'Your car is a piece of shit!' Harry exclaimed, lobbing the keys to Draco as he strode into the kitchen at the manor. 'I had to use magic to restart it five times, once at a set of traffic lights with a police car behind me. If Arthur Weasley knew, he'd be hauling me in front of the fucking Wizengamot.'
'Dar, you've been spending too much time with Uncle Ron!'
'Oh! Teddy! Sorry, I didn't realise you were there. Don't you dare...'
'I know, Dar, don't you dare repeat any of it.'
'Repeat what?' said Scorpius, coming into the kitchen.
'Dar's been swearing again. He does it when he's frustrated and tells me not to dare repeat any of the words. I know them all anyway. There's this boy at my school called Frankie...'
'Edward Lyall Lupin-Potter.'
'Yes, Dar?'
'Don't!' warned Harry.
'Okay, Dar. Come on, bro, let's go and explore the orchards again.'
'Alright, bro!' replied Scorpius.
Both boys giggled.
'Wrap up warm, boys, it's beginning to snow!' Harry called after the retreating backs of Teddy and Scorpius.
'You know he's only going to tell Scorpius all the swear words he knows once they're out of ear-shot.'
'I'm sorry.'
Draco waved it off. 'Scorp probably knows them all too, and then some. You should hear maman when she drops a saucepan on her toes.'
'I am in the room, Draco-darling. I can hear you, you know.'
Harry blanched, 'sorry about the language, Narcissa.'
She rolled-her eyes, 'I was blessed with Bellatrix for a sister, do you really think you've just tainted my poor innocent ears for the first time...'
'Even so... I apologise.' Harry nearly added a bow, sometimes it felt like he was talking to royalty when it came to Narcissa. 'What's with the "bro" thing?' Harry asked Draco.
'I don't know, I noticed it at breakfast. They've been whispering about something all morning. I don't dare ask.'
'Probably best not to, I notice Teddy is keeping his hair blond these days too.'
'Honestly, you two are as blind as each other sometimes.' Narcissa rolled her eyes and left the breakfast table. 'I'm going to read my paper in peace, away from such corrupting language and this idiocy, in case it's contagious. Draco-darling, why don't you take Harry down to the farm, the stocks need checking on with Aaron, but I don't want you doing it alone seeing as you're just getting over another bout of your condition. It would save me a job next week.' She paused at the doorway, looked back and smiled fondly, 'and wrap up warm, boys, it's beginning to snow!'
Harry and Draco caught eyes with each other and Harry quirked an eyebrow.
'Come on then, Potter, it seems as if you've been cast as my carer for the day, even though I'm not the invalid she treats me as.' Draco led them off to the hallway.
'She just cares. She loves you.'
'I know, but I'm twenty-seven. I can look after myself.'
'You still live at home...' Harry pushed his feet into his boots and wordless tied the shoelaces.
'Piss off, Potter! Oh... that has good alliteration to it, most satisfying. Why didn't I use that at school?'
'Because you were a stuck-up prissy. Who's Aaron?'
'The estate manager, and a muggle. And I need you to teach me that shoelace trick.' Draco was kneeling down in front of Harry, tying his own. 'It would be better with these bloody fumbling fingers of mine.'
'Sure.' Harry was very aware that this was a conversation they were yet to have and he was slightly anxious about having it. He could only assume the shaking and weakness that Draco referred to was an aftermath of war, of his father's and Bellatrix's training and he wasn't sure how to broach the subject of what it meant for Draco, for the future. 'Thanks for the forewarning about Aaron. So, where is this farm and what are we doing? Is it far? Am I going to end up carrying you there and back, seeing as you're so weak and feeble?'
'Questions, questions. Just get your coat on, Harry. I'll explain as we go. And you only get to carry me over the threshold into the house.' Harry blushed as Draco grinned wickedly.
'Actually,' Harry thought aloud as he shrugged his coat over his shoulders. 'I've already done that. Too bad you were so out of it on Thursday, you missed an opportunity.' It was Draco's turn to blush. Harry liked the way the tips of his ears tinged pink.
'You're defying my gendered stereotypes, Jane!' Draco snarked back.
'That's because you have made some assumptions about whether I top or bottom,' Harry quipped despite his lack of experience.
'Oh Salazar!' The colour had actually visibly drained from Draco's face as he stared at Harry. 'Please don't say things like that to me,' he muttered huskily.
Harry stepped closer to Draco. 'It's true though, isn't it?' he said quietly. 'You've made an assumption about me.' Harry could feel his heart thumping wildly. 'What happens if I say I don't bottom?'
