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Building With Worn-Out Tools	By : Lomonaaeren Category: Harry Potter > Slash - Male/Male > Harry/Draco Views: 54266 -:- Recommendations : 2 -:- Currently Reading : 2
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.

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Chapter Twenty-Five—Draco and Blaise

            The Healers could move fast when they wanted to, Draco had to admit. He’d appeared outside the hospital, but it seemed that some alert must have sped ahead of him, because by the time he floated the bubble containing his mother and Harry’s still body inside, they were waiting for him.

            Two of them immediately stepped forwards and cast spells that dissipated the bubble. Narcissa whimpered and stretched her hand out as if she would cling to him and beg him to keep her safe from the strangers, but Draco hugged her, kissed her nose, and then maneuvered her gently into the arms of a strong, large woman. He turned to watch what they were doing with Harry.

            The first pair of Healers to move to him had stepped back again, shaking their heads. Draco felt, for a moment, as if some clawed beast had taken up residence in his chest and was trying to get out as he thought of all the things that might mean. That Harry was gone, that Harry was dead—

            But it probably only meant that the Healers didn’t feel themselves qualified to handle a patient in such bad shape, because almost at once another one appeared, this one a man with gray hair and an interested, curious expression which reminded Draco irresistibly of Professor Flitwick. He looked at the floating strings of blood, nodded, and then flicked his wand several times. In moments, the blood had folded inwards, wrapping around Harry, and even the fluttering strings of flesh looked less alarming than they had been. The Healer tenderly laid a hand on Harry’s forehead. If he noticed the scar, he didn’t seem to care. He whispered a word to Harry, and then both he and Harry vanished.

            “Where’s he taken him?” Draco demanded of the nearest mediwitch, who was taking his arm and seemed to be trying to get him to sit down.

            The woman blinked. “Why, the Spell Damage floor, of course,” she said. “I assure you, he’ll be fine.” She smiled, perhaps assuming that Draco’s nerves could be cured by conversation. “I assume that the Stasis Spell preserving his life was your work?”

            Draco nodded shortly. “And my mother?” he asked, turning towards Narcissa. The Healers had persuaded her to trust them, at least, and were floating her on a pallet of air towards the stairs. “Even though her mind has been damaged, she’s not—dangerous. She stays with me permanently. It’s only the spell damage that she needs to be treated for.”

            “Then she’ll see your friend at the Spell Damage floor,” said the mediwitch firmly. Though she must have known by now who they were—the Malfoy blond hair, Draco thought, was unmistakable—she simply pressed him towards the nearest chair again, with firm and tender hands. “You should rest. One of the worst things for family of the patients is to dash about and try to accomplish that which they simply don’t have the strength to do.”

            Draco would have liked nothing more than to sit down and worry only about what would happen to Harry and his mother, but he had another task. He shook off the mediwitch’s hands and stood. “I have something else which must be done,” he said. “Thank you for taking care of them.” He hesitated, then took a ring from his finger, tapped it with his wand, and cast a complex charm. He handed it to the witch a moment later. “If you hold this and think about my mother or my friend, I can feel you thinking and will be able to respond. Please don’t do it unless they’re in danger.”

            “Mr. Malfoy, I—“ The witch sounded overwhelmed, even as she curled her fingers around the ring.

            Draco nodded at her and Apparated. He had to return to the Manor and retrieve a certain book if he were going to take the revenge that he dreamed of on Blaise.

*



            The book was exactly where he had left it the last time he ever looked. Draco took a few minutes to stand and study it, leaning against one of the shelves in the library. It felt odd, to know that he was the only one who had a right to possess those shelves now, that his father was dead, and so he didn’t have to worry about the Manor and his mother’s safety suddenly being snatched from under him, the way he had always done before this.

            Or, at least, if someone does possess the Manor with me, Draco thought, as he swatted dust from the book with one hand, I’ll decide who it should be.

            He used the next few minutes to practice the incantations of the spell he wanted to use, and then nodded and vanished, Apparating into the manor house where he had left Blaise. He ignored the large stain of blood spread on the other side of the room—he had the perhaps childish notion that, if he didn’t look at it, he wouldn’t guess how little blood must be left in Harry’s body—and stood staring at Blaise in silence.

