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China Roses	By : Lomonaaeren Category: Harry Potter > Slash - Male/Male > Harry/Draco Views: 3049 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter. I am making no money from this story.

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Chapter Two—A Curtain of Roses
            “You like roses, don’t you?” Malfoy asked, but in such a soft voice that Harry could have ignored the question if he wanted to.
            He didn’t want to. “Yes,” said Harry, and waved his hand. The curtain of deep blue glass roses, strung on silver chains, that guarded the entrance to his flat swung back and forth in response, and Malfoy blinked and turned his head away as though he would find something less dazzling to look at.
            Good luck, Harry thought, amused. The rooms of the little flat held sheets of glass, and delicate china bowls, and worked gems waiting to be pried out of their settings on brooches and rings, and all the other raw materials he used to make his countercurses. The drawing room and the dining room spilled indistinguishably into each other. Malfoy wandered around as though he was looking for firm boundaries.
            “Hungry?” Harry added, picking up a silver toasting fork that already had a slice of bread stuck to the end of it.
            Malfoy gave the bread a politely horrified glance. Harry grinned. “It’s only been sitting out a few hours. With Freshening Charms on it.”
            “Perhaps I will not,” said Malfoy. “I brought some food.”
            “You did? Really?” Harry shook his head, bemused. “Well, it’s probably not as fresh as mine. Or don’t you trust my magic?” he had to add, as Malfoy opened his mouth for what was probably going to be another refusal.
            “I trust it.” Malfoy was darting his eyes around in the old paranoid way. Harry was fascinated by how little he’d changed since their eighth year at Hogwarts when they had put together a sort of friendship. Of course his career and his family life were different, but his tells were still the same. “I—would not leave guardianship of my son in the hands of someone I didn’t trust.”
            And that was a big admission for him to make, Harry realized. Harry smiled a little and nodded. “I knew that, actually.”
            “Oh.” Malfoy looked as if he had no idea how to pick up the conversation.
            “Let me feed you.” Harry didn’t smile this time, and that seemed to make Malfoy listen more closely. “I have fresh dewberries. More bread that hasn’t been sitting out. A huge wedge of white cheese I’ve hardly made a dent in.”
            “Simple food.” Malfoy made the statement and then watched Harry as if it was a test.
            A test of how I respond to it, anyway. Harry merely nodded. “I like to live that way,” he said. “If nothing else, every time I go over to someone’s house it’s like I get a feast.” Most of his friends either had house-elves, a fascination with cooking, or an interest in making sure that they had the best food for guests.

            “I have no objection to food not cooked by house-elves,” said Malfoy. “I simply…” He sat down in the one chair Harry always kept clear for guests and frowned at a blanket woven of Demiguise fur as if he was trying to decide what it was.
            Don’t know what to say when we haven’t seen each other in so long, Harry supplied silently. He might have been the same way, but running Countercurses meant he had to see a lot more people on a daily basis than a history author did.
            “You’re not used to it,” said Harry. “I understand.” He ignored the next politely horrified glance he got, probably because he had talked about it instead of avoiding the subject, and went into the kitchen.
            It took longer to find a knife capable of cutting the cheese and bread than it did to arrange the food, and then Harry carried the huge wooden plate back out. Malfoy had reached out to touch a dragon’s scale shimmering on the table near the chair, but he jerked his hand back.
            “None of the things up here are dangerous,” Harry said. “I would have warned you if they were.” He cleared some amulets off a table to have room for the plate and started to arrange the berries.
            “I wasn’t afraid,” said Malfoy. “It occurred to me that it might be impolite.”
            Harry glanced up with a smile that he didn’t bother to hide. “Do you remember what you said the exact same thing about?”
            “There were no dragons’ scales in Hogwarts,” Malfoy began. Then he spun around and faced the fire as if that would help excuse the blush crawling up his cheeks.
            “No,” said Harry calmly, and was happy that he had the task of cutting up the cheese now to hide his shaking hand. It had no reason to shake. He glared at it, and it calmed. “But there were other things that might have been glad of your touch.”
