Brothers in Blood: Father and Sons by JAWorley

“Jacquelyn.” Harry walked up behind her, a smile on his face. For some reason he felt little apprehension talking to her today. Perhaps all of the drama from the night before had left him feeling he had had enough of it for a while, and didn’t need to be so dramatically pathetic when talking to her.

“Oh, hi Harry.” She seemed quiet and suddenly Harry’s confidence had gone away as he felt the conversation already beginning to take a turn toward awkward.

“I was wondering if you wanted to study later tonight… maybe in the library or something? Flitwick said we have that Charms test coming up.”

Jacquelyn bit her lip. “I don’t know Harry… maybe.”

His heart sank to the pit of his stomach now. “Oh,” Harry nodded. “Well, that’s ok if you don’t want to. I understand.” He began to back away, but she suddenly took a step forward.

“Harry?”

He looked up into her beautiful blue eyes. “Yeah?”

Biting her lip again, she said, “Is it true what they’re saying?”

He tilted his head. “What who’s saying about what?”

“You know… that you and Draco attacked Ron last night?”

“What!?” Harry began shaking his head. “Nobody attacked him last night!” Anger was suddenly filling him again, and he realized too late that he had just shouted at Jacquelyn… well, not really at her, more of in front of her, but by the look on her face, it seemed she couldn’t tell the difference.

Harry sighed, and Jacquelyn backed away, saying, “Well, I have class…” She turned and headed for the crowd nearest her in the corridor. Harry took a step back and met a wall, which he used to bang the back of his head against several times at his mistake. What was going on here? Had the whole world gone insane?

It turned out that for Harry the whole world, or at least the whole school had gone insane. At lunch when he sat down at Gryffindor table, the entire table, minus Ginny, Neville, and a few first years rose and moved off to sit at other tables or left the Great Hall altogether.

Harry felt awkward sitting there by himself until Draco finally showed up, and was surprised to find the table mostly empty.

“What happened?” Draco asked as he took his seat across from Harry.

Harry lifted his head from where it had been resting on the table. “They think I’m a Slytherin now… I had to lock myself in the boy’s dorm last night… thought they might come in and hex me in my sleep.”

Draco scoffed and shook his head. “Maybe you are a Slytherin… or maybe they’re just not Gryffindors anymore.”

“And what about you?” Harry asked. “Once a Slytherin always a Slytherin?”

Draco shook his head. “Don’t throw me in with the rest of that lot… I’m a Slytherin, they’re not. Slytherins aren’t supposed to attack each other, but they do it anyway.”

Shaking his head and feeling sick, Harry said, “This is all wrong. The school has gone mad, and it’s because of me.”

Thinking for a moment as he looked down the table and spied Ginny watching him, he turned back to Harry and said, “It’s not because of you Harry. It’s because of Weasley. He’s the one spreading lies around… come on, I have an idea.”

Together they rose and left the table. Once they had gone, the Headmaster watched from the Head Table as most of the Gryffindors reappeared at their own house table. He was becoming more displeased by the day to see the attitude his students had taken against each other. Had his speech at the beginning of the year meant nothing?

Because it was Friday, and they were done with classes for the day, Draco wasn’t worried about being caught at what he was about to do. He lead Harry to a secret passage behind a picture of Helga Hufflepuff beyond the kitchens, and hurried him inside.

“I shouted at her,” Harry said lamely, not paying attention as Draco lead him through the low stone corridor.

“Shout at who?”

“Jacquelyn… she asked if it was true that you and me attacked Ron last night. Then I shouted… it was kind of horrible.”

Draco gulped. “Maybe she wasn’t the one for you… what about Hermione? She seems ok.”

“Oh, yeah, brilliant. Ron would really love me then if I stole his girlfriend. And since when did you think Hermione was ok?”

Draco raised a brow, not knowing when he had decided that. It didn’t matter though because soon Harry wouldn’t remember anything that had happened in the past couple of days, and he wouldn’t have to remember either.

Harry squinted as they emerged from underneath the castle and from behind a large green bush into the bright sunlight. Today was one of the first sunny days in a week. The grass was still squishy with water from the final rain the night before.

