Top!Harry
Bottom!Draco
Summary: The post-war world is not an easy place to navigate when you are Draco Malfoy and none of the certainties you grew up with are valid any more. Basically, you are a bit of a mess. But at least you're hot - that has to be worth something, right?
Author: raitala (on ao3)
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"Have you ever just wanted to go back — miserable as it was. Horrible as it was — go back because at least then, things made sense; everything seemed as though it was exactly as it was supposed to be, and you never had to wonder whether it was just you — "
Lettered, IDK, My BFF Hermione? (2011)
The hall was cold. The sealing charms around the windows had never been quite the same since they had been forced in the Auror raids on the manor at the end of the war. There was a fierce draft, but the candles had been charmed not to gutter.
Draco stood mutely by his father's bier. His mother stood opposite him. The fine gauzy folds of her mourning veils were not charmed and fluttered gently around her. She looked like smoke.
They had been there for three hours. The low winter sun was already fading from the west window. Shadows were a forming in the corners of the hall and beginning to creep towards the catafalque. Draco's mind drifted. He could remember his grandfather's funeral. He had been eight at the time and his father had supported his strenuous claims that he was old enough to stand with the family through the twelve hour vigil, from noon to midnight.
The hall had been packed, he remembered. Around the bier had stood his father and mother. The Lestranges had been there, the Averys, Crabbes and Goyles and a number of old wizards, associates of his grandfather's that Draco didn't know. The Minister for Magic had been there for a few hours. Further back in the hall members of lesser families, tenants and clients of the Malfoy family had appeared to show their respects. These people had shifted in an out, their places taken by others, only the family and close mourners had stood the full vigil.
Draco had been so proud of his place at his father's side. He hadn't been particularly sad. He and his grandfather had not been close and he had tended to stay out of his way. Drawing Abraxas' attention invariably resulted in generating criticism. "When is the boy going to go to school?" – "He is too noisy." – "He is too mousy." –"That boy has no discipline." – "That boy has no spirit. At his age I had a gang of lads following me and we used to get up to all sorts."
Draco hadn't grieved about his grandfather. He didn't think his father had either. His father had stood, tall and stern, bathed in the golden light of hundreds of candles. Though ostensibly there to mourn Abraxas, every eye in the hall had been on his father. Draco had understood, even then, that they had come to see the new head of the Malfoy family. The respects they paid were to his father, not the dead.
Draco looked at his father now. His features were sunken and grey and his hair leached dry. Azkaban and failure had left their mark and even the glow of candle light could not soften a face turned pinched and bitter. He tried to feel something ... appropriate, but nothing came. He wondered if his mother mourned. Behind the veils she was inscrutable. Had anyone ever sincerely mourned in this hall? Perhaps that was what this vigil represented: a rigorously enforced pageantry to mask the reality of a fundamentally unlovable family?
There was no one now, come to pay homage to the new head of the family. Mostly this was a relief. There were no other eyes here, apart from his mother's, to witness how far they had fallen. No one there to judge just how poorly this last Malfoy measured up to his forefathers. But, of course, their absence was itself a judgement.
In the outer reaches of the hall there was the soft rustle and patter of the few house-elves who had resisted Ministry offers of freedom and alternative employment. Had there been house-elves at his grandfather's funeral? If there had been no one would have noticed or thought to notice.
Draco shivered and wondered if he could twitch his wand from his sleeve for a discreet warming charm. Discreet from whom? His mother? From the dead who, if they were watching, were already well past disappointment. Draco made an effort to stand up straight and felt the weight of the wools and silk of his mourning robes shift around him.
Another hour inched round. Draco's stomach rumbled. They had eaten and drunk nothing since dawn. Ostensibly this was one of the marks of mourning. More likely it was because nothing undermines the power of ritual like key players needing to pop out for a pee. After his grandfather's interment there had been a feast. All the mourners who had stayed untill the end had approached his father to press his hand and offer their condolences. In the brief words exchanged their alliances had been affirmed and the web of Malfoy influence maintained. Draco and his mother would probably have some sandwiches in her room before heading to bed. Though Draco had already decided to go down into the cellars when this was done and get well and truly smashed. On his own, in the dark.
There had been dubious heirs before now. Phineas Malfoy, who had squandered his fortune and kept a harem of red-headed Muggle prostitutes. Alphaias Malfoy, who had not exchanged a single word with his wife after the wedding ceremony, barred her from the house and maintained a very close relationship with his golden-haired estate manager. But there had always been cousins and nephews to step into the breach. At the failure of one branch, another branch had assumed prominence and the family rallied.
There was no one else now. He was the last Black and the last Malfoy. He was also a coward and a whore.
*
Thinking back, Draco couldn't even identify the point when it had all started to go wrong. When had the brightness of his eight-year-old future begun to dim? There had been memorable moments though, most of them in this bloody hall: when his mother and he had learnt of his father's arrest, in fifth year; when he had been forced on his knees to take the Mark, not in triumph but in retribution and when he had stumbled back here, on Severus' heels, to scenes of wild jubilation. Jubilation he'd been forced to recognise, and then quickly conceal, that he couldn't share. Driven, up to that point, by the urgency of the Dark Lord's commands he was suddenly without purpose or goal. All that was left was meaningless endurance. At least he'd known what he had to do during sixth year, even if his childish visions of winning the esteem of the Dark Lord through acts of schoolboy valour now made him feel empty and sick.
He thought of Rowle. Rowle had been one of the first people Draco had been forced to Crucio. Here in this damned hall. Rowle and Dolohov had almost caught Harry Potter in the aftermath of the raid on the Weasley home, but had, for some reason, failed. The Dark Lord had been bitterly furious and it had amused him to force Draco to be the one to administer the Cruciatus to Rowle.
When the Dark Lord finally grew bored of them he swept from the room, leaving Rowle slumped on the floor. Draco's legs buckled and he fell to his hands and knees retching weakly. The two of them stayed there for some time. Rowle rolled onto his back and lay there. Slowly the pained rasps of his breathing became quiet. Draco hadn't been able to stop shaking even though he hadn't been the one who'd been Cruioed.
Eventually Rowle rose to his feet and limped over to the door. He paused there. "Get up, Draco." It took Draco a second or two to understand. He started and looked up. Rowle loomed in the doorway, swaying slightly. "Come on, Draco. Get yourself up. You can lend me your shoulder back to my rooms." There was no particular rancour in his voice, only the weariness of a long day.
