Harry Potter The Long Lost Malfoy

Harry hesitated. This sounded like a trap. Then again, he reminded himself, quietly, that the Malfoys were not the Dursleys, and Mr. Malfoy wasn't Dudley making what sounded like a good bargain so Harry wouldn't get bullied, then coming back to bully him anyway.

"Yes. But I want to look at them and make sure that you actually did something good."

Mr. Malfoy nodded. "In return, what do we get?"

Harry hesitated, rapping his fingers on the side of the table. He hated this. He wasn't good at this. Yes, Healer Letham had suggested that he make bargains with the Malfoys if he could, but he hadn't thought it would be this literal. He'd just thought it would be acting happier once he had Dobby as his personal elf, which wouldn't have been difficult.

"I act happier?" he asked. He hated that it sounded like a question, but it was.

"You act happier, or you are happier?" Mr. Malfoy countered swiftly.

Harry scowled at him. He wasn't as smart as they were. He wasn't a Slytherin. He hadn't grown up like this.

"I'll try to be happier," he said. "I will be happier that you aren't abusing them anymore. But I can't promise that I'll be happy in exactly the way you want me to. I'm not a Slytherin. I don't turn my emotions on and off like that."

"Fair enough." Mr. Malfoy nodded and then glanced to the side. Harry looked around, wondering if another elf had appeared.

But Mrs. Malfoy was still sitting there, and she straightened her shoulders and said, "We can stop scolding the elves when they make a mistake."

"What about not telling them to punish themselves?"

"Is that rather what you would want instead?"

"Why not both of them at once?" Harry clenched his fists, but he did it under the table, although from the way Mrs. Malfoy focused on him, she might have noticed. "Why are you bargaining with me like this?"

Mrs. Malfoy sighed. "Because we have overrun the boundaries, I think. We have assumed that you would be exactly like the son we lost—our stories of the son we lost. You are not." Harry eyed her suspiciously and wondered if she'd been talking to Healer Letham. "And you are assuming that we would be more like your Muggle captors. Neither assumption has worked."

"I think it would be more productive to lay out these boundaries and discuss them as bargains we're making, artificial as it seems. It ensures that we know where we stand, and what barriers are still in the way."

Harry nodded. All right, he understood that. And he would rather that they not go around telling lies to him about Dobby and evil plots in Hogwarts again. He turned to Dobby. "Dobby, if you had to pick, would you rather avoid being scolded or being told to punish yourself?"

Dobby lifted his head and let his eyes dart back and forth between Harry and the adults before he dropped his head again. But his voice was still audible. "Dobby and the other elves does not wants to punish themselveses. It hurts."

"Very well," said Mrs. Malfoy. "I ask that you continue your sessions with Healer Letham in return."

"But I thought you would make me do that anyway."

"I do not want to make you do anything," Mrs. Malfoy said, so passionately that Harry stared at her. "I want you to be part of our family, Henry. I want to help you recover. I want to bring you home."

"I'm here."

"But only in body, not in mind or spirit. If we can have you here, then all other sacrifices are worth it and we will learn a new way."

Harry bit back the words that said they shouldn't have been abusing their house-elves anyway, if they were good people. That would just start another argument that he didn't want to start at the moment. "All right. You don't order the house-elves to punish themselves anymore, and I'll continue the sessions with Healer Letham."

"Done." Mrs. Malfoy smiled at him in relief so radiant that Harry had to look down and fiddle with his silverware for a second.

"And what do I get?" Draco asked, sounding exactly as petulant as he had when complaining about all the things his father would hear about.

"Draco," Mr. Malfoy began, his voice stern.

"No, wait," Harry said, and turned to Draco. His brother still looked like he had something shoved up his bum, but he had looked that way so often that it wasn't anything new. "I want to bargain so the house-elves don't get scolded anymore."

"Yes." Draco nodded as if he was perfectly happy to agree to that, although Harry wondered how many times he had screamed at the house-elves in private. Then again, Harry had never seen the Malfoys interact with any elf but Dobby, so he didn't know. "And in return, you stop telling them to call you Harry."

Harry shrugged. "All right."

Draco squinted at him. "Just like that?"

"It's a small price to pay to make sure that the elves are safe."

Draco looked as if he had swallowed a lemon. Harry grinned at him. He knew why. Draco probably thought that was the most Gryffindor sentiment he'd ever heard.

"I mean," Draco went on in a dogged way, "it must matter a lot to you if you told them to call you that. And now you're giving it up. Just like that?"

....

Do you want to read ahead by more than 60 exciting premium chapters?

Then join my p*atreon right now.

Link: p*atreon.com/Sonic_Spectre (Remove the *)

Free members can unlock upto 2 chapters.