            He held out the plate to Malfoy. It took him a minute to notice, and he swallowed half the biggest chunk of cheese on the plate, as if he wanted to make sure that he would have even more excuses not to talk.
            Harry sat and watched him. Malfoy had reminded him of Scorpius at first; since he’d been around Scorpius for months, he was Harry’s frame of reference now. But he could see the differences when he looked closely enough.
            Malfoy was taller, or wore his height in a different way. Harry had never met Astoria Greengrass, only seen her from a distance, but he knew she was the source of the difference. Scorpius could bend in all sorts of ways and twist and use his height to reach upper shelves where Harry would have had to Levitate things down from. Malfoy walked as though nothing would ever make him bend or twist, and he would thank people not to think such degrading words around him.
            And Malfoy’s face was finer in its bones than Scorpius’s, and his hair was nearer white than gold. Harry asked himself, quietly, if Malfoy was handsome, and received no answer back from the echoing emptiness inside him.
            That had more to do with Harry himself than Malfoy, he knew. He had rarely thought much about having someone to date in the years since Ginny. There was magic, and his friends, and clients to wrangle with, and apprentices to train—although no one who had ever shown as much promise for it as Scorpius. Harry sometimes felt he was lucky to get his bed to himself. Someone else would have taken up time even there.
            “Potter?”
            Harry stirred, blinked, and came back to Malfoy. “Yes?” he asked, when he saw Malfoy staring at him as if he had said it more than once.
            “You looked so far away there.” Malfoy was hunching up his shoulders in his best defensive style, turning his head slightly to the side. “Sorry for startling you if you were daydreaming.”
            “Even if I was daydreaming, it’s impolite to do it with a guest around,” Harry said, and smiled to ease whatever sting was making Malfoy look at him as if he’d stepped on a trapdoor. “Now.” He leaned forwards to pour more tea into Malfoy’s cup. “You’re satisfied that Scorpius can make a career out of this?”
            “Making a career is different from thinking he’s safe, which I do think.” Malfoy took a long swallow of his tea. “What could he do if you’re already selling these things and have control of the market?”
            Harry waved his hand. “Oh, I’ve never trained anyone to directly succeed me, of course. What I’m doing is giving them the skills to create their own magical objects. Scorpius is talking about doing artifacts.”
            Malfoy narrowed his eyes and set his cup down. “Artifacts are defined by their rarity, Potter.”
            “Right now, they are.” Harry sipped some more of his own tea, hiding his smile. He’d thought Scorpius had talked about this with his father, but it appeared not.
            “Artifacts are also subject to high Ministry regulation.” Malfoy spent a moment playing with the cuff of his robe. “Scorpius would have to spend a lifetime proving they’re safe and filling out paperwork.”
            “I don’t spend a lifetime at it, but paperwork takes up a portion of my time every day.” Harry tilted his head to the side and smiled a little winsomely at Malfoy. “I have to prove that my new countercurses are safe and that the Ministry doesn’t need to spend all its time coming down here and examining them.”
            Malfoy blinked once, like a lizard on a wall. “So you’re training him to do some of the paperwork, as well?”
            “Training him for his. He can’t help me fill out mine. Unfortunately,” Harry added wistfully, thinking of how much time he would save if he could have had apprentices do that. But the Ministry had forms that were enspelled to resist both the writing of anyone except the person who was supposed to fill them out, and duplication charms.
            Harry suspected someone had adapted either one of his spells or Hermione’s to produce paperwork like that. He supposed he couldn’t really blame them, as annoying as he found the results. It was both impressive and useful.
            “You’re strange,” Malfoy said, but he was frowning in a gentler way now. “You think he can make a career of this. Really.”
            Harry nodded and looked at him. “Once he stops trying to combine artifacts he doesn’t understand with power he doesn’t understand.”
            Malfoy’s smile was slow in coming, but rich as late afternoon light when it did. “A less fatal lesson than it could have been.”
            “Yes,” said Harry. He was feeling warm and relaxed and contented now, and he leaned back in his chair and sipped some more of the tea. “Did he tell you about what happened the first time he met one of my Killing Curse shields?”
