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Veela-Struck	By : Lomonaaeren Category: Harry Potter > Slash - Male/Male > Harry/Draco Views: 52830 -:- Recommendations : 2 -:- Currently Reading : 2
Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, and I am making no money from this writing.

Chapter List
- 1-Veela-Struck
- 2-Changed
- 3-Thought-Through
- 4-Met
- 5-Challenged
- 6-Snapped
- 7-Struggled
- 8-Lost
- 9-Dazed
- 10-Worried
- 11-Shamed
- 12-Hidden
- 13-Dazzled
- 14-Astounded
- 15-Marked
- 16-Damaged
- 17-Chosen
- 18-Shuddered
- 19-Broken
- 20-Spoken
- 21-Influenced
- 22-Gifted
- 23-Promised
- 24-Distressed
- 25-Held
- 26-Tempted
- 27-Warded
- 28-Rumored
- 29-Fought
- 30-Flayed
- 31-Identified
- 32-Practiced
- 33-Enchanted
- 34-Blazed
- 6
- 7
- 8
Thank you again for all the reviews!

Chapter Seven—Struggled

            “Harry?”

            “Yeah, Ron?” Harry didn’t look up. He was in the middle of an old file that he thought he had almost figured out. The Aurors who had originally handled the case had made so many mistakes that Harry didn’t know why they were still in the Department. Well, one of them, old Trigg, wasn’t—he’d retired last year—but Harry certainly wasn’t going to look at Auror Whittaker with the same respect he’d always used.

            “Why was your Floo connection shut?” Ron asked. His voice was cautious, as if he found something odd in the sight of Harry’s hunched shoulders and ferocious scowl. He shouldn’t, Harry thought. This was the way he often looked when he worked, especially since Ron had started leaving regularly to be with Hermione and Rose. “I only caught you this morning because I took a chance on seeing if it was open. Is something wrong?”

            “It’s Saturday, Ron.” Harry gave him a smile, and was proud of its naturalness, but Ron’s skeptical expression remained. Bloody inquisitive Weasley. I reckon Hermione taught him to be like that, or maybe Auror training did. “I don’t have to take Floo calls if I don’t want to.”

            “But you’re working, Harry.” Ron’s voice had taken on a careful tone that Harry hated. “Listen, I’m coming through, all right?”

            “It doesn’t seem to matter whether it’s all right with me or not,” Harry said bitterly, “since you’ve already made up your mind.”

            Sure enough, Ron didn’t hear him because he’d pulled back from the flames and was on his way through the fire at that moment. Harry pushed the file away—Ron refused to talk to him when he had work in front of him, something Harry thought was perfectly ridiculous—and folded his arms across his chest. That wasn’t enough, though, so after a moment, he stood up and prowled back and forth.

            Ron materialized in the drawing room, stumbled in the way that people always did—and Harry wasn’t thinking, or trying to avoid thinking of, one person in particular—and then took a step towards Harry. “We’re worried about you,” he said.

            “You don’t need to be,” Harry said. “I was working late on Friday, and then I kept the Floo connection closed because I was tired, and now here I am, still working.” He tilted his head at the stack of files on his table, wondering how soon Ron would let him get back to it. The files were like a wall, holding out the world. Not that he had anything to hold out, of course. “You can see for yourself that I’m all right.”

            “No, you’re not,” Ron said softly. “You’re acting the way you did when you first came back to work after Laurent—”

            Harry swung around. He knew crackling black fire had sprung up around his head, because he could see it from the corners of his eyes, and his wand tingled warmly in his hand where it was aimed at Ron’s heart. Ron’s eyes widened, and he stood still, staring at Harry as if he didn’t know or recognize him.

            That was worse than the fear Harry had expected, but he pushed the idea grimly away. The whole point of this was that Ron ought to have known better than to mention that.

            “Don’t continue,” Harry whispered.

            “Harry. Mate.” Ron held up one hand, palm towards Harry, as though he were trying to calm a wild beast. Harry felt shame somewhere, buried under all the alertness that thrummed through him and made him want to jump and kick and scream, but he couldn’t bother to bring it to the surface. Ron knew better. He ought not to have brought this up. “You need help.”

            Harry burst out laughing hysterically in spite of himself. “Those were the same words Malfoy said,” he told Ron, whose face was so pale the freckles stood out. “And it didn’t work out, did it?”

