Harry found Dudley standing awkwardly in the drawing room at Grimmauld Place. He’d spent the early hours of the morning in conference with Scrimgeour. The Minister had talked for some time, words sliding smoothly into each other as if each one was greased, about spinning this and using the story for pathos and how perhaps Harry now saw that this alliance could be of great mutual benefit. Harry was so tired he hadn’t even wanted to punch Scrimgeour in the face. Much.
They’d given a press conference, cameras flashing too bright and hot right in Harry’s face, and Harry had thanked Scrimgeour and the Ministry very much for their understanding and support.
“Just let us know how we can help you, Harry,” Scrimgeour said in the fatherly voice he used for addressing Harry around the press. “Anything you want.”
“I want to go home,” Harry said.
One of the reporters caught it and scratched a note, eyes gleaming like a hunting bird’s through the long sweep of her quill. Harry didn’t see how that was news, but he’d let it all go, and he’d finally stumbled home only to have Tonks tell him that his cousin was in the drawing room.
Tonks’s father was a Muggleborn. She was used to Muggle relatives who treated you like real family: she thought that Harry and Dudley would be able to comfort each other, or something.
There was no prospect of comfort, but Harry still had a responsibility. He tried to press out the creases between his brows with his thumb and shoved the door open before he could hesitate.
Dudley was standing with his back to the door, facing the bay windows. His big shoulders were set in a way that reminded Harry of how Uncle Vernon would hold his on the morning of a day when he had an important presentation to make. Harry was so familiar with Dudley, with Uncle Vernon: he felt vaguely that this familiarity should have carried some other feeling with it.
He just felt tired. But he was the only person Dudley had left now. If Dudley needed him, he had to be there.
He cleared his throat. “Hey. I’m—I’m sorry I wasn’t here earlier.”
Dudley spun around, a flash of fear on his face, and Harry held up his hands hastily in a gesture that said he surrendered and showed he wasn’t holding his wand. After a moment, Dudley relaxed.
“That’s okay,” he said at length. “Your cousin Draco stayed here with me.”
“Who?” Harry said blankly, and then remembered that Malfoy and Dudley had strangely almost got on at Privet Drive, and the extremely technical and possibly nonexistent cousinship he and Malfoy had decided on. “Oh, right.”
“He said it was all right to call him Draco,” Dudley offered, obviously noting that Harry was taken aback. “And I can’t call a guy Mallory, for God’s sake.”
“He’s not—Never mind. ‘Course it’s all right. I’m glad that he was with you. Is he—is he still around?”
“Yeah,” said Dudley. “Some redhaired guy asked for a minute.” Dudley thought this one over, and added: “I’d like to know about the redhaired guy’s weights regime.”
“Er,” Harry said. “He’s a dragon trainer.”
“Jesus,” Dudley exclaimed, in a sharp, disgusted voice. Harry stared at him and Dudley looked quickly away. “I guess that’d do it,” he said, his voice going back to a muted tone. “This is all so—you killed some of those guys, didn’t you. The guys in the masks. With your—”
He gestured with one big hand at Harry’s wand, tucked into the belt of his jeans. Harry didn’t know what to do with Dudley, so obviously out of his natural environment and so dazed: he seemed like a bear stumbling around a circus ring, confused by the lights and colours.
“Yeah,” he said slowly. “I killed some of them.”
“Draco seemed to think you might get in trouble for that.”
“No,” Harry answered. “No, I worked it out.”
Dudley nodded jerkily. “The—the bigwigs in your pretend government, they must know all about it,” he said, clearly trying to sound like Uncle Vernon and sounding shaky and young instead. “Draco explained it to me. The way this guy, You Know What or whoever, he’s going after families who sometimes have fr—people like you. Since Mum was Aunt Lily’s sister, and Aunt Lily could do fr—magic. He’s, he’s coming for all of us. And we can’t do. Well. You know.” Dudley knocked his fists together in a convulsive movement. “There isn’t much my left hook could do against magic, is there?”
“I suppose not.” Harry tried to think about this story Malfoy had fed Dudley: he didn’t know what to do about it. Voldemort’s motivation sounded plausible. Voldemort probably did want to do that, one day, but the thing Malfoy was concealing was that here and now Voldemort hadn’t been trying to eliminate families who might produce the Muggleborn.
Dudley’s parents had died because Voldemort wanted to strike a blow against Harry. Surely Dudley was owed the truth.
“But you and this lot,” Dudley said. “You’re all working against that guy, You Know Whatever.”
“Yeah,” Harry said cautiously.
Dudley swung around in a movement that Harry thought at first was a lunge. He went for his wand only to release it a minute later when he realised Dudley was simply pacing, in heavy uncoordinated strides, as he tried to sort things out.
“I know we didn’t always—get on, all of us,” Dudley said in a rough voice at last. “But you won’t let this guy get away with what he did. You’ll make sure he gets what’s coming to him. For Mum and Dad.”
Harry took a breath. “I will.”
“Even if they weren’t,” Dudley stopped. “If we weren’t all that great. They were just scared.” He laughed, a sudden short horrible huff of laughter. “They had something to be scared of.”
“I’m really sorry, Dudley,” Harry said. His voice came out stiff and as if he didn’t mean it at all.
Dudley stared at the curtains, which rustled sympathetically to him. He jumped violently and then glared at Harry as if daring him to comment on Big D, afraid of curtains. When Harry said nothing Dudley exhaled and shoved trembling hands into the pockets of his jeans.
