Harry sighed as he closed the cover of another book, and hefted it aside. He paused in his weary shuffling of dusty scrolls and parchments to watch the tremors that were building in his hands. The tension between his shoulders had built to a distracting burn, and the veins that traveled down his arms in blue chords seemed to pulse lightly with the strain of his increasing heart rate. Madame Pomfrey had explained months ago that it was a sure sign he overworked himself, this uncontrollable trembling that twitched through his limbs in the late hours of the night. She had continued with a stern warning that if he were ever admitted to her care again, for something as negligent as pushing himself to the point of shaken exhaustion, she would personally enforce a strict week of bed rest and lessons in common sense health measures. Harry sighed and returned to his search. They had both known the underlying cause for a seventeen year old to shake like the elderly. Neither had felt it necessary to discuss Harry's multiple encounters with the Cruciatus. Spaced periodically over a year of war, Harry had suffered his fair share of curses in the occasional Death Eater encounter, all of which had left his nervous system as treacherous as an Erkling in a Primary School; to his ever increasing frustration and embarrassment, Harry found himself unable to work the eighteen hour days the war had accustomed him to.
Rest and recuperation were not pastimes Harry could indulge in. There were too many questions unanswered, and far too many dark memories to crowd his mind when he resigned his aching body to a bed. He preferred to sit here, alone but for Colin's spectral form, scouring the annals of Dumbledore's private records collection.
Harry had never been one for history. The whirling transition from ignorant orphan, trapped in the giant Muggle world of outsiders, to an eleven year old legend with magical abilities, had done little to affect his interest in the past, magical or no. He had tuned out Professor Binns' droning in favor of the notes Ron would scratch across the scroll between them. Harry's time in History was spent concealing snickers at poorly drawn cartoons, or eagerly answering questions from Ron that no one had ever thought to ask him before. What's your favorite color? Harry had wondered at the possibility that he didn't know. Green. It only took a moment to realize the answer, and another to scribble discretely with his quill before shoving the scrap of parchment toward Ron's waiting hand. He had flinched at Ron's reaction, but even the look of distaste on his new friend's face had not caused enough embarrassment to squash the sensation that tingled from Harry's chest to his throat, tightening there until he felt light headed. To share something so simple, so personal; having a best mate was breathtaking. History class for Harry had been built of the present, in one small joy or another, each a form of magic in their own right when compared to his past. He had been almost complete then. Ignorant, naïve, and foolish. Happy even.
Harry shook off thoughts of his past, dropping a stack of faded parchment in favor of a small book, dull grey and moth riddled. He wasn't here to relive his own past. He was here to bring Severus back from the dead.