            “This has something to do with Malfoy, then?” Ron sighed. “I told Hermione that I didn’t know if he could help you. You ought to have been talking with the Mind-Healers for a longer period of time. You ought to have eased into dating a Veela.”

            “Shut up!” Harry shouted, talking a step towards him. Ron glared, and Harry fought his anger back under control—for now. Why won’t he stop talking about it and go away? He knows better. He’s so stupid sometimes. “You know the Mind-Healers would have kept me from work,” he managed to say, his voice almost calm. “That’s the reason I didn’t stay with them. For Merlin’s sake, Ron, we’ve been over and over this.”

            Ron shook his head, gaze level. “I see now that we haven’t talked enough about it.”

            “There’s no reason we have to talk any more about it.” Harry knew he was spitting, and the black flames had surged high enough to streak around his mouth now, but he didn’t care, he didn’t. He wouldn’t. He forbid himself to care. “Malfoy did something. He showed me that I couldn’t trust him. It’s done. It’s over. And you have Hermione and Rose to worry about.”

            “I can worry about them and about you at the same time.” Ron took a step forwards, not seeming to notice how Harry’s wand promptly jumped up to point at his heart again. “This—this situation with Malfoy needs to be worked out, because either it’ll impede your healing for the rest of your life, or you’ll think about it once you do heal and obsess over it and feel guilty for it.”

            “Go and talk to him yourself, if you want.” Harry’s breathing was getting faster and faster, and there was sweat on his palms, and all he could see every time he blinked were those mounds of white feathers rising up in front of him, like mountains, fit to shut out the sky. “I don’t—I don’t care. I’m done with this. I’m done with him.”

            Ron nodded, though Harry didn’t think he was agreeing with the need to end this, and stepped back towards the fireplace, never taking his eyes from Harry. “You haven’t communicated with him, have you?” he asked. “Refused his owls and the like?”

            “That’s none of your business,” Harry said flatly.

            “Yes, it is,” Ron said, and gave him the pitying glance Harry hated. “Because I’m your friend.” He vanished into the flames.

            Harry sat down and closed his eyes. He wanted to scream from the unfairness of it all. He had already suffered this, and he had made a recovery. Everyone agreed that it was remarkable. The Mind-Healers had wanted him to spend months in St. Mungo’s, and he had proved them wrong, that he didn’t need it. Other Aurors said that they would have understood if he hadn’t come back to work, but he had. He had healed. He had fought. He had struggled so hard.

            And now Ron was telling him that it wasn’t enough.

            How much of my life am I going to spend in someone else’s care? Harry thought, lifting his head and staring at the wall. His mind whirled with feverish pictures, the white of Veela wings imprinted with the black letters that composed the official verdict on Laurent and the cases he had been studying this weekend. How many times am I going to have to fight the same bloody battle?

            Then he caught his breath and reminded himself that he was probably worrying over nothing. After all, what exactly was Ron going to do? A week had passed. Draco had probably given up and was looking for someone else by now. Harry wouldn’t be surprised; in fact, it was what he wanted.

            Veela were made to protect and love the people they chose, Draco had said. Good. Let him choose someone who would be happy to have that. Harry wished him nothing but the best.

            Just as long as Draco never came near him again.

*

            The sound of the Floo flaring to life woke Draco from a sound nap. He had wanted to hear it so badly, had waited for a reply to his owls, and there had been nothing, he thought as he patted his hair back into place and retracted the wings that had immediately sprung out in response to his anxiety, and now it was happening, and—

            Ron Weasley’s head floated in the flames. Draco stopped, his excitement dropping back into numbness, and struggled to remember for a moment why Weasley would have known his Floo address.

            Oh, that’s right. That bloody harassment case last year when I gave it to the Aurors. Draco sank down into a chair and sighed. “What do you want, Weasley?” he asked. He knew his voice didn’t sound as sneering and defiant as it should have when he was speaking to one of the dreaded red-haired family. It sounded defeated and tired.

            Instead of explaining himself, Weasley blinked and studied Draco attentively. “You look like shite, Malfoy,” he said.

            Draco pulled himself up a little. He knew he did, and he knew why, but neither of those reasons were something Weasley would or should know about. “Did you firecall me merely to inquire about my health?” he asked acidly.

