The Dark Side of Reason

Sometimes, Remus wonders whether the Veil that imprisons him has been purposefully designed to resemble that which took Sirius. It may have been. There is not much the new Dark Lord leaves to chance. There is even less he's not capable of.

Green and gold flickers cloud the edges of the Veil, echoes of the tapestry that hides its presence from the other side. The Dark Lord's... study. And no matter what direction Remus turns inside his little prison, it always shows him this same scene.

At the beginning, he had ripped at the fabric, clawed at the flimsy, smoke-like folds, thrown himself against them with all his might - and sometimes more. They leave shallow cuts on his skin, a sharp sting, a few scattered drops of blood, and then just smooth around him in a soft, solid mass. Impenetrable.

Behind the Veil, there is no time, no transformation, neither hunger nor thirst. And there is never any leeway.

***

Remus had been the most unlikely of spies. But they were out of options after Snape had been exposed in Harry's sixth year, and Tonks' infiltration attempt had resulted in disaster. Setting Remus up as a victim of Ministry persecution of werewolves, disenchanted with Dumbledore, had been as good an option as any.

And facing Death Eaters was kinder than the look on Harry's face as Remus dragged him away from that other Veil in the Department of Mysteries. The sight of that mad grief had cut like a jagged blade at Remus' throat. Almost as sharp as the urge to sink claws into Harry's soft, arched neck even as he pulled him to safety. Harry was a child, entitled to make mistakes. But Sirius was dead.

They had sneered at the newcomer in their midst, Voldemort's henchmen. A half-blood, a creature, no proper wizard. He'd been prepared for Macnair to come after him, had steeled himself inwardly for that kind of abuse. But never Malfoy. Remus never quite understood what had drawn illustrious Lucius Malfoy to the quiet, reclusive new traitor who wasn't someone you'd look at twice, and more beast than human to boot.

Remus had gone to Lucius' bed on the most casual of invites, mildly relieved, prepared to prove himself to the Death Eaters, and viciously unconcerned about the cost. Sirius was dead; there was no one left to be careful for.

And there was a cold radiance about Malfoy, a vibrancy Remus had only ever experienced in the company of James and Sirius, who had drawn him into their orbit with the pull of twin planets. A shining knight without need for armour.

Lucius Malfoy had been obsessed with Remus' scars, as if he was tracing the surface of his own ravaged soul on Remus' skin. During some full moons, he'd talked Remus out of using Wolfsbane Potion just to run his mouth endlessly over the self-inflicted injuries the wolf had left afterwards. In retrospect, Remus could not remember whether he'd dreaded those nights for their agonies of transformation, or for the sickening, treacherous pleasure that followed.

He let Lucius rake his skin with silver-wrought claws because he asked, suffering the silver eating into his skin without being able to tell, at the core of his soul, whether he wanted to gain Malfoy's trust or simply wanted to please him. It had always come too easily to him, that need to please and excuses for it. Like in the old times - that yes, Snape was a malicious git who'd give as good as he got given the chance, and who deserved being cut to size. Certainly Malfoy's coaxing only barely hid the steely command underneath; surely Remus had no way of refusing him. Plausible lies, all of them.

But how could Remus, of all people, have believed that he would not be tainted by association?

***

It is not only the Veil which the Dark Lord controls. The spells that have been wrapped around Remus' body are no less binding. Lucius does not come often. But when he pulls aside the Veil, Remus crouches there frozen; not immobile, but helpless. His flesh lies pliable under the long, pale fingers, his mouth opens to accept a smooth tongue just as his body opens to embrace warm, hard flesh in the most intimate of surrenders.

Remus shivers inwardly. It's not a place for pleasant memories, his prison.

He hasn't fought the Veil for a long time. Only when the Dark Lord brings one of his captives into the chamber beyond, he struggles, clawing, howling, begging. None of it ever makes it through, of course.

