Forces of Nature

Forces of Nature

*****

The boy was so much like his mother... the mother who died because I betrayed her.

Brave, fierce, defiant Lily... brave, fierce, defiant Harry: both, during their individual peeks in life, untamed flames - so real, so vivid, as if the rest of we mere mortals were but shadows to their exuberance.

I've heard the boy compared most to James, hell, I've even done it myself, but other then his looks there is no denying which side of the gene pool reigned supreme. It is her in those eyes, and it is her in that stance.

Lily Evans.

I had loved her once... perhaps I even love her still, I never allow myself to think of it too often. But it was James who got her, just as it was James who got everything. James who, up until the day he died, had never known defeat or want, James whom I resented with jealous zeal, but James whom I couldn't help but admire nonetheless. Perhaps a small bit of that admiration lingers still; it would explain my secret fascination with the boy.

After all, even I couldn't deny that the combination of Lily and James Potter had spawned an extraordinary child.

I'm still not sure if the universe at large will forgive us the death of Harry Potter, after all, it never forgave us the death of Lily... the very essence of her sheer ability to love astounds us to this day: haunting us, hanging over us.

But die he will.

It's been a long time coming.

We finally have the boy in our clutches, and soon, perhaps even very soon, my master will dispose of him and triumph over the wizarding world... that is a long time coming, too.

In fact, I can't help but wonder why the Dark Lord hasn't done it already...

*****

It is Lucius and I who are assigned to take the recently captured Harry Potter to a cell, and I can't help but look back and forth between both men with trepidation as we walk.

Lucius has always been a cold, conniving bastard. Easily placed, easily categorized. But the months he spent in Azkaban this past year, and the corresponding abandonment by his wife, had changed him somewhat... he's no longer so easily transparent. He's almost... quiet now, always watching, his eyes calculating, as if his mind is working a mile a minute, although what it is he is thinking or plotting one could only guess. To be honest I liked him better the old way - this new version gives me the creeps.

And Harry, well, my trepidation around Harry goes without saying.

The boy is unnervingly calm, head high, face unreadable... the very picture of bravery, as if he's not the least bit concerned about his imminent death.

And his eyes, whenever they train on me, display nothing but loathing.

Lily's eyes, staring at me with utter hatred - accusing me; it's almost more than I can take.

I owe this child a life bond, but the power of my fear of Voldemort outweighs my sense of wizarding propriety. It is clear by the contempt in those clear, green eyes that Harry has deciphered that already without a word being spoken between us.... He won't plead to me for help. He won't give me the satisfaction.

His mother and father would be so proud.

When I die I just know that Lily is going to make my afterlife hell. I'll be doomed to an eternity of 'how could you, Peter?! How could you?!'

But Harry, well Harry is doing a pretty good job of making my current living-state hell. Who knew that eyes could also convey a guilt trip so thoroughly?

By the looks of things Lucius is also mesmerized by our juvenile adjudicator, his silver eyes trained on the boy's face, never leaving, always assessing. Harry pays him no mind, acting as if Lucius' constant perusal doesn't faze him in the slightest. In fact, the more stoic Harry trains his face to become, the more the edges of Lucius mouth twitch, as if he's amused by the boy's antics.

I wonder what this means... I wonder if I should be frightened by it.

I can't wait to get this task over and done with; the entire situation is far too eerie... Voldemort should have just killed the boy from the off instead of locking him up and biding his time.

I still don't know what to make of all of this.

*****

The Dark Lord has confided in me that he wishes to break Potter and then convert him to our side. He doesn't want to make a martyr out of him; doesn't want his death to grant strength by spurning the need for revenge among the Order of the Phoenix members and the general public at large.

Which is all well and good... in theory. Personally I think he'd stand a better chance of convincing a dragon to give up breathing fire than he would getting Harry Potter to do anything that he's opposed to doing.

That kid has a stubborn streak that would do a mule proud.

And a weird part of me can't help but feel a little proud of him for it. After all, I held this kid as a baby, I was even present at his first birthday party. Sure, I want him dead because he stands between my Lord and wizarding world domination, and thus my own right to power, but I had changed his diaper once, that had to justify at least a small degree of parental-type affiliation.

Which would explain why I can't stay away from the boy's cell, at least from a hidden distance while within rat form... what it couldn't explain, however, was why Lucius Malfoy can't stay away.

I caught him at the boy's chamber again the other day, asking Harry in a pointed way if he was comfortable, and how he liked being locked up.

I couldn't be sure, seeing as how Lucius has refined stoicism into a rare art, but I think we were *both* stunned by Harry's answer.

'You Death Eaters act as if locking people up in small spaces and then starving them to death is a new, revolutionary idea. Trust me when I say that this isn't anything I'm not used too. You'll have to do better than this to impress me.'

At the time I could physically feel my jaw drop, marveling at the boy's utter gall... did he truly have a death wish?! What was he on provoking a death eater, and Lucius Malfoy of all people, like that? And where the hell had this kid been confined and starved before?

But a quick look at Lucius quickly replaced one shock for another... the man wasn't smirking at this newfound knowledge, wasn't gloating, in fact, he wasn't giving much of a reaction at all. He was simply staring at the boy, silver eyes locked with green, quietly assessing, per usual.

This didn't bode well... didn't bode well at all.

*****

Despite my trepidation, I didn't report Lucius' visits to Potter's cell to the Dark Lord... I was too fascinated by Harry... too fascinated by them.

Lucius visits grew more and more frequent, while their conversations grew less and less antagonistic, crossing almost into 'inquisitive' territory. They were infinitely curious about each other, that much was obvious, but why?

