Work Text:
LISTEN to Even Good Boys Bleed narrated by BriarandTones on Spotify
Original cover art by @merlinstits on Instagram
“The truth. It is a beautiful and terrible thing, and should therefore be treated with great caution.”
-Albus Dumbledore
***
The Astronomy Tower - June 30, 1997
The Astronomy tower was cold. The kind of cold that made breath visible and seeped deep into bones until they ached. Draco shivered, flexing his already numbing fingers as he mounted the final stair, boots scuffing against worn stone, the sound too loud in the silence. Each step felt heavier than the last, like the tower itself was resisting him, warning him. Like it knew what awaited him at the top and was trying, belatedly, to turn him away.
He rounded the corner- and froze.
Harry Potter stood near the battlements, half-swallowed by shadow, moonlight catching sharply in the line of his shoulders, the curve of his jaw. His back was to Draco, his wand gripped tightly in his fist. Draco’s gaze lifted to the dark scorch mark that spiderwebbed across the opposite wall and his stomach lurched, the distinctly acrid scent of an unforgivable lingering thick and heavy in the air.
“Potter?” Draco forced a disinterested tone even as his every instinct was screaming that something was very, very wrong. "Potter, what the fuck are you doing up here? You shouldn’t be-" He stopped mid-step, his breath abandoning him entirely as the scene before him came into focus. Still, hope was a vicious thing, whispering that this had to be a misunderstanding, a spell gone wrong, an accident. It lingered, insidious as a snake slowly coiling its way around his throat.
“Potter,” he said with more urgency now. "Look at me-"
Harry didn’t move, didn’t look up as Draco approached. Instead, his eyes remained fixed, unblinking on the body that lay sprawled, lifeless at his feet, as if waiting to see if it might rise again.
“Potter, what have you done!?” Draco gripped Harry by the shoulders tight enough to bruise, shaking him as if he could somehow wake them both from this nightmare. When emerald eyes finally collided with stormy gray they were dark. Unflinching. Whatever remained of Draco’s fragile hope shattered completely as Harry straightened, taking one slow, determined breath.
“I killed Albus Dumbledore.”
The world tilted. The room spun. There was no remorse, only an immovable resolve…and something far worse. Draco cursed, staggering back as if he’d been struck. Harry took an instinctive step toward him, like he couldn’t help himself. And maybe he couldn’t. They’d been doing this dance since the day they met. Advance and retreat, pull and resist, never letting the distance grow larger, never allowing for too much space to exist between them.
Draco threw up a hand to stop him from coming any closer. “Don’t, you can’t-” He closed his eyes briefly, taking a breath, dragging frantic, shaky fingers through his hair. “You can’t look at me like that.”
“Like what-”
“You know what!” he shouted, glaring at the personification of his complete and total failure in the form of Harry fucking Potter. “Like, that!” he said, his voice betraying him as Harry’s entire demeanor softened. “Like I fucking mean something to you!”
Draco stalked toward him, shoving him hard in the chest once. Twice. "You stupid, selfish, arrogant, reckless, idiot! They'll kill you for this-"
"They’ll try,” Harry said dryly.
Something in his tone had dread creeping up Draco’s spine like tiny spiders curling around each bone, burrowing between the vertebrae. He narrowed his eyes. “What the fuck is that supposed to mean?”
“Nothing.” He waved a dismissive hand. “Besides, he was already dying. Some incurable curse.” The words were dripping with disdain as he gestured to Dumbledore’s body. “Not that it matters to me, but I imagine it does to you.”
Moonlight slid across the floor as clouds shifted overhead, bathing the headmaster’s body in a pale silver. Draco’s gaze flickered toward it and he had to force back the rising bile, the urge to vomit. He cupped a hand over his mouth.
“He deserved worse than death for what he did to us,” Harry spat bitterly, pulling Draco’s attention back.
Us
The word rang in the air between them as Draco laughed, a brittle, broken sounding thing that tore its way out of his chest. They’d never named it. Never openly acknowledged the pull, the gravity that bent them toward each other no matter how violently they resisted. The undeterminable, undeniable something that made distance feel like deprivation, trapping them in a whirlpool that could only ever end in drowning.
“There is no us,” Draco said weakly, forcing away the memories of tangled limbs and strong, confident hands and broad shoulders. Memories of his fingers twisted in soft brown hair and his mouth…
Harry’s head tilted, lips curling into an amused smirk. “It has always been us, Draco.” He took a tentative step, the dance beginning anew, and this time Draco didn’t stop him.
***
NINE MONTHS EARLIER....
September 13, 1997
Draco would never forget the first time he met Albus Dumbledore.
