Adult-FanFiction.org : Harry Potter

Love, Free as Air	By : Lomonaaeren Category: Harry Potter > Threesomes/Moresomes Views: 32706 -:- Recommendations : 1 -:- Currently Reading : 2
Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter and I am not making any money from this story.

Chapter List
- 15
- 16
- 17
Thank you again for all the reviews!

Chapter
Sixteen�Upending

�� I�m sorry,
mate. I just don�t understand.�

�� That makes
two of us,� Harry muttered as he shrank his trunk and looked around the room
for anything else that he might need. He couldn�t see it, though. He had
already removed most of his clothes, his broom, those few books he regularly
read, his wizarding chess set, and the research books that he was using as he
began to prepare for new jobs. What else was left? The dusty sheets on the bed,
the bed itself, some clothes that were too torn or ripped to justify taking
along�Dudley�s old hand-me-downs, for the most part�and the fixtures that were
part of the house itself.

�� Well, and
the stool where Ron sat with his hand on his forehead.

�� Have you considered this at all?� he told the
floor, or maybe Harry�s feet. With his hand positioned like that, it was
difficult for Harry to see where he was staring. �Please tell me that you�ve
considered it.�

�� Of
course,� Harry said. He gave Ron a grin. He knew that his friend was worried
about him, but he thought it would help if Ron could see that Harry wasn�t worried. �I�m not upending
my whole life, even if it looks like it. I�m just moving to another place for a
while. I regularly spend weeks on the road anyway, you know that.�

�� Ron rose
rapidly to his feet, his cheeks flushing the ugly red that meant he was really
angry. Harry blinked and stared at him. �What�s the matter?�

�� You really
care about Malfoy, at least,� Ron said. �Don�t try to pretend you don�t. Don�t
act as though this doesn�t matter. Of course
it does. And that means that I have to care about this, too. It�s going to
hurt you if this doesn�t work out, and it�ll hurt if he rejects you.�

�� Harry
squeezed Ron�s shoulder. That was the one downside of having such caring
friends, he thought. Sometimes they believed that you weren�t as emotionally
strong as you knew you really were.

�� The other
downside, of course, was that he couldn�t mention Snape at all thanks to the
stupid Unbreakable Vow. He wanted to be honest with Ron and Hermione, but the
need to keep Snape quiet and placated�and protected�worked against that for
right now.

�� I promise
that I�ll tell you if something isn�t working out,� he said quietly. �But I
expect everything to do so. And if he hurt me�it would hurt. It wouldn�t kill me. I know this is a risk. I haven�t even
been with a man before, let alone one who used to be my enemy. Do I know it�ll
work out? I don�t. But that�s no reason to avoid the risk.�

�� Ron took a
deep breath, and the red flush faded from his face. Harry was glad. He really
didn�t want to kill his best friend with an apoplectic attack.

�� If you�re
sure, then of course I�ll support you,� Ron said. His face set like iron
suddenly. �And of course I�ll come around and beat up Malfoy if he doesn�t
accept you.�

�� Harry
rolled his eyes. �That�s the point,� he said. �I hope that it will work out with
him. But if it doesn�t, then I don�t want to blame him, and I don�t want you
beating him up or Hermione lecturing him.�

�� You can�t
think that it would be just your fault
if it fails,� Ron said, and stared at him with piercing eyes. �Not even you are that much of a saint.�

�� Harry coughed,
feeling his skin heat up with a vivid blush of his own. Apparently Draco wasn�t
the only one who found his greater attempts to practice patience and
understanding in the last few years annoying. �No, not really. But�I�d like to
come back here and be with you and Hermione if it doesn�t work, all right?
Nurse my wounds. Not be reminded of them because I was still paying attention
to Draco.� He felt another twinge of conscience about leaving Snape out, but
the Vow tightened around his throat like a noose at the thought of speaking his
name, last or first.

�� Ron smiled
at once, and reached out to hug him. �Of course, mate. I should have thought of
that.�

�� Harry shook
his head. �You and Hermione have both been wonderful about this, you know,� he
muttered as his hands tightened on Ron�s shoulders. �I wouldn�t have been
surprised if you�d blasted Draco the minute I came back with him.�

�� He�s
obviously all right,� Ron said, though he gave Harry a dubious look as he
stepped back, as if to say that he doubted Draco�s claims to higher praise than
that. �Just�be careful, will you? And if Hermione is going to free Malfoy�s
mum, then you might need to come back and talk to her anyway.�

�� Harry
nodded. He wondered what would happen if they needed to do that, whether Snape
would feel left out or something even more pernicious. But he couldn�t do
anything about that at the moment, and if the issue came up, then Snape would
have to be the one who made the choice.

