Disclaimer: Nothing is mine; everything is J K Rowling's.

Number 87. Just finished on Monday, though with only about half an hour to spare!

Enjoy...

Chapter 87

'Come in, Harry, come in,' the headmaster beamed, pulling his half-moon glasses from his nose and setting them down on the desk. They were promptly stolen by Fawkes, who, trilling triumphantly, hopped back onto his perch, spectacles clutched in one taloned foot.

Dumbledore gave the phoenix a reproachful stare, which Fawkes pointedly ignored in favour of inspecting Harry as he conjured a seat opposite the headmaster.

'How have you been, my boy?' Dumbledore extended a hand across the desk in the direction of his phoenix, silently, and wandlessly, summoning his spectacles out from the talons of the distracted phoenix. Harry suspected it was neither the first nor the last time that this particular battle had been fought.

'Fairly well,' Harry answered honestly. He'd been improving everywhere he devoted his time to, practicing and mastering a handful of dangerous spells, as well as absorbing everything Snape could offer him. Versatility was everything in a duel, though speed and power were crucial too, and while his rituals, and natural gifts made him more than a match for most, his arsenal of spells was still relatively small, and he was not fighting most. Neither Voldemort nor Dumbledore could be lumped in with the rest.

His fingers slipped to the slim, gold chain about his neck. In a little while, at this precise moment in time, Harry would be seeing if Snape could still be useful, and if he wasn't, then Dumbledore himself would provide his alibi.

'Professor Snape told me you have done a remarkable job in teaching some of the others in your year the Patronus Charm,' Dumbledore nodded gently. 'A very admirable deed, my boy, it is a hard charm to cast, despite its simple theory, and yet so many of your peers have achieved a corporeal version. Perhaps you should consider teaching yourself.'

'I think I lack the necessary patience, sir,' Harry admitted. 'Did Snape really use those words?'

'Professor Snape,' Dumbledore looked almost relieved to be making the familiar correction, 'may have not said that in so many words, but his meaning was easy to infer.'

'After you picked your way through the insults?' Harry asked, eyebrows raised.

'He was quite complimentary I assure you, Harry,' the headmaster replied softly. 'He was most curious about the form of your patronus. I understand it is no longer a stag?'

'An anzu,' Harry said evenly. There was no point trying to keep that a secret. If Snape had mentioned it, Dumbledore would already know anything Harry might want to hide.

'Remarkable,' his smile was incredibly soft. 'Miss Delacour is a lucky girl. You must be quite devoted to her for it to affect you so deeply.'

'Snape's patronus is similarly affected,' Harry shrugged, unwilling to discuss Fleur.

'Yes,' Dumbledore sighed, rubbing the corners of his eyes, and the point on his crooked nose where his glasses sat. 'He mentioned that you had noticed that, and that you disapproved.'

'That is not the only thing I have noticed, professor,' Harry began hesitantly. It would require some skill, and no small amount of subtlety to successfully imply Malfoy had fallen out with Snape. 'I saw Malfoy arguing with Snape about something, and Hermione has warned me that Malfoy has been up to something, lurking in odd areas of the school, and holding his forearm.'

'I am aware of Mr Malfoy's actions,' Dumbledore admitted. 'His target does not concern me, I do not believe he has it in him to be successful. Professor Snape is taking care of it nonetheless, Harry, and it would be best if you did not involve yourself. Mr Malfoy may act rashly if antagonised.'

'Of course, professor,' Harry agreed. Given it was likely Malfoy's target was Dumbledore Harry had little reason to act in the first place, and even less if the old wizard believed Malfoy no threat.

'Mr Malfoy has yet to truly choose his side,' Dumbledore explained slowly and gently. 'I hope to show him that there are other ways than those of his father before he loses himself completely. While he is in Hogwarts, I can keep him safe, and make sure he does no harm to others while he is fixed on this mission he is undertaking.'

'Do you know what it is, sir?'

'Yes,' Dumbledore looked suddenly weary, 'I am aware, don't let it trouble you. There are others you should be worrying about before Mr Malfoy.' His veiled reference to Fleur did not go unnoticed, and Harry's jaw twitched slightly in irritation.

'My apologies, Harry,' the headmaster offered, noticing. 'You are both capable of making your own decisions, and mistakes.' Harry said nothing in reply, and Dumbledore hurriedly continued. 'That is not to say I consider your relationship a mistake, my boy, as dangerous as it may be for her, and for her family,' Harry's jaw tightened ominously, 'anything that has such an affect can only be for the best. Love is, after all, the most powerful of magics.'

