…o0o…

Four and Half Seasons

Part III

Winter 2008

…o0o…

When Harry goes to Malfoy for the first time in a decade, he does it just to pick a fight. There is an old, restless rage deep in his bones that itches for an outlet.

In the end he leaves with his battle unfought, while the taste of cheap Earl Grey still lingers on his tongue.

If he keeps going back, it is somewhat for the tea and only a bit because the haunted look Malfoy wears reminds him of Sirius.

Mostly it is because Malfoy appears so thoroughly messed up in the head that he makes Harry feel almost sane.

...

Harry makes wands.

When the days pass him by agonizingly slow and uneventful, he passes the time by carving pieces of wood into proper shapes. Oak, cypress, hawthorn, maple. If the walls of his house begin to loom over him heavily, he leaves to wander in the forests until his pockets are full of branches, feathers and hairs. At night, the ghosts of people long dead haunt his dreams as if the Peverell ring itself were on Harry's finger, so he gets up quietly and wastes the night away placing cores into their wooden shells.

Willow is an exceptionally difficult wood to work with. Touch it too soon, whether by hand or by magic, and it will bend. Wait too long and it will crack. Willow is all about timing and Harry has never been a patient man.

Swishy and snappy , Mr. Ollivander always described the material, sounding fondly frustrated every time.

Harry feels nothing fond when he carves yet another wand and mutters swears under his breath. Usually he finds wandcraft relaxing, almost like a meditation that takes off the edge of his constant restlessness.

Today is different.

So, he gives up, pulls on his boots and throws on a worn coat. He Dispparates before the door of Grimmauld Place has swung closed behind him.

Malfoy's face is blank and utterly unsurprised when he opens the door. Harry has showed up on his doorstep half a dozen times now and from what he can tell, Malfoy doesn't get any other guests.

"Don't you have a home of your own?" Malfoy asks as a greeting, but the bite is missing.

"Yes, but it's full of cursed things. Your tea cups are a safer bet," Harry replies and steps in, the wards a warning but welcoming hum in his head.

Malfoy looks unconvinced, but puts the kettle on nevertheless. Harry stalks through the tiny rooms, back and forth. Malfoy sits at the table and watches.

Minutes pass, until the kettle whistles.

"Why are you here?" Malfoy asks.

Harry doesn't know.

"Get your coat," Harry says then, too agitated and restless to stay confined, "We're going hunting."

Malfoy blinks slowly, surprised, and asks, "Hunting for what?"

Harry knows his grin is on the side of wicked because an alarmed look appears on Malfoy's face.

Harry takes him to the Forbidden Forest without thinking much of it. It is only when Malfoy looks around the trees, moss and ferns with an old worry written all over his face that Harry realizes that the nostalgia that strangles at his throat might become too much to bear.

"Hunting for what?" Malfoy asks again slowly in that measured, careful way he speaks nowadays, like every word is precious.

Harry grins, "Let's just say that at least Quirrell won't be a problem anymore."

Malfoy's expression is sour, but doesn't argue when he follows Harry through the trees.

They don't find the unicorn this time around, but they collect shimmery white hairs that are stuck on branches and tree bark here and there. Malfoy doesn't say much as the hours tick by, but Harry is sure he is not the only one who feels younger and braver than he ought to.

...

Afterwards, Malfoy stands in the entry hall of Grimmauld Place, ancient dust creeping up his ankles, and Harry beings to hesitate. He's not sure why he brought them here instead of Malfoy's pristinely orderly apartment; why he'd want to subject anyone to the godforsaken hellhole that is his home. But when Harry makes twitchy, awkward gestures back towards the door, Malfoy doesn't seem to even notice. He looks around the grim hallway with a blank expression.

"About as cosy as Azkaban," he observes finally.

"Then you should feel right at home," the remark rolls from Harry easily, carelessly.

