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The Dove With Razor Claws	By : Lomonaaeren Category: Harry Potter > Slash - Male/Male > Harry/Draco Views: 2318 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter. I am making no money from this story.

Chapter List
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Chapter Two—Into the Storm
            Draco had considered several possible plans by the next morning, and discarded them all. He didn’t think he could create a scenario where one of Potter’s friends was in danger and Potter charged in to rescue them, only they weren’t really in danger and so he looked like a fool. A plan that you couldn’t come up with any way to implement was as useless as a stupid one.
            Draco had learned that this summer, at least.
            He swallowed and glared across the House tables at Potter. He was sitting at the Gryffindor table and not so much chewing his food as champing it, while staring off into space. Something had happened to displease him, Draco supposed.
            Draco swallowed in pleasure and then contemplated Potter’s face and Weasley, beside him. A second later, he had it.
            Potter was still going out for the Quidditch team this year, of course. And some of Draco’s Housemates had stopped pretending he didn’t exist yesterday to tell him that they still expected him on the pitch as Seeker. It was because they didn’t have anyone better.
            Draco knew that. He had sat there simmering after the conversation anyway.
            Now, though, it was going to work for him. Especially since he doubted Potter would be able to turn down a challenge to a race that Draco offered him in front of his friends. And because he thought Draco still had a bad broom compared to his, he would think he’d win easily.
            Draco smiled a little. He had read a lot about spells over the summer, not having anything else to do. And he had learned about some spells that were banned from Quidditch.
            They had been banned for so long that most Quidditch players didn’t even look for them anymore, and the enchantments placed on pitches that were supposed to protect against their use weren’t popular or often cast. Draco doubted the enchantments on the Hogwarts Quidditch pitch would still be active or renewed after this long.
            After all, the professors had had other things to do in the past year.
            Draco leaned back on the bench and sipped some cool water, never taking his gaze off Potter. He heard whispering next to him that he ignored. People who might think he was as obsessed with Potter as usual were welcome to go on thinking that.
            It was all part of his disguise.
*
            “Malfoy was watching you all morning, mate.”
            Harry shrugged a little as he stepped out onto the Quidditch pitch. He was carrying his Firebolt over one shoulder, and the air around him was full of soft smells and an even softer feeling that probably came from the rain earlier this afternoon. What mattered was that he could fly. “Well, he was in the office with Dumbledore at the same time I was.”
            He locked his legs around the broom and kicked off from the ground, ignoring Ron’s earnest attempt to tell him something else. He was outside now, and he was just going to fly.
            He did, zooming around and turning sharp corners. His scar felt burned with the wind that swept along it, but at least it wasn’t burning now because Voldemort was alive and making it burn.
            Was I really part of him? Part of something so evil that it killed my parents and threatened the whole wizarding world?
            Harry shook his head sharply. He wasn’t going to spend the rest of his life worrying about it. Maybe if Dumbledore had told him earlier and let Harry work with him, then it would be worth worrying about. But he hadn’t known, and he wasn’t going to go back and consider everything he’d done and wonder if it was somehow secretly evil.
            “Mate!” Ron finally yelled, catching up with him. His broom wasn’t as fast as the Firebolt, but Harry had slowed down to mop at some of the sweat on his forehead.
            “What?” Harry snapped back, and then saw two things. The first was Snape strolling out into the middle of the pitch with a broom over his shoulder. Harry almost groaned. Of course Snape was going to be his first guardian on Quidditch practice, because he looked forward to any chance to ruin Harry’s life.
            The second was Malfoy marching behind Snape. He looked up and fixed his eyes on Harry’s. Then he gave him a nasty smile.
            Harry wanted to swear. Why was Malfoy doing this? If anything, he should want to get along with Harry, because they were subject to the same restrictions. So they would probably be in the same detention or something sooner or later.
            He muttered about it under his breath, and Ron shook his head wisely. “Slytherins, mate. If they’re unhappy, they want to make someone else unhappy even if it’s for a stupid reason.”