Draco scrambled to his feet and together they staggered up the back stairs and to Rowle's room. Draco's knees were buckling under the weight of Rowle's large frame. The man really was built like a castle wall. And though he was supposed to be helping, it was really Draco who clung to Rowle, to the strength and the warmth of the body he felt through his clothes.
Reaching Rowle's room, Draco managed to whisper, "I'm sorry."
Rowle just laughed hoarsely and squeezed Draco's shoulder. "Rather you than Amycus. You curse like a girl."
Draco turned and fled back to his rooms, before he could give into the urge to follow Rowle inside. For the promise, however tenuous, of a little warmth, a little forgetting.
Draco began to watch Rowle. He saw a man who seemed, inexplicably, comfortable in himself, a rarity among the occupants of the Manor. His loyalty was unquestioned, he followed orders effectively and nonchalantly. He participated neither in the squabbles for the Dark Lord's attention, nor the scrambles to avoid it. It helped that he was both physically and magically powerful, most people steered clear of a fight with him. He was capable of shocking brutality, which he executed with calm efficiency. Draco envied him his detachment.
Six months later, the shoe had been on the other foot. The Malfoys and Bellatrix let Potter slip through their fingers. In their own front hall, no less. This time Rowle delivered Draco's Cruciatus. When it was over and the Dark Lord and the other Death Eaters had left, he hefted Draco onto his shoulder and carried him upstairs. Deposited on his own bed, Draco curled into a ball, his breath still wheezing and throat raw from screaming. He lay there rigid, fighting down the overwhelming urge to turn to Rowle and beg him not to let this happen to him again. As if even Rowle could make such a promise. He felt the balm of a cooling charm over his whole body, then heard Rowle's gruff voice saying, "You'll feel better in the morning," and the door creak shut.
Draco lay there in the dark, aching and trying not to whimper. Somehow, he could not fall asleep and as dawn crept back into the room he crawled from his bed to sit by the fire. He was so cold.
In the soft light he attempted to face facts. He was completely fucked. With Bellatrix's star temporarily occluded, his mother's leverage with her would be worth very little. His mother and father's powerlessness was well known, though their attempts to continue to hold their heads high had only aggravated the lesser rabble of the Dark Lord's camp. For the remaining ten days of the holidays he was defenceless, at the bottom of the heap among some of the most depraved witches and wizards in the country.
He had vacillated in that moment when he could have identified Potter. He had let the seconds pass, when he could have seized Potter in triumph, because he had been unable to let go of the thought that, with Potter dead, there would be no hope of an end to this nightmare. It would just go on and on until he himself was dead. Given how poorly he had managed to negotiate his place in the new regime, that event wasn't likely to be a long time coming.
He just wanted to be safe. He just wanted to not be frightened anymore. Surely it was all right to want that? There were other things he wanted too, of course. Things that were not all right.
Rowle seemed to like him. He wasn't a nice man, but he wasn't an out and out psychopath either, and given Draco's choices at the time that had to count for something.
Draco remembered the shock on the first night after his return home from Hogwarts. Rowle and he had been the last two left in the blue drawing room after dinner. Rowle on rising had advised him to get to his rooms and not linger around the Manor at night. "This is no place for a boy like you, really. It's a shame your mother didn't get her way about sending you to her aunt's, but your father insisted."
Draco's head had spun. His father, his father had wished him back here! Presumably he was still nursing the ridiculous hope that Draco would manage to do something to redeem the family name. Make good his own mistakes. Be a son he could be proud of. A son who didn't end up vomiting on his own shoes when taken on a raid against some Muggle hamlet or isolated Wizarding dwelling. Draco was just one last throw of the dice in a game his father was losing, and a poor throw at that.
Draco stared into the fire, his heart beating faster and a light sweat starting to prickle the middle of his back as he wrestled with the question. Could he really do it? Ask Rowle for protection? More to the point, could he really offer what he would need to offer to secure it? He had thought about it ... thought about sex with men before. It hadn't really been something he'd assumed there would be ... room for in his life. It wasn't really ... acceptable. His duty to his family ...
If he was going to die soon, he didn't want one half-hearted fumble with Pansy to be the sum total of his sexual experience. He could probably have got someone at school to fuck, but that wouldn't have helped with anything else. If he was going to, he thought, ... well, he might as well try and secure some sort of advantage.
At school it could have been a secret, though. But if Rowle was looking out for him, it would not be long before everyone put seventeen Sickles together and made a Galleon. In fact, Draco thought, feeling suddenly quite sick, it would be necessary for people to know.
The Dark Lord didn't drag him into the dungeons to torture people because he sought his service. He did it to humiliate him and, more so, to humiliate his father. The Dark Lord was no leader of men. He delighted in seeing his people tear into one another. Even success was not enough. He needed his own to fail to feed his endless need to punish and destroy. Draco's father had failed him, more than once, but it amused the Dark Lord to punish him through Draco. It was so effective, drawing out the pantomime of his father's impotence, and it demonstrated his willingness to hit a pure-blood family where it really hurt: the heir.
But the Dark Lord was not merely opportunist. Draco knew now that he was absolutely insane. All tactics aside, he just loved to see people hurt. And nothing, nothing would hurt Lucius Malfoy more than seeing his son whore himself out to a man who was no better than a common soldier. Nothing. Draco shivered.
The Dark Lord would have little patience with cossetting Draco's weakness. But the final and abject humiliation of Lucius and Narcissa Malfoy, a blade to prick Bellatrix with whenever he wished, something that would make every pure-blood wince, that would perhaps be entertaining enough to really buy Draco what he wanted: some degree of security.
Mother. He couldn't do it. Father would never forgive him. He absolutely couldn't do it. It would be the end. He would have no future. Did he really think, though, that he could survive this on his own? He was not strong enough. Not strong enough. Draco hugged his knees and rocked before the fire. Could he do it? Couldn't he?
Once the plan had taken shape, it was impossible to force it from his mind. It offered an end, of sorts, to nearly two years of loneliness. From his father's fall from grace following the fiasco at the Department of Mysteries Draco had been self-reliant in a way he'd never been before. And through this he had proved again and again how completely and comprehensively he incapable he was.
