(no subject)

[fics_by_maple]

Written for rontoberfest, originally posted here.

Title: A Knut More Than Tricky
Author: maple_mahogany
Team: Team Winter
Prompts: Werewolf Capture Unit and Trainee Healer
Pairing/Genre: Harry/Ron, established relationship slash
Rating: NC-17
Word Count: 3332
Warnings: Slash,
A/N: I'd like to thank mrsquizzical and queenbe23more for the beta help, and the members of winter_ron for contributing their thoughts on the shaping of my ending.

I tried to encapsulate this short story in the way a single episode of a television drama might be. I enjoyed the writing challenge, anyway, regardless of the success of the outcome.


~

"Ron!"

"Harry, you're frightening people, be quiet," Susan urged, half running to keep up with him.

"Ron!" he called out again, causing several more faces in the corridor of the Magical Injuries Ward of St. Mungo's to turn towards them.

"That you, Harry?"

They spun around at the sound of Seamus' voice and looked back down the corridor and to the right where the sandy-haired wizard was peering outward. "Ron's in here."

Ron was sitting up on an examining table, his robes and shirt lying next to him while a Trainee Healer cast cleansing charms on abrasions over his back.

"I'm fine," Ron said the moment Harry stepped in the doorway. "It was just an accident."

Harry's chest quivered with a hiccough of breath and he gave Ron a wistful look but said nothing.

"Whoever said men could handle stress …?" Susan muttered, rolling her eyes. "So, what happened?" she asked the Healer over Harry's shoulder, pushing him into the room while showing her Auror credentials.

"Our young man here was brought in by his partner, unconscious. Took a hex of some kind apparently, but I don't see anything worse than a few scrapes and a bump on the head."

Seamus gave Ron a guilty look and squirmed more than was appropriate for a grown man.

"It was my fuck up, I'm sorry," he said, more to Harry than to Ron.

"It's ok, Shay," Ron said. "It was an accident."

"Go easy on yourself, young man," said the Healer. "I tend to Aurors in here all the time. The fools on the Werewolf Capture Unit are the worst of the lot." The balding gentleman chuckled but only Susan and Seamus managed to give him a polite smile. Harry and Ron were just looking at each other with obvious worry. "Eh, I'll just go see about that release paperwork, then."

"Thank you, sir," Ron said, glancing his way before resuming his sheepish gaze at Harry.

The moment the Healer was out of the room, Harry flung his arms around Ron's shoulders.

"I told you I’m ok," Ron protested under the observing eyes of Seamus and Susan.

"You're not allowed to get hurt." Harry's voice was as tight as the grip he had around Ron's neck.

"Really, mate, they didn't find anything wrong." Ron feebly tried to nudge Harry off of him, beginning to blush at Harry's uncontrolled display of emotion. "Not so much as a freckle out of place."

"I'll be the judge of that. I'm taking you home and counting them all right now."

Seamus and Susan both sniggered but retreated and turned to each other in low conversation to give them some veiled privacy.

Ron knew Harry wasn't going to let go of him until he got some reassurance, so Ron nuzzled the side of Harry's head and put a hand on Harry's waist, squeezing.

"I'm ok." The words were whispered but strong in Harry's ear.

Harry leaned back and Ron took one of his wrists in his hand, rubbing his thumb in a reassuring circle around the bone. They held each other's eyes for a moment, communicating in that silent war of wills that they'd mastered over the years. Harry wanting to be strong for him, even when it was Ron that really held him together.

"Hey-ah, we'll just wait for you two outside, yeah?" Seamus said as he and Susan left the room, neither quite looking at them.

"Here, I'll help." Harry, ignoring their friends' departure, held up Ron's shirt for him to put his arms through the sleeves, and Ron winced as he shifted. "Sore?"

Ron nodded, looking down to watching Harry button his shirt for him. "Just feel beaten up." He rolled his shoulders, stretching. "Everything kind of aches."

"We'll get you home and you can rest."

Ron watched Harry push the last button through the hole and looked up into Harry's face. He was accustomed to being patient with overzealous mothering but it never failed to amuse - and annoy – him, when the source of it was Harry.

"I'll give you another hour of this shit, Potter," Ron warned with a playful smirk. "And then you better knock it off, got it?"

Harry brooded for another second but then rolled his eyes, smiling. "Got it."

"Very well, Auror Weasley," said the young, earnest looking Trainee Healer. "Your Ministry Department parchments have been filed, you may go. Please report back to the Healer immediately if you have any lingering side-effects."

