Adult-FanFiction.org : Harry Potter

Veela-Struck	By : Lomonaaeren Category: Harry Potter > Slash - Male/Male > Harry/Draco Views: 52830 -:- Recommendations : 2 -:- Currently Reading : 2
Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, and I am making no money from this writing.

Chapter List
- 1-Veela-Struck
- 2-Changed
- 3-Thought-Through
- 4-Met
- 5-Challenged
- 6-Snapped
- 7-Struggled
- 8-Lost
- 9-Dazed
- 10-Worried
- 11-Shamed
- 12-Hidden
- 13-Dazzled
- 14-Astounded
- 15-Marked
- 16-Damaged
- 17-Chosen
- 18-Shuddered
- 19-Broken
- 20-Spoken
- 21-Influenced
- 22-Gifted
- 23-Promised
- 24-Distressed
- 25-Held
- 26-Tempted
- 27-Warded
- 28-Rumored
- 29-Fought
- 30-Flayed
- 31-Identified
- 32-Practiced
- 33-Enchanted
- 34-Blazed
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- 22
- 23
Thank you again for all the reviews!

Chapter Twenty-Two—Gifted

            “How long has it been since we did something like this?” Ron asked.

            Harry shook his head. “I don’t know,” he answered honestly, rocking Rose. Hermione had gone into the kitchen to check on the progress of the soup and probably add something secret and extra-healthy to it, if Harry knew her. He was trying not to think about what would happen when she brought the soup to the table. He looked down and made faces at Rose to distract himself. She waved her hands at him and goggled with her mouth. Harry wasn’t sure if she was yawning or trying to make faces back, although she was probably too young for that.

            “Well, we should do it more often, that’s all.” Ron toasted Harry with his glass of Firewhisky and gulped down some more, leaning back against the chair. “Did I tell you what Lewis did?”

            Harry looked up curiously as he rocked Rose in a more complicated pattern, making her goggle again. “What?” He remembered the young Auror, of course, though he was more remarkable to Harry for his hatred of Draco than anything else.

            “He was stupid enough to get caught saying that he could do a better job than Kingsley of being Minister.” Ron smirked into his glass.

            Harry let his mouth fall open, both because it was surprising—Lewis had never seemed interested in power like that—and because Ron would expect it of him. Harry was trying to ease his way back into his friends’ lives with this evening, take an interest in them that he hadn’t in a long time. “What? Why? What did Kingsley do?”

            “Well, he could hardly ignore that, but it isn’t a crime to talk about becoming Minister, either.” Ron swallowed more Firewhisky. “So he called Lewis into his office and said that he wanted his advice about running the Ministry. When Lewis came out, he was white and shaking.”

            “Good,” Harry said, with feeling that made Ron glance at him curiously. But Ron seemed to dismiss it a moment later and accept that Harry was just as incensed as he was about the way the idiot had talked.

            “Yeah,” Ron said, with an admiring shake of his head. “I wouldn’t want to go up against Kingsley.” He hesitated, then added, “I hope I never have to.”

            Harry stroked the down on Rose’s head that was too soft to be called hair yet and didn’t answer. Ron was more thoughtful and mature than he had been during Hogwarts, though you didn’t always know it. Sometimes he sounded as if he only thought about Hermione, Rose, the next case, and drinking—which, to be fair, was a wider variety of subjects than Harry usually thought about—and then he would come out with something like this.

            “Dinner’s ready.” Hermione bustled out of the kitchen, brushing her hands together. She gave Harry a private, quiet smile, the kind she’d been using since he showed up tonight, and reached out to take Rose. Harry handed her over willingly. He liked holding her, but he wasn’t used to the sheer smell of a baby yet.

            Besides, he would need his hands free for what he had to do next.

