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The Wages of Going On	By : Lomonaaeren Category: Harry Potter > Threesomes/Moresomes Views: 43959 -:- Recommendations : 3 -:- Currently Reading : 7
Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter. I am making no money from this story.

Chapter List
- 42
- 43
Thank you again for all the reviews! This is the last chapter of The Wages of Going On. I hope you’ve enjoyed it.
Chapter Forty-Three—Different Kinds of Names
            “You didn’t tell us you were going to be gone that long.”
            Harry made an apologetic face at Ron and hugged him, watching Hermione over Ron’s shoulder. She seemed a little more inclined to simply frown at him, but Harry had to admit that he didn’t know how much she was trying to hold herself back.
            “We had to conduct a knowledge ritual to find out that information I told you,” he said. “And I did send you a letter yesterday.”
            Ron snorted. “That you were rooting around in the garden for bits of fur and bone! That doesn’t tell us much, you know, mate?” He stepped back and gazed critically at Harry, as if examining him for signs of suspicious Slytherin diseases. “It doesn’t stop us from worrying.”
            "I'm sorry," Harry said, as sincerely as he could. And that was pretty sincerely. But he couldn't stop from thinking about the way that his friends would have reacted if they'd seen the knowledge ritual and the way that the force, or creature, or whatever it really was, had answered the question, and couldn't help snickering. "The important thing is that the ritual told us for sure that there's no danger of the person connected to the Lestranges coming back and harming us again. That's all over and done with."
            "The person is gone forever?" Hermione asked him, with a twist of her voice and a raise of an eyebrow that told him she probably suspected the truth.
            Harry gave her a bland look. "Yes. Completely gone."
            Finally Hermione softened and came over to give him a hug and a soft kiss on his cheek. "I can't pretend to like it, or understand it, but I'm glad that you have this sort of peace. I just wish we had been able to do more to help you achieve it."
            Harry placed his arm around her shoulders and led her towards the Burrow, picking up Ron's shoulders with his other arm on the way. "You lot helped me more than you could ever know," he told them softly. "By giving me something normal to come back to. Draco and Severus are good at lots of things, but normal isn't really them."
            That made his friends laugh, and then Ron made a joke about Gryffindors and Slytherins that started Hermione talking about the past, and soon they were sitting around with food and drinks talking about past Gryffindor Quidditch games and what would have happened if Hermione, for some incomprehensible reason, had become a Beater. It was the sort of reasoning that made sense when you were drunk, if not the morning after.
            And all the time, Harry sat there with both a smile, sincerely felt, on his lips, and a sense of mourning and uncertainty in his heart. It didn't drive out the joy he felt at being in the presence of his friends, but it was there all the same, the same way there was an unacknowledged Gryffindor part of him beating at the bottom of his mind when he was with Draco and Severus.
            The thing he couldn't tell his friends, although it was there at the back of his mind and sometimes even in his tongue, was that he wasn't sure if he did normal anymore, either.
*
            Draco sighed as he set aside the second book he'd been trying to read for enjoyment that day. He felt restless and out of sorts, trying to imagine what he was gong to do now that the excitement of the knowledge ritual and their vengeance was gone. Severus had his brewing, always, and the way that they had made the Aurors reappear, Harry might be able to resume some of his old life. But Draco was left with no abiding passion or interest of his own.
            That's not true. You must have done something to fill your days, before. You didn't spend all your time with Severus.
            That was true, but the memories filled Draco's head in strange, wispy traces that seemed all light without color. Had he really spent all day reading the paper and writing letters of business? That had hardly filled an hour this morning. He'd lost the ability to make it stretch, to think of time as something that would be his to play with, making what he did a matter of no great urgency.
            He stood up, restless beyond measure, beyond words, and went to see what Severus was doing in the lab. That was a stopgap measure, too, but at least he would be with one of the two people who had become the most important to him for reasons he couldn't help.
            When he knocked at the door of Severus’s lab, there was no response save a faint, dull sound, and the appearance of a yellow ward above his head. Draco sighed. That ward meant any noise he made would automatically be silenced inside the lab, so as not to disturb Severus while he worked on a delicate potion.
            Draco grimaced. All that time that he’d wanted to be rid of the bond, and now he kept running into situations where the bond would be useful.
            He settled down in the corridor to wait, Summoning a chair and the book he’d been reading earlier. A history of Muggle-wizard conflict wouldn’t be his first choice, but this book was written from such a different, non-pure-blood perspective that Draco had been a bit surprised to find it in a Malfoy collection. At least it gave him something to argue with.
*
            Severus checked when he opened the door of his lab and found Draco sitting on a chair a short distance away. The sense of quiet, pulsing contentment that he had finally made the new version of Wolfsbane do what he wanted melted away, and he automatically drew his wand and glanced up and down the corridor, searching for Harry.