'Your note mentioned a memory, sir?' Harry asked, eager to leave this topic behind.

'Ah,' Dumbledore nodded, beard swaying, and rose to open a nearby cabinet. Inside Harry glimpsed a bowl of carven stone set in simple wood, with rings of runes around its rim. 'Would you care to join me, Harry,' he extended a gloved hand, the uninjured one.

Harry dismissed his chair, stepping around the desk to stare into the swirling silver mist within the basin.

'This recollection belongs to Professor Slughorn,' the headmaster revealed, poking the mist with the tip of his wand. Harry frowned, not recognising the odd shade, and grain of the slender piece of wood, nor the knotted carvings along its length.

'What will it show us?' He inquired, sidling subtly closer to Dumbledore's wand hand.

'You will see.' The wand vanished back into his sleeve, and the headmaster extended his hand once more. 'Harry?'

There was a brief, disorientating lurch as their fingers touched, then Harry found himself standing in the same room he had been brewing in only a few days ago; it was almost identically furnished, though Slughorn himself was slightly slimmer, and his waistcoat looked less strained.

The rotund professor set his glass down upon the desk, closing the box of what Harry suspected was crystallised pineapple, then started at a sudden noise behind them. Harry jumped too, his wand halfway into his hand, before Dumbledore's firm grasp gently steered him to the edge of the room where they had a clear view.

'Look sharp, Tom, you don't want to be caught out of bed out of hours, and you a prefect…'

The younger Riddle looked almost unremarkable, save for the slim gold band on his finger, the same ring Dumbledore now wore, he appeared almost exactly as he had in the Chamber of Secrets in Harry's second year. The only hint of his infamous future was the faint eldritch gleam of power to his hardened eyes, and the confidence with which he held himself.

'Sir, I wanted to ask you something.'

'Ask away, then, m'boy, ask away…'

'Sir, I wondered what you know about… about horcruxes?'

Slughorn stared at the young Voldemort, who looked innocently back, observing his professor's nervous fingering of his wine glass with a perfectly feigned air of obliviousness.

'Project for Defence Against the Dark Arts, is it?'

'Not exactly, sir,' Riddle replied. 'I came across the term while reading, and I didn't fully understand it.'

'No… Well… You'd be hard pushed to find a book at Hogwarts that'll give you details on horcruxes, Tom. That's very dark stuff, very dark indeed.' The slightest enigmatic smile appeared on Riddle's lips at Slughorn's mention of a book, no doubt he was amused by the ease with which he had found it within Salazar's library; it shifted into the tiniest sliver of a sneer when Slughorn mentioned the false dichotomy of dark and light.

'As you can see, Harry,' Dumbledore interrupted softly. 'Tom was already quite proficient in extracting what he wanted to know from those around him. By the time he was this age, sixteen, he already knew far more than most adult wizards ever would about the intricacies of magic.'

'Why are watching this, sir?' Harry asked, glancing back at Riddle, who was listening intently to whatever Slughorn was explaining to him about horcruxes.

''This is the moment I believe that Tom started down the road to Voldemort,' Dumbledore sighed. 'The instant he decided that anything was better than death.'

No, Harry realised, staring at the eyes of his distant relative. It is not.

He could see a terrible, desperate ambition already reflected in those intense mahogany eyes, fuelled by a vast, hopeless fear. Tom Riddle was already well on his way to becoming Voldemort; it was so obvious he could not understand how Dumbledore did not see it.

Whatever fear it was that drove Tom Riddle to become Voldemort had already consumed him to the point where he was nothing else but its pale shadow. A spectre of that which he sought to escape.

Death, Harry suddenly knew. He fears death.

He could hardly blame him; there was nothing he could imagine that was more terrible than death.

To be nothing forever, he shivered.

'Yes, sir,' Riddle was saying, an air of caution in his tone. 'What I don't understand, though - just out of curiosity - I mean, would one horcrux be much use? Can you only split your soul once? Wouldn't it be better, make you stronger, 'a gleam of hunger rippled through his eyes, 'to have your soul in more pieces? For instance, isn't seven the most magically powerful number, wouldn't seven -?'

Whatever Slughorn's yelped response was was lost in Harry's numb, icy shock.

I underestimated him, he realised. Seven, not three, seven.

Somewhere out there were another four horcruxes, hidden, just as the three that had already been destroyed were.

Merde.

They were nowhere near destroying all of Voldemort's safeguards.

'You understand now,' the headmaster noticed. 'I too looked just as horrified as you when I first saw this memory. Its revelation was my price for Slughorn being allowed to return to the safety of these walls.'

