It's been eating my brain for a week. Literally. To the point where I'm on the phone with customers, and I start saying bits of dialog instead of whatever it is I get paid to say.

I haven't been able to finish the books I was nose deep in, nor the fics I've been getting caught up on.

Never mind the fire_fic fic. It comes in drips and dribbles. But at least it's not (I don't think, but I'm no judge of these things) sucking.

Supernatural--omg. It's was like reading tabaqui--laughter and tears, right on the heels of each other. I'm in dire need of hug-age.

Oh, and snow? 8-10 inches today. Winter Wonderland my shiny hiney.

So. More Prisoner!verse. Concrit would be brilliant =)


Heavy Words, And Lightly Thrown
Author: _beetle_
Fandom: HP
Pairing: Draco/Dennis, (mentions of Harry/Dennis)
Rating: R (surprise!)
Disclaimer: Stealing other people's ideas to warp them for my own sick amusement is fun . . . but not profitable. Concrit very welcome.
Notes/Spoilers/Warnings: Set post-Hogwarts by thirteen years, in the Prisoner!verse, a few months after Proactive Measures. Angsty.
Summary: I think the Smiths sum it up much better than I ever could, but . . . epiphany meets inordinately bad timing. Wackiness ensues.



"You have to know something more than they do!" Creevey blurts out, blocking a surprised Draco at the entrance to the Potions classroom, taking up the rest of a conversation Draco doesn't recall starting and has no intention of continuing.


He tries to move past Creevey into the dim corridor, but finds his way blocked again by the wide-eyed, clearly upset wizard. He sighs. "Of course I do. And I know a lot more than that, besides. Now, if you'll excuse me. . . ."


But Creevey doesn't move, merely gapes at him for a moment. Gobstruck is not a particularly attractive expression on him.


Crossing his arms, Draco sneers as forbiddingly as possible. He'll not likely cow the man, only annoy him, but sneering is habit, and those die hard. "How may I assist you, Mr. Creevey, and at such a mature hour?"


Creevey's mouth shuts with a snap and he squares his narrow shoulders. "The Mediwitches and Wizards--the ones that say he'll--" those pale blue eyes are shuttered as his shoulders slump. "You're from a family of dark witches and wizards, practically one yourself--"


Draco's lip curls like that of a cornered stray. "I never took the Mark, if you'll recall."


Creevey laughs, a jagged sort of exclamation. "There were Dark Wizards long before there was anything so convenient as a Dark Mark to make spotting them easi--oi! Steady on!" He glares when Draco grabs his arm and propels him into the corridor.


"A little more discretion from you, Creevey. I'd rather not have teams of Aurors breaking down my wards in the middle of the night. Yet again," he hisses in the man's ear, close enough to smell his skin . . . almost taste it. But Creevey yanks his arm away and plants himself in Draco's path, like he's settling in for a good, long talk--like it, or not, Mr. Malfoy.


Draco glances around the seemingly empty corridor and sighs again. "If you must persist in asking me such questions, you'll not do so in a public corridor. Come with me."


He steps around Creevey and stalks off deeper into Slytherin territory. Creevey shadows him, edgy but wraith-silent. They encounter no one on their way. Of course. The only other people with reason to be about this late are the Prefects and Filch. The former learned long ago to turn a blind eye to Professor Malfoy's late night strolls and the latter is rarely seen near the Dungeons, anyway.


A brief pause to check that the Potions supply closet is still locked--Draco muttering about Gryffindor thieves--and they continue on to his office.


The Dungeons are far too dank and dismal for a sybarite of Slughorn's age and temperament to take up residence in, but perfect for Draco. His office and personal quarters were once Snape's, and he finds such blatant reminders of the man he's been forced to model his post-Azkaban life after . . . comforting.


After all, if Snape had learned put up with that scatty old codger Dumbledore for twenty years, then Draco could certainly tolerate Potter for a mere five.


At nearly three years on, he finds he has to tell himself that less and less often. His life, though far from good, is tolerable.


Most of the time, Draco thinks, wandlessly unlocking his office door and passing through his wards. Creevey follows him in trustingly, stupidly. Merlin save the world from Gryffindors.


But at least he has the good sense to look around him once inside. Draco does the same out of habit, noting the full bookshelves and spartan furnishing. A desk and chair directly opposite to the door. Two sturdy old chairs in front of his fireplace. A cloak-rack near the door. All of it undisturbed since this morning.


Draco sits in the left-hand chair without offering Creevey its opposite. But the man immediately takes it anyway, as if they've been sitting together at this hearth for years. The thought sends a frisson of--something through Draco.


For while, nothing is said. Draco tries not to stare at Creevey, and Creevey stares at his hands. They're shapely and clean. Draco briefly wonders if he and Potter play Quidditch together, but is easily distracted by the rare chance to observe without being observed.