Rowle was strong and knew how to look after himself. It was possible he could be persuaded to take equal care of someone who belonged to him. Draco had seen Rowle look at him. Couldn't he just ...? Around and around. Why did he always have to choose and why were his choices always so bloody poor?
Draco didn't know what time it was when he rose. He showered and found clean clothes. Examining himself before the mirror, he ran his fingers through his hair. It had been a long time since it was last cut. It hung down to his jaw. He usually charmed it back, close and tight to his head where no one could see the length anyway, but now he left it soft and feathery about his face. Searching his memory he dredged up the words he'd heard his mother use at her dressing table hundreds of times. He charmed the dark circles from around his eyes, brightened the white around his irises and added a little pink to his cheeks.
"Nice to see you making an effort, dear," the mirror clucked.
He looked at his refection. Good. You'd never know he'd been Crucioed the night before. 'Painted whore', his mind supplied. He shook his head. Potter better fucking be making the most of not being in the Malfoy dungeon. Potter better be doing something to end all this.
*
"What do you think you are doing?" his father hissed furiously at him. They stood in an alcove of the entrance hall. No one else seemed to be about, but of course that didn't mean no one was listening.
Draco looked away from his father. Lucius' face was contorted with rage and emotion.
Bawdy remarks had been exchanged at dinner. Macnair had been attempting to insinuate that Rowle's mind was no longer on his job. Rowle, as usual, had not been drawn and the discussion had devolved into crude speculation as to exactly how Draco might be distracting him. Macnair was always trying to get a rise out of Rowle. Bellatrix's fury and the horror of his parents had been enough to ensure that everyone had joined in the fun.
His father grabbed his shoulder, wrenching him round to face him again. "Are we not degraded enough? Is our situation not thoroughly debased enough that you would have to do this?"
"What did you expect me to do? What did you think I would do when you brought me back here?" Draco asked quietly.
"Not this!" his father exploded. "I brought you back here to give you a chance. A chance to redeem yourself and win back some respect." He shook his head. "And you do this! Are you completely devoid of shame? Have you no self-respect? Have you given any thought to what this will do to your mother and me? To play the whore for a man like Rowle. Here in your own house. In front of your family and all those you might have called friends!"
Draco shrugged.
"I will not have it!" his father snarled.
"But you don't get a say anymore. Can't you see? You are no longer the master here. Not here, in what was your house, in front your family and all those you might have called friends," Draco said.
His father slapped him. Draco's mouth fell open in shock before he deliberately closed it and the sound of the slap echoed around the stone walls of the hall as they stood in silence facing one another.
"Who do you think taught me to see the world in terms of those with power and those without it?" Draco said. "Who taught me to despise the weak and respect only the strong?"
"Yes?" said his father impatiently.
"I've tried to live like you wanted me to, to bend the world to my will. I couldn't understand why it never worked. But I understand now. I'm not the one who is strong, father, and I never was. I'm the one who bends."
"You are a Malfoy. You are the last of the Blacks. That at least should have been enough to keep you from this vileness," his father spat.
Draco shrugged again. "That strength must have all run out before it got to me."
"I would have hoped a son of mine would show more backbone." His father drew himself up. "Your mother was sick when she carried you. We should have ended it then and tried again when she was stronger." And he turned his back and strode off down the hall.
The next day Draco wore green silk and sat in Rowle's lap and smiled pleasantly when Avery called him a whore.
*
Of course Draco apologised to his father later. He always did. His entire relationship with his father revolved around apologising, admonishments and disappointed letters. 'I'm sorry, father. It won't happen again... I will do better.'
He honestly tried to rise to the challenges of the post-war world. To put the past, as his father and mother both urged, behind him. He interpreted this as an injunction to wear sober clothes and hold his head up, as if he had never begged, terrified, for his own life and as if he'd never let another man fuck him. He didn't think he was very convincing. He'd certainly never convinced his father and his mother's smiles of encouragement were always filled with pity and concern.
He remembered standing in the great hall of Hogwarts immediately after the final battle. His mother had seemed unable to let go of him. He remembered her repeating how he was safe now. That he was dead and would never touch him again. It had taken Draco a while to work out that his mother was referring not to Voldemort, but to Rowle who had also died in the final battle.
How do you explain to your mother that being the catamite of some rough Death Eater was actually quite okay? Draco found that he simple couldn't. He could see that she was haunted by the thought of his violation. But he couldn't bring himself to explain that he had actually mostly enjoyed it. That would somehow be much worse. To see his mother look at him like his father did.
The chimes of the Dresden clock in the corridor struck eight. Eight o'clock. Four more hours of the vigil to go. Draco's shoulders were stiff. Lucius Malfoy was dead. Draco was the new head of the family. The empty hall indicated that absolutely no one on earth could give a shit.
His father had been full of plans. "Of course you won't have your pick of brides as you might once have. Your fortune is considerable though, once the Ministry sees fit to release it, and you have a pretty enough face. Possibly a minor Prewett..." His mother kept saying absurd things like, "We just want you to be happy."
It was not supposed to be like this. When he was thirteen he'd thought he would marry Pansy Parkinson. He would father a son and the Malfoys would go on: being powerful, spending money and sneering at Weasleys. That was what was supposed to happen. That was before Pansy had grown tits and freaked Draco out by pressing them up against him. Even before the war he had not been quite right.
Last time he'd gone into Gringotts he'd seen bloody Ron Weasley working there. Ron Weasley, of the tatty robes and second-hand everything. Hadn't he even read that Weasley and Potter had robbed Gringotts during the war? Neville Longbottom was Deputy Headmaster at Hogwarts and would probably go on to become Minister of Magic.
Neville. Fucking. Longbottom.
Greg's florist's business was prospering. A recent piece in The Sunday Prophet had included G. Goyle: Fleuriste in what it had called 'Diagon Alley's Shopping Renaissance.' And Pansy's tits were finally achieving the universal acclaim they deserved as Lady P, lead singer of Hubble.
At least Harry Potter had remained predictable: going into the Aurors, fighting evil and saving the day. He was still reassuringly ill-groomed and scowling. If the photographs in the press were anything to go by, he looked like he wasn't getting any either. The Girl Weasley seemed to have given him up for professional Quidditch. At least there was someone in the universe who appeared to have as piss poor a sex life as Draco. That thought inevitably led to thoughts about the last time he'd had sex.
