TBGC

Call It Love
Chapter Eight

Lucius knew that he was quickly losing what little sanity he had managed to retain over the years. He wasn’t just obsessed, he was something that went well beyond a simple obsession. This was ridiculous. This was him sitting in a chair next to his bed watching the two Potter’s curled around each other while they slept.

Actually, he could not be entirely sure Harry was asleep. After rocking Evan to sleep on the bed, Harry had simply lain down next to him and hadn’t moved since.

And the crying! Until that morning Lucius had been blissfully unaware that anyone could make that kind of noise, that loudly, and for that long. He had tortured people and animals for days on end, even till death, and he had never heard anything like that before.

Harry’s eyes opened, clear and alert. “You’ve been sitting there the whole time. Why don’t you lie down, or leave? I’m sure you can think of something else to do besides watch us.”

“I’m thinking.”

Harry creased his brow, “About what?”

“How anything that small can make that much noise.” To his great surprise, Harry buried his head in a pillow and laughed. “I’m glad you find it amusing.”

The raven-haired wizard looked up, eyes twinkling, “That was nothing. You should have heard him when I took my NEWTS.”

“You didn’t take him in with you?” It was meant sarcastically, but Harry simply smiled.

“Not until after the first written exam. We could hear him screaming in the dungeons and by the time I was released to go quiet him down Snape’s ears were ringing. I never thought he’d agree to watch Evan again.”

Lucius said nothing else, content to watch Harry languidly stroking Evan’s hair. It was strange to think that so many people could be drawn to one person. Harry was like a magnet of attraction and Evan was turning out to be no better. To think, the famous sultry Potions Master of Hogwarts babysitting a screaming brat and agreeing to do it again.

That was definitely not the Severus Lucius had known in school. In school Severus would have sooner drowned a helpless infant than rock it to sleep. That was one of the many things Draco had informed Lucius of. Snape was not only taken in by the spoiled little Potter child, he was one of the chief reasons Evan was spoiled in the first place. According to Draco all the five-year-old had to do was pout and Snape gave in.

Harry sighed into the silence, “Why does it come as such a surprise, anyway? You had a son before, might not have been very fond of him, but you had one and he had to have been little at one point.”

Lucius scowled at the memory of Draco as a child, spilling things, knocking things over, making a general nuisance of himself. “I was hardly around him when he was that age; I preferred to stay as far away from him and my wife as possible.”

“So, Draco wasn’t kidding when he said he was raised by house elves and nurse maids.”

“No, he wasn’t. The only times I took him out was to introduce him to pure blood families with female children.” Harry frowned and Lucius found himself smirking at the discontent. “Yes, Harry, I was trying to set up some sort of arranged marriage, but he took to none of them, so they never went through. Although, I think the Parkinson child may have been overly fond of the idea, she never did give it up.”

Harry sat up on the bed, still stroking his son, “Of course he didn’t take to any of them, Draco was stone cold gay. I don’t think I ever saw him take interest in any girl, unless you count Pansy, who was more of a rather ugly ornament than anything else.”

“The only one who ever caught my son’s eye was you.”

With a derisive chuckle, Harry shook his head, “Until Evan was born the only thing Draco wanted was to make my life miserable. I don’t think I’ll ever understand what changed his mind.”

There was a rather lengthy pause and Harry flinched when Lucius suddenly stood up. The silence had been somewhat unnerving, but nice all the same. Evan’s temper tantrums always gave him spectacular headaches. The blonde wizard stared down at him with that air of superiority that made Harry want to rebel, talk back, show himself to be just as powerful. If he had his wand, he would be.

“Bathe him, get him dressed, and bring him down to the parlor. He can show you the way to his room.” Without further instructions Lucius swept around the bed and into bathroom, shutting the door determinedly. So, Draco hadn’t told him about his life long obsession. It would have been interesting to see Potter’s face when he heard the truth about Draco’s miraculous switch, but it would also, most likely, cause set backs in his plan.

Lucius remembered well the first day he had taken his son to Diagon Alley. Draco had been left in Madame Malkin’s while he attended business elsewhere and when he’d returned all he had heard about for the rest of the day was ‘the boy with brilliant green eyes.’