            Weasley shook his head, his hair swaying around his ears. “I know that something happened between you and Harry, and it’s tearing Harry apart. I know that you’ve sent him owls he hasn’t returned. I know that you were trying to date him.” He paused. “And I know about the reasons that Harry has trouble dating Veela.”

            Draco sat up and stared at him. It almost sounded as though Weasley was offering to intercede between Draco and Harry, but that was—

            Insane, he thought, and bit his lip to stop the hopeful questions he wanted to ask. He said, managing a bored drawl better than he had managed indifference, “What is that to me?”

            “Don’t be an arse, Malfoy,” Weasley snapped. “I don’t like seeing my best friend suffer—bloody hate it, in fact—and I know the reason you probably look like that is because you’ve chosen someone and now he’s rejected you.”



“The legends about Veela pining to death over one person are just that,” Draco told him dryly. I should have known, of course. Bloody Gryffindors and their savior complexes. “I’m not going to die because Harry rejected me.”

“But you want to feel better, don’t you?” Weasley insisted. “And you want Harry. I don’t think you’ll ever be contented with anyone else.”

Draco narrowed his eyes. “Don’t think that you know me, Weasley.”

            “I only have to see what’s in front of me to figure this part out,” Weasley said, and rolled his eyes. Draco had always found that an odd sight when someone’s head was floating in the flames. “Now. Listen. I want to see Harry get over this wound that’s destroying him. I don’t know if he’ll stay with you, but he deserves a chance to figure that out for himself, rather than letting his fear control him.”

            Draco blinked. “And?”

            “What happened?” Weasley’s head bobbed towards him in a manner that Draco knew meant he was leaning forwards. “I need to know that so I can know how to fix it.”

            You don’t have to tell him. Draco twined his fingers in his lap and thought about that. He certainly didn’t need to tell Weasley about the soft, horrified apologies from his mother when Harry had fled, or the way his father had flinched from the look Draco cast him, or how much he had wanted to hurt Lucius. He didn’t need to know how Draco had agonized and wept over the letters he sent Harry.

            But he could tell him about the incident as it had happened. It might be the only way he would get Harry back.

            And as true as it was that Draco wouldn’t die of the pining, and that he could choose someone else and attempt to be happy with them, it was also true that he wanted Harry. He wasn’t going to be defeated by something that had happened before he ever met Harry—something he could do nothing about when Harry wouldn’t even let him punish Laurent. That meant he had to do something about what he could control, instead.

            I’m not that different from Harry, really, Draco thought, and some of the ice that had clutched at parts of his heart melted. If they were similar, there might be a chance for them to reconcile and get along better after all.

            So he told Weasley what had happened, making sure to emphasize that he hadn’t known his parents were going to ask Harry those questions about Laurent, that they had no idea what had happened and had doubtless thought Harry would respond easily, even disdainfully, and that Draco had spread his wings because he was afraid of Harry’s magic.

            Weasley listened to the story with his brow wrinkled. Draco finished it, and waited for the denunciation, the return of Potter’s best friend who would surely hate Draco and his family for doing that to Harry.

            Instead, Weasley began to grin.

            “What?” Draco snapped, leaning forwards. “You’ll excuse me if I don’t see anything funny about this.”

            “But it’s perfect,” Weasley said. His hand came briefly into view, as though he were making a wide gesture with it, which of course Draco missed, since he couldn’t see most of the git’s body. “You spread your wings because you wanted to protect your parents and you thought Harry would hurt them, right? And that was the most powerful weapon you had.”

            “Yes,” Draco said slowly, wishing he knew what had got into Weasley. Perhaps he’d been too near the effects of a Stunner recently. Perhaps he had to continually cast Cheering Charms on himself to make sure that he didn’t fly into a rage and start blasting people apart. Draco had seen similar effects when either of those things happened.

            “But that’s perfect,” Weasley repeated, and this time both hands briefly appeared, apparently because they were orbiting his head like fireflies. “Don’t you see? Harry understands all about protection. He only died to save everybody and all. He died because he had to before You-Know-Who could die,” Weasley added, probably because of the blank look that Draco could feel taking possession of his own face. “Then he came back to life—I dunno how he managed that, really—and saved the world.”