            Malfoy choked on a dewberry and sat forwards with his hands dangling next to him. “No one can resist the Killing Curse.”
            Harry slowly placed a hand over his heart. “Seems to still be beating.”
            Malfoy shook his head. His face was pinched around the eyes, and he was sighing out hard, like he had a bellows in his chest. The thought crossed Harry’s mind that he would have been a good crafter, if he could look like that when he was doing some of the work. “That’s not what I meant. No one can block the Killing Curse.”
            “I’ll be able to, when the shields are done.”
            “Tell me.”
            There was so much hunger in Malfoy’s face. Harry stared at him for a moment in wonder, and then decided abruptly that he knew the reason. Malfoy’s art was history, the same way that Harry’s was defensive magic. He was probably thinking of the way history would change once Harry’s shields came into common use. Or could have changed. Who could have survived.
            The realization softened Harry’s voice as he began the story.
*
            Scorpius checks over his shoulder before he shuts the door. He can feel his breath coming as short as it did when he and Al sneaked up to the height of the Astronomy Tower and cast a net over the side that would support them if they jumped.
            Then, he and Al were going to pretend to the dramatic desire to jump, and then pretend to actually do it, to frighten some of their stubborn Housemates who wouldn’t shut up about Al not belonging in Slytherin. Now, Scorpius is going to do something worse.
            No pretense. Reality.
            And Harry is nice. Wise. Wonderful to work with, and watch when his magic is wreathing around glass and gems and bringing them to life. Scorpius can admit that without flinching.
            What he can’t admit is the way that his own magic burns in him and kicks him beneath the heart when he lies awake in his bed. He knows why Harry wants to go slowly. Scorpius was glad of it in the first weeks when he handled all sorts of magic and materials he’d never thought existed.
            But Scorpius knows he is ready, now. He can feel the magic lapping out to welcome him when he comes into Harry’s “conservatory.” It’s reaching out for him right now, as a matter of fact, as he walks through the walls of roses to a small, sheeted dais at the far end. Harry uses those miniature daises to showcase all the countercurses that he actually sells in the shop, and even ones that remain experimental or just for him in his home.
            But Scorpius hasn’t been allowed to approach this one. Harry has told him what it is. A shield for the Killing Curse.
            He won’t show Scorpius how to work it, though. He keeps saying Scorpius needs more practice with lesser magic first.
            Scorpius does not. No, he hasn’t managed to cast the Killing Curse or any of the other Unforgivables yet. He at first didn’t know how Harry could, since Grandfather always taught him that it requires intense hatred and cruelty.
            Then Scorpius saw the compassionate, detached expression on Harry’s face when he first made a dummy of wood and cloth writhe with the Cruciatus, and now he knows. Harry can force himself through the spell because he’s thinking of all the lives he’ll make better with his solutions.
            Scorpius reaches out and rips the silver sheet back. It falls on the floor and makes some of the roses ring softly in the wind of its passage.
            Looking back at Scorpius is an actual shield, also made of silver. Scorpius blinks. Most of the time, Harry shapes his countercurses in the forms of living beings. It seems strange he would choose a simple object.
            On the other hand, depictions of dragons and snakes crawl around the edge of the shield, and they have small garnets and topazes for eyes. Scorpius nods, reassured. Harry hasn’t gone far adrift from his usual magic in making the shields, then.
            The middle of the silver disk is blank. Harry told him why. He’ll place the central control slit and a rune he’s developed at the center of the shield when he’s ready to perfect them.
            Right now, they’re not perfected. This is the most complete shield Harry has ever made. He’s told Scorpius over and over again how focused the emotions and magic that make the shields have to be, to create a thing that can turn the Killing Curse.
            But Harry’s as cautious with himself as he is with Scorpius. He keeps stopping to rest when Scorpius knows he could go on. He makes those little slits in his countercurses and feeds in the magic a drop at a time, instead of a gushing torrent.
