Adult-FanFiction.org : Harry Potter

Company Manners	By : Lomonaaeren Category: Harry Potter > Slash - Male/Male > Harry/Draco Views: 12863 -:- 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.

Chapter List
- 1-Company Manners
- 2-Part 2
- 3-Part 3
- 4-Part 4
- 5-Part 5
- 6-Part 6
- 7-Part 7
- 8-Part 8
- 5
- 6
- 7
Thank you again for all the reviews!

�� Harry�s
plan was to wank over Draco when he got home, fall asleep in the middle of his
sheets after a quick Cleaning Charm, and then wake up in the morning so that he
could take a proper shower and wank over him again.

�� As it
happened, only the first part of the plan went according to schedule. He woke
in the middle of the night to a terrific hammering on his window and leaped to
his feet, rubbing his eyes. There was only one kind of owl that knocked like
that.

�� His heart began
to pound, and he had to swallow several times before he could lower the wards
on the window and let the bird in.

�� One of the
Ministry�s express owls circled his head three times, then landed on his
shoulder. Harry winced, since he�d been sleeping naked, but bore with the fact
that its claws were drawing blood. The express owls had been crossbred with
falcons so they would fly faster, in quiet defiance of the ban on experimental
breeding, and Kingsley never used them except in an emergency.

�� The letter
was simple and short, but it still made Harry�s stomach throb and clench into a
ball like a fist.

�� A prominent advocate for Muggleborn rights
has attacked Emma Lansby. Lansby is demanding a term in Azkaban for him. At the
moment, she�s at St. Mungo�s. I need you to go to her and do anything you can
to prevent her from demanding so extreme a sentence.

�� Harry
closed his eyes. He knew why this was so important. Not only would it poison
relations between pure-bloods and Muggleborns incredibly if a leader for either side was condemned to Azkaban,
which was still a horrible place, but Lansby would become overconfident if she
managed to secure this, and so would other pure-bloods. They would press for
more and more concessions from the Ministry. When Kingsley refused, as he would
have to when their demands became unreasonable, they would become discontent
and drift further away from the central government of the British wizarding
world into their own small parties that might foment rebellion.

�� Or open war.

�� Harry went
mechanically to choose his robes, his mind already flinging itself through the
loops of memory. He called to mind all the conversations he�d ever had with
Emma Lansby, and decided based on them what he would wear.

�� Dark grey robes,
the color of a stormcloud, but not all the way to black. Harry knew how to
create embroidery enchantments that would last a few hours, and so he would
embroider eagles onto his sleeves and collar. The symbol of Lansby�s family was
the eagle.

�� Sympathy
and mourning at once, as if he were afraid that they would lose Lansby. He
would soothe her and coax her and drag her back into service to the Ministry so
gently that she wouldn�t know it hadn�t been her own idea.

�� Which would
be exhausting.

�� Harry
grimaced and shrugged. I still choose to
do the job. I could quit if I really wanted to.

*

�� I see your
boyfriend�s been out preventing war again,� Blaise told Draco in the morning.

�� Someone
has to,� Draco responded automatically, and sipped at his tea before he
realized that Blaise had had a sharp note in his voice, instead of the wry one
he seemed to get when he talked about Potter most of the time. He leaned back,
blinking, and asked, �Has something happened to Harry?�

�� Harry, even,� Blaise told Astoria, who
sat across the table from him and was eating delicately buttered scones with
fingers that somehow missed getting even the slightest scrap of stickiness on
them. Draco was used to good manners, but Astoria�s were almost unnatural. She
gave Blaise a level look in response to his statement and picked up another
scone.

�� It was in
the papers this morning,� she said blandly, �that events somehow conspired to
do Emma Lansby an injury, by means of that insufferable Muggleborn bore Ernest
Poppycock. She�s in St. Mungo�s for the injury, and Potter is with her, wearing
those dove-grey robes I�d like to know where he bought.�

�� Draco
hesitated for a moment. He was not sure how much Blaise and Astoria knew about
the truth of Harry�s job. Certainly they had no idea how thoroughly he despised
most of the pure-bloods, so Draco would have to tread carefully in his attempts
to defend Harry.