            They went into the kitchen, which was large enough that Harry thought Mrs. Weasley must feel a pang of envy when she visited. The table could change sizes with the tap of a wand, and was small and intimate right now. Hermione placed Rose in a cradle to the side of the table and cast a spell that made a ball of colored light manifest right above her head. Rose giggled and reached out with both hands, making awkward snatching motions. Harry watched her with a smile, partially because she was funny and partially because he wanted to wait for Ron and Hermione to sit down.

            With a whisk of Hermione’s wand, the food appeared on the table. Slightly steaming, meaty brown soup, and a salad thick with lettuce that caused Ron to catch Harry’s eye and scowl, and something else that looked like another salad made with bread and eggs but which Hermione insisted held meat.

            Harry aimed his wand at his plate.

            “Harry? What are you doing?” Hermione’s voice was wary, and her eyes darted back and forth between him and the food as if she thought it would explode into flying criminals any moment.

            “Sorry,” Harry said. “But you know my issues with food.” He had decided it would be for the best if he could just acknowledge what was wrong with him and do what he needed to alleviate it, rather than pretending that nothing was wrong. Pretending hadn’t worked to heal him, after all. “I wanted to eat with you instead of preparing my own food, but I have to test it for—things. Sorry,” he added again, when he saw Hermione’s stricken face. “I have to.”

            Hermione, hands over her mouth, nodded. Harry thought she was blaming herself for forgetting about his issues as much as anything else.

            Ron leaned forwards. “Do you have to?” he demanded in a hiss.

            Harry nodded and began to cast the spells. Luckily, he used them all the time at the shops to test the ingredients and had become excellent at casting them non-verbally. He didn’t want his friends to think he didn’t trust them.

            He did trust them. But he didn’t trust food. Laurent had chosen everything for him, for months before the Blazing Season where he had raped Harry. Only later, when Harry looked at samples of his own blood and performed other spells, did he realize the charms and potions they had been laced with—charms to keep him faithful, potions to make sure that he didn’t have enough independent will to leave Laurent.

            No one was ever going to do that to him again.

            As he proceeded through the spells that detected the most harmful and common hexes and the ones that would make any ingredient in contact with a potion during the last five hours glow, Ron and Hermione exchanged glances. Harry kept his eyes carefully away from their faces. He could try to force himself to act like everything was fine and then eat nothing or vomit it up later. Or he could do this, apologize, and sit down and eat a meal with his best friends. He was sorry he was making them uncomfortable, but his choices were limited.

            Someday, they wouldn’t be. That was the day he was working towards, with their help and Draco’s. He just wasn’t there yet, that was all.

            He finished the last of the spells in five minutes and took his chair with another quick, apologetic smile. Then he picked up a spoonful of soup and sipped it. The taste was spectacular, and he knew that he couldn’t have made this for himself.

            “Thanks, Hermione,” he murmured. “What did you use to make this? Beef? Chicken?”

            Hermione exchanged one more glance with Ron and then began telling him, getting enthusiastic about ingredients as she talked. Harry smiled. Hermione had wanted to become good at cooking not because she was trying to imitate Mrs. Weasley, as Ron had suggested once when he was drunk, but because it was so similar to Potions, and it was a matter of pride for her to be good at one when she was good at the other.

            That reminded Harry of his conversation with Draco, and he wondered what else he would be able to do with Draco when he was more comfortable. If Hermione could make a dish he couldn’t make and so wouldn’t have got to taste otherwise, then maybe Draco’s house-elves could do the same thing.

            And sometimes his breathing sped up throughout the evening when he tasted something unfamiliar, especially in the not-quite-a-salad, and sometimes his throat locked and he had to spit a bite privately into his napkin. But other than that, and the sweat that seemed to collect continually at the back of his neck and under his arms, he got through the meal perfectly well.

            He would have to walk the road one step at a time. That was the hardest part to remember.

*

            Draco blinked and looked up from the book he was reading when the Floo flared to life. Then he saw Pansy’s head starting to form and quickly shoved the book under the chair cushion. Perhaps he would have trusted Harry with the knowledge that he read romance novels on occasion, but Pansy would subject him to merciless teasing for it.

