CHAPTER 21

A/N:
ravens secret stalker: about the spelling issue. "realise" and "practise": British spelling…Just because a spelling is different (without deviating from the so-called norm) due to the type of English variety you are using, it doesn't mean that it is wrong. I am studying English Linguistics as one of my subjects, so I know that there are many "Englishes" out there…

Red Kitsune Flames: about the nine chapters: I noticed that. Don't worry – all the chapters and reviews are there, there seems to be a glitch with server, it's been around since the 21st July. Just type in the chapter number in the URL if you can't get to it via clicking on a link.

Sentences which start and end with a degree sign (°) are sentences from Harry's dreams or sentences someone said and which Harry recalls and repeats to himself.

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The maze of thorn bushes did not fail to visit Harry a second time. He was running again through various paths, and Snape's voice was calling him faintly. At last, he reached the square. A wind was blowing Snape's hair across his face. He pushed it back, revealing his pale angular features and black eyes, which stared into Harry's green ones.

"Why aren't you answering me?" Snape asked in a dull monotone.

Harry tried to tell him in sign language that Voldemort had robbed his voice. Snape did not react, continuing to stare at him. At last he spoke.

"Where is the exit?"

Harry stretched out his hand. A thorny branch shot out of the floor and lashed out at his hand like an incensed serpent, lacerating his skin. Then a wall, bristling with enormous thorns which resembled basilisk fangs shot up, obscuring Snape; but his soft voice floated over to Harry.

"I can't find the way…"

With a gasp, Harry's eyes flew open. He sat up in bed and wiped the sweat from his face.

With a silent spell, he made some dim light illumine the room and examined his hand. There was no blood, no tears from fang-thorns. He went to the bathroom to use the toilet and wash his face.

He refused to go to sleep afterwards. It was four o'clock in the morning and a long time more until breakfast. Complete silence lay heavily upon his quarters. He put on some soothing music and summoned his diary.

Severus Snape, why are you haunting me? This is the second time I have dreamt of you. I already dreamt of you last night. Is that maze a reminder of my fourth year? Why can't you find the way out? Why can't I seem to reach you? Or is there another way to your location? But then…it is only a dream, not a vision. Is it a metaphor for your situation?

He brooded over the dream until, in spite of his refusal sleep, his head nodded and he semi-somnambulated back to bed, clutching his diary to his chest, like a child holding a beloved doll.

He was consequently rather tired the next day. Snape came across him in the middle of a gigantic yawn. He raised an eyebrow, and Harry lowered his hand with which he had covered his mouth.

"Late night wanderings in the castle, Potter? I assume it is hard to break the habit."

Harry looked at him closely, searching his face for the message he had given Harry in the dream…

°Where is the exit?…I can't find my way…°

Snape gave him a cold glance and brushed past him. Harry turned, watching the long black hair caress the back of his robes.

I need you to teach me how to live without a voice, but why would you need me? It is only a dream, only a dream, Harry's mind said.

He felt those lithe arms slip around his body, felt that whisper stroke his ear and skin, felt the nearly tangible ray of those black eyes as they viewed his thoughts during Legilimency…

It suddenly seemed very difficult for him to breathe because of the odd weight in his chest.

That night, the dream of the maze did not visit him, but another equally disturbing dream plagued him. Snape was correcting his wand position, hissing instructions to him in his usual disagreeable way. Then his hand slipped casually down to Harry's thigh, squeezing it lightly. Harry let his wand fall and turned to face Snape. Snape crushed their bodies together, raising Harry's right thigh so that Harry's leg embraced Snape's left hip. The slender long-fingered hand made sure that Harry could not pull back by keeping a firm grip on Harry's right knee, pressing it against his hip. Snape's hair was touching his face, and his eyes were locked with his…

Harry woke up cursing silently. His body was throbbing with arousal. He relieved the situation with his hand, convulsing as he reached his climax. It was the third time in a row that he had not been able to sleep through. Nevertheless, the dream found its way into his diary. He showered and lay in bed anxiously, wondering how he would be able to look Snape in the eye after fantasising and dreaming about him so vividly. He was therefore rather tense when he visited Snape's office for his lesson. The unfathomable wizard studied him penetratingly as he sat down.