He had sincerely tried to put the whole Rowle thing behind him and go back to not thinking about men at all. He had been under stress, after all. An aberration. He'd managed to keep a lid on it until he was seventeen. It shouldn't be too hard to just ... stop. That, it turned out, had been too much to hope for, but he had been discreet, furtive and sporadic in his liaisons.
The last time had been on a visit to Scotland. Three months ago already. He'd been visiting the Caithness estate. A holding so paltry even the Ministry couldn't be bothered to seize it. Jamie McKieth was the son of the tenant there: skin like milk and shoulders like granite. Merlin, he'd been a sight for sore eyes and Draco hadn't been able to conceal his appreciation.
A few hours later he had his face pressed into prickly, sweet smelling straw and Jamie's fingers leaving bruises on his hips. He had been so desperate for it. It had been so long, he hadn't been able to stop his tongue from begging for it. From babbling out how much he needed it. Jamie had laughed and promised to take care of him. He'd been true to his word too, with a steady tenacity and rhythm that had Draco moaning like the whore he was. He'd wrapped his fingers into the twine binding the straw bales tight and held on. It had been glorious.
Oh great, now he had half a stiff one at his father's funeral. How was this his life? He tried to stifle the high-pitched giggle that bubbled up. He must have been only partially successful, given the swirl of his mother's veils.
And what did it say about him that those twenty minutes, with his trousers round his ankles in a draughty croft had been the last time he'd been warm in months? That he needed a stranger's endearments in his ears, telling him how hot and sweet he was, to feel right in his own skin and not like he was wearing another man's borrowed clothes?
He needed to keep it together. Think of something else.
Of course, he was never really going to be able to stop now, was he? Damn Rowle. And pity his poor future wife and son. And one day his mother would find out and she would cry and blame herself for her failure to protect him and he would finally have to confess that it hadn't been her fault and it hadn't been Rowle and he'd been like this all along.
He closed his eyes.
He should probably accept now, that this was the best he was ever going to manage. This half-hearted facsimile of composure and respectability. He wasn't really fooling anyone. Certainly not his friends. They'd all moved on. Transformed themselves. They'd done what Slytherins were supposed to do: bob to the top, whatever the circumstances.
He couldn't seem to catch the rhythm of this new world, just as he'd always been just a beat or two out of time in the old one. So he'd misstep and apologise and stumble on. And nobody else gave a damn about any of it, the empty hall told him. His father had cared and his father was dead now. He didn't even know what his mother thought. She would just look at him with pity and murmur, "Oh, Draco."
What was he doing it for? A plain, ambitious Prewett? A couple of decades of 'trying to do better', wearing dismal robes and not fucking men. And then what? Dropping dead to leave his son standing in this cursed, cold, ugly, fucking empty hall.
What if ... what if he just didn't? He didn't have any talent like the rest of his school-fellows had shown. He wasn't going to build a new life for himself like they had. But if he was going to be an abysmal fucking failure, perhaps he could at least stop pretending about it. Because, and Draco was increasingly sure this was the salient point, nothing made sense and it wasn't going to. And nobody cared any more, except the dead. And, maybe, the dead could just fuck off?
What would he do, if he wasn't trying to be a proper Malfoy anymore? He could get laid, for a start. He could walk into a nightclub, let his hair down, take his shirt off and get his first taste of cock in three months. Fuck, that would be good.
He could buy himself new clothes. Drashook had said at their last meeting at Gringotts that negotiations with the Ministry were going well and that 'in the not too distant future' (alluding delicately to his father's imminent demise) it was likely that significant assets would be released to him. He could send his mother abroad. Somewhere sunny. He could get her a Palazzo in Venice. She'd enjoy the opera and he recalled that she had old friends there.
He could buy flowers from Greg every day. Damn it, he could buy a flat in London to keep the flowers and never come back here. He could have a poster of Pansy on his wall and buy one of those new phonograph machines to play her records on.
He could stop walking that post-war tightrope, trying to maintain poise in the face of people who he knew had lost family members to Death Eaters, if not his own family. He could just apologise, if he wanted to. Even if it was ridiculous and embarrassing and didn't do any good, he could say he was sorry about those things.
When he next saw Ron Weasley at Gringotts, he wouldn't have to walk past briskly and try to look as inconspicuous as a six foot, platinum blond in a long swishy cloak could look whilst speed-walking. He could stop and tell Weasley that he was sorry for what happened to his brothers and congratulate him on his new job. He could say he was sorry for all the things he had said at school and share his opinion that, with Weasley's Wizard Wheezes doing as well as they were and Bill and Ron Weasley so successful at Gringotts, the Weasleys would undoubtedly be richer than the Malfoys before too long.
Hermione Granger! He would go and apologise to Hermione Granger. He had watched her being tortured in this abominable hall. He had heard her scream in a voice he knew from when he had been eleven years old, and he had done nothing. He had done nothing for her and yet she had testified at his trial, telling the Wizengamot that he had played no active part in her suffering. She needn't have done that and Merlin knew she had every right to wish him rotting in Azkaban.
He would go and thank her for that and apologise for everything else. Why, in fact, was he even still standing here, when there was so much to do? First and foremost, he was going to have a drink. Not a miserable, furtive, solitary drink, sitting on a wobbly wicker chair in the Malfoy wine cellar. A proper drink in a shiny, illuminated bar with sparkling mirrors and other people.
He took a minute to look at his father. He knew he would never shift a measure of the grief he felt that he hadn't been the son his father wanted or needed. He looked up at his mother, dignified and silent through this ordeal, as she had been through everything, and he felt the familiar stab of shame. But that alone could not keep him here.
"You know," he said out loud, "I think I've had enough now."
He turned before he could see her reaction and left the hall.
*
It was four days before Draco was sufficiently recovered from that 'proper drink' to be able to go and make his apology to Hermione Granger.
"Miss Granger says she can spare you ten minutes," said her assistant with a narrow eyed look that suggested this was excessively generous.
When Draco was ushered into her office, Hermione looked at him quizzically and asked coolly what she could do for him.
"Nothing," he replied. "I would simply be grateful for a few minutes of your time as I wanted to make you a proper apology. First, I should give you this." And he had set down the large, red amaryllis he was carrying. Hermione raised her eyebrows.
"I didn't want to come empty handed. Um, but of course there was nothing I could bring that would be ... that would make amends. So I thought flowers. But not romantic flowers, obviously. And nothing too funereal. I don't think there is anything that can be read into an amaryllis and looking at it now, it is fairly fleshy and with the pot too there's some bulk to it, so if you want to just throw it back in my face it will have a more satisfying heft than most flowers."
