Adult-FanFiction.org : Harry Potter

A Brother to Basilisks	By : Lomonaaeren Category: Harry Potter > Slash - Male/Male > Harry/Draco Views: 85173 -:- Recommendations : 2 -:- Currently Reading : 15
Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter. I am making no money from this story.

Chapter List
- 111
- 112
- 113
Thank you again for all the reviews!
Chapter One Hundred and Twelve—The Challenge Direct
“Oh, Harry!”
Harry hugged Hermione as she nearly tackled him to the floor. Dash, long since recovered from his injuries of almost a month ago, watched them tolerantly. Hermione still flushed when she looked at Dash, and helped Harry carefully up and brushed him off.
“Dash was a lot more injured than I was,” Harry said, and grinned at her when he saw her blush deepen until she looked like her face was made of sunlight.
“I know, but—” Hermione bustled around for a second, and then pulled a piece of parchment out of her bag and held it out to him. “What do you think of this? I’ve been working on it all through August, and I really wanted your opinion!”
Harry scanned the parchment in puzzled silence. It seemed to be equations, probably Arithmancy, but he wouldn’t know since he didn’t take Arithmancy. He shook his head and handed the parchment back to Hermione. “I’d let you know if I could make sense out of any of them.”
Ron, standing on Hermione’s other side, snorted. “I think one reason Mum agreed to let us come to Hogwarts two days early is because she got tired of seeing all the equations,” he said in a loud whisper.
“They’re perfectly rational!” Hermione huffed, and then looked a little uncomfortable. “They’re just not complete yet. I’m missing the final variable.”
“What are they?” Harry asked, and craned his head to look at the parchments again. No, they were still missing the magical key that would spell out what they were supposed to be.
“A way of locating the other Horcruxes.”
Harry looked up at her with wide eyes. “You’re brilliant, Hermione,” he said, and then glanced at Ron, who didn’t look surprised. “She told you?”
Ron snorted again. “Yeah, but I said I wouldn’t tell you because I wanted to see the look on your face when you heard.”
“How does it work?” Harry asked, and took up the parchment again and turned it around. But the mixture of numbers, runes, letters, and what looked like geometric patterns made no more sense upside-down than it did right-side up.
“Short version,” Ron added quickly, as Hermione opened her mouth to list things.
“Oh.” Hermione flushed a little, again, and sat down on the side of Harry’s bed. Harry had moved back to Gryffindor Tower since school would be starting so soon anyway. “Well, basically, Horcruxes are really Dark magic. Really Dark.”
“I didn’t know that,” Harry said solemnly.
“Well, it has to do with the splitting of the soul—” Hermione said in all earnestness, and then glared at him. Harry put up a hand, grinning.
“I do want to hear what you discovered,” he said. “I just didn’t need to hear things I already knew.”
Hermione glared one more time, then began again. “Dark magic has a kind of—weight on the world. It stretches the normal connections between magic and its environment. It’s like putting a huge blanket over yourself when you go to sleep at night instead of a thin one. You would notice a difference, wouldn’t you?” She waited for Harry to nod before she took a quill out of her bag and started scribbling. “Arithmancy usually charts the normal order of the world. It’s just things you don’t know already. But you can figure it out because the values of the numbers and the connections between magic and the world stay stable.”
“Okay,” Harry said uncertainly as he watched her draw a circle that, for some reason, was connected to two equations with dotted lines. “I think I see.”
“But Horcruxes distort those relationships,” Hermione said. “So it’s a lot harder to figure out anything that applies to them. They stir up the equations, and that’s probably another reason You-Know-Who chose them, as an extra layer of protections. But if I can just find the right variable to plug into the equations, then I’ll have new ones, ones that can predict the Horcruxes. How many there are and where they are. Because it’ll describe the magical distortion they put on their environment.”
Harry smiled. “You are brilliant.”
Hermione smiled back at him. “Thanks, Harry.” Then she sighed at the parchment again. “Of course, none of us can actually use this until I find a way to come up with the missing variable.”
“You’ll do it,” Ron said, and grinned at Harry over Hermione’s head. “Because you’re brilliant.”
Harry grinned back. He was glad his friends were here. And while he didn’t have any great news like Hermione’s to tell them—he was still unsure about his relationship with Sirius, and he specifically couldn’t tell them about his practice with Dark Arts—he could spend a few days playing Exploding Snap and listening to Hermione’s lectures and reassuring them about Dash’s health.
Good plans.
*
“You know very well that the dummy is only made of cloth and glass,” said Severus calmly as Harry stood there, his wand clutched in his hand, and stared at the figure across the classroom from him. “You can do this.”
“Right,” Harry muttered, with a slight shiver. Then he raised his wand and said, in a flat voice, “Ossa evanesco!”