“When do I leave this place?”
“Oh—no,” Harry said. “This is my home. You can stay here as long as you like.”
Dudley was staring. “You have a house?”
Dudley probably had a house himself. Harry had heard Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon talking about insurance policies, the mortgage and doing right by Dudders. He doubted Dudley would be any more pleased by home ownership than Harry himself had been.
“Yeah.”
Dudley looked doubtfully around at the room: Malfoy had put the cobra snakeskin in the glass cabinet and Kreacher had polished the snake-shaped chandelier until it gleamed.
“Don’t think much of your decor,” he said at length. “So I’m not—I’m not being kept here for questioning? I can go?”
“Where would you go?” Harry asked.
“I’m going to Piers’,” Dudley said instantly. “Of course. We’re like brothers.”
As soon as he’d said it he and Harry realised what, exactly, he had said. They stood staring at each other.
The moment stretched on, long and cold and a little horrible, until Maud the curtain rustled again and Dudley flinched and went pale.
“I can’t stay here,” he said, low.
Harry remembered Dudley in Privet Drive, marvelling at Malfoy doing wandless magic. He’d thought it was cool then: but this was an alien world, and it seemed threatening to him.
Magic had made Aunt Petunia sick: well, it had killed her sister. Now magic had killed Dudley’s parents, and he would never feel safe, feel wonder or curiosity or anything at all about magic, ever again.
“If that’s what you want,” Harry said. “You can go right now.”
Every line of Dudley’s body was taut with eagerness, like a dog straining desperately to break his leash. “Please. I—Tell Draco thanks for staying with me.”
“I will.”
“And you’ll make that guy pay for what he did to Mum and Dad,” Dudley said again.
“I’ll kill him myself,” Harry said. “I swear.”
Dudley went still when Harry said that, looking scared and reassured at once. He took a step backwards when Harry reached for him and Harry had to explain about Apparating, and when they got to the Polkiss house he ran through the gate and pressed the bell.
Harry stood outside the gate looking in at the white stucco front of the house, the neat front garden, and Dudley standing on the doorstep next to the morning milk bottles.
Dudley looked over his shoulder. “Thanks,” he said. “I know I can—I know you’ll keep your word. Thanks.”
“That’s okay, Dudley,” Harry said, soft and tired, and he Apparated away before the Polkisses could see him. They would have enough questions without an appearance by the delinquent cousin. It was better for Harry to just disappear from that world, to become another thing to be discussed over the hedges as a footnote in the Dursley tragedy: and that boy. Heard he came to a bad end.
Grimmauld Place came back into view, Number Twelve bursting into existence between two other houses in a way that had probably upset Dudley badly when he’d seen it. Harry looked at the twisted serpent doorknocker, the great black door, and the way the house seemed to have risen slightly off-kilter from the pavement, a shadowy crooked neighbour to its adjoining houses. He’d called it home to Dudley without even thinking.
Harry went up the tall stone steps of home and on up the stairs to Malfoy’s room. He crawled onto the bed and then just sat there, staring blankly at the carved eagles on the headboard, loath to sleep in case Malfoy was back with Voldemort by the time he awoke and trying so hard not to think about Privet Drive that he felt dizzy.
When the door creaked open he knew who it was. The tension did not so much drain from his body as fall away, like a weight he could not have carried a moment longer.
“Hey,” Malfoy said, and walked over to stand by the side of the bed. Harry didn’t turn around, but he leaned back and Malfoy was there, solid and warm. “How are you doing?”
“I’m fine,” Harry said. “I talked to Scrimgeour. Said all the—right things. I think.”
“I know, you were all over the morning papers,” Malfoy said. “Quite a triumph. Your hair has never looked so horrible before.”
His fingers in Harry’s hair were like his tone rather than his words: gentle and a little tentative. The sky over Malfoy’s bed was morning-grey but clear, it looked cool and tranquil as if there was no possibility of rain. Harry kind of liked it.
“Will you sleep?” Malfoy continued.
“Will you stay?”
“Oh, naturally,” Malfoy answered, mocking and tender. “Say what you like about the man, the Dark Lord is very understanding about me taking days off. I also have regular tea breaks.”
“Come off it,” Harry mumbled. “You don’t drink tea.”
Malfoy laughed, a little uneven sound. “You have me there. Seriously, Potter, are you all right? Talk to me. I know they were—but they were your family.”
“They weren’t,” Harry said on an exhale. He shut his eyes and turned his face, leaned his cheek against the soft wool of Malfoy’s jumper. “You are.”
“Well,” Malfoy said, heartbeat fast against Harry’s ear. He sounded uncertain, but he kept stroking Harry’s hair, so perhaps he was just concerned.
“Dudley said thanks for staying with him,” Harry said. “Thanks. I mean—from me, too. I’m grateful.”
“I should think so,” Malfoy told him. “Do you think I permit Muggles to call me by my Christian name for just anyone?”
He pushed Harry away a little and then pushed him down, lightly but firmly. The pillows felt indescribably luxurious and Malfoy leaned over him fussing with them, pale narrow face even paler in the grey light.
Dudley had thanked Harry, too. There was a chasm of magic and fear between them, there always had been, they had different worlds and different homes and Harry had never been anything like Dudley’s brother. But he could be Dudley’s avenging arm.
It wasn’t anything more than the entire wizarding world expected of him, but it felt strange that the only comfort he’d had to offer was a promise of revenge and death.
