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An Alchemical Discontent	By : Lomonaaeren Category: Harry Potter > Slash - Male/Male > Harry/Draco Views: 10911 -:- Recommendations : 1 -:- Currently Reading : 1
Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor any of the characters from the books or movies. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

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Chapter Six—Too Dignified To Be Called An Argument

            “He has house-elves, doesn’t he?”

            Harry sighed and fought the temptation to bury his head in his hands. He should have known better than to describe the meal he’d had at Draco’s shop to Hermione, even if it was in an effort to reassure her that Draco could be polite when he wanted to. Hermione had apparently not made the connection Harry wanted her to make—that excellent brewing skills implied good cooking skills, too—and now stood staring at Harry with an appalled expression.

            Harry sighed. “Listen, Hermione, we’re going in the morning, so he might not even serve a meal—“

            “He has house-elves, doesn’t he?” Hermione repeated insistently.

            “He’s still in contact with the elves who work for his parents, so, yes, you could say he has them,” Harry said. “But look, Hermione, he treated them well when I was there, at least as well as I treated Kreacher, and you know you got used to Kreacher—“

            “You were willing to moderate your treatment of him, even free him if necessary.” Hermione folded her arms. “I don’t believe that Malfoy would willingly do the same thing.”

            Time to prove that I was listening to her when she gave me those lectures on political skills. Harry stared Hermione straight in the eye, hoping that would help with his sincerity. “You told me once that politics depended on compromise,” he said, “and the only thing you could truly hope for was to partially serve your goals without absolutely betraying your principles.”

            Hermione hesitated, “Yes,” she said, finally, reluctantly.

            “I’m not asking you to eat a meal cooked by house-elves,” Harry pointed out. “You won’t betray your principles. Just come along and have a conversation with Draco about the Desire potion, without bringing up the house-elf issue every five minutes.”



            “And if he brings it up?” Hermione was bristling a little, and Harry suspected she was envisioning Draco summoning one of his elves and then smiling slyly at her, daring her to object.

            “Then you can argue, yes,” Harry said. “But you’re going to have plenty to argue about with him, anyway. We’ll be talking about means to protect and promote the Desire potion, after all.”

            Hermione smiled at once. “There are certain concessions I’m going to demand in return for being part of this,” she murmured, and then turned and approached Harry’s Floo; Draco had agreed to open his hearth to Harry and Hermione today, so that neither Nott nor Diggory would see them coming through the streets to his shop on a day it was supposedly closed.

            A sharp tap sounded on the window of his flat just as Hermione threw the powder into the flames. Harry trotted over to retrieve the owl, calling to Hermione that he’d follow her. Hermione had already said, “Draco Malfoy’s shop!” and only gave him a distracted nod as she stepped into the green fire and was whirled away.

            Harry shook his head as he opened the window. Hermione had spent so much time immersed in the political life of the Ministry lately that it had made her hungrier for argument. He only hoped she didn’t manage to pick one with Draco in the moments before he arrived.

            He blinked when he recognized the light, tawny bird sitting gracefully on his wrist. This was Ginny’s owl, Aphrodite. His head light and his breath short, he opened the letter that Aphrodite offered him and then gave her a few pieces of bacon left over from breakfast, which she devoured.

            The envelope was thick, and when Harry opened it, a number of sheaves of parchment tumbled out, all in different handwriting. Ginny’s letter was on top, though, and she had formed the letters slowly and carefully, as though Harry was more likely to believe the accusations against Draco if she printed them neatly.

            Here are the dispatches from my friends that I promised you, Harry. Go through them when you have some time to yourself and a clear head. I know you won’t want to believe them at first, but there’s just too much weight here to deny.

            Oh, and one more thing: Dean thinks we ought to get together for dinner sometime soon, and I agree. Seeing you the other day made me realize… it’s been six years, and I still haven’t managed to move on, and I don’t think you have, either. Maybe if we can talk this out instead of running away from each other, we’ll have a better chance of overcoming the fear. And the guilt, I think, on your part?

