Adult-FanFiction.org : Harry Potter

19 Years and 5 Minutes Later	By : TheMightyFlynn Category: Harry Potter > Slash - Male/Male > Harry/Draco Views: 58417 -:- Recommendations : 3 -:- Currently Reading : 6
Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, or any characters related to that series; they are JK Rowling's. I make no money from this.

Chapter List
- 1-19 Years and 5 Minutes Later
- 2-Ch. 2
- 3-Ch. 3
- 4-Ch. 4
- 5-Ch. 5
- 6-Ch. 6
- 7-Ch. 7
- 8-Ch. 8
- 9-Ch. 9
- 10-Ch. 10
- 11-Ch. 11
- 12-Ch. 12
- 13-Ch. 13
- 14-Ch. 14
- 15-Ch. 15
- 16-Ch. 16
- 17-Ch. 17
- 18-Ch. 18
- 19-Ch. 19
- 20-Ch. 20
- 21-Ch. 21
- 22-Ch. 22
- 23-Ch. 23
- 24-Ch. 24
- 25-Ch. 25
- 26-Ch. 26
- 27-Ch. 27
- 28-Ch. 28
- 29-Ch. 29
- 30-Ch. 30
- 31-Ch. 31
- 32-Ch. 32
- 33-Ch. 33
- 34-Ch. 34
- 35-Ch. 35
- 36-Ch. 36
- 37-Ch. 37
- 38-Ch. 38
- 39-Ch. 39
- 40-Ch. 40
- 41-Ch. 41
- 42-Ch. 42
- 43-Ch. 43
- 44-Ch. 44
- 45-Ch. 45
- 46-Ch. 46
- 47-Ch. 47
- 48-Ch. 48
- 49-Ch. 49
- 50-Ch. 50
- 51-Epilogue
- 27
- 28
- 29
A/N: Thanks for the reviews!
BAFan: Looking back on it, it wasn't very clear :/ She was struggling too much for them to risk moving. Sorry for that :)

“If you’d just done your job correctly in the first place, none of this would have happened.”
I froze. I kept Ginny and the kids safe for nineteen years, but this time I froze. Nineteen years and not one serious injury caused by my work, but Draco spends six weeks with me and he’s lying in a fucking hospital bed. It’s all my fault. I should have made Ron’s warning clearer: the team would have been watching closer.
“Me? You’re the one who couldn’t restrain her properly or even Stun her when we first saw her.”
What if they can’t Heal him properly? What if there’s some kind of permanent damage? He deserves so much better than this. If I hadn’t pushed him into this relationship, he would be safe right now. If I’d just stayed with Ginny and kept my mouth shut, none of this would have happened.
“At least I Disarmed her! You spotted her before I did, why didn’t you Stun her?”
“Shut the fuck up, the both of you!” Harry slammed his hands down on the arms of the chair he was sitting in and shoved himself to his feet. Agents Gould and Reynolds both jumped and turned to face Harry with guilt clear on their faces. Harry closed his eyes and breathed deeply in the hope of being able to speak evenly. “If neither of you have anything productive to contribute to this investigation while standing here, then go and help back at base.”
“Sorry, boss,” Reynolds – the woman who had been trying to restrain Ginny’s feet – responded. “I’ve definitely got paperwork to fill out.”
Harry sighed. He knew he shouldn’t be taking his guilt and fear out on the two of them, but their bickering had ground down his final, straining nerve.
“As of 5 this afternoon, I am no longer your boss: you’re now reporting to Mikhail. I know this is part of your investigation, but until Draco’s out of danger, there isn’t anything you can do here. I saw everything the both of you did, so I’m no help to you at the moment either. So just... just let me work things out here. I’ll be fine on my own.”
It took a few seconds, but they both left the room with mumbled apologies, leaving Harry to his guilt. Had it really only been six weeks since that day in the toilets? It seemed like much longer, but it couldn’t have been. Six weeks and he had fallen so hard for Draco that it was difficult to imagine life without him. He had a feeling that that was what he was now facing, however, and he sunk back into the chair, his head in his hands.
