Disclaimer: I own only the obvious, the rest belongs to JK Rowling.

Authors Note: Thanks for all the reviews. Here's chapter six. Hope you enjoy.

-Chapter Six-

Severus waited impatiently for Tiaret Ade to go to bed. He needed to have a loooooooong chat with Potter, as much as he hated admitting it. What was the brat hiding? What was the deal with his blood? Who was this Ignatus? What was this Bonding-deal the two of them constantly were talking about? And what was their next step going to be? This all needed to be discussed without a female Slayer who had enough problems to last her a lifetime, present.

 "So, Harry, what are the two of you going to do next?" Ade asked.

Well, so much for the no-female-Slayers-allowed rule.

 "I'm not too sure," Potter replied. "I was thinking of going to Hogwarts and seek out Dumbledores advice."

 "Hmmm, that might be your best choice of action; that is, if our resident Potion Master has nothing to add?" she turned to him, her brown eyes calculating.

 "If it hadn't been for the fact that Malfoy would expect us to run to the Headmaster, I'm sure it would've been a magnificent idea." Severus replied smoothly from his place in the couch, looking up from the book he was reading. 'The Order Headquarters are out of the question as well.' He added silently, hoping that Potter would catch on to the meaningful look he sent him.

The brat, it seemed, was either smarter than he looked; or had one of those once-in-a-lifetime-genius-moments that Albus Dumbledore was so infamous for. 

 "Yes, that is a point." The young man said thoughtfully. "I guess we can't do anything until the Death Eaters pull their next move."

 "Or you can cheat." The voice came from the corridor leading to the front door of the apartment. Severus looked up and met a pair of ancient, unnatural, blue-grey eyes that studied him critically for a while, before softening as the Old Vampire smiled. Severus wasn't impressed, nor was he going to let his guard down.

The vampire in front of him chuckled. //Fine, if you want to play it that way fledgling.//

He wasn't surprised that the blonde man had the gift of Telepathy. If Ades tale was right – her description on Ignatus had been quite colourful – then this vampire was over 2000 years old.

Ignatus turned to see Tiaret glaring murderously at him, and Potter watching him with a blank look on his face. It really wasn't a look that fit Potter; it made him look much like Voldemort had in his younger days, before he turned into a snakefaced monster.

 "Ah, my dear Lioness," the Old Vampire greeted the female Slayer. "Always a pleasure to meet up with you, though we really have to stop meeting for such grave situations."

 "What the bloody hell are you doing here, you pompous windbag?!" the girl yelled. "And didn't I tell you to knock first and then enter?" she seemed quite flushed about something or other.

Potter adapted a truly evil smirk. "Care to tell us what happened Ti?"

 "No, not really." Ade turned quickly to the Old Vampire. "And don't you even dare to open your mouth."

Ignatus just smiled secretly.

Having enough of being overlooked, Severus decided to step into the conversation. He had to be careful while talking to the ancient vampire. Some of the Old Ones tended to develop a hate towards vampires under 500 years; and since Snape himself only had been a vampire for about two years, he was definitely on the black list.

 "If I may ask, what did you mean by the 'or you can cheat' comment?" he asked as politely as he could. He really hated to submit to people, but he didn't want to die without at least taking Malfoy down with him.

Ignatus mentioned to the two Slayers to come and join them as he sat down in an armchair opposite Severus. "There are certain ways of avoiding Death Eaters that not many people – mortal or immortal – know about. Take us Old Vampires. How do you think we hide from the fledglings who are crazy enough to try to capture us and drink our blood? We have two options. First option is to live together in a big group, but that'd bring the Slayer Organisation on our necks. The second option – and most preferred choice of hiding for most Old Vampires – is to simply make the younger vampires ignore us."

 "Like a Concealment Charm." Potter noted.

 "Almost, but not quite. They see us and they feel our power, but their brain doesn't register what they feel or see; just pushes it away is if we were normal mortals, or an hour-old fledging."

