Hiding Under the Ninth Earth
Book 02 : A Bit Of All Right
by I Got Tired of Waiting

Part V : Together
Chapter Forty Seven : Burning Cold and Hot

14 August 2003 Continued

They went to the small couch in the study and faced each other, legs overlapping.

Severus took Harry's hands in his, studying his face, his eyes earnest. "You and I both work with forces sometimes outside our control, you more so than I now with your healing, although that may not always be the case. As you delve deeper into the Dark Arts to heal those hurt by it, you will need to access the library many times to expand your knowledge of what you encounter."

Harry looked thoughtful, but said nothing.

Surprised at his silence, Severus continued. "Trust me--as your reputation grows, so will the obscurity of the spells used to incapacitate. Lucius is still loose; he has a corresponding library much like this one he maintained for Voldemort, although it is not as complete. Lucius grows more powerful, his followers strong, their numbers subtly increasing. Determined to prevail, they will be a thorn in our sides for many years to come."

Harry nodded. "I'd not thought of that, but you're right." He sighed.

Severus cut to the crux of the matter. "They want us both dead. They will hurt people just to get to you, Harry, and to me. They'll try to ensnare you with the magic they use on their victims. This is how they caught Mecadia; he had some--unique--talents he'd gained from his studies; Lucius used his family bond to obtain his magic for Voldemort and made me the unwitting carrier of the curse that killed him. In the end, his stubbornness about protection coupled with his ignorance of his brother's depravity destroyed him."

He bowed his head, his heart hurting all over again at the thought of his old friend and how short his existence had been. Harry tightened his hold on his hands and waited him out. Severus was heartened by the contact.

Severus raised his head, his eyes shining bright. "I will not abide them doing so to us. Mecadia's talisman will not protect you, nor will it protect me anymore should we marry. Hear me well, Harry. I cannot make vows with you until you agree to this, to our warding. I cannot stand by and see you destroyed the way Mecadia was, not if I could have prevented it. I love you too much--it would be more than I could bear."

Harry raised his hand and cupped Severus' cheek. "What do we need to do?" he asked quietly, his acceptance in his eyes. "As I told you in Hana, I want no doubts, no secrets anymore. I just want to love you my whole life--nothing more, nothing less. Tell me what I have to do to set your mind at ease."

With immense relief at Harry's unequivocal acquiescence, he stood and pulled Harry up with him. They were close and it was all Severus could do to keep from taking him in his arms and never letting go. "Now?" he asked quietly. "Are you ready now?"

Harry chuckled and said jokingly, "Is it going to hurt? I might need a few minutes to prepare for that, but otherwise I'm ready."

'If it does, it will hurt only me,' Severus thought, not sure he was prepared, but there was no helping it. Harry knew about the library now; it was imperative he be protected from it and allowed free, safe access. 'This much I will allow me.' He ran his thumb gently over the tops of his fingers. "No, I don't think so, although the spell says it will leave its mark on us."

"What is that supposed to mean?" Harry demanded, suspicious of Severus' hesitation and shrug. "You're never ignorant of the outcome of any spell before you cast it. You're backsliding, Sev," he gently chided.

"Perhaps, but speculation is not the same thing as knowledge; the spells I examined are unclear as to what it means. They only agree there will be a 'physical mark' left on each of us." He tilted his head. "There is no mention of discomfort, only an exchange--it can't be too bad, or it would have been noted."

Reading Harry well he added, "And no, I do not know what kind of 'exchange'. The spells are purposely vague as the form is different with each casting, that much was clear also. I promise, I'm not being deliberately obtuse; the spell is doing that just fine all by itself."

Harry smiled, apparently satisfied.

Severus reached into his robes and pulled out the box he'd placed there earlier. "Seems I was inadvertently prepared for this moment. I have something for us."

Harry opened the package with all the abandon of a child on his birthday, paper flying. Severus smiled as he opened the wooden box and gasped. Nestled in purple silk was the gold glyph from Mr. Langley's shop, the one the rings were modelled after. A heavy, round serpent chain was threaded through the twisted loop on the top. He pulled it out of the box, holding it up to admire it in the light.

