Staking Claims

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor any of the characters from the books or movies. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

A/N: Sorry for the super month long wait. I was promoted at work at the same time midterms popped up. Then with all the extra hours I had to put in I've barely had any time at all to sit at my computer to read, let alone write. But eventually the muse kicked my ass back in gear and heres another chappie to prove it. Its a bit short but at least its an update!


Draco had just finished the complicated wards when he heard a familiar crack coming from upstairs. Albus had warded the secret house himself against apparition so it could be only the man himself. Draco rushed up stairs, eager for news. But when he entered the room Harry was pacing and Dumbledore looked grave, it was not an uncommon sight as of late.

Harry turned his head and Draco knew by the look on his mates face that things were bad. The room was dim, lit only by the flicker of the magicked torches and the light made shadows on an already shadowed face. Draco was sobered.

“I’m sorry.” Was all Harry said. A knot was forming slowly in Draco’s stomach as he stared between his new lover and his sullen headmaster. He wasn’t looking for comfort when he looked to Albus so he was not disappointed when he found none. Instead he steeled himself.

“Mr. Malfoy I’m afraid I have bad news.” The understatement was laughable if their faces were anything to judge by.

“Yes, I gathered that.” He hadn’t meant to sound snippy but then again, old habits die hard.

“I went to check in at Wilshire when I received yours and Harry’s correspondence. Your parents were not there. We must assume they have been captured. I’m sorry.”

Draco’s mental rebuke had been instantaneous. NO! But he couldn’t seem to vocalize it at the moment. He felt the burning behind his eyes but he did not cry. His body shook with pain and his throat constricted as his mouth opened wordlessly, but he did not speak. He had not seen them, he had not said goodbye. He wanted to run, to leave and catch the night bus or apparate to Wilshire and hunt for them until his last breath was chocked out of him by the madman they used to revere. His muscles twitched with restless energy, pushing him to act but he did not move. His father and he had argued when they had last spoken and his mother, his sweet mother was at the hands of vicious, sadistic Death Eaters that had once been her confidants and friends. That is if one could call any Death Eater a friend. It could not be so. In his mind he only saw his father’s smiling face, however infrequent and he felt his mother’s gentle touch on his head. She had always liked to play with his hair.

In his brief interlude of introspection he hadn’t seen Harry move but he felt the comforting hand touch his back, gently holding him up. He saw glistening tears in Harry’s bottle-glass eyes and knew that Harry understood his pain.

“Unfortunately, in the light of these terrible events I’m going to have to ask you boys to come with me back to Hogwarts, this house is obviously no longer safe.” Draco gathered himself up and nodded.

“Yes.” He couldn’t manage anymore but he was resolute. With a reassuring smile to Harry he backed away and retreated to his bedroom to gather his clothes.

Upon his entrance he heard muffled sobs. The gilded mirror he had come to befriend was crying. Draco walked to the wall and saw that his reflection was wiping away tears. Draco nodded. His reflection looked up and smiled a wavering smile.

“I’ve just heard. I’m so sorry my young friend.” Then his reflection laughed sadly. “Its no use really telling you that I hope you and your new mate will be alright. But I do.” Draco stroked the gilded frame. “And I’ll say that I haven’t been as happy as I was while you both were here since Regulus and Sirius lived in these very rooms, even if you’ve both only been here for a few days.” His reflection smiled sadly.

Draco knew he couldn’t leave the mirror behind.

He nodded his appreciation at the mirrors words and smiled slightly.

“That’s good because I planned on taking you with us. That is if you’re not hung with a permanent sticking charm.” The reflection let out an uncharacteristic whoop and violently shook its reflected head in the negative. Draco winked and lifted the mirror from its hook on the wall and shrunk it to a reasonable size for his modest bag.

When he was done shrinking and packing the remainder of his worldly belongings into the discreet leather bag he placed the mirror delicately on top. He had wrapped it in a black silk scarf. He was just finishing latching the buckles when he heard a blood curdling scream. In a second the bag was forgotten and he was in the corridor facing a bewildered Harry and a determined Dumbledore.

“My mother. That was my mother.”

“Are you sure?” Draco nodded his assent to Harry and gripped his mates shoulder as another scream ripped through the drafty house. Only this time it was followed by a low, pleading moan, ‘No.’ His parents were downstairs and from the sound of it, in desperate need of assistance.

Draco dodged Dumbledore’s arm as it shot out to catch him. He silently thanked his vampiric speed and Dumbledore’s slightly slowed reflexes as he raced down the hall to the narrow steps, his feet barely skimming the ground. Harry and the Headmaster were following. Good, he figured he’d need some help, so let them come.

He had reached the middle of the stairs when an image of Harry, lifeless at his feet, brought him to a screeching halt. He spun and raced back up the six stairs to the top and shoved out his hands. The thought of Harry being injured or worse was debilitating. There had been a time in his life when he wouldn’t have cared, maybe even welcomed the death of the golden boy. But now Harry was his golden boy and Draco would not let him go running into danger. Harry reached Draco first.

“Harry, no.” The wild haired youth had a maniacal look on his face and his cheeks were flushed.

“Damn it Draco move! Why have you stopped?”

Dumbledore pushed through them with a rushed ‘stay here’ and was flying down the stairs with his midnight blue robes swirling behind them. Harry was struggling to pass the blond as well, looking at Draco pleadingly, but Draco was having none of it. “Draco HE’S downstairs! We have to hurry!” Draco only sadly shook his head.

“No, I have to hurry. You have to stay here. Stay safe! And-and if you don’t,” which was highly likely given Harry’s history, “then I will stay and guard you.”