'Seven,' Harry murmured. 'So many.'

'I had suspected such a thing for some years now,' Dumbledore confessed, pulling them from he pensieve. 'I had hoped for three, but I know, having seen this, that he intended to make seven, even if he was not successful.'

'Not successful?' Harry settled himself back into his chair, re-conjuring it.

'Tom has always had a flair for melodrama, and a terrible hubris,' the headmaster explained. 'He would only use items he deemed worthy to use as horcruxes, and only create them from the deaths of those he thought noteworthy.'

'The diary?' Harry asked. It seemed not to fit with Dumbledore's theory.

'That diary is proof of his heritage and ancestry, something he has always been proud of,' Dumbledore explained kindly. Harry, however, couldn't quite accept it, there seemed something wrong with the headmaster's suggestion, something that didn't quite ring true with what he knew of Tom Riddle.

'So we have destroyed two of seven?'

'Two of six,' Dumbledore corrected. 'Seven pieces means six horcruxes, since one part of the soul must remain within the body.'

'Oh,' Harry blinked, embarrassed. He'd been too caught up in his horror at there being more to realise that.

The diary. The diadem. The ring. And now three more.

'I have,' the headmaster continued, 'over the last few years of searching, located a few of the items I believe to have been made into horcruxes by Voldemort. If you will venture with me once more?' He was still standing by the open cabinet.

Harry drifted over, deep in thought to take the headmaster's gloved hand once more.

If Dumbledore knows more about these horcruxes, then I cannot risk his death, he decided, as the silver mist swirled past them. So I cannot risk Snape fulfilling his vow.

The golden time-turner, freed from the wards of the chamber, weighed heavy around his neck at the realisation. If Snape did not agree to help him unconditionally, then he would have no choice but to remove the wizard from the way, else he was risking everything for the life of the man who had betrayed his parents.

Even if he did it to save her I cannot risk it.

The memory flowed around him, an older Riddle, paler faced, with eyes that glowed with power, and carrying such an aura of puissance that the nearby house-elf looked almost as giddy as the old woman with whom he conversed.

'He is eighteen,' Dumbledore revealed, as the old lady delightedly directed Riddle's attention to two, velvet lined boxes, and a small platter of lemon cakes. 'You can see for yourself that his pursuit of power has already lead him into controversial areas of magic.'

Rituals, Harry recalled. Blood magic too.

Salazar had said as much, and Harry recognised the ethereal edge to Riddle's eyes from his own visage.

'Tom was, by this point, quietly pursuing his own goal of immortality while he waited to apply for and take up a post at Hogwarts itself. He was much taken with the castle,' the headmaster noted sadly, 'I believe it is the only place he ever considered home.'

The boxes were opened carefully, and Harry recognised both artefacts with a sickening plummet of his stomach.

He didn't.

The golden badger was all too clear upon the cup, almost as evident as the crimson flecks in Riddle's eyes as he gazed at it, magic swirling in ardent avarice about him.

The next piece almost made Harry lash out at the memory. A slim, silver chain, attached to an elegant locket inscribed with a single letter S. Identical to the one Salazar had worn and sacrificed. He carefully concealed his wand, holding his sleeve shut to cover the bright viridescent glow of his fury that poured off it in crackling waves of sparks. Dumbledore, fortunately, was on the other side of him, and remained oblivious to his ire.

Riddle corrupted the pair of Salazar's locket, he seethed. Defiled it when he should have treasured it.

The insult to his ancestor, the one who had taught him, helped him, was unforgivable. There was only one person whom that locket could have belonged to, Salazar's sacrificed wife. The woman who had died to leave a gift to all those who would be her family had had the final treasure she owned adulterated by her own descendant.

The crimson glow was obvious now, gleaming scarlet suffused Voldemort's irises, for by now Harry knew there was nothing of Tom Riddle left about this boy, and the familiarly cold, contemplative expression he wore when the old lady turned away sent a chill down his spine.

Harry knew that face; it was the countenance he wore himself when he decided to kill someone who opposed him, only seeing it on Voldemort's face was extremely unnerving.

'Hepzibah,' Harry presumed that was the lady, 'died later that week, apparently from accidental poisoning by her house elf, but,' Dumbledore shook his head sadly, 'we both know that that was unlikely to be the case. The locket and the cup were missing.'

'Is that all?' Amazingly his voice was still and even, despite the bursting points of icy rage within.

'I think that is all we need to see of this,' Dumbledore answered sadly.

