Indago:Reborn
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Harry Potter › Slash - Male/Male › Harry/Draco
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Category:
Harry Potter › Slash - Male/Male › Harry/Draco
Rating:
Adult ++
Chapters:
33
Views:
79,907
Reviews:
947
Recommended:
0
Currently Reading:
1
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.
Chapter Twenty-seven
AN: Just a bit of pimpage. If you like Top!Draco/Bottom!Harry stories, please check out the newly reformed yahoo group that? *smile* So, just giving a heads up.
Hope you all keep enjoying!!
Betaed by the lovely deathangelgw.
Chapter Twenty-seven
It was dark. Why was it dark? It had not been dark before. Why was he in the dark?
Stop asking silly questions. Find out where you are, idiot!
Harry carefully opened his eyes. It was still dark, but a small light shone from the ceiling and illuminated the room, reflecting off the metal walls. Harry lay on a metal floor. There was no sound save for his own breathing. It was cold enough that his breath was misting out of his mouth and condensing on the floor. He didn’t recognize the room, though it did seem familiar. It almost felt as if he was back at the Zoo in a containment room for one of their bigger animals. He wasn’t surprised to see a small grate in the floor not far from where he lay.
Draco. Maia.
Harry’s heart squeezed in his chest at the small thought. He had to get home. He didn’t know where he was, but he had to go home to his family. They needed him. Squeezing his eyes shut, Harry tried to remember where he was. The last thing he remembered was eating. Yes, he was eating and something was wrong. Draco was angry. Harry’s eyes slammed open. Oh gods! He had slept with those people! He had … and Draco had found out!
We broke our bond! We angered Draco!
The small voice made him want to die and finally Harry recognized the voice of his subicio, his need to obey and please. It was frantic at the thought of what Harry had done. Harry was frantic as well. How could he have done that?! Maybe there really was something wrong with him! Maybe he really had gone crazy!
Oh no! Had Draco locked him away? Was that where he was? A cell? No, Draco wouldn’t do that, would he?
He’s angry! We defied him!
But, Harry worried, Draco still wouldn’t put him in a cell, would he? Draco loved him, right? But if he were going crazy… No, Draco wouldn’t… But he had committed adultery!
He hates us now. We are nothing! We let others outside of the pack have us!
Harry pushed himself up with his hands and sat up, trying to use the physical actions to distract him from the awful thoughts in his head. His body ached, especially his nose and jaw. Why was he achy? Did he fall? Did Draco stun him and drag him to this… wherever this is? Why couldn’t he remember?
He slowly looked around from his new height and realized that his glasses were missing, making everything hazy and blurry. But it wasn’t hard to miss the blood stains on his shirt. Blood?
A loud thud and scraping noise distracted Harry from the disturbing thoughts and he quickly went on guard. He almost felt for his wand, which was ridiculous since Draco and he had been doing wandless magic exclusively for a few years now. But still, it would have been nice to feel its comforting and trusty weight in his hand right now.
Draco put us here. We must obey whatever happens.
Harry ignored his inner subicio and concentrated on making out the moving object -- a door, he surmised -- across the room. The door scraped open, creating a lighted opening. In the light, Harry could see two blurry figures coalesce and then the door was shutting them inside with him.
“I’m glad you are finally awake,” a man’s voice said, echoing slightly in the metal room. “My medical skills aren’t as good as I would like them, but I’ve been busy with other things and haven’t had much practice.”
Medical. He said medical. He was in a hospital. Oh gods, Draco had really had him committed! No wait, a saner part of Harry’s brain interjected. He said he wasn’t very skilled in medicine. That means he can’t be a doctor. Harry nodded to himself and ventured a question.
“W-who are you?” His voice was hoarse, as if he had just woken. Well, he had, so that was okay.
The sound of a boot heel on metal had Harry straining to see who was walking toward him. They came closer. “I’m shocked you don’t recognize me,” the voice said smoothly. It rang bells in Harry’s head, but he couldn’t …quite…remember. The man came closer and his form began to clear for Harry’s eyes. “Ah, I forgot. You’re missing your glasses. Sorry. I’ll have one of my friends try to find you a replacement. Of course, they may not be as good as your own, but perhaps they’ll help.” Finally, the man knelt down and Harry could see his face.
“Muroch!” Harry exclaimed in surprise. “You’re the American Indago.” Stupid! He knows who he is, Harry berated himself. He doesn’t need you to introduce himself to himself.
Muroch smiled. “Hey, you remembered me. Great.”
Harry frowned in confusion. “Why are you here? Where … where is here? Where’s Draco?”
The other man winced at Draco’s name. “Ah, well, you see, you and your husband had a fight last night…pretty nasty one at that. One of my friends happened to be walking by and found you banged up. You had a broken nose bleeding all over the place and quite a few other bruises. Especially around your throat.” Muroch’s hands came up to his own throat in pantomime to show how exactly Harry had gotten those bruises. Harry blinked in shock.
“A… a fight? Draco…Draco and I fought?” Harry fingered his throat, trying to remember. Had Draco really tried to strangle him?
We left our mate! We angered him and fought him! His inner subicio was screaming. Tears sprang to Harry’s eyes unbidden. He wiped them away quickly and tried to speak firmly.
“Thank you for …for healing me. That was very nice of you. But I think that I should return home now. But please, come visit our home at any time so that I may thank you properly with dinner and wine.” Draco would be so proud of him for his formal speech. Guess all those lectures of Draco’s had sunk in after all. Harry began to get to his feet when the other man cleared his throat. Harry paused and looked at him expectantly.
“Well, you see… I really don’t think that that’ll happen,” Muroch said sympathetically. “Your husband threw you out, bleeding all over the place, and was screaming that he didn’t want you to come back. Those news reporters were writing everything down and then he told them directly that he was … Geez, I don’t know how to tell you this. But he said he wanted a divorce from you, saying that you had betrayed your marriage vows.” Muroch winced again, his eyes sad. “I’m sorry.”
Stunned, Harry sat on the cold metal floor as he tried not to panic. No, Draco wouldn’t do that. No, he wouldn’t. He definitely wouldn’t air his dirty laundry to the press. No, it was a mistake. It had to be.
We betrayed our mate! We left our pack! We hurt our young! Draco is angry with us!
Harry felt the tears begin to fall down his cheeks as his inner subicio cried and screamed. This couldn’t be happening. No, Draco … Draco was angry, but he had written to Snape and… and Snape was going to come and then everything would be fixed. Draco knew that Harry would never betray him.
But we did! We did betray him!
Stop! No! I won’t listen to that! Draco would know that something was wrong and that Harry would never do anything like that. And Maia! He wouldn’t take Maia away from Harry. His arms ached to hold his daughter. Draco would never do that to him.
“I’m really sorry.”
Harry looked up, remembering that he wasn’t alone. “It’s… it’s alright.” He quickly wiped the wetness from his cheeks and eyes again and cleared his throat of the emotion that was making his voice thick. “Um, I really should try to get home. I… Draco was just angry and we have a daughter that I have to get home to.”
“Yes, yes, your child.” Muroch smiled encouragingly. “But still. You know that he’ll get custody of her, right?”
