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There's a Pure-Blood Custom For That	By : Lomonaaeren Category: Harry Potter > Slash - Male/Male > Harry/Draco Views: 41050 -:- Recommendations : 2 -:- Currently Reading : 5
Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter. I am making no money from this story.

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All Relative
            “Where did you get that ring, Harry?”
            “A friend,” said Harry, and went on, knowing he hadn’t satisfied Andromeda, but also that she would have to rest unsatisfied. “Can I talk to you and Teddy for a second?”
            Teddy’s chest swelled up. He was just old enough, at ten, to feel like he should be included in adult things. Harry grinned at him as he swept Teddy into the drawing room with them. Andromeda was looking back and forth between the two of them in what seemed like wonder. Harry settled her gently in a chair that was some distance from the fireplace and then turned around and gestured Teddy to sit wherever he wanted. Teddy sat on the hearth, his face so bright that Harry wasn’t surprised to see his hair turn Weasley red a few seconds later.
            I just hope he won’t be disappointed once he finds out what it really is, Harry thought, but he didn’t think Teddy would. He wasn’t in the habit of expecting unrealistic gifts. He turned back to Andromeda and said, “There’s a relative of yours who would like to bring his son to meet you.”
            Andromeda’s mouth fell open a little, and then her chin tightened. “Is this about who I think it is, Harry?” she asked, with dangerous quiet.
            “That depends on who you think it is,” Harry responded, and winked at her.
            “Who is it?” Teddy had bounced up from the hearth and was standing next to Harry, arms folded as if he could compel an answer that way. “What relatives do we have? Some of Dad’s?” He hadn’t, as far as Harry knew, had much contact with any Lupin relatives left living, but then, they hadn’t had much contact with Remus, either.
            “No,” said Andromeda softly. “My sister’s son. And his son. You are talking about that, Harry?” Her hands had curled like claws around the arms of her chair.
            “Yes,” said Harry, meeting her gaze squarely. “He’s at fault, too. He told his son that all his relatives on the Black side were dead. But both of them want to meet you, now. Or at least he’s agreed to tell his son that you exist, and see how it goes.” There wasn’t a doubt in Harry’s mind that Scorpius would want to come over the instant he learned about Teddy, but Malfoy would take more convincing.
            “I have a cousin?” Teddy interrupted quietly. His hair had turned black, and his eyes almost as deep a color as Snape’s. “Who?”
            “Draco Malfoy,” said Harry, turning to him. “And his son, Scorpius. They’re your cousins, yes.” He didn’t know the exact term for the degree of cousinship between Teddy and Draco—first cousin once removed or something, but he probably had it wrong—but he knew that wouldn’t matter to Teddy. “They had some problems with your grandmother, you know. That’s why they’ve never tried to meet you.”
            Teddy stared up at him. “They’re pure-bloods.”
            Harry nodded. “And Malfoy—I mean, Draco—did used to believe that there was something wrong with someone who had Muggle blood. I don’t think Scorpius ever did. He’s too young to believe it on his own, and I don’t think Draco taught him.” It was strange to have Draco’s first name in his mouth. After a few seconds, Harry figured out why. Malfoy hadn’t invited Harry to call him by his first name, and until he did, it would feel a little like Harry had taken a gift without asking for it. He supposed that he would only use the name when he absolutely had to, to clarify things, until he got that invitation.
            Teddy stared at the floor. “I don’t want to meet someone who thinks less of me for being Dad and Mum’s son,” he whispered.
            Harry knelt down in front of Teddy. “If I thought he did, then I wouldn’t let him come over how no matter how he begged,” he said softly. “But I don’t think he does. He wants—he wants the best of everything for his son, and if he thought you were inferior, he’d never agree to bring Scorpius over here.”
            Teddy squinted at him. “So, really, we’re depending on him being sincere because he’s arrogant?”