Malfoy shoots him a glare. It tugs the corners of Harry's mouth upwards, as he raises a finger to his lips, urging silence. Malfoy doesn't question him and they tiptoe past Mrs. Black's portrait like two kids up to no good. It makes Harry feel reckless and foolish; ; like he's fifteen again and ready to take on the world and war and whatever may come.

The portraits in the hallways are intrusive and curious when Harry leads his guest through the house. The house hasn't seen many visitors over the years, so the ancient Blacks take their amusement where they can. Harry feels oddly like he can relate, just a bit on the side of giddy.

"This way," he says and steps into the room he uses when he works.

Malfoy steps in, casting wary looks at the showcases and haphazardly packed boxes. There is a dusting of wood chips and sawdust over everything; both Harry and Kreacher have a lax approach to cleanliness. The scene is discriminating and the dots connect quickly.

"You. . . make wands," Malfoy says, as if testing the words out.

Harry shrugs, "Yes."

Malfoy just stares and Harry twitches uncomfortably.

"Everyone needs hobbies," he says and discreetly wipes wood chips off the table top.

"Wands," Malfoy says and looks around with strange bafflement.

Harry laughs. He's not quite sure why, but it feels damn good.

...

They develop a routine where Harry regularly drags Malfoy out of his apartment to roam in whichever forest Harry can come up with. Afterwards, they always return to Grimmauld place and drink tea, or firewhiskey, or both, and sort through wandcrafting materials in silence.

Kreacher carries a strange, fervent torch for Malfoy and often wanders after him around the house with a worshipful look on his wrinkly elven face. It amuses Harry only slightly more than it disturbs Malfoy.

"You should just put his head on the wall," Malfoy tells Harry daily.

"Because isn't that just what the décor needs," Harry replies and not even Malfoy can argue with that.

12 Grimmauld Place, true to its name, is grim and old and miserable, but somehow Malfoy fits right into the empty spaces. Perhaps it is because he is a Black and the house welcomes him home. Or perhaps it is because the years in Azkaban have rendered him into a silent, haunted version of his former self and Grimmauld Place always has room for one more ghost. Harry does not question it too much, because somehow Malfoy's presence fills some of the empty spaces in him , and that is a blessing Harry tries very hard not to count.

"Don't you have a home of your own?" Harry teases him one day when Malfoy turns up on his own early one morning.

Malfoy doesn't take the bait, merely shrugs and says, "Not like this."

Harry has no answer to that, so he feeds Malfoy Kreacher's horrible casserole and offers the mouldy smelling teas he finds in the cupboard for dessert. Even when Malfoy makes displeased faces throughout it, there's something almost peaceful in his eyes sometimes, so Harry doesn't mind.

...

"I apprenticed for Ollivander," Harry reveals eventually.

It's a cold Sunday in early December and they are sitting on the workspace floor, sorting through piles of unfinished wands. At Harry's words Malfoy looks up from the task and quirks a brow curiously.

Harry shrugs, "I had nothing else to do. I think he secretly hoped I could remake the Elder Wand or something like it, since I had once mastered it."

Malfoy hums noncommittally and bins an unsalvageable birch wand.

"Could you?" he asks, almost as an afterthought.

"I don't know," Harry admits and offers a wry smile over the box between them. "You tell me."

Malfoy stares thoughtfully at the numerous wands spread across the room for a while, a small wedge forming between his eyes. "These are all shite."

Harry snorts, "I know. I keep the good ones elsewhere."

They sit in silence for close to an hour and work, while an insistent idea grows in the back of Harry's mind. He catches himself staring at Malfoy's hands on more than a few occasions, wondering.

Eventually Malfoy has enough of it: "What?"

"I could make you one," slips from Harry's tongue and once the idea is out in the open it's impossible to cage again, "A wand, you know. I'm not actually half bad."

The silence afterwards is mute with surprise, and Malfoy just sits there staring at him. Juniper perhaps, Harry thinks absentmindedly, or hawthorn.

