Title: Cry Havoc

Disclaimer: J. K. Rowling and associates own these characters. I am writing this story for fun and not profit.

Pairing: Harry/Draco, Draco/Astoria as background

Warnings: Angst

Rating: R

Wordcount: 2900

Summary: Harry knows that his obsession with Draco has taken a drastic turn since the announcement of Draco's engagement to Astoria Greengrass, but he runs from the implications as he's never run from Voldemort.

Author's Notes: An Advent fic for mangled_form, who asked for an eighth year fic where Harry thinks about Draco all the time, but doesn't understand why, until he hears about Lucius and Narcissa having decided on Draco's engagement to Astoria.

Cry Havoc

Harry bolted from the Great Hall a few minutes after Ginny, who kept up with the gossip in Slytherin House because she said someone should, told him that Draco Malfoy was now engaged to Astoria Greengrass.

"A long engagement, they said," Ginny had murmured comfortably around her porridge, not looking at him. They had got along better since they had decided that they were definitely not going to date again, and usually Harry could listen to her morning "news session" with interest or indifference. "It has to be, since Astoria's a year younger than I am, but there it is. Pure-bloods for you," she added.

"You're a pure-blood," Harry had said, his voice soft and numb. It was something to distract Ginny, while his mind reeled around the gossip like a crow around bones.

He stared across the Great Hall at Malfoy. It was true that Malfoy hadn't looked at Astoria this morning, but did they have to? Maybe Slytherins didn't conduct their romances like Gryffindors, the way Ron and Hermione were always giggling at each other.

Maybe they didn't conduct romance at all, and this was a perfectly loveless engagement. The kind Malfoy probably wanted.

Then Harry felt the confusing mixture of anger and guilt and fear and discomfort building up in him, the sort that led him to lie awake at night thinking about Malfoy and why it troubled him that Malfoy didn't look at him anymore and didn't speak to him anymore, and he had to stand up and walk out. By the time he reached the doors of the Great Hall, it was a run.

He leaned against the wall of the entrance hall, once he got there, and clapped the back of one wrist over his eyes. He was breathing as hard as though Malfoy had tried to knock him off his broom during a Quidditch match.

Not that that happened anymore, either. Malfoy had given up Quidditch the moment he returned to school, announcing to anyone who asked why that he had more important matters to demand his attention.

Was his engagement one of them?

Maybe it was. Malfoy could have known for a long time before his parents had decided to announce it to the general public. That would also be typical of pure-blood engagements, from what Harry was hearing, now that he had the time to pay attention to such trivial things.

His blood thrummed. Harry thought he knew what this was, and he didn't like it.

But I'm not gay.

At least, he didn't want to be. But the way his mind turned on Malfoy, and the way he'd now reacted to the news of this engagement, was worrying.

Harry might not know how his obsession had started, he might not want to face what it meant exactly, but he thought he knew how to cure it. He watched Malfoy even more in the next few days than he'd already been doing in his quest to figure out what bothered him about the sudden lack of insults. He did it subtly, though. He used the enchanted surfaces of cauldrons and textbooks, which he'd grown good at turning into small mirrors, to gaze at Malfoy, who usually sat behind him these days.

Either he would see Malfoy acting lovingly towards Astoria, or he wouldn't. If it was the first, Harry thought he could move on. He didn't want someone who wanted someone else. It might hurt, but this would have nothing to do with whether Malfoy was a bloke or not. He could just let it lapse into silence.

If he saw Malfoy acting cold, well, it was the same thing. Malfoy was a git, and Harry didn't want a git, either.

He steadfastly ignored that he seemed to miss Malfoy acting like a git. It was the lack of insults that had attracted his attention, after all. It must be that, if he did like Malfoy—and he wasn't admitting it to anyone, not even his stupid brain that wanted him to spend more time considering it—he liked the way he acted now.

Malfoy, though, didn't change anything. He kept on quietly working on his potions, or his Charms, or whatever else it was, and he sometimes leaned across and helped Goyle. Those were the only times that he ever seemed to wear much emotion. He would look slightly behind Goyle, as though there were supposed to be two of him.

Harry knew who he was looking for.

If the engagement changed nothing, there went Harry's plan to use it to cure his mad obsession. He would have to try something else.

That something else was not supposed to be sticking his hand down his pants when he woke up that morning.

Harry didn't mean to. But he'd been awake all night, with his mind whirling and picking apart his meditations on Malfoy—why did he care? He didn't care. Malfoy could be plotting something. He was probably trying to live a normal life. Harry should move on. He couldn't move on until he'd figured out what this was—and he'd got no sleep. He didn't enjoy the feeling of waking up with gritty eyes, no matter how familiar he found it. And Ron and Hermione weren't totally lost in each other, the way they had been the first week they were dating. Ron would notice if Harry was stumbling in circles from weariness.

