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Most Favourite Bedtime Story	By : Sasunarufan13 Category: Harry Potter > Slash - Male/Male > Harry/Draco Views: 10153 -:- Recommendations : 1 -:- Currently Reading : 3
Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter nor make profit of it. J.K. Rowling owns it.

Chapter List
- 5
- 6
- 7
Author's note: Apologies for the delay! I had to do some research for this story and that was difficult to combine with my exams. This weekend was kind of exhausting as well, but I pushed through to finally update this story again! Once again, my apologies for the delay!
Thanks to the following reviewers: Smile317 (I'm not giving up on this story, you can be sure of that. Your message was truly one of the sweetest I've ever received and really lifted up my spirits, so thank you!) and Jan
Warnings: Hm, nothing special
I hope you'll like this chapter!
Chapter 6
Now knowing that Draco could send presents through his wards Harry wasn't that freaked out by the presence of the carnation. Surprised, yes, but not freaked out anymore and he couldn't supress a smile when he picked up the flower and carefully touched its red petals.
There was probably some sort of meaning behind it; if Draco had just wanted to send flowers, he would have gone for the traditional roses most likely. That it was a carnation instead told Harry that this had to mean something but for now he was content to just appreciate the flower.
After placing it in a vase, he took a quick shower, wanting to be in the Great Hall before too many students would try to clamp onto him and ask questions about their classes. He liked teaching, but some of the students really didn't understand that professors liked to be left alone when eating unless it was literally a life or death situation. With Voldemort no longer amongst the living, there was no life or death situations anymore and so Harry preferred to eat his breakfast in peace instead of trying to explain once again to one of his fifth years students why trying to blow up a Boggart wouldn't work.
He was pretty sure he hadn't been this bad as student nor had anyone else been from his year – and he had been in the same year as Neville who held the dubious record of melting down the most cauldrons in the history of Hogwarts.
Right as he was about to leave his quarters, a glistening in the corner of his eye caught his attention and he uttered a noise of surprise when a bright white daffodil of all flowers appeared on the table. Mystified he picked it up and stared at it for a bit. A carnation and a daffodil? Talk about a curious combination. Now he was becoming intrigued about the meanings behind them.
The daffodil joined the carnation and he made his way to the Great Hall, nodding in greeting at some sleepy students and stepping aside to avoid being splattered by a mud ball, courtesy of Peeves, who hissed angrily and turned upside down in the air, glaring at him balefully.
"Better luck next time, Peeves," Harry said pleasantly, using his wand to clean up the mud from the wall.
"Potty is as always very annoying, yes he is," Peeves said irritated. "Can't let poor Peeves have fun."
"If you want fun, why not go to the third floor?" Harry suggested innocently, putting his wand away.
Black eyes narrowed suspiciously. "Why, what's there?"
"The Bloody Baron. Think he's looking for you," Harry said cheerfully, his grin widening when Peeves cursed loudly and instantly disappeared.
Good thing that threat never failed.
Draco was already eating breakfast when Harry arrived and he nodded at him in greeting. "Good morning, did you encounter Peeves?"
"Yeah, he tried to throw mud on me. He tried the same thing to you?" Harry questioned curiously, reaching out to fill his mug with coffee.
"No, he attempted to flood the dungeons," Draco replied dryly. "Unfortunately for him, I caught him and the Bloody Baron was nearby too."
"How was he even going to try to flood the place?" Harry asked mystified. There weren't any toilets except for the dorm area, so what had been his plan?
"He was trying to break one of the walls in the hopes of hitting a pipe."
"Well, you can't say he isn't creative," Harry muttered and spread toast on his butter, nodding at McGonagall when she passed by him on her way to her own chair.
"He can be creative somewhere else then," the blond said dismissively.
Harry snorted quietly before deciding to change the subject. "Got the flowers by the way."
"Yeah?" Draco's smile was faint. "You like them?"
"Of course, who doesn't like flowers? What's their meaning, though?"
Grey eyes glinted when Draco glanced at him. "Why are you assuming that they mean something?"