"I can't use magic," Malfoy replies eventually, reluctantly, as if confessing something shameful and ugly.

For a moment Harry is confused, thinks about the hundreds of spells and hexes he has seen the other cast. When it clicks, he feels a bit like an idiot. Not can't , precisely, but not allowed.

"Oh," Harry mutters and turns back to the task at hand. A dozen wands move from one pile to another, before he breaks the silence again, "I won't tell if you don't."

Malfoy looks at him frozenly, eyes brimming with something hesitant and carefully hopeful. Harry swallows hard under the weight of it, wondering if he's perhaps promising too much; throwing rocks at a drowning man.

"I'm pretty sure the wards can hide it," he adds, and for some reason it is quiet, almost a whisper.

A minute ticks past slowly while Malfoy seems to waver. He clutches one of Harry's wands in a white-knuckled grip and there is something between sheer terror and burning need fighting behind his eyes. Harry doesn't dare to say anything, just holds his breath and waits.

" Accio, " the spell is almost soundless when Malfoy casts. The flick is perfect, and it summons one of the wands that has rolled too far away; the simplest of spells. Still, the charm seems to shudder through Malfoy's entire body and the rough gasp that leaves him sounds almost pained. Harry makes an instinctive, aborted movement towards him as if to reach over to touch, but stops before he quite can.

When Malfoy's eyes snap up to his they are full of wonder and old ache.

Ten years, Harry realises suddenly, and all words seem insufficient.

"Maybe this one isn't terrible," Malfoy gives, as he looks down at the wand he holds.

If Harry afterwards spends ten hours straight working with juniper and unicorn hair, then no one needs to know about it, least of all Malfoy himself.

...

Winter nights are long and Harry has nothing but time, so the situation gets quickly out of hand.

Where Ollivander had used words such as 'supple', 'brittle' and 'volatile' to tactfully describe Harry's less fortunate attempts, Malfoy calls the wands flimsy, feeble and fucking lethal. But he never complains, not really, just casts silly little charms with every one of them and makes unimpressed faces even when his hands begin to shake and some unnamed emotion steals his few words.

Eventually Harry keeps to his promise and manages a decent one. Then five of them. After a dozen he starts to wonder if he can ever stop. He has made hundreds of wands, but never for a specific person, never like this. Malfoy pretends indifference, but Harry has seen his expression grow softer and eyes warmer with each wand Harry presents him, so maybe for once everything is just fine.

...

"I should go," Malfoy says when the shadows grow long and dark one night.

"Or you could stay," Harry suggests.

Malfoy scoffs. "Salazar forbid. I'd rather not."

He stays. If he somehow forgets to leave altogether, neither of them brings it up.

Malfoy takes over one of the bedrooms upstairs and becomes such a fixed part of Harry's life that sometimes when he leaves Harry feels out of sorts, lost in the rooms of his own home. As time passes Malfoy's absences become rarer but more prominent.

"Where do you think he goes?" Harry asks the painting of Phineas Nigellus on Christmas Eve, when the house is emptier and hollower than it usually is.

"Probably home, you fool," the former headmaster answers and shakes his head despairingly.

"Oh," Harry replies and works through the night to distract himself, because evidently he is a fool. Malfoy doesn't live here and he is free to spend his Christmas however he wishes to. Harry has no claim.

In the morning the screams of Mrs. Black alert Harry and he finds Malfoy in the entry hall. He sits on the floor leaning heavily against the wall and stares at the angry, raging woman in the painting. There's soot on his face and ash in his hair, and Harry can't help it, he worries.

Harry wanders over and sits on the floor next to Malfoy, not close enough to touch, but close enough to smell the smoke that clings to him.

"I burnt it down," Malfoy tells him, quietly.

"Burnt what down?" Harry asks.

"The Manor," Malfoy replies. "I had a dream that he was still there."

Voldemort , Harry's mind supplies. He can imagine the nightmare all too vividly, because his own aren't that different.

