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Forgive Those Who Trespass	By : Lomonaaeren Category: Harry Potter > Slash - Male/Male > Harry/Draco Views: 20651 -:- Recommendations : 1 -:- Currently Reading : 1
Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor any of the characters from the books or movies. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

Chapter List
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Thanks again for all the reviews!

Chapter Twenty-Three�The
Seventh Pensieve

�� By the time
the white light of the seventh Pensieve room appeared, it was all Harry could
do to keep himself from crying out in welcome and running forwards. He knew
they would see images of horror in the Pensieve. But at least they were known images of horror. Harry would
prefer that to another veil, a sudden surprise he was not prepared for.

�� He noticed
that Draco followed him very carefully into the room, however, staring in
several directions and jumping when Harry cast one of the spells that would
identify any lurking magical creatures. Harry frowned at him. �Are you
remembering something we need to be careful of here?� he asked, tilting his
head back and looking at the ceiling. Nothing up there, but just because the
Pensieve rooms so far had all been clear�

��

�� He felt a
sharp tug on his sleeve, and looked back to see Draco frowning at him over the
top of the communication sphere. Of course, he�d probably tried to sign an
answer, but without Harry looking at him, he was shouting into a void.

�� Harry
flushed, remembering, all over again, his feeling when he had realized the Unspeakables
had rendered Draco easy to ignore by taking his voice. �Sorry,� he mumbled.

�� Draco gave
him a curt nod, then rapped his fingers on the facets that meant, The center of the maze.

�� Harry
closed his eyes for a moment, trying to recall the pattern of the maze he�d
seen inscribed on the table in that first set of memories. There�d been nine
balls, yes: one for Draco himself, and eight for the Pensieves. They probably
were close to the center of the maze.

�� You�re
worried about what we�ll find there,� he said, opening his eyes.

�� Draco
nodded, and tapped his throat. Then he shrugged, traced the letter R in the air
with two of his fingers bunched together, and shrugged again.

�� Maybe my voice. Maybe Richard. Who can tell?

�� The haunted
look to his eyes did more to remind Harry of what was at stake here than any
irritation in the tone of a voice could have. He nodded. �I�m sorry. I�ll keep
a sharper look out. But my spells have already said that no one is waiting to
trap us here.�

�� Draco let
his lips flutter open on a soundless sigh, as if to show just how much he
trusted Harry�s magic, but he joined Harry at the side of the Pensieve and
stared solemnly into the silvery liquid for a long moment. Harry could almost
feel his muscles tightening as he prepared himself for the horror he would
undoubtedly be committing inside this Pensieve�at least, if it followed the
patterns of all the others.

�� Harry put
an arm around Draco�s shoulders. The other man started, but didn�t draw away
from him. �Ready?� Harry whispered, as he cast a pair of nonverbal Sticking
Charms and then lowered his wand to his side.

�� Draco gave
him a look compounded of amusement and despair all at once. Harry understood
better than he would have if Draco had tried to use the sphere. Even if I am, that won�t make much difference,
will it?

�� Harry
tightened his arm as they lowered their heads. No matter what Draco had done in
the past, he wanted him to know that Harry would never turn away from him or
abandon him now.

�� Unless it�s necessary to free him from the
maze, of course.

*

�� The light
that enveloped them in this memory was unlike the brilliant white glare and the
firelight that so far had seemed the Unspeakables� preference. Harry blinked,
and blinked again. He knew the glow was blue, the color of sheet lightning, but
that didn�t make it any easier to get used to.

�� At last, he
managed to make out that it illuminated the bars of a narrow, hexagonal steel cage,
constructed in such a way that the prisoner inside couldn�t lie down or stand
up comfortably. The prisoner sat silent and stoic towards one side of the cage,
the part furthest from where Harry and Draco stood. He was a young man in dress
robes, as though the Unspeakables had caught him on his way to a party. His
hair was red, and Harry�s heart lurched, but no matter how long he stared, the
boy�s face refused to take on any resemblance to Ron�s. He couldn�t be a
Weasley cousin, either, not having freckles.

�� Harry�s unease
only increased when the past Draco came into the light. He must have appeared
from a door on the other side of the room, but the contrast between the blue
glow and the darkness was so intense Harry couldn�t see it.

�� The Draco
at his side had gone as still as a mouse that feared the shadow of a hawk.
Harry hugged him with his arm again, and turned back to the scene as the past
Draco started to speak.

