Mates
Chapter 15: Mates
Both Draco and Snape were dumbfounded; they were not expecting something like this. Snape was especially in denial at first, everything that Dumbledore has told him came to mind and he realized that it wasn’t Harry who came up with stories...
Snape sat down next to Draco and just slowly lifted his arm to touch the scars. Harry, being very sensitive about this, cringed and tried to get off the bed, unfortunately both Draco and Snape were not letting him leave.
“Harry, why didn’t you tell anyone?”
Draco was very confused; he couldn’t understand not having someone to talk with about issues and to trust with sensitive subjects. Draco could always go to his parents and even to Snape if he needed someone.
“I tried to tell Dumbledore but he just told me to stop exaggerating and to stop making stories and that family is important and I am to stay with them until I’m of age no matter what.”
Harry was looking down, ashamed of his body and of how weak he is to let muggles scar him so badly. He just knew that Snape and Draco were going to make fun of him now.
“Mr. Potter, Harry, Dumbledore is in the wrong and you are definitely not going back there anymore, as your Alpha I have a say in where you stay and you’ll be staying with me. As for your so called family, just wait until I get my hands on them.”
“Sev, maybe we should tell my father and get them arrested, bring them up for charges and sent to jail. That way there’s no chance of you getting into trouble by taking your own revenge.”
Draco knew the way of the laws, unfortunately muggles couldn’t go to Azkaban but they can still be sent to jail if found guilty. Snape nodded his head and agreed that that was a better idea; Harry on the other hand was just very confused. All his life people ignored him, made his life seem normal for him, he was a freak, and freaks don’t get the same treatment as regular people. Why would these two men, who didn’t care about him before, care now? He just didn’t understand.
Draco just realized that the scars spelled out Freak and he winced. How deep did they have to make the cut to get the scars to stand out so bad?!
“Harry, I’m sorry. I didn’t know. I was always told that you were a spoiled guy and that you were raised knowing all about our world. I thought you just didn’t care about the wizarding traditions just like how the Weasleys don’t.”
Harry looked over at Draco all confused. What was he talking about?
“Wizarding traditions?”
“Oh Merlin, Sev this is worse than we thought. This whole time he didn’t know the people he insulted and the customs he broke.”
Draco was flabbergasted, this changed so much. Snape on the other hand thought this was perfect for what Tom wanted him to do. If Harry was treated this way by the light, he might want to switch over to the dark where he’ll be well taken care of.
“Ok, we have a lot to discuss but let’s get some sleep first and try and relax a little before we really get into it.”
Harry nodded and tried to turn over so his back was on the bed to hide his scars once more. Draco and Snape both let him do so and decided to go to their own bed to sleep, they were going to have a busy day tomorrow.
The next day they all woke up and got ready for the day, it was Monday so they had classes to get to. Draco and Snape kept giving Harry some looks, unsure if he was ready to face the crowds. But they both figured that since he has to stay with Draco anyways that it should be alright until they can discuss everything that evening. Harry on the other hand still felt off from his attempt the previous day, he wasn’t sure if he was ready to face other people.
“Ok, our schedule today is pretty light. We have Potions with the Gryffindors and Charms with the Gryffindors then we have lunch and after that we have Arithmancy. It should be a decently easy day.”
Draco was looking forward to this day; he knew that he did well in all three of these classes. He packed everything up and stood waiting for Harry by the door. Snape was keeping a close eye on Harry; he wasn’t sure about letting him go to class so soon. They have a lot to learn about each other, especially after what they found out last night. He made a lot of assumptions that are obviously incorrect and he’s going to have to discuss a lot with Albus, not forgetting letting him know what Tom is up to. But with what he knew at this time he was unsure which side he wanted to follow.
“Ok, Harry, stay with Draco and if it becomes too much please just let him know and we’ll get you back to our rooms.”
Harry nodded and followed Draco out of the rooms towards the great hall for breakfast. Snape followed closely behind them until he got to the teachers’ entrance. Once he lost sight of Harry he got a tightening in his chest, he thought it was just him though for it left as soon as they were all seated in the hall. He could see Harry and Draco surrounded by the other Slytherins. Things seemed to be back to how it was before the Malfoys showed up, Harry seemed accepted again.
