Adult-FanFiction.org : Harry Potter

Bard of Morning's Hope	By : Lomonaaeren Category: Harry Potter > Slash - Male/Male > Harry/Draco Views: 9573 -:- Recommendations : 1 -:- Currently Reading : 2
Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter and am not making any money from this story.

Chapter List
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Thank you again for all the reviews!
Chapter Six—Unwanted Answers
            “So Ron tells me that you have a problem,” said Hermione, and swept her cloak behind her, sitting down with a flourish in the largest chair at the table.
            Harry grinned and leaned back with his legs crossed, one foot on the table, because he enjoyed what happened when he did that. He received a glare harsh enough to nearly roast the wood, and certainly his leg. He blinked tamely at Hermione and dropped his foot to the floor, looking up at her from beneath his eyelashes.
            “I wish you wouldn’t do that,” said Hermione, with a shake of her head that seemed to accuse herself of indulging him as much as it accused Harry of indulging in horrid behavior. “It’s disgusting to have a shoe up on the table.” She brightened. “Did you know how many germs there are on the bottoms of shoes? And then you track them through all the mud and put them on the table, and, combined with the loose magic you have trailing around you—”
            Harry rolled his eyes and raised one hand. “All right, Hermione, that’ll do.”
            “But I hadn’t even got to the connection with dragonpox yet,” Hermione muttered, eyes glinting, and peered at him around her hand the way Harry had around his shoe.
            Harry had to laugh, because the games he and Hermione played with each other were fun, now that they were no longer kids in school and taking either Voldemort or their academic reputation deathly seriously. Hermione was the one who had discovered a connection between several magical diseases and the “loose magic” that many wizards and witches trailed around after them, collecting Muggle germs and transforming them. For nearly a month after that first discovery, she had admonished Harry and Ron all the time to finish their casting movements neatly instead of just letting them trail off into big sloppy gestures, and speak their incantations clearly instead of muttering them. Otherwise, the magic would linger around a wizard’s body and make them more likely to get sick.
            Now, she was past that stage, and Harry enjoyed teasing her about it. And being teased back.
            “Not a huge problem,” Harry said, and sipped from his tea again before he put his mug down on the table in front of him. “But the Bard did come through the wards last night, and tried to attack Narcissa Malfoy.”
            Hermione opened her mouth, then sat up straight. “You said tried.”
            Harry nodded. “Well, I suppose I should say that the attack did happen, but she survived, and the Bard faltered for some unknown reason.” He bent down beside him and picked up the blood-splattered Transfigured shawl. “I wondered if you could take a look at this and tell me about any spells lingering on it.”
            Hermione drew her wand and cast a spell that surrounded the shawl with a silvery orb of power. Hermione exclaimed softly, and then sank into a wide-eyed trance, gaze locked on the shawl and never deviating.
            Harry smiled. Hermione had been invited to join the Unspeakables, but she had ended up in a unique position, floating between them, the Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures, and the Ministry legal departments. She did plenty of legal work, but also spell creation, theory research, and investigation of artifacts deemed Light enough to leave the protective custody of the Department of Mysteries.
            And right now, Harry trusted her more than any other to tell him about what evidence the Bard might have left behind.
            “There is strength here,” Hermione whispered. “Loose magic. It’s just unlike any kind of magic I’ve seen before.”
            Harry shook his head, both amused and dismayed. At least that gave them a good reason none of them had been able to capture the Bard before, but it didn’t exactly promise reassurance about whether they would be able to do so in the future. “What’s different about it?”
            Hermione shot him an uncertain glance. “It’s going to be hard to explain to someone whose magical theory background isn’t up to par.”
            Harry propped his chin on his hand and gave her a dangerous smile. “Try me.”
            “All right,” said Hermione, and her eyes were challenging right back. “The magic here is a lot looser than normal. Whoever cast this spell was trying to turn the shawl not just into a handkerchief, but also a murder weapon. That’s why there’s blood. They were doing a Transfiguration that wasn’t complete yet. This wasn’t suffocation. I think they were trying to turn Mrs. Malfoy herself into blood.”
