“It might be,” Kingsley snaps the leather journal he was leafing through shut, and shoved it all into his desk drawer, like he was putting away meddlesome paperwork. “Just let me deal with it.”
“But—”
“Potter.” He was the kind of man who inspires confidence, and Kingsley is able to stop any protests with only a few words and a hand on Harry’s shoulder. “Let me handle it. I’ll let you know if I turn anything up. But until then?” He’s ushering Harry out of the office, and Harry could imagine him locking the door behind him, opening that drawer back up, and combing through it, because they both knew that even though people called Mad-Eye crazy, he knew a threat when he saw one. “Don’t tell anyone.”
That was two months ago, and Harry had tricked himself into thinking that maybe it wasn’t a real problem, that the fight was actually over.
He thought that, but now he’s having an Order meeting in his kitchen.
He really thought that this part of his life was done and over with, but apparently not, because here he was, calling for quiet in his own house with the remnants of the Order and Dumbledore’s Army staring back at him.
Dumbledore’s Army, he thinks, in those few seconds between being a friend and becoming a leader again, looking at them all gathered here like some sorry class reunion. What a sorry bunch we make.
In the end, it is Ginny that gets all of their attention, standing up on a chair and whistling. She stumbles on the way back down, and there are snickers, but it stops as soon as he stands.
Once before, he had stood in front of a crowded room and told them that they were going to look for something, not knowing that he was commanding them all to go to war, to fight for him, to die for him. Now, he has learned, and knows exactly what it means when he asks for their help.
“Mad-Eye left us a job to do.” He had decided on absolute honesty, because Dumbledore had always been caught up in a web of lies and half truths, and Harry didn’t not want to be that kind of leader. “We—Draco, Hermione, Ron and I—found a journal up in the attic, telling us about the people he suspects that were still out there, hiding, biding their time. Ones that might not have been supporters of Voldemort, but who were just waiting to ride the tide of his defeat to their own power, like he did with Grindewald.”
There’s a noticeable flinch when he said Voldemort’s name, but he ignores it, and moves to the blank wall instead, rolling down the spreadsheet that Draco had spent last night painstakingly creating. It listed the names and locations of suspects, their crimes, what they might be planning to do. Wizarding terrorists, hate crimes waiting to happen. “Kingsley came to me last night, which is why I asked you all here.” He felt nervous, more than he ever had before, because it was one thing to ask them to fight when they are young and think that war brings glory, but it is another when they have felt the truth of it. “These are the most credible threats.”
“And what’s that got to do with us?” George called out from the back of the group, his voice tight and angry. Harry tried not to flinch at the tone of his words—this was not an easy situation, and ever since the loss of his ear and the absence of Fred to hide behind, George hasn’t done well in crowds of people. The anger, he reminded himself, wasn’t directed at him. “The ministry can’t handle it?”
“The ministry is…inadequate for this particular situation.” Harry knew he had to choose his words carefully, unless Kingsley came after him for revealing secret information. “There’s still some concern of corruption, and this is sensitive information. We have to handle it independently, like we did before.”
There were only blank stares. “And why should we?” It was George again, sullen, angry, hurting. “How much more do they expect us to give?” He shook his head, then stood up so fast his chair fell to the floor. “No. I’m sorry, Harry, but I’m done.”
And then he walked out.
Harry didn’t really know what to do with that, because one of the constants of his life is that when it is time to fight, there have always been people willing to stand beside him, even when he wasn’t asking them to. And now that he was asking them to, he was getting no volunteers, no one to stand beside him, only Ron and Hermione standing silently behind him, like guards.
(And Draco, who was across the room, hidden in the back, but Harry was trying not to look at him because it was more distracting than anything else.)
“Look,” He said, weakly, and words were not enough to explain why they should let themselves be drawn back into this. “You don’t have to. I get that, that you’ve given enough. But someone has to do this, and I’m going to try, even if I have to do it alone.” The only response was a tilt of the head from Ginny, a silent agreement passing across the room that told him he didn’t even have to ask. As for the rest, they still looked uncertain. “I’d like some help.”
It was Percy who ended up breaking the silence, leading the rest to the cause. “I’ll fight.” He shoved his glasses up his nose, a gesture born from nerves “Was late to the last fight. Might as well make up for it now.”
Harry swallowed hard, then nodded, grasping onto Percy’s hand when it was offered. “Good,” He said, talking around the emotions welling up in his throat. “We’ll need you.”
He ends up alone with Seamus, staring at the Black family tree. Seamus was tracing all the burn marks, and Harry could not stop staring at the mark that used to bear his godfather’s face. He didn’t know why the thing was still up.
(Probably Kreacher.)
“You don’t have to do this, you know.” Harry knows he should have left it alone, but when he saw Seamus in the back, pale faced and looking like he was facing the worst thing imaginable, he had felt the guilt ball up in his stomach. “You’ve done enough.”
“And what, just sit and watch all the others fight?” He laughed, a sharp and biting sound that cut through the air. “I don’t think so.”
“But—”
“But I tried to off myself once and everyone’s afraid I’ll do it again?” There was no laugh now, just tense anger falling off the sharp line of his shoulders. “Don’t worry, Harry. I can fight just as well as I could before.”
“That’s not…” He sighed and scrubbed at his face, tired, wishing they had all left him alone. That’s all he ever wanted, was to be left alone. “That’s not what I meant, Seamus.”
