Chicadoodle

Life's Blood, Soul's Essence

Chapter One (The End of Something Precious)

Author's Note : I've decided to rewrite this story. I like where I was going with it, but the writing was just terrible! And I certainly didn't put a lot of thought into how I worded things. It felt rather rushed, as well. As such, I am re-writing the story itself. Chapters will be longer, which will also mean updates won't come as quickly as they used to. Considering how long it's been since this story has been updated, however, I suppose it will feel like lightning speed!

This chapter is 4 pages long, single-spaced, written at size 10 Time New Roman font. Enjoy!

The scars ran up and down a pale back - angry red lines that tugged at the memories of a young boy who had seen the harsh end of a belt perhaps one too many times. The man that boy had become pushed the memories to the back of his mind, to that dark corner that held all his childish fears and regrets, staring down at the form huddled on the floor.

School robes were polled around the feet of the hunched figure, but that wasn't so surprising; this was Hogwarts, after all, and a lack of school robes would have been far more surprising than their appearance here. No, what surprised him was not that the child was a student, but rather who said child was.

He had never imagined Harry Potter to be a coward, nor that he would take the 'easy way out'. The boy was self-righteous, convinced of his own superiority, and a hypocrite - just like his father. This image had lasted Severus Snape several years of teaching the boy, and he had never before been proven wrong.

But that didn't change the fact that the boy was a shivering mess on the floor of the girls' lavatory, arms wrapped around himself as he shook under the weight of Merlin-knew-what nightmares come to plague him during the day.

Stepping gingerly around the smear of blood that graced the floor next to the boy, Severus Snape knelt down quietly next to the boy, dark eyes calculating as he took in the stiff set to the shoulders of the young man before him. There was no doubt in his mind that Potter had finally become aware of his presence - though the fact that it had taken him this long was testimony to the boys' lack of survival instinct.

"I know you can hear me, Potter." Startled green eyes rose to meet his own darker orbs, and for just a moment Severus Snape was given a glimpse into his student, unguarded.

What he saw frightened him.

The boy was frightened, and confused. But not of Snape - if anything, a hint of relief that it was Snape who had found him persisted. Who could he have expected that would be worse than his feared potions' master - the most hated teacher in school?

He had his answer a moment later, as the Gryffindor spoke. "Did somebody finally notice I was gone?" There was a bitterness to his words, one that Severus had heard before - falling from his own lips.

He had been a lonely child, and that lack of bonds had followed him into later life. He didn't mind - not now. But as a child, he had often resented those around him for the easy way they formed relationships - romantic or otherwise. But to hear that same bitterness coming from Potter's lips - it was strange.

And it didn't fit.

He was about to tell Potter so, before the boy cut him off with a sharp laugh. "Do you really think they notice? That they care? Dumbledore told them to watch me - told them I needed friends. I suppose I should thank him - at least I'm not the friend-less freak I am at home."

Potter met his eyes head on, and once again Snape was taken back, only this time by the sudden fierceness that had entered their green depths - a ferocity that had nothing to do with the heat of battle.

"What are you doing here, Potter?" So he tried another tactic, unsure what to make of the boys' strange behavior, and so moving into familiar ground - safe territory ... he the teacher, the authority figure, the one with power over his young companion.

The reminder seemed to shock Potter into some kind of awareness, for he attempted to shove past the older man with the familiar bravado of a Gryffindor.

This, he could handle. This was familiar ground.

Fingers tangling in the collar of the teenager's robes, Snape hauled him to his feet, dark eyes narrowing as he surveyed the rumpled form before him. The boy was pale - too pale for his normally tanned and rugged appearance. The pleasing features of the Gryffindor boy-hero were replaced with tired eyes and frown lines, a face that appeared too old for the young body in which it was situated.

The struggles were instantaneous, as Snape had known they would be - the boy squirming in his grasp, looking for any way out. One hand wrapped around his wrist, nails digging in through the cloth of his own dark robes, and Snape sneered down at the slight form.

"Let. Me. Go." The words were carefully pronounced, and Potter glared up with a shadow of his old defiance, but even that was a pale reflection of his usual bravado.

When it became clear that the boy would say no more - though thankfully his struggled had ceased - Snape let his eyes wander once again over the boys' form - and the evidence of his earlier activities upon the floor of the girls' lavatory.

The blood smeared on the floor was the boys' own - evidence enough of that on the boys' forehead, where blood was splashed across his inflamed scar. More blood and bits of skin from that same forehead lingered under the boys' fingernails, and from the jagged edges of torn skin he could only assume the teenager had been the one to inflict damage on his own scar.

