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Ron stared at his Chudley Cannons poster dejectedly before casting the unsticking charm to take it off his wall. He didn’t know why his Mum had insisted he clear his bedroom of all his things, but he suspected it had to do with the way she’d been complaining about him living at home for the last three months. She’d probably decided to make him bunk in the attic with the ghoul to encourage him to move out. 

Ron had never intended to move back home. When he’d worked as a trainee Auror after the war, he’d been renting a small flat in Diagon Alley with Harry and Hermione. Ron had gone on to be an Auror with Harry because that was what he’d always done: stick by his best mate. But while Harry had been driven by his anger at Voldemort and his followers, Ron had struggled with the way the Aurors treated the suspected Death Eaters they took in. He’d been shocked to learn, when they were 13, that Sirius had been thrown in Azkaban without a trial, but cases like that were depressingly common. Hermione, hearing his stories, had begun a campaign to create oversight committees and make Aurors accountable for their violations of suspects’ rights. Harry had been furious with her and felt betrayed, and the rift in the trio had been made worse when Ron had thrown his support behind Hermione. 

He’d left the Aurors as the political tension grew and moved back into the Burrow, and it was only then that he learned how deep his parents had sunk into their addictions. Arthur and Molly Weasley had always had a drug problem; it was why their family was poor despite coming from Pureblood fortunes and his father having a salaried job at the Ministry. It hadn’t been as bad before the war, but after Fred’s death in the Battle of Hogwarts, the two of them had taken refuge from their grief in the illegal potions they’d once taken such care to hide their dependence on. His Mum no longer tried to keep up the facade of the perfect wife and mother, and his Dad was in danger of being fired for missing so much work. Ron’s attempts to help out around the house and pay some of the expenses could only go so far, and his pleading with them to get help for their addictions fell on deaf ears. 

He wondered if he’d even get the attic or if they were going to ask him to move out altogether. He almost hoped for the latter. Nothing he’d faced during the war was worse than getting up every morning and trying to ignore what his parents had become. 

“Aren’t you done yet?” 

It was his mother’s voice, and Ron turned to look at her, his heart aching at how skinny she was and the dirty tangle of her hair. 

“Nearly. You ready to tell me why I’m packing up my things, or will I just be getting a Portkey to the nearest bus station?” he asked, trying to make a joke out of it but instead sounding as bitter as he felt. 

“It’ll all be explained when you come downstairs.” Molly Weasley’s voice was practically a parody of the cheerful assertiveness she’d once had, but the same steel was underneath it. 

“Right. Well, I’m coming then,” Ron said dully. He cast a levitation spell on his trunks and they floated behind him as he descended the stairs behind his mother to see a man in a Muggle business suit standing in the living room.

“Here he is,” Molly said with a little wave of her hand at him. “All yours once you pay us those Galleons. Feel free to use a Calming Charm on him if he gets skittish about it.” 

“Skittish about what?” Ron demanded. “What do you mean, ‘he’s all yours?’”

“You know your father and I have been having money troubles, Ron,” she told him tiredly. “This gentleman has been looking for someone to serve a band he manages. He’s willing to buy you for enough to pay off more than half our debts.” He stared at her in disbelief. Buy him? His mum looked almost apologetic for a moment, but then her expression hardened to one of resolve. “We’re your parents, and you owe this to us after all the stress and sorrow you put us through over the years, risking your life again and again.”

“I risked my life to protect my friends!” Ron argued, anger flaring up in his chest. “You and Dad were part of the Order of the Phoenix too. How dare you act like I was being reckless when we were both fighting the same enemy!” 

Molly folded her arms and glared. “Don’t talk back to me, Ronald Bilius Weasley. You’re leaving now. It’s that or we lose the Burrow.” 

Ron felt a stab of grief at the idea of them losing their home, but still, he narrowed his eyes at the man in the suit. “It’s not legal to buy and sell people, mate.”

“I see Hogwarts no longer teaches Latin,” the man said dryly. “I suggest you look up the etymology of the word privilege. Private law. The law works differently for people with money and fame, and my employers have a good deal of both.” 

“I’m not going anywhere with you,” Ron said flatly. 

“I’m afraid you are,” the man said, and Ron heard a sharp crack. He spun around to see Molly with one half of his wand in each hand. She’d just snapped it in two. “Mum!”

“He shouldn’t be nearly as much trouble now,” she said drily. “Ron, you will do this for our family, or you will no longer be a part of our family. Is that understood?”

He just stared at her and the broken halves of his wand. She must have taken it out of his pocket. He knew he had never been her favorite. He’d been disappointing her over and over for years: from age six when he’d gathered up the courage to tell her that he wasn’t her oldest daughter but her youngest son, to his mediocre OWL results, to the way he’d sided against Harry and the Ministry and thrown away his career.

He wasn't any use to the family.  He wasn't clever or brave or charming like his siblings. For a while, he'd thought he'd earned their love with his deeds during the war, but he was back to being the unimportant one. The expendable one. 

The only way he'd ever made them proud was by being Harry Potter's friend, and now, with Ginny as Harry’s girlfriend, they didn't need Ron to get close to the Chosen One. 

But he could do this for them. His brothers and sister would never have agreed to it, but one thing his time with Harry had taught Ron was that sacrificing yourself for people didn't get you any reward, just more demands. You made the sacrifice anyway, because someone had to and you were the one who was there to do it. 

He didn’t decide to go with the man, exactly. He just… didn’t resist. This all felt like a nightmare, but a lot of things in his life had, hadn’t they? He’d survived all of them, and somehow he’d survive this.

Side-along apparition always made him nauseous, but the churning in his stomach as the man took his arm and the world spun and blackened around them had nothing to do with the spell and everything to do with the hardness in his mum’s eyes as she watched them vanish.

-

The room they appeared in was a Muggle one; Ron could tell immediately from the strange-looking upholstery of the furniture and the giant TV screen that was somehow attached to the wall. 

“Where are we?” he demanded. “And what’s your name, unless you want me to call you ‘Kidnapper?’”

“Mr. Randall will suffice,” the man told him coldly. “I work for the band One Direction, and now so do you. We’re in their penthouse hotel suite in Brest. They’re currently at the end of a long tour. You’ll be accompanying them on the last few days of their travel, then returning with them to their home in Bournemouth.”

Ron’s brows drew together. The name sounded familiar– he was sure he’d heard Hermione say it more than once. It was one of the Muggle pop and rock bands she’d liked, wasn’t it? Some group of boys. 

Had that been why his Mum had snapped his wand? Not just to make it harder for him to fight back, but because she was sending him off to pretend to be a Muggle? Blimey. He knew how to use a phone and the telly and those machines you got soda from at Muggle restaurants, but he’d be lost trying to do the other electronic things Muggles did every day. 

“Accompany them? Am I supposed to carry their things, or what?”

Mr. Randall laughed a little unpleasantly. “Your job is to keep them happy, Mr. Weasley. You will do whatever they tell you to, and in return, you’ll be taken very good care of. Plenty of witches, wizards, and Muggles would kill to be in your place, you know.”

Keep them happy. Why weren’t they happy already? They were so famous that even Ron, a wizard, knew about them, and they must be rich if they could pay off half his parents’ debts to buy… whatever he was now. If being able to have anything they wanted wasn’t enough for them, he didn’t think much of his own chances at making them happy. 

“You’ll need to meet their security personnel. One moment while I call him in. You’ll want to be on good terms with him; you’ll be seeing a lot of each other.”

“Yeah, sure,” Ron said absently, tangled in his own thoughts.

“Remind me to get you something respectable to wear,” Mr. Randall said in parting. 

The door closed behind him as he left, but when it opened again a moment later, Ron found himself staring at someone he definitely wasn’t expecting to see. 

“Malfoy?” he burst out. “What are you doing here?”

“What are you doing here?” Malfoy shot back. 

“I asked first,” Ron replied, wishing he had his wand at the ready in case the Slytherin decided to try anything sneaky. “Of everyone in the wizarding world, why would you be working security for a Muggle pop band?”

Malfoy gave him a flat look with his icy blue eyes. “They're not Muggles, Weasley. They're wizards. They like to keep that private since they work in the Muggle world. But if they let a Muggle work security, it would notice things and have to be Obliviated. The Wizengamot sentenced me to rehabilitation shortly after the war and I was placed here where I'd have to interact with Muggles every day so I could ‘understand their lives and how privileged I've been.’” His drawl was filled with contempt. “So now you know why I'm here. What's your explanation?”

Ron set his jaw.  There was no way he was going to humiliate himself by revealing his family had sold him. 

“I wanted to get away and travel for a bit,” he said shortly. “Knew a bloke who got me hired to work for the band while they tour. And of course I knew they were wizards, but like you said, they mostly perform for Muggles.” He'd never guessed that Hermione's favorite Muggle band might be secret wizards, but he wasn't going to admit that either. More importantly though, would Malfoy believe his lie? It was definitely more believable than the truth. 

“Of course you'd never be able to afford to travel otherwise. This will be quite the broadening experience for you. You might even have the chance to wear a piece of clothing that isn’t secondhand, won’t that be exciting?”

Ron didn't know what his new masters would do to him if he punched their head of security, but he was about to find out when the door opened. His first impression was that they were younger than he’d expected them to be– not much older than his age. His second was that they were very handsome.

“So here he is,” a young man with green eyes and dimples purred, looking Ron up and down. “Not bad at all, though his fashion sense could use some work.” 