“What? No, no I have to go home and …and fix this.” Harry struggled to his feet and saw Muroch rise as well. “Can I apparate from here?”
“No. No, you can’t.” Muroch looked at Harry for a moment and then smiled softly again. “Harry, why don’t you stay with me? You were banged up pretty good there and I have plenty of room here. I’m a pretty nice guy and I’ll take good care of you.”
Harry’s brow furrowed in confusion. “No. I mean, thank you for the offer, but I really need to go home.”
“Yeah, but what are you going home to? Draco’s ticked and I can’t see that old grump Snape being too happy with you. You slept around. That’s pretty bad.”
Severus will be angry with us! He’ll hate us! He won’t take us and protect us!
Harry’s chest heaved as he struggled to breathe through the panic that had gripped him. His eyes pleaded with Muroch to understand. “I- I didn’t mean to! I wasn’t… I wasn’t thinking clearly. I… have to go home and fix this.”
“But can you? You allowed others to touch you. You let them put their scent on you. You left your young unprotected. That’s really bad stuff, Harry.” Muroch’s warm brown eyes were stern and uncompromising. Harry couldn’t meet them anymore, his guilt was too much. He had done all those things. He didn’t need his inner subicio screaming at him to know that.
“I know,” he whispered. “But, I have to go home and …and accept what happens. I have to see my daughter.”
“Harry, I’m really sorry. But I can’t let you do that.” Harry’s head shot up at those words. Muroch was looking at him sadly. “My instincts just won’t let me allow you to go back to a dangerous situation. They could kill you as soon as look at you.”
“No! No, Draco would never do that. He might… he might h-hate me, but he wouldn’t do that!” Harry protested.
“Are you sure? I’m not and so I just can’t let you go. Besides, see it from my point of view.” Big tanned arms opened wide. “I’m a Supero without a pack. You’re a subicio without a pack. We should band together, right?”
“No, no, Draco and Severus are…”
“They threw you out. Draco renounced you to the world. Harry,” Muroch stared into his eyes. “You don’t belong to them anymore.”
It felt as if his throat was closing and he’d never be able to breathe again. This couldn’t be happening! He couldn’t be away from Draco and Maia. “I have to go home!” he cried desperately. “I know you’re only trying to help and… and maybe after everything is… is figured out then… But I have to go home. Draco is my husband and I have to go home!”
Muroch stared at Harry for a long time and then sighed heavily. “Alright. I tried to reason with you. It wasn’t my first choice but I thought I’d be a decent guy and try.” Harry looked at him in confusion and Muroch smiled. But it wasn’t a nice smile anymore, and his eyes weren’t gentle and understanding any longer. They were hard and condescending. Harry stiffened in wariness.
“I’m going home!” he declared.
“No, you’re not. You are going to stay here. You are going to be a good little boy and do as you’re told or I’ll handle you the way you’re meant to be handled, you got that?” Muroch’s voice was sharp enough to slice Harry’s skin open. Then he felt it. It finally dawned on Harry that he should have felt the other’s Supero power. He did now as it began to swell into the room. In a panic, Harry tried out-running it and dashed for the door.
“Nice try!” A steel hand grabbed his hair and jerked him to a harsh stop as he tried going around the other man. He was quickly thrown to the floor and the Supero’s power took him over. He huddled in on himself.
Don’t make him angry. He’ll hurt us if you make him angry.
“Now, let me run things down for you,” Muroch spoke as if he were merely a waiter reciting the wine list. “There is no way out of here. You obey me and your life will be good. You’ll finally give me the children I want and I’ll make sure you live a long and comfortable life. Fight me, and you will dread opening your eyes every morning. Do you understand me?”
Harry stayed still.
“Do you know how hard it has been, Harry?” Muroch squatted down on his haunches again. He loomed over Harry. “I have struggled all my life to make our race something to be recognized and respected. The States don’t have the laws you have here. I really like the U.K. for that. But in my country, they couldn’t care less if you have some special blood in you. No, we are a country of mutts and almost all of Wizard-kind in my neck of the woods has something in them: Elf, veela, giant, Hydra, selkie, sprite…anything and everything. They don’t understand how truly exceptional we, the Indago, are. Not even my parents could get that through their heads. But I knew. I knew how rare and prized we are. How powerful. When I came to understand how very close we were to the brink of extinction, I decided to do something about it. I made a commitment to put us and the rest of the world in the proper pecking order, with us on top. But do you know my friends and family thought I had it wrong? They thought I should just let nature take its course.” Muroch barked out a laugh. “I have had to deal with ridicule and disgust for years. Even my mother was disgusted with me. She, an Indago herself, couldn’t see how important this was! Isn’t that sad?”
“M-Maybe she just wanted you to be happy and not worry?” Harry whispered. He wanted to make the Supero content and not angry. He didn’t want to please him, but maybe if he could make him think he was on his side…
“Happy?” Muroch shook his head with a sad smile. “No. She wanted me dead. Tried to kill me herself before she committed suicide. I wouldn’t have cared, but she killed the only viable offspring we ever created together. She thought my tactics were wrong. But, really, Harry, what else was I supposed to do, huh? She was the only subicio. I had no other choice, now did I?”
Oh gods! He was insane! Had he really… with his own mother? Harry tried to control his chaotic and panicked thoughts. “I… I don’t know. Maybe, maybe Draco will let you join our pack and you could-”
“No. Harry, I don’t want you to ever speak that name again. Your old ties have been cut. You’re mine now and that’s that.” Harry jumped when hands grabbed his thigh and turned him over to his back. “Now, you and I will begin a new chapter. You’re a proven breeder. It’s unfortunate that you had to lose that first baby. But that’s fine. I have an entire program designed for us. In a few years, when you have given me three children, I will let that Snape guy breed with you. Then, a little later, there is another elderly Supero in India who will still have viable seed. From that first generation, we will pull the top three options for strong breeding subicios and I will mate with them, beginning the second generation.” Muroch’s brown eyes glowed with his visions of the future. “We will finally have our place in society. And you and I will have started it, Harry.”
“No,” Harry moaned. His subicio was wailing at his opposition, but he couldn’t do this. “No, I won’t…won’t do that! I’m not a cow!”
Muroch looked down at him, his eyes narrowing. “What did you say?”
“I-I won’t do that. You’re as bad as… as those werewolves! I won’t breed for you!” Harry felt like the very air was trying to strangle him as he fought against the pheromones of the other Indago.
Muroch looked at him seriously and then smirked. “Funny you should mention that,” he said and then motioned over his shoulder. Harry had forgotten that there had been two blurry shadows that had entered the room. The other one had been silent until that moment. As it approached, Harry struggled to focus on its face. Then he sensed it.
“No! No, stop!” he gasped and began struggling away. Muroch smiled and held his thighs down, cementing him to the floor. Harry kept fruitlessly scrambling to get away, his panic increasing. “No! Get away!” He threw his hands out and tried pushing it away with his magic.
“Ah, ah, Harry. No magic in here. I’ve got an impregnable shield up that will stop all magic. You see, I’ve been preparing for you for some time. That is how much I need you.” Harry wasn’t listening, he was still trying to claw his way away from the figure that now seemed to loom over him. Its scent was overwhelming. The figure squatted down next to Muroch and its features came into focus.
