Thanks to everyone who reviewed!
Chapter twenty two- A father-son moment!
"You-Know-Who is going to train you to be the heir of Slytherin?" Ron whispered the next morning at breakfast.
Damien nodded, a frown evident on his face.
Ron, Hermione, and Ginny stared at Damien for a couple minutes before a chuckle was heard. Damien's head snapped up to see Ron giggling softly.
Damien stared at the redhead with wide eyes as the laughter got more hystericle. "Er...Ron..?" he asked almost cautiously.
Ron burst out laughing as he swayed dangerously in his seat.
"He...he wants you to become the heir of Slytherin! But you're the Boy-Who-Lived!" Ron said in an almost excited whisper.
Damien arched an eyebrow, "Um...yeeeaaah..." he said slowly.
Ron snickered, "S-Sorry...it's just..." he broke off, covering his mouth with a napkin. "...it's just...you're his enemy and he's going to train you... And in our second year everyone was so convinced that you were the heir of Slytherin!" he chortled. "Oh the irony!"
Damien, Ginny, and Hermione stared at him. Ron immediatley stopped laughing when he realized that no one else was laughing with him. He cleared his throat and his ears turned red, "I just thought it was kind of...funny..." he muttered, embarressed.
"Oh yes...real funny Ron!" Damien said coldly as he got up from the table and walked away.
"What'd I say!" he heard Ron yell after him but he ignored him as he made his way down to the dungeons.
Draco was still in the Slytherin dorms, he had asked Damien to go on without him.
It was Saturday and for that, Damien was thankful that he didn't have classes. He needed some time to think...to clear his mind...
Christmas break started on Monday and everyone, except Damien and a couple other students, were going home for the holidays due to the escalating war.
Ron, Hermione, and Ginny hadn't wanted to at first but Damien had convinced them to. After all, it wasn't like he was going to be alone for the holidays was it?
Damien inwardly smiled at the thought of spending Christmas someone who actually cared for him and who was actually...related to him...
He almost immediatly sobered up though as he thought about the previous Death Eater meeting. So he was to be the heir of Slytherin...
Damien snorted aloud. Yeah right...there was absolutely no way that Severus was going to let him train with Voldemort...alone...
He nearly gagged at that thought.
For once Damien felt grateful that Severus was so overprotective of him. He didn't want to be the heir of Slytherin! He didn't want to train with Voldemort and come back every other week-end almost insane!
That thought sent shivers down his spine.
He knocked on his father's private rooms and the door opened to reveal a tired looking Severus.
Damien smirked as he walked in, "Rough night?" he asked almost cheekily.
Severus grunted in responce as he sat down on the couch, drinking on a yellowish potion. Damien recognized it immediatly.
"Hangover Potion, Dad?"
"Oh hush..." his father muttered hoarsly. Damien shifted uncomfortabley before saying in a quiet voice, "So...what are we going to do?"
Severus knew instantly what he was talking about. The man frowned in thought as he spoke very seriously, "I spoke to Dumbledore about it..."
Damien arched and eyebrow, "And?"
"We are both going to stop spying..."
"What!"
"Damien, we need to! There is no way, NO WAY that you are being trained by him!"
"I know, I know...it's not like I want to or anything!" Damien said almost heatidly.
Severus relaxed slightly.
"What?" Damien snapped as he noticed his father's relief. "Do you think I want to be trained by that monster!"
"No Damien, it's just..."
"Just what! Tell me! Ever since you found out I tried to do the Cruciatus on Lestrange, you've been acting different around me! Do you honestly think I am going to join the dark side!" Damien snapped, all the fear and worry he had felt from the previous night seemed to be building up inside of him.
"Damien!"
"Just leave me alone, okay?" Damien growled as he turned away.
"Damien you know I'd NEVER think something like that!" his father said quietly.
Damien turned around, his eyes narrowed slightly. "Then why have you been acting as if I'm a ticking bomb?" he snapped in an accusing voice.
Severus sighed, "I never meant to act like that...especially to you...I'm just worried is all..."
"Why?"
"Why!" Severus repeated incrediously. "Why do you think, Damien? My son has just been marked to save my life! Not only that but he is to be trained to be the heir of Slytherin by a man...no a monster that has wanted to kill him since before he was born!"
Damien stared at the man in surprise.
"I just found you, Harry..." Severus said quietly, using Damien's old name. "I don't want to loose you...and if I ever did..." a pause, "...I'd probably kill myself..."
Damien shook his head slowly, "Don't say that! You know as well as I do that in the end I have to face Voldemort...and there's no gaurantee that I'll survive..."
Severus stared at him for a long time before he sighed and rubbed his eyes tiredly.
"Then why are you so upset about not spying anymore?"
"It's just..." Damien began. "I got marked for nothing! And what about Draco? He's going to be all alone!"
"I know, Damien..." his father responded tiredly. "You underestimate the Dark Lord...you don't know what it will be like if he trains you... He is insane! He thinks it helps if you are put under the cruciatus until you are begging for him to kill you! He thinks it makes you stronger! He feeds you a multitude of potions to build your pain tolerance and it feels worse then the cruciatus, it feels as if your insides are being ripped out through your stomach. And that's just the beganning..."
"And how would you know all this?" Damien snapped almost suspiciously.
"Because, Damien, I was trained by him personally for three days when I was eighteen..." his father said with surprising coolness. "And I'm still surprised that I'm sane enough to tell the tale!"
Damien blinked, "You never told me that!"
