Ivory Villa
It had been almost three days since that incident. Harry knew it would take a while for Draco to get settled into his new house, seeing as how he was not only moving houses or cities, but also provinces, so it would be a harder move. And he was moving alone, unlike him, who had moved to his current house with Hermione and Ron, though they had moved out to celebrate their engagement, much to Ron’s protests.
Harry smiled at the memory of his friends telling him about their engagement and Ron’s reaction to Hermione wanting to buy a house that they could live in together as partners, one that they could go to once the wedding was over. A home of their own.
~
Harry was watching Teddy as the persistent child stared him down, determined to not eat any of his vegetables that day. The child was more stubborn than he thought possible, a trait that he must’ve gained from his mother, as Professor Lupin was never this stubborn with him relating to anything at all.
Suddenly, the front door slammed open, which was odd, as he was not expecting his friends back from their date so early. They usually spent all day on a simple restaurant date. Why were they back so early? Before lunch at that? Ron hated his cooking. Perhaps he should learn how to cook. That was probably why Teddy was being so stubborn at the moment.
When he finally looked over at his best friends, he was taken aback by how disheveled they looked, as if they had both been crying before they had entered. Yet they were smiling the biggest, widest, happiest smiles he had ever seen plastered on anyone’s face. Hermione’s hair, which she had done for this restaurant date, was messy and out of the bun she had put it in. Her makeup was smudged and ruined, yet the shine in her eyes overshadowed that. Her outfit was wrinkled, almost as if some aggressive movement had messed it up. And if that looked messy, she was pristine standing next to Ron. his hair was mused in ways that hair should never be mused. He looked like he had been bawling just moments earlier, and was about to burst into tears at that very second. His clothing was completely rumpled, and he was wearing his tie wrong. But he was smiling.
“What’s going on?” Harry asked, dumbfounded. What had happened in the last two hours that had caused them to appear so messed up?
“AUNTY HERMIONE! UNCLE RON!” Teddy squealed loudly, welcoming the guests which had distracted Harry from trying to shove vegetables down his throat.
Hermione walked over to Harry shakily, eyes shining.
“Harry… me and Ron have something we want to tell you,” she said, voice shaking and watery. “Ron and I… we’re going to get married!”
“What?”
What? Since when?! He knew they had been dating for the past six years, but when did they get engaged?! And why had Ron never told him about this?! They were best mates right?!
“We’re going to get married, Harry.” she repeated, fresh tears falling from her eyes, as if she couldn’t believe the shocking news either.
Harry looked over to Ron, who seemed just as shaken as he was, though he seemed rather pleased and giddy with happiness. Then it dawned on him, Ron had told him, though indirectly. He had asked if he knew what kind of jewels Hermione liked, and if he could borrow several Galleons, saying that he needed to make a life-changing purchase. He understood now. He was buying an engagement ring, full of Hermione’s favorite jewels. He was so stupid for not having noticed earlier.
Hermione shakily raised her hand, her flushed face now making more sense, and showed the ring that Ron had bought her. It was beautiful. If the ring represented how much Ron thought Hermione was worth, based on appearance alone, she would be worth thousands of Galleons. It was a silver band, with golden flecks engraved into the side, that spelled out ‘Mon Amour’. He didn’t know French, but he could guess that it said something about love. As for the jewels, there were several diamonds, a few rubies, and a few pieces of gold scattered at the top, the very few framing the outside of the ring. Ron had seen it, and deemed it worthy of Hermione, and he could see why. He smiled when he saw a single emerald in the center of the ring, almost invisible. The red represented Ron, the gold represented Hermione, and the emerald represented him.
“It’s beautiful… congratulations!” Harry exclaimed, feeling overwhelmed with joy for his two friends now that he understood the situation.
Many tears had been shed afterwards. Many hugs. Many calls, and many more tears had been spilled, and they had cried that whole night, celebrating, dancing, drinking, and crying.
~
It had been a few days after that, that Hermione had dropped the bomb of her wanting a house for her and Ron, not only as a way to celebrate their engagement, but also as a way to symbolize their never ending love, established into a single building, and a way to represent their future, in a building that would never fall.
