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An Alchemical Discontent	By : Lomonaaeren Category: Harry Potter > Slash - Male/Male > Harry/Draco Views: 10911 -:- Recommendations : 1 -:- Currently Reading : 1
Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor any of the characters from the books or movies. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

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Chapter Sixteen—Two Traps

            “And you’re sure that this will work?” Hermione didn’t bother concealing the skeptical look she was giving Draco even as her quill scribbled away on the parchment. They had decided that Hermione should be the one to write the letter, as Cordelia would probably be more suspicious of either Harry’s or Draco’s hand, but Draco was dictating.

            “Cordelia was a Slytherin,” Draco retorted. He was pacing back and forth in the middle of the bedroom, his head lifted and his hands making tense little gestures at his sides. Harry noticed that his formerly broken leg still wasn’t functioning quite as well as it should, meaning he limped slightly, but even with that he looked beautiful.

            He was apparently prone to noticing Draco’s looks now. Harry thought it better to accept his weakness than try to deny it and end up distracted at an inappropriate time.

            “That means she’ll be looking for codes, hidden letters, anagrams, any clue of what we really mean,” Draco was telling Hermione. Harry blinked, and mentally scolded himself for drifting off like that. No matter how hard it was, he had to pay some attention to the here and now. “The code I’m using is a simple one. It spells out Theo’s first and last names, and then captive.”

            “Hmm.” Hermione looked back at the parchment in front of her. “And do you think she’ll take the words about coming alone literally?”

            Draco stopped and laughed softly, clasping his hands behind his neck so that he could rest his head on them. Harry thought he looked supremely confident, handsome and proud and utterly in control of the situation. “Oh, yes. The way they’re positioned after the code shows her they’re meant as stated, rather than part of the hidden message she should be trying to decipher.”

            “I will never understand the way Slytherins think,” Hermione muttered, but she had already finished writing the last words. She turned and Summoned an envelope from Harry’s small stack on the bedside table, then rose to her feet. “I’ll need to find an owl to post this. Don’t do anything without me.”

            Harry swallowed a little as Hermione’s gaze crossed his. She had questions that she wanted to ask him, her eyes said, and just because she had let them go for a little while didn’t mean he should expect a long reprieve.

            Harry was relieved when she ducked out the door of the flat, and for more than one reason. He could put off her interrogation a bit longer, but he also could be alone for a complicated task that Hermione’s presence would only render harder.

            “I wonder what Cordelia’s face will look like when she receives that note,” Draco said dreamily. He was rocking back and forth on his heels now, his hands still clasped behind his head, his breath coming faster and faster with excitement. “And when she arrives to find her dear brother really captive and her enemies in possession of some knowledge they shouldn’t have.”

            “On the first one, we can only speculate,” Harry said, and smiled. “As for the second, Hermione and I will be sure to tell you all about it.”

            Draco continued rocking for a moment longer, but Harry knew he had heard him. Draco was just trying to find, from the rigid shifting of his body, the proper response to deal with the words. He could have all the time he liked, Harry thought. Even with Hermione getting out of sight of his Muggle neighbors and Apparating, it would still take her a little while to find the nearest available owl post office.

            “I’m sorry,” Draco said at last, his voice still cheerful, relaxed. “I thought you just implied that I wouldn’t be going with you.”

            “That’s right,” Harry replied.

            Draco spun around to face him. His eyes and his cheeks were both brilliant with anger, and Harry shivered. It was a hard thing not to simply melt right there and let Draco do whatever he wanted. But if Harry could no longer control his emotions, at least he had learned to recognize their effects. This was lust speaking, not anything deeper.

            “And why not?” Draco whispered. “Whose plan was it to lure her in? Who told you what spells to cast? Who gave you the estimate of Cordelia’s character necessary to predict what she’d do, and told you when and how to reveal the information about her aunt?”

            “You did,” Harry said. “You did all of it, and I think you’ve played a large part in our endeavor. That should be enough for you.”