He wished everyone would stop harping about his clothing. He hadn’t even been planning to leave the house that day when his Mum had bloody sold him! If he had been, he’d have at least put on real trousers instead of old tracksuit bottoms. And he had plenty of decent clothes in his trunks. 

The man beside the first, who was several inches shorter, waved a hand dismissively. “We'll have new clothes bought for him, of course. It's what's underneath that I'm more interested in.”  He had a hint of an Irish accent in his voice. He walked up to Ron and ran a finger down his cheek, making him tense slightly. “I look forward to getting to know you much better, love.”

Ron’s face burned. He stared fixedly ahead, unwilling to look at Malfoy as another band member with dark hair and eyes and olive skin circled behind him and leaned close, inhaling deeply. 

“You smell delicious,” he whispered before pulling away.

“He's blushing. Are you shy?” The one with messy light brown hair and a blue striped shirt asked, sounding delighted. “You're not a virgin, are you? Liam, did Randall say if he was a virgin?”

The fifth man– Liam?-- with curly brown hair and dark brown eyes, rolled his eyes. “He’s one of the Golden Trio. A couple years ago he was almost as famous as we are, so I’m guessing he hasn’t been saving himself just for us.”

Why, oh why, did Malfoy have to be standing here listening to this? Ron wanted to sink through the floor. 

“Wait. Are you working for them as their whore?” Malfoy demanded. Ron's head shot up to glare at him. 

“Maybe getting to shag four fit blokes is just a bonus of the job I'd like to take advantage of, did you ever think about that?” He snapped, all the rage he couldn't vent at his family and his new masters coming out at Malfoy. “Jealous, Malfoy?”

The green-eyed one laughed in delight. “Oh, you're a firecracker, aren't you? I can’t wait to see what a wild thing you’ll be between the sheets. And as for you–” With a flick of his wrist, a wand shot out from his sleeve and into his hand and Malfoy was pinned to the wall, gasping for breath. “Don't you ever talk about him like that again. Treat him with respect. Your duties extend to keeping him safe as well now.”

Malfoy nodded as much as whatever spell that held him pinned to the wall allowed. Then with a flick of the green-eyed man’s wand, he collapsed to the floor, scrambling up white-faced and expressionless.

“You’re dismissed, Malfoy. See that you don’t forget your place again.” Malfoy’s attacker turned back to Ron. “And you, beautiful…” He shot Ron a blindingly handsome smile. “Are you hungry? We’re ordering Thai; pick whatever you’d like.”

Ron expected to feel smug, even victorious, with the way Malfoy had been put in his place, but instead, when the glowering Slytherin left the room and Ron was alone under the hungry eyes of the band, he felt even more nervous.

He knew what to expect from Draco Malfoy. He didn’t know what to expect from One Direction.

-

Over takeout, the band introduced themselves to him. Another green-eyed Harry with a quick temper would take some getting used to– not that there was the slightest risk of mixing this man up with his friend. His Harry had hated his fame, while Harry Styles clearly lived for being the center of attention. Of all of them, Ron liked Liam the best, with his calm demeanor and more mature attitude than the others. They were all looking at Ron with clear sexual interest, but Liam had been the one to make sure he didn’t have any food allergies before they ordered for him and hadn’t tried to touch him uninvited. 

He pushed to the back of his mind any embarrassment about the way his traitorous body had begun to respond to Niall and Zayn’s casual touches, as they sat and ate together. He was pretty sure he knew where this night was going. Might as well try and enjoy it, right? he told himself. While he’d mostly dated witches, he’d done enough experimenting to know that he liked blokes too. 

If he’d run into any of them at a party looking to pull, he’d probably have been interested. As he’d said to Draco, they were fit. If he had run into them at a party, though, Ron could have told them to sod off and gone home alone if he felt like it. 

His thoughts kept coming back to that as he ate delicious noodles on the weird Muggle sofa and listened to the band banter and tease each other. There was a TV show playing in the background, but it didn’t have aliens, sword fighting, or proper explosions, so it wasn’t one of the good ones. He ignored it. 

Plenty of people would kill to be in his place, Mr. Randall had said. It was a pity one of those people hadn’t killed Mr. Randall and switched places with Ron. His mum would still have her money, the band would still have a slave, he wouldn't be here, and everyone would be happy. 

“You all right there?” 

Ron glanced up at Louis, who had asked the question, and shrugged. “I wasn’t expecting any of this,” he said. “Is buying another person normal in the Muggle world, or are you five just mental?” He should probably have worded that better, but his life had been turned upside down and he really didn’t feel like being polite. 

“It’s not exactly normal,” Louis admitted. “If it wasn’t you, we probably wouldn’t have, but, well… we’ve all had crushes on you ever since the war. I’m sure you’re used to that, being the pretty one of the trio–”

“The what?” Ron stared at him, baffled. Yeah, he was used to random people fancying him, because that’s what happened when your picture turned up in magazines next to the word ‘hero.’ But the pretty one? “I’m the Loyal Friend,” he said. “You know: The Boy Who Lived, The Brightest Witch of Her Age, and their Loyal Friend Ron Weasley.”

“Well, they can’t exactly say ‘the Really Shaggable Ginger One’ in a newspaper, can they?” Louis retorted. 

“They say I’m ‘a strategic thinker and a steadfast ally.’ You never hear anyone go, ‘I want to have it off with a really steadfast bloke, someone strategic, you know? I want him to… I dunno, take me like a chess piece!’”

Louis cracked up laughing and took Ron’s hand, running his thumb lightly over the scarred knuckles. “I'd let you take me like a chess piece any day of the week. But to answer your question? We bought you because we were bored with meaningless hookups with fans and sick of working with only each other for company. When Mr. Randall told us about your family selling you, we decided we couldn’t stand the idea of you belonging to anyone but us.”

That… was still not great, but “we didn’t want someone else to own our celebrity crush” was better than “we buy slaves all the time,” right? 

“I know we come on a bit strong sometimes,” Louis told him, his eyes gentle and reassuring. “We can take it slow. It’s just so exciting, knowing you’re really ours.”

“I’d rather take it slow, thanks. Does that mean I can kip on one of these sofas tonight? I’d really rather.”

“Oh no, beautiful,” Harry interrupted. “You’re sleeping in my bed.”

“He’s not a seat in the car, you can’t just call shotgun,” Niall complained. “Let him choose whose bed he wants to share first!”

“You don’t have to do anything but sleep and cuddle,” Louis said quickly. “We just want you close to us. We’re feeling protective.”

Ron’s family had been poor for as long as he could remember, but he’d never had to share a bed with anyone if he didn’t want to. Even camping out in the forest with Harry and Hermione– who he wouldn’t have hesitated to curl up next to if they’d needed to share– he’d always had his own bunk in the tent and they’d all given each other as much privacy as they could manage in the circumstances. 

Apparently that was one of those things you didn’t get to have when you were a…. band slave, or whatever he was now. Maybe he should be grateful that he didn’t have to shag them right away, and that he got to choose which of them he’d share with. He didn’t feel grateful. He felt resentful as hell. 

He’d always planned to have more in life than he’d started out with. He wasn’t a Slytherin. He wasn’t ready to lie or cheat or hurt other people for his ambition. But enough money that he didn’t have to scrimp and save all the time, a job where he didn’t have to commit what Hermione called “ethics violations,” respect from the people around him…those had always seemed like ordinary things to want. Realistic things. 

Things he wasn’t going to be allowed to have anymore. Sure, they were going to buy him clothes, but that was so when he was “ready,” they could enjoy taking them off him. He’d be sleeping in their beds like a pet. 

“I'll spend tonight in Niall’s bed,” he said, because Niall had been the one to insist on them letting Ron choose. That was a good sign, right? Niall immediately came over and pulled Ron to his feet, wrapping his arms around him from behind as if Ron didn't have a foam container of food in his hand. Ron defiantly put another forkful in his mouth and chewed while Niall nuzzled his neck and slid teasing fingers beneath the hem of his shirt. 

“Do you mind? I'm trying to eat, ” he pointed out dryly, making them all laugh, including Niall, who lifted his hands and stepped back. 

“Sorry, love. You're just hard to resist.”

“Try.” Ron sat back down and went back to his dinner. They were all smiling at him fondly, as if him standing up for his right to eat without being groped was cute and quirky. It was like they were just… living in an entirely different reality where people bought each other and that was normal. It was messing with Ron’s head. 

“Tell us more about you,” Zayn encouraged him. “What's your favorite one of our songs?”

Ron probably shouldn't say he'd never heard their music. “Er… the one about… your heart being broken?” he guessed. Every band had a breakup song, right? Hopefully they did. 

“Over Again!” Louis exclaimed, smiling. “My kiss can mend your broken heart,” he sang softly, and Ron nodded, relieved. 

“Yeah, that one.”

“Do you have a broken heart, my little Firecracker?” Harry asked gently. “I suppose you must, after your breakup with Hermione and then being sold by your family.”

“I'm at least four centimeters taller than you,” Ron told him. “I'm not your little anything. And Hermione and I dated for a couple months three years ago. We're both pretty well over it.”

“Everyone knows you were secretly dating for longer and kept it secret so Harry Potter wouldn't be jealous,” Liam said, “and that's what really broke up the Golden Trio, not politics.”

“Yeah, that's what they say.” Ron had heard that one. He'd also heard the one about how they'd all three been lovers since their school days and now Hermione was pregnant with a vampire's baby. People liked making up nonsense. “And I suppose everything your fans think about your love life is true?”