As usual, Creevey's eschewed decent wizarding attire for yet another pair of a seemingly endless supply of denim trousers, and sports-related jersies (Puddlemere United this one proclaims in faded gold letters; every so often a tiny snitch goes flitting across the deep blue background). Instead of sandals, his feet are shod in some sort of silly Muggle tennis shoes, a concession to the chilly weather.


There's nothing special about Creevey's looks either, as Draco will be the first to attest, should anyone ever ask him. He's a man of average height, tending toward short (an inch taller than Potter, three inches shorter than Draco), average build, tending toward slim, with even, completely unremarkable features aside from his eyes.


Eyes that are currently concealed by a hanging head and shaggy fringe, but have recently looked like nothing so much as desperate and lost.


"Explain yourself," Draco commands, almost gently. Creevey brushes his hair off his face and it immediately flops back.


"They keep saying he'll get better. That he's not just a piece of meat laying in a hospital bed, staring out a bloody window till he stops breathing. For eight years they've said have hope and we'll sort something out. You'll get your brother back." Creevey turns his gaze from the empty hearth to his hands, biting his bottom lip. A habit picked up from Potter, no doubt.


"But you no longer believe that," Draco prods when Creevey's brooding silence has filled up a good five minutes.


"How can I? They can't even fix Gilderoy bloody Lockhart for more than a few days at a time. Col wasn't--isn't as lucky."


"Lucky? Interesting word choice to describe any patient in the Spell-Damage ward."


Creevey laughs bitterly. "Not their exact words, but that's what was implied. That we were lucky Col wasn't dead. D'you know my mum would go to church every day just to thank the Lord for sparing her boy? But she never asked Him to bring Col back, no. As if God might actually take her child's life as punishment for her presumption, if she did."


"That's ludicrous."


"Not to a lapsed Catholic. She never stopped blaming herself for--'a lifetime of sin' being visited upon her firstborn. Till the day she died, she--" Creevey stops himself, as if aware he's rambling.


Draco shifts uncomfortably, unsure of how to offer comfort, even if he were of a mind to. Mrs. Creevey had been a . . . kind, if distracted woman. Nothing like his own mother, of course. Very obviously Muggle, small, thin. Plain, like her sons: annoyingly enthusiastic, like her eldest son. She'd doted ridiculously on her youngest, however. And Potter, as well; in such a manner that even Draco's teeth ached when he saw her simply in passing.


But the orphan in Potter had seemed to take her in stride, went out of his way to make time for her, even when Creevey was off de-cursing . . . whatever.


"The worst Obliviates on record weren't catatonic," Creevey says so softly, it robs his voice of any tone. "They'd simply regressed to a state of mental infancy. A blank slate that was capable of learning--relearning their lives all over again. If it was just that, it would've been . . . hard. But in time, I'd have had my brother back. Colin . . . his mind wasn't just wiped clean, it was wiped out. It's a miracle the part of his brain that controls involuntary function hasn't suffered."


Following Creevey's gaze to the cold fireplace, Draco mutters Incendio, and a blazing, inappropriately cheery fire springs into being. He does this in unheard of deference to Creevey's lack of robe. But his guest seems to notice neither the wandless magic, nor the fire itself.


Sighing, Draco casts his mind over what he knows.


Mostly, it's just dribs and drabs he's heard from Potter: Colin Creevey has been in the Spell-Damage ward of St. Mungo's for ten years. Obliviated by person or persons unknown, whilst chasing the biggest story that would ever hit the pages of any newspaper in the wizarding world.


Three days after Potter was found stumbling around Devon, delirious and half dead, Creevey was found, blank, dehydrated and filthy, at the outskirts of Nott Manor.


To this day, there is only speculation about how many times Creevey had been Obliviated, and in how rapid a succession. The wand presumed to have done the Obliviating was destroyed, along with its wielder, making Priori Incantato useless for revealing anything other than--the last spell Creevey had cast was not defensive in nature.


Snuck up on and cursed while his back was turned, is the prevailing theory. Colin Creevey had not been challenged to a Duel.


Draco's mouth purses in distaste. "And all of this concerns me . . . how?"


The tired gaze Creevey turns on him is too candid, too uncomfortable to bear, and Draco isn't even looking at him. "We live in a magical world, goddamnit. There has to be something. If not a spell, then a potion--"


"There doesn't have to be anything, Mr. Creevey," Draco says coldly, or means to. But for some reason, his voice only sounds matter of fact. No doubt the late hour effecting his energies. "And just as one does not cure toxins with spells, so one does not cure curses with potions. Any third year, even a Hufflepuff could tell you the same."


