The Only True Lords | By : Lomonaaeren Category: Harry Potter > Slash - Male/Male > Harry/Draco Views: 54578 -:- Recommendations : 4 -:- Currently Reading : 11 |
Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter. I am making no money from this fanfic. |
Thank you again for all the reviews!
Chapter Thirty-Six--The Meaning of Family "The fuck did you think you were doing?" Draco would have made some snide comment about how Potter was so upset that he wasn't even speaking his sentences correctly, but he found his eyes falling and his cheeks heating up as Potter stalked around him. It didn't help that the bond mark on his arm kept throbbing and glowing, sending a twinge of heat up to his shoulder every now and then. Draco glared at it. I already blush with my face, I don't need to blush with my arm as well! "I'm still waiting for an answer, Draco." That combination, of the flat tone, and his first name, and Potter's bloody assurance that he had the right to call Draco by his first name like that and scold him like a child, finally kindled the anger Draco needed to sustain his replies. He glared at Potter in turn. "You'll go on waiting," he told him. "I don't owe you an answer." Potter stared at him with eyes that could be described as black. Draco flinched, but said nothing. Potter wasn't actually Professor Snape or the Dark Lord, and Draco had survived both of those. "I felt as if you were dying," Potter said tightly. "It was the same sensation I had through the bond when Blaise was in danger from his mother. You are ridiculous if you tried to poison yourself because you thought it was better than living with the bond. If you feel that bad, then you should have come to me, and we could have talked about it." Draco paused, his head cocked. If Potter thought that was what had happened, then maybe Draco could get away with lying to him after all. And it would even be a superior lie to the Amortentia one, since Potter would have known what had happened right away if Draco took a love potion. "I've already talked to you about it," he muttered, making his voice as fretful as he could. "You know that I don't want my father go to prison. You've refused to do the only thing that would help." Potter laughed, a little wildly. He was running on the edge of his endurance, Draco decided, watching him cautiously. Well, that was a good thing. It meant Draco was a lot more likely to get away with lying to him. "Even being my vassals won't spare the lot of you trials," Potter said. "It's likely that your father would end up going to Azkaban if I took him under my wing anyway. Have you considered that?" Draco sniffed and folded his arms. "You told me you wouldn't do it because it would put your other vassals in danger. Well, not having him as part of the bond is putting me in danger. How are you going to choose between us?" There was a strange, buzzing sound. It took Draco a long second to realize that it was coming from the big shield mark on Potter's right arm. Potter laid his hand over it, and his face became frozen, immobile. Draco watched him, holding his breath. Maybe that buzz was someone else summoning Potter, because someone else who had been part of the bond was in danger, and that would give Draco time to come up with an even better lie. Potter turned towards him, and Draco braced for an announcement of the latest crisis. "You're lying," Potter said calmly. "I don't know why I'm not used to this by now. Sometimes I wonder if I should just get Severus to read the truth out of your mind instead of relying on what you say." He leaned towards Draco, his eyes hard. "Will you tell me the bloody truth for once?" Draco looked wildly around for his mother. She had departed the room, at what point he'd never noticed. Coward, he thought bitterly in her direction, and then faced Potter. "I was going to swallow Amortentia because I thought you would have to do what I wanted once I was in love with you," he said. Potter stared at him, then laughed shortly. His green eyes were maybe a little lighter, but not by much. "What? Did you think I would be fooled by seeing you suddenly acting in a completely stereotypical love potion way?" "That wasn't what this was about," Draco snapped, his cheeks aflame. "I knew that you would know I was under the influence of a love potion. I just thought--because I couldn't help worshipping you, I thought the bond would force you to do more for me than the others." Potter took a step towards him. His hands were trembling. As Draco noticed that, though, Potter promptly folded them behind his back, as though he wanted to stop Draco from noticing. "If you'd done this any other day, maybe it would be all right," Potter hissed. "But I have had as much as I can take of your bloody nonsense. The bond prevented the potion from taking effect, because