Whew! Sorry that this chapter took longer than I thought. Work has been…well, work! And if my boss catching me sneaking fanfic again I might be in real trouble! Anyhow, as always please R/R. And hey, while you're at it, read my Draco story "Choices" (shameless plug!).

Disclaimer Of course I don't own it. Would I be sneaking around at work if I did?

Chapter Five: Revelations and Memories

Snape sat in the familiar chair of the Headmaster's office and glowered at the boy across from him. He had not wanted to come here. Miss Granger-Mrs. Snape apparently, he thought wryly-had not allowed him to protest. She had just hauled him into the fire and joined him, standing a little to close for comfort in the small grate, and threw a handful of Floo powder at their feet, saying," Headmaster's office."

Snape nearly fell out of the fireplace. He bent over himself and gasped for air, fighting the urge to be sick.

"Sorry." Hermione apologized, stepping out of the fire behind him. "I should have warned you about the Floo network being disrupted. Makes for a rough ride." He narrowed his eyes at her and forced his body upright just as Potter stepped from Dumbledore's private quarters into the room.

"Hermione, Severus, won't you sit down? Tea? No? To what do I owe the pleasure?" Potter greeted them enthusiastically, as though Granger showed up in his bathrobe every morning. Snape felt his lip curl, disgusted. The boy was smiling at him in an all-to-familiar manner. He motioned to a chair and Snape was just about to take it when the boy walked around to the other side of the desk and sat in the Headmaster's chair. Snape jumped up. How dare the little prat sit in Dumbledore's place!

"Just what do you think you are doing Potter?" He hissed. The boy looked back at him nonplussed.

"Sitting at my desk." He replied mildly. He turned to Granger. "A spell?"

"Yes." She said. "I think a time-altering spell or perhaps a Displacement charm? He doesn't remember anything past the Battle. And the scar he had when the Dark Mark was obliterated is gone."

"Ah." He turned to Snape and the Professor felt suddenly pinned down by those eyes. He looked at the boy sourly. To say he was disappointed would be an understatement. He had always rather hoped that the Dark Lord and Potter would finish each other off.

"Sorry to disappoint you Severus."

It had been subtly done. Snape had felt no invasion, not the merest hint that the boy had been reading his mind. No one was able to do that to him. No one except…His eyes sought Potter's and the green eyes looked back at him. Only they weren't green at all. They were blue. Maddeningly, impossibly blue! Snape felt his face drain of color.

"How?" He gasped out. For the second time that day he was caught completely off guard.

"I trust you have heard of the Delegare Navaris?"

Snape searched his memory for the Latin: Delegare, to delegate or transfer, and Navaris, energy. It was an ancient spell, arcane and impossibly complex, even for a wizard of Dumbledore's ability. It's recipient was bestowed with the magical ability of the caster. But the side effects were ghastly. If the wizard who cast the spell did not pull out of it in time he could be drained dry. But surely Albus would have known the danger; surely he would not have sacrificed himself needlessly.

Unbidden, Snape remembered the last time he had seen Dumbledore. He had just brought the news that the Dark Lord was planning to attack the school. Dumbledore had sat back in his chair, fingers steepled and eyes far away.

"Thank you Severus. Please summon the other Order members and tell them to meet me in two hours time here in my office."

Snape turned to do as he was bidden but the Headmaster's soft voice stopped him.

"Have I asked too much of him?"

No need to ask whom the Headmaster meant. Potter had improved by leaps in the last year. Even Snape had to admit that he was not only an exceptional duelist but a talented Occlumancer as well. But he knew what Dumbledore meant. The boy was angry. He had suffered much loss in his short life. But he was not a killer. Snape had shared his fear that the boy did not possess the necessary ruthlessness with the Headmaster before but Dumbledore had showed nothing but faith in the boy's ability. Until now.

The Headmaster sighed heavily. "I have always placed great burdens on those I love. I can only hope that later they will forgive me."

Snape had said nothing. There had seemed to be nothing to say. But looking back on it he could see that Albus was apologizing, in his way. Not just to Harry, but to him as well.

He had been only seventeen when he had become a spy. In the twenty years he had served the Order he had seen things and done things that did not bear thinking about. He had done them gladly, knowing that he was serving the greater good. But despair and death warp the soul. His service had scarred him irrevocably, perhaps irretrievably. Albus had seen that and grieved for him.

