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A Brother to Basilisks	By : Lomonaaeren Category: Harry Potter > Slash - Male/Male > Harry/Draco Views: 85172 -:- Recommendations : 2 -:- Currently Reading : 15
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Chapter Eleven--Sparks That Will Settle
            "Just a moment of your time, Mr. Potter. That's all it's going to take."
            Harry could still hear the wheedling tone in Minister Fudge's voice when he'd said that. Harry had agreed, like the idiot he was, and that Dash was always telling him he was, and they'd gone out in front of the school so that the photographers could take their pictures and the reporters could interview the Minister about what an astonishing turn-around this was, finding Sirius Black innocent. They didn't seem interested in talking to Sirius or Harry at all.
            No one was interested in talking to Dash, either, but they all wanted to snap photographs of him, and Dash, curled around Harry's arms and neck and waist and legs as if he wanted as much of his body as he could get to be in contact with as much of Harry as he could get, had a lot of comments on them.
            Who is that woman with the green glasses? Does she know that she looks like a beetle in them?
            Harry glanced a little sideways at the woman Dash was talking about, hoping he could do it without giving himself away. She did look ridiculous, but no, he doubted she knew it. She was holding up a parchment with a quill scribbling quickly on it. I don't know her.
            You know that you have to find out, right? Dash's tongue was on the back of his neck, perfectly placed to make Harry start and ruin a picture that the nearest photographer was just snapping, of Fudge beaming over Harry's shoulder.
            Fudge looked down chidingly. "I know you're not used to this much attention, my boy, but you'll have to get used to it! You're the Boy-Who-Lived!" And he turned back to the camera with a smile. Harry thought he would have already put one hand on Harry's shoulder, but the presence of Dash vetoed that.
            The more often you do that, the longer I have to stand here, he thought to Dash, and pasted another false smile on his face.
            I know. But it's a brilliant chance to start your political education. Dash pointed towards another reporter with his tail, without making it look like he was pointing. Who's that?
            Harry did look, squinting, but all he could really see was that the wizard was short and white-haired and wore absolutely brilliant yellow robes that made some of Dumbledore's look sane. I don't know. Why don't we find out?
            He waited until the next photograph had been snapped and the Minister was opening his mouth to speak again, and then tugged gently on his sleeve. "Excuse me, sir, but who's that?" he asked, nodding at the yellow-robed wizard. He had good manners when he wanted, he thought. Aunt Petunia would have been proud of him. He even smiled meekly when Fudge peered down at him as if surprised that Harry could talk on his own.
            At least Fudge indulged him, looking over towards the yellow-robed wizard. He then laughed aloud, nearly making Harry jump again. It sounded like genuine laughter, which he hadn't known Fudge was capable of.
            "Oh, him," Fudge said, shaking his head. "You don't need to worry about him, Harry." Again his hand twitched as if he was going to pat Harry on the shoulder or ruffle his hair, and again had thought better of it. "His name's Xenophilius Lovegood, and he publishes a rubbish paper called the Quibbler that no one pays attention to. He might ask you questions about your basilisk, since he's interested in all manner of magical creatures. But he's harmless!"
            Harry nodded slowly, and wondered if perhaps he might want to speak to Lovegood more than some of the other reporters. None of them had asked him, anything, and certainly not about Dash, whom they preferred to pretend didn't exist outside pictures.
            There were more questions the Minister answered, mostly about things that seemed deeply boring to Harry, and then he got a chance to break away. The Minister waved his hand grandly, and Harry broke into a run towards Lovegood before he could change his mind, or the Minister could and pull him back for another session of false smiles. It wasn't as bad as posing with Lockhart, but that didn't represent a huge improvement, for Harry.
            He halted in front of Lovegood, who looked down at him with an impressive frown. His eyebrows jutted out like ledges. Harry caught his breath and asked the first thing that came into his mind. "Do you want to interview me about my basilisk?"
            Yes, he should, Dash said, and stretched his head out and turned it to the side so that Lovegood could admire the soft green gleams in his dark scales if he wanted to. Someone needs to publish a tribute so that when I come into my full, awesome dreafulness of being, the world is ready to deal with it.
            Lovegood stared at him, then at Dash, and there was a longing in his eyes that Harry thought was different from the longing that Lupin or Sirius used to look at him, as if he was special but distant, or even the way Dumbledore looked at him sometimes, which Harry didn't understand at all. "I would love to talk to you about your basilisk," said Lovegood, and his eyes burned. "But I didn't think you liked being interviewed."
            "I don't, when someone else is doing all the talking." Harry shifted so that Dash's tail, which was dragging on the ground between his feet, would fit around his leg again. "But you'd let me talk, right?"
            Lovegood, still watching him with that intense gaze, nodded and took out his notebook. "You can say whatever you want. Although I can't promise I'll publish all of it. I have a responsibility to the public."