He cannot help but watch. He has tried not to look, oh, often, has hidden his face behind drawn-up knees and pressed his hands over his ears to shut out the sounds. In the end, he always watches. He feels he owes it to them, to witness their struggles, a friendly, loving eye at the end. It's not altogether unselfish either; because no matter how the scene plays out, his imagination would always outstrip reality. And he will always be seduced by the sugared hope that maybe, maybe there will be mercy this time.

There never is.

Remus has been a solitary creature for most of his life, so there are not many whose loss will truly sicken his soul. Only one is left to break his heart.

He has not seen the young man in years. He had left to take on his duties as spy before the boy's seventh year at Hogwarts, sneaked away cowardly without an explanation. He'd learned of the defeat of Voldemort at Harry's hands a year later, but by then he'd already been confined. Not behind the Veil yet, but nearly as secure. When Lucius had come down to his cell to tell the tale, victory had already ceased to matter. Lucius had taken on the mantle of the new lord and a handful of crazed followers along with it, and left the wizarding world to its feeble dreams of freedom while he devoted himself to vengeance.

Remus often wonders how Lucius does it, picking off his enemies without alerting the Aurors. Is the Ministry so happy about Voldemort's death that they ignore this low-level campaign of terror? Or are they already closing in on Lucius? And Albus... Albus hasn't been among those who died in Lucius' chambers, not yet. Is he still looking for Remus, or does he believe him dead after their last disastrous communication? Does he even care? There is no way for Remus to know, and Lucius never talks to him. Not with words.

They lead him in, two masked, cloaked figures, and at first Remus refuses to look. Glimpses only buzz in his brain; a thin wrist grasped between leather-gloved fingers, white and fragile like a dragonfly about to be crushed. A lock of dark hair drawing a looping 'g' on a pale collarbone. The curve of an inky eyebrow. Bare feet under the hem of a rough black robe. If the pieces don't connect, he won't have to look at the finished puzzle.

Harry had still been a boy when Remus last saw him. He hasn't had time to grow into the young man he is now - he has been dragged, wand in hand, with tales of salvation ringing in his ears. He has suffered so much, and yet won't live to see his twentieth birthday. If Remus had any tears left, he'd shed them for him. But there is only a dry burn, and he revels in it angrily. One of the guards pinches Harry's hip, crudely suggestive in a way that tells Remus everything about what the boy must have suffered at their hands.

He is frail, is Harry Potter. Not so much in body, although he's too thin and his face too gaunt, but in his bearing. He seems to duck his head mentally, but keeps a straight back as he is led before the Dark Lord, trembling inwardly where his limbs do not. The beginnings of a shell. As a child during Remus' stint as professor at Hogwarts, Harry exuded life. It is gone now. Oh, he was never vigorous like James, sleek like Lucius, or vivacious like Sirius. Even after Azkaban, Sirius glowed with mad strength. But Sirius had had Padfoot to hide inside. Harry is just himself.

No, he never had confidence, Harry, not on the ground. Lily's shyness as a Hogwarts first year, combined with an awkwardness of limbs and an air of apology for being there and bothering the world with his presence. In the months after James' and Lily's death, after Sirius had been dragged off to Azkaban for their murder, Remus dreamed of a wild scheme - stealing Harry from his gruesome relatives and fleeing with him to some remote corner of the earth. He should have done it then. Maybe death would have snatched them both sooner, but it would have been more merciful than this.

Harry is cowed but unbroken, and he arches his back like a hostile cat when his guards try to force him to his knees before the Dark Lord. Lucius shakes his head, and they let go and retreat. It is a strange contrast - the straight-backed prisoner and the servants, bowing out of the door.

There has been a glint of silver when they released the young man's wrists, and Remus touches the red scars on his own arms in remembrance. The pair of charmed silver bracelets negates Harry's magic and renders him unthreatening to his captors. A form of mind control much simpler than the film of spells the Dark Lord has laid on Remus. Harry would not, wearing them, shed a drop of Lucius' blood even if the knife were right there in his hand. He couldn't.

Remus wore the same bracelets once, for three days while the silver ate its way into his flesh, and the metal particles inflamed his tainted bloodstream until fever and pain drove him to the brink of death. He shouldn't have fought it quite so hard then.

