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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 Forty-Two—In Centuries
            “I don’t understand why you didn’t come to me at once if you suspected something off about Moody.”
            Professor Snape’s voice was stiff, and he kept his back turned to Draco, his hands clasped behind him. Draco breathed slowly, calming himself down. At least they were in the hospital wing, where the professor had come to see Draco, and not in Snape’s office. It would be awful there.
            “I wanted to prove myself, Professor,” Draco finally said. He glanced once at the door a short distance from his bed, then decided that Snape would have shielded it if he was worried about Moody lurking around and learning they were talking about him. “I wanted to be a hero for Harry.”
            Professor Snape turned around and stared at him with a kind of steady astonishment that was worse than his surprise when Draco had tried to tackle Moody alone. Draco looked away with a dull flush making its way up his cheeks.
            “Why?” Snape whispered. “You thought that you had to risk your life as foolishly as he did?”
            Draco shook his head. “I thought Moody was under either a glamour or Polyjuice,” he said. “So I was going to pretend that Conflagration wouldn’t come back to me, and then that the spell I was planning to use to pull him back got mixed up with a revealing charm that’s supposed to cut through glamours and Polyjuice.”
            “You would have looked weak in that case,” Professor Snape said sharply. “As though you couldn’t control your snake and had forgotten a spell.”

            Draco shook his head. “No one would have paid attention to me if Professor Moody was exposed as a fake, though.”
            “Then that defeats your intended purpose.” Professor Snape drew himself up more and more, so that he looked like a pillar. Draco would have found him intimidating only a few hours ago, but he wanted to explain now.
            “I mean everyone would have forgotten about me for the moment because Moody was exposed,” Draco said. “But the people who really know me and knew what I had done would be appreciative.” He hesitated, because Professor Snape was opening his mouth and Draco just knew he was going to say that he wouldn’t have appreciated Draco’s sacrifice. “Mostly Harry.”
            “This is about him, then.” Snape took the chair by the bed, but it was still like a pillar sitting down in a chair, and Draco had to swallow.
            “Yes, professor.” Draco faced him down. This was the only time he would get to say this, probably. He had explained to Harry what he was trying to do with the spell and Conflagration, and Harry had found his hand and held onto it for a long time. But he couldn’t talk to Harry about his motivations. Harry was too committed to thinking of what he had with Dash as normal.
            To thinking of his whole life as normal, really, Draco thought, and continued. “Harry is special. He has powerful friends, or he could have them, and he still acts humble. He has a basilisk, and there’s nothing more special than that. He still offers to teach me Parseltongue and be my friend. I want to show him that—that I’ll protect him, and help him, and that I’m special in my own way.”
            Professor Snape considered him for a moment. Then he said, without a change of expression, “What is your father’s opinion on this?”
            “He sent me a cryptic letter that I had to figure out for myself,” Draco said. “But he was giving me discretion to act.”
            Snape paused, then gave a half-smile. “And considering what he can leverage against the Board of Governors in the cause of you being attacked and the attacker not being reprimanded for it, perhaps he wanted this to happen. Or something similar to it.”
            Draco’s cheeks burned. He hadn’t thought about that, and he didn’t know whether his father would have expected him to. He coughed and hoped that he didn’t look stupid as he added, “And Hermione Granger says that it’s wrong for professors to mistreat students, and she’s going to start a campaign to make sure it doesn’t happen anymore.”
            To his shock, that was what made Professor Snape look the most interested. He swung around on Draco and seemed about to say something, but a second later, he gave up and simply lifted a hand. There was movement outside the door of the hospital wing, Draco realized when he listened. Maybe Madam Pomfrey coming back.
            “I am grateful that you took no hurt, Mr. Malfoy,” said Snape, in the stiff voice that most people outside the Slytherins expected him to use, sort of bowing to him. When his mouth was down near Draco’s ear, he hissed, “And I will make sure that you are avenged if your father does not move within three months.”
            Draco didn’t have a chance to react before Snape was out of the hospital wing.
