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Ceremonies of Strife	By : Lomonaaeren Category: Harry Potter > Slash - Male/Male > Harry/Draco Views: 16218 -:- Recommendations : 1 -:- Currently Reading : 1
Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, and I am making no money from this writing.

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Chapter
Thirty-Four�Scattered and Shaken

�� Don�t do
that again,� Aran whispered, his voice so shaky that Harry winced back before
it. �I�ll tell you what you need to know. Just�just don�t do that again.�

�� Draco stood
in front of Aran, looking down at him. His face was perfectly calm, so fine
that Harry thought it would have been easy to mistake it for the face of a
statue. �I won�t need to,� Draco said, in a voice as cool, �if you�ll tell us
the truth, and what you are, and who gave you your orders.�

�� Aran
whimpered for long minutes without replying. Harry shook his head in wonder.
Aran hadn�t seemed the same since he attacked him in the corridor�the Spell
Lexicon instructor Harry knew would never have let himself be taken by surprise
and defeated by two trainees�but this was the greatest difference Harry had
noticed. Aran cowered away from Draco as if Draco were Nihil, lifting one hand
to shield his face.

�� And Draco
stood there with such pitiless eyes that Harry was sure he was enjoying it, on
some level.

�� What did
you do to him?� Harry whispered, bending close enough to Draco that he thought
other people would have a hard time overhearing.

�� Isn�t it
obvious?� Draco asked, and then glanced at Harry with a mean edge to his smile
that Harry hoped never to see again. �I hit him with a spell that didn�t permit
him to breathe for a short time, and he�s terrified I�ll do it again.�

�� I got that
part,� Harry said, lowering his voice further. How could Draco sound proud of that, of tormenting another
human being? �But why is he so frightened of that? If he really is part of
Nihil, then he must know that he isn�t going to die, no matter what happens to
the human body that he�s wearing at the moment.�

�� Oh, Harry,�
Draco said, and laughed into his ear in a way that caused certain stirrings
from Harry�s body he didn�t like to think much about. �It is obvious. But you�re polite and pleasant and good enough that I�m not surprised you don�t see it.�

�� Harry
jerked away, his neck prickling. He wanted to think it was with indignation at
what Draco had said, but he was afraid it came from�well, fear. �Explain it to
me, then,� he said, his voice rustling and crackling like eggshells being
stepped on. �Since I don�t get it.�

�� Draco
smiled at him for some time more before moving his glance back to Aran. Aran
had stopped whimpering, but still sat with his arms folded and his face
half-shielded by one hand. Hermione stepped forwards and knelt down next to
him, though she had more sense than to touch him. Her brow was furrowed, as
though she were studying the invisible marks Draco�s spell had left.

�� What
caused Nihil to become Nihil?� Draco asked. �What makes him so intent on
getting vengeance against Death Eaters?�

�� They tortured
him,� Harry said. �Or part of him.� It was still hard to explain what he had
seen in that vision in Nihil�s mind. He had guessed, though, that Nihil wanted
to protect it not because his original identity was a matter of such
importance, but because the vision contained the seeds of an answer to what he
was.

�� Yes,�
Draco said, and looked back at Aran. �If he is part of Nihil, then he will fear
torture more than anything else. It doesn�t even need to be torture as severe
as what Nihil, or Caradoc Dearborn, endured. He won�t be able to put up with
even the slightest suggestion of pain, and we can use it to make him tell us
the truth.�

�� Harry
closed his eyes. Then, knowing that Draco was watching him with eyes keen
enough to score slashes on his cheeks, he shook his head.

*

�� Draco
sighed. He had been afraid of this reaction. Or not afraid, exactly, because he
knew what needed to be done and he would do it whether Harry approved or not,
but he had known Harry wouldn�t support him in a time when it would be
infinitely easier to have his support.