“Of course it is,” Louis said, looking puzzled. “Harry and I are secretly in love and our publicists are making us hide it, and I have a fake baby with my fake girlfriend.”

“A fake baby,” Ron repeated.

“It's a Kneazle spelled to look like a baby,” Louis explained. 

“Why?”

“So people think I'm a straight man with a child and Harry and I can hide our love.” 

It really was like they had their own reality entirely separate from the rest of the world. He wished Luna were here. She would probably get along great with them.

“You've never heard of Nargles, have you?” Ron asked experimentally. 

“Of course we have. It's the ship name for my secret obsession with argyle socks,” Niall said immediately. “Like Larry Stylinson, or Larrot for Louis's love of carrots.”

It was possible even Luna wouldn't know what to do with them. 

-

The next morning, Ron woke up being spooned by a warm, solid body, light streaming into an unfamiliar window to touch his face. It would have been nice to get a moment of not remembering where he was or what had happened. He'd have liked that. Unfortunately, it was all pretty clear in his mind.

“Awake, gorgeous?” Niall asked in a voice still rough from sleep. He nibbled the back of Ron's neck amorously. 

“Oi, what are you doing? Yeah, I'm awake, and that's a hard-on you're pressing against my arse. Do you mind?” Ron tried to pull away, but Niall clung to him. 

“Do you like it?” he asked saucily.

“I'm sure it's very nice, mate, but I didn't ask for it. Let me go.” 

Niall slowly and reluctantly unwrapped his arms from around Ron's waist. How had he even slept like that without his arm going numb? Ron grouchily climbed out of the bed. 

Niall definitely hadn't been a Gryffindor. McGonagall had got them all together and lectured them about consent in no uncertain terms near the beginning of third year. Spooning a sleeping person while you had an erection might not be assault, but it fell solidly into ‘ask permission first’ territory. 

If Niall had asked, Ron might even have enjoyed the feeling of the hot, thick length pressing against him through their pajama bottoms. Pajamas that were nearly new and perfectly good quality but that had been declared unacceptable by the band. 

“I want to see you in silk,” Harry had said last night, and the others had agreed. 

“I thought you said you two were in a relationship?” Ron had gestured between him and Louis. 

“Now you're part of that relationship,” Harry had told him.

Ron grabbed a shirt, trousers, and shorts out of his suitcase and headed for the shower. 

“We could save water by showering together,” Niall suggested hopefully. 

“We could save water by casting Aguamenti instead of drinking fancy bottled mineral water, but I don't see you lot doing that,” Ron retorted, closing the door behind him.

He emerged in a somewhat better mood, wishing he had his wand back so he could clean his teeth properly. He had just about been able to manage the spell wandlessly, but not well. He, Harry, and Hermione had missed the seventh year training in basic wandless magic and he still struggled with it. Ron's tongue and back teeth still felt a little gross. 

The Muggle shopping mall they dragged him to was a bit disappointing. Formal clothes for Muggle men didn't come in interesting patterns and colors like wizarding dress robes. 

“It feels like I'm getting ready to do someone's taxes. While hiding in the dark. At a funeral,” Ron complained as a store clerk brought them suit jackets in every shade of black, dark gray, and navy. “Don't Muggles wear colors?”

“You can have a colored necktie,” Zayn consoled him. “And your everyday clothes can be more interesting. You look terribly handsome in that though.” In fact, none of them seemed to be able to take their eyes off him. Ron kept blushing and then hating himself for blushing. 

Zayn hadn't been telling the truth. The fancy expensive silk and linen shirts, fitted slacks, and leather shoes they took him to get next didn't come in any interesting patterns at all. Some of the shirt colors were okay, but they wouldn't get him the blue and orange patterned shirt he found. 

“Those are exercise clothes,” Liam scolded him, leading him away from the section of tracks of loose clothing in soft, breathable fabrics.  “You don't need to exercise. We love your body exactly the way it is.”

They left with nicer quality clothing than Ron had ever had, and he felt squirming guilt in his stomach at how much Muggle money they had spent on dressing him and how ungrateful he felt. He looked good in the clothes they'd bought, even if they weren't what he would have chosen. 

“And if course, you'll want a new broom,” Louis said casually as they were taking the strange paper tags off his purchases back at the hotel. 

Ron's broom was his pride and joy, a present from Bill and Fleur on his 19th birthday, but a second, newer broom wasn't a purchase he was going to protest. “Thank you,” he said, trying not to look overwhelmed or too eager. “I, uh, need a new wand too. My mum snapped mine when she sold me.”

Louis pulled Ron tightly to him, pressing a kiss into his hair. “I promise you'll never have to go back to that dreadful house again,” he swore.

“I like the Burrow,” Ron protested. “I just don't like not having a wand.” 

Being held felt nice. Ron had grown up with physical affection. Unlike Harry and Hermione, who could be a little awkward about touch, he liked long hugs and playful wrestling matches. He liked how warm Louis's arms felt around him. He let himself melt into the embrace a little. 

“Don't worry,” Louis murmured. “You won't need a wand, not with us. We'll take care of you. We'll give you everything you want, because you are everything we want.”

“I do need a wand–” Ron tried to say. 

“No, you don't. I know it's hard, I know you’ve been let down by people who should have cared for you, but trust me. You're safe here.”

Blimey. That’s not good.

-

The hotel hallway was well lit, and at first glance, it looked empty. 

 “Going somewhere?” Malfoy asked from where he'd been standing against the wall next to the door. Ron nearly jumped out of his skin. 

“Bloody hell, why are you lurking in the hallways?” he squawked. Reflexes still sharp from the war had his stolen wand in his hand and pointed straight at Malfoy before he even realized he was doing it.

“It's my job. Security,” Malfoy told him, his wand drawn as well but the tip safely pointed at the ground the way Ron had been drilled to do in Auror training. Sheepishly, he lowered his own, or rather, Zayn’s, which he'd managed to nick when Zayn wasn't paying attention.

“What are you doing wandering around the hotel in a fancy silk shirt with half the buttons undone? Five men still not enough for you?” Malfoy mocked.

Ron's face heated and he glared. Liam had insisted the shirt was meant to be worn that way, and of all the things he'd felt like arguing about, that had been near the bottom of the list. “I need to go get something for them,” he lied. 

“If they sent you, why were you so careful to close the door quietly?” Malfoy’s eyebrow twitched skeptically. 

“Harry is taking a nap.”

“I'm sure he is. What is it you're supposedly getting for them? Sandwiches? Fresh towels? A pet hippogriff?”

Ron scowled. “Mind your own business, snake.”

“You heard them tell me that my business is to keep you safe as well as them. I don't feel like playing babysitter for your little errand. They can send one of their Muggle personal assistants and you can go back in there and ice your knees, or whatever it is you do when you're not sucking their cocks.”

Ron took a step forward, jaw clenched. “Helpful tip from the good old days when you were on your knees for Old Voldy?”

Malfoy's eyes blazed in outrage.  “If you think fighting for the Dark was anything like your little gold digger vacation–” 

“I'm sure wearing masks and killing Muggleborns was much more satisfying for you than a vacation. My mistake,” he snarled. “You've got no right to judge what I do with my life, Malfoy, not after what you did with yours.”

Malfoy’s expression was pure contempt, and his wand hand twitched. “It must be nice not to have to face the consequences of your own side’s actions. You really think the Light didn't use the war as a chance to commit their own little atrocities? But celebrity symbols don't have to worry about those things, I suppose.”

The two of them were about the same height, and Ron was stronger than he looked. If it came to a physical struggle, Ron thought he could take him. In a duel using an unfamiliar wand, though? He didn't feel so confident about that. 

Ron had never backed down and shut up when the odds were against him, though, and he bloody well wasn't about to start now. 

“I know about the rigged trials and the Ministry raids and what happened to the South London werewolf pack. I don't like it either, all right?” he shot back. “The Order fought hard to protect the innocent people, but there was only so much we could do for the guilty ones. When you try to slaughter their families and take over their country, the victims want revenge. Big surprise there.”

“Well, they got their revenge,” Draco growled. “We're doing our time for our war crimes while yours are swept under the rug and ignored. Here I am, protecting a bunch of wankers who didn't even have the courage to join either side of the war. And here you are. The entire Wizarding world is ready to hand you everything you ask for, and you decide it would be a lark to run away and become a band groupie?” His mouth twisted in disgust. “Don't you have the faintest shred of dignity?”

“I didn't deci-” Ron slammed his teeth together, not letting himself finish the sentence. “You're in no place to talk. I'd rather be One Direction’s groupie than Voldemort's.”

But Malfoy had taken a step back, and his gaze had turned piercing. “Did you just say that you didn't decide?”

“I said I don't owe you an explanation for my decisions.” Without realizing it, Ron raised his wand slightly, and Draco narrowed his eyes. 

“That's not your wand, weasel,” he accused. “You think I don't know what the band members' wands look like? That's Zayn’s: pine and dragon heartstring.”

Fuck. 

“I didn't steal it,” Ron lied.

“You think I care? It stays in the room.”

Ron swallowed his frustration, because it would be suspicious to argue. “I'll return it. Do you know where the nearest Floo is?”

“Ask Zayn when you give it back. It's not my job to answer your questions.” Draco elaborately gestured back at the hotel room, because he was a petty bitch. 