            “What is it?” he asked, turning back to Draco, who was gaping at him.
            “What do you mean, what is it?” Draco shook his head and laid down a book Severus hadn’t consciously realized he was holding. “I only wanted to talk to you, but you had that bloody ward up that wouldn’t let him me knock. I was just waiting for you to finish.”
            Severus slid his wand back into his sleeve, feeling a trifle ridiculous, but only a trifle, for the reasons that he rapidly disclosed to Draco. “You could have waited in many more comfortable places. The library, for example. And had a house-elf give you word of when I had done. Or you could have seen me at dinner.”
            “As if a little discomfort would put me off the things I want, now,” Draco said flatly, and cast the book aside completely.
            As he stood, Severus had a moment’s vivid sympathy with Harry, who had stared at Draco during the knowledge ritual as if he knew what it was like to be hunted. This Draco moved with an intensity that he had never had before, and walked up to Severus and peered into his face as if he had a perfect right to do so. Severus found himself lifting a hand to ward Draco off, and Draco only caught it and turned it over.
            “What is it going to be like, now that the bond is gone and even our questions about the Dark Lord are answered?” Draco whispered. “Are you going to retreat from me, and just make us friends again?”
            “If I were going to do that, I would have gone home already,” said Severus. “I have a perfectly good lab there.”
            “Why haven’t you?”
            Severus’s muscles tightened. He knew the answer to that question, not because he had spent a long time pondering it, but because the instant Draco spoke said question, the answer appeared in his mind.
            He did have to swallow and respond, little though he wanted to. “Because you are here.”
            Draco kept his head and his hands up, but motionless. Then he reached forwards again, touch as confident as though he knew Severus wouldn’t reject it.
            Severus shivered as Draco touched his shoulder and the side of his neck, but he didn’t move away. This was—not inevitable, perhaps. Perhaps a side effect of the bond. Perhaps a way to try and recapture the closeness without tying themselves up in the idiocy of the bond.
            Or perhaps it was simply an acknowledgment that the bond had happened, and they could not go back to pretending it had not.
            “So your heart is beating like it wants to leap out and hide in my hand,” Draco said in a thoughtful voice, “but you aren’t actually retreating from me.”
            “I know that if I did, you would only come after me,” said Severus, and attempted to clear his throat and shake his head when Draco shot him a sharp glance. “That is not the only reason that I am doing this.”
            “Good.” Draco curled his lip. “I don’t want to be pitied. I’m going to live with the inevitable instead of struggling with it, but I don’t want to feel like I’m settling for second best.”
            Severus bristled. It was true that he had never had a regular lover or someone who wanted to spend long periods of time with him for more reasons than temporary alliance or life-debts, but he was not second best. “I would not do that, either.”
            Draco paused as though waiting for something else. Severus didn’t move. He was too pleased to see the crack in Draco’s self-confidence that he thought desire had put there.
            “Fine,” said Draco. “As long as we’re thinking the same things, then.” And he proved that they didn’t always do that by leaning forwards and kissing Severus, who had certainly not expected to be kissed.
            Severus did not dislike the kiss; it was simply new. He reached up and locked his hands around Draco’s head and neck so that he was the one who could control the pace and depth of the kiss. From the way he hissed, Draco didn’t dislike that, either.
            Severus slowly tasted Draco’s lips, his tongue, the corners of his mouth, his palate, his teeth. Draco was panting by the time he had finished, and Severus took pleasure in that, as well. If he was also affected, at least that showed that they were both the same, in several ways.
            “Bloody hell,” said Draco, slumping against him and panting into the side of his collarbone, which was a sensation Severus had had no idea could bring him so much pleasure. “It’s going to be hard to wait for Harry to return.”
            “Why should we?” Severus had not thought beyond the first few minutes of this encounter, but if those minutes now passed showed any indication, it was that they could let their hands and bodies could lead the way. His hand slid down towards Draco’s groin, and he did not specifically remember commanding it to do that.
            “If you think we can do this without Harry, then we’re not thinking the same things, after all,” Draco said quietly, pulling back and staring up at him.
            “I was not thinking of doing everything without him,” said Severus, and tensed his neck. “Merely that we could begin.”
            Draco grinned. “Then we’re closer to thinking the same things, after all.” He had got his hands into Severus’s hair and was doing interesting things with it, mostly running his fingers back and forth as if he was trying to make it into curls. “But I would still feel better if he was here for the first time.”
            Severus tried to look as if he was completely neutral about all of this. He knew it was probably futile, but he tried, anyway. “You don’t know that he’ll want to participate fully as we do. Perhaps he’ll only want to watch.”