He raised wondering eyes to Severus. "How did you--?"

Severus grinned. "I didn't until I saw the rings. That's what makes irony such a wonderful thing."

Harry made to throw his arms around him, but Severus stopped him. "I'm sorry, Harry, not until we're finished. Once the commitment is made to perform the spell, casual contact must be minimized to maintain the spell's potency." At the disappointed look on Harry's face, he ruefully laughed and said, "I know, waiting until later severely taxes my restraint as well."

Harry defied the stricture a little by running his fingers lightly down Severus' cheek. "I was not intending 'casual' contact." Severus shivered at his touch.

Leisurely taking the hand from his face, he stood and pulled Harry with him to the center of his study. Holding his wand, he intoned, "Supellectilis Leviosa," and levitated the desk off of the rug, moving it to the side of the room. "The focal point of the wards is under the rug where Dumbledore set them." He shrugged and lightly laughed, "Makes for an inconvenient place for my desk, but he was stubborn about it."

Harry chuckled wryly. "He gets that way sometimes."

Severus echoed him, saying, "Indeed he does." He gently pulled on Harry's hand to place them in the center of the wards; they could feel the leashed power under their feet.

"What do we do now?" Harry asked him, his face serious and devoid of any emotion. Severus knew then he was preparing himself and approved. Severus knelt where he stood and tugging, asked him to join him, which he did, a few inches of air separating them.

With steady hands, Severus undid the buttons on Harry's shirt, explaining as he did so, "The spell is Sanos based and the conditions say we must place the talisman between us, skin-to-skin, to make the shared mark. Most people choose the inner arm of their dominant hand, but since mine is already occupied--" he grimly thought of the faint dark mark still present on his forearm, "and, in any event, it is far too easy to see there--this location, in the middle of the chest, will be better. We're kneeling because it's more stable than standing." He tugged the shirt out of Harry's trousers until it was loose and open. He then unfastened the cuffs. Without touching his skin, he peeled it off of him, leaving Harry bare-chested. He threw the shirt to the side by the desk.

Harry shivered a bit, despite the warmth of the room. He lifted his hands, still holding the glyph, and began to remove Severus' shirt for him. "The location seems all right. I just wish we knew what kind of mark it will make." He continued unbuttoning the shirt. "Severus, the wards are making my scar tingle. Is this normal?"

Severus was thoughtful as the warm air touched more of him, button by button. "I don't know, but I don't see where it will make a difference. There is a balance of magic in the wards, perhaps your scar is reacting to the dark magic."

Unbuttoning the cuffs and taking the same care not to touch Severus' skin, Harry nodded. "Could be--actually, that makes sense. I often thought it reacted more to Voldemort's use of magic than his person, and it always ached whenever anyone used Dark Magic, including myself." He paused to pull the tails out of Severus' trousers. Removing the shirt, he continued, "I mean, it never twinged if Voldemort was using a mundane spell." Harry eyed him, a sudden thought travelling across his face. "He did use everyday magic, didn't he?"

Severus chuckled. "Oh yes, he did and was even known, on rare occasion, to miserly employ a cleaning spell--but usually only after Nagini complained about the stench."

Harry smiled. "Now what?" he asked, back on task.

Quietly, Severus said, "Hold out the amulet, I need to open it to take the ward." Harry did so, the chain across one hand, the glyph in the other. Severus tucked his wand in the band of his trousers. He held out his hands over the glyph and felt for the Schema. Confused, he couldn't find it. 'There has to be one. Every piece of power has one.'

He was about to ask Harry, who'd been watching him closely, if he could read it when Harry echoed his words to the shopkeeper, "It's an Iugia Proeliator Schema--it's all I could sense out if it before in the shop."