it thought it would harm you. You can't do something like that. Can I say that only once, or is it going to take longer to penetrate that thick skull?" My mother knew that, Draco realized numbly. It's why she let me go ahead and take the potion. She probably realized from all the reading she'd done exactly what would happen. "I can't just do nothing," Draco heard himself say, his mouth moving without his permission. "You're going to put my father in prison, and you want me to just give up and do nothing about it? Of course I won't! Of course I'm going to fight for him!" Potter's eyes were almost black again, and the shield mark on his arm was buzzing, and Draco added defensively, "And if that bothers you, well, sorry, but maybe it's just because you never had a family yourself--" Potter snarled at him, and the bond mark on his arm heated up so much that Draco winced and stepped back from Potter. Only the knowledge that the bond would never let Potter hurt him kept Draco from retreating from the room altogether. "That's stupid." Potter was speaking the words like slow drops of water falling into a well. "I don't know what else I can say to convince you of how bloody stupid this is. Yes, I do understand that you want to fight for your father. But nothing is going to keep him out of prison. Unless someone kills him first! He has a better chance this way than--" "He would have a better chance as your vassal, and you won't do it!" Draco folded his arms and stared Potter down. "No, he wouldn't," Potter said. "Because I would be splitting my efforts between so many people at once that he wouldn't receive a good defense, and neither would the rest of you. Why can't you understand that? What else can I say to convince your stubborn arse? He would drag the rest of you down, and my first loyalty is to the people already in the bond!" "But you could save him," Draco said. "You could do something. I know that you've freed Blaise, so that way you have an empty place that you could offer to Father, and you don't know exactly what the bond is capable of yet." "I had to know exactly what it was capable of to free Blaise," Potter snapped. "What, you think I could have done that with imperfect control?" "You could still do something," Draco said. "You killed the Dark Lord and initiated this bond in the first place. You could do something." He stopped, because Potter was shaking, and it really did look as if magic was making him vibrate from the inside. Draco backed cautiously away. What had his mother been thinking, to leave him here with someone this unstable? He was going to complain bitterly to her about her lack of care for him once he found her again.* The little fucker. The arrogant little bastard. Harry wanted to go away and calm down, but he knew that he would probably just explode at whoever he saw then, and he wanted to stay here and deal with this. Draco was the one who had put him into this much of a temper. Draco was the one who could bloody well deal with it. "Just because I did those things doesn't mean I can do anything," he said, in enough of a hiss that it made Draco flinch and Harry wonder for a second if he'd spoken Parseltongue. But Draco was still looking at him as if he understood, so probably not. "Your mother came to me and had the same stupid plan. I'm the hero, I should figure a way out! Except I did what I did with a lot of help, and I don't know what to do this time, and my vassals keep making it harder than it should be with their stupid antics!" "Wanting to save my father isn't stupid." Up went Draco's little chin again, as though he could change reality while squinting at Harry. "It is when you have no plan and you think I should do something even though there's nothing to do!" Harry shouted right back. The expression on Draco's face didn't change, and Harry almost walked away. He couldn't get through to Draco no matter what he did, so why should he try? But he controlled the impulse with a grinding of his teeth and a restraint that impressed even him, and inclined his head sharply instead. "How do you propose that we keep your father out of prison and away from the consequences of his actions?" "You take him as your vassal." Draco gave him a pitying look. That broke Harry's self-control again. He felt a sharp sensation in the shield mark, but it didn't seem as if it was discouraging him from snapping at Draco. "But I can't even keep you out of prison, maybe! Or Snape! And you didn't do as much as he did!" "Snape did. He was a Death Eater just like my father." This time, Draco gave a little snort, evidently because he wanted to make himself as irritating as possible to someone who was trying to help him. "But he didn't break out of bloody Azkaban!" Harry threw his arms up and turned away to pace, because he recognized the edge