alisanne (alisanne) wrote in drapery_snarco, @ 2009-03-13 17:42:00 |
|
|||
Current mood: | working |
Fic: Mercy (2/3)
Title: Mercy
Author: gatewaygirl
Pairings: Draco/Harry/Snape, background Ron/Hermione, Sirius/Remus
Length: 23,657 (total)
Rating: NC-17
Disclaimer: This story was written for amusement value only. Not my characters.
Warnings: BDSM (all), exhibitionism, minor abuse of authority, dirty talk, a tiny bit of bestiality, and misuse of equestrian supplies. AU.
Prompt: Werewolf!Draco and Werewolf!Harry are lovers, but lately they've been interested in getting a third into their pack -- they're convinced Snape would make a fabulous werewolf and submissive lover. Snape still hates/is terrified of werewolves, but they're determined to not take 'no' for an answer....
Author Notes: Thanks to calanthe_fics for Britpicking and beta (and putting up with yet more Snape), and clauclauclaudia for emergency kink beta when I was panicking, and for telling me it wasn't done when it wasn't. You're both wonderful!
Mercy: Part 1
The month passed without either of them mentioning the matter again. It was when Snape appeared in their Floo, two days before the full moon with their flasks of potion in hand, that the thought resurfaced in Harry's awareness. Suddenly, he wanted to smell Snape's fear.
"Come through," he commanded, stepping back. Draco, who had been reaching for the flasks, stepped back also.
Snape's face scrunched in as if he had bitten into a lime. "I hardly think it necessary--"
"To obey me?" Harry challenged. "Come through."
A flash of something, gone too quickly to identify, crossed Snape's face, and a moment later, he stepped out of the flames.
"Mr. Potter." His head lowered, either in respect, or to avoid Legilimency. Harry could hear his heart racing, but the stink of fear and unwashed human overpowered anything else scent might have told him.
In a flash of old anger, Harry moved closer. "Why so afraid, Snape? I'm safe for another fifty hours."
That brought the man's head up, his eyes flashing. "You are never safe," he snarled. "I know your kind. I watched Fenrir at sport with--"
"A psychopath," Draco interjected. "Such a fine measure of werewolves. Perhaps we should use Macnair as a measure of uncursed men and say none of them are safe either?"
Snape's face hardened. "None are."
"Still, I doubt you smell like this when talking with apothecaries," Harry observed mildly. At Draco's annoyed look, he realized that scent may not have been the most tactful indicator of fear to mention. With a wry smile, he reached forward and took the flasks from Snape. "Thank you. You may go."
"Wait," Snape said quickly. "As you did not respond equally to last month's changes, I customized the potions. The one with the red string on the handle is for you."
Harry's eyes met Draco's. Draco turned toward his old Head of House.
"If it harms him, I will kill you."
"I know." Snape's fear did not increase. His heartbeat steadied.
"Slowly."
"It will not. It is intended to be more efficacious, nothing more."
Draco nodded. "Go."
He stared up at the colorless moon and tried to figure out what was wrong. He wasn't here, as a wolf should be; he was somewhere else. He hardly felt the world about him. The other wolf -- that would be Draco, wouldn't it? -- kept trying to play with him, but he didn't feel like tugging on sticks. Draco never seemed to stop; he had bounced and yipped over a scent, and he had come back from a foray with a broken rabbit, which he had dropped between them. Ignoring it, he settled his head on his paws.
A heavy weight came slamming into him from the side. It took him a moment to realize that Draco was attacking him. He didn't know what to do about it. Teeth closed on his ruff and claws raked him painfully, but when he didn't fight back, nothing more happened. Draco's wolf backed away, sat down, and whined.
Changing back hit Harry like a bludger. All the energy and aggression of the wolf hit him when it should have been fading, and his side burned in long lines from Draco's claws. Already snarling, he turned on his lover, but Draco thrust the horseshoe that was their Portkey at him, and automatically, he grabbed his side of it.
His stomach, never its steadiest after a change, clenched alarmingly as the pull of the Portkey ebbed and their kitchen appeared around them. They usually stayed near Stag's Run Lodge, but Draco had been uneasy about this change and had insisted on an island. Draco had also attacked him, Harry recalled, straightening. Before he could turn, the banked fire in the grate flared green, and someone burst through.
"Oh, good!" she said. "Ron was worried. As much as I hate to admit it, he sometimes knows--"
She was radiating heat, and agitation, and prey. Harry closed on her as a hunter, even while some tiny part of his mind was cataloguing her as Hermione and as someone he loved. His hand, about to seize her shoulder and pull, jerked back. It itched to move forward again.