            Blaise was still whimpering, still staring into the distance. He couldn’t bring his hands up over his face anymore, since they were tied at his sides by the Body-Bind, but they twitched as if he would like to. His throat welled with a sudden scream, and the muscles in it jumped to the point that Draco curled his lip.

            He and Blaise had been friends once, though, as he’d reminded Pansy, their friendship had begun later than his friendship with her, or with Theodore, and far later than the friendships with Vincent and Gregory. Blaise had taken until fifth year to decide that he couldn’t ignore Draco any longer, and that it was better to cooperate with him and get some share of the spoils than to try to make allies with the younger students, who didn’t have as much standing in Slytherin, or the older students, who would leave school before he would. He had never been easy in the alliance with Draco; he had presumed too much, he had argued too much with orders, and he had sometimes objected to something Draco knew he enjoyed, like Gryffindor-baiting, merely because Draco was the one who had suggested it.

            So their friendship had been uneasy, but it had remained, through the war and beyond, and Draco had thought it valuable for that reason. He had never imagined that Blaise could come to resent him for doing his job. Surely Blaise must have seen that, if he couldn’t hire Draco, if Harry had hired him, and if he opposed Harry, he would have to oppose Draco, too?

            Draco hadn’t hated him then.

            He did now. No matter what the laws said was legal and permissible in a divorce case, Draco had his own ideas about it, and none of them included kidnapping his helpless mother. Perhaps other people could have borne it. Draco had too much pride, and, since he was in a position to avenge the insult, he would do so.

            He waved his wand, and banished Blaise’s nightmare spell with a faint twinge of regret. If he had featured in Blaise’s deepest fears, he could have left it, but Blaise was muttering about his mother and living in poverty all his life. It was time to teach Blaise to fear him, since he didn’t have the sense to do it already.

            Blaise gasped, and then opened his eyes and stared at him. Draco relaxed the Body-Bind just so that he could move his limbs into a more comfortable position, and watched Blaise’s face glow with humiliation. He knew, as well as Draco did, what the loosening of the spell meant. Draco didn’t fear him, and Blaise found that more embarrassing than even the knowledge of his own failure.

            “What do you plan to do with me?” he asked softly.

            “Well,” Draco said. “I didn’t know until I had listened to you talking about what you feared most. Now I do.” He laid the book he carried down on the floor, and Blaise’s eyes tracked it in a morbid fascination that would probably have served him for watching an Acromantula. “I plan to cast a spell that will tie your fortune to mine.”

            Blaise’s eyes snapped back to him. “That doesn’t sound so bad,” he said cautiously, and then his spite overcame him. “Since you’re rich and healthy and all.”

            “Ah, Blaise, you didn’t fully listen to me,” Draco said softly. He conjured a chair, and sat down in it, crossing his legs the way that Blaise had tried to do at the Three Broomsticks. His face felt very dry, as if he had been crying sandy tears. “It’s a very great fault of yours, that you interrupt before someone else can say everything. Your fortune will be tied to mine—in reverse. As I grow richer, you will grow poorer. If I lose a divorce case, then you will become wealthier, but not by much. And you know that I have never yet lost a case. Not even,” he added delicately, “when my opponent kidnaps my mother in an attempt to make me lose.”

            Blaise said nothing at all. His breath rustled and stirred the hair over his mouth for a moment, but his eyes were quiet and still, watching Draco. He knew, now, Draco thought. He knew, with Slytherin instincts, that something had changed irrevocably and he had lost the only chance he might have to pull back from it.

            “And I suppose you might think you can get around this spell just by killing me, or urging one of my opponents to kill me,” Draco said. “Don’t worry. I’m going to cast another. If I die, you will die. Immediately, suddenly. The beat of your heart will be tied to mine directly, as your fortunes are tied to mine in reverse.”

            He leaned forwards. “And I know where your mind will go next, Blaise, what you’ll think about and what you’ll ask. The answer, in fact, is no. I do care enough about Harry to protect him from you. A third spell, Blaise, will make certain of that. If you make a move against Harry, even if it’s just to whisper gossip about him or distribute information into the ‘right’ ears, you’ll begin losing parts of your body. A finger for gossip. A hand for actively participating in trying to kill him. Or maybe it won’t be as simple as that, or as fair. Maybe you’ll lose your sight the moment you even contemplate making a move against him.” Draco smiled. “I don’t think you’ll have much luck locating a copy of the grimoire to check the spell, since my father deliberately burned all the others.”