�� You surely
can�t think that he�d want to spend any more time in Lansby�s company than absolutely necessary?� he asked Blaise.
�I know that I would rather hate it, myself.�

�� Blaise gave
him a flat, unreadable look, and then turned back to his own breakfast, which
he didn�t eat anywhere near as neatly as his wife. Draco wondered idly if
Astoria had known that before she married him. �That�s just what I don�t know,�
he said. �Lansby is the worst sort of blood purist�loud and demanding. Potter
doesn�t have to spend time around
her. And yet he chooses to. He was even dancing with her at the last two
parties.�

�� Draco
regarded Blaise reflectively. He�d never been sure of what Blaise�s own
feelings on blood purity were. He didn�t particularly like Muggleborns or
half-bloods, but he invited them to his house. He called the Weasleys blood
traitors, but he admired them enough to think their daughter was pretty. He
seemed to admire what Harry was doing in trying to prevent war between the
factions, given the note that had been in his voice when they saw Harry at the
Ministry gala.

�� It was the
last part that decided Draco. �I have excellent reason to think,� he said,
�that Harry�s playing a long game in which the winner is the person who gets
closest to Emma Lansby.�

�� Not a
prize I would choose in any game I organized,� Astoria said. She had finished
her breakfast now, and all the crumbs had magically vanished. Draco wondered if
she had placed a house-elf under a Disillusionment Charm and ordered it to
hover around her plate, picking them up.

�� Well, of
course not,� Draco said. �But you can consider what stakes someone who had to
play the game might think were worth the risk.�

�� A
thoughtful silence settled around the table. Draco sipped at his orange juice
and hoped he hadn�t made a mistake.

�� Then Blaise
murmured, �I was planning on not inviting Potter to the party that we were
going to organize next month in celebration of the end of the war. If he simply
attached himself to Lansby, he wouldn�t come. She always avoids celebrations
like that,� he added to Draco, and Draco nodded. Of course Lansby would if she
were a hardcore blood purist, since she probably believed that the fall of
Voldemort was the biggest defeat blood purity had ever suffered. �Now I wonder
if I ought to reconsider the invitation.�

�� It would
give me someone to dance with,� Draco said in a carefully bored tone.

�� Surprisingly,
Astoria laughed, making Blaise and Draco look at her. She was sitting back in
her chair, her blonde hair playing freely around her face, and a spark of
wicked humor in her eyes that was directed at both of them.

�� It�s
perfectly obvious that you�re unhappy believing that Potter is really Lansby�s
running hound, Blaise, and it�s perfectly obvious that you don�t think he is,
Draco. So why shouldn�t you extend the invitation, since it will give both of
you so much pleasure?� She rose to her feet, shaking her head. �These rules we
live by should never be the excuse for pain. We do much too good a job of
inflicting that on ourselves.�

�� And off she
floated. Draco blinked at her back. Then he turned to Blaise.

�� I think
you have a remarkable wife,� he said.

�� Blaise
smiled back at him, the deepest and most relaxed expression Draco had seen on
his face since he came back to England. �I know it,� he said.

�� If I were
interested in women, I might even be jealous,� Draco said, rising to his feet,
and watched Blaise�s face change before he went off to write to Harry. He
wouldn�t go to St. Mungo�s, even though he was sure that Harry could use the
support, just in case he interrupted some delicate political dance, but an
offer of a date at the Three Broomsticks might be what he needed.

�� Maybe. You don�t know.

�� But that
was the pleasant thing about this relationship, Draco mused as he sat down to
write. It wasn�t closed-off in love, the way he thought his relationship with
Paul had been, and so he was much less worried about being perfect.