"Get out," he said, gasping for breath at the end of it. "OUT!"
"Harry?"
She stepped back, but not far enough. He could still see her, scent her. "Such fine skin," he choked out. "Bite--"
For a second time that night, Draco attacked him, leaping on him and pulling him back. They fell painfully to the stone floor, and Harry twisted, snarling.
"Run!" Draco screamed, and there was a hasty fumble at his back and a cry of "Little Alexandria!" and Hermione was gone in a flare of light at his back. Draco immediately went limp, and Harry changed from biting at his shoulder to licking his neck. A few seconds later, he was rubbing against him hard, his entire body in thrall to the desperate need in his cock. Draco tried to undress, but Harry had no patience to accommodate fingers doing anything other than grasping him, and he pressed them out of the way, grinding against Draco until he came in his robes.
He slept.
"Are you here?"
It was a question that took some thought. When Harry woke, it was usually in their bed, or occasionally on the sofa, or in the forest. Now, he was on the carpet in the sitting room, and he was sure he had not fallen asleep there. He thought back to the moon. It had all been strange, and then they had taken a Portkey back from the island retreat that Draco had insisted upon, and then Hermione--
"Yes," he said, feeling sick. "I'm here."
"Good," Draco answered fiercely, "because that was terrifying. And I was too weak for magic, and this was the softest spot I could drag you to. Bed?"
By the light, it was afternoon. He was in the bedroom, a large, airy room in the new portion of the Lodge, in his bed, and Draco lay beside him. Harry shifted, and Draco, usually a heavy sleeper, woke immediately.
"Harry?"
The query was tense, almost panicked. "I'm here," Harry answered, and the body at his side relaxed.
"Good."
Harry ran his tongue around his mouth. It felt dry and swollen. "Hermione is all right, isn't she?"
"Yes. She escaped." Draco shifted, settling an arm over Harry's chest. "And terrifying as that was, having you lying around like a doormat all night was no better. You let me beat you in a fight, you know. And you wouldn't mount me."
"Yeah, I remember." Harry turned to wrap a leg around Draco. "I couldn't process anything. It was all ... why is he bothering me? And you were all over the place."
"If I seemed more energetic than usual," Draco countered, "it was only by contrast."
"Ah." Harry took a long and shaky breath. "Frankly, I don't find that nearly as frightening as having nearly attacked one of my best friends." All the fears of his fourth year, long conquered, came back to him. He could have killed her -- a dear friend, Ron's wife, his goddaughter's mother.
"Yeah? Do you realize how doomed we would have been if a Welsh Green came after us, and only one of us was resisting?"
Harry raised an eyebrow. It was all he could manage. "And both of us? Do you think we could fight off a dragon?"
"A small dragon wouldn't attack two healthy looking wolves." Draco huffed. "I thought you were dying!"
The thought reminded Harry of the ribbon tied around the handle of his flask. "Do you think Snape tried to poison me?"
"I don't know!"
Draco's distress was obvious. He was often disdainful of Snape, but he trusted the man to care for him, and now that it came to it, Harry realized that he, also, rested some of his trust in Snape's potions on Snape wanting Draco safe and happy.
"We'd better figure it out."
Draco squeezed his eyes shut for a moment, and then his face smoothed into composure. "I think--"
Before he could say what he thought, the bell on the mantel began to ring. They looked at each other.
"Probably Snape."
With a nod, Draco stood and reached for his dressing gown. "Let me answer it."
Harry got to his feet. "Go ahead."
At another time, he might have been amused by Draco's play-acting. He sounded on the verge of hysteria when he first spoke. "Did you know this would happen?" he demanded, his voice rising.
"What? What went wrong?" Snape sounded startled, worried -- of course, Harry reminded himself, he had played that game with a far more powerful opponent than Draco. "Where is Potter?"
"Where do you think?" Draco spat back. "It was your potion!"
"Draco," Severus ordered, trying to invoke long-faded authority, "what happened?"
"What did you intend?"
"I intended for it to work! I adjusted the formula to compensate for his domineering attitude, but nothing about that should have harmed anything the weight of a wolf!
"His ... what?"
"Do you think I don't see how he bullies everyone who is beholden to him? Even you don't dare disobey him."
"You IDIOT!"
"Do you deny it?"
"I ..." Surprise had made Draco forget his act. Harry heard the soft thump and scrape of him sitting in a chair. "It's not bullying."
"Is it not?" Snape was still angry. "Potter sweeps in and commands things -- sending the Wizengamot to change centuries-old edicts, and you to pour the tea."