“Hello again, little one.”
*-*-*
“A fucking week!” The glass smashed into the wall before Draco spun back around and glared at Snape as the other Indago stood calmly behind him. “We live on a fucking island! Where the fuck could he have gone?!”
“The international apparition barriers have been monitored, yet no one matching Harry’s magical signature has crossed it. We have people searching Muggle London right now. Aurors specially trained in handling Muggle civilization—“
“I don’t want a list of their credits, Weasley! I want them to do their job and find my husband!”
Everyone in the room—Ron, Hermione, Arthur Weasley, Snape, and Lucius – was silent. Lucius moved from where he stood near the doorway.
“Draco, I have a particular tracking spell that could work--”
“I’m not giving you any of the blood!” Draco rounded on his father. “You’re not touching anything of his!”
“You are being--”
Draco cut off the cold rebuke from his father. “I don’t care how I am acting. You are not getting any of his blood or hair or anything else!” Lucius’s face tightened in anger but he remained silent.
“Draco, are you sure no money has been taken from your vault?” Granger asked. “Could Harry have a secret stash somewhere?”
“No. No money has been touched,” Draco snapped and wanted to throw something again. He wanted to rage and gnash his teeth. None of it helped. Harry was missing. A week and there had not been one sighting of him nor one word from him. In Draco’s darkest thoughts, he began to truly fear the worst. The media had been told of Harry’s disappearance two days after he had gone missing. Every headline in every paper reported the disappearance and ran daily articles on the progression of the search. Even Muggle papers had run articles about the young father who had gone missing, apparently suffering from a mild mental breakdown.
And yet still, there was no word.
“Draco, let these people go back to their jobs. Haranguing them with the same issues is not going to help,” Snape suggested quietly from his corner. With a nod of his head, the others, excluding Lucius, began to file out. All three sets of eyes were cast sadly onto the silent Draco, but his back was to them all. Once the front door shut, Lucius braved his son’s ire again.
“My son, I know you are angry with me,” the elder Malfoy began smoothly. “But allow me to make amends for my… unkind behaviour towards the boy. The tracking spell does have its roots in dark magic, but I assure you-”
“No.” Draco turned back toward the room. “No, Father, I will not allow you to do this. He is mine and I will find him.”
“I have already done most of those spells, Lucius,” Snape added. “They resulted in nothing. Where ever he is, something is blocking him.”
“Or he is blocking them,” Lucius interjected. He turned to look at his son again. “Draco, you must face the fact that he has left and probably has no intention of coming back. You must understand how impossible it is for an orphan to have a family. Obviously it overwhelmed him.”
“Lucius…”Snape warned but it was too late. Draco’s eyes gleamed with malice.
“The history of Harry’s childhood has nothing to do with any of this!” he hissed. “I will find my husband and then we will leave. You and your demeaning thoughts on the subject of Harry and our family will be left here in this pitiful kingdom you have created and I will thank you to forget that you ever had a son!”
“Draco!” Lucius’s face was a mixture of shock and outrage. “How dare you!”
“I dare because you have been nothing but a black cloud that has darkened my mate’s face. I have attempted to be accommodating to you both, but it ends here. Harry is the most important and you will not say another unkind, degrading, or insulting word about him!” Both Malfoys stared each other in the eye, both breathing hard.
“This accomplishes nothing,” Snape’s low voice broke into the tense atmosphere. “Renouncing your claim as your father’s heir only hurts yourself, Draco. And being acerbic at this time only creates more problems, Lucius. I suggest you both calm down and think with your brains and not with your emotions. You are embarrassing the House of Slytherin.”
Both blonds pulled back at the verbal slap in the face. Lucius seemed to regain his composure first and turned to look at Snape with a calm half-smile. “This is the reason I keep you as a friend, Severus. Otherwise, that tongue and daring of yours would have cost you your life long ago.”
“You flatter me as always, Lucius,” Snape replied coolly while raising an eyebrow.
Lucius nodded his head and straightened his shoulders, collecting himself. “Very well, I will intensify my own end of the search. There are a few places and people in Knockturn Alley that I have yet to question. And with the Aurors busy, I believe I shall be able to do a thorough job of it. Good day.” Without another look at his son, Lucius smoothly left the house.
Two hours later, Snape descended the stairs. The sitting room was silent when he entered it. Snape stopped in the doorway and watched an equally silent Draco stroke a pair of broken and blood-flecked spectacles. “We will find him,” Snape said.
“Is that your mantra, then?” Draco spat out. “You keep saying that, but where is he?” Draco pocketed the wire frames and stalked back toward the window, looking out. “A week, Severus! We should have been able to find him by now!” Draco paused and his shoulders seemed to slump. “Unless Father is right and Harry does not wish to be found,” he murmured.
“You will only drive yourself mad with those thoughts. You sound more and more like an emotional woman waiting for her drunken husband to come home.” Snape’s voice was firm. “When did it matter whether or not he wanted to be found? It is not his choice. He is ours. He has a place and that place is here, with his child, with his husband. Whatever ailment of the brain he is suffering from does not change his lot in life.”
Draco seemed to grow taller with those strong words. He nodded and continued to stare out into the green world. Not even the flutter of wings entering the sitting room disturbed him as he stared, but since there were owls coming in and out of the house at various times of the day, it really wasn’t surprising. Snape snatched the letter as it fluttered down and barely cast an eye at the bird as it flew back out.
“What does it say?” Draco asked with very little expectancy in his voice. Both men had stopped hoping as each letter stated the same negative words.
Snape looked up after finishing reading the hastily scribbled lines. “I do not know if this is good news or bad, but apparently Lupin has taken it upon himself to contribute to the search. Ms. Tonks writes that he has been out searching since he recovered from the full moon earlier this week.”
“I don’t want that mongrel going anywhere near Harry!” Draco hissed and spun to look at Snape. The older man calmly folded the letter.
“Draco, now is not the time to allow-”
“Would you quit with the fucking sermons! You’re as tedious as my father!” Draco snarled. “All you do is preach, but where are the results of the experiments you claim to be doing? Where are the answers I need to bring him home? You are nothing but a-” Draco was stopped by his backwards flight onto the settee. Snape stood over him, his eyes narrowed in anger.
“Would it help if I was as out of control as you? Perhaps I shall have a tantrum every three hours. Would that satisfy you?” Snape spoke icily. “I suggest you rein yourself in, Draco. You are not the only one concerned with this matter. There is an entire nation looking for him. Albus Dumbledore himself is calling in every debt he has ever accrued in his illustrious life to find Harry. The entire Auror division is scouring the cities and villages for any sign of him and all of Wizard-kind has their bleeding hearts in their mouths waiting for any news of their saviour. I suggest you realize that you are the strength of a small child and be her father instead of her sibling. Biting at me and those around you will do nothing to cure your worry.”
Draco glared up at the other man and pushed himself to his feet. Snape did not bother backing up and soon the two were nearly chest to chest. Finally, Draco lowered his eyes and nodded. “Now,” Snape continued in his normal formal tone, “I have nearly finished all my experiments. I am waiting on one last one, but I believe its results will merely confirm my suspicions.”