            Harry grinned. That was more the sort of thing he'd hoped to hear. He didn't like being interviewed, but he also thought that someone should know about the sorts of things the Ministry didn't want to say.
            Like Dash says, I know to learn some more about this, or I'm just going to have people talking over me all the time.
            You are learning the first lesson of having a basilisk, said Dash. Which is that the basilisk is always right.
            Harry ignored that, and nodded to Lovegood. "Can I tell you how I found him?" He was sort of hoping that if Lovegood published that story, maybe someone who knew about basilisk eggs would see it and contact him. Harry still had questions about Dash and the way he'd hatched that Dash was no help with.
            "Yes," said Lovegood, and waited, expectantly.
            He didn't even ask any questions, he just wanted Harry to talk! Harry's opinion of him was improving. Lovegood might be crazy, but at least he was polite. "All right. So I'm a Parselmouth, and I heard someone calling me one night..."
            Once he started talking, Lovegood started writing. He did ask a few questions, like about the Chamber of Secrets and the basilisk that had been in there, but most of the time he just wrote. Harry watched it with satisfaction. There would be an article about Dash, who was the reason that Harry had Sirius at all, and there might be answers, and Harry approved of both.
            Harry finally ran out of words, and Lovegood looked up and nodded. "This is very important," he said. "New stories about magical creatures always are. The next edition of the Quibbler will carry your words." He hesitated. "Have you met my daughter Luna? She's in the year below yours. She would love to meet Dash."
            Harry searched his mind, but he couldn't remember any girl named Lovegood, although he'd thought he would have remembered her. On the other hand, maybe she didn't wear yellow robes this bright. "No. What House is she in?"
            "Ravenclaw." Lovegood gave him a strained smile. "She probably wouldn't be around you all that much, anyway. Gryffindor has most of their classes with Slytherin, don't they?"
            "Yes, sir," said Harry absently, but he was still searching his mind. He thought he had heard someone talk about a girl named Lovegood, but it was a year ago, and it hadn't stuck in his mind, the way almost nothing had at the time except the voice he was hearing in the walls. "I'll look for her."
            "Thank you," said Lovegood, which was so strange that Harry blinked at him. Lovegood leaned heavily towards him for a second. "I think she would be glad to have a...friend."
            That was strange, but Harry didn't think he needed to worry about it. "All right," he said. "Thank you, sir." He turned around, then hesitated. Dash was silent on his shoulder, which meant he didn't object to Lovegood the way he did to a lot of other people, and that meant Harry could offer a treat that he didn't to most people. "Did you want to pet Dash? He likes the way you look at him." That much he knew was true without Dash even saying it, because Harry could feel it like a hum of contentment from his basilisk's mind.
            Dash flickered out his tongue to taste the air and inclined his head in a small, gracious nod that Harry thought even Lovegood, who wasn't very familiar with Dash's personality, could understand. Yes, by all means, let him touch me.
            That sounded a little less promising, and Harry kept a sharp eye on Dash as Lovegood reached out with a trembling hand. But the tremor seemed to appease Dash, who said, Well, here is someone who is properly respectful. Tell him that he may scratch the small scales behind my head. I haven't yet trained you to attend to them properly. He turned his head to the side and almost lifted those scales up, something Harry hadn't known he could do.
            "He'll let me touch him?" Lovegood choked out. "There?"
            "Yes," said Harry, and watched as Lovegood scratched in between the scales, smiling and shaking his head a little. He didn't understand the fire that burned in Lovegood's eyes yet, but he thought he was beginning to. For whatever reason, Lovegood was someone who just wanted to look at animals, and think they were beautiful, and watch them. Harry supposed he was the same way with Quidditch players.
            "Please tell him thank you," said Lovegood, and pulled his hand back. There were unshed tears in his eyes. "To be this close to a basilisk, a unique basilisk, born in such an unusual way..."
            Yes, you may tell him that he is welcome any time he wants to pet me again. Dash curled his head around so his chin was almost upside-down. He is a proper acolyte.
*
            The moment he stepped into the Potions classroom, Severus felt the change in the air. He held his wand close to his face as he swept down the aisle--a time when most of the students except a few Slytherins were too intimidated to look at him closely anyway--and cast a small spell that would tell him whether he was right.
            Yes. Over to the right side of the classroom crouched a shadow, if one looked for it. Severus might not have, if not for those spy's instincts that had let him know right away that something was different.
            Potter, at least, was not betraying any sign that it was there, but arguing with Granger in a heated whisper. He shut up the moment he saw Severus, and sat up. Severus kept a careful eye on him. He would see if the boy's respectful behavior the other day translated into more respectful learning in the classroom.
