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Ceremonies of Strife	By : Lomonaaeren Category: Harry Potter > Slash - Male/Male > Harry/Draco Views: 16218 -:- Recommendations : 1 -:- Currently Reading : 1
Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, and I am making no money from this writing.

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Chapter Fifteen�We Are
the Dead

�� Draco
studied Harry thoughtfully. They were on their way back to their rooms after
having secured permission from the instructors to go to Hogwarts, and now that
that worry was removed from his mind, he had time to notice Harry�s odd
behavior.

�� Or has it been odd for a long time, and this
is just the first time that I�ve paid this much attention to him?

�� Harry
walked along with a frown on his face. He kept his eyes on the floor, lips moving
as if he were counting his steps and wanted to be careful not to pass some
important number. His fingers tapped out random rhythms on his hips, his legs,
the backs of his hands. That was a habit that Draco didn�t remember Harry
having before.

�� Is he nervous about something? Draco
decided, after long moments of observation that told him nothing, that he might
as well ask. After all, he and Harry were on better terms with each other since
he�d told Harry he loved him, and Weston and Lowell had admitted that the
barrier between them was much improved, if not completely lowered. Draco
thought it would take time to lower it all the way.

�� Harry,� he
said, �is something wrong?�

�� Harry
jumped and gave him a nervous, guilty look. Draco�s eyes narrowed. Nervous he
could understand, if Harry was worried about an exam or an essay, but guilty?

�� Unless it�s that random guilt he always
carries. He always seems to think he should be doing something different than
what he is doing.

�� I�m
worried,� Harry admitted in a whisper. �I know that Snape left his library to
you, but what if there are traps in place that he forgot to remind you of? No
matter how clever he was, we don�t know exactly when that Pensieve memory was
made, and maybe he changed his mind after he made it.�

�� Draco
smiled. He knew the source of Harry�s nervousness now. He had nearly died when
a spell in a Death Eater cache caught up with him last year, and Harry had been
adamant against any more investigations after that happened. He was picturing
the same thing happening again this time.

�� I trust
that memory,� Draco said. �We don�t have to worry, because I�m sure that if
Professor Snape had changed his mind, he would also have changed the orders
that the Pensieve was to be delivered to me after his death.�

�� Harry
didn�t look completely convinced, but nodded anyway. And after that, Draco
noticed, some of his tapping ceased, and he could discuss their trip to
Hogwarts the next day like a normal person.

�� Good, Draco thought, curling up in bed
beside Harry with his arm over his chest. His
own feelings make him suffer more than any physical wound could ever do. If he
knows that I�m safe, he won�t suffer.

*

�� Draco, I�m sorry, Harry thought, closing
his eyes. It felt as if they were crusted with ice�the tears he couldn�t shed
without Draco starting to think that something was really wrong. But you would
never let me do this if you knew.

*

�� Draco had
expected a greater shock as they walked across the grounds of Hogwarts, past
the Forbidden Forest, heading for the castle. He felt as though too much had
happened in the past year to separate him from the boy he had been when he was
in school. He should have seen the towers like a blow; he should have been
overwhelmed with memories when he saw the lake and the stretch of grass where
the hippogriff had bitten him.

�� Instead, he
noted those things with faint interest and curiosity, and nothing more.
Thoughts of Professor Snape�s library immediately intruded.

�� I don�t know which books will be most useful
to me, he admitted mentally as he and Harry began to round the edge of the
lake, because my goals are so
ill-defined. But he had them organized well enough that it shouldn�t be a
struggle to sift through the information the way that it would be in a place
like the trainee library.

�� As the
thought of the library came to him in more detail, Draco found his shoulders
rising in triumph, his strides getting longer. They�d had to get permission
from Headmistress McGonagall to visit the school, too, and she hadn�t sounded
gracious about it. Draco assumed they would have a nasty confrontation when
they faced her.

�� But the
prize waiting for him made it all worthwhile.

�� Draco
abruptly became aware that his footsteps were crunching over the ground alone.
He turned back. Harry stood near the edge of the Forbidden Forest, staring into
it as if paralyzed.

�� Draco went
back to fetch him, one hand resting on his wand. They had met Nemo�s beasts
once in the Forest, and even though Harry had walked into the trap by going
there to help the foolish gamekeeper, there was no guarantee that the beasts
weren�t still lurking there.

