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Keep It Simple, Stupid	By : Lomonaaeren Category: Harry Potter > Slash - Male/Male > Harry/Draco Views: 8387 -:- Recommendations : 1 -:- Currently Reading : 1
Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor any of the characters from the books or movies. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

Chapter List
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Title: Keep It
Simple, Stupid

Disclaimer: J. K.
Rowling owns these characters. I am writing this for fun and not profit.

Pairings: Harry/Draco.

Rating: PG-13/T
for flirting and innuendo.

Warnings: This
completely ignores DH, because I could not find a way to make that book work
with the plot of this story. Also, it is absolutely ridiculous.

Summary: Draco
has kept tabs on the Death Eaters since the war, but they�ve made up such
ridiculous plots that he hasn�t been very concerned about them. Now they�ve got
a competent leader and a plan to assassinate Harry Potter. Draco�s worried�but Potter
ignores his warnings and flirts with him instead. Draco�s life is not very much
fun right now.

Notes: This was a
small but persistent idea that grew into a true fic with msarden�s
encouragement. So it is totally her fault, and dedicated to her. This is a WiP
in that not all of it is written, but it will be only around 5 or 6 chapters,
so it won�t be in progress for very long.

Keep It Simple,
Stupid

Chapter One�Draco and
the Death Eaters

�We can�t
use Imperius,� said Jugson, leaning forwards to emphasize his point. The table
that the Death Eaters had enchanted to hold glamours of triumphant battles for
the Dark Lord�s side during the war�almost completely made up, of course�wobbled
as he leaned on it. Draco rolled his eyes behind his white mask, but made a
note that Jugson must indeed have a secure hiding place, since he felt free to
eat all he liked. �The Ministry has put up wards inside the building to detect
its use. But I know what we can use.�

�What?�
Bellatrix asked in a breathless voice. Draco averted his eyes from her. Her
mind had shattered when the Dark Lord fell, and she was now convinced that he
was sleeping in some secret place and would rise to aid them if they could only
do something evil enough to make it worth his while to return. She was a
complete embarrassment. Draco wished fervently that his mother had had better
taste in family members.

�We use a Commanding Potion,� Jugson said, with a
fierce nod.

�Ah,� said
Avery, in a pleased voice.

�Ooh!�
echoed several of the others. Draco stifled the urge to beat his head against
the table.

There was a
long, reverent pause, and then Yaxley, who was the most sensible one out of all
of them, but still not in danger of causing the Ministry any lost sleep,
brought up the obvious problem. Draco couldn�t, since he pretended to be both
completely loyal to the Dark Lord�s memory and much stupider than he actually
was in order to keep attending these meetings. �But a Commanding Potion tastes
like dirty socks. How do you propose we feed it to the Minister?�

�I�m sure
someone can knock him unconscious,� said Jugson. �And then we pour the potion
down his throat!�

�Yeah!�
said Avery. Draco wondered idly how Avery�s family put up with him. Of course,
he�d never married and his parents had moved to the other side of the continent
to get away from him, so perhaps the question was moot. Draco tried to envision
an Avery family Floo call and came dangerously near to snickering.

He changed
it into a cough at the last moment, which was a good thing. Dolohov had chosen
tonight to watch him like a hawk. The Dark Lord�s fall had turned him into a paranoid old bastard who made
Mad-Eye Moody look the embodiment of laziness and social cordiality. Draco had
already had to Obliviate him twice�not
because he�d given himself away, but because Dolohov had ambushed him outside
the deserted old manor they used for their Death Eater meetings and tried to
kill him while shrieking that Draco was a traitor. The repeated Memory Charms,
it was true, had probably not done any wonders for his mental stability.

�I have a
question, though,� he said meekly. He was always meek here. He was variously �Lucius
Malfoy�s boy� and �the boy who failed to kill Dumbledore� to the other Death
Eaters; they tolerated him because one more person who had believed in the �vision�
of pure-blood superiority was worth too much now to kick him out. Draco didn�t
mind. It made his interventions to crush their mad ambitions much less obvious.
�There are wards in the Minister�s office that alert the Aurors if he falls
unconscious. How are we going to get past them?�

There was a
disconcerted pause.