 "I fail to see how this could help Harry and Severus." Tiaret said.

 "We walk amongst them as if nothing was wrong," Ignatus continued, seemingly ignoring the woman's comment. "Why don't you do the same?"

 "If we could, Ignatus, we would." Potter replied calmly.

 "But you can."

Severus looked suspiciously at the old creature sitting at the other side of the coffee table. "How could we accomplish that?" he asked. "We aren't ancient vampires, and the Death Eaters will easily see through any Charm."

The Old Vampire looked amused for some reason or other. In his opinion, that was definitely not a good thing. Dumbledore had had the same look when he was about to reveal one of his ingenious plans; take the Yule Ball in Potters fourth year. A complete disaster. He was going to end up doing things that he was going to regret later. He just knew it.

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 "Old Vampires have the ability to hide others in the same manner if we so choose." Ignatus watched in amusement as the other three began to understand. He looked closely at each of them.

First there was his beloved Tiaret who was fighting the Bonding with tooth and claw. She really lived up to her name. She harboured such a strong sisterly love for the young Mr Potter, that it had been the decisive thing to make him meddle once again into mortal affairs, even if he had wowed never to go down that path again after what had happened last time.        

Then there was Mr Potter himself. The man was an exceptionally powerful wizard already, and add to that the Blood he harboured, and you had a creature almost impossible to beat. How the Blood had ended up inside the boy, was still a mystery to him – one he did intend to solve, but still a mystery.

And last you had the young fledgling. A suspicious, cunning Slytherin who hated everyone and everything, and most of the time loved to scare people out of their wits. How the man loved his Potion-making; the simmering cauldron, the cutting and preparing of the ingredients, then mixing the whole thing together. But it left him lonely, isolated from the world. There was a longing in him that Severus himself didn't know about.   

Perhaps he should have begun to meddle long before now. The Potion Master and the Boy Who Lived had no idea what had happened between them while they had been captured by the Kali-worshipers. Both were made of the same strong stuff that gave a vampire that will to survive through countless centuries; the making of real immortals, just like Tiaret.

What a weird mix of people they were.

 "So, what you're saying is that you'd be willing to help us?" Tiaret asked suspiciously.

 "Of course I'm willing to help you. I have a debt to repay to Mr Potter," Ignatus replied. "But I alone cannot hide the three of you at the same time. We'll need the help of the other ancients."

 "You mean that the Old Vampires aren't on Malfoys side?" Harry was slightly surprised.

 "Certainly not. We remember what happened last time we got involved with the wrong side. Albus Dumbledore blasted Grindelwald to the seventh hell!"

Severus Snape looked at him; trying to see through his motive of doing this. Would Slytherins ever learn that not everything was motivated by something else?

 "When are the rest of you going to meet up with us then?"

 "They should be here by tomorrow night, my dear," the Old Vampire said turning to the female Slayer. "Nothing to worry about; we're way past the stage of craving mortal blood. Though I must warn you about Connor. He's a bit… grumpy most of the time; kind of like that retired Auror of yours, Mad-Eye Moody."

 "God! Not another Moody!"

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Severus looked at Ade. The woman was banging her head on the table, mumbling something about overly paranoid people who cursed everything that moved. Potter was currently trying to convince her to stop banging her head, arguing that it wasn't going to make it better if she had a headache as well when she met him. Ignatus was just sitting there, watching him.

Trust Potter to have the weirdest kind of friends.

How he always ended up with the maniacs was beyond him.

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The rest of the time until dawn was used to roughly plan a few ways to get to Dumbledore, and what to do when – or if they got there.

Ignatus left half an hour before the sun would rise, leaving Severus together with Potter and Ade. The female Slayer said goodnight, and went to bed shortly after that.

This was a perfect chance for the Potion Master to talk to Potter, and clear up all this Blood and Bonding business.

Severus found the young man sitting in the kitchen, drinking coffee and watching the sun rise over the rooftops.

