The Price of Light | drarry

four | malfoy's world

April 2002

Harry's a good twenty minutes' walk into the undergrowth of the forest before he cracks and realises his need for Lumos to see anything at all. It's growing into a cold, almost oppressive darkness in the centre of the woods, and gnarled branches and reeds bar his every step, while knotted logs and boulders create a frustrating obstacle course ok the ground.

What's more frustrating, of course, is that Harry has no idea what he's looking for. Is he looking for evidence that Lucius Malfoy was here before he died? Is he looking for an actual Horcrux? More Death Eaters in hiding? All three?

"Just find what you can," Rosen told him casually yesterday. But what's that supposed to mean?

Harry sighs and rubs his scar absent-mindedly. He wishes Ron was with him to keep up the usual banter and distract him from his thoughts, or just to share in the weirdness of the situation.

He's thinking about what else his boss said the day before, though, about the state of Malfoy's body when it was found. How it looked more like an unoccupied shell than a dead body. How there was a dark vision spotted flying from the prison walls in the early hours of the same morning - Harry's convinced it was a soul.

It's not a surprise that Lucius would have a Horcrux, but it's still disgusting.

Evil snake, Harry thinks suddenly, and he means it. Lucius Malfoy is - was - the most venomous and twisted creature ever to lead the revolution, with potential even above Tom Riddle in Harry's opinion. There's just something about his "Real Purebloods of the Revolution" slogan that makes Harry's blood run cold.

"Vile, vile," he mutters to himself. Twigs snap like little explosions underfoot. He's had enough of explosions, enough of chaos.

But then suddenly, he sees him. All at once, like a dream. And he's ... no - is he? Is he beautiful?

In his sleep, Draco Malfoy looks smaller than Harry remembers him, and less broad, more angular.

He's partially hidden under a web of fir branches that drop emerald needles in his hair, which just as light as it ever was, but now long enough to fall over his cheekbones and brush into his eyes. It was always kept short at school.

Harry wonders about waking him. He has to arrest him, that's for sure. Should he touch him now? Or now? He leans in. Weird. No.

Months of Auror training, and now all it takes is the sight of a sleeping boy he used to hate to completely throw Harry off.

Used to. It's hard to hate him in his sleep.

But in the end, the decision is made for him - in an instant Malfoy's eyes snap open, and he overpowers Harry onto his back in a fluid, panther-like motion. His sharp knees press straight into Harry's chest, and with one slender hand he holds the other boy's wrists down above his head.

"What a lovely surprise, Potter," he hisses. His face is inches from Harry's, his breath hot and his eyes wild, and for a good few seconds Harry's too shocked and overwhelmed to react at all.

Because in that moment, he's not twenty-two any more, with his Auror qualifications and his stubble and his mortgage.

He's fifteen and on the school Quidditch pitch with his rival, and God, he hates him so much, but more than anything he hates the way he makes him feel, and he hates the proximity and the heat and the aggression-