Harry Potter and the Bonds of the Fathers

Ch. 2 Draco's Pain

Draco's POV:

Draco Malfoy, lying in the same position he had been in since the day he arrived, was waiting for someone to come and feed him. He was only slightly aware of the fact that he hadn't bathed in nearly two weeks and that the only one whom he had enough trust in was far too old to help him without a guilty conscience.

He was rendered completely immobile; staring helplessly at the ceiling while waking dreams of a boy with ebony hair and eyes that shone greener than anything natural flitted through his head. He only vaguely acknowledged that he knew the boy from school.

He had inherited being a veela from his mother, and hefty part of the transformation was coming into his Inheritance at the early age of sixteen. It had become important from that point on to find his mate, who was the only one perfectly matched for him. Veela magic would forbid him from ever being with anyone else. And it seemed that he had found him.

In between visions he was aware that he had met him before and that knew him, at least to some extent. The large distance between them was the reason for his unresponsiveness; for his living hell. Yet this he chose to ignore. He focused instead on the images that flashed before his eyes, soaking in the knowledge of whom it was that he would spend the rest of his life with- if, that is, he was able to woo him.

He no longer tried to let the people around him know that there were conscious thoughts beneath his still facial features. The only way anyone really knew he was alive at all was from the slow rise and fall of his chest and the convulsions that racked his body periodically. The convulsions occurred often, coming and going at least three times a week since he had turned sixteen. He would writhe and cry out in pain although his steady eyes and blank face showed no sign of what was going on inside. Tears would come from the corners of his eyes, spilling onto the pillow beneath his head, but he paid them no notice.

As if called upon by thought, the worst set of convulsions yet began. His vision clouded with pain, and his legs drew up to his chest. Suddenly, in mid-scream, his limbs flopped back down on the bed and his head rolled to the side, leaving him unconscious. Still, his eyes shuttled and his mouth worked as he tried to call out while plagued by nightmares of lying on a hard floor, broken and forgotten like an old toy.

When Draco opened his eyes again, several hours had passed. His eyes were anything but still, yet his brain was, as usual, clouded by fog. Bit by bit he started to remember how to move his body, working first on his fingers, then clenching his toes, and then twitching his wrists, until he was able to move enough to dazedly sit up and stand beside the bed. He stood for a good five minutes before his mind cleared. When it did, the memories of his life and of what happened while he was unresponsive all exploded into color before his eyes, and he fell to the floor with the force of them. His memories of his mother and father stayed the longest, their faces burned into his vision. When he could finally see the room around him, he was relieved to find that the last few memories he had were real.

He had been rescued from his home from none other than Albus Dumbledore at the crucial moment before his father could kill him. His mother had tried to stop him and he had killed her for getting in the way. In a way, he was thankful for the semiconscious state he was in for the last few weeks- he didn't have to think about it... and now that he knew Potter had to be nearby, his mind focused on the sole thought of finding him. He stood up, a maniacal smile shining around his lips without him noticing it there. He half-ran half staggered out of the room trying to remember how to use his legs after two weeks of immobility.

As he stumbled down the stairs Draco's mind raced through all the options that Potter had for getting into the house. He hadn't heard the door opening; Potter arriving by any means of physical traveling was pretty much moot if he didn't use the front door to get in. Draco knew that Potter was too young to apparate legally, that unregistered Portkeys were illegal, and that he most likely didn't have Floo powder... or did he?

If there was one thing he knew about the Gryffindor Seeker, it was not to underestimate him. Or at least that's what he'd come to grips with in the weeks that would be leading up to his Inheritance in the long run. Just like he acknowledged that Potter was a better Quidditch player than he was--without cheating, that is. And the way his eyes lit up after he won. And how they glittered like twin emeralds when he was angry. Draco shook his head to clear the thought. He found his urge to find the boy was growing without his consent and he swept off to the closest fireplace he remember when he was brought here. Actually, it was the only fireplace he remembered because it was the only one he had seen before being whisked off to his room.

He gasped at the spectacle before him. The once sprightly Gryffindor was sprawled out on the ground in front of the fireplace. The fire from which he had arrived was rapidly turning from green to orange and was just beginning to devour his pant legs. He dove at the still body grabbing at the boy's dirty over-large shirt to get a good grip.

"POTTER! Holy SHIT!" Draco shrieked, dragging him out of the fireplace.