“But your parents.” Harry bristled in irritation at Draco’s unwillingness to cooperate. “Draco…MOVE!” A moment later the frustrated Gryffindor, cultivated for battle since he was eleven, did the unexpected and pummeled his Vampire/Veela mate in the stomach. They teetered at the top of the stairs for a split second before Draco gathered his wits and shifted his weight forward. They fell back on the landing and he gracefully caught Harry before the mop of black hair hit the corridor floor behind them. Harry was struggling beneath his stronger mate as the curses from downstairs grew louder. Then, with a sound like a train screeching from its tracks, they heard some of Draco’s wards shatter.

Harry’s eyes widened. He stopped moving and looked into Draco’s eyes.

“They need help.” He put one hand on Draco’s chest. “We’re mates, which makes your parents my parents. Don’t make me lose another set of parents without getting to know them Draco.” Draco shook his head again but his resolve wavered and Harry saw it. “If your parents die because you refused to leave my side it would destroy me Draco and it would destroy you and it would ruin us. Please let me fight with you.” A sharp crack from downstairs spurred Draco into action. He got up and Harry smiled and moved forward. Draco hadn’t meant to do it but he caught his mate in a brief kiss before turning to descend the stairs. “Don’t get yourself killed?” It wasn’t more then a whisper over his shoulder but he knew Harry heard. Stupid Gryffindor is always rushing off to save someone…anyone really. Draco found it annoying but was just a little happy for the help, especially as the reached the fight.

His heart stopped as he saw Albus sending curses through the wards at the black shell of a robe that could only be Voldemort. Draco had never physically seen the man. Believe it or not, as deep as his father had once been in the madman’s inner circle, Draco had never laid eyes on him. Now he wanted to so he could watch the red eye’s flicker out as Voldemort died. No one, not even the Dark Lord, messed with a Malfoy on a mission.

There was a circle of death eaters around Voldemort sending spells flying at Draco’s intricate wards, trying to break them entirely. He felt some were broken but most held. His father and mother had taught the wards to him as a child and when backed with his Veela power they were nigh unbreakable. He fumbled forward, his body bent on stopping the evil before him but his mind attempting to hold him back, sluggish in horror. In his fear he was pushed slightly aside by his experienced lover. Before he could respond Harry’s commanding voice rose above the din, silencing the room. All heads turned to focus on the dark haired youth.

“Leave them alone!” Voldemort turned, his snake like face for a moment open as if in reverence before a small and hideous smile distorted his features. “It’s me your after isn’t it?”

“My, my well you have grown.” The Dark Lord spoke as if Harry was a wayward nephew and not the threat that he was to the black garbed man, if he could still be called a man. “And with my young but faithful servant by your side.” Draco finally found his voice.

“I serve no man. Or beast.” Voldemort apparently did not like be compared to an animal because he turned his gaze onto Draco. His red eyes were brimming with malice as he spoke.

“Make no mistake young Malfoy, I am more then a man.” Draco’s mother sobbed softly but was struck silent by the hand of a near Death Eater. Draco shook with rage.

“You are naught but filth. The master of only lies and liars.”

“Silence!” Harry stepped towards the wards menacingly as Draco shook with impotent rage. He smiled eerily and pointed his wand and Voldemort.

“You have no power here to be giving orders.” Voldemort only laughed. Secretly Draco thought that Voldemort must have genuinely lost his marbles if Harry’s voice didn’t evoke a chilling sort of fear. It certainly would have made Draco think twice. Just then Dumbledore put his hand on Harry’s shoulder and nodded in the affirmative.

“Mr. Potter is correct Tom. You do not command us still with our wits about us.” The man hissed.

“I may not command you old man but I certainly command them.” He pointed his wand at the two captives, now on their knees, in the middle of the sitting room. “And now I command they die, for the greater good of course.” He lifted his wand and shouted.

“Avada Kedavra!”

“Avada Kedavra!” A brilliant green light shot from Harry’s wand and linked with the green light from Voldemort’s.” Harry, who knew this would happen held fast. Draco, shocked at how easily the ward had been ruptured marveled at the phenomenon of the wands. Voldemort, once again surprised by the link, fiercely turned to the boy.

“Fool!” The Death Eaters could have had a chance to kill their captives if they were quick thinking but they did not move. Harry had just managed to puncture a hole in the wall that had held them in the room and had joined wands with their great master for the second time. Dumbledore, being a quick thinker, motioned for Draco to drop the wards. He did.

With seven quick spells, five from the Headmaster and two from Draco, the rogue Death Eaters were stunned and bound. But Harry and Voldemort were still bound. The glowing link between the two jets of green was undulating and leaking pools of stray magic onto the carpet, burning holes in the wood. Harry, now at a loss as to how to react held on but the undulating ball did not seem to move closer to either spell casters wand as it had before. Suddenly, turning the tables, Voldemort ripped his wand back, severing the link and quickly ducked to avoid the ‘Avada Kedavra’ that shot out Harry’s wand and over his head. The stray spell, full of energy and power struck the far wall and crumbled the ceiling down and causing a large hole in the wall. In the commotion Voldemort was gone. He had lost this battle and he knew it.

Dumbledore immediately removed the apparition wards from the house as Draco tended to Lucius and Narcissa with the best healing spells he knew, working doubley hard to assuage his quilt for his total impotence during the confrontation. Dumbledore informed them that Mme. Pomfrey would look after the elder Malfoy’s (who were barely conscious) upon their return to Hogwarts. Harry quickly penned a letter to Molly Weasley, informing them of the news and asking her to send Arthur to the ministry. Aurors would be needed for a Death Eater round up and Draco thought Moody would be positively thrilled.

Now all they needed was a new Headquarters.