of his temper. It was the same way he had sometimes felt around Dudley when he was younger, so angry that he was going to punch him no matter what happened next. "Your father would still be on trial for that even if all his actions had the same explanation as Snape's!" "If he was a spy," Draco began. Harry turned around and stared. "That's your grand plan? To pretend that he was and under Dumbledore's protection?" He snorted. "Good luck forging the Pensieve memories." Draco bristled and glared at him. "I didn't say it would work if I did it myself! I just meant that you could lie, and they would believe you because you're the Boy-Who-Lived and you always get special treatment!" Harry began walking forwards. Draco began backing away from him, until both of them had to stop because Harry had literally backed Draco into a corner. Harry loomed close to him and glared down at Draco. They were both about the same height, he thought, but Draco was cowering before him now, and Harry had the moral high ground to stand on, whether or not Draco would ever acknowledge that. "The Wizengamot argued with me," Harry whispered. "I barely managed to persuade them of anything. They're spreading stories and lies about me, the same way that they did in school." He laughed wildly, and without knowing what the effect of his laughter on Draco would be, until he saw the pink splotches on his white cheeks and his wide eyes. "Remember? In fourth year? So many people believed I was lying about putting my name in the Goblet of Fire to become the Tri-Wizard Champion? You helped Skeeter write her articles then. And two years ago, they thought I was insane, and there were a bunch of people who at least went along with the idea that I was a wanted criminal for the last year! Yes, of course they all support me and give me special treatment." He whipped away from Draco. "If you were counting on me being invincible to save your family, you shouldn't have hacked away at my invincibility." "You could do all these other things," Draco whispered to his back. "Killing the Dark Lord was harder than saving my father. Why can't you do this?" "Because your definition of saving means that he doesn't pay at all," Harry said without turning to look at Draco again. Maybe the idiot would learn better that way. "And no one can keep him from doing that." "He did in the first war--" "When he had a lot of money, and bribed people, and they were willing to believe him," Harry said. "That excuse won't fly this time. And even then, he spent some time in prison, didn't he? I've got a nice prison for him right now, better than the holding cells. You ought to thank me for all I've already done for him." "That's an idea!" Draco sounded as though he'd had a revelation. Harry turned to eye him warily over his shoulder. Draco clasped his hands together and gave Harry a bright look. "Why don't you make him a vassal and demand that they release him into your custody? House arrest! We could do that!" "Because I don't want to be responsible for house arrest on Lucius bloody Malfoy," Harry said, in a low voice. Draco stared at him. "But I need it to be happy, and doesn't the bond force you to do what your vassals need to be happy?" he demanded incredulously. "No," Harry said, after a pause in which he thought it possible that the bond might contradict him. But nothing happened, and Harry grew more confident after a second. "I don't have to spend the rest of my life doing nothing but things you want. I don't think the bond can work that way. Lords would get fed up and kill themselves after a few days if they got nothing out of the bond." "You get the ability to command us--" "Because that's been really fucking useful and stopped you doing stupid things really well so far," Harry said sourly, and kicked the empty vial of Amortentia where it lay on the floor. A flood of color traveled up into Draco's cheeks, but he still didn't retreat. "You get a lot out of this bond. And we didn't choose this bond any more than you did. Rescuing my father seems like the least you could do." Harry uttered a short, frustrated scream, and stalked towards Draco again. Draco didn't cower this time, but he did fold his arms and tilt his head up in a peculiar way when Harry wasn't far off, and that might mean the same thing. It made Harry stop short and snap out the next words that he might have kept hidden forever, at least. "What do I get out of this bond? Short sleep, constant worry, the fact that I don't understand Lordship bonds and I'm always at a disadvantage, people expecting me to be a hero, people telling me that I'm no better than a slaveowner, people trying to kill me, vassals who do stupid shit and try to kill me, vassals who punch me, vassals who try to take love potions, responsibility that never ends, the main responsibility