Harry collapsed into the chair, taking subtle, deep breaths. Salazar would have been furious, beyond furious, at what his supposed heir had done to the locket that had once belonged the woman he loved. Quietly he vowed to destroy the tainted heirlooms, just as he had the diadem, better they were gone, than lingered on in such a corrupted form.

'What do you know of the others?' Harry inquired curiously, suppressing his anger, though not completely enough to prevent the slight distortion of parseltongue from creeping into his speech.

The headmaster winced slightly, but answered regardless. 'The locket and the cup I have worked to locate with little luck until lately, but as for the fourth of his horcruxes; I believe his control over the serpent Nagini is too great for a simple familiar.' A slight smile adorned his lips. 'As you have no doubt noticed I have very little influence over my own.'

'Fawkes does seem a particularly free spirit,' Harry smiled, grateful for the humour and distraction.

'That he does,' Dumbledore sent an indulgent smile in the direction of the phoenix. He took his seat again, and Harry emulated him, sensing that their ventures into memory had come to a close for the time being.

'There will be other horcruxes,' the headmaster said slowly, 'ones I have not yet been able to identify as certainly as those two, but I am confident that together we will be able to discover and destroy them.'

Locket. Cup. Diadem. Diary. Nagini. Ring.

Harry's mental list was six long.

I know of all of them, he realised, relieved.

Now there was only the not so simple matter of finding and destroying them. Nagini at least would be easy to locate, for she rarely left her master's side, and Harry hoped, probably in vain, that she might be present when they clashed, and thus eliminated without raising suspicion.

'There are a handful of other memories I wish for you to see,' the headmaster revealed tiredly. 'Ones that will shed some light upon Voldemort's character itself, and the connection to the heritage he was so proud of, but for now, Harry, I'm sure you have enough to think about.'

'Thank you, sir,' Harry offered quietly.

'Thank you, Harry?'

'For sharing this with me,' his gratitude was calculated, 'you could have simply pursued them alone and left me in the dark, but I am glad that you have not. It is nice to be trusted.'

'Indeed it is, my boy,' the headmaster's smile was soft, 'indeed it is.'

Harry made his way slowly down the staircase and back to the common room; it was late, and after bidding Neville good night he head upstairs and closed the hangings around his bed.

Once he was sure that everyone knew he was asleep, he pulled the time-turner from within his robes and spun it once, twice, thrice, until it glowed bright, then the sand faded to fine, black dust.

The world blurred backwards regardless, but the slim chain was cold, its magic spent, and the turner itself clinked gently against the edge of the goblet he had tucked under his cloak.

Harry disillusioned himself, throwing his cloak over himself for good measure, and carefully silenced his footsteps, before retracing his steps back out of the tower, and heading for Snape's office.

I have destroyed the horcrux that Dumbledore has not found, he mused, and Dumbledore will hopefully locate the two that remain.

As long as Dumbledore lived long enough to discover them, or to point Harry in the right direction, then things would continue on track, but if Malfoy, or Snape, fulfilled their task, then he might never be able to find the remaining horcruxes.

'Professor?' Harry asked, knocking politely on the door, and discarding both his concealing charm and the cloak.

'Harry,' Snape drawled, 'to what do I owe the pleasure of your company at such a late hour, should you not be with the headmaster.'

I am, he smirked.

'I wanted to ask you a few questions about the Dark Mark,' Harry answered innocently.

'More questions,' Snape looked suspicious, and rightfully so. It was late, and an odd time for Harry to be coming to him with such concerns.

So the game begins, Harry though, concealing a smile.

'How is it given?' He asked with curiosity that wasn't entirely feigned. The knowledge might prove useful. 'Are there any restrictions on giving it? Do you have to be of a certain age? Or fairly powerful?' He pulled his most innocent face. 'Could he give it to someone of my age?'

'The Dark Lord marks those of certain value to him,' Snape explained, turning his chair to face Harry, and moving his glass of wine out of the way of his elbow. 'However there are no restrictions save the receiver being magical, and consciously, knowingly accepting it.'

'So those who bear it,' Harry leant forwards, 'know exactly what it entails, and what they have agreed to do?'

'They think they do,' Snape corrected warily. 'Even if they are misguided in their belief.'

'Either way they are far from innocent,' Harry decided. Dumbledore, then, was likely wasting his time trying to save Malfoy from his self, especially as it seemed he was risking his own life to do it.

He scratched his shoulder, using the motion to touch his wand tip to the goblet, disillusioning it, and pushing it down onto his lap.

'There are very few innocents,' Snape sneered. 'Naivety is common, innocence is not. There are naive Death Eaters, and naive Order members, but no innocent ones.'