Without thinking, he immediately went to work putting out the fire with his own hands. Not even pausing to think about the raw, burnt skin on his hands after he had successfully extinguished the flames, he turned to ogle Potter's bruised and bloody face. He looked remarkably different from the boy he had known at Hogwarts. His jaw and cheekbones were more pronounced, his lips were now perfectly shaped to fit in with the rest of his face, and his eyes seemed more proportionate to his nose and pronounced brow. Even with the purpled flesh on the side of his gaunt cheeks and jaw line, and around his scar and the dried blood that had crusted over a nose that was undoubtedly broken, he emanated a kind of ethereal beauty.

"Oh god, Potter..." Draco said breathily, taking in the sight. His stomach twisted in fear looking over the crumpled teenager who was supposed to be his mate. His eyes widened to an unnatural roundness when he realize that it wasn't dirt or mud on the boy's clothing- it was dried blood. He fell backwards onto his rear and stared helplessly at the large amounts of blood that had been shed for however long the boy had been wearing the garment.

"Wake up, wake up, wake up," he said over and over again, rocking back and forth. He wrapped his arms around himself as he shook violently.

The double-doors on the other side of the room burst open to reveal a shocked looking Severus, and a tense looking Professor Dumbledore. A crowd of people with equally mixed levels of emotion running across their faces followed right behind them.

"Charlie," Dumbledore beckoned forward a tall red-haired boy. Draco would have scowled, recognizing him as a Weasley, if he had not been so busy muttering his mantra over and over again. That was all right however, because the redhead was scowling enough for the both of them.

"Alert Madame Chaise, please; we'll need Neville. If you can get in touch with Arthur... ah, and Miss Granger and the youngest Mr. Weasley will want to be alerted as well I think." He nodded and the boy took off following orders immediately.

Draco was impressed enough to stop his chanting and look at the old man in surprise. He had begun to trust the man who came to his bedside every day to talk at him about the daily news, but he didn't think he would command that large respect despite everything he was said to have done for the Light. His father's minions had never been that quick. They always delayed to fulfill orders even when they were for their own benefit. Just as his brain tripped down the path of thinking that maybe kindness did speak louder than fear, he stopped himself. He was not going to get all Gryffindor just because he wasn't stupid enough to make his father's damn mistakes. That was why no one had obeyed his father- his mistakes. Nothing more. He shuddered and promptly forced his father out of his thoughts.

Dumbledore conjured a stretcher, and levitated Potter onto it. Draco was shunted out of the way by a scurrying middle-aged witch and the others' unfriendly nudges and elbows. The witch seemed familiar, and then he realized why; she was married into the Weasley family. Mother to all the Weasley children, he added, remembering. He dazedly backed up, watching everyone scurry around. Some left going out the door, some Apparated, some Flooed, some hovered around Potter, and yet others stayed their distance but watched Draco with glares that told him they all thought he did this. He could feel their gaze, he knew they were thinking about making their own investigation on the spot. They must be Aurors, Draco guessed but he shuddered as he remembered his father's way of questioning. That's why they had stayed behind and clumped.

Mrs. Weasley had begun shrieking over Harry's sudden appearance and began firing off questions no one could answer about why he looked so different under his injuries and what had happened to give him those maimings.

"Draco," Severus said, "Why is it that you were kneeling over Potter's corpse again?" Draco's eyes widened. Corpse? That thought hadn't occurred to him before, and it made his chest seize painfully again.

"No," he moaned, surprising even himself. "Not corpse. Not dead. Not..." The stretcher floated by. Draco caught a brief glimpse at the boy's face, which looked as if it had lost all hope, and felt his insides clench with fury. Who would do this to him? Why wasn't he with his relatives who would have kept him safe?

'Maybe he decided he was fed up with all the praise he must get all the time and ran away... and was taken.' He shook his head though, unaware of Severus's eyes on him speculatively. 'He would never get fed up with praise and coddling, he surely expected it and... wait was that it? That they hadn't been giving him enough praise and he left?' Surely that was it. He snorted. 'Conceited Gryffindor. It's a wonder he's my mate, I'd never openly worship him.' He knew these condescending thoughts were only to deter the worry he felt but he thought them anyway as a way to escape the asphyxiating knot growing in his throat. 'Why did I have to have someone so...' he paused in his diversionary thoughts, knowing he couldn't really find something wrong with his mate when he was probably shivering in pain and being carted somewhere away from him.

