Second Chance (2025 Christmas Story) - Chapter 21

[sesheta66]

Title: Second Chance – Chapter Twenty-One
Author: sesheta_66 || AO3: sesheta_66
Prompts used: slythindor100’s early bird prompt P—Pillar Candles on Decorative Holders (picture under the cut) and dracoharry100’s prompt 24: Midnight Mass
Pairing: Harry/Draco
Word Count: 2.7K (this part)
Rating: R (eventually; this part PG)
Warning: none
Summary: This is the second Christmas for Draco without Astoria and Harry's first since Ginny remarried. Will best friends Scorpius and Albus be just what they need to rekindle something they'd thought fleeting and lost forever?
Disclaimer: All Harry Potter characters are the property of J.K. Rowling and Bloomsbury/Scholastic. No profit is being made, and no copyright infringement is intended.
Author's Notes: Written for the slythindor100 Early Bird 25 Days of Draco and Harry and the dracoharry100 Christmas Challenge.

On LJ: Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21

OR on AO3





Second Chance – Chapter 21

"I think I have an antidote."

Harry's heart leapt. "What?"

Draco approached his desk, hands raised. "Look, I know you said your priority was finding the guy making this poison, but once I managed to isolate all the ingredients, the next logical step was to figure out the one to transform them."

"Golpalott's Third Law, yes."

Draco's jaw dropped. "You know … ?"

"I may not have done well in Snape's classes but I did pick up a thing or two. Go on."

Draco blinked as though not quite able to accept this news. "Anyway, I've been doing this on my own time. I won't bill the Ministry for it. I know it wasn't what I was hired to do, but once the lab was up to speed and working on narrowing down the cases, I put in a few hours here and there at home trying to work it out."

"Are you fucking kidding me?"

Draco's face reddened and he looked angry. "I would have thought you'd want to save–"

Harry jumped out from behind his desk and threw his arms around Draco. "This is fantastic!" He released Draco, holding him at arm's length. Draco's smile lit up his face. "Get to Mungo's and see what they can do with this. I'll tell Ron and Drummond. Maybe we can save that little girl."

"Right."

"Oh, and Draco?"

"Hmm?"

"Great job."

Harry updated the team (all of whom were still working) and the lab (most of whom were also still at work) that Draco was en route to Mungo's to see if they could administer the antidote to the little girl. While potions tended to need extensive testing before approval for use on witches or wizards, they would likely administer one in cases of emergency with the parents' approval.

Buoyed by this news, Harry ordered in dinner for both teams and they doubled down on their efforts and continued working until nearly nine. By then everyone was seeing double and decided to call it a day and get back to it in the morning, despite it being the weekend. The aurors had tracked down the buyers that the seller had eventually given up. Two of them were dead ends, but one might have been sent by the guy they were looking for. He'd given them another name, which led to another, and they continued to track that last one down. His name didn't register – he was a homeless guy that the locals said moved around between shelters and parks in the city – so he wasn't the mastermind. Their best hope was that he was the final link.

It wasn't until Monday that Drummond heard back from the patent office. He passed along the details to Draco, to see if any looked like they could have been developed by this guy and he continued to go through the nearly forty possibilities.

Mungo's had indeed been given permission by the mother of one of the earlier cases, the one in the worst condition, to administer Draco's potion. He'd come round just that morning and was looking to be on the mend. They were running tests on him to be sure he had no adverse reactions before administering to the other children, front of the line being the little girl. Meanwhile, the labs at the Ministry and St Mungo's were producing the antidote as quickly as they could, so that it would be ready whenever they got the all clear.

By some miracle, no one had died from this round – at least not that they'd heard – but another dozen had been brought in. One of the healers had hypothesised that perhaps the added ingredient, by accelerating the effects ended up blowing through the active ingredient or ingredients that had overwhelmed the earlier victims. Either that or something in the chemical makeup had buffered the worst of the effects. They were going to continue researching both possibilities once all the cases were cleared. But for now, the focus had to be on treating the current patients.

The Muggle cases they'd looked into hadn't amounted to anything. While the symptoms and conditions had appeared similar, that's where any potential connection had ended. Their best hopes rested with the former potions students and patents angles.

On Tuesday, Drummond heard back from a potions master in Oxfordshire who'd been out of the country visiting family. When he'd heard what had been going on, he said that yes, in fact, he'd had a student that would be capable of producing a product of the calibre they were describing. He'd been the most gifted potioneer the man had ever seen.