'Least of all those who belong to both,' Harry remarked.

Snape's lips crooked and he inclined his head gently in agreement.

'I find it hard to believe that was your only reason for coming.' The spy eyed him curiously, and Harry caught his gaze, using the brief moment to set his hands, and the aconite smeared goblet on the table, placing it directly next to the identical one Snape was drinking from.

'It is not,' Harry conceded. 'I find myself with a dilemma,' he revealed with a small smile. 'I know a man who wears two faces, he smiles in two directions, and lies to both. I am forced to wonder if either are at all true.'

'A promise is only as good as the wizard or witch who makes it,' Snape answered enigmatically. 'A man with two faces might as well have three, or more.'

'And yet none would be true, and none could be trusted.'

'As long as he is necessary,' Snape's eyes gleamed with amusement, 'it would not matter.'

'And if he became redundant?' Harry raised an eyebrow, leaning back.

'Then he would find himself crushed between those he pretended to serve, no matter his true intentions.'

'I suppose, then,' Harry's smile turned slightly cool, 'that he best ensure he is always more useful alive, than dead.'

Snape inclined his head, smiling more widely than Harry had ever seen him. 'How fares your attempt to win over Slughorn?' He asked silkily.

'I have glimpsed another's successful efforts to do the same,' Harry smirked, enjoying the flicker of alarm in Snape's eyes. 'Sadly it conveyed no knowledge of potions upon me.'

'A shame,' Snape agreed calmly. 'I shall have to keep propping up your attempts, then.'

'I'm sure my mother would approve of your assistance,' Harry responded casually, and Snape's slight flinch was all the final proof he needed.

Pure intentions, he surmised, but no loyalty to anything but his revenge for a dead woman, and no way to convince him that my method is more likely to give that end than Dumbledore's will.

'I learnt an interesting thing today,' he continued, as if he had not come to a decision. 'Dumbledore showed me a memory about a young Tom Riddle, a name I'm sure you know.'

'Oh,' Snape drawled, clearly curious. 'And what did this young wizard do?'

'Nothing of great importance,' Harry lied, 'it was his manner that intrigued me. What do your… associates, think of death?'

'Many, if not most, consider it only as something they visit upon others,' Snape replied smoothly. 'Some, the more intelligent, fear its shadow in the form of the aurors of the Ministry, their master, Dumbledore... and you, but the Dark Lord believes himself beyond it, often he has spoken with quiet confidence of his overcoming of the last enemy.'

'The last enemy to be destroyed is death?'

'Yes,' Snape's eyes flickered up, 'those exact words, in fact. How do you know them?'

'They are a motto, a phrase held dear to a family Voldemort's illustrious ancestor once thought of great importance. I suspect he learnt them from the same place I once did.' A thought occurred to Harry, something that had not registered before, but now, now that he knew Voldemort so feared death, it was a possibility he could not ignore.

'Tell me,' Harry slipped his wand slowly from his to draw the Peverell coat of arms in purple flames upon the air, 'does this hold any meaning to you?' The unspoken or him was obvious.

Snape leant forward to inspect the simple symbol, and, taking his opportunity, Harry performed a simple switching spell, exchanging the blackberry wine in one goblet for the air in the other, and reversing the disillusionment spell upon the two to leave the full, poisoned goblet visible and the original concealed.

'No,' he decided slowly. 'The Dark Lord does not believe in children's tales.'

'Good,' Harry grinned.

'Should he?'

'I doubt he will find what he seeks if he does,' Harry answered. 'I do have another question, sir.'

'Ask away,' Snape said smoothly.

'What would I get if I added powdered root of asphodel to an infusion of wormwood?'

'You'd be perilously close to the draught of the living death,' Snape answered, and Harry silently vanished the invisible, original goblet.

'And what, professor, is the difference between monkshood, and wolfsbane?' He asked playfully.

The professor understood then, paling slightly at the implication, but acting as if he knew nothing, still confident he was more useful alive than dead. 'None,' Snape said dryly, 'they are the same plant.'

'A poisonous one also known as aconite,' Harry's smile curved in satisfaction at the spy's discomfort. 'I remember you asking me those questions right at the start of the first lesson you gave me; I'm sure you are glad to know that your students were listening.'

'You look like your father,' Snape admitted, surprisingly candid in his attempt to avoid acknowledging Malfoy's efforts to season Harry's meals. 'He and I… we did not see eye to eye, even before he married the girl I loved.' He regarded Harry cautiously, eyeing the wand that he still held. 'I have since learnt that there is precious little of James Potter about you.'