�� Do you
know why you�re here?�

�� The boy
hadn�t seen or heard him appear, either. He jumped, but then turned weary eyes
towards Draco. �You�ve asked me questions like that before,� he said. �No
matter what answer I give, you aren�t going to let me go. Won�t you be
satisfied with my silence and leave it?�

�� No.� The
past Draco raised his wand. His face was taut. Harry was sure it only seemed
cruel to his victim, but to him, who had so much experience in reading that
particular set of features, it said that Draco was struggling to control his
emotions and look cruel. �I need
certain answers from you, and if you won�t give them��

�� I don�t know anything.� For the first time, the
boy�s voice cracked, and Harry revised his estimate of his age downwards.
Fifteen, perhaps, or a small sixteen.

�� You were
overheard talking about the Department of Mysteries,� Draco said. �That means
you know something.�

�� It was a joke. That�s all.�

�� And now
you see how we treat jokes.� Draco began to move in a slow circle, around the
cage, forcing the boy to turn each time to look at him. �You might as well know
that pretending stupidity won�t save you, here. We�ll take the truth from you
one way or the other.�

�� You�you can�t
do that.� The boy clenched his hands in his lap. �I know that giving you
Veritaserum against your will is illegal.� He sounded proud of himself for
knowing, but the fear in the back of his voice kept growing and growing. Harry
winced, remembering himself when he�d faced Umbridge.

�� You think
you�re in a place where laws matter?� Draco tilted his head. �You need a
convincing demonstration, I see.� He flicked his wand at the cage and spoke a
single quiet word. Harry didn�t think it was an incantation; it sounded more
like a name.

�� The cage
abruptly tightened, the oddly distended sides shooting inwards, the bars
sticking to the boy�s skin and robes. The boy sucked in a panicked gasp of air.
Harry was sure that he wouldn�t have done much better in his circumstances. He�d
had his share of nightmares about being trapped in small, dark spaces where the
walls suddenly started to squeeze in on him.

�� Then the
bars began to burn.

�� The boy
screamed as the smells of singing flesh and hair rose from his body. The past
Draco stood watching with his hands behind his back, his face the picture of cool
calculation. Only someone at Harry�s or Draco�s vantage could see the way his
hands twisted around each other, as distorted as the way the boy�s body lurched
off the ground.

�� The burning
smell increased. Harry held his nose with one hand, then remembered it wouldn�t
do any good and let it drop. He hauled his own Draco closer to his side; the
other man was so pale Harry thought he might faint, and he wanted the support
for himself, too. Then he forced himself to look more closely at the boy, who
was continuing to scream in a high, thin voice.

�� The bars of
the cage were cutting into his skin.
And his skin was rippling, bubbling, transforming. Harry wasn�t entirely sure
what it was becoming, but whatever it was shone with the same blue glow as the
cage bars.

�� Then the
burning smell stopped. The boy�s whimpers continued for some time, before lapsing
into silence and little snuffling noises. The past Draco walked once more
around the cage. Harry thought he was trying to control his jumping stomach,
but he faced away most of the time and Harry couldn�t be certain.

�� Now,�
Draco said. �You have one more chance to tell me the truth before we decide
that you�re more useful in another form, and change you.�

�� I don�t know anything!� A childish wail, and
Harry was certain he saw tears sliding down the boy�s face.

�� I believe
you,� said Draco. �But that makes you only more of a candidate for
transformation, so that you can�t go back among other people and tell them what
you know now. And frequent Obliviation
is so messy.� He flicked his wand again, and this time Harry was sure he was
speaking to the cage.

�� The bars
tightened once more. Where they touched, the boy�s skin turned stiff and
gleaming�metallic. Harry could see the ripple of magic traveling up inside his
body, altering his bones, making them angled like the hinges that had held
together the stone dogs pursuing Draco in the last Pensieve. The boy screamed�at
least until the transformation reached his face, and it became a compound of
stone and metal. Then his eyes screamed his horror, until they became gems.
Harry watched life leave them and wondered if they were as dead as they seemed,
or if human feeling still quivered behind them.

�� For the boy�s
sake, he hoped he was completely dead, incapable of remembering what had happened
to him.