“I know.” He didn’t look the same, but there were flashes of the old Seamus shining through at odd moments, like when instead of a hug he turned and punched Harry as hard as he could in the arm, like that meant everything was forgiven. Harry thinks he is still expecting to see all the old versions of his friends when he looks at them, never mind that those people left him long ago. “It’s alright, Harry.”
They move away from the tapestry without talking about it, like they didn’t want to see the reminder of it anymore “Besides,” Seamus grins, then, and an image of him smiling through a mouthful of blood flashes in Harrys mind, the memories rising up at the worst times. “I’ve got some people to pay back, don’t I?”
Revenge. They all have their things they hang onto in order to get themselves through the day, and it seems that Seamus has found his.
When the house clears, it is only him and Draco, alone.
They’re cleaning up the kitchen, throwing away bottles and evaporating the leftover food. Harry can tell that Draco is following behind him and cleaning the spots he missed, even though it really didn’t make a difference. It was still the cleanest house to have ever existed.
“You really think this will keep going?” Draco asks. His voice was so quiet that Harry barely heard him, but he felt it, too, the need to talk about important things in hushed voices, like it might make them less real. “More fighting?”
“I think we have to try.” Harry said, and it was ridiculous that they were talking about battle plans while he was holding a wash rag in his hand. “We can’t just give in.”
“You could.” Draco didn’t need to talk loud, now, because he was close enough that Harry was reminded of that almost kiss in front of Hermione’s apartment. We can’t, Draco had said, tearing himself away, and then Harry was left staring at empty air. “You could let someone else handle it, for once. Give them a turn to be a hero.”
Harry wanted to. He had wanted to feel what it was like to live a normal life, where the nightmares weren’t visiting him every night and he wouldn’t be wishing that all his friends would come home safely from a mission he had sent them on. “I can’t just walk away.” Draco’s hands had found his way to the pockets of Harry’s hoodie, and Harry didn’t know what to do with that. He wanted to push him away, like Draco had pushed him away. “That’s not who I am.”
Draco smiled, then, a beautiful and wistful expression on his face. “I know.” His hands reached out to smooth down Harry’s hair, trying to tame the wild tangle that it always forms, and then it fell away, disappearing. “I’m going to help you this time.”
Harry didn’t want that. He wanted Draco safe, at home, where Harry didn’t have to worry. But there was no cause for that kind of treatment, when Draco was insisting that they were nothing more than flatmates. “Okay.” He grabbed onto his hand, but Draco just shook his head. No, he had said and must have meant it. We can’t
Chapter 18
Draco
Winter is sliding into spring, a quarter of his probation sentence done, and Draco had found himself completely and hopelessly in love with Harry.
He probably had been at least interested in him for a long time, back before the war, but then it was always kept out of reach, some fantasy to visit late at night, one where they got along and Harry had never turned down his handshake that first year, where Draco had friends and Harry liked him and everything was going to turn out okay. It wasn’t a real thing, nothing that would ever be possible, but that’s why he thought it was okay to like him. As long as it could never be real, Draco would be safe.
Except now, it could be real. Now he cooks him breakfast in the morning and they eat it together, now sometimes they fall asleep on the couch together and wake up curled around each other, now Draco is around to hear him wake up from a nightmare at night and talk to his cousin Dudley on the phone. He watches him check in on George and on Seamus, sees him wrap Hermione and Ginny and Luna in a hug with the protectiveness of a brother. He’s up and close and personal now, and even though the flawed parts of him might be enough to make others turn away, it just makes Draco want him more.
(Like, the cracks are only places for the good things to shine through, testaments to all he had done and will still to do to protect the people he loves, to preserve what is right.)
“What?” Harry was leaning over the kitchen table, wax paper spread out in front of him. He was marking off names with a grease pencil and rubbing them away, creating a plan of attack to show to Kingsley the next day. It seems that even when he tries to walk away from the fight, the fight just wouldn’t let him go. “Why are you looking at me like that?”
Draco had been staring at him for too long. He hadn’t meant to, but Harry wasn’t looking, and watching him was much more interesting than penciling in information about death eaters that he only met once, at some benefit when he was eleven.
“I don’t see how this helps.” He shoved the journal away, where he had scrawled meaningless details he had picked up from one party or another—who they had an affair with, where their summer vacation homes were, which ministry official they had reportedly bribed, what they had sold to Borgin and Burkes. It was tedious work, but it seems that when Draco stopped to think about it, he had gathered more tidbits of gossip than he thought. “What’s it matter who some guy cheats on his wife with?”
Harry smiled at him, shaking his head so his hair falls out of his face. He’s always having a constant battle with his hair now, trying to keep it out of his way but also wanting it long enough to cover his scar. Fashion verses function, the eternal battle. “If you’re getting tired, you can get a break.” He was a natural leader, but Draco had noticed that he was more content to take all the responsibility on himself than the parcel out jobs to anyone else. “That doesn’t have to be done tonight.”
“Only if you do.” He wasn’t walking away and leaving Harry in here to puzzle out the problems alone. Hermione had specifically told him not to, that it would go faster if Harry had someone to bounce ideas off of, even if that someone was about as helpful as brick wall. (It doesn’t matter if you know what he’s talking about, anyways, he doesn’t take anyone’s suggestions even when they’re good.) “You can’t possibly still be thinking straight.”
“That doesn’t have to be done tonight, but this does.” Harry straightens up, and his back pops when he does, proof to how long he had been sitting like that. “I need to keep working.”