"He can't be there, if there's no place to be," Harry concludes and Malfoy shoots him a grateful look.

Mrs Black disagrees, loud and obnoxious, "You foolish, arrogant boy! You'd destroy that which your ancestors built? You are all the same! Bloodtraitors the lot of you!"

"I imagine that's what my father would say," Malfoy sighs and seems to find it an odd comfort.

Harry just nods, understanding. They sit there for a moment, listening to the insults the painting spews at them.

"Merry Christmas," Harry says finally.

The thinnest sliver of a smile steals onto Malfoy's face. "Merry Christmas."

...

The thing is that Malfoy fits into Harry's life like a missing puzzle piece. He fills the odd holes, reaches across the disconcerting gaps and somehow just makes sense where none existed before. In some ways he is exactly as Harry remembers him, snarky and rude and a Slytherin to boot, and in other ways completely strange and foreign, quiet and downtrodden and impossibly sad. Somehow Malfoy becomes the bridge between the missing years; the overarching continuum between what was and what is; the storyline to the broken narrative in Harry's head.

"Potter," Malfoy says and tells him that he is insane, messed up and fucking useless. Maybe he doesn't use quite as many words, but it is all implied in the silence between the syllables.

And then Malfoy looks at him and that look says it's alright to be those things, because Malfoy is the same.

Harry doesn't quite know what to do with it.

...

After the year turns to the next, Harry finally finds the courage to confess.

"I forgot about you," Harry admits quietly one night in the Grimmauld Place's sitting room, the words reluctant and ugly.

Malfoy turns to look and his eyebrows draw together. "What?"

"They locked you into Azkaban for ten years . And I completely forgot about you," Harry says and swallows down guilt and regret and the taste of bile. He reluctantly takes a look at Malfoy, waiting for the verdict, but secretly wishing for forgiveness.

Malfoy doesn't look angry or resentful. Instead he looks back with something like thoughtful bafflement.

"Everyone did," he replies after a moment and shrugs a little.

Harry can't quite believe that Malfoy feels as nonchalant about it as he pretends, so, he insists, "It was like you never even existed. You were just. . . gone."

This time Malfoy huffs, his mouth twitching into a wry, one-sided smile.

"I know," he says and turns back to his book, "I had ten years to think about this. Trust me, I know."

Harry stares at him in the soft, flickering glow of the fireplace, takes in the gaunt face and bitter downward turn of the narrow lips, and silently, desperately, wishes for a timeturner.

...

Late one night the ghosts drive Harry to his work again.

He talked with Remus in his dream, " How is my boy ?" and Harry told him about Teddy and how bright he's growing up to be. Remus had shaken his head, " How would you know as little as you see him? " Sirius was there too, " Don't mind him, old friend. He never visits me either and it's not that long way to go."

So, Harry is awake with regrets both old and new on his mind, as he sinks into his craft. He likes to do it the muggle way, knife sharp and sure on its path across the wood.

There are quiet steps at the door.

"Can't sleep?" Malfoy asks as he lurks in the doorway.

Harry looks up enough to give him a wan smile. "Not for years."

"Me neither," Malfoy admits, still hovering, indecisive whether to come or go.

"Keep me company?" Harry asks, eyes firmly on his work.

Malfoy doesn't say anything, only steps through the door. He takes a seat on the windowsill and stares into the night. He is pale and almost ethereal in the dim light when Harry steals a look, the shadows under his eyes dark like bruises. He looks dead, Harry thinks, and suddenly the idea consumes him. Another ghost, of course, come to haunt him from the past, because why would Malfoy be here , in his house in the middle of his haunted night.

"Draco," Harry says quietly, almost a plea.

"Shut up. It's too bloody late for chitchat," Malfoy replies and shoots him a look that Harry can't quite read, before he turns back towards the window.