            Draco’s features dulled somewhat when he was truly outraged, Harry found, but not his tongue, and not his wit. “I won’t be left behind her like a child,” he said. “Or like—like some damsel from those romance novels Pansy was so fond of. I’m going to do something to help myself, too, Harry. I don’t need to be rescued all the time.” His voice turned sly. “Besides, wouldn’t you feel better if I was right with you, so you could keep an eye on me?”

            “I don’t think you need to be rescued all the time,” Harry said quietly. “It was a coincidence that Nott decided to bring down your shop at the very moment when you were lying in bed dosed up on pain potions. Nonetheless, I am going to leave you here, behind strong, secure wards, exactly where I know I can trust you to be safe.”

            “There is not a single rational reason for leaving me behind—“ Draco began, taking a long step forwards.



            And then what had to be fate intervened, though Harry would not have been above using a little spell himself to speed things along. Draco’s weak leg collapsed beneath him, and he fell to the floor, cursing. Or at least he fell part of the way to the floor. Harry caught him before he could hit, and cradled him close, murmuring into his ear, as he helped him stand again.

            “There’s your rational reason right there. I don’t want you caught in the middle of the spell battle that you think Cordelia is likely to instigate. I know that you’d try, but your leg might go out beneath you at an odd moment. At best, Cordelia could wound you more easily than normal. At worst, she might kill you or take you as a hostage.” Harry paused. Draco was still rigid with anger in his arms. Harry swallowed a little, and decided that he might as well make trial of his courage and Draco’s feelings for him in the same moment. “How do you think I would react, if anything happened to you?”

            Draco lifted his head and stared at him. “Well,” he said, looking flustered, “badly. But you could control yourself. The potion—“

            “It’s letting my rage through again.” Harry brushed his lips against Draco’s hair, because he could not, absolutely could not, resist the temptation to do so. “Not to mention my lust.” He laughed shortly. “And I’m finding them overwhelming to deal with. Whether because they actually are or because I’ve lived for six years without a hint of their touching me, I don’t know. Either way, they’re all focused on you right now. Do you really believe that I could go into battle with more than half my heart, unless I knew you were safe?”

*

            Draco reached out and put a hand on Harry’s chest, dizzied in spite of himself. And the near fall had nothing to do with it.

            Well, only a bit.

            He had hoped that Harry would be the one to pursue him, to make it clear that he wanted a relationship with Draco so badly he was willing to give up his potion. That would symbolize giving up his misguided fear of himself, too, along with the need for absolute emotional control at all times. But Draco had envisioned it happening across a span of weeks or months.

            Even if it was the potion doing something strange on its own, not because of any major change in Harry, Draco had to admit that he was extraordinarily happy to have it happen now.

            But it was a matter of pride not to admit defeat so easily.

            “Granger gets to go,” he said. “And you know that she was limping when she came in here and dropped Theo on the floor.”

            “That was a minor curse,” Harry whispered into his ear, stirring the delicate hairs around Draco’s lobe in the most delicious way. “And she was already walking straight by the time she left to find a post owl, did you notice? Easy enough to heal. You had a broken leg, Draco.” Harry shifted, arms tightening around him possessively, yet not enough to aggravate his recently broken rib. “Be upset with me all you like,” Harry added suddenly. “God knows it isn’t fair that you’re being left behind because I can’t control myself. But this should be the only time something like this ever has to happen. I expect you to take better care of yourself in the future, so that I don’t have to act without you.” His tone deepened into seriousness again. “I’m only going to do this at all because Hermione’s well enough to go with me. If she weren’t, I wouldn’t confront Cordelia until you’d fully healed.”

            Draco swallowed. He hadn’t expected any confessions, and now they were falling on him like rain on a parched field. He shifted his own arms so that he was holding Harry back and not simply being held.

            “I don’t like staying here,” he said. “Just because I might agree with you that it needs to happen doesn’t mean I’m happy about it.”

            Harry laughed, a sound so joyous Draco shivered. “If you were happy, I’d start to wonder what in the world was wrong with you,” he said, and leaned forwards enough to kiss Draco’s nose. “Thank you for behaving reasonably. Or for forgiving me my stupidity, whichever you think comes closest to the truth. I know how important truth is to you.” He smiled at Draco.