“Where are we going?” Harry asked, feeling good to be out on the grounds again after so long.

“Does it matter? I thought you just wanted to get away from the castle for a while.”

Harry nodded in agreement and didn’t ask again as Draco lead him around the side of the castle, through a patch of trees, and down to the Quidditch pitch.

“If they catch us flying…” Harry said, knowing they would get detention for sure.

“We’re not flying, so they won’t catch us.” Draco lifted up a flap of canvas and Harry climbed underneath, Draco following. They walked around the underside of the pitch for a few minutes until Draco stopped in front of Harry and began trying to lift a large rock from the ground. Harry moved to help him, and when they had moved the rock, a large hole was revealed. Just large enough for several bottles of what appeared to be some sort of rum.

“Homemade, but not so bad,” Draco said as he pulled one of the bottles out and uncorked it. He took a swig and plopped down onto the cold, dry earth, leaning against a large wooden support beam.

“You want me to drink that?” Harry asked, sitting down across from Draco.

Draco shook his head, “No, this one’s mine. Yours is still down in the hole.”

Harry looked into the hole and pulled out a bottle with green liquid inside. He had never drunk anything with alcohol in it before, and wasn’t sure he wanted to start now.

“Go on,” Draco said, watching him. “Takes away that sick feeling that everything has gone wrong with the world.” Wanting to forget desperately, Harry uncorked the bottle and his nostrils were immediately assaulted with the foul smell of moonshine.

He replaced the cork and said, “Maybe later… I’ll just watch you for now.”

Draco nodded, “Ok, sounds fine to me.” He took another swig and waited for the sensation to wash over him.

Harry ran his hand through his hair as he remembered the look on Jacquelyn’s face as he shouted. It had been a look of fear. There was no way she was going to go out with him now… not now that she was afraid of him. Draco drank a bit more as Harry thought about what Hermione had said to him about this year being their last, and about how it should have been simple… Harry and Ron should have been laughing and joking about class or Quidditch right now, not be fighting in the halls late at night.

“Ginny’s pretty,” Draco finally said after a while, giving a small hiccup. Harry looked up and frowned at him.

“Er… yeah, I guess.” Was Draco already drunk? He must be to admit something like that.

“Think maybe she likes me?”

“I think you hardly talk to her,” Harry said. Draco took another drink. Harry noticed that a quarter of his bottle was already gone.

“Maybe Weasley will be nicer to us if I’m dating his sister.”

Harry laughed and finally uncorked his own bottle again and took a small sip. He coughed violently for a few moments, and then held his nose as he took a long drink. So what if they caught him? He couldn’t stand to know the whole school was against him anymore. Finally he said, “If you think Ron will like us better because you’re dating Ginny, you must be smashed.”

“That’s the point Harry,” Draco said, raising his bottle to toast his friend. “That’s why I come out here. Maybe we deserve to think everything will be ok every once in a while.”

Harry and Draco sat and talked for a long time, and perhaps because time seemed distorted now that they had been drinking, it was dark and cold outside before they emerged from under the canvas flap, stumbling and laughing wildly about something having to do with Marcus Flint, Oliver Wood, and a Gringotts Goblin.

“I dunno,” Harry said, his words slurred. “Maybe we should just sleep out here tonight… go break into a locker room where it’s warm… c, can’t have any Prefects catching us like this.”

Draco shook his head. “Trust me, the locker rooms aren’t that warm this time of year.”

As quietly as possible, which was not possible at all with the two boys giggling uncontrollably at every little thing, Harry and Draco made their way back into the secret corridor and out into the empty Entrance Hall.

Harry looked at his watch, and was hardly able to believe that it was nearly midnight. It had only seemed to him like they had been out side for a few hours… little lone 12.

“Come on you brain bucket,” Draco said with a laugh as he dragged Harry toward the dungeons. “There’s a guest room you can sleep in down there… I know the password.”

Harry stumbled after him but before they made it all the way across the Entrance Hall, they heard a voice from near the top of the marble steps. “What the-”

Looking up Harry and Draco found Ron standing there. Harry had forgotten that tonight was one of Ron’s nights to patrol as a Prefect.

Draco sniggered and Harry did too, unable to stop himself, even though there was nothing that he found funny about being caught drunk.