�� Finally the
past Draco flicked his wand again, and the cage vanished entirely. The thing
that had been the boy lurched to its feet. To Harry, it looked like a rather clumsy
construct of stone and metal, shunted together with random strips of tough,
leathery flesh. The eyes and the fingernails and a few other parts of the body
had become gems. It might be immortal, but it wouldn�t be winning any beauty
contests.

�� Draco made
it walk up and down the room a few times. He had a complicated expression on
his face�as if he wanted to be pleased but could not; and as if he wanted to
express disgust but was afraid of what would happen should he do so.

�� The door on
the far side of the room opened. This time, Harry could see it clearly; light
was creeping into the chamber from sconces on the walls that had lit
themselves. Richard stepped in, shut the door behind him, and folded his arms
across his chest, nodding in approval as he watched Draco�s golem.

�� You�ve
done well,� he said. �And I think we can apply this research to the next
prisoner we use. After all, Sir Galen�s spell only says that someone must
forever suffer as the foundation of the maze. It doesn�t say that that person
has to be human.�

�� From the
quiver that traveled up the past Draco�s cheek as he bit the inside of it,
Harry thought he disagreed with that opinion, but he was smart enough not to
say so. Instead, he said, �And you haven�t harmed her?�

�� Richard only
went on admiring the construct, and said nothing.

�� Draco took
a quick, sliding step forwards, the way Harry had sometimes done in Auror training
when he let his instincts carry him ahead of the proposed patterns of strike,
hex, and counterattack. �You haven�t harmed her,� he said, his tone a demand
for reassurance.

�� Hmmm?�
Richard faced Draco again. Harry would have hated him less if he could have
thought Richard was acting for dramatic effect, but it really did seem as if he�d
forgotten all about Draco�s frantic question. As it was, he shook his head and
blinked a few times before he could bring himself back to the subject. �Oh, of
course not. You�ve done what we commanded of you, Draco�made your own advances
in immortality magic and selected your own victim.� His eyes went back to the
construct again. �And done a better job with it than we have. Perhaps innocence is a major factor in this
process, and using Azkaban prisoners is not the best idea. Hmmm.�

�� Draco
stepped back as if someone had driven a Muggle car at him. His face was so
revolted that Harry felt a surge of fear for him, before he remembered that all
of this was gone, and whatever Draco had suffered as a consequence of showing
his real feelings had been suffered already.

�� Suffered, indeed. Harry tried to smile
reassuringly at the Draco at his side, but his eyes were closed and he was
breathing shallowly. Harry wondered what had affected him most: the knowledge
that he had designed the cage himself, his choice of a child as victim, or his
selection of an innocent. He rubbed a soothing hand over Draco�s back, and
Draco let his head drop on Harry�s shoulder like a puppet whose strings had
been cut.

�� The past Draco
had controlled his face by the time Richard really looked at him, at least. �Tell
me,� said Richard, and Harry stiffened. That was the same tone Richard had used
when speaking of the sapphire spiders he�d dropped into Draco�s stomach. �How
did it feel, when you were pretending to be one of us?�

�� Draco�s
eyes narrowed as he felt through the question for traps. At last he said, �I am one of you.�

�� Richard
threw his head back and laughed. Harry wished he could hear some hint of
insanity in that laughter, but alas, it only sounded normal. Richard�s wasn�t
the gibbering kind of madness that might have convinced some of his underlings
to mistrust and turn against him. �Not in heart, Draco,� he said, when his
chuckles had calmed. �I know better than that. You came here for yourself,
because you wanted the Dark Mark removed. You don�t give a fig for the research
we do, or the lofty goal we serve, improving humanity, unless it somehow
benefits you.�

�� Draco said
nothing, but his eyes were narrowing further and further, until Harry thought
it was a wonder he could see out of them at all.

�� But,�
Richard said, and his voice dipped and slowed, �there are times when acting
goes too far.�

�� I did what
you wanted,� Draco said. �Now will you punish me for that as you would for
rebellion?�

�� You don�t understand
me,� Richard said calmly. �Not that that�s new. You have misunderstood my
purposes almost since we made our first serious try at building Sir Galen�s
maze.� He paused, and then began to walk in a circle around the construct. The
past Draco watched him with head cocked like a dog puzzled at the actions of
its master. When Harry glanced down, his Draco was watching his past self with
a mask of disgust.