Hermione just continued to regard him steadily. "Right, well," Draco continued, "I wanted to first thank you for speaking at my trial. That was extremely generous of you. I know it is meaningless now, but I also wanted to say that I am very sorry for the way I treated you in school. I was a total shit.
"I'm also deeply sorry for what you suffered when you were brought forcibly to my house during the war. It will never be in my power to make right any of these wrongs and the rest. But," he said looking around her large, light office at the files and photographs and marks of a busy and successful life, "fortunately, in your case, I can see this is not necessary.
"I can see what I should have been able to see at school. You are far stronger and more able than any witch I know, except my mother. You arrived in our world when you were eleven without any of the training, familiarity and contacts I enjoyed, but you have in just over ten years made this world your own and rendered it greater service than my family has in generations. Far greater service than I could ever have hoped to offer. I can see that now.
"You don't need me telling you this. You don't need anything from me. I think that's probably why I brought you this ludicrous, gaudy flower, because there really is nothing I could give you that you could not get for yourself, if you wanted it. So thank you, again. And thank you for your time today."
Hermione regarded him thoughtfully. After a long minute she replied slowly. "You know, Draco ... I never thought I would say this. To you. But, apology accepted."
They stared at one another for another few moments, till Draco said, "Well, thank you again, I should ... ."
"Wait," said Hermione, then paused again. "How are you ... doing? Ron said he saw you at Gringotts a week or so ago. He didn't mention the haircut or the, ah, glitter jeans."
"Oh," said Draco, running his hand up the shorn side of his head and shaking the long fall of the fringe out of his eyes, "I didn't have them then. It's quite a ... new thing."
Hermione nodded. Neither of them mentioned his father, though Draco could tell she was thinking of him. "You look very different," she said, "in a good way."
"Do you think?" said Draco smiling self-consciously. Merlin, this was awkward! "Well you look quite different yourself. Your hair ... very chic. And, well, Pansy. Quite a lot of people. Anyway, I was tired of just ... . Well, I should probably ... . Your assistant said you were very busy, so I should just ... " Draco rose to go.
"Wait," said Hermione again. "If you are serious about changing ... ."
"Changing?" Draco asked.
Hermione made a gesture at him that encompassed his new hair and clothes. "If you meant what you said about being sorry ..."
"Oh, I am sorry," Draco said. "I just ... didn't think of it as changing, just not trying to pretend any more. I mean, I was an arsehole. That was me. I'm just not a ... Head of the Malfoy Family, power-broking, politicking, world supremacy arsehole. I'm just ... a common or garden arsehole. Who likes drinking and dancing. And fucking. Sorry! I should probably ... "
Hermione smiled. "Well, let me know how it goes. Thanks for the amaryllis. I'll give it to my mother. She likes them."
"Oh good. You should tell her that there are going to be six blooms on a single stem. Greg did stress that to me. Seems like that's rather a point, or something."
"You got it at Goyles? I'll tell mum, she'll be chuffed. She read that piece in the Prophet at the weekend."
Draco blinked. "Is your mother allowed to read the Prophet? Only I thought ..." He trailed off uncertainly.
Hermione gave a short smile that didn't reach her eyes. "After what I went through and what they went through for the wizarding world, the Statute of Secrecy can just fuck off."
"Oh, quite," Draco agreed hastily. "You know, you're quite scary when you lay down the law. If I wasn't wildly bent, I'd probably find it quite hot."
"Then it's probably just as well for both our sakes that you are. Frankly, I think I'm coping remarkably well with you turning up out of the blue in sparkly jeans and an edgy haircut offering heart-felt apologies. If you cracked on to me too, I might turn hysterical."
"I agree. I, for one, feel rather in need of lie down. By the way, may I ask what smells so delicious in that little white paper bucket on your desk?"
"That? That's not ... It's a double sugar-free caramel latte."
"What does it do?"
"It doesn't do anything. It's a cup of coffee."
"Oh," Draco said. "The coffee cups at home are really very small, now I think of it. It can be rather a bore to have to keep filling them up again and again. I do like coffee. How can it have caramel in it and be sugar-free?"
"It's a Muggle thing."
"Oh."
"I tell you what, Draco. Come back here same time next week and I'll take you for a Muggle coffee. You can fill me in on how being a drinking and dancing arsehole is treating you."
"Oh," said Draco again. "Really? That would be ... very nice. Thank you ... Miss Granger."
"Hermione."
"Thank you, Hermione."
*
The first time Harry Potter arrested Draco happened about five weeks after this coffee with Hermione.
"Potter, you came!" Draco exclaimed.
"I didn't come. I'm here to arrest you," Potter replied dourly.
"Arrest me? What for?"
"For holding an illegal gathering in contravention of the Statue of Secrecy."
"It's a party," Draco said. "Hello, Susan."
Potter narrowed his eyes. "How do you know Susan's name? Have you been snooping around Magical Law Enforcement files?"
"She was at school with us," Draco replied, confused.
"Are you claiming you know the names of everyone you were at school with?"
"She was in our year, Potter!"
"Harry, let it go," said Susan. "You had a lot going on when we were at school. Hi, Draco."
"Are you arresting everyone?" Draco asked.
"No, just you."
"We couldn't get a warrant for anyone else," Susan added helpfully.
"Oh. Well, that makes me feel special," said Draco beatifically. "So long as it doesn't spoil the party."
"Draco Malfoy, I arrest you for instigating and assembling an illegal gathering in direct contravention of the Statue of Secrecy."
"Hermione said if we put up signs outside saying 'Convention' no one would notice people wearing funny outfits. It seems a bit odd to me. I mean, I don't know what's so conventional about a party ... ."
Potter interrupted. "You are annoying and endangering the Muggle residents of this hotel."
"Oh no, you see I booked out the whole hotel for the party. In case people wanted rooms, for, ya' know or were too drunk to Apparate or something."
"It is an illegal gathering."
"It's just a private party, Potter."
"You leafleted Diagon Alley. By Thestral."
"Everyone was invited," said Draco throwing his arms wide.
"Why are you all sparkly? Is it a spell?"