 "Anything on your mind, Snape?" the brat asked without looking up.

 "I have a couple of questions for you, and you'd better answer them." Severus replied as he sat down beside Potter.

 "Threatening me?"

 "No, advising you," he said smoothly.

Potter turned to him and looked him up and down. "Shoot." He said.

 "First of all, what's this Bonding thing? Both you and Ade have mentioned it several times."

 "When a vampire drinks someone's blood but lets the person live, they become Bonded in a way. I'm not exactly sure how it works, but in the end the vampire and the mortal end up in a sexual relationship. Most of the time the mortal one of the two becomes immortal so that they can spend the rest of eternity together." Potter looked back at him. "Of course, at times the immortal turns mortal again."

Severus thought over it for a few minutes. The vampire who had made him had had some time to tell him enough about the vampiric nature to survive in the world; the man had also mentioned something like that. The Bonding – according to the vampire – would occur when it was time for it to, and no one could do anything about it.

 "Then what is all this blood-talk?"

 "We're not sure yet," Potter looked extremely thoughtful. "It seems as though I have an endless amount of blood in my body. I can't bleed to death, and no vampire can kill me by drinking my blood. You should've seen the Dark Lords face first time that happened. Quite hilarious."

 "So, you have this endless amount of blood, no one can bleed you to death, and you have no idea what causes this?" the Potion Master asked.

 "You got it. We've been through the library in the Slayer Organisations HQs, and I've been trying to find the answer in the Orders HQ whenever I've had the time." The Brat Who Lived glared at him. "You can't tell anyone about this. If any other vampires find out, I'm dead meat."

What a wonderful way to blackmail Potter. Severus smirked evilly to the obnoxious brat. That particular smirk had made Ministers quiver at what might happen, but Potter just continued to glare. The unnaturally green eyes pierced his walls, and it felt like they were looking into his soul. His smirk slowly disappeared. 

They glared at each other, both refusing to give up or submit to the others will. 

It felt like he was X-rayed. The whelps stare was piercing to the bone. However, Severus refused to give up. The obnoxious little idiot was not going to get the best of him; even if he was rather cute when he was angry.

He did not just think that.

Did he?

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Harry glared at his former Professor. How dare the greasy git even think about blackmailing him! Weren't they supposed to be on the same side in this stupid war? If this kept up he was either going to end up killing the vampire, or jumping off the Eiffel Tower in a suicide attempt. Since he didn't want to give Snape the satisfaction of watching him plunge to his death, the first option was most likely to be used.

God, how he hated Snape! The man was third on his hit-list, right after Malfoy and Pettigrew.

And now the vampire just sat there glaring at him. Well, he'd be damned if he gave in to the Potion Freak. A damn good Potion Freak, but still a freak.

Those coal-black, bottomless eyes seemed to draw him in, promising the answer to all the worlds secrets. Now he understood how vampires managed to hypnotize their prey.

Hold it! That trick had never worked on him before. What was going on? 

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There. Finally done! Sorry for the long wait. Please review.

Thanks to:

Forgotten Loss: Thanks, and hope you enjoy this as well.

Deity: Hope you like it.

Phoenix Angel: All in due time, and thanks for the compliments.

jadeite: Everything will be cleared soon enough.

Sev Rickman: I'm glad you liked it. The Blood will be explained within the next few chapters I think.

wittchway: Thanks!

Sygirl:VALOR: Hope you like this chapter as well.

Sandra Solaria Dees: Hope this is enough Sev for your taste.

izean: Thanks.

Jester also known as Tidmag: Hope you like this chapter as well, and thanks for the compliments.

Aurelius: Thanks!

Tara-Chan: I'll explain it as soon as I myself know what the deal with the Blood is.

Iani Arcilla: Yep! Best books in the world! And I haven't given up, just not much time to write.

Water Fire Girl: Thanks!

J. Lynn: Thanks, and here's more!