Draco let out an indignant huff that Harry could hear from his place by the door. "Yes, Harry does take charge," he said, "but what you, blinded by your dislike, may have missed is that people let him do so. As it happens, some welcome it."
"Because he's the Boy-Who-Killed-Voldemort," Snape sneered.
"No," Draco said fiercely. "Because he's good at it. Which is also why he was the Boy-Who-whatever, not the other way around. He may not seem insightful, but he makes things happen, and even when his hunches are wrong, he gets somewhere."
Embarrassed at the turn the conversation was taking, Harry adjusted the hang of his dressing gown and stepped through the door. "Snape," he said tersely. He noticed that Snape, who usually tensed at his displeasure, instead relaxed.
"So you're fine," he accused.
"Now," Harry snarled back. "I nearly killed Hermione."
"That potion should have suppressed aggression, not--!"
"Oh it did," Draco cut in. "And everything else. I spent most of the night afraid he was dying."
"But after the change," Harry said, "it all rushed back in. Everything I should have felt all night compressed into dangerously few minutes."
"Oh." Snape settled back. "I see. Perhaps I miscalculated the effects of the temporal compon--"
"I don't think you see at all," Draco said, his head haughtily high.
"If you have finished with your games, perhaps some details--"
"Later, Snape," Harry said.
"What?"
"Later. I will not speak to you now."
"But the sooner--"
"I need to confer with my lover." Harry folded his arms over his chest. "And possibly the Minister."
Snape turned pale.
"We'll call you. Stay put."
"I assure you, I intended only--"
With a hard sweep of his arm, Harry closed the Floo, and Snape's head vanished. For a moment, he and Draco stared at the shifting embers in silence, and then Harry crossed to his chair and sat heavily. He stared at the wide grain of the tabletop in silence.
"I think he needs to live with us."
Draco's statement was quiet, but definite. Harry looked at him, confused.
"You still want him as a packmate? As a lover? After that?"
"I'm not sure," Draco confessed, "but it has become imperative that he understand -- both you and our relationship. And in the end, he may be easier to influence as a new wolf than as a man set in bad ways."
"But ... he'd never agree to stay here. We terrify him!"
Draco rolled his eyes. "Harry, he doesn't need to agree! You are in charge of his parole, remember? Call Shacklebolt, tell him that you are concerned about Snape's recent behavior, and that you require the man to stay under your direct supervision for a month." Sighing, he leaned into his palm. "Bully, my arse! You're inept at using advantages that are fully your right!"
"Yes, well -- we're not all Slytherins, you know. I did give him leave to experiment."
"On the Wolfsbane potion, meaning within the scope of its use. Attempting to alter your personality is not part of that."
It was good to hear Draco make sense of how angry he felt. Relaxing, Harry glanced at the empty table and sighed. "No breakfast."
"I think you frightened it off."
"Oh, very funny."
"Well, frightened off the person carrying it, anyway." Draco stood. "Stay there. I think I can manage to pour milk on muesli."
"Just remember to put it in a bowl first."
"Hush. That was tea. And it was only once."
They had bowls of muesli -- from which Draco had picked out all the raisins and dates -- and some leftover ham, and two cups of tea each, and then Harry spoke briefly to Minister Shacklebolt, who -- as they had expected -- affirmed that Harry had absolute authority over Snape. Once that was over, Harry stiffened his resolve and called Little Alexandria.
"Just a moment!" Ron called, from out of sight of the grate in the parlor. Under normal circumstances, Harry would have stepped through, but he didn't want to appear threatening. "Who's--" He stopped in the doorway, little Amanda held upright against his chest. "Harry?"
"Hi," Harry answered. "Look, I wanted to apologize to Hermione. Snape messed around with the formula again, and it had some after-effects."
"Harry!" Hermione darted past Ron and into the room. "I'd thought that must be it! You need to let him stop experimenting on you."
Embarrassed, Harry pushed a hand back through his hair. "Well, you know half his ideas are, well, good. Draco just had two of his best moon recoveries ever."
Ron's eyebrows scrunched down. "And you had a worse one? Mate, doesn't that strike you as a bit suspicious?"
"Oh, it struck both of us as suspicious, believe me. Snape said he was trying to compensate for my greater aggression--"
Ron snorted. "Just because he was a sneak about it doesn't make Malfoy less aggressive."
"Compensate?" Hermione asked doubtfully.
"Well, and something about the way he made it end went wrong. Believe me, I was utterly passive all night. Draco was terrified."
