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The Name I'll Give to Thee	By : Lomonaaeren Category: Harry Potter > Slash - Male/Male > Harry/Draco Views: 42129 -:- Recommendations : 2 -:- Currently Reading : 6
Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter. I am making no money from this fanfic.

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Chapter Eight—A Marriage With Teeth

            Harry fell back a step as he watched the mist swirling up around Malfoy. What the fuck was going on? He had assumed the mist was a sign the marriage was going according to plan, a decorative touch created by ancient Malfoys or something, but this was not a sign that anything was going to plan that he could think of.

            He looked for Malfoy, automatically trying to orient himself by what he saw in the faces of people around him, but he had vanished behind the mist. When Harry extended his hand, his fingers vanished into it without denting it or moving it aside.

            And then the pain began.

            It crawled up his wrists, it nipped at his veins, it shredded skin and knocked it aside. Harry went to his knees not because of that, though—it was really no worse than the stream of magically altered bees that a Dark wizard had unleashed on him a few years ago—but because of the screams he heard from beyond the mist.

            “Malfoy!” he shouted.

            The screams didn’t stop. Harry cursed, steadily, and ignored the darting teeth around him to fight his way forwards. But although the mist bent around him this time the way it hadn’t earlier, it flowed back immediately, and enveloped him, and Harry realized that he had no idea what direction the edge of the platform lay in. Malfoy’s screams enveloped him the same way, so that he couldn’t navigate by them, either.

            The screams trailed off into a sob, and Harry forgot all about sane things like navigation.

            “Malfoy!” he shouted again, and began to run. He didn’t care if he tripped off the edge of the platform, or if he slipped on the blood that was now flowing down his arms from his wrists. Those screams—he had to find Malfoy and soothe them. He had to make sure that they stopped. He could never stand hearing someone sound like that, not from pain that he knew he had caused.

            He stumbled into someone, finally, and put his arms around Malfoy. But the mist was closer, was flowing under his very skin, and Malfoy’s flailing arms knocked him aside. Harry tried to bounce back in, but now Malfoy lay on the stone and rocked back and forth. His wounds were minor, but the screams weren’t.

            Harry knelt down beside him and closed his eyes. He had no doubt that his refusal to swear loyalty to the Malfoy family alone had caused this, but he had no idea what he was supposed to do about it. He couldn’t say he would turn his back on his friends. They would never forgive him. He would never forgive himself.

            But he would also never forgive himself if Malfoy died during the process of the demi-marriage, this process that was supposed to be about saving him and his mum. Harry hadn’t even seen Narcissa yet, he didn’t know how big the damage from the first ritual was, but he knew that the loss of her son would probably kill her.

            He put his arms around Malfoy and held him firmly, ignoring all the thrashing, and said in a loud, clear voice, “I promise to swear loyalty to the Malfoy family above my own personal likes and dislikes, above my own petty desires.”

            The mist swirled, but Malfoy continued to shake, although he sounded as though he had torn something in his throat and he wasn’t screaming now. It wasn’t enough, Harry knew, and plunged into his compromise. Because the mist would probably also know if he lied and simply swore loyalty with the idea of making it conditional and really picking his friends later.

            “I promise to be as loyal to the Malfoy family as to my friends,” he said, loudly, and winced at the thought of what Ron and Hermione would think if they were here. But they weren’t, and he had chosen this, and he had said after the war that he wouldn’t run from the consequences of his choices, that he would bear them, that he would manage it, somehow. “Is that enough? Because anything else would be a lie, but I knew coming into this—I should have guessed, anyway—that the ritual would demand something like this.”

            The mist hesitated. Harry stared back into it and held his breath, feeling Malfoy’s fragile, ragged heartbeat against his hands.

*

            Draco could barely breathe through the pain, the surprise of the pain.

            Yes, perhaps he should have known that demanding Harry abandon his friends would result in something like this. But it wasn’t abandonment, precisely. It was asking for his loyalty.

            And Harry had already heard and spoken words that he knew would alter his appearance and strip away his name and put the Malfoy family first. Draco had thought he understood and was only objecting for form’s sake.