            Harry laughed in delight. Teddy was smart, that was part of the joy of him. “You could say that,” he said, and then stood up and clasped Teddy’s shoulders. “But I told you, I would never let him near you if I thought he still believed in blood purity. Can you trust me?”
            “I’ll always trust you,” Teddy said, and he leaned forwards and buried his head in Harry’s shoulder, admitting something he almost never did anymore, while his hair turned pale yellow. “I’m just scared.”
            Harry hugged him, and held him patiently until Teddy pulled back. “I really think it’ll be all right,” he said, and showed Teddy his hand again. “Malfoy gave me this ring. It’s a pledge of exclusive friendship. He used to hate me. If this ring doesn’t show that he’s changed, then I don’t know what will.”
            Andromeda cleared her throat softly behind him. Teddy, who knew the sound, scowled a little, but nodded to Harry and said, “Then I want to meet him. And my other cousin,” and retreated from the room. Harry turned to face Andromeda.
            She was still sitting, but she seemed to have acquired power and presence anyway. Harry blinked a little. He dealt with so many people who were fragile some of the time and needed his support that it was always a shock to be reminded that Andromeda was rarely that way.
            “I do not like this,” said Andromeda. “I know what that ring means, and that he wants to take you from us.”
            “If he does, then he lied to me,” said Harry evenly. “Because I saw him yesterday and asked about it, and he said that he didn’t want to trick me into marrying him or anything like that. He already lied to me once about what a mirror was made of that he gave me. I warned him that I wouldn’t consider myself bound by any silly pure-blood customs I don’t agree with.”
            Andromeda’s gaze fixed, brooding, on the ring. “By wearing that, you already are.”
            “What custom’s that? That people support bloody purity by wearing rings with vines on them, and a leaf here or there tells you exactly what they believe in?”
            Andromeda stared at him. Harry stared back. What did she expect from him? He had told the truth, and if he found out that Malfoy had left out information again, he was going to be very upset. But he wasn’t going to rip the ring from his finger and run shrieking in horror again, either, unless Andromeda could tell him what she feared.
            “An exclusive friendship,” she said instead. “A special friendship. One that he wants you to value more than any other.”
            “He can want me to value it more than my friendships with Ron and Hermione and George and the rest of the Weasleys and you,” said Harry calmly. “He can stand there and want it until the world ends. It doesn’t mean I will.”
            Andromeda looked baffled. Harry wondered if she was still pure-blood in some way, if growing up in a house with people who valued pure-blood customs had done something to her brain. As much as he liked Malfoy, he wouldn’t be surprised to find out it had done something to his, too.
            “But you’re wearing the ring,” Andromeda said, in the slow voice of someone willing to explore possibilities.
            Harry was glad to meet her on that ground. “Yes, but because it was a gift and because I do value his friendship. Not because I agree with it if it represents blood purity or marriage. Does it?”
            “No. But…” Andromeda still seemed to be lost at sea. Then she pulled herself together, and that aura of power showed up around her again. “Other people will assume that you’re in an exclusive friendship with the person who gave it to you.”
            “Other pure-bloods, you mean?”
            Andromeda nodded, and Harry shrugged. “If they act surprised because I’m friends with more than one person at once, I can explain it to them. The same way I would if the Daily Prophet reported that I was dating someone when I really wasn’t and I wanted to correct their silly gossip.”
            “There are people who would assume it anyway,” Andromeda warned him.
            Harry looked her directly in the eye, waited until he was sure she was paying attention, and then gave a massive shrug.
            “You don’t care about that,” Andromeda said, and she sounded a little dazed, a little uncertain. “Even though you would care about correcting the gossip in the Prophet.”
            “I would care about correcting it, but only so that my side of the story was out there,” Harry told her. “I know that there are some people who will never believe me, because that’s not what they want to believe about me. Likewise, I would tell people who asked about what the ring symbolizes, and if they want to go on thinking that means that I’m betrothed to Malfoy or something, they will. I can’t control people’s minds. I can only give them the chance to listen to the real story if they’ll hear it. And some people will believe me, and not bother me.”