Harry twirled the wand in his fingers, then tucked it away again, and Snape relaxed ever so slightly.

'Professor Slughorn tells me constantly that I remind him of one of his old favourites,' Harry agreed, 'though I am not sure if I should feel flattered or insulted by the comparison.'

'He always was fond of Lily,' Snape muttered, then his sallow face drew itself into a frown as he realised the true comparison that was being made. 'Flattered, I think,' he decided with a dark smile. 'There are few wizards who feel like the Dark Lord. His presence is intoxicating, his magic is almost tangible, his charisma, and intelligence nearly unmatched, and danger clings to him like smoke. If there is a wizard that embodied the Dark Arts, it would be him.'

'Subtle, elegant, ever changing and deadly,' Harry recalled from Snape's lessons. 'If you wish to survive them, you must become as they are.'

'I am glad you are finally listening to my lessons,' Snape's lips curled, but it was trembling ever so slightly at the tension. He was aware of the little game they were playing, and trying, as hard as he could, not to reveal anything that might affect how useful he was to Harry, while attempting to figure out what Harry already knew, and knowing, all the while, that Harry was the one in control, and each answer might be the words that decided his fate. Snape could not move against Harry, not without angering both his masters, but Harry had no such issues.

'If I imbued myself with a drop of unicorn's blood, amongst other things, can you guess what it might do?' It was time to change the game, time to be a little less subtle, and give Snape one last chance to demonstrate that he cared about more than revenge for Harry's mother.

'It would act as a potent protection against harm,' Snape decided after a few moment's thought. 'With right accompaniments, and some use of magic the Ministry would be tempted to condemn you to Azkaban for, you would be immune to most poisons, or any similarly effective spells…' he trailed off.

'I would be,' Harry clarified, 'but imagine, if you will, that I am sitting in a hall filled with children, the naive, if not the innocent, and everything that I might touch, could also be touched them, those who are unprotected.'

'A tragedy might unfold,' Snape agreed quietly, but there was no flicker of emotion across his face, nothing in his eyes, and even the faintest touch of Harry's legilimency revealed no hint of feeling, only understanding, and apathy.

He knows, Harry realised, but he does not care.

'It is fortunate, then,' he continued, 'that no such tragedy has occurred.'

'Very,' Snape nodded, smiling ever so slightly. 'I must admit I was concerned, Professor Slughorn expressed some worry over missing ingredients, and I too have found some of my supply gone.'

'I'm sure the guilty party will be revealed,' Harry smiled.

'Are you?' Snape drawled, reaching, at last, for the goblet. 'You have an inkling of who to blame then?' He asked evenly, taking a long sip.

'I know exactly who is to blame, Snape,' Harry's voice lost all hint of politeness, the ice he had been holding within him from his meeting with Dumbledore released at last. The vast, dark eyes of the monster staring out with furious, swelling, hungry hate, teeth bared; a thousand needle-like fangs poised to devour the world.

Snape flinched, dropping the goblet, which shattered on the floor, spilling aconite laced wine across the stones.

His wand was in his palm seconds later.

'I cannot allow you to harm him,' he gritted out, 'go, before my vow forces me to act.'

'I have no intention of harming Malfoy,' Harry assured him, and Snape sighed with relief, tucking his wand away. 'He is likely to be as successful in killing his target as he has been in killing me,' Harry continued, as Snape's eyes flared in alarm. 'You're vow to help him should he fail, however, does worry me. You might succeed.'

'I can interpret the vow how I choose,' Snape promised.

'It doesn't matter,' Harry told him coldly.

The game is over.

'It doesn't matter?' Snape stared at him, confused, then cleared his throat, rubbing at his larynx. He tried again, looking concerned this time, but it didn't seem to help.

Suddenly he doubled over in his chair wracked and convulsed with deep, wet, hacking coughs, spitting flecks of bloodstained foam onto the table in front of him, and clawing and clutching at his chest in pain.

'No,' Harry watched his futile struggle without moving, 'it does not.'

'Aconite,' he realised, gasping his words between spatters of crimson tainted foam. 'How… ironic.'

'Ironic?' Harry raised an eyebrow. 'Malfoy has stolen more than enough to take the blame, and Dumbledore believes the two of you were arguing, as will the school. My part in this will never even be suspected, given I am sitting with the headmaster at this very moment.' He briefly pulled the gold chain around his neck to display the time-turner.

