Before the Storm

Chapter 13

Waking up in Tom's arms, warm for the first time in days and secure in a way that he had never truly experienced before, was something beyond perfection.

During the run of his illness Harry's dreams had been blissfully empty. He would fall into a dark void of dreamless rest where nothing from his past could plague him. The down side had been that Tom was unable to reach him. He said that the connection seemed to blur around him, that Harry had simply fuzzed through his grasp when he tried to pull him in. As much as he missed spending his nights with Tom, Harry was quickly coming to love waking up to his presence. He had been there in the Hospital Wing nearly every time he opened his eyes. And yet it was nothing compared to this.

He hadn't moved much in the night, not that Harry had ever been much of a wild sleeper, one typically needed more room than he had been afforded in his youth to get in the habit of sprawling out. Though this time his stillness could have had something to do with the arms still wrapped around his waist, and the fact that he was koala hugging Tom within an inch of his life.

Perhaps the most outstanding thing about waking up in such a position was that Harry couldn't find it in himself to be even little embarrassed or uncomfortable about it. Instead he wanted nothing more than to stay there, with his head pillowed on Tom's chest, with strong arms around him, and the steady thump of Tom's heart lulling him back to sleep.

But the room was bright behind his eyelids, and even the perfect comfort he was in couldn't keep his stomach from growling, horrendously loud in the peaceful room.

Tom's chest shook as he laughed and Harry held tightly to not be knocked off. Even still he wavered on the brink of closing his eyes and going back to sleep.

"Come on, up we get. It's time for breakfast."

Harry was ready protest. He was warm and comfortable and he had a few vague ideas about picking up where they had left off the night before. He was feeling much better, something about sleeping wrapped around Tom seemed to have worked wonders on banishing the lingering exhaustion that had hung around him. And Tom was such a wonderful sight to wake to. He still looked near perfect even after a night of sleep. His hair softly curling around his face, the way the soft green light of the shifting lake played along the smooth planes of his face. Harry would have happily lay there for hours.

But his efforts to snuggle closer, to twist his fingers in Tom's tousled hair, to start peppering kisses along his jaw towards his lips, was cut off with a deep laugh and Tom moving them both bodily to sit up.

"None of that, or we'll miss breakfast altogether." Tom said sternly as he placed his feet on the floor and prompted Harry to stand.

Harry pouted and thanked his stars that he wasn't barefoot as the chill of the floorboards soaked into this stockinged feet. Then a thought struck him, and he smiled as Tom made to stand, "How is Tom, the perfect Head Boy, handling not being the first one into the Great Hall? I bet it's torture for you!" Harry chirped gleefully.

Tom scowled at him as he swept by on the way to his wardrobe, though Harry could feel amusement that wasn't his own.

"Rossier and Orion will take care of things in my absence," Tom said as he pulled out a fresh robe. Pitch black, perfectly pressed, the only difference between that robe and the ones he wore during school hours was the lack of the Slytherin emblem and silver threaded hems.

Harry padded around the bed to where his clothes sat in a nice little pile. The down side of having all his street robes....was that what people called them during this time....all in different styles and shades was that he could not simply put on the same robe the next day and go about his merry way. With a huffed sigh he started pulling on the robe, he would just change when he got to his room.