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I Give You a Wondrous Mirror	By : Lomonaaeren Category: Harry Potter > Slash - Male/Male > Harry/Draco Views: 17806 -:- 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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Chapter
Twenty-Nine�Unforgivable Things

�� Draco tried
to control the compulsion to fuss as they left the hospital�walking quickly so
that anyone who might recognize Harry wouldn�t remember that he was supposed to
be recovering and force him back into bed�and prepared to Apparate to Harry�s
house. He didn�t know what to make of the look on Harry�s face. It had settled
from open fury into something stronger and darker, like the expression of a
Gorgon when she saw her own face in a mirror.

�� When they
arrived just outside Harry�s house, Harry stood still for a moment, looking at
it, and then pulled out his wand. Draco tensed, but Harry turned and handed it
to him. Draco held the holly wand in his hand and just blinked at it for a
moment, wondering what he should do.

�� I don�t
want to curse Ginny when we start yelling at each other,� Harry said quietly.
�For the same reason, I�ll ask you to get the children out of the way. Ask Ron
and Hermione to help you if they�re here. They shouldn�t have to see what will
happen.�

�� Draco
couldn�t put off the compulsion to fuss any longer. �Harry, are you sure that you should be doing this? You�re
still tired, and the Healers did say
that you should go to sleep as soon as possible after you woke up. And is
taking the children away from your wife��

�� I have to
have them at a distance from her, at least,� said Harry, and his voice sounded
odd, rippling in and out as though he were speaking underwater. �I think she�ll
use them as pawns against me otherwise, and they don�t deserve that.�

�� And you
won�t use them as pawns against her?�
Draco asked. Maybe someone else wouldn�t have had the courage, with Harry in
the strange mood he was in now. He had never suffered from the same kind of
deficiencies that others did, however�he only suffered from uncommon ones�and
so he trusted Harry not to hurt him.

�� I won�t,�
said Harry. �Because this is what ends it for me, Draco.�

�� Draco
swallowed. He didn�t like the sound of that. �Oh?� he managed, since his throat
had closed up tight.

�� Yes.�
Harry shook his head a little. �I can�t�I can�t be responsible for her
happiness anymore. I won�t hold her back from seeing the children, though I�ll
take precautions to make sure that she can�t hurt or kidnap them. And when
they�re old enough to make their own decisions, they can live with her if they
want to. I�ll do my very best not to damage their relationship with her.

�� But for
me? This is the end. I will have no more ties to her after this.�

�� Draco
thought the news should have thrilled him. Instead, he felt like weeping, and
he didn�t even understand why. He
averted his eyes, and stood still for a moment. Harry pressed his shoulder
once, then vanished into the house.

�� Then he
heard the sounds of children playing from the garden, and decided that he
should gather them up. It helped that James and Al would recognize him, at
least. He tracked around the house towards the sounds.

�� He relaxed
when he saw Weasley sitting on a bench, watching the children, without his wife.
He glanced up when Draco came around the corner, his wand held not at all
casually in his hand, and then inclined his head.

�� Malfoy,�
he said. �Harry�s in there?�

�� Yes,� said
Draco, and turned so that Weasley could see the two wands he held. �And he gave
me his wand before he went in.�

�� Weasley
closed his eyes, and leaned his head back against the bench. Draco let him have
a moment, since he could hardly imagine that Weasley would be cooperative when
he suggested moving the children to Malfoy Manor.

*

�� Harry shut
the door of the house softly behind him. He wondered if Ginny would think it
was Ron coming back, or her mother, or him. Would she bustle out to confront
him, trying to pretend that nothing was wrong, or would she hide?

�� But something is wrong, Harry thought,
baring his teeth. Something is very
fucking wrong, oh yes, indeed.

�� His fury
was building again. Perhaps Draco would have said, were he there, that Harry
still had no conclusive proof that Ginny had been behind the overdosing, but Harry
knew. He remembered the way that Ginny had offered to make him tea the night of
George�s death, and how suddenly he had felt sleepy after starting to drink it.
And it had been incredibly hard for him to wake from slumber in order to join
the defense of Hogwarts from the dragons.

�� How could she have been so selfish, so�

�� Harry shook
his head. He would have the chance to ask that of Ginny in a few moments.

