Snape watched with a grim satisfaction as Harry seemed to wilt back into
his chair, tinging pale at first, then a sickly green. Of course, the boy
could never have suspected anything like this. This reaction was even
better than the day he saw Lupin having tea in his office.
'Y-You're - m-my father?' trembled the boy faintly.
Snape stared, aghast.
'Wh-? Of course I'm not, you stupid dolt!' He spluttered angrily, coming to his senses.
Harry breathed again, and colour seemed to improve a little. But then he shuddered, as if something had suddenly brushed past him.
'Dumbledore, my mother - and you?'
'Yes?' came the sour reply.
'So then - it was all real? And not just another dream?' Harry stood up quickly, quivering, his eyes scanning the shadowy room.
Blasted Merlin! -What- was the boy on?
'They were here - in this room-'
'Who were?' said Snape sharply.
Harry smiled. 'My parents of course! Mum? Dad?' he called, his eyes continuing to wander.
Snape stared. The boy was clearly still having hallucinations from the antidote. Maybe he had added a drop too much adder venom.
'Just hallucinations, Potter - from the poison antidote,' he said coolly. 'Sit back down.'
'My father, he didn't look too pleased. But - ' Harry said strangely, his eyes wandering back to Snape's face, 'my mother said she needed to tell -you- something.'
Snape was unnerved. He knew the boy was, too. 'You're talking rubbish again, Potter,' he hissed fiercely. 'I added too much venom-'
'IT'S NOT RUBBISH!' cut in Harry angrily. His look had been so ferocious it even caused Snape to raise an alarmed eyebrow.
'S-She-'
He swallowed, and shut his eyes. His mouth was drying out rapidly.
'She said I must tell you that - she is sad that she never had the chance to thank you for doing your best to protect us. And,' Harry rasped, almost horrified at what he was saying, 'she is - happy you - found yourself, and changed sides.'
Snape closed his eyes and breathed in deeply. How in Merlin's name could the boy know this? He could hear a pulse thudding in his head.
There was no possible way the boy could have found out the sworn secret. To know this, he would have needed to speak to-
It suddenly felt as if the full force of the fever was coming back again, and bringing with it, all the darkness of the past.
*******
Harry continued to stare at Snape, whose head had fallen onto his chest. He had experienced so many different emotions in the past few minutes, he felt like his brain was going to explode. He looks deathly now. Harry thought, alarmed. He couldn't fathom the reason why Snape's face should suddenly twist in such a way.
His imagination began to run loose with the possibilities. Maybe he's had a stroke or a fit? But he looks like death. So that would leave me in a room with a corpse? Will I always be doomed to witness death after death?
But to be trapped in a room with Snape, with a-
He gulped.
With another dead-
Harry now thought he might panic; and felt he had to break the silence. His voice trembled, 'W-What did you use that would make the killing curse bounce - sir?'
His question echoed off the stone walls, and died.
'Professor Snape?'
'Sir?'
The silence grew louder. The Candle flames flickered, casting deeper shadows, which seemed to shiver at their edges.
Harry had begun to fear the worst. And then, a faint, unusually hoarse voice shattered the quiet.
'A difficult draught - containing some blood. My -own- blood.'
Harry felt his stomach lurch. Snape's blood - used on him. So Snape must be a half breed as well. This must give him some resistance against Unforgivables.
Could this be the reason why he often felt so cold and cruel? Had the fear he'd uttered earlier on, turned into fact? Was he destined to become more like Snape?
Harry's breathing became shallow. He wasn't as mean as Snape, surely he'd never go that far? But the man had mixed his own blood in a potion, then he'd gone and -
It was too awful to think about. But, he still needed to know. 'S-So that would be - why the poison-'
'Yes.' Snape sighed abruptly. 'Yes, Potter.' He felt suddenly very weary -much older than his years. One weight had been lifted, but another had already fallen. And he had just had a message from beyond the grave. 'And I hope you're j-just overjoyed by what you've done.'
The last comment didn't come out sarcastically, as he would have liked. It had sounded weak. Snape cursed inwardly at his slip in front of Potter.