My father had died when I was very young, but one of his few bouts of wisdom that I remember was his claim that there are two kinds of people in the world: one who weathers the trials of life with resolve, learning from their experiences, but never allowing the memories of their trials hold them back - in essence, those who exhibit the bravery to move forward - and a second type who let fate and circumstance conquer them.

The self-realization that I displayed more tendencies towards the later than I did the former was not a pleasant one. In fact, I used to wonder why the sorting hat placed me in Gryffindor; I wasn't brave enough to face up to life's many challenges - the very idea of being on the trial side of circumstance was not at all appealing. More disturbing than that, however, was the fact that my good friends James Potter and Sirius Black were the epitome of bravery, nothing ever seemed to intimidate them, and I envied the hell out of them for it.

Fate was cruel enough to grant me the ability to recognize charisma and bravery, yet not own it, and honestly, how fair is that?

Harry Potter has surpassed even James Potter on both counts: bravery and charisma. He is a true survivor in every sense of the word. Apparently, though I would have never thought it through his oft displayed spoiled arrogance, so is Lucius Malfoy.

The Dementors are reputed to dredge up the worst of a person's subconscious and throw it back at them, repeatedly.... The Dementors were still at Azkaban those few months Lucius Malfoy was imprisoned. And unlike Sirius Black, Lucius didn't have a canine form to escape to. What hells had Lucius relived? How had it changed him? How had Harry's every day hell, for no one could deny that the poor kid's life, at least these past few years, was one gigantic metaphoric fire and brimstone experience, affected him?

Did the survivor in Lucius recognize the survivor in Harry? Two people, of different backgrounds, drawn together by this triumphant spirit they share?

Their conversations were really starting to make me believe that...

'Tell me, Mr. Potter, do you not fear death?'

'No, I don't. Someone once told me that death is but the next big adventure, and I'm the adventurous sort. Besides, if I don't fear it, it can't be used to control me. I look at it this way: death may allow me to finally meet my parents, or see my godfather again, and living, well, living lets me be with everyone else... that and my living pisses the hell out of Voldemort, and anything that causes *that* can only be a good thing.'

That conversation marked the first time I'd ever heard Lucius genuinely laugh. And to be honest, I couldn't help but chuckle a little bit myself... once I had moved safely out of hearing range, that is.

I was growing a little bit more enamored with the boy everyday.

*****

The attack of the Order was fast and swift, leading us all to believe that we had a spy within our midst... how else could they have found us?

But while everyone was distracted with fighting, I saw a golden opportunity: an opportunity to do something I had been contemplating for awhile now.... an opportunity to let Harry go free without it 'looking' as though I had let Harry go free.

Should we all live to see tomorrow I could easily claim that an Order member had strayed to the dungeon during the fight and released him... and this was a step I needed to take to be able to stop living in fear.

Fear of my own failings as a human being.

Besides, survivors shouldn't die... not when they had fought so hard to live. Who am I to deny him that?

I had played a part in the extinguishment of the parents, but I found that I simply couldn't do the same with the child.

He was truly the best of both of them, Lily and James, his weeks spent here had allowed me to find that, and in doing so, find bits of myself as well. And I did owe the boy a life debt...

Apparently I wasn't the only one who decided to take advantage of the moment, for when I reached the dungeon Lucius was already there, standing tall, his hand out in offering through an opened cell door.

And I got there in time to witness Harry Potter take that offered hand, stepping out towards freedom, and into Lucius Malfoy's embrace.

My body burned as I watched them kiss, heat traveling up my spine to burn my face like a fever. Their bodies soon became pressed impossibly tight in front of my gaze, as if they were clinging to each other with use of all of their combined strength, and they kissed in such a way that left their features to intermingle, by trick of the eye, like an impressionist painting: this body part joined with that, lips permanently molded... That's how naturally they entwined, that's how fiercely stark their embrace.

Watching them was both daunting and surreal... I couldn't look away. I couldn't move. I could only stand there, gaping, awed by the moment. Not knowing what to do, what to think, how to react... until eventually the rest of the Order did find us; Dumbledore leading the battle-weary, though thoroughly stunned, foray.

It was only at the sound of multiple gasps that Lucius broke the kiss, silver eyes shining as he looked up to Dumbledore, then back down to Harry, and reached up to caress the younger man's cheek gently with his fingers.

"You'll excuse me for not participating in the festivities, I had more important matters to attend to," Lucius said at last, words I can only guess were meant for Dumbledore, though he never broke eye contact with Harry while voicing them.

If the look on Harry's face was any indication, it dawned on him before it did me, what was truly going on... Lucius' jaunt through prison had done more than alter his perspective - it had altered his loyalties.

He was the spy.

These past weeks of conversation with Harry had served as affirmation to already cresting ideals; ideals I could never share, for I had never had to fight for them.

It dawned on me, in that moment, with many deaths behind me, and the bud of newly formed love in front of me, that I finally understood what it was that James, Sirius, Lily, Harry, and Lucius all had, what trait it was that gave them this larger-than-life persona I so desperately longed for all my life... passion for life in all its varying quirks and forms.

That was what father had meant.

*****

I surrendered without protest... my last and only gift to Harry and the whispered memory of friendship with Sirius Black, for only I could free his name.

My trials were coming, either by a life of imprisonment, or the awaiting of a kiss, but either way I would attempt to face it with the strength of those who had endured all before me.

I may have been slow on the uptake, but I'd like to think I am capable of learning by example. Sirius had faced this while being innocent. Me? I had sowed my own seeds, made my own bed. But even a creature such as myself must have a little life in him somewhere.

My last sight, before being carted away, is that of a couple tiredly watching the proceedings, their hands entwined together between them. Both of them ancient, both of them young, both brimming with passion and discovery - the boy who lived to love and the former Death Eater who lived to find it.

No matter what the future may hold, I will keep that image with me forever, for it is truly invaluable.

The End!