A/N: Here's another Valentines Day gift for my readers! Many of you have asked if I'm almost finished with this fic…yes, the end to this one is drawing near. Many have asked if there will be a sequel…yes, I am writing it now and I am up to Ch.9. Some have commented on the odd way the chapters are numbered…I have reviewed them and everything is there! The sequence is correct, it just looks wonky. I had trouble with trying to edit and when I pushed the wrong button a chapter was deleted. The only way to get it back was to combine 18 and 19. Anyway, nothing is missing, the numbering is just wrong. If I delete the story to start over with posting I will lose all your wonderful reviews and I do not want to do that! So enjoy these last few chapters! The sequel will begin soon after this is complete!

Chapter 37: Dobby

Harry didn't ask to try dreaming that night. Instead, he went to the Astronomy Tower to think. The stars were very bright and, for a while, he lay on the cool stones, naming constellations, reviewing patterns, cycles and phases. He thought that he remembered all that he should about it. There didn't seem to be any blanks, but if he didn't know it, he wouldn't know it, would he? He groaned into the link, 'Severus, my thinking is flawed again … how will I know if I'm not remembering things like I should, if I can't remember in the first place?'

His quest met with silence, and he stretched his senses out again. 'Severus?' Had he shut Harry out on purpose? Harry sat up and frowned as he concentrated harder. Pain flared in his left forearm and he immediately felt his scar begin to throb. He closed the link from his end as fast as he could and the pain in his arm diminished. Drawing his legs up, he put his head on his knees and began Occluding. It took several tries to get it right and he realized that he was way out of practice at doing it. Had he not needed it for a long time? Is that why it felt so hard to do?

The door to the Tower sprang open and Dumbledore was there with McGonagall right behind him. Harry looked at him in question. It took Dumbledore a few moments to see that Harry was alright. He came all the way out onto the tower and dropped down beside him. "Severus has been summoned."

Harry nodded and held out his arm in mute acknowledgment. Dumbledore looked at him with concern. "Have you been able to Occlude it?"

Harry held up a hand with his index finger and thumb about an inch apart. Dumbledore understood that Harry had done what he could to dampen the feelings but still felt a little of it. He asked again, "And your scar? Is it hurting as well?"

Harry nodded again. Dumbledore held up a vial. "This is a sedative draught. If you need to, we can use it to let you sleep until Severus is back."

Harry shook his head. He had a vague memory of a time in the past when he would have loved to sleep through severe pain in his head. It was apparently one of those memories that would only be complete with integration. Worry about Snape bloomed larger as he thought about what Dumbledore was saying. He looked at Dumbledore and up at McGonagall. Dumbledore stood up and extended his hand. "Let's at least get you to the Hospital Wing." At Harry's frown, he explained, "Last time Severus was summoned, he was injured. You felt what he was feeling and it was a very intense night for you both. I hope it doesn't come to it, but if you should need sedating, or if Severus comes back injured again, it would be best if you were already there."

Harry tried hard to grasp a fleeting image of being in the Hospital Wing with Snape, but it slipped away as quickly as it had appeared in his mind. He took hold of the offered hand and heaved himself to his feet, more unsteady than he had realized. Dumbledore took one side and McGonagall the other as they made their way down the long stairway and through endless corridors to the Hospital Wing.

Harry didn't much feel like climbing into a hospital bed. Instead, he paced the floor, looking at the paintings that lined the walls. He tried to avoid the following eyes of Dumbledore, McGonagall and Pomfrey. As they watched him move back and forth across the floor, he became more and more irritable. Finally, he looked at them and threw his arms up in a gesture that clearly asked them, 'What?'

McGonagall was the one who spoke and she did so apologetically and softly. "We're sorry, Harry. After the last time, we just worry about you so." She looked at Dumbledore. "Perhaps a game of Wizards Chess could get our minds off Severus?"

Dumbledore promptly conjured a chess set onto a small table in the center of the floor. Harry looked at her in disbelief for a moment before shrugging. Sitting down at the table, he dropped a heavy head into a propped-up hand and made the first move.

His scar intermittently made painful throbs that he rubbed at absently as they played. He made a bigger effort at Occluding when that happened, in spite of a strong desire to let up on it. A part of him wanted to see what was going on at the gathering of Death Eaters. Was Severus okay? Were they merely planning, or were they involved in committing atrocities?

Harry lost the match quickly, but that was hardly a surprise, since his mind was not on the game at all. Dumbledore watched him as he went about resetting the pieces on the board. He reached a hand over to still Harry's. "He will return before morning. He always does." Harry fixed him with eyes that looked tired. Dumbledore gave his hand a pat and withdrew.