"There are exceptions--"


"--that merely prove the rule." Draco meets Creevey's gaze, steeled against it. Or so he thinks till his heartrate picks up ever so slightly.


"He's my brother, Mr. Malfoy. Any exception is enough. Even if it only proves the rule." The righteous conviction that Potter seems to burn with almost constantly, shines quietly, but no less powerfully in Creevey's eyes now, the blue of them like the heart of a flame. "Can you help me?"


"I doubt it."


"Let me rephrase: if there's anything that can be done, will you help me do it?"


"Of course not."


A flare of that righteous Gryffindor anger, but with compellingly dark undertones of despair. Creevey seems to blink it away, his fingers tightening on the arms of his chair till they're as bloodless as any corpse. "But you're a Malfoy--probably a direct descendent of Salazar Slytherin! You were weaned on the Dark Arts."


Draco delicately hoists a quelling eyebrow. "I'm no dark wizard, despite what you may have heard or surmised. I'll admit that my family tree is . . . colorful. But I no longer have access to the Dark magic and artifacts once associated with it. The Malfoy collections and libraries are buried so deep within the Ministry even Scrimegour probably can't get to them. I'll bet Potter can, though," Draco adds, thinking: those spineless boot-lickers would stand on their heads if Potter asked.


Creevey snorts. "Harry does seem to be their fair-haired boy, once more. Was touch and go for quite a while there, because of you. And me," he adds ruefully.


A silence falls between them, too laden with grim irony to be comfortable.


"Creevey . . . for what it's worth, St Mungo's is quite possibly the best hospital on Earth. And while I don't suggest making a habit of accepting popular wisdom, if anyone can find a way--"


"Bollocks." Creevey's voice is low with anger. "They've already found it. Blood Magic, Dark Arts--something they can't attempt because of the Ministry's reactionary bans."


"Then why, may I ask, aren't you charming the solutions you need out of Potter, or Granger? Between the golden boy and girl, I would imagine there's very little magic under Ministry lock-down that you couldn't get access to." The clenched-jawed discomfort on Creevey's face would tell Draco everything he needed to know, if he didn't already know it. "But then, Granger's too busy trying to create public policy to help you break laws, isn't that right? And Potter--well. He won't help you get yourself tossed into Azkaban or worse for someone who's been dead for nearly a decade."


Creevey's head whips up in shock and Draco smiles humorlessly. "Your lover happens to be a bloody awful Occlumens." Or was, seven months ago. Teaching Draco has made him, by necessity, better, but still not as competent at it as at Legilimency. Potter always did have a flair for Offensive magics.


In Draco's experience, the average Gryffindor knows next to nothing about covering one's arse. Though he's surprised and obscurely pleased that Potter has more sense, and self control than he would've credited him with. Dennis Creevey needs to be knee deep in the Dark Arts like he needs a bludger to the head.


"You know about the fight, then." And how much what he said hurt, goes without saying.


"Yes. I know Potter's a tactless, autocratic bastard with a cruel streak that might surprise you. Mainly because he would never, ever direct it at you." Reassurance. Possibly the first time Draco's ever given it. It feels strange, unpleasant and unnatural. "Believe me when I say that if there's a way and Potter's being less than forthcoming about that knowledge, it's certainly for your own good. Spells and potions like what you're after exact prices that people like you aren't equipped to pay."


"People like me?" Creevey's mouth curls in a sneer of his own, and it's obvious the expression is one he isn't used to wearing. "You mean Mudbloods?"


Draco rolls his eyes. "I mean Gryffindors."


"Come now, Mr. Malfoy, House rivalries were half our lives ago--"


"Tell me, Mr. Creevey. How many chunks of your soul are you prepared to trade away to have your brother back?" Those blue eyes narrow, the fire in them guttering a bit. Draco smirks nastily. "That's what I thought."


Creevey looks away to the fire, visibly trying to calm himself. "It's not for Harry to decide, Mr. Malfoy. Or for you. I'm capable of deciding on my own what I will and will not sacrifice for Colin. But he--you won't even help me find out what my options are!"


"And why should either of us? When whatever spell or potion doesn't work out quite the way you expect--if you're still alive after casting or brewing it--it won't be Potter or I that'll have to deal with consequences that, were you operating at all rationally, would leave you quaking in terror from even nebulous contemplation of them!"


"That's why I need your help, Mr. Malfoy. To make an informed decision that'll keep Colin and myself as safe as possible!"


"Perhaps. But that doesn't mean I'm overcome with the urge to risk my future for you,” Draco huffs.


A frustrated sigh. "Look, just--forget whatever's buried in the Ministry or St Mungo's. It's verboten. Off limits. But you have access to Hogwarts' Restricted Section! Surely there's something in there . . . you don't even have to help me prepare whatever potion or spell you find, just jot it down--point me in the right direction!"