            He doesn’t appear to notice that he kissed me, Draco thought. His experience of Harry included both the passionate side and the potion-controlled side, but he had not realized until this moment how different they were from one another. He was very sure that the potion-controlled Harry would never have kissed him, or at least would have done so after long and serious consideration. It seemed to come as a spontaneous gesture to this Harry.

            “You’ll owe me for this, Potter,” he did manage to say, and drew back his arms to fold them in front of his chest.

            “Haven’t you had enough of debts and creditors?” Harry winked at him and assisted him to the chair by the bed. Draco would have said he could walk on his own, but he wasn’t fool enough to drive away the other man just as he was getting what he wanted. “I don’t know how long it’ll take to get a response out of Cordelia. In the meantime, let me make you some tea.”

            He slipped from the room, and Draco had to bow his head and put it in his hands. It spun as violently as he thought Harry’s emotional state must be doing at the moment.

            Is this real? I don’t suddenly get something I’ve wanted for months.

            But when he pinched the soft inner skin of his elbow, he jumped, and decided that yes, it was real. Perhaps, for once, the universe had decided that he’d suffered enough, and it owed him one, too.

*

            Harry shut the door of the bedroom softly behind him and stood for a moment staring at the limp form of Theodore Nott. He was breathing fast, though he had managed to keep that outward sign of his agitation somewhat stilled in front of Draco. The last thing he needed was Draco worrying about him, and deciding that Harry wasn’t competent enough to go after Cordelia after all.

            He thought he could be. He thought the storms of emotion sweeping through him at the moment might even be an advantage. He could face Cordelia with the kind of grim determination that had driven him during the quest for the Horcruxes.

            But at the moment, the rage was uppermost in his mind again, thick hot liquid like constant volcanoes erupting. And what Harry really wanted to do was hurt the man who had hurt Draco so badly, who had taken away something that Harry knew Draco valued almost as much as his life.

            Who had inflicted an enormous wound on Draco’s pride, just after his enemy had inflicted injuries so large on his body.

            Harry trembled and clenched his hand around his wand. Draco wasn’t expecting him back for a few minutes. Hermione wouldn’t return for longer than that. Nott simply wasn’t about to wake up, grab a wand, and stop him. The next few minutes belonged to Harry and his conscience and his storming anger.

            He really wasn’t used to controlling it anymore, he noted dimly. The notion of subduing his temper seemed faint and far away. His vision was congealing with red, the bloody color curling inwards, slowly advancing. Every sense seemed alert for the weaknesses on Nott’s body, and curses he’d read about in books and never tried to use seethed in his brain like electricity.

            He blinked, and realized he’d moved a few steps closer to Nott, of his own volition. His wand was in his hand, half-raised. Not quite pointed at a helpless captive, Harry thought, clinging to his sanity, but not quite hanging loose and relaxed at his side, either.

            He tried to calm himself down by imagining what Draco’s reaction would be, and then snorted a weak laugh. Draco was very likely to approve of this sort of vengeance, since they would be handing Nott back to his sister so soon. That didn’t help calm Harry’s eagerness to hurt and rend and tear.

            Finally, he imagined what Hermione would think if she walked through the door and found him holding Nott under Cruciatus, and that managed to snap the spell. He turned and marched stiffly to the kitchen, where he started the pot of tea that he had promised to Draco brewing. He raked his fingers through his hair, nearly poking himself in the eye with his wand, and relaxed himself with five or six deep breaths.

            A marrow-deep longing for the potion raced through him. If he could take it and calm himself down—

            But no. That would never happen again. Draco had said the potion would change as Harry changed, which could only mean that Harry had changed his priorities and wanted something else now. What?

            What’s the thing you want more than anything else?

            And Harry didn’t have to think about the answer, given the long argument he’d had with Draco over this very thing.

            Draco safe.

