Kyla: Okay, here's a new update! Sorry for such a delay... Again. My laptop messed up... Again. And had to be taken to the computer store, where it spent a week and a half when I had the time to actually sit down and write. I tried writing on paper and typing it up on the home desktop but that didn't work since my brother and the rest of the family need the desktop more than I do, but I finally got it back and worked on this update! Hope y'all enjoy it! I kind of like how it turned out. Sorry if it's a little too short.. I kind of wrote myself into the end of the chapter without realizing it, haha.
"Trust Me"
Chapter 9
by
Kyla
"Oh really, Potter? How can you be so certain of that?"
Harry rolled his eyes and set aside his cup of hot chocolate. "Don't be stupid," he growled and leaned forward some, "Voldemort would probably have won if you hadn't been a spy for the Light."
Severus faltered.
"You won't convince the Wizengamot of that," the Potions Master eventually replied, his voice soft and dreadful, a hint of hopelessness weighing his words down.
"Oh yes I will."
Severus sighed and laid his palm over his eyes. "Don't get your hopes up, Potter," he warned, "the Ministry is going to try its damnedest to make sure I am safely tucked away in Azkaban for my crimes."
"What crimes?" Harry spat. He swiftly continued before his professor could attempt to speak, "Any crimes you did commit have been repented for by the years of spying you did! You were pardoned the moment that you went to Dumbledore for help!"
Severus's lips tilted into a sad grin. He shook his head and murmured, "Promise me one thing, Potter."
Confused, Harry's brows knitted together. "All right," he agreed, "what do you want me to promise?"
"That you'll never lose your Gryffindor innocence or that fighting spirit."
Harry's nose scrunched up. "You haven't been drinking while I was gone, have you?" he asked, "Because you're acting very odd..."
Severus's jaw clenched tight, and his face lost all emotion. It was a blank mask, and Harry cursed himself. Here Severus was finally opening up to him and look what he does.
"I assure you," Severus said, "I have not been drinking."
"Tha-that's not what I meant," Harry stammered. He groaned and shook his head, grabbing the Potions Master's arm when he tried to leave. "I... I can promise you that, but what brought all this on?"
"All of what?" Severus asked, words as stiff as his jaw was. Still, he did not sit back down. He yanked his arm from Harry's grasp and stepped back out of the Gryffindor's reach, his arms settling across his chest.
"The civil conversation, the hot chocolate, the asking for a promise to... keep my Gryffindor innocence and fighting spirit?"
Severus's teeth ground together. "I am attempting to be nice," he said, "if it is not working, kindly tell me now before I waste time better served preparing for my trial."
"No! It's working, it just... surprised me is all. Sit back down and let's talk."
Severus eyed Harry with wary dark eyes. Then, he sighed and settled back down on the sofa. "Very well," he said and tapped his wand against his and Harry's cups. Instantly, hot chocolate refilled the mugs, and the two men sat about drinking the warm liquid and conversing in the most civil conversation they had ever had.
And both parties found that they enjoyed it.
Severus slipped under his bedsheets feeling more content than usual, but he found he could not fall asleep. Not at the thought of Harry curled up on that couch in the living room. Sighing, he stood up and returned to the den some two hours later. He gently nudged Harry awake and murmured, "Potter, come on, take the bed. I'll sleep out here tonight... We'll get you a room set up tomorrow."
"No," Harry hummed, half awake, "I'm fine here... just go to sleep."
"Potter," Severus hissed, "just take the damned bed! Let me be a gentleman for once!"
Harry sighed but pushed himself from the couch. "Okay, okay," he grumbled and wiped sleep from his eyes, "don't get your knickers in a twist... I'm going." He yawned and stumbled off, murmuring, "Thanks, Snape," as he made it to the doorway.
"You're welcome," Severus replied, "good night, Potter."
