eyebrows. Frankly, he�d been surprised when his father�s solicitor
commanded him to attend the reading of the will in Hogsmeade. Lucius hadn�t
exactly approved of Draco�s �activities� during the last few years. Those
activities had included both fucking men and altering Dark artifacts so that
they could be classified as Light and sold for a considerable sum. Draco wasn�t
sure which one had worried Lucius the most, actually.

�� But he was
here, and his mother, graceful and composed and perfect, was here, and if she
had inherited the Manor and most of the money, it seemed that Lucius had left
Draco something after all. Draco prepared himself to hear that it was some
paltry amount of money, just large enough to be insulting.

�� I leave
the house called Bubonic, which stands in the west of Surrey.�
The solicitor laid down the will and cleared his throat. He was a large,
nervous-looking man who fiddled with his glasses so often that Draco was amazed
he could see out of them; they must be covered with fingerprint smudges.
�That�s all. Your father did not specify what he wanted done with the house.
You may sell it or tear it down or live in it, as you will.�

�� Bubonic,�
Draco repeated, with his eyes narrowed. He�d thought he knew all the names of
all the Malfoy properties, as well as the Black ones that his mother had
brought�or should have brought�into the family. Lucius had repeated them over
and over again in the last few years since he�d returned from Azkaban, an
endless litany of curses against the people who had inherited those properties,
most of them not even pure-bloods, due to the vagaries of some ancestor or
another. �I don�t know the place.�

�� His mother
made a small sound. Draco glanced at her and saw her sitting with her hand over
her mouth, her eyes wide.

�� Draco
hadn�t often seen his mother display fear, but he knew it when he saw it. He
turned back to the solicitor and spoke quietly. �What is this place? Why did my
father leave it to me when he left nothing else?�

�� The
solicitor shook his head and took his glasses off, probably so that he could
pretend to be busy polishing them. �The late Mr. Malfoy didn�t confide in me
about his intentions, Mr. Malfoy. I�m sorry. I wish there was something I could
tell you. But what I mentioned already is true. This is a free gift, with no
conditions. You don�t have to accept it.�

�� The name of the place is hardly promising, Draco
thought dryly. I reckon there�s a curse
attached, and my father hoped it would consume me.

�� But when he
thought about it, he realized that he was considering this the wrong way.
Lucius Malfoy�s gifts were never so single-edged. There had to be something in
the house that could eat Draco�in one way or another�but also something that
would reward him if he was clever or daring enough. Lucius had been full of the
praise of daring in his last years, especially lamenting when Potter�s luck
outraced any number of risky attempts on his life.

�� I�ll
accept it,� Draco said.

�� His mother
gasped again. Draco didn�t look at her, but knew that they would be talking
later.

�� Finally,
they were outside the solicitor�s office again, and Draco stretched his arms up
to the air. His sides ached with the long compression it seemed they had
suffered in the office. He had breathed air redolent with the presence of his
father, and it was hard to realize that he would never suffer such a thing
again.

�� I wish you
had not done that, Draco.� His mother spoke in a subdued voice, keeping her
attention on the thin white handkerchief that she was twisting between her
hands.

�� Why not?�
Draco asked, turning to her. �Is it better to sell the house instead, do you
think? It�s true that I could use the money to work on my projects.�

�� His mother
only set her lips and didn�t respond. Draco knew she didn�t like his �projects�
any more than his father had. She thought Dark artifacts should be left the way
they were, as though there was some strict line between what people called Dark
and Light�as if that was a law of nature, instead of a human and legal
perception. Draco thought he had gone further into the true philosophy that so
many of the Death Eaters and the Dark Lord had professed to believe, that there
was only power and no Light or Dark. If that was right, then he could change a
few things and make one into the other.

�� Draco
smiled faintly as he thought of the latest artifact that had come into his
hands. It was true that some cases were more difficult than others. Among other
things, he suspected this particular artifact would require two people to work
on it, and there simply wasn�t someone he trusted enough to know the artifact�s
secret right now. He was considering the costs and benefits of hiring someone
from the Continent or putting someone under the Imperius Curse.

�� The story
of Bubonic is a long one,� his mother said, �and we should require seats.�

�� Draco
recognized one of his mother�s delaying tactics. Well, this time he didn�t
intend to accept it. He simply nodded and held out his arm. �I�ve been wanting
to try that new restaurant in Diagon Alley. Why don�t you come with me?�

�� His mother
grimaced lightly and took his elbow. Draco Side-Along Apparated them with great
pleasure, partially because his mother dropped his arm as soon as she could. Perhaps she thinks that the hands of a man
who fucks men shouldn�t touch her, Draco thought.

�� He had come
a long way from the days when the approval and love of his parents was all that
mattered to him. Of course, they had become shadows of themselves after the
war, and he had started to look about him and seen that he would have to make
his own way in the world if he wanted a place in it at all.

�� The new
restaurant was down a slight side-alley, the only building there, and set into
the stone of the walls. Draco smiled when he stepped through the doors and saw
the cavern theme continued with walls that glittered like geodes, a floor
patterned with a mosaic of an abyss, and stalactites of basalt and granite
hanging from the ceiling. His mother, behind him, gasped when she walked out
over that shining black abyss.

�� A table,�
Draco told the waiter who came to lead them in, clad in robes of purest white,
so as to glow in the dim place. Luckily, their table had candles. Draco wanted
to be able to see every flicker of expression on his mother�s face as she
spoke.

�� When they
were seated and had ordered drinks�the house�s specialty of orange-flavored
wine for Draco, water for Narcissa�the waiter left them alone, and Draco leaned
forwards, arms folded in front of him, and looked patiently at his mother.