�� He walked
down the entrance hall and turned right. A few glances were sufficient to
convince him that Ginny wasn�t in the library, the kitchen, or any of the
children�s rooms. That left the drawing room, the loo, or�

�� Harry bared
his teeth again, and turned right again, into their bedroom.

�� Ginny stood
there with her arms held stiffly at her sides, and her head bowed. Hermione
hovered a few inches from her, whispering words that Harry couldn�t make out,
her wand weaving back and forth as if she thought she would convince Ginny by
emphasizing her points with it.

�� Hermione
saw Harry first. Her eyes widened, and she stepped back and away. Harry
wondered for a moment if he looked like he had the day he killed Voldemort.
Hermione had once told him that was the only time she had ever been frightened
of him.

�� Ginny
looked up next, and her eyes met Harry�s. She froze for a moment, and then lifted
her chin and shook her hair back.

�� Maybe he
should have admired her for facing the consequences of her actions with
courage. However, it was rather too little, too late. Harry prowled forwards,
feeling for a moment as he had when facing the Masked Lady.

�� This hatred
was worse, deeper, more personal. The Masked Lady had committed no betrayal of
him; she was struggling against Harry because he had political power she would
have been a fool to ignore. This was Ginny.
His wife, his love, a woman he probably still loved if he was being honest with
himself, the mother of his children, the partner he should have been able to
lean on no matter what.

�� And now�

�� Now, Harry
was going to do his very best to light the remnants of his love on fire. He
couldn�t stand it anymore, to be connected to her the way he was. The links of
the past would remain, but they were the past and that was the way it should
be. This was now.

�� And now was Ginny saying, �Harry. I
didn�t�there�s something you should know��

�� There are
a lot of things I should know, I think,� said Harry, and his voice swelled in
power like the incoming tide. He felt the blaze of defensive magic pick up
around him, but he was channeling his rage through his voice, and he didn�t
think it would react adversely to Ginny. That was the reason he hadn�t been
afraid to give his wand to Draco: his wandless magic was primarily defensive,
thus unlikely to attack, but at the same time strong enough to protect him if
his �loving wife� fired a curse. �For one thing, did you poison me with the
Dreamless Sleep, by giving it to me long past the recommended dosage?�

�� Ginny
bristled, her skin flushing with lion-like heat. Given the flash in her eyes,
Harry couldn�t be sure that it was all embarrassment, either, the way he would
have liked it to be. �I did,� she said. �But I didn�t mean to poison you. I
just thought that it would make you stop dreaming of him so much, that it would bring you back by reminding you of what
we could have, that it would help you rest better��

�� Harry�s
raw, hoarse laughter cut her off. She stared at him as if she didn�t know how
to deal with that. Harry was sure she didn�t.

�� Not only
were the side-effects of the potion, whatever of them still remained, and his
lack of dreams coming down on him now, but all the years�and, recently, the
torturous weeks and days�he had worked hard for Ginny�s happiness. He�d worked,
and he�d hoped he could have a friendship with Draco without offending her, and
he�d felt so guilty for the dreams,
and he�d felt so guilty for the only things that made him happy, because he
knew those things cost Ginny. So much work and time and emotion poured into a
relationship that was just going to die anyway.

�� You knew better than that,� he said. �Why
wouldn�t I have taken the Dreamless Sleep every night in order to spare you, if
it was harmless? I would have. I put
your happiness ahead of my own so much that Draco had to trick me into
remembering my own. That�s the kind of fool I was��

�� Really, Harry Potter?� Ginny leaned
forwards, her fingers hooked into claws. �Not from what I can see. What I can see
is that you�ve been selfish all your life, and adept at concealing that
selfishness under selflessness. You wouldn�t have tried to have sex with someone
other than me if��

�� I didn�t
try to have sex with him��

�� You kissed him! Hermione told me! She saw!�

�� Harry
didn�t bother glancing at Hermione. Her guilt and her happiness weren�t
concerns of his at the moment.

�� Ripping
himself apart from Ginny, burning all his bridges so conclusively that she
would never want to get back together with him, was.

