#Bc Harry can’t sleep so he lets himself into the Headmistress’s office

[beloved-child-of-the-house]

okay so Allie @oflights got me thinking about this fic I wrote last year where Harry teaches Draco how to conjure a Patronus, and I just find the scene so fun that I’m going to post it here 🥰

“Right. Okay. So,” Harry leaned back against his desk, feeling a little self conscious. “The Patronus Charm is one of the most ancient pieces of magic still in common use. You can actually track surges of its use through history. It’s associated with troubled times, obviously. At the moment, we have an unusually high number of people trained in its use. Some of that is down to Dumbledore, actually. Because of the talking Patronus messages you saw Hagrid use yesterday. That was a favoured method of communication used by the Order of the Phoenix.” 

Harry paused to let Draco catch up in his notetaking, picking up the thread again when Draco raised his head and resumed eye contact, “There’s been this idea in the past that a Patronus can only be cast by someone pure of heart, which. I think is kind of silly. What does pure of heart even mean? The reality is that because it takes so much magic, it requires an equally incredible amount of focus and clarity of purpose.

“I find it helps in casting to understand what exactly a Patronus is-”

“It’s a physical manifestation of hope and joy,” Draco interrupted quietly. 

“Exactly. I’d add to that, it’s a physical manifestation of your survival instinct also. And since a Dementor's a sort of personification of despair, a Patronus can drive it away. The incantation actually translates to ‘I summon my protector.’”

“Poetic,” Draco said, scribbling in his pad. 

“Yes, well. It works. So the most common way to summon a Patronus is to fix a powerfully positive, joyful memory in your mind, focus on it with all your might, and then cast. Generally, I have my classes practise focusing on the memory before trying to cast the spell.”

“All right.” Draco didn’t move. 

“You should put away your notebook,” Harry advised, raising his wand, “Nox.” 

The torches in the wall brackets extinguished themselves, and they were plunged immediately into a much deeper darkness than Harry had been expecting. The curtains were drawn, and it was rather dark outside anyway, as it was snowing. 

“Potter,” came Draco’s voice, bemused from the sofa. “Are these theatrics strictly necessary?”

“Shush, you’re meant to be focusing.” 

“Fine. For how long?”

“That’s up to you. When you’re ready to try casting, try casting.” 

Draco fell silent then. Harry tried to keep as still and quiet as possible. The only sound in the room was Happy’s slightly whistly breathing from her bed. 

Presently there was a shifting as Draco rose from the sofa, “Expecto Patronum!” 

The room was illuminated by the silver cloud that burst from his wand. It hung moon-bright between them for a moment, then faded away into nothingness. Draco inhaled loudly and steadily and cast again, “Expecto Patronum!” 

This time, the thing that exploded from his wand was a distinctly animal shape, four legged, hairy, huge and dazzling in the dark office. It vanished too quickly to make out what it was, and Draco promptly dropped his wand. 

“Did you see it?!”

“Of course I saw!” Harry was so excited he could have hugged Draco. “I wasn’t expecting you to get it so fast.”

“One would think you’d have learned not to underestimate me by this time, Potter,” and Harry could picture exactly the whisk of his hair that accompanied that remark. “I told you I’ve cast the incorporeal form before. I’ll bet I have it perfect next time.” 

But Draco tried twice more, and produced only silver mist, even more indistinct than his first attempt. 

Harry heard him throw himself back onto the sofa with a huff, “Got to focus. Give me a moment.” 

The silence that followed lasted far longer than the first time. It set Harry wondering what happy memory Draco was honing in on. His desire to ask grew stronger as he waited in the dark, though he knew it would be abominably intrusive, and he didn’t dare break Draco’s concentration. 

Harry was thinking so hard about what Draco might be thinking that he didn’t even notice him get to his feet, and the bellowed incantation took him quite by surprise. 

“Expecto Patronum!” 

This time, the enormous shape that sprang forth was perfectly clear, a shining, silver-white lion so dazzling and so huge that it obscured Draco from him completely. It opened its jaws in a silent roar, then faded away, leaving them in darkness again. 

Harry felt hot all over, his skin too tight. He thought of Snape’s silver doe. Tonks’ wolf. His mouth went dry, and he fumbled for a seat more secure than the edge of his desk. 

After a moment, he raised his wand, “Lumos.” The torches flickered into light.

Draco was still staring in wonder at the place where his lion had vanished. “It was so beautiful,” Draco said quietly. “I didn’t know it would. I wasn’t expecting that.” 

Harry found his voice, “There’s nothing like seeing it for the first time. That bit of you that you’ve never laid eyes on before. Right in front of your face.”

“Yes,” Draco said reverently. Then, hesitant, “Show me yours?” 

Harry stood and raised his wand, “Expecto Patronum!” And the stag came at his call, as he knew it would. Quickly and easily as a devoted old friend. 

With the torches lit, the stag did not appear as dazzlingly as the lion, though it was just as huge. It stepped delicately right up to Draco, and lingered, nose to nose with him for just a moment before it disappeared. 

“I wish he could be with me all the time,” Draco said softly, almost to himself. “My lion.” 

“Well,” Harry said. “He is, isn’t he?”

A slow smile spread over Draco’s face, “I suppose you’re right.” 

———-

read the rest on AO3!

