A Season for Healing

By Dien

Summary and disclaimer in part one.

Rating: The series overall has an adult rating due to the Severus/Harry plotline... This part is PG.

Notes:

Continual thanks to lovely beta Nyarth. Everyone: GO READ HER STUFF! She's in my Favorite Authors. Go! Go! *but finish this first*

At least four people guessed what would happen next. I feel... sob... predictable. It's shameful.

Ah well. Continual, ever-lasting thanks to all my reviewers. I write for you people. :D

To those who want the romance now: Tough luck. :) Quote from Princess Bride: "This is True Love. You think this happens every day?" In other words, I intend to take my time with this. *adopts talk-show tone* They have so much resentment and pain to work through before we can even consider a healthy relationship... *grin*

Don't worry. Romance will get here, in Her own unique time. This is not the only epic I have going, but it's one of them. It could take a LONG while to finish.

'Peaking on sheer intravenous...' comes (sort of) from the introduction to the AUTHORITY comic book, written by Grant Morrison (the intro, not the book, which is written by Warren Ellis). Pick it up.

Goat Song: (what an... interesting handle by the way...) I've made Dark Angel Butterfly Official Keeper of Fenris on the weekends... you may have Macavity if you like, and think you can handle v.01 AND v.02... :p E-mail me if you do.

Aza, dear: Don't beat me! I was just getting so swamped with 'Net activity I dropped nearly everything I didn't have mod responsibilities in so I could get back to writing. *sheepish grin* Maybe someday I'll be back...

Sova: Good point about magic on hols. I've an idea on how to handle that, and I'll see if I can stick it next chappie.

Minnionette: Your question too will eventually be answered. I hope.

Kouji: Another good question, about Harry's final... I'll see if I can't address it. Later. :D

Alisan-chan: I needed gender equality on the animal staff and Mac was the only one who consented to get 'reversed.' But she wouldn't give up her name. :D

AHEM: I've gotten tired of e-mailing updates. :) So, I have instead got us a Yahoo! Group for purposes of same. You may also discuss there if you like. I may even give out spoilers/answer questions/be nice to people who join... Can be found here:

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/seasonofhealing/

Chapter Six. In which an encounter in the kitchen occurs, as told from the POV of one Severus Snape.

Severus carefully slipped the cork into the last of the bottles containing the Pepper-Up Potion and straightened up slowly, conscious of an aching back and fingers. Pepper-Up might be simple to make, but it was also extremely time-consuming. He'd spent a whole day on the bloody thing.

          He winced at the sharp pains that shot through his neck as he rotated his head, trying to free muscles of the stiffness acquired through long hours of concentration. He was tired. Exhausted, even.

          But a good tired-- the sort that came after eight, nine, ten... well, twenty hours of pure composition and work. The Pepper-Up had been a side note; the true accomplishment of the day was the softly glowing purple liquid that simmered over one of the workshop's flames.

          He walked over to it and used the long handled spoon to give it a stir. The consistency was good; just as he'd hoped. He dipped a small ladle into the mixture and pulled it out. Amethyst-hued drops fell from the scoop to land back in the thick mixture.

          Severus placed the small sample of the mixture in a secure, specially designed glass tube. He muttered the spell to seal the bottle, and it was instantly a solid cylinder with no openings. Perfect, and no outside influences to get in and spoil it. He set the sealed bottle on a shelf with many others. They were his method of insurance while making potions-- whenever he was at a good stopping point in a new creation, he'd take a sample, so if he later screwed up the active batch, he'd have a reference point to check back with. It was rather like taking a snapshot.

          That done, he turned back to the cauldron and stared into the deep purple depths. The fragrant, lilac-scented steam escaped through vents near the ceiling, but the room was still unbearably warm. He systematically stripped off gloves, goggles, and the heavy apron.

          The high counter that stood in the centre of the room was currently covered in sheets of parchment. With quick impatient movements, he grabbed one of the pieces and the nearby quill and began to scrawl more notes.

          His working notes were unintelligible to anyone but himself and occasionally his sister-- a combination of sheer genius being placed on paper, and the absolutely atrocious quality of his hurried handwriting. Calculations, measurements, instructions, proportions, comments, observations, and lists of ingredients filled sheet after sheet in an cramped and ungodly shorthand he had inherited from his mother.