He’d been just 11 years old, preparing to board the train to Hogwarts, buzzing with nerves and excitement about starting school. He recognized the old man instantly from his extensive collection of chocolate frog cards, though even without them, there could be no mistaking him. Which made it all the more strange that no one else on platform 9 3/4 seemed to notice him at all. His smile was warm, purple robes swishing on the ground around his feet as he approached. He’d held out his hand for Draco to shake and then casually asked the question that would change the course of his life forever.
“Would you like to be a hero, Draco?”
When Draco nodded emphatically, he smiled wider. “Good. Because I have a special job for you. One that only you are clever enough and brave enough to do.”
Draco had never been spoken to like that before. Like he was important. He basked in it. The attention. The praise. The way Dumbledore leaned in close as though taking Draco into his confidence.
A mission he'd called it. A duty only he could fulfill. He had been chosen.
“Harry Potter is coming to Hogwarts. You must be his enemy, Draco,” Dumbledore told him, calm and certain.“You must be the dark so that he may rise against it and be the light. Push him toward the hero he must become by being his rival.”
Draco nodded despite not entirely understanding, because what else is an eleven-year-old to do when the most powerful wizard alive tells him the fate of the world depends on him. It seemed simple enough:
Be bad. And in doing so, you will be good.
He had no idea at the time just how much of himself this mission would cost him. How much he had to lose.
Draco, like most wizarding children his age, had grown up on fantastical stories about the-boy-who-lived, the child who was so deeply loved that not even the Dark Lord could touch him. Draco wondered what that would feel like. To be that loved. To be that protected. He decided long before Hogwarts that when the time came, if ever they should meet, he would make Harry Potter his friend. And perhaps if he stood close enough at his side, some of that love and protection might rub off. That it might soften the sharp edges of Draco’s own upbringing.
Instead, he was instructed to sharpen them further.
At first it felt like acting. A costume. His father had been his muse. Sneers practiced in the mirror, insults delivered with theatrical cruelty. Dumbledore praised him for it, subtly, with slight nods and winks and carefully chosen silences but never in words. He simply watched. Calculating. Always calculating as if measuring how far Draco was willing to go.
Their rivalry escalated quickly, intensified by their friends and classmates and even by their professors who would often pit them against one another. It stopped being an act. It hurt. And what’s worse, it made Draco furious in a way that felt far too close to fear every time Harry put himself in danger, which was often. Harry wore recklessness like a badge of honor. Draco told himself he despised that about him. Told himself that the tightness in his chest was indignation. That the sharp, nauseating twist in his stomach was just irritation. Here he was playing the villain so that Potter could grow up and save the world, and yet this particular savior seemed hell bent on finding new and unusual ways to almost die. It drove him mad.
And then the Dementors descended on the Quidditch pitch in their third year and Draco was forced to watch from the stands as Harry fell from his broom, plummeting to the ground. He forgot to breathe. He forgot they were supposed to be enemies. Forgot the sneers, and slurs, and venomous words carefully sharpened and thrown like knives between them. Harry fell, and it felt like Draco was falling too.
That feeling persisted, long after Harry returned to their shared classes. Draco found himself watching. Counting the rise and fall of his chest during lectures. Listening for the sound of his voice. The anger changed shape. It was no longer that Harry was reckless. It was that Draco almost lost him. That he still could.
By then it was too late. Too many actions had calcified into reputation. Too many people believed Draco Malfoy was exactly what he pretended to be. Harry most of all. Dumbledore had called it duty, but eventually Draco began to see it all for what it really was.
A sacrifice.
Still, surely even sacrifices had their limits.
“He’s living in my fucking house!”
Dumbledore paused, his afternoon cuppa partway to his lips as he regarded Draco over the crescent of his half–moon spectacles. There was no surprise on his face at seeing him barge into his office. There never was. Only that unbearable, knowing look.
“Language Mr. Malfoy. Please, sit. Have some tea.” He gestured to an armchair.
Draco did not sit. “Did you hear what I said? He’s living in the Manor!”
“Yes,” Dumbledore said gently. “I know.”
“He wants me to kill you,” Draco blurted, the words tumbling over each other. “There’s a cabinet in the Room of Hidden Things and-”
“I know,” Dumbledore said again.
Relief hit Draco so hard his knees nearly buckled. He caught himself on the back of a chair, fingers whitening from clutching. If Dumbledore already knew then there was a plan. Some elegant bit of chess work at play that Draco was not yet privy to.
“So, what do I do?” he asked eagerly.
Dumbledore rose slowly from behind his desk, age showing in the movement, in the careful bracing of one hand against the wood. The other hand came to rest on Draco’s shoulder.
“You must do as he asks,” he said simply.
Draco blinked, certain he’d misheard him. “You can’t be serious.” His eyes widened when Dumbledore’s expression remained unchanged, the hand on his shoulder suddenly feeling more suffocating than soothing.
“You don’t understand, you have to stop this. You have to do something. I can’t fail him,” Draco said hoarsely. “If I fail, he will kill my father. Or my mother. Or-” His voice trailed off on the last word, panic setting in once more.
