Disclaimer: Not mine, mostly any how. A/N: For this chapter be aware that there are mentions of rape, and other things traditionally rated R. If you don't want to read about it skip Hermione's Occulmency lesson, which starts after she enters Snape's classroom.
Chapter 22-Severus's Biggest SecretJust moment before he headed down to the dungeons for Occulmency with Snape, Harry ran into a giddy Hermione. She had just finisher her fourth Animagus session and already knew her inner animal. Next, week she'd begin full transformation and as soon as she could control her moments in her animal form, who would reveal herself to Luna and the boys. Then, she'd start tutoring them in the process. She was so excited she almost forgot to tell Harry she wouldn't be at the Occulmency lesson because she had an inspiration about the mask research and Professor Dumbledore was going to help her wad through the Founders' journals.
Harry was also excited about the possibility of becoming an animagus. It would be the fun thing he could do during the year that could be helpful, but also link him to the memories of Sirius and his dad. He wanted to start right that minute. It was almost the first time he ever wanted to learn about something other than flying and Quidditch. But instead of starting advanced transfiguration, Harry had to run to get to the dungeons before Snape decided tutoring him in Occlumency wasn't worth the trouble anymore. Harry passed many Slytherins who turned and smirked as they saw him running toward remedial potions with Professor Snape and Hermione Granger.
While it had bothered Harry that everyone thought he was a dunce in potions, this year it hadn't really fazed him. After Professor McGonagall stared tutoring him, he had realized he knew more about potions than he thought, and he was sure he had done very well on his first potions exam. Harry was grateful for Professor McGonagall's help, but a bit resentful that Snape would get some of the credit. Harry just made it before Snape closed his door.
"Potter. Decided to make it then? Where is Miss Granger?"
"She is researching material about the masks and the song magic we may use in the clearing. She said she would be here soon, sir." Snape had resumed his regular look of revulsion.
"Right then. Well, let's get this over with. Clear your head of emotion. Focus on being calm . . . Legillimens!"
Harry taken off guard yet again, unable to rid his happiness of the possibility of becoming animagus, or to catch his breath, Snape was able to cut into Harry's mind. Harry felt him running through his memories. With each passing memory Harry's eyes fluttered. Without giving much restraint, Harry tried to focus on memories Snape had already seen or known about . . .
He was under the sorting hat and he choose Gryffindor over Slytherin. . . He was listening to Sirius tell him about the honorable house of Black astonished that Sirius was related to the Malfoys. . . He was waiting with Hermione and Buckbeak for his past self to go back into the castle, so they could fly up to where Sirius was being held captive and save his life. . . He was nine and a bulldog was chasing him . . . He was ten and Dudley's gang of friends were punching the life out of him while Dudley laughed . . . Bellatrix Lestrange laughed as Sirius, her own cousin, began to fall through the black veil. . .
No, not that again. Suddenly the memories changed and Harry realized he was seeing Snape's memories. Snape was flying in the air, held up by Harry's dad's charm, underclothes shown to a large crowd . . . Snape was watching a girl with long red hair play tag with her Gryffindor friends . . . Snape was painting a portrait of the girl as she sat studying under a willow tree . . . Snape was looking deep into the bright green eyes of Harry's mom, leaning towards her as if they were about to kiss . . . Snape was looking in the mirror in his dormitory applying hair grease to the tousled black hair colic that looked impossible to rule . . .
"Legillimens!"
Harry dropped his wand and Snape saw the memories Harry wanted to keep from him. Snape saw himself standing on a stone bridge next to Blanche . . . Snape saw himself in the library whispering in Blanche's ear . . . Snape saw the idea Blanche had given him all those years ago . . .
"Enough." Snape was worn. Harry felt dizzy, but was able to remain standing. This time he knew he had succeeded, for the most part, of denying the most horrible memories to Snape. Why Harry was able to see Snape's most embarrassing moment, Harry hadn't a clue. Snape looked at Potter with shaken eyes and in his steady, disgusted voice said,
"Potter, you didn't use your wand. Were you trying to?"
"No . . . eh . . . sir."
"You have improved. But you still could move quicker. Again! Legillimens!"
Harry was ready for a too quick start this time. Snape only saw one memory . . . Harry held his mother's portrait while he sat in his cot in the Hog's Head dungeon . . .
Before Snape could get to anymore of Harry's memories, Harry had stunned Snape, without using his wand, and began scanning Snape's memories for more of his mother's face . . .