            Ginny.

            Harry read that second paragraph twice, lingering over it. Only the thought that Hermione and Draco might well have proceeded to drawn knives by now kept him from reading it a third time. The lightness in his head had changed to a sharp feeling of anticipation.

            If there was a chance that he could be free of the guilt that overcame him every time he saw Ginny…if there was a chance that he could manage to free her from fear as well…



            The potion he took was a preventative, a protection against him ever harming someone again. It couldn’t change his feelings about the Incident itself. Only conversation with Ginny could do that.

            And maybe it had been too long since they spoke to one another frankly and freely. Dinner with Dean was a good idea, really. He could be there to act as a buffer between Harry and Ginny, and reassure Ginny that she wasn’t alone.

            Harry tossed the rest of the parchments on his table, and wrote a quick reply to Ginny, accepting the invitation, which he sent off with Aphrodite. Then he jumped for the Floo. Knowing Draco, he was already fuming over the time it had taken Harry to hurry to his side.

            He thought he heard a second tap as he yelled out, “Draco Malfoy’s shop!” but he didn’t have time to glance over his shoulder and see what it was.

*

            “The political sway of pure-bloods in the Ministry has nothing to do with a general belief in blood superiority, Granger.” Draco hated the rasp of irritation that had entered his voice, but Granger had to be made to see. “Even the ones who still have some vestiges of that belief—and those are small vestiges, indeed—thought the Dark Lord was mad. Our power now is based on knowledge, not blood.”

            “If it’s knowledge, it’s only knowledge that anyone could acquire.” Granger had planted her hands on her hips and was glaring at him, for what reason Draco couldn’t possibly know. “Knowledge of wizarding customs and society, I suppose you were going to say?”

            “I would rather be governed by the wise than the ignorant,” Draco drawled, and looked impatiently towards the fireplace. When was Harry going to appear? He wasn’t very politically astute, no, but he could deflect the worst of Granger’s common, vulgar ideas.

            “Then teach Muggleborns what they’re supposed to know,” Granger snapped. “Did you know there are still obscure laws in force declaring that you can’t take certain books out of the libraries unless your parents were wizards four generations back? And some of the files in the Ministry archives are like that, too. How in the world are Muggleborns to achieve legal parity with pure-bloods unless laws like that are repealed?”

            Draco sighed patiently. He would make one more attempt to do as Granger demanded and educate her, but if she didn’t understand the simple words he’d used so far, he doubted she would understand this. “It’s not book knowledge. I know you don’t want to hear that,” he added, before she could open her mouth. “You could study for the rest of your life and still not know everything about the wizarding world that I do. It’s the way you’re raised, the unconscious things you absorb when you’re a child. You can never know exactly what I do or act exactly like I do—“

            “Thank God,” said Granger with obvious distaste.

            Draco gritted his teeth, but continued pressing politely forwards, though he couldn’t keep himself from throwing another longing look at the fireplace. “You can’t fit into the wizarding world because your attitudes are different. So is the way you think about things. You won’t notice the things or make the little connections that are vital to functioning as a full member of society. I’m certain you know things about the Muggle world I never will, and I would be just as out of place if I visited it,” he added generously. “But the fact remains that you’re asking for the impossible, and frankly, if Diggory promised to support that kind of thing, it’s one more reason to be wary of him. It’s the sort of ‘struggle’ that would make him look good to the voters without ever coming out in something so disastrous as results.”

            “If the system is broken,” said Granger, with a quiet voice but a maniacal gleam in her eye, “then perhaps it’s time to change the system.”

            Harry tumbled out of the fireplace just then with a whoosh and a fall of soot, which spared Draco from having to answer. He turned away from Granger with a dignified shake of his head and went to assist Harry, who was tripping over his own robes. Taking Harry’s elbow and helping him to his feet wasn’t enough, but it was the kind of small touch Draco would have to be content with until he could gently suggest that Harry get off the potion.