"Slughorn has access to the Restricted Section. As does any other professor here who hasn't been convicted of serial murder--oh, did I forget to mention that I've killed innocent people using magic?" Just to see Creevey flinch. Draco stands up and paces to his desk, the cloak-rack, the mantle. Repeats the pattern in reverse. "Are you so curious to know how that feels? How it is to live with the death of an innocent on your conscience every day for the rest of your life?"


"You're twisting this around, trying to scare me—" Creevey's eyes are closed, as if Draco's pacing is making him dizzy.


"I'm merely trying to reawaken what passes for your common sense, though why I bother--" Draco looms over Creevey for a moment, then looks away, trying to keep his mind from wandering paths best buried. "Mourn your brother, and lay this madness to rest. Get some Ministry official to handfast you and Potter. Adopt some children. Move on with your life."


"I can't! Don't you understand? Colin's worse than dead, now. He's in limbo." Creevey's voice is shaking and thick. "There's no moving on until he starts recovering, or until I . . . until I put him in the ground. Tell me you understand what I'm saying?"


Draco does no such thing. Turns his attention to the mantle, where he keeps an unopened bottle of Ogden's Old Potter had gotten him three years ago, as part of a Muggle ritual called 'house-warming'. Though how one bottle of firewhisky could possibly warm an entire house is beyond Draco. "Look, do you want a drink or something? You seem . . . in need of fortifying."


"Then I've been in need for years," Creevey mutters then smiles limply and waves Draco off. "No thanks. I'm straight-edge."


Off Draco's questioning look: "No alcohol, no drugs, no . . . glowy, swirly potions. I don't imbibe, Mr. Malfoy. But thank you for offering." Draco shrugs away the thanks and sits down heavily. "I notice you and Harry have the same taste in firewhisky, though. Something to bond over, perhaps?"


"Hardly. Who do you think gave me the wretched bottle?" Creevey laughs. It's tired and strained, but it makes something within Draco loosen, want to laugh, too. So he scowls harder to make up for it. "I don't drink, either. Mind you, if I did, I wouldn't touch that vile swill. Your girlfriend wouldn't know good taste if it jumped up and bit his nose off."


"He's not, you know. Not my--mine. Not anymore," Creevey blurts out then answers Draco's raised eyebrows and unvoiced question. "I mean, since mum died, we've been drifting apart . . . and Col--"


"Oh-ho. So it's the dead relatives' faults you and Potter didn't work out, is it?"


"That's not what I said!" It's a rather childish sounding outburst, and Creevey immediately subsides, as if realizing this. Draco ignores the sudden roiling in his stomach, the fine sheen of sweat that's sprung up all over. Bloody fire's too hot.


"I won't argue over semantics with you, since you seem quite incapable of mature, logical rebuttals at this time. However . . . I've seen the way Potter worries over you. Whatever really came between you two, you let come between you. Lie to Potter and everyone else, if you must. But don't lie to yourself, and certainly don't lie to me. It's a wasted effort, as I can assure you I don't care one way or the other."


He expects denials, back-pedaling. A blush and stammer, at least. He gets none of them, merely a nod of acceptance, agreement or both.


"I love Harry--have done for half my life. And he loves me." Creevey smiles again, but it starts to slip almost instantly. "But he loves me the way he loves the rest of the world. Impersonally, selflessly--"


"Condescendingly?"


"I was going to say 'protectively.'" But he makes a face as if he doesn't quite disagree. "There's no real passion between us--ease, yes. Until recently, being with Harry was as easy as breathing. But that's all it ever was. Once, I thought it could be more, if I was patient. But he doesn't--he's never looked at me as if he wants me, you know? Not really, not like. . . ."


"Like?" Draco prompts when Creevey falls silent once more.


"Nothing." He blushes and looks down at his hideous shoes. "He just--he doesn't, maybe can't love me the way I need him to. Selfishly, like a man who would keep me at any cost. I want to be that fiercely wanted, not molly-coddled and treated like some precious, fragile child."


But that's precisely what you are, Dennis Creevey. Precious, and a child foolish enough to give your heart to a man who can save an entire world, but not himself. If Potter is even capable of loving you selfishly, as you put it, it'd kill him to do so or in any way admit it.


"You're idiots, both of you," Draco says spitelessly, tonelessly, glaring at the leaping flames and running damp palms along his robe.


"Why do you do that?"


"Do what?" Draco snaps at the fire.


"Act as if you hate him when you don't? As if you hate me when . . . you don't?"


Draco's shoots Creevey an ice-edged glance. "Well, if we're quite done here, perhaps you should find Potter and see if you can't twist him 'round to your way of thinking after all. I imagine he'd probably do anything to keep you."