Often after he returned from a Revel he would sit with Dumbledore in the Headmaster's office. Albus seemed to understand that he needed that time, needed reminding of who he was and why he had chosen to fight. Sometimes they would not speak, just sit together and stare into the fire. And sometimes those blue eyes would skewer his soul and he would confess in a trembling voice all the sickness and depravity he had just witnessed. And sometimes the old man would open his arms to Snape like a father to a son and hold him against the horror inside. In those moments when Snape allowed it, he felt that Dumbledore would gladly have borne all this pain for him and it made it better somehow. But he had never said it. And Snape had never told the old man what it meant to him to know that someone cared, that someone was sorry…

"He sacrificed himself." Snape said, his voice flat.

"Yes." Potter answered. "He gave me everything. I tried to give it back. I tried…but I didn't know how. I-" Potter's voice broke with emotion. Hermione reached across the desk and took his hand. Those wise blue eyes rose to meet Snape's and a memory floated out to him.

Harry raced through the Forbidden Forest, crashing through the bracken, a sob tearing the back of his throat. His body ached from battle, he was so exhausted he could barely keep hold of his wand, but it didn't matter. Nothing mattered but that he got there in time. He reached a clearing and a little hut sat in the shadowed center of the forest. Powerful wards had protected this place for a generation but they recognized him immediately and parted like a curtain for him to pass. Harry stumbled across the clearing to the door and wrenched it open.

It was very dark inside the hut and it took a moment for Harry's eyes to see the figure lying on the narrow cot in the corner. Dumbledore looked shriveled and grey and impossibly old. Harry half feared that he was to late but the old man's chest moved with his shallow breath and Harry threw himself across the room, clutching the Headmaster's body to him.

"Please, please…" He sobbed helplessly. "Take it back! I did what you wanted. Voldemort is dead. I don't need it anymore. Please!" He shook the old man, begging desperately but Dumbledore would not wake.

Harry stayed like that for three days, alternately shouting and pleading at the old wizard, watching the spark of life fade and finally die. And when it was over he laid the Headmaster's body down and covered him with a blanket. He walked calmly outside. Hermione was waiting for him at the edge of the clearing. The wards had allowed her to go no further but she had waited for him to return and when she saw him she rushed forward, hugging him hard.

"Oh Harry, are you alright? What happened?"

"Dumbledore is dead." Harry said, still with unshakable calm. Hermione pulled back and gasped as she saw his eyes, blue like Dumbledore's.

"Harry…?" She started in a questioning voice.

Harry smiled at her then, the old boyish smile that she remembered.

"Come on Hermione. They are waiting for us." He took her hand in his and led her away from the Forbidden Forest.

Hermione's voice interrupted the flow of memory. "We didn't know what he planned to do."

But Potter was looking at him over her head and Snape had to vague suspicion that Potter had known. He just hadn't known the consequences.

"Anyway, we still haven't answered the question of how Severus got here." Hermione brought them all back on track.

"Yes, you're right Hermione. Severus, what was the last spell you used?"

"Inflamentia Regalto." Snape lied. Potter was still looking at him with the Headmaster's eyes, damn him, and Snape knew that Potter knew he was lying. But he just leaned back in his chair.

"Well." He said at last. "There were a lot of strange things that happened during the Battle. All that Dark Magic flying around. Look at what happened to the Floo network. This is obviously just another side effect."

Snape shot Potter a confused look. Potter looked back placidly, apparently having no trouble lying straight faced to his friend.

He's inherited more from the old man than I imagined. Snape thought.

"So what do we do?" Granger asked. "I mean, how do I get my Severus back?"

Snape stiffened; not at all sure he liked being referred to as Granger's anything.

"I don't know." Potter ran his hand through his wild hair. Snape was relieved to see that his eyes had gone back to their usual color. "We'll think of something. In the meantime, you both will just have to act as normal as possible."

"In what world is it considered normal that I am married to Hermione Granger?" Snape snapped.

Granger gave him a look that would have withered anyone else. She looked on the verge of saying something but stopped herself, turning instead to Harry.

"I have to go, my first class starts in half an hour. See you." She got up and went to the fire without looking at her husband.

"Snape's' rooms." She said and disappeared in a whirl of green fire.

Harry's eyes rested on Severus for a moment.

"Would you mind telling me what really happened?" He asked.

A/N Well, I hope this chapter makes this whole story a little less cliché then it sounded in the beginning. Please R/R and let me know what you think. Thanks to Duj for your insightful criticism. Gwen Fairbrook, Vanityfair, Corky 42, and all the others that reviewed, thank you from the bottom of my heart.