            Apparently not, he thought, his breath heaving in and out as he realized that he was all right now, that the biting had stopped, and the mist had retreated to coil slowly around the platform. He listened to Harry speak, and opened his eyes. This was a respite only, he knew. The mist would return as soon as Harry refused to promise more.

            “That’s not going to be enough,” he whispered. “You have to be—you have to be willing to give everything up. You told me you were.”

            “My independence is one thing, and my friends another,” Harry said, his arms tightening until Draco thought he might be able to lift Draco from where he lay by the simple pressure of his muscles. “What’s happening, Malfoy?”

            “Call me Draco,” Draco said, his lips shivering as he answered. His teeth chattered for a moment, but he didn’t think Harry was the kind of person who would ignore Draco’s words because of that, or pretend he couldn’t understand him.

            No, the problem comes because he listens to only the literal sense of words and not the spirit, or prevents himself from recognizing what that spirit conceals.

            “Draco, fine, right,” Harry said. “Because Malfoy is my name now, too.” Draco nodded, grateful that he wasn’t the one who needed to repeat the lesson, and lifted his head to see Harry eyeing the mist. “But what in the world is this stuff? And why did it pop up even before I had my little temper tantrum?”

            Draco grimaced. He thought he had discovered another source of the problem, if Harry could discuss and dismiss his own behavior that way. Perhaps it was a learned skill, attempting to minimize his impact on the world—which he couldn’t be fond of—by pretending that he was the same as any naughty child.

            But for now, Draco was going to answer the questions, and try to get used to the feeling of Harry’s hands on his skin. They were far warmer than Draco’s, or than his mother and father’s hands had ever been, branding him. “The mist is supposed to be the gate, or form the gate, through which we pass united when the demi-wedding is done. It was rising because we were near the end of the ritual. And it hurt us because people who have made sacrifices for the family don’t like to hear someone else saying he won’t.”

            Harry turned his head and stared into the mist. “So this is the spirits of all your ancestors who went through this kind of marriage?”

            “Not spirits,” Draco said, fumbling for words. He hadn’t thought he would need to explain because he hadn’t thought it would come up, but even more, he hadn’t expected Harry to ask. And how to explain something that had lain, like the knowledge of how to walk, behind his eyes for most of his life? “Part of them, though. The—sacrifices. The—sharpness they had to go through for this. And we’ll have to suffer that sharpness if we refuse to consummate the ritual the way it should be consummated.”

            Harry stared at him. “You said we wouldn’t have to have sex.”

            Draco smiled dryly. “Some people would say that we’re close to it, the way we are at the moment,” he muttered, feeling Harry’s bare knees press up against his bare back. “But I didn’t mean that kind of consummation. This is the final promise, Harry, and you held back when you should have been yielding to it as a matter of course. You gave all the initial promises already. I thought you knew what you were doing.”

            “Not this,” Harry said. “I could walk through a fire and burn all the photographs I have of my parents and forget that I’d ever lived on my own, and that wouldn’t be a betrayal of Ron and Hermione in the same way.”

            “I heard you,” Draco whispered. “I heard you promise the mist that you would at least try to give the family the same level of faith.” He gestured to the mist and the way it danced back and forth next to the platform, like a beast caged for years who saw an open door. “I think that’s all that holds it back from attacking us now. It’s waiting to see whether that’s true. And what will happen if something the family needs you to do conflicts with something your friends want you to do?”

            Harry’s smile twisted. Well, at least he has the Malfoy smirk down, Draco thought. “I find it interesting that you phrase it as something you need, but that you think Ron and Hermione would just want,” he said.

            Draco held his gaze. What could he say but the truth as he saw it? And if it was bizarre to say it while lying on his back over Harry’s lap, the whole of the demi-marriage hadn’t been much more normal. Draco’s “normal” life did not include fighting dragons with a marriage ceremony or admiring Harry Potter’s arse.

            “We need you,” he said. “My mother and I. Your friends could need you, but not in the same way.” Harry stared at him, and Draco paused and reached for the right words. If he didn’t find them now, he thought, then he never would, and Harry would walk away from this, or try to. He couldn’t insult Weasley and Granger, no matter the temptation.