Me.
Dumbledore’s gaze did not waver. “And if you succeed?”
“If I- what?” Draco faltered, face twisting with disgust. The question struck like a slap.
Silence settled, thick and suffocating as Dumbledore waited for him to accept the truth.
“If I succeed, then I become what everyone thinks I am.” His mind drifted as it always did, against his will and better judgement, to Harry. He imagined his face agonized by unspeakable loss. By anger and hatred. He felt hollow even as the familiar nausea set in. Harry’s pain would be proof of Draco’s success. It would always be this way.
“Yes,” Dumbledore said softly.
Draco could do little more than stare. “You expect me to kill you? To open the door and to let death and destruction into this school. If I mend the cabinet they will come. They will- ” His mind filled in the rest. Black cloaks flooding corridors, screams of students echoing, the red and green flashes of curses flying through the air. “People will die-”
“I understand the implications,” Dumbledore cut him off. “But you must continue to play your part, Draco. Now more than ever you must be so convincing that no suspicion falls upon you. Not from Tom. Not from those who serve him. And especially not from those who watch you here.”
“You mean Potter,” Draco said bitterly.
A flicker of something passed through Dumbledore’s eyes. “Yes, especially him.”
Draco dragged a hand through his hair. “He hates me.”
“Good.”
“He thinks I’m a coward.” The word tasted sour.
“Even better.”
Draco threw up his hands, daring to ask the question that had been bothering him for years “Are you really so worried Harry will turn to the dark? Even now? He’s practically the poster child for all things good. Frankly it would be unbearable if it wasn’t so…him.” He sneered to hide the admiration in his tone.
Dumbledore eyed him carefully. “He is who he is, because you are as you are,” he said finally.
Draco heaved a frustrated breath, unable to meet Dumbledore’s stare, his voice pathetically small as he said “and what if I don’t want him to hate me anymore-”
“This is your mission, Draco,” the headmaster snapped suddenly. His tone had sharpened into a command as his eyes narrowed, sounding more like a drill sergeant than the eccentric soft spoken wizard he presented. “This is all for the greater good of the entire wizarding world. Remember that.”
Be bad. And in doing so, you will be good.
Dumbledore spoke of the greater good as if it were a mathematical certainty. Draco often wondered if he ever once stopped to consider what it meant to ask a child to become someone irredeemable for the sake of his perceived greater good. Given current circumstances he doubted it very much.
“He’s in my house,” Draco said again, hating the thinly veiled despair in his voice. There was no safe place for him. No respite from the dark. Nowhere he could truly be himself. He didn’t even know who that was anymore.
“Goodbye, Mr. Malfoy.” Dumbledore dismissed him with a gesture toward the office door, left wide open by Draco’s dramatic entrance earlier.
Draco waited as the old man muttered something, placed his wand to his temple and extracted a silver thread of memory from his mind, depositing it in the nearest pensieve, just as he did each time they met. Then he gritted his teeth, turned on his heel and stormed out of the office, so distracted he nearly trampled Harry on the staircase as he rushed past.
***
October 31st 1997
He’d slipped away from the Halloween festivities early, grateful for the distraction. From the Great Hall below came the muffled swell of music and laughter, the warm glow of jack-o’-lanterns and buckets of candy floating in bewitched constellations. He rolled his eyes at the idiocy of it all. The naivete.
His footsteps were measured, silent as he made his way through the school. He did not hurry. He did not look over his shoulder. He had perfected the art of appearing as though he had nothing to hide even as his nerves frayed and his thoughts shifted to cursed objects and vanishing cabinets and the Dark Mark burned hot beneath the fabric of his uniform-
“Malfoy!”
Harry stood halfway down the corridor, tie loosened, sleeves shoved up, hair even more unruly than usual as if he’d run his hands through it too many times. There was something infuriatingly unfair about the way he’d grown into himself. Taller now. Broader through the shoulders. The awkward angles of boyhood had sharpened into something Draco found annoyingly handsome. A stronger jaw. More defined cheekbones. Eyes green like a killing curse and just as deadly when they landed, with purpose on him.
And to make matters worse, he was everywhere. Following Draco. Questioning him. Waiting for him in the corridors. Watching his every move. Draco would look up during meals or in the middle of an exam to find him staring, some unknowable expression on his face.
The same expression he wore now.
Draco sighed, forcing a calm he did not feel as he lifted his chin haughtily. “Potter. To what do I owe the displeasure? Have your friends finally realised you’re insufferable?”
Harry ignored that. “You weren’t at dinner.”
“How touching. You noticed.” Draco gave a thin smile.
“I always notice the people who try to kill my friends.”