            Harry sighed. He wanted to think that wasn’t true, because some Slytherins had been pretty friendly to him in class today. On the other hand, they might just have decided that it was a good idea to be Harry’s friend right now. “Let’s go down and see what Snape wants.”
            Ron grunted agreement, and they flew down and landed. Harry made sure to keep in between Malfoy and Ron. He thought Malfoy was probably there to make trouble for Harry himself, but Malfoy would fight with Ron if he could possibly come up with a reason for it. “Are you the designated guardian, sir?” Harry asked Snape.
            Snape sneered at him. “I am designated, yes, Potter. I would hardly have volunteered for this duty.”
            You might have if there was a chance of getting me in trouble. But Harry didn’t say that, either. Hermione had told him he should be more mature. Dumbledore had told Harry about some of the things Snape had risked during the past year.
            Really a lot of it, though, was that Harry was just tired of playing out the same fights with Snape over and over again, and he was going to have enough of them now that Snape was teaching Defense.
            So he ignored the way Snape was talking and nodded to Malfoy, then turned around again. He wanted to get back into the air and start the actual practice. Snape being Snape, he would make a sarcastic remark about Harry just wanting to fly around sooner or later.
            “Wait, Potter.”
            That was Malfoy, and not Snape, surprisingly. Harry turned around with a sense of tired inevitably. No matter what Malfoy said or did, Snape would be in favor of it. “What do you want, Malfoy?”
            “Is that a way to speak to a fellow student, Potter?” Snape murmured, right on cue. “I think you could stand to ask more politely.”
            Harry just ignored him utterly, this time. He was interested to see that Malfoy did much the same thing; in fact, his face flamed for a second. Then he took a step forwards and announced loudly, “I challenge you to a Seekers’ race around the Quidditch pitch.”
            Snape didn’t have anything to say about that, of course. Harry had never heard of a Seekers’ race, though, but he assumed it must be a real thing, or Ron would have been bellowing about violations of the rules. He only considered it for a second, then shrugged and asked, “Will we chase the Snitch?”
            “No,” said Malfoy, and his smile was the kind of sneer Harry had seen on him last year when he was being part of Umbridge’s little Inquisitorial Squad. It made Harry want to knock his teeth in for old times’ sake. “Just race each other.”
            “Yeah, mate,” Ron muttered beside him. “I’d do it. You know he can’t win!”
            Harry supposed he either had too much sense of fair play or an utter inability to hide his emotions, because he looked at Malfoy’s broom and raised his eyebrows.
            Malfoy laughed in a way that might have convinced people who had grown up in the wilderness and never heard human laughter. “Don’t worry about that, Potter. We have some…equalities that you don’t know about.”
            “Of course you do,” Snape interjected then. “Such as Mr. Potter’s stubbornness being equal to your talent in Potions, Mr. Malfoy.”
            Harry ignored that again, thinking it was a weak insult. Malfoy must have thought the same thing, because his eyebrow twitched a little, but he kept looking at Harry. Now it was the way he had looked at Harry in the Dueling Club, and Harry felt his blood heating up the way it had in Dumbledore’s office last night. It would be stupid of him to back down now.
            He would tell Hermione the same thing if she was out here and telling him not to get in trouble, but she wasn’t.
            “A race,” Malfoy whispered. “Six times around the Quidditch pitch should do it, I think. Enough to allow me to show off real skill and not be overcome by a minor discrepancy in the brooms.” He moved a step forwards . “Of course, if you’re worried about what that test is going to show, then—”
            “Not at all,” said Harry, and he was pleased to see Malfoy fall back a little and stare at him as if he hadn’t thought that was what Harry was going to say. “I assume we’re starting the race now?” He looked at Snape for a second, and then hopped onto his broom when he saw Malfoy had already done the same.