�� So I
kissed him,� he said. �Strange that even before
that happened, you poured Dreamless Sleep in my tea��

�� I saw that
you were becoming closer to him!� Ginny spat. �You bastard, if you cared about me at all, if you cared about the
children, you would have gone to a Mind-Healer the way I urged you to and let
her suppress the dreams��

�� I tried,
there was nothing she could do without driving me insane��

�� That would
have been��

�� Who took
their problems outside this marriage first?� Harry snarled, his magic flaring
around him enough to stir the curtains. �Hermione tells me that you were
telling her all about our marriage problems for years��

�� Because
you wouldn�t listen!�Ginny�s throat sounded raw with her scream. �I tried to
talk to you, and you pushed me aside, or dismissed me, or told me that I had
nothing to worry about, that you only loved me!
What a load of rubbish that turned
out to be.�

�� I didn�t
know that I would fall in love with Draco��

�� But even
if you didn�t,� Ginny spat at him,
�once you did, then you damn well
should have stayed with me and given
up going to see him. There were plenty of other things that you could have
done, Harry. It�s not like this was another fucking prophecy. You could have fulfilled the life-debts and dissipated
the magic that way. You could have spent more time at home with your family
instead of staying over with him all the time��

�� I had to do that��

�� You
fucking did not! At least admit that you chose this instead of
hiding behind your excuse of needing to do it��

�� All right!� Harry shouted. His nerves had
been worn down faster than he would have believed possible. If Ginny wanted to
hear what she thought was the truth, then she would hear it. �I treasured every
moment I spent with Draco, and dreaded coming home to you! I can�t remember
when the last time was that I felt passion for you, instead of feeling that I
had to protect you like you were a helpless child! With Draco, I can have
someone who�s my equal, someone who doesn�t need me to look out for his
happiness all the time because he�s perfectly fucking capable of taking responsibility for it on his fucking own! With you, I�m always
dreading when I�ll say the least little thing wrong and ruin your whole damn
day, because God knows, you�re not resilient enough to push the little things
away and find some happiness in the midst of it!�

�� What did I
endure?� Ginny�s voice was low and quiet. �Having three children in a row even
when I didn�t want that third
pregnancy, and then staying home with the children just so that you could work
overtime with the Blood Reparations Department. Tell me that I�ve let little
things ruin my happiness when you�ve been pregnant,
Harry, and miserably sick every single morning for weeks��

�� If you
didn�t want Lily, you should have told me! I would have agreed to do something
about it,� Harry said, but he choked, and Ginny leaped onto that sound like a
Niffler onto gold.

�� Oh, yes,
because that wouldn�t have been the
end of our marriage right there,� she said, and rolled her eyes. �You giggled the day I told you, Harry. All
you�ve ever really wanted are children. If there was a way to have them without
having a wife, then you would have been perfectly happy to do so��

�� Well, I
wish there had been a way without having you
as a wife, you�re right about that,� Harry said, as coolly as he could, but now
his mind was full of the image of Ginny, pregnant with Lily and not nearly as
happy as he�d always assumed she was.

�� You never
asked,� Ginny went on, stalking forwards. Harry refused to back up, but he did
avert his eyes, and he saw Hermione with her head bowed and tears streaming
down her face. Ginny�s voice snatched his attention back again. �You just assumed that I was happy to have all the
children in the world, and in a few years you�d be suggesting that we have
another. But, of course, any objection on my part would have got me looked at
as if I were inhuman. And what do you think Mum would have said? She�s always
wanted dozens of grandchildren. She�s not satisfied with the six she has! Tell
me that I could have said something about it without immediately being
ostracized by my own family, Harry. Tell me that and mean it.�

�� Harry was
breathing harshly. He wondered what in the world Lily and Ginny�s relationship
would be like in the future, with Ginny continually looking at the girl and
remembering that she hadn�t wanted her. Suddenly the weariness that he had seen
on Ginny�s face when he came home from Blood Reparations work in the last few
months took on another meaning.

�� How could
he not have known his own wife like this?

�� And it was
made worse because he really would
have looked at Ginny like that if she had suggested not having Lily once she
was pregnant, and he knew it.

�� He looked
up and straight at his wife. He tried to imagine getting into bed with her now,
or trusting her again, and revulsion curled up his spine at the idea. His trust
had been broken into pieces by this revelation, and it hurt the more because
Ginny was right. If he had been as
sensitive to and in tune with her as he�d always believed, then he would have
noticed her discomfort when she became pregnant for the third time in four
years.