�� What is
it?� Draco whispered as he came up beside Harry. He glanced into the forest,
but it was an unbroken wall of solid green to him. From the devastated look Harry
turned on him, he saw more than that.

�� Don�t you
see them?� Harry whispered.

�� See who?�
Draco tried another glance. The trees remained the same. He could hear no
crackling or smashing sounds that would indicate the approach of large beasts
like the ones who had attacked the Ministry, the ones Nemo tended to favor.

�� Then he
looked again, and saw.

*

�� Harry had
felt eyes on him from the Forbidden Forest the moment they arrived at Hogwarts,
but he hadn�t thought much of it. After all, centaurs lived in there�centaurs
who were less friendly to humans than ever since the war, as if they resented
that a battle had occurred at Hogwarts�and probably some werewolves, and the
latest beast that Hagrid would be trying to tame.

�� But the
eyes grew so close and persistent that he finally turned his head.

�� A unicorn
stood staring at him from the edge of the Forest. Harry was surprised that one
would come so close to a wizard�especially a male, adult wizard�but he prepared
to enjoy the sight anyway.

�� Then he
realized that the unicorn was transparent, and its haunches went through the
trees. Its body was oddly distorted in shape, too, wavering at the edges as if
made of smoke. Its horn was a short, stubby block one moment and a long,
elegant corkscrew the next.

�� It stepped
forwards, and Harry heard no sound from its hooves, even the slight crackle
that was all he would expect to hear on the thick leaves.

�� Then the
unicorn spoke.

�� The voice
passed straight into Harry�s head without benefit of his ears. Perhaps that was
because it held so much concentrated bitterness that hearing it aloud would
have destroyed Harry.

�� We are the dead. We are the left-behind
ones, the remnants of experiments, the ghosts of slaughter. You saw us made,
and you did not avenge us.

�� I don�t
know what you�re talking about,� Harry whispered, his eyes flicking to the
sides as more and more unicorn ghosts came up to join the first one. They
blended into each other as easily as they blended into the trees, so it was
hard to tell how many there were. �I�ve never killed a unicorn. The only one I
know who has is��

�� Harry
stopped when he remembered how he had come upon Voldemort drinking from the
blood of the dead unicorn in his first year. Yes, he had seen it die, and he
knew others had perished to satisfy Voldemort�s appetite as well. But he had
never thought of what they might leave behind, other than bodies and a grieving
Hagrid.

�� Harry
attempted to straighten up and speak more firmly. He could feel Draco coming
back towards him, and that gave him courage. �I avenged you more than two years
ago. Voldemort is dead.�

�� The ghosts
crowded towards him. Their breath made the air cold. Their bodies made the
universe sway. If Harry had seen unfulfilled longing in the eyes of his own
dead, there was nothing but hatred here�hatred, and longing for a life that had
been stolen from them, rather than anything Harry could give back to them.

�� Draco came
back and asked a few questions. Harry thought he answered. He couldn�t
remember, later. His attention was totally consumed by the unicorns, and his
struggle to figure out what they were asking of him.

�� When long
moments had passed, Harry finally shook his head and said, �Yes, I watched one
of you die and didn�t avenge you.� He didn�t say that he�d only been eleven at
the time. He doubted that ghost unicorns would care. �But what do you want me
to do about it now?�

�� We are the dead, the voices said. They
beat against his ears like a swarm of icy bees.

�� I
understand that,� Harry said. His fingers were turning blue, and he had to
struggle to speak. �But what does that mean? What concrete action can I take,
since you seem to want one?�

�� Draco�s arm
tightened around him, and Harry thought he could hear him saying something
about how Harry tried to take too much action, tried to take too much on
himself. Harry couldn�t listen. He had to
hear the voices of the dead, and he strained stubbornly forwards to them,
listening.

�� We are the dead, said the unicorn.
Suddenly the rest of the ghosts had vanished, and only one stood there. Harry
wondered if it was the one he had first seen, but again, it changed so much
there was no way to tell. We need peace.

�� It
vanished. The sensation of watching eyes went at the same time. Harry didn�t
think the unicorn ghosts were drifting through the Forest and looking at him
reproachfully right now.

�� He
shivered, and reached up an absent hand to pat Draco�s arm where it was slung
around him, pulling him tight against Draco�s body. But his mind was on what
the unicorn had said.