For a moment, Hermione looked like she might launch into theories, but then she took a quick, settling breath. "Harry, look -- David Charmer can make a perfectly adequate Wolfsbane potion, and I'm only planning to nurse for twelve months, so by next winter--"
"I'll keep it in mind," Harry said. "But for next month--"
"At least insist that it be standard."
"Actually, I think I'll insist on last month's formulation, but--"
"And if the bastard murders you?" Ron objected. At his roar, the baby began to fuss, and he jiggled her absently.
"Ron's right, Harry. At least a standard formula can be tested, so--"
"I'm going to make Snape spend the month with me. Draco will supervise any brewing he does."
"That won't be pleasant."
"Pleasant isn't the point."
Hermione tsked and shook her head. "Will you come through, Harry?"
Ron stepped back a pace, arms protectively around his daughter. Harry met his eyes and smiled.
"Nah," he said. "I think I'm okay, but I wouldn't want to be near Mandy yet." He yawned. "Too tired, anyway. Dinner on Friday?"
"Of course."
"How DARE you!"
Snape was not taking Harry's declaration as well as Ron and Hermione had. Draco sat in silent amusement, a cup of tea balanced on his knee, and watched.
"It is well within my authority," Harry responded coldly. They had kept Snape waiting for two days, while Harry recovered from the moon and regained the energy needed for this confrontation.
Snape's unusually high color drained away as fear replaced fury. "I won't. You fool! I can't!"
Harry stared, waiting.
"Even if you weren't--" Snape shuddered. "My work! What would I live on? And I am REQUIRED to make you Wolfsbane, due to those spineless DOLTS on the Wizengamot, and how could I POSSIBLY--"
"I believe you will find my brewing facilities adequate," Draco volunteered in a bored tone. "Not to your standards, of course -- nothing ever is -- but adequate to the purpose."
"I--" Snape tried.
"Kingsley offered to send an Auror escort," Harry declared. "They should be arriving soon if they haven't already, but I've said that you should have three hours to pack, and may make multiple trips to move your belongings."
Snape lowered his head. "How kind," he said, and if his voice dripped with sarcasm, he at least made no more denials.
The front bedroom in Stag's Run Lodge had always been their guest room, so there was little to do to prepare it for Snape. Draco added a few books to the shelf above the bed, cast a freshening charm on the unused bedclothes, and declared it ready. He ignored Harry's suggestion that they darken the window glass and turn the curtains and duvet black.
"I'm just thinking of his comfort," Harry said brightly.
Draco snorted. "Of course you are." He leaned back against the bed. "Which brings up another matter -- how do we treat him?"
"What do you mean?"
"Well, you do have authority over him, and this is a consequence of his actions. You could present it -- and approach it -- as punishment."
Harry cocked his head, trying to grasp what Draco wasn't saying. It was an unfortunate necessity when dealing with Slytherins. "And how do you think I should approach it?"
"As education," Draco said promptly. "He does need to be here, but it doesn't need to be unpleasant -- or no more unpleasant than his own prejudices make it."
"I see. I can try, certainly." Harry frowned. "As long as he doesn't start thinking he can get away with things."
"Hm." Draco wriggled a little, shifting back on the bed. "You know what I think we should do?"
"Shag on that bed you just cleaned?"
Tilting his head, Draco gave him a coy smile. "Perhaps," he said. "At least have sex where he can't help but see. And you should refuse to touch him."
"I hardly think he'll mind me not touching him."
"Oh, he will ... if you make it a snub. Move so you couldn't possibly brush against him."
"And what does that accomplish?"
Draco laughed. "He never gets the chance to do the same to you."
"Ah."
"And your touch will become something of mine."
Harry scrunched his face up for a second, and then shook his head. "I'm not sure I follow that, but all right. You understand him better than I ever will."
Consequently, while Harry declared that Severus had to eat dinner with them, and that not being hungry was not a sufficient reason to not attend, he also went out of his way to ensure that dinner was worth eating. He was not a showy cook, but he could manage a number of stews and roasts that filled the house with savory aromas. While Snape painstakingly moving his brewing equipment, Harry went down to town and obtained a joint, returned, and began to prepare it. Companionably, Draco joined him in the kitchen and began work on some fussy arrangement of sliced potatoes and cheese sauce, periodically consulting the moving illustrations in Charming Dinners.
When everything was ready, Draco went to fetch Snape, who returned with Draco as far as the doorway, but then stood there, hovering awkwardly at the border of the kitchen.
"Come in, Snape," Harry said. "It's roast beef. You can't eat it standing up from ten feet away."