They look at each other, the Dark Lord and his former master's nemesis. Lucius is not taller by more than an inch or two, but the confidence of his posture and the rich folds of costly robes make him loom.

Then Lucius reaches out, a feather-light touch to the side of Harry's jaw. Neck muscles harden under the fingers, zoomed into focus by the wolf's perfect sight. Harry doesn't move when the enemy's hand creeps up to his ear and removes battered glasses off his nose. There is something terribly unsurprised in the stern complicity of the boy's posture. Lucius slips his prize into his pocket, and probes the now unshielded eyes. In spite of everything, they haven't dulled, only darkened.

"Tell me, Harry," says the Dark Lord, "tell me who killed my son."

And Remus' nails slice into his palms, nausea bubbling in his stomach. He remembers how life slid out of Draco Malfoy's face as if wiped away by a callous hand when the curse hit, limbs splaying on the carpet like a broken poppet.

Just a boy, little more than the arrogant, malicious child Remus taught at Hogwarts, bright mind evident in the cutting accuracy of his barbs. Sirius' cousin, and very much his like despite a thin veneer of aristocratic Malfoy mannerisms. Vicious children, both.

Remus, crouched over the warded fireplace of Malfoy's study, naked and marked from a night in Lucius' bed, the sweat on his limbs turning to ice in the winter chill. His one chance to warn Albus Dumbledore about Voldemort's impending attack on Harry and Hogwarts. A horrid risk, firecalling right out of the stronghold of the enemy, but by then Remus had stopped caring about danger. He would play this to the end, pay his debts to Sirius and James and Lily, and finally break the chains that bound him, ever more closely, to Lucius Malfoy with every night he spent under his hands. One firecall, and it would be over.

And then the voice, no drawl this time but high and scared and angry.

"What are you do-"

Green light snuffed out the boy's life before he could even finish his last words. A foolish child, not a Death Eater, not a minion of the Dark. A child who would pause to question his father's toy, his former teacher, instead of striking safely from behind. Not a warrior, and he'd never have the chance to become one now. A split second to choose between one boy's life and another's. And in the end, it would be Harry, in spite of everything. There was never any doubt about it.

"Could you forget that you love him long enough to be able to hurt him?" Albus had asked, that long-past night in Grimmauld Place through yet another fireplace, when Remus had demanded, in unminced words, to be allowed to tutor Harry in Occlumency in Snape's place. It had silenced his protests then, and he did not ask again even in the aftermath of the boy's fifth year, when the answer would have changed to 'yes'.

Remus delivered his warning over the boy's corpse, ensuring Harry's safety in front of the dead eyes of the price. He had downed the flames after telling Albus in crisp, short words about Draco Malfoy's fate, before the old man could express horror, or pity, or some vain promise of assistance. Then he picked up the dead boy, carrying the body through the silent manor and freezing the portraits on the wall as he went.

Draco's silk house robe was cool against Remus' bare skin, his hair a silken trickle against Remus' shoulder. His father's son. He did not quite hide the body, but deposited it behind a bookshelf far away from the study to prevent anyone from making the connection. He had kissed the boy before he left him, to erase the open-mouthed surprise from his face, and because he couldn't resist the lure of Lucius' lookalike stillness.

All that was left to do was to delete the last few spells from his wand to forego Priori Incantatem, and to render the night's events inaccessible in his mind with Remus' considerable skill at Legilimency. It wouldn't make him stop knowing, but it would stop the words of confession from leaving his mouth, and the thoughts from leaving his brain.

Later that night, when he re-crafted his mind beside Lucius' sleep-warm form, long hair tickling his shoulder and Lucius' mouth as soft in oblivion as his son's had been in death, Remus realised that he had wiped out two wizarding houses tonight. Malfoy and Black. Now, there would be nothing left of Sirius but Harry.

And after this night, not even that.

'Tell me who killed my son.' Remus has heard that question more often than he can remember, heard it answered in a dozen of different ways; silence, protests of ignorance, shouts of hatred.

He looks up at Lucius, James' son, and the corner of his mouth twitches, once. Tell me who killed my son...