[beloved-child-of-the-house]

here’s some stuff that happened to harry between the end of the war and seeing draco again in moonrise

-he gave kreacher all the money sirius left to him, and tried to give him grimmauld place but kreacher didn’t want the house; for a while they lived together like roommates, and then kreacher went to live with some elves from the free elf movement in france

-harry testified at a ton of death eater trials, including draco malfoy’s and narcissa malfoy’s (lucius disappeared between the battle of hogwarts and the arrest of his wife and son; he was later found dead and draco has some very specific theories about that)

-due to harry’s testimony,  draco had a reduced sentence of 2 years of house arrest and 1 year of no magic (harry still had draco’s wand at the time so he knew draco was lying when he said it was destroyed during the war but he didn’t say anything); narcissa spent 6 mo in azkaban and is technically still under house arrest at the start of moonrise, but she breaks it to visit her sister bc she’s a malfoy damn it and she does what she pleases

-harry went back to hogwarts for a while to get his NEWTs because obviously hermione wanted to go and ron wanted to go with hermione and the idea of being without them and figuring out what to do with his life next made harry feel like he couldn’t breathe

-he had a VERY emotional first term with lots of yelling and storming off to sit by himself and he’s having trouble sleeping and he and ginny got back together and then broke up again and halfway through exams week during first term, he broke into the headmaster’s office in the middle of the night and just broke down sobbing because he couldn’t take it anymore and dumbledore’s portrait told him that he didn’t have to carry on at hogwarts and no one was going to be hurt/angry/disappointed in him, and he was SUPER relieved and he scared the crap out of professor mcgonagall (headmistress obvs) in the morning by having fallen asleep under the desk

-he went to stay at the burrow after that like he went for christmas and then the week between christmas and new year he broke down again and ginny told him that it’s okay that he needs help coping and there’s nothing wrong with getting it so he checked into st. mungo’s

-st. mungo’s has a new ward to treat wix who have been traumatically impacted by magic like straightforward spell damage or just had some kind of traumatizing experience with magic (mainly due to muggleborns being like please ma’am a crumb of therapy) and there are a ton of hogwarts students there including a bunch of slytherins and harry sees a lot of folks he knows which he finds kind of sad because they are all suffering at the same time for the same reasons and then also he knows there’s something good about it too because they can get help now, which they wouldn’t be able to before

-he sees neville a lot at st mungo’s, bc neville goes there to visit his parents and he gets sort of fascinated/obsessed with neville the way he does sometimes bc he can’t stop thinking about how neville could have been the chosen one and also he realizes that he’s attracted to neville and for a while he thinks neville kind of fostered this fundamental change in him because he’s never been conscious of being attracted to men before

-harry tries to ask hermione if there’s some kind of magical explanation for his interest in neville and hermione very gently tells him what being gay is, and harry’s like uhhhh yeah i actually have heard of that hermione but i’m not gay what about ginny so hermione goes to a muggle library and brings harry back a book about bisexuality and harry is like !!!!!!! he also revisits his past and realizes that he was very attracted to cedric diggory and viktor krum (he likes jocks) and also he realized that he still IS attracted to bill weasley 

-harry gets really into books because he didn’t know books could tell you such personal, useful things! hermione makes him get a library card

-ron leaves hogwarts after having obtained an acceptable number of NEWTS and moves in with harry at grimmauld place; hermione lives with her parents and ponders magical law school and visits a lot

-he starts dating neville! he only meant to come out to neville but neville thought harry was asking him out and accepted and harry was like okay yes let’s go with that 

-he gets a job in a muggle feminist bookshop and the middle aged muggle ladies who work there LOVE him so much because he’s polite and kind and down to earth and he loves books and harry is so MOVED because they don’t know he’s harry potter, they just know he’s a lovely boy. there’s one point where someone mentions a niece rather hopefully and harry’s worried it will get awkward but he just politely brings up neville, and they love him even more

-he breaks up with neville because he’s a little bored? he feels like there isn’t enough friction and then he is kind of miserable and self loathing for a while because he hates disappointing people and he has a little bit of a downswing

-ginny comes out as a lesbian and starts dating luna and at first harry kinda wonders if it had anything to do with him and he kind of hints at that to ron and ron scoffs and tells him he’s got a big head and harry is sheepish and realizes he’s being silly 

-ron and hermione get engaged which makes harry feel panicky again for a while and he thinks about how charlie weasley is part of a triad and harry wonders if he wants that with ron and hermione and then decides he’s not in the least attracted to either of them so probably not and then he makes them camp out in the sitting room of grimmauld place with him and they toast marshmallows on the fire and sit up all night talking and harry feels very loved

-the slytherin kids start showing up at grimmauld place one by one after they stand up to their bigot families and get disowned or else they just burn out in general. they tend to be a little snide but harry makes it clear that there is a standard for respect and kindness at grimmauld place, and people mostly meet it. harry and hermione help them learn some muggle skills and find muggle jobs so that they can support themselves (some of them have been banned from using magic or had their wands snapped but they’re trying to better themselves and learn how to treat ppl and harry rlly respects that) 

-around this time, harry starts spending more time with teddy lupin, and he keeps running into narcissa malfoy at andromeda tonks’ house, and he’s honestly kind of impressed that she’s risking being sent back to azkaban by breaking her house arrest just to see her sister and her nephew and he’s seen some other slytherins change, and besides she did save his life just because she loved her son, so he’s cautiously friendly to her

-the way narcissa (aunt cissy to some) talks about draco makes harry very curious about him like she implies he has a Terrible Secret and harry’s like !!!!!!!!!!! i must know all at once

-harry digs up draco’s wand, which he has never bothered to return and decides now is the moment to return it because he’s DESPERATE to speak to draco and see him with his own two eyes