"Brilliant! Thank you."

Ron carefully hopped off the table in front of Harry and their eyes met. Tension arced between them and Ron went pale, the freckles across his nose stark against his pallor.

"Bloody fucking hell." Ron's eyes went wide as he looked straight into Harry's.

"Er, you can get that Healer in here," Harry said, his voice dead calm. "I think we found a side-effect."

Ron was the same exact height as Harry.

~^~

"Hexes such as these are can be a tricky sort," the Healer said, rubbing a spot from his spectacles with the lapel of his robes.

"Tricky? I'd say this is a Knut more than tricky," Ron said in a huff.

"Well, you're not wrong about that, son. All Shrinking Spells are made of strong stuff."

Harry, who hadn't spoken a word since the Healer's return, let out a frustrated choking sound from the back of his throat. Ron gave him a mollifying glare.

The old Healer continued. "Now, you have the sort of Shrinking Spells that are modified Transfiguration spells, and while they are dead effective, they do wear off after a short amount of time. Usually restoring the subject to original condition."

"Usually?" Harry pressed.

"And …?" Ron prompted, pacing the room juxtaposing Harry's angry stature posture in the corner.

"And the other kind is more serious. If the spell isn't merely a temporary hex, but a true Transfiguration, the kind that mutates cellular structure at its core …"

"So how do we know which one we're dealing with?" Harry demanded from the corner in a blast of cold anger.

The Healer seemed largely unaffected by the Avada Kedavra stare in Harry's eyes.

"I think it's best not to interfere with these things too soon. Wait and see what we're dealing with. Young Healers these days, they'd try all sorts of spells, potions, charms, you name it."

"And you wouldn't?" Ron asked.

"No. We might interrupt the magic before it has the chance to dissipate, or possibly make it mutate into something worse. I've found that sometimes the wisest strategy is to just let the game play itself out. Save your best move for last."

Harry looked like he might burst into flames. He wasn't good at waiting. Ron, however, paused, studying the elderly man's face. They considered each other for a moment before Ron spoke again.

"I do like a good strategy."

~^~

Harry saw Ron arrive but he didn't look up. He turned his head though, resting his other cheek on his knees where he had both arms wrapped around his bent legs. It would do for an acknowledgment; Ron didn't expect anything fancy.

"Hey." Ron sat on the ground against the wall to Harry's right, not getting too close, but not seeking out the furthest wall either. Just close enough.

"…Hey."

Harry had retreated to the rooftop of their building the moment they got home. The small rectangular space between chimney pipes, gutters, and television aerials had been touted as a potential space for an 'urban garden'. Five years later and there was still no garden, not counting the dried and dead remains of the potted houseplants Neville and Molly continued to foist upon them. What the small space did have was a view of the red brick turrets of St. Pancras Station and just a hint of King's Cross beyond it.

Harry fixed his eyes on the place and then closed them, imagining the anonymity of wandering among the crowd.

"Don't you dare think about Disapparating again," Ron cut into his thoughts.

"I'm not."

"Good."

"Fine. … What do you want?"

Ron fidgeted where he sat, unsure what to do with his legs. He'd settled for bending one leg, resting his elbow on it while chewing fastidiously on the cuticle around his thumbnail. "You disappear the second we walk in the front door and you think I'm not gonna follow?" Ron snarked, squinting his eyes in a scowl.

"I – no, you just," Harry stopped talking and slumped over his knees again.

"You're a dick, you know that?" Ron grumbled.

Harry sat up again, making a surprised gasp. "I – what? You're calling me names, now?"

"Yeah." Ron spat a minuscule bit of fingernail to the side. "Maybe you forgot who this is really happening to, but I'm the one turning into a midget." Ron cast his angry eyes around the dingy brick terrace with a look of incredulity before shaking his head and biting his nail again. "So yeah," he said through his teeth. "You're a dick."

Harry gaped at him. He was sitting here on the cusp of rationality, the threads of his desperation beginning to snap and he expected, well, maybe not coddling, but to at least be allowed to grouse in private so it wouldn't hurt Ron further. "First of all, you are my height, arse. Not a midget, thank you. And, I was trying to be, supportive – whatever." Harry tensed his hands in mid-air before letting them flop into his lap. "And you told me to knock it off!"

"I told you to knock it off when it was just a few bruises from work! You were being stupid. But then we find out I'm shrinking to death and-"

"Don't say that!"

