Favoring The Strong {Drarry}

- x -

It takes exactly three hours for Draco to lose his mind. He doesn't know where he is or who has him, but he can't believe the idiot thought the polyjuiced-Harry trick would work now, when it didn't even work the last time. He guesses that it's probably for the people watching, not for him. A way to keep the press at bay if only for a little while. Draco knows this, but it still rattles him that it would be so easy. That it takes nothing more than a flash of messy black hair and a smirk beneath those green eyes for people to just let them go anywhere they'd like even when Draco knows he looks like he'd rather be anywhere else.

He doesn't know how he feels to be thinking about Harry this way again after so long. Letting in the self conscious and self sabotaging ideas that used to rattle him at night. The ones that forced him to walk out on the very pregnant love of his life years ago with barely half a mind to turn back and apologize. He's understands he's grown since then, but this disguise and his ensuing disgust is tugging at those old twinging thoughts.

Draco takes account of himself and tries not to let his panic go much further. Whoever this is can't see him sweat. He knows Harry will be looking for him by now if they haven't placed a false version of him near the pub. He groans and wishes he could have left a trail behind like he'd seen in the muggle fairy tales, but it's too late to dwell on that.

He hopes his burst of untamed magic will be enough.

--:--

Draco's missing.

Harry sent him off to the loo to wash the tears and anxiousness from his face and now his husband is fucking missing. Meanwhile, he's sitting at the table with the boys and he's about to absolutely lose his mind.

There's the sound of an explosion somewhere outside and Harry is out of his seat and running towards it. He's always had a thing for running headlong into danger and with Draco in trouble it seems like the only viable direction. He can hear the sound of padding footsteps running behind him and knows that his sons aren't going to sit this one out of they have a choice. He knows that he wouldn't.

Harry doesn't give them a choice.

"Petrificus Totalus," he calls, turning around quickly to knock the boys off their stride. He throws a shield around them and sends his patronus stag up to Minnie back at Hogwarts before taking off around the bend where he sees a group of confused and disheveled people gathered around a patch of charred cobblestone. The residual magic in the air feels like Draco's though it's masked by the musky scent of someone else's apparation. Harry doesn't wait before calling for Ron at the ministry.

Though he never finished his Auror training, Harry knows well enough to clear the area of pedestrians, and keep both the physical and magical crime scene clean of contamination. When he's cordoned off the area he goes back to where the boys are lying petrified beneath his shield charm and checks them over. They seem fine. Angry, sad, and terrified, sure. But they're unharmed and without a clue where his husband has been whisked away to, that is the best he can hope for right now.

McGonagall comes down from the castle with Ron and a team of Aurors in tow. Harry can feel his friend's eyes on him, but whatever he sees must be enough because he doesn't poke at Harry's emotions or the way it feels like his heart is clawing it's way out of his chest. Ron simply nods at him and dives into the questions and facts.

A part of Harry wonders if that comes from years at war or years in service. Either way he is grateful.

"Did anyone else see anything?" Ron asks Harry as a Junior Auror takes notes of the case with a quick quotes quill. Harry shakes his head, but his eyes don't stray from where the headmistress is helping JL and Teddy adjust to being able to move again.

"Everyone I've asked swore to Merlin's left bollocks they saw him walking with me towards the apparation point, but—"

"But it wasn't you."

"Exactly! I was with the boys in that new pub," he says turning slightly and pointing his thumb behind him. "They haven't even gotten a chance to eat with all that's happened."

"I'll be sure they get something from the kitchens," McGonagall says as she checks the boys over for injuries and leads them back up to the castle from Hogsmeade. The look on her face says that she should have never let them leave. Any of them. Harry wants to tell her it can't possibly be her fault, but he knows too well that guilt isn't always logical. That more often than not, guilt is like a kneazle after a knut, unstoppable.

"See," says Ron, letting the first small grin glide onto his face which helps to ease some of the pain in Harry's chest, "McGonagall will make sure they eat."

"Yeah," Harry agrees distantly, looking between his boys and people who have known him and his husband since they were just boys playing at being soldiers.

"We'll sort everything out here, and report back as soon as possible, Headmistress," Ron assures her and part of it assures Harry as well.

"I always thought it was just you three," Headmistress McGonagall says with a glance at the empty alleyway where the Aurors are hunting for clues. "But as I remember, Mr. Malfoy was never too far away, was he?"

"Let's hope that's still the case," responds Ron under his breath.

--:--

It's dark when Draco finally blinks his eyes open again. He's sure another few hours have gone by, but there's still no one else in the room with him. He tries as best he can to gauge his surroundings again, but nothing changes. No part of the dank area he is huddled in makes it any easier to distinguish where the bloody fuck he's been hauled off to. Or why they've come after him when there are so many other more prominent Ex- and Neo- Death Eaters still hiding out in plain sight.

Then Robards walks in, whatever disguise he used to get here melting away to reveal his true self, still in his Head Auror uniform. Then everything makes sense.

This is not an anger directed at Death Eaters or murderers, or most criminals. This is an anger at the Malfoys. An anger at Draco. And a part of him doesn't think he can escape it.

-&-

hehehe... hey futher muckers

i know yall aint seen me in forever buttttt... im back? kind of?

i kinda got a new job...as a teacher?
i know, i don't trust me either
my immediate first thought is violence
but i like books so i guess i can teach language arts, yeah?

anywayssssss only 2 chaps left
hope y'all enjoyed this

love yall
blm ✊🏽✊🏾✊🏿
sah 🚫

-- angel janeé xoxo 💋