�� Harry,� he
said. �Do you have a better solution to the problem of getting answers,
especially since we can�t use Veritaserum?�

�� Harry gave
him a level look and folded his arms. �Forget about answers for now,� he said.
His face had set in the particular stubborn lines that Draco remembered seeing
when he had confronted Harry in the past about risking his life for insane
reasons. �I�m more worried about what this will do to you. How can you torture
someone without losing your soul? How can you do it without corrupting
yourself?�

�� Draco
rolled his eyes. He really shouldn�t have called what he was doing torture if
he wanted Harry to listen, he realized. Still, that didn�t mean he was the only
one to blame here. Harry had always been irrational about certain small things.
�Listen, Harry,� he said, and hoped that his voice didn�t shake with fury or
exasperation. �I�m not worried about some kind of nameless, faceless, abstract
corruption. You�ve already faced corruption that�s fairly strong and definable,
and you haven�t succumbed to it. Can�t you trust that I can do the same thing,
use the Dark Arts but not give in to them? Whatever giving in means,� he had to
add, because that was one thing most of the books he�d read had no idea about.
Either they approved the use of the Dark Arts as just another tool in a
wizard�s arsenal or they hinted at dire consequences and never explained what
those dire consequences were. Draco had tried for years to find a book that described
the �horrible fates� of Dark wizards, in vain. Most of the time, the horrible
fate seemed to be Aurors.

�� It�s not
the magic,� Harry said. �I�ll acknowledge that you can do the Dark Arts if I
can do necromancy, and still walk away unscathed. But causing pain�� He shook
his head. �What kind of person will that make you?�

�� Draco
sighed. �A sensible one?� Harry�s mouth tightened, and Draco decided he would
probably have a shouting match on his hands in a minute if he didn�t try to
treat this a little more seriously.
He lowered his voice again and did his best to make it persuasive. �One who
knows exactly what he�s doing and why. One who knows what he�s responsible for.
And I�m sure that you�ll stay beside me and tell me if you see me going too
far, Harry.� This time, he could make his smile genuine, considering the
methods he thought Harry would probably resort to to tell him that. �This isn�t
a lightly-made decision.�

�� But the
Dark Arts�� Harry began.

�� Dearborn
was right about one thing,� Draco said forcefully. �What spells were declared
Dark Arts depends a lot more on what the Ministry says and what the historical
circumstances of the time were than anything else. There are harmless spells
that someone didn�t like because, say, they were the signature incantation of a
political enemy, and so they were banned. Those political rivals are dead now
and no one cares about their passions anymore, but we all have to suffer the
consequences.�

�� I wasn�t
talking about the Ministry�s definition,� Harry said, his gaze direct and
unflinching. It reminded Draco of the way he had looked in that final duel with
Voldemort. �I�m talking about spells that are used to harm people. Those are
what I�m calling Dark Arts, and those are what I don�t want you using.�

�� Draco
tapped his fingers against his arm. �What do you call the spells the War
Wizards use?� he asked, and hoped that his voice wasn�t as taut with fury as
his chest felt. Harry folded his arms and retreated a step anyway. �What about
the spells that Ventus and I used in the battle against Nihil�s army?�

�� They�re
dead,� Harry said. �I don�t want you, or anyone, using spells that could hurt living people.�

�� We�ve
already hurt Aran,� Draco said, and his voice deepened into a growl. He didn�t
care. If Harry wanted to make this a fight, Draco would. He wasn�t going to
give up the chance to learn the answers that Aran and Nihil had been keeping to
themselves for so long and which he didn�t think they would have an opportunity
of fighting the war without. �We learn spells in class every day that are meant
to kill Dark wizards if there�s no other option. Would it make you feel better
if I gave Aran his wand back and let him fight me?�

�� That�s not
the point,� Harry said. �Don�t be ridiculous.�

�� Then tell
me what I should do instead, since you oppose this course of action.� Draco
clasped his hands together so that he wouldn�t strike out at Harry. He loved
him, he did, but he didn�t love these
principles that bound Harry like chains and that he would try to wind around
other people at the most inconvenient times. �What I�m doing is only different
in a few essentials from what we�ve already done and you had no qualms about.
And since we�re not about to release Aran or
turn him over to the instructors right now, then I need to know what we can do, Arbiter of Justice.�

�� Harry�s
teeth were grinding together, if the sound Draco heard from behind his closed
lips was any indication. �I don�t want to restrict what you can do,� he said.
Draco snorted, and Harry flicked him an irritated glance as sharp as a whip.
�That�s not�I want to restrict the illegal and dangerous things you can do,� he
said. �I�m sure that you�re familiar with the impulse, since you keep me from
trying to risk my life.�

�� Ah, so that�s it. Draco stepped towards
Harry and leaned in towards his ear. By now, Weasley and Granger were staring
at them with avid curiosity, obviously wanting to know what they were talking
about. Ventus continued to watch Aran and ignore them, which made Draco more
grateful to know her.