"I see no reason why I must attend your dinners."
"So you have said. And I say you will."
"Severus, really," Draco chided, the name dropping as naturally from his lips as if he were his father. "Do pretend to have some manners."
"What use are manners with beasts?" Snape snarled back, and for a moment, Harry was able to glimpse Draco in fury -- beautiful, blood-flushed, turning so quickly that his hair floated out -- and then, in an instant, he was once again the Malfoy, self-possessed and light of tongue.
"What a disgrace you are to Slytherin," he commented. "You sat at the Dark Lord's table, through entertainments of torture and death, and you behaved. Nothing so outré will happen here. Do you require murder to feign civility?"
Flushed, Snape took a step forward, and then, after a second, another. Finally, he sat at the old table, head forward so that his face was nearly hidden, only the hook of his nose and the occasional nervous glint of an eye in motion showing through the hair. Draco poured wine, dark and intense, and red glowed from black in the candlelight as he and Harry shared a silent toast.
"How was your day?" he asked Harry. "Any gossip from town?"
Harry laughed, as if Snape were not brooding like a vulture between them. "Would I notice?"
"Someone must have spoken while you were in the butcher's shop."
"Yeah, but it was just chatter. Someone's moving to London, the new shop assistant at somewhere is dreamy, that sort of thing."
"A new assistant somewhere is 'dreamy,' and you did not bother to note where?"
Harry met his eyes. "Why would I?" he asked simply, and reached across the table. Snape made a strangled sound as their hands clasped in front of him.
"Well," Draco demurred, "you know I like to look." Still, his fingers turned to lace with Harry's. "Usually to mock the commenter's taste, of course."
"Of course." Harry's mouth twitched, and he let go of Draco to cut a slice of his beef. "Where would the world be without you mocking it?"
"I don't know, I'm sure," Draco answered placidly. "And you Severus? Did your move go smoothly?"
"Considering that I was forced from my home into a place I have no desire to be, yes. I can make no complaint as to the logistics." Snape lifted his head. "One of the Aurors helped with carrying my books."
"Good, good," Draco answered, nodding. "The Ministry could use more public servants who are genuinely helpful. Did you get his name?"
"Her name was Camellia Crunch."
Harry coughed slightly on his wine and Draco shuddered. "How unfortunate. However, Harry will commend her to Shacklebolt, won't you Harry?"
"I suppose," Harry said. "Though it was rather unprofessional of her, wasn't it? I mean, what if she'd had to go for her wand?"
Snape drew in breath. "Either she did not consider me a flight risk," he spat, "or she thought the two other Aurors were adequate to ensure my cooperation."
"Kingsley sent three?" Harry said, surprised. "Well, all right, then."
"How many did you ask for?"
"I told you, he volunteered them."
For a minute, there was silence.
"The potatoes are good, Draco," Harry said, more quietly.
"Thank you. The roast is as well." Draco glanced over at Snape. "You should try it, Severus."
"Oh? Did you kill it yourself?"
Harry laughed. "Have you ever met a cow, Snape? We're not that much bigger than natural wolves."
"Wolves kill herd animals," Snape argued. "And you're far more vicious."
Harry clenched his jaw. Under the table, Draco stroked his leg with one foot, and when he had Harry's attention, looked appealingly at him.
"Werewolves are more vicious towards humans," Harry said stiffly, "assuming they are not on the Wolfsbane potion, which you know we are. Cattle are much larger and heavier than people, and they have hooves. I'd need another two or three more wolves before I attempted it, if I wanted to, which I don't."
"The butcher is far less likely to leave you requiring a healer," Draco agreed.
"You hunt deer," Snape objected.
"What?" Harry stared at him. Draco put a hand over his eyes. Snape flinched.
"Or so I would imagine," he amended.
"You would? Why?"
"Stag's Run Lodge?"
"It's my Patronus!" Harry pushed back from the table.
"Essentially," Draco clarified, "he named the house 'Joy-Protection.'" He shrugged. "We do hunt fallow deer, occasionally, but Harry won't touch the red deer."
"Which are still," Harry persisted, moving the subject back to safer quarters, "a quarter the weight of a cow, I'd estimate."
Draco shrugged. "It's not as if I would know."
"Oh, come on! You've been rambling with me. We go through at least two cow pastures on a regular basis. You--" Harry managed to stop himself before saying how terrified Draco had been the first time one of the creatures had approached them.
"And I was entirely occupied with watching where I put my feet," Draco said curtly.
"Yeah, well. Cows." Harry ate a slice of carrot that had been caramelized in the juices from the roast. "Rabbits, now -- they're fun to chase. I think birds are my favorite, though."