"Because it's you who sent them and there's no way you're just going to randomly sent a carnation and a daffodil," Harry replied deadpanned. "If you just wanted to give me flowers, you would have gone for roses."
"Now that's rather cliché," Draco told him amused.
"But true, no?"
The other man inclined his head. "Maybe you should have gone for an Auror career after all; you definitely have a knack for sniffing out mysteries."
"Come off it." Harry rolled his eyes, but couldn't help but smile. "So, what do they mean?"
Draco rose up, having finished his breakfast, and winked. "Why don't you try to find out?" he smirked and his hand brushing over Harry's shoulder was fleeting, almost not tangible at all.
Yet at the same time that spot seemed to burn with his touch, imprinting him with invisible heat and Harry's eyes remained glued onto Draco's back as the Potions professor leisurely walked out of the Great Hall. Before he left, he turned his head slightly once more and the smile he offered was almost teasing, sending a bolt of electricity almost through Harry.
"You look to be in a fine mood this morning, Harry," McGonagall said good-naturedly, pulling him out of his reverie.
"Hm? Well, I did sleep well last night," he said lightly. "That makes even the worst of Mondays slightly more bearable, don't you think?"
"Speak for yourself," Sprout groused, hiding her grimace behind a large cup of coffee. "I've got a double dosage of Slytherins and Gryffindors together this morning; not even the best of sleeps can conquer that!"
"Come, come, Pomona, they're not so bad anymore!" Flitwick admonished her humming. "Why, I daresay they haven't been this easy in years!"
"Not living during a war will normally do that to you," McGonagall said dryly.
"Not so bad? Filius, just last week one of the Slytherins thought it would be funny to rip off the earmuffs of a Gryffindor whilst I was showing them how to repot Mandrake!" Sprout shot back annoyed. "I do not call that being easy!"
"My dear, there will always be some daring individuals, but truthfully, in my personal experience they're getting along much better nowadays," Flitwick said cheerfully.
"I caught two of them trying to duel each other in the corridor two weeks ago! Are you becoming senile in your old age, Filius?"
Harry decided this to be an opportune moment to leave; when Flitwick and Sprout started arguing they could go on for hours, a fact which had surprised him immensely at first considering the two of them were considered to be two of the most mild mannered professors at Hogwarts. He supposed even a rivalry between Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff existed, though.
If he wanted to avoid being dragged in the argument, however – and they would drag him into it soon, no doubt, as it had happened before – he would have to leave now. He ignored McGonagall's knowing look as he stood up, cramming the last bite of his toast in his mouth. There was no reason to look like that at him; he had a class to run in less than ten minutes after all.
And a new mystery to solve.
The mystery bit was ten times more interesting than his classes, though, he wouldn't deny that.
The third flower appeared on his desk during a break between two classes. It was a pink chrysanthemum; the colour delicate and perfect, not a single blemish in sight. One minute he had been going over his notes for the next class, the next sparkles in the corner of his eye had attracted his attention and the flower had shown up seemingly out of thin air.
A carnation, a daffodil and now a chrysanthemum. The third flower had him becoming even more intrigued, because there had to be some kind of pattern or meaning behind these flowers, but what was it? What was the link between all three of them?
He would need to visit the library after classes for sure. Considering how herbology was one of the main classes taught at Hogwarts, there had to be books available depicting the meaning of flowers. He could go directly to Sprout, seeing as she knew everything there was to know about plants, but it was an idea he discarded as soon as it rose up in his mind.
He didn't want anyone – aside from his friends, that was – to know that he and Draco had started dating each other, but most importantly: he wanted to be the one to solve the mystery. It was perhaps stupid, inane even, to insist on solving the mystery himself instead of keeping things easy, but this was something between him and Draco. The Veela was not telling the message behind these flowers on purpose, precisely because he knew how obsessed Harry could get with supposed mysteries. This was like a game between them and Harry didn't intend on losing it.
He would figure out what this collection of flowers meant, even if he had to channel Hermione and stay at the library for hours.