            Harry shuddered. That was how one of the Bard’s earlier victims had died, transformed into blood that had melted into the bed. At least that confirmed it was more likely to be the Bard, and not some other kind of danger. “But they’re a sloppy caster?”
            “They have to be, if the magic is that loose,” said Hermione and shook her head. “Except with Transfiguration. Transfiguration is tighter. The weaves are bound around the body or object, and rotate it, and make—”
            Harry let a few sentences wash over him. Then he said, “Is the looseness the only unusual thing?”
            “No,” said Hermione, and she was really frowning now. “It feels like the Bard’s been dabbling in ice magic. There’s a kind of signature, here, that you only get with that magic.” She laid her palm on the side of the Transfigured shawl. “But on the other hand, that magic is fleeting except in arctic environments, because ice does melt. Most of the time, someone could cast a powerful ice spell and then move on to casting something else weaker, and that other spell would completely obscure the ice signature.” She looked hesitantly at Harry.
            Harry sat up. “Lucius Malfoy died because he was Transfigured into an ice statue that melted. And the Bard’s signature on the wall was in ice.”
            “That could have been enough, maybe,” Hermione hedged. “But that would depend on the person not casting any magic since then, and surely they’d have to use magic to get through your wards and Transfigure the shawl…”
            “You have an idea,” said Harry, narrowing his eyes at her. “Spit it out.”
            “It’s not something that I’m trying to keep from you because I think you wouldn’t react well,” said Hermione.
            Harry nodded, appeased. He and Hermione had gone through a period like that immediately after Hermione had been offered the Unspeakable job, and Harry had finally had to make it clear that he would rather know the truth even if it was uncomfortable or seemingly immoral. He trusted Hermione. He knew she wouldn’t do anything without excellent reasons. He had to know the reasons if he wanted to argue with her, or agree.
            “I think it’s possible this is a magical, animated curse, instead of a person,” said Hermione, and leaned towards him when Harry opened his mouth. Since he wasn’t even sure what he was going to say, Harry relaxed and listened. “It would explain a lot of things. The curse isn’t affected by wards because the wards are meant to keep people out, or at least magical creatures. It strikes viciously and without mercy because it can’t feel any.”
            “But it would still depend on someone casting the curse,” Harry said. He remembered, vaguely, learning about curses that had got detached from an object and wandered around attacking people in his first year of Auror training, but they always struck randomly or hit anyone who came into a certain place. “This is too focused. It only strikes Death Eaters and other people on Voldemort’s side who were at the Battle of Hogwarts.”
            “I know,” said Hermione. “But I’m saying that that person who cast it isn’t the one who’s kept it going now. Maybe that person is in St. Mungo’s, catatonic. Maybe they were wounded in the battle and later died of their wounds. Or maybe it’s someone who made it happen through accidental magic and doesn’t even remember now what they wished for.”
            Harry considered that, frowning. It was true that accidental magic could accomplish some amazing things. He knew, now, how rare it was to Apparate when a magical child was still as young as he’d been when he did it, and blowing up his aunt was something he didn’t think he could do now. But something still rang wrong about the theory to him.
            “The deaths are so deliberate,” he said. “So varied. I’d find it easier to believe it was a curse if all the deaths were the same.”
            “Well, let me take the shawl with me and I might be able to answer more of your questions,” Hermione said, reaching out and gathering it up. “At least, there are artifacts in the Department that can read magical signatures more precisely than I can. Maybe they’ll be able to sense something on it besides the ice magic.”
            “All right,” said Harry, and sat back and watched Hermione stand with a sigh. “Working too hard?”
            “It was a long night,” Hermione admitted. “One of those things you’re not supposed to know about got out of its cage.”
            “Then go home and rest first,” said Harry.