"Night," Harry yawned back and disappeared from sight, but Severus chuckled when he heard the creak of his bed when Harry apparently collapsed on it. Shaking his head, he stood up and hurried into the room, hauling Harry up all the way onto the mattress before pulling the sheets up to cover him.
"Silly boy," Severus quipped with a small grin splitting his cheeks.
Harry made a face and scrunched his nose for a moment. Then, he rolled over, facing his back to Severus, and drifted off into a settled sleep.
Severus fled from the room so he could collapse into helpless chuckles. "Potter's actually starting to grow on me," he murmured, "I can't believe it, the little brat." He pushed his back up against the arm of the sofa and tugged the blanket over his lap. He quickly fell asleep, into what must have been his first peaceful slumber ever.
Of course that peace was disturbed when he awoke a couple hours later to screaming. He almost fell off the sofa in his rush to the doorway of his bedroom. He wiped his eyes and swished his hand to brighten the room with a candle on the nightstand. "Potter," he called softly from the door and stepped into the room a few paces.
Harry was tossing and turning on the bed, throwing the sheets this way and that and capturing his legs in the blanket. He grunted and rolled again, coming dangerously close to tumbling from the bed. Then, he screamed with such fear and anger, that Severus was shocked.
The Potions Master ran over to the bed and just barely managed to prevent Harry from falling off and bumping his head harshly against the nightstand. He wrestled the young man further onto the bed, repeating the words, "Potter, wake up!"
With reflexes honed from years of being threatened with death by Voldemort, Harry sat upright when he awoke, so fast that his balled fist flew up and smashed against Severus's chin.
Severus grunted and drew back in a flinch. His hands flew to his chin, tenderly rubbing at the stinging he felt. "Damn, Potter," he growled, drawing Harry's attention to him.
Seconds passed before Harry seemed able to focus on Severus's pale form. He saw the pained expression on the older man's face and the way he was cradling his chin, and that's when Harry realized what had happened. "Snape," he exclaimed, "I'm sorry! Are you okay?"
"I'm fine," Severus snapped, a scowl blossoming onto his face. He rubbed his jaw for a second more before sighing and taking a seat on the bed. "What happened?"
Harry flushed and looked down, absently pulling the blanket up and over his lap. "It was nothing," he mumbled into the dark room.
Severus's gaze narrowed. "It was most certainly not nothing, Potter," he retorted, "it looked like you were having a nightmare."
Harry's cheeks twitched. He sighed, "Okay, yeah... it was a nightmare."
"And how often have you had these nightmares?" Severus asked. He took notice that the skin around Harry's famous scar, all red and puffy on his forehead, and the professor swished his hand again to brighten the light from the candle, then he dug through the drawer of his nightstand while Harry talked.
"Well," Harry murmured and rubbed his hand warily over the scars on the back of his hand, the words carved into his skin by the blood quill Umbridge made him use, "I've had nightmares for as long as I can remember... When Voldemort came back, they turned into visions, but... now that Voldemort's gone, they're just regular, terrifying nightmares..."
Severus finally found the healing salve he kept in the drawer by his bed, just in case, and opened the jar, scooping some of the lotion-like goop into his hand. "And what are these nightmares usually about?" he asked as he dabbed the salve on Harry's forehead.
The Boy-Who-Lived flinched away slightly at the cool salve on his inflamed skin, but he gritted his teeth and tried to ignore the slight stinging. "About the war," he admitted finally, feeling very embarrassed to be sitting here telling Severus about his nightmares, "about everyone that died... About the final battle, just about everything bad that's happened over my years at Hogwarts..."
"Have you never considered asking Pompfrey for Dreamless Sleep potions? Did you never try to research ways to rid yourself of the nightmares?"
"I asked Hermione to help me learn to brew Dreamless Sleep," Harry said, "but she wouldn't. She warned me that I had the potential to become addicted to it. And I never tried to learn to brew it myself.... Didn't want Pompfrey, or anyone else really, to know I had nightmares so bad..."