            And until I can get rid of Daphne. Draco frowned slightly. He had gone to her last night expecting that it would be easy to bore her—he’d just do everything cheerfully and complacently, and she would drop him because she liked the challenge of knowing he hated what they were doing—but she had laughed. She hadn’t Obliviated the memory of the conversation wherein she explained that she found his new attitude refreshing, and that she could tolerate a Draco whinging in pleasure as easily as one whinging from pain. Then his knowledge of the evening dimmed into fog, and Draco really wasn’t sure what they’d done next. Luckily, or unluckily depending on one’s point-of-view, the only reminder of it he’d found when he scanned himself that morning was a love bite on his arse.

            “Thanks,” Harry said, and stepped lightly back, apparently as cautious as Draco was about letting their bodies touch for too long. “Now can we…”

            He looked across at Granger, sighed, and glanced from one to the other of them. “Have you been arguing already?”

*

            Harry felt exasperation welling up in him. Granted, he didn’t know how long he’d stood and looked at Ginny’s letter, but it couldn’t have been more than a few minutes. And still Draco had managed to make Hermione puff up like Crookshanks.

            “We weren’t having an argument,” Draco said, and put his nose in the air with a haughtiness that Harry told himself he should not find adorable. “It was too dignified to be called an argument.”

            “Malfoy evidently thinks it’s perfectly fine to let pure-bloods rule in the Ministry, and he’s told me Muggleborns can’t learn everything that people raised in the wizarding world know, so there’s no point in trying to change things,” Hermione hissed.

            Harry stepped gently between them. He might not be any good at politics, but he was better at handling his friends. Draco didn’t deserve the protection, perhaps, but Harry would rather focus on the issue that had brought them here. “Draco isn’t the enemy,” he reminded Hermione. “Diggory would like to see him stopped as surely as he’d like to see us supporting him. The Desire potion is a nuisance to his campaign.”

            “It’s rather more than that,” Hermione snapped. Harry nodded encouragingly. At least she was letting herself be led away from the prior line of argument and towards a better one. “It’s drawing public attention away from coverage of the speeches and parties and other means to get elected the candidates for Minister are using. I’d say that means Diggory wants the potion gone so he can actually get more people to become aware of what he’s saying. I’ve heard more people in the Ministry talking about the Desire potion than the election in the past few days.”

            “That’s exactly what we want to happen,” Draco said, looking smug. “The more people talk about the potion, the more will become convinced they have to try it, and the sooner we’ll get past that little bit of awkward publicity the She-Weasel brought us.”

            Harry rolled his eyes and turned so Draco could see him doing it. Draco shut his mouth and glared sullenly. “Don’t call her that,” said Harry mildly, satisfied the point had been taken.

            Sure enough, Hermione, pleased by his defense of Ginny, wasted time with only a short glare before she moved on. “And you said that Cordelia Nott openly threatened you when you repaid her Galleons?”

            Draco nodded and leaned back against the wall next to his fireplace, folding his arms. He was near one of the windows—well, one of the false windows, Harry thought—and a shaft of sunlight drifted in, making his hair blaze. Harry tried to tell himself he wasn’t staring, realized he totally was, and blinked and glanced away just as Draco said, “Yes. I think they counted on getting rid of us fairly quickly, and probably on enlisting your help in the campaign for Muggleborn rights, too, Granger. Cordelia called me a pest, and she seemed personally enraged that she would have to expend more energy on me than I’m worth. The problem is that I’m not sure what their next move is.”

            “They’ll strike through our vulnerabilities, of course,” said Hermione, as if she had already figured it all out. And of course she had, Harry thought. She was quick like that. “Which, in this case, probably means at the person in this room with the least experience of politics.” She glanced expectantly at Harry.

            Harry frowned. “I think I’m cautious enough by now to avoid any approaches from Nott and Diggory, Hermione.”