-

Here was the thing: Ron wasn't trying to escape. If he'd wanted to escape, he could have. All Aurors memorized the telephone number to contact the Auror Office on a Muggle phone, and no matter how much they hated him, they weren't going to ignore a case as shocking as a wizard getting sold as a slave to a boy band. They'd have had him out of there in under an hour. 

And then they would have taken his Mum and dad into custody. The headlines would blaze from every news sheet: “Drug-Crazed Weasleys Traffic their Own Son! Golden Trio Member Held Hostage by Secretly Magical Muggle Band! Ronald Weasley, the Boy Who Was Sold to One Direction!”

Maybe his parents would have deserved it, but his brothers, sister, and friends didn't. Family reputation was everything in the Wizarding world. It would tear apart their lives. Weasley Wizard Wheezes would be history; Bill and Ginny might lose their jobs. Harry and Hermione would be harassed even more mercilessly by reporters than they already were. Even in Romania, Charlie's reputation would be damaged. 

He was trying to slip away without a fuss for an hour to go to Diagon Alley. He had some money in his Gringotts account, more than enough to buy a new wand and the kind of holster that was designed not to be visible under clothing. This mess hadn't been his choice, but he could choose what to do about it. He didn't have a plan yet, but he didn't like being wandless at all . 

If Malfoy hadn't stuck his pointy nose in, Ron could have Apparated there and back without the band being any the wiser. They had just told him he didn’t need one, not that he wasn’t allowed to have one, so if they found out, they wouldn’t try to take it from him, right?

He’d just have to wait for another chance.

-

The trip to the band’s home was surreal. 

“We can't fly or Apparate,” Niall had explained to him that morning. “Muggles notice if you show up in a different place without having traveled there nonmagically.”

They'd taken an airplane instead, something called a private jet. It was somewhere between a helicopter and one of the big planes further down what the band called the runway. The inside looked like some sort of long, narrow parlor, with couches and a little Muggle refrigerator with drinks in it.

“Why would people want to pretend they're indoors when they're flying?” he asked, looking doubtfully at the small size of the windows and the covered ceiling. 

“It's not safe to put windows all over the plane,” Liam explained. “If something hits us, metal will dent but windows will break.”

Ron tried in vain to find a latch or a button to open them. “How do they open? Does the pilot have to do it?”

“You can't open them. All the air will get sucked out and you won't be able to breathe,” Louis said matter of factly.

“No, it won't,” Ron argued. “People jump out of helicopters all the time on the telly.”

To his annoyance, the boys laughed. “This plane goes higher up than that,” Harry told him. “There's less air above the clouds.”

“If you say so.” One Direction might live in the Muggle world, but the thing about no air and getting sucked out of a plane sounded like something you'd tell little kids so they didn't mess with the windows. Giving up on fresh air, he sat down, and Louis and Zayn sat on either side of him. Louis gently rubbed the back of his neck. 

“Don't be afraid,” he told Ron. “They're perfectly safe.”

Ron had ridden a dragon at the age of seventeen. He wasn't especially afraid. And the doors were plainly marked Exit, so if the engine thingy stopped working, it wasn't like he'd be stuck in the metal tube. He could probably jump out just before they hit the ground. 

There was fancy Muggle champagne on the plane. It must have been stronger than it looked, because he somehow managed to get pissed on only a couple glasses. He ended up letting both Liam and Harry snog him and falling asleep with his head in Louis's lap. He woke up at one point to his hair being gently stroked. 

“He's so beautiful,” one of them said. He distantly recognized Niall’s Irish accent. 

He wasn't sure who responded, but their voice was deep and soothing when they said, “And he's ours.”

He wasn't theirs, but he went back to sleep anyway. 

-

Of course they had a bloody manor. Harry Styles, it turned out, had been born Harry Selwyn, and like most sons of one of the Sacred Twenty Eight Pureblood families, he lived on a family property. Ron tried not to be jealous of the high ceilings and antique furniture. Even if Harry hadn't been born with all this, the band was rich enough from their music that they could have bought a home like this anyway. So it didn't matter that they hadn't earned it, because they could have.

Still, it occurred to him that Harry Styles’s mother could probably have afforded a drug habit without selling a thing.

“Why do you all live together?” he asked. 

“We just do,” Liam said firmly. “Don't question it.  It means you can live with all of us at once, isn't that wonderful?”

“... Yeah. Sure,” Ron said. “Will you show me my room?”

“Of course, you'll need somewhere to keep your things,” Harry said, and Ron was led to a beautiful room with walk-in closets, a balcony… and no bed or lock on the door.

“There's plenty of room,” Zayn enthused. “We're sorry it's so bare; we didn't know how you wanted to decorate it so we thought we'd let you come shopping with us and choose. And look!” He waved his wand and what had looked like a wardrobe opened up to reveal a big Muggle TV surrounded by other mysterious boxes. “You have cable TV, surround sound, three different game systems, high speed internet– all the Muggle entertainment you could ask for. And there's a radio that picks up the Wizarding Wireless. You'll never be bored for a moment. And we'll get a great big sofa for all of us to come in and spend that time with you.”

Ergh. But when they left him to unpack and settle in, Ron put up his Cannons posters and then gave in to his curiosity about the Muggle electronics. 

Apparently when you typed ‘tits’ as a joke into the search engine on the little folding computer they'd left him, you got endless pictures of actual tits. Impressive. Slightly alarming. The telly channels were a little dizzying to navigate, so he turned boxes on and pressed things at random until he found a game that let you shoot at Inferi with a gun. He spent a while trying to figure out what controller buttons to hit to not get killed. He'd just about gotten it worked out when Harry and Louis came in and joined him. 

He was fully prepared to tell them to leave him alone. But they'd brought a bag of crisps, and they sat on the floor with him and taught him how to switch from one gun to the other and how to start a game where they could play too with the other controllers. Then they ordered dinner, and it was disturbingly easy to talk and laugh and banter with them and lean into the physical affection they offered. 

He almost forgot that he was a possession until it was time for him to turn in for the night, which meant putting on blue silky pajamas and climbing into Liam's king sized bed. Liam kissed him on the forehead, then the lips, and looked at him solemnly. 

“We'll take care of you, Ron. Your life is only going in one direction from now on, and that direction is up.” Then he stroked a hand through Ron's hair. “You should grow this out. It would be so sexy pulled up in a bun.”

“A bun?” Ron had considered growing his hair out like Bill’s, but he'd always imagined it in a ponytail. 

“Yeah.” Liam sighed longingly. “A messy bun.”

-

For the first time in his life, Ron had literally no responsibilities. Everything in the house was done by the house elf, Wendy. It seemed like the band didn't do much when they weren't on tour, occasionally leaving for an interview or charity event. He and the band played Quidditch and video games together, and they filled his room with everything he asked for except a wand and a bed. They lavished kisses on him that made him ache and told him over and over how perfect he was, and it was…

He didn't know how to feel. It would all be fine if this was a fantasy. But in real life, it was missing a lot of important bits. The boys were insistent on him not spending time with his “dreadful family” or “friends who never appreciated him,” and they'd gotten into several rows already because Ron didn't let anyone talk like that about the people he loved, no matter how well meaning the speaker was. And they were all so convinced that they were well-meaning that every now and then he found himself questioning his own doubts.

Weirdly, one thing that anchored him to reality was Malfoy. He had a room somewhere in the manor, where he presumably ate and slept, but he mostly patrolled the grounds, leaving the band to their privacy. Whenever Ron came across him, the two of them sniped at each other as if they were still at Hogwarts. Malfoy made no secret of his contempt for Ron’s family, political opinions, looks, and sex life, and Ron gave as good as he got. There was so much about Malfoy worth insulting that it was difficult to choose sometimes. It was… almost fun.

And it was reassuring. If anyone would have been all right with slavery, it was Malfoy, right? Especially since it was Ron who’d been bought and sold. He’d probably think it was hilarious. But he sneered at the way Ron let the band refer to him as ‘theirs’, which meant the band hadn’t said a word about buying him to their own security guard. If they weren’t sure a former Death Eater would approve, that had to mean this situation was as fucked up as Ron thought it was.

-

When they went to Diagon Alley to buy him a broom, Ron waited until they were walking past the wand shop, then turned and went in before they could stop them. It wasn’t Ollivander’s, which had been destroyed during the war. Ollivander had retired, and wands were now bought from a slightly larger shop run by Madam Davies, a witch from South Wales. 

“My wand’s been destroyed and I need a new one,” Ron said loudly before the band, who had rushed in behind him, could say anything. 

Madam Davies nodded at him cheerfully. “I’ll be with you in five minutes, love,” she said, and Ron smiled back, trying to look calm and normal. 

“It’s not necessary, Ron,” Harry said quietly in a voice that wouldn’t carry. 

“I’ll pay you back,” Ron said, pretending to misunderstand. “We can stop by Gringotts right afterwards. You know I’m good for it. I just don’t feel right going without one for a second longer.” He kept his voice loud enough to carry to the others in the room.

“You know it’s not about the money,” Louis said, touching Ron’s hand and speaking just as quietly. “Please, don’t be silly about this. Let’s go on to the broom shop now.”

Ron’s suspicions were right. They didn’t want him to have a wand, but making a scene trying to stop him from buying one would make them look controlling and creepy, and they didn’t want that. 

“Let’s go to Gringotts now, so you can get that money and pay with your own Galleons,” Harry said, this time more audibly, with a sidelong look at the family and Madam Davies. “Then we can come back, or you can send off for one of the wands in that catalog you were browsing earlier.”