Creevey shakes his head. "He'd do anything to protect me. But as I've said . . . that's not what I need or want."


A sarcastic snort is all Draco permits himself, and even that's too telling. Or it would be if Creevey wasn't so oblivious to everything but his own drama.


"Assuming I feel like taking insane risks for someone I barely know and care nothing for--" liar, Draco's heart whispers savagely "--what's in it for me?"


Creevey looks up at him, hopeful and surprised at this seeming change of heart. "You mean payment?"


"Perils of dealing with a Slytherin, Mr. Creevey: we don't do favors. So make me an offer or make yourself absent." Draco's face is already schooled into his coldest mask. This is all purely academic, though. Morbid curiosity and nothing more, as he has no intention of helping Creevey carry out this farce. There aren't enough galleons in Gringotts.


Creevey stands and walks slowly to the mantle, his hand drifting past the Ogden's Old to a grisly bit of bric-a-brac that had once been Snape's, and has probably been in residence longer than Draco's been alive. "Alright, then. What is it you want, Mr. Malfoy?"


"My freedom? My family fortune? My family? Ah! A time-turner, perhaps?" When Creevey winces again, Draco laughs and allows his eyes slip shut, closing out the firelight for a few moments. (He's not used to much more than minimal candlelight in his rooms. From the beginning, it'd seemed sacrilegious to have Snape's old haunt lit any brighter than absolutely necessary.


And dim lighting suits Draco's moods much better, anyway.)


"There must be something you want," Creevey says in a strangely still voice.


"Must there?" Even were he inclined to be kind, no one--certainly not a corpse that needs only to lay down and die--would be worth losing even the pittance of a life he now has. There's nothing Creevey has that would do Draco one drop of good, beyond his influence with Potter. But Potter's already so far in Draco's corner, it would take several sticks of Muggle die-no'-mite to blast him out. "What I want, you haven't the power to give m--"


Draco freezes when a hand pushes aside the heavy grey twill of his robe, and the other settles tentatively on his crotch. He opens his eyes to Creevey kneeling between his legs, eyes wide and nervous. Determined, in that earnest, Gryffindor way.


"May I inquire as to what you think you're doing?" Draco seethes in clipped, arctic tones, even though he knows, and knows Creevey knows exactly what he's doing.


Creevey swallows, but doesn't move his hand. At least not away.


And Draco doesn't dislodge it either.


"I'm making you an offer," Creevey says, that sure, even voice at odds with the furious flush on his face. He squeezes tentatively, his fingers finding the buttons to Draco's fly, his eyes asking permission.


Draco doesn't give it. Doesn't groan. Doesn't slouch down in his chair. Certainly doesn't spread his legs wider. Doesn't body-bind Creevey and strip him naked.


Doesn't do any of these things.


He is, after all, rehabilitated.


"Your arrogance is rivaled only by Potter's," Draco says tightly, his breath gusting in and out in an embarrassing fashion. It's an uphill battle not to push up against Creevey's palm.


"I'm not arrogant, merely observant. For some strange reason, you want me, Mr. Malfoy. I see it in your eyes whenever you look at me. I can see it, right now," Creevey says, sadness ghosting quickly across his features, lashes lowering to shutter his gaze. "Which only makes it more noticeable that I've never seen it in . . . other eyes."


Draco's heart has been broken more times than he cares to count, and in more ways than he can catalog. He is something of a connoisseur of that particular experience. But the keen feeling that rips through him while Creevey simultaneously fondles him and yearns so poignantly for Potter's is . . . quite indescribably awful.


For nearly a minute, all he can do is stare into the fire with wide, stinging eyes.


"Mr. Malfoy?"


Creevey's guileless blue eyes are confused, concerned; he seems quite unaware of the devastation he's wreaked, and Draco intends to keep it that way.


"So you think a quick tumble will convince me to risk what passes for my freedom, possibly my life to help your brother?" His posture is relaxed, his expression entirely calculated to make Creevey flinch away. Modeled after a look Snape once gave a first year Hufflepuff, who then promptly wet her robes.


All Draco receives, thankfully, is a painful-looking blush then blanch. "I--"


Draco isn't interested in justifications, and shoves a very surprised Creevey away from him, bitterly satisfied when he goes sprawling. "I'm no hormone-addled teenager, to be led around by my prick. And least of all by a shameless deviant such as yourself. You may go, now."


But go, he does not. Only gets to his knees and inches warily closer, as if afraid Draco might kick him. And indeed, Draco briefly considers it, until Creevey's hands come to rest on his thighs.


He shivers, and a light comes on in Creevey's eyes, something wondering and bold.