Guilt twisted sharp in his stomach even as he forced an unaffected eyeroll. He had not meant to hurt Katie Bell. He’d intended the necklace for Dumbledore. A stall tactic to buy himself time by showing the Dark Lord he was trying to accomplish his task. “Still on about that, are you? It’s flattering how much of your time you spend thinking about me. Really, it’s cute.”
Harry’s jaw tightened as he approached, his hands fisted at his sides, shoulders squared like he might decide to charge at him. Gods, he was beautiful. Draco hated the way his body reacted, aware of every step, every inch of space disappearing between them. Like watching a train approach while being tied to the tracks, helpless to do anything but brace for impact.
“You were in Hogsmeade,” he accused.
Draco chuffed. “Potter, half the bloody school was in Hogsmeade. If that’s your idea of proof-”
“Just, stop,” he said, his eyes falling shut briefly on a sigh. “I know it was you. What I don’t understand is why.”
Draco stepped forward without meaning to, drawn into Harry’s orbit like gravity. He could see the faint scar at his temple, the slight bob in his throat as he swallowed.
“You don’t know anything.”
“I overheard you talking to Dumbledore in his office,” Harry said defiantly. “I know you’re on some kind of mission.”
And there it was. The impact.
Draco’s heart slammed against his ribs as he met Harry’s stare, startled to find none of the usual animosity behind his eyes. He looked almost…concerned. Draco placed both palms on Harry’s chest and shoved him back. Hard. “Get out of my way.”
“Make me,” Harry volleyed, stepping right back into his space until they were standing chest to puffed-up chest, Harry’s fingers digging into his shirt to keep him from pulling away. Draco pushed instead, backing him against the wall.
Push and pull. Advance and retreat.
There was a dull thud as Harry’s body connected with stone, Draco stumbling forward with the momentum. For a second neither of them moved. Then Harry’s hands settled on Draco’s arms, holding them at his sides. Just… holding. Draco swallowed and Harry’s eyes fell to his throat, lingering on his mouth as they blazed a trail back up to meet his own again.
“What the fuck do you want from me, Potter?” Draco demanded, his voice too raw. Almost pleading, “Can’t you find someone else to haunt?”
The words landed differently than they should have and Harry’s eyes widened. His breath stuttered as it ghosted over Draco’s heated cheek. Green eyes flicked over his face, searching, and for one wild, careless moment, Draco allowed himself to enjoy it. To lose himself in the feel of Harry’s attention.
“You look like hell,” Harry muttered softly. “Pale even for you.” His grip had loosened, his palms now just resting on Draco’s arms, warm through the fabric of his shirt. It was the closest thing to an embrace, to being held, that Draco felt in years.
Fuck. What was he doing? He had Harry pinned against a wall, and worse, he was the one leaning in, closing the distance between them. He did not allow himself to dwell on the fact that Harry could have pushed him off at any point.
And didn’t.
“Why do you care,” Draco hissed, pulling away and breaking whatever temporary spell had overcome them.
“I don’t,” He said too quickly. But the look in his eyes…Draco could not afford to let Harry look at him like that.
“Fuck off,” he spat with as much animosity as he could summon. “You have no idea what I’m capable of, Potter. Best be careful or I’ll give you a real reason to hate me. Maybe next time it will be Granger instead of Katie.” Draco finished, colder now.
Hate me. You have to hate me. This only works if you hate me.
Harry scoffed as if seeing right through him. “You’re a coward.”
The words hit their mark and before he could think better of it Draco reacted, stalking forward until they were mere inches apart once more, Harry’s back against the wall, caged in by Draco’s arms braced on either side of his head.
“Say it again,” he sneered. “I dare you.”
“Coward.” It was almost teasing. A challenge.
This was a mistake. A catastrophic, humiliating mistake. Draco cursed, releasing a growl as he stepped back again, running both hands through his hair. “You’re fucking infuriating.”
From below, a swell of laughter echoed up the staircase, the world simply spinning on, oblivious to the monumental shift in gravity currently happening in the seventh floor left corridor.
Draco sighed, exhausted by the immense effort of keeping Harry Potter at arms length. “Just, stay away from me. For both our sakes,” he said as he turned and headed back the way he came, those green eyes boring holes into his back as he hurried away.
***
May 10 1997
Harry did not relent after their…whatever that was. On the contrary, the prick doubled down, hell bent on finding answers to things he was never supposed to know, his singular talent for nearly getting himself killed now honed to perfection. They circled each other, drawing closer and closer to the center and Draco knew there was only one possible outcome awaiting them once they reached it. Mutually assured destruction. If he was honest, a small part of him hoped for it, clung to the inevitability of it. At least then it would be over. When Harry’s curse sliced him open Draco was almost grateful to him for it.
But it was not the sweet release of death that visited him in Pomfrey’s care. It was Harry.