            “I see what Hermione means about you.”
            “Oh?” Harry hadn’t thought Hermione had visited Andromeda recently, at least not when he wasn’t there.
            “That you’re so resilient that you don’t even want to change your behavior to avoid suspicions being thrown at you.” Andromeda’s gaze swept up and down him as though she expected to see spikes growing out of Harry’s body to prick the bubbles of those suspicions. “Perhaps it would be better if the rest of us could be like that, but we aren’t.”
            “No,” Harry agreed.
            They went on looking at each other for a little while, and then Andromeda sniffed and turned her head aside. “You can bring these Malfoys to my house because Teddy is looking forward to it so much,” she said softly. “But if they show the least bit of prejudice towards him…”
            “Then I’ll clear them out,” Harry reassured her. “I don’t think Scorpius would, but Malfoy is older and might still have some unfortunate beliefs. I don’t want him to hurt Teddy, though.”
            “Of course,” said Andromeda.
            She was still staring at him as if he was strange. Harry shrugged. He knew she had to bear her own burden of grief, since her daughter and husband had died, and sometimes he thought that she mourned Remus almost as much as he did. If it wasn’t that she had to be strong for Teddy, maybe she would have been more like Ron and Hermione.
            “Seriously, is there anything about this ring that Malfoy didn’t tell me?” Harry turned the ring so that it flashed in the sunlight coming through the window. “I will throw it away if he lied to me. I told him I wouldn’t put up with that.”
            “No, it means an exclusive friendship.” But Andromeda’s mouth pulled down anyway, and she looked away from him. “I’d appreciate it if you would keep an eye on him the whole time he’s here.”
            “I can do that,” Harry agreed easily. He thought about telling her that Malfoy would probably consider it no hardship to have Harry watch him, and then discarded the notion. She would only start interpreting things in a silly way again, ring or no ring.
*
            Harry had to admit that, concerns about the ring and the prejudices Malfoy might have retained and all, he was glad that he had been there to see Teddy and Scorpius meet. Scorpius came into the house with his head turning back and forth as if he thought his cousin might be hiding behind a wall, and then he stopped and stared when Teddy actually walked into the middle of the drawing room.
            Teddy stood staring at him for a moment, too. Then he turned his hair the color of Scorpius’s, although he retained the green eyes he currently had, the shade of Harry’s.
            “You’re my cousin Teddy,” said Scorpius. He said it with the certainty that had probably been trained into him, but Harry saw the way that his eyes flicked sideways, and he knew Teddy could destroy that budding confidence with a word.
            Teddy obviously saw no reason to. He nodded. “And you’re my cousin Scorpius.” He looked Scorpius over critically. “You’re a lot smaller than I thought you’d be.”
            Scorpius bristled at that, but he said, “I am unusually tall for my age.” He sounded like an adult for a second, until he added, “Daddy said so,” and glanced over his shoulder at Malfoy.
            Malfoy, who stood next to Harry, shivered out a breath. Then he said, “That’s true, Scorpius. It’s one of the things that’s true about you, although it might not always be true.”
            He switched his gaze to Teddy. Harry found himself tensing despite the ring and Malfoy’s sincerity and all his reassurances to Andromeda. If he had prejudices remaining, they would come out here, against Teddy, descendent of a Muggleborn and a werewolf. From the way that Teddy stared straight back at Malfoy, undaunted, he knew it, too.
            But Malfoy merely said, “I’m sorry that I never brought Scorpius to meet you before, Theodore. It was a mistake on my part.”
            “I prefer Teddy,” said Teddy, and studied Malfoy some more. Then he turned to Scorpius. “You’re small enough to sit on this dragon of mine that I kept when I got too big for it. Do you want to?”