He had seen it before, in those who had second thoughts after joining with Voldemort - those who thought that if they could only remove his Mark, they would be rid of his influence. He knew better, and had seen too many succumb to their own pain. he had called them weak, at first, until the temptation to go out that same way had risen in him.

It wasn't so different, he supposed - that cursed scar and the mark he bore on his own arm. They were both marks left by the Dark Lord, marks that tied the individual to him in more ways than one.

"Don't. Just ... don't." There was a desperation to the younger voice now, and Snape tore his eyes away from the blood-stained floor to meet jade-green eyes. "Don't go there."

"Ignoring it won't make it go away." When had they changed the topic, when had he stopped sneering at the boy and started looking at him with sympathy? Potter must have found the change of topic just as unnerving as he, for the boy tore his eyes away from those of his professor, instead staring at a pint just beyond his left shoulder. When it became apparent that the boy would keep his silence once again, Snape sighed heavily before releasing his grip on the boys' robes.

"You should be at the Welcoming Feast." The reprimand came easily, as one he had given on more than one occasion to his Slytherins. They were, perhaps, the most likely of all the Houses to skip such celebrations, to sequester themselves away in the Dungeons in preperation for the coming school year ... particularly the younger years'. those second and third year students caught between missing their parents' and beginning to take part in the world as adults.

"Why?" Potter met his eyes once again, a soft laugh escaping his lips. It was not particularly elegant or cultured, but neither was the sound as uncouth as Snape had been expecting. "Because people will notice? Their precious savior not there to bask in the light of his popularity?"

It was the sort of comment he himself might have made, and Snape was taken back hearing the words falling from the lips of the subject of scrutiny himself. "Don't insult my intelligence, Snape. Nobody will really care. And I have neither the time nor the inclination to care what they think."

If there was one thing that Harry Potter prided himself on, it was that he was a good person. Perhaps he had his faults, but then so did everybody else. But he, unlike many others, did what he could to make those around him happy. It was a cliche, perhaps, but the truth. Perhaps it made him like his mother, like Sirius said. There were far worse people to be like.

But tonight, he just couldn't bring himself to care. Not with everything that had happened, not with everything he had to look forward to in the immediate future. He just wanted Snape to leave him alone.

He hadn't been raised to be rude - Petunia had managed that, if nothing else. But going against what he had been taught had always been a sure way to be left alone - if perhaps with a few more bruises. Yet the old method wasn't working with Snape, and he wasn't sure why.

"Taking the easy way out, Potter?" Snape quirked a brow down at him, and Harry grit his teeth as he strained his neck to stare up at the man towering over him. His collar was still stretched taut, biting into his neck, as he was forced to lean toward the man lest he be pulled that way by the strength of the taller man's arms.

Damn potions freak was stronger than he looked.

"Maybe I've just stopped caring." There was a bitterness to his tone that he wished he could take back, particularly when Snape's fingers loosened on his collar and he was allowed to lean back into a more comfortable position. Long fingers - for once not stained with potions ingredients - moved around to rest almost comfortably against the back of his neck, as the older man stared down at him with a strange look in his eyes.

What must he have looked like? Blood smeared across his face, the evidence of his self-inflicted damage on his hands. The sting of sweat in his eyes let him know just how disheveled he really was, even before Snape had handled him around.

"Nobody just stops caring, Potter."

At some point the similarities with his Slytherins had finally hit him, and now as Snape spoke, he spoke as though he were speaking to one of them. It was easier that way - but staring intot hose brilliant green eyes was still difficult.

Potter glanced away, and Snape stared down at the mop of unruly black hair with a deep frown. One hand still placed gently against the back of the boys' neck, he urged the younger man toward the door. "Come on."

The boy was isntantly resistive, planting his feet firmly against the floor and refusing to budge. Seeing this, Snape bit back a sigh. "Potter, you don't even know where we're going." This was said with a bit of exasperation, though he couldn't help the small smile that tugged at the corners of his lips.

"You're not taking me to the Headmaster?" There was a fear in those words Snape wasn't expecting, and he paused to turn his head, staring quizzicly into the frightened eyes of his student.

"Not if you don't want me to." He finally spoke after a slight pause, during which Potter seemed to work himself up into quite a state. The consummate Gryffindor, not wanting to go running to Headmaster Dumbledore with the smallest of problems? Perhaps they weren't as close as he had thought.

Or perhaps Potter wasn't the consummate Gryffindor he had always assumed the boy to be.