'Of all people!' he thought angrily, 'When I recover from this pathetic weakness, I'll - I'll -'
'So - what type of blood is it, sir?' The question was out even before he knew whether he wanted to hear the answer. Filling with dread, Harry got up silently. He aimed to try the door again. Deathlike Snape wasn't dead, and he wanted out before he got angry.
Snape's fingers curled. This was intolerable. How in blasted Merlin, was it this boy could attempt suicide, then escape death, and still have enough strength to ask questions? Was he gloating?
'Why should you care, Potter?' he snarled abruptly, his head snapping round. 'And GET back here!'
Harry stopped in his tracks, and stared. The professor still had his eyes closed, but had still managed to point his sneer right at him!
He turned, and walked back over to the desk. On that point, maybe he shouldn't attempt to escape. Maybe this blood thing was why Snape knew him so well. His blood like a tracer, or something to be homed in on by members of the same species..
Perching gingerly on the edge of the chair, Harry gazed up at the ceiling, and shuddered.
He thought back through all the Defence Against the Dark Arts lessons. Lycanthropes, Vampires, Zombies, Ghouls, Wights. All had blood curses, but he was pretty sure Snape wasn't dead, or rotting, or a wolf. So most of them were ruled out.
He turned to Snape's memories. He saw the hook-nosed man shouting at the cowering woman. He looked an awful lot like Snape did when he was yelling at him, but somehow even scarier, paler-
Then the dark room, and the two silhouettes became visible; it was that memory again.
But something else was now audible just before the scream. An odd type of spitting snarl. Then the darkness obscured it all. He winced as the horrible scream played through his head again, before cutting off.
'I care, sir,' replied Harry softly, 'because your memories have been disturbing - ' he faltered. 'Haunting me. For weeks-'
'If that is so, then, why didn't you run and ask Know-it-all Granger to explain the blatantly obvious to you, Potter?' he snapped. 'She's probably been writing a carefully constructed thesis on me for years.'
'No! I would never do that. I swear, on their lives, I have never done that! Why would I, when I never even told her the reason why I stopped Occlumency last year?' he replied, steadily, looking the professor in the face.
'They still have no idea - sir.'
Snape opened his eyes, and found the boy looking earnestly at him, waiting for an explanation.
Such Gryffindor nobility.
Instantly he felt the old malice burn. It was such a battle to keep it back. He's still James Potter's son. But he was also Lily's son.He could care, but.Hate was so much easier. Much less taxing, demanding. And the rest. Damn his whole family! Damn them all!
Harry watched as Snape's face tensed, relaxed, then scowled. 'But sir, I heard what you called my mum - in the -'
'Like you Potter - she had to stick her blasted nose where it wasn't wanted!' spat the professor. 'Besides,' he added bitterly, 'your tantrum earlier echoed everything I always told you about Black and your father. Didn't it?'
'B-But-' he trailed off. And what he had said to Lupin-
Harry had no wish to carry the debate on any further. He felt as if too many bits of information had been shoved at him all at once. He lapsed into a gloomy silence.
Snape was glad the boy had gone quiet. His whole body was aching considerably. He was also being disturbed by various flashes of memory he had viewed in more recent Occlumency sessions. He would never suffer to admit it, but Harry's memories had actually begun to haunt him.
The muffled silence and odd security of sitting in a stale, dark cupboard. Staring at the wall for hours on end - the gentle buzzing of bees while lying concealed in a heat parched, strong smelling flowerbed - standing all alone looking over a Wintery Hogwarts' lake, listening to bare tree branches being whipped about by the wind - hearing the distant shouts of Quidditch players, while flying high and alone on a broom -
Last year there had been violence, fear and anger in virtually all of the boy's flashbacks. This year there had been almost none. Just endless memory after memory of silent, detached apathy. Somehow these ones bothered him more than the violent scenes. He knew in which direction Harry's mind was heading.
Snape half wished he was now lying concealed in a flowerbed, or some such remote place. Alone and undisturbed, his name unknown, identity unrecognised. Anywhere but in this bloody office.
