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Soldier's Welcome	By : Lomonaaeren Category: Harry Potter > Slash - Male/Male > Harry/Draco Views: 25565 -:- Recommendations : 1 -:- Currently Reading : 1
Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter; that belongs to J. K. Rowling. I am making no money from this fic.

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Chapter
Thirty-Nine�When Wielding Power

�� Harry
Potter?�

�� Harry would
have wanted to do something for the owner of that voice even if he hadn�t known
who it was. It was small and quiet, as though someone had shouted at the owner
until she was more inclined to shut up than say anything, even things that she
knew she should say.

�� Harry
remembered that feeling from the Dursleys�. He�d never been that afraid, but he
had learned to keep his thoughts to himself most of the time.

�� Yes,� he
said, leaning out of the room and ignoring Timmons and Redworth, who wore
identical sour looks of disapproval. �What�s your name?�

�� Joanna
Kepler.�

�� She floated
in a chair that looked as if it were made of cloth wrapped around wicker, with
her legs extended in front of her. Harry could smell both the strong perfume of
what he thought was a spell and the rotting stink that crept up from her legs
anyway. Joanna�s face was pale and tired, but she watched him with a greedy
gaze that wasn�t. She had dark hair streaked with grey and blue eyes. She held
out her hand.

�� Harry
stepped up to her and grasped it firmly. He was aware of Pollian Kepler
watching from behind her sister�s chair, arms folded, but he didn�t see why he
should have to pay that much attention to what she wanted. She intimidated him in Ketchum�s classroom, but they
weren�t there right now.

�� I wanted
to see you,� Joanna said, and her eyes were bright and her hand was so strong
and hot that Harry thought he�d get burns from it. �You were the cause and the cost of the war.�

�� Harry
winced. He�d had people put it like that to him in the past year, but usually
not so directly. However, he would have to get used to this. He�d probably have
to appear in front of people more than once if their project of using Harry�s
name to appeal to pure-blood families worked. He pasted a tight smile on his
face and nodded. �Yeah. I think Voldemort would have taken over Britain the
first time if I hadn�t stopped him, and then we would never have had a second
war.�

�� Joanna
blinked, as if she hadn�t expected him to defend himself that way. Then she
laughed. The laugh was as strong as her grip. She leaned towards Harry and
whispered, �I thought you�d be like this. Or I hoped it. There were so many
stories about how you brooded after the war. I didn�t want them to be true. I
wanted you to be strong and to know your own rights. It was unfair of me to
accuse you of causing the war. I�m sorry.�

�� Harry
blinked in turn. Then he found himself smiling without being sure when he�d
begun. Joanna was a little like Draco, then, in the way that she would push him
to respond with sharp words instead of wallowing in guilt. He found himself
liking her for the first time.

�� So many
people said your name like a talisman,� Joanna told him, still holding his hand
and looking at him as if she would never stop. �They thought it would protect
them. But a lot of them died anyway.�

�� Harry met
her eyes. �That was Voldemort�s fault, and the Death Eaters� fault,� he said
firmly. �Not mine.�

�� A delighted
spark worked its way into her face this time. �Good,� she said. �I�m glad. I
wondered whether anyone would survive the war, sometimes, though I told myself
not to be stupid; I knew someone would. But it�s different being in the midst
of war and thinking that, and being�existing
after the war.�

�� Harry
nodded. Joanna shifted back in her chair and gestured to her legs. �There�s no
answer to this,� she said. �There was no reason. I didn�t do anything to
deserve it.�

�� Harry
stared at her. Did she used to think she
did? �Of course you didn�t,� he said.

�� Just keep
that in mind,� Joanna said, �The world isn�t fair. There is no ultimate
justice. The good people don�t always win.�

�� But they
win sometimes,� Harry said. �I wouldn�t be trying to become an Auror if I
didn�t believe that.�

�� That still
doesn�t make the world fair.� Joanna pulled her hand away from his and folded
her arms, as if daring him to respond.