            “But they may approach you disguised,” said Hermione gently. “And you’ve never been that great at seeing through disguises, Harry. You go with your instincts and your gut, and that works in desperate, sudden situations, but this will be the result of long-range plans. Now. Has anyone spoken to you in the past few days in an odd manner, or acted strangely? In any way? Even the most innocent interaction?”

            Harry hesitated, and swallowed. He knew one thing that qualified right away, of course. But revealing it would mean that he was betraying Ginny’s confidence.

            Besides, he hadn’t had a chance to look at the information Ginny had sent him. It might be from people duped by Diggory and Nott, or from Diggory and Nott themselves, acting behind a front. But it also might not be.

            And I’ll probably ruin my chance at reconciliation with Ginny if I betray her confidence.

            It was one of those times he really had no idea what to do, and wished he could ask someone about it. Of course, the perfect person would have been Ron—and Harry caught his breath for a moment, then shook his head—but with him gone, there was only Hermione. And asking Hermione about it with Draco in the room would rather defeat the purpose.

            Unfortunately, he’d hesitated too long. Hermione narrowed her eyes and leaned forwards. “Something’s happened already, Harry, hasn’t it? Tell me.”

            Draco straightened up and listened intently. Harry gnawed his lip for a moment, then went with his gut in the way Hermione had described him doing and decided that half the truth would have to do.

*

            Draco wanted to roll his eyes. It was obvious when Harry was lying. He couldn’t look at anyone else straight on to save his life, and he bit his lip as if it were a sweet. But he was still charging ahead as if his only audience was blind and gullible.

            “Uh, well, someone sent me information that purports to be about Draco,” Harry admitted. “His past as a black-market brewer.” He sneaked a quick, guilty look at Draco, who wanted to snort aloud. As if that weren’t obvious! “I think it could be people acting for Diggory and Nott. Whether it’s them or people honestly agitated by Desire and the fact that Draco’s selling it, I don’t know.”

            Draco glanced to the side, and met Granger’s gaze. They stared at each other for a moment, in a perfect exchange of glances. Of course Harry was lying; he most likely knew exactly who had sent him the information. But confronting him now would result in defensive bluster, and force him to choose that person’s side over theirs. Better to wait and trap him later when he wouldn’t feel so much on the spot.

            It was really too bad that he and Granger had so many philosophical differences, Draco thought, as she turned back to face Harry. They would have made a formidable team if they could agree on anything beyond the necessity to confront their political enemies and not provoke Harry.

            “All right,” Granger said soothingly. “Can you bring that information to us, Harry, so we can evaluate it?”

            “It’s in my flat.” At least Harry looked vaguely ashamed of himself. He stood and headed towards the Floo with alacrity, though. “You want me to bring it now?”

            “I’d appreciate that, yes,” Granger said dryly.

            Coming from one of Draco’s friends, such a tone would have been cause for a fight. Harry appeared to be used to it. He nodded, cast a handful of Floo powder into the flames, and called out, “Harry Potter’s flat!”

            When he was gone, Draco turned to face Granger. “I suspect I know exactly who sent him that information.”

            Granger sighed. She’d taken a seat, finally, on the least comfortable chair in the room, as though enjoying herself in Draco’s private quarters was against her principles. “Ginny,” she said. “She’s the only one he would want to protect so fiercely.”

            “So what do we do about it?” Draco folded his arms.

            “Let him hide whatever would reveal she sent it, and pretend not to care,” Granger said. “Meanwhile, I’ll get in touch with Ginny. She’s not frightened of me, and she knows that I’m opposed to Desire in practice. I can coax out of her whether Nott and Diggory are behind this—if she knows about them, of course.”

            Draco made a noise of frustration. Granger raised her eyebrows. “You know how he feels about her,” she said. “You have a better solution?”

            “I just don’t like him tormenting himself with guilt over an incident that was relatively minor,” Draco muttered. He knew well enough not to bring up his feelings for the Weasley family in general around someone who had almost married into it.

