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Nature of the Beast	By : Lomonaaeren Category: Harry Potter > Slash - Male/Male > Harry/Draco Views: 48977 -:- Recommendations : 3 -:- Currently Reading : 5
Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter. I am making no money from this story.

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Chapter Four—Settlement and Secrets
            “Did you settle things?” Ron asked, coming up to Harry the moment he and Malfoy stepped out of the anteroom. They were back once more in the Atrium, but the Aurors had cleared the reporters and other people who might have lingered to gossip and stare out. Harry was grateful for that. He had the impression that it would be hard enough not to snap at Malfoy as it was, and the presence of people Malfoy had obviously wanted to impress—since he had decided to show up and “claim” Harry in public—would have made it infinitely hard.
            “We’ve agreed that I’ll live in Malfoy Manor and try not to insult him,” said Harry. He glanced sideways at Malfoy. He had finally let go of Harry’s hand with his wing, but in exchange for keeping the edge of the wing on Harry’s shoulder instead. Right now, he appeared to be staring off into the distance, ignoring Ron and Hermione, who had crowded up on Harry’s other side. “And that I won’t put myself in unnecessary danger.”
            Ron whistled softly. “That’s a lot for a Veela to agree to.”
            “Do submissive mates get any say in these situations?” Harry asked. Ron—and Malfoy—kept talking about what Veela wanted and didn’t want and were used to, and so far it seemed incredible to Harry that no submissive mate ever rebelled or ran away. Their lives must suck.
            “Usually, this is what they want.” Ron sounded a little apologetic, at least, even as he shook his head. “To be taken care of and be the heart of the house.”
            “That’s a phrase I’m going to look up,” said Hermione, making a little note on a scroll of parchment she was carrying with her. Harry craned his neck, not surprised to see that the word “Veela” already showed up several times. “Other people keep saying it, as though everyone is supposed to know what it means, but I don’t.”
            “That’s because you—”
            “Anything you can say about her also applies to me,” Harry muttered to him, cutting Malfoy off. “I’m Muggle-raised, and I might as well have been Muggleborn when I came into the wizarding world.”
            Malfoy gazed helplessly at him for a moment, and then looked away. Again Harry’s stomach churned with pity. Maybe some people loved being looked at like that, maybe some people loved doing the looking, but Harry didn’t think that was the case for Malfoy this time, any more than it was for him.
            “Fine,” said Malfoy, after a moment. “My mother—my mother deserves to know what happened and that things didn’t fall out as I expected. And if you come home with me, then you can start moving in.”
            “If it doesn’t take more than two hours,” said Harry, and cast a Tempus Charm just to make sure, even though he had the schedule drilled into his head every morning by obsessive reading. “I have a meeting in two hours.”
            “A meeting?”
            Maybe that word means something different in Veela. “Yes,” said Harry, evenly. “With some Muggleborn wizards who left our world and went back to Muggle society when they completed their education at Hogwarts. Partially because of Voldemort.” Malfoy tensed at the mention of the name, but didn’t flinch. Interesting. “I convinced them to set up this meeting and talk with me. Maybe I can persuade them to move back and lead some of their lives here.”
            “Why would you want them to come back?”
            “That, right there,” Harry told him, “shows that you don’t understand what I’m trying to accomplish here.” He turned to Kingsley, who had waited off to the side. Harry felt a little bad at making the Minister wait like that, but he’d done the same thing with Fudge and Scrimgeour. He supposed that he should continue the tradition even with the one Minister that he liked. “What do you think the effect on the public of this mating bond is likely to be, sir?”
            Kingsley squinted at Malfoy and then shook his head, a little sadly. Harry had to grin. Kingsley was a good actor and could play up any kind of emotion that would benefit the situation, no matter what it was.
            “I think that the pure-blood crowd might like it, a bit,” Kingsley finally replied, turning back to him. “Not as much as they’d like it if you were the submissive in truth.”
            Harry firmly squashed the question in his eyes. “They’ve agreed to talk to me even though I have a Muggleborn mother. They’ll agree to talk to me even when I have a non-submissive Veela bond.”
            “Who have you been talking to?” Malfoy stared at him. “And why didn’t they convince you of the right way to act when you have a dominant mate?”
            “The Greengrasses are probably the only ones you know,” said Harry, but continued on to answer the question in his eyes when he wouldn’t stop staring. “The Hellions, the Raysons, the Kleins.”
            Malfoy opened his mouth and then closed it again, looking disturbed. “None of those are pure-blood families in bad standing,” he said slowly. “But they’re not the kind of people who have much power or influence.”
            “Right now, the ones who have a lot of power and influence don’t want to talk to me,” said Harry dryly. “I’m hoping that will change.”
            “A Veela mate might change it.” Malfoy leaned along the length of his wing against Harry’s shoulder. “Someone who acts properly in public and can convince others that he’s a real Veela mate, at least.”
            “Good, that should be no problem for you,” said Harry, and took up his wand while Malfoy was still silently spluttering. “Shall I go to my flat and get my things, and meet you at the Manor?”