"I see," he murmurs, more to himself than to Draco, who bares his teeth. Creevey's response to that is a warm, quirky smile that makes Draco fight a blush of his own. "I'd actually like to rescind my previous offer. I want you, and regardless of whether you choose to help me . . . I'd like to have you."


"No! Stay away--stop touching me!" He says hoarsely, smacking at Creevey's hands, masks slipping away more quickly than he can replace them under such a gentle touch, with such ridiculously sincere eyes leveled at him. "I said leave. Now!"


Creevey shakes his head slowly. "No, Draco."


Before Draco can summon another sneer, Creevey's bobbed up and kissed him. It's short, almost chaste. But it sets something in Draco afire, makes him lean forward as Creevey pulls away, his hands clamping vice-like on the other man's arms to hold him still.


Those blue, blue eyes are open and fearless and that gives Draco pause. He ignores his first instinct, to greedily take the mouth he's fantasized about for three years, and instead he pulls back a little. Studies the lips that just touched his own. Ponders the next kiss until Creevey starts to shift, and lean back in of his own accord, his eyes slipping shut as his lips brush Draco's lightly.


For the longest time, there's only the warm press of their lips; the shallow breaths in and out of their noses. Then Creevey's right hand slides up Draco's chest, and to the back of his neck, urging him closer.


Creevey's mouth is yielding and intent; sweet and salty, like pumpkin juice and crisps. His scent--


Myrrh . . . that's myrrh. . . .


Draco grunts from the impact of his knees hitting the stone floor, but otherwise doesn't notice. He's far too wrapped up in the delightful stroke and slide of tongues, and the warm, firm body against his own. One hand is still vice-tight on Creevey's upper arm, the other sliding around to the small of his back to the slight denim-covered curve of his arse.


This time Creevey is the one to moan, though it sounds more like a sigh of relief.


This kiss . . . is unlike anything Draco has experienced or imagined. It's sloppier, wetter, more frantic. Immeasurably better. In his imaginings, Creevey wasn't so responsive, so deliciously desperate. He didn't want this as much as Draco does.


Never has he imagined feeling such a visceral, reciprocated need for anyone.


And having almost no one else to model his fantasies after, Draco had assumed being with Creevey might be like being with Pansy had been: pleasant, but ultimately unsatisfying.


But Creevey is no genteel, Pureblood witch. He shows every indication of being able to take whatever Draco chooses to dish out, and then do some dishing out of his own--


And this is the first time Draco's consciously considered the possibility that Creevey might want to bugger him. He finds the thought far from repellent.


"Merlin," is all Draco has time to mutter before Creevey's kissing him again--devouring him. Conversely, his fingers are gently stroking the nape of Draco's neck, undoing the length of ribbon that ties back his hair. Then there are gentle fingers moving across his scalp, scritching and scratching as if Draco's a large cat (and causing a rumbling sound that's embarrassingly like a rough purr).


Creevey laughs a little, breaking the kiss by the simple expedient of tugging on Draco's hair. "You're dead sexy," he says in a breathless rush.


"Must you belabor the obvious?" Draco asks irritably, cutting off Creevey's laughter with another brief but languid kiss to take the sting out of the snark. He lays them down on hearth-warmed stone.


He's built sparely, but still solid enough to hold Creevey down--not that he's trying to get away. All his squirming seems aimed at getting closer, not farther away.


Creevey's hands slide back down to Draco's shoulders, to the long pale hair curtaining their faces, threading it through his fingers. The firelight makes his eyes dance, renders his features exquisitely lambent, and Draco wants to look away. He's an expert at self-preservation and seeing Dennis Creevey like this is doing many things to him, and none of them are about the preservation of himself.


Creevey's hands shift, as if he's about to cup Draco's face in them. . . .


He nips that in the bud by pinning Creevey's hands to the floor and attacking his mouth and neck with lips, teeth and tongue, memorizing the taste of soap and salt. Of incense and desire.


Despite wanting to be in control of this situation, Draco is drowning in it, in the near orgasmic relief of finally, finally having, after three years of wanting, and going without something he's needed so badly.


Someone he's loved however blindly and foolishly. . . .


His mouth is possessive, seeking to be everywhere at once, woefully lacking in technique and subtlety, but his efforts are extremely well-received.


"Oh, wow . . . oh, Draco," Creevey moans low in his throat, bucking up against Draco, also with more ardor than artifice. "Would you . . . can I . . . bloody hell, I really want to fuck you."


Draco's response is to rock his pelvis against Creevey's, hard and repeatedly. He's not overly familiar with homosexual argot, but that seems to be a correct response, if the protracted groans, and writhing of the body beneath his own is any gauge.