�How do you know about this, Malfoy?� Dolohov
said at last, his voice a thick growl.

�I�m an
Auror, Dolohov,� said Draco, and let just a bit of haughtiness enter his voice,
because they would expect to hear it. �They tell me these things. And
Scrimgeour has some sort of medical condition that sometimes causes him to fall
asleep unexpectedly. He could hit his head on a sharp object and require
immediate medical treatment. So the wards are there to let us know if he needs
transportation to St. Mungo�s. Knock him unconscious, even assuming we could
gain access to him, and we�d have three Aurors through the door before you
could pour the Commanding Potion down his throat.�

�I have an
answer to that,� said Rodolphus smugly. Draco relaxed. Rodolphus never came up
with any plan even halfway workable. �There�s a book in the Black family
library I remember reading that talks about an amulet which functions like a
specialized Portkey. It�ll take us past any wards at all, let us grab the Minister
and force the potion down his throat, and let us leave again at once.�

�Wonderful!�
Avery said.

�Yes,
wonderful,� Draco said, pouring pleasure into his voice. �How do we make this
amulet?�

�Oh, you
can�t make it,� said Rodolphus, with an airy wave of his hand. �It�s a bloody
magical artifact, Malfoy. The Amulet
of Golden Wind, it�s called.�

�So where
is it?� Jugson asked eagerly.

The light
went out of Rodolphus�s eyes. �Er,� he said.

Draco
swallowed his chuckle better this time. Rodolphus was always forgetting some
vital detail, such as that the magical artifact they would need to work their
plan had been lost for several centuries.

�Well, do
you have any clues?� Jugson asked, impatient now. �What else do you remember?�

Rodolphus
scratched his head. �I�m not sure,� he said. �Maybe it was called the Amulet of
Silver Wind, in fact. Or maybe it wasn�t an amulet at all, but a bloody great
wooden horse. I would need to get to the book again to check.�

�Right,
then,� said Jugson, with a firm nod. �We�ll divide into teams, and one team
will get into the Black family library, and one team will prepare to retrieve
the amulet when the first team finds the information on it, and the third one
will brew the Commanding Potion so that it�s ready when we have the amulet.�

Draco sat
back whilst, all around him, the others began to argue about which team they
wanted to be on and how they were going to get to the Black family library,
which was in Number Twelve Grimmauld Place, where Potter and his permanent
guard of Aurors lived. Most of the time, his job as a �spy� on the remaining
Death Eaters was mindless entertainment. They hid well, because they had more
intelligent relatives�ones who had not signed up to serve the Dark Lord�who were
determined to protect them, but their plans were hopelessly convoluted and
likely to become more so. A little pressure here and there, and they would bicker
for years without doing anything dangerous. So far, Draco had only angled to
make sure that Fenrir Greyback actually made a public move and was captured,
and that was because Greyback was actually a threat, both to the Ministry and
Draco�s own position.

On the
other hand, there was a remote chance that they might stumble into a
necromantic ritual that could actually raise the Dark Lord, or find a leader
who could give them the direction that had made them dangerous when he was still alive. Draco could keep an
eye on them to prevent that, just in case.

Their
stupidity both depressed and enlivened him. At least he always knew, when he
went back to work on Monday morning after a Sunday night Death Eater meeting,
that his colleagues could not do anything worse.

Now,
however, someone knocked on the door that led into the cavernous room of bare
stone, lit only by flickering torches because Jugson was a traditionalist.
Draco lifted his head sharply, then wondered if he should have reacted so fast,
but luckily, Dolohov already had his wand out and his face turned in that
direction.

�Who is out
there?� Bellatrix asked in a soft voice.

�There
shouldn�t be anyone,� said Jugson grimly. �We�re all here. It�s probably the
Ministry.�

A current
of energy coiled through the room. Death Eaters were good at mindless violence. Draco bit his lip, wondering what he
should do to convince the Aurors, if they were out there, that he was actually
on their side.