He laughed thinking of Ron’s horrified expression, and how weak he had been to her asking him, and finally surrendering to her and buying a small cottage in Sevres, where they still lived, quite happily at that.
It was true that he had been rather lonely after they had left, yet he had picked himself up the same way he always had, and focused on raising Teddy by himself. He didn’t want to be a nuisance to people and ask them to help him raise his own godson. He was not irresponsible, he could do it himself.
Sudden knocking on his door snapped him out of his daze. He knew it was just Teddy, who was going to ask something silly, but it still freaked him out, knowing that someone else was in the house when he was the only one that could defend both him and his godson.
He trudged over to the door, stretching along the way. When he opened the door, Teddy looked more distressed and fidgety than he usually did, and something about the way he was acting made Harry acutely aware that he was just wearing sweatpants.
“Uncle Harry… How do you make Gougères?” the boy asked sheepishly, looking at the floor. Harry also noticed how Teddy had changed into actual clothing without being forced into it, like he usually was on the weekends.
“Where… where is this question coming from?” Harry asked back, yawning and rubbing the sleepiness out of his eyes. He hadn’t realized he was still so tired.
“Draco wants Gougères.” Teddy replied simply.
“Right… wait, what?!” Harry shrieked, panicked. “What do you mean, Draco wants some?! Is he in the house?!”
Teddy’s guilty look should’ve been confirmation enough, but something in his mind said that there was no way that the young man would be in his house at that moment, wanting some French food he had no idea how to make. So he naturally went over to the living room, and surely enough, there was the ethereal human being.
He should’ve expected this, but it still caught him off guard. Draco was in his house. In his house.
“Oh, hello Harry.” Draco said upon noticing him, uncaring of how disheveled he looked, or on how he was clearly not prepared for any visitors at the moment. “Teddy let me in and offered me some food, do you know what happened to him?”
Harry turned over to his godson. Teddy just looked at him apologetically, seemingly unaware that it was wrong to just let people into your house when it was in a state of disaster. Everything was on the floor, it was dirty, and almost all of the plates were still in the sink.
“Mr. Draco, just give me a moment while I use my expert cooking skills to make you the best meal you'll ever eat in your life.” Teddy proclaimed loudly, rushing off into the kitchen, loud crashes following his every step.
It was quiet for a moment. And awkward. Harry looked like a mess, while Draco looked as pristine as always, with clothes that were just between casual and formal.
“Why are you here?” Harry asked suddenly, realizing that the man was probably there for a reason that was not food.
“Well, I have found that moving everything into my new house to be much more difficult than I had originally planned it to be. And you did give me your address, and I have heard the rumors that you don’t work. So I assumed that it would be fine to drop by and ask for help moving, in order to get the task done more quickly.” Draco replied swiftly, never once stuttering over his words or stopping. Harry confirmed that his voice was rather airy, and it had a sweet quality to it, drawing people towards it. It made him want to agree with everything he said without ever understanding anything that fell out of his mouth.
“Of course I’ll help you!” Harry replied quickly, realizing he had been quiet for quite a while, and that was probably the worst response.
At that moment, Teddy returned, a porcelain plate in his hands. On said plate, were several microwaved snacks, some macaroons, and a glass filled with apple juice. Teddy had arranged everything to what Harry assumed was his maximum skill, though it was still very messy.
“Here you go Mr. Draco! Enjoy!” Teddy said with flourish, waving his hand as soon as he set down the plate on the wooden table.
Draco ate contentedly, uncaring that this was not what he had asked for, never once even daring to attempt to complain.
“Uncle Harry, you have to go change!” Teddy told him.
Harry then realized that he was still in just dirty sweatpants and ran out of the room, hearing a laugh drifting through the air as he did so.
~
They Apparated over to Draco’s old manor, which, low and behold, was picture-perfect.