"How come I had never heard you experiencing a nightmare? In the countless days you have been living here?" Severus asked as he finished rubbing the salve into Harry's red forehead.
The younger man shifted uneasily. "I usually raise a silencing spell every night before I drift off... I didn't tonight though, since we stayed up talking... I forgot," he muttered and looked down to the sheets. He pushed himself off the bed and began pulling the sheets back onto the bed, trying to make it look decent once again.
"What are you doing, brat?"
"I'm making the bed back up," Harry said as if that was very obvious, "Sorry for messing it up so badly. I'll go sleep on the couch."
"Do not leave this room," Severus warned just as the Gryffindor was about to walk around the bed and head for the door. "We haven't finished talking," he added, "now sit back down here." He intentionally tossed the sheets back down and making an utter mess.
"What did you do that for?" Harry sighed but sat back down on the bed.
"Because I don't care if the bed is a mess, and you apparently need to realize that I am in no way a neat freak. I do like tidy, yes, but bedsheets are completely unimportant, especially at this moment."
Harry's brow furrowed. "And what do you mean by that? Because it's the middle of the night?" he asked.
"No. We are busy talking about your nightmares. That's much more important than my bedsheets."
"It's not that important," Harry grumbled and tried to amuse himself by picking some lint from the blanket. "It's something I've dealt with all of my life; it's not that big of a deal."
Severus's nostrils flared. "It is that big of a deal, Potter," he hissed and reached a hand out to grip Harry's chin fiercely. He ignored the pained sound it caused and instead glared deeply into green eyes. "Miss Granger was wrong," he said, "Dreamless Sleep has no addiction properties, and trust me, I have researched that extensively. I had to overcome my nightmares in some way."
"You had nightmares, sir?"
"Yes," the professor confessed, and his eyes softened with his voice. He loosened his hold on the boy's chin. "I've had my share of nightmares... I will start brewing you Dreamless Sleep. I'll teach you as well, just in case I am shipped to Azkaban after my trial."
"You won't be," Harry stated.
"Now I said to keep your Gryffindor innocence, but I think it would be best to put that damned Gryffindor optimism aside! Look at reality with reason and see how impossible it will be!"
Harry just shook his head stubbornly and stood up. "Just get some sleep," he said, "you're getting cranky."
"I am not sleeping in this bed, Potter," Severus snarled and grabbed the boy's arm, yanking him back onto the bed, "you are sleeping in here just as soon as I retrieve a dose of Dreamless Sleep for the both of us."
"Both of us?"
"Yes, Potter," Severus answered and made his way to the bathroom door across the room. He continued to talk as he dug through the medicine cabinet, "I must take a certain amount 3 times a week. That's the price we must pay to sleep without nightmares." He returned with two vials of the potion, handing the larger dose to Harry. "You, however, will need to take it every night for a month before you can slowly start lowering the dosage and stop taking it every night."
"Goodie," Harry groaned but choked down the potion, pausing after he swallowed, "wait... This actually tastes good.. Isn't it a universal rule that all potions taste horrible? I've had Dreamless Sleep in the hospital wing before and it tasted horrible!"
Severus smirked. "That's because I am Poppy's supplier. I simply do not add the sweet flavor when the brewing is finished. Or else it may become addicting. I only add it when completely necessary, if we have to deal with small children in Hogwarts or during Order business."
"Evil bastard," Harry mumbled jokingly.
"Good to know my reputation is still in tact," Severus said as his smirk grew wider.
"Okay," Harry sighed, "Just hush up... I'm tired."
"Very well," the Potions Master nodded and stood up, "have a good night, Potter. I'll see you after the sun has risen.
"Night, Snape."
Kyla: And that's as far as I've gotten... I'm trying to figure out if I want to skip right to the trials or if I want some filler chapters, maybe one where Harry goes back to visit the Malfoys agian before the trial. If y'all prefer it any certain way, please review or PM me and let me know! I appreciate you all reading, and I hope you enjoyed it!