�� We need peace.

�� How in the
world could Harry give them that, when they weren�t even human? He thought he
understood what the spirits of people he had known in life would want, but not
these others. They probably didn�t even have bodies to be buried anymore, which
was what ghosts traditionally seemed to want in most of the stories Harry had
heard.

�� Harry!�

�� That shout,
right in his ear, woke him up. Harry blinked and turned towards Draco. Then he
realized his fingers were much colder than they should be, and beat them
together as he stared into Draco�s eyes.

�� Were they
talking to you?� Draco�s face was pale. Harry couldn�t tell if that was fear,
or strain and stress. He thought he once would have been able to tell, but he
had traveled a long way in one direction, and it wasn�t a voyage that Draco
could share with him. Harry wasn�t even sure if the unicorns had spoken to him
because he had seen one of them die, or because he was becoming a necromancer,
or because he was the one who was supposed to kill Voldemort, or for some other
reason.

�� Yes,�
Harry said. �They said they were dead and wanted peace.� The words sounded
strange when he spoke them, as though the dread majesty of their bitterness had
been stripped away. He blinked and shook his head.

�� This is another thing that I can�t share
with Draco. He would only tell me to�

�� You take
too much on yourself,� Draco said. His voice was steady, but flat with anger.
He met Harry�s eyes and held them, a silent challenge to just try and look away in his gaze. �You always
did. I don�t know what the fuck they wanted or what they would try to compel
you to do, but just remember that you don�t need to listen to them.�

�� Harry
nodded, but said nothing. How in the world could he make Draco understand?
There was a claim on him, a claim because he was the one who had heard the
unicorns speak and no one else. If other people wouldn�t clean up the mess, it
was up to the person who discovered it.

�� We�ll ask
the Headmistress about them,� Draco said, more calmly now, but still looking a
little wild around the eyes. �I can�t imagine that a bunch of unicorn ghosts
wandering the Forest would go unreported.�

�� It might
depend on who comes out here, and when,� Harry muttered as they began to trudge
towards the castle again. �What if they were attracted by me, and so they came
out for the first time?�

�� Draco gave
him an odd look. �Why would they be attracted by you?�

�� And that
was another of the things Harry couldn�t explain. Luckily, he had an out. He
could shake his head weakly and mutter something about how he just thought it
was likely, and Draco would see it as another instance of his tendency to be
overdramatic and imagine himself at the center of events when he really wasn�t.

�� When did I become so good at lying? And
manipulating someone I love, who loves me, someone I�m supposed to have the
most honest relationship in the world with?

�� Harry had
to close his ears to those objections. He had
to. Because he wouldn�t betray the dead for the sake of the living. He
wouldn�t do it the other way around, either, of course. That just meant that he
had to be as careful as he could, and walk a thin line, and consider all his
actions before he made them.

�� He would
work it out in the end. He would have to.

*

�� But surely
someone must have��

�� Nothing
like what you described has been reported, Mr. Malfoy.� The Headmistress�s
voice was as smooth as ice. She took one glance at Harry, though, and her voice
softened. �Are you sure that you don�t want help searching in the dungeons? No
one has been near Severus�s rooms since he died, and I don�t know what kind of
traps he may have left in place.�

�� Draco
rolled his eyes and wondered when Gryffindor loyalty lessened, or if it ever
did. Yes, Harry had been a Gryffindor and McGonagall�s student and the Savior
of the World and all that rot, but Draco had been her student, too.

�� It sounded
extremely thin, when he put it that way. He decided to stay silent for now,
while Harry gave McGonagall a weak smile.

�� I think
we�ll be fine,� he said, and his eyes went to Draco. �Snape left his library to
Draco, we know that�and he was on our side in the end. I don�t think he would
have left traps that could hurt Draco.�

�� When it
came to the protection of his knowledge, Severus was adamant.� The Headmistress
started gathering her robes around her as if she would rise and accompany them.
On the walls, the portraits of past Headmasters watched with interest. Draco
had the impression that Dumbledore was particularly interested, though he
refused to look up at him. Snape had a portrait, but wasn�t in it. �I think I
should make sure that two of our most famous students aren�t injured in the
pursuit of it.� She looked pointedly at Draco.