            Potter was at least paying attention, which was more than Severus could say for some of the Gryffindors. He would never understand why they chose the most physically dangerous class in the school--with the possible exception of NEWT Transfiguration--to dislodge their attention. He cast a simple spell that made a sharp crack echo through the air, apparently originating in his cloak, and watched as arses left chairs.
            "You are brewing the Enlarging Solution today," said Severus. "The opposite of the Shrinking Solution that so many of you ruined a month ago." He sneered at the cowering Longbottom. The boy's cowardice was infuriating. He inspired fear in his classmates, and that was unforgivable. "The ingredients list is on the board." He waved his wand again, and they appeared. "You are to work alone on this potion."
            Granger's mouth opened. Severus looked at her. Granger's mouth closed.
            "I will know if you cheat and help each other," Severus added darkly, and to himself, For example, if Longbottom creates a potion that is passable.
            He began to pace slowly around the classroom, even though the students were scurrying for their ingredients and no one had actually begun to brew as yet. Draco was sneaking a glance at Potter, but that in and of itself was harmless. Severus would not interfere until the boy began to make enough of a nuisance of himself to disrupt the class.
            No, his target was that shadow in the corner, the one that was cast by nothing, or at least was if you knew the contours of the walls and the door and the tables as well as Severus did.
            It didn't move as he came closer to it, either, but Severus murmured the incantation for the Summer Breeze Charm, and something silken swayed atop it. Severus then cast the Body-Bind Charm, because he knew what it was now: Sirius Black hiding under Potter's Invisibility Cloak.
            Black struggled for a moment, but he had collapsed with the Cloak over him, and Severus's glare intimidated the few children who glanced in his direction. Potter wasn't among them. He had gone to get his ingredients and was squinting at the instructions with commendable anxiety.
            Severus cast another charm that would deflect light from Black's body and the Cloak and make them hard to see, and then floated them both into the air next to him. "I will be in my office for the moment," he said. "Try not to add bloodstains to the ones currently on the floor." He turned and stalked into his office with Black bobbing after him like a Muggle toy on the end of a string. Severus made no attempt to ease the journey for Black.
            He had the answer to a question he had wandered about. Yes, Potter would thank Severus for his efforts on Black's behalf, but Black never would.
            It wasn't worsening their rivalry to dump Black on the floor of his office and tear the Cloak off with a flick of his wand, sending it floating up to the ceiling. It wasn't even harming the delicate bond that Severus must hope to construct between himself and Potter. For one thing, he believed that Potter had not known Black was there.
            For another, he thought part of the boy would disapprove of Black's antics. As long as Severus did not actually hurt Black, there was no reason that the boy would take Black's side over Severus's.
            That was so unusual a thing to think about James Potter's son that Severus paused for a long moment before he cast a Silencing Charm on the door of the office, and then released Black from the Body-Bind.
            Black leaped to his feet, his black hair swaying around his face. Severus watched him clinically. While the madness induced by Azkaban would not have not changed the man for the better in most people's eyes, it had a significant virtue from Severus's point-of-view. More viewers would now see the deranged maniac that had been there all along.
            "You have no right to do this to me," Black snarled, and really, Severus ought to have known he was a dog Animagus, the same way he ought to have known Pettigrew for a rat the minute he saw the cringing, sniveling man as an adult. "I'm Harry's guardian and I have the right to check up on his education--"
            "And were you planning to observe Lupin's classes in the same way?" Severus leaned an elbow on the table and watched Black. "Minerva's? Sinistra's?"
            Black's baffled, angry silence was as good an answer as anything. Severus nodded and began prowling in a circle that would take him closer to Black at the endpoint. Black snarled and edged a hand towards his wand.
            "You might want to take a care," Severus said softly.
            "If you hurt me in this school, you're going to feel the wrath of Albus Dumbledore," said Black, with so much certainty that Severus had to stop an acid retort from escaping his lips.
            I know that. He was sure that was why Albus had been so eager to give second chances to Black the minute he found out the man might be innocent, in fact: Albus had a level of affection for Black that he had showed no one else in Severus's experience. Not even Potter. Not even Lupin.
            Not even the younger Potter.
            "I am not telling you to take a care with me," said Severus. "I am telling you to take a care with your godson."
            Black's eyes chilled, and he looked now more like Bellatrix than anyone sane had a right to do. On the other hand, Severus had already thought that Black was dangerously close to the edge of madness. "If you're suggesting that I'll reject him because he has that snake, I already told him he could keep it."
            "But are you flexible enough to accept that he might be less the son of James Potter than he's currently perceived to be?" Severus smiled, and watched as Black twitched. It was like Severus's words were tiny poison darts, afflicting Black effortlessly, and Severus didn't even need to lie. "That he never knew his father, and therefore can't imitate him?"
            Black laughed wildly. "That's rich, Snivellus! When the word around the school is that you can't see any difference between James and Harry!"