Harry looked again at Malfoy through inexorably falling eyelids and saw him leaning against the bedpost. Harry wondered distantly how much of his thoughts he’d been saying aloud, since Malfoy looked so worried.
Harry must’ve slept for almost twenty-four hours. When he woke there was morning light filtering through the curtains, the sky in the canopy still grey but darker now, with the shadowy quality that said it was very early morning.
Clear in the absolute silence was the sound of the front door softly opening and closing.
Harry sat up in bed and stared at the door. Curled like a cat beside him Malfoy murmured “Shh” apparently in his sleep, and reached out to give a random pillow a soothing pat.
“Shh yourself,” Harry said quietly to his ruffled blond head, then reached for his wand on the nightstand and slipped silently out of bed.
He padded on socked feet out onto the landing, and looked over the rail where he could see the stairs stretching down to the hall, and in the hall—Charlie Weasley stood with a bag over one burly shoulder, squinting up at him.
“Up early, Harry,” Charlie observed, flashing him a grin.
Harry only realised all his muscles had been tensed for a fight when they relaxed. “I suppose I am,” he said warily. “What are you doing here?”
“Well,” Charlie said. “Well—I thought I might come stay for a while. If that’s okay with you.”
“Sure, I guess,” Harry answered. “Any particular reason why?”
“Oh,” Charlie said. “I thought that you might be having a tough time with Ron—” his voice softened appreciably on his baby brother’s name—“and Hermione gone, and all that stuff happening with your family. I thought this big old house might get a bit lonely and I thought maybe you could use the company.”
“I see,” Harry said slowly. “You thought all that, did you?”
Charlie’s next grin was slow too, white teeth gleaming in his freckled-to-a-tan face, warm and rueful and inviting Harry to smile with him.
“Something like that,” Charlie murmured.
“Charles!” Malfoy said behind Harry, sounding sleepy but delighted. “You here! What a surprise, and yet how excellent. Come and see your room.”
He charged down the stairs and dragged Charlie up them by his wrist, telling Charlie earnestly what a pleasant but definitely surprising surprise it was to see him and how as soon as he had seen him he’d immediately thought of what room he should occupy.
“Don’t bother about me,” Charlie said, low and pleased, obviously charmed to be in the centre of Malfoy’s bright whirlwind of attention again. “I can bunk anywhere.”
“Don’t tell me about sleeping in the crook of a dragon’s elbow in Roumania, Charles,” Malfoy said absently. “It makes me worry that the fumes in dragon breath have affected your brain.”
Harry followed them up to the third floor where Charlie had a bedroom up high with large windows, bevelled glass glinting even in the pale morning light, the view clear across the rooftops of London as if seen flying.
“It’s great,” Charlie said, looking at Malfoy, and Malfoy beamed all over his pointed face and Harry thought that whatever conversation Charlie’d finally persuaded Malfoy to have, it must’ve gone really well.
Harry was cheered by Malfoy saying he could stay awhile and Charlie saying he had to get ready for work, even though Malfoy’s idea of a good time was to make him read books on the theory of Occlumency.
“Wow, Malfoy, this looks like a thrilling read,” Harry remarked, turning Being Insert-Name-Here: A Guide Inside the Minds of Others over in his hands.
“Pay attention, there will be a quiz later,” Malfoy said sternly. “Also if you fail at Occlumency the Dark Lord’s giant killer snake will eat your head.”
“I mostly fear the quiz,” Harry said.
“Take care, you guys, I’m off to work!” Charlie shouted through the door.
“Bye!” Harry shouted back, which he considered quite enough, but Malfoy, who had been leaning easily against Harry’s chair looking at the book, straightened up.
“Hang on a minute.”
“What?” Harry said, twisting and half-rising from his chair.
“I’m just going to say goodbye,” Malfoy said, already at the door. “Stay where you are. Read your book!”
He vanished, shutting the door firmly behind him. Harry gave his book a look that said this wasn’t over, then got to his feet and followed to make sure Malfoy didn’t get himself into any trouble.
When he opened the door he heard Malfoy say: “Charles.”
Malfoy was standing at the top of the stairs and Charlie at the foot: Harry leaned against the rail and was about to speak when Charlie said: “I can’t stop. I’ll be late for work.”
Charlie’s story checked out. He was looking at his watch and dressed in work clothes: old cloth and scuffed leather, his arms bare.
“I’m sure all the students won’t instantly kill themselves if you’re a little late,” Malfoy said loftily. “Maybe they’ll be a bit downcast, but think about how happy they’ll be when you arrive. Anyway…” His voice went soft. “I just wanted to thank you.”
Charlie’s voice went softer in what might have been an involuntary response. “You’re welcome.”
Malfoy came down the stairs towards Charlie, moving slightly differently than normal, and Harry was shocked by a jolt of recognition, like a bolt of lightning striking somewhere between his stomach and his spine. It was—the way Malfoy was moving was the way he’d moved half a year ago, a lifetime ago, with the easy animal grace of something on the prowl. When the twins had fed Malfoy that Potion at Bill and Fleur’s wedding.
It was terribly strange to remember that, now so much time had passed and so much had changed, now he felt so differently. He remembered Malfoy’s face, close, his eyes intent under lowered lashes.
He could see Charlie’s face now but not Malfoy’s, and on Charlie’s face was the dawning of alarm and something else under that.
“Really,” Malfoy said. “I didn’t have anyone to ask: not somebody I could count on.”