Where were Granger, Weasley, Creevey, and all his other adoring fans in these memories? The people who he knew always cheered for him in the great Hall and at Quidditch? All those heroic scenes his father loved to revel in? Girlfriends, even? He should have bothered to point all this out to Dumbledore really.
Dumbledore.
'I should have known!' muttered Snape; sitting up, suddenly. 'He conjured the seal!'
'W-Who?' gasped Harry, starting back.
'The Headmaster!' he snarled, leaping up and swooping past him to the door.
Harry was stunned. Snape was blaming Dumbledore - not 'Potter?'
'DUMBLEDORE!' bellowed Snape, placing the tip of his wand on the door.
It creaked open. Snape was out menacing the gloomy corridor in a flash. Harry followed close behind.
When they got into the entrance hall Harry stopped trailing him and went to sneak up to the Gryffindor common room instead. He was dying to ask Hermione about Snape's curse. But as he placed a foot on the stair the Potions Master whirled about, his eyes flashing murderously.
'Potter! Come here!'
Harry scowled.
'You are accompanying me to the Headmaster's Office,' Snape said coldly.
Harry looked longingly up the stairs.
'Now! Or I will take points-'
A few other students in the entrance hall all turned to look at him. Harry narrowed his eyes as he turned around. The greasy, hook faced git -
Snape's voice was at its lowest and most dangerous.
'Scowl at me like that again and I will personally make you clean every -single - surface in my dungeon; with - your - toothbrush.'
Harry relaxed his face. 'Well, it was an inventive punishment,' he thought grimly. Snape must be feeling better.
He followed the professor, who swept along the corridors aggressively, his black cloak rippling out behind him. As Harry had grown still more, and was now almost Snape's height, he had little trouble keeping up.
He felt students' wide-eyed stares fix on him. They were probably wondering what in Merlin's name he had done to make Snape look even madder than when someone blew up one of his best cauldrons.
They reached the Headmaster's gargoyle. As Snape snapped the password, and the gargoyle stepped aside, he glanced back to check on his charge.
'But if I hated someone as much as Snape hated me,' Harry thought angrily, as he followed the swishing cloak up the stairs, 'why would I choose to spend even more time with them?'
'Y-You're - m-my father?' trembled the boy faintly.
Snape stared, aghast.
'Wh-? Of course I'm not, you stupid dolt!' He spluttered angrily, coming to his senses.
Harry breathed again, and colour seemed to improve a little. But then he shuddered, as if something had suddenly brushed past him.
'Dumbledore, my mother - and you?'
'Yes?' came the sour reply.
'So then - it was all real? And not just another dream?' Harry stood up quickly, quivering, his eyes scanning the shadowy room.
Blasted Merlin! -What- was the boy on?
'They were here - in this room-'
'Who were?' said Snape sharply.
Harry smiled. 'My parents of course! Mum? Dad?' he called, his eyes continuing to wander.
Snape stared. The boy was clearly still having hallucinations from the antidote. Maybe he had added a drop too much adder venom.
'Just hallucinations, Potter - from the poison antidote,' he said coolly. 'Sit back down.'
'My father, he didn't look too pleased. But - ' Harry said strangely, his eyes wandering back to Snape's face, 'my mother said she needed to tell -you- something.'
Snape was unnerved. He knew the boy was, too. 'You're talking rubbish again, Potter,' he hissed fiercely. 'I added too much venom-'
'IT'S NOT RUBBISH!' cut in Harry angrily. His look had been so ferocious it even caused Snape to raise an alarmed eyebrow.
'S-She-'
He swallowed, and shut his eyes. His mouth was drying out rapidly.
'She said I must tell you that - she is sad that she never had the chance to thank you for doing your best to protect us. And,' Harry rasped, almost horrified at what he was saying, 'she is - happy you - found yourself, and changed sides.'
Snape closed his eyes and breathed in deeply. How in Merlin's name could the boy know this? He could hear a pulse thudding in his head.
There was no possible way the boy could have found out the sworn secret. To know this, he would have needed to speak to-
It suddenly felt as if the full force of the fever was coming back again, and bringing with it, all the darkness of the past.