�� There are
always other choices�� he began.

�� Ginny shook
her head impatiently. �I won�t be a bad mother, whatever other kind of monster
you make me into,� she said, and her voice swelled with passion. �I love my
children. I want what�s best for them. And that includes having their father
around.�

�� Harry
lifted his head slowly. The rage had withdrawn, and guilt had nearly taken its
place, but now the anger was washing back in. �So,� he said quietly, �you
really didn�t care what the Dreamless
Sleep potion might be doing to me. As long as it made me into a better husband
and a father for your children, then��

�� It�s
inevitable anyway,� Ginny snapped. Her eyes and her cheeks were bright. Harry
knew the feeling. He�d felt it in hospital, the sudden shock of realizing that
he was saying something he�d wanted to say for a long time. �We�re bound by
these marriage vows. We can�t change them. We can�t depart from them. This
really changes nothing, Harry. I�m
glad you�ve survived. Maybe you can be a little more considerate of my needs
from now on.�

�� Harry shook
his head slowly, eyes locked on her. The fury was rising, sloshing around him.

�� You could
have said something,� he said.

�� I told you
why I didn�t say anything about my feelings towards that third baby��

�� About the
dreams,� Harry said, and his voice broke off at the end, into a snarl. Ginny
narrowed her eyes at him, as if trying to determine what he could have to be angry about. �About your fear of their effect
on our sex life. You told Hermione. Why couldn�t you tell me?�

�� Because
you would have reassured me, and done nothing
about it,� said Ginny. �You were aroused by them. You wanted them, Harry��

�� I never
did!� It was Harry�s turn to scream. �You think I wanted to lie awake next to
my wife, aroused by another man, aroused by my old school rival? Of course not!
I��

�� You could
have done something about them, if
you really didn�t want them!� The air around Ginny was stirring with her magic
now, too, lifting and letting the ends of her red hair fall as if she were some
kind of banshee.

�� I tried!� Harry roared. �I went to
Healers, I researched spells, I tried any combination of potions a few years
ago, remember? Nothing worked. What
am I supposed to have done, taken a Time-Turner back and not saved Draco�s life
so that I wouldn�t owe him anything?�

�� Don�t give
me that,� Ginny said. Her voice had lowered and grown more deadly once again,
while Harry was fighting the temptation to keep from just leaping ahead and
hurting her. �You�re Harry Potter. You defeated the Dark Lord. You always find
a way around obstacles that should stop you. Hell, you made me want Lily after
she was born, just because you were so enthusiastic around her. You make a
business out of changing minds and hearts so that Muggleborns can return to the
pure-blood parts of the wizarding world. If you really wanted to overcome those
dreams, you could have. That you
didn�t tells me you wanted them, for whatever reason.�

�� I am not a
bloody fucking hero for all seasons, Ginny,� said Harry, and his voice was
soft, now, as he came to the crux of the problem. �I can�t solve everything. I
can�t do everything. I certainly can�t do anything about problems that I
thought we�d mutually decided to live with, when all the solutions I could try didn�t work.�

�� There�s
always some way,� said Ginny. Her eyes and her face were overly bright, as with
fever. �And you were the one who just came home one day and shrugged and told
me that you couldn�t do anything about the dreams. If you�ll remember, which
you probably don�t because your own
needs have always occupied you more, I had to turn away to hide my tears. I was
sworn to living with a man who wanted someone else. At least I never did that
to you, Harry. I never fell in love with anyone else. When I did feel a pull of
attraction, I stopped spending time with that person. You just went right ahead and fell blithely in love again. Of
course, you�ll probably forget about him,
too, in a month�s time, when the challenge of pursuing him isn�t enough for you
anymore, and find someone else. Does he know that? I bet he doesn�t. He
probably doesn�t realize that someone who�s fickle to one partner can be just
as fickle to another one.�

�� Harry shook
his head slowly. �I put off considering my happiness for years, Ginny, because
I thought that was what you wanted. I didn�t complain, I didn�t tell you what I
was thinking, because when I tried it seemed to hurt you so much. I went to
therapy because you wanted me to. I��

�� Not enough, Harry,� Ginny said, and now her
hands were clasped around each other, scratching hard enough that her nails
were tearing off flakes of skin and blood was springing out beneath them. �I
never asked you to consider my
happiness that way. I�m an adult. If you really felt that way, you should have
told me, too. How can you accuse me of keeping secrets when you did it all the
time?�

�� Harry
closed his eyes and tried to control his breathing, since he could feel the
magic building up in dangerous levels against his skin.