Why would Draco want to stay with him after this? Harry hadn’t been able to keep him safe, hadn’t even moved to stop Ginny when she had lunged for Gould’s wand once she had struggled free. Why hadn’t he moved to Stun Ginny? He had been the only one standing there with both hands free. No, Draco deserved so much better than what Harry could give him: someone who could protect him and give him everything he needed. It was now obvious to Harry that his life would be too messy and too dangerous for a while for him to be selfish enough to want to involve anyone else in it. He was better off alone for the time being. It caused pain to lance through his chest, but he knew he should let Draco go, for his own safety if nothing else.
“Harry!”
Harry was on his feet and reaching for Astoria almost before he knew what he was doing. She threw herself into his arms, wrapping her own arms around Harry’s shoulders. Harry held her close, his eyes sliding closed as he felt her trembling.
“I’m sorry, I am so sorry,” he mumbled into her hair. “I couldn’t stop her... I couldn’t keep him safe.”
“They wouldn’t tell me anything, just said to get here fast.”
Harry took a deep breath before pulling back from her. Astoria’s eyes were bright and her hands clung to his shirt, giving away exactly how scared she was. Swallowing hard, Harry gathered as much calm as he could before explaining.
“They took him straight up here when we arrived. The only thing they’ve been able to tell me so far is that Ginny managed to cast two spells at him in quick succession. The first was an exsanguination curse to make sure he bled a lot and the second was what broke his nose. I Healed his nose on-site at the ballroom, but that didn’t stop the bleeding. They’re working on that right now.”
She took a slightly shaky breath before smiling up at him. “Thank you. You probably saved his life.”
Harry had to resist scoffing at her. He didn’t deserve to be thanked: it was his fault Draco was here in the first place. He kept that thought to himself, however, and simply moved backwards to take his seat again. His arrival in the reception of St. Mungo’s with a blood-soaked and unconscious Draco in his arms had caused a panic that Harry hadn’t seen in a long time in the hospital. Not that he spent much time there anymore, but if the mediwitches scrambling to get Draco into a room was any indication, then the curse Ginny had sent at him must have been quite serious. He had been sat there in the waiting room of the Spell Damage ward for the past fifteen minutes, simply waiting to hear something from them.
“Harry?”
He jumped, almost having forgotten that he wasn’t there by himself anymore. He turned to see that Astoria had taken the chair next to him. She was staring at him with so much sympathy in her eyes that his chest constricted and he had to swallow against the hard lump forming in his throat. He wouldn’t take that sympathy; he didn’t deserve it.
“It’s not your fault.”
Harry’s eyes closed again and he turned away. “Yes it–”
He would have continued, but the door to the waiting room opened at that moment to admit a harried-looking Healer. Harry shot to his feet, eager for good news. Astoria stood beside him, placing her hand on his lower back in a gesture of support.
“We’ve stopped the bleeding and he’s stable. The combination of the two spells Mr. Malfoy was hit with caused a lot of damage to his nasal cavity, but thankfully none of it was permanent.” He offered them up a smile. “He’s on a lot of pain medication as well as Blood-Replenishing potions. He will be very fuzzy for a while yet and unstable on his feet. I have to ask you both to please not excite him because it may cause the bleeding to start up again. He caused a bit of a fuss when we informed him he would have to stay here over the weekend, so maybe one of you can convince him that it is necessary?” He waited until they both nodded before continuing. “I can unfortunately only allow one of you in at a time because of the reactions he had to us. If he starts to work himself up again, I would ask that you simply leave him to cool down, please. He needs all the rest he can get.”
“Would you mind...?” Astoria turned to Harry with pleading eyes.
Shaking his head, Harry took a few steps backwards. The relief rushing through him was sending his head spinning and he closed his eyes to stop the room from spiralling in front of him. A strong hand clamped around his bicep and he allowed himself to be guided over to the chairs again. The Healer placed a hand on his head and bent him forward, his head between his knees. Harry could feel a diagnostic charm washing over him before he sat up again.
“I’m fine.”