            And then Harry faltered and gripped the edge of his kitchen table, because it made sense, didn’t it? His priorities had changed from keeping his own magic and darker emotions under control to making sure that Draco could survive no matter what. And it only made sense that his magic was increasing in the swiftness of its response to him, because his magic was the best tool he had for protecting Draco. The potion was taking away his weakness, his helplessness, the most loathed part of himself at the moment.

            And with the potion changed, then the emotions were slithering out of control again. Harry still feared them, still feared what might happen if he saw Draco in a situation like the one Ginny had placed herself in—willingly kissing a romantic rival—but apparently not as much as he feared the thought of Draco losing his life.

            Harry swallowed and stared into the stillness of the kitchen, terror rising up in him for the first time since he’d seen the shop collapsing on top of Draco’s head. Even that emotion felt sharper, keener, than it should have.

            Could he remember what it was like to live without the potion, and adopt a normal rhythm of thinking and feeling again?

            Could he keep Ginny’s friendship, once she realized that he was no longer taking the potion? And of course he would have to tell her.

            And could he convince his priorities to change back again, once Draco was safe beyond a doubt, once Diggory and Nott were taken care of and Draco’s mysterious enemy identified and stopped?

            Did he want to? Draco would surely refuse a romantic relationship with him again if he thought Harry was becoming what he saw as a person who couldn’t really feel passion for him.

            The kettle was dangerously near boiling over. Harry reached out a shaking hand to retrieve it.

            At that moment, Hermione stepped into the kitchen, her hand clutching a letter. “I didn’t have long to wait, after all,” she chuckled. “Cordelia must have been at the Ministry, and I Apparated nearly there before I found an open post owl office. We have her response already, accepting our choice of location.”

            She paused then, and stared Harry straight in the eye. “I’m willing to leave you alone for right now,” she said, “but when we’ve dealt with Nott, I expect to hear the full story of what’s happened to you. Understand?”

            Harry gave her a weak smile and nod, and turned to find a cup for Draco. His heart beat frantically against ribs that felt as weak as the shell of an egg.

            So soon. I didn’t know I would have to leave him—so soon.

*

            Harry and Hermione stood side-by-side in a small alley not far from the Ministry. Someone had covered the walls with graffiti displaying what looked like a gutted cat. Harry shuddered a little. Though he had been raised among Muggles, there were times they seemed more alien to him than the most Slytherin pure-bloods.

            At their feet lay Nott, still unconscious and bound. Every few minutes, either Harry or Hermione stooped to make sure he stayed that way, whilst the other covered them with their wand and careful eyes on the alley entrance.

            Harry was glad to find that his wildly swinging emotions had calmed almost the moment they left the flat. He knew Draco was behind wards as strong as he could make them; he knew Hermione was at his side with knowledge of more magic than Cordelia could have studied. His rage retreated, and he was able to focus on the demeanor that Draco had told them they would need to maintain with Cordelia: coolly mocking, wryly knowing.

            Besides, the fact that they could remove one of their three most powerful and dangerous enemies from the board if this gambit succeeded rendered Harry both determined and cheerful.

            Hermione’s elbow touched his side a moment before a shadow crossed the alley entrance. Hermione was already waving her wand in the motions of a nonverbal spell that would detect any unseen human companions Cordelia had brought with her.

            But she stepped into the alley alone. Harry studied her in silence. He couldn’t really see the beauty that Draco had talked about and which apparently had snared many young men other than Diggory, if her brother spoke the truth. Of course, the coldness of her eyes might have something to do with that.

            “I am here,” Cordelia said, her voice flat. “You said that you had my brother to give me, that he had been indiscreet and careless. He certainly has.” The glance she gave Nott then made Harry feel almost sorry for him. “Give him to me, and I shall see that he doesn’t trouble you again.”

            “Oh,” Hermione said, voice the epitome of restrained amusement, “I don’t think the bargain should be so simple. Not when you’ve already caused trouble for us in multiple ways, and not when your brother was so willing to tell us about more about you than simply his value as a hostage.”

            Cordelia’s eyes widened the tiniest bit. “Theo is a babbler,” she said, with a lithe shrug. She wore fairly ordinary robes, Harry saw, but across her shoulders lay a beautiful purple shawl; it scarcely trembled with the movement. “He would say anything to save his life, and anything to ensure that you knew about the relationship between us. Why should you believe what he might have come up with?”