�� There�s
something you should know about me,� Draco whispered. �I thought you already
did. Why, I�m not sure. But you don�t know, so I�m going to tell you now, and I
want you to always remember it.�

�� Harry
narrowed his eyes and nodded. Draco could feel the tension hovering in the air
between them, and licked his lips. He knew the best way of solving that
tension, but it was hardly possible with Harry�s friends in the room and a
prisoner to interrogate.

�� I don�t
care about as many people as you do,� Draco said. �The ones who are important
to me, the ones I want to protect, are the people I love.� He rested his hand
on Harry�s arm and hoped the weight, if not the words, would emphasize what
category Harry was in. �That means that I don�t care about the abstractions in
the way that you do, or the faceless mass of people that you were willing to
die to save. I wanted the world saved, but that was because my parents and I
lived in it, not because I cared about everyone else.�

�� Harry�s
face went white, while his lips clamped down so hard Draco honestly thought he
would break some teeth. Then he whispered, �That can�t be true, or why did you
keep from identifying me when the Snatchers brought me to Malfoy Manor?�

�� Because I
thought you were the means to saving people I loved,� Draco said. �Why else?�

�� Harry
looked away from him, half-shut his eyes, and shook his head. �No. That can�t
be right. I know that you�re a better person than you think you are. I know you
care more about principles than you say you do.�

�� Draco
sighed in disgust. �And there you are again. Why does caring about the abstract
motivations behind someone�s actions make you good? It makes you Gryffindor, and you�re still locked into
that mindset. But I�m not, and I�m going to use this spell, and others like it,
to interrogate Aran, and you�ll have to fight me to stop me.�

�� For a
moment, he thought it was going to happen. Harry tensed, his shoulders
rippling, and stared at Draco. His face had some color back. Draco waited for
his hand to dip into his pocket and grab his wand. That would be the beginning
of a serious duel, and one he would have to pay attention to, as much as he
wanted the interrogation to be over right now.

�� But then
Harry turned away and dropped his head, his fists clenching. Draco nodded.
�Thank you for admitting that some of your rules have to yield to
practicality,� he said, and turned back to Aran, already considering what spell
he should call on next.

*

�� Harry
watched from the corner of one eye as Draco lifted his wand again and Aran
crouched down, both hands splaying in front of his face despite the chokehold
it put on his neck as the ropes pulled tight. His face was blank, his eyes
looking flat with fear. Harry felt his throat ache, and wondered if he should
move forwards and stop it.

�� His
conscience said yes. His sense of practicality and his loyalty to his friends
and Draco, the part of him that was tired of fighting endlessly and receiving
no answers, told him to stay still and see what would happen. Perhaps it
wouldn�t be anything too bad.

�� Since when is torture not anything too bad?

�� Harry
ground his teeth. The hell of it was, he didn�t have a better plan for getting
the answers out of Nihil, or at least out of someone Nihil had possessed,
assuming Aran had ever existed independently of him.

�� To distract
himself, he studied Aran, wondering why the man was so different from what he
remembered of him. That Aran had been cool, self-possessed, in love with the
sound of his own voice. That man had confronted Harry for a few minutes in the
corridor, when he had first cast the spell and continued to move forwards
despite Harry�s taking away his wand and attacking him. But after that, he had
acted childish and helpless, and that was continuing at the moment.

�� Why?

�� Yes,� Draco
said, as if agreeing with someone invisible who had given him advice, and then
brought down his wand in a swift slashing motion. Aran strained up against the
ropes and cried out at the same moment.

�� Harry
stared at his leg, where the pain seemed focused, if the way Aran�s muscles
twitched and spasmed was any indication. There was no cut there, or bruising,
or signs that the blood had stopped flowing. And yet, Harry had no doubt that
the spell Draco had cast was responsible for the pain Aran experienced.

�� Finite Incantatem!� Hermione cried out.

�� Nothing
happened. Aran leaned forwards to clutch his leg, and gagged as the ropes
pulled tight. But his whimpers were fading now, and he stared at Draco with
frank fascination, the way a mouse might look at a snake.