            “Pansy,” he said, smiling at her, and glad now that he hadn’t sent the letter Harry had originally demanded he send. He and Harry had talked about it after Draco had told Harry the truth, and agreed that it would only make her more suspicious. “What’s wrong?”

            “Nothing’s wrong,” Pansy said, rolling her eyes. “Honestly, why do you think I only firecall you when something’s wrong?” Draco pursed his lips, and Pansy sighed. “It’s good news, I promise.”

            “Don’t tell me,” Draco said, locking his hands together and touching them to his forehead. “You’ve finally met a rich old man who’s promised to leave you everything in his will.”

            “Idiot.” Pansy appeared to flounce, despite the fact that it was difficult to do that while kneeling.

            “Ah, of course not, forgive me,” Draco said, and waited just long enough to see her smile before he struck. “A rich old woman.”

            Pansy rolled her eyes again. She had an unfortunate habit of doing what when Draco was around. “Do you want to hear the good news or not?”

            “I don’t know.” Draco folded his arms and frowned thoughtfully, tilting his head to the side so that he would appear more judicious. “Do I?”

            This time, Pansy wisely decided to ignore him and just go ahead. “My friends have found out what happened to that Laurent I told you to find information on.”

            “Oh, did they?” Draco said, and kept his face blank while his heart started beating hard enough to make him feel dizzy. “How strange. I thought you were saying that they had the most trouble tracking him down.”

            Pansy leaned forwards, lowering her voice. “He’s in Azkaban, can you believe that? We have confirmation, though it was from a guard who used to work there before he was sacked, not anyone still working there, so our means of getting a message to him are limited. But the guard was absolutely sure he saw someone like that brought in almost three years ago.”

            “Are you sure you can trust the word of someone who was sacked?” Draco dared do no more than flavor his voice with the faintest touch of disbelief. He didn’t think that Pansy would be likely to overlook it if he displayed too much interest. “Maybe he found your bribe more attractive than the truth.”

            “No, I tested him with a few charms of my own,” Pansy said, and gave him a sly smile. Draco refused to rise to the bait. She had always claimed that she had discovered a spell that mimicked Veritaserum, and Draco had never been sure whether he should believe her or not. “Anyway, it would explain why Laurent seems to have vanished from the world of the living, and yet there’s no record of a death or a funeral, either. And to make it even more mysterious, there’s no record of what he was tried for. That means it had to be a secret trial, in front of the Wizengamot.”

            “What could he have done that would get him there?” Draco sounded bright and excited, because he had to be. Harry, forgive me. But all I can do now is control this and try to make sure they don’t find out the truth. It’s too late to disassociate myself from it.

            “Well, generally people are only tried in front of the Wizengamot for murder,” Pansy said, frowning. “But even that wouldn’t need a secret trial. There are factions in the Ministry that would love to popularize a murder by someone of Veela blood, because then they could argue that you’re dangerous animals who need to be controlled. It makes no sense to conceal a murder when Laurent himself wasn’t powerful or deserving of any special consideration.”

            “Maybe the Veela arranged something,” Draco suggested. He would throw off suspicion as much as he could. “There are Veela-favoring factions, too. Bribe one of the Wizengamot members enough, and he could push a secret trial through, so that the murder couldn’t be used for the purpose you just mentioned.”

            “But why would the other members agree, when some of them belong to the factions that want magical creatures more under control?” Pansy shook her head. “No, there’s something deeper here, something that I have to understand, but don’t yet.”

            Pansy had involved herself in the investigation? Draco felt a chill travel down his spine. He could understand why she would do that, if she was intrigued enough or if she liked these friends well enough, but it was bad news. She was like a terrier: she wouldn’t let go of a secret until she broke its neck.

            “Then I must confess that I don’t have any idea why he would be tried in secret,” Draco started to say. Then he stopped and caught his breath, staring at the wall.

            “What?” Pansy demanded, leaning forwards. “What?”