Sure enough, Draco made sure that Harry was accepted once again among the Slytherins. He decided the Dark Lord could figure something else out, he knew Harry needed this more than the Dark Lord needed his following. His father may be disappointed in him but this was his bondmate, he had a responsibility to Harry. Everyone seemed to be welcoming Harry back as part of the group, Harry was slowly feeling comfortable with them again.
Once breakfast was over Snape left to go to his classroom and that feeling came back, he was just about to turn around when he spotted Draco and Harry at the entrance to the classroom and he felt fine once more. He was wondering what the Alpha in him wanted. He couldn’t stick beside his Beta and Omega his whole life, they had separate lives that they’d like to live he was sure. Well he’ll leave things as is for now and deal with it if it happens after class.
Harry sat down with Theo, while Draco was stuck with Lavender Brown once again. Theo helped Harry understand the cuts and stirring versions needed for the potion they were working on in the classroom. Harry was a little unsure of everything though, Snape was being gentle with him and he was being harder on the other Gryffindors instead.
“Weasley, what do you call this potion? It’s pure poison! Twenty points from Gryffindor for lack of attention.”
He swished his wand at the potion and made it disappear; Snape did not want that poison around, it was just asking for trouble. He told them to start fresh and try and catch up but both Ron and Hermione were sure they were unable to catch up at this point. The class kept going with Gryffindors loosing points right and left and Slytherin gaining points for small acts done correctly. Harry was happy with the outcome for once; he figured the Gryffindors were getting their just desserts.
“So every four clockwork turn you need to turn once counter-clockwise, this helps the ingredients to mix completely.”
Theo was explaining to Harry who was enjoying potions once again now that he’s understanding things a little better. He followed the instructions from Theo and could tell his potion was going very well so far.
“Now see how I’m juicing these ingredients, using the side of the knife like this makes more juices which is always useful.”
Harry looked over to Theo’s side of the table to watch him work. Unfortunately Ron never learned anything from his first mishap and decided to mess with Harry’s potion by adding a slug to it. The potion started boiling right away.
“What happened? It was fine a second ago! Theo what’s wrong with our potion?”
Theo looked over at the potion and cringed. He knew exactly what was wrong with their potion. He pushed Harry slightly aside and started working on the potion to see if he could save it. Harry moved over and sighed thinking he messed up once more.
“I’m sorry Theo; I swear I was only doing what the instructions say. I don’t know what could have caused it to act this way.”
Theo was too busy fixing the potion to reassure Harry, he was moving back and forth getting different ingredients and mixing the potion in rhythmic movements. After a good five minutes of this the potion seemed to finally calm down and go back to where it was before all the excitement. Theo wiped his forehead and sighed and just sat down for a minute to catch his breath.
“I’m sorry Theo! I don’t know what I did!”
Harry was panicking thinking that Theo wouldn’t want to partner with him and help him in Potions any longer.
“It wasn’t anything you did Harry! Someone threw something in our potion which caused it to react that way. It was sabotage at its greatest and you’d think after what happened last time someone caused a disaster they would learn better.”
He said that last part loudly enough for the whole class to hear. Snape came walking by wondering what was going on.
“Gentlemen, what happened?”
“Someone threw a slug into our potion, luckily I was able to fix it but it could have been another explosion.”
Snape looked over at Weasley and could see he was trying to ignore him. Weasley was keeping his head down and pretending to be paying attention to his potion while everyone else in class was looking over at the professor. Snape snarled.
“Weasley! Didn’t learn your lesson the first time you tried to sabotage a potion? Fifty points from Gryffindor and also three weeks detention with me!”
Ron looked shocked.
“You can’t prove I did anything! For all you know Malfoy did it!”
Everyone laughed at that making Ron go bright red. He just looked Snape in the face and gave a him a look that said he’d get him back. Snape held in a chuckle.
