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Bonded Consort	By : Lomonaaeren Category: Harry Potter > Slash - Male/Male > Harry/Draco Views: 33015 -:- Recommendations : 4 -:- Currently Reading : 5
Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter. I am making no money from this story.

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Chapter Thirteen—Charmed
Draco didn’t think his parents could move anymore. He wondered, for a moment, if Harry had used more of that wild magic that followed his will instead of his wand and made them stay in place.
Then he saw the way his father’s hands trembled in rage, and doubted it.
“What is this you have brought home, Draco?” His mother’s voice had no emotion in it. It didn’t even crackle like ice. It simply was.
“Not a what, a who,” Draco said. He wouldn’t begin this with misconceptions. “And I thought I told you already.” He adopted a puzzled face. “My consort. Didn’t I mention that?”
“I thought you did, and loudly enough that it made my ears tremble.” Harry leaned on him heavily, and his smile at Narcissa wasn’t particularly pleasant. “But maybe your parents have trouble hearing? We know they have trouble sensing magic.”
Draco caught his breath, but when he thought about it, he supposed there was no actual reason not to carry the battle to his parents. He simply hadn’t imagined doing it so soon. “Well, I’d like to know the answer to that, too.” He slid his arm behind Harry’s back and guided him up the last steps into the house. “Why didn’t you insist on having your son bonded to a powerful Dark wizard? You must have sensed what Harry was the instant you saw him for the first time after he defeated Voldemort.”
Narcissa turned and looked at Lucius. They held a silent conversation with their eyes, in the way Draco would have liked to do. Draco shook his head a little. The desire to have that kind of conversation had driven him away from Dahlia and in search of his true consort.
He could only be thankful that he’d found Harry in time.
“You have interesting ideas, Draco.” His father’s voice creaked. Draco knew he was holding back rage, but Lucius’s control was so perfect, Draco didn’t know what else lay behind it. “Including the idea that you’re free to choose your own spouse.”
“Oh, I know I’m not,” Draco said, and saw the moment that Lucius’s mask trembled a little. “But a consort is a different matter. I’m free there, since the contract doesn’t say anything about whether I have to have a wife or a consort. It only says I must be bonded to a Potter child.” He gave his father a smile.
I never knew how much fun it could be dueling with words. Draco hadn’t often challenged his parents, though. He’d kept his banter for friends like Blaise and Pansy, who could appreciate it. Talking back to his parents too often would only get him snapped at.
And now it could get him worse than snapped at. It might get him disowned.
It astonished him how little he cared. What mattered was the weight of Harry’s arm around his shoulders, the warmth of Harry’s side against his.
I could get used to this.
“We should discuss this in private,” said Narcissa.
“In private,” his father agreed. His mask had solidified again, and he turned to regard the door of the room across from them, glancing back at Draco as if he was sure that Draco would consent to accompany them.
“If you don’t want house-elves overhearing…” Draco said with a little shrug. He knew perfectly well what they meant, but pretended ignorance was a tactic he had picked up from Harry, and that also worked remarkably well. He started forwards, only to stop as his father drew his wand.
Draco turned his wrist so the bonding bracelet caught the light. He wouldn’t drew on Lucius unless he had to; it was the current head of the Malfoy family’s prerogative to defend himself inside his own house, and that meant nasty spells would strike Draco if he tried. “I am engaged to bond, Father. Don’t make me defend my consort because you can’t control yourself.”
Those words were effective weapons, as he had known they would be. More than anything else, a man like his father didn’t want to be accused of not being able to control himself. He lowered his wand with a motion that reminded Draco of some of his great-grandmother’s clockwork productions, and tucked it away.
“Then come with us, Mr. Potter. Since you must.”
Maybe Harry didn’t catch the emphasis on that title instead of his last name, but Draco knew why it was there. It was meant to remind Draco, and Harry, that it should have been Miss Potter instead.