Severus nodded his thanks. "Impressive as always." He dove deep into it, not noticing the pleased surprise on Harry's face. Finally locating the Schema he studied it for a moment, easily recalling his notes made years before, thinking, 'Damn, why does it have to be Gaelic? Always sounds like infant-speak after I get done mangling it.' He laughed a bit and at Harry's raised brow said, "Gaelic. I hate it."

Harry shook his head, "I know none, so I'll be impressed for both of us, all right?" Severus smiled.

Still holding his hands over it he intoned, "Leig ris e seun." Nothing happened for a moment and about the time he was beginning to wonder if he'd pronounced it right, the gold began to glow with an inner light. At a gesture from Severus' hands, it rose and hung in the air between them before looping over Harry's head to settle squared on the center of his breastbone.

"The Glyph is old and has never been cast. There will be two wards spoken--one of them yours, the other mine. It's ready to receive our wards. I'm ready to cast them. Are you?" he asked Harry.

"Why is there only one--?" Harry stopped and shrugged. Severus knew he'd been about to ask why there was no second talisman for Severus if they were both to be protected. He was about to explain about the marks again when Harry nodded and asked, "What do you need me to do?"

"Come here." With arms extended, Severus and Harry met in the middle, bodies pressed close together, skin to skin, heart to heart, the glyph warm between them. Severus whispered the spoken ward he was to say in Harry's ear, tickling it, telling him they needed to say it together.

They held the embrace while Severus took what comfort he could against what he suspected would follow. Taking a deep breath, he closed his eyes and cried, "Dìon m'leannan!" over Harry's simultaneous fiat, Defendo Maritas!.

The two wards exploded through them. Severus knew that to Harry the spell was freezing, like shards of raw ice, glacial, making him shiver violently although he did not let go. He would be feeling Severus' strong power, Severus' essence flowing through him, through his veins, joining with his magic to eventually make a temperate clime within him. 'And if mine is like ice then his will be--'

Fire. Burning through him. Excruciating, powerful fire, overwhelming him. He'd suspected Harry's magic would burn, would rend him before his could recover and infuse. And he'd not been wrong. He felt Harry's arms holding him tight against him, his own face buried on Harry's shoulder as he rode the magic within, trying to cool the heat with his own cold magic. Eventually, he felt it subside, meld, join him. It was over, the wards securely in place. His chest hurt. 'That was almost like getting the Dark Mark, only much less painful.'

They clasped each other, sweat slicking their bodies, their hearts beating as one, their minds at peace. Harry's awareness of his surroundings returned with the prickling of his healing senses, and he suddenly felt the pain in Severus' chest. Concerned, he pulled away and, looking down, sucked in his breath on a long hiss. In the identical place the amulet hung on him was the burned image of it on Severus' chest. The skin was raw and blistered, the shape and figures on the amulet clear to the finest detail, only etched forcibly in his skin. He caught Severus' weary eye. "You knew this would happen, didn't you?" he accused, horrified.

"No," he replied honestly, "but I strongly suspected it would. As I told you, the spell said it would leave its mark. And it did; it's a perfect match to yours. Look." Severus lifted the heavy glyph and released it from its chain by removing the loop with a careful spell, leaving the wards they'd buried deep within it undisturbed. He held the warmed gold piece in his hand; the heavy chain remained intact where it hung around Harry's neck. He fancied he could feel the extra weight of the spells captured within.

Harry looked down at his own chest and saw an identical raised scar down to the last detail shining ghostly pale against his tanned skin--a mirror image born of ice.

Severus' fingers tingled where he traced the edges of it. "No one can remove this protection from us by taking the amulet. They'll have to carve it out." He shuddered, shying away from the gruesome pictures his statement made.

Harry grimaced. "Now there's a cheery thought."

Severus rose unsteadily to his feet, Harry following. He winced when the skin of his chest pulled with the movement and sighed, resigned to the discomfort for a while longer. There was a topical potion he could use afterwards to deaden the pain while it healed. "We're not done yet. We still need to set the talisman into the library's wards."