            Hermione eyed him. “It’s not that urgent even though you had an attack here last night?”
            “I want you to be rested so you’re not making mistakes,” Harry said, standing up and coming around the table to hug her. “That’s the urgent thing right now.”
*
            There’s no way that Potter will listen to me about my suspicions, not when he trusts her that disgustingly much.
            Draco could feel his hands digging into the wall behind him, but that still hurt less than the smile he saw on Granger’s face as she stepped away from Potter and made some light joke, heading towards the door. Potter laughed and waved after her, and stood there smiling until the door shut. Then he began moving around the table, gathering up the remains of his breakfast. And hers.
            Did he not want me to know she was here? Draco put up his back and advanced slowly down the staircase. He would act ignorant if he had to, but at the moment, keeping Potter from suspecting the secrets Draco held was even more urgent.
            “Good morning, Malfoy,” Potter said when Draco’s foot was an inch from the bottom of the last step.
            Draco froze for a second, wondering if Potter had known he was there all along, or had only heard him when he came down the last few creaky stairs. But as long as Draco didn’t have to refer directly to Granger, he wouldn’t. “Good morning,” he said stiffly, and walked around the kitchen table to pick up a cup for himself. He would cast some subtle detection spells on it, to make sure that Granger hadn’t left poison behind. “I thought you were going to stay in the room with us during the night?”
            “I did,” said Potter, and gave him a baffled look. “Did you not sense me?”
            “I mean you weren’t there when I woke up this morning,” said Draco, wondering how Potter had already managed to wrongfoot him. “And if the Bard had attacked again, you wouldn’t have been there to save us.”
            Potter gave him a thin smile. “I stayed awake the rest of the night, with a spell called the Constant Vigilance Curse.” He went on before Draco could ask why he would cast a curse on himself. “And I added something else to the wards.”
            “Like the other thing you added that stood us in such good stead?” Draco sneered.
            Potter only blinked gravely at him. “This particular addition will warn me every time something crosses the wards.”
            Draco frowned in thought. “Including—”
            “Anything alive,” said Potter. “Including birds and insects. It’s good that the Constant Vigilance Curse won’t let me sleep anyway.” He began to run hot water into the cups in the sink, keeping his back turned to Draco as if he didn’t want to meet his eyes and see the suspicion of Granger there.
            But I haven’t said anything about it yet, so he can’t know I feel it. Unless he suspects Granger himself. Draco was also confident that Potter couldn’t have read anything accidentally out of his head, either. Potter had never been that good with Legilimency, from what Professor Snape had told Draco.
            “Why do you call a spell that you’re using to defend us a curse?” Draco cast a small detection spell on the sausages that waited under a smoldering Warming Charm. The house-elf had probably made them, but still.
            “Because when it’s cast on someone without Auror training, they start and leap at every sound,” said Potter easily. “It won’t let them sleep. It can drive them mad, or at least to hallucinations.” He turned around from the sink and smiled at Draco. “When someone with Auror training uses it, it works more like a charm that sharpens their senses, and it simply means that they won’t fall asleep on the job.”
            As long as they stay in the same room as the job, Draco thought, and decided that he might as well approach one problem directly. “If the Bard doesn’t cross the wards, though, what good will the spell do?”
            “Well, now,” Potter said, and nodded his head at Draco’s breakfast. “If you want to finish eating and then wake your mother and have her come with us, there are some things I want to test. And show you.”
            Draco nearly choked, he inhaled the food so fast.
*
            “I wish to know what you will show us,” said Narcissa, in that pale silvery voice Harry was already growing used to from her.
            “Yeah, I should,” Harry said, and turned his hand palm upwards. When he thought about it, the silvery fire flickered there. He saw Malfoy move away from it out of the corner of his eye. Harry shrugged at him. “It’s not like I asked for or wanted this kind of magic, really.”
            “Are you ever going to tell us what it is?” Malfoy’s voice was a little shrill, and he kept his eyes locked on Harry’s hand.