"No. They're wearing it in all the clubs. It's a gel. It rubs off on everything. Do you want to be sparkly, Potter?" Draco dragged his finger across his shimmering collarbone and dabbed the glittery end of his finger on Potter's nose. To be fair, he was tripping balls at the time.
*
The sixth or possibly seventh time Harry Potter tried to arrest him (Draco was starting to loose count) he felt he had to protest.
"You can't arrest me, Potter. It's for charity."
"You and your ... friends ... are causing a public disturbance and disrupting the smooth operation of business and traffic in the area," Potter had replied, his arms folded stubbornly across his chest.
"It's a publicity stunt for S.P.E.W. We're raising awareness."
"Of what? What you look like naked? Because, from what I gather, a sizable proportion of the population are already aware of that," Potter retorted.
Draco rolled his eyes. "Hah bloody hah. This is a bona fide charity event, signed off on by Hermione, so you can't arrest me. Hi, Susan."
"Hi, Draco. Nice tea towel," said Susan.
"Can you all at least go inside? You're blocking the thoroughfare."
"No we can't go inside! That's the point. We're raising awareness and talking to the public about Elfish welfare."
"Here's your ice cream, Draco."
"Thank you, darling. Potter, Susan, you know Tobias? He plays for the Hornets."
"Ooooh yes!" said Susan. "Very nice, very small tea towel, Tobias. You know Harry, I really don't think we should be obstructing these ... fine gentlemen in their charitable endeavours. I, for one, feel a pressing need to be better informed about Elfish welfare. Tobias, come and talk to me!"
"Standing about eating ice cream is not the same as doing real charity work."
"Don't ask me about the ice cream. It's that group of ladies over there who keep buying them for us," and Draco gave a little flutter of his fingers and a group of middle-aged witches standing nearby tittered back at him. "If I was being generous, I'd say they were concerned about us getting over-heated standing out in the sun, but really I think they just like to see us sticky and licking things."
Potter growled at him. Really, the man had no sense of humour.
"Is everything all right, Draco?"
"It's fine. Freddy, this is Harry Potter. Potter, this is Freddy Ljungberg. He's a footballer and model. His sister's a witch. She is doing a European Wizarding Governance Professional Exchange programme over here with Hermione. We felt that a celebrity figure from the Muggle world would be valuable in raising awareness among Muggle-born witches and wizards who are often unaware that the exploitation of house-elves is still a very real issue in our society."
Draco turned as Dean Thomas trotted over from where he had been setting up his shot.
"Draco, hi!" Dean said. "Great to see you, Harry. It's been way too long. Draco said you'd be here. Look, I'm ready now. If I could get you all standing together beneath the Diagon Alley sign." Dean ushered them over to the corner of the street.
"What's going on?" Potter asked a he drifted with them, looking confused.
"Dean's doing pictures for the Prophet and Witch Weekly. I told you, publicity stunt. Raising public awareness."
"You told him I'd be here?"
"Potter, I can't set foot outside my flat without you trying to arrest me. I knew you'd show up."
"But I don't want my picture taken. I hate having my picture taken," Potter protested.
"Look," said Draco patiently, "you like elves and you like Hermione. You're right here. Now get in the fucking photo. Emmanuel, give him an ice cream. You know Emmanuel. He's the drummer with Hubble. What am I saying? Of course you know him. He's the bloke I was in the lav with, last time you tried to arrest me."
The picture of Potter looking fed up with life, surrounded by half-naked men in tea towels holding ice creams was so perfect Draco pinned a copy to the wall in his flat.
*
Draco looked up with a groan from where he had been huddling on Hermione's sofa. Harry Potter crashed through the Floo and stumbled onto the carpet.
"What are you doing here?" Potter demanded as soon as he'd dusted himself down.
"Waiting to die. Why can't you come through the Floo like a normal person?"
Potter ignored him. "Where's Hermione?"
"In bed. She's sleeping in. Probably because I woke her up at 5 o'clock this morning, so the generous thing would be to let her be."
Potter frowned at him and strode out of the room. "Fine. I'll wait in the kitchen."
"You wouldn't make me a coffee, would you?" Draco called after him. His head was killing him. Everything was killing him.
"No, I would not make you a bloody coffee, Malfoy. Get it yourself!"
"Fine, I will. Merlin!" And Draco, still swathed in the blanket from the sofa, limped after him into the kitchen.
It was fucking difficult to make coffee and keep the blanket from slipping off from his shoulders. "Look, Potter, could you at least make yourself useful and Accio the blue bathrobe from Hermione's bedroom. I don't want to go in and disturb her."
"Accio it yourself," Potter, who had been glowering at Draco as he tottered round the kitchen, retorted.
"I would," said Draco, steadying himself with both hands on the kitchen table. The room was starting to tilt alarmingly. "But if I try to use magic when I'm like this I'm likely to blow a hole in her bedroom wall."
"Why? What's wrong with you?" Potter frowned suspiciously.
The blanket was slipping from his shoulders again, but Draco daren't let go of the table. "For fuck's sake, Potter! Accio me the fucking robe. I'm freezing. I need to sit down and I need that coffee. Then you can carry on with your fucking routine interrogation. All right?"
"Fine. Accio blue bathrobe!" The robe swept down the corridor and Potter caught it, balled it up and tossed it across the table.
The kettle started to whistle and Draco took a deep breath and straightened up, shrugging off the blanket and pulling on the robe as he shuffled over to the hob, ignoring Potter's hiss of horror at being momentarily confronted by naked man arse.
His hands were shaking and bloody sore. He should run them under the cold tap, but the sink was just too far away. He poured boiling water across the counter and swore. After he finally succeeded in getting sufficient water into the cafetière, he turned back to Potter. "There's enough water if you want tea or something, but you'll have to get it yourself."
"Have you been in a fight, Malfoy?" Potter asked, frowning fiercely.
Oh Merlin! Draco sighed. "No, I haven't been in a fight. I was out last night and now I'm just a little worse for wear."
"You look like you've been dragged naked across rocks?"
Draco closed his eyes, but opened them again when he felt the room start to tilt alarmingly. "Sex, Potter. I was having sex. Some of it might have got a little vigorous."
"You're bloody all down your back!"
"Am I? It certainly feels like hell. Oh shit!" Draco exclaimed, suddenly anxious. "I hope I didn't bleed on Hermione's sofa again!"
"You often turn up like this?" Potter sounded outraged. Presumably on behalf of Hermione's soft furnishings.