They were even supplying a reason for him not returning if they stopped him coming back. How far were they willing to go? Ron felt sick to his stomach. He should have found a way to get to Gringotts first, but it would have made them suspicious when they were willing to buy everything for him. 

Madam Davies came to his rescue without realizing it. “Just write me a signed order with your vault number. The goblins prefer it that way nowadays in any case, after the trouble with Polyjuice during the war.”

The use of money orders had been spreading in other wizarding areas, but many of the shops on Diagon Alley had clung to their old-fashioned ways– coins only. Ron was pathetically grateful that apparently this shop was one of the less stubborn ones. 

“Well, that saves us a trip!” he said cheerfully. The band members looked at each other, but what were they going to do, publicly drag him out and make a scene?

It felt really, really good to leave with a wand in his hand once more.

-

That night, Ron woke a few hours before dawn, drenched in sweat and crying out frantically, and hit Niall in the face when the other man reached for him to calm him.

“Shite, sorry. ” Ron ran his hands through his hair and tried to breathe. He could still hear Harry and Hermione’s screams in his head and see the green flare of curses shooting towards them while he was pinned, wandless, unable to save them. “Sorry. Bad dream.”

Niall got out of bed, went to the bathroom, and returned with a cool, wet hand towel that Ron gratefully pressed to his face, heart still racing. “Do you want to talk about it?”

Ron shrugged. “It’s just… rubbish from the war. My head scrambles up things that happened with things I was afraid would happen and… anyway, lots of us have them. A couple of the ones who were back at Hogwarts and got tortured by the Carrows still take Dreamless Sleep potions at night.”

“Should we get you–”

Ron shook his head. “I’m fine.” He wasn’t. The shaking was getting worse. If Harry had been here, or Hermione, or Neville, he could have– they would know–

“Come here.” Slowly and gently, so as not to startle him, Niall pulled Ron into his arms and ran a hand through his hair. “I have trauma from the war too. Dark trauma, full of pain and loss. So does Zayn. That’s why he’s so brooding and why I hide it with humor. We do understand.”

So what Malfoy had said wasn’t true– they hadn’t all been hidden away from the war. Ron wrapped his arms around Niall and held him tightly, letting himself be comforted. 

“I had to leave behind two of my favorite pairs of shoes in a hotel room when we had to leave the country after the Dark Mark was cast over the Quidditch Cup,” he murmured sadly. “And an entire rotisserie chicken. But our manager insisted we leave the country at once. It wasn’t safe.”

Right. Ron really wished Niall hadn’t said that. He would rather have believed that they’d been cursed or lost friends or family, which was horrible of him, because it was a good thing they hadn’t. The idea that maybe he wasn’t alone in a house full of people who’d never had to experience the war… it would have helped. So much. 

“And Zayn?” Ron asked, dreading an answer that he knew would be just as bloody stupid.

“Oh. His first lover died,” Niall said. “Her name was Betty.” 

“Oh no. Was she one of the Muggleborns they went after, or–”

“No, no. She was in the dumpster behind a shopping mall the Death Eaters attacked.”

“Merlin, she was hiding in a dumpster and they found her? That’s awful.” Ron’s heart ached for Zayn.

Niall’s hug was protective, loving, and– well, he and Zayn were close, weren't they? He’d grieved with his friend. So maybe he did understand, even if all he’d lost were shoes. That helped too. It had been more than a year since he’d lived with anyone who had understood and been there for him when he woke from the dreams– Ginny had moved out of the Burrow and in with Harry when the trio broke up for good, and his parents hadn’t even heard him cry out from their drugged stupors.

“She wasn’t hiding there. He’d put her there. She was a pretty old blow-up doll, and he didn’t want to risk the paparazzi finding her outside somewhere that we were staying.” Niall sighed into Ron’s hair. “There’s no way she would have survived the explosion though. It was a very tragic end for her.”

Ron shut his eyes and gave up on hoping for anything meaningful to come out of Niall’s mouth. It shouldn’t matter so much whether they understood or not. The war was over. They were just dreams. 

Niall held him until he fell asleep.

-

After about a week at the manor, Ron realized he was going to shag them eventually, so he just went ahead and did it. They probably thought he had finally given in to their constant, passionate coaxing and the way they treated his boundaries like suggestions, but he’d been a celebrity. He’d grown a thick skin about that sort of thing before he was eighteen, and he knew how to stand up to it. He just… didn’t see the point in holding off. 

Zayn was quiet and intense in a way Ron really liked, leaving him nicely sore-sleepy-satisfied the next day. Louis and Liam were both attentive and eager to please. Louis in particular was very good with his mouth, which Ron appreciated in a partner. And easygoing, laughing sex with Niall after an afternoon of flying made for some brilliant evenings. 

Of all of them, Harry would probably have been the best in bed if he could keep his bloody mouth shut. He kept calling Ron his “little firecracker” whenever he was particularly enthusiastic. Few things were a quicker turn-off than being called little in bed whenever you moaned too loudly. And having someone you decidedly did not love look you in the eyes and tell you they loved you mid-shag was… awkward. Ron liked him. He liked all of them, despite himself. But it wasn’t love and it wasn’t going to become love. You didn’t love people who owned you. 

Draco was right; Ron was acting like a complete slag, but he didn’t care. He’d enjoy himself however he pleased. Until he could work out some way out of this, this was his life.  

“Are you happy here?” he’d asked the house elf tentatively at one point, thinking of Hermione. “Do you want to be freed?”

Wendy had looked at him with big eyes. “No. Do you?”

Yeah. As much as the sex and the broom and the Muggle video games were brilliant, he did. But every day, the possibility seemed less real and the situation less horrifying. It was starting to feel normal, comfortable, and that was the most horrifying thing of all.

-

Letting himself get comfortable was the worst mistake he could have made. He left his wand on the kitchen counter one day, bringing his cup of tea to the table, and when he turned, Wendy was sitting on the counter with the wand in her hand. 

“Oi, give that back,” Ron protested, more startled than worried. Elves weren’t allowed to use wands unless they were ordered to, and he hadn’t told her to, so–

“Masters is saying Ron Weasley isn’t needing this. Wendy is putting it somewhere safe for him,” she said and then disappeared. 

“Wendy! Come back right now!” he shouted, and she reappeared promptly, without the wand. 

“Wendy is here,” she said. 

“Bring my wand back this instant!”

“Masters said to put it somewhere safe,” Wendy repeated firmly. 

Ron felt his hands clench into fists. “You’re their house elf, so their orders are above mine. Right, I’m going to sort this out.”

They were in their home studio, rehearsing a new song, when he found them. He didn’t bother to be tactful about it; he stormed in, slamming the door behind them. They stopped in mid-verse and looked up at him.

“What’s wrong?” Niall asked, startled. 

“Tell Wendy to give me my wand back.” He kept his voice as even as he could, trying not to shout at them or let it tremble. 

“The war is over, Ron. You don’t need to carry it around the house,” Zayn said in a tone that probably wasn’t meant to sound as bloody condescending as it did. 

“I need my wand to use magic. I’m a wizard, war or no war. If you want a Muggle, buy yourself a Muggle. You bought me easily enough,” he snarled. 

“We don’t carry our wands everywhere around the house,” Louis protested. “Mine is back in my bedroom.”

“Yeah, and you can get it and use it any time you want.” Ron refused to back down. “I just asked Wendy for my wand back and she said no. That means you told her not to let me use it any time I want.”

“We’ll cast any spell you want for you, whenever you want, give you anything you need, and make sure you’re always safe,” Liam told him. “You don’t need a wand when you have us. Why don’t you trust us?”

Ron stared at him, disbelieving and outraged. “Why don’t I trust you? I dunno, maybe because you had the house elf nick my wand and now you won’t give it back. What are you afraid I’d do if I had it? Why don’t you trust me?”  

He stared from one to the other of them, and when they didn’t seem to have a ready answer, he turned on his heel and left. Louis’s wand was in his bedroom, was it? They’d just see how he liked being wandless. 

“Wait!” Harry burst from the room after him. Ron didn’t stop walking. “Wait, little firecracker. I’m sorry. This is my fault.”

“Of course it’s your fault. It’s your house and your elf. No matter what the rest of the band wants, you could have her give it back to me,” Ron said, not turning around or stopping, making Harry almost run trying to keep up. “Are you going to?” 

“It’s complicated.” Harry’s voice was raw and emotional. “I’ve lost people, Ron. It’s hard. I just want to keep you safe here with us.”

This did make him stop from the sheer senselessness of it. “How would not having my wand make me safer?” he demanded. “I’m safer with it. We all are, since half of you are so used to going without your wands in the Muggle world that you leave them around the house.”

“Zayn and Liam are Muggleborn,” Harry argued, neatly avoiding the point. “It makes sense that they don’t feel the way you or I do about our wands.” 

Hermione was Muggleborn and Harry was raised by Muggles and you’d have to pry their wands from their cold, dead hands. Ron narrowed his eyes. 

“If you’re trying to say we Purebloods are more– more connected or whatever to our wands than they are, that’s rubbish.”

“Are you calling me a bigot?” Harry flinched back as if Ron had hit him.

“Right now, I don’t give a toss what you are. You want me to trust you? Then give me back my wand. I don’t trust people who nick my stuff.”

“No!” Harry’s voice broke on the word. “Look, I just– want you to need us as much as we need you. I know I’m possessive. It’s what happens when a person feels and loves this powerfully.” He took one of Ron’s hands in both of his and pressed Ron’s palm to his heart. “I’m going to make mistakes. But we’ll get through those mistakes together.”