            “I just had a thought,” Draco said, which was true enough. She didn’t have to know that it was a thought about how to fool her and make her start hunting down a false trail instead of a thought about how to help her find the truth. “What if this Laurent had committed a crime that would disgrace the Veela community and the Ministry if it was discovered? That would be a powerful incentive for both factions to keep the crime secret, and I’m sure those who didn’t care one way or the other could be persuaded.”

            “But what kind of crime would do that?” Pansy rocked back, tapping her lips with her finger.

            “I can think of one,” Draco said. Dangerously close to the truth. Dangerously close. But if I can only make her think this! The Wizengamot members have layered defenses of secrecy that could take her years to get through, and her friends can’t have enough money to bribe everyone. “If he tried to use the allure to influence key Ministry and Wizengamot members. If he already had, in fact. It could set Veela and wizard relations back years if it was discovered, and the Ministry wouldn’t want to admit that some of its members made bad decisions under the influence of magic. They already have enough problems in that direction as it is,” Draco added, thinking of the way that some Muggleborns still didn’t trust Ministry officials who had acted under Imperius during the war.

            “That must be it,” Pansy whispered. “Oh, you’re right, it must be.” Her eyes were wide with excitement, and Draco relaxed a bit. Pansy was emotionally involved in this now, proud to be connected to wizarding politics, and there was a high chance that she would ignore contradictory evidence to keep the story going. “You’ve been a big help, Draco.” She smiled at him and started pulling back. “But I have to go talk to my friends now and tell them about this, so that we can start preparing for what we may find.”

            Draco managed to hang on to his temper until she vanished. Then he leaped to his feet and paced around the room furiously. Even listening to Harry’s calm heartbeat through the bracelet didn’t help.

            He had to do something. He had to. His chosen was in danger, and Draco couldn’t completely stop it without betraying Harry’s trust and exposing his secret to other people—which would give them the power to hurt him in the future.

            If theirs had been a normal relationship, then Draco would simply have visited Harry’s house and embraced him in his wings or pinned him to the wall and kissed him until this sense of thorny protectiveness disappeared. But it wasn’t.

            An inspiration hit Draco, and he decided what he would do, and what Harry might accept. Even better, it would take some extensive thought, which would allow him to distract himself from the threat of Pansy’s interference.

            Moments later, he headed out the door, a pouch of Galleons jingling on his belt and his mind whirling red and silver and green with anger and desire and anticipation.

*

            Harry blinked. He’d been sitting in front of the fire, almost lulled into a trance by the flames, full and content and satisfied. That had been the first meal he’d been able to eat from someone else’s hands in almost three years. He had planned to dream the rest of the evening away.

            But someone knocking this late probably meant trouble. Harry snatched up his wand and went to examine the wards.

            They told him Draco was there. Harry opened the door for him at once, so concerned that he only experienced one tiny trickle of worry at letting a Veela inside his home. He had anti-Veela wards that he could activate, if he needed to.

            Harry’s confusion increased when Draco stepped through the door. He was draped with boxes and bags and what looked like one shrunken trunk, and Harry wondered if he wanted to come and live here. Harry wasn’t ready for that yet.

            “What are you doing?” he asked, as Draco began to put the bags on the floor. “Draco? Is something wrong?”

            Draco looked up at him. His eyes were brilliant, silvery, almost glass-colored, and Harry saw then that white feathers sheathed his arms and his nails were claws. His voice was low, so soft and sweet that Harry imagined he’d had no trouble in charming the shopkeepers he’d just visited. “Harry. Pansy upset me tonight. They’ve discovered information on Laurent, that he was arrested and tried in secret before the Wizengamot, though not for what for. I tried to misdirect them as best I could, but I needed to do something else for you, since I couldn’t protect you completely.”

            Harry licked his lips, trying to control his breathing, and then his nausea, and then his urge to lock himself in the secure room he had created to be warded against his magic and never come out. He reminded himself, sharply, that Draco had said he had taken care of it, and he could trust Draco.