The next game ended just as quickly as the first. Harry looked down at the chess pieces as Dumbledore's knight lanced through his queen. He began to set the board up again. He was almost finished when the Floo made a loud whoosh. All eyes looked up to see Snape standing there.

He still wore his Death Eater robe and carried the mask in his hand. His face was thunderous and menacing. Harry stood up, ashen, and started forward before hesitating.

Snape looked at Dumbledore and snarled, "I will speak with you in my quarters."

"Of course, Severus." Dumbledore stood and moved to the fireplace.

Snape held out a forbidding hand to Harry. "Not now." Harry stopped short, question in his eyes. When he took another step, Snape bit out, "What part of 'not now' did you not understand, Potter? I said not now and that's what I meant. Go to bed." He stood tall and threatening on the hearth, every inch the old Snape, the black bat from the dungeons of hell. He glared at Harry with eyes filled with malice.

With that, he stepped back into the grate, yelling for his quarters. Dumbledore gave Harry an apologetic glance before following. Harry stood there, blinking back sudden tears. After the flames died down, he swiped at his eyes furiously before the tears could roll.

McGonagall put an arm around his shoulders after walking up beside him. "He's always like that when he returns, Harry. Remember where he's been, after all. He'll give his report to Albus and then be back to his usual self." To herself, she hoped that his usual self would be decent to Harry, as the Snape she saw was as surly as he had always been before this past summer. Patting Harry's shoulder, she finished, "Come, I'll walk you up to your room."

Harry lay in his bed for a long time, careful to leave his end of the link open, hoping Snape would call to him after he'd finished whatever conversation he had to have with Dumbledore. He waited until early dawn began to lighten the room beyond his drawn bed curtains. He waited. Snape never called.

He must have fallen asleep finally, because the next thing he knew, a squeaky voice was beside him.

"Master Harry Potter is about to be missing his breakfast, sir."

Harry woke with a start that sent a strange creature flying off the bed. He sat up and stared for a moment. 'Dobby?' He recalled that this was a House elf, and that Dobby was pretty excitable.

Floppy ears waggled as the house elf vigorously nodded his head. He jumped back on the bed throwing his skinny arms around Harry. "You is remembering Dobby, sir! You is remembering! They said you might not, but you is!"

Harry grinned. 'Of course, I could never forget you, Dobby.' Then a frown crossed his face. 'Can you hear me? No one else but Severus can hear me …'

"Oh yes! House elves can hears their masters no matter how they call them, sir. We needs to hear so we can do master's bidding at any time!" He tugged on Harry's hand. "Get up, Master Harry, breakfast will soon be gone and you will be hungry!"

'That's okay. You could always bring me something.' Harry wasn't looking forward to going to the Great Hall and seeing that awful, hateful look on Snape's face again. He shivered at the memory of it from the night before.

"Headmaster Dumbledore was saying Harry Potter might say that, sir. He says to tell you, you is to come anyway. You is to come and eat breakfast with everyone else." Dobby pulled on his arm again and Harry reluctantly got to his feet. Dobby waited until Harry got dressed and then walked with him down to the Great Hall.

Harry looked at him. 'Dobby, you don't have to walk with me do you? You could just pop back down.'

"Oh no, Master Harry Potter! Dobby is staying right with you. Headmaster Dumbledore is saying you might need me to hear what Harry Potter is needing. Dobby wants to help Harry Potter and Dobby will stay with him, I says to him."

Harry shrugged. He hadn't thought about a House Elf being able to hear him when he spoke in his mind. But then, he hadn't even remembered their existence until he had seen Dobby. He looked sideways at the creature hopping along beside him. Dobby smiled toothily up at him, apparently very eager to be of service to him. Dobby didn't leave him until they reached the Great Hall, and then he looked at Harry happily.

"When you needs Dobby, you just think my name. Dobby will be there in a snap to help Master Potter."

Harry thought, 'Could you call me Harry?' Dobby started to shake his head and Harry added, 'I need for you to call me Harry.'

Dobby smiled and nodded his head. He snapped his fingers and was gone with a pop.

Harry looked around the Great Hall and saw that he was the center of attention. He flushed and ducked his head as he took a seat.

Dumbledore spoke to him, "I trust that you are comfortable allowing Dobby to help you, should you have need?"

Harry looked up at him, and then around the table. Snape was absent. Instead of answering Dumbledore with a nod, he looked at the place at which Snape would normally sit and then gave him a questioning lift of his eyebrow. Dumbledore looked at Harry over the tops of his glasses.