Dark green eyes widen ever so slightly, and a range of emotions flits over Harry's face. There is understanding and precious little apprehension, a slice of remembrance, a spark of pity even. Yes, Harry would recognise the ravages of loss, wouldn't he? It doesn't last longer than two or three seconds before Harry's face reverts back to a guarded mask. He stares at the Dark Lord for a long moment, before his shoulders rise ever so slightly.

"I did." Harry's voice, clear and calm, and a sound burrows out of Remus' throat, an inarticulate howl of protest from an observer behind and beyond the world those two share. His hands claw at the Veil, pressing into iron softness with no hope for escape. Don't, oh Harry...

Ron gave him the very same answer, back when he stood where Harry stands now, facing up to the Dark Lord in his innermost sanctum. And Ron died screaming.

Lucius takes a step forward, never breaking eye contact, until his body nearly touches Harry's.

"You did?" he inquires, voice as bland as the younger man's.

"Yes."

Remus' chest aches when Lucius lifts his arm and grabs Harry's neck, like a kitten's. A hard grip, and Harry's neck looks so very fragile rising out of the collar of his robe. Breakable. They all are.

And then Lucius pulls Harry's mouth to his and covers it with his own, a slow, languid slide of lips and possessive tongue in the boy's unresisting mouth. Remus watched those two accomplished liars kiss even as he wants to cover his eyes at the way Harry's tension relaxes ever so slightly, not quite trusting the unexpected gentleness, but an instinctive exhale at the absence of pain.

Please don't hurt him! Remus' mind begs, remembering Ron, screaming and bleeding, torn inside and out.

And Lucius doesn't. He lets go of that slender neck, smoothing his hand along the sharp curve of Harry's cheek, and lightly trails his wand down the front of his prisoner's robe. The material parts without evident damage. Lucius slides the fabric off pale shoulders, and it flutters to the ground like the wings of a desiccated bird.

Captivity has marked Harry's body; too thin, too pale, with dark shadows of bruises left by advanced healing charms marring his skin. Remus has experienced first-hand the injuries that necessitate such spells, and his eyes brim at the thought of Sirius' godson, so ill-used. From the near-reverent way Lucius's hands now run over Harry's still form, touching each bit of skin as if to conjure it into existence, Remus can't say whether Lucius has been overseeing the boy's torture himself, or has just left him to the cruelty of his subordinates.

And Remus, who never wanted to see the body of Harry Potter bared and presented to him like this, cringes because those eloquent hands disclose the boy's inherent beauty. Lucius stands behind Harry, dark head nestled into the curve between his neck and shoulder, presenting the oblivious young man to Remus' invisible prison like a diabolic vendor.

Harry's eyes are shut, his lids drawing dark crescents on the still face. He suffers the touches, unresisting under his silver slave bracelets and with an air of unsurprised stoicism. He goes meekly when Lucius coaxes him to his knees on the rune-patterned hearthrug, its dark blood red setting off the young man's skin. Oblivious to the blood of his friends and allies that has drenched those woven runes. It was Remus who served as their witness. Harry couldn't know. Couldn't know, he insists against his own sneering inner voice. Could no more know that he's allowing the murderer of his friends to fondle him on the very spot that soaked up their blood than he could have known Sirius would follow him into the Department of Mysteries and to his death. He does not deserve this!

Remus has seen so many die on the carpet of Lucius'... execution chamber. Old friends and students alike, from Dung Fletcher to Kingsley Shacklebolt to poor Ron Weasley. Even the uncomprehending elderly wife of the Wizarding Oddities shopkeeper Remus worked for after Hogwarts, who insisted her husband keep him on even after his werewolf secret was out, until the pressure from the customers became too great. Remus had told Lucius about that anecdote when they lay together one night. Lucius hadn't forgotten.

But there is beauty in Malfoy as he kneels behind the boy, hands on his bony hips and teasing his thighs apart with an insistent knee. He has grown beautiful in mastery, Lucius, shedding the pompousness of the aristocrat together with the ingratiating air of the political schemer. Remus has had time to watch him grow even more beautiful as madness bestowed its very unique glow on him.