Snape pushed himself off his chair, staggering a couple of paces before collapsing onto the floor, and crawling desperately towards the chest of drawers on the far side of the room, and Harry spied a section labelled bezoars there.

He rose, stepping swiftly around the coughing wizard, and placed a foot on his outstretched hand before he could reach his salvation.

Snape looked up at him, pupils dilated, and face pale, staring at him as if he was truly seeing Harry for the first time; there was horrified disbelief in the man's dark eyes, and Harry's instinctive legilimency revealed Snape's horror at what Lily's child had become before he slumped down onto the floor, breathing light and fast as the poison claimed him.

'Lily's eyes,' he whispered hoarsely into the stone floor, 'were never that cold.'

Even now he only thinks of the woman he loved, Harry thought, his smile twisting from satisfied to sad.

He removed his foot from Snape's wrist, flipping him over onto his back, and pinning him down as the wizard's body trembled on the threshold of death.

Would I die like this? He wondered.

Harry knew the answer, knew how he would die if he could see it coming. He would go fighting, struggling with all he had against the nothingness he feared until his final hope had faded, but his last thoughts, those that came when he knew he had failed, would always be for Fleur.

He thrust out one hand behind him, summoning, without words or wand, a bezoar from the drawer, and stuffed it into the mouth of the man who had betrayed his parents. Snape's breathing slowed into a gentle, peaceful rhythm, but he remained unconscious.

He is too like me, Harry decided. I cannot kill the man I could so easily become.

And it was obvious to him at last what had made Snape into this ruin of a wizard. The bitterness, the apathy, the hollow, cruel, shell-like shadow of the young wizard he once was were all that remained of anyone when the only people who mattered to them were torn away.

He does not deserve to die, but he cannot remain here.

'Gemino,' he muttered, conjuring a perfect, but inanimate copy of Snape, then, vanishing the remnants of the poisoned wine and goblet, he took a pinch of Floo Powder. Disillusioning all three of them, and hauling Snape, and his corpse double with him he chose a destination.

'Borgin and Burke's,' he commanded, then disappeared into the whirling green flames.

The shop was empty, and closed, covered with anti-apparition wards, and more, but Harry knew how to break them, and he tore them apart with ease, marvelling, as he did, at how easy something that most wizards could not hope to manage had become. The anti-apparition wards shattered like thin ice underfoot as his magic swirled, practically visible, through the shop in a brilliant, burning aura of power that melted, warped and ruined the artefacts around him, and set fire to the handful of wands on the closest shelf.

He dropped Snape and the body in the small copse of elm trees, uncaring of the damage he had dealt to the store on Knockturn Alley, and sent his patronus to alert Fleur to his return.

'Where are we?' Snape rasped, rolling over to stare at Harry. He had awoken more swiftly than expected, evidently he had built up some immunity to the poison, even if it had not been enough to resist the huge dose Harry had slipped him.

'My home,' Harry answered, 'you will not be able to find it again, given it is under the Fidelius, and you do not know the secret.'

'I am still alive.' Snape sounded quite surprised, and not particularly thrilled.

'Yes, you are,' Harry agreed softly.

'I did not realise you were capable of such compassion.'

'You reminded me of myself, so devoted to the woman you loved,' Harry admitted softly. 'If you had not, I would have killed you like I intended.'

Snape frowned, pulling himself up into sitting position.

'What did I do wrong?' He asked after a moment. 'I thought for sure that you needed me alive, more than dead.'

'I can persuade Slughorn without your help, now,' Harry said calmly, not revealing the real reason. 'You are inconveniently perceptive, cunning, and serve two masters I distrust. Your death weakens both Dumbledore, and Voldemort, while strengthening me.'

'So what now?' Snape demanded. 'If we go back, we will be playing the same game again.'

'Only I am going back,' Harry decided.

'And me?' Snape gave him an incredulous stare. 'If you are not going to kill me, what will you do?'

'You are leaving,' Harry instructed. 'Your part in this is done.'

'My vows will not allow me to,' Snape shook his head almost in disappointment at Harry's simple resolution. 'I have made promises to follow the orders of both Voldemort and Dumbledore.'

'He demanded an oath too?' Harry asked, spying Fleur leaving the house at the far side of the field.

'I swore a more vague one to Dumbledore, to allow me to still serve Voldemort and play spy, but such a vow to you would be useless at best.'

'Does the Dark Mark show if you are alive?' Harry asked.

'No,' Snape answered, suddenly attentive, and staring with avid interest at the limp replica of himself still lying on the ground before them.

'Nobody gives orders to dead men,' Harry suggested.

'That might work,' Snape agreed softly, 'if I wanted to leave and disappear.'