            There are bigger things at stake here than my dislike of them.

            And that, weirdly and paradoxically, freed him. Perhaps it could function as a complement to the fact that Harry thought of his friends as the center of his universe. Draco held his eyes and spoke calmly. “I accept that your friends will need you, that they’re the most important people in your life. We’re not asking to replace them. We are asking to take the place of people who’ve been missing ever since you were a year and a half old.”

            Harry’s eyes opened, closed. Then he said, “If you think that you can be my bloody father—”

            “Family,” Draco cut in firmly. He knew that Harry had been raised by Muggles who were related to him by blood, because he’d heard his Aunt Bellatrix talking about the blood wards, but for some reason, Harry didn’t consider them family in that same light. Well, good. Draco would control his curiosity on the matter, because that meant his course was clear before him. “Friends and family don’t always get along, but most people can negotiate the line. Pansy’s mother had friends her father didn’t approve of. Blaise was friends with a Hufflepuff. My father disagreed with me about whether it was appropriate for me to do some of the same things that Vincent and Greg’s fathers let them do. We handled it. It wasn’t the end, and it wasn’t as though—I didn’t have to pick Vincent and Greg over my family. They just existed, and they were in the same life, my life, and I think you can do a similar thing.”

            The silence stretched. The mist had not come back towards the platform, to Draco’s great relief. He lay there and looked up at Harry, and Harry crouched there, staring back.

            “The Weasleys are my family,” he said at last.

            “In the same way as Ron and Hermione are your friends?” Draco asked, knowing he was greatly daring to use their first names, but despite the way Harry glared at him, Draco thought he’d managed to prevent a sneer creeping in. “Or are you closer to them, and the Weasleys are your family because of Ron?”

            For the first time, Harry hesitated. Then he said, “I hurt George and Andromeda in that spell I performed as well as you and your mum. I feel the urge to make it up to them in the same way.”

            “Not in the same way,” Draco said hastily, because the mist was coming nearer. “I mean, the intensity of your desire is the same, but are you really going to swear your last name away and become a Weasley or a Black?”

            Harry glared again. “No, because you were the only one stupid enough to demand that of me.”

            Draco shook his head. He had to make Harry understand, and still the mist came nearer and nearer, and he thought he could catch the sound of teeth munching the air from the corner of his ear. “Listen, Harry. You said that you were willing to do almost anything to make it up to them. And to me, to us. Why are you balking now? I don’t understand.”

            “This is part of the almost,” Harry said, and his arms tightened under Draco until Draco thought he was going to throw him from the platform.

            Draco wanted to scream. They had come so far, he had succeeded in fooling himself that the rest of it would be—not painless, but less painful than it had been. He didn’t know how to go back now, and he didn’t know if there was a reversal that the demi-marriage and the parts of his ancestors left behind would accept.

            Which meant it was up to him. Which was nothing new, either. He was the current Malfoy heir, and the only one who had the legal and the magical power—weak as that was—to solve the current situation. Harry was stronger than Draco was, but it meant nothing if he refused to use that power.

            “This is my vow to you, then,” Draco said solemnly, and put his hand on Harry’s. “I promise you that I will never require you to do anything that contradicts or goes against what your friends would ask.”

            Harry narrowed his eyes as though squinting down a tunnel. “What? You can’t possibly predict that.”

            Draco ground his teeth. Didn’t Harry understand that he was trying to work with him here, the way Harry had tried to work with the mist by swearing equal loyalty to his friends and to the family?

            Then he realized that, no, Harry probably didn’t think of it that way. And enough trouble had happened because Draco had assumed that Harry understood things it turned out he didn’t understand.

            “All right, Harry,” he said, as gently and soothingly as he could. “I’m saying that I will do my best to predict that. The way that I want you to do your best to live with both being a Malfoy and having Weasley and Muggleborn friends.” He was glad that he had had some practice, in the last years, avoiding saying the word “Mudblood.” Harry’s expression at the moment told him that it would have been the last straw for Draco to blurt that out now. “And if a situation comes where my demands could potentially conflict with theirs, I’ll do my best to step back and bow out.”