Since his first reaction to things like that was always to ask about Harry's scar, Harry was just as interested in staying away from that conversation.

And the one that would happen if Ron heard him doing this, too. Harry ground his hand against himself and ground his lips together, holding back the groans. He wasn't even really thinking much about how pale Malfoy's skin was, or his hair, or his hands, or anything else that people were supposed to think about when they were in love with someone. He couldn't be in love. He was obsessed, but he didn't know—he thought about the way that Malfoy looked away from him and the way he used to look at him—

Harry came with a little gasping sob, and closed his eyes.

He still didn't want to be gay. But it was plain that he had to do something, because this in-between state, when he didn't even know why Malfoy made him bloody come, was worse.

Harry walked right up to Malfoy that day. Malfoy was standing outside the Defense classroom, waiting for Professor Hawthorne to arrive. He was studying his book with a frown, and didn't look up until Harry was right in front of him.

Then he blinked as if he had rain in his eyes. "Yes, Potter?"

Harry stared at him, and thought of lots of things he could say. Telling him about Harry's obsession didn't seem like a promising start. Neither did accusing him of evil things that Harry didn't have any proof of.

But he needed to make sure of one thing. "Is it true that you're betrothed?" he asked.

He at least still had Malfoy's attention. Malfoy even cocked his head to the side as though he needed to view Harry from another angle. "Yes, it's true," he said. "We won't be married until we're out of school, of course. Neither Astoria's family nor mine believe in marriages between schoolchildren."

Harry nodded. "All right." And he turned his back.

Then he decided that he might as well fling everything to the winds right now. "Why the fuck not?" he muttered, and turned back. At least it would change things. And that would mean he would stop obsessing over Malfoy like this. Maybe he would nurse a broken nose instead, and his passion for Malfoy would die a swift death.

"Excuse me?" Malfoy had shifted his Defense book in a way that made it seem as if he wanted to have his hand ready to reach for his wand.

Harry took a moment to look at him. Maybe his cheekbones looked less pointed than before, but his nose had decided to compensate for it, since Snape was no longer here to be the resident hook-nosed dungeon-dweller. And he had long, soft lashes, and he kept blinking.

No, neither of those things were the source of his obsession, either.

And Harry leaned forwards, and took Malfoy's earlobes in his hands, and kissed him harshly enough that Malfoy staggered.

Malfoy's lips felt cold and motionless under Harry's. Of course they did. Even assume that he was gay and attracted to Harry, Harry hadn't informed him.

Harry stepped back, and told Malfoy, "I just thought I should show you what other options are out there."

Then he waited to see the reaction. Whether Malfoy punched him or yelled at him or told him he was mental or delivered a speech about how uncultured Harry was to kiss someone who was betrothed, it would break this stupid mental tension.

Malfoy, though, gathered up his book like a shield and fled into the classroom as Professor Hawthorne arrived, his cheeks pink and his mouth still hanging open. He took a seat near the very front of the room, which wasn't like him, and kept his back firmly turned to Harry. Harry could tell he wasn't reading his book, though.

Harry raised his eyebrows and took a seat near the back, where he could more clearly see the slow fade of the flush from the nape of Malfoy's neck.

Huh. Interesting.

"I want to know what you thought you were doing."

Harry looked up and blinked. He'd been researching his Potions essay at a table near the back of the library, sheltered from sight (and the people who still thought they ought to worship him daily) by a tall shelf. He found the words almost flying from his quill, something they hadn't done in a month. Yes, kissing Malfoy was the best thing he could have done.

Even if Astoria Greengrass didn't think so.

Harry folded his hands on top of his essay and regarded her with interest. "What do you mean?"

"Kissing my fiancé." Astoria rocked back and forth a little on her heels. Harry had never paid much attention to her before, and he didn't know how typical this was for her. She was a small, pale thing, with a posture that made Harry think of how Aunt Petunia had stood when she was trying to spy on the neighbors. "It made him uncomfortable, and it did the same thing to me."

He must be closer to her than I thought, then, if he told her about this. Or he was more affected, because he didn't laugh it off. Harry shrugged. "I want him. I thought I'd tell him. It would also have been dishonest to keep it up from him."

That appeared to confound Astoria. She stood in silence, and Harry sat and watched her. Then she tossed her hair and said, "You can't break an engagement like the one settled between our families."

"No," Harry agreed, and her pale lips widened in a little circle. Harry continued pleasantly, "I can't."

