Into each life some Lichtenstein must fall, however, and so Draco and his teammates were here on the campground instead of inside the stadium training, preparing to watch the Cup from the comfort of a box and ill-wish both teams with lazy Parisian malevolence. It was a fine and cosmically appropriate addition of insult to injury that as soon as Draco walked out of the tent on the evening before the game, the first thing he saw across the ebullient crowd was Harry Potter with the Weaslette hanging off his arm like the Potter groupie she unabashedly was.
Draco frowned and stepped back a little into the shadow of the tent, but there was no fear of Potter seeing him. It was hard to tell from this distance, but he looked as if he'd finally had a growth spurt - he might have been able to look Draco in the eye now, instead of squarely in the collarbone. He'd filled out, too, broader across the shoulders and with hard, defined biceps not quite covered by the short sleeves of his Chudley Cannons shirt. He repaid inspection from the waist down as well, long thighs packed tightly into some sort of heathen Muggle trousers and slender hips framed by schoolboy robes. He was still wearing those ridiculous glasses, of course, and his hair still looked like he'd flown cross-country in a lightning storm, but Draco had to admit - very, very grudgingly, because a fit Harry Potter did uncomfortable things to his brain - that the Weaslette was in an enviable position if she was getting into Potter's pants on a regular basis. Or even on an irregular one.
Of course, Potter was still probably an irredeemable bastard and a disingenuous famewhore - and also a smug, vicious hypocrite, which meant that he and the Weaslette were a match made in heaven - but a good silencing spell before sex did wonders for that sort of thing.
Arms slid around him from either side and Draco found himself snugly sandwiched between France's chasers - Aurélie and Gervais, blue-eyed twins with black hair and porcelain skin, who were determined to undermine Draco's disinterest in group sex and women and came very close to succeeding.
"What are you looking at, p'tit?" asked Gervais, who in point of fact was two inches shorter than Draco. He leaned in to nuzzle lightly behind Draco's ear, his dark hair drifting into Draco's mouth with the wind.
Potter was laughing at something the Weaslette was saying. She appeared to be trying to convince him to paint a Lichtenstein flag on his face. Go ahead, Potter, it'd be quite you, wouldn't it? Draco thought sourly. "Nothing," he said to Gervais, smiling off-handedly.
Aurélie gave him a good-natured slap on the cheek and pulled his face around to her. "Don't lie to us, l'Anglais. Either somewhere out there is a snitch that's been charmed to dispense that bordeaux you're addicted to, or Gervais and I are in danger of losing your affections. Tell us it's a snitch, beautiful one, or we'll be displeased."
Her smile was bright and teasing, but Draco felt a small jolt of lively apprehension anyway. He'd had the twins displeased with him before and it wasn't something he cared to experience again. "Of course it's a snitch," he lied smoothly; after all, it was hardly the alternative. "There are hundreds of them flitting around. It's like being a cat in a room full of mice."
"Good," Aurélie said, pressing into his side in a way that made him concede that, attached to the right woman, breasts held a certain fascinating charm.
"It would've spoiled our plans for the evening if you'd been watching some man or other with all that lovely intensity," Gervais murmured, trailing a fingertip up Draco's tattoo and making it tingle under his shirt.
"Plans?" Draco asked absently. Potter was talking earnestly to the Weaslette, hands forming swift-moving illustrative shapes in the air in front of him. Draco supposed his voice had deepened too - Potter's reedy tenor would have fit ill with that body and a jaw that could break a centaur's fist. Although, all other things being equal, it would probably be preferable for him to not have a voice like dark melted chocolate on top of everything else, he probably did, because that was just how Draco's luck ran.
Bastard.
"Plans," Gervais said firmly. "We're going to have a long, lovely dinner, during which Aurélie and I are going to ply you with wine until you're tipsy and accommodating. Then we're going to lure you into our bedroom, charm the beds together, and -"
Potter's gaze strayed away from the Weaslette, following something in the crowd at, yes, just about arse level. From this angle, Draco couldn't see the target of that distractedly interested gaze.
"All right, then," Draco said abruptly.
Gervais went abruptly silent, blinking at him in surprise. "What?"
Potter had turned his attention back to the Weaslette, blushing a little. "I said all right," Draco repeated. "What, you weren't bluffing, were you? Never bluff about sex, Gervais, it's an unpardonable sin."
Aurélie raised an eyebrow. "Well, well. Your little snitch appears to have been of some use after all."
"That's not why," Draco told her.
"If you say so," Gervais said with a shrug. "Leave him alone, Aurélie, or he'll change his mind and go off chasing his snitch after all."
No fear of that, Draco thought grimly. Unsettled, he followed them inside.
It was only his imagination that made it feel as if Potter's gaze was on him from the minute he turned around until the tent flap closed behind him.
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