"Of course they are. We are both Seekers, after all."
"Convenient, that."
Snape shoved his plate away. "Why am I here? If you are planning to punish me, then DO it. I do not need to sit here and listen to your hunting preferences."
Harry glared. Draco patted his lips with a napkin and turned slightly in his seat. "You are not here for punishment."
"What ELSE would you call this?"
"Education," Harry said firmly. "If you are going to attempt to change my personality, you should at least learn what it is."
"I have had years to learn your personality! I know you are an arrogant, bullying, reckless fool, who returned to school as a murderous creature, knowing the risks you posed your friends--"
"I didn't have a choice!"
"Of course you did! You merely thought you were more important than the safety of other students--"
"Damn it, Snape, I didn't WANT to come back. I told Professor Dumbledore I wouldn't come back. I spent the evening of my fourteenth birthday stuck in Mr. and Mrs. Weasley's bedroom, with him telling me about the prophecy, and that it was vitally important to the Wizarding world that I return, despite the risk, and when I finally gave in, I insisted that Ron and Hermione be given Portkeys to the infirmary, in case something happened."
Snape hesitated. He hadn't known, perhaps. He recovered, pursing his lips before speaking. "You were arrogant enough to believe him."
"I was FOURTEEN. God, Snape." Harry pushed his hair back. "I was terrified. I made Hermione carry a silver dagger. Then a year later, I totally mucked things up with Cho by buying her one as a present, and not being able to tell her why." Exhaling, he tried to lower his shoulders and speak more lightly. "Still, it wasn't all bad, was it? Who knows how long we would have had a Death Eater teaching Defense Against the Dark Arts if I hadn't smelled the real Moody in his trunk."
Draco snorted. "Was that how he was caught? You never told me, Harry."
"Yeah." Harry reddened. "Pity it didn't get me out of the tournament."
"Oh, you did well on the First Task, anyway. And not badly on the Third, for a fourth year."
"May I be excused?" Snape asked, edging his chair back. "I am finding this nauseating."
"Suck it up, Snape. I find a lot of things nauseating."
"Harry." Draco's voice was mild, but chiding. "If he is to live with us, perhaps you might call him Severus?"
"I don't want him to call me Severus!"
Harry snorted. "Severus it is."
Hands on the table, Severus started to rise. "I won't stay here to--"
"Sit!" Harry's wand was out. Severus froze. Angrily, Harry snapped it forward. "Abstergere!"
Severus jerked back, knocking over his wine. He and Harry both froze. Sighing, Draco charmed the wine into a liquid ball that floated over to the sink and splashed down into it.
"After dinner," Harry said through clenched teeth, "you will bathe. Severus." He expected a pleading look from Draco, but his lover looked more relieved. Harry supposed that made sense. Draco's nose was as sensitive as his own, after all. "And you will bathe before dinner next time."
"You cannot expect--"
Draco raised his head. "Every other day should suffice."
The rest of the meal was eaten largely in silence.
The next week continued nearly as awkwardly. Snape brewed most days -- for as much of the day as he could, Harry thought, emerging only when it was time for dinner or his bath. Harry didn't think he used anything but water, but if his hair was still greasy, at least he didn't smell. After two incidences of ruined potions, Harry and Draco began to plan for when dinner would be served, something they had previously done only when one or both of them had evening plans. With four hours' notice, Snape could time things effectively.
Harry looked up from his papers as Draco walked by, heading for the cellar stairs, and watched as Draco called down a dinner warning. Draco turned and caught his look.
"What is it?" he demanded.
"Nothing. I just like watching you move. Come here."
The last words were unnecessary. Draco was already approaching him. Harry set the reports aside and left his arms open, which was all the invitation Draco needed to straddle his lap.
"God, you're hot," Harry murmured, as the first set of kisses
"Well, I did say we should do it in front of him."
"Was that still the plan? I've lost track."
"It's still my plan."
"It could make things worse."
"Do you care?"
At first that made sense. Of course he didn't care. Harry lost himself in the contest of their mouths, Draco's taste and Draco's ferocious energy, and stayed submerged in it until he thought he heard the click of a boot on the stairs.
"What?" Draco demanded breathlessly.
"Yeah," he said. "I do." His ears had apparently deceived him; Snape did not emerge. "Care, I mean. I want to tame him."
"Tame him?" Draco asked incredulously.
"Well, not really. But you know when Luna got that dog? The one that had been abused? It's like that. It would be ten times sweeter to have him come to my hand."