His voice was low and rough when it did come out, but he hoped Draco would overlook that—probably, considering the state he was in. “What—what did you need to do?”

“I bought you gifts.” Draco ducked his neck in an inhumanly graceful motion when he opened one of the bags. Harry thought it made him look like a swan. “Please accept them. You have to.” His words held the edge of a shrill chirrup that told Harry he would get worse if not soothed.

Harry’s emotions swung wildly for a moment; he was sure he showed his fear. But he had read, in the better books on Veela that he’d been trying to get himself to read lately, that the influence couldn’t happen until after both Veela and chosen had consented to be with one another. It was only hurrying what would happen, helping it, rather than forcing it. And Harry needed all the help he could get.

            “All right,” he said, and tried to ignore his own embarrassment as Draco fixed wide, grateful eyes on him and shoved a tangle of cloth at him. Harry juggled it for a minute before he could get a good look at it.

            It was a cloak, a large, dove-grey one made of such fine material that Harry stroked it instinctively just to feel more of it. And it was light, too. He could wear this and hardly know he was wearing it, Harry thought.

            “Draco,” Harry whispered. He wanted to say thank you, and he also wanted to say that it was the kind of thing he never would have bought for himself, and he was also wondering how much money Draco had spent on it and whether he would want to return it once he came to his senses and was no longer so worried.

            “Accept it,” Draco said, words slurring at the edges. Harry glanced at him sharply and saw his claws flexing as if he would rip his own sleeves. “Please?”

            This was important, Harry knew. And neither his embarrassment nor his modesty should prevent him from taking it. Besides, Draco was perfectly capable of deciding whether he wanted to return the cloak himself, in a rational frame of mind, without Harry making the decision for him.

            He hated people making decisions for him, Harry thought, and turned so that his back was to Draco. “Put it on me?” he asked in a meek voice.

            Draco was behind him in seconds, unfolding the cloak and unfastening the pin that held it shut, which was in the shape of a silver owl. He crooned and purred and chirruped into Harry’s ear, then took him firmly by the shoulders and swept the cloak around him.

            Harry closed his eyes. Yes, the lightness was just what he had thought it would be, and the cloak brushed against him like a veil or smoke. He couldn’t help wriggling his shoulders, half to feel the cloak furl into place and half to feel Draco’s grip tighten.

            “It looks perfect on you,” Draco said, in a lower, more human voice, and a more heated one.

            Harry nearly conjured a mirror in front of him so he could see for himself, and then stopped. He wasn’t ready for that yet. “Does it?” he asked, tilting his head back so his hair brushed against Draco’s face.

            This time, the sound Draco made was most definitely a trill. He pressed closer, until Harry could feel Draco’s chest against his back, his legs against Harry’s legs.

            His erection against Harry’s arse.

            A sharp, mindless moment passed, during which Harry’s mind spun with panic and Draco’s trill lowered into a human sound once more. Harry swallowed and slowly stepped away. He said that he would know when he’d pushed me too far, that the influence would let him know. It’s all right.

            “What else did you buy?” he asked brightly, already deciding that he couldn’t possibly like the rest of it as well as the cloak.

            Nor did he, but watching Draco’s face glow with pride and pleasure as he displayed his gifts was reward enough. There was a bracelet of white jade that Draco insisted on clasping around Harry’s upper arm, his touch lingering. There was a silver knife in a rich sheath of tooled leather, which had enchantments on it that meant it could cut through steel. (Harry privately admitted to himself that it would be a useful thing to have if an enemy used chains or reinforced steel doors). There was a thick tapestry decorated with creatures so delicate and strange that Harry only thought they were hounds, horses, deer, and phoenixes. Or maybe the deer were unicorns, given that they were white and had single, branch-like horns on their heads.

            Draco hung the tapestry beside the fireplace and the knife on Harry’s belt before he continued. Harry nodded when he saw the next gift, a fake wand that could be thrown at an enemy and which would become a wooden snake to coil around their legs and bind them. Everything Draco had got him so far was either an ornament or a means of defense, although the cloak was arguably also useful. Veela liked to display to their chosen and protect them. It made perfect sense, and reassured Harry, a little, that Draco hadn’t gone mad and simply spent Galleons like water.