The force behind the spell was stronger this time, Severus thought critically as he watched the beam of yellow light streak from Harry’s wand and crash against the nearest dummy. The dummy jerked, and the chips of glass that Severus was using to substitute for bones came flying out.
“Better,” Severus said, with a nod. “In time, you will make the bones vanish completely, instead of simply making them fly out of the body.” He watched as Harry paced carefully to stand in front of the next dummy.
“Ossa evanesco!”
This time, the beam of yellow light was a little broader and brighter, and the chips of glass came soaring out, but only about half of the amount Severus knew were stuffed into the dummy. The rest sparked and vanished. Severus smiled. “Very good, Harry.”
Harry said nothing as he took up his position opposite the third dummy. Severus stepped forwards to get his attention before he cast the spell. Incompetent as Harry might be for now, Dark Arts was nothing he wanted to get in front of. “What is wrong?” he asked quietly. “Why do you resist being good at this magic as you have at nothing else?”
“It’s Dark Arts,” Harry said. “I believe you when you say that it’s not evil,” he added quickly. “But it’s still magic that only really exists to hurt people.”
“That is what your enemies are trying to do to you.”
“So I should try to do it to them just because? Just what? As revenge?” Harry swung to face him, and his words were escaping so fast that Severus realized how much Harry must have been bottling up. “It’s horrible, Severus. What they did to Dash. What—” He swallowed. “What Dash did to them.”
Severus sat down on the chair that he had conjured which was enough out of the way of the spells that he hadn’t needed to dodge anything yet. “If you have a problem with what Dash did, you must take it up with him,” he said quietly. “But, Harry, it is not wrong simply to fight back. Was what the Death Eaters trying to kill you and Draco and your friends did also wrong?”
“Of course it was! But I expect it from them.”
Severus paused, then nodded a second later. So this wasn’t so much about the spells. It was about the way that Harry was being forced to see himself. He wanted to be a good person, so strongly that he had gone into Gryffindor the minute he heard insinuations about “evil” people in Slytherin.
“I can promise,” he said softly, “that no one who matters will see you as a bad person for doing this. And Dash will never see you that way no matter what happens. Except perhaps your public, and I thought you didn’t care about them.”
Harry jerked, and looked at him. “Then why did you tell me not to tell Ron and Hermione?”
“I was anticipating their immediate reactions, not their long-term ones.” Severus hesitated. “And I still do not trust their discretion. I must tell you that. If Granger even told her parents, there is the chance of her owl being intercepted.”
Harry snorted a little and nodded. Then he faced the third dummy and snapped, “Ossa evanesco!”
The dummy’s side tore open, which wouldn’t happen when Harry reached his full control of the spell, but no chips of glass came soaring out. Severus found himself smiling. “You are incredibly competent when you want to be,” he praised him.
Harry nodded. His jaw was set, but at least it was in the way he set it when he intended to master new magic, no matter how much he might hate it. “Thank you, sir.” And then he stepped back to wait for Severus to repair the dummies so that he could go back to vanishing their pretend bones.
Severus squeezed his shoulder as he passed him. Harry bowed his head, shook a little, and then straightened and nodded.
Severus restored the chips of glass to the dummies, and moved out of the way.
*
Draco carried Ultio and Conflagration entwined around his arms as he walked into the Great Hall. He smiled as he saw Harry sitting at the Gryffindor table, and nodded at him. Then he took his seat among the Slytherins, watching with faint amusement as Crabbe and Goyle shuffled in. They looked as if they didn’t know what table they were supposed to go to until they saw him.
“You look proud of yourself.”
Draco leaned back a little, casually, so that he could see Theodore Nott more easily, and nodded. “I learned a lot of new things over the summer. And I have a new companion.” He turned his arm so that Theo could see Ultio. The little snake obliged by waking up and yawning, stretching his jaws and his tongue, before snuggling up to go back to sleep.
“I see.” Theo’s eyebrows were raised. “Do you think you’re going to get away with keeping him in school?”
“I don’t see why not. The rules have already been stretched to accommodate a much bigger snake.” Draco nodded to the entrance as Dash slid in and made the first-year students waiting for the Sorting shriek and wail and flinch to the side.
“That Umbridge woman,” Theo said, turning to the head table. “I’ve heard she doesn’t like snakes. She’ll probably try to make Potter give his up, too.”
Draco looked up at the professors. It wasn’t like he hadn’t known she would be there; Harry had told him the minute he found out. But it was still unpleasant to see the woman’s squat face and the grin on her lips when she leaned forwards as if evaluating all the students for rule-breaking.
“You head about the little club the Headmistress is starting up?” he asked Theo.
“Like she’ll let Slytherins join it. Or maybe just you, since you’re Potter’s boyfriend.”