Lily was hooded in black with a silver mask in her hand . . . Lily smirked as she called off James's joke on Snivellus . . . Lily was sitting under a willow tree while Snape painted her portrait . . .Blanche was talking to Snape on the Astronomy Tower . . . Blanche had to take her wand back from Snape to get it back . . . A flash of green light passed in his mind . . . gave Snape another idea . . . Voldemort was standing over an unconscious Blanche . . . Green smoke circled Blanche's orb necklace and disappeared within it . . .
"That's enough!" Snape fell to one knee, his face cringing with pain, as he managed to control his anger. Harry realized that despite the professor's cool, monotone exterior, he was still a very emotional man, just like Sirius was. It appeared every bit as difficult for him to control his feelings, as it was for Harry. Snape on the verge of mental breakdown, gave Harry a look of despair and said in a very calm tone,
"Potter, Where did the portrait of your mother come from?"
"It was a gift."
"Sir," Snape growled.
"Oh, yes . . . It was a gift, sir."
"Do you know where it was found?"
"I have no idea, sir. So you did know my mother well then?"
"A lesson you need to learn, Potter, is when to allow your curiosity fulfillment and when to keep the cat in the bag."
"But Professor . . . the portrait . . . sir?"
"You will learn more if you get better. You aren't good enough to get to the memories I protect from you. However, I'm sure you noticed, Potter, that I am no longer using the pensive. Professor Dumbledore has convinced me that there is nothing in my past you could not know more about, however, you'll have to force it out of me. I will not be the man who openly tells you what I knew about your mother."
"But Professor . . . please." Harry looked at Snape with a desperate need to know more, but Harry knew too well that Snape would rather hurt him than help him.
Snape looked at him a bit angry and strained, "Perhaps curiosity will prove to be strength in the end . . . Perhaps we both can gain something from this." Snape rolled his eyes as if repeating something someone told him to say, and suddenly looked physically drained. Harry was in disbelief of what he just heard. Snape actually sounded like a normal teacher, and he didn't complain about his technique. "Remember this, Potter, a person's memories can be changed if they will them to. What you see in that person's mind is the truth the person wishes to remember." One of Snape's eyebrows rose as he said, "Puzzle about that for next time. You may need to figure out what is fact and what is fiction in just a one brief moment." Snape nodded at Harry as a signal to leave. Just as Harry got to the door Professor Snape called to him,
"Oh and Potter. You managed to squeak by on your Potions test. You better thank Professor McGonagall."
About fifteen minutes went by before another knock was heard on Professor Snape's classroom door. The familiar snappy greeting allowed the Gryffindor prefect to enter. When Hermione sat her book bag down and took a seat, she looked toward where Snape stood leaning against a doorframe she'd never noticed before.
'Private lab, I bet.' His eyes were closed and his facial expression was worn yet peaceful. He looked like he had just had the workout of his life, minus the sweat, and needed some real rest. Hermione shook her head, realizing she had been staring.
"If you're tired, sir, I could come later this week," Hermione politely suggested.
"No, no I have other duties later this week. Tonight is it," Snape said calmly but obviously tired.
"If you say so, sir."
"I do, Miss Granger. Now let's get started. Last week it took far to long for you to block me out of your mind. Have you been practicing like I told you to?"
"Of course, sir. Every night."
"We shall see. Legillimens."
Snape floated into Hermione's mind searching for more of the visions of Deidre and Naisi she had told him about. He wanted to see if they were the same ones he had been having without the muse's help. But, she must have been expecting it, because all he saw were some rather insignificant events, at least according to her emotions. Snape saw Hermione in first year charms casting Wingardium Leviosa and he felt her confident pride . . .Hermione kissing Viktor Krum after the second task of the Triwizard Tournament and felt her disgust at the wetness of her lips . . . Suddenly there was a hard stone wall and nothing else. Snape tried to get past the wall but was unable to before Hermione cast,
"Legillimens."
Now Hermione was breezing through the professor's mind looking at memories and feeling the emotion and sense of touch for each of them. She saw Severus kissing Blanche and felt his warmth, affection, love, and arousal for her . . . Snape watching Hermione in the library and felt his peace, curiosity, and wonder . . . Snape talking with Lucius Malfoy in a study of some kind drinking fire whisky and felt disgust, and hate . . . Severus as a young boy being beaten by his father and crying with fear, anger, numbness, and humiliation . . . Snape holding back laughter as he administered potions to a half-cat, half-human Hermione during her second year but still felt respect . . . Severus as a young man being whipped by a Death Eater and felt fear, pain, and more humiliation . . . Severus being forced down while the Dark Lord branded him with the Death Eater tattoo and felt anger, fear, pain, and hate . . . Severus being passed along from one Death Eater to another to be raped and blood-tortured and felt humiliation, hate, anger, worthlessness, hopelessness, pain, arousal, and self-loathing. . . Snape holding Hermione back from the werewolf feeling fear, warmth, protectiveness, and bravery . . . Snape covered in blood and pulsing with after shocks of the Crustaceous Curse outside the Forbidden Forest only to be found by Hagrid and felt the peace, and hope disappear as Hagrid approached and then felt anger, hate, and pain . . . Snape watching Hermione enter the Great Hall for the Yule Ball during her fourth year and felt attraction, wonder, arousal, self-loathing . . . Snape reading Hermione's essay on werewolves and felt respect, admiration, and pride . . . Snape watching Hermione laugh with her friends in the Great Hall and feeling jealousy, desire, and admiration . . .