*

�� Harry
sighed as he flung himself into his chair and closed his eyes. That had been exhausting. Lansby had required more
reassurance than Harry had realized it was within his power to give. Somehow,
he had dug down into himself and tamed his impatience and frustration with her
and his hatred of blood purist rhetoric, and given her the listening ear and
firm hand that she needed.

�� Somehow, he
had convinced her that it would be a much more entertaining spectacle, and much
more embarrassing for Poppycock, if she pushed for a public hexing and a fine
instead of an Azkaban term. After all, without the money that he needed to fund
his pet projects, Poppycock would be much more frustrated than he would be if
he found himself in Azkaban and could act like a martyr. And it might take him
months to overcome the effects of several good, combined hexes.

�� Not the
best solution, but then, neither was the way that Poppycock had stepped into
the middle of a volatile situation and waved his wand around. Harry hoped that
Kingsley, who would be handling Poppycock, sat on him, hard, and quelled any
tendencies to speeches full of suffering. Harry couldn�t deal with speeches
full of suffering right now.

�� Something
pecked him on the shoulder. Harry opened startled eyes and found the owl that
had delivered Draco�s last invitation to dinner sitting there, head tilted to
the side as if it thought of knocking on his skull next.

�� Harry
removed the letter from the owl�s leg and opened it, wondering if he had the
strength to deal with Draco after today. It was almost six, in any case, and
Draco might already have dinner plans.

�� Dear Harry,

�� I understand that your duties with Emma
Lansby have grown harder. I wondered if you would like to go to the Three
Broomsticks again and spend a little time in the company of someone who will be
considerably softer than she was�unless you prefer a certain part of me to grow
hard.

�� Yours,

�� Draco.

�� Harry
smiled at the ridiculous innuendo, which told him something about how far he�d
fallen in relation to Draco.

�� But the
thought of the Three Broomsticks made him want to vomit. There were Muggleborn
advocates who made that one of their regular meeting places, including some of
Poppycock�s followers. They would certainly come up to him and confront him
about what he�d been doing in hospital instead of joining them in demonstrating
outside the Ministry.

�� A sudden
thought struck him, and Harry acted on it before he thought better of it He
turned the letter over, Summoned the nearest ink and quill, and wrote, Why don�t we go to the Perpetual Party? I�ll
be there at eight.

�� He
hesitated, then added, Yours, Harry. He
felt a bit silly copying Draco�s closing, but at least it conveyed some of his
feelings without involving him in the difficulties of deciding on different
words. And his intention to attend the party anyway left Draco an out if he
didn�t want to come.

�� With some
gratitude, Harry went to change out of the grey robes and into the red-and-gold
ones that were his favorites. With proper tailoring, they looked actually
elegant. Harry grinned. If Draco came, Harry could surprise him by showing him
that Gryffindor colors and beauty were not mutually exclusive.

*

�� Draco shook
his head and smiled as he stepped into the front entrance of Lori Porter�s
home. Just as it had been when he left five years ago, the noise of constant
music brushed past his ears, though the color scheme of the hall had changed
somewhat. Draco studied the dark green and red drapings as he waited for an
attendant to find him.

�� Delighted
to serve you!� A laughing woman in white whirled up, her dark hair gathered
into a net of thin black strands studded with tiny pieces of obsidian, onyx,
and ebony. It made her face look pale and large, higher in the forehead than
Draco thought was natural. She dropped a flawless curtsey to him and reached
out to take his cloak. �The mistress is holding court on the other side of the
room, if you wish to greet her.�

�� Draco
smiled and nodded, then slipped the woman a Galleon. Lori Porter preferred
human servants to house-elves, because house-elves offended her aesthetic
sensibilities. Draco had heard from Blaise that Harry�s friend Granger got on
well with Lori, though trying to make Lori do anything political was
impossible.

�� With that,
he stepped out of the darkly glowing entrance hall and into the Perpetual
Party.