            The urge to strike because of that despised nickname was very strong, but Severus held his hand. He had more words to give. "Can you accept that he is a Parselmouth? That he was almost Sorted into Slytherin?"
            Black jerked against an invisible barrier this time, one that made him snap his teeth dangerously near Severus's head. "You're lying. Harry would never."
            Severus laughed, enjoying this immensely. "You don't know nearly as much about your precious Harry as you think you do."
            Black's hands closed into trembling fists. "I know that he would never trust you or do anything that you wanted him to."
            Severus considered whether to tell Black about Potter's apology, and decided that he would not. That would create more trouble for Potter, and most of Severus's declarations so far were well-known facts, minus the one about the Sorting. And that was known to Albus, to whom Black would certainly speak.
            Severus would seek to drive a slender wedge between Potter and his godfather if he could, because someone with Potter's potential should not be influenced solely by Sirius bloody Black. But a wedge that was made of truth and could not be traced back to him, Severus had no compunction about using.
            "Perhaps you are right," said Severus, and managed to cant his head and shrug in such a way, he thought, that Black could not boast of the victory he had won by subduing Severus, because he had not subdued him, only made him acknowledge the truth. "But nor do I think he would like you spying on him beneath his Invisibility Cloak. Did you even ask before you borrowed it? Or did you take it without asking because you once again confused the son with the father, and didn't think he would mind?"
            The pallor of Black's face told him the answer. Severus smiled in a way he knew was unpleasant and lifted his wand. Black snapped taut, but all Severus did was cast the Disillusionment Charm on him, send the Cloak floating back to him, and nod to the door of the classroom.
            "Leave, Black. I won't tell Potter about this as long as you leave now and never return."
            He could leave the threat unspoken, he thought, both of what he would do should Black return and the threat of blackmail that he could now hold over Black's head. He heard the low, rumbling snarl from the ripple of shadow that was Black's hidden form, and then he turned and strode out of the classroom.
            Severus, well-satisfied, returned to the class, and found that no one had melted a table or a cauldron in the interim--although Longbottom did so less than five minutes later, creating a blast of green liquid and fumes that required trips to the hospital wing for three students.
            Well. It was still a better day than many on which he had Potter's class to teach.
*
            "And I know that Potter could get me a basilisk if he wanted to..."
            It was nothing personal, really it wasn't, but if Draco kept going on in that obsessive, obnoxious way about Potter, Blaise was going to have to kill him and bury the body somewhere. And thanks to his mum, he knew a lot about discreet burial of bodies.
            "He just wants to keep the basilisks all to himself. As though you needed to be a Parselmouth to be able to communicate with a snake that speaks in your mind!"
            Should I point out that Potter could only create the bond in the first place because he's a Parselmouth? Blaise wondered, and shifted so that his head was almost hanging upside-down off the couch in the Slytherin common room, to see if Draco would notice. Verdict: negative.
            "He thinks he's so special sometimes! I need him to notice me."
            True, but still annoying, Blaise decided, and rolled over. Draco was pacing in front of him, waving his arms. Some of the older Slytherins were giving him amused looks, but that didn't penetrate Draco's cloud of Potter-focused obliviousness the way any mocking attention usually did.
            This is bad, Blaise decided, and broke into the tirade. "If you want a basilisk, why not go steal one yourself?"
            Draco broke off and looked at him. "What?" He noticed the amused glances his way, now, and glared back. Several of the upper-years didn't bother to hide their snickers as they went back to their homework or NEWT reading, Lucius Malfoy's power or not.
            "Well, that's the way Potter got one in the first place, ready?" Blaise hadn't read the details of Potter's story about the basilisk in the Quibbler closely, because he honestly didn't care, but Draco had read him the article aloud anyway, so he knew this much. "He went down and found these eggs, and just took one. If you find your way into the Chamber of Secrets, then you could do the same thing."
            "You have to be a Parselmouth to find the Chamber of Secrets," Draco drawled slowly, sounding more like himself again.
            "Just like you have to be a Parselmouth to bond a basilisk?" Blaise asked with a pointed look.
            That made Draco stand up as though Blaise had shoved a wand up his arse. "Right," he said. "I'll find it. And I'll show you."
            He flounced up to their bedroom. Blaise chuckled. Draco was extremely unlikely to find his way into the Chamber of Secrets by himself, and in the meantime, Blaise could enjoy some peace and quiet.
            If Draco did manage it?
            Then Potter will have to rescue him, and Draco will resent him for it, and I'll have enjoyment of a different kind, Blaise decided cheerfully, and went back to carefully correcting his Potions homework.
*
            staar: There will be some problems, but not as many as Severus hopes for.
            ChaosLady: Yes, the plot is getting more complex now.
            moodysavage: Harry trusts Dash--mostly--so he does indeed trust what Dash says about someone.
            Jan: Thank you!
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A Brother to Basilisks