Charlie reached out and put his hand gently on Malfoy’s shoulder, palm up as if blocking him.
“Hey, Draco,” he said. “I said you were welcome and I meant it. You’re welcome to ask me for help, any time, and I’ll help you. I wouldn’t ask—I don’t want—”
He stopped, eyes searching as if he was fumbling around for words he was sure he’d put down somewhere close by.
“Which is it?” Malfoy asked, warm and a little playful, his voice curling around the words the way his fingers could curl around hair.
Charlie sounded extremely distracted. “What?”
“You wouldn’t ask?” Malfoy repeated, turning the echo into a question. “Or you don’t want to?”
Charlie’s hand fell away from Malfoy’s shoulder.
“You see,” Malfoy went on, light but relentless. “You caught me off guard before. I wouldn’t like you to think that was an example of how I usually go about things.”
The air seemed charged. Charlie looked like he’d found words but he was afraid to put them together in case they were explosive.
“What are you saying, Draco?” he said at last.
Malfoy laughed a little, low and pleased, his voice still holding that caressing playful note. “I’m saying, come—” He reached out and looped slim fingers around Charlie’s belt loop, tugged him forward, and his voice changed to a whispered promise on a single word, “Here.”
Malfoy’s free hand flew up, fingers light on Charlie’s jaw. He tilted Charlie’s face up slightly and kissed him.
There was silence, a long slow moment of uncertainty, and then more silence but the moment changed, Charlie and Malfoy both moved and they were pressed up against each other, the separate lines of their bodies melding into a sudden fierce curve. Charlie’s scarred dark hand was at the nape of Malfoy’s neck, in a possessive clasp.
Malfoy pulled his mouth away, stepping back and using his hold on Charlie’s belt loop to push him back a little, into the stair rail.
“Hey,” he said, slightly breathless and sounding as if he was smiling. “You can’t stop. You’ll be late for work.”
Harry uncurled stiff fingers from their death grip on the rail, and stalked back into the room where his book lay waiting for him. If they were planning on any more kissing, he certainly didn’t need to be there to see it. He slammed the book open, the calfskin cover hitting the table with a thump, and began to read the pages at speed.
He was angry. He wanted to be angry with Charlie, which he could reluctantly admit made no sense: Charlie certainly hadn’t been making the advances this time, he wasn’t confusing Malfoy. Malfoy didn’t seem confused. He actually seemed pretty clear about what he wanted. So Harry shouldn’t be angry with Charlie and he didn’t want to be angry with Malfoy, which left him with unfocused but definite rage and no idea what to do about it or how to make himself feel better.
Not too much later, though still not soon enough for Harry’s liking, Malfoy came back. He was humming a little and looking generally pleased with himself as he took a seat at the other end of the table.
“How are you getting along with the book?”
“Fine,” Harry said in clipped tones. “Are you planning on sitting around feeling pretty all day, or do are you going to be useful at some point?”
Malfoy’s eyes narrowed to cold slits. “You know, I can’t believe I told your Muggle—” he said the word as if he’d be washing his own mouth out with soap later—“relative that I was your cousin when it’s quite clear you’ve appointed yourself my maiden aunt.”
“Look, I can have an opinion—”
“No you can’t!” Malfoy snapped. “Because it’s none of your business. It’s not a big deal so you don’t need to know anything about it and you can keep your opinion to yourself. But yes, since you asked, there are plenty of useful things I could be doing and none of them involve sitting around here while the freaking Dark Lord wonders where the hell I am and I wonder what the hell I’m doing hanging around here for you to snarl at me!”
“I didn’t mean—don’t go,” Harry said.
Malfoy’s eyes were flashing by now. “I’m putting this down to a screaming abandonment issues grief-stricken no normal concept of privacy thing,” he raged on, making for the door even as he spoke. “I’m not—I don’t want to fight with you. But I’m not staying.”
Charlie had left the house unobtrusively. Malfoy shut the front door with an apocalyptic slam.
Charlie came back just as quietly. Malfoy did not come back. Harry almost took pleasure in how Charlie looked when Harry told him that Malfoy was already gone. He didn’t only because it was impossible to take pleasure in anything that meant Malfoy was with Voldemort.
Things were awkward, especially since Charlie stopped going to work over Christmas: Harry sort of resented Charlie’s presence. Harry didn’t need a keeper and he hadn’t invited Charlie into his home, didn’t need Charlie messing about with his family, but Charlie was an okay guy, he had to grudgingly admit. He was cheerful and patient and he took his turn cooking while Kreacher was off hysterically weeping into the tapestries about Malfoy’s absence, and he never betrayed by look or deed how much he would’ve preferred to be back at the Burrow.
More than that, Charlie was a Weasley: his slow cheerful laugh reminded Harry of Ron and sometimes he caught a glimpse of red curls in gold light and thought that Ginny had returned. He missed them too much. He couldn’t hate Ron and Ginny’s brother, couldn’t be awful to a member of the family he’d always thought of as the best family possible, who had been so kind to him. Even if he sort of wanted to.
Harry tried to get through it. Surely, he thought, surely, surely there would be some word from Ron and Hermione at Christmastime. Surely Malfoy and Ginny would come back for Christmas.
On Christmas Day an Owl from Ron and Hermione came, the owl that came with it looking bedraggled. The card was nothing but a piece of Muggle paper folded in two, almost transparent with damp, but Hermione—Harry was prepared to bet—had enchanted the stick figures on the front to start carolling tunelessly as Harry opened it.