�� You came
here convinced of nothing but your own right to be free from pain,� Richard
went on, smoothly. �You have clung to that goal through months when our plans
deepened and solidified. Sometimes we had to use persuasion to make you agree
with our more extreme actions, but you have remained. Doubtless you could tell yourself
that you were forced to do this, since we had surveillance on the people you
love.� He threw a keen glance at Draco. �Though, I wonder. Can someone who
would see suffering and disease continue in the world�someone who does not want others to live forever�know what love
is? An interesting dilemma.�

�� Get on
with it,� Draco said, though without much voice behind the words.

�� You made
your justifications,� said Richard, as though obedient to the command. Harry
thought it simply amused him to seem to
obey. �And they were pitiful. I have listened to them and shaken my head and
still allowed you to participate in the project, because you did good work and
showed skill and intelligence that few of the others have. Do you see, Draco? I
have no problem admitting the good qualities of people who do not appreciate mine.�

�� Harry very
much feared that that was true, and it would make Richard an infinitely harder
opponent to deal with.

�� But now,�
said Richard, �now and at other times, when we asked you to do something�you went
further and did something else. No one asked that you select a child, or even a
young wizard, for your task. That is something you did. No one asked that you build this cage and force someone
else into a golem�s shape. That is something you chose on your own. No doubt it
was not as grotesque as it could have been; you threw up after you skinned your
last prisoner, I understand. But the skinning was not something I told you to
do.�

�� I don�t
understand what you�re getting at.� Draco turned as if he would walk out the
door. �I have work to do, and I have to compile the results of this experiment
in a simple, easy code if others are to understand them.�

�� I wager
Pearl would understand it, no matter how long you waited to write it,� Richard
said softly to his back.

�� Draco went
still. Then he repeated, without looking around, �I don�t understand what you�re
getting at.�

�� You made
certain decisions when you had no choice, or told yourself that you had no
choice,� Richard said. �It was a defensive maneuver to allow you to retain your
contempt of us whilst telling yourself that you
would never do something like this of your own free will. It was a truce with
your conscience.

�� And now
you have done something horrible of your own free will. You have made it harder
for the prisoner who would transform that I would have.� Richard�s voice held a
hint of laughter. �You see the perils of spending too much time with one kind
of person, now? You are becoming like us, whether you want to be or not.�

�� No.�

�� Harry was
not the only one who heard the snarl of despair under Draco�s denial. Once
again, his shoulder received the heavy weight of his Draco�s head.

�� Yes, you
are,� said Richard. �Why did you choose a child?�

�� Because it
would impress you! Because it would keep you from hurting her!�

�� And yet,
you could have refused. If you were as tender-hearted as you believe you are,
you would not have chosen a child as a victim no matter what provocation we
offered you.� Richard raised his eyebrow. �You care more about the people
around you than you should, Draco Malfoy. This compassion for them will undermine you. If you were
more committed to abstract principles, you would refuse to harm someone who had
never done you harm.�

�� Draco made
no response, but his breathing sounded like the blowing of wind through a metal
machine, or the series of whirs and clicks his construct was making.

�� You could
have knocked the child unconscious before you Transfigured him,� Richard
continued, relentless. �You could have caused the transformation to happen
without pain. You could have ensured that he thought he had a friend in you, so
he spent his last moments in pleasure and not fear. And yet, you did none of
those things, though no one was here to recommend that you use straight pain.�

�� No
response.

�� You think
we are monsters,� Richard said. �I could understand resistance. I could
understand joining this project with such selfishness that you simply refuse to
see the suffering of others. I could understand believing as we do and
accepting that the short-term pain will make for long-term gain for others�people
like Pearl�s Muggleborn relatives, for example, dying of cancer.� Again the
past Draco flinched. �But I cannot understand your allowing yourself to become what
you think of as a monster, no matter what the cause. Unless you carried the
seeds of evil within yourself already. Unless pain appeals to you at the
deepest level, and you really have no compunction about hurting an innocent,
though you pretend you do because it�s more socially acceptable to have that
kind of conscience.� Richard paused delicately. �You liked it, didn�t you?�

�� No.�

�� But you
only looked as if you would be sick when you started torturing him,� Richard
said. �It didn�t actually happen. You only looked as if you would stop. It didn�t
actually happen. You were reluctant, but you did not stop the transformation
halfway through, though it was slow enough, and your magic powerful enough,
that you could have.