for defending the house even though I don't have a wand, more people coming up and staring hopefully at me, responsibility for adults placed on my shoulders, and accusations of selfishness and cowardice and wanting the bond from every direction! Yes, I did this because I so wanted this bond. Yes, my position as Lord is so enviable!" Draco had paled again, but he just watched him instead of saying anything, so Harry went on with his rant. "And if I do want something, I get told it's selfish, too. Well, fuck you very much, Draco Malfoy. I refuse to save your father, who's apparently so weak that his idea of doing something is to cast himself at my feet and then lie there trembling. And I refuse to give in to your pleadings, when you wouldn't give a shit if one of my friends or one of my family were the ones going to prison. I don't care. I don't have to care about anyone who's outside the bond, because the bond won't force me to." "If I'm unhappy," Draco whispered. "Blaise was unhappy, and I released him from the bond." Harry gave Draco a smile he knew was nasty, and he really didn't care. "So that's always an option." "I wouldn't survive the trials free if you did that." Draco locked his arms around himself and stood there looking lost and miserable and sorry for himself. "You can't do that. The bond will force you not to." "There is literally nothing else I can do," Harry said. "I can't keep your father out of fucking prison, understand? Nothing can do that." "If you made him a vassal," Draco began. And there was a final snapping somewhere deep inside Harry, something that made him fly across the room and shake Draco as hard as he could, holding his shoulders. Draco's teeth snapped and shivered, and the bond didn't object. "I'm not going to do that because I don't want to," Harry said, when he could speak instead of spitting incoherently with rage. "Get it? You can talk all you want about how I should and the bond should force me to and you'd like me to and it would be right, but what it comes down to is that I don't want to. You can't make me, either." God, it feels good to say that. It did. It felt good to see the utterly astonished look on Draco's face, too, while he looked Harry up and down, at a loss. "But the bond has to force you," Draco whispered. "The same way it would have forced you to if I drank the Amortentia." Harry smiled at him, and Draco flinched. "And notice that the bond kept the potion from taking effect. It stops things that put the vassals in danger. It would have reacted a lot sooner even to the kidnapping attempt if the Freedom Fighters hadn't been smart enough to use those Calming Charms on you. It also won't let you try to commit suicide or cause harm to yourself, or whatever other bloody stupid plan you've come up with next." He leaned near enough that their noses crushed together. "And you won't be able to force me with guilt, because I'm the one with the power." Draco stared at him, dazed. Harry waited. Draco finally came out with, "I never imagined--I never imagined that you would be so harsh a Lord." "I never imagined I'd have to, until people pushed me so much that it was this or just give in and do whatever you wanted." Harry pushed his glasses up his nose, not having realized until that point that they'd slipped down. His hand was shaking, and he clenched it a little and lowered it back to his side. "I don't want to hurt you. But I don't want to take on the burden of your father, either, and I'm not going to do it." Draco rubbed his shoulder, eyes so intent on Harry's face that Harry wondered if Draco thought he could convince Harry that way. "You could if you wanted to," Draco said. "But you're not going to do it." Harry sneered at him. "I could, if I made a choice that he should escape prison and he shouldn't pay for his crimes and I should do whatever I could just to spare your feelings. But that's not going to happen." "You're doing it this way because you decided to," Draco whispered. "Not because the bond made you." Harry threw up his hands again. "Yes. Believe that if you want. Believe I'm your enemy and that I could spare your father prison if I wanted, even though I'm not the Wizengamot and not even the one who can make the bloody legal decision. Just stand there and tell me like your mum that I should have done something else." He walked towards the door. He'd done his best to convince Draco, and Draco wouldn't listen, and Harry was sick of it. "Potter?" Draco's voice was so tentative that Harry hesitated with his hand on the knob. He really shouldn't listen, he told himself. He should walk out of the room and not look back. He had already given more of his time and patience to Draco than any sane person would require. But Draco's voice was a bit different, and there was a strange vibration traveling down his shield mark, like it was a glass someone had flicked with a finger. Harry turned around. "What?"