"Professor Snape finds himself unable to be here at this time. I believe that you have found that you can speak to Dobby just as you speak to him?"

Harry nodded. Dumbledore nodded in a satisfied way and turned his attention to his plate and to Professor McGonagall. Harry felt very unsatisfied. Why was Snape unable to be here? Where was he? When would he return? Did it have to do with Voldemort? He had seemed somehow angry with Harry when he had returned from the Death Eater Gathering. Was he angry? What had Harry done to upset him? His mind was a whirl of questions and each one seemed to make him feel more apprehensive.

He picked at the food on his plate, not feeling the least bit hungry anymore. He was relieved when some of the professors began to leave, so he could slip away too.

He didn't want to go back to the empty common room, or the Astronomy Tower, so he went to the Library. Madame Pince was shelving new books when he walked in. She frowned at him and he ignored it in favor of roaming the stacks, looking for a subject that might catch his interest. You'd think that, with the size of the Library, that wouldn't be very hard. But Harry couldn't find anything that looked good. He left the Library and wandered a few corridors before deciding to head out to the Quidditch pitch. Sitting in the stands, he imagined himself on a broom, soaring high overhead. It seemed a familiar sensation, one that he had felt before, but he couldn't bring himself to find a broom and try it.

He started when Dobby popped into the seat next to him. "Is Master Harry needing anything?"

Harry frowned. 'Harry is not an invalid. What did Dumbledore ask you to do, anyway? Keep an eye on me?'

Dobby's eyes got wide. "Dobby would never spy on Harry Potter, sir!"

'Yeah, but you have to do what he says, don't you? He's like the ultimate master of the castle, isn't he?'

Dobby looked at him with his big bulbous eyes and nodded. "Headmaster Dumbledore is a great wizard, like Harry Potter. He would never tell Dobby to do something that would hurt Harry Potter."

'I know that, Dobby … it's just that it seems like they think I need watching all the time. It's hard, not being able to speak out loud. They know I don't remember everything, and I think they believe I'll do something stupid.' He looked at Dobby with a shake of his head.

"Dobby will tell you what Headmaster Dumbledore says. He says Harry Potter is missing his best friends and Dobby is to be his friend. He says that sometimes Harry Potter is getting himself lost and he cannot be calling out for help. He asked Dobby to listen for Harry Potter, in case he was lost, or frightened."

Harry sighed. Certainly, Dumbledore meant well. Dobby was attentive, even overly so. Harry remembered that the elf could be quite devoted. But really, he'd rather have- Snape. Putting his head in his hands, he tried again to call him. 'Severus, please answer me. Please.'

Dobby reached out a slender-fingered hand. "Professor Snape will not be wanting to answer Harry Potter."

'Why, Dobby? Where is he?' Harry hated the desperate tone in his voice.

"Professor Snape is here. He is in his dungeons."

Harry stood up quickly. 'Great! Lets go.'

Shaking his head, Dobby pulled on Harry's arm. "Dobby was being told you is not to go to the dungeons." Harry looked at him in disbelief. Dobby lowered his head and whispered, "Dobby is sorry, Harry. Dobby knows Harry wants to see his teacher, but Dobby cannot let you go there."

'But why?' Harry could feel all the insecurity, all the doubt, all the fear welling up inside as he stood there. Dobby didn't seem to have an answer to that.

Harry sat back down heavily. Dobby sat beside him. Harry just sat in the stands for hours, ignoring the movement of the sun as the day passed, ignoring the rumble in his stomach when noon passed. He felt paralyzed with indecision. Snape had somehow become the one person he wanted to be with; the one he trusted more than any other. Part of him seemed to be warning him against those feelings, and that's what caused the indecision. He was afraid that the trust he felt was faulty. Like Snape had told him; his thinking processes were flawed.

Harry hoped that one day would be enough for Snape to work through whatever he was dealing with. Then he would answer him, he was sure.

Snape did not answer, nor did he initiate a connection.

Dumbledore took note of Harry's increasing melancholy. As the next few days passed, he ate less and less. Dobby reported that he would ask for snacks at times, but then would stop eating them after a few bites. He also said that Harry wouldn't come to the Great Hall unless Dobby insisted.

