Stuck With You / drarry

The Hearing

Harry was wearing his neatest Head Auror robes, the black ones with the silver embellishments, carefully steamed and ironed. That morning he had – for the first time in weeks – shaved closely and done his hear carefully, Malfoy almost ruining his ensemble by pulling him back into bed and kissing him impatiently. "Fuck, is it bad if I want to rip these robes right off you?" Draco had murmured into the kiss.

Harry had chuckled into his delicious mouth and pulled away reluctantly. "I have to go, I'll see you at the hearing."

Even though he wanted to be by Draco's side that morning, and through the hearing, Harry had to be at the Ministry early to oversee Lucius' transfer, and was already leaving, albeit grudgingly, when Draco started to get out of bed. It had been two weeks since Harry had visited Azkaban, and he felt that a lot of things had happened in quite the short amount of time since then. Hell, a lot of things had happened: the court date had been set (and fast-tracked), Harry had had to convince Kingsley that he wasn't going to fully return to work early even though he was overseeing Mr Malfoy's security through the trial, Kingsley had been anxiously shouting at him about the elections that were still looming in the distance, but what was most noteworthy, in Harry's opinion, was that Draco had travelled back to Italy, and made Moretti a partner in the business. He was now in charge of the shop indefinitely, until Draco would either return, or sell his share to Moretti – Harry hoped for the latter. Today, though, the plan was for Draco to get ready, to fetch Narcissa from home, and to be at the Ministry at eleven.

A few minutes later, Harry was standing in front of the holding cells at the Ministry, waiting for a portkey to appear, carrying two Aurors with Lucius in tow. At 9am sharp, Blackburn and Rivers turned up in front of Harry with a swirl, clutching Lucius firmly between them. All three of them looked more or less nauseous from the churning of the travel, and Harry felt sympathetic to their condition, but didn't comment on it.

Lucius, who was now looking pale green, was glaring at Harry, as per usual. "Lucius," Harry uttered simply, "welcome back to the Ministry," and when he received silence in return, continued, "you have a few hours to prepare, we've recovered some robes that will surely fit you, if you'll just follow me." Harry swirled around on his heel and started for the cell at the end of the corridor without waiting for a response. In front of the more private, though still austere, cell, Twigs was already waiting for the convoy that was now stomping his way.

At ten forty-five, Harry had checked and strengthened the protective spells around the cells and Level 10, one could never be too careful when bringing a former Death Eater to the Ministry. He had had a meeting with his team of Aurors, and they were now in position all around Courtroom Ten, and outside of its doors, as well as few who would escort Mr Malfoy from his cell and into the trial.

Five minutes later, Draco and Narcissa descended down the steps from the ninth floor to enter the courtroom. Harry was there waiting for them with McGallon, both of them giving a polite nod at Narcissa, who didn't seem to be looking too chatty. Harry thought it best to leave her to take a seat and calm down before the start of the trial. As Narcissa already went inside the courtroom, Draco looked at Harry hesitantly. "Can you give us a moment, Katherin?" Harry asked McGallon, who eyed the pair of them like she was trying to assess a possible threat, but then just nodded and disappeared inside.

Now it was just the pair of them, standing in the corridor. Draco stepped closer to Harry, and raised a hand to gently tangle in his hair, rubbing his scalp. They were very close, the gap between them almost invisible. Harry could feel Draco warm breath on his cheek, but didn't think it the best time to start snogging him, so he raised his hand on Draco's waist and rubbed his side. "No matter which way this goes," Draco said quietly, "I just want to say thanks... for doing this, for helping my family, you know how much they mean to me."