Draco could feel him. Feel his presence even hidden beneath that stupid invisibility cloak. He always knew when Harry was there. Like a sixth sense. Sight, sound, smell, touch, taste, and him. He’d first realized it years ago when Harry Polyjuiced himself into Goyle of all people, fishing around for information. Somehow Draco just…knew it was him. He’d even said something cruel about Granger as a test. Since then, Draco used it to his advantage. Used whatever this thing was between them, this awareness, to make sure Harry overheard the things he needed to.
He feigned unconsciousness as Harry drew in closer, until he was standing beside his hospital bed. The distinct buzzing of a muffliato settled around them as green eyes darted over his face like floo flames against his skin. He could feel it. And then Harry spoke and Draco’s world came to a screeching halt.
“I needed to see you, to make sure you were alive. Needed to-” he blew out a shaky breath, almost a laugh. “Fuck, I don’t know I just, needed you.”
The affliction was entirely mutual but Draco had remained still. Silent. Fighting to keep his breaths even. At once both desperate and terrified to hear more.
“I wish I could just hate you. I’m supposed to hate you, right? That’s what everyone wants.” Harry exhaled sharply, as though the words had been stuck in his throat. “So why can’t I stop thinking about you? Worrying about you.” His voice was pained, even in whispers. “You feel it too, don’t you?”
Gooseflesh prickled Draco’s skin and he had to suppress a sigh as Harry’s fingers lightly traced the silver scars marring the side of his neck, scars put there by his own careless Sectumsempra the night before, the majority of the damage hidden beneath thin hospital sheets.
“I’m sorry I hurt you.” He said it so quietly Draco might have missed it if his ears had not been acutely attuned to every word. “I didn’t know, I didn’t - fuck! I’m so sorry, Draco.”
His name floated from Harry’s lips on a whisper, barely there at all, but it was enough to send his entire nervous system into chaos.
Movement within Pomfrey’s office had Harry tearing his hand away, his secret whispered confessions trailing behind him as he quickly left the hospital wing, slipping through the large double doors. It wasn’t until Draco heard the soft click of the lock that he allowed himself to exhale, his lungs burning with the effort of not calling out, begging Harry to come back.
*****
May 13, 1997
Days later Pomfrey, finally, released him at Snape’s insistence and Draco headed straight for the seventh floor corridor. After all, the vanishing cabinet would not mend itself and he was running out of time. The dark lord was growing impatient.
He absentmindedly paced the floor in front of Barmy’s tapestry, trolls twirling in obscene pink tutus as he dragged a hand through his hair, fingers trembling. He needed to concentrate on the door. He needed to focus on his task. Still, traitorous thoughts gnawed at him despite his best efforts to occlude them into oblivion.
I needed to see you.
You feel it too, don’t you?
I’m so sorry, Draco.
He stopped short, breath coming in labored gasps, heart stuttering painfully against his ribs. He leaned forward placing his palms on his thighs, tamping down his panic through sheer force of will.
The door appeared.
He turned the knob.
It opened.
And suddenly, he was falling as a body slammed into his back, momentum driving them forward through the threshold just as the door vanished behind them. Draco slammed into the floor face first, hard enough to rattle his teeth, the impact driving the breath from his lungs. Before he could even suck in air, strong hands turned him over and a forearm landed with purpose beneath his chin with just enough pressure to lock him firmly in place.
He didn’t need to see his face. Every cell in his body already knew it was him.
“Shit! Are you ok? Did I hurt you? I didn’t mean-”
“What the fuck, Potter,” Draco snapped, breath coming shallow and ragged. “Get off me.”
“I know what you’re doing.” His voice vibrated through Draco’s bones.
“This again?” Draco laughed, sharp and mirthless. “You’re embarrassing yourself.”
He twisted violently, rolling onto his side to free himself but Harry was quicker. He threw himself forward again, pinning Draco back down before he could scramble away. Knees braced on either side of his hips. Hands planted beside his shoulders. The proximity was suffocating.
Harry growled, teeth clenched as Draco thrashed beneath him. “I can help you. I want to help.”
“Fuck off,” Draco hissed. His pulse was a riot, blood roaring in his ears. “You want to help me, oh Chosen One? Why don’t you go save the world and leave me the fuck alone.”
Please.
Please.
Please.
The plea lodged in his throat. You can’t be here. You can’t see this. You can’t-
“There is only one person I am interested in saving.”
The words landed heavy on Draco’s chest and his breath hitched, traitorous and loud in the cavernous silence. For a moment they just stared at each other, something dangerously close to a confession hanging low in the air between them. The magic of the Room hummed around them, walls lined with shelves, cluttered with forgotten things. Rusted suits of armor, cracked mirrors that caught and fractured the light, trinkets both meaningless and inconceivably valuable. And in the far corner, the cabinet loomed, casting its dark shadow.
Draco couldn’t breathe. So he reached for cruelty like a lifeline and held tight with both hands.