Draco didn’t care. He drew Harry along with him, and after a single deep glance into his eyes, Harry nodded and followed.
Draco strutted, deliberately not turning to look at his mother, who followed them, or the whispering portraits that crowded the walls to stare at him and Harry. Yes, this would be hard. He had known that when he first began imagining some way to escape from his betrothal to Dahlia.
Hardship alone was no reason to give something up.
*
The first thing Harry thought to himself when he saw the interior of the house was, How did someone as generous as Draco manage to grow up in this place?
He supposed it was beautiful, and it certainly indicated the Malfoys had money, but it was so cold. The marble walls gleamed, and the portraits and landscapes on them made them no warmer. The portraits were all formally arranged blond wizards and witches with glistening blue or grey eyes, and the landscapes were all of winter fields with black trees in the distance.
And along the way to whatever private room the Malfoys wanted to talk in, they passed closed doors of white and black wood, and marble statues of wizards dueling centaurs and goblins, and once a wooden pedestal that held a glittering scroll Harry supposed was important. The same lack of real color, the same feeling of horrible repression.
No wonder they approve of Dahlia, if what Draco told me about her was true.
Harry shook his head a second later. Of course it was true. It reminded him of his memories before his exile. Dahlia had always been quiet, monotonous, walking around with her head bowed. Mrs. Malfoy probably thought that was the epitome of the woman Draco should marry.
I wonder if she realizes some things are different, though? It was obvious Mrs. Malfoy had emotions, just by the way she snapped her head back to meet Harry’s eyes, and snapped it forwards again, and moved with a grace that had a hint of stiffness to it. Harry didn’t think he could tell what they were, but he knew they were there.
Does she know that Dahlia has no spirit like she does?
Harry had no real time to wonder about it. They were evidently at the door of the sitting room where the Malfoys had wanted to talk “in private” with Draco. Mr. Malfoy snapped it open and gave a single, elaborate bow.
Harry suspected it was ironic, but Draco nodded as if he expected this and paraded into the room with Harry on his arm.
This room had the only portraits that had deigned to do no more than whisper behind their hands so far. The one that hung above the chair facing the door actually stood up. He was an old wizard who had dangling white hair and grey eyes so fierce that Harry thought for a moment of a grumpy iguana he had healed a year ago. It had nearly taken his hand off.
“Get him out of here! Why is he parading beside my grandson? And why is wearing that bonding bracelet?”
At least that answers the question of who this portrait is, Harry thought, and tried to look as comfortable and cool as he could, nodding to the picture instead of responding. Draco leaned towards him and murmured into his ear, “My grandfather Abraxas.”
“Why does this whelp deserve an introduction? Get him out of here! Out, out—”
“Now, Father,” said Lucius, although from the lazy droop to his eyelids, he looked pleased. Harry wondered for a second why he thought this portrait would intimidate Draco into backing out of the relationship when none of the others had, but Lucius answered the question in the next second. “I’m sure that our mutual descendant has his reasons for violating the traditions of his family.”
They know they can’t make Draco back down, but they’re hoping to make me do it, by showing me what Draco could lose.
Harry shook off his own anxiety like a dog shaking off water, and didn’t care about the way Mrs. Malfoy’s mouth pursed. He would let Draco handle this, as he had so far, and speak up in support. He wouldn’t undermine him by expressing fear.
“No Malfoy heir can marry a spouse his parents disapprove of,” the portrait snapped.
Draco looked as if he wanted to laugh, and turned his wrist again. “But I intend to bond, not marry, and to a consort, not a spouse. And there is nothing in any of the inheritance documents Father has shown me about that.”
Technicalities, Harry thought, and blinked. Well, he had to be grateful for the technicalities. Draco never would have thought of seeking a consort his parents hadn’t already approved without them, after all.