He knows he should budge up a bit to get their trousers undone, if nothing else. He's spent countless nights imagining how Creevey will feel against him, how he'll taste. Spent these past minutes wondering how it'll feel to impale himself on the hardness growing against his own, until he's too lost in sensation to remember who he is--


Yes, and you're doing such a fine job of remembering who you are, right now. Smooth, sneering voice as familiar as the conscience Draco pretends to ignore. Falling in love with, and letting yourself be . . . manipulated by this Muggle-born catamite? Potter's cast-off, no less? Why, you've quite outdone yourself, haven't you, Draco? Bravo!


Unsurprisingly, Lucius's amused observations in the back of Draco's brain dampens the mood. He rarely hears it, anymore--hasn't, in recent memory, done anything his father might have objected to, circumstances notwithstanding.


Now . . . it reminds him of who he is. Who Creevey is, and most importantly, to whom Creevey belongs.


As wake-up calls go, his father and Potter are more effective than a cold shower.


"Draco?" Creevey is breathing heavily, eyes dilated, lips wet and very red. His legs are bracketed by Draco's, their hips moving in perfect counterpoint. Wool and denim do nothing to mitigate the hot hardness indolently thrusting past Draco's balls. No bloody wonder Potter's always grinning like a loon. "Is everything--are you alright?"


What an asinine question, another voice notes; it's the one that doesn't sound like anyone but Draco. It's quiet, but stronger than it used to be. Oddly dispassionate. If you allow this to go on too much further, you'll never be 'alright' again. When he's gone back to his neat little life with Princely Potter, you'll still be stuck in these Dungeons, in this endless, awful life--everything made the darker for this tiny bit of light having been shed.


Suddenly chilled despite the fire at his side, Draco returns his attention to Creevey's neck, distantly pleased when he wrings a high-pitched gasp from the man. It's still gratifying to be as good as, if not better than Potter at something. This, too, occurs rarely, and very nearly restores the arousal that, between them, the voices have murdered.


Very nearly.


And it's surely only moments before Creevey notices Draco's flagging . . . interest.


Self-preservation, the voice--his own voice--whispers. You know what we must do.


Of course. If there's one thing Malfoys, Draco in particular, know, it's cutting off one's nose to spite one's face.


Bearing down all his weight on Creevey, until the man can barely draw in a breath, let alone struggle towards completion, he waits till the pleas and profanity turn into soft, frustrated moans.


"Shhh." He licks the delicate curve of cartilage leading down to Creevey's earlobe before closing his teeth on it quickly. Creevey shudders and shakes, exhaling humidly on Draco's neck.


"May I be honest with you, Dennis? You'll live your whole life and never again receive such an offer from a Slytherin. You should feel honored." A choked-off whimper that Draco takes as a fervent 'yes, I do feel honored'. "I've wanted you since the moment I saw you. You were Potter's but I wanted you for my own; to make you crazed with wanting me, and no one else.


"Eventually, Potter didn't enter into it at all, anymore. I simply. Wanted. You."


Draco pauses, aware that he's losing the plot--saying far, far too much, but is unable to take it back. Able, only, to go forward, cut himself open as much as he can stomach because the only way to protect himself from worse pain and embarrassment in the long run is to douse himself in it now . . . guilt being the only weapon against a persistent Gryffindor.


He has to make sure Creevey doesn't come sniffing after him again for some misguided reason or other, unintentionally destroying the praxes that keep Draco from complete despair.


"One thing I never wanted was your pity," he hisses, his lips brushing Creevey's cheek. The skin is damp--smooth, as if he's just used a depilatory charm. "I never wanted you showing up here, dripping Gryffindor self-sacrifice, expecting me to lap it up gratefully. I ,never wanted you to willfully disrupt the equilibrium I have worked for three bloody years to attain."


He gets to his knees and sits up, releasing Creevey whose brow furrows guiltily, his eyes shifting away from Draco's. Time to twist the knife a bit. "'Regardless of whether choose to help me, I'd like to have you'. You almost had me gulled . . . and if I was any kind of Malfoy at all, I suppose I would applaud you for using my weakness to manipulate me, heavy-handed though it was, 'round to your side. Unfortunately for me, I've never been much of a Malfoy."


Creevey's eyes flutter shut for a moment, then blaze fearlessly up into Draco's. His face is still luminous and earnest in the flickering firelight. "I meant what I said, Draco, and . . . love is never a weakness," he says softly.


It hurts to hear that, and Draco sits back as if slapped. But he doesn't deny the feelings that would now be patently obvious even had he not admitted to them. Ignores the fact that his name said in that low, husky tenor causes the blood in his veins to sing southwards once more.


"Really? Do you tell yourself that when you look into Potter's eyes and see only your reflection there?" Creevey's mouth drops open slightly in shock and hurt, and Draco wants to back-pedal, to take it back with kisses and more awkward reassurance--but no. No. Malfoys never whinge over collateral damage. He's regained control of this situation and that's what matters. That's--


--strangely unsatisfying. His nonexistent pride isn't soothed, and all he wants is to be alone. To forget what just happened and all the things he'll never have, of which Creevey is merely one.


