Thanks for reading! This is the second and last part of the story.

"Did you do as I asked you to?"

"Go home and meditate?" Harry took his time arranging himself on the couch today, wanting to feel his limbs fall loose and relaxed instead of tensing up the way they tended to do the minute he stepped into Malfoy's presence. "Yes."

"Good."

Malfoy seemed in the mood for short responses and introductions today, given the way that he immediately whispered "Legilimens" and attacked Harry's mind. Harry met Malfoy's eyes, told himself off for thinking of it as an attack when Malfoy was only trying to help, and leaned back into the couch's embrace.

This time, Malfoy's attention was flickering and poking, as if searching for something. Harry resisted the temptation to compare it to the way Snape had approached his mind. For one thing, the way Malfoy touched his thoughts wasn't actively painful.

For another, he didn't settle on one memory and try to drag it forwards. Instead, he kept flicking around, and Harry finally grew annoyed enough to bring up the imagined velvet curtains he had used to shield his mind last time.

Yes. That's what I want you to do.

Harry nodded once and settled down to the hard task of caging Malfoy. His mental voice was neutral. Harry supposed they were back on those terms again, which was as well as he could expect things to be. He swished the curtains again and again, growing more skilled at moving them back and forth and trying to shield different memories.

But it was impossible to catch Malfoy. He might have been a fairy, jumping around, now a spark of light flashing, now a little black scurrying object. Harry shook off any unfortunate comparisons with Rita Skeeter and went on trying to close the curtains.

He finally did feel that he'd shut them around the most vulnerable center of his mind, the one that contained his memories of the final confrontation with Voldemort. He didn't want to share the image of his parents and Sirius and Remus surrounding him as he walked to his death with everyone.

But you'll share this?

As suddenly as if he was still there, as if it was still happening, Harry found himself reeling through a memory of Uncle Vernon yelling at him. There was a broken plate on the floor, and eggs and bacon covering the legs of Dudley's chair. Dudley was snickering at Harry the way he still did sometimes in Harry's nightmares.

And then it went away, because Harry had reacted instinctively and shrouded the whole scene with blue and green velvet.

Good, good, said Malfoy. But it's strange. What could make you more vulnerable than memories of an abusive childhood?

Feeling the prickling sensation of sweat that he had shed as a child, Harry still managed what he thought of as a fairly casual shrug. For one thing, so few people know about that. There are those who would tease me, but they're rarer now that I'm out of school. He paused, and then added pointedly, At least, I think they're rarer.

I would never do something like that.

Harry winced. Malfoy still didn't cause him the pain that Snape had caused when he was inside Harry's head, but he did set up a kind of vibration that was summoning other memories, ones that Harry didn't want to think about. He said, Fine. You won't. But you won't know what makes me more vulnerable than my childhood, either.

Malfoy was silent for so long Harry would have thought he'd cut the Legilimency connection, but instead, he murmured, You need to learn how to work with me, Potter. You can't resent and ignore me, not if I'm to teach you more about Occlumency than a couple of temporary shields.

Who's to know?

You think I would lie for you?

Harry winced again. Having Malfoy angry in his head really was very uncomfortable. He took a deep breath and said, No. I mean, who would know unless a criminal tried Legilimency on me in the field? And then it would be my own bloody fault if my shields weren't strong enough. Not your fault at all.

Malfoy was silent again, but Harry could feel his presence casting back and forth like a hound on a scent. Then he said, The Minister will order you tested, of course. He was the one who felt that you should do this. He won't let you go without making sure that you've actually done it.

Harry sighed and wished he could rub his forehead without other people immediately thinking that his scar was hurting again and screaming in panic. Right. I see now. It's just—I don't trust you, Malfoy. I don't trust Legilimency. I don't trust people in my head. I'm not naturally good at Occlumency. It's tiring to try and get good at it.

Malfoy was silent again. Harry waited. He wanted to snap at Malfoy to just say what he was thinking, for Merlin's sake, but that would be counterproductive at best, stupid at worst.

Malfoy finally said, so utterly unexpectedly that Harry just gaped a little, What if we made a trade?

What?

If I showed you a memory that I don't want anyone to see you—freely, so you wouldn't have to steal it the way you did yesterday—Malfoy ignored the way Harry tried to protest that that wasn't what had happened—and you could share the one that you're hiding. Then I could better judge how strong your shields are, and you would get a chance to see what really strong ones are like from the inside.

The more Harry thought about it, the more he thought this just came from Malfoy's curiosity. But he couldn't think of any reason not to do it, as long as Malfoy didn't talk about the memory. And why would he? Harry would have identical power over him now, and he would always know who'd run to the papers.