            “A real dragon?” Scorpius looked awed, turning around as if he wondered how a dragon fit into the relatively small rooms of Andromeda’s house.
            “No, a toy,” said Teddy, but he seemed amused now, and his eyes changed to match Scorpius’s. Harry heard Andromeda make a small sound. He wondered if it was because Teddy looked like a Malfoy, or because he looked like Narcissa. “Come on, I’ll show you. You can ride it. I’m too big now, unless Uncle Harry casts a Lightening Charm.” He turned to Harry.
            “You could cast it yourself if you would practice with your grandmother’s wand,” Harry said mildly, but he relented when Teddy crossed his eyes, and cast the charm on him. “All right. Now go show Scorpius your dragon.”
            They tore away together, although Teddy ran much faster than Scorpius and he had to pause near the far door to let Scorpius catch up. Teddy looked at Harry and smiled, nodding and mouthing, “He’s all right,” before he and Scorpius vanished.
            That left Malfoy and Andromeda to look at each other. Harry thought about stepping between them and waving his arms to cut off their heated gaze, but he had known this would be awkward. Anyway, he wasn’t sure who he wanted to protect more.
            “Nephew,” said Andromeda at last, her mouth pursed as if she thought Malfoy would reject even that label.
            Malfoy slowly inclined his head. “Aunt.”
            Harry blinked. He didn’t think Andromeda, still so focused on Malfoy’s face and whatever ghosts she saw there, had noticed, but Malfoy had reached out and clutched his hand, down at waist level. He was rubbing his finger feverishly back and forth over the ring that Harry wore.
            After a moment of waiting for a genie to materialize or something, Harry decided that it probably was just a gesture to reassure himself. He turned his hand a little so that Malfoy lost hold of the ring. Malfoy’s fingers tensed as though he was going to snatch his hand back, but instead Harry clasped his wrist, and intertwined their fingers.
            Malfoy relaxed with a sudden blast of air from his lungs. Andromeda raised her eyebrows, but didn’t seem inclined to look for what had suddenly made him less nervous.
            “Well,” said Andromeda. “The kind of conversation we can make standing here and waiting for the children to return is limited. Will you not come into the parlor to wait for them?” She hesitated, then added, “And perhaps have some tea?”
            Malfoy nodded, as if he had just remembered that he was the one who had made the decision to seek Andromeda and Teddy out after so long. “I would like that,” he said, and followed Andromeda at a sedate pace. Harry started to part their hands, sure that Malfoy had recovered his natural arrogance and wouldn’t need his support anymore.
            Malfoy halted near the hearth, at the length of their arms, and looked back at him.
            Harry relented and came up to walk beside him. When he did, Malfoy once again took the opportunity to rub his ring.
            “That doesn’t cause me to fall in love with you mysteriously or something?” Harry whispered to him.
            Malfoy stumbled, and Harry narrowed his eyes. But Malfoy only gasped, in a faint voice that made Harry suspect he was trying to hold back laughter, “No, no. It—it only means the friendship I told you about.”
            Then he lifted his head, and his eyes burned into Harry’s.
            “But that you chose to wear it, even here, means more to me than you can imagine.”
            And he strode on his way, Harry’s hand clasped firmly in his. Harry followed, blinking, and trying to decide how he felt about it.
            Pleased, he decided at last.
            As long as there’s not really a genie or a love spell.
*
delia cerrano: Harry has pretty well divined Draco’s loneliness. He’ll wait until Draco actually says anything about it to acknowledge it, though, like waiting to use his first name until Draco gives him permission.
MoonlightVampiress: Harry was thinking of something focused more purely on sex, which isn’t at all what he wants.
SP777: Harry would only make fun of Ron like that if he said something really ridiculous! But yeah, it might be fun.
Jester: At the moment, Harry doesn’t really think he needs to make a reply, but he’ll do something suitable if something suitable presents itself.
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There's a Pure-Blood Custom For That