            “I will be timing the race,” said Snape. He looked as though he expected Malfoy to win, which only made Harry all the more determined that it was going to be him. He looked into the sky, and nodded. There were some low clouds, but no threatening rain.
            “Whatever you want, sir,” Harry said, and Snape looked disgruntled in turn before he mounted his broom somewhat awkwardly and soared into the sky. Harry watched Malfoy from the corner of his eye for a second as Malfoy waited, trying to look poised. Harry dearly wanted to tell him that he only looked constipated instead, but he doubted he would be able to get away with it when Snape was right there.
            “Go,” Snape said.
            Harry was aloft in seconds, surging in a way that seemed to catch Malfoy by surprise. Harry bit his lip so he didn’t laugh, and kept flying, bent over his broom. He didn’t need to look behind him, because he knew Malfoy would be there.
*
            Draco tried to suppress his bitter indignation when he realized Potter was ahead of him. That was the way he wanted it, he reminded himself. Potter would speed up and get so far ahead of him that he would be confident and not watching.
            And meanwhile, Draco had already drawn his wand, even though he was keeping it low down at his side. If someone saw it before he could cast the spell on Potter and they were all distracted by its effects, then he would be punished.
            Draco didn’t want that. He wanted something to be normal and different at the same time. He would be fighting Potter, which was usual, but he would also be defeating him, which was the different thing.
            Draco smiled at the thought, and then concentrated hard on the spell he had looked up last night, to make sure he remembered the incantation right. He twisted his wand in a swift spiral, whispering, “Ungula accipitris.”
            There was a long shudder as the magic passed through him. Draco blinked. He hadn’t expected that. The magic wasn’t Dark Arts, so casting it should have just felt like casting an ordinary spell.
            But anyway, the magic sped out from him and crashed into Potter’s broom, but it was an invisible wave of force. Anyone else could only see it by what happened, and Draco wanted to cheer as he watched it work perfectly. Several of the important bristles flew away from the tail of Potter’s broom, as though cut by a hawk’s talon, the literal translation of the spell.
            Potter’s Firebolt whirled and spun, and then made a beeline towards the ground. Draco laughed aloud. Then he tried to look properly shocked.
            It had worked, though. Potter was losing both height and speed, and all the other people on brooms or the ground were yelling about the spectacle. No one was paying attention to Draco. He could go ahead and finish the race.
            Draco was just starting to turn in the direction he would need to round the end of the pitch when he realized something. Potter was steering his broom so it soared directly at Draco’s, and he was wobbling furiously as he did so. He would probably crash straight into Draco and send both of them plummeting to the ground.
            Draco had a moment to stare, and then another moment to plan. But unlike Potter, he was in control of his broom. That meant he could do whatever he wanted, and Potter would have to continue dropping down.
            Draco turned slightly to the side, then more widely. Potter was still coming, and maybe his angle wasn’t what Draco had thought it was at first, and that meant—
            But then Potter’s broom turned over, and Potter crashed full-on into Draco’s Nimbus, which promptly tried to buck Draco off. Draco yelped and grabbed hold of it. His thoughts skittered through his mind, thoughts like It’s not bloody fair, even my own broom likes Potter better than me.
            Neither of them fell, though, Draco probably because he had a death grip on the broom shaft, and Potter because he had a death grip on Draco. Draco kicked at the legs wrapped around his legs, but he couldn’t do much about them. If he was seen visibly wrenching Potter off him, then no one was going to believe this was an accident.
            “Stop kicking and flailing, Malfoy! I can steer this broom if you’ll just—”
            At least Potter was breathless, in the middle of being as arrogant as ever. Draco kicked at him again, for good measure, and snapped back, “You need to get behind me, or we’ll fall—”
            “I know more about flying than you do!”
            “Not on a Nimbus, not when your bloody Firebolt—”
            “Which you cursed somehow, you—”
            Draco had lost track of the broom’s flight, but when he heard people shrieking below, he looked again. They had dropped much lower, and now they were probably only three broom-lengths up from the pitch. Professor Snape was flying towards them as fast as he could, but he had never been that fast or graceful on a broom, and the one he was riding wasn’t even a Nimbus.