The door
opened before anyone could cast a spell, however, or snarl instructions to
move, and the intruder easily ducked the curse that Dolohov fired off a moment
later. He stepped easily into the center of the room, in fact, moving with
large, long strides that suggested a big man. A suggestion was the most Draco
could get, since the drape of his thick dark robes hid his body most
effectively. He wore a white mask just like the other Death Eaters, and he
turned to face them from the head of the table, next to Bellatrix, with a
dangerous smile in his voice.

�Shoddy
security you have here,� he drawled. �I took down the wards in two minutes, and
with no alarm to you. If I had wanted to kill you, you would have died never
knowing who your murderer was.�

Bellatrix
and Dolohov nearly sprang at him then, because they were mad, but luckily
Jugson had better sense�a touch of better sense, Draco thought. �Who are you?� he asked. �And why don�t you
want to kill us?�

�Call me�a friend,�
said the stranger, cocking his head. Draco felt a maddening familiarity curl up
his spine at the sound of his voice, but he couldn�t place it no matter how
hard he searched through his brain. Was it one of the Carrows, perhaps, who had
vanished and never been found? Someone he worked with in the Ministry? �I was
never part of the Dark Lord�s glorious inner circle, but I watched what he did
with admiration.� His tone abruptly hardened. �And I have watched what you have
done since with contempt.�

�Oi!� said
Avery.

�We have
done the very best we could with limited resources,� Jugson began, in a
delicately miffed voice.

�I�m sure
you have, I�m sure you have,� said the stranger, sounding bored. Draco�s
momentary suspicion that he was there to incite the Death Eaters into a killing
fight he could claim was self-defense faded. No, this was something else, maybe
the slight chance he had been thinking might occur all along. He shifted.

The
movement drew the stranger�s eyes to him. Either he already knew who Draco was,
which would not surprise Draco at all, or a curl of white-blond hair had
escaped his hood, because the man nodded. �Lucius Malfoy�s boy, aren�t you?�

�Yes, sir,�
Draco said, warier than ever. That was exactly the term the Death Eaters used
to address him. For how long had he been watching these meetings?

The
stranger spread his hands. They were covered with thick leather gloves, hiding
any sign of skin, though Draco thought he made out the lumpish shape of a ring
beneath one cloth finger. �You see how he addresses me with respect?� he asked
the rest of the circle. �He knows me for your natural leader. And I am. I
learned from the Dark Lord. I learned from other Dark wizards. I have spent the
last few years traveling the continent of Europe, studying under every powerful
and dangerous practitioner of magic I could find. I am an expert on curses and
on potions, and on defenses against them�and neutralizing those defenses. And
it was all to one end. I have the same goal you do.�

�Bringing
the Dark Lord back?� Bellatrix asked, as she would.

�Leading us
to world domination?� Jugson said.

�Eliminating
the Muggles!� Avery pounded on the table with one fist.

�No,� the
stranger said, and he was laughing behind his mask, Draco was certain of it, at
how utterly beyond this pathetic group all those goals were. �I can give you
Harry Potter. I can bring him to you, I can show you how best to torture him,
and I can find a way around his freakish luck that will enable you to dispose
of him.�

The entire
atmosphere of the room shifted. Draco could see the idea taking root in their
heads, utterly eliminating the hopeless�and harmless�plan of controlling the
Minister�s mind and, through him, the Ministry.

And Death
Eaters were, ultimately, good at mindless violence. Political plotting had
never been their natural arena.

�What do
you want in return?� Dolohov asked. Draco would have liked to know the same
thing, since he was sure the answer the stranger gave them wasn�t genuine.

