A Dark Time For The Light

46

I can remember. Dumbledore told me. He heard the clap of the front door. “Someone has returned, Harry. Someone who wishes to see you. He is in the Entrance Hall”.. I run out like a demented loony and there you are at the bottom of the steps. Your hair is a delicious mess, your robes are all askew as if I’ve already been kissing you, you are a delight to behold, particularly all dishevelled like that.

I do not care that Ron and Hermione are behind me. I care only that I see you. And that I love you utterly. I approach you, my feet taking an automatic path down the steps although my knees threaten to betray me by failing me. I feel your hands in my hair, your words of love, mine, who cares who utters them first. I care not. You are in my arms and I am in yours and we love each other. It is that simple and that devastatingly complex. For now, I take you into my arms and love you too. I have missed you so much. This is not mere lust, although, admittedly, it plays it’s part. This is love, my Dragon, pure and simple. I hope that you can accept it for what it is. We kiss, they all see, we are out, at long last. Tomorrow I’ll panic when this gets back to your Father, but tonight, I’m the happiest boy on the Planet.

They wake, more or less together, both heads a little sore from hangovers. Harry dressed and headed out. For painkillers and fluids. For his fiance. The term still surprised him, but he’s getting used to it. Draco used it severally while they made love last night. Draco melts as he uses the word, despite his head aching. Draco still wanted to marry him and Harry still accepted. The looks between them, once they surfaced, would melt glass, and they succumbed to a wonderful morning of love and acceptance and future bonding and they both revelled in it, then made each other scream. Draco murmured, “My husband”, as they clambered down from their sexual high, the highest they had ever been.

Harry clutched his sweet Dragon and before they slept, he muttered, “I love you too, my husband”, as sleep claimed them both. They slept in a tight pile. In their own bed. In their flat. It felt so right waking up next to Harry the next day. Loving him, claiming him, even before he was properly awake, then taking him, still befuddled by sleep, making him howl out loud as his Dragon sank himself over and over in his hot willing heat, coming a storm that had Harry clinging to his lover needily. Draco could have taken advantage but didn’t, preferring his lover to lie trembling in his arms and simply holding him ‘til the heat cooled. They trusted each other.

At some point in the celebrations they remembered that they had invited Severus and Remus for the weekend. Neither were particularly surprised to be put off. This had been a trying week for the Light and they accepted the rebuttal in the spirit it was meant and the apology.

Seeing as he had the rest of the week off work and Draco started his own new job next week, the boys made the most of it, feeding each other by day. Exhausting each other by night. Calories in during daylight hours. Calories expended at night.

On Saturday, Harry took Draco to Bond Street and found him a beautiful little ring, a white-gold snake with two pale sapphire eyes that exactly matched Draco’s. Harry protested when Draco suggested buying him a ring, but Harry left his ring to be stretched, “No, Dragon. This is the ring you gave me, and I love it, so this is the ring I will wear”. The young jeweller smiled at them, “You aren’t the first same-gender couple in here looking at engagement rings, and I’m so glad that our government has finally taken their heads out of their collective bottoms and seen sense. Congratulations, boys, when’s the happy occasion?”.

They spent the rest of the day wandering about, eating, exploring, just loving to be alone together in the anonymity of the streets. They fantasised about owning various large mansions they saw in Belgravia, until they peered into the windows of an estate agent’s and Harry pointed to the price of the converted stables or liveryman’s mews cottages alone, never mind the mansions themselves. Draco gagged in astonishment. “I really do feel broke now, Harry”. Harry laughed, “Welcome to the rest of the world, lover of mine”.

They were just leaving the Tube station near their flat, when both of their phones trilled almost simultaneously. They both looked puzzled as they withdrew their phones. Seamus on Harry’s, Ginny on Draco’s. A flood of panic into their respective left ears. Harry. “Whoa, whoa, Seamus, slow down, mate. The traffic’s a bit loud. I can’t tell what you’re sayin’ if you gabble”. Draco was having just as hard a time understanding Ginny.

Then Harry looked up, a prickle in his scar, as Draco was attempting to unlock the flat door, his phone wedged against his ear, then nudged his lover, who’s eyes followed Harry’s. A Dark Mark in the sky, lying in the direction of the Bunker.

They tipped into their hallway and slammed the flat door. “Seamus, there’s a Dark Mark over you. You all have to get out of there, now”. Draco told Ginny, “You’d better leave the Bunker....”, he carried on listening. The calls ended and they waited. Harry tried to contact the other cadres but just got engaged tones. Harry felt very exposed, and went around the flat closing all the curtains, despite the fact that it was still daylight outside. Draco huddled on the couch trying to disappear and Harry paced about, “What in Merlin’s name happened?, Did someone use Magic or what?”.

“Ginny didn’t say, just that someone is dead, it was an accident. Something happened in the kitchen. I couldn’t make it out, she was babbling a bit. They’re on their way here”. Sure enough, the sound of taxis pulling up outside propelled Harry to the front door and the partiers of the other night all trooped in, bearing bin-bags hastily packed and the components of the computer. All the faces were tight with tension. Not a word was uttered until Harry had them all sitting in the lounge.

Hermione was visibly shaking, in shock. “I’ve really fucked up, Harry. I, er, I just killed Peter Pettigrew”.

Silence greeted this. All of the Bunker crew were clinging to each other, fear in every face. Harry’s voice was gentle, “Tell me, ‘Mione, from the top”, he urged. The girl sank her head into her palms, “I was just starting dinner. You know how difficult it is to keep the food supplies from attracting vermin down there, and yesterday, we had to throw out a whole sack of porridge oats ‘cos something had eaten a hole in the sack. I had one of the large cast-iron frying pans in my hand and I saw this blur out of the corner of my eye. A fucking rat. I didn’t stop to think. I just whacked it hard with the frying pan, killed it in a single stroke. Only then it Morphed back into Pettigrew. I’ve just killed a frigging Death-Eater. The Mark you saw was his expiring, the Bunker’s probably awash with ‘em by now. Everyone else has gone, we were the last to leave. Tonks and Kingsley are in the honeymoon suite and everyone was ordered only to take as much as they could carry and to either take or destroy anything written or on disk”.

Draco pondered all of this, “If he’s been filching your food since yesterday, they may already know about the place in any case, though hopefully not the other station, and it’s not like we haven’t detected them before, while we were still there, so it’s quite likely, He was homing in on the Bunker anyway and sent Pettigrew in, I mean a rat is a pretty common sight on the Tube. Sneaky bastard. Where have all the others gone?. Did you all scatter?”.

Seamus spoke up, “No. The majority are on their way to Liverpool as we speak, some are going to Glasgow, the rest have to stay here ‘cos of work and such”. Harry and Draco shared a look then ducked out of the room together, “We’ll have to let them all stay at least tonight and we’ll go and see Hussain later or tomorrow”. Draco nodded, “Yeah, they can all sleep here, but what do we feed them on?”.

Harry whipped out his phone, checked the time, then rang the pub. Belinda, the barmaid, answered. They had a short conversation, then Harry closed his phone, grinning. “They serve food ‘til ten. Come on, love, let’s take them all out for some grub”. Draco returned the smile and kissed his lover on the nose, “Brilliant plan and beats cooking. Lead on”.

Half an hour later and eight sat in the pub, their second drinks in front of them awaiting food and starting to relax. Ginny summed it up as she scrubbed at her face with her hand, “Fuck, guys, what a week!”