Albus Dumbledore had once said that if you had taken a chicken, fed it a Hallucination Draught, stuck its feet in ink, and let it run around on paper, the resulting nonsense would be more legible than Severus Snape's notes.  Severus had replied that his notes were not for other people to read, but for himself, and that he had absolutely no problem with his handwriting. Dumbledore had chuckled, and the matter had been dropped-- though the Headmaster of Hogwarts had demanded any papers meant for the inspection of others had to be understandable. So Snape effectively had two styles of handwriting-- one he used for his own benefit, and the other, a beautiful and precise blackletter script he had learned from his ever-proper father. The system worked.

He placed the latest notes atop a stack of other, similarly filled sheets, then cast a glance at the cauldron. It could simmer unattended for a while. This was wonderful as he admitted he needed a break.

He cleaned up a bit and then climbed the stairs that led back up to the library tower. A glance at the carved grandfather clock that lurked malevolently on the tower's ground floor revealed it was nearly one in the morning.

Until two, then. An hour would be enough to rest. Get some coffee into his system, maybe twenty minutes or so of resting his eyes, then work out what the next ingredient would be.

He crossed the courtyard towards the part of the castle that housed the kitchen. The cold air of the early early morning felt delicious after the stifling, steamy heat of the workshop, and he undid the top two buttons of his work shirt.

As he walked, his long strides taking him quickly across the paving stones, he couldn't help the smile that curled his lips. This was perfect-- this was what he lived for. The chance to work. Peaking on sheer intravenous creative energy.

There was a purpose in this particular potion, of course; if he could make it work, it would be undeniably his most useful and life-saving concoction yet. But when the energy was alive-- when he was blazing through ingredient after ingredient, calling on a mental inventory of literally thousands of plants and mixtures and powders as he searched for the one perfect ingredient, the one that would make it work-- when calculations swirled through his brain with a potency all their own-- when he suddenly knew what he needed to do next-- when he added and measured and crafted and mixed and it all came together under the motions of his hands... when he put things together in a way they had never been put together before and made something magical and powerful and alive and potent...

Then it didn't matter if he was creating a recipe to cure boils or save lies. He was creating. The energy, the rush, tore through his veins like a tidal wave. He could bottle fame, brew glory, stopper Death herself.

Nothing better. Nothing like it.

And he could work. It was summer. His time, his season. No students, no god-awful children sitting dumbly through lectures they would never remember about a subject they would never appreciate. Little fools. Taking his time up, taking time away from this.

But it was summer. He could work for days, going on sheer adrenaline and alcohol and potions and the food Wiggin considerately shoved down his throat. It would come together-- oh sweet taste of success-- and then he would take a day or two off for sleep, reading, sunlight, music (the violin would be taken out of its case), wine. Maybe visit London, take in a play... and then when he was sated, the itch would start again, and he'd begin thinking of what waited back in the workshop, and he'd go back to being something that was a little like scientist and a little like artist and a little like God. A sorcerer in the truest and highest sense of the word.

Sometimes he would put on Beethoven while he worked; listen to the man's glorious genius and madness and imagine the man also creating, symphonies and stanzas flowing onto paper, and he'd feel a kinship connecting them over the centuries. The same empathy he experienced when he saw Michelangelo or Leonardo's artworks.

To be a Master. To create.

The idiot smile was still on his face as he entered the kitchens and sat down wearily at the central table, rolling his neck in a further attempt to get the kinks out. Nezzy was already at his elbow, asking him what he wanted. Normally, he'd tell her to 'move, dammitall, I can make a sandwich for myself' which would annoy the hell out of her... but he was tired enough that he didn't care.

"Coffee. Please. And some fruit. And bread," he murmured, sliding down in the chair with boneless languor. God, but it felt good to relax.

Nezzy and a few of the others bustled around on the fringe of his peripheral vision, and in half an instant he was holding the strong coffee and had a plate of oranges and berries and melons at one elbow. Another plate appeared a half second later, with slices of at least three different kinds of bread. He smiled faintly. Overkill, of course. Silly elves.

He sipped at his coffee, leaned his head back, and felt tension drain out. Um. All he needed was a bloody massage, and he'd either die or ascend to Nirvana. Or both...