Inside was Ron’s scrawl, wishing Harry a Merry Christmas and adding that they’d had loads of wicked adventures and wait until Harry heard about the poisonous leaping lizards. ‘It’s not the same without you, mate‘ he added in writing so hurried that Ron was either scribbling a hurried afterthought or embarrassed. ‘Nothing is.’
Hermione wrote that they were all right and she calculated that they were getting very close, and she was sure Harry would have been horrified by Ron’s foolish behaviour with the poisonous leaping lizards. She said that she really missed Harry: that they both did.
“I don’t miss you, Potter,‘ Zacharias Smith had written in smug round letters. ‘I don’t see why I should, as I barely know you. Still, Ron insisted that I write something, so here it is: happy Christmas, I suppose. Z.S.”
Underneath Ron had written: ‘Don’t mind Zach, that’s just his way.’
Hermione was calculating something and Ron was dealing with leaping lizards and Zacharias Smith was still a git, halfway across the world. Harry couldn’t seem to put the card down, even though he knew cards belonged on the mantelpiece. He ended up keeping it in his pocket with the picture of Malfoy, just until he decided what to do with them.
The Weasleys came over, all save Bill and Fleur who were apparently planning a love nest Christmas. Charlie was obviously deeply thrilled to see them and Mrs Weasley gave Harry a hug, arms soft and forgiving, as if he hadn’t lost her son and daughter. Then she had to go off and direct Percy, who was staggering around with a four-foot jelly obscuring his face as Fred earnestly told him where to go and Percy earnestly told Fred that he didn’t trust him an inch.
It was nice, the bustle of a Weasley Christmas, but Harry didn’t have the links to the Weasleys he needed, the links to normalcy: Ron, Hermione and Ginny were all gone. He offered to help with the cooking, though, and he laughed at all Fred and George’s jokes. He watched the door.
They were half-way through dinner when Malfoy finally arrived. Harry took his habitual glance at the door and found himself automatically looking away before he realised what he was seeing and his gaze swung back. Malfoy was leaning against the doorframe, not lounging but leaning gracelessly, as if he was very tired. There were circles under his eyes that looked like bruises.
His eyes took an inventory of the room and settled on Harry. “Hello, everyone.”
“Draco,” Charlie said, standing up and knocking his chair over. “God, you look awful.”
“Thank you, Charles,” Draco said gravely. “Well, that’s the Death Eater lifestyle for you. It gets so crazy at Christmastime: more presents for the Dark Lord! More egg nog for the Dark Lord! Let’s start a conga line for the Dark Lord! Sometimes it’s hard to cope.”
The twins made a sound of disgust that seemed to come from a single throat.
“Cut it out,” Charlie snapped.
“Leave him alone,” Harry snarled.
Malfoy rolled his eyes. “Thank you for this chivalrous protection. Will one of you kind gentlemen lead me to the fainting couch?”
He headed for the chair beside Harry, which Harry had managed to keep empty, and reached out and started to snag all the food within reach. Even Fred and George couldn’t get too upset about Malfoy staying quiet and eating, and besides that Percy drew their fire by lifting his voice to tell a long involved story about the new filing system at work. Mr Weasley and Charlie both tried to get Fred and George to shut up as they valiantly pretended interest, and Harry thought that Percy’s dreary monologue was the sweetest thing he’d heard in weeks.
He slid a glance over to Malfoy, who was eating cauliflower and did not seem interested in looking up from his plate. Harry touched his left arm to get his attention and Malfoy jerked violently away, a shudder going through his whole body, eyes wide and blazing terror for a moment before the blind emotion was pushed away and Malfoy saw Harry again.
Gently, giving Malfoy time to stop him, Harry turned Malfoy’s arm over so he could see the Dark Mark.
It was still there even with the room hung with Christmas decorations, even at the festive table: the black vile mark that Malfoy had taken willingly, the mark of loyalty that Malfoy had meant, once. The skin around it was livid and raised, as if the snake was trying to burn Malfoy’s arm away and crawl off the blackened bone. Harry wondered whether Voldemort had inflicted this on Malfoy purely for staying away more than a day without permission or whether he liked to do it a lot to his favourite scared rabbit. He wasn’t sure which was the better choice, that Malfoy got hurt a lot for no reason or that Malfoy had been hurt because of him.
Malfoy made a small uncomfortable sound, and Harry lifted his head to see the Weasleys en masse staring at the Dark Mark. They all looked sickened, except for Charlie, who looked simply sad.
Harry lowered Malfoy’s arm to the table, not letting it actually touch the table. He kept hold of Malfoy’s wrist and glared furiously around at all the horrified faces, wishing he could do something violent in order to fulfil this impulse to cover and protect. Disgusting, tragic, terrifying, whatever they thought he wanted to make one thing clear: he was laying claim. This was his.
Malfoy pulled his arm sharply away. “I shouldn’t have come,” he said, low, and he slipped out of his chair, damned slippery slithery Slytherins, before Harry could force him back down.
“He did take the Mark,” George said in his most reasonable voice. “So really, whatever happens because of it—”
Harry threw him up against the wall. His wand was at George’s throat and George’s eyes were on him, wide and stunned, before he even realised that he’d moved. George hadn’t had a chance to defend himself: he wasn’t fast enough, he was used to school fights. George had never killed anyone.
“Don’t you dare even say it,” Harry hissed, and then because George was a Weasley he let him go.