            Draco moaned against him, and his hips moved in a way that was completely uncoordinated. Severus stared at him. He didn’t need to ask what kind of reaction his words had inspired; what he didn’t know was why.
            But Draco’s face was pale and slack as his, and when the color did come back into it, he glanced away. “I didn’t know that about myself,” he muttered, feeling the back of his neck as though his blush was a surprise to him, too. “I’m not sure I needed to know that about myself.”
            “I think that we will learn far more than that,” Severus murmured, and placed a hand casually on Draco’s shoulder when he tensed as if he would have withdrawn. “Will you allow such knowledge to make you retreat?”
            “I was only pulling away to get some air,” said Draco. “Since I don’t want to go further without Harry around.”
            “And you don’t know if he will want to go even so far as this,” said Severus softly. “It is not cowardice?”
            “I won’t deny that I was a coward a lot of the time in the war,” said Draco. “But I haven’t been one since then. Did you think it was something other than courage that let me bring the two of you together, and made me sensible enough to see that there was no resisting the bond?”
            Severus chuckled, and let Draco go. He raked his hair back into place with fussy motions that Severus wanted to watch more of.
            That fact, that he wanted to watch what Draco did with his hands and his hair and even such seemingly unimportant body parts as his hips and belly, made Severus wonder for the first time if perhaps he was—well, if perhaps one day there could be a conventional name for what they felt and what they were to each other.
            Now we will have the chance to think about that, and try on different names, and see if they are appropriate—something we would never have if the Dark Lord had returned or if we had died in one of the Lestranges’ traps.
            We will have time.
            Perhaps that was the greatest luxury.
*
            Harry eyed the bird that had landed on the kitchen table in front of him warily. It looked like one of the owls that some pure-blood families kept and bred to be handled only by themselves. Harry had dealt with some of them in his work as an Auror. The owl would snap until it felt good and ready to give the message over.
            But this magnificent silver-white bird—making his throat tighten a little, as he remembered Hedwig—didn’t snap. It merely waited until it was the center of his attention, then stretched out its right leg with languorous dignity. Harry snorted and took the envelope from it, nodding his thanks.
            The owl waited, staring, until Harry actually said aloud, “Thank you. And you’re a lot like your owner.”
            If the owl understood that at all, it seemed to take it as a compliment, because it turned calmly away and flew to the Weasleys’ perch to drink some water. Harry shook his head and opened the envelope.
            A second later, he lost the impulse to laugh.
            We want you. Please come.
            Both Draco and Severus had signed it.
            Harry laid down the letter and made himself breathe, a breath that made all the strings in his lungs shiver. Now he wished the owl had played with him some more, so he could have put off opening this letter for longer.
            But that was stupid. He knew as well as he knew his own name that Draco and Severus wouldn’t hurt him, simply because they knew how hard he would strike back.
            And is it for no other reason than that?
            No other reason to go, or no other reason to put off opening the letter? Harry was even confusing himself now, and he didn’t know what kind of answer he would get if he kept asking the questions.
            He sighed and looked at the owl. It had turned around again on the perch and sat there with its tail fanned a little, as if the decision he made would only have relevance to it when he finally sealed the letter.
            There was no doubt that it waited for a reply, though, and so Harry sat there wrestling with himself and not the owl as he debated what he was going to do next.
            There was only so far he could retreat, of course. The connections they had between them—not willing ones, and some very painful ones, but connections, nonetheless—didn’t allow him just to waltz out of Draco’s and Severus’s lives. He would have resented it the same way if they had tried to shun all contact with him. He might not always know what kind of contact he wanted, but he knew that he wanted the option open to him.
            Now they were pushing him to define the kind of contact. When he replied to the letter and went to the Manor, or didn’t, then certain kinds of conduct would no longer be open to him.
            Harry swallowed again and made his decision, the decision he was always going to make, but which he admittedly would have put off as long as possible if not for this push. And he reached out and turned over the sheet of parchment they had sent him and wrote a single line, followed by his name, on the back.
            I’m coming.
            The owl didn’t balk at taking the same sheet of parchment and the envelope back, although Harry had thought it would. It just looked at him with calm, grave golden eyes, and hooted once, and soared out the Burrow’s window into the morning with its wings reflecting some of the golden daylight.
            Harry stood there watching it, until it was out of sight. Then he turned and went to fetch his cloak and wand.
*
            Draco turned his head as Harry Apparated outside the Manor’s gates. The wards would hum and sing like that whenever someone known approached them, of course, but Draco knew who this particular person was, had to be.
            Severus, who had come back to the library with Draco and found his own unexpected treasure, a book on brewing and crushing diamonds, lifted his head at the same time. Draco wondered if he had merely been alerted by Draco’s reaction, or if he had grown used enough to the wards around the Manor to feel when they changed.