You distrust a lot of people.

Do you know how many people have tried to assassinate me in the past year, Malfoy?

This time, there was just confusion, as if he had managed to hit on a topic that Malfoy had never considered. One? I remember that story in the Prophet about the crazy fan who got too close by pretending to take pictures of you, but I never—

There were nine. The others, we managed to keep out of the papers. Lucky for the last bloke, too. He was a fellow Auror, Malfoy. It turned out that he had a sister who supported the Death Eaters, and escaped because her connections weren't well-known, but then she utterly failed to get back into society at all, and she committed suicide last year. He blamed me for that. Because, obviously, Voldemort ruling the world would be fine as long as his sister was still alive.

This time, the silence had a more considering quality to it. Harry became aware of the couch under him again.

He sighed. Kingsley and Malfoy would probably say he wasn't cooperating if he tried to go to sleep, but good Merlin, he was tired.

I didn't know that, Malfoy said, and his darting presence was slow and considering now. I would have approached you differently if I knew.

Harry shook his head, already regretting telling Malfoy that, a little. It probably made him sound pathetic and overwhelmed, and he didn't really feel that way, except now and then in odd moments. What he needed to do was get Malfoy out of his head and take a holiday from Occlumency.

Can we meet back here in two days, instead of one?

Shacklebolt dictated the schedule, not me. But there's something else we can do instead of more Occlumency, Malfoy added, and Harry winced a little at the pity that shone in his mental voice. Come out of your head, Potter.

Harry sighed as he slowly swished the velvet curtains shut and stopped concentrating so much on them and on the other sensations in his mind, letting the bodily ones seep back. The world swirled around him, then steadied. By the time he opened his eyes, Malfoy was standing up from the opposite couch and moving towards him with a curious, intent expression on his face.

"I don't think you've had a lot of people consider your wishes, in the last few years," Malfoy murmured.

Harry shook his head, not in disagreement, but because he didn't see what this had to do with learning Occlumency or taking a holiday from it. "No, but I knew that I was going to take a certain amount of orders when I signed up to be an Auror."

"No one should have to be in constant danger just because they're an Auror."

Harry laughed even though he was a little concerned about hurting Malfoy's feelings again when he did that. "Have you studied the kind of cases an Auror takes, Malfoy? Being in danger is part of the job description."

"But you have personal enemies. That's different."

"It is. But what can I do about it?"

Malfoy halted in front of his couch and stared down at him. Harry looked back at him in silent, limp question. Malfoy finally nodded and said, "I wanted to offer you the chance to duel me, if you wanted."

"What?"

Malfoy frowned a little at his blankness, and pushed his blond hair out of his eyes. "You sound like you need to conquer something or someone. You can't do it with your enemies who are already in Azkaban, or dead, or otherwise beyond your reach. But I'm here. I thought you might enjoy the sensation of defeating me."

Harry sat up. He said the first thing that came into his head, as he was forced to exercise the tired muscles of his brain. "I'm not that person anymore."

"What?"

"Not the kind of person who can only be healed because of duels. Not the kind of person who needs to beat other children up because of something a professor did. I used to be, I admit it, and you suffered from it. But not now."

Malfoy gaped at him in silence. Harry stood up and walked over to him, putting his hand out. Malfoy flinched before he could stop himself, and Harry nodded and let his fingers come to rest on Malfoy's robe front. He was sure that they still concealed the scars that he must be carrying from the Sectumsempra curse Harry had flung at him.

"You don't have to offer yourself up a sacrifice, Malfoy," he told the man softly, watching the frantic rise and fall of his chest, and the equally frantic confusion in his eyes. "You probably thought my mind would be clearer after that, and I would be a more cooperative Occlumency student, right?"

Malfoy moved a step back. "I wasn't thinking that at all," he said, but the flush of his ears and the way his eyes avoided Harry's gave him away. Or maybe Harry was just learning to read him, which was equally possible.

"I don't need you as a sacrifice," Harry repeated, and patted his shoulder. At the moment, he felt even older, and more like one of the Auror instructors who had been training young ones for years than anything else. "Kingsley will just have to accept a change in the schedule. I'm going to be useless when I'm this tired. And I'm going to ask for the day off from work tomorrow, too." He added, after a second's thought, "Or does this need to be finished for you as soon as possible? Is there a deadline that you have to meet? Or can you only spare a certain amount of time to train me?"

"For you, I'll make time."

Harry blinked. The worried, confused Malfoy had disappeared as if he had never been. Standing in front of Harry was the man who had met him that first day, the confident Occlumency teacher he had been barely able to believe had emerged from his schoolboy rival.