“Have you two gone completely mental?” Fred demanded, leaping up and getting his shoulder in front of his twin’s. “I mean, it’s pretty clear what the problem is with Charlie, although I can’t imagine anyone having a crush on that little worm—”
“Charlie?” Mrs Weasley exclaimed, the sound coming out of her like a loud startled hiccup. “What?”
Charlie looked at the tablecloth, arms crossed over his broad chest. “Thanks, Fred.”
“Ooh.” Fred winced. “Sorry, Charlie.”
Mrs Weasley looked almost determinedly uncomprehending. “Charlie, what on earth is he talking about?”
Charlie directed his words, very softly, to the tablecloth. “Sorry, Mum.”
“I’m sorry,” Percy said, terribly polite. “But I really haven’t been able to keep up with current events in the family. Does Mum still not know about Charlie, or is this about that Malfoy boy? Because really, Charlie, I have to say, he’s very young and, well, very obnoxious—”
Colour flooded Charlie’s face, drowning the freckles in a crimson tide. “Leave Draco out of this!”
“Do I still not know?” Mrs Weasley repeated, her voice rising. “Do I—Arthur, what do you know?”
Mr Weasley whipped off his glasses and started industriously polishing them. “Me, dear? Nothing, dear. I mean. I suppose it’s possible that I may have had my suspicions, possibly.”
Mrs Weasley started shouting at her husband, even as her hand went out to catch one of Charlie’s large, scarred hands. He linked his fingers with hers and grinned as noise erupted around him, Mr Weasley saying: “Dear, don’t overreact,” and Fred saying “Oh it’s Draco, is it?” and Percy saying: “Really, Mother, statistically speaking there was going to be at least one of us!”
Harry took the opportunity of all-out Weasley warfare to leave the room and go upstairs to Malfoy’s. He found Malfoy sitting on the bed, his knees drawn up to his chest and his head in his arms.
Harry crossed the room in two strides with the demand to know exactly why Voldemort had hurt him and the following demand that Malfoy promise never to go back on his lips. Both demands died when Malfoy lifted his head, face flushed and eyes glittering, and said in a desperate voice: “I didn’t go home for Christmas last year.”
Harry climbed up on the bed. “Er,” he said cautiously. “Yeah. I know that.”
“I—I thought, I wanted more time to fix that Cabinet,” Malfoy said rapidly, mouth twisting in an ugly shape. “I thought if I could fix it then by next Christmas—this Christmas—Dad would be out and we could all be together again, I told Mother that it wouldn’t be a real Christmas without him, she asked me to come back and I said I didn’t want to.” He swallowed, a thick sound that meant he was struggling ferociously not to cry. “I would have—I should have gone home for Christmas. I didn’t know she was going to die!”
“‘Course you didn’t,” Harry said, helpless. This time last year Malfoy’d had what Harry hadn’t ever had: what Harry didn’t know how it felt to lose.
“My f-father’s back there with the Dark Lord,” Malfoy said, strained. “It’s horrible. He keeps trying to talk to me. He killed her and he keeps trying to talk to me! I didn’t want to be there. Sometimes I think I can’t stand it there a minute longer.”
“Well—good,” Harry said.
Malfoy stared at him, blinking like a startled but disdainful owl. “Good?”
“Yeah,” Harry said. “I’m glad you came here. I wanted you to.”
Malfoy stared for another moment, then bowed his head back over his knees. Harry felt a flash of panic, thinking that Malfoy was going to actually cry and all Harry could do was say how sorry he was, but Malfoy only sucked in a deep breath, his back hunched up sharply as if he was trying to sprout protective spikes. Harry leaned over and patted the spot in between his shoulderblades awkwardly, and the spike attempts smoothed out. Malfoy lifted his head, looking considerably more composed.
“What are that lot up to?” he drawled. “Still all atwitter over seeing that stupid Mark again?”
“Uh, actually no,” Harry answered. “Fred accidentally outed Charlie. Bit of a scene going on down there.”
Malfoy snorted and eased himself back a bit, so he was leaning against the eagle-carved headboard. “Accidentally?” he repeated with withering scorn. “Of course, all that horrible mayhem that follows the atrocious twosome everywhere they go, a strange series of accidents. You know, since twins run in the family, why couldn’t Charles have been twins instead of the two-headed monster?” His expression became contemplative. “I’d have liked that.”
Harry scowled. “You know, twins do not mean there’s two of the same person around.”
“Really, then how do you explain the Weasley horror show, tell me that,” Draco muttered. “Anyway, don’t judge me. Are you telling me you wouldn’t like Ginny to be twins?”
The sound of her name spoken casually aloud sliced through Harry, as if his whole body was a sore tooth that had just been prodded. “Why, so they could both run away from me at once?”
Malfoy said “Hmm,” in a regretful sort of way and reached out to touch Harry’s shoulder, touch light and absently smoothing the tension out.
Harry wished abruptly that he could do that: be casual and comfortable enough with touch that it made things better, when Malfoy’s mother was dead and had left him to Harry, who didn’t know what to say or do.
“I got you a present,” he offered abruptly.
Malfoy brightened. “I like presents.”
“Okay,” Harry said. “Uh, it’s in my room. I’ll go get it.”
“Be careful not to get lost,” Malfoy called after him. “I realise you don’t go there very often.”
Kreacher was letting dust gather in his room, it was true. Given last Christmas and the maggots, Harry felt lucky that it was just dust. He rummaged around in his chest of drawers and got out the gift. When he came back to Malfoy’s room, bright and familiar, a parcel flew at him unexpectedly through the air. He caught it automatically.