"Ah. That sort of tame. I'd like to see him hunt, myself; all that strangled energy released."
"Mm." Harry stroked his hands along the taut muscles of Draco's arse. "There might be other ways to release it," he whispered.
"Oh, yes."
Draco leaned his head back in that way that drove Harry insane, and Harry yanked him close and rose up against him. Draco was squirming in the limited motion that Harry would allow him when the cellar door opened.
For a moment, all of them froze. Then, with a sighing moan, Draco began to rock in Harry's loosened hold. His breath resuming, Harry rubbed his face against Draco's soft shirt.
"Harry. I want you. I can't--"
Quick footsteps crossed the room, accelerating in the hall. The door to the bathroom slammed. They separated -- guiltily, Harry thought, but guilt was apparently the furthest thing from Draco's mind.
"Well. That touched a nerve."
"Apparently."
Draco's sharp face lit with mischief as he looked down. "I," he said, "have a plan."
"Oh? That's usually good for some fun -- or calls for some damage control."
"Are you up for being fucked?"
"Fucked?" Harry had to ask. Draco liked being buggered so much that he was seldom interested in switching roles. Half the times they did were because Harry had asked. "You know I love you inside me, baby."
"All right." Draco sat back on his heels and Harry's knees. "Well, you know I did have a tendency to, um, listen at doors...."
"Did?" Harry asked pointedly.
"Well, it's hardly interesting with you. You'll tell me anything, after all. But at the Manor, the last summer...."
"Yes?"
"From some things my father said, as well as what was done to me, I gather there was a certain amount of sex-as-dominance among the Dark Lord's followers."
"And?"
"I believe it might throw him off balance to see me mounting my alpha."
Harry laughed. "Your alpha. I like that. So off-balance is good."
"Of course! He won't learn anything until he realizes that what he knows is wrong."
"Well, I'm game. Any plan for how to get him to see?"
"Mm. Well, dinner is a stew. It can sit. We'll start in the hallway, just before he should be leaving the bath, and one of us can charm the door not to reclose."
"All right." Harry nudged Draco, who slid back off his lap. "But let's go to my room and warm up, okay? I can't take it as fast as you do."
"Lack of practice."
"And whose fault is that?"
"You do have dildos, you know."
"Prat."
They were trying to be quiet, so as not to give warning. Harry was bent over, both hands clutching a wall sconce above, forehead leaned into his elbows, and both slick with sweat. Draco, behind him, was holding his cock tight to get the head in. At the clack of the door and Snape's gasp, Harry twisted his head to look. The man was twisted away, yanking furiously at the persistently open door.
"Stay," Harry said drunkenly, half-lost in the otherworldly feel of Draco's cock stretching him as it pushed in. "Y'should watch."
"I have no desire to--"
"Hush."
Harry thought Draco might have enforced that with a hex, because Snape didn't speak after that. He didn't even try to turn away, although he did shift uneasily, visibly more and more agitated, as Draco began to thrust. Harry tried to watch, to absorb the burning color on Snape's face and the distension of his dressing gown as his own cock began to rise, but the sensation of Draco moving inside him was too much. His eyes closed as Draco picked up his pace, his hands digging into Harry's hips rather than curling around his cock, where they belonged. He wanted to ask for more attention, to beg for it, but he couldn't bring himself to speak, only to cry out and rock back harder.
Draco, usually so vocal, didn't speak either, just grunted and panted with effort, his grasp tightening as if he were holding Harry upright, which he might have been, by now. Even without words, Harry could still detect the rise in his voice as he neared orgasm. Without that, he would have been taken by surprise as Draco first froze and then slowly drooped, his torso sagging heavily onto Harry's back. Harry gave him only a few seconds before he twisted away and turned to brace his back where his forearms had been a moment before. Snape, who had taken a step forward, twitched back. Harry had forgotten him.
"Mm?" Draco looked dizzy. Harry stroked lovingly along his cheek.
"Suck me, baby, please?"
"Oh." Draco blinked at him for a moment, and then stepped close. "Yeah."
Without preliminaries, he dropped to his knees and rubbed his face against Harry's bare cock, streaking his cheek with glistening liquid.
"I'm such a spoiled brat. You never forget me like that."
"I like the way you get lost," Harry murmured, his fingers trailing through bright hair. " I like watching you stripped down, all your plots dissolving, until you just go by feel, and don't even notice...." He cried out as Draco's mouth closed on him, hot and eager and with none of his usual teasing. Draco wasn't lost in this, though. He reached back, pushing fingers into Harry's still loose hole and Harry's head fell back, stopping at the wall with a soft clunk. He was vaguely aware of Snape still there, trapped between them and the bathroom, but he didn't really care, not when he was so close to exploding into Draco's wet mouth, squirming between that and the tiny pushes of his spread fingers, stretching him just a little more, taking him just a little deeper.