            Draco’s arms itched. He wanted to wrap them around Harry and reassure him that he didn’t have to do anything like that anymore, that Draco was here and could spare him the effort if he wanted.

            But he won’t want. And that’s part of the problem.

            “Harry does harsh things because that’s the only way to protect me and Hermione and other people that he cares about,” Weasley said. “He’s already been over to our home to make sure that the strongest wards and tracker spells are in place in case someone decides to kidnap our daughter.” Draco tried to force his mouth open to speak a congratulations, but Weasley went on at full speed, not seeming to expect such words from Draco. “He’ll understand that you did this to protect your family, in a way that he never would if you’d done it to soothe him or calm him down.”

            “You didn’t see his face,” Draco snapped. “He was terrified. He said that he didn’t ever want to come near me again.”

            “That’s how he felt then,” Weasley said, indulgently, as though he were talking to a child who didn’t quite understand the words flying over its head. Draco folded his arms and scowled at him. Even that didn’t deter Weasley, who just gave him a funny little smile and continued right on. “He was too frightened to think straight. If you write to him and explain that you were acting as a protector, I think he would come around.”

            “You don’t know that,” Draco said, trying to ignore the suddenly rapid beating of his heart.

            “But it’s more hope than you had half an hour ago, isn’t it?” Weasley challenged, and Draco nodded in spite of himself.

            “All right,” he said. “I’ll try. But he’s ignored all my owls so far. I don’t know what makes you think he’ll accept this one.”

            “Because an owl’s not delivering it,” Weasley said, speaking, again, as if Draco should have known better than to say the words he did. “I am.”

*

            Harry tensed when he heard the sound of the Floo opening, but he didn’t take his eyes away from the notes he was madly scribbling. Solving cases. Helping people. In the case of old files when the victim was years in the grave, giving some peace to their family by bringing the murderer to justice. That was what he did.

            He had been a fool to try doing anything else.

            “Mate?” Ron climbed out of the fire again and shook himself all over, as if that would get the soot off his robe. Then he held out something. Harry kept his eyes on the desk, so he couldn’t see for certain, but he thought it was a square of parchment.

            “I don’t want it.” Harry didn’t recognize his own voice when he spoke. It was a desperate gasp, rattling as though it had shavings of iron in it.

            “You don’t have a choice.” Ron spoke mildly, but Harry knew that tone of voice, and also that Ron would stop at nothing to get through to him. He would camp out in Harry’s drawing room if he had to. And it wasn’t fair that he should stay, not when Hermione and Rose needed him.

            Harry gave Ron a deadly glare, to let him know he was deeply annoyed by this, which Ron returned by a cheery grin. Harry accepted the parchment and unfolded it, already braced to find justifications and accusations. That was what Laurent had done long before he made Harry Veela-struck, when Harry had wanted to take a holiday alone. You’re leaving me, aren’t you? You want someone else, don’t you? Ordinary Veela behavior.

            Harry, I’m sorry. I should have insisted that my parents not confront you like that. And I should have thought about what I did before I did it, but I wanted to defend them so badly I didn’t consider it.

            Harry blinked, and then leaned back in his chair. Draco was defending his parents?

            That made sense. A Veela’s wings could be weapons, but they were more often shields. Harry had known that long before—long before the knowledge was pushed into his head and held there.

            His own thoughts made him grit his teeth and read on, though he wondered about the multiple apologies. The situation had evolved out of a misunderstanding and Harry’s own foolishness. He never should have tried to date Draco in the first place.

            I felt your magic, and I believed it might harm my parents. You’re powerful, and terrifying with it. I know that you were afraid of me, but I felt much the same way about you.

            Harry shook his head. “If you’re trying to convince me that we belong together, Malfoy, you’re doing a bloody poor job of it,” he muttered. Ron sneaked a quick glance at him, but Harry refused to look up and meet his eyes.

            I know that you’ve defended my parents in the past, but at that moment, you were the threat. I’ve never forgiven myself for not being there to interfere when my parents suffered the attack that left my father crippled and my mother scarred. I vowed that I would never let them be left exposed again. So I obeyed my instincts, and you obeyed yours, and we’re left with this mess.

            “We are,” Harry told the letter. “And I don’t see a way around it.”