The sound of soft footsteps pierced the haze of his contentment, and if he hadn't been utterly wiped out from working intensely since five o'clock on the previous morning, he would have been up and with wand out. His reflexes, bred into him and honed by a lifetime of curses, hexes, spying, duels, magic, and death, were excellent.

But he was tired, and drained, and this was his well-protected home, where he could allow himself to relax. Perhaps these accounted for why it was a full three seconds after Harry Potter stopped dead in the kitchen doorway that Severus's eyes finally shot open and fixed on the intruder.

What in fucking hell. Is Harry Potter. Doing in. My home, his mind said in something that was half moan and half scream. Could he possibly be having a waking nightmare?

Right on the heels of the first question came: Nightmare, yes, so why has my twisted and perverse subconscious chosen to dress Potter in guest robe, glasses, glaringly hideous boxers, and nothing else? Not that it's not a fetching look on him.

Dear God. Did I just think that?

I'm tired. I'm very, very tired.

The apparition spoke. Squeaked. Something. "Professor Snape."

Oh hell. That's right. The boy is staying here. Oh HELL.

"Potter," he managed to rasp out, and sat up with an effort in the chair.

The boy seemed to erupt into a flood of words. "I'm sorry, sir, I didn't mean to intrude on you, I just came down for a little snack, I had some trouble sleeping, I--"

Merlin and Circe. Too much bloody noise.

Severus made a instinctive cutting motion with his hand and Potter miraculously shut up.

Oh thank you.

He relished the blessed silence for a moment with his eyes closed, but it was not to last. If it wasn't Potter speaking, it was one of those blasted things that was supposed to on his side.

"Master Potter!" squeaked Nezzy in a tone so motherly it put Wiggin straight out of business. "Was Master Potter having trouble sleepings? Nezzy is giving him a glass of warm milk, which will be putting him straight to sleepings!"

Severus cringed. Thank God Nezzy could no longer force that stuff on him. Not that she didn't still try. For a moment he found himself once more pitying Harry Potter.

The Boy Who Lived... Through Warm Milk.

"Master Potter should be sitting, yes? Sit!" barked the formidable kitchen-elf, and a rather helpless Harry Potter obeyed, sitting at the opposite end of Severus's table. He wasn't sure if he imagined the apologetic look on the boy's face.

A few seconds passed in uncomfortable silence as Nezzy, also known as the domineering she-tyrant of the kitchen, bustled around making her cure for all the evils of the world.

"So... Professor Snape. Um. Had trouble sleeping?" Potter asked awkwardly from where he hunched at his end of the table, pulling his robe tightly around his nearly bare figure. Severus rolled his eyes at his coffee. Next time the idiot boy would know better than to walk around half-naked, wouldn't he?

Oh. And he was asking a question. Making conversation. Damn the fool. Didn't he know it was-- glance at the kitchen clock-- after one o'clock in the morning?

"No, Mr. Potter. I was working."

"... Working?"

"On a potion. Research."

"Oh..."

'Oh,' indeed. The damn fool wouldn't know research if it bit him on his little Gryffindor arse.

"... So, was it going well?"

"What?"

"Was, uh, your research going well?"

"Oh. Yes. Yes, it was," Severus replied, the question distracting him from the person asking as he once more thought happily of how far he'd gotten with the potion. Even Potter couldn't ruin that feeling, that glow of satisfaction.

With an odd little twist in his gut he realized it had been some time since someone asked how his work was going. Albus did sometimes, but the man was so very busy these days, running a school and a covert war at the same time... Siobhan might ask, but Lord knew she had projects of her own. The animals didn't ask about his work as potions were both uninteresting and incomprehensible to them. Wiggin just saw to it that he had food to keep working.

He hadn't thought it mattered to him whether others asked about his work or not. Circe knew he didn't create for them. He made potions for himself. Benefits others might gain from his work were incidental.

So why... did he feel this odd little flush of... pleasure? Pride? He shook his head angrily, staring into the dark depths of his coffee mug.

"Going very well," he heard his own voice repeat blankly. He tore his gaze away from the brown liquid to stare up at Harry Potter as the boy was handed his warm milk by a cheerfully smiling Nezzy. House-elves, as far as he knew, had no biological need for sleep.

Now why couldn't his mother have seen fit, in her mad little experiments, to try and graft that particular trait?