Ron shook his head and said, “I thought I knew you Harry.”

This statement seemed to sober Harry just long enough to stand up straight, and say without slurring his words, “I guess not. I guess you thought we were brothers too… must not be since our bloodline only seemed to be thick as water for you to throw it all away.”

Draco slapped Harry on the back, almost knocking him over, and grabbed the back of his jacket to drag him down the steps to the dungeons, leaving Ron standing there at the top of the steps looking dumbfounded.

At the bottom of the steps to the Dungeons, Draco giggled and said, “Guess we showed him… didn’t even have to pull our wands out and he looked cowed.”

Harry wasn’t laughing though, because he was looking past Draco to where Snape was standing in his open office door with his arms crossed.

Draco turned at Harry’s horrified look and stopped giggling immediately. Without a word Snape pointed to the inside of his office, and Harry and Draco tried to straighten up as they walked down the hall and inside.

Angry, Snape strode in after them, slamming his office door. “What do you think you’re doing?” he half shouted.

Harry and Draco looked to each other for help, but found none forthcoming.

“I asked you a question,” Severus said in a lower, more deadly tone.

Ashamed, Harry looked down to the floor. Draco who seemed more immune to the effects of alcohol when professors were around sat up straighter and cleared his throat. “Getting caught sir.” Although Draco had said this very seriously, Harry burst out in laughter again, clamping his hand down over his mouth to keep more from spilling out. He knew it was the wrong thing to do to laugh, and was suddenly very unhappy with himself for not being able to control his actions.

Snape slammed a fist down on his desk and Harry stopped laughing, both boys looking up at the tall, menacing man in front of them.

“I expected more from you! From both of you!” he clarified. “Getting drunk is not the answer! You should have at least had the common sense to stay in a room somewhere rather than wandering around the castle in this state!”

When neither of the boys said anything, Severus sighed and pulled open a desk drawer. From within it he pulled out a phial of something brown and nasty looking. He poured half of it into a cup and handed it to Draco, and then handed the other half in the phial to Harry. “Drink that. Now!”

They did as they were told despite the disgusting taste of the brown muck, and immediately Harry’s head began to clear. Suddenly the seriousness of the situation they were in came to him, and he sat up straight, eyes glued shamefully to the floor.

“If I ever catch either one of you drinking again, I will not hesitate to request your expulsion from this school… is that understood?”

“Yes sir,” both boys said in unison.

Sighing again, Snape said, “Fifty points from Gryffindor and Fifty from Slytherin. I expect that won’t help your popularity much, but that’s not my problem. And I suggest that you two find a better way of dealing with your problems than liquor.”

Harry put his head in his hand. He had a splitting headache that he had not expected after the potion. He wanted desperately to ask for a better way to deal with his problem of Ron and the rest of the school hating him, but wasn’t sure Severus would be any help to him at the moment considering how angry he seemed to be.

“Go to bed… both of you.”

Harry and Draco stood up, and moved for the door. Before Harry got to the door however, Draco said quietly, “Sir?”

“Yes?”

“We’re sorry.”

Severus gave the boy a long look, and nodded. “Good. Now to bed with you both.”

When Harry got back to Gryffindor common room, he found it mostly empty. Ron had obviously already been there, because the remaining people there watched him intently to see if he was indeed drunk. Fortunately for him Severus had made him drink the sobering potion.

Harry scratched his head as he passed Neville, trying to finish an essay by the fire, and said, “Night Neville.”

“Night Harry,” he said back brightly, happy that Harry wasn’t drunk, although he did smell faintly of booze from close up.

Ron lay quietly in his four-poster when Harry opened the door to their dormitory, but Harry could tell from the lack of snores that he was not yet asleep.

“You’re a right git, you know that?” Harry said as he sat on his bed and pulled off his shoes. “Coming back to the common room and telling people that I attacked you when I didn’t… then coming back and telling everybody that I’m drunk.”

Ron rolled over to put his back to Harry, but remained silent. Harry tried to feel bad for a moment about calling him a git, but couldn’t feel anything but dislike for him at the moment. They seemed to be long past the moment of forgiveness and reconciliation.