“We can get through this mistake by you calling Wendy and having her give back my wand. Now.” Ron yanked his hand away. “I feel and love pretty powerfully myself, and that’s made me act like a prat plenty of times. It’s never made me want to take people’s wands away so they needed me more.”

“How about a compromise?” Harry pleaded. “When we go out anywhere, she’ll get your wand for you. You won’t have to leave the manor unarmed, little Firecracker. But I’m a selfish man.” He set his jaw. “I want you to trust us and rely on us, and if it takes keeping your wand sometimes for you to learn that, I will.” 

-

Ron stopped spending nights in Harry’s bed after that. Harry pleaded with him, argued with him, even shouted at him a time or two. Ron was perfectly happy to shout back on those occasions, not that it made any difference. 

“He means well,” Niall tried to tell him. “He loves you.”

“He’s mental,” Ron retorted flatly, “and if you think I’m going to forgive him for taking away my wand , you’re mental too.”

“Try to understand,” Niall said. Ron just threw the controller to what he now knew as a Playstation at him. 

“Do you want to race or not?”

–

Ron and Liam were sprawled in each other’s arms, enjoying the peaceful moments after sex, when Liam put his hand unexpectedly on Ron’s lower abdomen with a possessive caress. 

“I’m gonna put a baby in you someday,” he whispered, and Ron froze.

He’d misheard. He had to have misheard. Why would Liam say that?

“Gonna look so beautiful pregnant. All big and round with my little one inside you.”

“No,” Ron managed to get out, the word catching in his throat. “No.”

“Oh, yeah. Fill you up with my come and make a little red-haired baby, just as perfect as you are. Make you ours forever. We’d be a family.” His arms tightened around Ron, and Ron tore himself away frantically.

“I’ve got to go shower–” he blurted out, and grabbing the silky robe by the bed– Liam’s, but he didn’t care, just couldn’t bear being naked right now– he bolted from the room. 

Ron managed to get out the door and into the hallway before his legs and lungs stopped obeying him. He slumped against the wall, gasping for breath, heart racing, and retched bile onto the carpet, Liam's words echoing over and over in his head. 

Put a baby in you. All big and round with my little one inside you. Make you ours forever.

He cried with the heaving, completely silent sobs he'd perfected years ago when he didn't want to wake Harry and Hermione up in the tent. But back then, he'd owned his own body. Back then, he hadn't been the property of someone who wanted to– to–

“Merlin, Weasley, what's wrong with you?” He saw Malfoy’s shoes on the carpet in front of him but didn't have it in him to look up. Didn't care. He shook his head. There was a rustle of clothing as Malfoy crouched down in front of him. A hand reached out and he cringed away so hard his head hit the wall.

 “I just want to see if you're hurt, all right? I won't touch you if that's… did they do something to you?”

Ron couldn't talk. Couldn't uncurl his body from around his stomach. He could feel Liam's… promise… on his skin, sticky as cold sweat. Or maybe what he felt was cold sweat. He was shaking. 

He didn't know the answer to Malfoy’s question. The sex had been consensual. He wasn't in pain. But something had been done to him, even if he didn't know how to put it into words. 

“I can owl someone if you tell me who,” Malfoy said, his voice tightening with alarm and something that from anyone else Ron would have thought was anger. Annoyance, probably. “Or send a Patronus, that would be quicker. Or maybe St. Mungo’s? Weasley, you've got to tell me what happened or I can't bloody do anything.”

Ron retched again, though there was nothing left in his stomach. He shook his head. He couldn't speak, couldn't do anything but imagine.

“Right, first we're getting out of the hallway. Whatever they did to you or you did to yourself, them coming out here and finding you like this isn't anyone's idea of a good time. Do I need to go check the room first? You didn't murder them or all get attacked by an intruder or anything?”

Ron shook his head. 

“I’m going to Apparate us somewhere safe, then. Stand up. I've got to put my hand on your shoulder to do that, so try not to brain yourself on the wall. Just your shoulder, just for a moment, then I'll back off, I promise.”

Ron nodded and forced himself to his feet. He didn't actually care if Malfoy touched him so much as he couldn't stand being inside a body that could be– that they could– 

A firm hand on his shoulder. Everything spun, and Ron pitched forward, his feet slipping on tile. Malfoy caught him, and somehow instead of letting go, Ron found himself grabbing handfuls of the Slytherin prick’s shirt like a lifeline and burying his face in his shoulder. Malfoy tensed and froze, but he was warm and steady and quiet and Ron couldn't do this anymore. He couldn't. 

After a long moment filled with more silent, wrenching sobs, Malfoy tentatively wrapped his arms around him and held him, supporting his weight when Ron leaned into him.

“I can't,” Ron whispered. “I can't, I can't. I won't let them.”

Malfoy’s arms tightened around him a bit for a moment– almost protectively. “Whatever it is, they can't get in here to do it. My wards will fry their skin off if they try.”

Horrifically comforting. Ron almost hoped they would try. 

Was it just Liam who wanted to get him pregnant, or was it all of them? Had he been living with, sleeping next to, and fucking men who planned to make him carry their child? Was this what they'd wanted all along, or did they just “love him” so much that they'd started planning out a delusional family?

“Where are we?” he whispered hoarsely. 

“My rooms. My bathroom, specifically, in case you're going to throw up again.”

Ron nodded into his shoulder. He should probably let go and step away. Tell Malfoy he'd been having a flashback from the war. Thank him for helping but say that he was perfectly safe with the band, safer with them than a former Death Eater, say that–

“He told me he was going to get me pregnant,” he heard his voice blurt out. “Said he'd put a baby in me and I'd be theirs forever and–”

“He what? ” Malfoy pulled away, hands gripping Ron's shoulders, his face horrified. “Merlin, that's just… fucking creepy. Obviously you know it's creepy, why am I telling you it's creepy? You're the one throwing up about it. Maybe he can't actually do it, but that’s really not the point. Do you want me to go in there and get your things for you so you can get out of here?”

“They can– they can try–  I'm trans–”

Malfoy rolled his eyes. “I know that. Your birth name changed to Ronald in the Pureblood lineage books when we were children. Easy enough to work out why. But there's contraceptive spells. Potions. If you still wanted to shag the rest of the band– I imagine you're not having any more to do with whoever said that – you could still–”

“I’m due another hormone potion next week. They might not take me to the Healer for it if they want to–” Ron choked on the words, wrapping his arms around himself. “I'd Apparate there myself if I had a wand, but they'll catch me if I borrow one of theirs. Same goes for contraceptive spells.”

Malfoy went very still. ““What do you mean, if you had a wand?” he asked, his voice suddenly dangerous. 

“Exactly what it sounds like!” he snapped, tears burning in his eyes, nose running. “I didn't just wander off to be a groupie boyfriend for a band I'd barely heard of, all right? My Mum sold me to One Direction to pay her debts and I don't know how to get out of it without my entire family being humiliated when people find out!” He wrenched his shoulders from Malfoy’s hands and spun around, unwilling to see whatever pity or contempt was on the other man's face. “Mum snapped my wand before they took me. I managed to get a new one a couple weeks ago, but Harry had Wendy take it from me and I can’t have it back unless we go somewhere outside the manor. And ever since they took it, we haven’t. ” 

As gently as the boys in the band ever had, Malfoy placed a hand on Ron's upper back. Mercifully, he didn't speak. Ron wiped his eyes angrily. 

“So that's that, then. Now you know, and if I see it in the papers in a few days, I'll know exactly who told them and I'll find a way to make you pay for doing it, wand or no wand.”

“I'm not going to the papers. Merlin, why would I– right, because I'm an evil Death Eater who enjoys the pain of others.” Malfoy let out a long breath. “Well, I won’t, and clearly you don’t want the Aurors called either for the same reasons. Even if you hired a solicitor to sue them on the grounds of ‘you can't bloody purchase a human, what the fuck,’ the news would get out when it was taken before the courts.”

Of course Malfoy's first reaction was hire a solicitor. Ron almost laughed. 

At least the Slytherin understood about protecting family reputation. Hermione and Harry wouldn't have, which was why he couldn't ask them for help. If they found out, the only thing left of One Direction would be a pile of greasy ashes and the scandal of the century. 

“If you walked out the door now,” Malfoy asked slowly, “what would happen?”

“I don’t know.” His voice was bitter. “But Harry’s a Selwyn, and the others are all bloody rich too. They could pressure the Ministry to fire Dad. Buy the Harpies and have Ginny thrown off the team. There’s loads of stuff they could do to Hermione through the Muggle world– she bought her house through Muggle banks when Gringotts wouldn’t give her a loan.” Tears and rage choking him, he punched the wall hard, once, then again and again. Malfoy, to his surprise, didn’t try to stop him. 

His knuckles were bleeding and aching when he stopped and pressed his fist to his chest, curling his body around it. He glared up at Malfoy. “You really think that I haven’t thought about it? That I’d just live here and be their toy if leaving wouldn’t have consequences?”

Malfoy swallowed hard and gently pulled Ron’s hand toward him. His silence was as good as an admission he was right. Ron was sure he’d seen Malfoy Senior, may he rot in Azkaban, do plenty of that sort of thing all his life. 

He touched the tip of his wand to Ron’s knuckles and Ron felt a soothing coolness flood over his hand, then the tingling pain of a healing spell. 