            There were also two books on Veela that Draco said were written by Veela he knew and trusted, and which Harry could trust in turn. Harry stroked their thick leather covers and smiled at Draco. The smile made Draco unfold his wings and beat them, once, although he tucked them away before Harry could react.

            The trunk was the last thing Draco unpacked, and Harry was getting curious about what could be in it, since everything else had fit neatly inside smaller containers with shrinking charms.

            It was a bed.

            Harry stared as he watched it become larger, abruptly making his drawing room a much more crowded place. The frame was a rich wood so dark that it was probably ebony, although Harry knew nothing about luxuries like that. It stood on a raised pedestal with three steps up to it, and the sheets were an ivory color that made Harry feel dirty just touching them. Pillows lay on the sheets like a snowfall. The canopy was a phoenix with widespread wings, ornamented with cloth of gold and rubies for eyes.

            From the yearning gaze that Draco fixed on him, Harry knew his acceptance of this last gift was absolutely crucial.

            He closed his eyes. This was a bed that was meant to be slept in by two people; the sheer size indicated that, if nothing else. And the luxury. Harry had never needed anything except a bed that was warm, soft, and long enough to hold him. It was more than he had ever had in the cupboard, after all.

            But he thought—

            He thought he could do this, and more than this, something that would soothe Draco and give him back some perspective. It made Harry hurt to see Draco so fixated on him—although he had said the influence would make him so—with his eyes set to dim if Harry acted displeased for one second.

            Harry slowly climbed the steps into the bed and lay down against the pillows, muscles tensed and trembling. But he lay there for some minutes and nothing happened, and the fear began to pass. He was good at facing fear, challenging it, he thought. The main problem since he had been raped was that he hadn’t faced those fears.

            He looked up at Draco and smiled. “Would you like to sleep in it with me tonight?” he asked.

            Draco stared at him, eyes wide, and Harry wondered if that had been the right question after all.

            Then Draco was beside him in the bed, seemingly Apparating between one point and another without sound. Harry thought Veela could do that when they needed to. Draco nuzzled into his neck and took a deep sniff, then whispered in an almost human voice, “Are you sure? Are you absolutely sure?”

            “Yes,” Harry said. His voice trembled, but so what? “No sex, obviously.”

            “Of course not.” Draco sounded ready to fight anyone who would suggest that.

            Harry reached up and delicately wound his arms around Draco’s neck. Draco leaned down on top of him immediately, moving to cover Harry with his body. Harry wriggled partway free and closed his eyes, wondering if he could sleep with someone. It had been so long. Wasn’t it the kind of thing you forgot without practice?

            As it turned out, no, it wasn’t. Draco’s warmth blended with his, and the weight—once they had settled that Harry wasn’t going to lie completely separate from Draco and Draco wasn’t going to cover all of Harry—actually comforting. If someone came up to him in the night or in his nightmares, Harry thought, he wasn’t alone.

            He didn’t have to go to work tomorrow. He didn’t have to worry about anyone thinking it was absurd for him to sleep in his drawing room, fully clothed, in the middle of such a huge bed. Draco was cooing into his ear, a sound far enough away from the trill to be soothing.

            He relaxed.

*

            Draco went to sleep with joy so intense that it hurt like a pair of hands resting on his throat.

            Or around his heart.

*

            luvlustblood: Thank you!

            Lady_of_Clunn: Glad you thought that was one of the good days. I think Harry is too prone to classify everything as a bad day unless everything goes perfectly.

            Soria: Thank you!

            thrnbrooke: I know, it’s amazing, isn’t it?

            Night the Storyteller: At the moment, Harry is still planning on staying away from Draco. But those books Draco gave him include details on the Blazing Season that might make him decide that’s impossible.
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