"Sometimes. Look, I hate to ask, but can you help me back to the table? I don't think I can make it with the cafetière and the mug." When Potter failed to leap to his feet, Draco continued. "Let me put it like this: Hermione will be angry with you if I end up lying scalded and naked on her kitchen floor because you were being a judgemental arse."
"Fine," said Potter again, shortly. But at least he did help Draco back to a seat at the table and brought him sugar for his coffee while he made himself a cup of tea.
Having picked the visible bits of dirt and glass out of the heels of his palms, Draco propped one foot up on the rung of the chair next to him and began to do the same to his knee, which was, frankly, a bloody mess.
"Why didn't you just ask Hermione to heal that for you last night?" Potter finally asked.
"I didn't want her to see." Draco stared into his mug. "I had sort of promised her, after last time, that I wouldn't ... ." He made a sketchy gesture to indicate his overall physical condition. "She worries. So I cast a glamour over the bad bits. I was still so wasted I didn't really feel it last night. I think I'll have to ask her to fix me up when she wakes. It hurts like, well, fuck."
"Is that why you come here, to get fixed up?"
Draco stared up at the ceiling. "Sometimes, Potter, when you've been out all night and fucked by three strange men in an underground car park you just don't feel like going back to your empty flat, you know?"
Potter's face twisted up in what was probably disgust. "Fuck Malfoy!" He shook his head. "Why do you have to be so ... ?"
"Vile? I don't know, Potter. It's just the way I am." Draco started to work on his other knee, the robe falling most of the way open. Potter hissed again.
"Oh grow up, Potter."
They sat in silence, until Draco tried to get more comfortable in the chair and groaned. "I don't suppose you know a spell for anal tears?" he asked.
"Argh! Just shut up, Malfoy! Seriously! Just fucking drink the rest of your ten-person cafetière and don't say another word until Hermione wakes up. Okay?"
"Fine," Draco smirked.
It was strangely reminiscent of being back at Hogwarts: drinking his morning coffee, bathed in waves of animosity sent towards him by Harry Potter. Of course, at school they hadn't been sitting at the same table. Potter had looked similarly sleep-deprived then, though and for the first time Draco wondered why Potter had burst through Hermione's Floo at 8 o'clock on a Sunday morning.
He still had the same frankly astonishing bed-head he'd had at school. Really, how did his hair get that way? At school he'd speculated that Potter's dorm mates must rouse in the night and use his sleeping head to clean out their cauldrons. It seemed like it just went that way on its own.
Potter noticed him staring and glared back fiercely. It made Draco notice something else: the complete absence of any hostility on his part. Certainly he still took a lot of pleasure in winding Potter up. And it was irritating and inconvenient at times to be arrested so regularly. Even if they had stopped any attempt to charge him with anything. But he honestly didn't hate Harry Potter any more. Odd.
*
Draco knew he was being followed when he went up that alley. Sometimes, though, the dancing and the sex just wasn't enough. Sometimes the itching under his skin just couldn't be dealt with any other way. He'd felt that rising boil inside himself for a few days now, and it had to stop.
When you got trapped in cycle of thoughts that just wouldn't go away; when you started dreaming again, then sometimes the only thing that would fix it was a good fight. Or, to be more precise, a good kicking. Nothing cleansed the system like that adrenalin surge when you thought that you might, this time, have gone too far.
"You think we've all forgotten? Well, some of us ain't forgotten. We know what you're like," one of the men snarled at him. "Death Eater scum!"
Draco lounged back against the wall and drawled, "You want to talk about my father? Really?" Mentioning Lucius Malfoy was guaranteed to get their blood up. He surreptitiously flexed his knuckles. Just because he was going to get his arse kicked didn't mean he wasn't going to give them something to remember him by.
"Malfoy."
He turned. Harry fucking Potter. Oh great! "Merlin help us," sighed Draco. "Potter."
"Go on," Potter said to the men surrounding Draco. "Get lost. I've got this."
"Saved again by Harry Potter. How's that for laughs?" Draco took a deep breath and tried to compose himself, but really, this was the end of enough, when you couldn't even go out and get a beating in peace.
"I'm not saving you, Malfoy."
Draco clenched his teeth and exhaled through his nose. His nerves were on fire and he needed ... he needed. Maybe he could get Harry Potter to punch him, if he pressed the right buttons. He slid further down the wall, canting his hips out. "Oh. I see," he said. "Am I being disorderly then? Come on and tell us."
Potter was favouring him with the furious glare he seemed to reserve particularly for him. Draco uncoiled from the wall and prowled towards Potter, swaying his hips. "Is this ... disordered?" he breathed, leaning in towards Potter and lightly cupping the back of his neck.
As expected, Potter shoved him away. "Come off it, Malfoy."
But his voice was wrong: breathless and strained. Something was wrong about this whole thing. The alley felt like it was full of electricity and something might go up in sparks any minute. Draco was disquieted. "Never were much fun," he muttered. He needed a cigarette.
"Smoking, Malfoy? Really?"
"No," Draco said. "It's just for you."
And they were at it again, snipping at one another, just like always, but it still didn't feel the same.
It was supposed to be simple between them. They were supposed to hate each other. It had been the one fucking constant in Draco's life, but it wasn't working any more.
For some reason, probably the rum, Draco found himself trying to explain this to Potter and it all came spilling out. How he'd meant to be friends with Potter, like his father wanted. How, like everything else his father had wanted of him, it hadn't worked; how he'd hated Potter and how, somewhere along the line, that hate had just evaporated.
Potter wasn't so fickle though. Potter was one hundred percent reliable and had always just plain hated him. He only had to look at Draco to know that he was rotten to his soul. Draco didn't know why he couldn't hate him back any more.
"I'm supposed to hate you, Potter. Why don't I just hate you?" Draco asked. That was the last time he mixed rum with tequila.
Potter was starting to look a bit panicked and Draco's head was spinning. It was too dark in the alley. He needed to see Potter's face. He leaned forward, peering into Potter's eyes and he could smell him, clean and honest and not filthy and disgusting. "Have you ever just wanted to go back — miserable as it was. Horrible as it was — go back because at least then, things made sense; everything seemed as though it was exactly as it was supposed to be, and you never had to wonder whether it was just you — "
Then Potter had kissed him and Draco recoiled, because this was not right at all. The world was most definitely spinning now. It was probably the End of Days and if it was ... . Draco regained his balance and caught hold of Potter's shirt, kissing him hungrily. His other hand wound up in Potter's hair and he pulled his body flush against him. Potter's body was hot and strong and against all reason Potter was gripping him tightly and kissing him back.