It had large bushes with colorful flowers all over it, which seemed to become even brighter within Draco’s presence. You could see the house behind the hedge, which was large and seemed to have been made to perfection, each sand-colored stone seemed to only be able to fit where it was, never anywhere else. The walls were covered in plants, expertly covered to seem well-kept, but also give it a magical feeling just by looking at it. There were several large windows, each shining and sparkly in the sun. A large fountain was in front of the house, and it seemed to have been there forever, yet Harry could never imagine it anywhere else, as the smooth sandy stone seemed to fit in so well with the house in the background. Several stone paths connected the outside of the house to every other area. To the left, he could see a large lake with several white swans swimming in its depths, a table in the corner of the lake with two pristine chairs. To the right, he could see a large tree with a treehouse on it, and a park set next to it.
Teddy immediately ran off towards the park set and treehouse the second he lay his eyes on it, with a goofy little smile on his face.
Looking at the manor, Harry couldn’t help but wonder why Draco would want to move out of it, seeing as it was clearly worth a lot and he must have a lot of memories in it, if the park set and treehouse belonged to him as a child. Unless something was in Versailles that was causing him to move out. Was someone blackmailing him? Was he in danger? Or… did he have a lover that lived in Versailles? No, that couldn’t be the case. Then, did he have his eyes on someone, and did they live in Versailles? Did Draco have a crush on him? He lived in Versailles. Did-
“Harry, is something the matter?” Draco asked him, seemingly sensing that his strange spiraling thoughts were going in a not-very-good direction.
“NO! Nothing at all!” Harry nervously replied, pushing his disgusting thoughts out of his mind. “Anyways, what are you having trouble moving?”
“Well, I’m having trouble moving everything out of my room.” Draco said simply.
Harry’s brain short-circuited. Draco’s room? He had to go into his room?
“Of course!” he replied, deciding to do this. He was a Gryffindor, he was brave. He could go into an attractive person’s room without making himself look like an idiot.
He looked back up to the house, only to realize he had missed a huge detail about how it was made. There was a large balcony at what appeared to be the third floor. The balcony overlooked everything, and had a table and a few white chairs surrounding it. Yet, that wasn’t what caught him off guard about the centerpiece of the house. It was the woman that was sitting at one of the chairs.
From what he could see, she was dressed elegantly in an off-shoulder green dress that reached the floor. The dress had a few jewels along the top and the bottom, and matching jewels adorned a necklace that the woman was wearing. She was seated with one leg over the other, a teacup in her hand while the other laid across her lap. He was somewhat taken aback by her hair. It was both black and blond. The black hair was at the top of her head, while the blond was more towards the sides.
“Harry!” Draco called out.
Harry quickly ran towards Draco, who was standing at the front entrance, a large wooden door with several intricate designs carved into it.
Draco opened the door and entered, going towards a staircase and going up. Harry first took his time to take in what Draco’s manor looked like from the inside.
Much like outside, it was elegant and picture-perfect. Two large staircases on either side that led to separate areas with plush red rugs on them. There were several couches with fluffy pillows thrown on them, a large table in the center with several brightly-colored flowers in a vase. A flickering fireplace with dragon designs carved into it stood proudly behind the table. At either side of the fireplace stood a set of closed double-doors, which led into unknown rooms. On the other side of each of the double doors, stood two more grand staircases with plush red rugs thrown on them. The room was large, but had a cozy feel to it, as if it wasn’t almost completely empty. Harry looked up and saw a twinkling chandelier on the ceiling, which had several paintings on it. There were more paintings decorating the halls that went up with the stairs.
Harry went over to the staircase that Draco was on and followed him up. As he walked up the stairs, he noticed that most of the paintings on the wall were abstract, and likely held a deeper meaning than originally met the eye. Though he couldn't be bothered to try to decipher them.
Upon reaching the top of the stairs, he saw that the large windows served the purpose of providing natural light to the entire hall, as there were few candle holders in the hall. He followed Draco down the hallway of the second floor until they reached a set of double-doors that were much smaller than the ones in the ground floor. Draco threw the doors open and stepped into a bedroom.