Draco had to smile. “No, she said in her letter to me that all students from all Houses were welcome. But I think she’s probably relying on me to spread the word about it, since she doesn’t know which Slytherins would consider it and which would go running to Umbridge.”
“There’s a fine example of House prejudice right there.”
“No. There’s a fine example of how much some of our House hates Harry, now that the Dark Lord has returned.”
Theo went still, only clapping a little as a tiny first-year girl was Sorted into Slytherin. “You think that’s the real reason?”
“Of course it is. I’ve chosen my side, but you know where a lot of our Housemates’ allegiance is going to be.” Draco held Theo’s eyes. After all, just like Draco, his father had been a Death Eater, and not one that Lucius had seen fit to contact about their new ability to take away someone’s Dark Mark.
Theo turned his head away.
“Where do you fall, Theo?” Draco asked softly.
“I haven’t decided yet.”
“Then you should, soon. I don’t think this is a war that will leave a lot of people patience for neutrality.”
Draco turned back to his food. He ignored the way Theo scowled at him, even though he could easily feel it. He wasn’t worried about his personal safety in Slytherin, not with two snakes around to protect him most of the time.
He felt the shape of the vial hanging around his neck through his shirt, and smiled a little.
And not with the new magic that he’d learned over the summer.
*
“Mr. Potter, if I could speak to you for a minute?”
Harry felt as though something had left a slimy trail down his back. He took a deep breath, and reminded himself of all sorts of things, including that Dash was there, and Severus would shield him, and other people had endured worse things, like Sirius being in Azkaban for twelve years, and turned around.
“Yes, Professor Umbridge?”
She walked up to him and smiled at him. Harry thought that maybe her head was a little tilted so that she could purposely exclude Dash from her vision.
“You want to be very careful with that snake around these little children,” she said, and nodded to a cluster of lost Hufflepuffs making their way through the corridor, checking their timetables and the castle walls at the same time. “You never know when he might snap and go after them.”
“I’ll be careful, Professor.” At least at first, Harry was going to try and keep his temper around Umbridge, so that she would be the one who antagonized him and got the blame if something happened.
“And you should also know that the Ministry is going to mandate an educational decree very soon that will make it illegal to have pets in school.”
Not when they can’t find her body, Dash said cheerfully.
Harry kept his face calm with an effort, and said, “Oh, no, Professor! But then how are we going to write to our families?”
“What are you talking about, Mr. Potter?”
“I mean, what about the poor post-owls? There are lots of students who have owls as pets. If we have to get rid of them, then we have no way to communicate with people outside the school!”
Which might be part of the point, Dash mused.
“Of course we are not going to ban owls as pets, Mr. Potter.”
“And the cats,” Harry said, staring into the distance and shaking his head as if this was tragic. “My friend Hermione has a cat. Crookshanks. I hate to think of her having to pack him home to her parents. And my friend Neville has a toad. He’ll be lost without Trevor. I mean, it’s Trevor that usually gets lost, but—”
“You will cease this nonsense at once, Mr. Potter.”
“I don’t understand, Professor.” Harry blinked and looked up at her. “I’m trying to anticipate the future. It’s something my guardian wants me to do more often after the attacks this summer. Can you tell me how the decree will work if it’s not going to ban owls and cats and toads?”
Umbridge’s cheeks puffed out. “We’ll have to look at the wording together and see,” she said sweetly, and then turned and walked away. “I will see you in Defense class this afternoon, Mr. Potter.”
Pretty well for a first confrontation, Dash said, as they started towards Charms again. You could have let me lunge at her and snap at her feet, though. That would have made her jump in an entertaining way.
Harry scowled down at him. You’re not as funny as you think you are.
I’m as funny as I know I am, though.
*
Minerva nodded as she watched the students filter into the classroom that she’d chosen for the Defense club. It was on the fifth floor in a far wing of the castle, about as far as it was possible to get from Umbridge’s classroom and still be in the same building. She had chosen one that went back a long distance, so the entrance was almost a tunnel. That would give her plenty of room to see someone unwelcome coming.
The predictions she had made to herself had proven accurate. There were a few Slytherins in the group, notably Mr. Malfoy and some of the first-years, but not many. There were likewise few Ravenclaws; they wouldn’t yet have got to the point of realizing the Defense book Umbridge had chosen contained no information. Gryffindors and Hufflepuffs mingled and chattered among themselves.
Minerva frowned a little when she realized that George and Fred Weasley were part of the Gryffindor group, and gave them a stern look. They gave her wide grins in return. Minerva shook her head and whipped her wand around her head, loosing the prepared spell that she’d put on a timer.
Students stopped talking and started gasping instead as they watched the classroom rearrange itself. Walls staggered and melted, Transfigured into cushioned, padded swatches of fabric on three sides and mirrors on the other. Minerva found mirrors helpful when she was practicing smaller wand movements and wanted to see exactly where she was going wrong.