“What suspicions?” Draco asked as he sat back down on the settee.
“Just now, I have finally isolated what I believe is the cause of Harry’s erratic behaviour.” Snape moved away and stood behind the armchair across the room. Draco surmised that it was the teacher in the older man needing a podium of any kind. “Harry had large amounts of pheromone in him that he should not have had.”
“In him?” Draco’s eyes narrowed. “I thought a pheromone was something that you put out, not have in.”
“Exactly. Harry should not have been showing any pheromone in his blood. But even more disturbing was that it was Supero pheromone.” Snape nodded at Draco’s calculating look. “Yes, now you see it, don’t you? Harry was presenting signs that are typical in one of us in a more… uncivilized mood. The need to dominate, the sexual aggression, the complete disregard he had toward the child, these are all behaviours of a Supero with no pack bonds. His place in our group was as a subicio, therefore, as a Supero, he was struggling. I believe this is what was causing all of it.”
“How could this happen? How would the pheromone be in his blood?” Draco asked sharply.
“The last test I am waiting for will confirm it, but I believe it was ingested. That would explain why he would vary between these stages of… identity crisis. It would not be natural therefore it would only have an effect for a certain time period. It would also depend on how much of a dose he had at each sitting, how often the doses were administered, the layering effect of each dose in a certain period of time, and any activity that would cause the additive to pass through his system faster. All of these factors would cause the violent swings in his demeanour and thought process.”
“And what, did this also have an effect on his memory? Don’t you think Harry would have noticed feeling strange and aggressive?” Draco asked disbelievingly.
“Harry had full recollection of his actions and feelings,” Snape answered, not responding to his companion’s caustic tone. “Unfortunately, this … poison, for lack of a better term, did not alert Harry to the danger due to its gradual take-over of him. Once it had left his body, Harry seemed to have … validated his behaviour as best he could. He described it as being ‘stir-crazy’ when in actuality he was feeling aggressive and had the need to control something. This is where my misinterpretation of his memories came from. I could only understand what he was feeling after the events took place, not while it was actually occurring. If I had been able to, either one of us would have recognized many of his emotions and urges. Harry, having never experienced them before, could only interpret them as best he could and, of course, try to make amends afterwards.”
Draco sat still, his sight unfocused as he stared at the fire slowly licking its way through a large log. Everything was beginning to fall into place now…all of Harry’s actions and words…even his promises that he wouldn’t do it again. Harry really had meant those promises.
Silver eyes looked up into black ones. “Who and why?” he asked, his voice sharp and deadly.
“That I do not know. Have you had any dinner guests? Any fruit baskets or special deliveries?”
“No, none. Wait, Harry’s friends came over the day he disappeared for his ‘walk’,” Draco said and stood up. “I was given a complete list of the persons present, but I would not believe any of them would have anything to gain by turning Harry into a nutter.” Narrowing his eyes, he paced to the fire. “Granger. I could see Granger trying to make Harry leave me, even try to initiate a fight with me.”
“No. A good suspect to want to make Harry more dominant, but Granger is not known for rash moves, especially any that could harm the baby. Besides, this distillation of our pheromone is not known to anyone.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean that only in the last three months have I been experimenting with the idea of bottling our pheromones. I have, of course, done it in complete secrecy. It is possible that there were similar experiments being conducted without my knowledge but-”
“Where did they get the material?” Draco broke in, finishing the question. Snape nodded.
“Exactly. They would have needed to extract the pheromone from a Supero. Not only that, they would have needed a working knowledge of our physiology, which is information I have not published nor spoken about.”
“And they would have had to know not only the Supero but the subicio body and mind,” Draco added.
“And Harry is the only known subicio,” Snape finished. Both men stared at each other for a moment.
“Could we have a spy?” Draco asked darkly.
“It would appear so. I believe we need to start with what food was contaminated. I believe that may lead us to Harry.”
“Ably!” Draco called. With a small pop the elf appeared, his eyes and ears downcast. A faint tremble shook the wringing hands. “Ably, were there any special deliveries of food or drink that occurred during the last week Master Harry was in residence?” Draco’s tone was firm, holding back the anger he felt. The elf had been skittish since the upheaval in the house and he did not want to deal with a frightened house-elf bashing himself in the head in repentance for a fictitious crime.
“No, Master Draco. Only the regular delivery from the grocer came,” the elf said with a tremble in his voice to match the tremor in his hands.
“There was nothing out of the ordinary? No special request by Master Harry?”
“N-no, Master Draco.”
Draco looked at Snape. “Could it have been hidden in the flour or sugar?” he asked impatiently.
Snape pondered the question for a moment. “No,” he finally answered. “This was a delicate task. It had to have only gone to Harry himself. Otherwise you would have felt the effects, as would the infant. The poison could only be administered by someone who knew when Harry was not feeding Maia and had to have been given to him separately …from …you.” Both men stared down at the house-elf, both coming to the same stunning conclusion. The house-elf’s trembling became even more violent and the creature seemed to melt into the floor. Draco snarled and snatched the elf up by its teacloth.
“What have you done?” he hissed.
“Please, Master Draco!” the pathetic creature screeched. “Ably would never hurt Master Harry!”
“Draco, I thought you would have learned from your father’s mistakes and bound the elf to you?” Snape asked sharply as he moved closer, his presence adding to the intimidation.
“I did!” Draco bit out and bared his teeth at the elf in his grip. “He was bound to never leave, never harm any member of this household, and never lie!”
“Then we have an anomaly,” the Potions Master said darkly as he eyed the terrified house-elf.
“Please Master Draco, Ably would never hurt Master Harry! The man said that it would not hurt Master Harry! Ably would never ever use p-poison!” Tears fell from the enormous scrunched eyes.
“What man?” Draco growled and shook Ably hard. The elf cringed further.
“Ably doesn’t know the man’s name. But he gave Ably the potion. The man said that if Ably did not put the potion in Master Harry’s food and drink, then the man and his friends would… would eat my sister and brother.”
“Eat them?” Snape asked.
“Yes, they already ate Ably’s p-parents!” the little elf wailed. “But Ably would never hurt Master Harry, even for Ably’s sister and brother. The man said that the potion would only make Master Harry stronger. The man said this to Ably while taking the truth telling potion!”
“He swore under Veritaserum so the elf could proceed without breaking his bonds to you,” Snape said quickly to Draco then moved even closer and grabbed the elf’s ear. “What did this man look like? Describe him!”
Ably winced at the hard tug on his ear but nodded quickly, eager to help in any way he could. “The man was tall with dark hair. He had a bad scar on his cheek and mean blue eyes. Ably thought he smelled funny, like something that should be washed.”
“And did he come here to this house?” Draco questioned, fighting the urge to tighten his hand around the stupid thing’s neck. “Did he ever speak to or see Harry?”
“No, no, Master Draco. The man only came to the edge of the garden one day. He sh-showed Ably what he had done to Ably’s parents and then told Ably to give Master Harry the potion.” Tears began to flow anew. “But Ably never ever wanted to hurt Master Harry!”