            “Of course not.” Malfoy sounded a little ill. “I’m going with you.”
            Harry nodded, resigned. He really should have guessed that from Malfoy’s failure to let go of his shoulder even though they were in public now. “Come on, then,” he said, and extended his arm for the Side-Along Apparition.
*
            It hurt Draco’s soul to see the place Potter had been living.
            It was one of the flats in Hogsmeade that you could rent if you knew where to look for them, at the top of a building with a shop on the ground floor and the shopkeeper’s quarters on the first floor. In this case, the shop was Zonko’s, and Draco had assumed when going in that he would find Potter’s rooms piled with gifts of toys and pranks from the shop.
            But instead, he found a mostly bare place, with a roof that slanted like an attic’s and a window that looked out on other buildings’ walls instead of over the prospect of Hogsmeade, as small as that prospect was in itself. Potter did have a few photographs on the mantel, and a single display of what looked like a prank—but not from Zonko’s—in the form of an open box with some smoking and vibrating little toys near the door. Draco stared at them. They were probably Weasley’s Wizard Wheezes, he decided a moment later.
            He didn’t have long to examine them, though, because Potter was striding around the room packing his clothes and his pillows and a whole box of personal items that he apparently kept under his bed, and Draco had to move constantly to remain in contact with him. He finally snapped, “Can’t you just stand in one place and use the Packing Charm or the Summoning Charm, Potter?”
            Potter stopped with a breathless little sound and closed his eyes, shaking his head. “Of course. I’m sorry, Malfoy. I’m—a bit rattled.”
            Draco wanted to say that reasonable people would wait past the appointed meeting hour if they knew what was good for them, but Potter aimed his wand at several corners of the room and incanted several Summoning Charms. More books and pieces of parchment than Draco would have thought were there came flying out from under loose floorboards and the mattress and the stones on the fireplace.
            “Are you paranoid or something, Potter?” Draco finally asked, as he watched contents that wouldn’t have disgraced his own library at home shrink and settle into Potter’s single small and battered trunk. Potter heaved it up onto his other shoulder, the one Draco wasn’t touching. “And you could float that behind you, you know.”
            “That’s right, I could,” said Potter, and cast the spell that would make the trunk float, then started towards the door at a smart clip. It was just within the limitations of the pace Draco could keep up with if he wanted to keep his wing resting on Potter’s shoulder. He cursed softly and followed.
            “Are you paranoid?” he repeated, as they reached the bottom step of the staircase that led out onto the street.
            Potter gave a small shrug with his free shoulder. “Zonko let me rent the room when there were still Death Eaters after me. I owe it to him to take reasonable precautions.”
            And even unreasonable ones, Draco thought in irritation.
            “Hiding all your books and possession doesn’t seem reasonable to me,” he said, trotting to keep up with Potter as he started striding again. “And will you walk slower?”
            Potter slowed his pace at once. “Sorry,” he said, absently. “I’ll try to be better about that. I’m just not used to having someone walk touching me.”
            “You’ll try,” Draco said. “You realize that we’re not likely to get a second chance if you mess this one up?”
            Potter eyed him mildly over his shoulder. “I thought no one really knew what happened when a mate refused a Veela, because it had never happened before.”
            “I don’t think fainting and trying to claw my eyes out are positive symptoms.”
            Potter seemed to engage in much longer and deeper thinking about that than was at all justified, but when he gave a faint smile at Draco again, at least Draco knew that he hadn’t dismissed it out of hand.
            “Right,” he said. “Tell me when something’s hurting you, and I’ll do what I can to help you.”
            Draco thought of claiming that he hurt all the time with Potter’s rejection of him, and only a kiss or a more than casual touch could make it better, but Potter was already reaching out with one hand. “I think I remember what the gates of Malfoy Manor look like,” he said. “It’ll be all right if I Apparate us there?”
            “Please, Potter,” said Draco with a sneer, and moved in to wrap his arms and wings around Potter. He wanted to melt into the shiver of pure pleasure that enveloped him when he did that, but he doubted Potter would be sympathetic. “I’m the Veela here. I’ll do it.”
*
            He’s also the one who lives in Malfoy Manor.
            It was that consideration that kept Harry from protesting, not any desire to submit to Malfoy’s dominant Veela-hood, whatever he thought. It was also that consideration that kept him silent as they proceeded along the corridors of the Manor, and into a room covered with mirrors and loaded with white furniture, where a woman Harry had last seen being tried for her knowledge of Death Eater activities rose expectantly to her feet.
            Narcissa Malfoy wore white, like everything else in the room. She also wore a pinched and disapproving expression when her eyes fell on Harry’s bare chest, and she said, speaking to Malfoy alone, “He didn’t accept the medallion?”
            “He’s Muggle-raised,” Malfoy said, with directness that Harry could only commend him for. At least Malfoy had lowered his embracing wings enough that Harry could see over the top of them. “He doesn’t know the traditions, and he doesn’t feel the instinctive submissiveness.”
            Narcissa’s mouth fell a little open. Harry raised an eyebrow. He hadn’t thought anything could do that. She had taken even her trial and the punishment of her husband with a life’s sentence in Azkaban calmly.
