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A Brother to Basilisks	By : Lomonaaeren Category: Harry Potter > Slash - Male/Male > Harry/Draco Views: 85172 -:- Recommendations : 2 -:- Currently Reading : 15
Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter. I am making no money from this story.

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Chapter Thirty-Eight—Questions About Allegiance Rings
            You will have to do something about it sooner or later, Dash said, twining out of Harry’s bed and poking the box on the table with his nose. The allegiance ring that Selwyn had given him rattled inside.
            Then it can be later, Harry grouched, and dragged himself out of bed. His muscles throbbed. Even though he had had worse aches before, especially when flying or when he’d received a pounding from Dudley, there was a special ache about the first day of being back to school that made him want to sleep in.
            Not that he would get to, of course. Dash had woken him up early so he could shower and get to breakfast on time, but also so that he could go to the library and look up allegiance rings.
            Draco should have told me enough about the bloody things already when I asked, Harry thought, as he stepped into the shower and deliberately turned on the cold water. Not only did it wake him up with a leap and a shout, but it meant Dash had to stay outside the shower stall until it got warmer.
            You are so anxious to be parted from me, then? Dash was now tall enough to rear up and look over the wall of the shower, at least if he slung a coil of his body around one of the sinks outside.
            Harry bowed his head and scrubbed his fingers through his hair, not saying anything. He had thought—well, he had just hoped that he could stay out of it all this year. He probably couldn’t get away from Voldemort completely, since there were reports of Dark Marks at the Quidditch World Cup. And, well, Professor Snape and Mr. Malfoy were Death Eaters, or had been. Still were, if you listened to Sirius, which Harry didn’t make a habit of doing.
            But he could stay out of politics. People were getting used to Dash now. The excitement around Pettigrew’s trial and Sirius’s release had already died down. Harry hadn’t done anything remarkable at the end of last year, nothing to compare to saving the Stone or entering the Chamber of Secrets and rescuing Ginny.
            He’d just thought, hoped, that people were forgetting about him.
            Did you forget that you announced your abuse to the papers, and some other people started coming forward? I know you didn’t look at the papers much of the rest of summer, but I did, and the public paid attention to that.
            Harry paused and squinted up through the soap and shampoo at Dash. You read the papers? Really?
            Yes. I didn’t inflict it on you because I thought you needed some freedom from them. Dash’s tail lashed once, and he ended up falling down from his high perch. But he just flowed over the wall again and into the water, since it was warm now. But I wanted to make sure that no new threats to you were brewing there.
            Harry swallowed, and then reached down and swept a hand across Dash’s flat head, because it replaced a lot of things he could have said and didn’t have the words for.
            You’re welcome. Dash stuck out a tongue and licked at a bit of shampoo, then shuddered and scrubbed his tongue on the stones. He always said that shampoo looked like something that should taste good, since it was thick and glistened the way blood did, but he was always disappointed. In the meantime, you need to pursue the matter of the allegiance ring.
            Harry sighed. Yes, he might prefer to forget about politics if he could, but it seemed politics weren’t going to forget about him.
            Fine, but I think it’s just going to be a disappointment to them, he said, ducking his head through a final scrub of his hair and then stumbling out and reaching for the towel. After all, I’m not Slytherin reincarnated or whatever. What are they going to do when they find that out?
            You’re not, Dash agreed. But that doesn’t mean you can’t lie and claim to be.
            It was Harry’s turn to fall, as he whirled around to stare at Dash in shock and tripped over a slight irregularity in the floor. He choked and got up again, while Dash slid towards the door and said, Clumsy, clumsy. You should practice walking like a pure-blood.
            Harry glared at him. Pure-bloods don’t walk any better than Muggleborns or other wizards.
            But they receive some training in grace, because of how embarrassing it would be to stumble in front of a political opponent. You should try it.
            Harry gave up in disgust. You can’t seriously mean what you said. About pretending to be Slytherin. I’m not a good liar!