A fourth flower greeted him as he entered his quarters, feeling a bit drained after having had to break up a fight between some Ravenclaws and Slytherins. He still didn't know what had caused the fight, but the end result had been ugly with eight out of the ten students involved having to be escorted to the Hospital Wing. Madam Pomfrey hadn't been happy at all and he had managed to duck out of the wing just in time to avoid hearing her berating the group.
The other two students had been brought to Flitwick as they belonged to his House and judging by the look of his face, the usually jolly man was going to have some severe words with his students.
"So far the 'they're not so bad anymore' shtick," Harry muttered, rubbing a hand over his face.
They had been idiots to boot, holding the fight right in front of his classroom when they knew very well he was still in the room at that hour. At least he and Draco had tended to have their fights out of the teachers' range most of the time.
He found the flower on the table just like this morning and it felt like a déjà vu because again it was a white daffodil. The sight of it left him a bit stumped, to be honest, because even though he hadn't expected a fourth flower, he thought it would have been something different again. Did this mean that he could expect a second carnation and a second chrysanthemum?
He saw the note only when he picked up the daffodil. It was folded neatly in two, too short to be an actual letter and he opened it curiously.
Think you can figure out what these four flowers mean?
It wasn't signed, but it didn't take a genius to know that this note had been sent by Draco. Harry thought it was safe to assume that there wouldn't be any other flowers forthcoming – for now at least – because why else sent a note now? The Veela hadn't done so with the previous three, so him sending a note now had to mean that Harry wouldn't have to expect duplicates of the others, right?
In that case the presence of the two daffodils made everything only more intriguing, because why sent two of those but only one of the other two?
"You're having way too much fun with this, you git," he muttered, but couldn't really stamp down the excitement brewing in the pit of his stomach.
It had been a while since he last had to solve a good mystery. Fortunately this time, it was a mystery he would enjoy solving as opposed to the previous ones, which usually had ended with him landing into trouble.
Of course some would say that dating Draco of all people might lead to trouble too, but well … Harry had never been good at staying out of trouble after all.
Madam Pince barely looked up when he strode past her desk. While she might watch students like a hawk whenever they dared to touch one of her precious books, she was more lenient towards professors, most likely assuming that adults would know better than to defile a book.
All the same, he knew he would have only two hours at most before she would kick him out, because professor or not, the library's closing hour was a closing hour for everyone and she adhered to that strictly.
He selected three books which looked the most promising in the herbology section and made his way to one of the more private nooks of the library. It was in a rather dark corner, hidden away behind an aisle of stuffy old history books and barely any student sought out this place, which made it the perfect spot for Harry. He liked his students, but some of them were incredibly nosy and he knew all too well how fast rumours could spread in this school. The last thing he needed was to be badgered about why he would need to know the meaning of flowers. Especially the girls could be a tad too insistent with their questions.
Moving two books to the side for now, he opened the first one on the index page and traced the list down until he found Carnation. It was the first flower he had received, so he thought it fitting if he looked up the meaning behind that one first.
The book was rather blunt in its descriptions, which Harry appreciated even when it left him with his cheeks slightly burning as he read the section underneath Carnations and its Colours: What Do They Mean?
"When one wants to know the meaning behind the carnation, one has to pay utmost attention to its colour, for even a lighter shade of the same colour can confer a vastly different meaning. … It should come to nobody's surprise that … Dark red carnations are especially the right choice when one wants to convey their deepest love and affection for their loved one."
"Right, should have seen that one coming." Harry cleared his throat and rubbed his left cheek, a tad annoyed at how hot his skin felt.
It was a bit presumptuous of Draco to send a flower with that kind of meaning already when they had only just started the courtship, but he assumed he shouldn't have expected anything less from the Veela. It was clear that Draco was serious about this and mates tended to stay together their whole life, so would it really be that strange if he already sent flowers with that kind of deep meaning attached to it? To other people: most likely yes. But Draco was a Veela and they couldn't be compared to non Veela people.