            Well, all right, he had seen her close her eyes once. That was right before Malfoy himself was acquitted of most of the charges against him.
            “What?” Narcissa came up to him, and Harry really thought she might lay a hand on his forehead to check for fever or something. Luckily, she didn’t, but once again looked at Malfoy instead of him. “How can that be? The submissive instincts are natural. Inborn.”
            “Less inborn than many people think they are, at least with me,” said Harry, as politely as he could. He glanced at Malfoy, but his gaze was averted as if he was ashamed. Harry had to continue without him. “Malfoy and I are doing our best to compromise. I don’t want to get into danger that affects him, or insult him without knowing what I’m doing. But I can’t stay in the house all the time, either.”
            Narcissa put her hands to her cheeks as if trying to hold down a blush or a shout. “This is unexpected,” she whispered.
            Harry gave a little shrug in response. He supposed he should be embarrassed himself, but this time, unlike the times when he hadn’t studied a book Hermione got him, or he had forgotten about Sirius’s mirror, it wasn’t his fault. He hadn’t known about Veela or mates, and no one had ever seen fit to enlighten him. It didn’t happen often, Harry supposed, or they would have taught him something about it in Care of Magical Creatures if nowhere else. As it was, they would have to muddle through.
            Narcissa dropped her hands and stood looking into the distance as if considering something. Then she turned back to Harry. “Did you come here merely to meet me, or for some other reason?”
            “Malfoy and I agreed that I ought to live here.”
            “Then we need a room prepared for you,” said Narcissa, and looked over his shoulder to catch Malfoy’s eye. Harry started to turn around, but Malfoy pushed a wing into his shoulder and made him stand still. Harry grimaced, rolled his eyes, and did so. If they wanted to have a private discussion about elves or spells or the kind of rooms that he needed, so be it. He was sure that he would find enough hidden places to store his belongings, and that was all that really concerned him at the moment.
            The silent eye-conversation ended, and Narcissa turned back towards him with a calmer expression. “Would you prefer the east wing or the west wing?”
            Harry half-shrugged. “Which set of rooms is closer to Malfoy’s?”
            The wing on his shoulder trembled, and Malfoy leaned in until Harry could feel his breath on the lobe of his ear. “I didn’t know that you wanted to be close to me. That’s a very good sign.”
            Well, you might need me in the middle of the night, and I don’t fancy running all over a house this big. But Harry wasn’t about to say that. He knew that Malfoy would react better if he didn’t have insults or comments that implied they weren’t normal. “Good,” he said. “So. Which one?” He wasn’t going to cast another Tempus Charm until he had to, but he knew that the time for his meeting with Muggleborns was getting closer and closer, and he would have to leave fairly soon if he wanted to get there on time.
            “The east wing,” said Narcissa, and glided off in what Harry thought was probably the right direction. “Follow me, please.”
            Harry blinked a little at her back. He had thought she would get some house-elves to lead them, but as it was…
            Well. This is polite of her, at least.
            Harry settled into a long, swinging walk, aware of Malfoy coming along behind him with little flutters of his wings against the side of Harry’s neck. He was still breathing on Harry’s ear, too, and if Harry didn’t listen closely, the noises sounded distinctly like little sighs of passion.
            Harry closed his eyes in resignation. That was the part he hadn’t wanted to think about closely, the fact that he would have to sleep with Malfoy at some point.
            What the hell. It’s only sex.
            He hated to think about it like that, with one part of him, the part that had wanted to spend time hiding away after the war. The part of him that whimpered in the night and wanted Sirius back. The part of him that was afraid of all the threats that the Aurors had protected him from in the last few months.
            But everyone had a part like that, Harry thought. The trick was not to listen to it.
            And if he had to ignore it to get through sex with Malfoy, fine. He would do what he had to do.
*
dkrosich: Harry’s not going to do that at all. He’s much more focused on trying to establish peace.
delia cerrano: And probably seeing that no “in stone” declarations would hold for now, as well.
Kain: Harry is involved in parts of the peace process, but not the whole thing. He also doesn’t think that getting pure-bloods to pay Muggleborn reparations is the best idea right now, given that some of them were never involved in the war. Plus, what happens with someone who’s technically counted pure-blood and has lived all their lives in the wizarding world but had a Muggleborn grandparent who was mistreated? Do they have to pay reparations or not? What about half-bloods? Harry wants to address simpler issues right now, such as seeing what would get some Muggleborns who abandoned the wizarding world to return, and see people punished for the crimes they directly committed. These people need to live together in a small community, and just like driving away and pissing off Muggleborns is not the answer, demanding reparations from pure-bloods isn’t, either.
And Draco thinks that Harry should stay at home for the same reason that a lot of men, who do consider themselves feminists, think that women should be the ones to stay home with the children once they start having them. Because of a whole bunch of unexamined cultural attitudes that people don’t necessarily confront until they start mattering to their own lives.
SP777: Draco is sure, and Harry is sure that he doesn’t want to be dominant or submissive. Let’s put it that way.
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Nature of the Beast