The Healer eyed him critically for a few seconds before nodding. He glanced over towards the door before speaking again.
“He’s been asking for you since he woke up.” Harry had to resist wincing in guilt, but the man spoke again before he could react properly. “He’s a very lucky man, Mr. Potter.”
“What?” Meeting the Healer’s eyes, Harry could tell he wasn’t being hit on, but why the man would say something like that was completely beyond him. “What do you mean?”
“The combination of spells he was hit with had the potential to cause serious, permanent damage. As it is, we were able to stem the flow of blood rather quickly because of your fast reactions. He will still need to be on pain potions for at least the next week and be on the lookout for any bleeding, but he won’t suffer permanent damage. He has you to thank for that, Mr. Potter.”
Sitting and staring up at the Healer, Harry had to wonder if that meant that Draco had been in danger of bleeding out. Had Ginny tried to kill him that night, or had she simply cast spells that she knew would cause the most damage? He pushed that question to the back of his mind as his stomach lurched.
“Thank you for saving him. I know it’s your job, but... Thank you.” The Healer nodded to him and began to walk away, but Harry stopped him by grabbing his wrist. “This will turn into a huge case with both the press and the Auror Corps. Is it possible to keep the press out and away from him at least until he leaves here?”
“Besides the Aurors themselves, our security force is the best trained in the sector. We’ve managed to keep the press out each time you were a resident here and I believe they have only gotten better in the past few years.”
The smile the Healer offered up before exiting the room was sympathetic and Harry automatically smiled back. He had a lot to sort through before he could go in and speak to Draco about anything.
*~*
Draco fought against the fog descending on him caused by the strong pain potion the Healers had forced him to take. He would have preferred to have taken a weaker potion and put up with some of the pain, which would have allowed him to have full control over his faculties rather than be swimming around in this fog with his brain feeling all mushy. He had always hated the feeling of not being in control of himself, which was the reason he had only ever tried drugs once: they left him feeling so out-of-control that he had almost had a panic attack. He jumped and scowled when a noise from the doorway startled him.
“Tori?” Blinking rapidly to bring her into focus, Draco smiled. He had been hoping for Harry, but Astoria was almost as good at that moment.
“My God, you are as high as a bloody kite.”
He could hear the tears in her voice and frowned, wondering vaguely what had upset her. “What?”
A watery laugh was her only response as she moved up to the side of his bed. He leant forward obediently as she reached behind him and adjusted his pillows. Her hands slid over his shoulders and she played with the collar of his pyjamas for a few seconds before he grabbed her wrists, holding her still so he could meet her eyes.
“Tori, what’s wrong?”
His eyes widened as she took a shuddering breath and climbed carefully onto the bed with him. “You know you’re like a brother to me, Dray. You know that I love you just as much as I love my own sister. You also know that I would do anything for you. But I swear to God, I could just strangle you right now.” She buried her face into his shoulder and he wrapped his arms around her automatically, holding her as she shook. “You promised me you’d be safe tonight. You said you wouldn’t go looking for trouble and that if Ginny showed up, you’d stay out of her way. When I first married you, I thought I’d never get one of these messages, telling me to come to the hospital immediately because you’d been seriously injured. Other women get those messages: the ones who married Aurors and Hit Wizards. You were my safe bet, in more ways than one, but here we are.”
She trailed off, her shoulders shaking as the threatening tears finally began to fall. Draco tightened his grip on her, allowing her to cry herself out. A vague sense of guilt tried to be felt through the pain potion, but the potion was too strong for Draco to feel much more than numb. She was right, of course: he had promised her that he would stay safe that night, but there had been extenuating circumstances; circumstances that Draco couldn’t have ignored.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered into her hair. “She was trying to hurt him, Tori. I couldn’t just let her take him from me like that.”
