I'm An Auror Forced To Work With My Rival, And Our Late Nights In His Lab Are Getting Dangerously Hot

The file on his desk felt heavier each time he opened it. Inside, the photograph of the latest victim, a young witch named Eleanor Vance, stared up at him with unnervingly vacant eyes. She was the third. All of them found in the same state: frozen, breathing, but utterly gone from the world. It was a perfect, terrible stasis, a curse so seamless that the Healers at St. Mungo’s had nothing to work with. No residual magic, no decay, no discernible dark signature. It was like a switch had been flipped inside them, turning them off.

“Anything, sir?”

Harry looked up. Michael Finch, his new partner, stood in the doorway of his cubicle, looking hopeful and far too young. He’d been out of Hogwarts for less than a year, his Auror robes still stiff with newness.

“Nothing,” Harry said, rubbing the bridge of his nose where a headache was beginning to form. “Forensics came back with the same results. It’s clean. Too clean. Whatever the caster is using, it leaves no trace.”

Finch shifted his weight, hesitating. “Sir, I was speaking with my cousin in Magical Law Enforcement. She mentioned something… a long shot, maybe.”

Harry gestured for him to continue, leaning back in his chair with a sigh. He was ready for any long shot at this point.

“Well, she said that when the Ministry’s own labs hit a wall, especially with potion-based residues or curse-suspensions, there’s one independent potioneer they consult. He’s… apparently the best. Unmatched in diagnostic brewing.”

A flicker of interest sparked in Harry’s chest. “Who is it?”

Finch swallowed, his Adam’s apple bobbing. “It’s Malfoy’s Apothecary, sir. In Diagon Alley. Run by Draco Malfoy.”

The name landed in the small office space like a curse in its own right. The flicker of interest in Harry’s chest went cold, replaced by a familiar, acidic burn of animosity he hadn’t felt in years. He had actively, consciously, avoided that part of Diagon Alley since the shop opened. He’d heard the whispers of Malfoy’s new trade, his quiet success, and had pushed them aside.

“No,” Harry said. The word was flat and final.

“But sir, if he can identify—”

“We’ll find another way, Finch.”

“There is no other way, Potter.” The voice came from the head of the aisle. Gawain Robards, Head of the Auror Office, stood with his arms crossed, his expression grim. He’d clearly overheard. “I’ve just come from St. Mungo’s. Vance’s condition is deteriorating. This isn’t a schoolyard rivalry anymore. This is about saving lives. Malfoy is the foremost expert in this specific field. You will go to him, you will show him the case file, and you will use whatever resources he offers. Is that understood?”

Harry’s jaw tightened. He looked from Robards’s unyielding face to Finch’s anxious one. He was cornered by his own duty. The war was supposed to be over, but its ghosts had long, persistent fingers. Arguing would be pointless; it would only make him look petty and unprofessional.

He gave a short, sharp nod. “Understood.”

Robards stared at him for a moment longer before turning away. Harry slowly closed the file, the image of Eleanor Vance’s empty eyes burning in his mind. He was going to have to face Draco Malfoy. After five years of silence, their worlds were about to collide again, and he felt a profound sense of dread settle deep in his bones.

The walk down Diagon Alley felt like a march to the gallows. He found the shop tucked between a dusty bookstore and an old robe emporium. The sign was understated, elegant black wood with silver lettering: Malfoy’s Apothecary. It was nothing like the garish establishments of his school-era rival. Taking a breath that did nothing to steady his nerves, Harry pushed the door open.

A small, silver bell chimed softly, announcing his presence. The sound was immediately swallowed by a profound quiet. The air smelled clean and sharp, a complex mix of dried herbs, minerals, and something coolly sterile, like winter air. Everything was in its place. Rows of polished dark wood shelves lined the walls, filled with hundreds of glass jars, each perfectly aligned and labeled in elegant, looping script. The floor was spotless, the brass scales on the counter gleamed, and the light from the enchanted globes overhead was soft and even. It was a world of absolute, meticulous control, and it made the chaos of Harry’s own life feel loud and clumsy by comparison.

And there, behind the long counter, was Draco Malfoy.

He was decanting a shimmering, viscous liquid from a large beaker into a series of smaller vials, his movements economical and precise. He looked up at the sound of the bell, and his hands stilled. For a single, unguarded second, Harry saw the boy he remembered in the man’s face. The shock was plain, his grey eyes widening, his mouth parting slightly. Then, it was gone. A mask of cool indifference slid into place, so quickly it was as if the flicker of surprise had never happened.