            But there are things you can conceal, the way you concealed your abuse for years and years. Dash shot out his tongue and flicked it once as though he was gathering in a scent he had been searching for. I think Snape would help you. Draco would help you. Even Mr. Malfoy would help you, if he thought it was to his advantage. Dash turned and flicked his tongue out along the same path as his back, and Harry received a clear vision of him polishing his scales.
            Maybe. But not something like that.
            How do you know until you try?
            Harry said nothing. He could see some sense in what Dash was saying, and a lot more trouble.
            Then he said, as he rubbed his hair furiously dry and ignored the way it stuck up, because it was always doing that, What would be the goal, anyway? If it’s so important to lie, then what would I gain?
            Dash flung a casual coil around his hip and leg. Except that it bound Harry and stopped him from walking, it felt a lot like a hug from Ron or Hermione. Harry looked down at him.
            You gain people who would follow you, said Dash, leaning his jaw on Harry’s leg. Fight for you. Protect you. People who would help me, and make my life easier.
            And that was what it was really about for him, Harry was certain, feeling the throb in his brain, down their bond. Dash didn’t care much about the human politics of Gryffindor and Slytherin Houses, except if it meant that some other student would try to attack Harry because of it. He didn’t care whether the human families like the Selwyns got told the truth.
            He wanted Harry safe. And that was all there was to it.
            Harry stroked his scales until he heard people waking up in the bedroom, because he didn’t know any other way to convey how grateful he was that someone cared about him like that. Just him. Just Harry.
            Then he said, All right. We’ll try it.
            Dash immediately squeezed him tighter for a second, then let him go and glided in front of him, saying, Yes, Lord Slytherin. We should get ready for your first public debut.
            Harry rolled his eyes.
*
            Severus was ready when he saw Harry walk into the Great Hall and detour over to the Slytherin table. He was far from deaf, and the excited gossip in Slytherin last night had alerted him to Selwyn’s giving the allegiance ring to Harry.
            Harry stopped in front of Draco to exchange nods, and then turned to Jackson Selwyn. Severus immediately and shamelessly cast the charm that would allow him to hear clearly from this distance.
            “Jackson Selwyn, right?” Harry asked, with that stare which broke out in a smile a moment later. It was much more charming than he had ever realized, but this time, Severus thought he was doing it on purpose.
            Selwyn stared, seemingly star-struck. Severus concealed a sigh. He thought only family tradition and the boy’s own pleas with the Hat had landed him in Slytherin. He had as much guile as a Crup.
            “Y-yeah,” Selwyn said, and then he seemed to make an effort to smooth down his hair and sit up more, probably in imitation of his parents at dinner parties or negotiation efforts. “Yes, of course. I mean, I am.” He glanced slyly at Harry, and then added, “I’m honored you know my name, sir.”
            Sir? Severus narrowed his eyes. Of course he knew what the giving of the allegiance ring meant and why it had happened, but he was surprised at the respect that flowed so freely from Selwyn.
            Other than the way Harry reached down to touch the basilisk’s neck in the way that always meant he wanted reassurance, there was nothing to show how rattled he was. “Yes. Well, I wanted you to know that I’ve decided to—” A brief hesitation. The basilisk would be feeding him the right words, Severus thought. “Acknowledge and honor your family’s allegiance. Keep faith with me, and I’ll keep faith with you.”
            Severus raised his eyebrows. Those were not the words of the most ancient of allegiance vows, but they were close enough to it that he doubted they were coincidence. Yes, the basilisk would have learned them. Or perhaps Harry had got them from Draco.
            Selwyn looked ready to die of the honor. “Of course, sir,” he burbled, and held out his hand to tap his fist against Harry’s. “An honor to serve you, sir.” He hesitated, then added, “What should I tell my parents?”
            “That I’d like to meet them.”
            Severus sat back, thrown. He had thought Harry would come up with some appropriate words about waiting for now. This was an unusually proactive step.
            “Yes, sir,” and Selwyn looked almost ready to float off the floor. “When would you like to meet them?”
            Harry pretended to ponder. Only because he had been so close to him during the summer, however, could Severus tell that it was pretending. Harry was standing a little stiffer than he did when he was simply thinking, and his hand kept up that self-comforting stroking of the basilisk’s scales.