            “Pull back, Malfoy!” Potter screeched suddenly into his ear, and Draco saw the pole off to the side that held the Keeper’s hoop.
            It was too late, though, and they crashed into the side of it, Draco swearing as he felt the pole slam him in the ribs. Potter was silent, except for a grunt. Draco sneered as they both began to fall. Bloody hero about even expressing pain.
            But then Potter whipped his wand out, and muttered something that sounded like, “Aranea.”
            They crashed into something that bounced and then bent beneath them instead of dropping them straight to the ground. Draco grunted and leaned his head back. Yes, there were sticky strands clinging to his hair. Potter had conjured a spiderweb, of all the dirty and unnecessary spells he could have done.
            They were going to live.
            Draco whipped around to give Potter a piece of his mind. Potter was right beside him in the web’s net, being forced lower and lower, and he was bending near as if he also wanted to yell at Draco, or shake a finger in his face in righteous Gryffindor rage.
            And Draco hadn’t planned on this—
            Well, he hadn’t planned on so many things, including Potter crashing into him, and them crashing into the pole, and losing the race, and Potter being the one to have to save Draco’s life—
            But he especially hadn’t planned on their faces being forced so close by the bending angle of the web that his lips became planted on Potter’s.
            There was a long moment when Draco was too frozen by the beat of his own heart to do anything but hold still in shock. And then Potter was flailing around to get loose, but his arms were snared by his own web when he moved them, and then he couldn’t move them, and Draco reared back, but the web behind him wouldn’t tear or yield.
            They weren’t kissing. Not really. Because a second later, their lips popped apart, and Draco was wiping his mouth and swearing loudly, and Potter, who could turn his head enough to get his lips against his shoulder, was wiping them over and over on his shirt with a silent deadliness that was even stronger than the glare he threw Draco’s way a second later.
            So it wasn’t really a kiss. And none of Draco’s friends were on the pitch, so there was no one who would torment Draco about it anyway. And Potter’s friends were probably desperate to get him out of this situation and help him forget all about it, anyway.
            The web touched the ground. Neither of them could move, though, until Professor Snape came over and flicked his wand and severed the web, saying coolly, “You appear to have lived, although not without some regrettable consequences of your stupidity.”
            The way that he seized Draco’s shoulder at the same moment as he pronounced that word made Draco stare upwards with a sinking feeling in his stomach. And yes, the professor was glaring at him.
            Oh, shit. Oh, shit. Snape had seen his spell, or somehow knew exactly what he had done. Maybe it was just that he was smart enough to think that if something went wrong with Potter’s broom in Draco’s vicinity, it must be Draco’s fault.
            Draco cowered a little.
            “Get off the field,” said Professor Snape, and turned and looked at Potter and the rest of the Gryffindors in a way that made Draco envious even though he was in the midst of so much trouble, because he wished he could glare like that at people and have it stick. “If I hear that you’ve been near the outer boundaries of the wards again, Potter, then you and I are going to have a talk.”
            Potter lowered his eyelids and said nothing, just turning away with Weasley’s arm over his shoulder. But he did give Draco a glare that rivaled Snape’s as he turned.
            Professor Snape turned back to Draco, and the glare was even worse when he didn’t have members of his rival House on the field to share it. Draco huddled with his arms over his head for a second. Professor Snape said nothing, but his contempt was a silent, withering flame. Draco finally lowered his arms and looked up again.
            “You did something stupid and dangerous for the sake of a prank,” Professor Snape whispered. “Tell me you have not become an honorary Gryffindor.”
            “It wasn’t a prank!” Draco protested, astonished that his Head of House would see it like that. “I was trying to beat Potter! It’s no different from a move during a Quidditch game—”
            “This was not a game.” Professor Snape moved towards him swiftly enough that Draco cowered again, and then grabbed him under the arm and hauled him to his feet. “If I hear that you have done something against Potter again, I shall make you sorry you crossed me.”