He was thinner than Harry remembered, the lines of his face sharper, more defined. The sneering softness of his youth had hardened into a severe, almost ascetic handsomeness. His white-blond hair was shorter, styled neatly away from his forehead. He wore pristine, dark grey potioneer’s robes that fit the lean lines of his body perfectly. He looked older. He looked tired.

“Potter,” Draco said. His voice was a low, smooth baritone, stripped of the petulant drawl Harry remembered. It was just cold. “An unexpected visit. I trust you aren’t here for a boil-cure.”

Harry’s hands clenched into fists at his sides before he forced them to relax. “Robards sent me.” He walked forward, stopping before the counter and placing the case file on the polished wood. “I have a case. We need a potions consult.”

Draco didn’t look at the file. His gaze remained fixed on Harry’s face, analytical and unreadable. “The Ministry has its own labs. I seem to recall they were considered more than adequate.”

“They’ve hit a wall,” Harry said, his tone clipped. He hated this, hated having to ask for anything. “This is beyond them.”

A corner of Draco’s mouth lifted in a ghost of a smirk. It was a deeply familiar, irritating expression. “And so they come crawling to me. How fitting.” He finally glanced down at the file, then back up at Harry, his eyes narrowed. “My consultation fee is five hundred Galleons per day. Non-negotiable. The Ministry will be billed directly. I assume your budget can withstand the strain.”

Harry’s teeth ground together. The fee was outrageous, deliberately so. It was a power play, a way to put Harry in his place. “Fine,” he bit out. “The Ministry will pay.”

“Good.” Draco’s tone was clipped, all business. “Then let’s not waste any more of my valuable time. What am I looking at?”

Harry slid the file across the counter. He opened it to a small, sealed evidence bag containing a glass vial. Inside, a faint, silvery vapor swirled, the only physical trace left by the curse. “This is the residue. Our labs can’t break it down.”

Draco picked up the bag, his long fingers handling it with a delicacy that seemed at odds with Harry’s memory of him. He didn’t look at Harry again. He turned and walked toward a door at the back of the shop, clearly expecting Harry to follow. The room beyond was a laboratory, even more meticulously organized than the storefront. Stainless steel counters gleamed, beakers and phials were arranged by size and function, and a low, steady bubbling came from a series of cauldrons simmering over contained magical flames.

He placed the vial on a sterile silver tray and, with a pair of fine-tipped tweezers, removed the stopper. The silvery vapor coiled out, and he expertly trapped a wisp of it in a smaller, enchanted slide. Harry stood by the door, feeling large and out of place in the pristine environment. He watched as Draco moved with an unnerving, silent grace. His focus was absolute, his entire being narrowed to the task at hand. There was no trace of the sneering schoolboy; this was a man completely in his element, a master of his craft.

Draco set the slide under the lens of a complex brass instrument that looked like a cross between a microscope and an astrolabe. He peered into the eyepiece, one hand adjusting a series of knobs with minute, precise turns. Harry found himself staring at that hand—the pale skin, the elegant length of the fingers, the way they moved with an unquestionable confidence. He had only ever seen those hands gesturing arrogantly or gripping a wand to cast a hex. Seeing them work with such focused skill was profoundly unsettling.

After several long minutes of silence, punctuated only by the soft click of the instrument’s dials, Draco straightened up. He didn’t turn to face Harry, instead staring at the slide as if the answer were still materializing on its surface.

“It’s Fae-silver and powdered Moon-Lace,” he said, his voice quiet but clear in the still room. “The base is common enough for a suspension curse. But it’s bonded with something else. An amplifier. It’s organic, but… inert. It acts as a magical catalyst while being untraceable itself. That’s why your Aurors can’t identify it.”

He finally turned, his grey eyes meeting Harry’s. The analytical light in them was cold, devoid of any personal feeling. “I’ll need to run a full diagnostic sequence. It will require a slow-brewing Revealer Draught. I won’t have an answer for you before tomorrow evening.”

He picked up the evidence bag and placed it in a magically sealed container. The gesture was one of finality. A dismissal.

“Come back after eight,” Draco said, turning his back on Harry to begin laying out ingredients for the new potion. “I will have a preliminary report for you then.”

Harry stood there for a moment, feeling wrong-footed. There was nothing more to say. He had been given his instructions. With a tight, muttered, “Right,” he turned and walked out of the lab, through the silent shop, and back into the noise of Diagon Alley. The bell chimed softly behind him, a quiet punctuation to the strangest encounter he’d had in years. As he walked, the image of Draco’s intense concentration, the fluid, certain movements of his hands, was burned into his mind. The familiar sting of animosity was still there, a low hum beneath his ribs, but now it was tangled with a sharp, grudging flicker of respect.