“Stop the blubbering!” Snape barked. “Do you still have the container of potion this stranger gave you?”
“Y-yes, sir. Ably still has it. It still has some potion in it,” the elf whimpered.
“Show us!” Draco growled and tossed the creature down. They quickly followed the elf out of the room.
Hope you all keep enjoying!!
Betaed by the lovely deathangelgw.
Chapter Twenty-seven
It was dark. Why was it dark? It had not been dark before. Why was he in the dark?
Stop asking silly questions. Find out where you are, idiot!
Harry carefully opened his eyes. It was still dark, but a small light shone from the ceiling and illuminated the room, reflecting off the metal walls. Harry lay on a metal floor. There was no sound save for his own breathing. It was cold enough that his breath was misting out of his mouth and condensing on the floor. He didn’t recognize the room, though it did seem familiar. It almost felt as if he was back at the Zoo in a containment room for one of their bigger animals. He wasn’t surprised to see a small grate in the floor not far from where he lay.
Draco. Maia.
Harry’s heart squeezed in his chest at the small thought. He had to get home. He didn’t know where he was, but he had to go home to his family. They needed him. Squeezing his eyes shut, Harry tried to remember where he was. The last thing he remembered was eating. Yes, he was eating and something was wrong. Draco was angry. Harry’s eyes slammed open. Oh gods! He had slept with those people! He had … and Draco had found out!
We broke our bond! We angered Draco!
The small voice made him want to die and finally Harry recognized the voice of his subicio, his need to obey and please. It was frantic at the thought of what Harry had done. Harry was frantic as well. How could he have done that?! Maybe there really was something wrong with him! Maybe he really had gone crazy!
Oh no! Had Draco locked him away? Was that where he was? A cell? No, Draco wouldn’t do that, would he?
He’s angry! We defied him!
But, Harry worried, Draco still wouldn’t put him in a cell, would he? Draco loved him, right? But if he were going crazy… No, Draco wouldn’t… But he had committed adultery!
He hates us now. We are nothing! We let others outside of the pack have us!
Harry pushed himself up with his hands and sat up, trying to use the physical actions to distract him from the awful thoughts in his head. His body ached, especially his nose and jaw. Why was he achy? Did he fall? Did Draco stun him and drag him to this… wherever this is? Why couldn’t he remember?
He slowly looked around from his new height and realized that his glasses were missing, making everything hazy and blurry. But it wasn’t hard to miss the blood stains on his shirt. Blood?
A loud thud and scraping noise distracted Harry from the disturbing thoughts and he quickly went on guard. He almost felt for his wand, which was ridiculous since Draco and he had been doing wandless magic exclusively for a few years now. But still, it would have been nice to feel its comforting and trusty weight in his hand right now.
Draco put us here. We must obey whatever happens.
Harry ignored his inner subicio and concentrated on making out the moving object -- a door, he surmised -- across the room. The door scraped open, creating a lighted opening. In the light, Harry could see two blurry figures coalesce and then the door was shutting them inside with him.
“I’m glad you are finally awake,” a man’s voice said, echoing slightly in the metal room. “My medical skills aren’t as good as I would like them, but I’ve been busy with other things and haven’t had much practice.”
Medical. He said medical. He was in a hospital. Oh gods, Draco had really had him committed! No wait, a saner part of Harry’s brain interjected. He said he wasn’t very skilled in medicine. That means he can’t be a doctor. Harry nodded to himself and ventured a question.
“W-who are you?” His voice was hoarse, as if he had just woken. Well, he had, so that was okay.
The sound of a boot heel on metal had Harry straining to see who was walking toward him. They came closer. “I’m shocked you don’t recognize me,” the voice said smoothly. It rang bells in Harry’s head, but he couldn’t …quite…remember. The man came closer and his form began to clear for Harry’s eyes. “Ah, I forgot. You’re missing your glasses. Sorry. I’ll have one of my friends try to find you a replacement. Of course, they may not be as good as your own, but perhaps they’ll help.” Finally, the man knelt down and Harry could see his face.
“Muroch!” Harry exclaimed in surprise. “You’re the American Indago.” Stupid! He knows who he is, Harry berated himself. He doesn’t need you to introduce himself to himself.
Muroch smiled. “Hey, you remembered me. Great.”
Harry frowned in confusion. “Why are you here? Where … where is here? Where’s Draco?”
The other man winced at Draco’s name. “Ah, well, you see, you and your husband had a fight last night…pretty nasty one at that. One of my friends happened to be walking by and found you banged up. You had a broken nose bleeding all over the place and quite a few other bruises. Especially around your throat.” Muroch’s hands came up to his own throat in pantomime to show how exactly Harry had gotten those bruises. Harry blinked in shock.
“A… a fight? Draco…Draco and I fought?” Harry fingered his throat, trying to remember. Had Draco really tried to strangle him?
We left our mate! We angered him and fought him! His inner subicio was screaming. Tears sprang to Harry’s eyes unbidden. He wiped them away quickly and tried to speak firmly.
“Thank you for …for healing me. That was very nice of you. But I think that I should return home now. But please, come visit our home at any time so that I may thank you properly with dinner and wine.” Draco would be so proud of him for his formal speech. Guess all those lectures of Draco’s had sunk in after all. Harry began to get to his feet when the other man cleared his throat. Harry paused and looked at him expectantly.
“Well, you see… I really don’t think that that’ll happen,” Muroch said sympathetically. “Your husband threw you out, bleeding all over the place, and was screaming that he didn’t want you to come back. Those news reporters were writing everything down and then he told them directly that he was … Geez, I don’t know how to tell you this. But he said he wanted a divorce from you, saying that you had betrayed your marriage vows.” Muroch winced again, his eyes sad. “I’m sorry.”
Stunned, Harry sat on the cold metal floor as he tried not to panic. No, Draco wouldn’t do that. No, he wouldn’t. He definitely wouldn’t air his dirty laundry to the press. No, it was a mistake. It had to be.
We betrayed our mate! We left our pack! We hurt our young! Draco is angry with us!
Harry felt the tears begin to fall down his cheeks as his inner subicio cried and screamed. This couldn’t be happening. No, Draco … Draco was angry, but he had written to Snape and… and Snape was going to come and then everything would be fixed. Draco knew that Harry would never betray him.
But we did! We did betray him!
Stop! No! I won’t listen to that! Draco would know that something was wrong and that Harry would never do anything like that. And Maia! He wouldn’t take Maia away from Harry. His arms ached to hold his daughter. Draco would never do that to him.
“I’m really sorry.”
Harry looked up, remembering that he wasn’t alone. “It’s… it’s alright.” He quickly wiped the wetness from his cheeks and eyes again and cleared his throat of the emotion that was making his voice thick. “Um, I really should try to get home. I… Draco was just angry and we have a daughter that I have to get home to.”
“Yes, yes, your child.” Muroch smiled encouragingly. “But still. You know that he’ll get custody of her, right?”
“What? No, no I have to go home and …and fix this.” Harry struggled to his feet and saw Muroch rise as well. “Can I apparate from here?”