"Finite Incantatum!" Hermione ended the spell.
"Professor, are you alright? Should I get Madame Pomfrey?"
"No, Miss Granger. I'm just not my usual self today."
"Professor, last night. Was that last night that Hagrid found you?"
"Last night and many others." Hermione's eyes began to tear. Snape looked away. "Please, Miss Granger I do not need your sympathy or anyone else's."
"Why do you go back? There has to be another way," she cried passionately.
"There isn't," Snape said coldly. Then in a voice softer than she ever heard come from him, "I think next time I will use a pensive during your lesson. You may go, Miss Granger."
"Professor? Am I supposed to be able to feel what you felt as you experienced the events I saw? It didn't happen last time."
"What do you mean?" Snape said, startled, still uncomfortable, and perhaps embarrassed.
"I . . . ah . . . emotions . . . touch . . . pain. I could feel them. Why am I feeling what you felt?" Hermione gazed at Snape trying to read the answer from his face. She waited patiently and witnessed a plethora of emotions floating in his eyes. Before she could figure out what they meant Snape snapped,
"I . . . Leave now, Miss Granger!"
Harry ran through the Gryffindor common room past Ron, who was dully eating a sandwich, to his dormitory eager to look again at the portrait the Weasley twins had given him for his birthday. He opened his trunk and pulled out the plainly framed canvas. His mother smiled back at him, but strangely, like before, she did not move. Harry frowned, but a thought came to him. He pulled the frame away from the canvas and took off the brown paper that protected its backside. There, in blood red paint, was the artist's signature. Severus Snape. Harry stared at the signature in disbelief. Snape and his mom? Harry puzzled with the possibilities. If Snape's memories were true . . . But as Harry looked at the portrait, he knew what he saw in Snape's mind was the truth. He looked around him, ashamed of his newest glimpse into his mother's life. Ron came into the dormitory still munching the same sandwich. Harry tried to hide the portrait behind him, but Ron caught on and said,
"Isn't that the portrait of your mom Fred and George found?" Harry still shocked with the news, didn't answer. Just then a stunned Hermione came in.
"Well, how did Occulmency go, Harry?" Ron avoided Hermione's dazed gaze and focused on what Harry was hiding.
"Hermione, Harry is hiding something. I wonder what he has discovered about that portrait?" Ron exclaimed with deep curiosity.
"Portrait. What portrait?"
"The one the twins gave him. I knew there was something fishy about it. They were wandering around Knockturn Alley trying to find a weapon for Harry. Instead of getting a mind numbing grabby hand, they bought that portrait at a Pawn Shop. So does it change into something . . . naughty? Come on Harry, out with it."
"Yeah, we'll get it out of you anyway. Or do I need to my Legillimens skills on you?" Hermione grinned evilly as if possessed by both the Weasley twins. Harry reluctantly took the portrait from behind him and showed them the signature on it. Harry slumped in his chair and leaned his hand on one of his hands.
"Yeah, so. Do you want to use it to forge Snape's signature or something?" Ron asked sarcastically.
"No, it's my mother's portrait. The one that doesn't move. Just sits and smiles. Professor Snape painted it." Harry forced a sarcastic smile and added, "I wouldn't have ever known, but I saw him paint it. In his memories." Ron and Hermione's expressions were priceless. Hermione's jaw spread far enough to fit a giant fire shooting skrewt in it. Ron just shook his head and laughed,
"How did Snape get close enough to your mom to paint her portrait."
"Don't you need to know the person quite well to give it life?" Hermione questioned.
"You know, it's really not bad," said Ron taking the portrait form Harry, trying to offer comic relief. Then, absent-mindedly looking at Hermione, "I doubt I could come close to doing this good painting Luna." Ron blushed realizing what he had suggested. "Well anyway, if Blanche's memories are true, and they dated or something, they would have had time." Ron changed his gaze back to Harry.
"But the thing is I don't know it's true. Blanche's memories could be skewed, since she loved Snape, and hated my mom. All I know for sure is that Snape painted this portrait, for some reason never activated it, and either lost it or traded it for something. I tried to ask him about it, but he said he would not be the one to tell me what he knew about my mother."