The desks that had been in the center of the classroom flew apart and Transfigured into benches, chairs, and light wooden shields that could be shattered impressively by spells. Minerva had trained using those. The distance the splinters flew would tell her something about the relative strength of the spells wielded to break them.
Hanging from the ceilings were more shields, dummies, bags of straw and sand and flour, ropes for climbing, bars of metal and rock, and a few coils of wire. Minerva had seen classmates of hers use the coils impressively as weapons, although she hadn’t been that fond of them herself. But she was going to try to accommodate all kinds of learners in this club, some of whom would be very different than she was.
She turned around and smiled when she was done. The students had either taken seats on the benches or remained standing. Even the Slytherins looks a little impressed.
“Welcome to the Defense Club.” Minerva had given up on creative names for it. From the Weasley twins’ faces, they could imagine some. She might even adopt any suggestion that wasn’t obscene or a pun. “As long as you are here, you will be committed to learning Defense techniques at least two years ahead of where you are now.”
“But what about—” Angelina Johnson began, her face creased in a frown.
“Those of you who are seventh-years will be learning magic usually reserved for Aurors,” Minerva said, and had to smile at the looks on their faces. Mr. Malfoy was whispering with one of the first-year Slytherins. “I have an Auror who’s agreed to help instruct you.” Actually, the Auror had been a member of the Order of the Phoenix who’d suffered some problems in the Ministry when her affiliation became known after Albus’s death, but they didn’t need to know that.
“Wotcher!” said Auror Tonks cheerfully, standing up from behind the chair where she’d been crouched, her hair and skin tone perfectly mimicking the wood. It flowed and changed as they gaped at her. Harry, Minerva was pleased to see, already had his wand drawn. “My name’s Auror Tonks. You’ll learn from me, or I’ll know why not.”
She took a step forwards, probably meaning to look impressive, and tripped over the foot of one of the benches Minerva had Transfigured. Minerva sighed a little as she went down in a heap and the children snickered.
“Sorry about that,” Tonks said, and lifted her head, grinning as her hair shifted to blue. “I promise I actually am good at Disguises! I’m a Metamorphmagus, too. I’ll be able to teach you.” She winked and turned her nose into a pig’s snout.
The Weasley twins immediately began to scribble something on a piece of parchment. Probably trying to figure out a way to do that to someone without having their own Metamorphmagus talents, Minerva decided.
“You will also be split into groups to learn different spells, and to hone talents you may already have,” Minerva told them. She looked straight at Harry. “Mr. Potter, would you mind coming up to demonstrate a spell for us?”
Harry blinked, hesitated, and then moved forwards. Dash slithered alongside him, then curled up in a corner to be out of the way. Tonks was staring at him in frank fascination.
“What spell did you want me to show, Professor?” Harry was shifting his feet and looking around as though he thought she would make him expose all his secrets right there.
“I believe that you know how to conjure a Patronus,” said Minerva calmly. “I’d like some of the others here to see it.”
Harry immediately relaxed and smiled. “Of course,” he said, and traded glances with Dash that made Minerva wish, for a moment, that she could be included as part of their bond before he spun and aimed his wand at the ceiling. “Expecto Patronum!”
The silver blur that came forwards changed quickly into a stag, and cantered around the room for a moment, shaking its antlers. Even Tonks was watching with a bright smile. Most of the students looked as though they’d like to pet the creature. The Weasley twins were once again scribbling on the parchment.
“That’s so brilliant,” said Lee Jordan, almost hanging out of his seat. “How old were you when you learned how to do that, Harry?”
“Third year.” Harry only shrugged when they looked at him. “I’m sure that most of you will pick it up really fast.”
Minerva chuckled behind her hand, and said, “I think that we should at least give them some chances to practice, Harry. Everyone who wants to learn the Patronus Charm, split into groups by year. I’ll be the instructor for first through third year. Tonks, if you’ll take the sixth- and seventh-years? Harry, work with fourth and fifth.”
Everyone quickly got into the groups, ignoring House affiliation for now as they watched Harry and Tonks performing the correct wand movements. Minerva observed them for only a few moments before turning to her own, younger students, most of whom probably would take a year to produce a full-fledged Patronus.
But training them would still teach them more than Umbridge was doing in her classes right now.
Minerva shook off the clinging thought, and concentrated exclusively on introducing Patronuses to a wide-eyed, slightly trembling group of children between eleven and thirteen, reassured that behind her, a basilisk watched the door of the classroom unblinkingly.
- 111
- 112
- 113
You need to be logged in to leave a review for this story.You need to be logged in to leave a review for this story.
Report Story

A Brother to Basilisks