            “It’s something I put up around the wards in hope that it would help keep the Bard away,” Harry said, and frowned at the wards again. As far as he could tell, they hadn’t been disturbed at all. That meant he would have to look at the sympathetic magic theory and how the Bard could have sneaked something inside his house.
            It had to have come with the Malfoys.
            Harry kept his face neutral, though, because while he thought he might persuade them to part with their clothes and so on, he didn’t know how he would persuade them to get rid of the keepsakes of Lucius, and said, “Watch.”
            The silvery fire bubbled up when he called on it, ringing the wards with a glistening, flickering radiance. Harry separated his hands and clenched them, and the fire dived down and wove in and out of the wards. Malfoy was watching with an open mouth. Narcissa looked as unimpressed as she always did. Harry had to admit that both reactions gave him a faint satisfaction.
            He finally called the silver fire back into him, grimacing at the slightly unpleasant taste on his lips as it branded its way into his mouth, and said, “This is a power that’s based on—well, on protection of Slytherins. I didn’t think it would let anything cross the wards that wanted to harm one. So we’re left with the chance that the Bard didn’t cross the wards. But I want you to help me look at them and make sure of that.”
            “What is it?” Malfoy whispered. “How did you get something intended for the protection of Slytherins?”
            Harry sighed. “When Snape died, I was there. He gave me some memories I had to have, memories that let me defeat Voldemort.” Malfoy forgot to flinch at the name, so intently was he watching Harry. “I watched the memories, and I thought that was it. But I’d touched the memories in their raw form, either when they came out of Snape or when I put them into the Pensieve, I don’t know which one. So I found myself with the ability to use this magic, sometimes. Only when it concerns the protection of Slytherins, really, or if I’m in absolute peril and something’s taken my wand away.”
            “I’ve never heard of that,” Malfoy said, and acted as if he was trying to stare a hole through Harry.
            Harry shrugged. “Neither had the Healers at St. Mungo’s. And it was a long time before I understood what I had. The way I got to your room so fast last night? This.” He held up one hand, and there was a sullen spark of silver fire for a moment before it died. “But it only functioned that way because I was trying to protect you.”
            “Or if you were in danger of dying,” Malfoy said. “Why? What kind of fondness did Snape hold for you, that his memories would protect you that way?”
            Harry stared at Malfoy in silence, and said nothing. That had been Snape’s secret, his vow and his fondness for Lily. He’d had to give it to Harry, but Harry could at least ensure that it went no further.
            After a moment, Malfoy seemed to realize he wouldn’t get anything else out of Harry. He turned a stiff, offended little shoulder and looked around at the wards. “You want to know how to strengthen them?”
            “I want you to recognize places in them that I might not see, thanks to my lack of Black blood,” said Harry, and nodded to Narcissa. “And if there’s anything else you can tell me, useful tricks, then of course you can add those as well.”
            Narcissa stood a little taller, slipping a different shawl down from her shoulders. “I can certainly do that.”
            Harry relaxed. He hoped that this collaboration would help to make them feel they were doing something useful as well as strengthen the wards.
            And, when they were done with it, maybe they would feel comfortable enough around him to listen when Harry asked them to send those little keepsakes of Lucius back to the Manor, just in case they were tainted.
*
SP777: Harry does suspect him, but he doesn’t think Dennis is smart or powerful enough to cast the Bard’s spells.
Kain: Hermione isn’t affiliated with the Muggleborn Legion. She’s more interested in making changes through reform, not revolution.
At this point, Harry isn’t all that worried about alienating the Legion, though he would prefer not to. He doesn’t think they’ll let them have access to their records, anyway, and he already has enough proof to convince him that Dennis was involved in a different kind of criminal activity. He sees them as enemies, not potential allies.
Hermione was interesting, I hope! And I can’t reveal much more of the answers right now than I did.
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Bard of Morning's Hope