Let's do it Right This Time, Chapter 25
AN: This chapter is dedicated to Wolf of the secret Flame for inspiring me. Also, I offer the obligatory disclaimer: I own only my own plot and word choice. Remember my poll, and don't forget to review. Please? Also, thanks to everyone who did review, because I'm now past the 200 review mark. Yay!
Aurelius Gaunt felt as though his head was going to crack open like an egg. Everything hurt; his muscles were aching with magical exhaustion, and he could barely breathe with the brutal legillimancy attack.
Sirius Black, struck by a stunner, falling backwards through the veil as he screamed his name. Teddy Lupin, pressed down by a pair of aurors while Umbitch smiled smugly and cast the killing curse. Umbridge again, but this time it was his fifth year, and she was making him write with the blood quill. Quirrelmort, in the room with the Mirror of Erised, hissing "where is it!" Dumbledore toppling backwards from the Astronomy tower as Snape's killing curse struck him. Aurelius tried to fend Snape off, but couldn't. Remus Lupin in the Forbidden Forest, fur sprouting and face twisting into a snout as the full moon rose. The basilisk, blood still leaking from blinded eyes as it chased him though the Chamber of Secrets while he tried desperately to land a blow on it with the sword of Gryffindor. The Time Room in the Department of Mysteries, Rabastan Lestrange getting one of the enchanted jars on his head and having it shrink to infancy, mature, and shrink again in a sickening cycle, while the children ran, crashing through racks of timeturners as they went. Tom Riddle, writhing and fading as Harry rammed the basilisk's fang into the horcrux diary. The cauldron of polyjuice bubbling away in Moaning Myrtle's boarded up bathroom. Voldemort rising amid sheets of steam after the third task, while a snivelling Pettigrew lay by the base of the cauldron. Ginny Weasley, sobbing over the wreakage of their anniversary dinner."But y-you never loved me! It was all amor-amor-amortentia!"
Now Snape was trying to withdraw from his mind. If he had done so from the beginning, Aurelius might have let him. As it was, he was exhausted, in pain, and humiliated, and he slammed down his mental walls instead, trapping Snape inside his kaleidoscope of a mind, shoving memories at him. If Snape wanted to see his memories, let him see them!
The fight with Draco Malfoy in Moaning Myrtle's bathroom, when Draco threw the crucitus and he cast sectumsembra. Snape bleeding out in the Shrieking Shack as Voldemort turned on his heel and left. He could feel Snape trying to pull out again, harder, but after a supreme struggle he managed to pull him back into his mind and use reverse legillimancy to ram more memories into into his mind.
The vision of Nagini devouring Charity Burbage. Lily Potter screaming "Not Harry, please not Harry!" Snape, in Dumbledore's office, holding a goblet of thick golden fluid expostulating with him "And my soul? What of mine?" Dobby with a kitchen cleaver in his chest. Voldemort's high, thin voice screaming "Kill the spare!" and Cedric Diggory collapsing, eyes blank and lifeless. The terrible occlumensy lessons in his fifth year, Snape snarling "Get up and try again. Or do you think the Dark Lord will give you a chance to catch your breath?"
And then Aurelius, even through his exhaustion, smirked as he brought up yet another memory. Serve Snape right for messing around in his head.
He and James Potter in his old apartment in the other timeline, screaming at each other, the shimmering invisibility cloak lying like a carcass between them. "You ought to be grateful. At least you're not Snivellus's son!"
"I wish I was, you son of a bitch! The man may have been a bastard but he did more for the Wizarding World in one year than you did in your entire miserable life, and died for it, too, all while you sat back on your arse eating bonbons with your new pureblood wife!"
And that was when Snape toppled backwards in a dead faint.
Aurelius certainly hadn't expected it of him, and at any other time he might even have laughed. As it was, Aurelius had to simply sit there for approximately half a minute, trying to fight the pain and the nausea. Then he straightened, head still swimming, and realized that Snape had literally fainted across the coffee table, and was simply lying there, blood trickling from his nose with the force of both the reverse legillimancy and possibly a concussion. Aurelius took a moment to smirk at this- serve the bastard right- and then reluctantly eased him onto the sofa and conjured a moist cloth; he was not one to let anyone suffer. He did, however, cast an adapted binding charm to keep him in place, and removed his wand, dagger, and secret potions stores.