He drained the last half-inch of coffee and held the cup out for a refill, idly taking a bite of bread while he waited. It wasn't until the solid food hit his stomach that he realized how hungry he was, and set to work on the rest of the plate.

Potter was staring at him. He forced his eyes from the food up to the Gryffindor currently infesting not only his day but his night, and sighed.

"Enjoying the milk, Potter?"

Severus nearly laughed aloud at the expression on the boy's face. Harry Potter shot a nervous gaze to make sure Nezzy wasn't watching him, then made a face as if he had swallowed something scraped from the bottom of a cauldron. Enough dignity remained that he managed to convert the laugh into a snort.

Nezzy was refilling the cup when he spoke again, mostly out of a vague feeling that it was still his turn to try and observe the social niceties of conversation.

"Well, Potter, exactly what are you planning to do with yourself for the holidays?"

Potter put down the milk he had been sipping half-heartedly, made another face, and answered hesitantly. "Well... I've got homework, of course... maybe for once I'll actually get some studying done over the summer," he said with a grin, than instantly sobered as he remembered who he was talking to.

"... and, uh..."

"Spit it out, Potter."

"I... was wondering if, um, I might-- could do some flying, in the courtyard. With my broom."

Severus froze. The freedom of soaring. The indescribable sensation of unfettered, natural flight. Then. Pain. Harsh cruel strong fingers, crumpling him, ripping him from the sky. He fell. Forever. Pieces of him ripped off, he was still in the clutch of the monster. Broken and tattered. Falling. The ground--

"Sir? Did... did you hear me? I said-- I asked if I could fly around the courtyard..."

No! No no no. A thousand times no. Gods no.

He dragged his gaze up from the coffee cup, forcing his fingers to unclench around it, and looked at Potter's face. He was conscious of the pounding in his veins, the sudden lack of oxygen in his lungs, and fought through it. He would not give in to it.

"I... don't see why that would be a problem," he managed after a moment, sure the cup was going to shatter in his hand.

The boy's face broke into another genuine grin, an expression he'd rarely seen on the boy. (Well, not surprising, as we hate each other's innards with a passion only surpassed by our hatred of each other's outards.) Oddly, his smile looked nothing like James Potter's.

"Thank you, Professor," said Potter. Severus closed his eyes briefly and nodded. He felt dizzy and drank from the cup in an attempt to wash the dizziness away.

"Uh... one other thing..."..."

Yes? What, Potter? How about, May I also have permission to hit you in the head ninety-nine times, sir?

"Well?"

"Can I, uh, read some of the books in the tower?"

Severus blinked. My God. Did the little bugger just ask permission to do something intelligent?

"That's... that would be fine. However," he added sharply, "wreck, ruin, or lose anything in my library and I'll be using your skin to bind my next volume of notes."

Potter swallowed in what was a gratifyingly intimidated fashion. Severus smiled grimly, feeling a little more like himself at the sight.

Nezzy interrupted the discussion with an irritated sigh. "Master Potter, you is not drinking your milk! Now it is all cold! Wait. Nezzy is getting you some more..."

"No! I mean-- uh, no thanks, that's all right, I'm very sleepy. It worked. I think I'll just go back to bed," the boy said hurriedly, then tacked on what had to be the most blatantly fake yawn Severus had ever seen. Nezzy looked at him suspiciously, and Severus once again managed to restrict laughter to a snort.

The boy was standing up, his robe still wrapped tightly around him. He turned and headed for the door.

"Before you go, Potter..."

"Sir?"

"Don't make a habit of walking around the house at night. This is an old house. Things live here that I really don't think you'd want to meet in the dark. Also, there are wards you could inadvertently trip. The resulting mess would be something I'd rather not have to clean up."

"Uh... yes sir. Good night, sir."

Severus felt his mouth twisting in a perverse little smile. "Pleasant dreams."

The boy mercifully left, and Severus drained the last of the coffee before he rested his head on his forearms and engaged in a nice long round of creative, masterful, energetic swearing.

When the throbbing headache began to pass, he straightened up and sighed. Why hadn't he said no? He should have said no. Idiot boy would be flying-- flying-- around the damn house. Perfect.

He cursed a few more times, ignoring Nezzy's disapproving Look, then stood. Enough. Back to work, and the oblivion he hoped he would find there.