Unfortunately, he'd had to let the boy go a year into his training, because he'd caught him producing his own potions in the lab. The man had strict rules around that sort of thing, and had made that clear when he'd hired him. The boy had left in a rage and months later an "accident" had nearly destroyed the man's lab. He hadn't reported it to authorities at the time because he'd been able to save the lab, thanks to the extensive security precautions he'd had in place. And he couldn't be sure that it was his former apprentice who had done it – he had no proof – and didn't want to accuse him without some sort of evidence. That had been about five years ago.

Drummond passed along the apprentice's name to Draco, and he found two patent applications authored by him near the bottom of the pile, which he would review right away.

Draco, Drummond and Ron knocked on Harry's door late that afternoon. "This could be the guy," Draco said. "I can't be sure without seeing the potions themselves, but based on the descriptions and methodology noted here, it's sophisticated work."

"Were the applications approved?" Harry asked. "Are the potions on the market now?"

Draco shook his head. "No, they rejected both for lack of sufficient details to replicate. It seems our boy here didn't want to give away his secrets, even if it meant being unable to get patents to sell the fruits of his labour."

"But there's enough information for you?"

"No. But there's enough here for me to conclude that both were developed by a highly skilled person. That's the best I can do without seeing the potions directly and analysing them."

"But we're much further ahead now than we were a week ago," Drummond said.

"Do we have a current residence for this guy?"

"No, but he grew up in Wales and was homeschooled until he decided to pursue an apprenticeship in potions. He spent a year at Hogwarts to prepare for his exams. I have a meeting with Professor Slughorn after classes today, to see if I can get a better measure of him. Meanwhile, he's since had three flats here in London and we've got the team out canvassing the neighbours, discretely, both in London and back in his home town."

"Great work, everyone." Harry looked at their exhausted faces. "We're closing in. We're gonna get this guy."

"Let's bloody hope so," Ron said.

"Amen to that," Draco agreed.

They regrouped after Drummond returned from Hogwarts. "Slughorn said he was almost unnaturally talented at potions, like he had a second sense about how they functioned. Said he could visualise the connections like they danced colourfully before him in mid-air. But he was undisciplined, possibly due to his homeschooling. Slughorn only met the boy's father once, but he seemed like a bit of a wild card, unimpressed that his son would have to attend formal school even for one year in order to prepare for exams. He'd only relented when he'd been told that no potions master would take him under their wing unless he'd passed his potions NEWT. Slughorn said he'd tried to caution the boy to at least feign an interest in complying with established protocols, but he was not particularly interested. Even still, he did give a recommendation for him to apprentice, based on his skills."

"Did he have any problems at Hogwarts?" Ron asked. "Any trouble with the other students?"

"The usual that might come from attending a school only in the final year: not included in established groups, seemed to keep to himself. Might have had a couple of run-ins with other students, but nothing that was ever brought to Slughorn's attention. He also didn't attend other classes, just potions, so he didn't get to know too many people. And he wasn't assigned a house, but rather stayed in guest quarters at the castle."

"Sounds like the perfect set-up for other students to see him as either someone to be preyed upon or jealous of," Draco said.

"Have experience with that, do you Malfoy?"

"Shut it, Ron," Harry said.

"No, it's okay, Potter. Yes, I do. You may not have experienced this in Gryffindor, but in Slytherin we were taught to look for weakness in others, or opportunities to gain from associations. I imagine that hasn't changed. Someone like that – no friends, no house affiliation – would be viewed as weak, or at least easily targetted, if they didn't have any support. Alternatively, if he didn't have to share living quarters with anyone, he could be viewed as being favoured by the administration. Someone to be jealous of. That would also have made him a target."

"Good points," Harry said, cutting off any rebuttal Ron might have chimed in with and turning his attention to Drummond. "Maybe you could follow up with McGonagall in the morning. She might have seen some things Slughorn didn't, particularly if he wasn't placed in a house. She'd have seen the bigger picture, I think."

They signed off for the day, but Harry asked Ron to stay back. When the others had left, Harry closed his door. "He's been a huge help on this case. You aren't helping matters reacting like you just did."

"Sorry, mate. Force of habit. Just sort of came out. And yeah," he conceded, "he has helped a lot."

"Glad you can acknowledge that. And it does seem you've been working together well."

"I wouldn't go that far, but yeah. We both want the same results, so we've done what we had to do." Harry nodded, pleased that they'd made progress. Then Ron grumbled under his breath, "But I don't have to like the git."

Harry sighed, knowing a lost cause when he saw one.

He'd thought about telling Ron about the party, but figured he might just leave it until the day. Better to deal with it head-on. Plus it wouldn't help anyone to hear Ron grumbling around the office for the next week. And Harry didn't feel much like giving him time to prepare a line of attack. He'd tell Hermione and leave it up to her and Rose to prepare him or not.