            “It’s him,” Severus said, in a quiet voice without a trace of a question in it.
            Draco nodded, not trusting himself to reply at the moment, and stood. Once he would have remained immersed in his book, determined not to show Harry that he was that important. But that struck now as not only childish but silly. Of course Harry was important, as they were all important to each other, and there was no good pretending that it was otherwise.
            It didn’t take long for a house-elf to guide Harry to the library. Draco heard the quick sound of his footsteps, and a second later, he was there, taking off a heavy cloak that he seemed to have worn in anticipation of nonexistent rain.
            Draco opened his mouth, and then realized that he didn’t really know what to say. The sheer depth of the look on Harry’s face wasn’t what he would have expected, not even from receiving the owl back with that single line about how Harry was coming to them.
            Harry laid his cloak down on air—the house-elf who had guided him to the library took it immediately, Draco was glad to see—and came a few steps forwards. His feet seemed perfectly molded to the floors of the Manor, and he cut a hole in the air that fitted him and only him, Draco thought, as he stood there.
            “So,” Harry finally said. “I’m here.”
            Severus nodded and crossed over to stand next to Draco. Draco thought for a second he would continue past and walk up to Harry, but he stopped himself abruptly in place and put one hand on Draco’s shoulder, pressing down. Draco stayed where he was, too.
            And he understood the wisdom of that, a second later. Harry was going to choose both of them, not just one. Draco didn’t think there was much chance that he would only choose one, but Severus didn’t want to contribute to a possibly mistaken impression by going forwards to greet him alone.
            “Well?” Severus asked at last, when they had stood there looking at each other for more time than Draco had known existed.
*
            Severus could feel beads of sweat gathering on the nape of his neck and sliding down underneath his hair. His breath was quickening in a way that shamed him to listen to it, but he knew that he would not be able to slow it down even if he tried.
            There was an intolerable pause while Harry stood there and stared at them, and Severus wondered if he was afraid, if he had changed his mind but had thought to come here and give them the word in person, if he was still too angry about the ritual rape to ever be at peace with them. It mattered more to Severus than it should, but then, that had been true about the bond from the beginning. He should be used to that, by now, cling to it as the one spar of familiarity in a strange ocean.
            Then Harry made a little sound under his breath, said, “I still don’t have a name for this,” and moved towards them.
            Severus was glad for the hold he had on Draco’s shoulder, then. It enabled both legs and arms to be steady as he reached out his other hand towards Harry.
*
            Harry didn’t know what would happen when he saw Severus’s face moving towards his. There were only a few possibilities, maybe, but there was always the unacknowledged one that he might flinch away, that he couldn’t bear to let Severus touch him, that Severus himself would jerk back in disgust—
            But it was there, the bare, broad touch of lips to lips. And while Harry couldn’t say that all of his blood leaped and heated at the idea, there was a sense of relief at finally having decided how one thing between them was going to go, and one thing had a name.
            And the kiss was cautious, testing, something that could change. Maybe someday, Harry thought, the passion between them would be full and fierce, not as cautious. He didn’t know if it would ever be uncomplicated, though.
            Severus released him at last, and Harry turned towards Draco.
            Draco lunged forwards, as though Harry had been neglecting to kiss him only out of his own perversity, and their mouths mashed together. Harry made a long hiss of surprise that got lost in the luxurious sound of the kiss.
            Draco finally stood back, and his hair was a little mussed and his eyes a little wild, but Harry had got the message, and he thought Draco had, too. Harry nodded, and looked over Draco’s shoulder at Severus, whose eyes weren’t wild, but were certainly watchful.
            “It might still take me a long time to name what this is,” he said. “We’ve fought by each other’s sides and cooperated in rituals, but I wouldn’t say that we were friends. And we’ve—I mean, you fucked me, but I wouldn’t say that we were lovers.”
            Severus nodded. Draco seemed to be holding his breath. The silence around them felt brittle enough that Harry thought it would shatter if he touched it.
            “But,” said Harry, “I think—maybe what we’re going to create will have echoes of both of those names. It’ll just take a long, long time.” He stepped back enough that he could see both of them at once. “Someone told me that wizards live a long, long time, and have years enough even for this. I just want to make sure that’s true.”
            Draco closed his eyes in something that might be bliss if you didn’t know him, and maybe even if you did. Severus nodded.
            “Good,” said Harry. “I—good.” He was breathless suddenly, not so much with relief as with the visions of the possibilities. “Then, should we begin?”
            The End.
*
BAFan: Draco didn’t mean to place it so high. It was just something he kept wondering about.
SP777: Severus is too reticent to have his say with a lot of words, but I think he manages admirably despite a lack of them.
And I think they’re moving towards defining their relationship for themselves.
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The Wages of Going On