He gets to his feet as gracefully as his twisted robes allow and sneers down at Creevey. Opens his mouth to say--he doesn't know what. (It's difficult to focus when Creevey sits up and gingerly adjusts his pants, which still bulge noticeably despite the past few minutes.) "You asked me what I wanted in return for aiding you? I wish nothing more than to see you walk out my door and never darken it again. That is my price for researching your cure."


Whatever he expected to come out of his mouth, it certainly wasn't that. The last thing he needs is something to tie him to Creevey. . . .


However, Gryffindors are notorious for keeping their promises. If Creevey agrees to stay away in repayment of Draco's help, he'll be as good as his word.


"Well?" Draco smirks, smoothing hair and robes in one fluid gesture. Creevey watches him with wounded, disbelieving eyes.


"That's unacceptable, Mr. Malfoy."


A small part of Draco is certain that Creevey is referring not to the amount of aid on offer, but to the price he'll be obligated to pay for it. But he doesn't need the ghosts in his machine to tell him that letting his resolve slip even a little could spell disaster.


"That is my single term and condition, Mr. Creevey. You may take it or leave it." Draco walks over to his desk, not interested in seeing disappointment turn down a mouth that still bears the evidence of his kisses.


"I'll take it, then," Creevey says finally. His voice is stony but for the strange hitch at the end. It takes everything Draco has not to look over his shoulder and see. . . .


No. I will not give in to this. "Come back in three months, then."


It'll be easy enough to get into the Restricted Section after midnight without getting caught (he knows from firsthand experience). And since it's not as if Colin Creevey is going anywhere, he can take his leisure at researching.


What won't be so easy is rebuilding the masks Creevey's destroyed, all unknowing. But one useful thing Draco's learned from Potter is that there's no such thing as failure, only opportunities for self-improvement.


Draco's life to date has been rife with such . . . opportunities, tonight being only the latest example. An Occlumens of his ability should be better not only at hiding his emotions, but controlling them. Now that he's aware of such a gaping hole in his defenses, he can work towards repairing it in time for the trial-by-fire it'll receive in nintey days if, despite giving his word, Creevey makes anymore sexual advances.


Speak of the devil and watch him appear. Draco can sense Creevey hovering hesitantly behind him, as if waiting for something further. For his sake, he'd better not be holding his breath for any further emotional outpourings. They'll sooner be levitating his corpse out of the Dungeons than that happens.


"I trust you can find your way back to Potter's bed--and his selfless love--without my assistance?" Draco asks with snide solicitousness, snatching up a handful of scrolls: First Year essays on the key differences between pennyroyal, peppermint, and fluxweed--utterly abysmal, all, and already graded accordingly.


"Draco--" Creevey sighs, and moves in silently. Draco can feel him getting closer, but still inhales sharply when a hand touches his waist, sliding around to his stomach to settle. "Please. Can we at least talk about what just happened?"


"No, we cannot. Three months, Mr. Creevey, not a day earlier. Stinguero." The troublesome fire winks out, and Draco pulls away from Creevey's hand, making for the safety and cave-like darkness of his suite without waiting for a response. Once there, he shuts the door and leans on it. With a muttered Excludus, the multiple wards on the door lock down tight, like a portcullis.


A few minutes after the scrolls have dropped to the floor and he with them, Draco senses Creevey pass through the cursory wards on the office. Hears the heavy door snick shut and lock.


The Witching Hour finds him as it almost always does, of late: alone, and in darkness that suffocates where it used to succor.


Suddenly every candle in the room flares into bright, fevered life, casting leaping shadows all around.


”Your intent, and the force behind, decrees the shape and the intensity of the spell. You seem to use the words as a focus, the way you would your wand. In time, you'll outgrow them both. . . .”


Potter had said that two years ago. Draco hadn't outgrown it, hadn't thought he ever would, but. . . .


This lends credence to Potter's claim that, in magic, intuitive leaps forward usually happen in times of stress or desperation.


Master would be so pleased, if he knew, Draco thinks with a detached sort of gallows humor. He reaches inside himself, toward the center Potter insists he has.


What he finds is a grey knot of despair and confusion, tied so tight he couldn't begin the unraveling of it. As it is, he simply gives the knot free reign, finding it next to impossible to care what this tangle that is at the core of him will decide to do with such license. . .


After a few minutes, the candlelight diminishes to acceptable levels, gutters fitfully . . . then winks out altogether, leaving him darkness once more.

*

Continues in the companion piece His Brother's Keeper


I'm going to sleep.