            “Because it seems true,” Harry said, taking a step forwards both to draw Cordelia’s attention to him—Hermione was quietly preparing defensive spells—and to take the lead in the conversation. “I mean, it did sound odd, when Draco described it to me, the way you had suddenly inherited a large sum of money from an aunt that no one else in your family had ever heard from or kept in contact with.”

            This time, the slight movement Cordelia gave was born of rage, and Harry knew it. He smirked at her, and if the expression wasn’t quite up to the standard that Draco would have used, it was still lazy, and knowing, and Cordelia bristled at the sight of it.

            “I suppose you’re here to take me to Azkaban, good Gryffindors that you are,” she said in a bored tone, one hand fussing with the edge of her shawl.

            “Actually, no,” Harry said. “Given that one person involved in the case is dead, and the other could become a major trial to us in the courts, forgive my simple pun, we thought a bargain would be the better thing to make.” He nodded to Theo. “You’ll have him, and you’ll have our word that we’ll never tell anyone about your putting your aunt under Imperius in order to win her money.”

            Hermione hissed a little at him, because revealing their knowledge so openly could have been disastrous if Nott had been wrong about the details of Cordelia’s inheriting her aunt’s money. But it had evidently happened. Cordelia’s nostrils flared, and she said, “And what do you get?”

            “An Unbreakable Vow,” Hermione said, voice hard. “You’ll stop supporting Diggory both politically and financially, and you won’t seek vengeance against any of us. In return, we’ll swear the Vow that we won’t reveal what we know about you and your illegal activities.”

            Cordelia laughed a little. “You would consent to use such powerful and such Dark magic?”

            Hermione looked at Cordelia, unflinching. “I would.”

            Harry saw the other woman study Hermione in silence for some time. Then she sighed.

            “I should have listened to Charlemagne when he told me that the cost was too high, even for Theo’s life,” she said.

            And then her hand moved, flinging the shawl straight towards them. It became a web as it flew, and a pair of enormous spiders sprang out. Harry recognized them in a heartbeat: half-grown Acromantulas.

            In the next heartbeat, he and Hermione were fighting for their lives.

*

            Draco wandered around the flat, sighing. Now and then his leg gave out beneath him, forcing him to sit down. He bent over and massaged it gently, and fancied he felt the muscles slowly twitching their way back to strength.

            Harry was probably right to say I should stay behind.

            He was just slipping into a pleasant daydream of other things Harry might be right about when his eyes flew open and he sat straight up. Something was wrong. He listened, and heard nothing, save for the slight laughter of some of Harry’s Muggle neighbors going down the corridor.

            Except that he shouldn’t be able to hear that. Normally, the wards kept out such unimportant noises.

            The wards had fallen, and been taken down with extreme skill and extreme speed. Draco reached for his wand.

            And then the door simply dissolved into smoke and particles of wood, and the young witch Harry had shown him two photos of stepped through, smiling. She aimed her wand at him, and invisible hands grabbed Draco and held him in place, digging painfully into his skin, constricting his throat so he couldn’t even grunt in pain.

            The witch’s face melted and flowed like molten silver, and Daphne’s face was revealed in its stead.

            “Hello, Draco,” she said. “I missed you, so I decided to come find you.”

            The unseen fingers held Draco’s eyes open, so he didn’t even have the satisfaction of closing them in dread.

*

            Lunatic with a hero complex: Nope! Hermione wouldn’t do something like that to Harry, I don’t think, especially after he worked so hard to get the potion perfect for himself. It’s all Harry.

            Thrnbrooke: What do you think?

            Mangacat: Cordelia was not quite outwitted.

            Lilith: They tried to take down their enemies, but it didn’t quite work.

            Yume111: Harry would just stop taking the potion if he really didn’t want to be dependent on it; simplest solution.

            And I’m really glad you like how they interact. Now to see if all of them live…
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An Alchemical Discontent