“No. No, you can’t.” Muroch looked at Harry for a moment and then smiled softly again. “Harry, why don’t you stay with me? You were banged up pretty good there and I have plenty of room here. I’m a pretty nice guy and I’ll take good care of you.”
Harry’s brow furrowed in confusion. “No. I mean, thank you for the offer, but I really need to go home.”
“Yeah, but what are you going home to? Draco’s ticked and I can’t see that old grump Snape being too happy with you. You slept around. That’s pretty bad.”
Severus will be angry with us! He’ll hate us! He won’t take us and protect us!
Harry’s chest heaved as he struggled to breathe through the panic that had gripped him. His eyes pleaded with Muroch to understand. “I- I didn’t mean to! I wasn’t… I wasn’t thinking clearly. I… have to go home and fix this.”
“But can you? You allowed others to touch you. You let them put their scent on you. You left your young unprotected. That’s really bad stuff, Harry.” Muroch’s warm brown eyes were stern and uncompromising. Harry couldn’t meet them anymore, his guilt was too much. He had done all those things. He didn’t need his inner subicio screaming at him to know that.
“I know,” he whispered. “But, I have to go home and …and accept what happens. I have to see my daughter.”
“Harry, I’m really sorry. But I can’t let you do that.” Harry’s head shot up at those words. Muroch was looking at him sadly. “My instincts just won’t let me allow you to go back to a dangerous situation. They could kill you as soon as look at you.”
“No! No, Draco would never do that. He might… he might h-hate me, but he wouldn’t do that!” Harry protested.
“Are you sure? I’m not and so I just can’t let you go. Besides, see it from my point of view.” Big tanned arms opened wide. “I’m a Supero without a pack. You’re a subicio without a pack. We should band together, right?”
“No, no, Draco and Severus are…”
“They threw you out. Draco renounced you to the world. Harry,” Muroch stared into his eyes. “You don’t belong to them anymore.”
It felt as if his throat was closing and he’d never be able to breathe again. This couldn’t be happening! He couldn’t be away from Draco and Maia. “I have to go home!” he cried desperately. “I know you’re only trying to help and… and maybe after everything is… is figured out then… But I have to go home. Draco is my husband and I have to go home!”
Muroch stared at Harry for a long time and then sighed heavily. “Alright. I tried to reason with you. It wasn’t my first choice but I thought I’d be a decent guy and try.” Harry looked at him in confusion and Muroch smiled. But it wasn’t a nice smile anymore, and his eyes weren’t gentle and understanding any longer. They were hard and condescending. Harry stiffened in wariness.
“I’m going home!” he declared.
“No, you’re not. You are going to stay here. You are going to be a good little boy and do as you’re told or I’ll handle you the way you’re meant to be handled, you got that?” Muroch’s voice was sharp enough to slice Harry’s skin open. Then he felt it. It finally dawned on Harry that he should have felt the other’s Supero power. He did now as it began to swell into the room. In a panic, Harry tried out-running it and dashed for the door.
“Nice try!” A steel hand grabbed his hair and jerked him to a harsh stop as he tried going around the other man. He was quickly thrown to the floor and the Supero’s power took him over. He huddled in on himself.
Don’t make him angry. He’ll hurt us if you make him angry.
“Now, let me run things down for you,” Muroch spoke as if he were merely a waiter reciting the wine list. “There is no way out of here. You obey me and your life will be good. You’ll finally give me the children I want and I’ll make sure you live a long and comfortable life. Fight me, and you will dread opening your eyes every morning. Do you understand me?”
Harry stayed still.
“Do you know how hard it has been, Harry?” Muroch squatted down on his haunches again. He loomed over Harry. “I have struggled all my life to make our race something to be recognized and respected. The States don’t have the laws you have here. I really like the U.K. for that. But in my country, they couldn’t care less if you have some special blood in you. No, we are a country of mutts and almost all of Wizard-kind in my neck of the woods has something in them: Elf, veela, giant, Hydra, selkie, sprite…anything and everything. They don’t understand how truly exceptional we, the Indago, are. Not even my parents could get that through their heads. But I knew. I knew how rare and prized we are. How powerful. When I came to understand how very close we were to the brink of extinction, I decided to do something about it. I made a commitment to put us and the rest of the world in the proper pecking order, with us on top. But do you know my friends and family thought I had it wrong? They thought I should just let nature take its course.” Muroch barked out a laugh. “I have had to deal with ridicule and disgust for years. Even my mother was disgusted with me. She, an Indago herself, couldn’t see how important this was! Isn’t that sad?”
“M-Maybe she just wanted you to be happy and not worry?” Harry whispered. He wanted to make the Supero content and not angry. He didn’t want to please him, but maybe if he could make him think he was on his side…
“Happy?” Muroch shook his head with a sad smile. “No. She wanted me dead. Tried to kill me herself before she committed suicide. I wouldn’t have cared, but she killed the only viable offspring we ever created together. She thought my tactics were wrong. But, really, Harry, what else was I supposed to do, huh? She was the only subicio. I had no other choice, now did I?”
Oh gods! He was insane! Had he really… with his own mother? Harry tried to control his chaotic and panicked thoughts. “I… I don’t know. Maybe, maybe Draco will let you join our pack and you could-”
“No. Harry, I don’t want you to ever speak that name again. Your old ties have been cut. You’re mine now and that’s that.” Harry jumped when hands grabbed his thigh and turned him over to his back. “Now, you and I will begin a new chapter. You’re a proven breeder. It’s unfortunate that you had to lose that first baby. But that’s fine. I have an entire program designed for us. In a few years, when you have given me three children, I will let that Snape guy breed with you. Then, a little later, there is another elderly Supero in India who will still have viable seed. From that first generation, we will pull the top three options for strong breeding subicios and I will mate with them, beginning the second generation.” Muroch’s brown eyes glowed with his visions of the future. “We will finally have our place in society. And you and I will have started it, Harry.”
“No,” Harry moaned. His subicio was wailing at his opposition, but he couldn’t do this. “No, I won’t…won’t do that! I’m not a cow!”
Muroch looked down at him, his eyes narrowing. “What did you say?”
“I-I won’t do that. You’re as bad as… as those werewolves! I won’t breed for you!” Harry felt like the very air was trying to strangle him as he fought against the pheromones of the other Indago.
Muroch looked at him seriously and then smirked. “Funny you should mention that,” he said and then motioned over his shoulder. Harry had forgotten that there had been two blurry shadows that had entered the room. The other one had been silent until that moment. As it approached, Harry struggled to focus on its face. Then he sensed it.
“No! No, stop!” he gasped and began struggling away. Muroch smiled and held his thighs down, cementing him to the floor. Harry kept fruitlessly scrambling to get away, his panic increasing. “No! Get away!” He threw his hands out and tried pushing it away with his magic.
“Ah, ah, Harry. No magic in here. I’ve got an impregnable shield up that will stop all magic. You see, I’ve been preparing for you for some time. That is how much I need you.” Harry wasn’t listening, he was still trying to claw his way away from the figure that now seemed to loom over him. Its scent was overwhelming. The figure squatted down next to Muroch and its features came into focus.
“Hello again, little one.”