            He could do more. Scorpius tells himself that. He’s doing this for Harry as much as for himself. Maybe Harry will see how much more he could achieve now, and will look at Scorpius with eyes full of wonder, and turn to a real challenge.
            Scorpius picks up the shield. It feels heavier than it should, but he’s used to that with Harry’s other countercurses. He lays the shield gently down on the floor, and then bends over it and begins to focus his magic. He’s going to complete the shield, not by casting the Killing Curse at it but by the reverse process.
            He has the most powerful Shield Charm he’s ever cast just building up inside him. He hasn’t used any defensive magic for the past week, telling Harry he wanted more time to study theory. Harry seemed a bit suspicious, but only a bit.
            And now Scorpius can use that stored magic, and show how he can force and focus it to his will.
            The sparks are leaping off his fingertips by the time he opens his eyes again. All around him, Harry’s roses are stirring slightly, their leaves curling and waving. Scorpius ignores them. They literally couldn’t hurt him even if he made them all explode and fly all around the room in whirling shards of glass and china. It’s not in their nature.
            He stands for a moment, forming the word with his lips, aiming one hand downwards at the shield. Then he nods, and the sparks all coil up and around him, as ready to strike as one of Harry’s healing roses.
            “Protego!” Scorpius roars.
            The shout drags all the magic out of him, shaping it around the sounds of the word. Scorpius hears his heels scrape as he lurches forwards, pulled by the power. He gasps aloud, and the wind seems to catch up even the sound of his gasp and drive it into the shield.
            The eyes of the dragons and snakes begin to glow, gold and red. Scorpius leans forwards, his own mouth starting open as he stares at the shield, and his shoulders ache with excitement.
            The counter-blast blows him off his feet, and across the room, and out the door, and into the foot of the stairs, where he gets to see the bottom of Harry’s robes swinging as he runs down them.
            “That wasn’t supposed to happen,” Scorpius says, blinking up through fuzzy eyes at Harry, and then he falls into unconsciousness to escape the pain that he can feel coming.
            And the moment when Harry’s expression will probably change to one of disappointment.
*
            “…and he didn’t understand that there was a reason I had told him not to mess with the shield.” Harry sighed and sat back, shaking his head, one hand playing for a second with the side of his sleeve. He could still remember the way he had felt when he saw Scorpius lying on the floor and recognized the tendrils of magic crackling around him.
            “What did you do?”
            Harry blinked and looked up. Malfoy was pointed towards him, his hands extended. Steam had stopped rising from his teacup. Harry held out his wand and heated the tea again.
            Malfoy only gave him an impatient glance, as if he thought the way Harry was acting was meant to put off the moment when he could answer the question. Harry sighed and answered. “I put him to bed and let him heal. And then I told him the reason he’d survived.”
            “Which was?”
            “The roses in my conservatory are meant to be the counter to Blasting Curses,” Harry explained. He had told enough customers this that the words fell naturally from his lips. “Not just blocking it, but cushioning things.” He paused, and saw Malfoy’s expression, and stopped talking to him like he wanted to buy roses. “If he’d tried to pump magic into that shield in any other room in the house, he never would have lived. The backlash would have killed him.”
            Malfoy leaned back and picked up the teacup again. His mouth had gone flat. In fact, his whole face was flat.
            “Are you all right?” Harry asked quietly. “Regretting allowing Scorpius to come here?”
            He posed the question as lightly as he could, but he could feel a flutter of anxiety in his stomach. Malfoy might or might not want to be friends again. Harry was actually stunned that he’d agreed to stay and wait for Scorpius to recover. If he took Scorpius away, though…
            It was the most important bond Harry had ever had with an apprentice. But he couldn’t contest Malfoy’s right to be a concerned parent. Harry would have felt the same way if his children’s overconfidence was likely to get them into similar situations.
            “I’m amazed that he lived,” Malfoy said flatly.
            Harry swallowed a little. Yes, it sounded like Malfoy would insist on a dissolution of the apprentice contract immediately.
            “And that you kept him here.” Malfoy shook his head. “I was under the impression that this accident was the first of its kind.” He stared at Harry. “And you say he has talent?”