“How romantic,” He drawled, forcing an eye-roll, the practiced sneer falling into place like armor. He leaned in closer. “I. Don’t. Need. Saving.” He bridged his hips hard, bucking Harry off of him and quickly rising to his feet.
Harry Potter had just straddled him and now the feeling of his body, the delicious weight of him as he pinned Draco to the floor - he would never be able to unknow it. Draco’s skin tingled. His fingers itched. He needed to get his shit together.
Harry rose too, the relentless prick. “Listen to me. I know you’re scared-”
“You don’t know anything about me!”
He had to forcibly keep himself from retreating as Harry approached, brazenly stepping right into his space until there was barely an inch between them.
“I know you’re a Death-Eater.”
The accusation hit like a punch to the gut, leaving Draco gasping. His heart was a metronome in his ears, pulse racing so fast he was certain he would collapse. It took everything in him to remain standing as he braced himself for what came next.
But Harry only raised a brow and with a smug, self-satisfied nod of his head, he said, “Dumbledore doesn’t lock his office, did you know that? There’s just that old Gargoyle and a series of ill-will wards designed to keep out those who would seek to do harm.” He huffed a bitter laugh. “I didn’t seek to do harm when I entered, not until I took a little dip in the Pensieve. Let’s just say it was…enlightening.”
Draco stood, mesmerized, as an emboldened Harry lifted a hand, hesitated, then placed it at the side of Draco’s neck, soft fingertips tracing the scars there for a second time. “I overheard the two of you arguing in his office back at the start of term, but I didn’t understand.” His thumb gently brushed across Draco’s pulse as he slid it up to cup his chin. The effect was devastating. He shuddered involuntarily, every nerve alight at once, as though Harry had found the one place his armor didn’t quite cover. “I understand now. The things he made you do. All you gave up for him,” he paused. “For me.”
“You’re wrong,” Draco clung tight to those last shreds of his denial, sounding every bit as desperate as he felt.
Harry tsked. “Too late for that now.”
“I hate you,” he attempted. It came out too soft. A confession wearing a disguise too flimsy to fool anyone.
A slight curl formed at the corner of Harry’s mouth. “I know the feeling.”
Their foreheads touched. He could feel Harry’s breath against his lips, warm and uneven.
Harry.
His mission.
His ruin.
“He let them kill my family,” Harry whispered, his eyes widening, as if saying it out loud somehow made it more real. “Dumbledore knew what Riddle was doing. He let him kill my family to create me. To create his savior. His weapon.” A pause. “They ALL knew.”
The revelation was staggering. Draco was not the only child Dumbledore had been manipulating all these years. Of course he wasn’t. How had he not seen it before? How could he have missed it?
He and Harry were the same. Opposites sides of the same fucked up coin. A long, weighted silence fell.
“I didn’t know. About your family.” It was all Draco could manage.
Harry smiled sadly, cupping his chin a little tighter and Draco leaned into his touch, unable to stop himself. “Neither of us ever had a choice in any of this. Not really. But we have one now.” He paused, taking a breath. “I’d like to choose this. Whatever this is.” He let out an amused huff as Draco sucked in a startled breath, his eyes comically wide as his occlusion shattered and every emotion hidden beneath was suddenly there on full display in brilliant shining silver.
Fuck.
“Then you are an even bigger idiot than I thought.”
“Probably,” Harry agreed, his gaze drifting to Draco’s mouth, fingertips stroking his cheek gently.
Draco thought of the cabinet. Of the Dark Mark burning beneath his sleeve. Of all the horrible things he’d said and done and the things he still needed to do. Of Dumbledore’s dismissal, leaving Draco alone against the darkness.
You must do as he asks
“I can’t do this,” he whispered, shaking his head against Harry’s heated stare. “Don’t you get it? This is how it has to be. You can’t fix this. It’s too late.”
“Only broken things need fixing,” Harry answered into the quickly diminishing space between them. “And you are not broken.”
Draco should have ended it then. Pushed him away. Said something cruel enough to cauterize the moment before it turned into something he would never recover from. He should have made Harry Potter leave.
He didn’t.
Instead he let the boy-he-loved lean towards him in painfully slow motion. Giving Draco time to stop him if he wanted to.
He didn’t.
When their lips finally touched it was barely a brush. That was all it took. Draco’s arms wrapped around Harry's waist, pulling him close until their bodies were flush. The kiss was not sweet. It wasn't gentle or careful. There were no tentative touches or soft caresses. No. This was a ravaging. The kind of kiss born of restraint snapping clean in half. Messy and uncoordinated chaos, the result of years of obsession and fascination and desire masked as hate and the yearning for something they were never supposed to want.
Draco melted into it, into the sick relief of giving up. The blissful agony of finally, finally giving in to whatever this thing was between them. They tore at each other, teeth clashing, tongues wild. Hands tangled in each other's hair, bodies moulded together as Harry pushed Draco up against the door.