�� Lori Porter
was the last of a long and distinguished pure-blood line who had been interested
in accumulating money instead of power, and were widely suspected of having
used Time-Turners to travel back and start accounts in multiple banks around
the world. Or so the rumor went. No one Draco knew had ever pretended to have
uncovered the source of the Porters� enormous wealth. Apparently, the people
Lori dealt with were only concerned that she had it.

�� Lori had
decided that she didn�t want to marry, have children, or dabble in politics,
which left attending parties as the only respectable activities for someone of
her family�s age and rank. But leaving one party to attend another bored her,
so she simply started a single large festival in her house and left it going at
all times. When she wanted, she could leave and rest; her guests were happy to
eat, drink, dance, gossip, and listen to music without her, and her human
attendants traded shifts throughout the day to welcome them.

�� The
Perpetual Party had started two years before Draco left England. He wondered
idly if it would ever stop. Of course, there was no reason it should as long as
Lori had the money and the interest. Who said that every pure-blood had to be
ambitious and sophisticated? Draco�s class needed its clowns as much as the
Muggleborns did.

�� He paused
thoughtfully, and wondered if that was one reason for Harry�s request to meet
him here, which had rather surprised Draco at first.

�� For the
present, Lori had adopted an underwater motif. More dark green hangings covered
the walls, blending with dark blue hangings and elaborate murals of waves and
aqua tiles and the largest ultramarines Draco had ever seen. Fish swam past his
face, well-done illusions of angelfish and dolphins and the occasional shark.
Shells crunched under his feet; Draco glanced down and saw that the entire
floor had been redone in them. Sparks of golden magic arched up and renewed the
shells as each top layer was crushed.

�� Lori held
court on a coral throne in the middle of a circle of adoring men and women.
She�d grown her golden hair long, and a siren�s tail had replaced her legs.
Draco shook his head. Knowing how far Lori would go in pursuit of a conceit,
that might even be a real Transfiguration, instead of simply glamour.

�� Draco.
Thank Merlin.�

�� Draco
turned around in some concern, wondering if Harry had been harassed by people
who recognized him. But Harry simply smiled at him, a brilliant flash that made
Draco feel more dazzled than the ultramarines had, and linked his arm through
Draco�s. �Come on. I think the food without experimental potions in it is over
here.�

�� Draco
laughed and let himself be led. He was exulting in the thought of the picture
they must present, and still more in the fact that the admiration they
attracted at the Perpetual Party was likely to be entirely aesthetic. He didn�t
want Harry to feel pressured to perform today. �Had the experience of waking up
with your cock gone invisible, have you?�

�� Harry
snorted. �No, but it does take an awfully long time to stop thinking one is a
sea turtle when one�s been wallowing on the floor half the morning.�

�� The
sideboard of �traditional� food ran along most of the far western wall of the
room. The majority of it was seafood, Draco noticed, and the water tasted
salty. For all that, he managed to achieve a satisfactory plate of frogs� legs,
lobster, and oysters. Harry slapped a thick piece of salmon between two slices
of bread that he�d found Merlin knew where and took a large gulp of salty
water. Draco winced.

�� Harry met
his eyes with a challenging gaze. �What, I�m not being dainty enough for you?�

�� Draco
carefully shook his head. �It has nothing to do with that,� he said truthfully.
�I was wondering how you were able to drink all that salt without wincing.�

�� I�ve been
here long enough to develop a taste for this,� Harry admitted. �Porter�s had
the same motif for the last six months.� He took an enormous bite of fish, and
then ate it delicately enough, never opening his mouth, which Draco thought was
more than he would have managed. �And saltwater tastes better than the flattery
that I�ve had to pour on Emma Lansby�s head for the past eight hours.� He
tilted his head back to rest against the wall and closed his eyes. A sunfish
swam past his forehead.

�� Hard
work?� Draco murmured. Yes, it was redundant, when he could already see the
effects of that fatigue in Harry�s face, but it gave Harry a chance to complain,
which Draco thought was principally what he wanted.