It took fully half an hour for his ministrations to produce any effect. At last the Potions Master groaned and shuddered, trying to sit up, and immediately fell back again as the ropes wrapped around him more closely. "Gaunt...?" he rasped.
"Severus Tobias Snape," Aurelius snapped, rubbing his temples, as he still had a headache. "You are very lucky that I have some marginal respect and personal regard for you, and that I happened to be magically drained when you tried that little stunt."
Snape stared at him, eyes slightly glassy, and Aurelius figured that he was probably still in shock or concussed. "What?" he asked at last.
"An illegal legillimancy attack on a minor is the surest way to get yourself stuck in Azkaban, especially with your tacky little tattoo. Not to mention that I could just take care of you myself." He smirked; it wouldn't hurt to give the professor a bit of a scare, not after what he had just done. Especially since Aurelius was still carrying around the emotional baggage of a previous lifetime. "So would you rather take a vow or be obliviated? Or both, I could do that to..."
"Mr. Gaunt," Snape rasped.
"No, you listen to me!" Aurelius snapped. "I trusted you to at least not question me until I was healed. You betrayed that trust. There is very little stopping me from transfiguring you into something so mundane that no one will ever find you, and then replacing you with a golemn." Well, there was, but Snape didn't have to know that just yet.
Snape struggled futily with the bindings, his already pale face nearly white. "I...apologiz-"
"Don't." Aurelius told him harshly. "It's cowardly to apologize with no intention of changing anything. I want an oath on your magic before anything else happens here."
"I would need access to a wand," Snape protested hoarsely.
"Do you take me for a fool? I know you're quite talented in wandless magic, Snape, even if active magic were required in a Wizards' Oath. Repeat after me: I, Severus Tobias Snape swear upon my life and magic to keep the secrets of Aurelius Gaunt as long as Tom Riddle remains alive and Albus Dumbledore remains alive and unpunished, unless under severe duress or to those who already know said secrets and to never to intentionally work against him in matters of consequence unless under duress or in self defense."
"An if I don't?"
"Then I will obliviate you, and believe me, I can do it. Not even an occlumens like yourself could recover those memories when I am done with you. So hurry up," and Aurelius.
Snape swallowed hard and then at length echoed the oath haltingly, pausing occasionally for prompting as to the direct wording; it was clear that he felt that there was no other way. Magic pulsed as he completed his oath.
Aurelius relaxed at once, waving his hand to release the body-bind. "Right. Thank you. Now would you mind telling me where you keep your damn headache relievers?"
Snape, who had scrambled up the instant he had been released and had summoned his wand, probably in preparation for attack, was back to staring at him as though Aurelius were a puzzle that he couldn't figure out. "Now that I have sworn a vow, there had better be explanations," he demanded. "And you can start by telling me who you really are, because you're definitely not a first year."
Aurelius Gaunt studied him for a long moment, thinking. Snape deserved to know the truth, and he would also make a good ally, but Aurelius was still very angry at him, even more so because of the events of the other timeline, and the petty part of him wanted just to let him suffer. But at last the rapidly diminishing rational portion of his brain took control. "It's a very very long story. And I think it'd help if I showed you first." And he slowly, ever so slowly, unlatched his glamorie watch and let it fall, still ticking, into his lap.
Long blonde curls melted into messy black waves of hair. Wide violet eyes turned emerald green. Elegant features turned more rounded and babyish. Snape gave a little gasp. And that was when Aurelius began his story.
"I was Gryffindor's shining star the first time around," he said. Snape mouthed "first time around?" but said nothing, and so Aurelius went on. "I didn't know anything about magic until my Hogwarts letter came, despite being a halfblood, and I took everything at face value, including Dumbledore, which got me into a great deal of trouble. And I wasn't too concerned with rules, or my own safety, because I had been abused. My first year, I took it upon myself to defend the Philosopher's Stone, and ended up killing Quirrell, although he was possessed at the time so it was sort of self defense. And did I mention the troll my friends and I clobbered in a bathroom? I can kind of see now why you were always so mad at me." He grinned wryly at that.