The room was in good condition, everything in place. The soft-looking bed was well-made, the cabinets were closed, and anything important seemed to be in its fixed location . Only a few boxes littered the floor. Yet it also had a messy feel to it, as if something, or someone, had been frantically pulling the room apart. He could see a large closet thrown open with several articles of clothing off the hangers. He could also see that the walls seemed rather bare compared to the rest of the household, as if several paintings had been taken off. He also saw that the chandelier’s candles were blown out, causing the room to appear much darker than it actually was.
“I’ve been trying to put everything in boxes, but I found it a difficult and long process to Apparate it to my new house whenever it got filled up. I thought it would be faster if you were around.” Draco said simply, going to the wall and taking down another painting, before stuffing it into another box.
“Can’t you just use magic?” Harry asked, taking down a few more paintings from the wall near the door, unsure of how much he should explore the room.
“The house has a spell that was implemented that doesn’t allow for magic to be used in it. That is why we Apparated outside.” Draco explained quickly, clearly uncomfortable with the subject.
Harry decided not to press it, he didn’t want to ruin whatever it was that was going on. He just kept grabbing things and putting them in boxes. Grab. Put in box. Grab. Put in box. Grab. Put in box. Grab. Put in-
“Draco, who is this?”
Harry turned so quickly and so abruptly, he swears he could’ve snapped his neck. It was the same woman from earlier. He could see more clearly now that the jewels on her dress did, in fact, match the ones on her shiny necklace. He could also see now that her eyes were a deep dark brown, like chocolates, and that she had a very poised aura. Her voice matched her, firm and composed, yet also kind and gentle.
“This is Harry Potter, he is helping me move.” Draco replied, not turning back. He just kept putting some way-too-long books that Hermione would kill to have in boxes.
The woman stared at him, and he felt deeply uncomfortable with her doing that. Her gaze seemed to stare not just at him, but seemed to go through him, as if she was deciphering what he was thinking, what he was feeling, his very soul.
“Well, he better keep working if you plan to finish moving out by tomorrow.” she said coldly, sending him a blood-curling glare before stepping away and going to some unknown household location.
Harry stood there frozen. She was terrifying, but seemed kind. He wondered how Teddy was doing. Had he seen the woman?
“Don’t worry about Teddy, mum loves kids.” Draco told him firmly, sending him a glance that said to continue putting everything away.
Harry continued to stuff clothing into more boxes, his sudden worry for Teddy calming slightly. That was Draco’s mother? He could see the resemblance, but she had a much colder and sinister aura than her son, even though it was still somewhat warm. He quickly realized that they had put almost everything away, the only things that were not in boxes were the main structures of the room: the bed, the cabinets, the closets, and the drawers.
Harry glanced over to Draco for directions on what to do next.
“We should start taking the boxes outside, and then we should Apparate them over to my place.” Draco said quickly, swiftly grabbing a single box and walking out of the room with it.
Harry picked up several of the cardboard containers and followed him out. They walked outside quietly, tensely. Harry thought about how cold his mother had been towards him, and felt a shiver pass through his body when he thought about how she had seemingly seen through him.
They repeated the process of getting boxes and setting them up in a large pile outside until Draco’s room was completely bare. Once this was done, Harry went over to collect Teddy from where he was.
His godson was swinging himself frantically on the swings, going much higher than Harry was comfortable with. The boy could fly off the swing and crack his skull if he wasn’t careful!
“Teddy, let's go!” Harry called.
Teddy stopped the swings, and sprinted towards him, teal hair getting mussed in a way that would be impossible to brush later.
“LET’S GO!” Teddy shouted happily, grabbing his hand and running towards the mountain of boxes.
“Harry, can you Apparate most of the boxes? I’m afraid I am unable to Apparate consistently for long periods of time.” Draco asked, seemingly embarrassed admitting his lack of magical power.
“Sure.” Harry replied. “Just show me where we are going first.”