“A fucking week!” The glass smashed into the wall before Draco spun back around and glared at Snape as the other Indago stood calmly behind him. “We live on a fucking island! Where the fuck could he have gone?!”
“The international apparition barriers have been monitored, yet no one matching Harry’s magical signature has crossed it. We have people searching Muggle London right now. Aurors specially trained in handling Muggle civilization—“
“I don’t want a list of their credits, Weasley! I want them to do their job and find my husband!”
Everyone in the room—Ron, Hermione, Arthur Weasley, Snape, and Lucius – was silent. Lucius moved from where he stood near the doorway.
“Draco, I have a particular tracking spell that could work--”
“I’m not giving you any of the blood!” Draco rounded on his father. “You’re not touching anything of his!”
“You are being--”
Draco cut off the cold rebuke from his father. “I don’t care how I am acting. You are not getting any of his blood or hair or anything else!” Lucius’s face tightened in anger but he remained silent.
“Draco, are you sure no money has been taken from your vault?” Granger asked. “Could Harry have a secret stash somewhere?”
“No. No money has been touched,” Draco snapped and wanted to throw something again. He wanted to rage and gnash his teeth. None of it helped. Harry was missing. A week and there had not been one sighting of him nor one word from him. In Draco’s darkest thoughts, he began to truly fear the worst. The media had been told of Harry’s disappearance two days after he had gone missing. Every headline in every paper reported the disappearance and ran daily articles on the progression of the search. Even Muggle papers had run articles about the young father who had gone missing, apparently suffering from a mild mental breakdown.
And yet still, there was no word.
“Draco, let these people go back to their jobs. Haranguing them with the same issues is not going to help,” Snape suggested quietly from his corner. With a nod of his head, the others, excluding Lucius, began to file out. All three sets of eyes were cast sadly onto the silent Draco, but his back was to them all. Once the front door shut, Lucius braved his son’s ire again.
“My son, I know you are angry with me,” the elder Malfoy began smoothly. “But allow me to make amends for my… unkind behaviour towards the boy. The tracking spell does have its roots in dark magic, but I assure you-”
“No.” Draco turned back toward the room. “No, Father, I will not allow you to do this. He is mine and I will find him.”
“I have already done most of those spells, Lucius,” Snape added. “They resulted in nothing. Where ever he is, something is blocking him.”
“Or he is blocking them,” Lucius interjected. He turned to look at his son again. “Draco, you must face the fact that he has left and probably has no intention of coming back. You must understand how impossible it is for an orphan to have a family. Obviously it overwhelmed him.”
“Lucius…”Snape warned but it was too late. Draco’s eyes gleamed with malice.
“The history of Harry’s childhood has nothing to do with any of this!” he hissed. “I will find my husband and then we will leave. You and your demeaning thoughts on the subject of Harry and our family will be left here in this pitiful kingdom you have created and I will thank you to forget that you ever had a son!”
“Draco!” Lucius’s face was a mixture of shock and outrage. “How dare you!”
“I dare because you have been nothing but a black cloud that has darkened my mate’s face. I have attempted to be accommodating to you both, but it ends here. Harry is the most important and you will not say another unkind, degrading, or insulting word about him!” Both Malfoys stared each other in the eye, both breathing hard.
“This accomplishes nothing,” Snape’s low voice broke into the tense atmosphere. “Renouncing your claim as your father’s heir only hurts yourself, Draco. And being acerbic at this time only creates more problems, Lucius. I suggest you both calm down and think with your brains and not with your emotions. You are embarrassing the House of Slytherin.”
Both blonds pulled back at the verbal slap in the face. Lucius seemed to regain his composure first and turned to look at Snape with a calm half-smile. “This is the reason I keep you as a friend, Severus. Otherwise, that tongue and daring of yours would have cost you your life long ago.”
“You flatter me as always, Lucius,” Snape replied coolly while raising an eyebrow.
Lucius nodded his head and straightened his shoulders, collecting himself. “Very well, I will intensify my own end of the search. There are a few places and people in Knockturn Alley that I have yet to question. And with the Aurors busy, I believe I shall be able to do a thorough job of it. Good day.” Without another look at his son, Lucius smoothly left the house.
Two hours later, Snape descended the stairs. The sitting room was silent when he entered it. Snape stopped in the doorway and watched an equally silent Draco stroke a pair of broken and blood-flecked spectacles. “We will find him,” Snape said.
“Is that your mantra, then?” Draco spat out. “You keep saying that, but where is he?” Draco pocketed the wire frames and stalked back toward the window, looking out. “A week, Severus! We should have been able to find him by now!” Draco paused and his shoulders seemed to slump. “Unless Father is right and Harry does not wish to be found,” he murmured.
“You will only drive yourself mad with those thoughts. You sound more and more like an emotional woman waiting for her drunken husband to come home.” Snape’s voice was firm. “When did it matter whether or not he wanted to be found? It is not his choice. He is ours. He has a place and that place is here, with his child, with his husband. Whatever ailment of the brain he is suffering from does not change his lot in life.”
Draco seemed to grow taller with those strong words. He nodded and continued to stare out into the green world. Not even the flutter of wings entering the sitting room disturbed him as he stared, but since there were owls coming in and out of the house at various times of the day, it really wasn’t surprising. Snape snatched the letter as it fluttered down and barely cast an eye at the bird as it flew back out.
“What does it say?” Draco asked with very little expectancy in his voice. Both men had stopped hoping as each letter stated the same negative words.
Snape looked up after finishing reading the hastily scribbled lines. “I do not know if this is good news or bad, but apparently Lupin has taken it upon himself to contribute to the search. Ms. Tonks writes that he has been out searching since he recovered from the full moon earlier this week.”
“I don’t want that mongrel going anywhere near Harry!” Draco hissed and spun to look at Snape. The older man calmly folded the letter.
“Draco, now is not the time to allow-”
“Would you quit with the fucking sermons! You’re as tedious as my father!” Draco snarled. “All you do is preach, but where are the results of the experiments you claim to be doing? Where are the answers I need to bring him home? You are nothing but a-” Draco was stopped by his backwards flight onto the settee. Snape stood over him, his eyes narrowed in anger.
“Would it help if I was as out of control as you? Perhaps I shall have a tantrum every three hours. Would that satisfy you?” Snape spoke icily. “I suggest you rein yourself in, Draco. You are not the only one concerned with this matter. There is an entire nation looking for him. Albus Dumbledore himself is calling in every debt he has ever accrued in his illustrious life to find Harry. The entire Auror division is scouring the cities and villages for any sign of him and all of Wizard-kind has their bleeding hearts in their mouths waiting for any news of their saviour. I suggest you realize that you are the strength of a small child and be her father instead of her sibling. Biting at me and those around you will do nothing to cure your worry.”
Draco glared up at the other man and pushed himself to his feet. Snape did not bother backing up and soon the two were nearly chest to chest. Finally, Draco lowered his eyes and nodded. “Now,” Snape continued in his normal formal tone, “I have nearly finished all my experiments. I am waiting on one last one, but I believe its results will merely confirm my suspicions.”
“What suspicions?” Draco asked as he sat back down on the settee.