* Draco felt as though a strange, glacial calm had gripped him. Potter's words seemed to echo and chase themselves around his head, but Draco only heard fragments of them at one time. What he was actually thinking was his own paraphrase of them. He could make the choice to take on my father under the bond, but we've used up all his goodwill. We've exhausted him. He doesn't trust us. His reputation is poor, too, and he can't shield my father all that well. He's not the one who'll decide whether my father is sent to Azkaban or not. Draco took a deep breath. He could--he could accept that. For years, he'd been thinking, endlessly, that Potter wasn't so special, and it was incredible to him that only him and Professor Snape and his father and a few other people were the ones who could see that. Why did people think it was a big deal if Potter picked his nose? Draco could prove that he broke the rules and slept and ate like anyone else, because he saw Potter doing it every day, even though Potter wasn't punished for breaking the rules anything like near as often as he deserved. And now Potter was the one telling him that Draco had been right. Potter wasn't an invincible hero. He couldn't do miracles just because people looked at him with shining eyes and demanded that he do it. Draco had become one of that mob of people staring at Potter that way and imploring him, sure that he could do it just because he was Potter, and a hero. He had forgotten the important things he'd known as a child. It would have been different if Draco had had some solid plan to save his father. But even if Lucius became a vassal, Draco had to admit, he didn't know exactly how things would work. Potter was still the one who would have to fight the battle. It also would have been different if Potter had thought he was special because he was a Lord now. But he didn't think that way, and Draco thought--he thought he could accept this tired, ordinary boy staring at him from across the room. His eyes and his shield mark and his scar and his messy hair, which so many people even in Slytherin had thought were so special, weren't that remarkable when you saw them like this, Draco thought tolerantly. He discovered that Potter was still waiting for him to say something, and he said, "All right. I don't--I don't want my father to go to prison, but--I accept that you won't do anything about it. That it would be pretty hard even if you wanted to do something about it." Potter looked at him closely. Then he said, "And you won't do anything else stupid like use Amortentia on yourself?" Draco grimaced and nodded. He didn't want to agree, but he also didn't have much choice. That smile that had startled him once before leaped across Potter's face, the one that did make him look like someone special, more than all those photographs in the paper had ever managed. "Thank you," he said simply, and left Draco alone in the room, still tired and with the lingering remnants of his anger draining towards peace.*Kain: Arguably, the time that Harry used the Cruciatus on Carrow was unnecessary, so all that he’d done was taunting McGonagall.
And yes, Draco is grasping at straws, but that happens with the Malfoy family in relation to each other.
delia cerrano: Right now, the pairing is Harry and Draco. I know that seems unlikely, but we’ll get there!
qwerty: Thank you!
SP777: Well, he didn’t really get a chance, but I don’t agree that Harry is stupid, either.
While AFF and its agents attempt to remove all illegal works from the site as quickly and thoroughly as possible, there is always the possibility that some submissions may be overlooked or dismissed in error. The AFF system includes a rigorous and complex abuse control system in order to prevent improper use of the AFF service, and we hope that its deployment indicates a good-faith effort to eliminate any illegal material on the site in a fair and unbiased manner. This abuse control system is run in accordance with the strict guidelines specified above.
All works displayed here, whether pictorial or literary, are the property of their owners and not Adult-FanFiction.org. Opinions stated in profiles of users may not reflect the opinions or views of Adult-FanFiction.org or any of its owners, agents, or related entities.
Website Domain ©2002-2017 by Apollo. PHP scripting, CSS style sheets, Database layout & Original artwork ©2005-2017 C. Kennington. Restructured Database & Forum skins ©2007-2017 J. Salva. Images, coding, and any other potentially liftable content may not be used without express written permission from their respective creator(s). Thank you for visiting!
Powered by Fiction Portal 2.0
Modifications © Manta2g, DemonGoddess
Site Owner - Apollo