“They heal all buggered up if you let them stay broken too long, and then you can’t fix them unless you want to regrow your hand bones,” Mafoy explained a little distantly, holding up his own right hand. Ron hadn’t noticed, but two of his knuckles were… positioned wrong, and had a strange, knotted look. Why would he– but he’d been held in Azkaban without his wand while he was awaiting his trial, hadn’t he, just like all the other Death Eaters. Ron supposed Dementors weren’t the type to do first aid. 

Whatever. Malfoy’s elegant, long-fingered hands and weird knuckles weren’t his problem. 

“I don’t want to know how far they’d go to keep me,” Ron whispered. “I don’t know how many people they’d hurt and I don’t want to find out. If they have me, they won’t have any reason to try.”

“What are you going to do?” 

“Go back in there, I guess,” he said, his throat tight and his stomach churning at the thought. “It’s not… I can say no. To sex. They've always listened when I told them no.”

“How considerate of them.” Ron couldn't put a name to the emotion in Malfoy’s voice, but something about the edge to it made him feel like it wasn't just him. Like the whole thing really was as sick as it felt. He didn’t look at the other man’s face. 

Ron washed away the tears and snot in the porcelain sink, and Malfoy walked him back to Liam’s room in silence. Ron wondered if Malfoy was as reluctant to watch him go in there as he'd been to leave the Slytherin's arms, but he dismissed the thought. Just because the wanker was sane enough to realize this was wrong didn't mean that he cared. And wasn't that ironic? The band was desperate to love him and give him everything he wanted and he still felt safer with his bloody childhood enemy.

When Ron paused outside Liam’s door, Malfoy put a hand on his arm before he could go in. 

“If they do try and force you, I can't do anything to stop them,” he said quietly. “They'd claim I attacked and they were defending you from me . What a shame, Malfoy wasn't reformed after all. Good thing Ron’s loyal boyfriends in One Direction were there to protect him. You'd be in the same position as before and I'd be in Azkaban.” Malfoy’s gray eyes were half apologetic and half defiant. “I'm not throwing away my freedom to defend your honor.”

“Good,” Ron said, and the icy resolve in his own voice surprised him. “No one asked you to.”

Malfoy nodded once, curtly. “Good.”

-

“Of course we’ll take you to the Healer for your potion,” Zayn said the next morning over breakfast, looking surprised that Ron had asked. “We’ve told you, we love your body just the way it is.”

Louis reached over and put another helping of mushrooms on Ron’s plate. “Just let us know when to make the appointment, sweetheart. You should probably get a checkup as well. We want you healthy.”

“What for?” Ron asked, staring into his tea rather than looking at them as he asked.

“What do you mean, what for?”

“Last night, Liam said–” it was hard to get the words out– “said he wanted to get me pregnant.”

“Oh.” There was an uncomfortable silence, then Niall cleared his throat. 

“We weren’t going to talk about that yet, Ron. We were waiting until you were ready. We’re all still young; there’s no need to start our family right away.”

“But you want to, too,” Ron said dully. “You want me to have your baby.”

“How could we not, little firecracker?” Harry asked, and Ron pulled his hand away when Harry reached across the table to take it. “It makes me so hard, just imagining you holding a tiny One Directionlet, feeding it, kissing it goodnight…”

“I’m not getting pregnant,” he burst out, his chair scraping loudly over the floor as he stood. “I’m not having anyone’s baby. I’m not going to change my mind or be ready.”

“But–” Liam started. Zayn stopped him with a hand on his arm. 

“Give him time to love and trust us more,” he urged, and Ron strode to the kitchen sink and leaned over it, fighting not to retch. Louis came up behind him and rubbed his back, ignoring Ron’s attempts to shrug off the touch. 

“It’s natural to have doubts this early into a relationship,” Louis told him. “We’re willing to wait. We have the whole rest of our lives.”

-

Ron stood propped against the locked door to his bedroom, listening to Zayn and Liam argue outside. They had started by begging him to come out and, when that didn’t work, reminding him that they could Apparate into the room any time they wanted and the only reason they hadn’t done it already was because they respected his privacy.

He’d stopped responding when they said that because if they couldn’t see the irony, nothing he could say was going to get through. Now they were arguing with each other in low voices as if the fifth kid in a family of six wasn’t damn good at eavesdropping even without Extendable Ears. You just had to find the place on the other side of the door that sound carried best to. 

“Maybe having a child with him isn’t the best idea,” Zayn said. “I can’t believe you mentioned it when he’s barely been with us more than a month. No wonder he’s freaking out.”

“I couldn’t help it,” Liam shot back defensively. “I don’t want to wait, Zayn. Maybe if our baby was growing inside him, he’d understand that this is forever.”

“He’s still upset over the wand thing, for Merlin’s sake. He’s not ready to be completely ours. He’s defensive. Frightened. Afraid to let himself love.”

“He has nothing to be frightened about! Haven’t we given him a safe home? Protected him from his abusive family and horrible friends and bought him everything he wanted? We deserve his love!”

Ron did not like the sound of that at all.

“He’s skittish, Liam,” Zayn said. “Like a baby deer lost in the woods. He wants to trust us, it’s just hard for him.”

“We already told him we’d wait until he was ready to have a baby, and he’s still upset at us. It’s like he doesn’t want to bear our child at all!” Liam sounded disbelieving, as if a trans man being unwilling to get pregnant made no sense. 

“Maybe he doesn’t! And I don’t want to lose his trust over this. We should tell him that we changed our minds and we don’t want to have kids.”

“You can tell him that. I’m not lying to the man I love.” Liam’s voice was resolute. 

“Can’t you see how unhappy it’s making him?” Zayn was beginning to sound angry, and Ron felt a spark of hope. Maybe Zayn was truly on his side. If being a ‘baby deer lost in the woods’ meant Zayn respecting what he wanted for his own body, sure. Fine. The bar was low enough at this point that even a very small baby deer could step over it. 

“Can’t he see how unhappy it’s making us?”

-

Ron came down for dinner, because he was too proud to hide and ask Wendy to bring him food. He refused to show them he was afraid. The tension at the table was so intense he could feel it crackling on his skin. Despite Zayn’s earlier arguments on Ron’s behalf, neither he nor any of the others apologized. The conversation between the band members was stilted and awkward. He ignored their gentle touches and attempts to get him to say something and ate in silence, then got up and left the table. 

Louis caught up with him in the hall. “Ron, please–”

“No.”

“You don’t even know what I was going to ask,” Louis said, perplexed. 

“I don’t care. Unless your question is ‘do you want us to give you your wand and your life back,’ the answer is no.” He looked Louis in the eyes. “Is that your question?”

Louis’s shoulders sagged. “No, it wasn’t. I just wish you’d try to understand.”

“If I didn’t understand, I’d be a lot less angry.”

“It’s not like they asked you to become a Death Eater! It’s natural to want a child with someone you love. Can’t we all just agree not to make a decision yet?” Louis pleaded.

“I played along,” Ron said quietly. “I let you call me yours and tell me you loved me. I let you make believe you were nice blokes who’d saved me instead of spoiled rich pricks who’d bought me like a pet. But there’s lines I won’t let you cross.”

“That’s all this is to you? Playing along?” For the first time, Louis looked actually angry. 

“You. Bought. Me,” Ron enunciated. “Against my will. I didn’t hate you for it at first, which was bloody generous of me, but you can’t buy a boyfriend who loves you.”

“Don’t you at least care about us? Zayn and Liam and Harry are all mad at each other, Niall was trying to make peace and now they’re mad at him too, I don’t know who to side with– this is tearing the band apart! Can’t you see what you’re doing to us?” He folded his arms. “Yeah, we bought you, and since the moment we had you, we’ve adored you. Worshipped you. You deserved better than how the world treated you and we gave you that!”

“My mum didn’t offer to sell me,” Ron said with a cold shock of realization. “Merlin’s toenails, it wouldn’t even have occurred to her, would it? She even said your manager was looking for someone to serve the band. You sent him to her. You asked him to buy me.”

Louis said something in reply, but Ron couldn’t hear it. It hadn’t been a question. Molly Weasley had her faults, but she wasn’t a monster. She wouldn’t have been willing to auction him off to be used and abused. They’d convinced her, just like they’d convinced themselves, that he would be happy with them and they’d give him everything he wanted– the life she’d never been able to provide for her children. 

No sober person would have gone for it, but his Mum had been desperate, and a way she could get rid of the child who was still home to witness that she wasn’t the perfect mother she pretended to be? A way she could force Ron to stop making decisions she didn’t approve of and ‘wasting opportunities?’ How many owls had she sent trying to convince him that she’d done it for his own good, while he’d imagined she’d abandoned him entirely?

How many owls had his friends sent that the band had kept from him to separate him from his old life and make him think they hadn’t noticed he was gone?

None of it had made sense, none of it had felt real, because it hadn’t been real. They’d been manipulating him from the beginning. It had all been a game, and every move they’d made had been planned out while he’d been playing purely on tactics, no strategy at all. 

He shook off Louis’s hand when the shorter man tried to hold him back and headed straight for his room. He closed the door behind him but didn’t lock it; the lock didn’t mean anything. As they’d pointed out, they could Apparate in. 

Ron Weasley (also known as The Loyal Friend, The Strategic Thinker, and The Boy Who Was Sold to One Direction) sat down and visualized the board and the pieces he had to work with. 

-

He approached Malfoy that afternoon when he knew he’d be making his rounds outside the house. “I need you to send an owl for me.”