As Harry left for the day, he took a chance and swung by the lab. Sure enough, Draco was there. "Haven't you done enough for the day?" he asked.

Draco jumped. "Merlin's beard, Potter. Warn someone when you enter a room."

"It's not like I was being stealthy."

Draco went back to his task. "Yeah, well, Auror training. You're stealthy without even realising it."

"Am I?" Harry wasn't so sure about that, but he'd let it go.

"Like a ninja!" He didn't look up when he said it, but his lip twitched.

Harry laughed. He'd never been called a ninja before. "So, back to the matter at hand. My budget is going to run out of money if you keep working late."

Draco looked up finally. "I told you, I did the antidote work on my own time."

Harry rolled his eyes. "Oh, don't be an idiot, Draco. We all want this guy caught, but we also want the kids to get better. You'll be paid for your work."

"Not if I don't submit an invoice for it I won't."

Harry glared at the man, but couldn't be angry with him. He was helping to save kids' lives. "Fine. Then dinner's on me. Pack up your shit and get back to it tomorrow. You won't do anyone any good if you're over caffeinated and under nourished."

"Twice in one week? What will people say?"

"I don't give a damn what people say." Strangely enough, once the words were out, Harry realised that he meant them. He wondered what might have happened had he adopted that stance twenty years ago, but before he could dwell on that thought for too long, his stomach chose that moment to let out a cry. "Besides, I'm hungry, obviously, I don't want to cook, and it'll be easier to avoid random strangers coming up to me if someone's along for the ride."

Draco eyed him suspiciously but didn't argue with his logic. "Fine then. Use me as your shield. But I pick the place this time. No pub food tonight."

Harry sighed. He liked pub food. But he found he quite liked Draco's company too, so he'd go to a proper restaurant with the man.

Fortunately, Draco didn't pick the fanciest restaurant in town – something Harry wouldn't have put past him, particularly when it was Harry who was paying – but it was a nice Italian place, one Harry hadn't been to before. The tables were set tastefully, with candles set atop miniature wreaths. Festive but not overtly so. Classy but also not overtly so. It suited Draco. The place was warm, quiet, and perfect after a long day. Long week, actually.

Draco opened his menu. "So, what are your plans over Christmas?"

Harry closed his menu and put it down, having already decided what he wanted. "Let's see, party next week, dinner with Andromeda and Teddy whenever she decides on a date, Christmas Eve dinner at the Burrow, and then I don't know. Nothing else planned."

Draco put his menu down and scrutinised Harry. "You are going to your ex-wife's family Christmas dinner? How does that work?"

Harry sighed. "They're my family too. Have been since I was in school. Molly would hear nothing of it when I suggested they could celebrate without me." Draco's eyes bored into him, and if he didn't know better he'd swear the man was trying to read his thoughts. "She said that I was as good as her son, no matter what happened between me and her daughter. If Ginny had a problem with that, she could take it up with her, because there was no way in hell she was leaving me to have Christmas alone." Harry cleared his throat. "Or something along those lines."

"Wow." Draco picked up his menu again and they sat in silence while he decided what to have. As soon as he closed it and placed it on the table, the waitress came to take their order. Once she'd left, he resumed boring into Harry's brain. "So what did Ginevra say?"

Harry shrugged. "Nothing. She's fine with it. We get along well enough."

Draco leaned back, crossing his arms across his chest. "And how do you feel about it?"

"They're family, even if Ginny isn't anymore."

"Huh."

Uncomfortable with the scrutiny, Harry countered. "So what about you? What are your plans?"

"Similar to yours, actually. Apparently I'm attending a Christmas party with my son." He smirked at Harry. "Then Andromeda's whenever she decides, then Christmas Eve dinner at the Manor, after which we go to midnight mass and back to the Manor for the night. Christmas Day is lunch and afternoon at the Greengrasses. Sometime between Christmas and New Year I'll have dinner with Pansy and Blaise, and the rest is up in the air."

The waitress brought their wine, Draco pronounced it acceptable, and she left.

"And I believe we are to have a house guest for a few days, timing to be determined." He raised his glass and Harry clinked it with his own.

He savoured the wine for a moment before asking, "No New Year's plans?"

"I prefer to stay in and my friends tend to go out, so we have nothing planned so far. You?"

"My friends are Ginny's friends, and I get them for the Christmas party. She gets them and the kids for New Year's. So no plans yet."

Their meals arrived and plans for the holidays were forgotten as they enjoyed their meal.

Comments

[piratesmile331.livejournal.com]

This is all so exciting! Can’t wait for more!

[enchanted-jae.livejournal.com]

Ring in the new year together!

[sesheta-66.livejournal.com]

❤️

[sesheta-66.livejournal.com]

Yes! ❤️