*******
Harry continued to stare at Snape, whose head had fallen onto his chest. He had experienced so many different emotions in the past few minutes, he felt like his brain was going to explode. He looks deathly now. Harry thought, alarmed. He couldn't fathom the reason why Snape's face should suddenly twist in such a way.
His imagination began to run loose with the possibilities. Maybe he's had a stroke or a fit? But he looks like death. So that would leave me in a room with a corpse? Will I always be doomed to witness death after death?
But to be trapped in a room with Snape, with a-
He gulped.
With another dead-
Harry now thought he might panic; and felt he had to break the silence. His voice trembled, 'W-What did you use that would make the killing curse bounce - sir?'
His question echoed off the stone walls, and died.
'Professor Snape?'
'Sir?'
The silence grew louder. The Candle flames flickered, casting deeper shadows, which seemed to shiver at their edges.
Harry had begun to fear the worst. And then, a faint, unusually hoarse voice shattered the quiet.
'A difficult draught - containing some blood. My -own- blood.'
Harry felt his stomach lurch. Snape's blood - used on him. So Snape must be a half breed as well. This must give him some resistance against Unforgivables.
Could this be the reason why he often felt so cold and cruel? Had the fear he'd uttered earlier on, turned into fact? Was he destined to become more like Snape?
Harry's breathing became shallow. He wasn't as mean as Snape, surely he'd never go that far? But the man had mixed his own blood in a potion, then he'd gone and -
It was too awful to think about. But, he still needed to know. 'S-So that would be - why the poison-'
'Yes.' Snape sighed abruptly. 'Yes, Potter.' He felt suddenly very weary -much older than his years. One weight had been lifted, but another had already fallen. And he had just had a message from beyond the grave. 'And I hope you're j-just overjoyed by what you've done.'
The last comment didn't come out sarcastically, as he would have liked. It had sounded weak. Snape cursed inwardly at his slip in front of Potter.
'Of all people!' he thought angrily, 'When I recover from this pathetic weakness, I'll - I'll -'
'So - what type of blood is it, sir?' The question was out even before he knew whether he wanted to hear the answer. Filling with dread, Harry got up silently. He aimed to try the door again. Deathlike Snape wasn't dead, and he wanted out before he got angry.
Snape's fingers curled. This was intolerable. How in blasted Merlin, was it this boy could attempt suicide, then escape death, and still have enough strength to ask questions? Was he gloating?
'Why should you care, Potter?' he snarled abruptly, his head snapping round. 'And GET back here!'
Harry stopped in his tracks, and stared. The professor still had his eyes closed, but had still managed to point his sneer right at him!
He turned, and walked back over to the desk. On that point, maybe he shouldn't attempt to escape. Maybe this blood thing was why Snape knew him so well. His blood like a tracer, or something to be homed in on by members of the same species..
Perching gingerly on the edge of the chair, Harry gazed up at the ceiling, and shuddered.
He thought back through all the Defence Against the Dark Arts lessons. Lycanthropes, Vampires, Zombies, Ghouls, Wights. All had blood curses, but he was pretty sure Snape wasn't dead, or rotting, or a wolf. So most of them were ruled out.
He turned to Snape's memories. He saw the hook-nosed man shouting at the cowering woman. He looked an awful lot like Snape did when he was yelling at him, but somehow even scarier, paler-
Then the dark room, and the two silhouettes became visible; it was that memory again.
But something else was now audible just before the scream. An odd type of spitting snarl. Then the darkness obscured it all. He winced as the horrible scream played through his head again, before cutting off.
'I care, sir,' replied Harry softly, 'because your memories have been disturbing - ' he faltered. 'Haunting me. For weeks-'
'If that is so, then, why didn't you run and ask Know-it-all Granger to explain the blatantly obvious to you, Potter?' he snapped. 'She's probably been writing a carefully constructed thesis on me for years.'
'No! I would never do that. I swear, on their lives, I have never done that! Why would I, when I never even told her the reason why I stopped Occlumency last year?' he replied, steadily, looking the professor in the face.
'They still have no idea - sir.'