With another snort he quickly ran after the group of people following Potter. Trying to regain his previous trail of thought he took a different approach to his Potter problem. 'Why did I have to have an Intended who has such a long terrible history with me?' As soon as this thought entered his head he felt a sense of panic that was almost overwhelming. What if Potter didn't want anything to do with him?

He heard Potter give a gurgling cry of fear-laced-pain and he ran full-tilt to the room they had brought him into, shoving people out of the way. He stopped only when he standing right in front of the bed the shivering boy had been placed upon. He fell to his knees and hunched protectively over the incapacitated Gryffindor. Dumbledore had just finished saying something when he had come in, and whatever it was had the woman from before- Mrs. Weasley,- crying. No, he corrected, full on bawling would be more appropriate. Draco eyed her warily from his position on the floor. She paused only long enough to close her mouth, briefly. Her eyes widened and her mouth opened once again and a wail escaped, heartbreak infused all through it.

"Oh god, Harry," she moaned. "No... I dreamed.... but never this way..."

"He's not going to... to die!" Draco growled at her, tired of people insinuating that his mate was going to leave him. She scowled at him.

"You-" she got out before her own throat choked her. Dumbledore placed hands on both her shoulders before drawing her into his arms in a paternal hug.

"Molly, there's nothing we can do until Neville comes. He isn't going to die, I promise." Dumbledore swore. She pulled out of his embrace forcefully.

"You said his lungs were bleeding!" she screamed, pain transforming into anger before their eyes. "You said his lungs- that they were FILLING with blood and... and... his head..." She gave back into pain and sobbed into her hands.

Draco's ears roared and his stomach dropped painfully. His mind began to work on developing a chain of thought. His lungs were bleeding which meant no oxygen would be able to get into them. Oxygen came into lungs because it was breathed in. Breath came from- he looked at Potter's swollen lips and swallowed. Air came through those slightly parted lips in short weak gasps. He was watching Draco though only partly opened eyes, which were clouded with confusion.

Draco, commonsense forgotten, pressed his own healthy lips to the boy's, willing them to conform to his will. Right now his will was that Potter would be able to breathe through them again. Later he would vaguely remember the gasps of shock and disgust from behind him, but at that moment he was conveniently distracted by the other boy's perfectly healed lips pushing against his own, and the once-broken arm wrapping around his neck ensuring he didn't break the kiss.

Finally, Potter released Draco and let his head drop back the scant inch it had risen from the pillow. Draco lurched up and fell back onto his behind, tripping over his own feet. Potter- a perfectly healthy and newly unconscious Potter- lay on the bed before him. Draco lifted his hand to his lips and pressed it's coolness unto them to ease the throbbing. He had kissed Harry Potter! A hand on his shoulder was Dumbledore, silently nodding his approval- of what? Draco wondered. A fainting Mrs. Weasley and a flustered Longbottom rushing into the room brought Dracos to his senses.

"Dumbledore!" Longbottom called out irritably. The Headmaster met his gaze with an expectant smile. "Get a real Healer," he commanded before rushing to Potter's side without waiting for an answer. The professor nodded, not intending to follow his familiar command as many in the knot of spectators chuckled knowingly. Draco's eyes bugged out at the sight- the slightly pudgy Gryffindor was different. Didn't he used to be a quivering mass of jelly? Neville paused.

"I thought Charlie said he had been beaten badly?" he asked.

"He was." Dumbledore answered calmly, his eyes following Mrs. Weasley who was being carried out, presumably to another room to be able to calm down after she awoke.

"That he was covered in old and new bruises and he had broken bones?"

"He was."

"This blood looks as it he bled, but," he ran his hand inches above Potter's body in concentration. "The only thing I feel is that he's disgustingly undernourished- he's going to need some blood replenishing potions and strengthening potions- but," he said moving his hands around more carefully decreasing the space between his palm and Harry's threadbare clothes.

"Not disgusting," Draco growled, but he was ignored.

"There's not even a scratch anywhere. I seem to remember him having a scar, here," Longbottom said touching Potter's forearm. Draco let out a low rumbling sound, rapidly becoming irritated because this boy was touching his mate so unashamedly in front of him. As soon as he realized what he was doing he tried to stop the growling, but he found that he couldn't stop. "That scar is completely gone, however," he said pushing back the sleeping boy's fringe, "this one stays."