"Malfoy—"

"You're right about your uselessness if we push you now," Malfoy said. He looked Harry over and nodded to himself. "This has been coming for a while. Today was just the catalyst. So. I'll talk to Shacklebolt. Go home and sleep." He unlocked the door and stepped through it, looking as if he was going to soar up through the Ministry like a memo himself to land on Kingsley's desk.

"And meditate?" Harry called after him.

Malfoy looked back at him, a stripe of shadow painting its way down his face and making him look almost roguish. "No," he said gently. "I think you've had enough deep thought for today, Potter."

He disappeared then, and left Harry wondering whether he should feel insulted or not.

Not, he decided at last, but he left slowly, looking all the time for Malfoy around every corner.

He didn't find him.

At least I did get some peace of mind, Harry decided as he stepped once more into the Occlumency room. He found the door open and the couches in evidence, but no Malfoy. Still, Harry knew that didn't mean he should slack off.

He sat down on "his" couch and tried to meditate on blue and green. It was difficult without Malfoy there to coach him along, though. Harry frowned to himself. He would have to be good at Occlumency in the field, too, not just when Malfoy was there to help him.

"Good afternoon, Potter."

Harry actually yelped and turned around to face Malfoy with his wand drawn before he could stop himself. He did lower the wand and mumble a greeting, blushing.

Malfoy regarded him with raised eyebrows. "Did the holiday from Occlumency help at all, if that's your reaction?"

Harry swallowed and shook his head a little. "Not that," he explained, and put his wand away. "Just that I was thinking so deeply about whether I can carry Occlumency with me into the field that you startled me."

Malfoy nodded and locked the door as usual. He paced slowly back and forth in front of Harry instead of settling on his couch, though. Harry watched him in confusion, not even capable of guessing at this point what was going through the former git's head.

"Listen," said Malfoy, turning towards him. "You seem extraordinarily nervous about what I'm going to find your head, and whether or not I'm going to use it against you, despite all my efforts to convince you to trust me."

Harry shifted his shoulders a little, embarrassed now. "That's not your fault, Malfoy. That's just—shit I'm still dealing with from the past. I told you why I was having trouble concentrating, and that part is true. I slept a lot and enjoyed it, and that still doesn't completely relax me. I don't think anything will."

Malfoy only gave him a frown, as if he hadn't heard Harry's words well. Harry would have repeated them, but he was sure Malfoy had understood.

He just didn't accept.

Why not? Harry thought wearily as he watched Malfoy begin to turn in another circle. He didn't cause this, even if his actions exacerbated it. This is just something that happened. And he wasn't around to prevent Pewsey and Snape from destroying parts of my mind. Not his fault.

Malfoy turned back and said, "I cannot give you the calm mind that Occlumency normally requires, Harry. I can get you to meditate and relax your body, and that's enough for some people. My mistake was in thinking that it would be enough for you."

"Not your fault," Harry said, glad he finally got to speak. "It all goes back to things you didn't know about and couldn't have prevented, and—"

"But part of an Occlumency teacher's job is to anticipate problems like these." Malfoy frowned at him again. "I ought to have known, from what I know about your past."

"Even though you didn't know about these specific problems?"

"Even though."

Harry blinked and rubbed the back of his neck. He was going to get embarrassed and have to leave soon, he knew. Malfoy's absolute insistence on blaming himself was enough to do that for him. "It's not your fault," he said, deciding he would try one more time. "It's not something you could have done anything about even if you knew it at the time."

Malfoy's eyes had taken on a strange glitter. "You think I couldn't have blocked your last Occlumency teacher form rooting through your mind looking for things he had no right to look for?"

Harry couldn't tell whether he meant that he would have reported Pewsey to the Minister, or whether he was talking about engaging in an actual battle, Occlumens against Occlumens. Either way, it was enough to make Harry nod. "I believe you could have done that. But nothing against Snape."

"Perhaps not," Malfoy said, and for the first time since he'd begun speaking like this, he looked a little deflated. "Not with the person I was then, and the one you were, and the professor Snape was." He bowed his head. "Perhaps not."

Harry sighed a little. Malfoy seemed so discouraged that Harry wanted to throw him a bone. "But I appreciate you wanting to do something about it now," he added. "It's a lot more than other people have been willing to do for me in the past."

"But that's wrong."

"I know, but that's the way the world works when your name's Harry Potter."

"And to think I envied you for years," Malfoy said quietly. "I thought you must be spoiled growing up. My parents spoiled me—yes, I can admit it now—but I thought it would be nothing next to what the Savior of the wizarding world would be receiving. I cried myself to sleep at night sometimes thinking about how your parties must be better than mine and your Christmas gifts were richer."