�For
starters? I would like to see him dead.� The man�s voice dropped to a sibilant
hiss, and suddenly Draco was less certain that he really didn�t want this. It
was possible to want more than one thing, after all, though he thought he was
the only other person in the room to realize that. �He hurt me badly. Him and
his money and his fame and his prestige. I am going to see to it that he pays.� He darted a glance
around the room. �Who�s with me?�

They all
cried out in rapture, utterly won over. Draco made sure to cry with the rest of
them, but he could feel cold sweat gathering under his arms and behind his
mask.

The
stranger wouldn�t show them a hint of a plan as yet. He would cajole and make
promises and work them over, so that he could be sure he had their loyalty and
they didn�t question his motives.

And that
was exactly what he did. He was probably a public speaker in his ordinary life.
By the end of the evening, Draco might even have believed him, if he were a
good deal stupider.

The rest of
the Death Eaters ate it up. By the end of their
evening, they were muttering the praises of this new stranger, who had told
them to call him Prince, and swearing various complicated revenges on Harry
Potter.

Draco left
the room half-frightened, but mostly resolved. For too long, the Ministry had
been content to leave the Death Eaters alone, partially because it would mean
antagonizing certain powerful families but also because the defenses around the
manor house where they gathered were supposedly impossible to pass without a
Dark Mark on one�s arm�a piece of magic that the Dark Lord, and none of them,
had designed. Well, this Prince had managed it. Draco would suggest that
someone get started studying the matter at one. Perhaps they could come up with
a Portkey that would actually function in the damn place.

*

Draco ran a
hand through his hair and studied the report in front of him, then nodded. A
copy had gone to the Minister to warn him about the Death Eaters and Prince and
discuss possible solutions. Draco had also given a copy to one of Potter�s
guard of Aurors who was there early, because of course Saint Potter was too
high and mighty to come into the office before eleven on a Monday. Hopefully, that would be enough.

But Draco
didn�t know anything about Prince yet, save that he was a powerful wizard and
had the same grudge as the Dark Lord but far more brains. The precautions they
already had in place might be enough
to save Potter�s life, but they might not be. Draco sighed heavily and pushed
the report away from him, to attend to some of the other pieces of less
essential paperwork crowding his desk.

�Malfoy!�

Startled,
Draco looked up, and blinked when he saw Potter striding towards him. There
were dark circles under his eyes, and his hair looked extraordinarily ruffled.
Draco rolled his eyes, not caring if Potter saw him do it. The man had remained
a Gryffindor, for all that his habits had grown wilder and wilder. Potter would
probably think it was a grand joke, and say, �That Malfoy, he never changes,�
to his friends later.

Draco
suppressed the tiny wish that he were
one of Potter�s friends to appreciate and laugh over that remark. They had
drifted into a sort of truce when they both became Aurors, based largely on
never partnering and ignoring one another when they met in the office. That was
the best Draco could hope for, and he knew it.

�What�s
this about a threat to my life?� Potter asked, far too loudly. Draco�s office
was isolated at the end of a corridor, but still.
Draco winced and cast a privacy spell with a small flick of his wrist.

�There�s
someone commanding the scattered remnants of the Death Eaters,� said Draco. �A
wizard who calls himself Prince and claims to have a grudge against you. I
would act carefully in the next few weeks, Potter, until we can��

�That can�t
be,� said Potter, with an easy wave of his hand, and leaned in unnecessarily
close. Draco glared back, not wanting to shrink against his chair like a girl,
but uncomfortable with the way Potter�s musk�did the man never bathe?�was wafting into his nostrils. �Prince
was Snape�s last name, and Snape is dead.�

Draco
swallowed. �I know.� Severus had died protecting him, an action which Draco was
simultaneously grateful for and unable to forgive. �But someone else could have
chosen the name as an alias. If we can figure out the psychological reasons for
that, then��

�I mean, I
don�t think this bloke�s a threat.� Potter shrugged and nudged enough of Draco�s
paperwork aside to sit down on the desk. Draco opened his mouth in outrage to
tell Potter that was his desk, but
the idiot was chattering on, and what he said next was enough to shut Draco�s
mouth hard. �It�s not Snape. Therefore, he�s not a threat. Just some other git
with a grudge. If he comes after me, then I�ll kill him. Pow!� He flourished his wand, and a blast of green smoke shot out
from it and impacted against the wall. Draco held his nose as he anticipated
the scent of rotten eggs that spell usually left behind. He was startled to
smell roses instead. Potter must have modified the spell. Quite a feat, to both
do that and make the incantation non-verbal.