Something tight unfurls in Harry's chest. He turns back to the piece of wood in his hands. It takes shape slowly. Maybe by the dawn Harry will know what it ought to look like.

"Grumpy git," Harry mutters to Malfoy, before getting back to work.

They sit in silence through the night, both endlessly grateful for the company of another living soul.

...

Ron drops by one morning on his way to work. It's January and the world is crisp and brittle with winter chill. Ron shuffles awkwardly in his auror's winter gear around Harry's sitting room, casting wary looks around.

"Blimey, this place gives me the creeps," he says.

Harry looks around, frowning. "I think it's fine."

Ron looks at him and grins like Harry's response is the funniest thing he's heard in a while. "I know. Merlin's hairy balls, do I know. Your bizarre taste is why I'm here."

"Yeah?" Harry asks, absentmindedly, and discreetly kicks a couple dust bunnies under the sofa. "Do you want tea? Firewhiskey?"

"Some of us have work with regular hours," Ron points out. "I don't really have the time. Ginny send me and she'll expect a report once I get to the Ministry."

"How is Ginny?"

"You're deflecting. What's up with you and Malfoy?"

Harry startles. "What?"

"Don't pull that crap with me," Ron says and even though he looks amused, the words are steel. "Ginny's gone all mother hen on the sleazy bastard and she wants to know about your intentions."

"I don't have any?" Harry replies, uncertain and wrong-footed. "He just visits sometimes." It is a gross understatement, as lately Malfoy is more often there than away.

Ron gives him a searching look, before nods carefully. "Right. I'll tell her that. She seemed to worry that you're, eh... I don't know."

Harry knows. "She thought I was keeping an eye on him. Because he was a Deatheater and I'm sort of crazy."

Ron grimaces and shuffles on his feet.

"Well, she's wrong," Harry says, suddenly agitated and slightly insulted.

Ron shrugs. "Yeah, that's what I said. You were obsessing over Malfoy long before he was a Deatheater."

Harry can't make up his mind if that is any less insulting.

"And are you, you know, shagging him?" Ron asks next, awkwardly.

Harry stares. Ron stares back, uncomfortable but resolute.

Harry clears his throat. It's loud in the silent sitting room. "Ginny asked you to ask me if I'm shagging Malfoy?"

"Yes. I mean, no. It was 'Mione," Ron replies. "And she just speculated but… mate, it's Malfoy. "

"I'm not shagging him," Harry hurries to interrupt.

Ron doesn't look convinced. "Yeah?"

" Yes . He's just… here. Sometimes," Harry stumbles over words, looking for an adequate explanation. "You know, for tea."

"For tea?" Ron repeats, eyebrows going up. "Mate, that swirl you serve for tea is practically poison. Whatever he comes here for, it's not the tea, I promise you."

"I don't know why he comes here," Harry lies and thinks about the desperate, elated way Malfoy casts spells in Grimmauld Place. The wards are old and strong and seem to hide every incantation, but still weeks later Malfoy seems to wait for the ax to fall after every spell he casts.

Ron shakes his head and returns to the fireplace. "Well, I don't care to know. I can tell Ginny to relax and that's enough for me. Maybe she'll get off my back about this."

Ron steps into the fireplace and says, "Family lunch this Sunday at the Burrow. Be there. Mum will be sad if you miss it and the kids are forgetting what you dumb face even looks like."

"Well, we can't have that," Harry mumbles, "Me and my dumb face will make an appearance."

"You better or I'll sic Hermione on you," Ron smiles. Then he hesitates for the briefest moment, before adds, "You can bring Malfoy, if you want."

Then he floos away before Harry can recover from his surprise.

He doesn't bring Malfoy to the Sunday lunch with the Weasleys, because it is an all-around bad idea. Yet, when he sits there surrounded by friends and family and their endless, benevolent prodding, he misses home.

...

It is late January and Malfoy cooks in his kitchen one evening. The sight makes Harry stop in the doorway.