“Now, everyone finish your potions you have fifteen minutes.”
Theo whispered to Harry to let him finish it off and that he’ll help him more next time. Harry sat back and let Theo work while he was just disappointed that his so called best friends were now sabotaging him in school as well as selling his secrets to the Daily Prophet. He wondered what he did that was so bad other than try to help Draco from getting a face full of potion.
‘Oh right, Hermione is against gays, that would have wrecked our relationship anyways I suppose. I guess I just have to learn to forget them and move on, it’s not like I’d take them back even if they did apologize.’
Harry sighed and just packed his stuff staying out of Theo’s way. Once Draco was done his potion he came over to him and just gave him a pat on the shoulder. Theo finished his potion a couple of minutes after Draco and they were set to leave the classroom after handing in their end results.
“Typical Weasley. Have no manners at all.”
Draco was trying to get Harry to feel a little better but he knew that there was no possible way to make him forget that his once best friend is out against him again. He just felt bad that he wasn’t helping more than he was. He didn’t know what to do.
“Come on Harry, Theo; let’s get out of here before Weasley and Granger finish their potion. We can head to Charms before everyone else and get the good seats in the back. I think we’re working on healing charms at this time.”
Harry just kept his head down and kept quiet but followed Theo and Draco to the classroom. At that time Snape was getting that pressure in his chest again, he wasn’t sure what was going on but he figured it had to be something to do with the bond as nothing else would make sense.
He tried to keep calm and let the feeling go but it just kept getting stronger the longer he ignored it. Finally he had enough.
“Ok, class dismissed. I’ll grade where you’re at just put what you have in a vial and bring it to the front to my desk.”
“But professor we still have five minutes left of class!”
Granger just couldn’t leave before class was over; she still had a few steps to go with their potion since they had to restart it so late. Weasley just gave her a shove to get her to keep quiet, he was happy to leave early when possible.
“I don’t care Granger, I said class is over so it is, bring what you have or you’ll get a zero.”
The pressure was getting weird, it was pulling and pushing and just very uncomfortable, almost to the point where it was painful. Everyone brought forth vials for him to grade and cleaned their stations, and then they all left the classroom. Snape left the classroom as well, locking the door behind him; he didn’t want the next class to get into his classroom without any supervision there. He then went towards the charms classroom where his bondmates were supposed to be at. He knocked on the door and Professor Flitwick answered the door.
“Would Mr. Potter and Mr. Malfoy be in class perchance?”
“Actually I never saw them, the rest of Slytherin except them and Nott are here.”
“Thank you, I’ll find them.”
Flitwick went back to his classroom and Snape went back towards his classroom seeing if he can find any sign of his missing mates. The feeling in his chest was getting worst so he decided to skip the looking and go straight to the finding.
“Invenient.”
He did the spell to find someone and followed the light that it emitted. It brought him to a closet with a locked door.
“Alohamora.”
Three boys fell out of the closet as soon as the door opened. They looked a mess and Harry was especially looking out of sorts. He could tell they were beat up and he found their wands on the floor outside the closet, which explained how they couldn’t get out.
“Boys, what happened? Who did this?”
Draco helped Harry to stand up and looked over at Snape.
“I don’t know, sir. They had hoods on and wouldn’t speak. There were around four of them and they grabbed us and beat us and then stuffed us in the closet. They were particularly vicious with Harry so I’m assuming it was Gryffindors.”
Harry winced when Snape tried to help him stand straight. He thought they broke a rib or something.
“Come. Let’s get back to our rooms and I will heal you up. Mr. Nott you may come with us as well.”
Harry says: “I’m alright sir. Don’t you have class to teach?”
Harry didn’t want to cause more trouble. He just wanted to go back to how things were before everything happened. But knowing that that will never happen he goes with the flow of what is happening now.
“Don’t worry about classes. You guys are more important and I need to remember that.”
The feeling in his chest left as soon as he saw Harry and Draco and he knew now that the feeling was telling him to stick to his mates. Apparently since Harry tried to die the bond is not taking any more chances and wants to keep them in sight.