�� Her sister
was giving him a long, heavy look from behind her head, but Harry didn�t intend
to let that stop him. She was still wrong. �No one said it did,� he muttered.
�But I can try to make the world a bit fairer, as long as I�m here.�

�� How do you
know you�ll succeed?� Joanna gave a short, sharp, bitter laugh, and slapped one
of her legs. Harry winced when he heard the sound that came when she did, like
someone slapping a wet rag into a wall. �Can you come up with an answer for
crimes like this? Why should I care if the one who did this to me is arrested now? What good does it do me? It doesn�t
bring back my ability to walk again.�

�� Harry
frowned at her. He had the feeling she was much more intelligent than he was
and he was missing the subtleties of all her arguments, but the only thing he
could do was respond to what he understood. �But is that the only kind of good
someone could do you?� he asked. �Some people would be happy to know that the
person who hurt them was never going to get out of Azkaban. Other people want
revenge. And other people want the chance to confront the person who hurt
them.�

�� Joanna fell
silent again. A strong emotion that Harry couldn�t read twisted her mouth. She
stared down at her lap for a minute, and then shook her head.

�� You�re not
what I expected,� she said.

�� Why? Because
I�m not a hero? Or the cause of the war?� I�m
probably saying the wrong thing again, Harry thought, but this is all I can think of to say.

�� All those
things,� Joanna said. �Though I think you only give small meanings to the word
hero, if you think that it can�t mean you.� She turned her head and nodded to
Pollian Kepler. �I�m tired, and I�ve seen all that I care to see. I think I can
die in peace, now. Remove me, please.�

�� Kepler
inclined her head, her eyes blinking quickly. Harry tried to make her look at
him by stepping closer, but all she did was turn and start her sister�s
floating chair-bed down the corridor the right way. Harry thought she would
have followed Joanna, but Draco cleared his throat from behind Harry.

�� There was
a small matter of what you promised if Harry spoke to your sister, Kepler,� he
said.

�� Harry
started and glanced over his shoulder. He�d forgotten Draco was there in the
intricacy of trying to deal with Joanna. Draco stepped up now so that his
shoulder bumped into Harry�s and gave him a single intense glance, as if to say
that he knew he�d been forgotten and resented it.

�� Kepler
turned back slowly. �Yes,� she said. �The healing potion.�

�� Harry
opened his mouth to protest that it should have been Veritaserum, but Draco
stepped on his foot and looked pointedly sideways at their bodyguards. Harry
smiled weakly. �Yes,� he said. �My joints are still paining me.�

�� Draco
stepped on his foot again, probably in a warning about trying to make the lie
too elaborate, and extended his hand. �We�d like it now,� he said.

�� Kepler took
a glass vial out of her pocket and handed it to them. Harry tensed for a
minute, wondering what Timmons and Redworth would say if they saw that the
potion was clear, like Veritaserum, and then realized that the glass of the
vial was tinted green. He sighed and hoped it would sound like relief instead
of�well, relief.

�� These lies are too complicated for me, he
thought, as he tucked the potion into his robe pocket. Draco nodded at Kepler
before pulling him into their rooms again. Harry craned his neck so that he
could watch Kepler and Joanna leave, but neither of them turned back.

�� Then the
door shut, and Draco stood in front of it with his arms splayed out as if he
was going to defend it from enemies. Harry arched his eyebrows. Draco dropped
his arms and shook his head, evidently a bit embarrassed now.

�� You
weren�t paying attention to me at all,� Draco said, softly but piercingly, as
he lifted his eyes back to Harry�s. �I don�t like it when you don�t pay
attention to me.� Politesse hurried across the floor to meet him, and Draco
scooped him up, but all Harry�s hopes that he might be distracted were in vain.
Draco kept staring at him, and the largeness of his eyes and the depth in his
voice seemed to demand an answer.

*

�� Draco had just
seen Harry playing the hero from much closer than he had when he saw Harry
defeating the Dark Lord, and he�d been able to think about it from more of an
emotional distance. Yes, Harry had been heroic when he snatched Draco from the
fires in the Room of Hidden Things, too, but Draco had been rather occupied
with trying to survive then, instead
of thinking about the nature of heroism.

�� Harry
cocked his head now and raised his eyebrows as if he couldn�t understand what
was the matter with Draco. His eyes looked ordinary, instead of shining with a
deep and intense light they way they had when he listened to Joanna Kepler. His
face was curious instead of calm and stern.

