The Sleeping Beauty Curse

Chapter 15

The next morning, as soon as Harry woke up from a deep, delicious sleep to the horrible sound of his alarm clock, Draco said, "We didn't complete the bond, by the way. Just in case you were wondering. I took off the watch for a moment, just to check."

Harry jumped out of bed and attempted to stab his alarm clock. "You what?" he said as the thing deflected his attempts to kill it. He almost gave up and just tossed it out of the window, when it seemed to sense this imminent destruction and gave in. The silence it left was ringing, too, though. "You said the only thing that would complete the bond was . . ." He faltered, because it was an embarrassing thing to shout, but powered ahead. "Full-on shagging!"

Draco yawned and stretched. He was still wearing Harry's bathrobe, Harry noticed, and it had fallen open to reveal all he'd got. "I know I'm a wonderful sight," Draco said, avoiding the question, "but only rude people stare."

Harry stared at his face instead. It was a pissed-off stare.

"I was almost certain we wouldn't complete the bond," Draco said, failing to wilt under it. "Bonding spells being so obsessed with the creation of an heir. I mean," he continued thoughtfully, and shrugged, "I'm not even certain that if we fucked, the bond would stick. It probably would, given that I'm pure-blood, but it's not like I've grown a womb while we weren't looking."

This wasn't a good way to start a workday, Harry thought, especially after such a great night's sleep. He was pleased that Draco had been spared a nightmare, but did he have to raise things like this now, when Harry had to go to work? "All right, sunshine, get dressed, we're going to see Zabini before I start work," he said grimly, and was deaf to all protests. It was about time Zabini gave them an update, at any rate, he thought. It had been a week, and he and his team must have some news, even if it was just a list of things they'd tried that hadn't worked.

When they got to the Ministry, though, Zabini wasn't there. Kevin saw them instead, and seemed flustered that they'd hoped to see the Slytherin gitface. "H-he never works on Sundays," Kevin said apologetically. "O-or Saturdays either. S-sometimes he doesn't work on W-Wednesdays either, and T-Th—"

All right, all right, Harry got the idea. Zabini was, as he'd always suspected, a useless layabout who—

"I'm glad to hear that someone has some self-control over their working hours and takes proper, regular breaks," Draco said poisonously beside him. "A weekend is a weekend. One Saturday off a month is just self-flagellation."

Harry took from this that Draco was mad that he was back to work on a Sunday. "I work shifts!" he protested.

"Yes, always on and never off," Draco said. "But you were saying, Kevin," he said politely, turning back to the trembling Unspeakable.

Kevin explained that they'd tried loads of things, and done loads of research, but so far they'd found nothing useful. Apparently, no one in the history of wizard-kind had ever stopped a bonding ritual at this particular point. He gave some alarming examples of delayed rituals, which had Harry pressing his thighs together – but modern healing being what it was, Kevin said, they'd all ended happily. One old man had become overexcited by his beautiful new bride and had died, Kevin mused, but the death had released his wife from the spell, returning her magic instantly.

"H-have you considered c-c-c-c-comple-e-e—"

"No," Harry interrupted, putting Kevin out of his misery. "We haven't."

Draco sniffed, suddenly stiff and sarcastic. "Would it even work?"

Kevin frowned at this. "I-I expect so," he said. "It would have failed in the f-first place, if it wasn't going to w-work," he reasoned. "And there's always Polyjuice," he added brightly, "i-if heirs are required. I've often w-wondered if that could work for c-couples like yourselves."