Walking up to the wall hiding the entrance, he once again dropped the wards revealing the door. Once opened, he preceded Harry into the room. Harry staggered the last few steps up to the table; Severus reached out, steadying him. "Scar hurts?" he asked solicitously.

"And how. It's quite overwhelming." Severus could hear his teeth grind against the pain, his hand futilely rubbing his scar which, for the first time in more than four years, burned an ugly, familiar red.

Worried and contrite, he murmured, "My apologies, Harry. I didn't realise the room would affect you in this manner, or I would have warned you beforehand. It must be Voldemort's hand-written texts causing the problem. We'd best hurry now."

They stood side by side at the table in the center of the room, Harry swaying with the effort to control his wild reaction to the contents of the room. Severus pulled his wand out of the waistband of his trousers. At his spoken "Liberatio," the gold talisman in the center of the black stone working surface flashed and popped out, rolling like a coin when flipped.

Severus pushed it aside for the moment and placed their glyph in the exact same place. He guided Harry's unresisting hand to one side, Severus' fingers held it on the other. "We say the wards together." At their simultaneous commands the glyph glowed, it was both hot and cold to the touch, and sank into the stone until slightly recessed. Severus removed his hand slowly as did Harry. The talisman was fixed in place.

Harry sagged against him in relief and then straightened, standing on his own. "Ah, much better. One does not truly appreciate the absence of pain until it's gone."

"All too true," Severus said with a relieved smile when he saw that, while a little swollen, Harry's scar was almost back to normal. "No one can see the amulet but us, and of course, Albus. I was so afraid it would disappear--the spell was vague on that point as well--it's such a beautiful piece--I would have not liked losing it."

Harry ran his fingers over it in appreciation. "Yes, it is lovely; it's ironic we both wanted it," he chuckled, "although for different reasons; I thought to have it made into a clasp for your formal robes. This is much better."

Severus briefly considered the dangers inherent in giving anyone an empty amulet of this power, but forbore to mention it--now was not the time for a lesson or a mild admonishment. Instead he said, "I concur. The glyph is best held by those who can truly appreciate its full value. To use the library safely, all you need do is touch the talisman and repeat your Ward."

Harry nodded. "Seems easy enough. What are the other spells I need to know?"

Severus blinked. "Hmmm. I think we'll need to talk to Albus about the nature of the spells he devised. I'm not sure they will work for you as they were made for me. I'm sure he can either tell us if they will protect both, or else he can just create some new ones for you. Either way, we'll not be using the contents tonight." He picked up Mecadia's talisman from the table. "Come, we should probably close this room up now until we know for certain."

Harry agreed and they were soon back in the study, Harry closing the wards behind them. Indecision in his eyes, his face neutral, he held out his hand. Confused only for a moment, Severus placed Mecadia's talisman in the outstretched hand, resisting the urge to snatch it back. Harry blinked hard and examined the tiny piece. Smaller than a Galleon, the front was embossed with two serpents intimately entwined over the crest of the Slytherin House wrought in the finest detail. The back was smooth except for the words, "My dearest Severus" engraved deeply. Harry balanced the coin on his fingertips. He said softly, "He never intended to protect himself, did he?"

Muted, Severus' tone spoke of his reluctance to respond. "No, I don't believe so. He was a scholar, learned, more arrogant in his intellectual confidence than I. But blind. He never dreamt anyone would be interested in capturing the fruits of his research, certainly not his brother, the wastrel."

"And you loved him," he stated, not asked.

Bowing his head, Severus replied, "Yes, I did."

Harry was silent, still. Then, "You never told him?"

Severus ground out one anguished word. "No."

Harry closed his eyes. Severus chanced a glance at him, surprised by the stark sadness on Harry's face. Harry opened them and Severus suddenly found himself lost in their green depths. He barely registered that Harry took the talisman and placed a soft kiss on the front of it. He then took Severus' hand and, placing it in his palm, he tenderly closed the long elegant fingers over it. "Remind me someday, when I am about to pass beyond, to thank Mecadia for taking such good care of you."