�� Does he even know that he looked so powerful?

�� Probably
not, Draco decided after a moment�s consideration. Harry seemed to think he was
ordinary most of the time.

�� But he
wasn�t, and he had forgotten about Draco entirely in his focus on the woman.
Draco could understand such things, but he still needed reassurance. Until this
moment, he had thought Harry could never step so completely away from his body
and leave Draco behind. He had resisted the entreaties of his best friends. He
had talked to other people, but he always seemed to know where Draco was and turn
towards him the moment he moved.

�� This time,
Draco had moved away from the door into the corridor, and the bodyguards had
reacted, but not Harry. He was seeing, thinking of, focusing on, Joanna.

�� I know
that,� Harry said, and Draco had to struggle to remember that he�d said that he
didn�t like Harry not paying attention to him. �But it was only for a few
minutes. And she needed it.�

�� Needed
what?� Draco snapped. �You didn�t give her anything.�

�� Harry gave
him a startled look. �You�re not stupid,� he said, after a moment�s
consideration.

�� Thanks
ever so much,� Draco said. Politesse picked up his mood and started to stalk
down his arm, rattling his scorpion tail at Harry. Draco put a hand on his back
to halt the movement.

�� I gave her
reassurance,� Harry said. �She seems to think that she can die in peace now.
And that�s enough.�

�� He had a
peaceful expression as he uttered the words. Draco drew in his breath through
his teeth.

�� He understood, now, something that he
hadn�t before. If Harry hated being a hero so much, why did he go on doing it?
Why not turn his back on the world and hide away? It wasn�t as though someone
had forced him into becoming an Auror. The world was wide and full of
opportunities for the Chosen One.

�� But Draco
knew the answer now. Some part of Harry needed the ability to give other people
gifts, to protect them from all the dangers that he thought he could face but
they couldn�t. He wouldn�t ever be able to turn his back on the suffering and
vanish into his privacy as Draco had thought he could.

�� And
that�that could be a problem.

�� If I
wanted the same kind of reassurance,� Draco said, grateful that his voice was
calm and steady and that Politesse had retreated to his shoulder, �would you
give it to me?�

�� Harry
smiled. �Of course, Draco. Anything that I can
give you, I will.�

�� It�s the qualification that worries me. Draco
licked his lips. �And what if I think I need something that you might not be
able to give me?�

�� Harry
tipped his head to the side. �What are you thinking of?�

�� I need
your attention all the time,� Draco said, deciding that he might as well be
honest. He didn�t think Harry understood how much that aspect of their
relationship was important to him. Of course, they�d barely talked at all about
many of the things that Draco wanted to talk about, thanks to Nihil. �I want�I
want you to be mine. I hate the thought that you�ve already had a lover. I get
jealous when you spend too much time thinking of or talking to other people.
You�re mine.�

�� The silence
that followed was full of Harry�s blinking and Draco�s wondering if saying that
had been such a good idea after all. Then Harry blew out a deep breath, blinked
again, so hard that Draco thought his eye muscles must be getting a lot of
exercise, and frowned.

�� I�Draco,
that�s flattering in one way,� he said carefully. �But you must realize that I
can�t think of you all the time.
There will be times that my mind is full of homework, or Ron or Hermione, or
even Ginny, when she sends me a letter.� He rolled his eyes, and Draco knew he
was thinking of the one he had received yesterday. He had Vanished it before it
could begin to speak, the way he had been certain it would.

�� I want you
to pay me as much attention as you can,� Draco said, more quietly. He was
regretting saying as much now, no matter how true it was. He stroked
Politesse�s back and stared at the floor. �I need that. I want to be the most important person in the world to
you.�

�� Silence
from Harry.

�� I was afraid of that, Draco thought. He gives so freely of himself to other
people that the thought of keeping himself for just one person, someone who has
the right to demand more of him than others do, is alien to him.

�� He felt
fingertips beneath his chin, and Harry tilted his head up. He still spoke
slowly, as though he had heard Draco�s words for the first time in a foreign
language and wanted to show his struggle to understand.