            And it might not be wise to react, anyway. Draco lay back against the pillow and nodded to himself. Yes, Snape was still a good Head of House. Draco had sometimes thought that Snape was getting too involved with Harry and might only value Draco because he was Harry’s friend.
            He should have known better. Professor Snape was capable of concentrating on more than one thing at a time. His father had told him always to remember that, if he was planning some mischief that might make Slytherin look bad if he was caught.
            Draco smiled thinly and closed his eyes. His head had been pounding, but it calmed now, helped by the way that Madam Pomfrey came bustling over to him with a flask of golden potion and a scolding tone in her voice she used to address everyone.
            For now, Draco didn’t want to think about his pain or his father or whether Professor Snape would have to avenge him. He wanted to think about the way Harry’s face had looked when Draco had told him what he was trying to do to the fake Professor Moody, and why.
            It had only been a moment of staring with wide eyes and flaming cheeks, and then Harry had reached out and put his hand on Draco’s wrist. Dash had curled tightly around his hand a second later.
            “You didn’t need to do that,” said Harry, and then frowned more sternly at him than ever and shook his head. “Dash doesn’t think you should have done it, either. You almost got eaten by Conflagration!”
            Draco smiled as the potion started affecting him, slipping further and further away from the world. Harry had said that. Dash had supported him, flicking his tongue out at Draco in a way that made it seem as if he was scolding him without words.
            But the way Harry had looked…
            Nothing could change that. Nothing could corrupt that, and Draco would carry it with him as a precious jewel always.
*

            Harry and Ron were waiting for her. Hermione knew that. But she also knew that it was only sporting to let the enemy know you were after him.
            And give him a chance to change his ways, if he would. Somehow, Hermione didn’t really think that would apply to Professor Moody. But she still had to do it.
            She marched straight up to Moody where he stood behind his desk. He looked at her with his magical eye, while his normal one seemed to focus on the papers he was sorting. But then he nodded and gave her a faint smile. “Miss Granger. Impressive performance today.”
            “Thank you, Professor Moody.” Hermione wanted to smile, because Moody’s compliments were rare, but she knew she couldn’t let herself get distracted. “There’s something bothering me, though.”
            “Of course.” Professor Moody nodded as though he had expected the question. “The morality behind knowing the Dark Arts? I did attempt to emphasize that we should understand them in a theoretical way only, not that we should practice them.”
            “I understand that, professor,” Hermione said. “What’s bothering me is your treatment of Draco Malfoy the other day in the Great Hall.”
            Moody stood further up and stared at her. Then he said, “I was given to understand that this—young man has bullied you on more than one occasion.”
            “He has, Professor,” said Hermione. Ron had said the same thing to her. But she had the answer. “That doesn’t make what you did to him right.”
            “I didn’t take revenge on him,” said Professor Moody. He seemed more confused than anything, which puzzled Hermione. But she shook that off. If he wasn’t agreeing that what he did was wrong, then he was still in the wrong.
            “But you hurt him,” said Hermione. “When he hadn’t done anything that hurt you.”
            “The sparks could have blinded my magical eye.”
            He sounded a lot more exasperated than he ever got during class. Hermione wondered how many people had ever dared to disagree with the renowned Auror Alastor Moody in the last few years, though, and pushed bravely ahead. “But they didn’t. And you could have killed him. Why did you turn him into a mouse, Professor?”
            Moody had both eyes firmly fixed on her now, as if by glaring, he would get her to go away. He hadn’t paid much attention during the last few weeks, Hermione thought. People glared at her in class when she knew too many answers or told them they were wrong, but she still didn’t go away.
            “He needs to learn not to attack professors,” Moody said.
            Hermione just looked at him, because she knew that wasn’t an answer. “With respect, Professor Moody,” she said, “almost killing him isn’t a way to teach him that lesson.”
            “Well, he won’t do it again, will he?”
            Hermione thought of the way that Malfoy had looked at Harry when he was in the hospital wing, and a few cryptic references he’d made that it was “all for Harry.” Harry had turned red when Malfoy was talking about that.