�� She really does think that I would try to do
harm to Harry, right here and now, Draco thought incredulously, and opened
his mouth to defend himself.

�� No,
Headmistress,� Harry said, and his voice was firm. �We�ll be fine, but thank
you. Stay here and do the more important work we interrupted.� He took Draco�s
arm and gave her a much firmer smile.

�� He can sense that she doesn�t like me, Draco
thought, and calmed. He would never want Harry to defend him all the time, but
it was nice to know that someone was on his side no matter what happened.

�� Very
well,� said McGonagall, after so long a pause that Draco thought she was going
to force the issue anyway. �Then go.� She sat down and rearranged the papers on
her desk, probably to cover her loss of dignity. One of the portraits cackled
and said something in a Scots accent so thick that Draco couldn�t understand
it, but McGonagall turned and glared.

�� Come on,�
Harry said, and hauled Draco out of the office and onto the moving staircase.
Draco stood there and fought memories of Dumbledore until they consented to lie
down like the dead things they were.

�� Only then
did he look at Harry, who stood with one elbow braced on the turning wall and
watched everything with calm, intelligent eyes.

�� You seem
to have got over your encounter with the unicorn ghosts,� he said.

�� Harry
turned his head quickly, blinked, and studied him. �Draco, are you jealous?� he
finally asked. �You sound like it.�

�� Draco blew
his breath out and tried to pin the irritation he was feeling down to a
singular cause. �Maybe,� he admitted at last, aware that he sounded sulky, but
not sure what he could do about it. �I don�t see how you can escape the
memories here, but you�re doing better than I am.�

�� Harry
reached out and stroked his arm. �Mine are less traumatic.� Draco snorted
almost hard enough to expel a lung, but Harry persisted. �No, listen to me. I
fought Voldemort here, and it hurt, yes, but I was triumphant in the end.
That�s what I remember, more than anything else. The last few times you were
here were times of fear and pain, and you didn�t get a lot of closure the way I
did. So it�s understandable that you�re suffering the way you are.�

�� It makes
me weak,� Draco said.

�� Harry�s
face underwent a short, sudden change, which in the end faded back to his calm
expression. �I don�t think so,� was all he said.

�� Draco
followed him down to Professor Snape�s rooms, wondering about the suppressed
expression and what it meant.

*

�� Harry had
never realized that a library could smell so overpowering.

�� The scent
of dust was everywhere. So was the scent of leather. So was a scent that Harry
thought of as wet and green, though he wasn�t sure what it really was. Probably
some Potions ingredient left behind, or a small creature who had managed to get
inside the wards surrounding the library and then died there.

�� He leaned
against the wall in the entrance to the room and watched as Draco turned slow
circles in the middle of it, staring at the neatly organized books. His
expression was rapturous. Harry smiled in spite of himself. He thought that was
the kind of look Hermione would wear if this library had been left to her.

�� And I do wonder if Snape had any books on
necromancy.

�� Just
looking at the books, Harry couldn�t identify any. The books were all uniformly
bound in black leather, with gold lettering on the spines that spelled out
their titles or, sometimes, an author�s name with no title. Draco seemed to
understand the organization perfectly well, because he had already stepped up
to the nearest shelf and was running a finger approvingly along one set of
books. But Harry didn�t know whether the library was ordered by subject, title,
author, nastiness of magic involved, or something else known only to Snape.

�� This is
interesting,� Draco said, and pulled out a book. �This might be something we
could use in the study with Lowell and Weston.� He turned the book so that
Harry could see the title. Pressures of
Compatible Magic.

�� Pressures?�
Harry asked, coming closer and trying to look interested and not as if he was
scanning the shelves for something else. �What does that mean?�

�� I don�t
know,� Draco said, and flipped the book open, apparently preparing to get lost
in the words.

�� Harry
coughed delicately, and waited until Draco peered at him. �Not that I want to
interrupt your reading,� he said. �But we should crate these books up as soon
as possible and bring them back to the Ministry. Our leave was only for the
morning.�

�� Draco
blushed�the first time in a long time Harry had seen him do that in a situation
that didn�t involve sex�and tucked the book under his arm. �Of course,� he
said. �Sorry. I wasn�t thinking.�

�� Harry shook
his head and couldn�t help giving Draco an amused smile. �It�s all right. But I
thought you�d like to know about it before we ran out of time.� He drew his
wand and conjured the first crate. He and Draco had discussed the best method
of moving the books, and agreed that it would be containers they could shrink
and carry, but neither of them had been able to Transfigure or conjure an
acceptable trunk. Crates were easier.