�� Draco was right. She never asked to be
managed. I should have realized that.

�� I should have done something like this long
since.

�� You�re
right,� he said, opening his eyes and looking at her.

�� Ginny
stared at him, caught off-balance like someone who had been building up to a
run and then had her opponent give up the race. �What did you say?�

�� You�re
right,� Harry repeated. �I wasn�t sensitive enough. I didn�t notice. I didn�t
talk enough.

�� And I
never will be able to, because I
can�t be what you need, either. I can�t be someone who doesn�t have dreams of
Draco. I can�t be the perfect father of your children who makes you love them
because I love them, too.

�� And most
of all, I can�t be that hero you need, Ginny. I won�t overcome the obstacles
you need overcome all the time, and I won�t be perfectly loving and forgiving.
This�I can�t forgive this. I can�t forgive that you almost poisoned me. And you
didn�t know about the specific symptoms, maybe, but you knew that Dreamless
Sleep was dangerous.� Harry�s head was pounding, his vision blurring. He
wondered almost clinically if he would cry if he stayed here much longer. �I
can�t read your mind. Your motives, as you tell them to me here, don�t convince
me. It�s through, Ginny. I�m walking away now.�

�� Harry, you
can�t.� Ginny was sighing now, like she did when confronted with James�s antics
on his toy broom. �We have to stay together because of the marriage vows. The
children��

�� Are
apparently restricting your freedom,� said Harry. �And I don�t know what you�re
capable of anymore. What you say makes sense, but�how that could have led you
to think that slipping me the Dreamless Sleep was a good thing, instead of talking to me about it more?�

�� You didn�t
listen to me when I talked to you!�

�� Did
Hermione?� Harry asked. The tears were squeezing the corners of his eyes. He
wasn�t sure what he was mourning. Maybe the death of his marriage, maybe just
the extent to which he�d done damage
to it.

�� I like to
think so,� said Ginny. �But none of the advice she offered was practical. She
just told me to talk to you again, and�well, you know what it�s like when I
do.� She laughed. The sound was bitter. �I was caught in a trap no matter which
way I turned, Harry. You say that you can�t be the hero for everything, but
when you were deaf to me, I needed someone
who would be.�

�� Why didn�t
Hermione talk to me?� Harry whispered.

�� Because I
swore her to secrecy, of course,� Ginny said, looking at him like he was mad.

�� Harry shook
his head. It was just all too much. And talking to her about it would only spin
them around in further circles, with Ginny refusing to see what she had done
wrong and Harry condemned to mistrusting all her words.

�� All he had
left was this.

�� I�m
going,� he said. �I�m taking the children with me��

�� You can�t do that��

�� Because I
don�t know what the hell you�d do with them, now,� Harry said. His voice was
dull. Everything about his feelings was dull, as if they were knives that
hadn�t been sharpened in weeks, cutting away at him. �They restricted your
freedom, you didn�t want Lily, you love them now but you were absolutely sure
that you needed a father in the same house for them even if he was getting sick
because of lack of dreams��

�� I�m not a
monster,� Ginny said, her voice steel. �I won�t let you make me into one. I
told you, I love my children.�

�� But I
don�t know that,� Harry whispered. �I
don�t understand anything anymore. As you say, I wanted children. I know that I
can take care of them. I�m not sure about you. Someone can be a good person and
still incapable of taking care of children properly, Ginny. I won�t use them as
pawns against you. I�m not sure that you won�t use them as pawns against me.
You�re already trying��

�� You can�t��

�� I can and
I will.� Harry looked into her eyes. He didn�t recognize her. He wondered if he
would have at any point during their marriage. �I would rather go without sex
for the rest of my life, and negotiate out all the delicate points of having
our children visit you, than stay with you for one moment more.�

�� He turned
and walked out. He would have to fetch his wand from Draco, and Summon his
clothes, and Tutela, and the other things that were his and that he might need
from this house.

