[ for @microficmay day 14. drarry | rating: t | word count: 254 | part 12 | part 1 here | read the full story here ♡⋆˙ ]
After a morning of broom maintenance and more testing on his (as-yet-in-progress) training wheels charm, Harry finds Draco in the tertiary lab. It’s small and unadorned and the one McGonagall set aside for Draco to complete his Owl-post potions mastery program.
Draco sits at his scattered desk, flipping through envelopes and scribbling into his notebook. The work table is a stark contrast, organized carefully, neat as a pin. A small pewter cauldron bubbles over the low simmer of a charmed hearth stone.
“Wolfsbane?” Harry murmurs, finally catching Draco’s attention.
His gaze snaps up, a smile flicking over his face before falling away.
“The mod I’ve been working on. I’m trying to imbue some of the elements of a Pepper-Up, so the characteristic crash isn’t quite so abrupt, but the bicorn horn and the occamy egg powder are counteractive— I mean, obviously. I thought I could use dried occamy as a substitute, but it doesn’t perform as efficiently alongside the necessary dosage of Sopophorous beans.”
He taps his fingers across the desktop, thoughtful.
“I’m wondering if I could supplement the dried occamy with porcupine quills, but there have been limited studies on their interactions, and nothing that’s gone to the clinical stages, and I don’t really have time to start from scratch, at least not right now, but I thought— what?” Draco falters.
“Nothing,” Harry says, lopsided grin unchecked.
“You’re remarkable,” Harry huffs, approaching his desk.
The tips of Draco’s ears go pink.
“Don’t be ridiculous,” he says.
“Don’t be modest,” Harry answers.