            Blaise’s eyes were filled with terror. He had stopped trying to move against the Body-Bind at all, and most of his attention seemed to be consumed with licking his lips, so that he could get some moisture out of them. Draco waited, his hands clasped on his knees, his heart full of some emotion too savage to be called joy. He was sure that Blaise had questions, and he was eager to answer them.

            “Why would you do this?” Blaise whispered at last. “It’s cruel to do that, to control my life this way, and I never knew you to be cruel, Draco. Just greedy and selfish.”

            “I’ve learned lessons in cruelty since you knew me,” Draco murmured. “You never did bother to correct your impressions of me from Hogwarts, Blaise. I learned cruelty from other Arguers and from opponents in divorce cases. And I learned cruelty from my father, and from what happened to my mother. The difference is that I learned to live with it, instead of crumbling beneath it. You won’t, because with every move you make, you’ll know that your life is under my control.” He smiled, and hoped that he looked like his father in that moment. “You really shouldn’t have inspired me, you know. You were my latest lesson in cruelty, my latest example to match.”

            The horror in his eyes…Draco had to fight against closing his own and uttering a deep sigh. It was so sweet, to know that he could cause that much terror and pain.

            “Please, no,” Blaise whispered. “I’m not sure what you want from me, Draco, but whatever it is, I’ll give it to you. I’ll promise to lose the case, if you want. Not appear in court, or withdraw from it. Spend a year at my mother’s house. Tell everyone who asks that you were in the right, and that I should never have challenged you. Leave Potter alone for the rest of his natural life. Apologize to your mother. But not this.”

            Draco bent towards him. Blaise looked up at him with hope in his face, and yet also hatred that Draco knew was for himself, for letting his hope be visible.

            “That is exactly why I want to do this to you,” Draco whispered, his breath barely stirring Blaise’s hair. “I want to make you suffer. I want you to remember, always, that you’re not in control of your own fate, and never will be. I want you to pick up the newspapers with a mixture of dread and hope in the morning; you’d dread to hear of my death or my winning in court, but you would always be hoping for news of a loss, so that you could live a bit better. Your life could be sweet, Blaise. That will hurt more than if I’d simply cut off any possibility. Won’t it?”

            “How long do the spells last?” Blaise hissed at him, muscles tense as if he thought the best course would be attempting to resist.

            Draco leaned back in his chair and raised his eyebrow. “Forever, of course. What, did you think I would use incantations that could end in a few years?”

            “I will get you back,” Blaise said, and his eyes shone with a ferocity that Draco had seen before in the eyes of his father, and sometimes in the mirror. “I don’t care how long it takes me, or how indirectly I have to do it. I’ll have my revenge.”

            “You are very welcome to try,” Draco murmured, and raised his wand. “Why do you think I didn’t choose a spell that would protect me from harm the same way I intend to protect Harry? I look forwards with interest to what you do, Blaise, since I am sure that I can resist any strike you make.”

            Blaise closed his eyes, but didn’t bother responding as Draco cast the spells, chanting the Latin aloud, even though he could have made them nonverbal, so that Blaise could hear his doom. When the last spell, the one that would maim Blaise if he ever tried to hurt Harry, took hold, Blaise shivered and bucked in his Body-Bind.

            “Now,” Draco said, sitting down in his chair again. “I do need your decision about what you will do concerning the divorce case.” Blaise stared at him incredulously, and Draco only deigned to smile. “Yes, of course I am still considering that. It is one way that I intend to add to my wealth, after all.”

            Blaise’s eyes turned flat with loathing again, but he only said, “I don’t know what I’ll do. I need to have Ginny’s decision on it.”

            “Did you know,” Draco said, deciding that he could do worse than insert a knife into a crack in Blaise’s confidence and bear down on it, “that your beloved mistress asked us to rescue her from you? She said that your attempt on my mother’s life sickened her, and she couldn’t bear it any longer. She passed a note to Potter, and he decided, do-gooder that he is, that he’d snatch her from your evil clutches.”

            “She’s carrying my child—“ Blaise began, and stopped.

            “And I’m your friend,” Draco said, twisting his neck like a swan, “but that didn’t stop you from betraying me.”

            For long moments, Blaise just shut his eyes and lay there, breathing.