            Harry shook his head a little, eyes still locked on Draco. “You can’t predict that you can do that every time.”

            “No, not every time,” Draco snapped back, his temper flaring. “I’m trying to compromise again, as stupid as that appears to me when you keep refusing it! Sometimes I won’t be able to stop insisting. For example, if Weasley wanted a lot of money from the Malfoy vaults and wanted you to give it to him because it used to be your money, then I would have to say no.”

            Harry blinked, and shifted his grip on Draco again. The mist had reached the edge of the platform and was sliding little while tendrils towards them. Harry appeared to have no difficulty in ignoring it. Of course, Draco thought sarcastically. It hadn’t hurt Harry as badly as it had Draco.

            “Ron would never ask for something like that,” Harry said.

            “Good, then we’ve solved one problem,” Draco said, with forced lightness. “Look, this can work. Your knowledge of your friends means that certain things I’m afraid they’ll ask for are probably paranoia. And my knowledge of my family makes me say that most of the time, we should be able to avoid tangling your loyalties. Isn’t that good enough? Isn’t that—can’t we go ahead with the marriage now?”

            Harry stared at him from eyes that looked as deep as forests. Draco held his breath and waited, trying to hold Harry’s gaze, too, and not think about the pain.

            Because Harry would be pushed to a certain length, and no further. Draco thought the demi-marriage might accept Harry’s vow of equal loyalties, since the mist hadn’t attacked so far, but Harry was capable of refusing if he felt pushed.

            And then Draco would probably die. He wanted to live, wanted to win his magic back again and see his mother healed.

            Wanted to know Harry.

            It hit him so hard that he opened his mouth and let the words spill forth before he thought about it. “When did getting to know you become one of my goals?”

            Harry laughed, and the mist halted and swirled. Harry bent towards him. “All right,” he said. “I vow loyalty to your family above my own needs, above my likes and dislikes, above all but the demands my friends must make where the loyalties are going to conflict. And you swear loyalty to me as my family, taking that place in my life.”

            Draco didn’t hesitate. This was the best compromise he would get, and while Harry’s words weren’t the traditional ones of the demi-marriage vow, being hurt by the mist wasn’t usual, either, or the specific demand about friends, which Draco had had to add in because Harry had no blood relatives to want him back. He reached up and laid his left hand over Harry’s heart, drawing down Harry’s right one to rest above his. “I so swear.”

            The mist vanished.

*

            Harry raised his head, blinking. He hadn’t realized how much the mist was pressing against him, how much of his attention and time it demanded, until it was gone, and he could swallow without feeling as though something was about to knife into his throat.

            If you felt that way, why did you let it go that long without swearing loyalty to the Malfoys?

            But Harry had to shake his head when he thought that. It wasn’t possible for Malfoy to coerce him against his will, and that went double for Malfoy ghosts that left pieces of their soul, or whatever, behind in mist to bite their descendants. He still didn’t know how well these vows would work, but they were both still alive. That was enough for him right now.

            He reached down for Malfoy’s hand, but Malfoy pulled back from him and stood on his own. Harry rolled to his eyes as he got to his feet. Until two seconds ago, Malfoy had been perfectly happy lying in his arms. It made sense that disdain of touching someone he still thought of as a Mudblood would make him get up on his own.

            But maybe Harry had been wrong and it was simple pride that had propelled Malfoy to his feet, because Malfoy was looking at him in a way that made Harry self-consciously touch his face, then his hair. “What?” he asked. “Did I get mud on it or something?”

            “This is the part where we look at each other,” Malfoy murmured. “The part of the demi-marriage where the illusions have been dismissed—at least, so one would assume with the barriers broken and the vows made—and we can see what we’re getting.”

            Harry flushed. That was probably part of the purpose of getting naked, too, he thought, not just shattering a final barrier. He bit his lip and tried to look at Malfoy in a neutral way, without embarrassing either of them. “Well, look your fill, but make it quick if you can,” he said, snapping a little. “I don’t know how much naked man I can take.”