"My second year," he continued, "my best friend's baby sister got a hold of a dark artifact Voldie had made when he was sixteen and possessed, and she released the basilisk in the Chamber of Secrets. Since I'm a parcelmouth everyone thought I did it, never mind that I both A. had a muggleborn best friend and B. was trying to figure out a way to stop it. So all these children were getting petrified, we had a DADA teacher whose idea of a class was releasing a whole lot of Cornish pixies for us to catch and then hiding under a desk, and some mysterious monster was slithering through the pipes. Oh, and we were brewing polyjuice, by ourselves in a boarded-up bathroom on our off hours because we were hoping to try to infiltrate the Slytherin common room in out spare time." He barked a laugh. Snape seemed transfixed.
"So then the possessed girl was brought into the Chamber itself, and I and her brother went like the idiot Gryffindors we were to save her. We'd learned a little something from last time, so this time we got a teacher, too. The only problem was that it was our idiotic defense teacher and we had only one working wand between us. Honestly, the only smart decision we made was to shove Lockhart down the passage first. So we went into the Chamber. Lockhart tried to obliviate us and run to absolve himself of any responsibility but the problem was that he used my friend's broken wand, which blew up, destroying his mind and half the tunnel and separating my friend and I. So I went down there alone, without even a way to contact anyone if I were to die and wondering what could be down there, because sweet Merlin, it's Slytherin's monster and it petrified people...I dunno, maybe it's a bloody chihuahua? I was really stupid back then."
Snape gave a little choking laugh.
"So I went all the way into the Chamber and saw the girl just lying there, and so I stupidly dropped my wand and ran to check on her. Voldie, who'd by this time attained a corporal form, have me a stereotypical supervillain monologue and then sicced the basilisk on me. So I was running around without my wand or the hope of backup, dodging between columns while this damn thing with venom, fangs, and a bad attitude was coming at me, and I probably would have died if Dumbledore's phoenix hadn't mysteriously showed up, along with the Sorting Hat. So while Fawkes pecked out the basilisk's eyes, I somehow managed to pull Gryffindor's Sword out of the hat. So then I took on a sixty-foot death snake with a sword and killed it, getting bitten in the process. So then Fawkes saves me, I used a fang wrenched out of the basilisk's mouth to destroy the dark artifact and then we all live happily ever after. Well, except for Lockhart who had no memories whatsoever. But he kind of brought that one on himself. And don't forget the Malfoys' eccentric house elf, the giant nest of acromantula, and the flying sentient Ford Anglia."
"Flying sentient Ford Anglia?" Snape managed.
"Oh, yeah, Ron Weasley's dad had a Ford Anglia he'd experimented on. It sort of looked like Chitty Chitty Bang Bang."
A dark eyebrow went up.
"A car from a muggle movie," Aurelius explained and went on.
"Third year was pretty tame in comparison. All we had to contend with was dementors stationed at Hogwarts, the werewolf DADA teacher who forgot his Wolfsbane just when we needed his help and my escaped murderer of a godfather. And, of course, the animagus Death Muncher masquerading as my friend's pet rat. And my friend (well, actually she was being paid to be friends with me by Dumbledore- with my money- but who's counting) had a time turner which she used to get to classes on time and study and also help free recaptured convicts and condemned hippogriffs."
Snape's mouth had began gaping rather unattractively somewhere in the middle of this narrative, but Aurelius hadn't noticed it until now.
"My fourth year," Aurelius went on, "some of the more zealous and drunk Death Munchers started a riot at the world cup which caused a number of problems. Later that year, the Triwizard Tournament was revived and I was entered as an illegal fourth champion. The DADA teacher for that year turned out to be Barty Crouch Jr. polyjuiced as Mad-Eye Moody and he not only confounded the Goblet of Fire to make me a champion but also managed to slip me a portkey straight to Voldie. I was then forcibly used in a resurrection ritual to reimbody him. Then he summoned all his Death Munchers for the usual monologue and testing of new torture curses. Luckily my wand was a brother wand to his, and when we fought it initiated prior incantem and I got away.