Draco connected hard with the wall behind him, as Potter drove him back against it. Potter was straining against him, pressed thigh to thigh and chest to chest and then he yanked on Draco's necklace, choking him and forcing his head to one side as he licked up his throat and sucked on the piercing in his ear. And Draco thought he might come just there. Just like that.
His head throbbed from where it had cracked against the stone wall and he could feel broken glass beneath his boots. The alley stank of piss and Potter shoved his knee between Draco's and pulled his hips so Draco was riding Potter's thigh and he was so hard, so hard right now.
"And underneath it all you're just a dirty motherfucker," Draco gasped into Potter's hair. All this time! Potter wasn't reliable and he wasn't good. He just wanted. Just like Draco wanted.
"My flat," Draco moaned breathlessly as Potter ground against him.
"Here," Potter growled.
Harry Potter wanted to fuck him in a back alley. Draco moaned his acquiescence into Potter's mouth and, Merlin, he wasn't going to last long. He fumbled for lube in his pockets, whilst Potter held him pinned up against the wall and kept up a merciless assault with his tongue and his hands and his thigh rubbing Draco, like he wanted to crawl into his skin or tear him apart.
'I'm going to get fucked by Harry Potter. I'm going to get fucked by Harry Potter,' his brain supplied in a loop. And Potter's eyes were black in a white face and he was lubing up his fingers like he wasn't quite sure how he got there. And just suppose this wasn't something Potter had done before. Suppose it was just Draco. Just Draco who got him like this. Draco's cock jumped at the idea, as he peeled down his jeans and guided Potter's hand between his legs, sliding one thigh up to Potter's waist.
He felt Potter's finger breach him. Oh Merlin. Oh Morgana. Oh Circe. Oh fuck! Draco's head thunked back against the wall as Potter started to move again.
"Harry Potter. I'm going to get fucked by Harry Potter," he said.
He was going to get fucked, up against a wall, by Harry fucking Potter. Draco wrestled free of Potter's grip and turned round. "You'd better do it this way."
Looking over his shoulder, he saw Potter staring at his arse and biting his lip like it was all he could do not to howl with want. But Potter wasn't moving and he looked wild-eyed and skittish too, like he might just bolt.
That was not acceptable at this point, not acceptable at all. He didn't know if he could cope with Potter bottling it now. He was riding the rush that always came with these encounters, letting go of his moorings, letting go of what he knew was right and drowning in the wrong, fierce want of a stranger. But this wasn't a stranger, this was Potter, and Draco suddenly needed this more urgently than anything in his life.
"Now you've got me all wet and messy, are we going to go?" he asked. Potter still hesitated, his eyes still glued to Draco's arse. "Or are you just going to watch?" Draco writhed against the wall, stretching up against it.
"I'm going to fuck you," Potter said finally and advanced.
"Come on and do it," Draco goaded. Only the need he felt was seeping into his voice and he was pressing back greedily as, with one hand on his hip and one hand on his own cock, Potter finally breached him. "Merlin!"
"Shut up!" Potter pushed into him hard and his hands were all over Draco and his panting breaths were broken, almost moans, and he thrust again. And Draco could tell how Potter was frantic with it. How he couldn't help himself.
And it was just like it always was. All those men, those men who were good, honest, brave and loyal, or who at least might have been, they were no different from Draco. When it came down to it, to this grunting, wrestling need, to their base animal desires, they were all no better than he was.
They might call him a slut, might push him up against dirty walls, tell him to shut up, like Potter was doing now, tell him they hated him, like Potter was doing, but they couldn't control what was inside them any better than Draco could. He could force it out of them, with a look, with a tilt of his hips or a spread stance. He could make them like he was. They thought it was an invitation, a come-on. They called him a whore, but really they were just as powerless. And when Draco felt them inside him, felt their hot, harsh breath on the back of his neck, their desperate grip on him, he knew they were beasts just like him.
"You thought you were too good for me. You made my life a living hell," Draco panted.
"You were an annoying little shit," Potter grunted.
"And now you're fucking me. You're shoving your big thick cock inside me and I — I don't believe it; I don't understand why I — more, Merlin, Harry Potter, can't you fuck me any harder?"
"This is fucked up," said Potter.
"Just fuck me harder, Harry Potter, you sanctimonious pompous fucking bitch — "
Harry Potter, who managed of all people to be better, stronger and purer, was just as filthy as the rest of them. Just as helpless to resist the hot, slick, perfect slide into vileness. Harry Potter was just like him. And this was not how it was supposed to be. Harry Potter was not supposed to be thrusting urgently into him, fucking him so hard and fast, like he couldn't get enough of it. It was not right, it didn't make sense. Nothing made sense any more.
But, perhaps, just briefly it didn't matter. Not when Potter's rhythm was stuttering and he was coming inside him and when his own orgasm was tantalisingly close. Draco held Potter's hand tight up to his groin, rutting against it as he felt Potter pulse inside him, until he came into Potter's palm.
Draco felt the familiar wash of cold as the warm body behind him stepped away and the air began to chill the sweat on his back. He felt the familiar hot dribble of come starting to make its way down his inner thigh. After the endorphin rush of his orgasm, the usual sense of dislocation, of not fitting and nothing being right, began to creep back. So soon. Always too soon.
"I'm a goddamn freak," he said, dropping his head against the cold damp of the wall in front of him.
"Malfoy," Potter said. There was uncertainty in his voice. But Draco wasn't a fragile flower. He might be a giant fuck-up, but he'd had enough awkward post-fuck exchanges to know nothing good came of hanging around.
He cleaned himself up roughly and extended the same courtesy to Potter.
"Malfoy," said Potter again and suddenly it was more important than ever that he didn't say any more. Draco didn't want to hear Potter try to extricate himself from the brief intimacy of their shared hunger. It wasn't like he needed to explain that 'he wasn't really like that', or whatever cack-handed excuses he'd come up with. That he wasn't, and would never be, like Draco.
Draco looked at him and smiled tightly. "Thanks for the fuck, Potter."
Potter stared at him, looking strangely conflicted. "Don't mention it."
"I won't." And Draco Apparated away.