            “Tell me,” Draco asked in academic interest, “did you ever have any real interest in Weasley for herself, or did you just want Potter’s money?”

            “Both,” Blaise whispered, and his eyes flared open. “Unlike some people, not everything in my life resolves to simplistic motives.”

            The insult was so pitiful that Draco couldn’t do much more than roll his eyes. “I suppose that you’ll need to talk it over with Weasley. After tomorrow, of course, since none of us will be attending the court session then.”

            “I could still go,” said Blaise with stupid quickness. “And so could you. I don’t know where Ginny is, and of course Potter’s wounds will prevent him from attending, but—“

            “You’re going to be busy,” said Draco, raising his wand. “And so am I.”

            He put Blaise into an enchanted sleep before he could protest further, and stood looking at him for a moment. The temptation to torment him physically, the way Harry had been tormented, was there, but Draco restrained himself. Among other things, if he tortured Blaise as much as he wanted to, then the more delicate, careful revenge he’d planned out wouldn’t have a chance of taking effect.

            He turned and Apparated back to St. Mungo’s. He had to retrieve his ring from a certain mediwitch, and then look in on two important patients.

*

            Narcissa would indeed be fine, the Healers had reassured Draco. The broken arm was a simple, clean snap, and they had repaired it with a few passes of their wands. The large wound under her breast had given them more trouble, but they’d identified the malicious magic that would have prevented it from healing cleanly after they realized the attacker might be a Death Eater—they’d seen the same spell several times during the war—and now it was closed to nothing more than a thin scar and she was resting. Draco had spent a few moments in silence cupping her cheek before he went to find Harry.

            The Healers had done what they could for him, and then cast a modified Stasis Spell that would allow the magic to work but nothing else to influence him, not even the passage of time. They would need to get him further away from the edge of dying before their efforts would have any effect, as one of the mediwizards had put it to Draco.

            Draco could hardly see Harry through the blur the Stasis Spell cast, but he could read the report that the Healers had left hooked over the end of the bed well enough. He was probably not supposed to read it. But a Confundus Charm cast on the trainee who was supposed to watch over this section of the fourth floor assured he would not be disturbed, and since Harry was, in so many important ways, his, he was hardly going to think that he didn’t have the right to read it.

            The Flaying Curse had destroyed most of the skin on his back; the only good thing about that was that the Healers expected it to heal without scars, since they would have to restore entirely new skin instead of trying to heal cuts. And then Lucius had evidently used a curse Draco had only ever heard him talk about, the Organ Dance. It should have killed Harry immediately, the Healers said in their writing, and it was the major reason they could only cast their spells one by one; it took enormous magical and physical strength to survive it, and they had to look up the two or three cases of such survivors in the past before they could proceed, to see how they had been treated.

            But the Healer who concluded the report, a Mediwizard Goode, was confident Harry would live. If he had made it through the Organ Dance in the first place, his magical strength was obviously enough to bear the weaker shock of healing.

            Draco put the report down and leaned back to make out a hazy glimpse of Harry’s face again. His skin was pale, his eyes so tightly shut it looked as though they wouldn’t open again, and his hair arranged in such a way that the lightning bolt scar stood out perfectly. Draco wondered idly if it had fallen like that naturally, or if one of the Healers had thought it prudent to remind the people tending him who he was.

            Such thoughts were small, and didn’t distract Draco from his main contemplation: that Harry had very nearly given up his life to save Draco and, what was more important to him, Narcissa. He could probably argue that Draco didn’t owe him a life-debt, because Draco had cast the Stasis Spell that saved his life next, but there was still the one remaining from the time when Harry had pushed him to the ground under Lucius’s Killing Curse.

            And Draco didn’t need a debt to make him feel that Harry’s presence in his life was important.

            He risked himself. For me. Whom he supposedly has no reason to like, for whom his attraction is supposedly small and stupid.

            Draco smiled slightly. If Harry had been awake, he probably would have pulled back in terror from that smile.

            It isn’t just physical attraction. It isn’t just debts owed. I want him to stay. And I will make sure he understands that when he wakes up—the great, bumbling, heroic idiot.

*

            WeasleyWench: Well, at the very least, Draco isn’t going to allow Harry to hide anymore.

            Daft Fear: Well, I hope you thought that Draco’s revenge on Blaise was better than just killing him. ;)
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