‘You should have seen them, father, they were like emeralds. He was really quiet though; I wonder what he sounds like. I wonder if he’ll be put in Slytherin, he might have been a pure blood. I hope he is. With those eyes he’d look stunning in green and silver.’

Years of throwing his son at every available pure blood girl and the first person he shows any interest in is a boy; a boy with green eyes; a boy he isn’t even sure is pureblood. It was outrageous. Narcissa had only made matters worse, claiming she’d always suspected as much.

If he’d thought Draco’s going back to school would have made things better, it hadn’t. Within the first week Narcissa got a letter from Draco, but not just any letter, a letter ten pages long. He didn’t even have a particular fondness for the woman and he was writing her ten pages, every one of which was about the indignity of Harry Potter turning down his hand in friendship.

It hadn’t taken long to figure out that Harry Potter was the green-eyed boy from the robe shop. Of course, that didn’t help matters any either, but Lucius had, at the time, been glad they didn’t end up getting along. If Draco wanted to be interested in boys, fine, but he didn’t need to go as public as coming onto the savior of the wizarding world.

The next few years only saw the obsession growing. Draco couldn’t stop thinking and talking about Potter incessantly and it was beginning to drive Lucius somewhat insane. He’d bought his son’s way onto the team in hopes that if Draco could beat Potter at Quidditch he might shut up.

Through five years he’d endured Narcissa insisting on reading every letter their son sent home aloud at dinner. It didn’t seem to matter that he called her irritating, she’d just continue on as though he hadn’t said anything. Perhaps it was a matter of ‘if she had to suffer, he would too.’

When Potter had been captured before sixth year the entire house had gone suddenly silent. His son, rather than gloating, simply sat quietly at the dinner table, or in his room, studying, he was positively sullen about the situation. It was almost as if he hadn’t thought it was possible for Harry Potter to not be a part of his life and now that the option had been opened he refused to discuss it.

That had been when things had gone terribly wrong. Voldemort’s original plan had not been for Potter to carry the child, as most believed. He had thought it was too risky at first; what if he were rescued, or escaped? What if he just wasn’t mentally stable enough?

Harry was intended to be the father and Draco was meant to carry the child. Still a Malfoy and a Potter, but a plan that Lucius was not pleased with. Draco, while not as small as Potter, was by no means a large child. There could be difficulties with altering the body of someone so young and while his son was gay, he could not idly stand by and watch his only heir be put in harms way.

Draco wasn’t meant to know until the night it was performed. He would be given something to drink without being told the consequences and then locked in a room with Potter, who would have been forced to take a few very strong aphrodisiacs. So Lucius had done the only thing he could think of. He told Draco the plan and watched his son turn several shades of green before saying that he was going to turn his back and ignore anything that happened within the next hour.

Narcissa had been blamed for it; her attachment to her son had always been obvious. Lucius had claimed to have seen her during the time Draco left, but it hadn’t been enough; someone had to have told him of the plans or he wouldn’t have run.

Voldemort had killed her. It wasn’t a great loss for Lucius, but Draco took it hard. To make matter worse, Potter eventually escaped and the young Malfoy heir was one of the few students who saw the state he was in before they quarantined him.

There had never been a time in Draco’s life when he had been able to look at someone and think ‘it could have been me.’ He’d always known with certainty that his father would protect him, that his pure blood line was respected, and that Voldemort would never come after him because of who his father was. Now he had been faced with several sharp realities. His mother had died, despite her pure blood, despite her death eater ties, despite having done nothing, Lucius had done nothing to save her, and Voldemort had very much wanted to do to him what had been done to an enemy.

It was for those reasons that he had gone to see Potter in the infirmary after the baby was born. Snape had mentioned it looked as though they would be sending it away soon if Harry didn’t come out of his stupor. So, he’d gone down and done what came naturally to him, he had been somewhat insulting about the child’s entirely unMalfoy-like appearance, and it had worked.