�� You have
no idea.� Harry pried open an eye and snorted. �Did you know that all the blood
purists in Britain are waiting on her orders? And that she could have Ernest Poppycock
assassinated soundlessly in the middle of the night, and people would only
quake in fear of her instead of trying to retaliate? Never mind that she would
have taken over the country already if she had anything near that kind of
power. Imagine trying to act as if you believe that.�

�� Draco
winced again, but more sincerely this time. �I�m surprised that you chose to
come here, after that,� he said, moving on to what he had wondered about when
he first stepped into the Perpetual Party. �Haven�t you had enough of blood
politics and polite manners for one day?�

�� Blood
politics isn�t the same as the presence of pure-bloods,� Harry said. �And I
knew that any pub I could go out to tonight, even with my friends, would only
involve me in the politics again.� He used his free hand, the one not clutching
the dripping sandwich, to make a slashing gesture around the room. �No one
talks about that kind of thing here.�

�� But
they�re still pure-blood,� said Draco. �I�m�surprised that you haven�t become
sick of us all after having to deal with people like Lansby.�

�� Harry met
his eyes, and said, unsmiling, �I like some pure-bloods.�

�� Draco
caught his breath, and felt warmth like sunlight move through him.

�� Not to
mention,� Harry added, �that I like some of their manners and their customs,
too. Some, not all. Maybe thirty
percent.� He looked around the Perpetual Party and the whirling, laughing,
munching, talking crowd. �I wanted to come to a place where I could see beauty
and be around people who are far too polite and interested in other things to
mention politics when they realize that you don�t want to talk about them.�

�� Draco felt
as though someone had picked him up like a rug and beaten most of the tension
out of him. So Harry did recognize
that he could like pure-blood customs and manners separately from the people
who made such great nuisances of themselves in his daily life. And obviously
not everyone was a nuisance, given that he had just acknowledged Draco�s family
background.

�� He wished
he could say something back. Appearing at the Three Broomsticks with Harry last
night was the beginning of showing Harry that Draco wanted to be comfortable in
his world, too, but he didn�t know it nearly as well as Harry knew this one. He
had no idea what an appropriate gesture would be.

�� Then he
decided that, since Harry had chosen to come to this party instead of being
forced to do it by the exigencies of his job, and since he had mentioned a
liking for beauty, Draco might as well act like a pure-blood for tonight. He
held out his hand. �Do you care to dance?�

�� Harry gave
him a startled look, but quickly it became a smile. He finished his fish
sandwich, handed his cup of salty water to an attendant who conveniently
appeared just when he was wanted�as they always did�and then clasped Draco�s
fingers. �Let�s.�

�� The music
was constantly changing, and various kinds clashed with one another, so that
one only had to choose the part of the room that suited one�s mood. Draco saw
couples doing waltzes, pavanes, wild dances that had no name he knew, and
dancing that was practically sex with clothes on. He wondered which one Harry
would choose.

�� Harry
dragged him straight to one of the places where gentler music played, and began
to pull Draco through a slow pavane. Draco adjusted at once, and placed a
possessive hand on Harry�s back, just so that no one else would think they had
the right to interrupt.

�� Harry
smiled at him with half-open eyes and sighed as the music swirled upwards,
tugging Draco�s imagination with it. He watched as light sparked off Harry�s
robes�red and gold, and still tasteful, for a miracle�and thought about how
soon he�d be able to pull them off. He watched the graceful motions of Harry�s
feet and thought about how long it had taken him to learn to dance like this.

�� He could
still remember the schoolboy who had floundered around the dance floor at the
Yule Ball and taunted him, if he tried. But the reality of the strong,
confident man in front of him melted through the fancies and sent them
spinning. This was the man he
desired.

�� He thought
about how soon they could go to bed.

