The Boy Who Cried Wolf
Draco makes a half dozen of the accusations in his sixth year, Remus's second year of teaching. It's a cry for help, Dumbledore says, the boy asking for something he can't name. It's pathetic begging for attention, and they are not to regard it, Minerva tells the teachers privately, and Remus agrees. But he wonders, just a little, where Draco's come up with the idea. It's obvious that someone, sometime, did something to him. It might have been his father, or Snape, both of whom history has proven capable and neither of whom have been mentioned.
But Draco is lying about Harry's attempts to touch him in the shower; Harry wouldn't, and especially wouldn't with Draco. Any more than Fred and George would catch the boy in the hallway and force him to his knees and--that one keeps Remus hard for a solid hour, thinking of the red-haired boy with his cock in Draco's mouth, and the brother looking on. It's a good thing Flitwick is so long-winded; Remus is free to reflect on it at leisure, while the little man drones on.
More troubling--and less arousing--are the things the boy says Dumbledore has done. Things he did when Draco was small, and with his mother's permission. Remus wonders if someone ought to report this, but report it to whom? And maybe Draco made it up, maybe he never sat in the old man's lap while those gnarled fingers rubbed him through his robes. Remus finds neither small boys nor old men attractive.
Most troubling (and hottest) of all are the accusations Draco makes against Hogwarts' new assistant flying instructor. Remus has a suspicion that, if anyone at Hogwarts were going to grab the boy by the wrist, hard enough to leave bruises, and push him down on the bench in the Quidditch changing room, and fuck him until he bled, it would be Oliver Wood. Oliver is big and brutishly handsome, with large hands and thick fingers and stubble first thing in the morning. Remus finds him striking, if dangerous, and the thought of him with the delicate Malfoy boy bent beneath him is an erotic one indeed.
But, false or true, Draco's allegations mean one thing: he cannot be trusted. No one at Hogwarts can believe a word he says, not without believing terrible things of good men. Draco has talked himself into a corner, and Remus is happy to keep him company there. He waits and waits for the perfect moment, and masturbates in the privacy of his room beneath the critical painted eyes of Godric Gryffindor.
And finally Professor Sprout sends the boy to Remus for detention. She just can't bear to listen to another of his false words, she fumes, and hasn't Remus got some sort of Dark Creature he can set on the little monster? Remus has. He does miss James and Sirius and even Peter, because the opportunity to say that the creature is in his pants comes along all too rarely. But Ceres wouldn't understand. She's a good woman, an honest one, and would rather believe that Draco is evil, than that the rest of them are.
Remus can almost understand that, although it's been a long time since he was so innocent. He can understand wanting to think the best of people, even though he knows it is foolish and dangerous. It's nice to know she would defend him, if what he is about to do to Draco should ever come to light.
But Remus is confident enough that no one will ever believe anything Draco says, ever again. Draco deserves that; Remus is sure--nearly sure--reasonably confident--that the things the boy said are the desperate lies of a cornered weasel. And if they are not, well, innocence is a quality he is better off without. Faith in authority will get him nowhere; any Slytherin should know that. No one had believed the things Sirius said about his father, or the things Snape said about James. Why should Draco have it any different?
Even so Remus is careful. It's the quiet caution of a predator. He has found it comes naturally to him, the waiting and watching. He is so still that the boy, coming in, does not see him at first. He drops his bag on a desk and sprawls in the seat, petulance in every line of his body. He is fifteen, caught between man and child, awkwardly managing the worst of both. A part of Remus thinks he looks good enough to eat, even so.
He could eat the boy, but it is the wrong time of the month and would almost certainly lose him his job, no matter how lenient Dumbledore has grown since Snape's death. What he has in mind will be nearly as amusing and utterly justified. "Mr. Malfoy," he says, and watches the boy scramble to his feet and whirl to face him. His terror is appetizing, the more so because it is unfounded. He is afraid of Remus-the-wolf; he doesn't seem to realize that Remus-the-man can do worse than kill him.
Remus will be happy to enlighten him. And he knows it's at least partially because the boy is innocent or mostly innocent. The things he's been saying are lies, the kind of lies that ruin lives--that follow a person forever. If they'd been true the boy wouldn't be thinking of white teeth, but of white bodies.
He's been naughty, and it will be up to Remus to discipline him. And if Remus finds a little pleasure in that, what of it? The boy has brought it on himself. "Take off your robe, pull down your trousers and bend over the desk," he growls, and Draco flinches. He's been beaten before, then; Remus spends a moment speculating who and why, and vacillates between Snape and the boy's father, either of whom would have had motive and opportunity.
Draco takes off his robe and throws it over the desk. His shirt is pale gray, not the white the school requires, and his cuff links are silver and emerald and worth a year of Remus's salary. But his lip trembles as he fumbles with his belt buckle. He's terrified, despite his arrogance, and it makes Remus think of Sirius. For a moment he's not sure he can go through with it. But Sirius had the temerity to die and leave Remus alone; Remus owes him no favors.
The boy's trousers slide easily down his narrow hips. He wears shorts under them: Remus could have him remove them as well, if it seemed worth the trouble. It doesn't. It's pain, not pale skin, that Remus finds arousing. And, peculiarly, leaving the boy as he is, in his shorts, and with his trousers at his knees, makes him even more vulnerable than nakedness would.
Remus has a switch already cut, a fine, flexible length of hazel, and he uses it to point to the desk. Draco bends over it. When Remus is certain he won't be able to see, he eases his cock out of his own pants and gives it a quick stroke. He could do it openly, of course, because the boy has no one left to complain to. But he finds the lack of discretion foolish and unnecessary.
"Twenty of the best, Mr. Malfoy," he says. "I trust you can keep count."
The boy whispers his assent. Remus has no doubt he's trembling, biting his tongue, teary-eyed. He's the sort of child who is brave only when it is absolutely compulsory. It's a cynicism Remus has begun to find admirable, after all the years of useless deaths. Courage has no place in a war, or a public school.
He does not put the whole force of his arm behind the first blow, but Draco's soft gulping "One," is enough to start his cock hardening. "Two" is harder, and "Three" harder still; "Four," drags a sob out of the boy. Remus can imagine the welts he'll have. Pureblood children are thinner-skinned, more delicate than the Muggle variety, and Remus is striking him hard enough to bruise a grown man. He pauses, less to let Draco catch his breath than to have a quick fumble at his cock. It had been a mistake to order twenty when he would have been satisfied in ten.
He makes five, six, seven, eight, as gentle as he dares, and feels the boy start to relax. Nine is the hardest yet, and ten makes the boy sob in earnest. Remus is close, so close it hurts--although it undoubtedly hurts Draco more. He strokes himself as he waits for the boy to regain control.
Eleven he makes soft, and still Draco can barely force the word out. Remus wonders if he's damaged him; the boy's buttocks must be striped with darkening bruises already. Twelve, thirteen; he's not going to make it. He pinches himself to keep from coming. The boy is shaking, his forehead pressed against the cool dark wood of the desk, and Remus imagines he must have looked much the same bent over for Oliver Wood.
"Nineteen," the boy whispers, and Remus is nearly sure he's counted wrong, but lost track somewhere around fifteen. His cock is a pulsing purple monster, harder than the rod in his other hand. On twenty he comes so much that it hits the ceiling. Draco pulls his trousers up, buckles his belt with clumsy fingers. Remus makes no effort to put himself away, smiles at the boy's consternation.
"Please, do tell, Mr. Malfoy," he says, and the boy limps away without a word.