A deep, sick ache burns in the pit of Remus' stomach at the sight of Harry's body as it lets itself be spread open, the tightly-curled fists below the silver bracelets the only sign of how much effort it takes him to remain still. The smooth curve of his back under Malfoy's hands. That kind of submissive display is fit only for an aging, greying failed spy with no one left to live for, and with a feral core that allows him to shove such indignities into a remote corner of his consciousness. Not for this bright spirit who fought so hard all his life, and who is all that's left of James and Sirius. Not Harry!

Harry's eyes seem fixed directly on Remus' tapestry as Lucius enters him. A grimace of reflexive pain flits over his features for a moment before his body seems to accommodate the intrusion. Which it shouldn't do, not quite so easily.

There is no ignorance of course on Lucius' face as he takes thorough possession of Harry's poor body, and rakes his fingers through the young man's dark hair while looking directly at Remus' invisible prison. Remus feels cold tears on his cheeks and lowers his eyes to Harry's face instead, which, despite its harrowed look, is still a more merciful sight. His frame shakes under the age-old rhythm of intercourse, a song so familiar it hums along Remus' own nerves. Harry's eyes go wide in surprise when one of the pale, long-fingered, familiar hands snakes around to his front to curl around him, teasing turgid reluctance into full compliance. It sketches a raw expression onto the boy's face, evidence of his inner struggle.

And why not? If he's been marked for death or destined to go back to whatever unnamed torture chamber the Death Eaters have dragged him out of, who will blame him for sucking as much contentment out of the moment as he can find? Remus can hardly fault him for it, having himself accepted the pleasure and whatever else Lucius' body had to offer.

He is too beautiful to blame, Harry, when that dark head comes to a reluctant rest against Lucius' shoulder, and wild black strands mingle with Lucius' severe pale braid. Harry lets his body be rocked in primal rhythm until he stiffens, mouth falling open in slack surprise, spilling over Malfoy's coaxing fingers. Remus feels a traitor's heat in the pit of his stomach, wrong to the bone. Malfoy keeps working every bit of betrayal out of the boy's over-sensitised flesh as he brings himself to climax inside him. His eyes never leave the Veil, not when his cheeks stain in pleasure, not when he lifts his stained hand to Harry's mouth, imperiously demanding access until the boy's pink tongue attends to it in small, shameful licks.

Only when his fingers are clean does he extract himself from Harry's body with a sound so obscene that Remus' hands fly up to cover his ears in pure reflex. The Dark Lord reaches out to catch his discarded dressing gown from the floor. He pulls the generous fabric around his shoulders without bothering to draw the strings, leaving it to flow out behind him.

Then he kneels to wrap his arms around the naked, shivering boy whose eyes still seem to reach, unseeing, for Remus behind his tapestry. He leans into him, cheek against cheek, until Lucius' mouth is at Harry's ear, curved gently as if to whisper dainty secrets. So beautiful, those two together, both of whom Remus has loved, in their different ways. Merlin forgive him, he still might!

"You killed my son?" Lucius murmurs against the fine hairs of the boy's temple. Harry's voice is hoarse, his expression almost wry, but he nods.

"Yes."

Oh, Harry, don't, not for me!

Lucius never bothered with interrogating his household members, or the Death Eaters present in his manor at the time. Instead, he had his house-elves fetch his son's limp corpse, unmindful of the discoloured spots that already marred his fingers and cheeks, to force Draco's soul back into his body for a few minutes of necromantic spelltime.

Remus remembers the boy in the circle, cringing inside his own skin with a sea of terror in his eyes.

"Who killed you?" his father had asked, and the boy, lips pressed shut as if something disgusting would dribble out if he didn't, looked at the ground, shoulders pulled up, then at Remus, whose horror at the monstrosity enacted in front of his eyes eclipsed whatever fear he harboured for himself, and then down again at the floor.

Lucius' expression never changed as he raised his wand and a wall of flames engulfed the shivering creature and burned it to ashes in the course of seconds. Unmoved by his lover's betrayal, and just as unmoved by his rape of his own son's soul.