            Ron shifted. Once again, Harry ignored him. He knew that Ron had gone to Draco and interfered, but that didn’t mean Harry was compelled to pay attention to Draco, or take him back, or whatever the point of this letter was.

            It will take time to work through what happened, and I wouldn’t blame you if you wanted to speak with me by owl or firecall for a time instead of meeting directly. I can put up with that, and I made sure to tell my parents that they had forfeited their right to your secrets by acting the way they had. They accepted this. In particular, my father is no longer concerned about me because he has seen how you reacted to my defenses.

            Harry mustered the shadow of a smile. Perhaps that would be the one good thing to come out of all this.

            We both have our overwhelming terrors, Harry. Mine is that something else might happen to my parents, something that I can’t keep them from. Yours is of Veela. Perhaps we could get together and work on overcoming those, as well as comparing our protective instincts.

            I know that you will be reluctant, among other things, because I saw your fear. But your fear has the same effect as your anger. I want you more.

            “You can’t,” Harry whispered. “It’s mad for us to try and be together, don’t you see that?”

            Part of me is Veela, yes—the part that raised its wings, the part that drove you away. But the rest of me is human, Harry, as I’ve tried to prove by confessing my fears to you. Will it surprise you to know that we’re similar in other ways, such as how we try to control our lives? I can’t guard against every possible threat my parents might get. You can’t control your every flinch or your reaction to my wings.

            Yet.

            I want to be stronger. I want you to be stronger, for reasons that I think you know. There’s no way that we can accomplish that on our own. If we could, the last few years would have showed us how.

            Please, Harry. Allow me this privilege, to lean on you and show you how to lean on me. There are no two people in the wizarding world so suited to doing that for each other as we are.

            Draco.

            Harry shook his head. His mind felt clouded and hazy. He had tried to put the incident out of his thoughts so strongly because he had known Draco would blame him, and he was ashamed of the way he had reacted, and he was angry about what had happened, but it would be useless to hope for an apology from the Malfoys.

            Here was proof that Draco didn’t blame Harry as much as himself (which was worrying and irritating in another way, but Harry would deal with that later). Here was Draco admitting his own kind of shame and holding out a hand to help Harry over his. Here was Draco’s word that his parents were at least sorry for the consequences of their actions.

            Harry clenched his fingers down on the edge of the letter. There were still problems here. He knew that he would shy back from Draco far more than he had so far. He didn’t like this notion Draco had about teaching Harry to lean on him. He’d already done that too much with Laurent, thank you.

            But there was a path forwards.

            Harry had not known how much he wanted one until then.

            He glanced up, realizing he owed gratitude to more than one person. “Thank you, Ron,” he said quietly.

            Ron nodded to him, a smug smile on his face that wasn’t concealed very well. “No problem, mate. Hate to see you dragging around like this.” He punched Harry in the shoulder, and turned to the fire. “Just try not to have a crisis every week, all right? I’ll waste all my energy running back and forth between you and Malfoy like a right berk.”

            Harry was still smiling when Ron vanished into the flames.

*

            yaoiObsessed: About the only thing that can be said is that Lucius and Narcissa really didn’t know.

            And Harry thought he shoved Draco violently away, but, well…

            Lady_of_Clunn: In the end, Draco’s parents do love him more than they love the truth, though there’s a lot that he isn’t telling Harry about how they reacted.

            Amiyom: Unsurprising, huh?

            Byond_repair: Thanks! If it had been left up to Harry or Draco, this problem might not have been solved. Luckily, there’s Ron.

            paigeey07: Thank you!

            SP777: Draco really couldn’t think of a way to warn them without sharing confidences about Harry that he shouldn’t. And with people as smart as his parents, saying that might have been as good as telling them the truth.

            mrequecky: Thank you!

            Sarah: Thank you!

            Sneakyfox: I don’t know if it would have been resolvable without outside help.

            Soria: Here it is!

            Kibou32: Draco really had no choice about the protection—something Harry honors him for.

            N: Thanks. Although it might seem as if love has triumphed here, there are lots of issues still to overcome, especially that Harry hasn’t yet considered what Draco’s protective instincts might mean where he’s concerned.

            Shiro_neko: Harry was always more angry at himself than Draco, though of course he did assume that there was no way he could see Draco again.

            polka dot: I don’t know. I’ve seen it work anyway when someone was just drunk…

            js: Thank you!
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