�� He was
dazed with pain, and ending, and the need for sleep. He wanted to go away. He wanted
to fold himself up in Draco�s embrace and shelter for a while from the world.

�� He wasn�t
sure that he deserved it, when he�d played such a part in destroying his own
marriage and apparently done everything wrong no matter how hard he�d tried,
but that was what he wanted.

*

�� Luckily for
Draco, Weasley had listened to what he had to say about taking the children to
the Manor and simply nodded.

�� Might be
safer for them behind the wards, anyway,� he said, and then turned to pick up
Lily, who lay sleeping on the bench next to him, and handed her to Draco.
�Here, take her. You do know how to hold a baby, right?� Amusement bubbled
under the surface of his voice.

�� Draco
almost snapped that of course he did, but he quickly found out that holding
Scorpius and holding a little girl were different. Lily�s bright brown eyes
were fixed on him with what seemed to be more innocence, and it had been a long
time since Draco had held a child this small. He went quiet at the warmth
against his chest, and for a time it helped him to stop thinking about what
might be happening in the house. He hadn�t smelled the sharp ozone smell of
Dark magic, at least, and Weasley had said that his wife was inside with his
sister and would stop any incipient duels.

�� Why are
you being so pleasant about this?� he asked, his voice muffled, since he had
his head bowed over Lily.

�� Weasley
didn�t answer. Draco looked up to meet a thoughtful gaze, somewhere between
rueful and wistful.

�� I�ve
watched Harry�s marriage falling apart for much longer than he realizes,�
Weasley said quietly. �But I always thought I was mistaken. Hermione didn�t
want to talk about it. And Harry seemed happy. I�ve never been the keenest
observer. Emotional range of a teaspoon, Hermione tells me.� He shrugged. �But
you learn patience as an Auror, so I thought I would at least wait and see
whether I was right or not. You�you�re not the end of their marriage I
expected, but you�re a lot better than what it could have been. And Harry�s in love with you. I can tell. I�ll
accept it for his sake.�

�� Draco
looked away. He hoped, more strongly than ever now, that Harry�s friends never
found out he had killed George.

�� Harry
walked out of the house.

�� Draco stood
up. Harry�s sons, who had continued to play with toy wands, oriented on their
father and ran over to him, babbling. Harry put his hands gently on their
heads, and smiled, and Draco was grateful to see a spark of joy in him after
all, in the middle of his desolation.

�� My wand,
please,� Harry said, turning to him.

�� Draco
paused, both because he held Lily and because he didn�t know what Harry was
going to do with the wand. But Harry just shook his head. �It�s over,� he said.
�I know it won�t work, even if she doesn�t. I�m just going to Summon my clothes
and Tutela and the rest of what I want, and get the hell out of here.�

�� She
accepted your taking the children?� Draco asked warily.

�� Not
accepted it,� said Harry. �But she confessed that she didn�t want Lily when she
was pregnant with her. That�s�I don�t know what it says. Bad things about me, I
think, more than about her. But I want them more than she does. That alone�� He
broke off.

�� Draco gave
his wand back in silence. This wasn�t the same Harry who had walked into the
house, who was silent in the midst of his frightening, flaring anger. This was
a Harry who looked as though he had listened to someone he loved die screaming.

�� Harry
turned and aimed his wand at the house, incanting several Summoning Charms. The
Guardian Angel was the first to come flying out, locked in her cage. The moment
Harry unlocked the door, she flew up and fastened her talons to his shoulder,
hooting and cooing in a mixture of tenderness and rage that Draco found
endearing. At least he would have help in taking care of Harry.

�� As the rest
of Harry�s possessions came flying, the door opened. Despite Granger�s attempts
to hold her back, Harry�s wife was walking across the lawn, staring at Draco
and then away. �Harry,� she called.

�� Harry
stiffened and shook his head, looking aside.

�� Harry, we
can still make this work, if you just try a little harder��

�� Draco
wanted to kill her where she stood, but Harry had already gathered his
possessions around him, shrunk them, and taken his sons� hands. A moment later,
they Apparated out.

�� Draco
followed with Lily, leaving Weasley and Granger to deal with the aftermath. He
wanted to get back home and settle the children as soon as possible.