            “One must not be hasty,” Harry said, and it had probably been the basilisk’s advice that he use the pronoun One as well. “Perhaps in a week? That gives me some time to see who else will declare allegiance, and perhaps like to come to the meeting as well. And it should be at Sirius Black’s house in Hogsmeade.”
            Severus frowned, baffled. Why would Harry wish to meet there, in front of Black, who would probably go mad when he found out that several Slytherin families thought Harry was Salazar Slytherin reincarnated?
            “Yes, sir! Thank you, sir! I’ll owl them right away!” And Selwyn actually leaped up from the table and ran through the arched doorway of the Great Hall, at least in the direction of the Owlery.
            Harry was frowning or smiling at Draco—one of the two—and rubbing the back of his neck as if it hurt him. That soothed some of Severus’s fears, a little. He had thought Harry might grow as arrogant as his father if he took the treatment of those Slytherin families to heart. Not that Severus thought Harry naturally arrogant any longer, but it was hard to resist the entreaties of those who seemed ready to worship you.
            But no, Harry was still himself, uneasy with attention and almost unreasonably modest. He would be able to put up with the attention if he was working towards a larger goal, the way he had when revealing the truth about his abusive relatives. But he wouldn’t do something that was merely meant as a way to gain adoration for himself.
            Severus still wished Harry had come to him before he made this appointment with the Selwyns, however. He might or might not know how to behave around them.
            Harry looked up and caught his eye. Severus nodded once. He would like to speak with Harry, and soon. Luckily, from the nod Harry gave him back, he knew that, and he was able to go over and eat his breakfast without fuss.
            “Planning something with Harry, Severus?”
            Severus turned to Albus. Albus hadn’t spoken to him all summer about the extra lessons he was giving Harry, although Severus was sure he knew about the ones in wandless magic. Severus and Harry had more than once mentioned that before portraits. It was only Occlumency that it might be dangerous for the Headmaster to know about.
            “Yes,” said Severus. “I want to let him know that some people are more dangerous than they appear.”
            “Ah.” Albus’s glance traced the path that Jackson Selwyn had taken out of the Great Hall, and he gave Severus a smile of cordial approval. “I think you are very wise to want Harry to know about his future enemies, Severus.”
            He thinks that Harry is converting me to the Gryffindor side, Severus decided, in carefully hidden amazement. Albus was capable of changing the direction of his plans based on a single unexpected expression on someone’s face. Severus had seen evidence of that before. Or at least to the side that thinks of Slytherins as evil.
            Severus could use this, which was the reason he allowed himself no more than a thin smile before he turned to his own breakfast. And then he was allowed no more than a few bites of his poached eggs before a hand nearly slapped down in the middle of his plate.
            Unluckily for the source of the disturbance, Severus still had instincts honed by years of conflict with the Marauders and then handling himself among Death Eaters. He had his wand out in less than a second, and had cast a spell that restrained the hand in midair, on a flexible, invisible shield. That spell, created in his fifth year, was one of the few reasons that he had achieved an Outstanding in Potions. Otherwise, James Potter and his friends would have ruined more than one draught.
            “You were saying?” Severus murmured, turning his head and giving Moody a dazzling scowl.
            Moody settled back and stared at him. Severus endured the gaze of that magical eye, though not easily. It was productive of unease, and Moody was a formidable Auror, one of the few who had interrogated Severus during the brief time he’d spent in Ministry custody after the war. But Severus knew the touch of another Legilimens too well to fear that Moody could actually see his thoughts.
            “I was saying,” Moody finally grunted, “that you seem to be far too interested in Harry Potter for one of your…persuasion.” His eyes flickered to Severus’s left arm.
            Once a suspicious bastard, always a suspicious bastard, Severus thought, but he inclined his head. “You will know that I intend him no harm by watching my behavior,” he said, and took a final bite of his eggs before he stood up.
            Moody rose too, squinting his real eye at him. “You’ll be telling him the truth about your past?”
            “I already have,” Severus said. It was the first time he had ever thought of revealing that awkward conversation with Harry to anyone else, but worth it for the way that both of Moody’s eyes widened. “And he still comes to my class and trusts me to treat him fairly.”