Draco felt
another rueful little pulse. Modifying spells was one of his favorite hobbies.
He would have liked to talk about this over Firewhiskey with Potter, and maybe
laugh at the stupid things he�d say when he was pissed. Certainly it had to be
a different, more amusing variety of stupid from that the Death Eaters or the
other Aurors provided Draco.

�I think
this could be the real thing,� he said. �Some of what he said last night��

�Don�t
worry your pretty little head about this, Malfoy,� said Potter, and patted his cheek. He seemed to think
that Draco�s stare of sheer goggle-eyed bewilderment was an invitation, because
he leaned in, his breath touching the place his hand just had, and whispered, �Instead,
why don�t you think about more pleasant things? Dinner with me tomorrow night, perhaps?�

Draco
stared for just a moment longer.

Then his
resentment that Potter seemed to be up to his old games, just when Draco had
finally thought they�d settled into an adult, working relationship, reared up.
Draco narrowed his eyes and made his voice icy. �I don�t go on dates in the
middle of the week, thanks.�

He expected
Potter to claim that this wasn�t a date next. Potter just looked horrified. �Look,
Draco�can I call you Draco?��

�No.�

�You�re
twenty-five, not seventy.� Potter
leaned closer still, and his voice fell into something Draco could only
describe as a purr. He was horrible at it, definitely. It did not make Draco
wish yet again, and more fervently, that things were different, no it did not. �It�s
perfectly acceptable to date in the middle of the week. Let me reassure you of
that, just in case you forgot.� His hand smoothed up and down Draco�s arm. �So,
what about it? I�ve been wanting to since forever, but��

�Potter.� Draco shook off the hand like a
dog shaking off water. �No.�

�Well, all
right, it was only since last week, but still, you�re bloody fit.� Potter
looked at him admiringly. �Come on, why don�t we go out for lunch today if
tomorrow night isn�t good for you? I know a place where we can get the most smashing
curry and you can forget about silly little braggarts who think they�re after
my life��

�This is serious, Potter!� Draco flung himself to
his feet, and away from temptation. �This isn�t a game! Prince is the best
candidate for murdering you I�ve seen since the end of the war.� Although I could give him some good
competition, the way I feel at the moment, he thought.

�But it is
a game.� Potter smiled at him beatifically. �You�re handsome when you�re angry,
did you know that?�

Draco
gripped the edge of his desk so he didn�t go for Potter�s throat. �Get out of my office.�

�Should I
have said that you�re beautiful when you�re angry?� Potter looked concerned. �I
almost said that, but I thought it was too girly. And I�m sure that you�re all
man, Draco.�

Draco kept
from screaming by a very narrow margin. He drew his wand instead.

Potter
pouted for a moment, then rose, holding his hands in front of him, when Draco
made a threatening flick with the wand. �All right, I�m leaving. No curry
today. But think about tomorrow night, all right? You�ve been working too hard
if you seriously assume that this Prince bloke is a threat.�

And then he
was gone, and Draco was left to sit down and weigh the advantages of helping
Prince against the advantages of standing in his way.

He got his
breathing back under control, slowly. Then he gave a determined nod and picked
up his quill again.

Protecting
Potter wasn�t his job, thank God. He was just supposed to keep meeting with the
Death Eaters and finding out what he could about Prince; he was sure that was
what Shacklebolt would tell him. Potter�s pet Aurors and his friends and his
fans would do all the guarding that could be wished.

Yes, thank
God. Because if he were responsible for Potter�s safety on top of everything
else, Draco was sure he would have gone mad. The man was infuriating.

In a good way.

Shut up, Draco told himself.
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Keep It Simple, Stupid