�� What are
you going to do about Kreacher?� Ron asked, clearing his throat. He often did
that after he�d hugged Harry, as if he thought that the air needed to be
reassured he was still a manly man.

�� He�s
stayed here and taken care of the house when I was absent for weeks or months
before,� Harry said. �He�ll do the same thing this time. If I ask him, then
he�s as happy to do that as he is to cook meals every day.�

�� Ron nodded.
His eyes were still uncomfortable, and Harry had the feeling that he knew
something more was happening than Harry was saying. But what exactly could
Harry do about it? The Vow constrained him, along with other things.

�� Good luck,
mate,� Ron murmured.

�� Yeah, I
think I�ll need it,� Harry said, and picked up the trunk and satchels that he
was taking with him.

*

�� It was
strange to be eating a meal with Severus again. And when Potter shuffled down
from his room, yawning, and joined them�generally half an hour after Draco had
already awakened and set the table for breakfast�it became even stranger.

�� The
conversation alternated between intense bursts of talk about potions, politics,
the missions that Potter had performed in the guise of a parrot, and food, and
equally intense bursts of silence. Draco would find himself watching Severus
and trying to determine what he thought of Potter. Then he would turn around
and watch Potter. Potter would usually be looking at one of them, but Draco
found it harder to read his face.

�� Or, rather,
he knew what was there: confusion. Intrigue. Sometimes desire, though that
showed up more often when he looked at Draco than when he looked at Severus.
But he didn�t know what to do about it.

�� And the end result of Potter coming to live
with us is that we�re all confused together, Draco thought crossly after
one such breakfast. Severus had vanished into his lab, as he still did during
the early parts of the mornings, and Potter had changed into his Animagus form
to go flying. He said that he forgot how to use his wings if he didn�t get
regular practice, which Draco thought was bollocks. At least it gave him an
escape from the fraught atmosphere in the cottage, though.

�� Draco was
strolling in the gardens, which had become his refuge. He sat down beneath a
tree as he thought about it now and studied the leaves, automatically beginning
a lesson in his mind. What kind of leaves were they? Oak. What potions were
they good for? Some healing potions, some love potions, a few potions that were
meant as soothing, if not healing, pastes for boils and burns and the like�

�� He blinked.
He wouldn�t have had those thoughts a few weeks ago. At least he could honestly
say now that he was absorbing the lessons that Severus offered him on potions,
and thinking more often about them.

�� He was
probably making a decision, in the way that Potter still sometimes talked
about. Whatever his career was, it would be in Potions.

�� A choking
feeling of panic seized Draco�s throat, and he bolted to his feet, then took
off running down the garden�s nearest path, though he wasn�t sure what he was
trying to outrun. Branches ripped and swayed past him, leaves danced in front
of his eyes, and flowers banged against his legs. Draco didn�t slow until he
reached the fountain and sundial that stood in the central part of the garden,
where several climbing plants that needed lots of water grew.

�� There he
sat down, shut his eyes, and leaned his forehead against his hands. He was breathing
as though he�d run much farther and faster than in fact he had.

�� Potter
would probably look at him with pity in his eyes, Severus contempt. Both of
them would say that he was being stupid. They would say that he had to make decisions, that even just
learning potions from Severus and thinking about them when he walked in the
gardens was a decision of a sort.

�� Draco shook
his head. Freedom had become a cage, he thought. He had assumed, once he was
away from Severus, that he could relax and be.
He had pictured, once he actually knew that Potter�s house had a large library,
being able to read whatever he wanted and get the education that he thought his
last few years at Hogwarts had denied him.

�� But he was
swept into this instead, where the future pressed on him as heavily as
Severus�s tendency to ignore him had in the past. There was no way to put off
making the decisions, and no way to make them without tumbling into a mistake.

�� Potter had
wondered who he was worried about disappointing, and didn�t seem to consider
that it could be them, Potter and
Severus, who were willing to upend their comfortable lives for the sake of
living with him. They never thought about whether he wanted that sacrifice.
They never thought about how it would be for him if they looked at him with
pity in their eyes.