Malfoy has one of the wands Harry has made him keeping up at least half a dozen spells, stirring, chopping, pouring, mixing. Kreacher stands next to him, bulbous eyes wide and horrified, small hands wringing at the dirty rags the elf wears. It is obvious Malfoys has taken over the kitchen by force. He seems less put together than usual, sleeves rolled up to his elbows and something unguarded in his stance.

Kreacher notices Harry first and utters something incoherent and desperate, but Harry barely hears.

"You should put his head on the wall," Malfoy tells Harry for the hundredth time. He glances up, eyes smiling, even though his face is somber. Harry barely hears him either.

His eyes are fixed on Malfoy's arm, where stark and distinct against the pale skin lies the Dark Mark. Malfoy catches on quickly and startles violently, the spells all breaking at once. Vegetables roll on the floor, a honey jar shatters, the pot spits out boiling water, and Malfoy is pulling down his left sleeve with quick, erratic movements.

"No, please, stop," Harry gasps. He makes a blind grasp and there's a scuffle. More things fall and break.

"Son of a bitch ," Malfoy grunts. There's a hex that stings something awful, but Harry's fingers are wrapped around Malfoy's wrist and he isn't letting go.

"Draco, please ," he manages and maybe it's the name, maybe it's the skin contact, maybe it's sheer shock and horror at being physically assaulted, but Malfoy freezes and stops struggling. His eyes are wide and startled, wary and weary. Harry can't bear to watch, so he looks away, down at the Mark.

He rubs his thumb across it experimentally, but it is real: the skull and the entwined snake, the Mark of the Dark Lord. It sits there, ugly, bold and condemning, branded on Malfoy's arm forever. Harry stares and stares and tries to breath.

"Let go," Malfoy whispers, low and threatening, but he sounds terrified most of all.

But Harry can't let go, and that is the essence of the whole problem.

"It's like it wasn't even real, The War. Voldemort," the words spill from Harry in a desperate, hopeless slew. Draco flinches violently at the name, but Harry carries on uninterrupted, "People just forgot and moved on like it never even happened. Sometimes… sometimes I think maybe I made it up. Made him up."

There is a beat of silence before Draco replies, forcefully, "It was real."

Harry looks at the Mark. Evidence. He looks at Draco. A witness. Still he wonders, wildly, if he made this man up too. Draco seems to read it on his face.

"I'm real," Draco says next. There is urgency in his tone, like he needs to convince not just Harry but himself too.

"Are you?" Harry asks in a moment of weakness.

"Well, you see me, even though no one else seems to," Draco replies and shrugs a little.

Harry snorts. "I wouldn't take that at face value. I might just be crazy."

Draco quirks a brow. "Might? You flatter yourself."

Harry does, doesn't he, because his next thought is loud and clear and very much about shagging Draco and isn't that just wonderful. It takes him by surprise, the sudden, desperate desire to push Draco against the kitchen cabinets and kiss him senseless, maybe strip him naked and lick him head to toe and blow him on the floor among the broken glass and vegetables, because surely, surely, you couldn't do that to a hallucination.

"Bloody Ron," he says. Draco makes a sour face at him.

"You're confusing me with someone else," he says.

"I'm really not," Harry grins and shakes his head. There's a jab and a searing pain in Harry's side and he startles back, letting go. He swears quietly that he will stop making Malfoy wands if the git continues hexing him. It is probably a lie.

"You're helping me clean up this mess," Draco tells him.

"My kitchen, I can leave it a mess if I want to," Harry argues petulantly.

Draco levels him a blank stare and Harry cleans up the damn kitchen. He tells himself that he does it just because it causes Kreacher evident distress that is quite amusing. By the time the chaos is cleared and the cooking is on its way again, Harry has almost convinced himself that it has nothing to do with how Draco has left his sleeves rolled up and how he keeps looking at Harry like he can't quite believe Harry is real either.

...o0o...

-tbc-

...o0o...