            Draco stared at him in apprehension, his mind full of everything from going to Dumbledore to writing to his mother.
            Professor Snape’s mouth crooked. “I shall tell your Housemates about the kiss you shared with Potter. And I shall tell them that you enjoyed it.”
            Draco gasped aloud and shook his head. “You can’t—that wasn’t—it wasn’t a kiss, damn it!”
            “Language,” said Professor Snape without turning a hair. In fact, the crook of his mouth had turned into the kind of full-fledged sneer that Draco usually only saw when he got a chance to humiliate Potter or Longbottom. “There will be no acceptance of the, ah, mitigating circumstances if it is my word against yours. And it will be, if you do something so stupid again, Mr. Malfoy.” He released Draco with a light push.
            “I don’t understand,” Draco said, through numb lips. Well, lips that were numb and something else. “Don’t you want to see Potter humiliated?”
            Professor Snape gave him a glare that would have done a basilisk proud. “In this political climate? At this stage of the world? And I thought it was only your behavior that was stupid.”
            Draco swallowed and looked away. Yes, he supposed that could be a problem. But then again, no one should have noticed, which meant he would have got away with it, and Professor Snape’s scolding would have been stupid anyway.
            He couldn’t help one more protest, though. “If it’s stupid to humiliate Potter, then how will spreading the story around be a good idea?”
            “Oh,” said Professor Snape, and drew the word out until Draco thought he had a whole new reason to hate him. “But I would hardly announce that Potter had enjoyed it.”
Then he dragged Draco towards the castle until he was inside the entrance hall, and turned away.
Draco closed his eyes and sat there until the lingering disgust of the cobwebs in his hair outweighed the humiliation he might receive from the Gryffindors if he went back inside. Then he stood up and Summoned his broom, swatting ineffectually at his hair all the while.
            He wasn’t looking forward to what the Gryffindors might say. He wasn’t looking forward to Professor Snape’s stony, knowing stare the next day in Defense.
            But more than all that, he wasn’t looking forward to what Potter would say when they saw each other again.
*
            “So what was kissing Malfoy like?”
            Harry gritted his teeth. For some reason, Ron had decided both that he was hilarious, despite lots of evidence to the contrary in George and Fred being the only funny Weasleys, and that teasing Harry about his “kiss” with Malfoy was hilarious.
            “Wet,” Harry snapped, and then stooped down and picked up his towel. He was going to shower, and try to get the sensation of Malfoy off his lips and hands.
            Ron stopped laughing. Harry glared at him, frowning, and found Ron staring at him as if Harry had killed his Pygmy Puff.
            “What?” Harry added.
            “That’s the same thing you said about the kiss with Cho,” Ron mumbled.
            Harry threw up his hands. “So I’m no good with description! And the thing I had with Malfoy was coincidence, okay, and the web forcing us together! And excuse me if I’m still recovering from learning that I had part of some madman’s soul inside me, okay?” He stormed off into the bathroom and slammed the door behind him, ignoring Ron’s protests and what might have been an apology.
            Once he was safely in the privacy of the shower, Harry shut his eyes and leaned his forehead against the wall.
            Damn it. Damn it. Damn it. The same hollow words boomed and beat again and again in his head.
            Because the kiss with Malfoy had been more like a real kiss, more like what Harry thought one ought to be, than the one with Cho. Shocking. Surprising. Making Harry want to leap forwards and—and do things.
            And the press of his lower body against Malfoy’s had been exciting, too.
            It’s the web, just the web, Harry told himself savagely, and twisted the faucet to bring water roaring down on his head.
*
BAFan: More rebellion in Chapter 3. This one, admittedly, was concerned more with Draco’s revenge.
Kain: Bellatrix may or may not show up. I do have a lot to deal with already!
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The Dove With Razor Claws