�� I don�t
want any other lover. You�ll occupy an important and special position in my
life. But I don�t know if you�ll always be the most important to me. I wouldn�t be more important to you than your
mother, would I?�

�� Draco bit
his lip and shook his head. Harry relaxed. �Then you know that it�s a silly
thing to demand,� he said, sounding like someone who was convinced that he had
the force of logic on his side. �Why would you want to demand something like that? It�s impossible, and you would
probably dislike me if I did it�think I was petty and obsessive and clinging.
I�d feel unnatural, too.� He gave his shoulders an exaggerated shake. �Let�s
forget about it for right now and discuss what we�re going to do with the
Veritaserum.�

�� And Draco,
whether he liked it or not, had to nod, and give in, and listen to Harry
talking about a good time to interview Granger and Weasley.

�� Yet that
didn�t answer his dissatisfaction, which kept brewing in him no matter how hard
he tried to make it be still.

�� I have to have some sign that he belongs to
me. That isn�t wrong or obsessive or unnatural. It�s just the way it is.

*

�� Are you Nihil?�

�� No.�

�� Harry
winced. It had been bad enough to listen to the instructors and Draco giving
their answers under Veritaserum, but it was worse to hear Ron�s voice drained
of life and excitement. He stared into the distance over Draco�s head. Draco had
insisted on being the one who did the questioning, but Harry was sitting at the
same table to make sure that he didn�t say anything too sharp. Hermione leaned
forwards beside them, quivering sometimes with eagerness and impatience and
giving Draco suspicious looks.

�� Harry
turned away from her just in time to catch the edge of a smirk on Draco�s face
as he opened his mouth.

�� No!� he
said.

�� Draco
glanced sideways at him. �You don�t know what I was going to say.�

�� I know
that look,� Harry said firmly. �No.�

�� Draco stuck
out his lip. Harry rolled his eyes and tried to ignore the incredulous look
from Hermione. Yes, he was a bit uncomfortable teasing Draco in front of his
friends, but they would have to get used to it sooner or later. Harry wasn�t about
to give either of them up. They would learn to work together.

�� Or else.

�� Spoilsport,�
Draco said, in a mild tone, and turned back to Ron. �Have you ever been
approached by someone you suspected was connected to Nihil?�

�� No.�

�� Have you
had suspicions about any of the other trainees or the instructors?�

�� Sometimes
I think that bastard Dearborn is up to something,� Ron said, which made Draco�s
face tighten briefly with anger. Harry put a hand on his arm. He could feel
Hermione glancing at him again. He didn�t care.

�� Or else.

�� But you
have no concrete suspicions?� Draco pressed.

�� No.�

�� Draco sat
back, satisfied, and Harry asked a few more questions, though by now he
expected the constant denials he got. Neither Hermione nor Ron was working with
Nihil, at least consciously. Harry hadn�t expected them to be, and yet the
relaxation in his chest, from tense muscles, made him feel the way he had when
he knew he�d finally passed his NEWTs.

�� I reckon I�ve got too untrusting, he
thought with a frown, as Hermione cast the charm that should flush the
Veritaserum from Ron�s blood and bring him back to normal. I haven�t relied on anyone but Draco for months. When I was fighting
with Ron, that was understandable�no, it wasn�t, because it meant that I�d abandoned
Hermione. If I want them to get along, I have to make a better effort myself to
tie them together and associate with all of them, instead of expecting Ron and
Hermione to accept it when I want to retreat into privacy with Draco and not
say anything when I come back to them.

�� And then
there was Draco, who leaned to the side so that he could feel Harry�s shoulder
against his even though he was keeping his gaze fixed alertly on Ron and
Hermione, and probably thinking about them. Harry knew he needed friends. He�d
been talking the most to Catherine Arrowshot, and then she�d vanished. That had
probably stung Draco and made him doubt his own judgment, but it didn�t change
things.

�� He needs other people so that he won�t think
he needs me so much.

�� Harry shivered,
causing Draco to glance over at him curiously. He shook his head and smiled.
Draco sneered at Ron the next moment, but shifted closer to the edge of his
seat again.