�� He and
Draco worked in silence, moving the books into the crates and conjuring more
crates as necessary. Draco sometimes stopped to exclaim over a book or stare at
it with greedy eyes. Harry patiently outwaited every incident of that. Draco
was still moving along at a good pace, and Harry still couldn�t ignore the
teasing promise of possible information that waited in the necromancy books in
the library.

�� If it has any.

�� Look at
this.�

�� Draco�s
voice was choked. Harry looked up. He was holding a book that looked much like
all the others, if smaller. Harry couldn�t see the title or author from the way
Draco�s hand was positioned on the spine. He leaned in.

�� The book
was a neat listing of names, with numbers, locations, dates, and notes beside
them. At a first glance, Harry couldn�t see anything that remarkable. It looked
like a list of Potions masters across Europe that Snape might have kept for his
own use, and was, for all Harry knew.

�� Then Draco
pointed a shaking finger to the name on the page that had drawn his attention,
and Harry caught his breath in shock.

�� Caradoc Dearborn.

�� Harry
blinked. �That was�that was Dearborn�s brother, wasn�t it?� he asked. �The one
who disappeared during the war?�

�� Draco
nodded. �This is a list of all the victims of the Death Eaters,� he whispered. �God
knows why Professor Snape kept it, but he did. We should be able to find out
something in here about Nihil, and maybe about the research they were
conducting.�

�� Harry
looked at the note beside Caradoc�s name. There was the date he had been
captured, the name of the cache he had been taken to�which Harry had to admit
meant nothing to him; they had a map of the caches, but didn�t know all the
names that the Death Eaters had given them�a number that could have meant
anything, and then notes. Notes on how he died, Harry thought. If Dearborn
himself had ever seen this, it could explain why he was passionate about Dark
magic; he might think that he needed Dark magic to fight the kind of people who
would do things like this to his brother.

�� But those
notes were less informative than Harry could have hoped. They said, Tortured almost to death using the
Flesh-Shredding Curse. Interrupted by o. Transformed.

�� While Harry
was frowning at the last word, Draco said, �This has to be it. The solution to
the mystery.�

�� What do
you mean?� Harry asked, looking up at him.

�� He was
tortured almost to death,� Draco said
fiercely. �And then he changed into something else. What can that mean except
that Caradoc Dearborn is Nihil? He discovered some means to pass beyond death,
perhaps because he was in such excruciating pain. Wizards can do amazing things
with their magic when they�re pushed. He probably did. They would have no
reason to cease the experimenting prematurely. They were interrupted. What did
it? He did.�

�� Harry
nodded slowly. It looked as though Draco was right, and Dearborn�s true
identity had been hiding among Snape�s papers all along.

�� While Draco
eagerly flicked through the ledger, looking for more information, Harry thought
again of that notation. For some reason, even though he couldn�t prove it had
anything to do with necromancy�and he wanted nothing to do with Nihil�s brand
of necromancy anyway�it aroused his curiosity.

�� Interrupted by o.

�� Who or what
was o?

�� With no
good evidence, Harry was inclined to think it wasn�t Caradoc.

*

�� SP777:
Well, we�ll see. Necromancy is not a common type of Dark magic, so it�s
entirely possible that Draco wouldn�t be familiar enough with it to notice.

�� And you may
be right.

�� MewMew2:
There are other reasons that Nihil might want Harry alive. Nemo spoke of a
transformation.

�� rafiq:
Lowell and Weston don�t expect instant progress, so it will be a while before
they start suspecting anything.

�� And yes,
necromancy itself literally has him in a chokehold. As the note warned Harry,
he progresses through stages in his addiction to this magic, and he won�t be
allowed to reach the fourth.

�� polka dot: As
happy as they can be with this secret hanging around�

�� Dragons
Breath: Thanks! He�s learned some lessons since Dearborn.

�� qwerty: Unfortunately,
answering your questions would ruin a large part of the story.

�� anciie:
Thanks! With Snape�s system of organization, even that tactic probably wouldn�t
work for Harry.
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Ceremonies of Strife