“You are disrespectful, boy,” said the portrait, his voice cold, but he leaned back a little, and let Harry look away from him for the first time. He supposed the room was furnished well, if you liked cold colors and the furniture being all made of stiff wood. “Your parents could teach you a lesson. Or I could, if I was still alive.”
“I’m sure you could, sir,” Draco said, in a voice so obviously placating that Harry couldn’t hide his grin.
Abraxas noticed, of course. He leaned over to squint at Harry. “Think something is funny, boy?”
Harry abruptly realized one perfect way he could answer, and they couldn’t even object to the content of his answer violating some unknown law of etiquette. He looked up at the portrait with as much meekness as he could muster, and hissed, “I would never dream of disrespecting you, except that it’s necessary to support Draco.”
He had to entwine his fingers with Draco’s a moment later and hold on, hard, to keep from howling in laughter. Abraxas was squeezed so far over on the side of his portrait that he looked as if he would disappear, and Lucius and Narcissa were staring at him as though he’d urinated on the furniture.
“What is that? Make it stop.”
“Parseltongue, Father.” Lucius recovered faster than the portrait, which Harry supposed he should have expected. His gaze was narrow and sharp as he moved his hand to the chairs. From the way Narcissa immediately sank into one, Harry supposed they were meant to do the same. “I didn’t know you could speak Parseltongue.”
“I can.” Harry saw no reason to say more than that, or to move away from the seat on the couch that Draco had pulled him down into, even though he was practically leaning into Draco’s lap and Narcissa was showing him a moue of distaste. At least, Harry thought it was called a moue. He’d never seen a picture, but it looked like exactly the sort of expression the word moue would be invented to describe.
“And I didn’t know you were a Dark wizard.” Lucius took the chair beside his wife, his back to the portrait.
“I am.”
Draco moved his knee slightly against Harry’s. Harry took one glance at the approval dancing in his eyes and managed to relax. He wasn’t forcing Draco to choose between him and his family, then.
They’re the ones forcing him to do that, Harry reminded himself, and beamed genially around the room.
“Why did you not tell us this?” Lucius was addressing Draco, then. Harry doubted they meant he should have Apparated across the ocean and told them. Drowned in it, maybe.
“Because I didn’t mean to seek your approval. I’m fulfilling the terms of the contract, and that means that I should be able to bond with whom I like.” Draco’s voice was as flat as a tray.
“But we would have approved of someone with these traits,” said Narcissa. Harry was almost surprised the words didn’t turn into icicles when they left her mouth.
“What did I just say, Mother?”
Harry winced a little. Of course he supported Draco in whatever he chose to say and do, but those words sounded like a declaration of war. He wasn’t sure if it was for his own comfort or Draco’s that he squeezed his hand again.
*
Harry looks as if he feels sorry for me. Or my parents.
Since Draco couldn’t tell exactly which it was, he didn’t think he had to address it right now. It was much more important to make his parents understand that they couldn’t order him around, and that he had the right to bond with who he wished.
Father had spoken more than Draco had thought he would, and so had Grandfather. Bringing them into the same room where the portrait was was a clever ploy, Draco had to admit. It made disapproval seem inescapable, as if it was possible to fill the air with it and crush them that way. But Draco could feel the steel in Harry.
Steel, and diamond. They usually resisted being crushed.
He said, when some moments had passed and his parents only stared with motionless eyes, “I chose a consort who would fulfill the terms of the contract. I did not know until I…learned more that Harry was a Parselmouth, and not until I met him that he was a powerful Dark wizard. Those aren’t the factors I based my decision on.”
“You seem to have been extraordinarily lucky,” said his mother, “finding an acceptable consort by chance.”
“He is more than acceptable, he’s wonderful, and he’s mine,” Draco told her. “I don’t care about whether he’s acceptable to you.”
Father drew in a sharp breath and leaned back. By that, Draco knew he hadn’t misread the signals, even though he didn’t understand his mother as well as Father did. Her fury was brewing like a volcano’s steam underground.