�� Actions
matter more than intentions, Draco. What has happened to you, no matter the
qualms of your conscience, makes you nothing better than we are.�

�� The past
Draco sank to the floor, his hands over his eyes. �I�m not like that,� Harry could
hear him whispering, his voice hollow.

�� Richard
stepped up beside him and patted his shoulder with extreme condescension. �Of course
you are not,� he said. �You simply associate with us when you think we�re
wrong, and you do what we do even though you loathe it. If one cannot see the soul,
Draco�and no one can, save when you cast certain very specific spells�do your
victims really have any reason to think that you�re different from us?�

�� And he
whirled and strode out of the room at high speed, only pausing to add over his shoulder,
�Your performance impressed me. I have not hurt her.�

�� Draco was
left to shudder, his fingers curling as if he would start tearing skin off his
face in a moment. And then the darkness fell, and Harry and Draco were back in
the Pensieve room again.

�� Harry
cleared his throat. His face was wet, but he managed to scrub away the tears
and fix his attention on his Draco, who needed him more right now.

�� Do you think so? Draco was already
tapping out on the communication sphere.

�� Harry
frowned. �Do I think what?�

�� Draco
jerked his head at the Pensieve, his hair flying around him. His eyes were wide
and desperate, but his face was so still that it looked like the transformed
boy�s as the stone and metal replaced skin.

�� A monster?�
Harry let his breath out and shook his head. �No. Richard�s a very convincing
speaker, that�s all.�

�� What I did�

�� Is in the
past,� Harry said firmly. �I don�t want to blame you. I don�t blame you. What happened was horrible, but what Richard did
is more horrible still. I�m�somewhat familiar with the ways a mind can twist
when constant pressure is put on it.� Once again, his mind returned to his
fifth year at Hogwarts.

�� You like me.

�� Harry
blinked. Then he said, �Yes, I do. But I�m�look, if we have to use Richard�s
way of looking at things, I�m like you. I can forgive people doing things like
that, when I see how it happened. I wouldn�t forgive you if I thought it was
unjustifiable, no matter how much I liked you.� He thought for a minute, and
added, �Besides, I don�t want to be gay, so remember, I won�t be looking for
excuses to exonerate you just because you�re attractive.�

�� Draco
stepped forwards and carefully clasped his cheeks. Harry watched him curiously,
and the more so when Draco indicated he should bend down.

�� A moment
later, a pair of cold, chapped lips touched his forehead.

�� Harry shivered,
and not from the cold.

�� This just ties us tighter and tighter
together. I�I can almost believe that I could change my life for him.

�� But I won�t be permitted to.

�� Sadness,
slow and sweet, coiled like a snake around Harry�s heart. He cleared his throat
gruffly. �We should go on,� he said, and unstuck their feet from the floor.

�� Draco
watched him with that piercing gaze as they left the Pensieve room, but Harry
was sure he didn�t know what he was thinking. If he knew, he would already be
lying on top of Harry as he had in front of the veil and demanding that Harry
not sacrifice himself as was the only option.

�� I have to do this, Harry thought again,
swallowing the sadness. It�s what he
needs. What kind of life would he have, dwelling forever here in the maze, even
with me by his side?

*

�� SoftObsidian74:
Harry might actually have been better able to deal with his parents, since he �knows�
them to be happy.

�� Lilith: In
this case, Draco was telling the truth.

�� Thrnbrooke:
Thanks for reviewing!

�� DBZVelena:
Yes, they�re pretty close. There were no letters on the base of this Pensieve
pillar, but the letters so far are Crepidinemexi.
And thanks for the compliment!

�� Mangacat:
There are hints in the story on how Harry plans to sacrifice himself. Interestingly,
most people are looking at a slightly skewed version of what will really happen.

�� GreenEyedCat:
As will be revealed, there�s something special about these last few traps in
the maze.

�� Hi-chan:
Even if Harry is in love, I don�t think he�s able to verbalize it right now.

�� Ha-chan:
Put it this way: so far Ron and Hermione don�t appear to be dead.

�� Rainwater:
Thanks for reviewing!

�� WeasleyWench:
Thank you! Yes, Harry is slowly growing, and with luck will get used to being
around Draco in all the ways that matter. And they�ll find out how long this
quest took in the end.

�� Whitmore:
Thanks! I certainly plan to continue it until the end.

Off_the_deep_end: Thanks for
reviewing!

��
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Forgive Those Who Trespass