Ron pouted. Harry pouted worse. A matched set of pursed and protruding bottom lips.

"I can't do anything, Ron!" Harry gritted through his teeth. "If there was a thing, I could, you know, find something to help, or capture someone or go fight … I could." Harry finished lamely and shrugged with a defeated harrumph.

"You're rubbish at this stuff." Ron said it simply, no accusation.

"You knew I was from the start!" Harry kicked out at Ron's shoe and Ron kicked back. "What do want me to do?"

"Perhaps you could start," Ron muttered with annoyance, "by not being so bloody far away."

Harry's scowl softened into sheepish reluctance.

He gave no warning except the double crack! of Disapparating followed by immediate Apparition by Ron's side.

"Fuck!" Ron shouted in surprise. "You bastard."

Harry chuckled and jabbed his shoulder into Ron's. Ron didn't jab him back, but just pressed his shoulder to Harry's. Pressed hard and didn't back off.

"I don't think I was wrong to agree with the Healer. I'm not. But it doesn't mean that – what if I actually shrink away and disappear?"

"You won't."

"I could."

"I wouldn't permit it."

Ron snorted. "It's still … Harry, I'm …"

"I know. Don't." Harry didn't want Ron to say it. Didn't want him to say he was scared. Didn't want him to give voice to the fear. Harry knew how to be scared for himself, but if Ron was scared of something, it was Harry's job to fix it, and he didn't think he could.

He took wild, leaping risks for work all the time. They fought about that sometimes, and usually, Ron just accepted it. But Harry couldn't take risks with Ron.

"What can I do?" Harry's voice barely audible over the slight wind and distant sounds of the city. It was difficult for Harry to ask anything, so difficult.

Ron didn't make it easier by shrugging and remaining silent.

"Are you hungry? I could run out and get something."

Food was usually a safe bet with Ron, but he looked at his chewed nails and then folded both hands under arms, withdrawing. "Nah."

Harry rubbed his thumb and forefinger under the nose pieces of his glasses and took a patience gathering breath.

"Wanna …ehm, play a game? Chess? Snap?" Snap? Honestly.

"I really don't. No."

"Well shit, help me out here! Give me something to do!"

Ron just looked at him, more annoyed than angry. "You can't fucking fix this!"

"I'm perfectly aware of my limitations here, Ron!"

"Fuck off, Harry. Do I honestly have to ask you not make this about you? Can't you just not freak out for once? I'm not asking you to hold my hand or anything. Just don't freak out on me, you infuriating prat! Be there, and shut it."

Harry considered this. His insides were churning with worry, guilt, and frustration and he only knew how to fight back.

In their recent years together, Ron had taught him enough about how to accept caring when he felt badly, but he hadn't yet learned how to give it. Not without somehow managing to twist it into actually being about Harry again. Both of them, by and large, failed in the Affectionate Boyfriend Department. They didn't usually need that sort of thing anyway. But something emerged in Ron's DNA as they got older that gave him better instincts than Harry.

It might have been in the freckles.

Ron let out a breathy shiver as a gust of wind blew past them. Harry didn't mind the bite of the cold on his nose and his ears and fingertips, but he didn't like the color of cold blue lips on Ron. It was just wrong against his natural warm coloring.

"So, I guess I am a bit of a dick." Harry offered.

Ron gave a silent snort and shivered but didn't disagree.

Harry got up to his feet and as he shifted upwards and out of the corner of his eye, he saw Ron's shoulders crumple and his face set into an expression of anger and disappointment.

Harry realized that he had caused that this time. Not a hex.

"Hey, I'm not, no." Harry reached out his hands. "I'm staying here. I just want to take you inside so you won't be cold. I'm not going."

Ron looked up, surprised. "Oh. I thought." Whatever Ron had thought, that Harry was stomping off again most likely, he physically shook off the idea and took Harry's hands, letting him pull him up to stand.

He sucked in a startled breath but Harry remained mortally silent. Ron was at least another half inch shorter than he was earlier.

Ron's eyes were round and tormented and Harry could see his chest rise and fall with anxiety within a split second. "Harry?"

"No. No, no. Ron? It's ok." He moved forward, taking Ron's head into his hands, pressing his forehead close and ignoring the confused state of the sense memory in his hands that was rejecting the notion that this was his Ron.

Ron's hands clung at his back while he nodded.