'Have you tried?' Draco's voice was raspy and whispery and doing the wrong things to Harry and he hated to admit it but his trousers felt a little tighter than they should. And suddenly they were stood too close again.
'No,' whispered Harry. He didn't add because, quite frankly, the thought petrified him. Harry saw Draco's gaze drop to his lips and he couldn't help reciprocating. And he saw Draco pulling his bottom lip in between his teeth and he nearly moaned aloud.
'You've only topped?' Draco said quietly. He was fiddling with the button on the front of Harry's coat, doing it up for Harry with shaky fingers. And Harry's stomach was in that Permanent Knotted-State once more.
'I've ... no...' Their gazes were flicking between each other's eyes and Harry could see flecks of silver and anthracite amongst the smoky-grey and Draco's pupils were definitely dark and blown, and, oh Merlin!
'When you said you'd had an experiment and a confirmation?' Draco's voice was so quiet and raspy it was hard to hear him. And Draco was looking at him with a commingling of quiet reverence and amazement and desire.
'Just enough to know my preferences,' Harry's hands were flattening Draco's hands against his chest, drawing him closer and, by Merlin, his breath felt laboured as his chest heaved and he glanced at Draco's lips in time to see him wet them.
'Harry,' Draco whispered. 'Please...'
Harry lent closer, hooking a finger under Draco's chin to pull him closer.
'Draco-darling, I've just remembered... oh!' came Narcissa's voice across the hallway.
Harry actually about-turned and marched out of the manor without his hat and gloves and Definitely Not Looking at anyone, at all, ever, again. Forever, if needs be. In fact, he might just move to Alaska with immediate effect. There was no way he could face Narcissa, or Draco for that matter, again. Merlin! It was mortifying. He contemplated Apparating straight home but there was Teddy to think about. He marched off to the orchard, ignoring the snow that was gathering in his hair and his fingertips which were freezing. He just stuffed his hands firmly into his pockets and strode round the house as fast as he could without actually running.
The moment Teddy's warning ward went off, Harry felt it instantaneously in the pit of his stomach and he knew that something bad had happened. He broke into a sprint, no longer caring about the cold or the Malfoys or his embarrassment or Alaska. He rounded the corner through the gateway and into the walled garden of the orchard, and he collided with Scorpius running full pelt into him.
'Oh, Harry! Quick! Quick!' the boy looked extremely pale as he grabbed Harry's hand and tugged at him to follow.
He could hear the yowling before he saw Teddy and the sound wrenched his heart in two, it was like nothing he'd heard before in all his troubled twenty-seven years. He needed it to stop. Not his Teddy! He let go of Scorpius's hand and ran towards the crumpled heap on the damp grass.
'Teddy!'
He sent a Patronus soaring off to find Draco and he skidded to a halt on his knees beside the boy in the settling snow.
'DAR!' Teddy was howling in pain and trying to lift his head to look at his leg but he kept dropping his head back. His hair was a mess of mousey brown lankness that tousled around his young face which was distorted in agony. His foot was at a sickening, unnatural angle to his leg.
'He fell out of the tree,' Scorpius was sobbing too. 'It was too slippy.'
'It's okay, boys. It's okay.'
'DAR! IT HURTS!'
'I know, Ted.' Harry was having to bite back the panic. It felt like all his years of training were slipping away from him. He cast a warming spell around them all.
'DAR! TAKE THE PAIN AWAY! PLEASE!'
'Brace yourself, Teddy, I need to bind it, then I can get you to St Mungo's.'
'DAR!'
'Hold my hand, Ted,' Harry grasped it.
'Mine too.' And Harry looked at Scorpius who, despite the tears which were streaking his pale face and the fact the he was transfixed by the horrible angle of Teddy's foot, was being brave for his friend. He felt an overwhelming fondness for the boy.
'It's going to hurt, Ted.'
'DO IT!' he screamed.
Teddy screeched as Harry cast 'Ferula' and his grip tightened ferociously on Harry's and poor Scorpius' hands.
'Dar!' he whimpered.
'Sorry, Ted. But I can move you now.' Teddy's legs were bound together securely around a splint.
Draco and Narcissa burst through the gate just as Harry was carefully lifting the boy up onto his shoulder.
'I'm taking him to St Mungo's,' Harry shouted across the orchard.
'Take me too, Harry, please...' Scorpius yelled hysterically, holding tightly onto his leg.
Draco nodded; as pale faced as his son while he took in what was happening.
'Hold tight, Scamp.' And Harry grabbed the boy's arm to make sure as he held securely onto the sobbing Teddy and they Apparated straight into the foyer of St Mungo's, Harry skilfully avoiding landing near any other people milling around the area with his two precious side-alongs.
*****