�� He needed
help, not the kind of pressure that they would reward him with.

�� He buried
his head in his arms and sat like that for a long time, taking slow breaths. He
looked up only when he heard a branch creak above him, and not in the slight
way that it did when a squirrel was skipping away or a bird alighting.

�� Potter sat
there in parrot form, head cocked, looking at him. Draco stared back, his mouth
dry, wondering if he�d spoken aloud the thoughts he was having. Did that mean
that Potter had heard him and was looking for some way to hurt him or humiliate
him for his worries?

�� But Potter
simply fluttered to a lower bough once he was sure that he had Draco�s
attention, and then onto the sundial. He cocked his head and uttered a low
cooing noise Draco hadn�t known parrots were capable of. Finally, he landed on
Draco�s shoulder and began to draw individual strands of hair gently through
his beak.

�� Don�t,�
Draco whispered, tensing.

�� The parrot
went on grooming him, and gradually Draco began to relax. He kept a wary eye on
Potter as he did, but Potter showed no sign that he would bite Draco. He
obviously intended the caresses to Draco�s hair to be soothing, and it was a
bit irritating to be patronized like that, but Draco would take it at the
moment over another conversation about decision-making.

�� I don�t
understand you, you know,� he told Potter.

�� Potter
chirped an inquiry and then stood on one leg to vigorously scratch himself.
Small feathers flew off and buried themselves in the ground at Draco�s feet. He
smiled in spite of his belief that Potter was deliberately doing things like
this to get him to relax.

�� I wonder why I resent it when I think Potter
is manipulating me, but Severus can do it and I don�t mind? Maybe because I
still think that it�s unnatural for Gryffindors to have skills like that.

�� No, I
don�t,� he continued. It was so much easier to talk to Potter like this, when
he was an animal. Perhaps that was the reason Potter had come to him in this
form. But Draco wasn�t going to think about that right now, about hidden
motives and reasons. �You want me to be free, but you keep putting as much
pressure on me as Severus ever did.�

�� Potter
jerked a little, and a small flash of pain ran through Draco�s scalp where he�d
tugged on the hair. But he kept on grooming, and Draco had the courage to take
a breath and then go on speaking.

�� You want
me to make choices. What choices? What are the right ones? You seem to think
it�s wrong for me to pause and consider them, or else you want me to think of
the pauses as just more choices. That would be like me moving you from a small
cage into a larger one and then telling you that the bigger one isn�t really a
cage because it has more space between the bars.�

�� Potter made
a small sound, but didn�t move around to look at him. Draco stared at the
fountain, which splashed water into the stone bowl from the mouths of two
rearing swans, and continued.

�� You�re
beyond my kind of help. You�re patient and kind and considerate and mature, and
it seems that you can admit to yourself that you�re attracted to men even
though it was something you were resisting. I don�t have that kind of maturity.
I need more help. But I feel as though you�re pushing me and pushing me to be
more like you without thinking about the years that it took you to get that
way.�

�� Potter
rubbed his beak against Draco�s face. Then he moved around in front of him and
stared at him with sober eyes. Even that, Draco thought, was easier to look at
in a parrot�s face than it would have been in Potter�s own.

�� I�m
sorry,� Potter said. �You�re right. I didn�t think at all about the fights I
had with my friends, or that I would have gone on struggling against you if I
didn�t already have my suspicions that I was attracted to you, because my
reactions were so strange. And now I�m part of this grand experiment where we
see if we can live together, and if it fails, it won�t hurt me as much as it
would hurt you.� He hesitated, then added, �I do think that you�re as intelligent as I am. But that�s not really
the same thing.�

�� Draco shook
his head fiercely. �No, it�s not. I know that I�m not as intelligent as
Severus, but he could still act better than he has towards me. But it�s something
different that I have and he doesn�t, or that I need to have and both you and
he think I need to have more of. Decision-making ability, maybe. Confidence.�

�� Yes,
confidence,� Potter said, as if he was relieved that Draco had been the one to
find the word. Draco frowned a bit. Maybe
he really doesn�t want to do all the work for me. �Confidence in yourself.
You don�t have much.�

�� Draco
snorted bitterly and looked down, nudging a few fallen leaves with his shoe.
�Would you, in the circumstances?�

�� No,�
Potter said. �Probably not. But I want to know what I can do to help you. Lack
of confidence is a problem that I had friends to help me deal with, so I�m not
sure what to say when it�s someone else.�

�� Draco took
a deep breath. This was what he had wanted, wasn�t it? A chance to talk to a
Potter and Severus who seemed willing to listen
to him, instead of just turn their backs and go back to the ideal Draco in
their minds, who never messed up?