Harry snorted. "I didn't have a birthday party until I was eleven years old."

"I know that now." Malfoy still hesitated for a long moment before he said the next thing, although to Harry's way of thinking, nothing could make him much more vulnerable than he'd already admitted. "You were so different from what I thought, and you still grew up stronger than I did."

"What is this, 'Comfort-Me Hour?'" Harry demanded. "No, I didn't. Malfoy. You have talents and skills that I don't, or you wouldn't have become my Occlumency teacher in the first place. Now. Are we going to stand around feeling sorry for ourselves and admiring each other for hours, or are we going to see what we can do about my sorry mind-clearing skills?"

Malfoy seemed to snap back to attention, which Harry hoped for a minute meant he'd got over his weird mood. But instead, he took a long step towards Harry and reached out to slide a hand down his shoulder in a strange way.

"I was thinking of another way," Malfoy whispered. "Another way that we can relax you, and a way I can make up for my failures in the past."

"Which weren't failures—"

"No, I believe you when you say there was nothing I could have done at the time, even if I'd known." Malfoy's face was so intense that it looked like a mask carved of bone, and Harry shivered in spite of himself. "But it's still—I should still have anticipated, from what you told me and what I knew of your past, that you would have some trouble relaxing around me, and clearing your mind wouldn't be as simple as it is for some other people. I'm glad that I assigned you the meditation exercises, or otherwise I wouldn't have got to know you well enough for what I'm about to suggest."

"Okay?" Harry asked, not sure where this was going.

"But I should have assigned you even better meditation exercises from the beginning," Malfoy said. "It would have helped you more. I might not have had to…" He bowed his head. "I'm sorry, Harry. None of this is coming out right."

Harry cleared his throat. "That's all right, Draco." He could at least return the favor of speaking to Malfoy with his first name, even if he didn't understand why Malfoy would consider it a favor. "Do what you need to do."

Malfoy looked up at him. His eyes had taken on a sheen like ice, which frightened Harry, because he thought it was tears. But then Malfoy brought up his thumbs and brushed them along Harry's cheeks, exhaling slowly.

"I've been inside you," Malfoy said. "You've been inside me. And that wasn't even a failure of my Occlumency shields, because you might have seen one of those memories of torture and not known what they were and been able to forget them. But it turned out you already knew about them, and that meant you didn't condemn me for them."

"Oh. Is that why you think you should have been able to know about what Pewsey did and keep it from happening? Because I already knew about some of your worst memories? But neither of those things was—"

Malfoy kissed him.

The sensation was so unexpected that Harry actually opened his mouth with a gasp, and Malfoy's tongue slid slowly over his lips. Harry reached out and grabbed Malfoy's hip and shoulder in response, then his neck, easing him around into an angle where the kiss would be more comfortable for the both of them.

It was easy to fall into. Malfoy was right about the intimacy that their minds had brought them. Harry could think of Malfoy's mental voice and hear it superimposed over his real one, he'd already thought Malfoy was attractive, and this was like the coming to fruition of—

But then Harry thought again.

There's another way we can relax you.

Harry drew back and shook his head when Malfoy's tongue tried to chase his. "I'm sorry, Draco. But I don't want to have sex just to relax me. You deserve better than that. So do I." It wasn't easy to catch his breath, looking into Draco's wide eyes. "It's—you're pretty bloody attractive. But not like this."

Draco stood there for a second. Harry thought he might do something because he was upset at Harry's refusal, but he only appeared to be thinking, deeply. His hands had come to rest on Harry's shoulder and waist in an echo of the way Harry was touching him. It had to be the kisses that had made Harry not notice that, because most of the time he would have been aware at once.

And then Draco looked up, and said, "I don't want to just relax you."

Harry blinked. Draco was wrongfooting him continually, and he had honestly believed that no one had the power to do that to him anymore, at least not since his last conversation with Dumbledore in the image of King's Cross. "But you said—"

"That was the acceptable thing to say. It was the right thing to say, if Shacklebolt ever demands to see memories of this conversation or your Occlumency training." Draco shivered and sighed at the same time. "But I know how to edit memories, as a master of Occlumency. I never need to show him this, and the real reason I want to do this."

"Which is?"

"You're pretty bloody attractive yourself, you know."

Harry stared. Then he said, "And you're gay?"