Energy pooled in his bollocks, drew in, and shot out, as air shot out of his lungs, a shout he could no more have held in then he could have not come. He sucked a breath in and let it out, Draco sliding a hand up his stomach to keep him upright through the sudden drain.
"God." Harry forced his eyes to open. "I can't believe how good you are. Still."
Apparently recovered, Draco smirked. Snape coughed.
"I am still here, you know."
Harry looked over. Snape's face was dark with blood, and his scowl especially deep. It might have been more effective if not for the lifted drape of his dressing gown.
"Mm." He let his gaze linger there significantly. "You don't look like it was entirely unpleasant."
"A physical reaction is inevitable," Snape protested. "Is that not the point of such displays?"
"Inevitable?" Draco murmured, but pushed the matter no further. Harry laughed.
"Did you learn anything?"
"That you're both perverts!"
Draco snorted and Harry grinned. "What, for that? I thought 'pervert' was for the whip rack next to my wardrobe."
Severus made an inarticulate noise, and Draco rose to his feet, pausing for a stretch at the top of it. "Harry finds the most interesting things in equestrian shops. I believe some of the shop assistants believe he actually has a horse."
Harry sniggered. "I may have dropped something about a feisty white barb."
"That is enough!" Snape snarled. "Let me go!"
Harry stiffened. Draco sighed.
"No," Harry said deliberately. "I think I won't."
"I am dripping, I am cold, and I want to dress."
"Oh that's fine," Harry agreed. "We'll come with you."
"I assure you, I can dress unsupervised."
"Obviously. But you've been avoiding us, and that won't do. You're going to spend the next three days in the presence of both of us -- maybe one for short stretches if needed -- at all times."
Severus stared. "You cannot be serious!"
"Oh, I think I am."
"Are you going to stand behind me while I brew?"
"No. You're going to take three days off from brewing."
"That is my living, Potter!"
"Oh, don't worry. I won't let you starve."
"I demand--"
"Three days is not that long, Severus, and you are perilously close to defying me."
"You capricious--! I will complain."
"Right. To whom?"
When several seconds had passed and Severus hadn't come up with an answer, Harry turned briskly.
"All right, then. Your room, then dinner."
"Will one of you follow me into the loo?" Severus demanded caustically.
"Hm. What do you think, Draco?"
"As I recall, this wasn't to be punishment."
The words were thoughtful, but Harry knew them as a correction. He felt himself flush. "Oh, all right. Privacy for that, but you can't hide in there."
Draco's subtle criticism twisted in Harry's thoughts as they walked to the guest room. He easily fell into humiliating Snape. It was a natural vengeance for his years at school, but if he gave in to that too much, he would never get anywhere. A pack member that didn't trust him would be miserable; he needed to reach some sort of trust. He wouldn't change his decision -- though it had been, as accused, capricious. However, he could soften the implementation. He talked to Draco as Severus changed into clothes, allowing him to do so in the narrow cover of the wardrobe and pointedly not looking, even when quick movements tried to attract his eye.
Severus was distressed when he discovered that Harry intended him to sleep in their room, but calmed to mere indignation when Harry transfigured a second bed for him.
"I understand the point, I expect," he said acidly. "An audience for your sexual activities."
"Perhaps that's it," Draco said lightly. "Harry is discovering exhibitionism."
Harry shrugged, uneasy at the implication that Draco had not agreed with his decree. "I just think, you know, if the point is to have him see what we're like with each other, it doesn't help if he avoids us all the time."
"And do you think I will believe what you choose to show me?" Severus demanded.
"Do you think I could fake anything for three days straight?"
"You hid being a werewolf for three years."
Harry jerked his head to the side, shaking his fringe out of the way. "Not the same. That was just moments of deception, though often. And I had two friends and three professors helping me."
Snape had been one of those professors. Briefly, there was silence.
"Did you enjoy having him watch?" Draco asked. He sounded genuinely curious -- or at least as curious as Draco Malfoy could admit to being.
Harry laughed slightly, and looked down at the duvet. "Honestly? I forgot he was there."
"Oh." As their eyes met, Draco looked as pleasantly lost as he had in the hallway. Contrary to Severus's expectations, they did no more than kiss and cuddle, that night, but that activity was both lengthy and sincere.
Mercy: Part 3