Title: The Path to the Astronomy Tower
Author: 
stillaseeker
Team: Team EWE
Prompt: The World
Wordcount: 1700ish
Rating: PG/Soft R
Warnings: None.
Summary: 'I can forgive, but I cannot forget,' is only another way of saying, 'I will not forgive.' One step forwards, two steps back. Draco's journey, in the eyes of certain Hogwarts portraits.
Author's Note The interpretation of the 'World' that I used can be found here. Many thanks to my wonderful beta A and to the amazingly supportive Team EWE — Ewe rock! =D
follow no path
all paths lead where
truth is here
1 year later - Rudyard the Redeemed
After seven years at Hogwarts with Potter, Draco has learnt to associate summer with death — sickly-sweet as flowers in bloom and the metallic after-taste of blood, of spells humming like bees through the night-soaked air.
There are twenty-one steps between the staircase leading to the Entrance Hall and the portrait of Rudyard the Redeemed. Painted in the style of the late-Goblin Age, Rudyard's features are a mass of angled slashes, like shards refracted from the earth; a prism of motion as he dances on the remains of his enemy. The foreground is marked by a few splotches of red and the etching of a scream.
Other than the odd shimmer of the paint in the growing darkness, and the watchfulness of Rudyard's eyes as they follow Draco's movements across the corridor, there is nothing overtly magical about the portrait.
But then, Draco knows better. Nothing so bloodthirsty could be anything but magical.
His grip falters on stone — Hogwarts, Hogwarts, hoggy warty Hogwarts, teach us something please — what on earth had he been thinking, coming back to Hogwarts?
The old castle remembers him too well. His naïve imaginings of warm stone and firelight, the drapes of the Slytherin dorms, the solid familiarity of the Great Hall and treacle pudding for dessert — nothing had prepared him for this onslaught of hostility from the castle itself, the recoil of its stones, the silence of its portraits.
Framed by the window, on the far side of the lake beyond the soundless thrashings of the Whomping Willow, the white stone from Dumbledore's monument gleams in the starlight.
Rudyard's mouth twists — a fraction of movement lost to the encroaching gloom — as Draco's face crumples in a bend of the corridor. Abruptly, with a sharp crack and ripple of his robes, he disappears back down the stairs, to the warmth of the Entrance Hall.
The dust motes settle with the quieting of his footsteps, and slowly, Rudyard's eyes shut.
3 years later - The Fat Lady
His mouth is warm, seeking against his. Helplessly, Draco lets his mouth fall open to the rough, wet glide of a tongue against his own, the prickle of stubble against his chin as they move; hands holding Draco against the wall, long fingers stroking the moist inner seam of Draco's buttocks.
His Hogwarts shirt, half-open, trails disconsolately over one nipple, sucked to transparency as the mouth leaves his to fasten over a dark pink aureole. An earthy smell, Quidditch-stained sweat, rises in the close confines of the broom closet.
All he can see of Harry is a wicked gleam of green, a softening of eyes from behind those abominable glasses, as Harry nuzzles his way up into the arch of Draco's neck, both hands coming up to frame his face, tangling in loose strands of wheat silk. Harry murmurs something — 'inner soon? — as Draco drops his head against Harry's own, taking his comfort in Harry's lush, laughing mouth.
They kiss for a while longer, long laps of tongue gentling into kittenish licks — Draco pressing his nose against Harry's in an unwilling gesture of affection — before slowly separating. They'll have time enough, after dinner. Hearing the rustling of Harry re-ordering his Quidditch robes, Draco tucks in his shirt; straightens his tie.
They're at Hogwarts after all. Standards have to be maintained.
He can't help, however, catching Harry's fingers with his own as they quietly exit the seventh floor broom closet. He raises their clasped hands to his mouth, breathing in the familiar musk from his body, bestowing a quick peck on Harry's knuckles before he lets go.
Harry's eyes crinkle into a smile.
The Fat Lady watches them as they leave; Harry's red cloak bright against Draco's standard black, the closeness of their heads as Harry bends to whisper something into Draco's ear.
Her forehead crinkles, creating tiny veined cracks in the paint, as she frowns.
5 years later - Severus Snape
There is nothing that quite prepares you, Draco thinks, for your past. Sometimes, he thinks he only recalls the most inane, pointless things about his childhood — a holiday in Germany, watching Riesling grow plump and limp on the vine; Dinky sneaking parsnip chips in with his dinner; the horrendous taste of dragon meat.
But here — memories rise through the flotsam of his mind like shrapnel. Severus, lank hair shielding his face as he bends over a cauldron. The malicious gold gleam, backlit by flame, of the Goblet of Fire. Dumbledore, smiling.
There are times he thinks he doesn't need a wand; all he needs is a basin, a Pensieve to dip his head into, to let the memories come oozing out in silver.
He trails his fingers over the rise and fall of Harry's chest. As usual, Harry has burrowed deep into the covers, flinging an arm and a leg over Draco, stuck to his side as firmly as a grindylow. In the shadows of their room, the bloodstone Harry wears on his ring finger winks like a sun upon the water, its red spots sparkling.