            Malfoy smiled softly. He moved a step nearer and spread his arms, displaying himself. Harry mimicked him, although something Malfoy had said was bothering him.

            He wouldn’t have said it, but lack of communication had not proven to be a great strategy so far, so he would. “Why does it matter how we think the other one looks physically? You said that demi-marriages weren’t consummated in the normal way.”

            “Oh, they aren’t,” Malfoy said, his voice distracted. Harry wondered why, then saw that Malfoy’s eyes were locked on his chest, on the scar that the locket Horcrux had left, and flushed. Malfoy didn’t seem to have noticed, although his eyes did grow a little sharper. “But it’s still important that no Malfoy have a deformed or impotent spouse.”

            “Of course,” Harry muttered, privately resolving to punch the ancient Malfoys in the jaw if he ever met them walking down the street. He spread his arms further, swallowing all the while, and let Malfoy continue to look at him.

            Malfoy was—interesting. Harry could see some scars that he knew the story of, like the silvery slashes on Malfoy’s chest that probably came from Sectumsempra. They really did look like a lion had had its claws in Malfoy, and dragged him around a while before letting him go.

            Harry shivered. Sometimes he didn’t like to think about what he had done during the war. But it did have to be faced.

            Then there were the scars leading down from Malfoy’s neck on either side of his collarbone, ones that aimed at his heart. Harry had felt them when he touched the skin above Malfoy’s heart a few seconds ago, he remembered. They were thicker than the ones Harry himself had left, raised. Harry didn’t say anything about them, but privately memorized the look of them, so that he could research them later.

            Or you could just ask.

            The thought made him blush further, for some reason. Malfoy laughed, but it wasn’t the kind of laugh Harry would have had to kill him for. “You embarrass easily,” Malfoy whispered. “Not many partners, then?”

            “Don’t believe that rubbish you read in the papers,” Harry said, which Malfoy could translate any way he liked, and went on looking.

            Malfoy’s muscles were wiry, his legs long and slender. Harry’s eye skipped past Malfoy’s cock; he was just glad that it wasn’t hard, because then he would make comparisons he did not want to make. Malfoy’s feet were long and slender, too, and, Harry reckoned, nice. It wasn’t as though he had much of an opinion on feet.

            He looked back up, at Malfoy’s face, and waited for him to get bored of staring.

*

            Some of Harry was familiar to Draco, but he had only really looked at his back while he bathed him, so this was different.

            The first thought that hit Draco was, So many scars.

            Of course, one was used to thinking of Harry and scars in the same sentence, but this was different. It looked as though everything that had ever attacked Harry had left its marks on him. Draco could see small burns, bites, the suckers of stinging tentacles that only certain species of deadly plants left, slashes from hexes, and a long string of tiny little puncture wounds that were probably the brand of a close encounter with an Acromantula.

            He could have had someone help him with some of those scars. Dittany might—

            But then Draco locked his eyes on a scar that wound across Harry’s inner thigh, right near his cock, where someone fucking him couldn’t possibly miss it, and paused.

            Yes, Harry almost certainly could have made some kind of difference in his body if he wanted. Despite the fact that he seemed to think money was for saving instead of spending, he had enough to afford access to the best Healers. He could have cleaned up the scars, cleaned up himself, made himself look bright and reasonable, expensive, a polished statue, in fact.

But he hadn’t wanted to.

Draco liked that. Not that he wanted to think someone ugly or approved of keeping scars on principle, but it said a lot for Harry’s honesty and reality, that Draco was seeing him as he was.

He met his eyes again, and smiled. “Now,” he said. “The last part of the ritual.”

*

kain: Yes, I think a Harry who’s been through what he has with his friends in the background to this story would definitely require at least a vow from Draco that he would do his best not to interfere (which is essentially what Draco did here).

unneeded: Don’t worry, that review got through! And yes, to Harry it’s a sticking point, though not little.

SP777: Thank you! But I wasn’t thinking of a particular kind of cheese, just more or less making one up.

Nightlo: Harry confused the mist by the vows he made, so he held it off long enough to make it possible to swear the new vows.
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The Name I'll Give to Thee