“Just now, I have finally isolated what I believe is the cause of Harry’s erratic behaviour.” Snape moved away and stood behind the armchair across the room. Draco surmised that it was the teacher in the older man needing a podium of any kind. “Harry had large amounts of pheromone in him that he should not have had.”
“In him?” Draco’s eyes narrowed. “I thought a pheromone was something that you put out, not have in.”
“Exactly. Harry should not have been showing any pheromone in his blood. But even more disturbing was that it was Supero pheromone.” Snape nodded at Draco’s calculating look. “Yes, now you see it, don’t you? Harry was presenting signs that are typical in one of us in a more… uncivilized mood. The need to dominate, the sexual aggression, the complete disregard he had toward the child, these are all behaviours of a Supero with no pack bonds. His place in our group was as a subicio, therefore, as a Supero, he was struggling. I believe this is what was causing all of it.”
“How could this happen? How would the pheromone be in his blood?” Draco asked sharply.
“The last test I am waiting for will confirm it, but I believe it was ingested. That would explain why he would vary between these stages of… identity crisis. It would not be natural therefore it would only have an effect for a certain time period. It would also depend on how much of a dose he had at each sitting, how often the doses were administered, the layering effect of each dose in a certain period of time, and any activity that would cause the additive to pass through his system faster. All of these factors would cause the violent swings in his demeanour and thought process.”
“And what, did this also have an effect on his memory? Don’t you think Harry would have noticed feeling strange and aggressive?” Draco asked disbelievingly.
“Harry had full recollection of his actions and feelings,” Snape answered, not responding to his companion’s caustic tone. “Unfortunately, this … poison, for lack of a better term, did not alert Harry to the danger due to its gradual take-over of him. Once it had left his body, Harry seemed to have … validated his behaviour as best he could. He described it as being ‘stir-crazy’ when in actuality he was feeling aggressive and had the need to control something. This is where my misinterpretation of his memories came from. I could only understand what he was feeling after the events took place, not while it was actually occurring. If I had been able to, either one of us would have recognized many of his emotions and urges. Harry, having never experienced them before, could only interpret them as best he could and, of course, try to make amends afterwards.”
Draco sat still, his sight unfocused as he stared at the fire slowly licking its way through a large log. Everything was beginning to fall into place now…all of Harry’s actions and words…even his promises that he wouldn’t do it again. Harry really had meant those promises.
Silver eyes looked up into black ones. “Who and why?” he asked, his voice sharp and deadly.
“That I do not know. Have you had any dinner guests? Any fruit baskets or special deliveries?”
“No, none. Wait, Harry’s friends came over the day he disappeared for his ‘walk’,” Draco said and stood up. “I was given a complete list of the persons present, but I would not believe any of them would have anything to gain by turning Harry into a nutter.” Narrowing his eyes, he paced to the fire. “Granger. I could see Granger trying to make Harry leave me, even try to initiate a fight with me.”
“No. A good suspect to want to make Harry more dominant, but Granger is not known for rash moves, especially any that could harm the baby. Besides, this distillation of our pheromone is not known to anyone.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean that only in the last three months have I been experimenting with the idea of bottling our pheromones. I have, of course, done it in complete secrecy. It is possible that there were similar experiments being conducted without my knowledge but-”
“Where did they get the material?” Draco broke in, finishing the question. Snape nodded.
“Exactly. They would have needed to extract the pheromone from a Supero. Not only that, they would have needed a working knowledge of our physiology, which is information I have not published nor spoken about.”
“And they would have had to know not only the Supero but the subicio body and mind,” Draco added.
“And Harry is the only known subicio,” Snape finished. Both men stared at each other for a moment.
“Could we have a spy?” Draco asked darkly.
“It would appear so. I believe we need to start with what food was contaminated. I believe that may lead us to Harry.”
“Ably!” Draco called. With a small pop the elf appeared, his eyes and ears downcast. A faint tremble shook the wringing hands. “Ably, were there any special deliveries of food or drink that occurred during the last week Master Harry was in residence?” Draco’s tone was firm, holding back the anger he felt. The elf had been skittish since the upheaval in the house and he did not want to deal with a frightened house-elf bashing himself in the head in repentance for a fictitious crime.
“No, Master Draco. Only the regular delivery from the grocer came,” the elf said with a tremble in his voice to match the tremor in his hands.
“There was nothing out of the ordinary? No special request by Master Harry?”
“N-no, Master Draco.”
Draco looked at Snape. “Could it have been hidden in the flour or sugar?” he asked impatiently.
Snape pondered the question for a moment. “No,” he finally answered. “This was a delicate task. It had to have only gone to Harry himself. Otherwise you would have felt the effects, as would the infant. The poison could only be administered by someone who knew when Harry was not feeding Maia and had to have been given to him separately …from …you.” Both men stared down at the house-elf, both coming to the same stunning conclusion. The house-elf’s trembling became even more violent and the creature seemed to melt into the floor. Draco snarled and snatched the elf up by its teacloth.
“What have you done?” he hissed.
“Please, Master Draco!” the pathetic creature screeched. “Ably would never hurt Master Harry!”
“Draco, I thought you would have learned from your father’s mistakes and bound the elf to you?” Snape asked sharply as he moved closer, his presence adding to the intimidation.
“I did!” Draco bit out and bared his teeth at the elf in his grip. “He was bound to never leave, never harm any member of this household, and never lie!”
“Then we have an anomaly,” the Potions Master said darkly as he eyed the terrified house-elf.
“Please Master Draco, Ably would never hurt Master Harry! The man said that it would not hurt Master Harry! Ably would never ever use p-poison!” Tears fell from the enormous scrunched eyes.
“What man?” Draco growled and shook Ably hard. The elf cringed further.
“Ably doesn’t know the man’s name. But he gave Ably the potion. The man said that if Ably did not put the potion in Master Harry’s food and drink, then the man and his friends would… would eat my sister and brother.”
“Eat them?” Snape asked.
“Yes, they already ate Ably’s p-parents!” the little elf wailed. “But Ably would never hurt Master Harry, even for Ably’s sister and brother. The man said that the potion would only make Master Harry stronger. The man said this to Ably while taking the truth telling potion!”
“He swore under Veritaserum so the elf could proceed without breaking his bonds to you,” Snape said quickly to Draco then moved even closer and grabbed the elf’s ear. “What did this man look like? Describe him!”
Ably winced at the hard tug on his ear but nodded quickly, eager to help in any way he could. “The man was tall with dark hair. He had a bad scar on his cheek and mean blue eyes. Ably thought he smelled funny, like something that should be washed.”
“And did he come here to this house?” Draco questioned, fighting the urge to tighten his hand around the stupid thing’s neck. “Did he ever speak to or see Harry?”
“No, no, Master Draco. The man only came to the edge of the garden one day. He sh-showed Ably what he had done to Ably’s parents and then told Ably to give Master Harry the potion.” Tears began to flow anew. “But Ably never ever wanted to hurt Master Harry!”
“Stop the blubbering!” Snape barked. “Do you still have the container of potion this stranger gave you?”
“Y-yes, sir. Ably still has it. It still has some potion in it,” the elf whimpered.
“Show us!” Draco growled and tossed the creature down. They quickly followed the elf out of the room.