"Wow! Now that is something! He must have known something big if he won't just tell you! Do you think the rumors Malfoy was telling people on the train have any truth to them? Could your mum have been a Death Eater too, Harry?" Harry looked back at Ron, deep in thought, and angry that even he was considering the possibility that his own mom, the same mother who protected him from Voldemort, could have been one of Voldemort's Death Eaters. Hermione looked angrily at Ron seeing that these rumors were torturing Harry. Hermione interrupted Harry's thoughts with an easier question,
"So Professor Snape knows you have your mom's portrait, then?" Slightly relieved to not continue his thoughts, Harry said,
"Yes, he saw me looking at it in one of my memories. And I saw some of the same memories Blanche sent me."
"Well, doesn't that at least confirm the memories that were the same?" Hermione said rationally.
"I guess it does, yes."
"Then, the rest are probably true. You know, not necessarily every tidbit, but the general stuff."
"Huh . . . Okay." Harry didn't need to confirm anything about his mom. He already could see where these memories were going. Snape and his mom had been a secret couple, and both of them had been cheating on the people they really loved. The rest Harry didn't want to know about, but he also realized he would learn soon enough. He hoped his worst fears weren't true. He couldn't imagine his mother as a Death Eater, but that was almost easier than thinking that Snape could possibly be his real father.
"Force it out of him next lesson," Ron said nonchalantly.
"I wish I could activate the portrait, then I could just ask my mom."
"I think only the artist can charm the portrait to life. I wonder why Professor Snape never did," said Hermione ending the conversation. Harry just continued to look stunned, as he shook his head still leaning on one hand. Ron yawned and told his friends he was going to hit the hay. Harry and Hermione weren't quite tired yet so they decided to head down to the common room and make use of the nice leather couch in front of the fire. As soon as they made themselves comfortable, Harry remembered that Hermione was supposed to have Occulmency tonight also. So he asked her,
"Hermione, what did you see with Snape today? You have been able to get farther in his head then me, so you had to have seen something."
"Harry, you know it doesn't work that way. When Snape sees me, the memories of your parents don't come up to the surface."
"But you could look for the answers now that you know what to look for, right?"
"I could Harry, but I think Snape might suspect that next time. In fact, he already had decided he will have to use a pensive with me next time. He may very well put all his memories of school in there along with the others he doesn't want me to suffer through again." Harry blanched at this, and looked at his normally cool friend holding back tears in her brown eyes and barely holding back the shakes. Concerned for his friend he asked,
"Mia, love, are you okay? What did you see?"
"I can't talk specifically about it. I promised, but I don't think I want to anyway. Some was absolutely terrifying. And some was heart breaking. But the rest was . . . it was . . . a somewhat wonderful surprise." Her voice shook as she said this. "I felt his hope, and some other things I even wasn't sure . . . Harry, I want you to never, no matter what you find out about your mother's relationship with him . . . I want you to promise me you won't talk bad about Professor Snape. I want you to promise, no matter how awful you think he is, that you will try to remain respectful in anyone's presence, not just mine. I don't expect you to stick up for the man, because you didn't see what I saw, but please, please do this for me. He deserves so much better from all of us. Please, Harry," Hermione pleaded passionately to the Boy-Who-Pretended-To-Still-Hold-Snape-With-Voldemort.
"I can't promise you much Hermione, but if it's that important to you, I will try. That's the best I can do."
"Thank you, Harry. You can't know how much this means to me." Hermione's tears finally began to fall and Harry moved over to his friend and held her, patting her hair and letting her tears fall onto his sweater. He couldn't help but wonder what she saw that would cause such a reaction in her, but he promised himself he would at least try to find out in his next lesson. For now he attended to his friend's needs.
Elsewhere in the dungeons the Head of Slytherin House was drinking fire whiskey and trying to come to terms with something he had not felt in seventeen years. Hermione's Occulmency lesson had gone terribly from his perspective. She was able to look around his head for ages. The thing that troubled him the most was that he wanted her to. It had been seventeen years since he had someone truly understand him. Since someone could read emotion in his eyes. The emotion hadn't left them. There just wasn't anyone who cared enough to look. He knew deep down he'd wanted that back again and now this girl, or young woman rather, at the very least cared. How could she feel what he felt otherwise? Why was he able to feel her emotions also, when he hadn't ever been able to do that, even with Blanche or Lily? 'Perhaps there is something to this soul mate thing after all. Maybe Miss Granger really is Deidre and maybe I really am Naisi. Destiny. Why is that so hard to believe?'