He looked up daffodil next, focusing on the white colour and raised an eyebrow at the information.
"While the daffodil symbolises rebirth and new beginnings, its colours have their own meanings as well. Yellow daffodils are used to show … White daffodils, on the other hand, stand for peace, neutrality, innocence, spirituality and purity; a contrast with the yellow colour."
Well, that was completely different. He frowned, reading the passage again. Maybe the daffodil in this case was meant to represent the whole new beginning aspect? Peace seemed like an odd choice after Draco had selected a flower meaning love. But why sent two daffodils in the same colour even?
Shaking his head, he flipped through the pages until he found the part about the chrysanthemum. This list of colours was a tad more extensive, considering how many difficult colours the flower could have.
"When one is tired of going for the age old cliché of using roses, one can always choose pink chrysanthemums. The pink colour represents gentle affection, attraction and romance. It is a perfect choice when one gifts it to a first date or a new love. It certainly is more creative than …"
Now he was even more confused. Leaning back, he stared at the page, studying the drawing of the chrysanthemum. So he had two flowers representing romance with colours similar to each other and one either presenting a new beginning or something like purity. Two had a link with each other, the third not so much. And why gift him two daffodils, but only one carnation and one chrysanthemum? Considering their meanings, he would have expected Draco to give him two carnations or two chrysanthemums instead.
Was he missing something still? He didn't really think so. The meanings sort of added up, one more than the other, and he wanted to get up and tell Draco he had solved the mystery, but something held him back.
It was the same something nagging at him that he was missing something majorly, something that would actually tie all four flowers together and even explain why Draco had chosen two daffodils of all flowers to present twice. But what? What could he still be missing?
Or was he looking too deeply into this, after all? Was he looking for meanings when they weren't there? He didn't think that was the case, because why would Draco otherwise have told him to solve the mystery? To mess with him? Possible, but he had to know that could potentially backfire. Would he really risk making fun of Harry this early into the courtship when he couldn't be certain yet that Harry would find it equally as funny? Veela were supposed to be very serious about their courtship and Draco didn't look like he would be deviating from that norm.
So he had to be missing something, something that was more than just the meaning behind the flowers or the colours. If not the meaning behind the colour or the flower itself, though, what else could it be? What else could flowers possibly represent?
Back and forth he went between the indexes of the three flowers, rereading every passage again and again until the letters started dancing in front of his eyes. He opened the other books and read the information in those as well, though predictably they offered much of the information that the first book contained.
From carnation to chrysanthemum to daffodil and back. From the dry information about their ideal growth places and origins to the meaning behind their colours and …
His eyes widened and he caught himself before he would slam the book down and call Madam Pince's ire upon him. There it was: the actual meaning behind the flowers, one he had overlooked several times when reading the passages, because it hadn't rung any bell immediately.
Now it did, though, and he bit down on his finger to keep himself from laughing aloud. He guessed he could never claim that Draco couldn't be original. He now knew what to do.
"The Ministry is really missing out on one hell of an Auror, I'd say," Draco's voice floated over to him from the entrance of the classroom.
Harry huffed a quiet laugh and straightened up from where he had been dragging the last desk back to its designated spot. "Careful now, Draco, or else I'll start thinking you prefer me away from Hogwarts and into the battlefield again."
"Knowing your foul luck, you'd end up at Saint Mungos on the first day," Draco drawled.
Harry turned around, resting his hands behind him on the desk. Eyeing the light pink aster and the Lily of the Valley he'd persuaded Sprout to let him take from the greenhouses, he commented, "I see you've got my flowers."
"Hm." Draco drew closer, twirling the two flowers between his fingers. "Not to offend you, but I hadn't expected you to be able to figure it out this quickly."
"I didn't at first," Harry admitted. "I was too fixated on the meaning behind the flowers at first to consider any other meaning."
"So what made you land on the right explanation then?" Draco halted less than two feet away from him. His robes were pristine even after a full day spent behind cauldrons and Harry idly wondered whether he had changed his robes before coming to find him.