He'd given Harry the ring on their third anniversary — Harry had been amused by its colours; Slytherin green and Gryffindor red. Can't leave the stereotypes behind, can you? Draco had kissed his mouth shut.
Looking at it now, on the finger of the boy he'd loved into slumber, he knows the ring is a symbol of more than their chequered past. It is known as a martyr's stone, a mute acknowledgement of a miracle he cannot find words to express.
Quietly, untangling himself from Harry's grasping paws, ignoring Harry's half-protesting snuffle, Draco tiptoes over to the window. From their vantage point in the Gryffindor Tower, he can just barely glimpse the crenallated roof, the cold ramparts.
He stays there until Harry brings the covers over to the window; naked and heavy with sleep, slumping beside Draco on the window seat, pooling the duvet around them. With Harry's head niched into the arc of his shoulder, Draco watches the sun rise over Hogwarts, grey stone transfigured into bronze against the hush of the sky.
7 years later - Violet
The students seem to get younger every year. Snow and cocoa, however, are eternal.
Draco blows on his fingertips as he crosses the Entrance Hall, sparing a glance, as always, at the staircase enveloped in shadow. There is a slow rumbling of the floor beneath him, reminscent of a hippogriff stampede, before a group of Third Years crash into the doors, spilling into the castle, scarves flying and cheeks alight with their first Hogsmeade trip.
Their exuberance, Draco thinks in disgust, waving his wand at the rings of cocoa spattered all over his cloak, is a little like snowflakes — overwhelmingly similar, yet subtly variegated with each new year.
A tow-headed twerp has the temerity to step on Draco's new boots, tripping over them as he crashes into Draco in the threshold of the antechamber. There is a hush in the hall as Draco stares at the young nuinsance, subconsciously noting the yellow-and black crest on his robes.
Professor Malfoy! I'm sorry — I didn't see you there — The boy's lower lip trembles alarmingly, and Draco wonders when he will finally be rid of Hufflepuffs.
Silently, he offers an arm to the nincompoop, drawing him up not unkindly, before executing a quick about-turn that causes his robes to billow behind him as he leaves the castle entrance. The students disperse, exclaiming over new Tangerine Tangos from Honeydukes and something inexplicable called Hersheys.
Violet, awakened from her nap, peers curiously after the disappearing figure in black. It's been years, after all, but the Fat Lady still likes to hear everything she can about her favourite Slytherin, nonetheless.
9 years later - Albus Dumbledore
Merlin — the Snitch's stuck up there, Draco. I can just glimpse it on my broom. Stuck in a spiders' web — one of Aragog's grandkids, no doubt.
Let me change out of my Quidditch robes — I'll pick you up and we'll go for dinner after.
Draco can still taste the soft salt-slick of Harry's tongue as he climbs the stairs. The corridor is as silent as ever — the tower isn't as popular as it was during Draco's school-days. The tapestries on the walls snake down in mazy caprice - even the house-elves seem to have forgotten this part of the castle.
Wand tip glowing before him, Draco passes the portrait of Rudyard the Redeemer. The wizard's head lies on a far-flung boulder as he naps on the battlefield, catching twenty winks between life and death.
Turn the corner, down another corridor.
He remembers these stairs — the headlong rush up their steep spiral so many years ago, the hurried tug at the iron ring on the door. Pushing it open at last, to find Hogwarts lashed by rain, the dragon-spine ridges of its hills shadowed and lit by the Dark Mark — and his dying headmaster.
His first chance.
The heavens are kinder today; their vicissitudes cowed — Draco lifts his head and sees only their fixed stars, freewheeling across the sky.
He's almost certain, if he turns ever so slightly, he can see the silhouettes of two wands — one trembling, about to fall; another certain, already fallen. Himself; Severus. He closes his eyes, wrapping his arms around his waist, surrounded by the death of a man who loved them too late.
When he opens them, his gaze is caught by a flutter of gold — Harry's Snitch. Stumbling forwards, he kneels at the ramparts, and uses his wand to shred the thick spiders' web around it. The Snitch, momentarily freed, pauses for a second, before taking off.
Draco catches it by reflex, feeling the soft beat of its wings against his palm.
He hears Harry's voice, and turns to find him on his broom, grinning cheekily, zipping through the night sky like the maniac he was at twelve, flying after something he couldn't yet comprehend.
Whimsically, taking a deep breath, Draco leaves his doubts, his memories behind, and takes a flying leap off the Astronomy Tower — off the ramparts.
Merlin's blue knickers, Malfoy! —
Harry catches him, and they both skid through the air on his broom before, breathless and fuming, Harry manages to stabilise them both, soaring once again through the twilight sky.
His heart thudding, arm tight around Harry's broad back, breathing in the mix of ozone and rainswept fields that is Harry and listening to his tirade — what did you think you were doing, you stupid crazy git! — Draco clutches the Snitch in his hand and allows himself a smile.
Once a seeker, always a seeker.
Finis