The door. It was back.
Reality returned to him with such force he might have doubled over if not for Harry's hips pinning him in place. Draco pulled back, breathless and shaking.
He’d been about to shove Harry away. To force them safely back into the molds that had been created for them - the right and the wrong, the good and the bad, the savior and the damned - But Harry’s hands began to roam his body, finding their way to the waist of his trousers. Buttons came undone beneath strong, sure, fingers. His shirt untucked. His pants pulled down just enough as Harry dropped to his knees before him. Draco gasped as he ran his fingers through soft, messy brown hair, lost to the feeling of Harry’s mouth as he took him in.
"Gods, fuck, slow down. I -"
Harry looked up, a lazy smirk on his swollen lips. Draco nearly came at the sight alone. “You know, you broke my fucking nose in that train car,” he said, taking him fully into his mouth, the tip of his cock hitting the back of Harry’s throat.
Holy hell. “You deserved it. You never mind your own Gods damned business. You were going - going to - fuck - get yourself killed,” Draco hissed as Harry rolled his tongue around the shaft. “Besides, you nearly murdered me in the loo so I’d say we’re about even.” His head fell forward as Harry increased the speed, his hands on Draco’s ass, pulling him tighter to his mouth. “Fucking hell. Slow. Down-”
“Or what? Your father will hear about this?”
“Shut up.” Draco groaned as Harry began to pump his cock with his hand, his thoughts bordering incoherence. “Could you not mention my father while my cock is- ”
“I know what Riddle wants you to do.”
Panic seized him as he tried to pull away but Harry didn’t stop. Draco bit his lip bloody to keep from crying out Harry’s name as pleasure swept through him, swallowing his moans and broken breaths. Harry took him deep, dragging his cock down his throat and back out again in a punishing rhythm and Draco slammed his head back against the door as he came harder than he ever had in his pathetic sixteen years of life.
Harry swallowed, wiping at his mouth with the back of his hand as he rose to full height in front of him and Draco surged, capturing his mouth with his own again, tasting himself as their tongues found each other, desperate to know what Harry sounded like, the noises he would make as he came undone in his arms. Draco’s hand dipped inside the waistband of Harry’s pants, gripping him, stroking the length of him until Harry was thrusting into Draco’s fist, gasping and whimpering. His forehead dropped to Draco’s shoulder on a delicious moan as he kissed and licked the scars on his neck, whispering impossible pleasure-induced promises into his skin.
“I’ll take care of it for you.”
“You don’t have to do this alone.”
“Let me help.”
Draco held Harry tighter as he came, pulled him closer, kissed him deeper. Because he knew that once he left that room, he could never see Harry Potter again. Not if he was going to survive long enough to save him.
His hand found the doorknob at his back, tightening around it, twisting it open and stepping out into the 7th floor corridor, his entire body rebelling against the sudden distance between them as he tucked himself back into his clothes. He would figure out a way to end this. He would find a way to keep Harry safe, from both Dumbledore and the Dark Lord. Even if it meant destroying himself in the process.
Harry’s eyes narrowed. “What are you doing?”
“I told you. It’s too late,” he said, rebuilding his shields, eyes fixed on the floor to avoid seeing the hurt on Harry’s face.
“I will find a way out of this for us.”
Another impossible promise. He took a step toward him, and Draco retreated further into the hall.
“There is no us,” he said firmly, with as much forced conviction as he could muster as he headed down the hall towards the moving staircases, resignation settling into his bones.
Harry’s laugh was humorless as he shouted after him. “It has always been us, Draco.”
***
The Astronomy Tower - June 30, 1997
Fix the vanishing cabinet or die.
Those were the options that had been laid out, plainly before him. And so, he’d done it. He’d fixed it. Turns out he was a coward after all.
He’d searched the whole bloody castle for Harry, to warn him, only to find him standing over -
Screams rose up from the walls and the terrifying, distinct howl of a werewolf in the distance had Draco’s heart racing as he tried again to make Harry see reason. To convince him to run, even as he wrapped his arms around him, weeks of longing washed away in an instant at the feel of him.
“You have to go. Please. It’s not safe for you here. They’re coming for you. They’ll find you-”
“Let them,” Harry said with a slight, almost disinterested shrug of his shoulder and dread crept up Draco’s spine once more.
“What aren’t you telling me?”
Harry sighed. “Don’t freak out, it’s really not as bad as it looks,” he said, stepping out of Draco’s embrace and casually rolling up the sleeve of his white oxford, revealing his forearm. There it was. Their damnation in the form of an inky black skull and snake tattoo, the twin to the one on Draco's arm that would forever brand them both fools.
Draco had failed him, failed everyone. Any attempt to breathe was futile.
