Bonding by Binding

UPDATED CHAPTER!

After a couple more days of bed rest and salve treatment Harry was finally allowed out of bed and out of the infirmary. Snape and Malfoy brought him to Snape’s rooms in the dungeons where they showed him the guest room he would be sharing with Malfoy. It had two double beds on each side of the room and a window showing the underside of the lake, that part made Harry shudder.
“Professor can we get rid of the window or is it permanent?”
Malfoy asked Snape as he noticed Harry’s shudder and completely understood the feeling after hearing about his time in the lake. Snape looked over at Draco a little confused trying to understand why he would want to get rid of the window now when he had no issues before.
“Precisely why would I try to get rid of a window that has been there since these rooms were created? You never seemed to have trouble with it before Mr. Malfoy.”
Harry cringed knowing that the professor would realize he was the reason for it being an issue.
“It’s alright, sir, Dra…um… Malfoy just noticed my reaction to the view. It’s fine I’ll get used to it.”
Snape scoffed and just left them to it not wanting to spend more time than necessary with Potter.
“Thanks for trying Malfoy, but I’ll have to get used to it anyways since we’re in the dungeons and I know we’re under the lake, seeing it just makes it more real.”
Malfoy just looked at Harry and nodded trying to understand how it would feel but not really being able to. It’s the first time he tried to see things from Potter’s point of view when Snape got like that with him and he didn’t like what he was seeing. Snape didn’t even try to understand why Harry would feel like that or why it might be an issue. This just wasn’t right, was it?
“Whatever Potter. The left side is yours, I’m on the right. Keep things tidy and we should have no problems.”
Malfoy tried to get back to his old self; he didn’t want to feel pity for Potter, he didn’t think Potter wanted him to feel pity either. He walked to his bed and laid back picking up a book from his night table and pretended to read while really watching Potter. Harry on the other hand saw that his trunk and all his stuff was brought from the tower, he made sure everything was there and that his most important items: the marauders map, the invisibility cloak, his photo album and his broom were where they were supposed to be. Those items were in the right place, but he did notice something else missing and his heart missed a beat. His Weasley sweaters. Where were his Weasley sweaters that Mrs. Weasley made him for the last 3 Christmases? He turned to Malfoy.
“Malfoy, you didn’t by any chance see some knitted sweaters around did you? Or did anyone have access to my trunk before it was brought here?”
Malfoy looked over with a brow raised shaking his head in the negative.
“We just got your trunk yesterday, I guess your old dormmates had access unless you have spells on it.”
Harry shook his head, no he didn’t think he needed those kinds of spells; he supposed Ron decided he didn’t deserve the Weasley sweaters anymore, he was just lucky that his map and cloak were still in there. It was just unfortunate that winter was coming and he had nothing warm to wear any longer, those sweaters were his warmest items and he depended on them during the coldest season, especially since he’ll be in the dungeons now.
“It’s fine, I guess. I must have lost them…”
Malfoy snorted.
“You mean Weasley stole them. I did see him burning something outside yesterday when Snape took a turn trying out his new potion on you. I thought he looked unusually happy. What were they?”
Harry shrugged not wanting to talk about it, he tried to keep that numb feeling he had earlier, it was better than the pain he knew he would be feeling. Instead he decided to stop trusting people and figured Malfoy would be perfect to teach him how, the first step would be to secure his trunk.
“Hey Malfoy, can you show me how to do some spells on my trunk? I just don’t want to chance this happening with more important things I own.”
Malfoy looked shocked that Harry wanted his help with something, or even trusted him to do this.
“Things to hide from Snape, Potter? And you trust me to show you spells I don’t know my way around?”
Harry just shrugged.
“I don’t care if you want access to my stuff, I just worry that if I ever have to go back to the tower more things of mine will end up disappearing and being burned to ashes. He already took my only sweaters and my only memory of being part of the Weasley family for a short while, but I don’t want him taking things that belonged to my father or my only pictures of my parents or anything else Ron might decide I no longer deserve.”
Malfoy kind of understood that, even if he doubted Potter would ever get back to the tower, not with this bond they have. He got up from his bed and pulled out his wand.
“Let’s get started then.”
For the next couple hours they spelled his trunk to only let his bondmates and himself to open the trunk. They figured if ever they needed to add anyone else to that they could do so later. Surprisingly they got along, and Harry even thought Draco was decent at teaching; Draco was also surprised that Potter would listen intently and try his hardest at actually performing the spells.
“What are you boys doing?”
They were so involved with spelling the trunk they never noticed Snape coming into their room. Harry whirled around and pointed his wand while Malfoy just laughed at him, Snape just stared at Harry waiting him out.
“Sorry sir, you startled me. We were just spelling my trunk so that others can’t get access, Ron already stole some stuff from it and I just don’t want to chance that happening again. Malfoy was teaching me some new spells to do this.”
Snape turned to Malfoy who had stopped laughing and just nodded his head to confirm what Harry said.