            Granger hissed like a cat. “I saw Ginny’s face shortly after that incident,” she said. “It wasn’t minor, whatever else it was. She looked like someone had tried to eat her, and partially succeeded.” Then she put up a hand and shook her head. “But let’s try to get along, all right, Malfoy? I think we can agree that Harry is the one Nott and Diggory will try to strike at first. But they surely won’t leave us alone. What else will they try?”

            “About Cordelia, I’m not exactly sure,” Draco said, drawn back into the discussion despite himself, and despite his immediate instinct to contend that forgetting this incident as soon as possible would be the best thing for Harry. “Her tactics in the past are well-known, but those were with jilted lovers. I’m not that to her; I was wise enough not to become so.” He smirked. “But I should say that the next step Diggory will make relates to you. He wants to control the Ministry. You’re in the Ministry. If he takes over, he won’t want you there, and he likes to think in the long term. He’s going to try to undermine you at your job if he can, Granger.”



            Granger drew her breath to dispute, but then let it collapse into silence, and shook her head. “You may be right.”



            “Of course I’m right.” Draco tossed his head. “I always am.”

            “What’s wrong with that statement would take too long to explain, Malfoy.” Granger stared broodingly at the far wall for a moment. “I wonder if he’ll approach through Abigail?” she murmured, and explained when Draco lifted one eyebrow, “A supervisor who doesn’t like me. She’s never directly taken her ire out on me, but she has muttered comments to the effect that I shouldn’t be there.”

            Draco nodded. “I’d keep an eye on her if I were you, Granger. And set up what defenses you can.”

            Granger nodded back, and then her eyes narrowed and chilled. “You do realize that you could take away one of Diggory’s main weapons by just putting a few restrictions on Desire? Willingly submitting yourself to the oversight of an outside committee, whilst demanding the right to sit in on the decisions? That would also defuse some of the negative publicity, and let you make the rules by which you were supervised.”

            She wouldn’t have made a bad Slytherin, if only she didn’t rely so much on what’s right instead of what’s real, Draco thought, and then shook his head hard, both to deny her suggestion and because no thought had ever scared him so badly. “I don’t want those restrictions,” he said. “The newspapers would find some way to spin it. Desire has side-effects we never noticed before, and now we’re being called to account for them. Someone somewhere has blackmail on us, and forced this through, and we were helpless to stop it. Desire really is dangerous, and anyone who took it is destined to die in two weeks. The result wouldn’t be as positive as you hope for no matter what happens.”

            “It would be for the best in the long run, though,” Granger said stubbornly. “And that’s what we need to think in terms of, since Diggory’s so fond of it. You would prove that you can listen to the will of the public—“

            “The whim of the public—“

            “And police yourselves. Do it well enough, and there would be no need for anything but nominal outside interference.”

            “It might be the best solution in the long term,” Draco said. “But I don’t know anyone in the Ministry I trust enough to be in charge of a committee like that—what’s wrong?” Granger was on her feet, wand drawn.

            “Harry’s been gone an awfully long time,” Granger said lowly.

            “How do you know something’s wrong?”

            She gave him a superior look, and Draco felt a wave of irritation. He hated that she had known Harry longer and better, and he doubly hated it when she flaunted that in his face. She didn’t bother speaking, but stalked towards the Floo.

            Harry tumbled out of it a moment later. Draco found himself anxiously scanning the other man for injuries. There was no blood, although Harry’s face was pale.

            “What is it?” Granger asked.

            Harry held up a letter. “There was a second owl waiting when I went back,” he said, voice dead. “From Minister Shacklebolt himself. He needs to talk to Draco and me right away. Apparently there’s been a death from Desire.”

*

            Pendragon6644: Thanks! Hope you enjoyed this chapter.

            Lilith: Draco does have tons of enemies. And now one of them has stolen the march on him, heh.

            Thrnbrooke: Draco assumed he could just end the term of his service to Daphne whenever he liked. He was wrong.

            Mangacat: Thanks! I think the major nastiness is about to start now.

            Moyima: Thanks! But Draco and Harry have more to worry about than sex for quite a few chapters.
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An Alchemical Discontent