Malfoy gestured with a tip of his head for Ron to come with him, and he matched his stride as they continued the patrol. Quietly, he said, “To whom?”

Ugh, he actually used the word ‘whom?’ “Dean Thomas. He has a magical and Muggle tattoo shop in Belfast. And I’m going to need you to help me order a couple potions.” He smiled humorlessly. “Also, when the time comes, we’ll need to have a look at your arm.”

It’s not like they asked you to become a Death Eater! Louis had said. 

We’re doing our time for our war crimes, Draco had said. 

Despite Harry and Niall’s claims of trauma, as far as anyone in the Wizarding World knew, the band had spent the years of the war performing in the Muggle world. But wouldn’t it be a scandal if it was discovered that they had been involved in the war after all?

-

“I wanted to apologize to everyone,” Ron said, looking around the table at the band. He hadn’t made the dinner spread out before him. There were lit candles and wine in every glass. It looked nice. Welcoming.

“I know I’ve been difficult about the wand thing,” he said. “I still would rather have it, but I understand your reasons. And your reasons for wanting  me to have a child.” Unfortunately for One Direction, he did finally understand their reasons, much too well. “I want to start over, all right? It was hard for me to trust after my Mum sold me, and I’ve taken that out on you.”

“You’re safer here with us than you ever were with her,” Harry said emphatically. “It was an awful thing for her to do to her son, but maybe it was for the best.”

“It brought me to you,” Ron said. “It changed my life. I didn’t know how to accept your love, but…” He tried to put a hopeful expression on his face. “Will you forgive me?”

“Of course we will!” Zayn exclaimed. “We’d forgive you anything.”

“You too, Wendy?” Ron bent and offered a smaller glass to the house elf who had been the one to make his apology dinner. Ron could cook with magic, but he couldn’t be buggered to learn to do it the Muggle way, so he’d enlisted her help. “I shouldn’t have shouted at you when you took my wand. You were just following orders.”

“Wendy is just being glad everyone is friends again,” she said, looking a little overwhelmed at being served by a human. 

“Let’s toast then,” Ron said, raising his glass. “To a new beginning, this time in the Right Direction.”

–

“The scales aren’t quite right,” Malfoy criticized, frowning at the tattoo on Zayn’s arm as he cast the healing spell so it wouldn’t look fresh. “You botched the ones on the tip of the tail.” 

Dean rolled his eyes, casting the Disillusionment charm on the tattoo with Zayn’s own wand and then Vanishing the used needle from his tattoo gun. “I thought you said the Ministry doesn’t bother to look properly at the evidence when they catch a Dark supporter.”

“It’s a matter of principle,” Malfoy muttered, and Ron felt an inexplicable surge of fondness for his former enemy. 

The Sleeping Potions in the wine were top quality. They’d worked in minutes and held up through the hours-long process of tattooing Harry’s, Niall’s, and Louis’s arms. The only one who’d had to be spelled back unconscious was Wendy– apparently potions made for humans didn’t work predictably on house elves. But she’d woken up woozy enough that they’d been able to hit her before she knew what was happening. 

Poor Wendy. None of this was her fault. She’d just been doing what she was told. Ron was beginning to have a new sympathy for house elves who didn’t want to leave their wizard families. Ron had been manipulated for weeks before he’d managed to escape. Wendy had been manipulated all her life, told that she was there to serve wizards and that they cared about her and wanted what was best for her. She had no friends to go to outside of the manor.

House elves couldn’t testify against their wizards, though, so her loyalty wouldn’t make holes in their plan. Anything she said about Ron would just implicate her master in a whole different crime. 

Ron clapped Dean on the shoulder. “Thanks, mate. Don’t listen to Malfoy. You did a brilliant job.”

“I just can’t believe your mum would do that. I won’t say anything, not even to Seamus, but… bloody hell.” 

Despite the band’s claims, the war hadn’t damaged Ron’s ability to trust. If anything, it had done the opposite. It had made him absolutely certain of the people he did trust. Though he hated to admit it, his mum hadn’t been one of those people, not entirely. Dean had been.  

“I know you won’t.”

And neither would Malfoy. Ron didn’t trust him to be good, but he could trust him to be out for his own good, and Malfoy would come out of this scheme looking extremely good.

–

Death Eaters Hiding in Plain Sight as Muggle Celebrities!

Rolf and Luna Scamander’s Second Book Hits the Bestseller Lists!

Ministry Lowers Regulations on International Portkey Travel: What Does This Mean for your Next Vacation?

Anonymous Tell-All Letter from One Direction’s Former Lover: “They Took Away My Wand and Threatened To Impregnate Me.”

Former Death Eater Makes Good: Parolee Draco Malfoy Exposes Members of You-Know-Who’s Inner Circle!

The St. Mungo’s visitor’s lounge had copies of every daily paper, and Ron looked at them with satisfaction, spread out over the table. 

“I can’t believe they’re still finding excuses to recycle the story after a month. That anonymous letter has got to be made-up,” Hermione scoffed, frowning, passing it to George, who shamelessly opened it to read it then burst out laughing. 

Percy, who’d already read his own personal copy of the Daily Prophet and passed it on to Ron, shrugged. “Who knows? When the Ministry raided one of the Selwyn properties, they found some pretty Dark stuff. It was Harry’s cousin living there, not him, but you wouldn’t keep your Dark artifacts in a house you shared with your Muggleborn mates.”

“‘They wouldn’t let me go anywhere alone, and they considered me their property,’” George read aloud. “‘They even wanted to take showers with me, and I was only allowed to sleep in their beds.’ Eurgh.”

Ron was reading the last paper with a slight smile on his face.

Interviewer: “Were you conflicted about turning them in when you realized that Harry, Niall, and Louis had once fought for the Dark Lord beside you?”

DM: “Not when I realized which Death Eaters they were. Most of us fought out of loyalty to our families, but some did it because they got a thrill out of torturing Muggles. They were using different names back then, but a lot of us weren’t comfortable around them. Knowing they worked in the Muggle world and what sort of things they must have been doing to their fans? I didn’t feel conflicted at all.”

Interviewer: “How do you respond to the band’s allegations that Golden Trio member Ron Weasley was involved in framing them?” 

DM: “I think that’s just a rumor spread by the tabloids to throw another celebrity name into the mix. If they’d been framed, they’d have agreed to testify under Veritaserum.”

Interviewer: “We can only wonder what crimes they’d confess under truth serum. Thank you for granting us this interview. It’s a stroke of luck for the Wizarding and the Muggle worlds that you discovered them when you did. What are you planning to do now that you’ve been released from parole?”

DM: “I’m planning to stay as far away from boy bands as possible.”

“Molly and Arthur can see visitors now!” The cheery voice of the Healer made Ron look up. He, Hermione, George, and Percy got to their feet and followed the stout wizard to the Addiction Recovery ward, a long-overdue addition to the hospital that had been built shortly after the war. 

Just as they were about to go in, the sound of running feet echoed through the halls behind them, and a breathless Harry and Ginny Potter turned the corner. 

“Are we too late?” Harry panted. He was still in his Auror robes, which were currently soiled with mud and what smelled like vinegar. With a disapproving look, the Healer cast a Scourgify on him. 

“You’re not, though you do know that visiting hours happen daily and you don’t all have to be here for all of them?” he commented dryly. “Most families take turns.”

“You must be new,” Hermione said, biting back laughter. “We are taking turns. Bill, Charlie, Fleur, Victoire, and Molly’s sister Muriel aren’t here today. They’re coming tomorrow, and the day after that your lobby will be filled with a good third of the Order of the Phoenix.”

“Ah.” He looked embarrassed. “Well, it’s good to see our patients with so much support. Former users aren’t as likely to relapse when they know they have friends and family who care for them.”

Ron felt a pang of guilt at those words. He did still care, very much, but he would never forgive his mum for selling him or his dad for letting it happen. It had been mostly Bill who had pushed them into the recovery program after Ron had told him– and no one else– what had happened. When they’d quietly let their parents’ friends know how serious the addiction was, people had rallied around them in support, and Ron had quietly stepped back and let them. 

He had his own flat now, and he’d swallowed his pride and asked George for part-time work at the joke shop. He’d even had coffee with Draco Malfoy a few times. The pointy-faced git was starting to grow on him. After they’d set up his ‘discovery’ and Ron had gotten away, Ron had expected never to hear from him again, but he’d received an owl a few days later, awkwardly checking in to ask how he was, signed Draco.

When the door to his parents’ room was opened, he let the others pour in ahead of them, Hermione and George fussing over how well Molly was looking and Ginny immediately launching into a play-by-play account of her team’s last victory. He found himself standing a little awkwardly next to Harry.

“Why did you have vinegar on you?” he asked, because Harry still smelled slightly of it– it was probably in his hair. 

“I’m, uh, liaising with the Accidental Magic Reversal Squad,” Harry admitted. “There was an incident at a county fair with an exploding barrel of pickles.”

“Accidental Magical Reversal?” Ron blinked. “I thought they had you on the fast track toward Head Auror.”

Harry shrugged, not meeting Ron’s gaze as he answered. “Turns out testifying against a fellow Auror for cursing a suspect to death doesn’t make you very popular. I don’t actually mind Reversal. Talking a scared kid covered in pickles down from a roof might not be as exciting as chasing Dark wizards and witches, but…” Harry shrugged. “It’s an interesting change.” There was a brief silence. “You?”

“I don’t know,” Ron said, “But that’s what makes me beautiful.”