“I got you a present too,” Malfoy said, standing by his wardrobe and trying out a smile.
“Oh, thanks,” Harry said. It had fancier wrapping paper than Harry’s did, and a ribbon.
“Okay, mine now,” Malfoy said, clapping his hands in a peremptory manner. “Come on, hand it over.”
Harry threw and Malfoy caught it neatly, then turned it over, shook it and finally unwrapped it with care. Then he turned it over in his hands, silver and gleaming.
“I like it,” he decided. “It is so little and Muggleish. What does it do?”
“Well, it’s a Walkman,” Harry said.
Malfoy’s face remained a polite blank.
“Little titchy Muggle radio,” Harry explained. “Uh, you put the little earpieces in your ears and you can hear Muggle songs and nobody else can.”
“Voices that no-one else can hear, this is your gift to me,” Malfoy said absently, smirking to himself and occupied with his Walkman.
Harry took a step forward, about to take it and show him how to use it, but Malfoy batted him irritably away.
“It’s mine and I shall learn how to work it. I am perfectly capable: I did Muggle Studies, unlike some.”
“You seemed to like Muggle songs,” Harry said.
“Yes, I did. I do,” Malfoy said, and looked up from his Walkman long enough to give Harry a real smile, crooked and flashing out like another gift. “I like it a lot, Potter. Now open yours.”
Harry did so and frowned at what he had in his hands with considerable puzzlement.
“Malfoy,” he said. “Uh. I hope this doesn’t come as a surprise, but I actually do own a comb already.”
“This is different,” Malfoy told him proudly. “This is an enchanted comb. I made up the spell myself, you know. It wasn’t easy. In fact, this comb may represent the pinnacle of my unparalleled genius.”
The comb which was the pinnacle of Malfoy’s unparalleled genius looked like a fairly ordinary comb to Harry. Well, a bit fancier than Harry was used to, but that was only to be expected.
“Go to the mirror,” Malfoy ordered impatiently, “and brush your hair.”
Harry went cautiously over to the mirror, and saw his own face frowning in slight bewilderment back at him. He brushed his hair a few times with the comb and then looked at his reflection: his hair was a bit flatter, he supposed, but that meant it got in his eyes. He didn’t look all that different.
“Oh that’s much better,” Malfoy declared.
“Er,” Harry said. “Okay.”
He was worried about the Weasleys. This was his house: he should be a host, sort of, and he’d just left them, but he didn’t want to leave Malfoy up here alone.
“Do you think we could maybe go back downstairs?”
He’d forgotten about Malfoy’s rules of courtesy, possibly because Malfoy had never been courteous to Harry once in seven years.
“Yes, we should,” he agreed immediately, even though he looked loath to part with his Walkman. He went over to the bed and hid it under a pillow. “There,” he said to the pillow. “You’ll be safe there. The Weasley twins won’t get you. I’ll come back soon.”
“The Walkman talks to you but you don’t actually have to talk back to it,” Harry let him know.
“Your suggestion is noted,” Malfoy told him loftily.
The Weasleys were in the sitting room when Harry and Malfoy came down: Mrs Weasley had got Charlie to hang boughs and little fairy lights up over the door, and there was a fire crackling in the grate. Harry had his shoulder pre-emptively before Malfoy’s in case anyone tried to hassle him, but Mrs Weasley made a point of taking Malfoy’s hands and giving him a kiss.
“You look pale,” she said. “You’ve been sleeping, haven’t you?”
“Practically every night,” Malfoy told her, squeezing her hands back.
There was no sign of his earlier distress: he was good at this, at slipping back into the role of the perfect guest for Mrs Weasley. Harry was only just starting to realise how extremely uncomfortable he must have been at the Burrow.
Malfoy, Harry noticed, lost no time extricating himself from Mrs Weasley and making his way over to Charlie. Malfoy started talking, low and concerned, head tilted to catch Charlie’s reactions. Charlie flushed a little as he spoke.
“Harry,” Mrs Weasley said suddenly. “Do you know, you’ve never looked so handsome! Have you done something to your hair?”
Harry could actually feel Malfoy’s intense smugness explode and radiate through the room like some kind of emotional supernova.
“Er,” he said.
That was when they heard the sound of the door opening and someone falling heavily onto the hall floor. Harry already had his wand out when he heard Tonks exclaim: “Was that mat always there?”
“Merry Christmas, Tonks!” George yelled out.
“Shut up, whichever twin you are!” Tonks yelled back.
Harry put his wand away before the door opened, Lupin ducking under the bough with Tonks’s hand tucked safely into the crook of his arm. He was looking down at her and murmuring something, teasing her a bit, and Harry smiled and then he felt the smile slip off his face, lost in the jarring sensation that the world had shifted slightly, become a different world with a smile and all reason lost in the shift.
Under the boughs stood Bellatrix Lestrange. Harry’s hand was on his wand again, the weight hitting his palm soothing as a whispered promise of revenge.
Then she moved out of the shadow into a bright spot cast by fairy lights, her hair catching gold the way Bellatrix’s never could have, and she was Narcissa Malfoy.
Harry’s eyes went to Malfoy, whose eyes were fixed on her with hope and fear and an intensity that made Harry aware that as far as Malfoy was concerned, nothing else in the world existed but her.
“Mo—” Malfoy began, then stopped himself with a vicious effort, and stood trembling like a hurt animal.
