Chapter 1 – Memories that Burn

Dumbledore looked at the aggravated young man before him, wishing there was some way to calm him. "Severus, I can't have you overstepping the boundaries like that," He admonished gently. "What if the jar had actually hit Harry?"

"It didn't though did it?" The young man hissed.

Dumbledore watched as the Potions Master paced the room like a caged animal, trapped as he was by the choices of his youth, and the results they had had on his life. Each movement was filled with nervous tension, his hands clasping and unclasping at his sides, a twitch returning where it had been long gone, no longer controlled by an iron will, the likes of which Dumbledore had rarely seen. That too, like the chances the man before him had of ever finding happiness in this life, disappearing as quickly as his sanity. "And I can't have him meddling in things that don't concern him. You teach him Occlumency. I am sure he would be more willing to learn and less willing to snoop into your thoughts."

"On the contrary Severus, Harry has already taken that liberty with me." Dumbledore responded quietly, trying to allay some of Snape's anger.

"Typical of the young prat. Just like his father." Snape froze. Just the thought of James Potter, and the torment he had faced at his hand, made Snape shake. Dumbledore could see him trembling with a mixture of pain and rage, from across the room. James Potter was long dead, he had been gone for the best part of two decades, yet the memories that even the thought of the man invoked, still shook his poor victim to the core. If only Dumbledore had known the depth of the young Severus' traumatic experiences at the hands of his nemesis, he would have curbed the Marauders behaviour, it had just never occurred to him that the young Slytherin had taken their behaviour so seriously.

At the time, Dumbledore had accepted their behaviour as nothing more than schoolboy pranks, he had trusted the young werewolf Lupin, by far the most considerate of the group, not to allow things to get out of hand, even to the extent of making him prefect, ahead of his more popular friends, although that in itself had nearly ended in disaster for all of them one night in the Shrieking Shack. It wasn't until much later that he became aware of the nearly disastrous impact those pranks had on the Slytherin student, and the enduring damage that that almost fatal event had done.

He had always been taciturn, a loner, with few friends and many enemies, even amongst the students of his own house, and it was no wonder he had turned to Voldemort in the end. It wasn't until he had come back, begging for redemption, willing to tell everything, including every terrible detail of a tragic childhood of parental abuse, that Dumbledore finally realised the damage that those 'schoolboy pranks' had caused. By then it was too late though, and he could do little except accept the lost boy back into the fold, and guide him as best he could as he recovered from the trauma of what he had seen and done. Now he was devoted to him, his Slytherin loyalties strong, and Dumbledore knew that to fail his saviour would kill Snape. He wouldn't quit while there was life in him. Dumbledore looked sadly at the trapped spirit – now he had forced him back to that dark place, and the trauma of that return, ready he had claimed, or not as Dumbledore was beginning to realise, was only causing the poor soul more damage.

The young man's dark eyes bored into the Headmaster, the intensity of the look staggering. Dumbledore realised now, how hard the double life Snape had been leading since the Triwizard Tournament had been. There was more than the usual superficial coldness in his eyes; there was fear. It was a sign that the constant, ongoing threat to his life that his position as a spy posed, was wearing him down. One word, one foolish mistake or false move would seal the Potions Master's fate. It would alert Voldemort and the Death Eaters of his betrayal and they wouldn't be pleased. It was clear to the Headmaster that Severus Snape was loosing control after facing constant danger for so long, and that didn't bode well for his safety – the man needed all his wits about him to survive the treacherous role he played. He walked a constant tightrope of calamity – the smallest mistake would result in his death, or worse, and Dumbledore knew he wouldn't be able to cope with the strain for much longer. The problem was he needed him – badly – there was no one else who could get the information that the distraught young man before him could, no one else belonged to Voldemort's inner circle as this man did – so Dumbledore used him as both men knew he must.

There was more to Snape's agitation and increasingly erratic behaviour than just the weariness of the game and fear though. Deep down in his eyes, deep below the coldness, deeper even than the growing fear, was the torment of a man being forced to do things he no longer wished to do. Dumbledore knew, that in his role as a Death Eater, Snape participated in horrible activities that he couldn't even imagine, well, he could, but he tried not to, and he could see the trauma that those activities evoked. It was clear that Snape's torment was great, even though what he did in the name of the Dark, he did for the Light.

Dumbledore realised, too, that the burden was even greater because of the man's constant battle not to fall again to the seduction that the Dark posed, knowing only too well, that to the boy who had known no joy in his young life, his time as a Death Eater must have seemed like bliss – it was the only time when he could release the iron self-control that had dominated every living, breathing moment of his short life. That control was even more important to wretched young man's life now.

Dark arts, Dumbledore knew, once held a fascination for the Potions Master, he had been particularly skilled in them when he had arrive at Hogwarts, but it wasn't until much later that Dumbledore had learned why, and it would be easy for them to creep, unnoticed, back into the man's being, if he didn't keep his guard up. That only made the Potions Master's task harder, and Dumbledore could see in the dark haired man's eyes, that it was slowly sending him insane.

The Headmaster felt deep regret and sorrow at what he had to force his loyal servant to do. He trusted him with the most important task that any member of the Order had, and he knew the man would do as he bid until he had no strength left. Unfortunately, Dumbledore feared that that time was rapidly approaching, and he knew they weren't ready.

"Severus, please."

The Potions Master did another lap of the office. The thought struck Dumbledore out of the blue, that they were always anticlockwise, as though trying to turn back time. He paused by the door. "Fine," he agreed quietly, trapped by his loyalty for the one that saved him. "As you wish, as always."

Dumbledore winced at that, and watched as the trapped man left his office. Sighing, he pulled a quill and parchment towards himself and started to write a letter he had hoped he would never need to send.

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