"The summer of fifth year this bitch from the ministry sent dementors after me in my home in a muggle town and then dragged me up on charges of improper use of magic when I tried to defend myself and my muggle cousin. They didn't expel me, but they tried. It almost would have been better if they had expelled me, though, because said ministry flunkie was also our DADA teacher that year, and since the ministry and the Daily Prophet were touting the conspiracy theory that Voldie was not back at all, instead I was insane and Dumbledore was trying to take over the ministry in some roundabout way or was possibly senile or both, she not only targeted me and made me do lines with a blood quill in detention but also refused to teach anything except theory, even to the OWL and NEWT year students. And I kept having visions Dumbledore refused to explain. Oh, yeah, and you were supposed to be teaching me occlumensy."
Snape's head jerked up at that.
"I wasn't a good student and you weren't explaining even so much as what occlumensy was so I just kept getting visions and finally Voldie figured out a way to send me a fake one about my godfather being tortured. So I rushed off to the ministry with several friends on thestrals only two of us could see and we broke into the Department of Mysteries. I would say like Gryffindors, but one of us was a Ravenclaw. We smashed a bunch of timeturners, utterly destroyed the Space Room, and wiped the floor with a couple of Death Eaters before reinforcements came for both sides and we realized it was a fake vision and that Voldie just wanted me to collect something for him from the Prophecy Room. My godfather fell through the Veil of Death, the ministry finally acknowledged that Voldie was actually back and Dumbledore said 'Oh by the way, you're the Chosen One and you have to kill Voldie or die.' I was so mad...if he'd only told me that...I don't know, first year?!"
Snape was wide-eyed, evidently putting the pieces together.
"Sixth year Dumbledore got cursed by a dark artifact and blackmailed you into killing him to improve your status as a spy, which caused an enormous mess in the ranks of the Light. That was also the year when Dumbledore finally mentioned that Voldie had made multiple ! horcruxes."
"There was no seventh year for me; the ministry was taken down and filled with Death Munchers and people like that bitch Umbridge, muggleborns were being stuck in concentration camps for the crime of "stealing magic" and the Carrows were teachers at Hogwarts, with you as headmaster and Bellatrix as deputy."
Snape choked.
"So two of my friends and I spent the year camping around the country, destroying horcruxes, breaking into Gringotts and escaping on dragonback and running from Death Munchers and Snatchers. Finally we went back to Hogwarts for the final battle, you gave me some memories and I learned Dumbledore had been raising me to die at the right moment, because I was one of Riddle's horcruxes. I died, I came back, Neville Longbottom killed Riddle's big-ass snake and I had the usual pissing contest with Voldemort before he tried to kill me with my wand and it sent the curse back at him. So he died. Finally. And it should have been over, but two years later I lost everything, again, learned that James Bloody Potter was not only alive he was a little piece of thestral excrement who'd used a love potion on mum, learned that Dumbledore had been using me all along while he had both hands in my vaults, and used a less than legal ritual to go back in time. It didn't quite work as expected though..." he trailed off.
Aurelius had never before seen Snape actually at a loss for words before. At last, voice unusually wavery, he managed: "you expect me to believe all that?"
Aurelius drew his wand. "I, Aurelius Sirius Severus Gaunt swear upon my life and magic that all which I have just disclosed is the truth, that I was born Harry James Potter, and" (on an impulse) "that I do not mean you any harm. Lumos. Nox."
Snape slumped back against the couch. For a long time he was completely silent. Then, at last, he summoned a bottle of firewhiskey with a swipe of his hand. "What are you going to do now?" he asked shakily, pouring himself a glass. He paused, then snorted and passed another to Aurelius with a muttered "you're not exactly a student" and then went back to staring at his own glass. "And what do you want me to do?"