The lightening bolt scar had remained on his head, though the immense bruises Draco somehow remembered ringing it had disappeared, along with the crookedness of his broken nose. The growl increased its magnitude and now even Longbottom couldn't keep up with ignoring him.

"Malfoy, as long as I am the one called for fixing the damage you have made you-" he stopped as Dumbledore cleared his throat meaningfully as Draco's growls increased by an octave. "What?" he snapped at the Headmaster. Everyone could easily tell he wanted to yell, even wanted to hex- or curse Malfoy for supposedly hurting his housemate, but also that he wanted to distract himself from the eerie continuous noise that was coming from Draco.

"Mr. Malfoy is not the party responsible for the abuse that was placed upon Mr. Potter. He actually quite effectively healed him. We were quite worried for a moment whether you would arrive... in time, and Mr. Malfoy...healed him," he said, thankfully leaving out the means of which Draco had cured Potter. He smiled slightly, as if amused by the situation, while some of the adults behind him grumbled confusedly. A few even left, deciding that the show had officially ended when their savior had not pushed the boy away. No, he had wrapped his arm around that Malfoy kid... he had hummed in agreement. They didn't even spare a backwards glance at their sleeping hero as the memory replayed in their heads.

"If Malfoy was a Healer, wouldn't he have been enrolled in the summer program?" Longbottom said carefully. Draco brought back his wary gaze from before fixing it on the boy whom he supposed was now a Healer-in-training. He suddenly realized all the changes made in the Gryffindor. He remembered Longbottom as being a scared little nothing of a boy; evidently something had happened which made him grow up quickly. Draco wondered what it was, that had worked far better than his parents' insanity had. At Longbottom's words the Headmaster's brow crinkled in thought. Draco frowned. There was something about his eyes that made him believe the Headmaster wasn't pondering his medical ability at all.

"Yes, he should have. Although I do not believe that is the case." Draco struggled to his feet. He tried to speak, to remind them that he was still in the room, but the growl he couldn't control blocked all speech. Dumbledore again placed a hand on his shoulder. Something pulled his attention to the bed where Potter lay, and his rumblings stopped at once. He wrenched his shoulder from the old man's pitying squeeze and brushed past Longbottom rudely to sit next the slowly waking Potter.

His heart fluttered in hope as those big green eyes opened slowly and rested on him. The whole room seemed to hold its breath waiting for Potter to react. Nothing came. Draco held those eyes with his, loosing himself within their swirling green depths. Potter's perfect mouth turned up into a smile, grateful, breathtaking- and just for him. Again murmurs were heard from behind them, but Draco ignored them, all except for one.

"I thought Harry hated the Malfoy boy," a witch with bright pink hair murmured on the other side of the room, bringing Draco back to his senses. It seemed as if she had meant to be quiet, but everyone heard her anyway. There were answering whispers by people better at lowering their voices and he heard her grunt, "Oops."

Real life hit Draco like a ton of bricks. Potter hated him, it didn't matter that he was Draco's mate, no it didn't matter- nothing did because Potter hated him. The worst part was that he knew that he deserved it. He suddenly wished it could have been anyone but himself that had hurt Potter and his friends for the last five years. His insides burned, and so did his eyes but he valiantly fought to keep the pain from his face. He knew he was failing but he kept working at turning his expression to a scowl.

"This changes nothing, Potter," he snarled, throwing all of his hurt into making his voice sound convincing and desperately wishing the kiss had changed the situation between them. He had been foolish- Harry clearly smiled at him in delirium... he didn't even have his glasses on! One short kiss couldn't change the past and mutate the present to his liking. He got up to run from the room.

Just before he managed to exit the doorway, Severus caught his arm. Seeing tears adorn his godson's cheeks he nodded and let Draco go. Severus carefully masked his face with the ease of long practice, but everyone in that room who knew him well knew he was concerned. Neville proceeded to clean up the calming drought that he had dropped after noticing the Potion Master's presence. He once again turned into the quivering pile of mush those who knew him were accustomed to from the potions lab. Severus nodded at Dumbledore who returned the gesture before slinking out of the room, taking the opposite route that Draco had.

"So..." the witch at fault started. The boy on the bed turned confused and anguished eyes to her. "Happy birthday Harry..." she murmured and the whole room, still reeling in distaste from seeing the two boys kiss, recoiled even more with the grating sound that was the boy's ironic laugh.