The truth of the matter was that he had stayed put in the ballroom as long as he could stand. He had promised both Astoria and Harry that he would stay as safe as possible, but with Harry under threat as he was, Draco’s nerves and anxiety had gotten the better of him. The problem he had faced was that there was no way for him to know if Harry was safe or not and the only way to resolve that problem was to physically go and check on him himself. Draco had stood in the doorway for longer than he should have – that he would acknowledge openly if anyone asked – simply watching as Ginevra Weasley completely lost her mind. He had watched her struggle out of the hold the Aurors had on her and had simply not been quick enough to cast any kind of shield before she had hit him with the whatever-it-was she had cast at him. The rest was a blur to him other than the sound of Harry’s voice close by. He knew Harry had saved him, stopped the pain and brought him here to the hospital, but that was all he was really certain about. He loosened his grip when Astoria pushed herself up onto her knees beside him.
“Right.”
Astoria swiped her hand over her eyes, wiping the tears from her face. He could see the moment when she pushed everything she was feeling to the back of her mind and he almost pulled her back into his arms, but held back; she had her own ways of dealing with things like this and he wouldn’t interfere with them. She offered him a smile before continuing.
“I’ll contact the school and pull Scorpius out for the weekend so he can see you himself before the newspapers splash this everywhere; the lawyers will need to be kept up-to-date on what’s happening; the wards on the house will need to be updated and I’ll go and see your parents personally tonight. Is there anything else you can think of that needs doing?”
Draco gave in to the impulse to pull her back into his arms as she finished. “You were right the other week, Tori: I wouldn’t have made it anywhere near this far in life without you.” The laugh he received in response was a little watery again and he smiled. “Thank you.”
“Lie back down and rest for a little while; I’ll tell Harry he can come in.”
Draco figured he wouldn’t be able to properly rest until he had reassured himself that Harry was alright, but it seemed he was wrong on that count. He lay down and closed his eyes for what felt like only a second, but when he reopened them, it was to find that Astoria had left, to be replaced with Harry standing by the door. Draco scowled and attempted to shove himself into a sitting position. This Gods-be-damned pain potion was going to be the death of him. He froze when he felt Harry’s hands on his shoulders, holding him gently in place. Instead of focussing on Harry’s face, Draco’s eyes travelled the length of him, taking in the midnight blue trousers and crisp white shirt he had worn beneath the formal robes that night. The colours contrasted perfectly with his lightly tanned skin and had warm desire pooling in Draco’s stomach before he even had a chance to realise that his mind had wandered. Scowling even more, he tried to focus properly.
There was a strange look in Harry’s eyes that Draco had never seen there and it sent a cold shiver through him, replacing the desire quite effectively. Harry’s eyes were never cold, but this look was quite close to being just that: cold and impersonal. It was almost as if someone had handed him a mask that covered everything that Draco knew to be him and it was one of the most terrifying things Draco had ever seen. He pushed it all aside, however, putting it down to the effects of the pain potion.
“The Healer says you’re not to put too much strain on yourself tonight.”
“You think sitting up in bed counts as strain?” Draco’s insides felt as though they had dropped down into his toes when Harry removed his hands and took a few steps back from him, his eyes still holding that strange, cold look. “Harry?”
“I’ve been thinking about what happened tonight,” Harry began and Draco had to restrain himself from hopping out of the bed and shaking him. There was an equally strange, almost monotonous tone to Harry’s voice that matched the impersonal look in his eyes and it was causing the repressed fear to turn Draco’s insides to ice. “I know that there wasn’t anything anyone could have done to prevent what happened, but there is something that I think has to happen to stop it from happening again in the future.”
“No.”
Harry raised an eyebrow, the gesture so familiar but also quite foreign, considering the look in his eyes. “What?”
“I know where you’re heading with this and I won’t let you.” Draco shoved himself up in the bed properly but had to close his eyes briefly as the room spun a little. “I’m not a helpless victim in this, Harry. I knew exactly what I was getting into when we entered this relationship. I won’t let you try to play the martyr because of what’s happened.”
That seemed to be enough to break through the shield Harry had been holding up against him and Draco was gratified to see a small crack in his armour as his eyes flashed with emotion. Even still, Draco kept a hand clenched in the sheet beneath him. His heart raced as he watched Harry’s reaction to his words. His guess, it seemed, had been right: Harry was going to try to leave him ‘for his own good’.