Draco nodded his lovely head, and reached over to grab Harry’s hand. Harry felt heat rush to his face, even though he had known that this was coming. Draco’s hands were cold to the touch, like smooth glass on a snowy winter day. His hands were soft and gentle, and were composed of fine bone, and Harry felt that if he squeezed too hard he might break them.
Teddy wrapped himself around Draco’s legs, a bright smile on his face. He probably didn’t understand what was going on, but was simply glad to be involved in the situation. Harry picked up as many boxes as he could hold firmly in his arms, and he then felt the pull of a magical force that did not belong to him envelop them. The magical force seemed to lift them off the ground and carry them to a new location, while keeping them safe. But Harry only focused on the small hand that enveloped his own.
When the force dropped them off, it sent them all tumbling. It was a rough landing with no coordination, unlike the take-off.
“Still working out that part.” Draco mumbled, letting go of Harry’s hand. Harry did not like that. Even if his hand was cold, it was a lingering presence that made him aware of all that was going on around him, a presence that felt safe. When he removed his hand, it felt too warm and too cold all at once. It made his senses go into overdrive, keen to keep the sensation where he knew he could find it. Safe in his warm hands.
Teddy was also keen to keep himself glued to Draco’s legs, though that made less sense since Draco was wearing pants. And it might just be because Teddy never had a mother figure in his life besides Hermione, and now she was gone. He might be searching for someone new that he could rely on besides Harry. And unfortunately, Ron had never quite fit the bill.
“We’re here.” Draco announced, prying Teddy from his legs.
Harry looked over to the building, and immediately felt the presence of riches and power, though differently from the other manor.
This one was much smaller and didn’t scream any of the above, yet you could see it upon looking closer. It had a hedge fence surrounding it, which was cut to perfection, and a gate in the center. Once they passed the gate, you could see a large garden filled with pastel-colored flowers. Small bodies of water littered the area, yet it just brought everything together. Large trees resided near the lakes, which he could see housed colorful fish and a few ducks. The trees themselves were magical in their own way, and presented elegance and beauty, much like the owner of the household. The stone path was much more natural, and spread out more, leading to where the main outdoor attractions were located.
The building itself wasn’t one, but several different units scattered along the land that belonged to Draco. You could see that they were unified and connected in several ways. One was their color, all ivory in color with large windows. They were all organized in a way he could not place, all connected by paths, all seemed to build up to the main structure. A large ivory building with large windows, and a single door in the center. The roof was of a darker color, and topped everything off. The area, when seen as a single unit, demanded wealth and power, yet not individually, which is how you saw it upon first sight.
“This is my new home, I call it Ivory Villa.” Draco said, a small smile playing on his lips.
“No park?” Teddy asked, sadness evident in his expression and voice.
“No, but you can help us prepare everything, and then I will be able to take you to school faster.” Draco told him, his smile growing upon seeing how excited Teddy became at the thought. The young boy grabbed the smallest of boxes and started carrying it towards the largest structure.
Harry mimicked the young boy, as did Draco. Upon seeing how little Draco was taking, Harry quickly grabbed more cartons of objects. He wondered if Draco was weak, after all, the man was unable to Apparate a lot, and seemingly could not carry many heavy objects. He wondered if he would be able to fight back in a fight or struggle. He probably wouldn’t be able to. He would struggle a lot to be able to. Then he wondered if he could fight against Harry. He worked out a lot and was called magically gifted and politically powerful by Hermione on several occasions. Draco would never be able to stand his ground, in a fight or… in more intimate manners.
Harry felt heat rush to his face as sudden unwanted thoughts clouded his mind. Thoughts of Draco struggling against him, of how his name would sound when ruined. Would his brain switch to another language? How would the language of love sound falling from those plush lips while the ultimate ritual of love was committed by the two of them?
He shook his head, trying to clear his head of such thoughts. He had to focus. Draco brought him here because he trusted him to help him with the move, not to think of having sex with him, no matter how inviting going down that train of thought was. It was inappropriate, and Harry felt that if Draco found out, he would never invite him again. Besides, he had to focus on making sure Teddy didn’t destroy the house that Draco was so proud of, no matter that it was really an expensive villa.