"The fact that you sent me two daffodils." Harry shrugged and tilted his head to the left. "I thought that was strange, especially considering their meaning. I figured that if you really were going for the colour meaning, you would have sent me two carnations or two chrysanthemums instead. You went for two daffodils and that's what made me look further. The birth months of my parents, Sirius and Remus – how did you know?"
It had been a detail he had overlooked time and time again when he had been browsing through the books. As it turned out, it was that small detail that created the link between the four flowers finally. Carnation was the flower of the month January – when his mother was born. Daffodil was March's flower – the same month in which his dad and Remus shared a birthday. Chrysanthemum was the flower of November; the same month his godfather had had his birthday in.
"I did some digging in old records," Draco replied lightly as if going through the trouble of looking up the birthdays of Sirius, Remus and Harry's parents had been nothing at all. "How did you know my parents' birthdays?"
"Some digging in old records," Harry retorted teasingly and Draco's smile widened just a tad.
"I didn't expect you to get one representing my father as well," the blond remarked then, almost casually but his eyes were sharp.
Harry rolled his shoulders and sighed. "Yes well, I might not like the man, but he's still your father."
"Do you think you could ever meet him? In a more official manner, that is."
The dark haired man raised an eyebrow. "Depends. Is he still likely to curse me?"
"Not unless he wants to face both me and mother," Draco smiled thinly. "Trust me, he knows better than to want that."
"Does your mother know about us?" Harry asked curiously, realising that this was the first time they were actually discussing Draco's parents. He hadn't thought about Narcissa and Lucius in years, but with Draco courting him there would come a day when he would meet those two again. Wouldn't that be an interesting experience?
"If she did, she would have been here before you would have found the first flower even," Draco scoffed.
"She doesn't know anything at all?" Harry asked sceptically. Somehow he had a feeling that was untrue.
"Well … She knows I'm courting someone," Draco admitted begrudgingly. "Just not who yet."
"Why not? You think she'll react badly?" Lucius probably would, given their history together.
"No, I just want you to myself for at least a little while before she hooks her claws into you," Draco answered dryly. "She can be a bit … overwhelming at times."
"So you're sparing me for now?" Harry questioned amused.
"Potter, you'll be thankful for that reprieve once you meet her, I promise."
"I'll take your word for it," Harry chuckled. He nibbled on his lip. "Thanks for the flowers. I didn't think you would go for a meaning like that."
He hadn't expected the Veela to do anything with regards to his family at all, given that they were all dead by now, but the gesture was sweet even while wholly unexpected.
"I don't know who you all dated before, but of course I'm going to be original with my gifts. I'm not going to be as plebian as to centre all my presents around the colour green or so, please," Draco scoffed and wrinkled his nose. "I have class."
"So I won't ever get a green gem from you?" Harry teased.
"I didn't say that." Suddenly Draco was right in front of him, his eyes glittering as he stroked Harry's cheek with the aster. "But when I give you one, it'll be meaningful and not gaudy."
"I take your word for it," Harry choked out, a tad overwhelmed at how close Draco suddenly stood. He could practically feel his body heat radiating through his clothes and he fought the insane desire to touch his chest and feel whether he really was that warm or whether he was just imagining things.
"With that said, make sure you're well rested for Saturday," Draco said and stepped back.
"Why?"
The mischievous smirk Draco gifted him sent blood rushing to his cheeks. "Because I'm taking you out on our first date."
When Harry went to bed later that evening, a single larkspur was awaiting him on his pillow. He grinned and added it to the vase with the others.
He couldn't wait for Saturday to arrive.
AN2: I took some liberties with flowers for the birth months of Narcissa and Lucius, seeing as I couldn't find their actual birthday. I hope it wasn't too awful! I'm now off to bed because it's already nearly three in the morning here and I'm so going to regret this when I wake up. (Do not follow my example, you will regret it)
Please leave your thoughts behind in a review; should you spot any mistakes, please point them out to me.
I hope to see you all back in the next chapter! Please stay safe and take care of yourselves!
Cuddles
Melissa
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