As unmoved as he seems now, bending down to whisper into Harry's ear, too low for Remus to hear. The boy utters a sudden gasp, face first going pallid, then pink with shame, and the way in which his eyes sharpen and focus on the tapestry hiding Remus' prison answers all questions. Remus doesn't need Legilimency to know that the young man is exposed as a liar, knows from the stare that seems to burn through the Veil that his secret is out. Remus has always wondered whether Lucius can see him through the Veil, but now he knows from the frantic look in green eyes that Harry can. His fingers claw unconsciously into the fabric of Lucius' robe. Remus wants to cradle the hurt shell of the boy's body in his arms so badly it hurts.

He doesn't cry, does Harry, no more than Remus can behind his tapestry. His eyes go dry, though, brittle, like a caterpillar curling in on himself to bury his hurt inside. Harry unclenches his hands from Lucius' robes in a jerky motion, like some Muggle machine. Then he places one of them on the pale flesh of Lucius' thigh, ever so gently.

Such a very Slytherin gesture in such a quintessentially Gryffindor choice.

There is a thin, indulgent smile curving about Lucius' mouth as he wraps his arms around the boy, presses his cheek to Harry's for a moment, then lays the most tender of kisses on the boy's temple. Harry's eyes close with a strange air of finality, and he lets himself be drawn limply further into the heavy-handed embrace. They've danced together, mirror images of the same serene madness, to the end.

Perhaps not just for Remus then - perhaps for himself as well. Remus feels no pain, just realises when salty metallic fluid spills into his mouth that he's bitten through his lower lip.

A strong arm warps around Harry's vulnerable neck, while Lucius' other hand cups his cheekbone and chin, and it's over before Remus can catch another breath. There isn't even a crack, just a flexing of muscle followed by a limp sprawl of limbs which just a second before were alive with smooth, bruised elegance.

There is no change in Lucius' smile as he lifts up the boy's head by the neck, studying the faint grimace on the familiar features. Then he leans forward to despoil the slack mouth with a kiss hard enough to bruise, if there were still damage to be done, unmindful of the unseemly wet trickle around the boy's prick. Then he dumps the body carelessly onto the scarlet carpet and calls for the guards.

The Death Eaters bow their way in, picking up the boy's naked remains and unceremoniously dragging him out. It isn't the first time they've performed that particular office.

Lucius stands with his back to them all, scrutinising the fireplace, his braid an immaculate coil down the middle of his black robes. Shattering Remus' soul without a hair out of place. As if Harry was nothing.

Only when a few minutes have passed after his servitors' exit, he turns around to look at the tapestry that hides the Veil beyond, eerie smile still frozen on his lips. The intricate fabric parts around him, the Veil brushing his face, lovingly as if its hair-fine strands were part of him. It only ever bars Remus' way, the Veil.

And Remus clenches his fists in a rage that is almost tangible, the wolf growling and slavering inside him, willing to sacrifice everything for one moment of vengeance. But his fists fall open just as Lucius stops in front of him. They always do, no matter how hot rage and hatred burn inside him. He cannot touch Lucius in anger - the spells don't allow it. In fact, he cannot touch Lucius at all, only lie pliant under Lucius' hands and respond.

Harry managed to say it without words, but Remus can't touch Lucius, so he screws his eyes shut until they hurt.

"Please. Please!"

He feels Lucius cupping his cheek, far too softly, and smells Harry's scent off him, sharp and acrid.

"Not long now," Lucius shushes him tenderly. Tears are gently licked off his cheeks.

Remus doesn't open his eyes, pulse fluttering on his lips until Lucius takes his hands away, until he hears the sound of footsteps, and the ghostly rustle of the Veil parting for its Master.

***

Lucius smiles when his back is turned, a slow, gentle smile for a faithless lover. Because there will be no death for Remus Lupin at the end of it. Lucius will send him away, with a smile as gentle as the one he smiles now, with a kiss on his brow and out into freedom, to live with his memories.

~ finis ~