Potter took to the child and Draco took to Potter and it was absolutely nauseating to watch. At least Voldemort had taken Lucius pleas for his son’s life somewhat to heart and hadn’t killed him; Draco had been a child, he had been scared. The Dark Lord had been content to let Draco alone as long as he was not actively fighting against them.

Lucius had attributed several of his son’s strange character changes to Potter being contagious. Draco started using sappy words like ‘love,’ which made the nausea worse when mixed with his own silent obsession.

It turned out Potter was more infectious than Lucius had suspected. Finding Draco riffling through supposedly secure documents pertaining to planned attacks had come as quite a shock. It hadn’t taken long for Lucius to do the math and realize that every time one of their plans was ruined it was shortly after his son made a visit and Draco did not bother denying it.

It had, of course, been a shame killing him. He was a full-grown heir and now Lucius had to think of a way to get another. There was little doubt in his mind that Voldemort would eventually seek to obtain Evan, probably as soon as he found out the boy was at Malfoy Manor. Lucius only hoped that he could forestall the inevitable until Harry was well and broken.

____________________

Harry waited until he could hear the water running to wake up Evan, touching his shoulder, “Evan, sweetie, you need to get up.”

The little boy opened his eyes almost immediately, giving his father the impression he hadn’t been truly asleep for some time, and crawled out of the bed. Harry stepped off as well, “You’ll need to take me to your room, okay?”

Evan nodded and latched onto his father’s hand, dragging him through a series of confusing hallways. Harry was beginning to think they were cursed so that only certain people could find certain rooms.

The room lit up the moment they entered and it was even more impressive then Harry had first thought. Evan seemed to be annoyed about something and immediately went to the toy chest, digging through it till he pulled out his stuffed animal and held it protectively to his chest. “Father?”

There was a quiver in his voice, making it very clear that he was still close to tears, despite his resolute stature. Harry sat on the bed, “Come here, sweetie.”

Evan sat on his father’s lap, immediately calmer at the close contact, “Can I sleep with you again tonight? I don’t like it in here alone. It’s not like at home, it’s empty and dark, and the house elves won’t leave a light on or open a window or anything.”

Harry held Evan tighter, trying to keep his temper at the idea of his son in a dark room all alone. “I’ll talk to Mr. Malfoy, okay? Meanwhile,” Harry quickly scanned the walls, looking for a particularly large magical creature, and pointing once he’d found it, “what’s that over there?”

“A dragon. Why?”

“Remember what big brother Draco told you about them?”

“That wherever there was a dragon he would be watching over me.” Evan held out the stuffed animal in his hand proudly, “That’s why he gave me this, so he would always know I was okay.”

Harry hugged Evan, trying to keep the pain from showing behind his eyes, “That’s right, Evan. So, see, nothing bad can happen to you because you’ve got two big brothers watching over you.”

“I’ve got a whole herd!” The little boy moved off his father’s lap, crawling across the bed to the wall space behind it. Harry could just make out a dark cave entrance above the headboard and watched Evan poke it until five or six dragons of different breeds came rumbling out, clearly annoyed at having their sleep interrupted.

“Look, father!” he enthusiastically poked one, “This is a Welsh Green, like Aunt Fleur’s, and a Chinese Fireball like Viktor, but the Hungarian Horntail doesn’t stay with the others, it’s... it’s...” his face screwed up, his grey eyes narrowing in concentration, “ornery, like Uncle Severus says you are.”

Harry raised an eyebrow and pulled Evan into his lap, “Really? I’ll have you know if there was ever a proper example of ‘ornery’ it’s your uncle Severus, not me.”

“But Uncle Severus says if I don’t practice using the big words like he teaches me I’ll be an ‘incompetent, ignorant little prat’ just like my father.”

“Will you now?” Harry lifted him up and carried him into towards a door he assumed was the bathroom, “We’d better get you a bath before you turn into greasy git like Uncle Severus, then. Lord knows we wouldn’t want you turning into either of us.”

Evan threw his arms around his fathers neck, “I want to be just like you, father.”

“I know, sweetie, now let’s find out why you smell like a fruit salad.”

-tbc-

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