�� So he
should take advantage of it, and say what he meant instead of retreating behind
a wall of excuses, the way he could feel the temptation rising in himself to
do.

�� I want you
to stop talking about this. Talk about something else. Talk about the jobs that
you�re going to take, or how hard it is to live with me and Severus, or what
makes you like me. But not about decisions and pressures and the way that I�ll have to do certain things to get along
in the world. That�s too hard right now.�

*

�� Harry
scratched his head again. He could see why Draco would say that, and at the
same time, he felt the urge to object. Everything
was a matter of decisions. And how long would this be �too hard� for Draco?
Since he had fallen into a routine of six years with Snape when he didn�t seem
to object or do anything for himself, Harry could see him doing the same thing
again and still promising himself, when he was thirty, that he would get going
and make a difference any day now.

�� But that
was only what he feared would happen,
not what would. As he�d said to Ron, he couldn�t hesitate based on fears. He
genuinely didn�t know what would happen if he moved in with Draco and Snape,
and he genuinely didn�t know what would happen if Draco waited a while to make
his choices.

�� Because I�m not Draco.

�� There was
that, and Harry sat still for a moment until he thought he could accept it.
Sometimes his impulse to help did carry
him too far. He couldn�t go back and change the past and make it easier for
Draco; he didn�t even know that he could make the future any easier, since
Draco was requesting that he help less. But he would try to go ahead,
apologize, and then leave matters up to Draco.

�� I�m
sorry,� he said. �I didn�t realize what effect this was having on you. I�ll
back off and talk about other things for a while.�

�� Draco watched
him with narrowed eyes. Harry didn�t know why until he murmured, �And you�ll
keep that promise, will you?� in tones of heavy irony.

�� I�ll try,�
Harry said. �Feel free to flick me on the head with a forefinger if I forget.�

�� For the
first time that afternoon, something he said pulled a smile from Draco, even if
it was a reluctant one. �I think I�ll need to do that fairly often,� he
muttered.

�� Yes, I�m
sure you will at first,� Harry said simply, meeting his eyes and hoping that
his own looked sincere. It was so hard, sometimes, to judge the expressions
that he wore as a bird, especially since he had to perfect looking stupid when
he was on a job where people expected to see only an ordinary parrot. �But I�ll
try.�

�� Draco
scowled and kicked at the ground again. Harry hopped so that he could keep his
perch when Draco�s shoulder trembled and asked, �Is something wrong?�

�� I�ll never
be as good as you are,� Draco
muttered. �It seems to be so easy for you to change your mind and apologize.
It�s not easy for me.�

�� Harry
laughed a bit, and that made Draco jump, too. Harry thought he probably didn�t
expect to hear a sound like that emerging from Harry�s beak. �You only see what
actually comes out of my mouth,� Harry said. �I still struggle with myself
pretty hard sometimes, the way I did when I thought I might be attracted to you
but I didn�t want to face it. The difference is that I don�t say those things
aloud, so you might get a false impression of how I actually feel.�

�� Draco shook
his head. �And if I�m never as patient as you are?�

�� I don�t
expect you to be,� Harry said quietly. �I know I�ve tried your patience
already, but that was because of my worry. It�s not because I expected you to
be like me.�

�� Draco still
raised a skeptical eyebrow, but seemed willing to accept that for the present,
which meant they could talk about other things, and Harry could actually have a
pleasant conversation about how and why the gardens had been planted before
Draco went back to the house and he flew to another tree to change shape. He
only did it in front of someone when he had absolutely no choice, as when he�d
taken the potion in Snape�s lab.

�� When he
changed back, he leaned against the tree for a moment and waited for things to
stop spinning. Then he stood up and shook his head. He could see the house from
here, but only the top of one stone wall, where it joined the roof. A window
stared across the gardens, but he couldn�t see anyone through it.

�� It didn�t
matter. He knew the house well enough by now to know that he was looking at the
window of Snape�s lab.

�� Snape�was a
different kind of problem altogether.