"My fiancé never would," said Astoria, and she turned her back and marched out of the library.

Harry grinned at her, and took up his quill again. This might not change things externally, but internally, it had cleared his head, and put the Snitch in Malfoy's side of the pitch. So it was worth it.

Besides, Harry didn't think people secure in their engagement usually came to threaten someone else who had kissed their fiancé.

"You're driving me mental, Potter."

Harry grinned at the wall ahead of him, even though Malfoy had snatched him on the way to breakfast and shoved him into this little alcove behind a tapestry where they probably wouldn't be disturbed. "That means it's mutual," he retorted, and leaned back against Malfoy's chest. If this was the only time he got to feel the muscles that were hiding beneath Malfoy's shirt—or that he imagined were hiding there—then he wanted to savor it.

"You're the mental one," Malfoy said sullenly, and then he whirled Harry around and stared at him. "Why did you do that?"

"Because I couldn't stop thinking about you," Harry said. "I was constantly thinking that I couldn't be gay, and wondering if there was a different reason I was obsessing over you. And so I decided to get it out of my head and into the real world, and see how someone else—you—would react to the notion."

Malfoy looked less handsome, but more intriguing, with the mulish way that he pressed his lips together. "I ought to tell you I'm not gay, either."

"Ought to," Harry said. "What an interesting choice of words."

"I'm not!" Malfoy tightened his hold on Harry's wrists and shook him for emphasis. Harry looked down at where Malfoy was touching him. "I'm betrothed to Astoria."

"None of that has anything to do with whether you're gay," Harry pointed out, and then decided that he had a more interesting question. Just like the way he'd decided to stop worrying about whether he was gay, he would change things with Malfoy. "The question is whether you want me."

Malfoy gave him a bewildered glance, emotions shifting and tossing back and forth in his eyes as though they were wind-touched. "You're impossible."

"But you haven't let go of me, and you haven't answered the question," Harry murmured. "Stop thinking of it as a life-changing experience." That was what he'd eventually had to do with his feelings for Malfoy. "Just think about it as a matter of desire."

Malfoy stared at him with his lips parted again. "I can't do this," he said. "I have a betrothal waiting for me. A life."

"And you're still not walking out there to claim it," said Harry, and his eyes were on Malfoy's, and there was no changing emotions now, only an endless, still, trembling tension. "You can, you know. Just shove me back into the wall and walk away. The way that Astoria walked to the other side of the library yesterday. It's easy."

That ought to have goaded Malfoy if anything did, Harry thought. The direct reference to Astoria wasn't only a reminder of what he stood to lose if he pursued this thing with Harry, but it was an insult to her. That would kick Malfoy out of this state of uncertainty for sure.

But Malfoy only stood there, and although his hands seemed firm on Harry's wrists, they weren't. They were trembling slightly with the tension that flowed down his arms.

"You're not sure," Harry whispered. "Not really sure. That's what I had to do. What I had to change. I couldn't stand the uncertainty, so I had to do something that would at least change it."

He leaned close enough to Malfoy to smell the soft scent of his hair—probably his shampoo—rising off him. "Do something," he whispered. "Shove me away. Walk out there and tell everyone what I did to you, instead of just Astoria. Or kiss me here and now, and give the ability to change things back to me. Because I'll have to react to that, you know. It's a way of compelling me."

He knew Malfoy had wanted to make him react, before this. But Harry hadn't known until this year how mutual it was. The thing was, he was playing his part. Malfoy was the only one who had refused.

"Come on, Malfoy," Harry whispered, as he hesitated again and again. "Come on. Choose."

He did expect Malfoy to walk back out of the alcove. Or say something about his life, and refuse to pick. It was the sort of thing that Harry could respond to, but it would guide his responses in a clear way, still keeping him out of the uncertainty that had paralyzed him before, so either one would be something Harry could accept.

Malfoy leaned forwards and kissed him aggressively, angrily, his tongue lapping out as though he wanted to warm Harry's lips up or do something else that Harry hadn't done to him before, something new.

Harry laughed in delight and leaned up into the kiss. And Malfoy didn't run away, but strained the muscles in his neck to make the kiss even harder.

Harry understood why he'd done that, of course. To show that he wouldn't be controlled, and mix things up further, and throw the Snitch back at Harry hard enough to strike him. It would start the tension again, force Harry to respond, and pull Malfoy into the dance—but at least for the moment, the responsibility wasn't on Malfoy.

Harry could envision the giving and taking that would result, the contest like a Quididtch game, movement and counter-movement, dash and competition.

He hoped it would never end.

The End.