            “Fairly.” Moody almost barked, and actually managed to draw Sybil’s attention away from her morning glass of sherry. Severus glared at her, and she returned to it fast enough. “Heard all about the way you base your treatment of the boy on his father. A fine man, James Potter. Good fighter. You don’t care about the boy compared to the father.”
            “I am certain that his father felt more affection for him, yes,” Severus said. “I understand that is in the nature of fathers.”
            Not that I would know. But Severus had kept Tobias Snape a secret too long to reveal his existence now, even in the face of provocation. He received provocation more extreme from Albus and Minerva on a regular basis.
            “You’re a deep one, Snape.” Moody moved up towards Severus, until Severus could smell a complex of ingredients on his breath. Severus frowned a little. There were several strange ones there, rare ones. Rosehips, which were not usual in most liquors or meads, and—
            “But I’m watching you. Wanted to let you know.” Moody jabbed Severus in the chest with one finger, gave him a nasty chuckle that he seemed to assume would frighten him, and walked away.
            Severus watched him go, then turned back and gave a look of indifference at Albus, who was also watching him. “And it is necessary that he teach here, Albus?”
            “He has Auror experience, which will prove invaluable when he teaches these youngsters to face up to curses,” said Albus, and beamed at him. “And he is absolutely loyal to our cause.”
            Severus knew what that meant. The cause of the Order of the Phoenix, rather than the Ministry. Not that Albus was about to name the Order in front of most of the professors.
            “Very well,” said Severus, and audibly sniffed and moved away in the direction of his classroom. He could hope that he would find Harry lingering along the way, and could give him his opinion of a too-hasty meeting with Selwyn.
            But he did not, and in fact, Harry nearly came in late to Potions. He panted into his seat a moment before Severus would have shut the classroom door on principle. Severus raised his eyebrows. Harry ducked his head and muttered something that sounded like a, “Sorry, sir.”
            Severus then hoped he would be able to catch the boy after classes, but Harry scooted out the door the instant he gave Severus his vial. He had done nothing horrible during the class, though nothing remarkable, either, apparently making his potion his reason for existence.
            Severus sighed. He hated to resort to owls or giving Harry detention, but he would do it rather than see Harry march into a meeting with the Selwyns unprepared. Harry needed some advice.
            That does not come from Black or Albus.
*
            Blaise blinked as an owl dipped towards him at the lunch table. His mother wrote to him once a week on Thursdays, and had never varied her habit in the last three years unless he wrote to her first. And post usually arrived at breakfast, anyway.
            Automatically casting the spell that would blur the letters of the words in the eyes of anyone trying to peer over his shoulder, Blaise slit the envelope.
            The writing inside was familiar. So familiar that Blaise almost tore up the letter before he remembered that no one else could read it, and so his secrets were safe. His breathing was still shallow as he did read, and he knew he was getting more than one curious glance.
            Brat,
            I was reading in the Prophet about that initiative to reveal the abuse among pure-bloods. The paper takes a distance to come, here. You’re not to say anything to anyone.
            Otherwise, I might have to take a little jaunt back to Britain.
            There was no signature. Of course, there didn’t have to be.
            Blaise shook his head and gave a slight, contemptuous smile, as if the letter held news not worth discussing, then ripped it up. He hid his shaking hands underneath the table.
            It had come. What Blaise was afraid might happen when he saw that reckless story of Potter’s in the papers, and more when he heard that Pansy had actually gone to Professor Snape and told stories about her father abusing her. The story had vanished into quietness after that, the way it should, but Blaise had still managed to hear that Pansy’s mother had taken Pansy and moved out of the house.
            Blaise had no such recourse. Couldn’t Potter have left things alone instead of stirring them up? The families handled such things in their own way.
            Or didn’t handle them.
            Blaise swallowed. Potter’s thinking had infected him. It was no wonder that the one other person in the world who held a portion of Blaise’s secret might think there was a chance of Blaise agreeing with Potter and deciding to expose him.
            Did he need to reply? After a moment, Blaise decided he did. There was too much chance that silence would be seen as defiance.