            “You don’t know that, though,” Hermione pointed out. “You don’t know unless you talk to him and find out what his motive was for the attack. Did you, professor?” She knew what Malfoy had said was his motive for the attack, but she was also nearly certain Professor Moody hadn’t gone and asked him.
            “My dear Miss Granger,” said Moody, and abruptly leaned over her with his magical eye glaring as though he thought she was cheating and trying to hide it, “you forget yourself. There is not equality between professors and students.”
            “No, but there should be respect,” Hermione began.
            “Exactly!” Moody stepped away and smiled at her. His smiles were strange, Hermione thought. Sometimes he seemed to mean them, and other times it was as if he had a cupboard full of masks that he only arranged on his face when he remembered to. She thought this was a mask-like smile. “And Mr. Malfoy wasn’t showing me respect by attacking me, was he? Perhaps after this time, he’ll remember to do so.”
            Hermione only ended up shaking her head again. “You weren’t showing him respect either, Professor Moody. But I think you should talk to him. Then maybe everyone could understand, and it could restore a calm equilibrium between professors and students.”
            Moody’s face twitched in irritation. “The matter is over, Miss Granger. I appreciate your concern for your fellow students, and for doing the right thing. But sometimes, you need to trust that the right thing is best left up to the proper authorities.”
            Hermione left the classroom without saying anything. Let him think he’d convinced her. Hermione still wanted to be as Gryffindor as she could in all things, because it was the best House, but subtlety was a weapon she would need in a contest like this, Malfoy had told her bluntly.
            And it wasn’t like she was going to hide or sneak around when she committed her next action to ensure that Moody treated the students with more respect. She simply wasn’t going to sit back and wait for him to stop being stupid.
*
            Harry blinked at the petition Hermione had slapped down in front of him. It had a long list of names and only a small sentence at the top that seemed to state what it was for.
            Harry read it, and nearly spat out his pumpkin juice all over the petition. But that would probably have made Hermione upset.
            A fair trade for plumping it down in the middle of dinner, said Dash, and raised his head. He already knew what the words had said, because they’d passed through Harry’s mind, and he nudged the platter of beef that Harry had been feeding him pointedly.
            I thought you didn’t like cooked meat, Harry said, even as he took another slice and fed it to Dash.
            I am expanding my tastes, Dash said, and took the meat in his tail as if he needed to study it before he swallowed it. The way that you’ve always wished I would, since you’ve lamented more than once that I was hard to feed.
            I never meant—
            “Harry? Are you going to sign it or not?”
            Hermione was hovering in front of him now, clutching the quill in her hand and giving him an expectant look. Harry nodded and took it, but he did say, “I’m not sure a petition to stop professors from Transfiguring people will have much effect. I mean, not if Dumbledore wants to keep Moody on.”
            “There are higher authorities than Professor Dumbledore,” said Hermione, looking mysterious, and swept away to bother the Hufflepuffs. Harry shook his head and turned back to his drink.
            You’re lucky to have her as your friend.
            I know that, Harry said irritably. And what happened to you being upset because she interrupted you in the middle of dinner?
            Dumbledore stood up and gently cleared his throat before Dash could respond to that. Harry thought it was probably because Dash didn’t have an answer, though. He’d never let someone speaking stop their silent conversations before.
            “The Tri-Wizard Tournament is fast approaching, as you know,” Dumbledore began. “The students from Durmstrang and Beauxbatons will be arriving tomorrow. They will each be housed in an appropriate student common room, with extra beds appearing as necessary. Currently, the plans involve accommodating the Durmstrang students with rooms in Slytherin, and the Beauxbatons students in Ravenclaw.”
            There were some grumblings from the Gryffindor and Hufflepuff tables, Harry thought. Personally, though, he was relieved. The last thing he wanted to do was watch over his shoulder all the time for more strangers.
            And maybe Voldemort would have tried to slip allies in among them, too.
            “I will remind you that these students are from other countries, and may be unfamiliar with the customs pertaining to Hogwarts.” Dumbledore held up a hand that Harry thought was supposed to be scolding. “If you want to make them welcome, don’t spend time teasing them or staring at them.”