"I would like to test your non-verbal spell-casting today, Potter," he said softly, "I think a Wizard's Duel would be a good way to find out."

Harry gave him a shocked look.

Snape's lip curled contemptuously.

"Don't worry, Potter, I don't wish to give Pomfrey more work than she already has or carry your majesty to his kingly quarters. Draw out your wand and please stand up."

They duelled, casting minor hexes and curses at each other. Harry found it tremendously difficult, coming to the conclusion that Snape was a far more accomplished Duellist than Voldemort. In fact, Harry had not killed Voldemort with a curse; Voldemort's own Killing Curse had rebounded on him, not killing him instantly because he had hardly been human enough to suffer an instant demise. Snape was quick as lightning and, brilliant as he was, could foresee nearly every gesture and movement on Harry's part. Finally, Harry caught sight of a bowl filled with water on Snape's desk. He dodged a spell from Snape and levitated the bowl of water. Snape whipped around, and, as once before, Harry made the water leave the bowl and splash into his face. It also caught him on the chest, since the bowl was far larger. There was complete silence for a few seconds during which Harry could not suppress a triumphant smirk. He half expected Snape to react with the same nonchalance as last time. Snape, however, had narrowed his eyes to slits; he flipped his soaking hair back and said in a deadly voice:

"You insolent fool! I will wipe that smirk off your face."

He pulled Harry's wand out of his hand and put it on his desk; then he seized Harry's arm and dragged him out of the dungeons. Harry struggled vehemently.

"You are just like your father," Snape snarled furiously. His fingers were digging into Harry's skin. Harry felt utterly defenceless without the means of protesting vocally, and he was too startled to resort to non-verbal wandless spells. Soft gasps came from him – and that was all. A couple of students leapt back in alarm as Snape hauled Harry up to the ground floor and to the main doors of Hogwarts. Harry tried to pull back with all his might – to no avail. Snape force-led Harry down to the lake and pushed him inside the water.

"I was humiliated frequently enough by your father!" Snape shouted, "I don't need his ungrateful offspring to do the same! I will admit that I was stupid enough not to appreciate your mother's kindness, which you have obviously not inherited, you are a replica of James Potter and Black!"

He shook Harry roughly and let go all of a sudden, as if he had been burnt. They stared into each other's eyes before Snape bowed his head and simply sat down on the bank of the lake. Harry was nearly crying, a mixture of shame and anger burning within him; shame for the bullying Snape had had to undergo, even if he had known more hexes than others, and anger at Snape's treatment of him. Was that the end of their tentative bond? Harry got out of the lake, robes dripping. His arm was smarting. He remembered how Snape had squeezed his arm after discovering him in the Pensieve in his fifth year. The barriers which he had managed to get out of their path, at least partially, were springing up, higher than ever. He could see Snape re-modifying the wards on his office-door, shutting him out completely again. A few months ago, he would not have cared. Now, due to his confused feelings for his teacher, he cared about the cynical man's pain. He sat down next to his teacher. Snape turned his head to look at him. In a voice which was so low that it was almost inaudible, he said:

"I'm sorry."

Harry's lips parted with surprise.

"Don't ask me to repeat it," Snape growled, gently taking Harry's arm and examining the already forming bruises on the skin before tapping them with his wand. He also dried them off with a charm – first Harry, then himself.

I'm also sorry, Harry said.

The black eyes locked with his.

"You had better be."

But sir…Snape's eyes narrowed dangerously again.

"But what?" he snapped.

Can you never let go?

"Let go of what?"

The past. I loved, and still love, my father and godfather. You hated, and still hate, them. But I am me, not them. Please don't lose me – Harry – out of sight because of them.