"I've had a few male lovers in the past," said Draco, and shrugged. "I've also always thought I want to be married someday. I'm not looking to cage myself in words I can't change. I want to—share with people a little longer than that." He slid a hand over Harry's chest, along his collarbone, and the sparks made Harry ache with their heat. "I didn't let myself think about it too much. It's beyond unprofessional for an Occlumency teacher to want that kind of thing with someone he's training. It can be fatal if it damages the trust between them."

"And you already blame yourself for all sorts of things that aren't your fault."

"I wouldn't put it that way," Draco said, with a grin that made Harry roll his eyes, because of course he wouldn't. But Draco was serious again when he drew Harry back towards him. "I want to do this because I want it. I was masking it with excuses that would make things sound better to you and the Ministry and even myself. But—I want this."

Since Harry did, and he didn't think he could ever distrust Draco again as much as he had at Hogwarts, he nodded and pulled him in. Draco rested his head on Harry's shoulder for a second. Harry held him more tenderly, wondering if he was overwhelmed by what had just passed between them.

But then Draco used the positioning of his head to suck the side of Harry's neck, and Harry gasped and laughed and cursed.

"You bastard."

Draco was smiling brightly at him, finally emerged from behind his calm and almost emotionless masks, and knelt down in front of Harry before Harry could even ask him what he wanted. Harry reached out and traced a finger along the curve of Draco's forehead, watching in an almost detached way as it trembled.

This was as far as he had ever gone with a man. It hadn't—he hadn't wanted to announce it to anyone until he was ready. And then he had held back and further back after the trouble with Pewsey, not wanting to allow anyone who would betray him so close.

But Draco wouldn't betray him. Harry knew that the way he knew the taste of his own blood on his tongue.

Draco was already nuzzling his head against the front of Harry's robes, and Harry pulled them open himself, holding the folds of cloth aside the way he had held the curtains aside to welcome him to his mind. The same comparison might have occurred to Draco, because he was gasping and flushed and wet-mouthed by the time he wrapped his lips around Harry's cock.

Harry dropped straight backwards, onto the couch. By the time he began to think that he might have hurt Draco by jamming his cock against his jaw, Draco had already moved with him, and resumed his former position, sucking with fervor.

It surpassed all Harry's expectations. His head was roiling with heat, his body blazed with it, and he lifted his hips again and again, not thinking about the discomfort he might be causing Draco now. If he did, it wasn't enough to make Draco pull away. He adjusted himself sometimes, pulling Harry's thighs apart with his hands and twisting his head to the side to get a better angle, but he never grimaced or acted as if his mouth hurt.

Not even when Harry tapped the back of his head with a shaking hand, the only warning he could give now. His voice was choked back in his throat. But Draco only closed his eyes and opened his mouth and accepted.

Was it any wonder that Harry spent himself so shamefully fast, when he had that vision in front of him?

But at least he could recover quickly, which was a part of Auror training that he was more than grateful for. Draco was still gasping when Harry rolled over and dropped into a crouch himself and grasped Draco through the cloth with his eager hands.

He had wanted to open his mouth and give Draco the sucking of his life, but apparently that wasn't what Draco wanted right now. He held Harry's wrists with his own and moved them back and forth instead, not even bothering to open his robes, his mouth open and his breath heavy and panting. He was shuddering so much that Harry wouldn't even have known when he came, except that suddenly there was soft wetness under his hands.

It didn't disgust Harry the way he had sometimes worried he would. He leaned in and kissed the side of Draco's neck, and Draco slumped against him, boneless and sighing.

When he could speak, he murmured, "When I thought of it as just relaxation practice and something for me, that was all right, but now…" He straightened up and brushed back Harry's hair from his scar. "You know I can't stay as your Occlumency teacher now. It would be unprofessional, and jealousy might sometimes get in the way."

Harry nodded; he'd resigned himself to that already. "But you'll know enough to help me pick someone trustworthy, and to be able to check on their work to make sure they're not doing anything they shouldn't."

"They had better not."

Harry laughed at the ferocity in Draco's voice, and the way he cleaned himself up, and his description of the "report" he would give Kingsley. He would say simply that Harry had mastered the basic details of Occlumency, but there was some little incompatibility in their minds and Harry now needed a new teacher.

"But one thing I can tell him, definitely," Draco said, standing up, and looking cool and sleek and professional in his robes.

Harry looked at him, still doing his own Refreshing and Cleaning Charms.

"You're going to be a good enough Occlumens to stay an Auror," Draco said, and pressed with three fingers into Harry's cheek, and left.

Harry stayed in the room for a moment, despite the unlocked door. There was languor in his own muscles, and a smile that wouldn't go away lingering around the corners of his mouth.

He was glad that he'd chosen to chance opening the walls of his mind to Draco Malfoy.

The End.