�� Harry
didn�t like the idea that Draco wanted to be the most important person in the
world to him. First of all, he couldn�t do that for anybody. Second, he�d
already failed at something like that with Ginny.

�� Third,
Draco should want more than that.

�� I�m going to get him friends, if I can, Harry
thought, and just like that, he had the beginnings of a plan.

�� He turned
back to the conversation as Hermione said peremptorily, �So now that we�ve
established none of us is Nihil, what are we going to do about those Death
Eater caches? Have you shown the instructors the map yet?�

�� Of course
not,� Draco said.

�� But why not?� Hermione demanded. Ron was
rubbing his jaw and glaring at Draco as if he�d like to say something, too, but
wasn�t quite sure the Veritaserum was gone. �You know from their bracelets and
the Veritaserum that none of them serve Nihil.�

�� The
information is mine,� Draco said. He leaned towards Hermione, his arms folded
and his eyes so dark and intent that Harry experienced the brief desire to
protect Hermione from him. �Professor Snape gave it to me. And I still don�t trust all the instructors. Nihil, when we saw
him in that duel with Ketchum, implied that he knew him. There�s a transfer of
information going on. That we can�t find it doesn�t mean it doesn�t exist.�

�� Then tell
Ketchum,� was Hermione�s instant response. �After all, you saw him fighting
Nihil. You know he can�t be Nihil.�

�� That
doesn�t keep him from being Nemo or Nusquam,� Draco pointed out.

�� Paranoid
little Death Eater, aren�t you?� Ron muttered.

�� Draco
stiffened. Harry said, �Ron, that�s not helpful,� at the exact same moment
Hermione did.

�� He
exchanged a glance with her and saw her lips quiver into a reluctant smile. He
patted her shoulder and turned back to Ron. �Draco�s right, and it�s his information,� he said, feeling Draco
lean into him with smug contentment. �So we have to find a way to use it, but
not to spread it around.�

�� Ron
grinned. �That sounds better. Why
don�t we visit one of these caches, the nearest one, and see what we can learn?
There�s a holiday coming up next week.� Harry nodded; he knew that most of the
Ministry would be gone, apparently because some long-ago Minister had decided
that people started looking as if they wanted to explode if they weren�t given
a day off at the beginning of March. �We can see what happened to it, if it�s
full or raided, and we can see if we find anything that we should tell the
instructors about.�

�� For once,
Weasley,� Draco said, speaking the words with obvious reluctance, �you�re saying
something like sense.�

�� Ron beamed
a moment, then seemed to remember who was talking. He looked haughtily
displeased in the next instant. Harry glanced sideways to see Hermione�s eyes
rolling, and was glad that she shared at least that much of his opinion with
him. Ron wasn�t inherently ridiculous,
just ridiculous when he ended up speaking with Draco.

�� I think we
should start with the cache on the outskirts of London,� Draco said, pulling
out his map. �I don�t know if it�s full or raided. I shouldn�t think it would
matter much, if this is only going to be a test to see what we can find out.�
He absently tapped his foot against Harry�s as he began to make notes on the
back of the map. Except Harry knew it wasn�t likely to be absent at all.

�� I know that Hermione knows about Battle
Brewing, Harry thought with determination. She must know some of the other trainees in there, trainees who like
Potions and who might be willing to become friends with Draco.

�� He needs other people than me to be happy.

�� And his happiness is�really important to me.

*

�� MewMew2:
Thank you! I�m glad you liked that detail.

�� hieisdragoness18:
Thanks! Draco may wish he wasn�t right about Harry, though.

�� SP777: Not
deliberately. I might have based them on Hogwarts teachers unconsciously, but
it wasn�t meant to be a one-to-one correspondence.

�� The title �The
Withdrawing� comes from the fact that Nihil has pulled back from the Ministry.

�� No, the
second story will cover the second year of Auror training, and there are three
years.

�� Mia: Thank
you!

�� Dragons
Breath: Thanks! Harry is getting more and more comfortable standing up for
Draco now, and is less uncomfortable with standing up for himself.

�� Koritan:
Thanks for reviewing!

�� Sarah:
Thank you! And yes, they were asked. I didn�t show all the questions.
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