            Harry blinked. Well, that’s more decent than I thought Dumbledore would be.
            Then he sighed a little. Just because Dumbledore was an arse to him didn’t mean that he couldn’t be nice to other people.
            You want to give your enemies too much credit, said Dash, and his tongue tickled Harry’s hand until he started feeding Dash meat again.
            “You planning to enter the Tournament, Harry?”
            Harry blinked and turned his head. Ron was leaning towards him, nodding. Harry glanced at the Head Table, but Dumbledore seemed to have finished his speech and sat down again.
            “Did he say something about who could enter?” Harry shook his head. “But I don’t want to. I’ll have enough to deal with this year.” Like Moody, if Draco’s right and he’s really not who he says he is.
            “He said it was restricted to seventh-years and above,” said Hermione, and sat down beside Ron with a little frown at him. “Which means that you can’t enter.”
            “I don’t want to,” Harry repeated, but Ron’s eyes were glowing.
            “I do,” he said. “Imagine it. Everyone looking up to you, and then all those Galleons.” He sighed longingly. “Then maybe I could buy myself a pair of dress robes that don’t look as though someone fished them out of a ditch.”
            Harry shrugged at Hermione when she began to scold, and fed another piece of meat to Dash. All he knew was that he didn’t want to, and no one was going to change his mind about that.
*
            Severus had thought they might have problems with the arrival of the other schools, and it was one reason he had listened to Albus when he asked the professors to be on guard, instead of rolling his eyes and attributing it to Albus’s extreme caution. But admittedly, he had not thought the problems would come from this direction.
            Currently, there was a shrieking file of part-Veela students standing in front of the school, refusing to look at Harry and almost on the verge of running. It was only the fact that Harry had Dash wrapped tightly around his body instead of slithering about that had kept things even this calm.
            Severus had come to accept the basilisk almost as part of Harry. If a giant venomous snake could seem ordinary, then Dash was. He didn’t attack people, other than perhaps Moody that first night he had entered the castle. He wasn’t inconspicuous, but neither did he try to call attention to himself.
            But to the students of a school that not only had no Dark Arts built into the teaching, as was the case at Durmstrang, but had a strong tradition of Veela blood, he was terrifying.
            Because Veela, in many ways, were birds. And Dash was still a snake.
            “You will remove the snake,” said Madame Maxime, her nose so far in the air that Severus could see how clean she kept her nostrils (extremely). Her accent had faded a little the minute she had stomped up to Albus to begin making demands. She turned now and looked at Harry, who had his hands full of Dash and his head turned as he argued with his friends. “My students, they are not accustomed to these…creatures.”
            “I’m afraid that’s not possible,” said, surprisingly, Karkaroff. He stood near Maxime, but kept his neck craned to the side so that he didn’t need to take his eyes off Harry. He looked at Maxime now, and his smile was faintly nasty. “Sorry for your girls and their ruffled feathers, Olympe, but the boy is bonded to the basilisk. And it goes deeper than a familiar bond. The bond of any snake to a Parselmouth does.”
            Severus made a silent note to check whether that was true. He knew it obtained with basilisks, but he had not heard that the same thing was true for ordinary serpents. If it was, then they would have to be more careful when Harry confronted the Dark Lord.
            And considering what Karkaroff had been, he might indeed have knowledge of the sort traditionally considered Dark that many others would not.
            “This is intolerable.” Maxime went on talking to Albus as though she hadn’t heard Durmstrang’s Headmaster. “How can you permit the boy to have it?”
            “I’m afraid there wasn’t much choice,” said Albus. His voice was still different than Severus was used to hearing it, although in this case it was hard to pinpoint the difference. Just—milder, perhaps. “Dash is bonded to young Mr. Potter. But I’ve placed mirrors about him that reflect the basilisk’s gaze, and diluted his poison.”
            He gestured to the mirrors hovering above Harry’s shoulders and whizzing around his head, mirrors that were such a part of Harry’s environment Severus looked past them all the time now. Dash lifted his head as if he wanted to examine them, as if Albus’s gesture had also recalled them to his existence. Severus narrowed his eyes.