�� Harry
leaned forwards and pressed his lips to Draco�s again as the dance music
finished. Draco stroked a hand through his hair and slipped his tongue between
Harry�s easily parted lips. The kiss lasted longer than the one the previous
night had, and was more thoughtful and considered, Draco thought.

�� It also
made him pant harder. He surged forwards, pressing his erection into Harry�s
waiting one. Harry gasped, his mouth falling open wider. Then he shook his head
and stepped away.

�� Not yet,�
he murmured. �I�m too tired tonight to be of any use to you.�

�� Draco
recognized the excuse for what it was, but he could still bow and then escort
Harry off the dance floor and go on talking, because he also recognized that
the reality of Harry meant he wouldn�t allow himself to back away forever.

*

�� Harry paced
his front room, filled with energy that he was startled to possess after today.
If nothing else, the dances he�d had with Draco should have released it and
made him collapse into bed with a sense of gratitude.

�� Instead, he
paced, and his robes swung around his ankles and hissed on the carpet the way
he would have liked to hiss at Lansby.

�� Then he
gave in and ducked into his bedroom, dragging off the robes as he went and
letting them fall to the floor. Any small tears or dust motes that they picked
up would be easy enough to clean off later. At the moment, what Harry needed
most was to quell the fire dancing up and down with short, sharp jabs in his
abdomen.

�� Draco.

�� He seemed
to be everywhere around Harry, though Harry clearly remembered walking away
from him at the Perpetual Party less than an hour ago. His face was bright with
laughter when he didn�t remember to control it, and with other flickering,
suppressed emotions that Harry wanted to learn how to read. Just because he
understood the culture of the pure-bloods didn�t mean that he understood every
individual within it.

�� He fell on
the bed and reached out, stripping off his pants with one impatient hand so
that he could get the other on his cock sooner.

�� Ah, Draco. Draco. He moaned the name
aloud, although that didn�t have quite the same resonance as the word did in
his thoughts. His hand jolted up and then down, almost painfully abrupt. He tried
once to stop himself and be a little gentler, but that didn�t work. His hand
sped up again as if of its own volition.

�� He thought
of the way Draco had moved in the dance, the way he had darted looks at Harry
with the same fascination that Harry had used on him, the way his hand had
settled on Harry�s back and he didn�t seem happy when it wasn�t there. He
thought of the swinging, swaying hair, the slightly parted lips, the very
slight lift of his chin when someone looked too hard at him. Harry bet that
Draco didn�t even know he made that last gesture, as if he were daring the
world to find fault with him because he had done a few stupid things once.

�� The flashes
of fire in his gut roiled and burst into flame.

�� Harry
arched his back and grunted as he came. The pleasure continued longer than it
should have, fine details of Draco�s language and face and personality
traveling through his memory one by one and then lingering there.

�� Harry fell
limp and tired at last, and barely managed the Cleaning Charms that folded up
the robes and dusted them and removed the semen from his thighs and hand. As he
curled up on top of the sheets, too tired to get under them, he thought quite
distinctly, It�s a fine thing to be such
a good observer that I can wank to what I notice about someone.

�� And I�m sure Draco will be flattered when I
tell him that he gave me sweet dreams.

*

�� Point of
Tears: Thank you! Kingsley doesn�t really have a sinister reason for ordering
Harry away from Draco; he�s simply got used to Harry doing whatever he�s told.

�� butterpie: What
upset Harry was Kingsley, though this is hinted at rather than outright
explained since most of the date is in Draco�s POV. As you said, it doesn�t
have the results that he wanted when trying to order Harry away from Draco. But
now Harry is moving in Draco�s direction on his own.

�� Blood Lust
777: Thanks for reviewing!

�� MewMew2:
Thank you!

�� SecondStoreyStairwell:
Well, thank you. I hope the story continues to please.

�� SP777: I
concentrated more on sexual flirtation at first because I feel I�m poorer at
that, and the only way to get better at it is to do it. But I�m glad to include
the more tender moments, too.

�� Thrnbrooke:
Thank you!
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Company Manners