            Harry started laughing before he could help himself, though he choked it off when he saw the almost crystalline hardness that had taken over Malfoy’s face. “Honestly, yes, he does,” Harry said. “I wouldn’t have kept training him after the shield incident if he didn’t. But he does need to learn how to be less reckless.” He thought about it, then grinned. “How to have more reck.”
            “I will, of course, be removing the Malfoy heirloom that I allowed him to borrow,” Malfoy murmured, “since he seems to have inappropriate ideas about what he’s allowed to do with it.” He seemed to be thinking deeply. “What else can we do?”
            “About?”
            “Protecting him from himself.”
            Harry cocked his head. “I think he will be careful after this, at least. I’ll say this for Scorpius, he never makes the same mistakes.”
            Malfoy shook his head slightly. “Not good enough. You put your trust in him, and he’s nearly killed himself, destroyed products you were working on, and set back your research.”
            At least I know what’s most important to him by the order he puts things in. Harry caught Malfoy’s eye and held it. “Listen,” he said, as gently as he could. “I was angry with him. Yes, that shield took months of work, and I had to start all over again. It’s one of the reasons I can’t put the shields on the market right now. But in the end, Scorpius matters more. I want you to know that.”
            “He’s my son. Of course he matters to me.”
            “And he’s my apprentice.”
            Malfoy considered him. Then he said abruptly, “I would have forgiven Scorpius likewise for destroying my books or notes or something else I needed to write. But I’m not only his father. He’s nineteen now.”
            Harry snorted a little. “And you think that makes him immune to stupidity? You’re thinking like him now.”
            “By the time you were nineteen,” said Malfoy, “you’d won a war.”
            Harry stared at him. Malfoy looked at him, but a faint blush had stolen into his cheeks. Harry blinked his eyes more and more rapidly, realizing something. Malfoy had acted much the same way around him when they were at Hogwarts in their eighth year.
            Malfoy envies me. Or is in awe of me. Or was. And he compares what he’s achieved to me.
            “It’s permissible for ordinary nineteen-year-olds to be a little stupid,” Harry said, and his voice was very soft. Malfoy seemed to know why, because his mouth shut with a click of teeth.
            But he didn’t glance away, which Harry thought was brave of him. He went on. “I think Scorpius is within the bounds of acceptable stupidity. I still want him to be my apprentice.”
            Malfoy sat considering it. Harry tried to subdue his own impatience and curiosity, and sipped more tea. He’d made the best case he could. Ultimately, though, Malfoy was Scorpius’s father and the one who had paid most of the necessary fees.
            “I think he needs to be here,” Malfoy said. “However, I disagree that he never makes the same mistake twice. It sounds like, at least twice, he made the mistake of thinking he knew better than you how much power to handle.”
            Harry paused. He hadn’t thought of that before, because the theory behind the shield and the theory behind the crystal unicorn seemed so different to him that they’d made the accidents Scorpius had with them different. But he could see it from Malfoy’s perspective now.
            “Go on,” he said, and leaned back in the chair again.
            “I think,” said Malfoy, “that we need to teach him a lesson. Scare him a little.”
            Harry blinked. “I—well, I can see your point, but I don’t think I could still have a mentorship bond with him if I lied to him.”
            “You don’t need to do a thing,” Malfoy almost crooned. “I’m his father, and I’m the one who studies history. I can draw on a thousand examples of parents who had to do things like this and teach their children better.” He touched Harry’s wrist. “Let me do this.”
            And Harry felt his own flush mounting his cheeks as he watched the spark in Malfoy’s eyes.
            There is something here. And not because he’s Scorpius’s father or could have been my friend two decades ago.
            Something I want.
            Harry had a lot of experience in getting what he wanted. There was a roomful of china roses downstairs that said that.
            But he doubted any countercurse would be of use to him when pursuing Malfoy. He would have to try other methods.
            Well. I think I’m still pretty bloody creative.

*
SP777: Thank you. I’m enjoying the chance to write a story with lots of art and conversations between people who are basically good.
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China Roses