            He was suddenly sure that Dash could escape the glare of the mirrors at any time he wanted, and that he had allowed them to orbit him only to make him seem harmless.
            But Severus didn’t know if his impression was true, and he certainly didn’t have time to pursue it right now. Madame Maxime was pointing an accusing finger at her Veela students. “What do you say to my students who cannot even enter the competition they came for, if this wild beast is not removed?”
            “He isn’t a wild beast.” Minerva, her back straight as she came to defend one of her lions. “He’s been obedient to Mr. Potter and hasn’t bitten anyone at the school since Mr. Potter hatched him. Your students will be fine, Olympe. Trust me.”
            Severus raised one eyebrow. Interesting choice of weasel words, Minerva. Dash had of course bitten someone outside the school, but Minerva had created a situation in which she would have some plausible deniability.
            She had also been the only one of the professors to openly accost Moody about the wrongness of what he had done to Draco. Severus decided that he would have to keep an eye on her. She might be a more useful ally than he’d realized.
            Maxime started to say something else, but just then, one of her students turned and approached Harry. Severus waited, one hand casually next to his side in a way that would only indicate he was ready to draw his wand to someone extremely expert in reading him. And since Albus had begun acting in his strange way, there was really no one like that here.
            The girl was tall and beautiful, even more than most of the students who had obvious Veela blood. Her silver hair swayed behind her as she gave a small bow to Harry. She was either gazing straight at Dash or averting her gaze from him a bit so as to be able to face the snake without bolting. Either way, Severus had to admit her tact.
            “My name is Fleur Delacour,” she said, in a breathy, softly accented voice. “Will you put your snake away, please? He is frightening us.”

            Harry blinked at Miss Delacour and seemed to think for a moment. Severus recognized that silence, though. Harry was getting input from Dash, which meant he would probably come out with something other than outright agreement.
            “He won’t bite you. I can promise that. I can even make it a formal oath if you want?”
            Don’t do that. Where did he learn about oaths?
            But Severus knew the answer. Draco, of course. He would have to have a chat with Draco about not giving Harry lessons in politics that Severus wasn’t there for.
            Miss Delacour turned her head and looked at someone—perhaps Maxime, Severus thought. She nodded, and Delacour turned back to Harry and said, “Yes, please.”
            “All right,” Harry said, and drew his wand, and laid it along the palm of his right hand. Dash flowed up beneath him and put his nose in the middle of Harry’s palm. Harry spoke softly. “I promise by my magic not to allow Dash to attack any student of Beauxbatons unless they’re attacking me and I need him in self-defense.”
            There was a flash and a glimmer, and the gentle blue light of an oath shown for a moment around Harry’s wand. Then the blue light spread down onto Dash’s neck and made his scales glow as it slowly worked its way around them, like spreading water.
            Severus felt the hair on the back of his neck stand up. And at the same moment, he found Karkaroff beside him, staring greedily at Harry.
            “Is your Mr. Potter by any chance aware that no one’s sworn an oath like that in hundreds of years?” Karkaroff asked casually.
            No. And you will not be the one to enlighten him.
            Severus settled for nothing more than a cool glare before he turned to watch the students of the other schools parade into Hogwarts. Harry watched Dash until the blue glow faded, but he seemed to be concerned only that his basilisk might have been hurt. He went into the school with the others a few minutes later.
            Leaving only Severus to be aware of the covetous and interested glances that followed him.
            The boy causes a walking political disaster even when he doesn’t mean to.
            But Severus did have to pause when he considered who might have been aware of what would happen—and wanted it to happen anyway.
            That basilisk is a worse menace than he is.
*
starr: I think whether Blaise and Dumbledore are bad depends on your definition of evil.
ChaosLady: Thank you!
moodysavage: It would have torn through Moody’s disguise if it worked.
SP777: Well, Draco did get a reward that matters to him, so there’s that. Thank you!
moon: Not at the moment! It’s already longer than I expected.
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A Brother to Basilisks