�� Stop it!�
Hermione said, whirling to face Draco and holding her wand towards him this
time, as if she were going to stab him through the eye with it. Draco acted as
if he didn�t see her, but Harry knew he did, and from the way he was tensing, he
was prepared to do something about it. �You can�t hurt someone like this and not
expect there to be consequences!�

�� I�ve
already had this discussion with Harry,� Draco said, his voice was flat as
Aran�s expression. �I have no interest in it with you.� He looked at Aran, and
his lips twisted into a small, cruel smile that Harry had only seen echoes of
on his face during the time they were in Hogwarts. �Besides, these particular
consequences are the ones we want.�

�� Harry
looked. Aran was shaking his head back and forth, gargling on desperate words
in his throat. �Please, no more,� Harry made out after a moment, whispered over
and over as if the repetition would be enough to keep him from pain. �Please,
no more.�

�� Draco
smiled at Hermione, who had her hands to her mouth and looked as if she were
going to be sick. Then he knelt down next to Aran and said, almost tenderly, �I
can stop it. But for it to stop, you have to tell us everything you know. About
Nihil. About what it means that you�re a part of him and can resist
Veritaserum. About anyone else you know in the Ministry who is connected to him
or infected by him. Do you understand?�

�� Aran looked
at him with something that Harry thought you could call filthy gratitude, and
nodded excitedly. �I don�t know everything, but I know much,� he said. �What
you have to understand is that I am only a part of him. I know as much of him
as he allows me to see, as much as I had to so that I could keep working for
him.�

�� And you
have his fears,� Draco said, smiling into Aran�s eyes and stroking his wand.
�Unless you were tortured, yourself?�

�� Aran closed
his eyes and shook his head.

�� Draco
rocked back on his heels, gave a triumphant glance at everyone in the room, and
then turned back to Aran. �What does it mean to say that you�re a part of
Nihil? We had thought he was one person, and although we know now that he can�t
be killed as readily as we thought he could, losing a body still takes him out
of the immediate area. Doesn�t it?�

�� Aran
sighed. Some color was returning to his face, and Harry tried, unsuccessfully,
to convince himself that that meant what had happened was all right. �No. Nihil
is more like a great plant, with many roots extending under the ground and
surfacing in unexpected places. I am one of the blossoms of those roots. Daffyd
Dearborn was another, at least after he became part of Nihil. Like him, I can
act on my own and possess my own opinions and enough of my former personality
to fool those who need to be fooled. But I am ultimately under his control and
answerable to him.�

�� Then won�t
he kill you when he finds out what you told us?� Hermione blurted out.

�� Aran gave
her a thin smile full of pity. �No. He cannot kill me. He can reabsorb me, pull me back into himself, and he may
do that. But he ordered me to destroy your gift for necromancy.� He looked at
Harry, and there was nothing gleeful in his eyes or his face. He might have
been speaking of being ordered simply to kill Harry. �He fears what could
happen if someone who knows his secrets and has a talent for it faces him on
the battlefield.�

�� Harry
swallowed. �And you resented his orders,� he guessed, remembering the things
Aran had said as he was attacking Harry. �You wanted to just kill me or knock
me unconscious and get rid of me that way.�

�� Yes,� Aran
said indifferently. �He has an obsession with you that I think quite unnatural.
There are other ways to accomplish his goals than by taking you and corrupting
you, or taking you and using your fame to his own ends. And he has the same
obsession with you,� he added, turning to look at Draco.

�� Draco let
out a huff of breath and his eyes widened, but Harry knew him too well to be
fooled by the pallor of his face. He was flattered and trying not to show it.
�Why me?� Draco asked. �I don�t have much in the way of fame to offer, except
the notoriety that would make people back away from me instead of helping me.�

�� You were a
Death Eater,� Aran said. His voice remained indifferent. He was looking over
their heads into a corner of the ceiling now, as though he were counting the
moments until Nihil came and reclaimed him. Harry wondered what would that look
like, when it happened�if it happened. �Or your father was. Either was good
enough for him. He thought that you might know secrets that would help. And of
course you might know Dark Arts, or have access to books, that he didn�t. And
he�s obsessed with that kind of magic. Since it was used against him, he wants
to make a weapon of it.�

�� He�s
always reacted like that, hasn�t he?� Harry asked, remembering the vision that
had flashed in his head, the strength of Caradoc�s desire to cause pain to the
people who had harmed him. �If someone does something to him, then he has to
respond in exactly the same way if he can.�

�� Aran
nodded, and he wore a faint smile this time. �You are beginning to understand
how his mind works. If you can call it a mind. If someone who is human can
understand something that truly is not.� He paused, seeming to muse for a
moment before he continued. �He is incapable of understanding anyone as an ally
or friend, of course, which limits him in his own way. You are resources to
him.�

�� Harry
shivered. Nusquam had said something like that. He reckoned he was glad he
hadn�t comprehended it fully before; it would have discouraged him as they
struggled to fight against Nihil.