            Blaise slipped away from lunch, an easy task when everyone else was listening enthralled to Draco bragging about his flame cobra. Blaise snorted a little. Draco hadn’t brought the snake to the Great Hall yet, the way he kept promising. Blaise thought this was little more than posturing on Draco’s part.
            As he made for the Slytherin common room, Blaise’s thoughts were far away, and he didn’t notice the sound of light footsteps coming towards him until he slammed into the person making them. She gave a little “oof” and scrambled away from him, then stood up and bowed her head. “S-sorry,” she whispered.
            Blaise glanced at her casually. Pale hair, sallow skin, an upturned nose: she was a Paxton. There was a first-year in Slytherin with that name, so it made sense for her to be down here. “Watch where you’re going,” he said coolly, not seeing the need to take more from a first-year than an apology.
            “Y-yes, I will.” The first-year gave him a nervous little curtsey and turned away. She had a box in one hand that gleamed with the Paxton coat-of-arms on top of it, and Blaise was abruptly sure he knew what she was doing.
            “Wait.”
            Paxton stopped and glanced nervously back at him, and Blaise took a long step towards her. “Is that a family allegiance ring you’re giving to Potter?”
            Paxton clutched the box closer. Did she think he would try to steal the ring? Well, Blaise could make allowance for the absurdities of first-years.
            He wanted to take the information and not the ring, anyway.
            “Y-yes.” Paxton’s head went up a little, probably because she thought she had the honor of her family to fight for this time. “My mother says that Salazar Slytherin’s prestige can protect us against the war to come.”
            Blaise laughed harshly. He had thought that was the reason Selwyn had given Potter his family’s allegiance ring, but he hadn’t believed the delusion would spread to other families. Everyone knew the Selwyns had a bit of an inbreeding problem, like the Gaunts back in their day. “You’re a fool if you think that Harry Potter is Salazar Slytherin reincarnated.”
            “But he has a basilisk,” Paxton began earnestly.
            “That’s because he has a Parselmouth. Anyone who was could command one.” Blaise took another step towards her. “And, in fact, anyone could learn enough Parseltongue to control a snake. Did you know that Draco Malfoy has a flame cobra? He hasn’t learned enough Parseltongue to make it obey him all the time, but some of the time works. You could do the same thing. Anyone could. Harry Potter is not Slytherin.”
            Paxton opened her mouth, then closed it again. Her hold on the box grew tighter.
            “But then who’s going to protect us?” she whispered. “My mum says someone needs to protect us in the war.”
            She also wouldn’t want you telling me that. But fuck if Blaise was going to reveal a secret so beneficial. He drew himself up. “My mother could.”
            Paxton blinked at him. Blaise thought he would need to give an explanation of who his mother was, but then she gasped and said, “You’re Blaise Zabini.”
            “Yes, I am,” said Blaise, and gave her a cold smile. “And you can think about what she’s done, including that duel with Scrimgeour a few years back.”
            Paxton stood there, trembling. Blaise added, as if generously, because he didn’t think he could prod her to go against her family’s decision right now, “Look, just hang onto the allegiance ring for a while, all right? Owl your mother back and ask her what she thinks you should do. Tell her what I told you about Parselmouths. Just try to make sure that you’re giving your allegiance to someone who can really protect you, not a fake.”
            The reasons Paxton must have been placed in Slytherin came to the fore then. She nodded, her face tightening in suspicion. “Yes, I have to ask.” And she turned back to the common room.
            Blaise closed his eyes in relief. That was one family who might never give their allegiance ring to Harry Potter, then.
            And the less powerful Harry Potter was, the better it could be for Blaise.
            Which didn’t get rid of the letter he still had to write. But every wave Blaise could prevent Potter from making was one more that wouldn’t splash on him.
*
ChaosLady: Thank you!
starr: Most of those answers will need to wait. And I don’t think many of the major characters like Dumbledore.
moodysavage: Thanks! Let’s hope this works out for Harry…
SP777: That might work. And his name is Conflagration no matter how silly it is. ;)
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A Brother to Basilisks