Draco didn’t actually care. He leaned forwards and gave her a lazy smile that he knew would bring the fury boiling up.
“You spent years foisting an unacceptable consort on me,” he said quietly. “I expressed my disgust of her in everything I did. I was rude, which you taught me was the unacceptable sin, in an effort to get rid of her. And yet you went on doing it. She’s a Light witch, she’s dull, and she’s incapable of giving our family everything that Harry can. She’s incapable of making me happy. Now, I want you to tell me something. Did you do this simply because of the contract, and because you thought Harry was a Squib and didn’t see any other way to get out of it? Or was there a motive that you have yet to reveal to me?”
From the way Narcissa arranged her hands on her lap, she was awaiting battle. Draco still didn’t care. Better to have her carry the battle than smolder away at him and attack his unprotected back.
That’s one thing Harry was spared from, a temperamental family who might strike out at any moment. Of course, the way he avoided it was by having his family strike him from the front when he was ten years old, so…
Draco promised himself silently, grimly, that he wasn’t about to envy Harry his family situation. They wouldn’t envy each other. They would simply support each other.
“She fulfilled the contract,” Narcissa was saying. “And she was pleasing to me.”
“Did it matter that she wasn’t to me? The one who would have to actually marry her?”
Narcissa sat in silence, and Draco had his answer. No. There hadn’t been any secret reason he hadn’t known about. Narcissa had placed his wife’s poise above the conversations that they could have with each other, the life they would have with each other.
Draco breathed in steadily through the pain, and knew when Harry touched his bracelet that he wouldn’t sag under it. “All right. Then tell me now whether you will accept my choice of Harry, and break off the betrothal with the Potters.”
There was a silence so heavy that Draco thought it would make Grandfather Abraxas’s portrait fall from the wall. Lucius said nothing. He only looked at Narcissa. Draco wondered if he had had reservations about Dahlia himself, ones he would never have brought up if Draco had swallowed dullness for the rest of his life and married her.
“You did not know what you would find when you went after—Mr. Potter.” Narcissa’s voice was low and tense.
“I believe that we’ve already addressed that, Mother.” Draco’s eyebrows lifted. “If nothing else, my desperation should suggest the many, many reasons that my betrothal to Dahlia Potter is inappropriate.”
“But you could not know.”
Draco studied her. Was this all she wanted, for him to admit that his choice of Harry had worked out better than he could have foreseen if he was a Seer? That he hadn’t known that, and he had gone ahead and done that anyway? That she had been the one relying on the known quantity?
That’s not flattering to her.
But it seemed to be what she wanted. Draco finally nodded and said, “That’s true.”
Narcissa closed her eyes. Then she said, “You must confront Mr. Potter’s parents before I will give my consent.”
“To what end?” Harry asked, his voice heavier than the silence had been. “They’re never going to put my name back in the contract. They think I’m Voldemort reincarnated.”
Father flinched. Draco had never been prouder of the way he could hold himself still.
Narcissa, of course, did the same. She leaned forwards and said, “To show that you are ready to stand beside my son no matter what life brings him.”
Harry’s eyebrows shot up, and then his body followed suit. He reached out a hand and hooked it into Draco’s elbow. “Shall we go and scare my parents, then, darling?” he asked. “Or shall we go back home, get M.H., and really scare them?”
Draco felt as if sunshine had invaded his chest. He kissed Harry’s hand before he allowed himself to stand. “Of course we should get M.H. Your family should welcome back all the people important to their son, shouldn’t they? And I’m sure M.H. has things to say to them.”
Harry touched Draco’s bracelet, and his eyes were bright enough that the sitting room, Draco’s watchful mother, his narrow-eyed father, and Grandfather Abraxas peering around the edge of the frame, faded into insignificance. There was only the now.
And how difficult can handling one Light family be, when we’ve faced the Dark?
*
DJaddict: Thank you!
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Bonded Consort