“If I hadn’t forced this relationship on you, none of this would have happened. If I had just stayed with Ginny and kept my mouth shut–”
“If you’d continued playing the martyr, you mean?” Draco interrupted. He knew he was pushing Harry further than he had since they had first started this relationship, but if pissing him off was the only way to break through to the Harry Draco knew and loved, then that was exactly what he would do. Taking a deep breath to try to calm the racing of his heart, he locked eyes with Harry. “I know the kind of life you were living before I came along. I’ve seen so many men absolutely miserable because they couldn’t find the balls to break out of a relationship that was bad for them. That relationship – if that’s what you want to call it – was poisonous for you. She was cheating on you, she obviously doesn’t give a shit about anyone other than herself, and has shown tonight just how unstable she is. Is that the kind of person you really want to be with? To expose your children to?”
Draco held his breath, hoping that his words had managed to break through the stubborn bastard’s thick head. Harry stared at him for a long time. Draco had no idea whether he was being measured against something or if Harry was just weighing his words, but he found the wait interminable. Something of this magnitude that had such a big impact on the rest of his life wasn’t something he should be dealing with in his current condition, he knew, but if Harry wanted to force his hand then he wasn’t going to let him go without a fight. Something flashed through Harry’s eyes after a few minutes and he turned from Draco, his arms moving to wrap around his middle.
“I’m too dangerous to be with at the moment and you know it. Whether you want to acknowledge it or not, you know that I am the sole reason you’re in here right now. You tried to convince me to back off, to leave you alone, but I forced this on you. If I hadn’t been so selfish, none of this would have happened.” Prompted by the growing need to shake some sense into Harry, Draco slid out of the bed and began to slowly make his way across the room towards him, using Harry’s distraction to his full advantage. “This is what’s best for you and for the kids and that’s what matters.”
Draco’s hands clenched as the room spun around him. If he had had full control over his faculties, he would have cursed the stupid sod for doing this to him. He had known Harry had a thing for taking responsibility for things that he had no control over, but this was really taking it too far. He reached out as he came within arms’ reach of Harry and grabbed a handful of his shirt.
“What are you...?” Harry spun around and stepped forward, pulling Draco into a tight embrace, balancing him out as he staggered a little. “You’re not supposed to be out of bed.”
“And you’re not supposed to be being such an arse.”
Draco wound his arms around Harry’s shoulders, using the embrace to stop the room from spinning around him. His eyes slid closed and he let his head fall forward onto Harry’s shoulder. He knew Harry was supporting most of his weight and tried to adjust his stance so he could stand properly, but Harry wouldn’t allow it. Being held so close helped to relieve some of the fear that Harry really was going to leave him, but it couldn’t stop all of it.
“I love you.”
Draco smiled. “I know.”
A small huff of what could have been a laugh sounded right near to Draco’s ear as Harry slowly began to move them back towards the bed. “I need to know that you’re safe.”
“And what better way to ensure that I am safe than for me to be by the side of the Head Auror?”
Harry’s grip on him tightened a little and Draco heard him let out a shaky breath. “Draco, I–”
“Stop.” Draco pulled back, ignoring the way the room spun as he locked eyes with Harry. “You’re worth the risk.”
Harry’s mouth opened and closed a few times and something flashed through his eyes that caused Draco’s stomach to flip. It took a few seconds, but Harry eventually gave up on speaking and drew him into a soft kiss. Draco leant into it, enjoying the feeling of the fear dissipating, but it didn’t last anywhere near long enough for his taste. Harry pulled back and scooped Draco back up onto the bed, lifting him as though he weighed nothing at all. It wasn’t until he was back on the bed that Draco realised that he had been shaking with the exhaustion that was running through him. His eyes closed of their own accord as Harry shifted him down beneath the covers. He managed to grasp a handful of Harry’s shirt before he moved away from the bed.
“Stay with me.”
“I’ll stay as long as you want me.”
- 27
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19 Years and 5 Minutes Later