'I will have a vow from you,' Harry told him, 'and when I am sure you cannot obstruct me, I will let you go from here to wherever you wish.'

'Who is this?' Fleur asked quietly, stepping close behind Harry. 'Snape,' she answered her own question. 'Why is he here?'

'I do not want to kill him,' Harry answered earnestly, 'but he cannot remain here, his vows make him too dangerous to us.'

'So you brought him here?' Fleur's voice rose an octave.

'He does not know the secret,' Harry reminded her, 'so he will not remember.'

'Miss Delacour,' Snape inclined his head politely. 'Lily would have liked you, from what I know.'

Fleur shared a glance with Harry, surprised that he made no response.

'Time for your vow,' Harry said simply, and Fleur, realising her part in this, withdrew her wand.

Snape, knowing he had no other choice, joined hands with Harry.

'Do you, Severus Snape, swear to never use your given name again?' Harry began, thinking furiously through all the possible avenues. He could not leave a single route for the wizard before him to explore, because Snape was capable offending and exploiting any loopholes.

'I do,' the former professor's face was unreadable, and a thin tongue of white fire enveloped their wrists.

'Do you swear to leave Britain, and to never return to its shores?'

'I do.' There was a second tongue of flame.

'Do you swear to never contact either Tom Marvolo Riddle, also known as Voldemort, or Albus Dumbledore, or any of their associates again while either of them live?'

'I do,' Snape answered, swallowing hard as a third line of fire looped around their wrists.

'Do you swear to take no action to harm Harry Potter, or anyone that he is associated with?'

'I do.' Snape's eyes gleamed with approval. He clearly appreciated the cautious approach Harry was taking.

'His death,' Fleur reminded him gently.

'Do you swear to never reveal the truth of your identity to anyone, in any manner, and to take any acceptable steps to prevent it from occurring?' Harry smiled his thanks at Fleur, who blinked fondly at him in response.

'I do.'

'Then that is all I require of you,' Harry said.

'I want an oath from you,' Snape demanded.

'You are in no place to make demands,' Fleur pointed out icily.

'Do you, Harry Potter,' Snape said, ignoring Fleur, 'swear to do your utmost to destroy the wizard who brought about your mother's death?'

'I do,' Harry said, lips curving. Snape was not thinking clearly, or he might have realised that Harry could interpret that as several different people, one of whom he had already killed.

A final sliver of flame wreathed their wrists, then the oath was done, and Snape leant back against a tree, more casual than Harry had ever seen him.

'What now?' He asked.

'I disfigure that body beyond recognition, and return it with your wand to Hogsmeade under the Dark Mark,' Harry replied. 'You disappear, and we never speak again.'

'Dumbledore will mourn the loss of the spy Voldemort finally discovered, and Voldemort will attribute another kill to your name,' Snape deduced smoothly. 'Neither side will suspect I live, and as long as that is true, then there are only two vows that bind me.'

'Your vow to Narcissa Malfoy relies on Malfoy failing his task,' Harry said. 'He cannot truly fail until he has died in the attempt, or placed himself in a position where he can no longer try. I will remove the memories of your life until now, if you wish it.'

Snape's lips twitched at Harry's twisted suggestion of mercy. 'I might not deserve to die in your eyes,' he said softly, 'but I do not deserve the freedom and bliss of forgetting what I have caused. Lily's memory should remain with me forever.'

'Then there is nothing else to say unless you have anything to add.'

Snape considered this quietly for a long moment.

'Make sure Malfoy's attempts do not succeed until he is released from the mission or dead,' Snape advised. 'Dumbledore will not live long without my potion, though I have brewed an ample supply for now, and I believe he intends his death to the event that will direct you back to the path he wants you on.'

'I will,' Harry lied. He did not care whether Malfoy succeeded or not, but he doubted he would even come close to killing Dumbledore before he died from the withering curse. Harry was even more sceptical that Dumbledore's death would suddenly give him the desire to die for so many people that meant nothing to him, but he didn't voice that sentiment either.

'Auf wiedersehen, Harry,' Snape murmured quietly, taking one long, last look at the final view of Britain he would ever have. Evidently his destination was Germany, or so Harry assumed from his chosen farewell. Snape was not one to choose his words lightly. 'Do better by Fleur than I did by Lily,' he added softly, glancing at the beautiful, silver haired veela who stood at Harry's side.

Snape dropped his wand onto the ground by the body, watching it roll across the dirt for a moment, then apparated away with soft crack.

AN: Please read and review, thanks to everyone that does!