"It's not something I'd wish to be public knowledge..." his father replied in the same tone of voice.
"So...if...uh...when he finds out that we are not going to spy anymore...he's going to want to kill us...right?" Damien asked cautiously. "I mean...at the end of my fourth year...after Cedric...after the third task when he was talking to the Death Eaters he was talking about Karkaroff and how he was going to kill him when they found him..."
Severus nodded slowly as he noticed his son's discomfort before saying quietly.
"Yes...but anything, even death, is better then being trained personally by him..."
Damien shivered.
They sat in silence for a couple minutes before Damien spoke up, "I don't want you to die..."
Severus looked slightly startled by the soft-spoken statement. "And I don't want you to die...but I do want you to stay how you are now and you will not stay the same if we continue spying..."
Damien looked at him, confused.
His father stood up and put a hand on his shoulder, "I want you to still be a child when this war is over...I don't want you to see war...I don't want you to feel the pain of lose, even though you already have...I don't want you to see what I've seen..."
Damien blinked.
"That is why we must stop spying...I want you to keep your innocence and not have to be forced to cast the Unforgivables on the people that you love..." Severus squatted down next to him.
"I don't want you to be out in a battlefield where you see your friends and family die before your eyes and where your own life is threatened...I'd give anything, anything for that to not happen, even my life and my sanity..." his father said softly to him.
Damien was surprised at the emotion that was in the man's voice. Sadness, concern, pain, and...love? Did Severus really love him? He knew that his father cared very deeply for him but...love?
Damien swallowed and turned away from the emotion in the onyx eyes, feeling his throat contstrict at the thought of someone actually loving him...
"That is why we are not spying anymore...you would be a completely different person if you were to be trained by the Dark Lord...I shouldn't have even let you get marked in the first place..." Severus told him as he sat down beside him. "But you will have to remember, the Dark Lord will try to get the other Death Eater's children to bring you to him. You need to be more careful, he hates traitors more then muggle-borns and will stop at nothing to punish them..." he said quietly.
Damien shivered again.
"Not to mention the fact that he wanted you to be his heir, it will just make you and I at the top of his hit list..." the man sounded tired again.
They fell into silence once again.
"You know..." his father began, causing Damien to look back at him.
"What?" Damien asked softly.
Severus looked slightly embarressed at what he was about to say.
"You know.." Severus continued, "After seeing your memories and seeing what you had gone through, I had felt so mad..." the man trailed off looking lost in thought. "But when I saw that one memory of your uncle hitting you with the belt...I...I don't know what I "
Damien wrapped his arms around himself as he remembered that particular memory.
"And you were crying...and I wasn't quite sure what to do at first...I have never really been one to give comfort...but when you hugged me..." he trailed off once again, his eyes focussing on Damien. "I felt as if a part of me had vanished forever...and it was replaced with...something else...but it was a good feeling...I liked it..." He continued to look at Damien.
"And at that moment..." his father's eyes became glazed again as he remembered the emotion he had felt that day. "...when I held you in my arms, I made a promise..."
Damien continued to look at his father as the man struggled with the right words.
"I promised...that I would never let anything bad happen to you...that you would never have to feel the pain that I have felt and that you would never have to see the things that I have seen...that nothing could ever take you away from me..." Severus paused once again. "But I knew I could never fulfill that promise...I could never protect you from pain and death..." he winced. "When people that you'd love would die...or betray you... Things that you'd once know would suddenly change and be completely different... Your friends would move on and grow up...all of your childhood days would be gone...replaced with responcibilities that no one is ready to face..."
"And sometimes I'd think...if I could just protect you from at least one of those things...if I could just...jump in the way and absorb all the pain and suffering for you..." he trailed off.
Damien stared at his father, he had never EVER heard the man express his emotions like this before. The man, though alot more open with Damien, had always seemed so...indifferent but now he was sitting here telling Damien his fears and dreams...something that Damien never would have thought the man would share with him.
Damien thought to himself. What was so strange about his father sitting here talking to him about his feelings was that all of Severus's feelings seemed to have to do with him. His father's fear was for him to loose his innocence and become cold and unfeeling. His father's wish was to protect him from everything...
It just felt so weird to be cared about so much...it was like Severus's happiness depended only on Damien's happiness and health.
"Promise me something, Damien..." his father said.
"What?"
"Promise me that you won't try to be a hero this year..." Severus said quietly.
Damien stared into his father's eyes, noticing the anxiety and concern in them before nodding slowly.
"I promise..."
Severus smiled and ruffled his son's hair playfully before pulling him into a hug. Damien froze for a moment, feeling slightly surprised before readily returning it.
"I'm sorry..." he mumbled, his voice muffled slightly from the fabric of his father's robe.
"For what?" Severus asked as he looked down at the dark head nestled against him.
Damien sighed, "For getting marked when you didn't want me to...for not listening to you...you've had more expeirence then I have...I've just been a stupid teen..."
To his surprise, Severus chuckled slightly,
"That's why you were sorted into Gryffindor first..."
() Okay I really hope I didn't screw this chapter up. A Sev/Harry fatherson moment, you gotta love 'em!
ALSO if anyone is interested in beta reading for me then be my guest (I suck at grammer). Like I said, since I am having a bit of writer's block I feel as if I'm forcing myself to write these last two chapters and it would be so much more easier if I were to have someone's opinion before I post it.
So tell me what you think, hope Sev wasn't tooo awfully OOC.
Review please!
Bye!