Their mouths came together, saying with their lips what they had no words for. Harry spoke his apology and consolation through silent demonstration. Reaching for the handle of his wand at his waist and squeezing Ron, Harry felt him relax, giving himself over and in that moment he Apparated them inside, where the waning light surrounded them in hazy blue-gray. Ron shivered again, but Harry pulled him close.

"Can we, Harry, can we just …? I know. It's weird, but I..."

Harry didn't let Ron finish. Didn't let him ask. He knew it wouldn't make it better but he was a difficult friend and a near impossible boyfriend, and he wouldn't allow Ron to ever feel like he had to ask for it.

He wasn't even hard, and he didn't think Ron was either, but they were young, they'd get there.

Harry's shirt was gone without thought but he removed Ron's slowly, remembering his sore arms, and pushed it off his shoulders, never breaking their easy kiss for more than a moment.

Ron's trousers were loose around his waist. Harry's pushed away thoughts of that as he began to open the fly. Ron clutched the back of Harry's hand, stilling further movement.

"Uhm," Ron gasped, his eyes trained upward avoiding Harry's. "I … I'm smaller."

The fear of rejection in Ron's voice was painfully honest, but Harry would have none of it. He dropped to his knees, giving Ron's hand a squeeze before pushing it aside and continued undressing him.

"It's still you, Ron. It's still you," he told him, just before taking him into his mouth.

Harry felt Ron's hands trailing over his hair, removing his glasses as he sucked. He didn't even open his eyes, knowing that Ron would set them carefully somewhere near.

It took effort and coaxing, using his hand with his mouth, to bring Ron to full hardness and when at last he was there, he pushed Ron back to sit on the couch and climbed astride his thighs.

"Oh," Ron muttered, as Harry sunk down onto him, a tinge of surprise in the pleasured sound.

Harry pressed his cheek to the side of Ron's face as he moved, threading his fingers through Ron's hair, pressing kisses to his face when he could catch his breath to do it. Ron's cock was different inside him, smaller maybe, but still enough to fill him to gasping.

Ron's hands skimmed over his flexing thighs and eventually grabbed Harry's hips as he rocked in Ron's lap.

Harry wished he could say something comforting, say something clever that would make it better, make them feel unafraid, but his insides quivered at how every touch of Ron's body felt ever so slightly off.

"Ngh, Harry. I need to, need …"

"Do it." Harry urged, reaching down to take himself in hand, tugging firm and fast while Ron held him with both hands, pulling him down roughly onto his cock. Ron's altered body still roused him, near to the point of shame that he found the feel of a different lover so enticing.

Ron's fingertips digging into the thin skin at his waist sent him off and Harry snarled through his climax, his come messy between them. He continued to grunt loud and with abandon as he gave himself, limp and yielding, to Ron's insistent and shallow thrusts.

"That's it. Go," Harry whimpered and when Ron tensed and stilled, Harry pushed down, taking Ron as deeply as he could.

The tenderness between them came several long and silent minutes later, when their bodies began to ache from exertion and clammy cold settled over them. That was when they could manage the softer kisses and comforting touches.

"What do you think could happen? Could I just keep shrinking?"

"Shh."

"Just keep on until I disappear altogether?"

"Don't."

"What would it be like, you reckon? Too bad my wand wouldn't shrink along with me, bet I'd need it."

"Ron! Merlin, will you stop it?" Harry clung to him, as if he could prevent the changes from happening. "Please."

Ron huffed, but it wasn't angry. He just stroked his hands (lawks, small hands) up Harry's spine and up the back of his neck. "Ok."

Harry took his other hand and without planning to they flexed their fingers, palm to palm, seeing the disparate size between them.

"Well, then, maybe we should go on back to St. Mungo's? Finally make our move and see what can be done?"

"Yes. Fuck, yes, you mean it?"

Harry stood up from the couch and pulled Ron with him, finding him once again eye to eye. The hex had already begun to reverse.

Ron gave him a hopeful smirk and was gracious enough not to say 'I told you so'.

But he did say, "You trust me now?"

"It was never about trusting you," Harry muttered, slumping into his chest with relief.

"Yeah," Ron hugged him. "This stuff isn't easy, is it?"

Harry nodded and then shook his head, into the crook of Ron's neck. "We making a bodge job of it, you think?"

"Of … our relationship?" Ron asked. "Nah. Not if you'd still want me titchy."

~^~

Comments

[brumeux77.livejournal.com]

Very nice indeed, yet my compulsive beta requires me to point out it's St Pancras station, not St Pancreas.