Snape opened his eyes, and found the boy looking earnestly at him, waiting for an explanation.
Such Gryffindor nobility.
Instantly he felt the old malice burn. It was such a battle to keep it back. He's still James Potter's son. But he was also Lily's son.He could care, but.Hate was so much easier. Much less taxing, demanding. And the rest. Damn his whole family! Damn them all!
Harry watched as Snape's face tensed, relaxed, then scowled. 'But sir, I heard what you called my mum - in the -'
'Like you Potter - she had to stick her blasted nose where it wasn't wanted!' spat the professor. 'Besides,' he added bitterly, 'your tantrum earlier echoed everything I always told you about Black and your father. Didn't it?'
'B-But-' he trailed off. And what he had said to Lupin-
Harry had no wish to carry the debate on any further. He felt as if too many bits of information had been shoved at him all at once. He lapsed into a gloomy silence.
Snape was glad the boy had gone quiet. His whole body was aching considerably. He was also being disturbed by various flashes of memory he had viewed in more recent Occlumency sessions. He would never suffer to admit it, but Harry's memories had actually begun to haunt him.
The muffled silence and odd security of sitting in a stale, dark cupboard. Staring at the wall for hours on end - the gentle buzzing of bees while lying concealed in a heat parched, strong smelling flowerbed - standing all alone looking over a Wintery Hogwarts' lake, listening to bare tree branches being whipped about by the wind - hearing the distant shouts of Quidditch players, while flying high and alone on a broom -
Last year there had been violence, fear and anger in virtually all of the boy's flashbacks. This year there had been almost none. Just endless memory after memory of silent, detached apathy. Somehow these ones bothered him more than the violent scenes. He knew in which direction Harry's mind was heading.
Snape half wished he was now lying concealed in a flowerbed, or some such remote place. Alone and undisturbed, his name unknown, identity unrecognised. Anywhere but in this bloody office.
Where were Granger, Weasley, Creevey, and all his other adoring fans in these memories? The people who he knew always cheered for him in the great Hall and at Quidditch? All those heroic scenes his father loved to revel in? Girlfriends, even? He should have bothered to point all this out to Dumbledore really.
Dumbledore.
'I should have known!' muttered Snape; sitting up, suddenly. 'He conjured the seal!'
'W-Who?' gasped Harry, starting back.
'The Headmaster!' he snarled, leaping up and swooping past him to the door.
Harry was stunned. Snape was blaming Dumbledore - not 'Potter?'
'DUMBLEDORE!' bellowed Snape, placing the tip of his wand on the door.
It creaked open. Snape was out menacing the gloomy corridor in a flash. Harry followed close behind.
When they got into the entrance hall Harry stopped trailing him and went to sneak up to the Gryffindor common room instead. He was dying to ask Hermione about Snape's curse. But as he placed a foot on the stair the Potions Master whirled about, his eyes flashing murderously.
'Potter! Come here!'
Harry scowled.
'You are accompanying me to the Headmaster's Office,' Snape said coldly.
Harry looked longingly up the stairs.
'Now! Or I will take points-'
A few other students in the entrance hall all turned to look at him. Harry narrowed his eyes as he turned around. The greasy, hook faced git -
Snape's voice was at its lowest and most dangerous.
'Scowl at me like that again and I will personally make you clean every -single - surface in my dungeon; with - your - toothbrush.'
Harry relaxed his face. 'Well, it was an inventive punishment,' he thought grimly. Snape must be feeling better.
He followed the professor, who swept along the corridors aggressively, his black cloak rippling out behind him. As Harry had grown still more, and was now almost Snape's height, he had little trouble keeping up.
He felt students' wide-eyed stares fix on him. They were probably wondering what in Merlin's name he had done to make Snape look even madder than when someone blew up one of his best cauldrons.
They reached the Headmaster's gargoyle. As Snape snapped the password, and the gargoyle stepped aside, he glanced back to check on his charge.
'But if I hated someone as much as Snape hated me,' Harry thought angrily, as he followed the swishing cloak up the stairs, 'why would I choose to spend even more time with them?'