Snape looked at him with a strange expression in his eyes, as if surprised at the maturity of the words.

When was the last time you were truly happy with something or someone, sir?

Snape rose abruptly.

"Enough of this sentimental sap. We are returning to the castle to continue our lesson."

He waited for Harry to start walking.

"Have you got any pain?" he inquired abruptly. Harry shook his head.

They left the lake, their silhouettes graceful in the dark – the tall thin wizard and the small slight one, walking side by side.

Back in Snape's office, Snape resumed the lesson at once, initiating a Stinging Hex. Harry ducked and countered with a Shield Charm. Snape managed to penetrate it with a powerful Disarming Spell and summoned Harry's wand to him; before the wand could fall into his hand, Harry summoned it back. The wand hovered between them uncertainly, then thudded against Harry's palm. Finally, Harry made the mistake of trying to combine a non-verbal spell, which would knock the opponent off his or her feet, with his wand. There was a deafening explosion which made several jars fall off their shelves. Snape ducked as a shard of glass sailed over his head; Harry fell onto his backside. Could the lesson get any worse? He had been utterly humiliated so far and, besides his feelings for the man, could not afford to hit back in full force. What Snape was teaching him would determine how he would handle his life without a voice. Snape straightened up and surveyed the mess.

"I think I was very clear when I said that that particular spell should never be combined with your wand," he said calmly, approaching the young man and holding out a hand. Harry grasped it with both of his, and Snape pulled him to his feet. He was surprised. He had been sure that Snape would order him to get up or even drag him down again to the lake for another dunk. They were close enough to embrace each other. Harry flushed at the realisation. Snape, too, had some colour in his cheeks, probably due to the shock of the explosion. His long fingers were warm.

"Reparo!" Snape said, withdrawing his hand, and the room was restored to neatness. The lesson ended with another chapter of Telepathy.

Why is it easier to transmit images than verbal communication? I mean, one actually hears verbal communications in the memories called forth by Legilimency, so what makes the transferring or words so difficult? Harry asked.

Snape eyed him coldly.

"Can you communicate with the people in the memories in any way, Potter?"

Harry shook his head.

"You have reached the stage where you can select memories and transmit them to me. Your Occlumency, ah, skills, have, shall we say, improved enough to block me out for a pitiably short amount of time. With Telepathy, even more concentration is required. You have to melt into the person's mind, speak and diffuse your voice into his or her mind space. When you interact telepathically with someone, his or her images and thoughts will confront you like a rippling wall of pictures, and all the while you will have to make sure you do not drown in them and can make yourself heard. Legilimency is the art of extracting thoughts and feelings; Occlumency blocks; and Telepathy shares components of both and is meant, very simply, to bind, to communicate. You can invade a person's mind with Telepathy, naturally. You will have to learn how to do that if you don't want to be followed around everywhere by your quill and parchment. Not everyone can read sign language. Regard Legilimency as reading, Potter, and Telepathy as mentally audible writing and reading someone else's mentally audible writing. This simplification makes me shudder, but it should assist you."

He paused.

"Telepathy is even more intimate than Legilimency, Potter. It is almost…" he doubled back and stared intensely into Harry's green eyes, "…like having sexual intercourse."

Harry could not prevent his colour from rising. Snape raised an amused slender eyebrow. He wondered what Snape would think if he knew that he wanted to keep his virginity until he had found someone he could trust and love and share it with. Maybe he was too romantic and idealistic, but it seemed extremely precious to him and worth treasuring. He remembered Snape kissing during the masked ball. The memory gave him an odd pang, and the idea of Snape having sex with someone else actually seem to…hurt.

Snape interrupted his thoughts by giving him a lot of assignments for the next lesson.

"And if you ever throw water at me again, Potter, intentionally or unintentionally, I will leave you at the mercy of the Giant Squid and the Grindylows."

When Harry crawled into bed, he asked himself what Telepathy with Snape would be like.

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