�� Don�t put
your elbows on the table,� she said, but it was obviously automatic, with
nothing of her heart in it. She looked from left to right, and waited until her
water had come, after which she began to drink it compulsively. Draco sipped
his wine and waited.

�� As he had
suspected would happen, the dark atmosphere and the grief at her husband�s
death broke down his mother�s resolve. She shoved her water away from her hard
enough to slop some on the table; Draco thought about commenting on that but
didn�t. Her mouth was finally opening, her eyes grim and fixed on him, and he
thought he would get the answers he deserved and desired.

�� Bubonic
remained in the Malfoy family when the properties were parceled up among your
ancestors� cousins centuries ago because no one else wanted it,� she said
abruptly. �It is a haunted place.�

�� Draco
snorted. �You forget that ghosts have held no terrors for me since I went to
Hogwarts, Mother.�

�� There are other
ways in which things can be haunted,� Narcissa said, and her fingers dug into
the obsidian-smooth top of the table. �Your father intended to tell you about
it once you came of age, the way that other Malfoy heirs have been told. But he
saw your daring and your�courage, and he concluded that you would think you
could go in and tame the house, rather than simply accepting the treasures from
it.�

�� Treasures?�
Draco asked, cocking an eyebrow. Contrary to what his parents thought, he would
be content to reap rewards for lesser work, as long as those rewards were good
enough.

�� Narcissa
nodded quickly. �The house produces four black diamonds each year, at the turn
of each season. If you gather them, as your father did, and sell them, then you
can be rich enough to satisfy your wildest nightmares without the inheritance.
The diamonds are always found lying outside the house�s front door.�

�� Draco
tapped his finger against the table. If Bubonic had been that simple, his
mother would have had no reason to show horror at the bequest (other than that,
perhaps, it could have made Draco independently wealthy). And Lucius would have
had no reason to give him such a simple gift.

�� What
else?� he asked. �What happens if I enter the house?�

�� Narcissa
shut her eyes. �Lucius never considered me worthy to learn the innermost
secrets,� she hedged. �He never seemed to think that anyone without Malfoy
blood should know the truth.�

�� Knowing how
much more his father had valued her than Draco, Draco simply arched a brow in
doubt and waited.

�� But there
is something else in the house,� Narcissa continued. �Something that makes it
haunted, something that will produce great wealth�greater than the black
diamonds�if conquered. I don�t know what it is. I think the stories of wealth a
myth, myself. But those are the stories.�

�� Draco
nodded. �And did my father ever venture inside after this secret?�

�� Soon after
he came out of Azkaban,� Narcissa said. �It was the source of the weakness in
his lungs that killed him.�

�� Draco sat
up. �I thought that was simply the cold environment of Azkaban and his
disappointment with me.�

�� Narcissa
gave him a speaking glance, as though to say that Lucius�s disappointment had
had more than enough to do with it. Draco looked calmly in return, and once
again she backed down in front of him.

�� I never
saw anything like the scars on his lungs that the Healers showed me,� Narcissa
said softly. �They could have been the marks of claws, but of course, if they
had been, he would not have survived. I think that the house is haunted by a
spirit of disease, hence the name, and that anyone entering it will be
extremely lucky if they manage to survive.�

�� Draco
grunted. He still thought it was possible that Lucius�s weakness had come from
the prison alone, and that this tale was the one Narcissa told herself to
lessen her shock and fear that her husband had died so young. But the scars on
the lungs were an intriguing piece of evidence.

�� And a
spirit of disease�such spirits had to have someplace to live. Draco thought it
possible that a Dark artifact was in the house, a more powerful one than he had
ever encountered, and of course his fingers itched to possess it.

�� I�m not
saying what I�ll do yet, Mother,� he said. �Black diamonds sound like more than
enough wealth to tempt anyone.�

�� His mother
gave him a suspicious look. �But you value other things more than wealth.�

�� Draco
smiled and sipped his wine.

*

�� He still
hadn�t exactly decided what to do the next morning, when he opened the Daily Prophet and caught sight of the
photograph and the headline. The photograph was Potter turning away from the
camera, his head bowed and a look of devastation on his face. The headline
screamed: SAVIOR DYING FROM THE
WITHERING CURSE!

�� The
accompanying article cast everything into the brave, martyred Gryffindor mode
that Draco would have expected from Potter, saying that Potter wanted to spend
the fortnight he still had before the pain began doing something to help
others. He didn�t know what that would be yet, but he invited people to contact
him if they had projects he could help with.

�� Draco
smiled and smoothed a thumb down the page. He wasn�t really satisfied that Potter was dying, but he
had to admit a cool unsurprise. That one was never destined for a long life,
the way he charged into things.

�� And then he
sat still for a moment before he laughed. He was still smiling, unusually for
him before the work of the day had begun, as he stood and made his way to his
Owlery.

�� Potter
might say, or imply, that he�d rather work at charitable projects, but Draco
knew better. The impulse to adventure ran deepest in Potter�s being, rather
than the compassionate one. Having discovered a tendency to that himself as he
worked with Dark artifacts, Draco could sympathize, a bit.

�� If Draco
offered an opportunity for Potter to adventure in Bubonic with him, Potter
would probably snatch it. He could explain to his friends that he wanted to
redeem Malfoy, or something equally stupid. He could do whatever he wanted. But
Draco thought it was a hook that would catch him.

�� And
meanwhile, he would venture into the place with a powerful, Auror-trained
wizard at his back�one who feared no death the place could fling at him.

�� Draco
grinned down at his letter as he composed it.

�� Dear Potter,

�� So sorry to hear that you�re dying�
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Heraclitean Fire