"Listen to me," Harry said, a firm hand falling to Draco’s waist, drawing both his body and his attention back to him. "It doesn't matter, do you hear me? None of it does. I don't give a fuck about any of it. Let that deranged asshole burn it all to the ground."
Draco’s scoff was incredulous. “I don’t care what he promised you. He is a liar. He will kill you at the first opportunity. I’m shocked he didn’t kill you on the spot-”
“He won’t,” Harry said firmly. “Because he can’t. And what more, he’ll make sure the order stays away too.”
“You’re mad,” Draco said hoarsely,“You’ve actually lost your mind.”
“Maybe.” Harry tilted his head, studying him in a way that made Draco’s heart skip. “But I think you like it.”
Before he could think of a suitable lie to deny it, Harry continued. "The night he killed my parents, when he tried to kill me, the spell backfired and a piece of Riddle’s soul bonded with mine. If he kills me, that piece of him dies too. But as long as I am alive, he can’t be killed. He knows it.” He stared pointedly at Draco. “Dumbledore did too. This whole time he knew I would have to die. He planned on it.”
“No.” Draco shook his head. “No, there’s no way.” Everything he did. Everything Dumbledore made him do-
“He knew what I am, and he planned to sacrifice me for the greater good,” Harry insisted bitterly, raising a brow at Draco’s horrified expression. “Sound familiar?”
Draco cursed, softly at first, then loud enough to send rippling echoes off the tower’s stone walls. So this was it then. The reason for Dumbledore’s fears. His constant doubts about Harry’s allegiances. Because in his own arrogance, his haste to create his savior, he’d also created the one person who could destroy everything.
“So, I made Riddle a deal,” Harry continued. “Told him I’d stay away. That I wouldn’t fight him. That I would even take the Mark as a show of good faith. And in exchange…” He pulled Draco close, running a thumb across his lower lip.
“In exchange, I get to take you away from all of this,” he breathed against Draco’s mouth. “None of it matters if I can't have you."
It was both the last thing and the only thing Draco had ever wanted to hear. They were beautiful, intoxicating, breathless words murmured against frozen skin and still somehow, Draco was burning. A strangled moan escaped him as Harry began peppering kisses against his cheek, his jaw, his neck. Blazing trails of cursed fiendfyre in his wake. Harry pressed him firmly into the back wall, just beneath the residual scorch mark of his Avada. Strong hands gripped him tightly. Greedy. Possessive hands. His tongue trailed down Draco’s throat, lingering at his pulse, sucking a licking. By the time his lips found the sensitive flesh behind his ear, his tongue guiding the way to the lobe, taking it in his teeth, Draco gave up fighting it.
“Harry,” he whispered, not a plea, not a warning. Just a name, spoken out loud for the first time, heavy with desire and all the things still unsaid.
I’m so sorry I hurt you.
I feel it too. I always have.
I love you.
“Tell me to stop,” Harry murmured, taking Draco’s face in his hands, forcing their eyes to meet. "If you don’t want this, if you don’t want me, you’re going to have to tell me to stop because I can’t. I won’t. Not anymore. Not ever again.”
Draco spent years building up his emotional walls, strengthening and reinforcing his defenses against the relentless, debilitating want of Harry fucking Potter. Defenses to protect himself from the soul crushing longing, the sickening need for the boy he could never have. He played the villain. The bully. The Death-Eater. Breaking himself apart piece by shattered piece, the darkness clinging to him like a necrotic limb he would never be rid of. All for him.
And still Harry had followed him, willingly, into the dark.
“Draco?” There was something intolerably soft in the way he said his name as Harry searched his face, brow furrowed, his own vulnerabilities and insecurities etched into the creases of his frown as he tilted his head in question. As if Draco might refuse him. As if such a thing were possible. He nearly laughed at the absurdity.
Voices echoed up the stairwell, footsteps pounding against stone.
“Draco!” Harry said again, louder, his grip tightening. “Time to choose. Now.”
Draco pulled free from Harry’s arms, backing away slowly. Then he turned and crossed the room to where Dumbledore’s lifeless body lay crumpled on the floor. Death had arranged him poorly. The great Albus Dumbledore reduced to a heap of limbs at grotesque angles. He met the old man’s open, vacant stare without flinching as he crouched beside him. There was no wisdom left in those eyes. No grand design. Only stillness. He’d needed to be sure. To see it for himself.
He’d been about to stand when an idea struck and Draco leaned over the body, plucking the wand from Dumbledore’s slack fingers, something telling him it might be useful. When he rose, Harry was watching him intently. The smile that broke across his face as Draco walked toward him was the most beautiful thing he had ever seen.
Footsteps thundered closer. A flash of black at the stairwell’s edge.
By the time Snape and McGonagall rounded the corner, they were gone. The wisps of black smoke dissipating into the cold night air, the only evidence that they had ever been there at all.