*

�� Severus
treasured the hours he spent with Draco in his lab. He had forgotten how much
pleasure he got out of teaching when he had a competent student. And Draco had not forgotten how to ask questions
and make cautious experiments of his own, while checking with Severus before
dropping any volatile combination into the close confines of a vial, which made
his pleasure all the greater. Words flowed and danced between them, and if
their fingers accidentally brushed each other�s when they reached for the same
ingredient, it was, at the most, the occasion for a few seconds of charged
silence.

�� Potter�Harry�was
different.

�� He seemed
to regard potions with a deference that meant he would not intrude into the
lab. Even when Draco deputed him to carry a message to Severus, he simply stood
beyond the door and asked the question or offered the words he�d memorized, and
kept his eyes and hands and limbs out of the sacred space where Severus brewed.
At times he blinked and stared when Severus came in with a handful of dried
flowers or owl feathers, but he never seemed to ask the questions that Severus
knew were racing through his head.

�� At first
Severus had appreciated that attitude, since it meant Harry would not interfere
with his instruments. Now it irritated him. Harry was content to retreat behind
walls of ignorance, it seemed, and resist attempts to breach them.

�� Now he had
come to the lab again, this time to ask Severus if he minded spaghetti for
dinner, and seemed intent on leaving again the moment he received Severus�s
affirmation. Severus called sharply, �Harry! Come here.�

�� There was a
long pause, and then Harry�s head appeared around the corner. His eyes flickered
across the room and then quickly to Severus�s face, as if vials might shatter
spontaneously if he looked at them. �Sir?�

�� I am not
your professor,� Severus said. �I am your host, and perhaps your lover. Come
here. You will not break anything if you assist me, I assure you.�

�� Harry
frowned, stepping into the lab. �I assumed you wouldn�t want me assisting you,�
he muttered. �Since I�m not good at potions, what place do I have in a potions
lab?�

�� Severus
rested his hands on the nearest table and stared patiently at Harry. After a
moment, his face flushed, and he cleared his throat. �Well, yes, and I was
keeping out of it,� he said. �But the objection still stands. I�m no good at
potions. Do we have to meet in here? We could just sit in the drawing room and
talk about something, or have tea together, if you wanted to get to know me.�

�� I wish to
get to know you in here,� Severus
said with quiet force. �This lab is also part of your home. You should be
comfortable in every room of the house. Why would you walk through every other
one, even our bedrooms, and look at things with curiosity, but leave this one
alone?�

�� Harry
shrugged with one shoulder. He looked closer to the boy that Severus
remembered, at least right now, than he had in the week since he�d moved in. �Because
I thought that you wanted it kept private,� he said. �And because I�m not comfortable here. And
because�because I wanted to avoid you.�

�� Severus
gave him a tight smile. �I�m still the undesirable part of the bargain that you
made to live here with Draco, aren�t I? I notice that you speak to me fluently
about him�as you did the other day when you advised me not to pressure him into
any decisions or talk of choices�but you are quiet on everything else.�

�� Harry
flushed, but met his eyes. �I don�t know what to say,� he said bluntly. �I
don�t understand you. I don�t know what will offend you. I understand Draco
better because I�ve lived with him for longer. But I still don�t understand why
you kissed me in the first place,
never mind anything else. What do we have to talk about? I don�t know.�

�� Ah, well. Severus inclined his head.
�Perhaps a few brewing sessions will bring you into closer communion with me,�
he said. �That is the way that I became closer to Draco when we first arrived
here. Now, if you take up that handful of leaves that is lying next to the lens
over there��

�� Dubiously,
Harry did as he asked.

He never did relax completely, but
he was better at following instructions than he had been, and by the end of an
hour, he had ceased to jump when Severus touched his shoulder to get his
attention or briefly took his hand to show him how to stir a cauldron. He left
smiling and with a few murmurs about returning the next day.

Severus basked in his
self-approbation for the rest of the day, conscious that he had been the first to try and make sure that the
bonds between them were strong.��

*

lryn: They�ll be lovers soon, but
have some issues to get through first.

Falcon-Blue: Well, thank you! I do
think threesomes are harder to make work than other pairs, which is one reason
I tend to go slowly with them.

Shadow Lily: Thanks! Harry advances
further in the next chapter, while Draco regresses a bit.
- 15
- 16
- 17
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

Love, Free as Air