�� And then he
would make sure that Harry went to sleep,
damn it.

�� Come to
think of it, given how delayed the dreams had been, it might not be a bad idea for
him to join in.

*

�� Harry was
perplexed.

�� He�d taken
some time to comfort the children and ensure that they settled in�as long as he
could before Draco shepherded him off, at least. Harry�s vision was shutting
down by then, and he could feel gray fuzz snowing across his brain, so he
accepted the dismissal inherent in Narcissa�s words and Draco�s actions, and
went to bed. He had expected to start having dream visions the moment he lay down.

�� Instead, he
was standing in the middle of a vast, empty space with stone walls, something
like one of the many rooms that Harry supposed must exist under Malfoy Manor.
He turned in a circle, looking up at the ceiling, and sniffed. The air smelled
stale. He pinched his skin. It hurt.

�� Harry?�

�� He turned
quickly. Next to him was Draco, looking as bewildered and out-of-sorts as he
had when Harry had last seen him awake. He looked around several times, then
turned to him and frowned. �What do you think this is? It seems to be an odd
dream.�

�� Harry
swallowed. He could smell Draco�s scent, and he could feel the stretch of skin
along his side when he moved, showing that the scar of the sixth life-debt was
still there. This wasn�t a memory of another life, or a dream of something that
could have been. This was them.

�� He
remembered how the dreams had changed after the fifth life-debt, and wondered
if they could have changed yet again. Or maybe the change had something to do
with the fact that he hadn�t dreamed in entirely too long.

�� He edged
forwards, and laid his hand against Draco�s cheek. He was shivering with
desire. Draco turned to look at him with a slight frown; he�d been peering at
the ceiling as if he expected to recognize the carvings along it. His eyes
widened as they darted from Harry�s face to the hand on him.

�� Harry?�
Draco whispered.

�� Harry�s
breathing sped up. He was touching Draco�s skin, sexual desire was racing
through him, and the marriage vows weren�t reacting to punish him. At all.

�� The wording
of the wedding vows returned to Harry, as clearly as though he stood in front
of the elderly wizard who had married him and Ginny in the Burrow�s garden even
now.

�� Flesh of my flesh and spirit of my spirit,
we are bound as one. We are loyal to one another. We need not ever fear
disloyalty, because the touch of our desire on our flesh is reserved only for
one another.�

�� Our desire
on our flesh,� he whispered.

�� Pardon?�
Draco was still staring at him.

�� I can only
touch Ginny when I�m in the flesh,� Harry said, his voice growing stronger.
�But, realistic as the dreams are, they never counted. The vows never punished
me in them, because they were dreams.

�� And so is
this.�

�� And with
dozens of emotions surging through him, too many for him to give them any name
at all, he lowered his head and pressed his lips to Draco�s.

*

�� Thrnbrooke:
Not even a murder attempt would violate the marriage vows; they were meant to
keep a couple together no matter what. And this was not a knowing murder attempt.

�� Rafiq: Yes,
there are more betrayals.

�� Mephistides:
Ginny would probably answer that Harry is equally as selfish. As for Hermione,
what she saw and heard in this chapter changed her.

�� Mangacat:
Harry was sort of happy about the chance to stop caring about Ginny�s
happiness, really.

�� Darquiel: Ginny�s
family won�t be happy, but, on the other hand, they have the fact that Ginny
did give Dreamless Sleep to Harry to worry about. And Hermione, who heard the
whole thing, can help persuade them that it might be best for Ginny if the children were away from
her, since she did feel they restricted her free time and Harry didn�t help as
much with them as he should have.

�� AlcyoneBlack:
There are two solutions to the marriage vow problem, a permanent one and a
temporary one. This chapter does present the temporary one.

�� Mariahs_fantasy:
A separation is not divorce in this universe; a divorce would be an actual dissolving
of the vows, which can be done for other characters (Blaise did it for
example), but not for Harry.

�� Myra:
Ginny, of course, does not at all think she was asking for it.

�� Amiyom: I
know about the slipping and the learn typos. Care to point out any others?

�� Anon: Have
fun on your vacation!

�� UNH: Thanks
for reviewing!

��
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I Give You a Wondrous Mirror