“Don’t trust your bondmates to stay out of your junk Potter? How typical.”
Harry frowned and shook his head.
“That’s not it, you and Malfoy are both keyed into my trunk sir. I figured I shouldn’t have any secrets from you if we’re stuck together. So far Malfoy knows most of my secrets; I just haven’t had a chance to share anything with you, yet, sir.”
Snape just smirked and scoffed. As if a Potter would trust a Snape.
“Right. I just came with your next treatment of the salve; this one should also help with the scarring.”
Harry nodded and lay down on his bed, slipped his left arm out of his top and just looked to the right while Snape stood on his left and roughly put the salve on his burns and scars. Harry closed his eyes and breathed deeply to try and ignore the pain of Snape’s rough treatment. Draco meanwhile was trying to compare Snape’s treatment to himself with his treatment of their new omega bondmate and he was slowly realizing that there might actually be something wrong with the way things are going. So he went to Harry’s right side and just started talking to him.
“Well, since you told me your adventures, and you plan on showing me the chamber of secrets, is there anything I can explain to you about anything? Like the wizarding world or our bond of anything?”
Draco knew that Harry was raised in the muggle world, even if he didn’t want to speak about it at all, so he figured he might have questions that Weasley wouldn’t have been able to answer, or maybe he had questions about the bond that Snape didn’t take the time to answer.
Harry opened his eyes and looked at Draco and gave a small smile. He was surprised that Draco was being so gentle but he was also very glad that at least him and Malfoy have made peace in some way. Hopefully it was not just temporary due to the fact that Malfoy pitied him or something.
“I’m alright, thanks though. When did you want me to bring you to the chamber?”
Harry dreaded going to the chamber but he did promise Draco and he could tell that he was excited about the idea of seeing Slytherin’s chamber. Besides, Harry wasn’t sure how far in they would be able to go due to the cave in at the entrance, he figured he better remind Draco about that.
“In fact, before we even go into the chamber we need to figure out a way to fix the cave in that Lockhart caused. I doubt you want to go through the small hole I managed when I was twelve.”
Snape had enough of the boys ignoring what he was doing and of them not thinking he might want to see this so called chamber.
“Maybe if you asked the adult in the room he may know how to deal with such issues. But I suppose, Potter, you’re quite used to doing things on your own without adults helping you… Now stop moving so I can finish this chore unless you prefer to do it on your own as well?”
Harry shook his head and stayed still while Snape finished putting the salve on his face. Draco on the other hand just shook his head and tried to ignore the pain he could see in Harry’s face.
“This salve will only need to be put on a couple more times; unfortunately it hasn’t been affecting the scars as much as I had hoped, but after the last treatment you’ll be fully healed and no longer have a chance of infection. You’ll just have to get used to having more than the scar that made you famous. Now it’s close to curfew, we have to get up early to discuss our scheduling and our future so I suggest you boys go to sleep. Your next treatment will be at 6, I expect you to be ready by then.”
And with that Snape left the boys and went to his own room to get ready for bed, he was expecting trouble waking the boys up in the morning but figured he’d deal with that in the morning.
The boys on the other hand just looked at each other and then shrugged, Harry got up from his bed and turned to his newly warded trunk and grabbed his nightly necessaries.
“The bathroom Malfoy?”
Draco turned around from where he was getting dressed himself, and just nodded walking out the room and towards the bathroom.
“We get to use the guest bathroom, Snape has his own in his room so we don’t have to worry about sharing with him, just each other. Go ahead first and I’ll go after you.”
“Thanks Malfoy, I appreciate everything.”
Draco just looked at him, raised an eyebrow and walked away.
Harry sighed, it was a start at least, he figured it was better than nothing, being civil was better than anything they had before. He walked into the washroom and locked the door, he knew he couldn’t shower due to the fresh salve on his burns but he didn’t like changing in front of people due to the other scars he had from his home life. He wished the salved worked better on scars because he would have tried to find a way to apply to his back. He turned and looked at his back in the mirror. ‘FREAK’ was spelled on his mid back, just in a spot where he couldn’t reach it, and he just tried not to remember how he got it there from his uncle and cousin. He changed quickly and did the rest of his night time business and left the bathroom to finally lay back down on his bed ready to fall asleep.
“Goodnight Malfoy.”
Draco on the other hand was just about to leave the room to use the bathroom himself and just nodded to Harry and left the boy alone. Draco was unsure what to think of Potter’s attitude and how friendly he himself was being as well. While in the washroom taking his shower he tried to figure if his new status was the reason he was pitying Potter and being so unlike his usual self. ‘He is my omega now, maybe I’m just feeling the beta attitude quicker than we expected… Oh well, it doesn’t matter, we’re stuck with each other and things are better with us getting along.’ Draco nodded to himself, finished in the washroom and walked back to their bedroom, he noticed Harry was already asleep and so quietly crawled into his own bed and passed right out.