�� What does
Nihil want?� Draco asked.

�� Aren�t
Nemo and Nusquam his allies?� Hermione asked at the same time.

�� Aran
answered Draco first, his voice tired. �The clue is in his name. Indeed, he has
told everyone who cared to know about him the truth from the first day, but
people rarely follow the clue back to its beginning.�

�� He wants
nothing?� Draco said. He raked his hands through his hair. �That makes no
sense, not when he�s been striving so hard after something, and he clearly wants to bring down the Ministry and
destroy Harry and me.�

�� He wants
to reduce the world to nothingness,� Aran said, with a faint bite to his words
that Harry suspected was as close as he could come to impatience at the moment.
�Himself included. He cannot die. He can change bodies, but he is always the
same in the core of himself, with the same driving purpose. Indeed, the
extensions of him who have some free will, such as the man you called Dearborn
and I, are often happier than he is. We can forget the pain for a time, the
memories.� He shuddered and glared at Draco. �Until something brings it back
again.�

�� Harry
shivered. �And he doesn�t care who or what he has to crush to do it, does he?�
he asked.

�� Aran shook
his head. �He didn�t strike for years after the first war because he was trying
all the various magical methods available to him of forgetting. Nothing worked.
So if the world is destroyed, and there�s no scrape of matter left for him to
animate or escape into when his last body is killed, then he figures he�ll have
oblivion and peace at last.�

�� That�s
insane,� Ron said, blankly. Bleakly. Harry glanced at his best friend and saw
him standing with his arms folded, his eyes wide.

�� To someone
human, yes,� Aran said.

�� What about
Nemo and Nusquam?� Hermione insisted. �Were they normal people that he
possessed, too? How does he possess people? Are they his allies?�

�� Nemo and
Nusquam are his most independent tendrils, the first ones he created,� Aran
said. �Nusquam is the part of himself that has perfected their methods of
travel, and Nemo works with the beasts. Nemo is less sophisticated than Nusquam
and has a less stable appearance through his various transformations. As for
the possession question, I can only try to tell you what I know of myself.
Nihil appeared to me in the guise of Daffyd Dearborn and flashed that onyx ring
he was always carrying at me. The infection travels by light. When I saw it, I
felt something change within me. The infection acted differently than it does in
those people, such as you, whom Nihil wanted to leave alone until he could
figure out how to use them. It ate away everything I was, and left me as this.�

�� There was
silence. Even Draco looked more somber than he had been, and Harry wrapped his
arms around himself and wondered if the others were thinking the same thing he
was.

�� How in the world are we going to fight this?

�� Then he saw
Draco lifting his head again and staring at him as if daring Harry, silently,
with his eyes, to give in. Harry began to smile back in spite of himself.

�� There�s a way. We�ll find it.

��

�� Although, Draco, please, it has to be a
different way than yours.

*

�� polka dot:
I don�t know how much you will like Nihil.

�� Kady Rae:
Yes, but he�s not completely part of Nihil the way that Nusquam is.

�� angelmuziq:
Thank you. Though I wonder how well you�ll like the nature of what Draco�s
doing.

�� SP777:
Well, I hope it�s sooner than the end of this story! The problem is that I�ve
been writing fics for anonymous fests on LiveJournal, and until I get those
finished, in time for upcoming deadlines, I really can�t start anything else.

�� Your
hypnosis idea is intriguing. However, I can�t really see a way to use it in a
story yet. Perhaps later.

�� Enamoril:
Thanks! And it helps, Harry is most tempted by the notion of bringing Sirius
back, too, although he�s not going to do it.

�� Dragons
Breath: Harry is currently worried about just that.

�� Thrnbrooke:
Here it is.

�� MewMew2:
Thanks! Although I don�t know how well Draco�s self-realization will click for
other people.
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Ceremonies of Strife