Stunned, Severus stared at him. He looked one last time at the object in his hand and pocketed it. He took a deep breath, saying, "I'll remember."

Harry smiled. He leaned into Severus for a kiss; Severus hissed in pain when their chests met.

"Oh, I am sorry. I forgot," Harry said contritely. Perplexed, he asked, "Sev, why did yours burn you so badly? Mine didn't hurt a bit."

Switching mental tracks, Severus put the last few minutes behind him for further thought and replied, "It has to do with our natures, Harry. We are and have always been opposites. The spell I chose depended on us being two sides of the same coin, just like the two sides to the glyph. You burn with fiery Gryffindor passion, I with cold Slytherin calculation. There was an exchange involved, much like the Sanos spells." He said gently, "Harry, I accepted a long time ago your magic is--while I won't say stronger, it is--different--than mine. Had you laboured with mine, the way I struggled with yours, you too would have been burned, only by the cold."

A myriad of thoughts flitted across Harry's mobile face as he digested Severus' explanation; he nodded his understanding. "Please, Sev, let me heal yours," he said earnestly, stretching out his hand. "Most of what I do does not require the Sanos. I can at least take away the pain."

Severus hesitated only an instant. "That would be pleasant and much faster than the potion I had in mind. Thank you."

Harry pulled him back to the rug. They knelt apart, sitting on their heels, knees almost touching. Severus knew Harry probably shouldn't be doing this; healing magic on loved ones or family, while not forbidden, was not encouraged either. Harry stretched out his hand and held it over the wound on Severus' chest, cupping his hand so it didn't touch it but made contact on the skin around the edges.

Severus sucked in some air; it still hurt, even where Harry had his hand, just like any burn would. He felt Harry pull in his magic and release it, ever so slowly, one bit at a time as it trickled into the wound. Harry was careful and just as the pain stopped and Severus relaxed, he let up on the spell and removed his hand.

It was perfect; Harry'd not obliterated it--the scar was silvery white against his light tan and slightly raised. It flashed on his chest when the light hit it right, each detail down to the scales present but was invisible when not looked for.

"Very nicely done," Severus said looking down on it.

"It's beautiful." Harry breathed, tracing the raised edges with his fingertip and then kissed it. "Just like you--hidden from everyone but me."

Severus went still inside. With purpose, he put his arms around his intended, relishing the sensuous weight of Harry's arms as they slid around him, his skin still sensitive from the wards. Eye to eye, black to green, he said, "Yes, Harry Potter, I will make vows with you." And not waiting for a reply, he kissed him.

They sank to the floor, the rug cushioning their happy tangled bodies until late into the night. And when they finally staggered into bed for sleep, the carpet was well and truly christened.

16 August 2003

Two mornings later, while Harry was gone to Diagon Alley to shop for dress robes, Severus took out an ornately carved wooden box he kept hidden in his old, battered school trunk deep in the back of the closet. Holding the talisman, he called to mind the ink stained fingers already stiffening with the swelling disease from hours of scratching exhaustive notes on rolls of fine parchment. He could clearly see the squint lines around Mecadia's dark grey eyes from working long hours into the night with inadequate light, eyes that would soften whenever Severus interrupted him for such mundane things like food and sleep, and the comfort that came before it. Such innocent pleasures that could ease, for the small moments they lasted, the horrors so much a part of his life at the time.

He placed his lips on the cold metal and for a brief instant remembered the sweet, absentminded kisses Mecadia used to give him, his attention, more often than not, on his books and studies rather than his lover. Yet he could almost taste Harry there now as well. Severus opened the box and lightly ran his fingers over the neat stacks of letters and other small trinkets--they were all that was left of his former lover, all other traces of him, even his name, erased by a family who never truly understood the man's worth. Without hesitation he placed Mecadia's talisman with those other mementos of a former life, closed the lid, and put the box back in his trunk with no further regrets.

Leig ris e seun = Open the charm
Defendo Maritas! and Dìon m'leannan! - Protect my Lover!

TBC