When Harry turned back to her she had stepped into the room and out of shadows and light she was neither Bellatrix nor Narcissa. She had dark brown hair with golden lights in it and such pale brown eyes that sometimes they looked light-coloured, and she looked kinder than either of them, softer, not willow-wand slim like Narcissa or haggard like Bellatrix but with curves under her jumper and jeans. She was staring back at Malfoy and suddenly she smiled, and it was Malfoy’s exact smile: lopsided, the left corner of her mouth higher than the other, unexpected and sweet.
“Merry Christmas, Draco,” she said. “I’m your Aunt Andromeda.”
Fred and George insisted that Percy play on the piano so they could sing carols. Percy played diligently and tried not to flinch at every note the twins missed, and Mrs Weasley requested the Celestina Warbeck cover of Magical Christmastime.
Under the cover of the noise, Tonks leaned forward and said cheerfully: “You look great, Harry! Did you do something to your hair?”
“Er,” Harry said.
“About the Dursleys,” Lupin told him. “I’m truly sorry, Harry.”
“I’m okay,” Harry told him, and Lupin nodded and smiled, always tactful, and quietly changed the subject to how excellent Mrs Weasley’s mince pies were.
Malfoy generally kept his distance from Lupin, but Harry didn’t have to worry about him. He was sitting beside Andromeda and she was holding his hand. He occasionally stole glances at her face, reverent and discreet, as if he had been permitted to look on the holy of holies but he was not sure how long the privilege would be extended.
Eventually she said she was going to wash up everyone’s wine glasses, and Malfoy tried to get up and follow her. “Sit down, Draco,” Andromeda told him. “Perhaps Harry will help me?”
“Sure,” Harry said, taking the tray from her.
Andromeda’s place on the sofa did not remain unoccupied for more than a moment when Charlie slid into it, and Draco smiled though his eyes followed Andromeda out of the room.
Kreacher would probably have had palpitations seeing Miss Andromeda doing the dishes, but he was off somewhere sulking about the amount of Weasleys in the house and she filled the sink with bright bubbles with a practised flick of her wand.
“My husband is shocking at domestic magic, and it took me years to learn how to do without house elves,” Andromeda said comfortably. “I have a theory that’s why Nymphadora is so clumsy: she spent her formative years in a house where the floor was always littered with things in the most unexpected places and embraced tripping over herself every other minute as a lifestyle. Will you dry?”
“Yeah, no problem,” Harry said.
He picked up a dishcloth and she rolled up her jumper sleeves.
“It’s a pleasure to meet you,” Andromeda continued after a moment. “Nymphadora told me all about you. I must say, I was expecting someone a little less grown-up.” She held up a soapy teacup in a moment of dismay. “Not that Nymphadore said anything uncomplimentary about you. It’s just that you’re very—self-possessed. Mature.”
She gave him that beautiful smile again. Harry grinned at her.
“That’s me,” he said. “Um. Manly.”
“Can I ask you something a bit cheeky?” Andromeda asked, her voice more like her daughter’s than anyone’s, casual and friendly with just a ghost of Narcissa’s careful precise diction behind it. “Would it be all right if I stayed here for a few days? I’d like to get to know Draco a little better.”
“Oh,” Harry said. “Yes. Absolutely. That’d be fine. You’d be—very welcome.”
If she stayed, Malfoy would stay. He could hardly bear to let her out of his sight. He’d stay and he’d be happy.
“Great!” Andromeda told him. “I don’t know why I waited so long to come here. I suppose I was afraid that he’d be—well, more Lucius Malfoy’s boy than Cissy’s, but once I heard what Nymphadora had to say about him I couldn’t resist leaving Ted with the clean-up and coming to see him. I’m so glad I did: he’s so like her. It feels like having a part of my family back.”
She looked out of the window, clear amber eyes staring at nothing. Harry remembered Narcissa Malfoy vividly for a moment, her ice-blue eyes: nothing warm about her, but fierce and loving and lost, now.
“I was thinking of asking Draco to come and live with me,” Andromeda said.
Harry dropped his wine glass.
The ring and crash of the glass, the splinters falling in a sharp pattern that made no sense, filled Harry’s mind as he muttered an excuse about being clumsy and Andromeda, amused, whispered a spell that made the glass vanish as if it had never been.
“Learned that one in the early days with my baby girl,” she said, turning back to the sink. Harry stared at the floor: she’d missed a spot, one sharp glint of glass still visible in the crack between the floorboards. “It’s very quiet at home these days without her, you know. I’d be happy to have Draco there. He seems to have a lot to say for himself: he was telling me all about how he’d taught the portraits to do a little production for us? I must say, I’m looking forward to it.”
“I don’t think you quite understand,” Harry said carefully, as if there was still broken glass to be dealt with. “Narcissa, she gave—” he paused and considered. “She asked me to promise that I’d look after him.”
Andromeda looked at him, her face warm and glowing, the good sister, an obviously good mother. “And I can’t tell you how much I appreciate that. I’m sure you’ve been very good to him. But Narcissa would have wanted me to take him, I know that: Narcissa would have wanted him to be safe, to have a real home.”
Andromeda spoke with certainty, and of course she was right. Of course that was what Narcissa would have wanted.
The dishes were done and Andromeda passed her wand over the dishwater, water drying up and bubbles bursting softly until the sink gleamed, clean and empty. She reached over and patted Harry’s arm.
“I’m sure you did your best,” she told him. “But you couldn’t be like family.”