When Harry became noticeably more drawn, Dumbledore decided that he would have to talk to Snape again. He reflected on the conversation between them following the Death Eater's Gathering …

Dumbledore followed Snape through the Floo from the Hospital Wing to his quarters in the Dungeons. The black Death Eater's robe snapped around him as he stalked through the room, throwing the evil-looking mask onto a table. He turned to face Dumbledore, who was already speaking,

"Harry has been very worried about you; perhaps you could give him a little reassurance."

"I will thank you not to tell me what I should or should not do. I do not wish to see him, nor do I wish for him to see me."

"Severus –"

"It is not negotiable," he spat. He flung the robe over a chair and began to pace the floor rapidly. Dumbledore watched him silently, knowing that something had occurred to cause this anger, and he would have to wait patiently for Snape to tell him what it was.

After a few turns on the floor, Snape turned to glare at Dumbledore. "I had to prove my loyalty tonight. The Dark Lord demanded that I show him through my obedience that I was ever worthy of his Inner Circle."

Dumbledore looked at him sadly. "I understand how that must make you feel –"

"You understand nothing!" Snape interrupted him. His face was livid with anger. "You understand nothing of what I am asked to do to prove myself to him!" He towered over Dumbledore. "Muggles died tonight. Innocent of everything, they were in the wrong place when The Dark Lord gave his orders. I had to participate in their torture and killing."

"I'm sorry, Severus."

"Sorry? Well, that makes me feel better," he sneered sarcastically. "I'm sure I'll rest easier knowing that you're sorry." He paced more. "I cannot risk exposing Harry to what I did. I will not taint him with it."

"Harry needs you," Dumbledore said quietly.

"He does not need a Death Eater."

"Ex-Death Eater," Dumbledore clarified.

"No. After tonight, I can no longer tell myself that I am playing a role as a Death Eater. I was a Death Eater. I followed every instruction that The Dark Lord gave, and that makes me just as guilty as he is, more so because it was my hand that spilled blood tonight."

Dumbledore paced more sedately around the room. "You are the only one he can talk to. He counts on you, as well you know."

"He will have to learn not to."

"Won't you go to him –"

"No. I will not." He whirled away towards the door of his private laboratory. At the door, he turned back. "Our relationship is over as of now. I will not be a part of what he is to become. It is not possible that he would need a Death Eater at his side." He entered the lab, and slammed the door.

Dumbledore contemplated the door for a few moments. He realized that Snape was angry, and extremely disheartened. He hoped that he would move on towards acceptance and open back up to Harry after he had a chance to think about what he had said …

But he had not relented in his feelings. He was adamant that he stay away from Harry and Harry away from him. When Dumbledore asked him how he thought Harry was to get his needs met, he had flippantly suggested that perhaps a House Elf could be assigned to attend the Boy Who Lived.

Dumbledore actually thought that was a workable suggestion and he called the one House Elf he would trust with such a job. Upon speaking with Dobby, he was assured that Dobby could indeed hear Harry, and would gladly do whatever it took to help him, whether it was for companionship, comfort, food, or protection.

Dumbledore sighed. Dobby was not what Harry needed, he was sure. For all the Elf's enthusiasm, he was still not the mentor that Harry would need to get him through the fate destiny had in store. Dobby was reporting restless sleep and perhaps nightmares each morning when he told Dumbledore how the night had gone. When he suggested that perhaps a mild sleeping potion, or Dreamless Sleep draught might help him, Harry had refused. He would look at Dumbledore with those green pools that were dull with a nameless fatigue, and Dumbledore wanted to throttle Snape.

He had avoided even mentioning Harry to Remus Lupin. He had been on a deep assignment to convert followers away from the renegade Greyback for more than six months. He had told Dumbledore to contact him if there had been an emergency with Harry. He wondered if this was the time. So far, he had been content to let the First Prophecy blossom on its own. It had seemed to be working out as it should. Now … could he afford to let much more time pass before he took some kind of intervening measures to get Snape back with Harry? Would the presence of Lupin make matters worse for Harry, if Harry even remembered him? Could he convince Lupin to try and force Snape's hand, without contacting Harry? If he contacted Lupin, he had to be willing to compromise his undercover position. He had to believe that Lupin would forgive the passage of time when Dumbledore had not told him about Harry's injuries and subsequent disabilities. The wolf could be a very reasonable man, but when it came to Harry … would he be reasonable concerning Harry's need for Severus Snape?

He felt that a decision would have to be made soon. The term was about to begin and Harry had not done any magic since he had been back at Hogwarts. Dobby said that his wand was in his trunk, untouched, and Harry had not tried wandless magic. Dumbledore had mentioned this to Snape and had received only a cold stare in response.

Dumbledore was uncharacteristically at his wits end.